to think that surely not EVERYONE hates Maggie?

[LadyOfTheManor]

Seriously, unless you're a miner or from a mining family, or Welsh... ok well even if you are, surely not EVERYONE hates Maggie T?

I'm a tad young, I was born in her "reign", but I did my degree in Politics and although I didn't really live under her (it was Major until I was 11) I couldn't see what she did that was SO terrible-let alone the sheer hostility when her name is mentioned here (in Wales!).

you didn't live under her - which explains why you find it so hard to understand - I did - up north - I hate her muchly - infact she's possibly the only person I do hate !

I dont agree with everything she did but i still like her and wish our current crop of politicans had her balls.

No I don't hate her at all. I think she was a good no-nonsense type of PM. I don't necessarily agree with every policy but I don't agree with them now. She was straight down the line and I think the country needs somebody like that, it's sliding out of control and isn't 'Great' anymore.

A friend of mine went to school with the children of miners, and saw how they struggled to afford basic food and clothes.

You don't have to have been directly affected to appreciate the harm she did.

i do. I've been planning the 'maggie is dead' party for years!

If you're in Wales then you should understand why she is so despised. It wasn't just the mines she ruined, but when that happened it had a massive knock on effect for the whole communities.

It wasn't just the mines either, it was the steel industry, the privatisation of anything that wasn't stapled down, the terrible things they did to the NHS...etc etc etc.

I thought she was fab. She got power-crazy by the end though, her time had definitely come, but I like that she spoke her mind and didn't care if she offended anyone. We need more politicians like that, not the wet dishrags we seem to have at the moment.

She was a twat who ruined this country, how the hell can she be considered 'great' ?

Am I right in saying...that it wasn't Maggie that shut the mines but the unions?

And you did your degree in politics....?

Duh.

I can acknowledge the good, from my pov, that she did, despite having an ex-miner FIL, in the same way I can look at Blair/Nu Labour that are currently vilified and identify the good they did.

Almost everyone I know does!

Even family members who bought council houses on the cheap admit that those years were pretty awful......unless you had spare money. Anyone who had spare cash to invest (very high rates!) or snap up shares in the utilities etc. tended to stuggle even if they were luck enough to keep their jobs.

Some struck lucky. Those that could buya council house, or some wealthier students of the time used their student loans to 'carpet bag'.

There would have been lots of hostility in Wales and Scotland because the English voted her in......but that also worked the other way of course. And then there was the poll tax!

re miners struggling to afford food and clothes. hell, both DH and I work full time and that applies now, and did under the last government too.
I lived in a mining village in Scotland during the strike - a lot of hardship sure, but a lot of miners sitting out on the wall by the pub drinking too!
There was a collection to help their children and my mother took a bag of good quality clothes (we had no money spare) and was told to "keep your fucking second hand stuff. My kids aren't wearing that!".
Kind of lost my sympathy for the miners after that.

I find the idea of a party to celebrate the death of anyone distasteful and incredibly disrespectful to the deceased family (whoever they are)

My degree consisted of the layout of parliament and legislation processes, not really the argument of "do secondary school aged children need free milk".

Just wanted an insight, especially from those who were directly affected by her...and as there's a fair few feminists on MN I wondered if there was a view on her being the first female PM (and evidently what most of you hope, was the last?)

No you aren't right in saying it wasn't Maggie but the unions that shut the mines.

It was Maggie. The only sense in which it might conceivably have been the unions is that the timing of the strike was badly judged, tactically. But I guess that even if it had been better timed she would have won in the end.

You're forgetting the Scots.

A very quick google search has thrown up this which may give you some insight.

Quote: "No prime minister in history, Labour or Conservative, has generated so such hostility for so long from so many in Scotland. Almost from the moment that Thatcher entered N0 10 in 1979, the Scottish Tories went into a tailspin from which they never recovered."
www.newstatesman.com/uk-politics/2009/02/scottish-scotland-thatcher

and this:
www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics-news/2010/05/05/tories-wreaked-havoc-in-scotland-the-last-time-round-and-working-folk-have-not-forgotten-86908-22235261/

And I don't hate her. I absolutely fucking despise her.

Some people find it very hard to separate personality from politics.

Criticise her policies by all means, but I do think it's quite childish when people resort to all the old "witch" and "harridan" cliches I've seen on here and elsewhere.

And to say you'll be "partying" when she dies is supremely tasteless.

hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha etc

I shall be flamed but I care not.... I have a bottle of champagned in the fridge that shall be drunk on the day her death is announced.

I feel no remorse for this - she decimated entire communities, created the 'me, me, me' culture that is still so deplorable today and created an ideology that is repellant to anyone who has an ounce of commpassion or moral integrity. We are NOT all born equal and we do not all have the same chances.

She is truely the only person alive (apart from Nick Griffin) who seriously rises my bile.

A pox on her.

Oh, that feels SO much better.

YABU, everyone should hate her. 'orrible woman. Although someone did tell me to fuck off in Feminism once when I called her a man in a dress. She WAS!!!!!!!!!