Anne Widdicombe Suspicious Death

[AClassicTrenchcoat]

Suspicious death, suspected murder. Think there is a press conference soon.

That is a very interesting point.

It's a lot more nuanced and complex than that, but hey. Plenty of Christians out there are genuinely lovely people who work hard to make the world a better place, and are kind, generous and loving with it. They don't feel a need to pontificate or moralise, they just do their best to follow the whole example of Jesus.

Ann Widdecombe was not one of these people.

You sound like one of those evangelical ex smokers. Many people have deep felt religious beliefs that are not driven by fear. Ann Widdecombe converted to Catholicism in her 30s. Do people attack Muslims for also not believing in gay marriage or abortion? No, they seem to get a free pass on that front.
I didn’t agree with AW’s views on abortion, LGBT rights, or immigration although I admired her for being staunchly anti fox hunting. I admired her for standing up for her beliefs, even when everyone else was disagreeing. I also admired her in the CBB house where she sensibly pointed out that if we have limited public funds then maybe kids with cancer or the blind should get priority over funding gender reassignment. She also stuck up for those falsely accused under Operation Midland which was admirable.

HMPPS policy requires that the use of restraints during pregnancy-related hospital escorts must be subject to risk assessment. In addition, restraints may only be used during a consultation in exceptional circumstances where the risk assessment has identified a particularly high risk of escape or a threat to anyone’s personal safety.

They’ve ruled out political motivation apparently. The man is in his 20s.

It's not him. He's been released and is no longer part of the investigation.

I don’t think she really pontificated or moralised. She just expressed her opinions on things and they reflected her religious views. Not even all gay people wanted gay marriage or saw it as a positive thing for instance.

Well, even a stopped clock tells the right time twice a day. You know what I mean.

I probably do have some common ground with her, but what I do resent - and I'll acknowledge this is triggering for reasons I haven't gone into in detail - is her use of faith to justify some very, very reactionary and unjust policies that make people's lives harder and sadder.

FYI “hate filled bigotry” ≠ holding views that Crocsarentslippers disagrees with.

An example of “hate filled bigotry” would be.. hmm.. I don’t know.. celebrating the death of an elderly person, revelling in the idea that their last moments were filled with terror and wishing that it was as painful as possible ..because she had the audacity to hold views that these hypocrites disagree with.

Now THAT is a level of hate and bigotry that I find difficult to comprehend. It’s distressing to know that we share society with people who lack humanity to this extent.

so, perhaps, you might like to reflect upon whether hearing the news of Anne’s murder was the right moment to start calling her names. If you think that was necessary in order to not “pretend she was a saint” then how embarrassing (for you).
As a matter of fact, it’s not a requirement to qualify your opinion when paying your respects whatsoever. Just expressing shock, sadness or respects is enough. Only a dunce would think that the equivalent of agreeing with her every belief and opinion.

Yes but the report someone posted upthread shows that this policy is still not always followed. It’s a complex thing but I can understand why eg someone convicted of a violent crime and who is a flight risk might need to be handcuffed during a consultation. And as I said, in the 90s, it was a policy inherited by AW, not one she invented herself.

We need a national DNA database. Surely, that would act as a deterrent against these sought of crimes?

Doctrine is important though, otherwise without it you end up with, as you've said, pious villagers who show very little of Christ, or the #BeKind brigade who have such a watered-down version of Christianity it barely qualifies.

There is currently an investigation:

https://ppo.gov.uk/special-investigation-the-restraint-of-pregnant-women-during-pregnancy-related-hospital-escorts/

Which policies? She held junior ministerial posts for four years (employment and prisons) and then she was in the shadow cabinet. She wasn’t actively making policies that made people’s lives harder. She may have been opposed to gay marriage but she wasn’t responsible for any policy making lives harder for LGBT people. And people have discussed the handcuffing issue already - it was a) not her invention but already policy and b) grossly misrepresented in the press, for which the Guardian issued an apology.

Christ there are some truly awful posts on here. The poor woman has been murdered, give her some peace, whatever your views, get out of your armchairs and leave the detective work to those who are qualified! Death really does bring out the horrible people on here. It's getting worse every day. This entire post should be removed.

I agree. It's not a universal thing. That's why I am sad that her life was cut short so brutally.

I completely agree . There has always seemed to me to be something performative about those types. Something disingenuous. And the 'courteousness' everyone talks about seems redundant when such abhorrent views are expressed. " Hello, I'm about to say something vile that might have real implications for making your life even more miserable than it is, but I'm going to do it with tremendous respect and dignity". Yuck yuck yuck.

Yeah, but doctrine seems hollow to me. It just doesnt seem fit for purpose. If it was such a good guide then how come there are religious wars everywhere.

She said this about fox hunting in 1997 - 'It is cruelty. I am not against killing foxes or culling deer. I am against the chase, the cruelty involved in the prolonging the terror of a living, sentient being that is running for its life. They laugh at it, apparently. When the deer is running, can feel the hounds closing in and knows that its strength is not going to last, it is uproariously funny...prolongation of terror is wrong. Those who practise it when there are alternatives that are already widely practised do wrong. Yes, the scenes of a hunt are splendid, so splendid that they are all over my dining room curtains, but they are colourful scenes of olde England, and in olde England, not in modern Britain, they belong.' It's quite weirdly, horribly prescient, when you consider the people laughing at and mocking her own awful death.

It annoyed me to see some of the LGBTQ community celebrating online yesterday - they want tolerance yet some of them are completely intolerant of Ann's beliefs and think she deserved to have her head caved in!

There's always been a lot of staunch Catholics like Ann in the world who have those unpleasant beliefs that she did, it doesn't mean they should be all killed!

It doesn't seem like Ann ever had any children from what I've read thank god because can you imagine trying to get your head around somebody doing that to your elderly mother!

Oh, that’s awfully poignant considering the way she died and the crowing that followed.
How sad.

She didn’t have children but she had nephews (including one who struggled with addiction and whom she helped enormously) and I am sure they are also finding it horrific that someone subjected their aunt to that.

I think it's important to point out that a lot of the nastier comments would have been made before it was made public this was a murder.

It's fair to assume that when a 78 year old dies it's more likely to be natural causes than anything else.

2 days after her brutal death is not the time to start listing her "problematic (to some)" beliefs

I can hardly believe I'm defending AW, as I did not take to her or agree with much of what she said when she was alive, but in the last 24 hours a good many people who knew her personally have said she had many very close friends who were gay men and who are now mourning the loss of a friend. She didn't believe same-sex couples should have been given the right to marry. She and others who thought that way lost the argument and she accepted that. This is quite a long way from being a hate-filled bigot, surely.