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Sensitivity Lesson - You better watch what you say in today’s Britain.
City Journal ^ | 19 January 2007 | Theodore Dalrymple

Posted on 01/25/2007 10:14:41 PM PST by neverdem

Here is an interesting little slice of contemporary English life.

The police go to a pub in a small town in Devon, looking for a suspect. They see a man there who they think resembles the suspect, and approach him. He becomes abusive and they arrest him and take him down to the station. He is drunk.

After a couple of hours in a jail cell, he says he feels sick and demands a doctor. The police call the police surgeon. When he arrives (he is an Indian), the arrested man says, “I want an English doctor, not a f*cking Paki.”

The police then charge the man with racially aggravated insulting behavior. He elects for a superior court trial, and the prosecution proceeds with the case as though it were a very serious one.

The judge decides that the court should not waste its time on so trivial a matter, especially when burglars and robbers frequently escape charges. The doctor, he says, is a man of some social standing; a single insult from a drunk could not, or should not, have harmed him unduly. He then gives a bit of advice to the accused: “Next time, call him a fat bastard and don’t say anything about his color.”

The judge soon had to explain publicly, in an almost groveling way, that he by no means underestimated the seriousness of racial insult, and that he was not making light of it.

Contained in this story, of course, are many elements of modern social and moral pathology. The judge, surely, was being ironic at the expense of those who thought that a single boorish remark by a man who, after all, had been wrongly identified by the police so threatened the social fabric that it deserved the attention of many highly educated people and a cost to the public of many thousands of dollars. But even mild criticism of the prevailing pieties is becoming intolerable in Britain.

In the very same week, the British Medical Journal published a debate on whether British Muslims should have their own, separate medical services—funded by the state, naturally. Now there’s irony for you.


TOPICS: Editorial; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: britain; india; islam; liberalagenda; muslim; paki; pakistan; racism; sensitivity
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1 posted on 01/25/2007 10:14:42 PM PST by neverdem
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To: neverdem

The inmates running the asylum?


2 posted on 01/25/2007 10:23:18 PM PST by Fiddlstix (Warning! This Is A Subliminal Tagline! Read it at your own risk!(Presented by TagLines R US))
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To: neverdem
"...“I want an English doctor, not a f*cking Paki.”..."

Hey that is about what we have to say here in Alabama when we go to the doctor.

If you want an in-network Aetna plan expect to have to go to either a Wholistic-hole healer who is not an MD or somebody with a name like Mohammed Hajee.
So we opt out of network and have to pay 100 percent up front and then wait to get a 70 percent reimbursement. A routine baby visit to a popular legitimate American MD will cost about $400 so it smarts.
3 posted on 01/25/2007 10:26:57 PM PST by Monterrosa-24 ( ...even more American than a French bikini and a Russian AK-47.)
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To: neverdem

This story shows the natural progression of socialist fascism....

Like France, Britain is an excellent audio-visual aid for viewing the America of the future, as the Democrats would have it - - a Euro-style, secular-socialist welfare state.


4 posted on 01/25/2007 10:30:26 PM PST by Lancey Howard
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To: Gengis Khan
The judge, surely, was being ironic at the expense of those who thought that a single boorish remark by a man who, after all, had been wrongly identified by the police so threatened the social fabric that it deserved the attention of many highly educated people and a cost to the public of many thousands of dollars. But even mild criticism of the prevailing pieties is becoming intolerable in Britain.

Paki Ping.

5 posted on 01/25/2007 10:36:43 PM PST by CarrotAndStick (The articles posted by me needn't necessarily reflect my opinion.)
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To: Lancey Howard

It is terrifying but it could happen here. Probably will if the lefties have their way. Sad thing is the American people will be responsible for putting these nuts into power. Of course if everyone who ever said anything offensive or insensitive were prosecuted for it, 90% of our population would be in prison now!


6 posted on 01/25/2007 10:37:45 PM PST by TNCMAXQ
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To: TNCMAXQ

TNCMAXQ wrote: "Of course if everyone who ever said anything offensive or insensitive were prosecuted for it, 90% of our population would be in prison now!"

Of course they wouldn't prosecute everyone for racially insensitive remarks. No, they would use it to target ideologically "inferior" folks. And so, it wouldn't tie up the courts.

Land of the free? Home of the brave? Not if our liberal friends have their way.


7 posted on 01/25/2007 10:49:46 PM PST by CitizenUSA
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To: neverdem
And when you sit at a restaurant table in England, minding your own business, the couple at the next table may not be minding their own!
8 posted on 01/25/2007 10:57:36 PM PST by gungadin
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To: neverdem

Britain's thousand year common-law tradition of free speech is fading away right before our eyes.

We are only a little behind them.

The left is going all out to abolish free speech, from Pelosi's effort to fine or jail individuals who speak out during election campaigns, to the Soros-funded push to revive for the Orwellian "fairness doctrine" and pass "hate-speech" legislation. Combine these with the institutional media's near-universal endorsement of the left's standard refrain that leftist rights are violated anytime someone dares to criticize them, and you have the makings of a totalitarian state.

It could be upon us in less than two years.


9 posted on 01/25/2007 11:02:30 PM PST by atomic conspiracy (Rousing the blog-rabble since 9-11-01)
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To: gungadin

Thanks for the link.


10 posted on 01/25/2007 11:08:57 PM PST by neverdem (May you be in heaven a half hour before the devil knows that you're dead.)
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To: neverdem

politically-correct pussies will soon be bowing to mecca

the state treasury and police force has been taken over by muslim-friendly socialists

imagine your money funding the p-c police

welcome to 2008


11 posted on 01/25/2007 11:31:37 PM PST by Enduring Freedom (President Bush - Your Public Relations Team Sucks!)
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To: neverdem
“Next time, call him a fat bastard and don’t say anything about his color.”

LOL. I wonder how the judge got away from the fat and illigetimate lobbies!!!

12 posted on 01/25/2007 11:32:08 PM PST by HeartlandOfAmerica (The Democrat Party: Best friends of America's WORST enemies!)
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To: TNCMAXQ

It has already happened here. Try criticizing one of our ruling "minority" pressure groups outside your living room and see what happens. Won't be long before they'll monitor your toilet habits.


13 posted on 01/25/2007 11:39:34 PM PST by Luke21
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To: Luke21

Couple this kind of abuse with Hillary's ability to use government organizations to harass her opponents and freedom is indeed in jeopardy. Of course all the dolts who now say Bush is taking away our rights will have no problem with the gestapo tactics a far left, PC president will use.

I suppose they are monitoring us now and taking names... I say that half jokingly but these kinds of threats are real. Pretty scary.


14 posted on 01/25/2007 11:45:36 PM PST by TNCMAXQ
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To: stanz

Be sure to check out the link in #8...


15 posted on 01/25/2007 11:50:51 PM PST by nutmeg ("We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good." - Hillary Clinton 6/28/04)
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To: gungadin

That is certifiably a flagrant abuse of the police force. With all the burglary and assault that occurs in London, you'd think they'd have something better to do than sit in a restaurant and listen into patrons' conversations.


16 posted on 01/26/2007 12:33:42 AM PST by CheyennePress
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To: atomic conspiracy
It could be upon us in less than two years.

Agreed. A nightmare future, one we all thought confined to poor science fiction at one time, could be one election away.

Then that Paki doctor is all you're going to have access to while you're stuck in re-education camp. Maybe we should pick up on some Urdu...

17 posted on 01/26/2007 2:44:20 AM PST by Caipirabob (Communists... Socialists... Democrats...Traitors... Who can tell the difference?)
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To: CheyennePress
That is certifiably a flagrant abuse of the police force. With all the burglary and assault that occurs in London, you'd think they'd have something better to do than sit in a restaurant and listen into patrons' conversations.

That might expose them to danger.

That is why gun laws only target the law-abiding...Well ALL laws, really.

It is easier to spy on, bully, and otherwise perscute the lambs rather than the wolves.

Maybe someday a few of the busted diners will start following these weenies around to protect other diners.

18 posted on 01/26/2007 4:23:48 AM PST by Gorzaloon (Global Warming: A New Kind Of Scientology for the Rest Of Us.)
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To: Monterrosa-24
So we opt out of network and have to pay 100 percent up front and then wait to get a 70 percent reimbursement. A routine baby visit to a popular legitimate American MD will cost about $400 so it smarts.

This is the reason I think the medical profession needs to re-think their charges.

I think that when a person has to pay out of their own pocket, the doctor should lower the fee. I believe they rip-off the insurance companies enough to make up the difference, anyway.

And, if you hear of any doctor crying about "the cost of malpractice insurance" or "having to pay back the loans" consider this: what kind of home are they living in and what kind of car are they driving?

19 posted on 01/26/2007 5:32:50 AM PST by beachn4fun (Liberals wouldn't know the truth even if it hit them in the face.)
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To: beachn4fun

Back in the 50s MDs had nice houses and cars but one could more easily pay out of pocket med bills. Nowadays over and above malpractice insurance, the accounting costs/staff add plenty to private practice costs.

In the end the market sets the price and the best MDs can charge plenty because they have more patients desiring them than they can possibly serve. High prices help weed out the field.


20 posted on 01/26/2007 5:45:42 AM PST by Monterrosa-24 ( ...even more American than a French bikini and a Russian AK-47.)
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