Three more grim “this is your future” stories out of Britain
Bookworm on Aug 25 2009 at 6:27 pm | Filed under: Britain, England
1. A major bed and midwife shortage has thousands of women giving birth in offices, hallways and even toilets. It sounds like a scene out of a bad war movie or a history of the Soviet Union, but it’s modern Britain under an imploding socialized medicine system:
Thousands of women are having to give birth outside maternity wards because of a lack of midwives and hospital beds.
The lives of mothers and babies are being put at risk as births in locations ranging from lifts to toilets – even a caravan – went up 15 per cent last year to almost 4,000.
Health chiefs admit a lack of maternity beds is partly to blame for the crisis, with hundreds of women in labour being turned away from hospitals because they are full.
Latest figures show that over the past two years there were at least:
* 63 births in ambulances and 608 in transit to hospitals;
* 117 births in A&E departments, four in minor injury units and two in medical assessment areas;
* 115 births on other hospital wards and 36 in other unspecified areas including corridors;
* 399 in parts of maternity units other than labour beds, including postnatal and antenatal wards and reception areas.Additionally, overstretched maternity units shut their doors to any more women in labour on 553 occasions last year.
Babies were born in offices, lifts, toilets and a caravan, according to the Freedom of Information data for 2007 and 2008 from 117 out of 147 trusts which provide maternity services.
You can read the rest of this very painful story here. Childbirth is a stressful enough situation without being shunted from pillar to post. Those British women have my utmost sympathy.
2. A man almost died from a ruptured appendix three weeks after British surgeons purportedly removed it. Ordinarily, I’d classify this simply as an “it could happen anywhere” malpractice story, but it seems to be part and parcel of a failing medical system, rather than an ordinary human error aberration.
3. In Britain, the burqa has become almost de riguer, as thousands of Islamic women wander the streets like animated black tents. It’s no surprise that enterprising thieves are taking advantage of its useful anonymity:
Police are searching for a burqa-clad man who helped steal designer watches worth £150,000 in an armed robbery yesterday.
Staff at the shop told police the offenders, including the one wearing the burkha, were all male.
The other two were wearing dark clothing and had their faces covered. All are thought to be Asian. [Translation: Pakistani.]
[snip]
Last month, a man dressed in a black burqa entered First Choice Travel in Broadwalk, Dunstable, and threatened two female workers with a knife before stealing cash and escaping through the back door.
In a similar robbery this month, a man, again dressed in a black burqa entered Thomson travel shop in George Street, Luton, and threatened female staff with a knife and taking a large amount of cash.
Read more here.
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13 Responses to “Three more grim “this is your future” stories out of Britain”
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If I founded a cult that required all men and women to wear only thongs on their bottoms in public, how long would it take before even the libertines of the left demanded that my followers dress decently while teaching grammar school or serving on juries?
So why would a government hesitate for even a second at outlawing garb designed to dehumanize women and cut them off from normal social intercourse? How is the burkha any less distracting or obscene than my cult’s near nakedness?
A society, or a civilization, has every right to pass laws regulating public decency. Whether they choose to or not is up to them.
It’s interesting to me that we are struggling with the burqha. On one hand, it is profoundly un-American to completely cover your face in public. Even veiled widows at a funeral have always worn see-through veils. On the other hand, we’ve always been extremely tolerant of religious garb of a wide variety.
The burqha is so extreme. That is what is giving even personal-freedom advocates pause. I’m personally uncomfortable with outlawing it. But if someone proposed a law banning *all* modes of public clothing that concealed the face, I think in the end I would vote for that law.
As for individual businesses… if they can post a sign saying “No shoes, no shirt, no service”, they should certainly be free to post another sign saying “No face, no service.” And be completely free to hold to it.
“No face, no service.”
That, Mike, is a very interesting idea.
As for the burqa, what bugs me about it is that it’s a cultural, not a doctrinal, symbol of female subjugation. I think one could colorably argue that the U.S., were it to outlaw extreme burqas, is not interfering with the exercise of religion.
As for me, I hate seeing women in burqas, partly because it a simple of complete enslavement, and partly because they scare the hell out of me. Who knows what’s really under those clothes? Knives? Bombs? Guns? Pathetic malnourishment? Bruises? They are the ultimate antisocial clothes in a social nation.
It is very obvious that in Britain, and Europe in general, people are very morally confused- especially when it comes to anything Islam related. Cultures have to have some standards where a line isn’t crossed. For example, the laws about child abuse are pretty specific as to what does and doesn’t constitute abuse in the United States. It doesn’t matter if a certain kind of discipline is legal or commonplace in another country. If it is illegal here it is illegal. Many times, Hispanic parents complained to me that it was illegal in the States to “discipline” their kids (of course, mixing up beating with discipline), and I remember well a story about an Asian family that was investigated for abuse because the child had streaky marks on his back. Turns out it was from “coining”, a custom in some SE Asian countries in which coins are rapidly rubbed on a person’s back when they are sick. Clearly cultural and with no intent to abuse- but the parents were told, “We respect your traditions and understand that they are not intended to abuse, however this is not legal in the United States.” This story impressed me. We have a law in the US and we hold it regardless of your cultural traditions. By moving here you chose to abide by our laws within the framework of your traditions.
So, the same should apply to burkas in settings that would require faces. And at the very least, it’s time we women started pestering our feminist organizations to acknowledge the burka for what it is; not a form of modesty but a way of rendering half a population entirely invisible. In France I read that they are tolerating genital mutilation in girls out of cultural sensitivity. This is the obvious result of no standards of child abuse and no standards of women’s rights. I guess it’s one more thing we shouldn’t be so silent about.
It’s a way of cultural invasion and exploitation.
Remember everything the Left said about American Imperialism? Just replace AI with Islamic Imperialism and you’ll pretty much have the right picture.
As a reminder to those that haven’t brushed up on their anti-American studies:
America is powerful because it exploited the natural resources of other people through military might and extortion.
America is on this land because they butchered the previous inhabitants who rightfully owned this land.
America forces its culture on other indigenous people with materialistic and overwhelming power/influence/money.
America is the most evil entity in the history of the world and every other human problem pales in the face of the need to exterminate America.
I’m sure you think can think up the rest now that you have a head start.
Charles & Mike
Between the two of you – the solution.
Burkah your face – expose your bottom.
Lulu
It is very obvious that in Britain, and Europe in general, people are very morally confused ……………….Islam related.
If it were just that simple. Britain and Europe have been ‘morally challenged’ for ages.
p.s. After a series of burka bank robberies in Philadelphia, the banks now insist that the face be exposed.
Charles, the libertines of the left would only object to a thong-wearing cult if the bottoms being exposed weren’t attractive.
Kali, good point. We could respond, Alinsky-like, by creating “The Front Against Buttism” (FAB), which would decry the marginalization of people with ugly bare bottoms and call for their acceptance in society and the workplace.
And we could have rallies where we cry out “Flab is FAB!” and “What are you ashamed of?” to all the prudes in the crowd. Never mind the huge increase in skin that can be used as a whiteboard for political slogans . . .
Okay, now I’m making myself nervous.
LMAO
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