I was very sorry to read that John Humphrys had apparently dismissed those who marched on Saturday as ‘grey haired marchers with their snidey little placards’. Coming from someone who is himself 75, I would have hoped that he might have recognised that there is some significance in the huge numbers of older people, the postwar generation who lived through an era of optimism, who had come out onto the streets to reveal their disillusion in a government which has treated the results of a referendum, narrowly split, as absolute.
Also, according to research at the LSE, it is worth noting that the older generation is not monolithic. Those who lived through the war are generally in favour of Europe. Those who came after are more likely to take the benefits of peace for granted, and to resent the move to federalism.
My first reaction ‘How dare he’! Second reaction: was he there himself, if so he should have gone to spec savers if he couldn’t see the number of young people and children who were there too
Yes, it’s an uncharacteristically ill-informed and patronising (actually, itself snide) comment
Sadly, I suspect he speaks for the leadership of the BBC, which does not seem as impartial these days as one would hope
It’s hard for them to maintain the political balance and the support of DCMS which their charter requires. Charles
O caro Carlo… i see you have again abandoned loverly pix for politix which i respectfully opine is not yr forte… Apart from questioning whether Humfy’s words were in fact his own I would ask:
(a) If not ‘as absolute’ how would you propose to treat the result of the referendum? And if, as you imply, an ‘absolute’ brexit was not intended by the 17.4 millions plebs who voted for it, what do you think is wrong with St Teresa’s far from absolute deal (having presumably gone on what in a previous blog you revealingly describe as your ‘first march’ to oppose both it and indeed anything else that resembles brexit?
(b) Do you really think the direction of travel of the EU (with or without us) is towards peace and/or what do you think is the cause of (the rest of) Europe’s relentlessly rightward route, most recently manifest in Holland (Thierry Baudet being an expert on ‘the significance of borders’ and jostling for power with Geert Wilders both of whom make our Nige look like a pinko)? As for ‘those who lived through the war [being] generally in favour of Europe’ (whatever ‘Europe’ means here), my Dutch mother and her parents, all of whom lived through the war in occupied and brutalized Holland (hiding Jews in their attic), were in favour of free trade (the EEC) but certainly not federalism, my mother and i being in rare agreement on the iniquity of the treaty named after a Dutch border-town which Rees-Mogg’s pa tried to sue silly Mr Major for signing. Most of what our incompetent politicians are now trying to unravel is the legacy of Maastricht (alas, there isn’t the space here for me to argue the extent to which Adolf and the war was the legacy of the bien pensant Weimar Republic).
But as someone about to be pensioned off myself I’m grateful to be informed that ‘according to research at the LSE … the older generation is not monolithic.’
Dear Edward, Yes, I generally try to keep off politics, but it’s hard to at the moment. Do you believe in the Prime Minister’s deal ? It seems to satisfy no-one. Charles
Edward, Sadly, a contributing factor to the “rightly route”, is the unfortunate influence of the demagogue we in America have as our leader. He is president but not absolute and he won by similar margins to Brexit. When the margins are/were so slim, overplaying & overreaching by the “winner” only invites resentment & massive dissent on both sides of the pond. And besides, in both instances many of those who voted for Brexit & for Trump have changed their minds once the truth has presented itself. I say march on young and old. Marta Galicki
Well said ! Charles