Help me explain to my teenager why Thatcher was bad.

[Johnny Canuck3]

Not pre Thatcher, then.

Looks like she was elected in 1979; the miner's strike apparently was in 84? I was there in 1980.

I don't think Thatcher had taken many if any of her steps to curtail union power etc in 1980; it's similar to Reagan who was elected in 1980, but didn't fire PATCO until 1981.

What I saw was Britain before Thatcher's drastic changes were implemented.

 

[Anudder Oik]

Has this been posted yet?

I blame Thatcher for One Direction

 

[butchersapron]

Looks like she was elected in 1979; the miner's strike apparently was in 84? I was there in 1980.

I don't think Thatcher had taken many if any of her steps to curtail union power etc in 1980; it's similar to Reagan who was elected in 1980, but didn't fire PATCO until 1981.

What I saw was Britain before Thatcher's drastic changes were implemented.

She almost immediately provoked/encouraged a massive steel strike that lasted 4 bitterly fought months - and in that same early period attempted to push through a raft of mine closures. She got working straight away.

 

[danny la rouge]

I don't think Thatcher had taken many if any of her steps to curtail union power etc in 1980.

She had taken plenty of steps by 1980.

So when does pre-Thatcher Britain end, by your definition?

 

[Pickman's model]

She had taken plenty of steps by 1980.

So when does pre-Thatcher Britain end, by your definition?

in tears in may 1979

 

[DaveCinzano]

She purposefully provoked confrontation with unions for ideological reasons. The Ridley Report was pretty explicit.

 

[danny la rouge]

in tears in may 1979

That's everyone else's definition. Johnny appears to have a different one.

 

[ymu]

Looks like she was elected in 1979; the miner's strike apparently was in 84? I was there in 1980.

I don't think Thatcher had taken many if any of her steps to curtail union power etc in 1980; it's similar to Reagan who was elected in 1980, but didn't fire PATCO until 1981.

What I saw was Britain before Thatcher's drastic changes were implemented.

Thatcher destroyed the economy remarkably quickly. Had to backtrack in less than two years. The bombs you mention were mostly her doing also, IIRC. I don't think the mainland got bombed much at all before her.

But you probably know loads more than I do, having been here as a tourist in a year you can't quite recollect, not having known who the PM was at the time until now. Obviously.

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

I don't claim to have an insider's knowledge. Mine is an outsider's view, a snapshot of how things appeared to me, based on a visit that lasted not even twenty days.

 

[danny la rouge]

I don't claim to have an insider's knowledge. Mine is an outsider's view, a snapshot of how things appeared to me, based on a visit that lasted not even twenty days.

Indeed. We lived through it, though. Well, those of us old enough to remember. And even vote at the time.

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

Indeed. We lived through it, though. Well, those of us old enough to remember. And even vote at the time.

I remember my first election where I could vote. I voted for Trudeau.

 

[ymu]

I don't claim to have an insider's knowledge. Mine is an outsider's view, a snapshot of how things appeared to me, based on a visit that lasted not even twenty days.

A visit that took place when Thatcher had already started doing damage.

Were you aware of the bombs from the news, or from what you experienced here?

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

A visit that took place when Thatcher had already started doing damage.

Were you aware of the bombs from the news, or from what you experienced here?

Nothing blew up near me. It would be from news here and there, as well as all the cops and guards going through bags at museums, and looking at the undersides of cars with mirrors on wheels.

 

[89 Til Infinity]

Can someone help me understand how she managed to get elected for three terms?

 

[ymu]

Nothing blew up near me. It would be from news here and there, as well as all the cops and guards going through bags at museums, and looking at the undersides of cars with mirrors on wheels.

I don't remember that kind of paranoia kicking in until the later '80s. Were there still bins in the railway stations? Or was this very soon after Mountbatten was assassinated?

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

1980. They searched bags at the entrance to the Victoria and Albert. Can't recall the exact locations of the cops with the mirrors, but it was something I'd never seen before except on tv.

 

[ymu]

Can someone help me understand how she managed to get elected for three terms?

1979 was the usual frying pan to fire.

1983 was the Falklands and the SDP

1987 SDP-Lib alliance and Kinnock 'rebuilding' in preparation for Blair, plus a mini economic boom

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

You know, it might have been 79. I got a bit of extra money in 78, and went travelling shortly after that.

I think I've gotten used to saying 'around 1980' because 1979 just sounds so..... old.

 

[ymu]

1980. They searched bags at the entrance to the Victoria and Albert. Can't recall the exact locations of the cops with the mirrors, but it was something I'd never seen before except on tv.

It's not something I remember pre-Thatcher. Terrorism being a useful excuse for introducing a police state via such public paranoia, of course. A few years after you were here, they took the bins off the street to stop bombs being put in them. I think they proposed trying that again last year.

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

I can't remember if there were bins.

 

[Pickman's model]

It's not something I remember pre-Thatcher. Terrorism being a useful excuse for introducing a police state via such public paranoia, of course. A few years after you were here, they took the bins off the street to stop bombs being put in them. I think they proposed trying that again last year.

So you're forgetting the old bailey, the tower of london, the parachute regiment barracks, the shooting (sorry no bomb) of ross mcwhirter, guildford and birmingham, among others.

 

[Pickman's model]

Btw with the bins it wasn't a few years, it was circa 1992 after the pat hayes (?) bomb o/s harrods.

 

[ymu]

I can't remember if there were bins.

No bins was a mid-80s thing. Part of the instrumental anti-terrorist paranoia that persuaded us it was better to be kept in a permanent state of fear and inconvenience by our own government than occasionally get frightened and inconvenienced by people our government won't officially talk to.

 

[Pickman's model]

I can't remember if there were bins.

No, i'm sure you can't. Doubtless littered our fair streets.

 

[danny la rouge]

watch the clock on the story spin back to sometime before she got into office...

You know, it might have been 79.

I bow to your remarkable prescience.

 

[ymu]

So you're forgetting the old bailey, the tower of london, the parachute regiment barracks, the shooting (sorry no bomb) of ross mcwhirter, guildford and birmingham, among others.

No. I'm saying I don't remember routine bag searches etc outside of exceptional circumstances before the 1980s. But I was only 10 in 1979, so this may be a feature of my awareness of such things at that age as anything else.

 

[Pickman's model]

No bins was a mid-80s thing. Part of the instrumental anti-terrorist paranoia that persuaded us it was better to be kept in a permanent state of fear and inconvenience by our own government than occasionally get frightened and inconvenienced by people our government won't officially talk to.

then how did the 'ra find bins to drop bombs in in the '90s? Hell, there were bins on the tube till the '90s before they brought in the transparent bags at above ground stations.

 

[Pickman's model]

No. I'm saying I don't remember routine bag searches etc outside of exceptional circumstances before the 1980s. But I was only 10 in 1979, so this may be a feature of my awareness of such things at that age as anything else.

sorry, on a phone and intended more to respond to your post 98 which is remarkably forgetful of the ira bombing campaign of the 1970s.

 

[existentialist]

I was just basing that on what I've read here. I thought it was the honest gospel.

Btw: don't get too insulted. I know you didn't like her, but she has a family that's grieving today; maybe try to keep things in perspective.

One family. A nation ruined.

I don't think we need any lectures on perspective.

 

[Pickman's model]

One family. A nation ruined.

I don't think we need any lectures on perspective.

I do, i'm starting drawing classes and i'd like a hand improving the perspective in my work.