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Food Banks


Gnasher
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We took our daughter for her 1 year check up last week, the health centre had loads of posters on the wall showing stats for the area. By the age of 4 31% of Stockport's children are overweight. Are they the ones that are starving?

 

Probably only a matter of time before they start measuring obesity like poverty, in "relative" terms.

 

Just as someone with a comfortable life but relatively low income is judged to be in poverty, someone who is a healthy weight will no doubt be considered "relatively starving" when compared to the obese majority.

 

The government will be condemned for the millions of people living in a state of non-obesity, who aren't getting their "fair share" of food.

 

Ed Miliband will criticise David Cameron for presiding over the biggest drop in calorie intake since the 1970s.

 

Meanwhile, the true starving and poor in the third world look at this country and shake their heads (if they even have the strength to lift their heads, of course).

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Probably only a matter of time before they start measuring obesity like poverty, in "relative" terms.

 

Just as someone with a comfortable life but relatively low income is judged to be in poverty, someone who is a healthy weight will no doubt be considered "relatively starving" when compared to the obese majority.

 

The government will be condemned for the millions of people living in a state of non-obesity, who aren't getting their "fair share" of food.

 

Ed Miliband will criticise David Cameron for presiding over the biggest drop in calorie intake since the 1970s.

 

Meanwhile, the true starving and poor in the third world look at this country and shake their heads (if they even have the strength to lift their heads, of course).

Silly glib comments when various reports and a wide variety of bodies have been highlighting real concerns in the past week over the impact of benefit cuts and the dramatic rise in people forced to use food banks in this country.

 

Ignorance is bliss.

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What are you on about? He was food phobic and starved, if he'd been a millionaire it wouldn't have made any difference.

Would've he starved to death if he'd been a millionaire?

 

Is it pure coincidence that he starved to death after the govt stopped his welfare payments? He had no money to buy food, he had no choice, he had no control over his situation. The govt took the chance to make his situation better away from him.

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The fact remains that people's standards of living are going backwards for no good reason, whether people were poorer in the 60s or not doesn't really matter, the fact in 2014 councils are turning their street lights off to save money and working people are walking to food banks is indefensible when you consider the reasons those standards are dropping, not because there's less to go around than there was before, but because more of it is going into fewer pockets.

 

Rico and SD are clearly sharp lads and I don't believe for one minute they really believe a lot of what they post on here these days and think much of it is just to get a rise. Shame, because there are two genuine sides to every view.

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The fact remains that people's standards of living are going backwards for no good reason, whether people were poorer in the 60s or not doesn't really matter, the fact in 2014 councils are turning their street lights off to save money and working people are walking to food banks is indefensible when you consider the reasons those standards are dropping, not because there's less to go around than there was before, but because more of it is going into fewer pockets.

Rico and SD are clearly sharp lads and I don't believe for one minute they really believe a lot of what they post on here these days and think much of it is just to get a rise. Shame, because there are two genuine sides to every view.

I'll give you my view on the modern day nick clegg liberal.

 

They walk round a supermarket in their sandals and tweed jacket, a supermarket which is making grotesquely massive profits due to not being forced to pay any tax. They stroll past a kid filling shelves for no money because he's been put on some bullshit scheme by the govt. They are oblivious to the shoplifter filling his pockets because he can't afford to pay. They get served by a checkout girl on a zero hour contract which means she has zero control over her life, they avoid the beggar being moved on outside by some roid head security guard on six quid an hour. Then when the modern day liberal gets home he convinces himself he's an all round good guy because he's bought a jar of fair trade coffee.

 

If there was any justice he'd get mugged.

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But that's my point, I'm being told hundreds of thousands are relying on food banks, but I'm also being told that people are getting fatter and a third of kids are overweight (I have a feeling it was obese but can't be 100%).

A third still leaves two thirds unaccounted for. Maybe the children relying on foodbanks come out of the other two thirds?

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Poverty is a strange concept because it conjures up all sorts of Dickensian images, or pictures of absolute poverty, such as we find in other parts of the world where there is drought and famine. But even if we don't have that sort of poverty in today's 'first world' Britain, it is not difficult to see that all is not well. We are a rich nation but huge swathes of the population are not accessing the benefits that should flow from that. It's clear to see that we have some problems that in this day and age we really should be beyond.

 

Having a nation with far too many fat, poor kids is a blight. A lot of these kids will die before their parents. They eat cheap processed crap, full of empty carbs, and many of them do not enjoy the sort of nutrition that will help to keep them fit, healthy, and bright at school. Eating a variety of fruits and vegetables is almost becoming the preserve of the middle class, and that can't be right. 

 

There are far too many people who do not have enough to eat properly, keep warm, and perhaps have a few options open to them in life. One of the overlooked things about poverty is that it is very isolating, and the lost social capital is enormously damaging for a nation's prospects. I'm not especially politically minded, but the whole lot of them, from all sides, need to have a word with themselves. Are we not able to do better than this? Really?

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A third still leaves two thirds unaccounted for. Maybe the children relying on foodbanks come out of the other two thirds?

 

No. They have to be the same ones.

 

Look, some kids are fat. Therefore no-one is actually poor and the country is not run by Tory cunts who's only aim is to make the rich richer.

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Rico and SD are clearly sharp lads and I don't believe for one minute they really believe a lot of what they post on here these days and think much of it is just to get a rise. Shame, because there are two genuine sides to every view.

 

I am quite sure there are a lot of people who find it extremely difficult to get by. I'm certainly not as willing to blame the government for every little problem. My mother regularly went hungry growing up because her father used to gamble away almost everything he earned. The fault of the government? No, the fault of a stupid, selfish person.

 

If everyone stopped blaming the government for everything that goes wrong, I would feel less of a need to respond with sarcasm and we could have a proper discussion about how we fix things.

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I'll give you my view on the modern day nick clegg liberal.

 

They walk round a supermarket in their sandals and tweed jacket, a supermarket which is making grotesquely massive profits due to not being forced to pay any tax. They stroll past a kid filling shelves for no money because he's been put on some bullshit scheme by the govt. They are oblivious to the shoplifter filling his pockets because he can't afford to pay. They get served by a checkout girl on a zero hour contract which means she has zero control over her life, they avoid the beggar being moved on outside by some roid head security guard on six quid an hour. Then when the modern day liberal gets home he convinces himself he's an all round good guy because he's bought a jar of fair trade coffee.

 

If there was any justice he'd get mugged.

You live in a fantasy world.

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The government oddly takes the position that adults should be free to make their own decisions.

 

Obviously this means that a minority of people are going to ruin their lives by making bad decisions; frankly I'll take that if it means I can plod along without being nannied by an interfering government that wants to micro-manage my life.

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Lots of poor people have a problem with gambling now, especially FOBTs. The government could ban them. They won't though, as they bring in lots of money for big bookmakers.

The proliferation and infiltration of gambling into every facet of our culture, every add break, is extremely worrying, it's an absolute time bomb in my opinion. Even the yanks have tighter restrictions on this stuff than we do. When we go for short term gains we do it in a more extreme fashion than any other country I can think of, a certain sporting franchise is another example. It comes to something when Americans have to come here to juice fans because their own sports are too tightly controlled.

 

I was walking around Liverpool yesterday and it always strikes me how many Chinese students there are. The university is pimping itself out to foreign money while ours are often either being put off going altogether, or falling into shit, poorly structured courses which have been designed to attract them in, juice them and then drop kick them with aplomb into the only public sector office job that will take them when they once again fail their resits.

 

If you gave the people formulating these policies a glimpse of the future, and said the likes of China and India were going to overtake us while we tool them up in skills while selling off our own schools to shit private sector sponsors and breaking the back of our own education system do you know what they'd do different? Absolutely nothing, because what happanes to the wider community ten years from now doesn't register, only what I have to gain a month from now, or a year from now.

 

Said it loads but those at the top no longer have their fates entwined with the long term future of the country, and as a result everything, absolutely everything, is for sale.

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Yes, I had a feeling you'd rather people had the freedom to be poor. I almost included it in my post actually. Bookmakers target the poorest areas of towns and cities. Bookmakers stretch the law (only 4 FOBTs per shop) by simply having more and then putting a glass window up between them and the rest of the shop. You can put £200 in a FOBT, but you're unlikely to be able to put £200 on a horse, especially if you have any track record of knowing what you're doing.

 

The reasons are quite simple. They're an attack on the poor. They prey on people's desperation.

 

But I'm sure its about people's freedoms really.

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The proliferation and infiltration of gambling into every facet of our culture, every add break, is extremely worrying, it's an absolute time bomb in my opinion. Even the yanks have tighter restrictions on this stuff than we do. When we go for short term gains we do it in a more extreme fashion than any other country I can think of, a certain sporting franchise is another example. It comes to something when Americans have to come here to juice fans because their own sports are too tightly controlled.

 

I was walking around Liverpool yesterday and it always strikes me how many Chinese students there are. The university is pimping itself out to foreign money while ours are often either being put off going altogether, or falling into shit, poorly structured courses which have been designed to attract them in, juice them and then drop kick them with aplomb into the only public sector office job that will take them when they once again fail their resits.

 

If you gave the people formulating these policies a glimpse of the future, and said the likes of China and India were going to overtake us while we tool them up in skills while selling off our own schools to shit private sector sponsors and breaking the back of our own education system do you know what they'd do different? Absolutely nothing, because what happanes to the wider community ten years from now doesn't register, only what I have to gain a month from now, or a year from now.

 

Said it loads but those at the top no longer have their fates entwined with the long term future of the country, and as a result everything, absolutely everything, is for sale.

 

As irritating as having Ray Winstone popping up on telly every 12 seconds is, I have little problem with actual sports betting. Obviously some people will develop a problem with gambling, and they'll need help with that, but there is at least a degree of a skill to sports betting. You can beat the bookies, hence the existence of professional sports bettors. There are also plenty of people happy enough to spend a fiver a week on horses/football, in the knowledge that they'll probably lose money long term, but its affordable, and its entertainment. Its a system where most people are fairly happy. Bookmakers make money, some clued up punters also do, lots of people have fun and only lose a few quid.

 

Where FOBTs differ is that they can't be beaten. Bookmakers are giving less and less of a fuck about horse racing and football (the two major sports people bet on a lot) because they're allowed to fill their shops with machines that ruin people's lives. I've seen it first hand. I've seen people stick a week's wages in one of these machines, in about 20 minutes.

 

 

 

Yeah, I remember you talking about that disconnect. It was about the one area of nationalism that was actually palatable. Being proud of stuff your country made. Unfortunately now the country is run by, and for, rich people that don't even require the services of their own poor.

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As irritating as having Ray Winstone popping up on telly every 12 seconds is, I have little problem with actual sports betting. Obviously some people will develop a problem with gambling, and they'll need help with that, but there is at least a degree of a skill to sports betting. You can beat the bookies, hence the existence of professional sports bettors. There are also plenty of people happy enough to spend a fiver a week on horses/football, in the knowledge that they'll probably lose money long term, but its affordable, and its entertainment. Its a system where most people are fairly happy. Bookmakers make money, some clued up punters also do, lots of people have fun and only lose a few quid.

 

Where FOBTs differ is that they can't be beaten. Bookmakers are giving less and less of a fuck about horse racing and football (the two major sports people bet on a lot) because they're allowed to fill their shops with machines that ruin people's lives. I've seen it first hand. I've seen people stick a week's wages in one of these machines, in about 20 minutes.

 

 

 

Yeah, I remember you talking about that disconnect. It was about the one area of nationalism that was actually palatable. Being proud of stuff your country made. Unfortunately now the country is run by, and for, rich people that don't even require the services of their own poor.

I think sports betting is just the tip of the iceberg. If you're ever unfortunate enough to be off work during the day time have a look at the adverts. Virtually every other show is sponsored by a bingo site and depict women on some fun activity, dancing, going the beach, having an 'online chat with the girls'.

 

They're cynically aimed at lonely stay at home or jobless mums. Everyone knows it, nobody cares until we get the inevitable fallout which probably ends at Wonga.

 

There's a whole poverty industry out there tied into exploiting the poor, the vulnerable, the lonely, you name it, and when they come a cropper we'll blame them.

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I think sports betting is just the tip of the iceberg. If you're ever unfortunate enough to be off worm during the day time have a look at the adverts. Virtually every other show is sponsored by a bingo site and depict women on some fun activity, dancing, going the beach, having an 'online chat with the girls'.

 

They're cynically aimed at lonely stay at home or jobless mums. Everyone knows it, nobody cares until we get the inevitable fallout which probably ends at Wonga.

 

There's a whole poverty industry out there tied into exploiting the poor.

 

Yeah, I agree. I just think there is a fairly important distinction between gambling where you have a chance of winning, and gambling where there simply isn't. And surely the former is the liberal ideal, no? The latter is indefensible. FOBTs are the centre piece for the poverty industry. They take money off the poor more efficiently than anything else.

 

I don't doubt that online bingo has a similar effect. With women as the target audience.

 

What a shame that you have to be over 18 to gamble. Perhaps that could be lowered as a way of allowing children more freedom.

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Gambling is popular because its become a one in a billion shot to break the cycle of relative poverty large swathes of the country are in. I like my gambling but im a little bit more clued up on it than the average person but i only win relatively small amounts through various loopholes and offers. But its not difficult to see how and why they are flourishing.

 

The biggest swizz these bookies are pulling is that they are all registering themselves in tax havens to avoid paying tax.

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