Idiotic thickos. Yes, another thread!!!

janthea - you will not be 'shot down'. You are entitled to your opinion even if some of us don't agree with it. Nobody is being personally attacked, we are just having a debate.

Oh! I have just twittered on about this on another thread.

Blimey how does being a formidable PM constitute a state funeral? It is absolute nonsense.

I think Baroness Thatcher was an amazing woman and Prime Minister. She did what was needed at the time and got the country out of a terrible mess left the the previous Government. I read somewhere that Harold Wilson closed 93 mines to her 22 mines, but no one is blaming him for that!! In fact a lot things being blamed on her were nothing to do with her. I think the Queen is doing the right thing attending the funeral. Baroness Thatcher was a formidable PM.

I'm not getting into a shouting match with anyone on this post. I've just stated my opinion and I think there are far more people like me in the country than people seem to think. Perhaps we just don't make a lot of noise about it.

So, I expect to be 'shot down' but I don't care. Do your worst!

I heard that some joker has suggested that Thatcher's funeral should be privatised to take the burden from the tax payer. Good idea!

Is it wrong to be against things, then? I am against poverty, disease, FGM, abuse of the vulnerable, drink driving........does that make me 'blinkered'?

I don't believe any politician is motivated by spite, but by the desire for power and in my most cynical mode, by a desire to make money for certain groups of people, including themselves. Some probably really believe they are doing their best for the country.
Movedalot - does 'blinkered' mean 'not agreeing with me'? Are you ever blinkered or does it only apply to other people?

gilly it is nice to see someone recognise that there were grey areas. I don't believe people are all bad or all good. I find it hard to believe that anyone would set out to destroy any part of our economy. Perhaps the results of some of Mrs T's actions were not good but I can't accept that she did them out of some kind of spite. There are so many things we cannot ever know, eg would we have been better off if there had been no privatisation? How can we ever know the answer to that? People will stand on either side of the argument but we will never know unless we go back and privatise them again.

Mrs Thatcher was clearly a leader who was either loved or hated with very little "grey" in the middle.

I can respect her as a strong leader who (faced with the climate she inherited) did what needed to be done to curb the unions etc. She was also the right leader to deal with the Falkland Island issue at the time and refused to give in to the bullying tactics of Argentina. On the other hand Mrs Thatcher was hated here in the NE for her dealings with the Miners (although I think it became a personal battle of wills between her and Arthur Scargill) and for the selling off of industry relied on by generations of manual workers.

Having said all that scrub my opening sentence which proves that there quite clearly some "grey" areas.

Incidentally at the height of Mrs T's power I think its important to add that I was a paid up member of the Labour Party.

Eloethan If you read the link Ana posted you will see that more people seem to think she was a good PM than think she wasn't. That is not reflected in the posts on GN.

I do think that generally more people are against things on GN than for but I am sure someone will see things differently. I noticed in the past that older people tend to moan more than younger but had hoped my own generation would be different and less blinkered. It seems to me that a lot of Gners do tend to notice the negatives rather than the positives and I am not just talking about Mrs T.

I think I posted on another thread - or it could have been this one - that any pro-Mrs Ts among posting Gransnet members may well not be prepared to face the negative responses they'd get if they ventured to put their views forward. Let's not pretend that wouldn't happen.

Thank you, jingle, but I think Sel is usually pretty good at speaking for herself!

*nightowl"

*j08" said "I think it's mostly the antis who come on boards like this to express their dislike."

I merely replied "I don't get your reasoning. Surely, those who are great admirers of Mrs T - and you say there are many - would be just as keen to voice their admiration, as you have done?"

To which j08 replied "the haters are noisier."

I don't see my remark as being particularly contentious. I was merely challenging the assertion that those putting forward certain opinions on Gransnet were unrepresentative of the mainstream - everybody, whatever their opinion, can express their views on GN. On what evidence can j08 assert "the haters are noisier".

I would not characterise myself as a "hater". I do not condone spiteful "celebrations" of Mrs T's death - I think they are despicable. However, I do challenge the establishment view - as expressed by David Cameron and as implied by the lavish and unprecedented preparations for Mrs T's funeral, that Mrs T was perceived by the whole of the UK as a force for good.

I really don't think the people who were out on the streets making a nuisance of themselves can be called protesters or demonstrators. The only reasonable things to protest about would be this absurd pantomime of a funeral and the expensive chat show in the Commons and Lords this week. As far as I can see, they were just making whoopee, some of it in a reckless and dangerous manner and all of it in a disruptive way. This was neither legitimate protest nor sensible political debate and behaviour of this sort undermines both these things.

You wouldn't, would you? Interesting, too, that only in Scotland did more people consider her to be a bad PM than a good one.

Interesting poll*Ana*. You wouldn't believe it from reading the posts on GN.

I expect Sel is talking about the gransnetters who have posted. No one can tell what the silent ones think. (more's the pity)

nightowl . I feel for you.

Sel, I would be interested to hear what data you used to arrive at an 80/20 split in members, considering we have some 15,000, the huge majority of whom have never posted anything.
You mention the word 'extreme' -could you tell us what you mean by that? For example, would you say BNP or UKIP would be at one end of the spectrum, and Socialist Workers at the other? Just asking, as jingle would say, but I am really interested.

Thank you j08 for that clarification. I'm not sure what Eloethan said to inspire your comment and don't have time to go back through the whole thread as I am at work.

Sel I appreciate your comments, thank you. I obviously cannot agree with yours analysis of who was to blame for the destruction of those communities. We could debate it all day and as you say, it is not a dispassionate argument for me. I believe those industries were doomed from the moment Mrs Thatcher came into power and the strikes made no difference either way. Look at the Nottinghamshire miners who worked and still lost their mines.

Suffice it to say, my dad was a striker, and a shop steward in the ill-fated steel strike. He was not a loony leftie or a communist or a trouble maker, but a dignified hard working man who looked after his family and did what he felt he had to do when his livelihood was threatened. He was not unique. I will not have those men vilified by anyone. I would ask anyone, how much would you need to be paid to work in a blast furnace, or go down a mine? I know my own answer to that - nothing would induce me to do either. These men were heroes.

Sorry to have strayed so far from the thread. I don't think I can say any more on this subject now. It is too painful and too close to home. I am shocked to find how deeply I have been affected by this woman's death. Now I must get back to work.

Margaret Thatcher more popular than Churchill in YouGov poll

nightowl I take your point about HMQ being politically neutral but surely that would also apply if she didn't go to the funeral?

I think Sel that it has been assessed that slightly more people were in favour of Mrs T than against, although not on GN.

It is always more newsworthy to comment on the 'antis' than the 'fors'

Aye to that, jings

Yes. People who admired her don't seem so vocal. Some people must have liked her to have voted her in three times. Some of those people must be on Gransnet.

nightowl I understand the points you are making and I have posted several times about my thoughts which are economically driven and why I, for one, think it is wrong to blame MT for the destruction of industrial areas. I would place much of the blame on the unions, the fact the country was close to bankruptcy and the fact that the world was changing, markets were opening globally and we were not competitive.

Having said that, it is a cold assessment not coloured by the emotion which you feel and I can understand that.

I think j0's comment about 'the haters are nosier' refers to the fact that those who hated MT outnumber those who didn't, at least amongst those posting on Gransnet.

I had just read about all this cruel "celebrating" when I started this thread. And I was very angry.