The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that with the penultimate weekend of the 2025 Six Nations Rugby its trial of a new system of Beard Bonus points is continuing.
Only England and Ireland got a Beard Bonus point in the first round of games. England, Ireland and Scotland got Beard Bonus Point in the second round of games. This pattern was repeated in round three. Italy, France and Wales so far have zero Beard Bonus Points
In Round Four England and Scotland achieved Beard Bonus Points
Beard Bonus Points Table
England 4
Ireland 3
Scotland 3
France 0
Italy 0
Wales 0
In 2025 a winning team will get a bonus point for scoring four or more tries. A losing team will get a bonus point on the same basis and a further bonus point if they lose by less than seven points.
The campaigners say that in each game a Beard Bonus Point will be awarded to teams that field at least 50% of players with facial hair across 80 minutes.
A final tally of Beard Bonus Points will be issued on March 15th with the final round of games
BLF Organiser Keith Flett, there is no question that Beard Power is important in men’s rugby and the Beard Bonus Points will be a key indicator of the winner of the Six Nations 2025
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has launched its annual search for My Hairy Valentine ahead of Valentine’s Day on 14th February.
In 2025 it again includes two categories:
1 Beards that are sexy, allowing for the reality that this is in the eye of the beholder
2 Beards that are loved because they add a reassuring presence to public life and should be celebrated.
There will be a round covering each category with the winners of both contests sharing the title in 2025
BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, we know that not all beards are sexy, think Jonathan Gullis, but at Valentine’s each year we celebrate those that are.
Voting for Beards that are ‘sexy’ is now open. Vote is pinned @kmflett. Because of issues with that site votes can also be made by responding to this post
The end of January 2025 was the fifth anniversary of Brexit which of course allowed Nigel Farage to spout a fresh round of BS.
However a comparison of Farage’s appearance with how he looked five years ago provokes a question asked by Dr Who of the then Prime Minister Harriet Jones in 2005 ‘dont you think she looks tired?’*
The Doctor correctly predicted that so few words would lead to rumours about the PM’s health and her ultimate departure.
In the case of Farage the ageing process is certainly promoted by the number of cigarettes he smokes. If the media werent so intent om promoting all things Farage they might ponder the statement below from an interview the Reform UK boss
London Standard 6/7th February 2025
Will you be prime minister in four and a half years’ time?
There’s a chance.
Give me a percentage.
I’d say there’s a 35-45 per cent chance. And by the way, it might not be me. Someone younger and better might come along. Somebody more suitable. And if they do I’ll recognise them.
Its finding suggest that the main reason voters said they would vote against Reform was Nigel Farage, with over a quarter (27 per cent) saying Reform’s leader was the key reason the party wouldn’t get their vote. Opinium poll 5th February 2025
Who built the seven gates of Thebes? The books are filled with names of kings. Was it the kings who hauled the craggy blocks of stone? And Babylon, so many times destroyed. Who built the city up each time? In which of Lima’s houses, That city glittering with gold, lived those who built it? In the evening when the Chinese wall was finished Where did the masons go? Imperial Rome Is full of arcs of triumph. Who reared them up? Over whom Did the Caesars triumph? Byzantium lives in song. Were all her dwellings palaces? And even in Atlantis of the legend The night the seas rushed in, The drowning men still bellowed for their slaves.
Young Alexander conquered India. He alone? Caesar beat the Gauls. Was there not even a cook in his army? Phillip of Spain wept as his fleet was sunk and destroyed. Were there no other tears? Frederick the Greek triumphed in the Seven Years War. Who triumphed with him?
Each page a victory At whose expense the victory ball? Every ten years a great man, Who paid the piper?
Six Years on: the London Brexit Rally Crowd on 31st January 2020
Six Years on Nigel Farage’s social media team had nothing to say on his behalf about the anniversary of this momentous day
The several thousand people who gathered in Parliament Square on the evening of Friday 31st January 2020 appeared from all the pictures that I saw to be mainly men of a certain age.
How can we characterise such a crowd? It was certainly not one of protest, since the object was to mark the departure of Britain from the EU, which was something achieved by the then Conservative Government.
It may have had aspects of the mob to it but reports suggest it simply dispersed fairly peacefully at the end of proceedings. A traditional London mob of reactionary intent might well have proceeded to try and sack the offices of the pro-EU Guardian at Kings Cross.
Less than 4 months before on October 19th 2019 the third and probably the smallest of marches for a People’s Vote had taken place, also ending up in Parliament Square
Compared to the first two marches there was far more Labour Party involvement with CLP banners and Sadiq Khan was amongst those at the head of the march. This was one only part of Labour sentiment on the EU, primarily around the People’s Vote campaign. The Party was far more centrally involved than before with Shadow Cabinet Ministers speaking in Parliament Square. We found out how well that worked on December 12th 2019. For some of course it worked exactly as intended.
The question of the crowd and particularly that in London has long taken the interest of historians.
In the Making of the English Working Class, E P Thompson, discussing the work of the crowd historian George Rude, looked at supporters of the radical London Mayor in the late eighteenth century John Wilkes.
Thompson wrote:
..the London crowd of the 1760s and 1770s had scarcely begun to develop its own organisation or leaders; had little theory distinct from its ‘managers’; and there is a sense in which it was manipulated.. to ‘operate on behalf of external interests’- the interests of the wealthy tradesmen, merchants and manufacturers of the City who were Wilkes’s most influential supporters.
Yet Thompson also noted of the mob that it was a ‘transitional mob, on its way to becoming a self-conscious Radical crowd’.
Could this transitional point be applied to at least some People’s Vote marchers and Brexit rally attenders? While both were made up primarily of ‘ordinary’ people both were certainly manipulated at the top by those who had interests quite other than those declared. The People’s Vote campaign was in part more interested in undermining Jeremy Corbyn and Labour, underlined when a key component of it the LibDems suddenly abandoned it in favour of renouncing Article50. That ultimately worked as well as the People’s Vote campaign itself.
With the Brexit Rally the anti-working class pro-exploitation agendas of Farage and Johnson were in charge, not a celebration of breaking free from a neo-liberal nexus.
Yet within the many thousands who marched for a People’s Vote were those who had protested against the Iraq War and are currently protesting about climate change. Far from all were on board with the full agenda of the organisers.
Likewise at the Brexit Rally, reports suggest that when a large image of anti-EU campaigner Tony Benn was flashed up on the big screen it was met with cheers. That doesn’t suggest there was a uniformly reactionary mood amongst the crowd whatever Farage and his cronies were hoping for.
The London crowd is forever a political work in progress. Climate Change protests by Just Stop Oil and others suggest an agenda that is more challenging to the interests of capital. The police certainly think so.
Contact BLF Organiser Keith Flett @keithbeard.bsky.social
Alexei Sayle retains Beard of Winter title after vote
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that veteran comedian and commentator Alexei Sayle, has won the vote for the Beard of Winter 2025 retaining the title he won in January 2024
Alexei Sayle achieved 63.5% of the 4,200 votes cast in the on-line Beard Off Final
Beard of Winter focuses on two areas:
Organic beards designed to withstand the winter weather
Beards that have been in the public eye in the previous couple of months
There were two preliminary Close Shave Rounds with the top two from each going to a final Beard Off. The Winner is announced on 31st January
BLF Organiser Keith Flett, we congratulate Alexei Sayle on retaining the Beard of Winter title. Not only does he have a beard that can withstand the most robust of winter weather, he also has beard power, speaking about Gaza and the actions of the Israeli army on a regular basis.
Private Equity group Keystone have acquired the brand names of well known craft beers Fourpure and Magic Rock. Henceforth they will be brewed at Black Sheep in Masham and Purity in Warwickshire.
Fourpure and Magic Rock were first bought by global brewer Lion/Kirin and then when they didn’t fit its business model ditched. They returned to independent brewing existence but the thrill, as it were, had gone.
Fourpure went into administration with brewing moving to Magic Rock in Huddersfield which has now also closed.
Keystone (formerly Breal) entered the beer market by buying Black Sheep. Subsequently they have acquired Brick, Brew By Numbers, Purity and Big Drop.
Craft beer was about provenance and being rooted in local communities. Masham is a great place and still the home of Theakstons but this is now about brands as much as beer. As the old bloke with the beard noted in the 1860s capitalism tends to monopoly
Historians call for 30th January to be a national holiday to mark first ever Parliamentary Democracy
The London Socialist Historians Group, which organises the socialist history seminar at the Institute of Historical Research in central London, has renewed its call for January 30th to be made a national holiday.
January 30th in 2025 marks the 376th anniversary of the Regicide that saw King Charles executed in Whitehall for treason.
This ushered in the Commonwealth and the idea that Parliament not the Divine Right of Kings and Queens should decide what happens. The despatch of King Charles 1st was the beginning of a modern Parliamentary Democracy (in fact since 1660 a Constitutional Monarchy)
The historians say that the event rather cuts against the idea that nothing particularly exciting or dramatic ever happens in British history.
Oliver Cromwell who headed the post-1649 Government died in 1658 and was succeeded by his son Richard.
However in 1660 the monarchy was restored and King Charles 11 dated the start of his reign from 30th January 1649 in the first attempt to write the Commonwealth period out of history. That is probably a key reason why the day is not a national holiday (as it certainly would be in France for example).
LSHG Convenor Dr Keith Flett said, you don’t need to be a republican to grasp that the moment when Parliamentary Democracy laid down its first roots is worth marking and a day off at the end of the bleak month of January would surely be no bad thing.
He continued, of course history is complex and while England and Wales can rightfully celebrate the events of 30th January 1649 as a democratic advance, in Ireland where Cromwell’s armies waged a bloody war things look rather different.
