Kmflett's Blog

Beard Liberation Front

PRESS RELEASE 10^th February

contact Keith Flett 07803 167266

‘MY HAIRY VALENTINE’ POLL: IT’S HOTTING UP

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, which campaigns against irrational prejudice against the hirsute, has said that with Valentine’s Day just a few days off its hotting up in the vote for the ‘sexiest’ beard of 2020.

Peter Mac Ciarrai retains a significant lead but other contenders are gaining

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, the question that will be determined when the vote closes at midday on Thursday is: who has the hottest Valentine’s Beard of 2020. The poll is already smouldering…

My Hairy Valentine Shortlist

Idris Elba

Prince Harry

Tom Jones

Gary Lineker

Mauricio Pochettino

George Clooney

Mo Salah

Justin Trudeau

Chris Woakes

Peter Mac Ciarrai

Drew McIntyre

Jeremy Paxman

Daniel Fooks

What is the criteria for the sexiest Valentine’s Day Beard?

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder & likewise what people find sexy can vary widely

1] A beard from Clint Eastwood stubble to full Brian Blessed organic

2] A stylish deployment of the beard, at least sometimes in the public eye

3] An attractive disposition in relation to the beard (the fulfillment of this criteria is up to the voter)

4] An appealing beard in terms of length, colour, style. Again its a matter for the voter

Beard Liberation Front

Media Release

10^th February

Contact Keith Flett 07803 167266

Hirsute Heroics: Beard Friendly Pub of the Year raises £127 for Trussell Trust Food Banks

The Bumble Inn in Peterborough which won the annual vote for Beard Friendly Pub of the Year in January has raised  £127 for Trussell Trust Food Banks through donations made to a commemorative badge struck to mark its victory

The Award is hosted by the Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, and the winner is determined after an annual on-line poll held in the first half of January

It is the first time a pub outside of London has won the annual award and the campaigners say it reflects the continued growth of beard friendly pubs

The commemorative badge to mark its victory was organised by pub regular and senior Peterborough citizen Toby Wood and promoted by pub landlord Tom Beran along with the BLF

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, well done to the Bumble Inn, Tom Beran and Toby Wood. The Beard Friendly Pub of the Year Award is a bit of January fun to liven the dark days and nights of the new year. Raising £127 for an excellent cause underlines just what a friendly pub the Bumble Inn.

There were as usual three categories within the overall poll:

1 Overall Winner & runner-up

The Bumble Inn, Peterborough

The Cock, London,E8

2 London Winner & runner-up

The Cock, London E8

Kernel Brewery Tap,Bermondsey

3 Regional Winner & runners-up

The Bumble Inn, Peterborough

The Stoneworks, Peterborough (tied)

Tom’s Tap & Brewhouse Crewe (tied)

BLF Inspectors surveyed pubs for beard friendliness and finalised a list including several nominations from drinkers.

The criteria for the Award included:

Beard Friendly Pub: a pub that welcomes the hirsute and often has a significant number of hirsute customers, including but certainly not confined to those with modern styles of beards.

Beard Friendly Ambience: a pub that may have fewer hirsute customers but is welcoming to the hirsute through some bearded bar staff and beard friendly beers, plus has a generally relaxed atmosphere for all.

The campaign group says it welcomes diversity in both appearance and drinking. The truly beard friendly pub will have a genuine mix of customers not just a load of old blokes grumbling about life.

The list includes a range of pubs, bars and tap rooms without attempting to classify into sections

CAMRA London Drinker Feb/Mar 2020

When veteran beard wearer Roger Protz was Editor of CAMRA’s Good Beer Guide I used to lobby him, as organiser of the Beard Liberation Front, to carry a ‘beard friendly’ symbol for pubs in the Guide.

In summary we could never quite agree on what the criteria should be. Clearly one was that the pub should have hirsute drinkers. Another was that this was a sign that it was open and friendly to all.

The 2020 winner of the Beard Friendly Pub of the Year, the Bumble Inn in Peterborough admirably fulfills both criteria (& rightly is in the 2020 Good Beer Guide).

I was pleased to see recognition of the point in one of CAMRA’s most long running magazine’s therefore. There is more coverage in the latest issue of the Peterborough CAMRA magazine which I’ll post on seperately.

For the moment we can just celebrate that at last CAMRA has embraced the concept of the Beard Friendly Pub

Ambridge Socialist

9^th February

Save the Bull Petition. Save the pub from Lilian Bellamy, Lynda Snell & Rupert Murdoch

Thanks to all those who have signed the petition to Save the Bull so far.

We are making a difference. Pressure has been kept up & the name has not yet been changed.

We now know who we are opposing:

Current owner Lilian Bellamy who wants to change the name & character of the Bull

Lynda Snell who wants a boycott of the Bull so it shuts

Rupert Murdoch who wants Radio 4 listeners for his new Times Radio station & see buying a bankrupt Bull as a key way to get them

Sign the petition & keep The Bull as it is for future generations (but with better beer)

https://www.change.org/p/residents-of-ambridge-and-listeners-to-the-archers-save-the-bull-ambridge?recruiter=45817997&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=share_petition&recruited_by_id=c320f9e0-7d09-0130-ecdf-00221964dac8

Eric Hobsbawm wrote a lot of very interesting history and as a member of the Communist Party until it dissolved itself he also opined on politics. The history was mostly much better than the politics (tho I should I add I was and am a member of the Communist Party Historians Group,now the Socialist History Society).

One point I completely agreed with Hobsbawm on was that marxist historians (myself included) should be ‘historians of the present too’. That is the history of the twentieth century and indeed of Stalinism (or actually existing socialism if you were that way inclined) had to be grappled with.

Hobsbawm did a lot of this in Marxism Today which started life as the CP’s theoretical journal but by the 1980s was more like (as Hobsbawm later admitted) the house journal of New Labour. Note ‘more like’ not ‘like’.

One example was the analysis he wrote after Labour’s defeat in the 1983 which was titled Labour’s Lost Millions:

Click to access 83_10_07.pdf

It is well a worth a read now because so many of the themes he raises and notes have featured in the discussion of Labour’s Election defeat on 12th December.

Hobsbawm’s analysis was of course wrong as it usually was.

Labour had not finally lost the votes of  millions workers. We need only look at the results of Blair in 1997 or Corbyn in 2017 to see it is much more complex than that.

He was certainly not right to think that Labour was set for a perpetual decline as a party. It is currently the largest social-democratic party in Europe.

On the other hand he had a point that Labour had to grapple with Thatcherite Toryism as a new variant.

This was the variant that didnt see any point in maintaining UK manufacturing capability when this could be done elsewhere but profits still gathered by the Tories friends from it. 40 years on, hello Huawei and 5G.

By contrast in 2020 Johnsonian Toryism is not a new phenomenon. In fact at the moment I’m not sure it can actually decide what kind of Toryism it is or wants to be.

Anyway, its interesting history of the present.

I came across it while pondering something altogether more serious for then and now: new realism. More of that anon

Beard Liberation Front

PRESS RELEASE 9^th February

contact Keith Flett 07803 167266

‘MY HAIRY VALENTINE’ POLL: IT’S GETTING HAIRY

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, which campaigns against irrational prejudice against the hirsute, has said that with Valentine’s Day just a few days off its getting hairy in the vote for the ‘sexiest’ beard of 2020.

Peter Mac Ciarrai retains a significant lead but other contenders are gaining

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, the weather is not hot, hot, hot but Valentine’s beards are.

My Hairy Valentine Shortlist

Idris Elba

Prince Harry

Tom Jones

Gary Lineker

Mauricio Pochettino

George Clooney

Mo Salah

Justin Trudeau

Chris Woakes

Peter Mac Ciarrai

Drew McIntyre

Jeremy Paxman

Daniel Fooks

What is the criteria for the sexiest Valentine’s Day Beard?

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder & likewise what people find sexy can vary widely

1] A beard from Clint Eastwood stubble to full Brian Blessed organic

2] A stylish deployment of the beard, at least sometimes in the public eye

3] An attractive disposition in relation to the beard (the fulfillment of this criteria is up to the voter)

4] An appealing beard in terms of length, colour, style. Again its a matter for the voter

Ambridge Socialist

8th February

Is Rupert Murdoch planning to buy the Bull?

With the Tory attacks on the BBC Rupert Murdoch is planning to launch a talk radio station, TimesRadio. That will compliment TalkSport which he also owns. TimesRadio will tie in to the paper and carry right-wing political commentary and discussion. It will not engage in the costly effort of producing radio drama. However TalkSport has already managed to get limited cricket commentary away from the BBC’s flagship Test Match Special (it retains rights to domestic cricket). It seems likely that in order to compete with Radio4 (Murdoch’s stated aim) he may be looking at a rival to the Archers, or taking it over.

To that end what better move by Murdoch than to buy out Lilian Bellamy at The Bull and use it as the base for the TimesRadio Archers. Programmes will not carry advertising but may be sponsored. So why not The Archers sponsored by Borchester Land?

If you want to stop this worrying development, make sure that you and all your enemies and friends have signed the petition below

Save the Bull Petition Update: Wrecker Snell on the retreat. Time to press our advantage.Sign!!

Lynda Snell’s attempt to wreck a recent night at the Bull by sending Bert Fry & Jazzer to tell stories to a younger than normal Bull clientele failed miserably. The stories were a big hit & Snell is in retreat. Even so the Bull is still officially quiet. It’s time to press our advantage. While Snell is on the backfoot we can get signatures on our real petition to save the pub and get Lilian to scrap the name change.

Now is the time to keep the pressure up and get more people signing the real petition to Save The Bull

https://www.change.org/p/residents-of-ambridge-and-listeners-to-the-archers-save-the-bull-ambridge?recruiter=45817997&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=share_petition&recruited_by_id=c320f9e0-7d09-0130-ecdf-00221964dac8

In other news

Kate is pregnant but hasn’t told Jakob yet. Then again, perhaps he isn’t the father.

Josh’s business has collapsed

Gavin is trying to be human

The Ambridge Socialist poll

Beard Liberation Front

9th February

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers,has issued urgent advice for beard wearers as Storm Ciara causes heavy rain and winds across the UK.

The campaigners say that while a beard normally offers protection against inclement weather, the extreme nature of Storm Ciara means extra precautions must be taken.

The BLF is advising beard wearers not to go out in public on Sunday without wearing a snood to protect the beard from being blown about and damaged in high winds.

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, if you must go out with a beard today, a snood is essential

The Chartists are coming & so is Storm Ciara in London

Hurrah for old England and liberty sweet,

The land that we live in and plenty to eat;

We shall ever remember this wonderful day,

The Chartists are coming, get out of the way.

The Chartists are Coming, Ballad, 1848

According to the weather forecast the impact of Storm Ciara on Sunday may be significant, both in the Capital and throughout the UK. The forecasts are made by professional weather forecasters, often trade union members of the professionals union Prospect, and so whatever Michael Gove may think, they both deserve to be taken seriously and are highly likely to be accurate.

The inability of perhaps particularly London to cope with even a modest element of bad weather is legendary.

On this occasion all the Royal Parks will shut for the day by official order

The expectation of bad weather in London is one of the great things of London life nevertheless. People peer anxiously out of windows for signs of it and search for reports it approaching (these days much easier to find with social media). In the mid-nineteenth century London, 170 years ago, it was the Chartists who got people looking out of windows, checking for any sign of impending disturbance

Suffice to say that in the revolutionary year of 1848 the Chartists did indeed come, on April 10th 1848, but actually they were rumoured to be coming far more often than they actually arrived.

Bad weather and the Chartists two of the great imponderables of London life.

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that with what could be the most hirsute Six Nations Rugby Championship ever underway, the Beard of the Six Nations poll is now at Round 2 stage

The campaigners say that the Beard of the Six Nations is not just about beards in the abstract but also crucially about the impact they make on play.

This impact of beards on the field has meant that even noted pogonophobes such as Clive Woodward who argued in 2013 on the BBC that he wouldn’t select players with beards, are now marginal voices.

The Beard Liberation Front’s long campaign against the Woodward’s of the rugby world has achieved considerable success so much so that in 2020 there are too many hirsute players to run an individual poll. This year the focus will be on the Six Nations teams

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, Jake Ball’s beard alone was enough to see Wales take an early lead in the first round of the Six Nations. Italy look a little beard light compared to previous years but we’re expecting a beard to beard encounter in the Calcutta Cup

Beards of Six Nations poll