We don’t wear fox fur stoles incorporating the animal’s tail and head. Dwarf tossing is no longer a sport.
This kind of thing no longer happens: My mum got engaged in 1970 because it was the option left to her. She wanted to get a commercial pilot’s licence (she'd done her solo flight) but under 21 she needed her father's permission and he wouldn't give it. She was a talented rider too but he wouldn't let her event either. (@desperatereader)
Men-only pubs, caffs and shops are a thing of the past. (There was no sign on the door saying WOMEN KEEP OUT, but everybody stared if you went in, or else looked through you and pretended not to hear you.)
I’ve talked to older parents who were advised by psychiatrists to put their son or daughter in the back ward of a state hospital, quietly remove their photos from the family albums, and never speak of them again. (Steve Silberman)
The judge said the Children Act 1989 provided that a mother has automatic parental responsibility for a child from the moment of birth, adding: "No-one else has that automatic parental responsibility, including the father." (BBC)
We don’t take newborn babies away from their mothers and look after them in nurseries. We no longer go out leaving small children at home alone.
Parents in those days, as a matter of course, always arranged everything over their children’s heads. (George Orwell, Coming up for Air He’s talking about the days before the First World War, but this is what our parents did in the 50s and 60s. He also says that parents made a big fuss over their children adopting adult clothes, though they left school and went out to work aged 14.)
In the late 1950s, [Roy Jenkins wrote] a tract entitled Is Britain Civilised?, in which he attacked Britain's "archaic" laws on censorship, homosexuality, divorce and abortion, as well as arguing for the abolition of capital punishment and changes to the country's "Victorian" criminal justice system. (Daily Telegraph, 2003)
In the Bad Old Days, we treated the mentally ill with clitoridectomy (19th century), electro-convulsive therapy and lobotomies. Circumcision of boys was standard. Homosexuals were given aversion therapy – painful electric shocks. Are we civilised yet?
In the UK and beyond:
2nd century CE Romans ban human sacrifice when they settle in Britain. (The Brits revived it after the Romans left.)
7th century CE Queen Balthild, slave turned Frankish Queen, "abolished the practice of trading Christian slaves and strove to free children who had been sold into slavery". (Wikipedia)
11th century CE The Normans ban slavery and replace it with serfdom.
13th century CE Henry III abolishes trial by fire and water.
1650 Oliver Cromwell abolishes the Halifax guillotine, used on petty thieves.
1778 Dundee is the first place in the world to outlaw slavery.
1780 Louis XVI abolishes torture in France.
1829 The British abolish suttee in India. (A widow was supposed to burn herself to death on her husband’s funeral pyre.)
1831 Slaves in Jamaica withdraw their labour and refuse to return to work unless they are freed and paid wages. (One of many rebellions that helped end slavery.)
1835 Cruelty to Animals Act outlaws bear-baiting.
1851 Window tax repealed.1851 Arsenic Act restricts use of the poisonous substance.
1879 Bulgaria abolishes serfdom.
1890 Women win the legal right to live apart from their husbands.
1912 After many attempts to ban it, China outlaws foot-binding (though it continues in secret for a time).
1917 International Women’s Day formally adopted.
1958 UK outlaws gin traps (metal traps that close on an animal's leg).
1960s Black train guard Asquith Xavier overturns London Euston station's whites-only recruitment process.
1967 Jewish worship legalised in Spain. (Banned since 1492.)
1970s Finland abolishes fee-paying schools.
1975 Sex Discrimination Act makes it illegal for pubs and bars to refuse to serve women at the bar, or insist they sit at tables. Some, like El Vino’s in Fleet Street, held out for a few years but ultimately they lost.
1985 The sale of contraception legalised in Ireland.
2008, Emily Thornberry supports a change in the law to allow single women and lesbian couples to seek in vitro fertilisation treatment.
2019 Saudi Arabia ends gender segregation in restaurants.
2019: Electricity from zero carbon sources surpassed fossil fuels for first time in centuries (Financial Times)
In 2020:
On April 22, 2020, under pressure from feminist lesbian movements, the United Kingdom announced that it wanted to ban operations for people under the age of 18 ... Since November 2019, six states in the United States have banned all forms of transition in children: hormones, operations, and puberty blockers ... Eight other states... are currently debating identical laws. (Le Figaro)
An emerging trend is ice cream parlours, which offer teens a similar experience [to pubs] at a low cost. Like chicken shops, dessert parlours attract young people who don’t drink for health and faith reasons – a group that is on the rise, with 25 per cent of 16 to 24-year-olds choosing abstinence in 2016, according to the University of Sheffield. (Daily Telegraph)
Oxfordshire County Council becomes the first in Britain to scrap guidance urging schools to allow transgender pupils to choose which lavatories they use after a 13-year-old girl challenged it at the High Court. (Times)
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani called on his cabinet Wednesday to quickly adopt laws aimed at curbing so-called honour killings. (voanews.com)
The Society of Homeopaths will no longer be allowed to promote anti-vaccination propaganda. Its website says: "As Homeopaths do not claim prevention or complete cure of any named disease, the Society does not permit RSHoms to practise or promote protocols such as CEASE therapy which are dedicated to specific named conditions." (CEASE therapy is alleged to "cure" autism.)
New London Synagogue in Abbey Road goes egalitarian.
Female village chief in Malawi annuls 850 child marriages and sends girls back to school.
Gambia bans Female Genital Mutilation.
Resorts like Magaluf are taking steps to stop pub crawls.
Great Green Wall of trees south of the Sahara planned.
First wild white stork “in centuries” hatches in the UK.
Rumours of a new law that will oblige foreign investors to rent out flats.
A bill introduced in the Lords would replace collective worship with inclusive assemblies in non-faith schools.
Period products will be supplied free to those who need them in all UK schools and colleges. And is the UK really taking tax off sanitary protection?
Parents force council leaders to shelve guidance that allowed transgender pupils to use girls’ lavatories.
From April, it is illegal to buy, import, transport or use military-grade assault rifles in Canada.
David Icke has been banned from Facebook, and YouTube has deleted his channel.
Sudan intends to ban FGM, start flights between Sudan and Israel, and create government boards for human rights.
Morrisons replacing plastic “bags for life” with old-fashioned brown paper bags in some stores. Other supermarkets may follow.
UK Probation Service renationalised after outsourcing caused untold harm.
Nigel Farage is off the air! And Katie Hopkins is permanently banned from Twitter.
Carnival to sell six cruise ships as bookings dry up.
Victims of domestic abuse will be able to access safe spaces at Boots and Superdrug pharmacies' consultation rooms where they can contact specialist services for support and advice.
Germany bans gay conversion therapy for the under-18s.
Hitorian David Starkey forced to resign from Cambridge college over slavery comments.
Victoria to set up Australia's first truth and justice commission to recognise wrongs against Aboriginal people.
Due to fears that it is a lobby group for medical transition, the BBC has removed Mermaids and two other organisations from its information and advice web pages.
Grime artist Wiley has been dropped by his management after tweeting a string of anti-Semitic messages over several hours, 24 July.
The European Commission orders France to outlaw “barbaric” glue traps.
2021 No-fault divorce available in the UK from September.
2022 Natural History GCSE to be taught in schools.
LESS THAN CHEERFULThe 1870 legislation also introduced the concept of renunciation of British nationality, and provided for the first time that British women who married foreign men should lose their British nationality. This was a radical break from the common law doctrine that citizenship could not be removed, renounced, or revoked. (Wikipedia. This right was restored to women in 1948.)
"Under the 1916 Proclamation, Irishwomen were given equal citizenship, equal rights and equal opportunities. Subsequent constitutions have filched these or smothered them in mere ‘empty formulae’..." (Electoral Address, 1943)
1920s Men and women students at Glasgow School of Art worked in separate studios.
1924 Virginia passes Racial Integrity Act, the "one drop" rule that strips anyone of mixed race from white legal privileges.
1930 Anti-Yiddish riots in Tel Aviv.
Between 1907 and 1981, more than 65,000 individuals were forcibly sterilised in the United States. In 1928 the Canadian Province of Alberta passed legislation-the Sexual Sterilisation Act of Alberta - that enabled the provincial government to perform involuntary sterilisations on individuals classified as “mentally deficient.” In order to implement the 1928 act, a four-person Alberta Eugenics Board was created to approve sterilisation procedures. In 1972, the Sexual Sterilisation Act was repealed, and the Eugenics Board dismantled. During the forty-three years of the Eugenics Board, 2,832 sterilisation procedures were performed. (Wikipedia)
2020 Countries that still impose the death penalty for apostasy: Mauritania, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Iran, Afghanistan, Qatar, UAE, Maldives, Brunei, Malaysia.
2020 California votes to REPEAL “The state shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin” from their constitution. (@RupertMyers)
2020 UK Contrary to news reports, “rough sex gone wrong” defence has not been banned.
More here, and links to the rest.
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