Ed West
Ed West is a journalist who writes for The Telegraph, according to their website 'a journalist and social commentator who specialises in politics, religion and low culture'.[1] West is a fan of the work of Chris Snowdon.[2]
Contents
Views
On Alcohol Misuse
- However, there are problem drinks that deserve close scrutiny. The super-strength lager known as 'wife-beater', alcopops, sugary sweet to make them more palatable to the kids, and brain-rotting cheap vodka; they are all draughts favoured by the trouble-makers the under-agers, the abusive alcoholics, the fist-flying yobs. Stereotyping drinkers as homogenous is a form of prejudice tantamount to alcophobia: punitive taxes should target the problem drinkers through the problem drinks. Why should the peaceful majority of the drinking community suffer because of a few extremists?[3]
On Geert Wilders
- Wilders may be 'a trouble-maker with a dodgy haircut ... he's not a fascist or a racist ... he's just a normal mainstream conservative'.[4]
On Smoking Bans
Ed West criticised Duncan Bannatyne for arguing that all smoking should be banned he argued:
- Er, the smoke-free law has driven loads of pubs out of business, you lunatic. I’m all for reducing tobacco use, but it isn’t any of the Government’s damned business whether people smoke in their own homes. What next? Will officials be able to come around and check they’re eating five a day? And as for children and the dubious case of second-hand smoke, there are 90,000 children in care in the UK, and four times that many (at least) in households run by people criminally unsuitable to raise children. Far more children have their lives ruined by the poverty and violence created by the benefits system of this Labour government – the same government Duncan Bannatyne has funded all these years. Maybe we should ban him. That’s what he’d do in our place.[5]
Chris Snowdon
Praise for Chris Snowdon
West praises the work of Chris Snowdon as forming part of a modern political movement of 'Skeptics', he says:
- One of the most popular political movements of the past few years has been the “Skeptics”, a group of bloggers who look at political issues from an evidence-based viewpoint. The movement is entirely atheist and almost entirely Left-wing, and yet apart from the libertarian Christopher Snowdon (who has done some excellent work blogging a big tunnel underneath The Spirit Level), there are very few conservative skeptics around.[6]
West singled out Snowdon's book attacking The Spirit Level for particular praise, arguing:
- Next time someone starts spouting off about “equality” – a goal that has dug more graves than all the gods in history combined – send them a copy of Snowdon’s excellent book and make sure they read it from cover to cover.[7]
Ed West also cites Snowdon's blog Velvet Glove: Iron Fist in order to criticise research arguint that the smoking ban reduced heart attacks.[8]
Affiliations
Notes
- ↑ Ed West, Ed West, The Telegraph, Accessed 16-December-2010
- ↑ Ed West, The Eurosceptics were right, but so are the welfare-sceptics, multiculturalism-sceptics and sex education-sceptics, The Telegraph, 22-November-2010, Accessed 16-December-2010
- ↑ Ed West, Drinkers aren't all to blame - it's problem drinks, The Telegraph, 23-June-2007
- ↑ Ecosse, Islamophobia's mainstream appeal, The Sunday Times, 7-March-2010
- ↑ Ed West, A total ban on smoking? The most sinister article I've read in a long time, The Telegraph, 12-October-2009
- ↑ Ed West, The Eurosceptics were right, but so are the welfare-sceptics, multiculturalism-sceptics and sex education-sceptics, The Telegraph, 22-November-2010, Accessed 16-December-2010
- ↑ Ed West, Does recycling cause suicide? Or why The Spirit Level is wrong and more equal societies are not happier, The Telegraph, 9-July-2010, Accessed 16-Decemder-2010
- ↑ Ed West, Has the smoking ban reduced the number of heart attacks in the UK?, The Telegraph, 9-June-2010
