STROBE you are 1000% correct in everything you say, and unfortunately there are only a small minority who still value their freedoms.
One day we will all wake up as communists/fascists brought about by people like 5haz and these people who wrongly blame 'capitalism' and terrorism for the financial crisis.
At the moment I'm very scared of where we are going, and everyone else in the country should be too.
Stop throwing up strawman arguments, and stop exagerating what I'm saying to suit your argument.
If your appreciation of civil liberties is limited to the fact you have the right to vote then that just proves my point that you are in no position to be listened to as you are ignorant of the relevant facts. Of course your History teacher isn't going to teach you such things because laws get passed all the time, basic education is exactly that, basic. It doesn't deal with the minutiae of legal matters.
Do some research and look for yourself at the number of laws passed over the last two decades which have taken away "freedoms" from individual citizens in this country.
Thats totally unfair.. ...if you came from Fife, and followed Raith Rovers, I would guarantee even you would be a miserable bar-steward. Heck even the most happiest person alive would turn into a miserable bar-steward.
We fought and dealt with the IRA for over 20 years. I can't believe the nation as a whole and the policital opposition is so ignorant or apathetic to think that suddenly we need this kind of Orwellian jurisdiction in government for some unspecified, unforseen, vaguely defined civil emergency.
@ Shaz - this has nothing to do with communism. Communism is an economic model, just like capitalism. Go back to school.
I don't see why this is a big deal. I was required to do 20 hours for highschool, and did over 150 hours in my first year of college while working part-time and atending school full time.
What do teenagers have to do that is so important that they can't go to a local charity office for an hour everyday for a while anyway? This might even stop them from masturbating so much, which is always a good thing.
And if you think that this is a sign that your government is turning into a dictarship, i suggest you grow up. If you can't, just keep in mind that some countries had George W. Bush to deal with, and they still turned out fine...well sort of. But still...
In a way, however the focus of this thread has nothing to do with communism, but rather the authoritarian tendancies of our govt. A highly authoritarian government does not make it a communist one.
Actually, that is called "fascism" (defined, by Mussolini, as a philosophy that humans are valuable insofar as being beneficial to their society, represented as the political state). "Communism" is specifically an economic ideology (having been defined, by Marx/Engels, as "the abolition of private property"), although it is similarly collectivist (attributing highest value to a population - either the entire society, or a faction within it - and that population's purportedly collective interests, rather than to persons and their individual, or freely cooperative, pursuits of their own interests), and it is likely to be accompanied by other (e.g. - political) manifestations of collectivism.
Capital = a material object (e.g. - a tool, a machine, an area of land, a factory, etc.) used for economic purposes; sometimes called "means of production."
Capitalism (also called "free economy" or "private enterprise") - capital is owned (i.e. - controlled) by individual (private) persons or voluntary associations of persons.
Socialism - capital is owned by the government.
Communism - capital is owned by the community of workers. First, capital is confiscated (e.g. - "nationalized") from private owners (the "class of capitalists"), so that it is then owned by government, which represents the "class of workers." Theoretically, this is a temporary situation, which remains until the members of the society have developed morally, to the point that all members/persons have become willing to pursue only the "common good." When this moral condition has been achieved, there is no longer any need for a government, and all capital is owned by the entire community. In practice, historically, that expected state of moral perfection, of society, never occurs (despite even violent attempts to achieve it - including, by killing or acting to "re-educate" those "counter-revolutionary" persons who manifest recurring capitalist inclinations or otherwise fail to cooperate), so that, to the extent that "communism" has occurred, it has generally exemplified a system having apparently become stuck in the socialist (economic) and fascist (political) phase of theoretical development. A hive of social insects, however, seems to do communism pretty well.
It can be noted that political systems are closely related to economic systems, since a political system (the structure and functions of a government) significantly includes mechanisms for ensuring civilized commerce, which commerce is arguably the principal benefit of a condition of civilization. However, a political system is distinct from an economic system - being not the method of making decisions about commerce, only.
BTW, economist Milton Friedman has written (in Capitalism and Freedom) that somewhat free economies have been observed, in the absence of general, political freedom, but that he has never observed a stable system exemplifying political freedom, in the absence of economic freedom.
As someone generally opposed to intrusive laws and find the whole terrorist 'threat' to be far from the top of my list of things to worry about I find this absolutely fine and sensible. Of course there may be issues with exactly when it can be enacted but there have been plans/action taken of localised organisation and control in the event of disaster (be it natural or nuclear) I don't see any issue with this.