Crackers!…Tube poster ludicrously banned for referencing the online sale of cheese

Read more food_censors.htm at MelonFarmers.co.uk

See article from nationalworld.com

Transport for London (TfL) has ludicrously banned adverts for business premises provider Workspace for using a cheese company as example customer.The posters put forward by Workspace featured three panels, reading: From crunching numbers to selling cheese online, it all happens at Workspace. The advert featured an image of a hand typing at a calculator and another of some cheese, alongside the names of two Workspace tenants – an accountancy company, and London-based online cheese shop Cheesegeek. But the adverts were rejected by TfL under its censorship rules aimed at cutting obesity. TfL claimed the poster wasn’t going to conform to their advertising rules because of the high saturated fat contained within cheese. TfL’s rules dictate an advert will not be approved if, among numerous other reasons, it promotes (directly or indirectly) food or non-alcoholic drink which is high in fat, salt and/or sugar, according to the Nutrient Profiling Model managed by Public Health England.Cheesegeek founder and CEO Edward Hancock slammed the decision as ridiculous and said it wrongly categorises cheese alongside genuine junk food.

Christians recommend…An Amazonian statue outside of Wakefield Cathedral

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See article from dailymail.co.uk

A few Christians have slammed a plan to erect a statue of an Amazonian love god near a cathedral as offensive and an insult.A 6ft 2in bronze figure is being paid for by taxpayers as part of a £1million trail of five sculptures through the centre of Wakefield, West Yorkshire. According to its creator, artist Jason Wilsher-Mills, the sculpture was inspired by a painting of local Victorian conservationist Charles Waterton capturing a caiman or alligator-type creature, the love story of his parents and his own connections with Wakefield. But a planning application to site the pagan statue on Cathedral Walk, close to the Anglican cathedral’s main entrance, has prompted more than 60 complaints from members of the public. One objector commented: How can you possibly think that the erection of a Sun God opposite the central place of Christian worship in the city and district could be acceptable? It is at best insensitive and at worst a deliberate attempt to mock Christianity, the cathedral and all it stands for. Is this a precedent? Should we expect the council to place such offensive statues outside other local centres of worship, Christian and otherwise? The project is being fully funded by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. If planning consent is granted the sculptures will be in place this summer.

Fury in the Aisles…Distributors pull out of distributing Darren Ward’s Crime Trilogy

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Beyond Fury is a 2019 UK action film by Darren Ward Starring Dani Thompson, Giovanni Lombardo Radice and Jeff Stewart Ex-Mercenary Michael Walker and his pregnant girlfriend Claudia are brutally attacked. Now with Claudia and the unborn child dead, Walker reverts to his military training to hunt down and serve his own kinda street justice. A BBFC submission was in process but presumably it will be cancelled now. A Day of Violence is a 2010 UK crime thriller by Darren Ward Starring Giovanni Lombardo Radice, Nick Rendell and Christopher Fosh Mitchell Parker lies dead on a morgue slab. In life, ‘Mitchell’ served the low ranks of Debt Collectors, surrounded by all the filth and scum that the world had to offer. He thought his luck was in, when on a routine collection he stumbles across 100,000 in cash. Passed 18 uncut by the BBFC in 2010 for very strong language, strong bloody violence and strong sex. Sudden Fury is a 1997 UK action drama by Darren Ward. Starring Chris Barfoot and Antony Dobson and Adam Light. Intent on seizing control of South East England’s cocaine business, small-time crime boss Randall hires notorious hit-man Walker to take out his competition. When Randall betrays the hit-man, however, the tables are turned. Passed 18 uncut by the BBFC in 2003. Direct Darren Ward has reported on Facebook that the planned UK Halloween release of his Crime Trilogy has been cancelled after supermarkets decided that it was too violent to be put on sale. He wrote I signed a contract with a UK distributor back in June for THE CRIME TRILOGY that covered the UK, Australia & New Zealand. However due to the violent content of my films, the distributor has pulled out resulting in the termination of the contract. BEYOND FURY and the other two movies WILL NOW NOT BE RELEASED on HALLOWEEN and probably will never see the light of day in the UK. It deeply saddens me that after everyone’s hard work and effort on a movie that has won 6 International awards, has been cast aside due to the simple fact that Supermarkets won’t stock them. What the Supermarkets fail to remember is that when released in 2010 A DAY OF VIOLENCE got to number 10 in the ASDA film charts across the country! To end on a positive BEYOND FURY will see release in Germany, Austria & Switzerland in 2023!

Banned by Edinburgh Fringe…Venue bosses get all easily offended by Jerry Sadowitz

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See article from dailymail.co.uk

A comedian has been cancelled by an Edinburgh Fringe venue after he got his penis out on stage and made jokes about disallowed topics on his opening night.Jerry Sadowitz was scheduled to play at The not very pleasant Pleasance at the Edinburgh International Conference Centre on Friday and Saturday. The censorial venue confirmed that it had been pulled because his material does not align with our values. One female audience member told the Scottish Sun that Sadowitz  called Rishi Sunak a ‘paki’ and said the economy was awful because it is run by blacks and women. The event listing carried a warning which read: This show contains strong language and themes some may find distressing. Revealing the decision, Sadowitz said on Twitter: Did a show last night, 75 mins, thought it went well. Didn’t see any walkouts. Today I’m told my show’s been cancelled. Great stuff. I’m truly sorry for everyone who travelled to see the show tonight. Offsite Comment: They finally came for Jerry Sadowitz 15th August 2022. See article from spiked-online.com by Simon Evans Comedians dismiss cancel culture at their peril.

On track to a police state where people are arrested for making ‘unusual’ journeys…

Read more awwb.htm at MelonFarmers.co.uk

See article from spectator.co.uk

Lucy D’Orsi, chief constable of the British Transport Police, says her force wants access to data from passengers’ mobile phones and bank cards so that it can track us around the network. At the moment, you can get on a train from Wolverhampton to London with a paper ticket and leave little trace. The ticket itself can be tracked if it’s put through the ticket barriers at a station that has them, but no rail company nor the British Transport Police can have any real idea who is travelling on that ticket, especially if it was bought with cash. D’Orsi was quite open about the possibilities that would arise. She quoted the example of someone who was spotted by an algorithm travelling on the Tube for six hours and who, she suggested, might be a pickpocket or a predatory sex offender. She also quoted the example of someone who caught a train from London to Liverpool and then caught one back straight away. That’s not normal, she said. That’s not what people do. So why is someone doing that? In future, she suggested, British Transport Police would be able to pick them up as a suspected drug-dealer. We are supposed to think, of course, that only criminals will be stopped. Except that there are very good reasons why we all sometimes find ourselves making unusual journeys. Next winter, I confidently predict, D’Orsi and her colleagues will find themselves feeling the collar of large numbers of poor people who are travelling the Tube to keep warm and save heating bills at home — henceforth they are could be suspected pickpockets or predatory sex offenders. As for who would want to travel to Liverpool and straight back again, I can think of numerous reasons: a parent dropping off their children with grandparents or an ex-partner for the week; someone who started a journey to attend a business meeting only to receive a call en-route that it had been cancelled; someone meeting family or friends from abroad and is going with them for the journey. All these people are, apparently, in the eyes of British Transport Police, criminal suspects, designated as such by an algorithm.

Hawkeye and Sneako…Cricket brings in spies to listen out for racism amongst the spectators

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See article from espncricinfo.com

Warwickshire County Cricket Club Warwickshire County Cricket Club has confirmed that snooping measures were brought in for Saturday’s international T20 match at Edgbaston. The crowd will be surveilled by undercover football crowd-style spotters .The move was in response to the recent test match where passage of play was marred by reports of racial insults from a section of the crowd. This subsequently led to a criminal investigation by West Midlands Police. Stuart Cain, Warwickshire’s chief executive, said: We cannot hide from the mindless racist abuse experienced by some fans following India in the Eric Hollies Stand. For Saturday’s T20 match, Warwickshire confirmed that undercover football crowd-style spotters would be deployed throughout Edgbaston to listen out for abusive behaviour and report it for immediate action, and added that there would be an increased police presence at games to handle such incidents swiftly, and enable more chance of successful prosecutions.The club said that all fans at subsequent matches would be encouraged to report abuse via the Edgbaston app, adding that anyone found guilty of hate crime will be banned not only from Edgbaston but from all venues under the ECB’s jurisdiction. The club has not commented on what speech it considers to be worthy of punishment nor has it detailed whether people’s conversation are being recorded in support its punishment regime.

Thorny issues…Southend Council censors artwork titled An English Garden

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See article from theguardian.com See also article from estuaryfestival.com

An artwork featuring three garden benches surround a rose garden has been banned by Southend Council due to it referencing the locally based development of early atom bombs which were then sent to Australia for testing. Promotional Material for the Estuary 2021 Festival explains: An English Garden is the Estuary 2021 Festival iteration of How to Make a Bomb , the durational gardening project by artist Gabriella Hirst. The project is centred on the propagation and redistribution of a nearly-extinct species of garden rose which was created and registered under the name Rosa floribunda ‘Atom Bomb’ in 1953. The How to Make a Bomb project aims to provoke questions about the relationship between of nationalism, gardening, and nuclear colonialism. The garden is a reminder that the red rose of England and the English garden is entangled with a violent past of gardening the world, which has continued into a dangerous present. The artwork is installed just upriver from Foulness Island at Gunners Park, Shoeburyness, which is former MOD land and is now a nature reserve under the care of Essex Wildlife Trust. An English Garden’s formal layout and beds echo the floorplans of Foulness’s nuclear heritage architecture, and the aerial maps of the Australian contaminated test sites. The artwork has now been taken away and placed in storage thanks to Sourthend councillors’ objection to the wording of a plaque in the installation that detailed the fact that nuclear weapons were assembled at Foulness (a matter of record) before being shipped to Australia, where they were detonated. The most vocal of the offended councillors, James Moyies, has said he objected to the artist’s view that by increasing its nuclear armament by 40%, the UK government was directing considerable resources towards industries of violence instead of those of care, and by the suggestion that Britain had a historical and ongoing identity as a colonial nuclear state. The councillors emailed the local arts charity Metal, which commissioned the work jointly with the artists’ charity the Old Waterworks, claiming that it constituted a: direct far leftwing attack on our History, our People and our Democratically Elected Government.

TuneIn worldwide free radio app blocks UK internet users from listening in to foreign channels

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See article from torrentfreak.com

In 2019, the High Court of England and Wales ruled that by offering an index of non UK-based or unlicensed radio stations to UK residents, radio aggregator service TuneIn breached copyright.In response the service has now geo-blocked thousands of stations leaving UK customers without their favorite sounds. Unless they use a VPN, then it’s business as usual. TuneIn is one of the most prominent providers of radio content in the world. Available for free or on a premium basis, its site and associated app provide access to more than 100,000 stations and podcasts. Unless you happen to live in the UK, which is now dramatically underserved by the company. Sued by Labels in the UK For Mass Copyright Infringement In 2017, Sony Music Entertainment and Warner Music Group sued the US-based radio index in the High Court of England and Wales, alleging that the provision of links to stations unlicensed in the UK represented a breach of copyright. One of the most interesting aspects of the case is that TuneIn is marketed as an audio guide service, which means that it indexes stations that are already freely available on the web and curates them so that listeners can more easily find them. When stations are more easily found, more people listen to them, which means that TuneIn arguably boosts the market overall. Nevertheless, the labels claimed this was illegal and detrimental to the music industry in the UK on licensing grounds. In response to the apparent decimation of its offering, TuneIn took to Twitter to address the complaints: Due to a court ruling in the United Kingdom, we will be restricting international stations to prohibit their availability in the UK, with limited exceptions. We apologize for the inconvenience, the company wrote. See further details in article from torrentfreak.com

Screened in the wrong postcode…Vue Cinemas ban the gangland film Blue Story after violence breaks out at a Birmingham screening

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See article from birminghammail.co.uk

Blue Story is a 2019 UK crime drama by Andrew Onwubolu. Starring Stephen Odubola, Micheal Ward and Khali Best. Blue Story is a tragic tale of a friendship between Timmy and Marco, two young boys from opposing postcodes. Timmy, a shy, smart, naive and timid young boy from Deptford, goes to school in Peckham where he strikes up a friendship with Marco, a charismatic, streetwise kid from the local area. Although from warring postcodes, the two quickly form a firm friendship until it is tested and they wind up on rival sides of a street war. Blue Story depicts elements of Rapman’s own personal experiences and aspects of his childhood. Vue Cinema bosses have decided to pull the controversial gang film Blue Story from all its venues after gangs with machetes terrified families when the film was being screened at an inner city cinema in Birmingham. Two schoolgirls, a boy and a man were arrested and seven police officers suffered minor  injuries as dozens of officers swarmed the area just after 5.30pm on November 23. People were evacuated as Vue cinema managers decided to close the venue. Other cinema chains are considering following suit. The cinema film was passed 15 uncut by the BBFC for very strong language, strong violence, threat, sex, drug misuse.

Celebrating diverse humour…Venue manager resigns as mayor overturns ban allowing Roy Chubby Brown to perform in home town Middlesbrough

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See article from bbc.com

The head of Middlesbrough Town Hall resigned in protest at the town’s mayor lifting a ban on controversial comedian Roy Chubby Brown.Mayor Andy Preston made the heroic decision in August, and free speech denier Lorna Fulton, who had run the council venue since May 2018, resigned September as a result. On Tuesday, Mayor Preston said the comic, from Middlesbrough, could come home. Last year, Middlesbrough Town Hall said there was currently no place in the programme for this show. ‘Defend his right to perform’, but in a Facebook post on Tuesday, Preston said Brown would perform there in the New Year. He explained Many big comedy names are controversial – in fact, that’s really part of what comedy is. Many comedians say things that some people may find offensive. Personally, Chubby Brown’s act isn’t my cup of tea – but I respect and will defend the right of Chubby to perform his act and for those who do find him funny to spend their hard-earned cash on tickets to see him. If you find Chubby Brown’s act offensive, there’s a simple answer – don’t go to see him. Brown’s manager Tony Jo told Teesside Live :  I’d like to thank the mayor for his support in clearing the situation up and Roy is looking forward to his return. He’s absolutely delighted. It will be a very emotional night for him and he can’t wait.