"Plebs" has suddenly become the word of the week. Do you think of yourself as a pleb? If you're not a pleb, what are you then? Are you offended if someone refers to you as a pleb, or patronised, or do you not mind? Do you call other people plebs? Do you even know what pleb means?
Rome’s working class, the plebeians had little individual power. Grouped together, however, they became a Roman mob and had to be handled carefully. By the first century AD, plebeians comprised a formal class, which held its own meetings, elected its own officials and kept its own records. The term plebeian referred to all free Roman citizens who were not members of the patrician, senatorial or equestrian classes. Working class heroes Plebeians were average working citizens of Rome – farmers, bakers, builders or craftsmen – who worked hard to support their families and pay their taxes. Over the course of this period, early forms of public welfare were established by Titus and Trajan and, in difficult times, plebeians could ask Roman administrators for help.
Actually the working class of Rome were the slaves. Slaves, freedmen, non-citizens, and women all ranked below the plebs, who might be better called the middle-class of those times. I was thinking about present day UK, really. Is it acceptable for a cabinet minister to call a policeman a pleb? Is it an insult? Or just a description? And is it a resigning matter? I must say I've always thought of myself as obviously a pleb, and would not be insulted.
It all depends on how it was said. If it was said to me as an insult it would feel the same as if I was called numerous other choice names and would get the reaction from me you might expect. By the way, has anyone explained yet why the cops didn't let him take his bike thru'? It seems like a simple thing to do to open the gate and let a harmless bike thru'. If they were just being bloody minded then I expect we would all find some choice words for them in the circumstances. Were the cops just being inflexible 'Jobsworths' or protecting the nation against dangerous bicycles? We need to be told to get balance in this media madness.
Apart from the roads, sanitation, irrigation, aqueducts, medicine, education, health, public baths, freshwater system, public order and governance nothing at all. :biggrin:
The word pleb is definitely a derogatory word in today's parlance, although the fact the copper has pursued the issue and involved other people might suggest the minister was right...Personally, I'd have punched the obnoxious twunt.
So much violence, so little provocation...think the bigger issue is that he can be arrested for swearing at a copper, but could you citizen arrest a copper for swearing at you? What a country of civil liberties eh
Police..... oh no. Not that chestnut again. I remember a police woman telling be to dismount from my bike cos I was riding it on the pavement in Cambridge. It's true: I was. I rode if off the road and straight on to the pavement for about 2 yards before putting in in a bike rack in the Cornmarket. She said it was dangerous. I said, how? She claimed that a child might run out under my wheels. This seemed very unlikely. "Where's he going to run out from, materialise from the 30 yard stone building in front of me which doesn't have any doors?" Police jobsworths there are. But it little behoves a cabinet minister to refer to a copper as a "pleb". It's not a term of abuse I'd ever employ. Let's face it, had the policeman been black, the minister would be instantly sacked if he referred to him a "sambo". So is it not unreasonable to think that the same should apply to a minister who clearly sees half the population as "other"? I just don't think that someone with that mindset should be an elected representative, let alone a powerful one.
It is derogatory and used in that context shows a lack of judgement. As usual though it is not the original offence which will cause his downfall but the way in which he has subsequently obfuscated. This won't go away, he is in a hole and still digging. The Police Federation scent blood. It underlines the 'rise of the political class' though.
Seems to me that if he said what he is alleged to have said, and threatened the copper re his job, then the copper had no choice but to make an official report. The question of why the copper wouldn't allow him through the gate seems to have been ignored in the media frenzy that has followed, and might go some way to explain his frustration, but that however does not excuse him abusing a member of the police in the way he did, particularly someone in his position. I feel he will have to resign his post in an attempt to diffuse the situation, and try to rebuild his reputation.
Swearing at the police can result in a custodial sentence: The Boy Who Went To Jail For What Andrew Mitchell Did - Andrew Mitchell - Zimbio I suspect Andrew Mitchell is keeping his fingers crossed nobody burgles his house for a while.......
I was under the impression that the law had changed now re swearing at police, something to do with swearing now being "normal everyday language", although I believe the police still aren't allowed to swear back. I'll try to check that with my mate from the Met and confirm.
