Nanny State.

"I am gobsmacked by this, it's just ridiculous," he said yesterday. "This is about a child being supervised by a parent and playing in a stream two inches deep.

Oh, those silly Brits and their Gob complex

Not sure what it looks like to get smacked by a gob.

If a butterfly flapping its wings in China can cause a hurricane in Florida then this kids damn may very well wipe out the entire Atlantic coast.

Can we please not link to sites that try to install spyware? mkay? Thanks.

Reminds of when I was about 10 or so playing with plastic army men in our gravel driveway and my grandfather got upset with me for "disturbing the gravel". This was on a small farm and the driveway was probably 600 feet long containing many tons of gravel... "disturbing the gravel" has been a family joke ever since.

Mary Poppins has really let herself go lately

My brothers and I used to build dams in ditches after rainstorms. I'm glad I grew up the dark ages.

This story just made my day. Such chaotic times we live in now.

Nanny State =!= Stupid and petty local parish government.

dadgum limeys are gonna tsunami the world!

In spite of all the problems over here, I'm kind of glad my forebears left there in the 1600s. This is beyond stupid.

Well I'll be damned.

/ h-linked

I hate when I get stopped to build a dam. Being stopped to do a anything sucks.

Dear Nettleham Parish Council:

A butterfly in your parish beat its wings and killed my family here in the US, please kill all butterflies, thanks

I used to really enjoy getting mucky and doing this kind of stuff when I was a kid. Seems councils these days want kids to grow up indoors. Guess it ensures all those lucrative playing fields can be sold off for high density apartments.

I used to do that

gobsmacked?

England is governed like it's essentially one big homeowner's association.

What child's dam may look like if left unchecked...





/dam child

"We have made pebble dams a few times. It's the stuff you do with your kids.

"It is a normal, everyday activity, something people do all over the country.

Sounds like a real national craze over there.

/my friend, Ming Tran, will hotlink you right in the face

Burn_Atlanta

While my forebears would have been very pleased if all of you had stayed at home.

not amused

Jacobin: Not sure what it looks like to get smacked by a gob.


Do you want something, a drink maybe? Anything, anything at all?.

/I'm always nice to him

If you can dam up a stream with pebbles laid down by one person.. the US army corps of engineers would like to have a word with you

problem solved

You people are so quick to mock and trash England for possible being too reactionary to an obvious problem. This is a slippery slope, this time the little girl is building small dams out of pebbles, next week she's building the dam out of the human corpses that she's recently killed....

Approves:


/hot like a ... hot thing

There should be a clause, when you take a position in any city council.
If you start to do petty crap like this, immediate termination should ensue. As you are obviously unfit for the position. Perhaps unemployment would give them something worthwhile to concern themselves with.

Why are the British so paranoid about everything these days?

Jacobin: Not sure what it looks like to get smacked by a gob.



I have a gob?

/Yes, I know it is "gub", but it's not funny if you explain the joke...
//Oops.

TheShavingofOccam123: problem solved

You could put an eye out with one of those things.

Uhh huhuh, was it a god damn?

Jacobin: Not sure what it looks like to get smacked by a gob.

No no. You get your smack gobbed.

Pelted with rocks and garbage: There should be a clause, when you take a position in any city council.
If you start to do petty crap like this, immediate termination should ensue.

As long as we're talking actual termination, not just being fired.

Dam kid is going to destroy the entire town...

Polly Ester: Can we please not link to sites that try to install spyware? mkay? Thanks.

1247 clicks on the link so far and you're the only one with a spyware complaint.
What does this say to you?

Polly Ester: Can we please not link to sites that try to install spyware? mkay? Thanks.

Logic Fail.

I read the article and it doesn't actually sound all that unreasonable if I understand it right. The village actually experienced some flooding in 2007 and the parish has been trying to keep the waterway clear of any debris. After cleaning up after them multiple times, they simply sent them a letter asking them to stop. The "disaster" wording might have been over-the-top but it's not as if they threatened to sue them. That one little boy's dam might not be an issue but if multiple kids are doing it on a regular basis, there could be flooding in the village. It probably wouldn't kill anyone but it might cause property damage, which it's the parish's job to prevent.

I think if the father and son would just knock over the dams at the end of the day, the official would be happy. Instead they're throwing a tantrum because someone dared make a request of them. Oh Noes! Teh Nanny State!

As a kids, my brothers and sisters and I would love it when it rained and we'd build a rock, stick and mud dam in the gutter next to the curb until we had what we thought was a decent sized lake to float stuff in. The old man down the street would drive by and yell at us (and threaten to tell our teachers...WTF?)for blocking his curb water.

2wolves: Burn_Atlanta

While my forebears would have been very pleased if all of you had stayed at home.

If they were Onondaga or Seneca, they demonstrated their displeasure to one of my great-great-great-great grandmothers, who was orphaned in the Wyoming Valley Massacre during the Revolutionary War.

"We can't have people doing this sort of thing willy-nilly. We are very concerned about the potential consequences of flooding."

Best thing I'm going to hear all day.

/New Orleans slashies

tiamet4: I read the article and it doesn't actually sound all that unreasonable if I understand it right. The village actually experienced some flooding in 2007 and the parish has been trying to keep the waterway clear of any debris. After cleaning up after them multiple times, they simply sent them a letter asking them to stop. The "disaster" wording might have been over-the-top but it's not as if they threatened to sue them. That one little boy's dam might not be an issue but if multiple kids are doing it on a regular basis, there could be flooding in the village. It probably wouldn't kill anyone but it might cause property damage, which it's the parish's job to prevent.

I think if the father and son would just knock over the dams at the end of the day, the official would be happy. Instead they're throwing a tantrum because someone dared make a request of them. Oh Noes! Teh Nanny State!

Have you ever tried to dam up a stream when you were a little kid? Water is powerful, it goes around and keeps on moving, which is why real dams take so much work and good locations to build, and why old ones fail so often. Even if the kid managed to completely stop flow for a little bit, the water would pile up and start going over the top, taking pebbles with it, and in two hours you wouldn't know the difference.

im almost thirty years old and every time i see running water i try to back it up. after this storm last summer we took eveything we could find to build up this dam. trying to flood out all the people building subs in our playground. Move somewhere else. Dam it!!!

addj: Uhh huhuh, was it a god damn?


No, it was a GOB DAM.

Kar98: Pelted with rocks and garbage: There should be a clause, when you take a position in any city council.
If you start to do petty crap like this, immediate termination should ensue.

As long as we're talking actual termination, not just being fired.

Got just the man for the job:

FTFA:
Council clerk Julie Finn added: "The gentleman had been going into a certain section of the beck and building dams. We had them taken out but they were rebuilt.

"That is when we had two complaints. In 2007, the majority of the centre of the village was flooded. The beck is the main water course through the village.

Methinks a relative of someone on the council has their knickers in a twist...