Margaret Thatcher, whether you loved her or hated her can you see it from another's point of view?

The reason I ask this question is because I saw a chap on TV last night who was one of the miners at the time. He said that he felt she did no good for the country whatsoever and I thought that this was a very broad statement and I wondered, if he put his own feelings of resentment aside (and I do understand why he feels resentment regarding the miners situation) whether he would be able to see the good in anything she did (giving tenants the right to by their council houses maybe?)

I’ll answer your question Leanne, because it raises a valid point, is anyone all bad?
I made my own personal views of her on another question & won’t go over them again save to say she was justifiably despised, particularly by the working class communities.
Anyway, I don’t see her as some evil bitch whose body should be dragged around the streets in some sick/twisted celebration, that’s just fucking wrong.
She clearly deserves a lot of credit for becoming the first & only female Prime Minister Britain has had & the longest serving ever, beating even the “Blair witch” by over a year.
All achieved in an age when men dominated in her field, that truly deserves respect, even if it is through gritted teeth.

Yes, well, Richard Nixon got the EPA and the Clean Air and Clean Water acts through Congress. But he still should have been thrown in jail.

So Thatcher wasn’t all bad, and instituted some changes in the UK economy that it really needed. But overall I am not going to concede she was “good” or that she was “good for the UK”.

Americans see her as England’s Reagan, but she supported socialized medicine, incredibly high taxes, and that insane monarchy.

To tag onto what @filmfann said, all over my facebook Americans are posting how Thatcher was a great leader and how we need someone like her. A slight against Obama of course. The irony that she supported socialized medicine when the Reagan loving right wingers here complain constantly about Obamacare and the mere idea of socialized medicine just tells me too many of the conservatives don’t want to look at all sides of anything or anyone. Overall I like Thatcher. I tend to be fiscally conservative, at least moderate, and socially liberal, and I think many of her viewpoints were similar.

@JLeslie She didn’t support socialised medicine. She pushed NHS dentists into the private sector, and her reform of NHS management introduced market-like competition into the health service—a precursor to various stealth privatisation policies by later governments. She’d have liked nothing more than to privatise the NHS outright, except that this would have been politically impossible, and if ever implemented would condemn the party responsible to a third party status for generations.

@filmfann See above about socialized medicine. She did not support high taxes—she repeatedly slashed income taxes, especially the top tax brackets. What she increased was VAT, a regressive tax burdening those on the lowest incomes. The final regressive tax she introduced was the Community Charge dubbed the poll tax.

Perceptions are more important than objective indicators.

Thatcher has been lauded for being the first Prime Minister without carrying a penis—seemingly a remarkable achievement.

She sat upon a tank like some modern-day Boudica, and the Union Jack fluttering beside her.

She was dubbed the “iron lady” by a Russian, who inadvertantly gave her a life-long marketable nickname with positive connotations.

She was also the “grocer’s daughter.” We were constantly reminded of her supposedly humble origins, even though it was firmly affluent middle-class.

Authoritarian-submissives in their millions fawned at what a “strong” leader she was. She was dogmatic and intransigent and made a point of being unwavering and assertive. Maybe it was all the more appealing that she was a woman too—nothing like submitting to a strong woman. Hot.

She took vocal training to reduce the pitch of her voice to make her sound more “authoritative.”

Then there’s a whole host of convenient narratives created by the overwhelmingly right-wing British press. All framing Thatcher and her policies as “necessary”, “tough”, “brave”, etc.

Yes. I know why people admire her greatly. There were those who directly benefited from her policies (maybe a third or so of the country) and then there were those who were enamoured by her image. If anything she was a genius in self-promotion and public relations (at least toward those who mattered for her re-election.)

She did accept global-warming science. That’s about the only positive thing I admire about her.

@Kropotkin I was reading your answer thinking, this is all well and good but he/she (sorry, I don’t know which) is missing the point of the question. Then I got to your last two sentences. Saved!

As you all may know, I am a fan of Maggie (and that “insane” monarchy @filmfann !!!), I am not from a well off back ground and I am often on the fence as to which party I support. @Kropotkin may call me an authoritarian-submissive but I did admire her back bone not because she was female but because so many of our politicians lack it and we strongly needed it. I strongly believe that she believed (rightly or wrongly) that everything she did was for the good of the country, that is my personal opinion and I respect others that may disagree but that is the reason that, on the whole, I ‘m a fan.

However, I do not agree with all of her policies (the infamous poll tax for example) and, having read her books, I agree with @Kropotkin that claims of a humble beginning are questionable.

The idea that she supported the monarchy is completely irrelevant anyway, considering every single government has to be given the Queen’s approval, they have no choice in supporting the royals, at least publicly.

If the media is correct her relationship with the queen was not great at all privately but we’ll never know for sure.

Yeah, two feisty figureheads, but who was strongest, as Harry Hill says… FIGHT!!

I am not as well informed about her policies as I would prefer to be before making an opinion, but her comraderie with Reagan, the policies I do know something about and her siding with censorship figure Mary Whitehouse tend to skew me towards Frankie Boyle’s view of her. Accepting global warming science is a point in her corner though that I didn’t know about before this thread.

I have to judge her based on my own experiences during her prime ministership. I could never admire her. I still remember being shocked and appalled at the growing number of homeless people who were on the streets of my city during her government. Many of them young people whose access to rent relief and the like had been cut. Homelessness more than doubled under her government.

In addition, unemployment went up. People could not get jobs but in concert with the increase in joblessness was the reduction in social welfare. For the only time in my life, I spent six months unemployed and I wasn’t entitled to benefits. I could not get a job. That’s when I lived on porridge and custard because it was the only food I had. By the time I emigrated to Australia, both my partner and I worked in good jobs but when we went grocery shopping, £50 would buy us two plastic shopping bags worth of groceries and that was being frugal. We had no savings. Everything we earned went to pay rent and just get by. Around 8 million people were living in poverty.

This is before we think about the effects and outcomes of things like the poll tax and the impact that had on families.

It’s all well and good to want a strong economy and government, but when the outcome is increased poverty and longterm unemployment for millions, and the government attitude is that this is just an unfortunate outcome. There is something seriously wrong.

When I did return to work after my period of unsupported unemployment, the company I worked for had no regard for workers’ rights. I witnessed young people working for weeks with no pay and having nowhere to go to get help. I saw people framed for theft because the company wanted to cut staff and to get rid of long term employees. I know they framed people because the rest of the staff set a trap for management and caught them out. However, people were terrified to join a union because they feared they would be fired for that too. While there has to be balance between union and management power during that time things had swung so far in favour of management rights, companies could abuse workers with little recourse. We were also all called in for interviews and told the security staff would be visiting our home to check for any stolen goods. They had no evidence any of us had stolen anything, these were just threats against a workforce would couldn’t do much because there were no other jobs.

She was also a racist who supported apartheid and a politician here has recently revealed she warned him Australia should beware going down the road of Fiji and ending up overun by Indians.

So no, I lived under Thatcher and was one of the many who said ‘enough’ and left. I have no admiration for her.

I saw the movie.

I admire her tenacity in a world ruled by men. I reject most of her political views.

@Kropotkin Would you say she supported universal health care? That every citizen should have access?

@JLeslie I think that only in America could she be seen to “support” universal healthcare. She wanted to privatize healthcare; she didn’t because of political opposition. Article.

@JLeslie No, not at all. Thatcher was an ideologue to the core—a committed free-market fundamentalist. Supporting free universal health care was simply contrary to her ideology and inconsistent with her policies. The only reason she didn’t, and couldn’t get rid of the NHS, is because it was and still is a nationally cherished institution that is a great boon to the British public. Her policies did nothing to support or improve the NHS, but to undermine it.

Any outright dismantling of the NHS and its privatisation could well have left the Tories unelectable for years and years.

@Bellatrix Thank you for your answer but the question was about looking at it from the other “side’s” point of view. Was there anything she did at all that you did agree or could at least understand why she felt it needed to be done? If the answer is no then that is fine but I was trying to avoid another simple “are you in the love or hate camp” type question!

While I agree with what @Kropotkin and @Bellatrix have posted, I support her opposition to the US invasion of Grenada in 1983.

According to this source:

Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher of the United Kingdom insisted, “in the strongest possible terms,” that “Grenada was part of the British Commonwealth, and the United States had no business interfering in its affairs.

Reagan later reminisced, “She was very adamant and continued to insist that we cancel our landings on Grenada. I couldn’t tell her that it had already begun.”

Following the invasion, Thatcher told Reagan,

“This action will be seen as intervention by a western country in the internal affairs of a small independent nation, however unattractive its regime. I ask you to consider this in the context of our wider East-West relations and of the fact that we will be having in the next few days to present to our Parliament and people the siting of cruise missiles in this country. I cannot conceal that I am deeply disturbed by your latest communication.”

@Leanne1986. I said “I have to judge her based on my own experiences during her prime ministership. I could never admire her”. Consquently, I don’t much care how many nice things people say about her or her policies, I will always view her through the experiences I had, and I witnessed other people have, under her government. To me they outweigh any positives. She was strong in the Falklands, but my understanding of her as a politician, removes any thought that this was an altruistic action on her behalf. That action bolstered her political position. I doubt she gave a rats about the Falklands.

If you want to think she was wonderful, that’s your prerogative. It doesn’t change my view.

@Bellatrix I am sorry if I offended you by asking you if you could see it from another’s point of view, that wasn’t my intention and it’s certainly not about me wanting to think she was “wonderful”. The reason I asked this question is because you never hear of anyone being “on the fence” when it comes to Thatcher, you either love her or hate her and she causes very heated debate. I just wanted to see if people can look at it from the other sides point of view rather than debating from their own personal opinion. It just made for a more thought provoking question, in my mind, than a “tell me your thoughts on….” type. I’m not trying to change your view and I would like to hear her supporters discuss what they may have disagreed with too, it’s not meant to be a one sided question.

She was divisive. She wasn’t the sort of leader who people are likely to be apathetic about. As to seeing it from another’s point of view, why would someone else’s view affect my own lived experience? Someone else may have had a very different experience but it wasn’t mine. I can’t discount what I saw and lived. It’s more than just an opinion. So when you say could I ‘see it from another’s point of view’ I don’t feel any need to do that.

I’m not offended either. I felt my opening sentence answered your question.

Ok