Ben Taylor @VoxDei@qoto.org

@ned I mean, on one level that's hilarious. The problem is that "The BBFC" didn't watch all ten hours. Not even their CEO. Some poor schmuck who isn't responsible for the system (or even for whatever happened to Shackleton to annoy him enough to do that) did. Bit harsh on that guy.

It's a bit like being pissed off by some ancient Roman senator, thinking "I'll show you" and beating up one of his slaves. Very little effect on its intended target.

@freemo I suspect it's just coincidence. We're genetically programmed to find at least human babies cute (um, once they've stopped looking like gremlins, I guess), and I wouldn't be surprised if as an evolutionary hold-over from when we were all the things before humans that evolution finds it much easier to specify "find anything that looks young cute" over being species-specific for humanity.

@garius I think I've developed a sudden love for the ISO. And I don't even drink tea, it's just that any organisation that can decide to develop international standards for it and the only objection is that the proposed standard doesn't do it right is all right by me.

@guardeddon @freemo @olives I bow to superior knowledge! I know little about the subject other than Google. 🙂

@freemo @guardeddon @olives Way beyond my personal knowledge, I was just going off that website (which says the most common is the MP5SF, which may be the same thing as you're talking about, and the G36C)

@freemo @guardeddon @olives Yeah, the ARUs are like that - you don't get them just hanging around the place, they turn up when they're needed.

All this said, on Googling, @guardeddon is correct about the model of weapon, but it's a single-fire variant in use. See https://www.eliteukforces.info/police/uk-armed-police/ under "Police Weapons". So similar in idea to the US, I guess.

@freemo @guardeddon @olives Well, depends a bit how you look at it. For your regular beat cop, not so much - ours don't carry firearms.

Comparing like with like would probably mean only specialist firearms officers (I guess the closest US equivalent is SWAT?). I don't know what they'd tend to carry in the US, but I suspect it's heavier than that?

@guardeddon @freemo @olives Is that the same weapon as you see the armed police at airports with?

@freemo @olives I don't claim to know a lot about the distinction, so it's entirely possible I'm wrong, but my belief was always that armed police in the UK had carbines. I'm reasonably sure they do not fire on full auto regardless. It's possible specialist counter-terrorism police have different armaments.

Police in the UK are not routinely armed with more than tasers, mind. It's only specialist armed response officers who have guns. Where I live in Devon I seem to remember hearing that there are only three armed response units to cover the entire county overnight, which is about 70 miles N-S, about 55 E-W, largely rural but with at least three population centres in excess of 50,000 people. Though again I may be misinformed.

@Glastomichelle @cstross Here's an illustration for the next Laundry book...

@drandrewv2 There is no possibility that the general election will be more than a week before it absolutely has to be. Because Sunak knows he's going to get hammered, and there's nothing that can possibly happen that'll avoid that short of Keir Starmer being charged with some horrendous sex abuse crime.

So I'm sad to say there will be one more Labour conference before the next election.

@freemo If you've got any time for sci-fi, try reading Blindsight by Peter Watts. Some very interesting exploration of the questions of consciousness, though I think he's more or less come to the opposite conclusion to you!