Goodbye - 2017

Those who died this year who I liked or admired in some way:

Mary Tyler Moore - 25th January, aged 80.

John Hurt - 27th January, aged 77.

John Wetton - 31st January, aged 67.

Peter Skellern - 17th February, aged 69.

Bill Paxton - 25th February, aged 61.

Chuck Berry - 18th March, aged 90.

Don Rickles - 6th April, aged 90.

Powers Booth - 14th May, aged 68.

Roger Moore - 23rd May, aged 89.

Peter Sallis - 2nd June, aged 96.

Adam West - 9th June, aged 88.

Michael Bond - 27th June, aged 91.

Martin Landau - 15th July, aged 89.

George A. Romero - 16th July, aged 77.

Deborah Watling - 21st July, aged 69.

Robert Hardy - 3rd August, aged 91.

Bruce Forsyth - 18th August, aged 89.

Jerry Lewis - 20th August, aged 91.

Harry Dean Stanton - 15th September, aged 91.

Hugh Hefner - 27th September, aged 91.

Fats Domino - 24th October, aged 89.

There are probably more, in less 'Celebrity' fields, but celebrity lists are much easier to find of course.

There may be more yet I suppose, but we are nearly done with this year.

This list gets longer as I get older.

"I grow old … I grow old …I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled."

Am I getting old?

I don’t think that I am old. I am 66 years, a pensioner.

I have had a good life so far. Not an exciting life, not a reality-TV show kind of life, but a good one. I had a fantastic childhood, the usual ‘difficult’ teenage years, and then a comfortable adult life.

I had the privilege of going to University when that meant something. I have only been unemployed once, for a relatively short time. I haven’t had big, powerful, meaningful jobs. But that is alright. I was never, ever a ‘career’ person anyway. I have earned just enough to be comfortable.

I am, in fact, very grateful for the life that I had, and am having.

I have been married twice. I am now married to the most wonderful partner a man could wish for.

One regret is that I have no children.

Despite the global population almost trebling in my lifetime, I have seen the world get better and better in so many ways. By any objective measure, all the key indicators have improved beyond all recognition during my life: Death rates; Infant Mortality Rates; Maternal Mortality Rates; Poverty; Starvation all going down, and general ‘Quality of Life indicators’ showing a massive upward trend. I have seen the fall of the most totalitarian, cruel and brutal political system. I mean, of course, communism.

I grew up with the ‘Cold War’ dominating politics and policy in the West. To most younger people that is just history now. And, as the discipline of History has been transformed into a mishmash of post-modernistic nonsense, I don’t suppose they even learn about it anymore.

I have seen the most amazing explosion in technology. There are things, today, in routine use that, even 20 years ago I wouldn’t have believed possible. This has had effects both good and bad I think.

In so many ways the world is a much better place than it was when I was born.

Yes, I took a degree in Sociology at the University of Essex from 1974 to 1977. After that I did some post-graduate work, finally leaving the University in 1979. Later I gained qualifications in Social and Cognitive psychology and went on to teach sociology and psychology to adults.

I loved teaching.

When I took my degree Sociology was, to some extent, seen as a ‘soft’ subject. It wasn’t. The focus was very much on empirical methods. The use of documents and the measuring of social processes. The focus was on how this could be done in a way to maximise the validity and reliability of the data extracted from the raw material using rational processes.

Marxism was, of course, very much present, but the focus was very much on ‘Humanist’ Marxism’. How to develop a theory of Marxism that took account of the individual.  But, the course was very open to all kinds of theories as long as empirical data was used and, of course, rational argument.

Even the Marxists, at that time, were prepared to discuss, debate and talk to people with differing views. They attempted to use empirical data and reason. They didn't just assert.

Post-modernism was, already, a cloud on the horizon, a foreshadowing of the coming storm. I discovered Foucault during this period and was wild about him. I still have a tiny, tiny soft spot for him or, at least, some of his work.

I learned a great deal, a very great deal both in the sheer breadth of knowledge and the importance of empirical data and reason.

All that seems to have disappeared from the so-called ‘social sciences.’ It astounds me how utterly ignorant modern students and professors are of basic facts about history, culture and reasoned argument. I can no longer call myself a sociologist and hold my head up.

Psychology, too, although it was always a dubious ‘science’ has disappeared in any real sense.

My politics at that time were various versions of Marxism, sliding slowly into libertarian socialism and finally anarchism. Later I became a left-wing Labour Party supporter but wasn’t very active. Today, if I should call myself anything, I would say that I am a conservative Classical Liberal.

But I don’t vote.

I have come to regard political ideologies as utterly irrelevant to what actually happens in the real world. It is now, and always has been, about power and the struggle for power. This goes under a variety of names and labels of course, but they mean nothing.

Humans in groups will always disagree and a means of resolving disagreements will always be needed. This is politics. Politicians and government are a necessary evil. But I have no respect for politicians. They are supposed to be the servants of the various groups of individuals they allegedly represent. Their job is to administer and ensure the security of the individuals to whom they are accountable.

Anyway, today the political process has become dominated by ideological movements of various kinds, both secular and religious. Maybe it always has been. I think a good argument could be made this is a central part of being human because humans love certainty, predictability and a nice simple narrative to ‘explain’ the world. Ideologies claim to provide this.

Politics - ‘Full of sound and fury, signifying nothing’ to quote the greatest playwright ever, somewhat out of context.

These days, of course, one can identify several significant religious movements. Islam, I have raved on about before. The other significant movements can be subsumed under the general heading of ‘progressivism’. Under this heading, I would place all the manifestations of social justice movements and third, or is it fourth, wave feminism, although they are not social and have little to do with justice.

Ideologies tend towards demanding a commitment to a central doctrine and will tolerate no disagreement. They all have dogmatic tendencies, a central creed, saints and sinners, and punishments like public shaming and ex-communication.

‘The question is, who is to be master, that's all’ as Humpty Dumpty says.

All these ideological movements are very similar to each. One could argue that Islam, at least, is honest about this.

The Enlightenment has gone. That short period in human history that seemed to offer hope for the human race and a way out of religious intolerance has gone. And I fear the future.

However within the next 20 years or so I will be dead and gone, soon to be forgotten and all this writing of mine will become even more irrelevant than it is now.

Maybe it is just because I am getting old. Old people, I know, have a tendency to see the past through rose-tinted spectacles and be somewhat nostalgic about the past.  That is part of it I am sure. But I would still maintain that my perception of the current malaise is accurate to a large extent. Some can be demonstrated empirically, the rest by using reason. A skill that is almost lost these days. 

I suffer from bipolar disorder and, for some people, that is enough to write me off as ‘mentally ill’, but it is worth noting that depressed people tend to have a much more realistic view of things.

I have been excommunicated by people I once thought of as friends because of my views.

So be it.

Anyway, those are my thoughts at this point in my life.

The Social Web - A rough first draft.

Here is a claim, an assertion – institutions, organisations, cultures, societies and so on do not really exist. They are genuine social constructions, narratives, discourses, ‘spooks’ in the words of Max Stirner.

Physical, material, reality does really exist whether we like it or not and cannot be ignored. Many different perceptions of physical reality exist. But it is possible to establish a truth about physical reality distinct from these perceptions.

For the most part, the most paramount elements in a human beings life are the socially constructed elements. Physical reality intrudes occasionally.

The institutions, organisations and other such constructions are made up of the individuals who constitute them and who to a greater or lesser extent believe in them. The daily interactions between these individuals constitute the ‘reality’ of these structures.

This is an old idea of course, and I claim no originality here. The origin of this can be traced a long, long time back in intellectual history. Relatively recently I would point to the work of Max Weber, George Herbert Mead and the symbolic interactionist tradition within sociology which was inspired by this work.

Deriving from the SI tradition other concepts may also be useful, such as negotiated order, the ecology of games and, even though he is not within the SI tradition, C. Wright Mills’ vocabulary of motivations. One could even draw on elements of the work of Michel Foucault, especially those to be found in his work Discipline and Punish. I cannot forget Erving Goffman of course and even, maybe, the early J-P Sartre, the Sartre of Being and Nothingness.

Now, I realise that I am just throwing out names and concepts here, name dropping in fact. I can, however, ground all these elements and concepts in a pretty thorough knowledge of the field. Right now I am just drafting areas to look at. When I get around to writing a more serious piece I will support all this with proper references and sources.

I also realise that, at this stage, I am not considering if these positions are even consistent with each other, or compatible.

One serious problem with this entire field, however (except, perhaps, Weber) is that it can so easily slide into a totally relativistic social constructionism. In fact, that is what has largely happened, especially since postmodernism reared its ugly head.

One of the reasons for this is that SI has no ground on which to stand. It is not rooted in anything outside of itself. This can be seen, for example, in Mead’s extremely woolly notions of the Me and the I.

Attempts have been made to ground SI on, for example, Freudianism and even Marxism. However, this is, ultimately, to try and base chalk on cheese, or cheese on chalk, whichever. These imported positions are fundamentally incompatible with SI.

I was, and to a degree still am, a big fan of SI, starting 40 odd years ago in my University days. So I am, basically, sympathetic to it as a field of study.

So, I would ground it in physical reality, specifically the reality of biology and evolutionary processes. This is the basic foundation upon which human behaviour and social interaction rests.

There is a great deal, a very great deal, to unpack in that claim I know. I hope to achieve that unpacking one day.

Elements of human social interaction – first draft:

1. Behaviour – biology, evolved, neuropsychological mechanisms (linking us to the world), = perception – non-conscious and fast.
2. Hormonal
3. Emotion
4. Personal belief system - ‘ideology’
5. Action – goal oriented, has meaning
6. Social action – stance, attitude towards the other, goal-oriented, has meaning
7. Rules of the game, available verbal motivations, explanations, resources …e.g., institutional ‘rules’
8. Goals – Cooperation – Conflict; Dominance – Submission; Persuasion – Resistance;

COMMUNICATION and how it rarely succeeds as intended.

I have also considered the notion, from Sartre, of the fundamental project. I don’t know. It may not be compatible. BUT – the idea that people live their lives forward, are always ‘becoming’ (not meant in some mystical or spiritual way by the way) is important in understanding individuals and social interaction.

However, human beings are not as unified as this concept implies. I once saw the human being described as a republic of separate systems working, more or less, towards the same goal just on different time scales, and with different histories. I cannot remember where I saw that, but I rather liked it.

An episode of human social interaction thus involves many elements. This is a field that has been covered in many ways elsewhere, and it is a topic of great interest to me. I admit that I have made, again, many claims here that need exploring and unpacking. Hopefully, when I get the time, I will do that.

I retire in 5 months time. Maybe then.

Out of these episodes of human interaction arises a web of social connections. This web IS the institution, society, culture or whatever. And this web creates the institution etc., etc.

Insofar as people are committed to the rules that nominally govern them, to the degree that they conform to these rules, and to the degree that they submit to these rules, the institution exists.

This means that change can come suddenly. Unexpectedly. The institution is, in principle, unpredictable and not fully understandable. The charts and diagrams, the descriptions of ‘social structure’ are simply rough maps of the social network.

And the map is often mistaken for the territory.

We humans like narratives and ‘stories’ are often created to ‘explain’ events. Such stories are highly selective, ignoring vast swathes of peoples lives and experiences and cannot possibly know all the details and, even more so, cannot know what is unknown.

Again, a lot of huge claims here, that require a great deal of work to flesh out and I hope to do so.

These, then, are some ideas that I am working on and thinking about. A series of potential hypotheses that require some empirical support.

Finally, I want to acknowledge the work of Nassim Nicholas Taleb and Ralph D. Stacey as sources of great intellectual inspiration.

Transformation?

Many years ago, when I was a student, I was a deeply committed Marxist in my political beliefs. Later, I toyed with Anarchism, and, eventually, became a rather soft Libertarian Socialist. I held this position for many years and voted for the Labour Party.

But, from the late 1990’s I found that the ‘left, liberal’ position was drifting towards totalitarianism and intolerance. This happened slowly at first but has accelerated at breakneck speed in recent years.

I found myself, at first to my dismay, drifting to the right of the political spectrum as the whole political spectrum shifted.

I found myself agreeing more and more with what are called ‘right wing’ arguments because they were the only political groups that were defending freedom of expression and freedom in general.

I was, and am, aware that there are some very dangerous groups out there on the extreme right, but they differ very little from the more extreme groups on the ‘left’, at least in practice.

This ‘drifting’ lead me to read more and more of the ‘Classical Liberal’ materials and traditionally conservative books and articles. And I agreed with them, mostly. This was a major shift in my views from 40 years ago.

Well, as they say, if you are not a socialist when you are young you have no heart, but if you still are a socialist when you are older you have no brain.

The only problem I have with these more conservative positions is their general social intolerance, their religiousness and their anti-science positions.

I am and have been for many years, a hard atheist, and that is unlikely to change. I have never found any evidence to cause me to change my views on transcendental or supernatural beings or forces. I dislike religion as a socio-political phenomenon in all its forms. The all tend to an intolerant and even totalitarian position. The only ‘religious’ philosophy that has, and does, attract me is some form of Buddhism. However, recently I have re-discovered Stoicism which is a philosophy very, very similar in practice to Buddhism.

I toyed with the Quakers once, but I could not accept a belief in any ‘god’ and nor could I be a pacifist.

I am very socially liberal. All forms of behaviour should be allowed unless they interfere with another's freedoms. A classical J. S. Mill position.

I would legalise all forms of drug use, all forms of sexual behaviour and all forms of transactions between people for money, including sexual transactions. I would hope that the old, and important, distinction between the public arena and the private sphere would become accepted once more.

I don’t care a jot about a politicians, or a businessman's or a celebrities private behaviour as long as they can do their job and do not transgress the freedoms of others.

My positions on issues like abortion are ambivalent. I do think that abortion is a form of murder, BUT the alternative to legalised abortion is far, far worse. I am, just, old enough to remember the time before abortion was legalised, in the UK. Therefore, it should be legal.

I am very, very pro-science as a method for discovering truths about the physical world. I fear that the process has become somewhat corrupted in recent times by politics and money, but I still believe in the scientific method as the only way to discover truths.

I believe in equality of opportunity, regardless of gender, race and all the other labels we use, but the outcomes will be what they will be. One cannot equalise outcomes without massive state intervention verging on totalitarianism.

I believe that the worst murderers, corruptors and abusers of power are States and organised religions. So I now call myself a Libertarian with conservative tendencies. A minarchist I suppose.

Heavens, that was a long spiel. The left itself has pushed me, and I suspect many like me, away from them and into a variety of other political and social positions.

Taylorism and Social Care

I have written this short article to outline, purely hypothetically, an issue that has occupied my brain space for some time now. It is a very rough draft of a hypothetical process and the impact that it may have. I am working on deepening this much, much more and on writing a much more substantial analysis, if I get the time.

What is Taylorism?

(Sometimes referred to as ‘Scientific Management.’)

“A factory management system developed in the late 19^th century to increase efficiency by evaluating every step in a manufacturing process and breaking down production into specialized repetitive tasks.”

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Taylorism

Named after the US industrial engineer Frederick Winslow Taylor (1856-1915)

This is a very brief definition—Read more at:

http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/Taylorism.html

Taylorism is not dissimilar to ‘Fordism’, although they developed their ideas separately.

This method of systematising production was applied to industry, the archetypical ‘ideal type’ being, of course, the production of automobiles. Over time other industries involved in the production of ‘things’ adopted all or part of this methodology. This lead to a massive increase in efficiency, production and, of course, a fall in the final price of the item to the consumer.

There were well documented negative effects on the workforce, however. That would also make an interesting topic. For the record, I am not opposed to the introduction of Taylorist principles where it is relevant. These principles have been a factor in making modern life so very comfortable for the average consumer.

In more recent times this way of thinking has been applied, at least in part, to working environments that are not concerned with producing things, but dealing with people.

The diagram I use here is derived from the article to be found at—https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1466626/

I will use this diagram to talk a little about the hypothetical impact the application of Taylorist methods to people-centred industries may have.

I will talk about the points listed in the box one at a time.

Specialisation/Fragmentation of Tasks:

This category almost speaks for itself. It is the breaking down of tasks and routines into the smallest possible elements, defining precisely what these elements consist of, possibly setting timings to these elements, defining the goal of each element and setting them in the appropriate order.

This, fairly obviously, works well with the production of things, like motor-vehicles for example. It would not be so straightforward for social care situations but, hypothetically, it could be done. It would be possible to break down the daily routine into stages and define what these stages consist of and the goal to which they are contributing. This would have an effect of deskilling, to some extent, the professional workforce. A degree of their professional judgement would be removed. It also shifts a degree of control up to management, in the setting and monitoring of these routines.

To a degree, maybe a marked degree, it would create a situation where some of the professional input was no longer required. The stages could be executed, hypothetically, by competent, but unqualified, personnel.

Evaluating and Standardising Tasks:

The various elements, by becoming more standardised, would also be open to a higher degree of evaluation. How well does a particular member of staff fulfil these routines? This, to an extent, again raises control to a more managerial level. But it could, hypothetically, create a situation where the personnel become their own agents of social control – a ‘panopticonisation’ (excuse the gruesome word) of the workspace, where all watch and monitor each other. The effect on the psychological ‘culture’ of the workspace could, hypothetically, be very negative.

This would also place higher demands on the time and energy of the staff. More time would have to be devoted to paperwork.

The evaluation process could also lead to a situation where performance could become more closely linked to reward.

Loss of control over conditions of work:

As, perhaps, can be seen, a real side effect of the first two points would be an increasing loss of control over their own workflow, a loss, as said above, of the use of their professional judgement by the personnel. This could lead to increasing dissatisfaction with the job and an increasing sense of alienation from the job, but also from their colleagues.

Deskilling:

I believe that I have mentioned the loss of professional judgement and the considered use of their own skills above.

To refer to Taylor's own words, the system matters more than the individual.

Depersonalisation:

The growing ‘mechanisation’ of the process leading to alienation, loss of control and deskilling could, hypothetically, lead to a situation where the recipients of the care process are treated more and more as ‘parts of a system’ leading to a loss of personal contact and to a ‘depersonalisation’ of the care recipients themselves. They become ‘units’ to work on.

Depersonalisation could, hypothetically, affect the staff too, as they become more and more like interchangeable ‘factory workers’, thus affecting the quality of their working space and a declining of their commitment it.

The official goal of this system is an improvement in the lives of the receivers of the care. The actual product is paper – evaluations, reports, plans and so on. It is this that becomes the most important output, and may hypothetically be prioritised over the recipients of the care themselves.

The map becomes mistaken for the terrain and becomes the most vital part of the system.

Negative side effects could well be, hypothetically speaking, increased alienation amongst the staff, loss of control by the staff, loss of interest in the overall process by the staff, increasing suspicion of each other by the staff, increasing absence due to sickness, increasing psychological problems amongst the staff and a higher staff turnover.

Conclusion, of sorts:

Does this work? Does such a mechanisation and systematisation of social care actually achieve the goal of improving the lives of the recipients of the care? Without much more empirical study, I cannot answer that and I will not try to.

I will say that in such a workplace an informal structure will always exist, much more elastic and much more relationship based. I would want to argue that it would be better to work with such an informal, more human, structure than to impose a dehumanising structure upon it.

The human being, in all his/her complexity, would be lost in the demands of the system. And with such an oversimplified approach, where we don’t know what we don’t know, the individual human being has been lost within the machinery and placed under a much more centralised system of observation, control and interference.

Again – I repeat very loudly, this is the first draft of a HYPOTHETICAL issue. A great deal of much wider empirical work needs to be done. I am aware of the utilisation of a ‘Taylorist’ approach to health care in certain Western institutions, with results similar to those I discussed above. I am talking, purely hypothetically, about the industrialisation of social care.

Freedom of Expression .. again.

“Freedom is an absolute state, there is no such thing as being half-free.” 

Daniel Delgado

This is brief, just another rant really. As an aside, I am aware that anything I write on this blog is utterly irrelevant and will have no effect on a damn thing. However, it is a place where I can, at least, write a little and express my views.

Freedom of expression (in speech, writing, art, music, video games and so on) is an absolute. One either has it or one does not have it. If one says "Yes, we have freedom of expression ... but ..." then freedom of expression has evaporated.

This is a point I have banged on about before until people are sick of me. But I won't stop because I really believe that freedom of expression is under threat. There exists censorship from large, powerful corporations and from many governments.

IF a group wants to march down the road sieg heiling, carrying the Swastika flag and singing the Horst-Wessel-Lied, then they should be allowed to. If they want to march down the road waving the Hammer and Sickle flag and singing the Internationale, they should be allowed to. If they want to march down the road talking gibberish and waving the Antifa banner, they should be allowed to. The same goes for Moslems, of all kinds, white nationalists, racists and the vilest examples of thought one can imagine.

This will, of course, provoke opposition. And that is good, ideas must be allowed to clash and combat each other. BUT - the use of violence instantly ends the right to their marching or whatever.

The USE of violence, not the THREAT of it.

At that point, the state has the right to exercise one of its few legitimate functions and use its monopoly over the use of force. All individuals engaged in the use of physical violence must then undergo the due process of the law.

NOTE: All of the above flags and banners above represent ideologies that are deeply obnoxious to me and are, for me, moral equivalents. But we must never stop the expression of those views.

The Lincolnshire Regiment.

The Lincolnshire Regiment was the county Army Regiment of my home County, Lincolnshire, in England. It has now been amalgamated out of existence. Of passing interest is the fact that Lincolnshire natives, like me, have, or used to have, the nickname of 'Yeller Bellies' (Yellow Bellies) possibly, just possibly, due to the facing colours of the Regiments uniform in the 18th Century.

The colour in the background is Lincoln Green - the colour of Lincolnshire. This colour is also closely associated with Robin Hood.

"The Royal Lincolnshire Regiment was a line infantry regiment of the British Army raised on 20 June 1685 as the Earl of Bath's Regiment for its first Colonel, John Granville, 1st Earl of Bath. In 1751, it was numbered like most other Army regiments and named the 10th (North Lincoln) Regiment of Foot. After the Childers Reforms of 1881, it became the Lincolnshire Regiment after the county where it had been recruiting since 1781. After the Second World War, the regiment was honoured with the name Royal Lincolnshire Regiment, before being amalgamated in 1960 with the Northamptonshire Regiment to form the 2nd East Anglian Regiment (Duchess of Gloucester's Own Royal Lincolnshire and Northamptonshire) which was later amalgamated with the 1st East Anglian Regiment (Royal Norfolk and Suffolk), 3rd East Anglian Regiment (16th/44th Foot) and the Royal Leicestershire Regiment to form the Royal Anglian Regiment. 'A' Company of the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Anglians continues the traditions of the Royal Lincolnshire Regiment.

Battle Honours of the Lincolnshire Regiment:

Steenkirk 8 July 1692, War of the Spanish Succession 1702–1713, Blenheim 13 August 1704, Ramillies 23 May 1706, Oudenarde 11 July 1708, Malplaquet 11 September 1709, Bouchain 13 September 1711, Peninsula 1816, Sobraon 10 February 1846, Mooltan 21 December 1848, Goojuarat 21 February 1849, Punjab 1857, Lucknow 1858 1863, Atbara 1898, Khartoum 1898, Boer War 1899–1902, Pardeberg 19 February 1899, South Africa 1900–02,

Great War:

Mons, Le Cateau, Retreat from Mons, Marne 1914, Aisne 1914, '18, La Bassée 1914, Messines 1914, 1917, 1918, Armentières 1914, Ypres 1914, '15, '17, Nonne Bosschen, Neuve Chapelle, Gravenstafel, St. Julien, Frezenberg, Bellewaarde, Aubers, Loos, Somme 1916, '18, Albert 1916, '18,Bazentin, Delville Wood, Pozières, Flers-Courcelette, Morval, Thiepval, Ancre 1916, '18, Arras 1917, '18,Scarpe 1917, '18, Arleux, Pilckem, Langemarck 1917, Menin Road, Polygon Wood, Broodseinde, Poelcappelle, Passchendaele, Cambrai 1917, '18, St. Quentin, Bapaume 1918, Lys, Estaires, Bailleul, Kemmel, Amiens, Drocourt Quéant, Hindenburg Line, Épéhy, Canal du Nord, St. Quentin Canal, Beaurevoir, Selle, Sambre, France and Flanders 1914–18, Suvla, Landing at Suvla, Scimitar Hill, Gallipoli 1915, Egypt 1916

Second World War:

Vist, Norway 1940, Dunkirk 1940, Normandy Landing, Cambes, Fontenay le Pesnil, Defence of Rauray, Caen, Orne, Bourguébus Ridge, Troarn, Nederrijn, Le Havre, Antwerp-Turnhout Canal, Venraij, Venlo Pocket, Rhineland, Hochwald, Lingen, Bremen, Arnhem 1945, North-West Europe 1940, '44–45, Sedjenane I, Mine de Sedjenane, Argoub Selah, North Africa 1943, Salerno, Vietri Pass, Capture of Naples, Cava di Terreni, Volturno Crossing, Garigliano Crossing, Monte Tuga, Gothic Line, Monte Gridolfo, Gemmano Ridge, Lamone Crossing, San Marino, Italy 1943–45, Donbaik, Point 201 (Arakan), North Arakan, Buthidaung, Ngakyedauk Pass, Ramree, Burma 1943–45"

Note: It didn't serve in North America during the slight trouble we had with the Colonists there in the 18th Century.

(Information from Wikipedia)

The march of the Regiment was The Lincolnshire Poacher:

When I was bound apprentice in famous Lincolnshire

Full well I served my master for more than seven year

Till I took up with poaching, as you will quickly hear

Oh! 'tis my delight on a shiny night, in the season of the year

As me and my comrades were setting of a snare

'Twas then we seed the gamekeeper - for him we did not care

For we can wrestle and fight, my boys and jump o'er anywhere

Oh! 'tis my delight on a shiny night in the season of the year

As me and my companions were setting four or five

And taking up on him again, we caught the hare alive

We caught the hare alive, my boys, and through the woods did steer

Oh! 'tis my delight on a shiny night in the season of the year

I threw him on my shoulder and then we trudged home

We took him to a neighbour's house, and sold him for a crown

We sold him for a crown, my boys, but I did not tell you where

Oh! 'tis my delight on a shiny night in the season of the year

Bad luck to every magistrate that lives in Lincolnshire

Success to every poacher that wants to sell a hare

Bad luck to every gamekeeper that will not sell his deer

Oh! 'tis my delight on a shiny night in the season of the year

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJdRxUPTKvU

The official flag of Lincolnshire is:

It has only existed since 2005 however. The red cross is the Saint George's Cross representing England. Yellow represents the crops grown in the county, as well as the nickname "Yellowbellies" given to people born and bred in Lincolnshire. Blue represents both the sea of the East coast and the wide skies of Lincolnshire, and green symbolises the rich lushness of fenland fields. The fleur de lys is a recognised symbol of the City of Lincoln.

The flower of Lincolnshire is the common dog-violet:

Just for information and interest.