Views
In his 1936 autobiography, G. K. Chesterton credited the Marconi scandal with initiating a subtle but important shift in the attitude of the British public:
It is the fashion to divide recent history into Pre-War and Post-War conditions. I believe it is almost as essential to divide them into the Pre-Marconi and Post-Marconi days. It was during the agitations upon that affair that the ordinary English citizen lost his invincible ignorance; or, in ordinary language, his innocence.... I think it probable that centuries will pass before it is seen clearly and in its right perspective; and that then it will be seen as one of the turning-points in the whole history of England and the world.--G. K. Chesterton, The Autobiography of G. K. Chesterton (New York: Sheed & Ward), 205–206.
A completely opposite view is argued by Bryan Cheyette. He argues that the anti-Semitic 'Jewish financier' stereotype was present first, and indeed was established in British culture quite some time before the scandal broke.
It has been said that the scandal effectively ended the UK's chance of being the world leader in radio.
Read more about this topic: Marconi Scandal
Famous quotes containing the word views:
“I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause. I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors; and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
“Though your views are in straight antagonism to theirs, assume an identity of sentiment, assume that you are saying precisely that which all think, and in the flow of wit and love roll out your paradoxes in solid column, with not the infirmity of a doubt.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The word “conservative” is used by the BBC as a portmanteau word of abuse for anyone whose views differ from the insufferable, smug, sanctimonious, naive, guilt-ridden, wet, pink orthodoxy of that sunset home of the third-rate minds of that third-rate decade, the nineteen-sixties.”
—Norman Tebbit (b. 1931)