A glimpse of stocking

Brian M at Samizdata posted yesterday that he was told by a security guard he was not allowed to photograph a building on Victoria Street, just down from Westminster Abbey. Read the whole thing here.

I just couldn't believe it so I went along this morning, dressed like an American tourist, right down to the enormous white gym shoes. I took one rather bad photo and a guy in a black suit zoomed out in an instant.

Guy in black suit: You're not allowed to take pictures of this building.
Me: I read about this on the internet but I didn't believe it.
Guy: It's true.
Me: But it's right here, just across from the House of Fraser.
Guy: I know.
Me: Can I take a photo of the bus stop right beside it?
Guy: Sure.

So here's a photograph of the sign that's on the building that we're not allowed to photograph:









And here's the bus stop right beside it:









I think if they want to keep secret a government office building that's devoted to justice, rights and democracy (no typo there folks), they shouldn't put a label on it, at waist height, on a busy main street in central London.


But I still have so very much to learn. Quite a few of my guy friends have been out to various places in the Middle East lately. One friend was impressed at how the women ate and drank tea while wearing their strange wired nose masks in Kuwait. Another chum said offices in Saudi don't have ladies loos as women aren't allowed to work.

Bumped into another friend this morning, just back from Tehran. "I hear they don't have ladies loos in office buildings because women aren't allowed to work". "Oh no, women work, they're even allowed to drive." Hard for me to think at all kindly of Iran after reading that they execute gals who are prostitutes INSTEAD of the customers. That unfair. Furthermore, it seems to me the message would be harder hitting if they executed everyone involved. After all, they execute homosexuals there. Doesn't all this just blow your mind? Even a hundred years ago the Brits only sent Oscar Wilde to prison.

There's a meeting in London on the 19th of October and the subject is 'Why Islamic sharia law is at odds with women's rights". I read about it at harry's place, and you can read the posting here. It is so hard for me to really understand...why women in these benighted places allow their guys to oppress them in these myriad ways. I'm going to try and make it and that's the question I will be looking to have answered.