You're technically correct (the best kind of correct), but the TV license is very much like a tax as you're required to pay for it just for having equipment that can possibly receive broadcast TV.
this isn't true. you're required to pay for it if you watch live TV. you're perfectly allowed to have a TV or laptop or any other device that can pick up live TV
Sorry, I haven't checked the rules in a while. It used to be the case that owning a reception device required a license, but as you say, that's no longer the case.
Lol. They can call it a non-voluntary charitable donation. It doesn't matter what they call it. It's still a tax. You probably think "National Insurance" is not a tax.
You understand that what something is called is not always the same as what it is, right?
>You understand that what something is called is not always the same as what it is, right?
e.g. how you just called it a tax? you're arguing against yourself
my man, your entire contribution to this discussion has been proxy arguments and rhetorical tricks without ever actually getting to the point of what you really think. who cares if it fits your personal definition of a tax vs someone else's definition of a fee? do you even pay it? and can you just pack in all the sophistry and proxy arguments and have out with your real motivations
my friend you're insulting my literacy after referring to a possession of mine with "you're", while making yet another attempt to emotionally trigger a sidetrack instead of just saying what you really think about the core issue. you read like you learned your style of discourse from tabloid newspapers
are you embarrassed of the real reason you don't like the BBC?
and you didn't answer, do you pay the license fee?
Ah, yes - that famous rhetorical trick - typo policing.
Yes, I pay the license fee. Do you?
Even if I thought the BBC was the most perfect organisation with sublime programming and insightful news coverage, I still wouldn't want it to be the cause of scores of women getting criminal records. You seem to think it a price worth paying though.
my friend I responded to your initial point by pointing out that even if this really is what you care about, what you're describing is clearly an issue with the current enforcement strategy, not the thing itself. quite clearly directly engaging with your argument as made
-- your response entirely ignored that engagement entirely besides taking a quote out of context in a weak and obvious attempt to draw moral outrage, more or less proving my point that you were simply using women's rights as a way to produce outrage and scare people into agreeing
to be honest perhaps I was a little quick to judge your motivations, and if you hadn't replied like this, perhaps you might have a leg to stand on, but instead you proved the point for me
whether or not calling it a tax was a rhetorical gambit or not, when pressed, it was instead a "non-voluntary charitable donation", and yet, is watching live TV not a choice? are you so unable to tear your eyes away from the 800th repeat of the Botswana special on Dave? is it "charitable" if the person who "donates" is provided with a consumable product?
can you avoid taxes by simply not letting the taxman in your house? can you avoid taxes by simply living in a house with someone who does pay taxes? can you avoid taxes by simply denying that you earn money?
and then you just started to make childish personal attacks about literacy. boring
