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Head of FIA for 16 years, a lawyer, racing driver, car building entrepreneur and whose political affiliations shifted during his lifetime from far right to centre left. An intriguing character, apparently a very clever and capable man. It's suggested that he could have rightly claimed to have moved forward several aspects of everyday car safety, having influenced the adoption of the Euro NCAP system.

Many lesser achievers have been given knighthoods, I wonder why he wasn't?

Nigel 

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16 hours ago, Bleednipple said:

Head of FIA for 16 years, a lawyer, racing driver, car building entrepreneur and whose political affiliations shifted during his lifetime from far right to centre left. An intriguing character, apparently a very clever and capable man. It's suggested that he could have rightly claimed to have moved forward several aspects of everyday car safety, having influenced the adoption of the Euro NCAP system.

Many lesser achievers have been given knighthoods, I wonder why he wasn't?

Nigel 

Because of his alleged previous political leanings.

There were many political mutterings about how he could be described as having...shall we say sympathetic leanings towards a fascist point of view. Check out his Wiki obituary, handicapped by his Moseley surname when his views changed, he became a Labour Party sponsor, eventually after controversy they declined his money. Met him once at March engineering when visiting with my sponsor, a thoroughly nice man to talk to.

Mick Richards

Edited by Motorsport Mickey
Clarification.
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Indeed, it just shows how having political opinions early in life that later become 'unfashionable' can follow you through the rest of your life even if you've long ago changed your views. Which seems to me very unfair. 

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18 hours ago, TorontoTim said:

I'm pretty sure that fascist sympathies (if, indeed, he had these) were pretty unfashionable at the time let alone later. 

Yes after the war I'm sure far right parties had very little support. Although the Union Movement party started by Oswald Mosely post-war and to which Max belonged was a curious collective advocating notions of "Europe as a Nation" and with some other unusual philosophies that don't seem to fit neatly with conventional extreme right dogma.

I've also been doing a little bit of reading about Oswald Mosley and trying to get a feel for how popular his British Union of Fascists actually was in the 1930s. Their direct membership is said to have reached 50,000 at one point which seems a fairly big number, probably bigger than the Communist Party of GB at that time I think. One yardstick (perhaps) of public sentiment and at least some sympathy with fascism in the mid 1930s was that the Daily Mail was the biggest circulation British newspaper (1.8 million) at that time and was notoriously vociferous in its support for the BUF.

Just rambling. I find the 'departure' of people like Max Mosley a good spur to find out something about the times they lived in.

Nigel

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5 hours ago, Bleednipple said:

Yes after the war I'm sure far right parties had very little support. Although the Union Movement party started by Oswald Mosely post-war and to which Max belonged was a curious collective advocating notions of "Europe as a Nation" and with some other unusual philosophies that don't seem to fit neatly with conventional extreme right dogma.

I've also been doing a little bit of reading about Oswald Mosley and trying to get a feel for how popular his British Union of Fascists actually was in the 1930s. Their direct membership is said to have reached 50,000 at one point which seems a fairly big number, probably bigger than the Communist Party of GB at that time I think. One yardstick (perhaps) of public sentiment and at least some sympathy with fascism in the mid 1930s was that the Daily Mail was the biggest circulation British newspaper (1.8 million) at that time and was notoriously vociferous in its support for the BUF.

Just rambling. I find the 'departure' of people like Max Mosley a good spur to find out something about the times they lived in.

Nigel

Agreed Nigel, the history is pretty interesting and I'm glad you added this.

Max was clearly a complex character, as they say.  There's no doubt he had a huge impact on both racing and civilian safety but I can't say I was a fan of how he managed motorsport otherwise.

But interesting, accomplished and highly intelligent he certainly was.  I can't wait to see the documentary.

Cheers,

Tim

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14 hours ago, TorontoTim said:

Decent obit from inside the world of F1 here, if you are interested:

https://joesaward.wordpress.com/2021/05/25/max-mosley-1940-2021/

 

So interesting and surprising.

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