The Fragile Progress of Democracies and Bad Bedfellows

It’s now almost a year since the Labour Party won the last election and the context in which it was won is in itself interesting: my view is rather than “Labour Sweeping to Victory,” it was the Conservatives that “Crashed to Defeat.” Either way, it felt pretty good at the time!

“If you want to make the gods laugh, show them your plans” (or similar), this sober reflection on the unpredictability of life came to horrific fruition when the brutal murders and assaults of Southport and the ensuing Civil Unrest, brought into sharp and stark focus, the dangerous currents that move beneath the surface of society; ones that are strong enough to pull us all out to an unforgivingly dangerous seas. And for every action, there is a reaction: the Government's response? Swift, decisive and divisive one it could be argued, that it contributed to further pressurising the fault lines and cracks in a series of already stressed society.

What's The Direction of Travel?

There’s an old line from Ireland: a traveller asks, “How do I get to Dublin?” and the reply is “Well, I wouldn’t start from here!”

But, we seldom have a choice do we? Lame as it sounds, the line “We are where we are,” has deep and important significance as we try hard to work out why the present is so difficult to understand, that the future is uncertain and it seems, determined to thwart our journey; you know, “It just shouldn’t be like this!”

So, why? Well, I’m not going back too far here, (honestly, I have a life!), but here we go. Since 2020, we’ve had: the Pandemic and Lockdown, and these combined, I feel, to expose some cruel social and economic fault lines that have (in some cases) been developing since the end of WW2. The Russian invasion of Ukraine together with its impacts on economies, supply chains and our general sense of safety and well-being, the increased impacts of Brexit, Liz Truss, strains on the NHS and Care Gazza. Add to this a toxic narrative that thrives and grows and multiplies in the petri-dish of informal immigration that contributes to to pre-existing cultural and religious hostilities and we have an increased potential to become more open to accepting of a narrative formed around this idea...

“The reason you’re doing so badly, is because they are doing so well”

Bad news is amplified, good news and fine intentions are mocked, the Nation is persuaded to see itself as weak and at the mercy of dangerous international conspirators and we are encouraged, by default, to be less kind to “all but our own.” I wonder where this has happened before?

And then there’s Donald Trump: I’m not sure what happened to the collective American psyche, however his presence on the world stage is truly Shakespearian, and in a not-good way. I’ll leave it there...for now at any rate

There was in 1987, the release of a six series sitcom called “Big Jim and The Figaro Club.” Set in the 1950’s, it revolves around the “relationship” between a group of builders and their foreman: a strong social metaphor in itself! The builders talk of,

 .'when we was going to build the new Jerusalem - you know, before the world turned lax and sour'. “

 and the series was in my view, a delightful gift of high comedy combined with sharp social commentary and its voice is more important now then it was then, as our individual and collective worlds appear to have  turned “lax and sour.” Mistrust and cynicism appear, for now, to have won. Our world has indeed appeared to have turned "lax and sour!"

I follow a few “The Way We Were” type groups on Facebook. You might know this sort of thing, photos of towns and cities from not so long ago. Safe enough eh? Well, not really: nostalgia is manipulated through comments that refer to

 “Safer and happier times, when Britain was Britain”

And the explicit and implicit messages therein are a concern to me, mainly because this approach works and feeds not, “nostalgia” as we understand it, but rather a “toxic nostalgia,” one that leaves us open to misinformation and manipulation.

So, where to now?

We need to talk with each other, not at each other, and these conversations need to happen at a highly localised level. They need to create both tangible and “feel good” outcomes and will need to take place in venues other than formal structures within which there is an explicit or implicit political (or Political ) agenda. My emergent vision is one where political institutions, organisations and organisers are known for their ability to facilitate that which is good and needed at local, almost street levels. Given that I’ve cast some shade (getting down with the kids here-yeah, right!) on nostalgia, I want to take you back to the earlier days of the pandemic. It was at this point that people went out of their way to help each other: small acts of great significance made life better at a challenging time, the spirit of which was eventually diluted by greedy,corrupt liars, ones for whom the only standard was a double one: they were and still are the worst of bedfellows to fragile democracy. But we mustn’t forget what we can be, especially when we talk to each other a little more, care for each other a little more and in so doing, reinforce the ties that bind us together, much more.

A Nice Cup of Tea and Other Brexit Benefits

 

The above image? Well it was grabbed from an article promoting the health benefits of a cup of tea, or as it turns out, pesticide left overs. Since Brexit, the allowable amount of  insecticide residue has increased, in some foodstuffs, massively so.

The important abbreviation here is MRL (Maximum Residue Level) and for tea, there are two (two for tea?), there are two important pesticides, mainly because the MRL has been increased by 4,000 times. They are

1. Chorantraniliprole 
2. Boscalid

I'm absolutely convinced that without pesticides and fungicides, we would experience severe interruptions to the food supply. I'm also absolutely convinced that we should know what we're eating and drinking and have a working understanding of the residual effects of pesticides and fungicides on the ecosystems.

Lets take a brief look at the weed killer Glyphosate. This is classed as a probable human carcinogen by the World Health Organisation and its use in protecting bean crops from weed infestation has been allowed to increase by 7.5 times.

Pesticide Action Network UK (PAN UK) have identified 49 different pesticides for which the MRL has been reduced: 15 of which are listed as "highly hazardous". The data was drawn from national and international sources, and the analysis from the Health and Safety Executive (HSE).

The weaker Maximum Residue Levels applied by the UK are drawn from the Codex Alimentarius and it's notable that changes to UK standards have been applied only where Codes standards appeared to offer less protection to the consumer. It has been suggested that the Codex has been subject to pressure an influence from US Corporate Lobbying, (as if!).

What of it? Well, we're pretty much beset by health problems and whereas I'm uncertain regarding the full scope of the possible associations/effects between what we eat and drink and our overall well being, it's not beyond the realms of possibility to suggest that there may be causal relationships between what we ingest and long term, debilitating health conditions.

Shall I Just Stop Drinking Tea?

No. That's not the point of this piece, it's more to signal that in an age where there is increased pressure on resources to care for chronic conditions, we should be doing all that is possible to strike a healthy balance between intervention in biosystems and their unwanted impacts on our health and other ecosystems. Drinking Tea? if only it were so simple: follow this link to find out more!

We should remember too, that as a result of globalised food supply and demand, those who farm the products we consume and enjoy, experience high levels of risk and low levels of reward. The multi national companies seem to be doing okay though. Now, ain't that a thing?

My Name Is Pat Dooner

Transcript.

My name is Pat Dooner, I was born and raised in O’Brien Street. I was born in 1914. I will try to tell you my life’s story.

I remember when I went to school, I went to the Nuns’ School and my mother used to give me a bowl of porridge going to school. And then, when I got to the school, the nuns would give me a cup of hot milk and a round of bread, I wasn’t the only one, there was quite a few of us.

Then when that was finished we went to the classroom and had this (indistinct) , we used to do prayers, these were the first things we used to do and then, when this was done, we used to have a little tray with sand in it and we used to do all our drawing, writing our names and making all sorts of things and that went on for quite a long time and then the nuns used to tell us little stories out of a book and one thing and another and I remember them very well.

And we were introduced to a slate with a wooden surrounding and a piece of chalk. And that went on for quite a long time and we was doing that and we thought it was great and anyway then we had a piece of paper and a pencil, we done some work with the pencil, probably we were doing that for quite some time and then it was time for us to move on into the Masters’ School

When we Clapped In the Street.

When in the first days of C-19 Lockdown we clapped on the street, it seemed so innocent and  unconditional. But that was around 9 months ago. Time for a child to be conceived, born and begin to thrive.
We're not right now, where we thought we should be and it feels like a deal has been broken. 
I put this together on the 29th of May 2020. The day we were informed by someone that we might stop.
I've heard today a suggestion that we should do it again. A lot has changed since the Spring of our seasons and in this Winter-it really is a "Winter of discontent,"- I wonder if that time of hopeful innocence has slipped...
We're not right now, where we thought we should be and it feels like a deal has been broken. 
I put this together on the 29th of May 2020. It was the day we were informed by someone that we might stop.
I've heard today a suggestion that we should do it again. A lot has changed since the Spring of our seasons and in this Winter-it really is a "Winter of discontent,"- I wonder if that time of hopeful innocence has slipped...

When We Clapped In The Street

The early days were frightening and the truth?
These days still are!

This "thing"
It seems it starts when you feel below par

A sore throat
An aching head

Hard to breath

Coma

Dead.

It seemed then and still does

That not much can be done

An invisible "thing" 
Had won.
And in the face of defeat

Someone suggested that we  clap in the street.

The kid down the road 

Again and again

Proved that trumpet lessons 

Are sometimes in vain!

Then, after we'd clapped there

Were those who'd say
How can you clap 
When they're on such low pay?
Why are you cheering?
How can you do it?

The whole thing is a mess
Can't you see through it?

And the answer is "yes,"
It's a mess.
So why clap?
What meme?
What trope?

We clap for ourselves,
For others,
For hope.

Gwendoline Looks at The Skies

A person who lives quite close to me has deteriorated of late. Her behaviour is consistent with some of the features of dementia. I've known this person in excess of 30 years and there's a difference between "neighbourliness" and friendships-and it's okay.

I've put some words together

Gwendoline Looks at The Skies

Detached. Her house is detached

and lonely

She still lives there and only, 
Gwendoline looks at the skies.

Detached. He is detached

 and lonely

So many plans but the thing is only,

Gwendoline looks at the skies

Detached. It's what she

has become

It's what he has become.

And as he watches their 
Plans fracture
He hopes that something might distract her
and help her once more to be

It's arrived!
So has she!

Then gone...

and he can see in her face 

that she looks for that

Place

Feeling

And time
The connection, just one
But one that connects to cruel seconds then gone.
Gone.

He slumps in a garden chair

Carefully placed strategically where

He can keep her safe in his eyes.

And cups his forehead 
In grief beyond disguise.

And Gwendoline?
Gwendoline looks at the skies

Their Daughter's First Day & A Long Farewell In Perry Barr

 When We Say "Farewell" But In Our Heart, We Know It's "Goodbye"

Here's part of what once was Birmingham City University's "City North" campus in Perry Barr. As I write, it has been leveled and a new housing scheme is part of the developments that are in progress right now. The original intention was for an "Athlete's Village" for the 2022 Commonwealth Games. Spiraling costs and other challenges meant that Athlete's Village proposal was abandoned and that the area will be part of the Perry Barr Regeneration Scheme. 

Places hold memories  

This is Perry Barr from the 1930's and I lived there in the late 50's early 60's. We lived in the house in the right foreground. It was the Caretaker's House for a Primary and Secondary Modern schools campus. They, together with everything else in view, have gone

So let's fast forward-it's September 2016 and I'm working at the BCU City North site. It's Welcome Week at the University for first year students. At the bottom of this building there was a cafe with some outdoor seating and I am watching the parents of student hang on to every minute they could before saying goodbye to their daughter. It is a hard watch: they are in deep pain.

Perhaps having lived there and my first school was on the same site (Birchfield Road Primary School), I felt keenly the longing for being in a place where change didn't have to happen and all the good things stayed visible, reachable and could be savoured in a second.

Would my dad come around the corner and catch me playing on the flat-roof of a building adjacent to the science block on the old secondary school site? Could I climb down the drainpipe that was hidden from view, would someone tell him that they'd seen me up there? Even now, some 58 years later, I am confident that I can describe the layout of our house, the school buildings and playgrounds: emotions and memories; they're powerful companions.

So back to that day in September 2016-I wrote a couple of notes that grew into this-it was re-discovered yesterday-19/12/2020 and I've rephrased a couple of lines today.

The Deferred Farewell

They talked,

Well, she talked

He heard and didn't listen

Or listened and didn't hear

Whichever it was

Deferred responses holding a Silence

That was holding an Ache

That was holding a pain that was

Heart and Soul deep

And still, she talked.

They stayed to make sure that her room

Their child's new home for....?

It seems like forever.

Hey! It's just three years

That's what we said,
In the empty one back home

Both spaces in which soon

Together or apart

Each newly, lonely heart will break.

When I was looking for some images of Perry Barr, this came up. It's the Blazer Badge of the 

Secondary Modern School that once shared the site and provided me with an adventure playground. The power of the motto the context of the poem and all it means to me isn't lost!

jd. 20.12.2020

My Dad and A Monument Made In Wood and Painted Blue

When My Dad Retired (1979)

He left the UK to return to Ireland and my mother went with him, even though she didn't much want to go. The whole experience didn't work out well and they were back in the UK in around 18 months.

He'd been a school-caretaker since the late 1940's/early 1950's and he began what turned out to be his final caretaking job in 1962, the first caretaker at one of Birmingham's flagship comprehensive schools, Perry Common Comprehensive. So, when he left in 1979 an appropriate and respectful series of celebrations and presentations took place. He'd been asked what he wanted as a retirement gift and had replied that he wanted some DIY tools, including a two-speed, hammer action Black & Decker drill. They'd bought a house in the countryside between Mullingar and Athlone and it needed work doing on it.

When they returned to the UK, they brought back everything they took with them, some shattered dreams and determination to be independent of anyone. I'll discuss this in another post at some future point.

Dad's childhood had been a "waste not want not" creative approach to the crushing poverty that had stalked Ireland for too many people for too many years. It grew in him an approach to making use of materials that in our  throw away society, would have been scrapped. He was also a permanently busy man. A lot of energy, driven (I think) by the determination to make the best of every situation with the resources to hand

Dad died in 1999 and my mom , broken hearted, carried on for four more lonely, sad years. "Broken Heart" doesn't figure on Death Certificates and whatever was written as the cause was in my view, an effect.

Clearing out your parents' house is awful. If you have, you'll know what I mean and if you haven't, I don't envy you. They die again. But you touch on stuff and keep it and then, out of the blue (literally and you'll find out why soon enough), its significance hits you in the core of your being and so it was with the two-speed, hammer action Black & Decker drill.

It was in a box!

and I can tell you for a fact that my dad would have made that box from "scrap" wood and the handle has been repurposed from a piece of leather. He had the means to buy a new and shiny one but his choice was I believe, driven by the "joy of making," thrift had developed into creativity and without knowing it, re-cycling!

...and on the inside...

As you can see-there's a box within the box

And look how well the drill fits around it-it effectively locates the drill and holds it steady when carried

and when you open the inner box-

there are the drill bits-

it's a dual-purpose piece of "making"

And so here we have it. Some spare timber, hinges and paint, all of it assembled around a well measured framework and the use of the inner space is a great piece of design.

My dad went to secondary school only when it rained, the rest of the time he worked, often labouring alongside his father. He never had a formal carpentry lesson in his life!

Born in 1914, he left Ireland in his early 20's, having made and sold a couple of pieces of furniture to finance his journey to England, He arrived at New St Station with 2/6 pence (12.5 pence) and started work soon after, working every day until his retirement (Holidays and illness notwithstanding!)

And so back to the box. It is a memory, a metaphor and a monument and when I open it, a drill comes out and love flows in. It's a good box, he was a good man.

Trust, Numbers and The Repair Shop

Things feel a little this way at the moment

The last few months have been great haven't they? We have more or less been able to get to a place that is "normal enough" and now we're not there anymore. The unpalatable truths about Christmas cancelled, plans in abeyance and increased financial insecurity are hitting home hard and often right now. 

One of the great T.V comforters is a programme called "The Repair Shop." Members of the public present items of great emotional meaning and the experts (and they are!) fix them. 

The emotions at the point of handing back a thing of great significance: that is "restored enough" is the emotional high point of the programme. There are generally 3 and I'm pretty much wrecked by the second one!

When a piece is handed in for repair, it is clear that its meaningfulness transcends value. Memories and moments are handed across too and a very special thing happens. The experts honour the meaning and memory and ask the owner what after restoration, they would like their treasured item to look like. The public don't want or expect "perfect." They want sympathetic restoration, something that speaks to the object's journey and its relationship to the owner'

So the experts then acknowledge and honour a relationship they can't see but can experience and then they do their work. Trust is key here: under-promise, over deliver: it works every time and it constructs the narrative for a perfect modern metaphor, the scaffolding of which is here.

• The public trust the experts.
• The experts share their thoughts about meaningfulness-they can feel how much it matters.
• There's consensus on what "fixed" might look like.
• Often the experts collaborate, skill sets, ideas and creativity blend well together and produce great outcomes.
• The experts can get on with their jobs because that have what they need to hand
• They are consulted, not supervised.
  
• The experts have experience.
• The experts are well-resourced.

They produce great differences but never, it seems "as new." The blemishes are part of the story. The trust shown by the members of the public is rewarded.

So how would it be if the true story was one of broken promises, poor restorations and shattered expectations. If the producers had no regard for expertise or time for the creative, what would the end products look like? The Repair Shop wouldn't function. 

Whether it wants to be or not, our government is our repair shop. The certainties, realistic aspirations and beliefs that held things together have been damaged and damage in my view, turned into near destruction when in the Rose Garden of Number 10, an unelected influencer placed himself above the reach of the very behaviours he and his ilk insisted others follow. Behaving without precaution or humility he effectively waved away what was by then, thousands of people with the shattered remnants of their dreams for their now deceased lived ones and he did this with impunity.

Let's be clear, I believe the virus is real. I question some of the assumptions we've been encouraged to agree to. Let's look at outdoor gatherings. We were told that mass events would lead to mass contamination but here's a thing

This link takes you to the daily recorded cases

https://tinyurl.com/y5hqumme

The current trend seems to suggest that mass public behaviour, pubs, raves, etc are significant, together with families mixing in houses.

However, if we accept the best given knowledge, that the virus has a 14 day incubation period, we can ask some interesting questions. 

• Pubs opened on 4th July I can see no national peak.
• Liverpool won the PL on the 25th of June-big celebrations-dire warning, no significant spike
• Leeds United won the EFL on the 18th of July-  big celebrations-dire warning, no significant spike
• WBA won promotion on 22nd July-  big celebrations-dire warning, no significant spike
• Bournemouth Beach 25th July- -dire warning, no significant spike 
• ...and on it goes.
• Until September and then....up it goes!

The more recent increase-and I take into account that increased testing will bring increased positive results- makes uncomfortable reading. If we look at the accelerated curve, it starts to gain in steepness around 14 or so days after children went back to school.

It would be naive to attribute the increase to a single event, however the possible association between this and other "spreading opportunities" needs to be introduced into the public arena. Right now the climate seems to be in danger to shifting to one of blame, "othering," inflated claims about what is achievable, a fogging of earlier mistakes and misinformation, accompanied by dire warnings of what might happen if we don't all behave. This is not how a repair shop works.

Where has this got us? The sum total of this is that preventive behaviour is more or less where it was 6 months ago and the economy might see "stagnation" as an aspirational target! Our National Repair Shop needs to do better. That means:

• Talk to us not at us and talk sense
• Explain variations in predicted to actual outcomes and if you can't, say so
• Wherever you can, give a time frame and describe how things will look at the end of each frame
• Give jobs to experts-The Repair Shop does not, as far as I'm aware anyway, give a precious thing to someone because they are "well connected and might knock a tune out of it,"
• Understand, one of your bigger battles is to restore credibility, your credibility. Choose your themes and words well.

Unlike those who hand over a precious object to a staged but beautifully engaging programme, we have no choice with our lives and those of our loved ones. The job of Government is to protect the people it serves; the task is to show them how it's being done.

Here's How I'd Like Things To Feel

And I'd like to close with my observation that in fixing their precious items, the owners are to some degree, fixed too.

jd 24/9/2020

A Duncery Of Conferderates

What a day! Deeply radicalised Moms and Dads have kept their 7 year olds out of school because the parents felt that being tested in this manner and at this age had nothing to do with education. And whereas it was a little more difficult to be clear about what the tests are to do with, the Moms and Dads were adamant in their belief this is wrong.

The title of this piece is a lazy corruption of that of a modern masterpiece. "A Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole and here's a quote that has some sting in it today:

"Ignatius graduated smart."

"Graduated smart," Ignatius repeated with some pique. "Please define your terms. Exactly what do you mean by 'graduated smart'?" 

It was a back-handed compliment because the central character (Ignatius) had indeed graduated smart in his academic subjects and he was an unemployable social failure, His "smart graduation" left him with a distorted view of his abilities and what he perceived to be everyone else's limitations.

Back to the Tests and children being ripped screaming from the arms of Teaching Assistants. There was no limitation on the anger on display today. Here in the Midlands some Moms and Dads and even took their kids to the park for some creative play I know this because it was on the television. This is the very thing the Education Secretary might insist they could enjoy more if only they were sharper with their subjunctives. I think she may have "graduated smart" too. 

It was suggested by official sources - probably other graduates of the Universtiy of Smart- that the children's' education might suffer because they's missed a day. Their futures will of course be blighted by this and the selfish actions of a small group of selfish people who want their kids to be happy. They can rest assured that they will be entered on a list. T is for Trouble Maker. Your days of easy credit, mortgages and free-parking are over my my aesthetic friends! 

If you're 7 today you shouldn't be reading this, you should be sharpening up on physics or something because this day off means you have only another 2,120 or so days to catch up on the work you've missed today-this is assuming that you stay on into year 13. I'm not trying to cause any trouble but you need to know how much your parents hate you. Your name will be ripped from your records and you will be known as Child of Trouble Maker (insert first line of address and post-code, or mobile number or something), your futures my young friends have effectively ended today. You might as well have taken the test and messed up big time. The world loves a trier but a troublemaker? It hates them!

Carry on making trouble please parents because this has gone too far. The value, the true value of the tests is measurable in negative megatonnes. They are a convergent and poorly considered mockery of education, the joy of learning and of happiness as a value worth pursuing, They need to go.

The Not So Magnificent Seven.

I wonder at what point we will look at the current position in France and accept that this is part of a multi-level and complex narrative that has led us to once more adopt a language that dehumanises and  "otherises" people?

You know, "people," the same DNA and so on who are now "cockroaches", are part of a swarm or a pack. These words are important because they grant a hidden permission to perceptually disperse, cleanse and stamp on rather than to embrace, help and accommodate.

And like all dangerous miss-assumptions a mythology is created. We are told that we are being invaded, not because we are good but because we are soft. We are also the most invaded because we are the softest and in some bizarre world of twisted logic, we kind of deserve it. 

This puts us in an apparently strong yet disastrously flawed moral place. Because we see ourselves as "over-good" we allow ourselves to believe that other nations are "under-good". That's why migrants think the UK is a soft touch and they ALL want to come here.

Here's something from the Irish Times, published a couple of days ago.

Far be from me or the Irish Times to burst anyone's bubble here but I'm pretty certain that this information is unlikely to make its way into the (our) tabloids that seem to have a vested interest in distortion and misrepresentation.

The significant hike in the numbers since 2014 isn't the result of global misunderstanding based around easy benefits, free housing, health care and education in the UK, rather it's to do with the humanitarian disaster in the Middle East that produced his sort of thing-a refugee camp in Jordan.

Umbilically linked to "The War On Terror", it is one of the the ill-considered outcomes of what happens when myopic nationalism is allowed to transcend greater humanitarian well-being. It is fuelled when national interests are gleefully re-branded by the business of war and the profits it generates as it exponentially multiplies in the toxic Petri-dish of:

1. Enforced military service (including child soldiers) as a weapon
2. Rape and torture as a weapon
3. Starvation as a weapon
4. Religion as a weapon
5. Ethnicity as a reason
6. Difference as a justification
7. Mass population movement/genocide regarded as a desirable outcome

So there's my Not So Magnificent Seven. One that we, our European and Global partners need to get to grips with in order to design an intervention template of more productive outcomes for the stricken-many.

Will it cost? Of course it will! But, wealth isn't the problem here. It is the manner in which it is produced, distributed and recycled that has reduced us to a point where good people are prepared to advocate the death by drowning, electrocution on rail-tracks or shooting of another human being who has been dehumanised not by their behaviour and aspirations but by us and our pitiful, ongoing self regard.

Like All Exceptional People, She Doesn't Think She Is.......

I come from a big family and just over 20 years ago it became a lot bigger than I thought when,as an adopted person, I connected to my birth family and a whole new chapter of experiences that I suspect is far from over!

Like any journey it has "had its moments" and here's one of a few us toasting the life of my Mom's husband Pat, who died at the end of March, a man of great sensitivity, compassion, intellect and humour.

It was here that I had a conversation with my cousin's daughter: a remarkable woman who is going to Nepal on a 3 Month V.S.O programme and here's a link to her "Just Giving" page.

https://www.justgiving.com/Eilish-Sorohan/?utm_id=13

Here Eilish explains a little more about the programme and its outcomes. There's more to it than the words for it is here we have the gateway to the heart of an exceptional person who has chosen to give herself to the critical elements of our humanity that are bigger than ourselves. She has made the choice to enhance the health and well being of others. She has opted to improve an as yet un-navigated future and the events of the week-end serve to sharpen her purpose as an already impoverished country has had its infrastructure decimated.
I hope you feel able to make a donation.
May all of you journey well and in peace, arrive safely and do no harm to others.

John

Oh My God, What Have We Become

"Call up the craftsmen

Bring me the draughtsmen

Build me a path from cradle to grave

And I'll give my consent

To any government

That does not deny a man a living wage

Go find the young men never to fight again

Bring up the banners from the days gone by

Sweet moderation

Heart of this nation

Desert us not, we are

Between the wars" 

From "Between The Wars" by Billy Bragg
 http://youtu.be/xjUA3RU4B8E

A while ago Malala Yousafzai was shot in the head because she wanted an education. For the perpetrators the concept of articulate and questioning young people who challenge the cherished principles of bigotry, power and loathing of difference is so frightening it is better to carry out summary execution and face the temporary wrath of a world that will move on to the next media hit than it is to accept the inevitable outcome of a developed and inter-connected generation with a strong and growing sense of justice, access and liberty. Malala was shot in the head. Well known in her native Pakistan for her Blogs that spoke about the importance of access to education for women and indeed the right to access to education for women. And because of this, she and two of her friends were shot.

Having been given life saving surgery in Pakistan Malala was flown to the UK where at Birmingham's Queen Elizabeth hospital, her shattered brain was repaired by experts and her body and spirit were restored by a dedicated team of the passionate, compassionate and dedicated. It was with some considerable emotion that I heard the restored Malala speak at the opening of the New Birmingham Library speak to her "fellow Brummies." I was proud to be considered part of a process that was an iconic testament to what good people can achieve. And that this had happened in our hospital, in our city gave further energy to the hope I felt that day. A hope that we are bigger than we seem, better than we are judged, technically skilled beyond the ordinary and compassionate above what is needed.

I remember too the chill experienced as I heard a strident caller to Radio WM declare that Malala shouldn't have been given this role-opening the Library because, she shouted "She's foreign!" And then there's Facebook and its fellow travellers.

I fear that any re-positioning of access to and use social media is a bit like getting toothpaste back in to the tube: yet what I have read about Malala being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize has saddened me. The energy vampires post their ill informed venom and puss on thread after thread wherein one abscess after another erupts and bursts like this:

• We should look after our own first 
• She;s already had an operation and opened the Library, now they're giving her a prize!
• What about an award for hard working people who have to wait for operations?
• She soon forgot about her friends in Pakistan
• What about pensioners who fought in the war?

And the liturgy of spite goes on: a bile-bitter cocktail of ill-informed nastiness, the flirts with comedy with its devastating capacity to jolt assumptions about reality. But it's not funny: it's awful.

We have repaired a broken icon: an icon who has spoken to the United Nations on behalf of the poor and the dispossessed everywhere making  it clear that a better world will emerge as a result of the changes brought about not by armies and hatred but by education and the capacity to draw judgement between right and wrong as we consider what connects us rather than immerse ourselves in that which divides us. We, in the Great City of Birmingham have done this and we should embrace our new citizen, celebrating her bravery, her ambition and her capacity to reach out and include others in her simple, powerful words.

It feels we are in danger of sleep walking into a new reality as: a tiny outpost of Northern Europe, changed and worsened not by change but by the way we have dealt with change, As we have sought to find the monster in others we have it would appear, discovered the monster in ourselves.
                                                     Sweet moderation

Heart of this nation

Desert us not, we are

Between the wars"

The Times We Live In-Society Has Gone Soft/Bring Back National Service/Make Prison Tough/It's An Immigrant Thing

I was saddened to read about this Youth Worker Slashed In Wolverhampton it's a pretty grim overview of what appears to be a pointless crime: the assailant got away with a set of earphones.

Social Media is a great way of communicating our thoughts and feelings and the outrage provoked by the above skipped like a flat stone on still water creating the following sentiments as it danced into the emotions of the reader

• They are scum
• Prisons are too soft
• Bring back National Service (in war zones)
• This is what happens when loads of immigrants get into our country.

and it reminded me of this.

A man in his early forties took his seven year old son to see a film. The person concerned was a Site Supervisor at a local school. From time to time he was asked to assist in keeping good order in a sometimes pretty rowdy Youth Club. As he was walking back from the film he and his son were surrounded by a group of teenagers who threatened to "sort him out" because he had been instrumental in removing and banning a couple of them from the club. They were tooled up, it was frightening.

He reached into his pocket and slipped a bunch of school keys onto his fingers. pulled out his hand and said something along the lines of:

"Right, lads, there's a few of you and I'll go down here but before I go down, definitely one of you, possibly two of you and there's a chance that three of you are going to be scarred for life.....now get out my way."  And they did.

At the time this happened, there was National Service, the Borstal regime was a brutalising experience, prison was harsh and there were no obvious immigrants in the group-there wouldn't have been, there was a great measure of anti-immigrant feeling by and large groups of youths stayed "within their own".

This happened in 1960. I was the seven year old in awe at my Dad's handling of the situation.

I understand the anger generated by the attack on the young man in Wolverhampton. I'm saddened by the simplistic, tired and clichéd responses that are no more of our time than is the willingness of some to opportunistically attack others for gain, revenge or fun. 

And here's a photo of him taken around 3 years before the incident, with the F.A Cup, won by Aston Villa. A light, wiry man of purposeful strength and strong purpose whose only short-coming was to support Ast......ah well: It's been almost 22 years since he passed and his legacy grows in my heart, those of his grandchildren and I think many of those who remember this quietly-considered, kind and dignified man as a person of conviction and courage.

He would have found the responses outlined above and present on today's Facebook thread irrelevant, poorly considered and offering little by way of solution or balance.