So the age old 'christian values' versus 'moral decline' debate raises its hoary head again. David Cameron reminds us this is a christian country and that the church must lead a revival of christianity to counter our moral decline. The state must have its order and as brown shirts are out of fashion it comes down to the word of god to keep us in line. Not the radical politics of Jesus Christ of course - for wealth must be allowed to pass through the eye of a needle on its way to heaven and never shall our cheeks be turned in submissive poses of non-violence. It is the omniscient (how god loves a good cctv), omnipotent god of the Old Testament to whom David Cameron refers.
This god of christian values shall smite us, or Pakistanis in the wrong place, from above for our trespasses. He shall ban gay marriages and stone adulters, single mothers or anyone giving birth in mangy estates. Women will remember their place as the bearers of tradition and children with appropriate fathers and white picket fences, staying home and keeping our sweaters loose and our skirts long. The undeserving poor would end their talk of structural inequality and accept their lot, turning into pillars of salt should they look back at the square mile of mammon that is annointed by god's heavenly host, and to which they will never enter.
And above all we will remember that it is our own ungodly ways that got us into this crisis, and only the scarification of recession and the falling to our knees before Argos catalogues and Strictly Come Dancing, beseeching god for forgiveness in the process, will get us out of it. And verily David Cameron would look down upon this world that he had created, and he would cry out 'hallelujah'.
Tuesday, 20 December 2011
Tuesday, 25 October 2011
Classifying an Occupation
Never have I lived in a country that is so determined to classify me. Every government document requests some demarcation of ethnicity, sexuality and/or disability. Then I must position myself as left or right as if there is a boundary somewhere across which I must not pass if I am to be able to express an authentic political opinion.
No wonder that the media and established politicians, and a few academics, are confused by the 'Occupy' movement. They can only use the term 'anti-capitalist' to describe it because they have no classification for 'amorphous bunch of anarchists, bourgeoisie, socialists, christians, communists, buddhists, environmentalists, capitalists with a small 'c', and even some people who work in the city'. The protest doesn't shoe-horn itself into 'left, right, left' and has explicitly stated that they don't know how they are going to achieve their goals which is refreshingly honest. No-one else knows what they're doing either but the government keeps on trying to fit reality into ideology because thinking outside those constraints requires too much imagination.
Spending an afternoon with the Occupy London protest has filled me with hope. Fitting in with my middle-aged sensibilities it's clean and self-organised and there is a working group for everything. There is first aid, a newspaper, legal observers, a university, a kitchen, an ecumenical meditation centre, and solar cells powering much of it. It is reiterated everywhere that 'this is a protest not a party' and the Tranquility Group are on hand to calm anyone down who thinks it's Glastonbury. The General Assembly operates via consensus, which initially filled me with dread reminders of a Gandhian NGO I used to work for (think meetings that went on for hours and decisions held hostage by personalities that could best be described as intransigent). But even in this much larger gathering there seems to be a decision making process and agreements generally adhered to. Okay, the Socialist Workers Party haven't taken down their 'Capitalism is Crisis' banner (it has been agreed that the prominent banner position has to be alternated each week), and no-one wants to be in the 'process' working group' (admin!), but what are we if not human. And this is nothing if not a very human process with frailties and foibles accepted, along with hard work and a long term approach driven by a belief that this could work. There is no spun fig leaf to cover the pretense that one leader, one party, one ideology has all the answers, and no three-line whip to enforce the charade as was seen last night in the British Parliament's debate on a European referendum.
The very presence of the camp on 'hallowed ground', partly, is also raising interesting questions about the commons, both physically in the form of land ownership and the commons that is embedded in institutions. The camp has redefined trespass and now has a working group to map land ownership in London, which will undoubtedly turn out to be a complex web of 'commons now made private' (as in Paternoster Square, the attempted site of the first camp) and 'government but not really commons' (as in some of the site around St Paul's which is 'owned' by the City of London). It's anyone's guess where the boundaries of the commons now lie. Similarly for the commons that are publicly owned and shared institutions. For example, the funding cuts and 'reforms' to institutions such as the NHS and schools are eroding the vestiges of the only bulwark against rampant inequality in this country. Public education and universal health care were at least something to balance out the differences between socio-economic categories.
There is one glaringly obvious gap though in the camp's population ... it is missing representatives from the estates and from the most economically marginalised who are the most vulnerable to the government's contingency plans of funding cuts in order to maintain its largesse to banks and lobbyists. But if the camp can manage to bridge those gaps it will be a force to be reckoned with. The best thing that could come out of the Occupy movement is the possibility of alternative connections and the desecration of classification in the process. With that may come new solutions, new forms of political organisation, a revitalisation of the commons, and a reminder of where power really lies.
No wonder that the media and established politicians, and a few academics, are confused by the 'Occupy' movement. They can only use the term 'anti-capitalist' to describe it because they have no classification for 'amorphous bunch of anarchists, bourgeoisie, socialists, christians, communists, buddhists, environmentalists, capitalists with a small 'c', and even some people who work in the city'. The protest doesn't shoe-horn itself into 'left, right, left' and has explicitly stated that they don't know how they are going to achieve their goals which is refreshingly honest. No-one else knows what they're doing either but the government keeps on trying to fit reality into ideology because thinking outside those constraints requires too much imagination.
Spending an afternoon with the Occupy London protest has filled me with hope. Fitting in with my middle-aged sensibilities it's clean and self-organised and there is a working group for everything. There is first aid, a newspaper, legal observers, a university, a kitchen, an ecumenical meditation centre, and solar cells powering much of it. It is reiterated everywhere that 'this is a protest not a party' and the Tranquility Group are on hand to calm anyone down who thinks it's Glastonbury. The General Assembly operates via consensus, which initially filled me with dread reminders of a Gandhian NGO I used to work for (think meetings that went on for hours and decisions held hostage by personalities that could best be described as intransigent). But even in this much larger gathering there seems to be a decision making process and agreements generally adhered to. Okay, the Socialist Workers Party haven't taken down their 'Capitalism is Crisis' banner (it has been agreed that the prominent banner position has to be alternated each week), and no-one wants to be in the 'process' working group' (admin!), but what are we if not human. And this is nothing if not a very human process with frailties and foibles accepted, along with hard work and a long term approach driven by a belief that this could work. There is no spun fig leaf to cover the pretense that one leader, one party, one ideology has all the answers, and no three-line whip to enforce the charade as was seen last night in the British Parliament's debate on a European referendum.
The very presence of the camp on 'hallowed ground', partly, is also raising interesting questions about the commons, both physically in the form of land ownership and the commons that is embedded in institutions. The camp has redefined trespass and now has a working group to map land ownership in London, which will undoubtedly turn out to be a complex web of 'commons now made private' (as in Paternoster Square, the attempted site of the first camp) and 'government but not really commons' (as in some of the site around St Paul's which is 'owned' by the City of London). It's anyone's guess where the boundaries of the commons now lie. Similarly for the commons that are publicly owned and shared institutions. For example, the funding cuts and 'reforms' to institutions such as the NHS and schools are eroding the vestiges of the only bulwark against rampant inequality in this country. Public education and universal health care were at least something to balance out the differences between socio-economic categories.
There is one glaringly obvious gap though in the camp's population ... it is missing representatives from the estates and from the most economically marginalised who are the most vulnerable to the government's contingency plans of funding cuts in order to maintain its largesse to banks and lobbyists. But if the camp can manage to bridge those gaps it will be a force to be reckoned with. The best thing that could come out of the Occupy movement is the possibility of alternative connections and the desecration of classification in the process. With that may come new solutions, new forms of political organisation, a revitalisation of the commons, and a reminder of where power really lies.
Wednesday, 19 October 2011
Lost in Translation
The BBC translation guide for the Middle East (with assistance from Mark Regev, BBC spokesperson for Israel and Palestine):
Word for Israeli combatant captured by Hamas = 'hostage'
Word for Palestinian combatant captured by the IDF = 'murderer'
Holding cell for Israeli combatant captured by Hamas = 'dungeon'
Holding cell for Palestinian combatant captured by the IDF = 'prison'
Description of Israeli combatant on his release = 'pale', 'gaunt', 'thin'
Description of Palestinian combatant on his release = none heard
Word for Israeli combatant captured by Hamas = 'hostage'
Word for Palestinian combatant captured by the IDF = 'murderer'
Holding cell for Israeli combatant captured by Hamas = 'dungeon'
Holding cell for Palestinian combatant captured by the IDF = 'prison'
Description of Israeli combatant on his release = 'pale', 'gaunt', 'thin'
Description of Palestinian combatant on his release = none heard
pleasure
There is a certain species of Londoner that appears at this time of year ... gaunt, pasty, bags under their eyes, starting to develop rickets from lack of sunshine, usually seen wandering around Leicester Square and Curzon cinemas with a moleskin notebook in hand. They are a seasonal reminder that the London Film Festival is on.
Much as I love movies, I am a lightweight in comparison to these seasoned film buffs. First there is the tricky process of selecting which films to see. It used to be that I could throw the programme up in the air and let the fates decide by booking whatever was on the page that was open when it landed. Now I actually have to trawl through webpages which means that any film starting with the letter 'P' onwards is unlikely to get my attention as by that stage my brain hurts trying to decide if the Romanian documentary on water skiing will be more important than the 'dark and gritty' realism of another British film verite. Secondly, I only managed to get tickets to three films. Actually getting any ticket to the festival is in itself a triumph so three isn't bad, but I do wonder how early I have to get up to get a seat that isn't either so far out in the wings or so close to the screen that there is a need for orthopedic support.
But such discomfort is more than made up for by the pleasure to be had in skiving off in the afternoon to see a film, especially when it is Nadine Labaki's 'Where do we go now?'. Sitting in a warm cinema, with a few hundred others (film and cultural studies departments must just close down for two weeks in October), falling in love with a small village in Lebanon, laughing out loud while eating steamed buns from Chinatown, pondering other scenarios where the judicious administration of hash cookies could bring about peace and good will among men (you have to see the film), and then walking out, smiling, into a soft autumn day with that feeling that only comes from knowing that you have shared something special with a small section of humanity who are, at this moment in time, content.
Much as I love movies, I am a lightweight in comparison to these seasoned film buffs. First there is the tricky process of selecting which films to see. It used to be that I could throw the programme up in the air and let the fates decide by booking whatever was on the page that was open when it landed. Now I actually have to trawl through webpages which means that any film starting with the letter 'P' onwards is unlikely to get my attention as by that stage my brain hurts trying to decide if the Romanian documentary on water skiing will be more important than the 'dark and gritty' realism of another British film verite. Secondly, I only managed to get tickets to three films. Actually getting any ticket to the festival is in itself a triumph so three isn't bad, but I do wonder how early I have to get up to get a seat that isn't either so far out in the wings or so close to the screen that there is a need for orthopedic support.
But such discomfort is more than made up for by the pleasure to be had in skiving off in the afternoon to see a film, especially when it is Nadine Labaki's 'Where do we go now?'. Sitting in a warm cinema, with a few hundred others (film and cultural studies departments must just close down for two weeks in October), falling in love with a small village in Lebanon, laughing out loud while eating steamed buns from Chinatown, pondering other scenarios where the judicious administration of hash cookies could bring about peace and good will among men (you have to see the film), and then walking out, smiling, into a soft autumn day with that feeling that only comes from knowing that you have shared something special with a small section of humanity who are, at this moment in time, content.
Monday, 3 October 2011
Swim Grid Grrrl, Swim
So ladies, here's your chance. Airtel are looking for Grid Girls for Delhi's Formula 1 race at the end of the month. You need to be 'confident, fit and glamourous'. There's an aspiration. You also have to take part in a reality programme where you will wear t-backs and hot pants, as well as swim suits and bikinis. But this is not just some beauty pageant, for although you have to share your hobbies and interests, and your height, bust, weight and waist measurements, for the compulsary swim suit round, according to Indian newspaper, First Post, contestants have to not just wear their cozzies but know how to swim.
Now, I confess that I do occassionally watch F1, but only because I want to see justice finally done and the Red Bull management acknowledge that Mark Webber is a better driver than Sebastian Vettel and that they were wrong to rob him of his championship hopes last year. And when I do watch it I have to also confess that I've never seen a pool anywhere near the grid. But I guess knowing how to swim could be handy should it suddenly flood in Delhi on the weekend of the race.
Contestants also need to be able to heft weights, at least the weight of any costumes they may wish to use 'to enhance their look', although usage of said costumes is, fortunately for fashion victims everywhere, subject to approval by the programme producer/channel.
One burden contestants don't have to carry is knowing whether her education qualifications and experience will be considered at the time of screening. The answer, according to the 'frequently asked questions' section of the website, is: 'No, contestants will be judged based on the judging parameters. Past achievements or educational qualifications will not be considered as a criterion for selection'. So if you are a mechanical engineer who could actually design an F1 car, forget about it, as long as you can swim that's all you need to worry your pretty little head about.
Now, I confess that I do occassionally watch F1, but only because I want to see justice finally done and the Red Bull management acknowledge that Mark Webber is a better driver than Sebastian Vettel and that they were wrong to rob him of his championship hopes last year. And when I do watch it I have to also confess that I've never seen a pool anywhere near the grid. But I guess knowing how to swim could be handy should it suddenly flood in Delhi on the weekend of the race.
Contestants also need to be able to heft weights, at least the weight of any costumes they may wish to use 'to enhance their look', although usage of said costumes is, fortunately for fashion victims everywhere, subject to approval by the programme producer/channel.
One burden contestants don't have to carry is knowing whether her education qualifications and experience will be considered at the time of screening. The answer, according to the 'frequently asked questions' section of the website, is: 'No, contestants will be judged based on the judging parameters. Past achievements or educational qualifications will not be considered as a criterion for selection'. So if you are a mechanical engineer who could actually design an F1 car, forget about it, as long as you can swim that's all you need to worry your pretty little head about.
Thursday, 11 August 2011
Running Amok
Yes, we're all fine. We haven't been burnt out or had anything stolen, and still have beds to sleep in. What to feel is the big question as the smell of a singed city wafts over my Hackney balcony ...
Basically, I feel tired. I'm now tired of dissecting what happened, especially when it involves hearing comments like 'they have such low IQs'. I wish I had a bar of chocolate for every time, over years of research, I've heard social conflict dismissed by the fundamental attribution error of assigning low IQs or 'uneducated' to an other. Besides, the guerilla tactics, the out-manoeuvring of the police, the coordination, would seem to suggest among some of these young people at least a high degree of strategic ability.
I'm tired of 'law and order' arguments without any acknowledgment of the role of poverty, inequality, boredom, gender, rampant consumerism, unemployment, seeing economic and political elites who have done a fair bit of pillaging in recent years getting away with it unpunished, funding cuts, lack of space, opportunism, catharsis. As a young man in Birmingham said on the news last night ... 'People are tired of struggling'. In Tottenham, unemployment among young black men stands at around 50% (Runnymede Trust). Youth services across the city, particularly in the poorest boroughs, have been slashed and burned. And the youth clubs, as daggy as they may be for some young people, were at least, according to one source, a means to avoid being 'stopped and searched' on the streets. One 'stop and search' too many was the catalyst for Hackney's contribution to 'the riots'. It is reprehensible to burn people out of their homes, but these riots were not necessarily senseless or irrational.
I'm definitely tired of seeing TV news images of young black men looting and neat white women cleaning up afterwards.
I'm tired of people who have never had to face a barrage of missiles and hate saying the police are not doing enough. The water cannon and rubber bullets they demand will not make them any braver or any more in control.
I'm afraid that the veneer of civility that holds it all together has been shown to be painfully thin and suspect many others who have been waiting patiently for something to trickle down to them may be thinking that perhaps they too should just go and take it.
And I'm puzzled by those who say they are disturbed because there was no 'politics' involved, no cause these young people were fighting for, no way of defining these actions into either Left or Right. And yet it was, first and foremost, all about power. And for a few nights at least, the estates had it ... petrifying the rest of London.
Basically, I feel tired. I'm now tired of dissecting what happened, especially when it involves hearing comments like 'they have such low IQs'. I wish I had a bar of chocolate for every time, over years of research, I've heard social conflict dismissed by the fundamental attribution error of assigning low IQs or 'uneducated' to an other. Besides, the guerilla tactics, the out-manoeuvring of the police, the coordination, would seem to suggest among some of these young people at least a high degree of strategic ability.
I'm tired of 'law and order' arguments without any acknowledgment of the role of poverty, inequality, boredom, gender, rampant consumerism, unemployment, seeing economic and political elites who have done a fair bit of pillaging in recent years getting away with it unpunished, funding cuts, lack of space, opportunism, catharsis. As a young man in Birmingham said on the news last night ... 'People are tired of struggling'. In Tottenham, unemployment among young black men stands at around 50% (Runnymede Trust). Youth services across the city, particularly in the poorest boroughs, have been slashed and burned. And the youth clubs, as daggy as they may be for some young people, were at least, according to one source, a means to avoid being 'stopped and searched' on the streets. One 'stop and search' too many was the catalyst for Hackney's contribution to 'the riots'. It is reprehensible to burn people out of their homes, but these riots were not necessarily senseless or irrational.
I'm definitely tired of seeing TV news images of young black men looting and neat white women cleaning up afterwards.
I'm tired of people who have never had to face a barrage of missiles and hate saying the police are not doing enough. The water cannon and rubber bullets they demand will not make them any braver or any more in control.
I'm afraid that the veneer of civility that holds it all together has been shown to be painfully thin and suspect many others who have been waiting patiently for something to trickle down to them may be thinking that perhaps they too should just go and take it.
And I'm puzzled by those who say they are disturbed because there was no 'politics' involved, no cause these young people were fighting for, no way of defining these actions into either Left or Right. And yet it was, first and foremost, all about power. And for a few nights at least, the estates had it ... petrifying the rest of London.
Wednesday, 27 July 2011
How to be good ...
So ten minutes out of Buddha Bootcamp and what happens ... I'm on the train trying to find my seat ... And there's a pensioner sitting in it. What to do? At the sound of her husband's excuse that they didnt know they had to reserve a seat it crosses my mind that he's lying out of his arse ... It's summer in France and this is a train. You don't get on it love without a reservation. I didn't actually say that. Just thought it. That probably still counts as bad karma. I pride myself however on actually saying 'ce n'est pas grave', and walk up the carriage to find a spare seat. Bugger. No spare seats. It's jamboree season and the train is full of scouts. Hell hath nothing on travelling during scout season. Facing the prospect of standing for an hour (as the scouts have taken all spare capacity and show no sign of getting out of their seats for a middle aged woman) I moan to the conductor who finds me a spare place. The husband and wife show no sign of gratitude and I give them death stares all the way to Limoges. That's probably bad karma as well. I am very attached it seems to displays of gratitude but then Buddha never had to travel on a train full of scouts. And besides, the principle of unreciprocated gifts sucks.
I'm not surprised really at such unBuddhistly thoughts popping into my head when even at bootcamp I had an attack of vipassana vendetta after someone sat in my meditation spot. Okay, it was her first meditation and she probably didn't realise that non-attached buddhists do in fact often get attached to their meditation spots when we've spent hours getting the stack of cushions just the right height and found the perfect shawls that are long enough to keep toes warm as well as head, it's not too near the front to attract the attention of the teacher in case he asks any tricky questions about non-duality, and not too near the back to get the drafts from the door. Attachment seems to grow even more stronger during periods of resource scarcity ... Everyone seemed to need at least three cushions (just in case knees started hurting and more height was required) even though we're only actually using two, and the shawls were all gone in 60 seconds. Good to know that when the apocalypse finally arrives the buddhists will be fighting for the last spot on the life raft as well. I'll just do it with a trained mind, in full awareness as I boot a pensioner out of my seat.
I'm not surprised really at such unBuddhistly thoughts popping into my head when even at bootcamp I had an attack of vipassana vendetta after someone sat in my meditation spot. Okay, it was her first meditation and she probably didn't realise that non-attached buddhists do in fact often get attached to their meditation spots when we've spent hours getting the stack of cushions just the right height and found the perfect shawls that are long enough to keep toes warm as well as head, it's not too near the front to attract the attention of the teacher in case he asks any tricky questions about non-duality, and not too near the back to get the drafts from the door. Attachment seems to grow even more stronger during periods of resource scarcity ... Everyone seemed to need at least three cushions (just in case knees started hurting and more height was required) even though we're only actually using two, and the shawls were all gone in 60 seconds. Good to know that when the apocalypse finally arrives the buddhists will be fighting for the last spot on the life raft as well. I'll just do it with a trained mind, in full awareness as I boot a pensioner out of my seat.
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