Thursday, 29 October 2009
Death of a klansman
Wednesday, 28 October 2009
A taste of Wing Chun
So here is a clip of my Sifu talking - not 'performing' or demonstrating. It gives a nice flavour of what the man and the art are about.
Monday, 26 October 2009
Punk's not dead - a father & daughter moment
I couldn't really imagine that punk-pop works in a 20,000 stadium but Billie-Jo Armstrong has got the same crowd-engaging energy to create a communal event on that scale the I have only ever really seen before in Bruce Springsteen. Which is really just a pretentious way of saying that, like Bruce, he can't hide the fact that he is fucking loving every minute of it - and that is highly infectious. And asking if there was a drummer, bassist and guitarist in the house and then pulling three kids out of the audience and handing over the bands instruments for a number was genius.
Most of all it occurred to me how lucky I am to have grown up after the social watershed of the 1960's. Much as I love my parents I can't imagine them - children of the Blitz* - coming with me to Motorhead gigs when I was my daughter's age.
* Just realised that would be a great name for a band !
Friday, 23 October 2009
'BNP's Griffin in bigoted fool shocker'
Nick Griffin dug himself into all the predictable holes you would expect - holocaust denial, islamophobia, homophobia and of course racism and... more racism. All this in spite of the ineptitude and bankruptcy of the major parties representatives' in trying to out tough each other over immigration controls.
Bonnie Greer did make Griffin look like the bigoted fool we know him to be - but I don't think any arguments about the migration of early man out of Africa following the end of the ice age, or the multi-cultural nature of Dark Age Britain (a subject close to my own heart) will win over any wavering BNP voters in Barking or Burnley.
Surprisingly I thought that one of the most telling points was made before the broadcast by Diane Abbott: She spoke about going on Question Time twenty five years ago as the first black woman MP. Nobody could remember what she said but everybody knew by her mere presence that the political landscape had changed. The same could be said of Griffin's appearance last night.
Wednesday, 21 October 2009
No such thing as bad publicity?
Just days away from their much sought opportunity to join the mainstream on this week’s Question Time they have their membership leaked (again), their party constitution is ruled in breach of human rights law, leading generals condemn them and their mis-appropriation of military iconography – and Griffin responds by likening the same generals to er…Nazi war criminals.
The trouble with this is that it plays to the ‘nobody likes us we don’t care’ siege mentality that the BNP are trying to build in the white working class heartlands. In fact the more the opposing voices come from elites - whether they are Tory-leaning army bigwigs or the liberal intelligentsia – the more it feeds their whining persecution complex.
When the panellists sit down at the table with Griffin tomorrow night conspicuous by its absence will be opposition to the BNP from the point of view of white working class socialists.
So a favourite parlour-game at the moment on the Left is ‘who would you choose to face Griffin on Question Time?’ Personally I like the suggestion of Bob Crowe as one of the few nationally known figures on the Left who could pull the rug from under the feet of the self-appointed fascist champions of the abandoned white working class – by force of argument and an ‘impeccable’ demographic. But it’s not a serious suggestion and it’s not going to happen.
Anyway the rise of the Far Right will not be staunched in the manner of a debating society no matter how effective the participants in the debate. But the Bob Crowe suggestion does highlight a more fundamental point in the question of how to take on the BNP.
Exposés and marginalising of the fascists have their place - but they also have their dangers if they turn the BNP into persecuted martyrs of a disenfranchised working class. There is absolutely no substitute for taking them head-on on those issues that effect the daily lives of ordinary people – jobs, housing, education and health.
And of course just occasionally taking time out to confront them when they make a show of force on our streets, and to ridicule their in-built propensity for contradictions and shooting themselves in the foot.
Monday, 19 October 2009
More historical ink
As a 'birthday treat' earlier this year I was indulged with a day out to Sutton Hoo. It's a National Trust site these days and amidst the tea-rooms and elderly couples clad in beige it's easy to be lulled into a cosy picture of our past - but the helmet, probably belonging to Raedwald of East Anglia, is nothing less than a piece of Dark Ages gangster-bling.
Raedwald was not a king in the modern sense of how we understand the term - he was bretwalda or overlord in the region having clawed his way to the position of top dog by a combination of military ruthlessness and political cunning. This included a tactical conversion to Christianity - although to keep his Pagan wife and family happy he sensibly hedged his bets and built twin Christian/Pagan altars.
The helmet was based on a Roman design and decorated with what would have been lavish ornamentation. At this time very few warriors would have had any armour at all, and the helmet would have been both a practical defensive piece and a status symbol that marked out the wearer as somebody very special. (In fact only four helmets from this period have ever been found in this country). With its face-mask of life-less human features it would also have left a pretty intimidating impression on any lesser person who had to face it in anger.
Friday, 16 October 2009
Two Worlds Collide
Monday, 12 October 2009
Cultural Interlude
Friday, 9 October 2009
We're all in it together
Tuesday, 6 October 2009
Hope I die before I get old ?
There was once some kind of a social-democratic consensus which held that as an individual progressed through life’s journey they would progressively experience the benefits of social justice. So the gap between those children born into poverty and those born into privilege would be eroded by a meritocratic education system that provided the gateway to equal opportunity. Along the way social housing, medicine and ultimately old age provision would narrow the gap.It was a blueprint for something like socialism - to be achieved by stealth over a few generations. It might well have been bollocks but it kept much of the Labour Party going for years.
Now George Osborne says that the Tories will increase the retirement age to 66 in seven years’ time, trumping New Labour’s own long-standing objective to do the same in seventeen years - ultimately rising to 70. By then final earnings, inflation-linked or even a basic state pension that you can actually live off, will all be distant memories. In effect old age will be privatized, thereby finally reversing the social-democratic consensus - as we get older we can now look forward to inequality (and life) actually getting worse.
At the same time we hear a lot of bullshit about the ‘third age’ and the ‘silver economy’. It’s one thing to be a grey-haired captain of industry working into your 70’s or to cash in on your good fortune on the property lottery and take early retirement in sunny climes. Or come to that, to pontificate about having a portfolio of flexible skills because we cannot expect continuous employment any more.
But in the real world most people will find in their 50’s that the skills they have built up over a career have become obsolete with little chance of re-training. They will then probably have to fill the next 20 years of employment with low paid part-time work just to keep their heads above water. They’d also better keep their fingers crossed that when they do finally stop working that they don’t need (almost certainly private) care.
And for their children they might get a small window of respite when they are in their 30’s; a few years in-between paying off their student loans and starting to support their own children ... and then their parents.