The power of a pantone reference

In my industry - 'pre-press' - we used to describe ourselves, rather archaically and ungrammatically as being part of 'the print'. Sometime in the 90's when Apple Macs replaced paste-up and PDFs replaced film colour-separations we slipped into becoming a part (sort of) of the design industry.

So increasingly  I've come to understand how real designers like to distance themselves from the commercial consequences of their actions: Look in the coffee shops of Hoxton where all those young creatives have a copy of Noami Klien's No Logo in their messenger bags next to the latest Mac laptop. They're grabbing an over-priced Americano before returning to the studio to knock out another piece of work for some brand that's getting fat on the sweat of off-shored labour somewhere.

Here in London, today is the launch of the Barclays Cycle Hire Scheme. As has been said elsewhere it is probably going to turn into the most all-pervasive corporate branding deal we've ever seen. From a professional point of view I can't help noticing that the colour of the  branding that  appears all over the West End is that old favourite 'Pantone Process Cyan'.  

Conveniently  Barclays' corporate blue was there all along in TFL's own corporate colour palette. Was that convenience or conspiracy ? And what came first the branding or the deal ? Did the whole sponsorship/partnership spring from the mind of an executive with a design background ?

Sometimes I wish I wasn't associated with design - and its bastard offspring of branding - and that I could just get back to being 'in the print'.

Small but necessary beginnings

Went to the meeting of our new local anti-public sector cuts alliance last night:

There's talk of these alliances mushrooming into a movement to re-energize the Left - and  analogies are being made with the anti-poll tax movement of 20 years ago. Maybe. I hope so.

It's a fairly modest start at the moment but it's easy to forget that there was a definite period of 'phoney-war' before the anti-poll tax unions took off. And  that there were distinct differences of opinion - over non-collection by council workers, or a boycott of non-registration, until the clear non-payment platform emerged. Even then it wasn't until the court summons were going out and ballifs were calling that the movement really spread beyond the usual activist suspects. 

I imagine it may well be the same this time around. This is complicated by what has been done to the public sector since the last recession - the insidious and diluting rise of quangos, agencies and voluntary sector bodies has made it harder to  see where the services are actually coming from. And there's no denying the ideological triumph of private good / public bad' that has conned a layer  of working class people into being turkeys looking forward to Christmas.

But these complicating factors are eclipsed by the simple truth that inner city areas like my own, with industries long gone and a crumbling and overwhelmed social infrastructure, need public services. Desperately. Taking away what is already inadequate could just  be lighting the touch-paper that ignites a movement.

Until that happens it will be a case of patiently laying the ground work and getting the structures of resistance prepared - much as it was in the early days of the poll tax. This isn't necessarily going to be easy - if TUSC was euphemistically called 'a fragile coalition' - then this could be doubly so.

Even last night I saw Labour Lefts who were upset every time it was mentioned that it was a Labour council who would be administering the cuts, anarchists who were strong on community networks but flinched at the idea of a trade union sponsored conference, and of course enthusiastic Swoppies who  everyone else suspects will hang around  only until a better offer comes along from another campaign.

Maybe it's just  a case of keeping this hanging together for a few months - events have a knack of overtaking everything else...    

Cop-killer v killer-cop

I'm struck by the ironic juxtaposition of the Raoul Moat case and the refusal to prosecute PC Simon Harwood - the killer of Ian Tomlinson at the G20 demo:

Raoul Moat was enraged with a grudge against the police - hence the  unprecedented mobilisation of armed police to hunt him down in the almost farcical replay of 'Rambo - First Blood' that obsessed the nation for  a few days. (Although  as events unfolded I couldn't help noticing that the same newspapers carried footnote stories of more 'expendable' inner-city youths stabbed in  parts of the country where the crack police units and their media entourage conspicuously weren't).

On the other hand PC Harwood gets a free pass from the CPS,  despite  being so psyched-up and spoiling for a fight that he assaulted an innocent by-stander who wasn't even on the demo he was supposed to be policing.  

And despite having all this captured on camera - and witnessed all over the world - there apparently isn't even a case to answer. Nor has there ever been for any other police officer in this country who has  killed a member of the public.

Sleepless sportster owner seeks fix

I'm prone to insomnia at the best of times. These muggy Summer nights don't help. But I'm also somewhat obsessive about my bikes - if one isn't working it gnaws away at me in the small hours. 

Following the 10,000 mile service on my grey bike it was running sweetly and I thought I'd treat it to a bit of TLC. A thorough clean (that doesn't happen often) and a bit of cosmetic tinkering - including re-locating the tacho. And then when I came to fire it up in the evening -  nothing. A quick check showed no spark at the plugs. Fuck-ety Fuck  Fuck -  I hate electrics.

Seat off, tank off, check all connections, spray them all with WD40 - still nothing. Get out the multimeter and the service manual and pretend that I know what I'm doing. There's power getting to the coil but still no spark. Maybe's there's water in the coil from where I washed it. Leave it overnight - but still no spark in the morning. In the evening  start looking at replacement coils on ebay. Go to bed - can't sleep.

Then it comes to me. What happened in between it sparking and not sparking ? I'd only been thinking of washing it and the possible introduction of water somewhere it didn't belong. But I'd moved the tacho' too - what if something was wrong there ? It's an electronic item so it is linked into the bike's main circuit - could a short there trip the ignition ? I'd like to say that I checked the wiring diagram but I have to say that I tend to find these as useful as hieroglyphics. But I do remember the Sherlock Holmes axiom though: 'when you eliminate the impossible whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth'.

So  I got up early in the morning. Took the tacho apart. Put it back together. Flicked the starter - and bingo. Fuck yeah - I can't recall being so pleased with myself for a long while... then I remembered that it was my own  initial cock up that had caused the  problem in the first place.

Multi-culturalism up close ?

The other day we were invited to a family barbecue party. The couple hosting it are a 'mixed marriage' - he's Jamaican and she's Bengali. Both cultures big on extended family and hospitality - hence a large party with lots of kids playing on a water slide in the garden - and mountains of great food brought by the guests. And also two cultures superficially on an apparent  collision course: The Jamaicans  loud and extrovert - the women colourful in skimpy summer finery. The Begalis decidedly quieter -  separating into distinct pockets of men and women - with the latter dressed in varying degrees of modest Islamic dress. But in fact  just  enjoying a bit of rare sunshine, tucking into the food and watching the kids enjoying themselves managed to  cut across any divisions and everyone just got on with having a good time.

This is what multi-culturalism looks like in practice and it's such a typical everyday scene in most parts of London that I wouldn't ordinarily even bother to mention it. But then this weekend I see that some   of the Sunday tabloids were cheering on the French ban on the hijab - and claiming that there is a consensus to follow suit in this country (presumably following a quick straw-poll taken from the regulars at the 'Racist's Arms' somewhere in Middle-England-shire). 

Personally I feel pretty strongly that religion - in all its forms -  is mad, bad and often both.  But I'd challenge anybody who advocates any sort of state  ban on its expression - whether a racist bigot fretting over the erosion of 'English-ness' or a crusading secularist liberal - to come and spend a sunny weekend in North London and enjoy a dose of simple live-and-let-live. No apologies  if that sounds soppy and naive; the consequences of living any other way just don't bear thinking about ...

Raoul Moat - rogue male ?

The Rauol Moat saga continues. Pop psychology/sociology would have it that the bizarre solidarity shown for him in death (30,000 fans on Facebook and piles of tribute wreaths) taps into some kind of alienation of an emasculated white working class. I find this deeply depressing. 

In fairness no one with a healthy distrust of authority couldn't help, initially at least, to see the funny side of hundreds of paramilitary keystone cops failing to find a lone nutter hiding in a small area they had thoroughly surrounded. But then as Moat's  back-story emerged other reactions took over: On the one hand, displaying a-sinking-of-the-Bellgrano-like sensitivity the red-tops reacted to Moat's death with triumphant 'Got Him' headlines - as if a rabid dog had been dispatched. And on the other hand the myth-making started in certain quarters as Moat emerged as an everyman folk hero.

But the whole point of the myth of the romantic outlaw (and it's the myth that matters here) - be it  Robin Hood or Jesse James -  is built upon the idea of the home-loving, peace-loving man who is forced to take up the sword in pursuit of righting some perceived injustice. Moat -  a  bullying inadequate, self-pitying and misogynistic, a wannabe fantasist obsessed with weapons and body-building, with a revenge psychosis fed on a steroid addiction, and  a record of domestic abuse including an attack on a nine year old girl - hardly belongs in this pantheon of folk heroes.

The argument that he was  a victim of a syndrome affecting the post-industrial working class male who has lost his role in society, or some kind of metaphor for our  times, belittles the vast majority of ordinary men who  struggle to find their way through economic and personal hardship, suck it up  and just try to do the right thing. Without attacking their loved ones or any other innocent who happens to cross their path. And it's these working class men - and women - not middle class liberals, who have to share the same estates and town centres on a Saturday night with violent  lumpen-ised nutters like Moat.

It's not every man that can live off the land*

I took a day off for what has become my annual pilgrimage to the Fens - it's our version of  vast open spaces and big skies in this little country: A bit of an overhaul for the 'grey bike' and a chance to catch up with my  friends who have swapped their inner-city custom bike shop for a small-holding up there.

  

My friends aren't unique - there's a whole little economy  of small-holders, making a living by trading with each other, supplemented by  odd bits of casual work  (such as working on Harleys). They also support each other - one of their neighbours  was hit by a car whilst I was there -  and everyone was rallying around to help tend his animals whilst he was act of action. 

You could call it a  kind of localised communalism or mutual self-help. It's not necessarily about hippies or townies fleeing to the country. Most of them seem to be ordinary people with connections to the area - possibly returning after some time away  - or after farming has skipped a generation in the family. They are not middle class drop-outs like Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall.  They just want to promote a traditional way of life and do something 'real'.

There's  an ideology that goes with this that's suspicious of big business, mass production and factory farming and  promotes local small producers, 'real' products and low-intensity agriculture. The Fens is an area where cheap Eastern European casual labour in agri-industry is well established so it could easily be  xenophobic or racist -  but actually it isn't. Animosity is mainly directed at the supermarkets who are forcing the race to the bottom. There's  a  definite disdain though for a generation of 'native' locals who are prepared to go along with this, and lack the gumption to do something for themselves.

It's not a lifestyle  for everyone. Politically it isn't a viable alternative on any meaningful scale to the rat race. But  I'm damn sure that my friends get more satisfaction from their work than I am getting from mine at the moment. 

* Every time I visit I'm reminded of the scene in Easyrider when they stop over at farm to fix a puncture and share a meal with the family. Wyatt turns to the farmer and says: 'It's not every man that can live off the land, you know. You do your own thing in your own time. You should be proud'.

Dated but still true

I found myself staying up last night to watch BBC4's documentary 'To Kill A Mockingbird Turns 50' - followed by the 1962 film version of the book. I hadn't seen it or read it for many years - becoming a standard text in schools or featuring in  lists of 'must reads' is a death sentence for any book: 

My memories of the film (and the story itself) are of of it being very dated: The brutality of Southern segregation undeniably  sanitised for genteel consumption - very much anti-racism through the lens of the white middle class.  I'm pretty confident that history shows that justice - social or racial - doesn't come through benevolence  or enlightenment but from struggle and self-emancipation.

But emotionally, the simple message of the humanitarian need for empathy cuts across this sophistication. On a practical daily basis, when forced to rub along with every kind of -ism, small-mindedness and ignorance you keep coming back to the simple wisdom of Atticus  Finch; You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view... Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.

Which is why an old cynic like me found himself slightly choked up at an old black-and-white film in the small hours of the morning.

'Leave them kids alone...'

There's been a regime change at my daughters' school. Dressed up in modern management speak about 'outcomes' and 'milestones' it seems to be a profoundly reactionary attempt to turn educational values back thirty years. Most visibly evident in a new uniform code that requires pupils to wear blazers and staff to wear 'smart office dress'.

Rather more sinister though is the creation of a biometric database of the pupils. To allow cash-less payment for meals in the school canteen. For fuck's sake! Whatever happened to 'dinner money' ? Or, if the intention was to save the humiliation of those pupils who get free school meals - then how about a pre-paid swipe card system ?

As I get older I get more paranoid about the creeping pervasiveness of authority's surveillance and control. Collecting and digitizing kids' fingerprints to create a database  suggests a normalisation of this kind of thing under the guise of a seemingly  innocuous pretext. In a couple of years we will probably next see an introduction of RFID tagging of pupils on the grounds of monitoring their  health and safety. 

Education has always had a large component of socialisation  - and it seems that kids are now being conditioned in their formative years to accept the Big Brother state. 

Judging by the small minority of parents who have opted to take their kids out of the scheme it looks depressingly like that sinister shit is working.

Getting to play god.

I've had a week or so in the position - which I still find bizarre - of being a 'grown-up boss': I have been recruiting a couple of new junior staff. In a small-ish business like ours  this is very much a one-person job without much formal process. It's also something of an eye-opener.

Unless you are a completely cold bastard it's impossible not to feel a paternalistic glow when offering someone a job that will give them the first foot on the ladder of their chosen career. Or equally -  feeling awful when you  have to dash others' hopes with a rejection. 

In reality it's often only a very precariously narrow thread that divides the two. It's inescapably a buyer's market at the moment. From an overwhelming field of qualified  and deserving candidates, you inevitably start making decisions by weeding out the badly laid-out CVs and the spelling mistakes in covering letters. (Although given that we are a graphics arts business that's not quite as arbitrary and heartless as it sounds).

And when you do get to the short-list for interview - at which point, given that this is a first job position there is pretty much a level playing field - you inevitably  fall back on choosing  the people you like best:  My own prejudices are not sexist or racist, but they do  favour people who I think are quirky and not boring - people who dress with a bit of individualism or display interesting tattoos - or better still people who are into any of my own extra-curricula interests.

Worse still, a sad reflection of the present economic climate, and the state of my own industry, is that the only objective criteria of differentiation is often the number and variety of unpaid internships that these candidates have undertaken.

In all this I'm always  very conscious that my own 'career' (for what's it worth) has hung off a few lucky breaks and twists of fate. And having kids of my own I'm very conscious that theirs' will too. But I have nothing to offer on any of this - you just try to do the right thing in the context of what is in front of you. 

It's depressing to reflect on how much talent is wasted and how many lives never get the chances they deserve. And if you don't stop and ponder that once in a while then you're well on the way to becoming just another arsehole-cog in the capitalist machine.

World Cup Madness

I'm confused:

I'm groaning inwardly as I look around me at my workmates: St George's flags everywhere, grown men in replica team shirts, and that endless talk about whether E-N-G-E-R-L-A-N-D can salvage something of the spirit of '66. I'm not sure if it's simply nationalism or a form of tribalism and psychological displacement  that enables the terminally un-athletic to refer to 'their' team  as 'us'.

But then again I find myself bristling  with class solidarity when I read the condescending smugness of the Guardianistas looking down their liberal middle class noses as the 'false conscious' of those masses who can get so excited about what is after 'only a game'. For fuck's sake lighten up - its no wonder that  much of the Left are so alienated from the working class.

Footy (or soccer) isn't my game. But I can appreciate the passion and the drama of it. I can even sometimes appreciate the beauty of it when Brazil are at their best - although that does seem to be a completely different sport from the one that England play.

Just like Finchley ?*

The findings of the Saville report published today only confirm what should have been known all along - that this was an act of military repression against unarmed civilians. 

It's real significance lies  not in these  conclusions but in the reactions that it still provokes from unionists and apologists for the British authorities: That it was a 'waste of money' or that it should be set against attacks on the British army - particularly the Warren Point shootings - in a tit-for-tat manner. They show as little understanding now as they did at the time.

Unlike many people brought up as Catholics in this country, I am not of predominately Irish descent (one great-grandmother from County Leitrim). So  I didn't grow up on a diet of nationalist songs or tales about the 'boys back home' - although history O level at my school - taught by a priest - did spend a disproportionate time on Parnell and Home Rule, and prayers were offered for the Maze hunger strikers.

It wasn't really until I developed socialist ideas  that I came to understand  the injustices perpetrated in the name of British people in Northern Ireland. And that nationalism wasn't an abstract sentimentality but was inextricably linked to day-to-day struggles for employment and housing. 

And there lies the powerful significance of Bloody Sunday  - then and now - this wasn't a march commemorating some distant historical event or a tribal sense of communal pride - this was a march for civil rights. And those killed were very ordinary - and largely very young - working class people facing the full force of the state.

* Thatcher notoriously  claimed in 1981 that 'Northern Ireland was as British as Finchley'.

Henry Vane The Younger

Continuing the occasional series of anniversaries of  slightly more obscure characters and events from the English Civil Wars:

Today is the anniversary of the execution in 1662 of Sir Henry Vane the Younger. To be honest it's not so much his life as his death that  I find most admirable:

He certainly doesn't really belong in the radical-pantheon of proto-democrats and socialists. In the Leveller disputes  he definitely took  the side of the men of property. He should be categorized as a patrician-republican in a similar vein to Arthur Hesilredge. Characterized by his belief in religious tolerance and the supremacy of parliament over the army, he belonged to  neither the Presbyterian  nor Army factions.  Consequently he followed a precariously independent path during the Republic and Protectorate.

With the restoration of the monarchy he was not initially targeted for retribution like so many leading parliamentarians. Essentially a 'moderate', Vane had actually refused to take part in the king's trial and  sentencing, but even so, the 'not-so merry monarch'  Charles II simply  deemed him 'too dangerous a man to be allowed to live'. 

At his execution he was noted for his calmness in delivering a long speech justifying his actions and those of the Republic. He also warned the axe-man to take care not to inflame the pain he was experiencing from a particularly large boil on his neck.

Vane is also thought to have probably had the distinction of coining the phrase 'The Good Old Cause' -  the rallying call for generations of radicals evoking the memory of the heady days of the English Republic.

The lonely musings of the long distance commercial traveller.

Back in the days when I was a studio manager I was virtually welded to my desk. I would regularly work a 12hour shift and felt that I couldn’t be away from the studio for much longer than it took to get a sandwich or I would loose control of what was going on. 

This was probably bollocks – but the thought of running my own diary and swanning around to meetings would have been a fantasy then. Nowadays it’s a curse – and I’ve just come to the end of a fortnight particularly dominated by having to doing it.   

But happily  ‘business travel’ is still far from typical of what I generally do and so has enough of a novelty to make me stop and think:

One trip was to Zurich, to pitch our services to a US owned multinational. Between the airport, the railway station, and the anonymous corporate HQ, I had no sense of actually being in Switzerland – or anywhere else specific for that matter. Staffed by shiny-eyed young aspiring execu-types drawn from across Europe and the US this was truly big business transcending nationality.

Another was to Thessaloniki to do a press pass on behalf of one of our clients - at least a  chance to use my technical skill rather than mere corporate whoring. I got only glimpses of the economic crisis in Greece. Lots of anarchist graffiti – a cab driver who suddenly became much more friendly when he discovered that I wasn’t German (for some reason I’m often mistaken for a German) – and a heavy riot police presence guarding some event at a conference centre. Staying at a typically ‘international’ business hotel didn’t really broaden my experience. Nor did my attempt to get a bit of culture in my downtime – the ancient city with all its associations with Alexander The Great and the Byzantines seems to have been rebuilt as an extensive shopping mall by the sea complete with Starbucks and GAP.

Strangely  the only trip in the past two weeks that actually made me think was to Blackburn, to pitch to a long established local business – one of the few still going up there.

I was shocked by the overwhelming post-industrial grimness of the town. Boarded-up shops, derelict factories, and significantly intact  BNP posters that anywhere else would have been defaced. It’s certainly not that I live a sheltered life – by any measurement my hometown of Tottenham is one of the poorest in the country. But even the most deprived parts of London have a certain life and vibrancy to them. In Blackburn there seemed to be a sense of hopelessness – from the Asian cabbie who took me to my meeting and regretted leaving his shop in Southall to join his family up here twenty years ago and now couldn’t afford to move out - to the white cabbie who took me back  - and jovially moaned about the ‘fooking pakis’ all the way. 

I suppose I really knew it already – but it was a reminder that London and the rest of England are very different places.

John McDonnell. Bad taste old boy ...

Poor old John McDonnell - what little chance he had to be a serious contender for the Labour leadership was probably scuppered by his gag at the GMB hustings about going back in a time machine to assassinate Thatcher. It's not a great gag maybe  but it's an honest reaction probably shared by any socialist  who has lived through the Thatcher years, the Blairite betrayal and is now thinking 'here we go again' with the ConDems. Actually I suspect quite a few people will think that  a bit of passion and honesty makes a refreshing change from politeness and spin.

I remember a similar tumble-weed moment when I was on a Labour Students executive dominated by Clause4 / Democratic Left types (remember them  - they eventually morphed into the fresh-faced Blairites of '97 ?).

This was at the time of the IRA's Brighton bombing: At an  executive meeting one of these characters said we should put something out about the bombing and Thacher's narrow escape. Me -  being sensible for once -  said well yes obviously it was tempting and would be funny and all that -  but we should be careful about  how it might be perceived. Cue shocked faces all around and an awkward tumble-weed moment....

Whilst we're on the subject  -  I wonder how long it will be before it is considered acceptable for history students to speculate what would Britain have looked like if the bombing had succeeded ? 

It's just a thought of course  - I'm not implying anything - obviously that would be in poor taste ..

Fight for your right to party ?

My daughter wanted to go on the Gaza demo this weekend. Remembering the demos from last year I wasn't too keen on her going on her own. I felt a bit bad about this - I went off on plenty of demos when I was her age - although back in those days the police hadn't become the twitchy rottweillers they seem to be now. I then felt worse when I heard that the Gazza protest had passed off without incident.

Then I head about this - a water-fight arranged for a hot afternoon in Hyde Park by some kids on Facebook. Perhaps disappointed by the lack of action at the Israeli embassy the  neathanderal coppers decided to treat the party as if it were a riot.

History subverts religious nonsense

I can't understand  parents who bemoan their kids growing up. One of the biggest joys of being a parent is watching them figuring out the world for themselves. We had one of those impromptu family discussions in our house yesterday prompted by one of those delightfully innocent questions that cuts through all the bullshit of the polite grown up world - just why do religious people believe such obvious nonsense ?

I should explain that our kids have grown up in a thoroughly free-thinking household - but at their school they seem to be  largely  surrounded by friends who are either practicing Muslims of varying degrees of orthodoxy, or Evangelical Christians.  Either way - happily my kids genuinely struggle to comprehend the barminess of their friends' beliefs - both in  theory and practice - whether it's the concept of an imminent apocolypse and the bodily resurrection of our ancestors, or having at all costs  to cover your hair and not consume shellfish. 

We can try  to explain it to them in terms of psychology - religion gives people comfort, or in terms of sociology - it affirms people's cultural identity.  But on  a purely abstract level, having encouraged the application of reason in  every other aspect of their education, it's very difficult to explain religious belief in terms of anything else other than  wanton stupidity and simple superstition.

However I've found help  in the unlikeliest of places -  the BBC's 'History Of The World in 100 Objects' -  this week they have been looking at the rise of the major world religions. They do so in terms of power - both political and economic. The 15 minutes a day programmes chart why the big four religions we are stuck with today triumphed over other local 'pagan' religions. And clearly slow that was not because they were any more intellectually vigorous or morally superior, but because they won by  military conquest (Islam), or by providing the fabric of empire (Christianity and Hinduism) or by trade networks (Buddhism). Maybe the disciples of the Flying Spaghetti Monster were just less fortunate in their historical breaks.

Wallpaper and revolution

I am trying  my best to resist gracefully slipping into middle age. But my parents, with good intentions knowing my taste for history, recently gave myself and Mrs Journeyman a present of National Trust membership: I felt that I had finally become a card-carrying member of the tea-shop frequenting, garden viewing, beige wearing ranks of geriatric Middle England.

One of the first uses of our membership was visiting William Morris' Red House in Bexley Heath over the bank holiday weekend. The visit was a perfect example of the 'twee-ification' of history rendered by the National Trust to suit the bland palette of its constituency and demographic.

The house is of course very nice to look at. As are the well-tended gardens and the cafe in the coach house where 'light refreshments' are served. The terribly posh and earnest guide talked with passion about the architecture, the  hand-printed arts-and-craft wallpaper, and the neo-medieval frescos Morris had painted in the house. But managed at the same time to say virtually nothing about who Morris was or what he was about.

Nothing at all about his status as one of the unsung homegrown pioneers of English Socialism. Or the fact that the wallpaper and the frescos were an intrinsic part of a personal evolution that led to his disillusion with capitalism and adoption of revolutionary socialism. Or his sadness and frustration at the irony that the products of his design and manufacturing business could only be afforded by the middle classes .

I can guess how he would feel about the reproductions being sold in the gift shop. If nothing else I was inspired to dig out my copy of EP Thompson's biography of Morris.

Dunkirk Spirit - myth & reality.

Inevitably with the 70th anniversary of the evacuation of the BEF this week, and of course the imminent World Cup, the idea of the 'Dunkirk Spirit' is being much touted around. And mis-appropriated - from fat red-faced football fans waiving St George's flags, to Cameron's 'we're all in it together vision' of people creating their own DIY schools.

If there is such a thing as national character - and straightaway we're on dodgy ground here - then  perhaps the Dunkirk Spirit is a particularly British form of stoicism, quiet understatement and dry-humour, along with a discovery of collective spirit provoked by adversity. It certainly isn't about waiving the flag and singing ENGER-LAND.

For my Mum and Dad's generation Dunkirk and the events of 1940 holds a special place in their memory. Although they probably wouldn't express it themselves that way - I think that for them it marks the start of the 'People's War'. Only this weekend they were reminiscing how my Granddad in the river police wanted to take his boat over to France but wasn't allowed to  because it might be needed in case of invasion -  whilst a firefighter Uncle  did go over on a fire-boat - presumably these were seen as more expendable.

The involvement of civilians and their boats in the rescue operations was in this respect very symbolic: The troops of the BEF were largely pre-war Regulars and called-up Territorials - the mass armies  of citizen-conscripts were to come later. The talk  of 'phony war' rapidly switched   - after France fell so quickly to the German blitzkrieg - to a genuine fear of an invasion of the British Isles.  Along with  a much-mythologized but undeniable sense of  standing alone  - without European allies, support from the Commonwealth still to be mobilised, and with the USA standing aloof .

For them there was/is a real sense that Dunkirk was a turning point in the national psyche. But even then - as now - there was much mis-information about the evacuation: 

Some parts of the BEF were sacrificed (notably in Calais) for PR purposes to reassure the French  - whilst there were bitter arguments over the evacuation of French troops that were to have recriminations for years. Ironically many French troops who were evacuated to Britain were then pointlessly returned to ports in Western France just in time for the mass surrender. 

Most fundamentally the threat of invasion averted by the 'miracle of Dunkirk' was probably more perceived than real. Historians have speculated endlessly whether the German forces had either the means or desire to stage an amphibious invasion. And conspiracists have pondered the crucial and mysterious order to halt the Panzer forces' pursuit of the BEF to Dunkirk. It's now fairly well established that the Nazis harboured hopes for a negotiated settlement with an isolated Britain that would leave the empire in tact whilst giving them a free hand in Europe. And it's equally well established that there were factions within the British ruling class - Lord Halifax and various other toffs - who felt the same way. Recently discovered evidence suggests that even Churchill didn't discount this at one point.

There are some extraordinary tales to be told about Dunkirk - just not the flag-waiving ones that we are likely to see this week ..

Parliament peace camp

Over the past few years whenever I ride around Parliament Square, I usually give a toot of the horn in recognition to Brian Haw and his (in the beginning anyway) one-man peace camp. 

Although  I have never had the chance to speak to Brian, I suspect that he is a bit of a loon - but   in the very best possible way. His persistent and eccentric presence in the shadow of the seat of government must be a source of continuing irritation and embarrassment to the powers that be. 

And for that alone he is worthy of the respect of all of us who carry out our activism in rather more comfort.

I fear that the police's raid on the camp yesterday, and mayor Boris's stated intention to have the protesters removed by a court order, is a taste of the new profoundly illiberal regime now in power in this country. I still can't help wondering how all those North London Lib-Dems who knit their own CND jumpers are feeling  about propping it up.