The death of polemics?

I've missed Burn's night - but I've  just realised that one of his quotes expresses much more succinctly what I was trying to grope towards in my last post about some recent squabbles on the Left:

“Oh wad some power the giftie gie us to see oursel's as others see us! It wad frae monie a blunder free us, And foolish notion”

And also from north of the border there is a perfect demonstration of the non-application of this principal in the three-way row between the SSP - Solidarity and George Galloway on Newsnight Scotland. 

I've still not fully resolved what I think about all this. Not so much on the specific  dark corners of the Tommy-gate affair  - but on  the more general question of when the best tactic is to sit on your hands and shut up in the interests of unity.

At home I have bookshelves of Marxist classics. Many, if not the majority, are written as polemics. The first passages of these are often  filled with  scathing but generally tedious  demolishings of political opponents who are now long-forgotten. These passages invariably generate a need for footnotes and historical introductions that  I skim over as quickly as possible: Engel's 'Anti-Duhring' is probably the most coherent summary of the Marxist approach to philosophy that you can find in a single source but frankly I'm not sure that anyone these days gives a toss about who Duhring was or what he said. Engels ' polemics against him may serve as a jumping off point for the development of his own arguments but are actually now more of a hindrance than a help to the modern reader.

Many of the Left would argue that these jumping off points are still needed and that polemics remain an essential part of the political process. The trouble with that argument though is that Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky didn't live in a mass media age with a literate and informed working class. The Left and its milieu  of their time was a closed and intimate little world often on the edge of what they would call 'civil society'. I wonder how these founding fathers would have come across in panel debates or online forums: If they stuck to the same styles they used in their written work then I suspect  they would be perceived as sectarian loons. 

But I also suspect that they were far too smart not to have modified their style to be effective in the society in which they found themselves.  Just a thought.

NSSN - two cheers not three

I went to the NSSN conference today and witnessed the overwhelming (3to1?) victory of the majority position to launch an all Britain anti-cuts campaign. I'm a member of the Socialist Party - who makes up most of that majority -  but still I can only feel that the decision was a necessary one to get past an obstacle - and not a cause for jubilation. 

So why my hesitation ?

Not because I had any reservations that the conference was a sectarian stitch-up. Doubtless some will be getting ready to claim this. But from what I saw the conference was scrupulously fair - almost painfully so; bending over-double to facilitate an even-handed two and three quarter hour debate from the floor. Having watched their antics over the years  in the ANL, the Socialist Alliance, Stop The War and Respect, I find any complaints from the SWP - frankly a bit fucking rich.

And not because I think there 'isn't room' for another organisation. We need a proper mass organisation that is campaigning and democratic. Not an unaccountable think-tank of the Left's great and good that claims to be 'one big tent' but has no democratic structure (CoR). Nor one that really is a blatant front organisation from a long lineage of  many previous front organisations (RTW).

The arguments from the syndicalist opposition lack the hypocrisy of the SWP,  and  so carry more weight - Essentially they argued that being a campaign is effectively beyond the remit of the original intent of an activist network, and  that the campaign will become dominated by one current at the expense of all others. The trouble with this is that it is in the nature of any discussion at a conference  that someone has got to win the argument. I  think the way the argument was conducted is proof enough that the SP is not the same as the SWP - and that there is still room for other currents. I genuinely hope they stick around and don't now take their ball home as some of them threatened to - but this threat cannot be used to hold the majority to ransom.

Actually my hesitation is based on something one of the minority delegates said about the wider pereption of the campaign's launch:

One advantage of being a parent is that you are forced to reconsider politics through the eyes of a new generation.  And I have to ask myself what relevance does the NSSN's decision have to my daughter and her friends from the student-kettles ? Or the under 30 year olds  in my own workplace where the union is a distant memory ? I suspect their reaction - however angry they are about the ConDems or worried about their futures - will probably be - 'wot?' And that's why I think that the conference was necessary - but really only a start. This isn't the 1980's and however proud we may be about the poll tax movement and Liverpool City Council, there's a whole new landscape to navigate and a new generation to be won. 

The King's Speech

I detect a monarchist conspiracy behind the 14 BAFTA nominations fof 'The King's Speech':

It was always going to be a winning  combination. Colin Firth the darling of the quintessentially English Sunday evening period costume drama; posh-totty Helena Bonham-Carter; George VI - it was him and the queen mum wot won the war for us; and of course the impending marriage of People's Prince William and the lovely Kate -she's so common just like us- Middleton.

Actually George VI may have been shy and reluctant to  become king ,and struggled with a little-understood disability - but probably the best thing to be said of him is that he wasn't actually an open Fascist sympathiser like his elder brother Edward VIII. 

He certainly voiced the prevalent attitudes of the  upper classes of that generation - anti-Semitic and favouring appeasement with Nazi Germany in the 1930's.  And despite the myths - he and his family didn't sleep through the Blitz in the tube station alongside his fellow Londoners but in the safety of a bunker under Buckingham Palace.  Which was why he was in fact boo-ed and jeered on his first visit to the East End.

Still I predict street parties next summer and open-air screenings of this palliative nonsense.

Rosa Luxemburg

Another guest spot yesterday over at 'On This Deity' - to mark the anniversary of the murder of Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht and the defeat of the Spartacist Rising in Berlin.  

Thanks again to Dorian for indulging me in a celebration of one of my heroes.

Dangers of living in your past

I like Vikings. It's a bit schoolboy-ish I know: My surname is of Norse derivation. I have quite a few Norse tattoos. I think their culture is fascinating; they were so much more than the hairy thugs in horned helmets of popular myth - explorers, traders and artisans with a political and legal system that has quite a bit to admire even today. And when I've had a shitty day at  work the prospect of a warrior culture that suffered no insult or bullshit without swift and honourable recourse is pretty attractive. But I draw the line at carrying around a bloody big axe and settling my disputes with trial by combat. In other words I know that I'm not really a Viking and this isn't the dark ages.

Why then do many Americans persist in carrying on as if they are in the Old West ? 

I mean, much like the Vikings, I can see the attraction: If I'd had the chance I would have been the first to strap on a six-shooter and after a hard day on the ranch blow away anyone who looked at me a bit funny in the saloon... But this is the 21st Century and that stuff  just doesn't wash anymore.

Although you wouldn't think so to listen to US politicians from both sides of the liberal divide talking about the fall-out of the shootings in Arizona.  Maybe Obama is trying to appear non-partisan. Maybe he doesn't want to antagonise a mythological Middle America.  But  of course Jared Loughner's attack on 'federal government targets' was inextricably connected to the Right's myth of a democracy with frontier values, its obsession with gun ownership and the macho political culture and language of hunting and shooting.

Class expectations

The latest school league tables - and in particular the stats' for the new 'English Baccalaureate' speak volumes -if not about education then certainly about class.

Having  myself been lucky enough to take a very traditional academic path until the age of 22, my views reflect my own  prejudices. I'm inclined to think that the baseline of English-Maths-Science-Humanity-Foreign Langauge is a pretty good summing up of a rounded education. But I'm not an educationalist and and I'll defer to anyone with a more enlightened take on this. These arguments aside though, the fact remains that of the top 100 results of schools in this country measured against the new standard there is not a single comprehensive amongst them nor even an inner city state school of any descripition.

We can debate whether the 'Bacc' is the right way to go: But thanks to the attacks on student funding with raised fees it's clear that we are going back to the days of two - or multi- tier higher education. And the Bacc. will  act as a ready-made indicator for those on a traditional elite academic path. It's probably only a matter of time before Oxbridge and then the Russell Group specify it as requirement much as they do now  with their lists of 'approved' A-Levels.

And so again working class kids in the cities will systematically have their expectataions lowered, their schools will be ill-equipped to meet the standard, and the message will again be 'it's not for the likes of you'.

Touts and agent-provocateurs

My first reaction was hilarity on hearing  that the case against a group of direct action eco-activists  had collapsed because undercover copper Mark Kennedy (pic here for future reference) who infiltrated them for ten years appears to have 'gone native' and offered to testify for the defence.

It's not the first time  that an undercover officer should find  that he's met  a nicer class of person amongst his 'targets' than in the police canteen.  I remember reading the  autobiography  of William McQueen - the ATF agent who went undercover in the notorious Mongols MC California. He recounts how he was overwhelmed at the genuine compassion shown by his MC brothers when his mum died in contrast to his law-enforcement colleagues who barely acknowledged his loss.  And you also can't help but laugh at  the old bill's consistent ability to get it wrong in who and what they target. Undoubtedly there are some terrorist  threats in this country  - but they don't come from vegans armed with nothing more deadly than wire cutters. Ten years infiltration at vast public expense probably prevented no more than a glorified act of vandalism.

But humour rapidly gives way to outrage that unaccountable state forces not only take it upon themselves to target entirely peaceful activists,  but actually use agent provocateurs to incite them to take extreme action. This is a conscious strategy to de-legitimise activism, alienate the 'public' from the activists and provide an excuse for ever-more repressive state powers.

Sounds paranoid ? Consider this - two of the most important 'terrorist' incidents in English history conformed to this strategy:

The original Gunpowder plotters may have been genuine religious fanatics who needed no encouragement but Wallsingham's secret service undoubtedly infiltrated their network and let the conspiracy run its course. With the result that it could be exposed at the eleventh hour and the regime strengthened with an anti-Catholic backlash. And centuries later the Cato Street Conspiracy - the last significant attempt at a coup d'etat in this country - was the result of a government agent providing a group of radical democrats with a plan to blow up the cabinet. This of course was the period of the notorious Six Acts - blanket repressive legislation that was a forerunner of the Anti-Terrorist Act of our own time.

Interestingly it was also  in this period - the first quarter of the nineteenth century - that English radical movements became so infiltrated with government agents that the system collapsed. Juries were reluctant to convict on dubious evidence against activists they were sympathetic with.  This, and outrage at the mis-handling of public order, were the  reasons why unaccountable agents backed by military force were replaced with a civilian police that was supposed to rely on public consent and co-operation.

Seems we're coming full-circle.

Meet the new New Left - same as the old New Left

A couple of times I have started writing to wade in at length  on the whole Laurie Penny / Alex Calinicos online spat.

I was going to write something against Laurie Penny's political dilettantism (New Labour apparachik- to LibDem voter -to angry  anracho-'new' Left). Another time  I was actually going to write something supporting her criticism of the traditional Left's fetishisation of producing and selling newspapers. 

On each occasion however I aborted the mission  because wonderful and democratising though this whole online thing is, it actually provides the masturbatory oxygen that makes possible the whole Laurie Penny phenomenon. A phenomenon that the whole Orwell Prize thing seems to celebrate - and it troubles me. 

It's a phenomenon that  represents a  new take on the very oldest  form of 'vanguardism' - that of the intellectual in the movement. Relatively privileged people who think that have just invented being poor, or being young and angry - and along the way  manage to pick up quite a nice career niche as the tame media-friendly wadicals of a new generation.  In other words I look at her and see Tariq Ali. 

Actually I do Tariq Ali an injustice; he might just be a media-twat these days but there was a time when he actually was an influence in the real world (albeit the student world) , and so for better or worse he  came to represent something.  A genuine moment in the history of the movement - and a bit more substantial than trading on the  experience of being kettled for a few hours.

And meanwhile as -  Though Cowards Flinch  so well describes -  life and struggle  goes on.

My 2011

After the Christmas hiatus - I've actually been in work over the holiday with very little to do and apparently nothing much to say here either - it's time to think about the coming year. 

To coin a cliche -  I expect the best of times and the worst of times:

Politically Cameron has already told us to expect the worst and grit our teeth  in his sanctimonious  state of   the nation podcast. But for those of us who had to endure Blairism and  the market-triumphalism of the 90's and 00's, we are seeing the best of times in the renaissance of activism. Although as one of those who reluctantly has to accept he is now part of the 'old Left', I have to temper my enthusiasm with a wariness that we are up to the task. At the moment Lefty-land is still  full of the usual internecine controversies - most topically the vying of three organisations to be the legitimate voice of the anti-cuts movement - and there is a danger that we will simply be by-passed by the Facebook New Left.

Personally - having AGAIN been fucked over by a big business client at work -  I am tasked in January with sorting out the consequences of redundancies and paring down. I'm not after sympathy here, I'm managing it not suffering it and I won't permit myself the hypocrisy of 'this will hurt me more than them' - but it is unquestionably the worst of times. The best of times is watching my kids coming of age - in every respect - but most of all in questioning and challenging the world into which they are now taking their place.

Watch this space...

Which side are you on ?

Everyone else in the lefty-blog world has an opinion. And although I have no inside information, and probably no original insight, - here's my view on Tommy-gate:  

It's not quite the same as my party - I don't see the need to juxtaposition the caricature of Tommy-the blameless and persecuted  hero to that of Tommy-the evil megalomaniac who destroyed the Scottish Left.  But it's certainly not that either of the Anti-Tommy alliance  from Anarchists to Tories who are rubbing their hands in delight at his downfall.

I don't know - or care that much - if Tommy was technically guilty of the charges against him. But although - as the official party line says he is  'innocent of crimes against the working class' - he is as far as I can see guilty of hubris, weakness and lack of judgement. It seems contradictory that a man strong enough to go to prison for his beliefs should also succumb to the social  pressures of convention in denying his sexual tastes. Tastes that if revealed would undermine a carefully constructed public image of a family man and regular guy. But then again (like myself) he was raised as a Catholic before he became a Marxist.

But contradictions are at the heart of the whole sad Tommy-gate tale - most fundamentally the contradiction that he could be the most charismatic left leader of a generation, the man who perhaps  made the single biggest contribution to a renaissance of a movement, and at the same time the man whose actions did the most to pull it apart.

And the biggest and most shocking contradiction of them all is that people who once called themselves Marxists - who understood that the State is an instrument of the ruling class - should think that a court case could deliver some sort of objective 'justice'  or 'truth' abstracted from its political context - and even worse were willing to collaborate in what can only be described as a conspiracy with those who were openly the enemies of the working class movement.

So, however much I may wish that back in 2004 when confronted with the evidence Tommy had taken a 'published and be damned - I'm kinky deal with it' line  - it is not possible to now  take a neutral stance and hand-wringingly reflect on the sadness of the whole affair. And for that reason alone I'm siding not so much with Tommy -  as against the state, the Murdoch press, embittered former comrades, and the Tories.

Dixie

I watched the Ken Burn's epic documentary series. Twice. I read Shellby Foote's monumental three volume history. And numerous others. I chose to do a paper in it when I was at uni.

It's out of my system now, but I was a bit obsessed with the American Civil War. 

Not as obsessed however as many Americans  - as evident from the 150th anniversary this week of the secession of South Carolina from the Union. This obsession is probably a good thing - it is the skeleton in the closet of the American Dream. It's relatively recent and it still poses unresolved issues - an itch that needs to be scratched - whilst us Brits in typical fashion chose to politely sweep our own - equally defining - civil war under the carpet.

But their obsession seems to be for so many of the wrong reasons: Naivety - the romance of Rhett Butler and crinolined Southern belles and a romantic lost cause. Unabashed racism - and the lie that slavery in  the antebellum South was some sort of benevolent paternalism. Or sheer ignorance of how history works -  individuals and groups may say they are doing something for a stated reason (states-rights or  crusading abolitionism ) - they may  genuinely believe they are acting for these reasons - but it still doesn't make it objectively true.

My favourite Southerner -  Steve Earle -  cuts through this nonsense in a couple of minutes in a song intro that puts many academic analyses to shame. As Steve says 'it never sees to amaze me - the pinko-shit you can sneak in to a bluegrass song':

Aspirational journeys

For a long while one of the main indices of social mobility was how many young people went to university from families where previous generations hadn't done so.  For many post-war working class grammar school kids it was probably the index of mobility.  

I've written before about my own experience of this and how social mobility isn't the same thing as social justice - by a long chalk. But it says something of a society that education - and at the very least a veneer of meritocracy -  is held up as  vehicle for mobility.  So the irony hasn't escaped me that in the same weeks as that  social ladder is being kicked away from a generation of school-leavers , we have the phenomenon of 'The Apprentice'.  It's a telling reflection of our times that brown-nosing, back-stabbing and bullshitting are now the preferred routes to 'betterment'.

This year and as in previous years, the winner was someone -  like Lord SirAlunSugar himself - who was self-made and had experienced a heart-warming 'journey' to get into the corporate world. I've got nothing against winner Stella English. I've been to Thamesmead a couple of times on anti-fascist activities - and can confirm that the estate she is from is every bit as desolate and downright scary as it is portrayed: Fair play to anyone who has managed to get out of it. 

But surely after all that  there are more worthwhile things to aspire to than a middle-management position at Sugar's IT-to-the-public-sector business Viglen Limited ? 

The Decembrist Revolt

Today I've again got a guest piece at 'On This Deity' to mark the Decembrist Revolt; In a senario that sounds horribly topical, the mutinous troops were 'kettled' in St Petersburg's Senate Square before the Czarist authorities let loose with (actual not water) cannons - and killed over a thousand people in less than an hour. The Daily Mail would have been proud.

Wrong priorities

An extraordinary - and rather obscene - juxtapostition in the media fall-out after the 9th December's fees protest:

Whilst it has been reported - although without any particular sense of burning outrage - that Alfie Meadows was truncheoned by the riot police and required brain surgery, focus is still on that incident when the royals found themselves in the middle of the protest and their car got a bit man-handled.

Never mind the outrageous revelation that police at Charing Cross Hospital tried to prevent Alfie from being treated and that he may well have died had it not been for the insistence of an ambulance paramedic. The Home Secretary has confirmed that in the royal incident  'contact' was made by a protester with the Duchess of Cornwall, and she may even - it is said in hushed tones - of been poked with a stick.

Resisting the temptation to crack funny about Camilla and barge-poles, I'm struck by this popular obsession with the sanctity of the royal personage. Touching a royal,  or in certain circumstances looking at one inappropriately, was once sufficient to warrant a death sentence (conversely a royal laying on of hands was thought to have healing powers). Not so long ago Aussie premier Paul Keating caused outrage when he put his arm around the queen. Maybe the divine right of kings is alive and well after all. 

There's  certainly an  obsession with the symbols of authority - notice the emphasis in recording how posh-boy protester Charlie Gilmour didn't just make a prat of himself - he actually swung on the union flag. 

Climbing on the cenotaph and re-decorating Churchill's statue are always going to be PR-home goals, but the real and  lasting damage and offence to society caused is nothing in comparison to what is being done by these cuts. And it's hard to believe that those who died in the war against Fascism ever envisaged that paramilitary police would be kicking shit out of their great grand-children right outside the 'mother of parliaments'.

Slackers at the taxpayers' expense

Here's another  typical layabout who  got pretty mediocre results as a student but still feels the world owes him a living.

With only 5 'O' Levels and a B and a C at 'A Level' - he still somehow managed to blag his way into Trinity College Cambridge. When he was there he didn't study anything socially-useful or practical  but chose a soft subject - Archaeology and Anthropology - with one  of the worst rates of graduate employment. Fortunately  he didn't fancy going  into teaching because his 2.2 degree wouldn't be considered a sufficient qualification in some circles nowadays. 

Still he has undeniable  'street-smarts'  - he's one of the only people who last year managed to increase his income to just under £20million whilst at the same time also reducing his tax bill by 10%.  

The not so strange death of the LibDems ?

Although of course they are 'all in it together', the LibDem end of the coalition has become the particular target for anger at the attacks on education for all. And rightly so - odious though the unashamed defenders of privilege in the Tory party may be -  there is something particularly fucking offensive about the smug sanctimony of the Liberals who wring their hands (rather than gleefully smiling) whilst  putting the boot in on the hopes and ambitions of a generation.

The personification of all that is offensive in the LidDems can be found in the MP for the constituency neighbouring my own -  Lynne Featherstone of Hornsey & Wood Green. 

Of all things, she was the previous LibDem spokesperson for Youth & Equality (!!!) and is now the ConDem Minister for Equality. A quick look at her blog will show how she sees no irony in now being part of a government who with  a single set of measures, will turn back the clock on social mobility and equality of opportunity to before 1976 when student grants were first introduced.

But hey it's not all doom and gloom: George Dangerfield's 'The Strange Death Of Liberal England' described how it took only four years (1910-14) for the previous incarnation of the Liberals to go from the party of government to terminal decline. This time round it might just take a single parliamentary vote to lose its base in the angst-ridden middle classes and misguided Labour protest voters ...

Secrets and lies

The whole WikiLeaks saga is unravelling like the plot of a lost Stig Larson novel. 

I'm not sure whether the diplomatic revelations expose sinister international conspiracies at the highest levels of the world's ruling class, or the petty bitchiness of overgrown-school boys with too much time on their hands. 

From what I have seen  I'm clear that there is an air if unreality about the whole business and very little to do with my life.  I'm reminded of  the Le Carre novels   - and their labyrinthine intrigues  of plots  and counter  plots - and the feeling that the world of diplomacy and epsisionage serves no more purpose other than just to keep going. A self-perpetuating game played in the final analysis for its own sake. 

Does the  diplomacy need to be secret? Within the narrow confines of the 'game' - then probably yes. But as soon as we start questioning whether the game is necessary at all or  if we are content to have a ruling class making decisions behind our backs then the answer has to be -  no. 

At the moment only the usual suspects on the Left and some eccentric right-wing libertarians have ralied to Julian  Assange's defence - Although he does seem to have pissed off all the right people;  from Sarah Plalin proclaiming some sort of fatwah, to the  US federal government banning employees from accessing Wikileaks... to the Colombian goverement telling students that they jeopradise their future job prospects if  they access the website.

Tellingly  though, these  diplomatic  revelations are supposedly just the tip of the iceburg and Assange is holding back dishing the dirt on international  big business until the shit really hits the fan. It speaks volumes that pissing of powerful national governements is one thing but taking on global capital is something else.

'Working from home' ?

The past couple of days I have chickened out  of riding my bike in the snow and have resigned myself to taking the tube to work. Today, looking at the surprisingly empty carriages, and now that I am in work at the half empty studio - I seem to be one of the few who hasn't succumbed to the bullshit of 'working from home'.

The concept of 'working from home' is a telling indicator of our times.

Firstly it shows quite  how far we have become ruled by the corporate culture of work and 'presentee-ism'. The snow is a freak occurrence for fuck's sake - many people can't get into work without ridiculous efforts - others are effectively cut off. But it is still not acceptable to say I'm staying in bed / watching daytime TV or DVDs of old black  and white movies / having a snowball fight / going sledging with the kids / drinking whisky hugging a radiator.  Instead there is the pretense of 'working from home'.

Which leads to the second point - the vast majority of  people with a 'proper job' simply can't work from home. If you actually make something or  provide some practical service you need a workplace to do it in - and usually other people to do it with. In the old days when most jobs were like this working from home would have been  unthinkable.

However if your job consists of gazing blankly into Excel spread sheets, preparing Powerpoint slides for meetings or writing a report of a meeting  you've been to - then working from home will suit you fine. And fucking good riddance too.

Everywhere I look - policing without consent

I seem to be in danger of turning into an 'all coppers are bastards' stuck record at the moment. I don't mean to give the impression that I'm vehemently anti-police - some of my best friends are coppers  - well come to think of it they aren't, nor are they ever likely to be -  but that's not the point.

It's just at the moment everywhere I look  I seem to see hordes of police intimidating - or actually attacking - legitimate protest. 

The latest was at the council meeting in Lewisham last night where anti-cuts protesters where met with riot police and a mounted charge. This came at the end of the same day when it was announced that the Met were disgracefully finally getting round to looking into possible 'misconduct' on the part of the TSG's PC Simon Harwood who attacked, and very probably killed  Ian Tomlinson last year. 

And today we see a repeat of the scenes from last week, in Whitehall (although the snow has ensured it is on a smaller scale)  -  as I write  mounted police are again charging students - many of them young school students.  

The Met have also  taken the opportunity today  to warn the parents of underage protesters (and most importantly I suspect potential protesters) that they should be aware of the dangers of protesting. In effect we are being told that we enter our own streets at our our own risks.

It's becoming a dangerous time to be a protester - but it's also becoming a dangerous time for authority. The state in this country has always rested on the idea of policing by consent - it's what gives the basis for our supposedly 'peculiarly english' tradition of shying away from political confrontation. Now, probably more so than at any point since the miner's strike of 84-5, that consent appear to be  being withdrawn.

Chip off the old block

I suppose it is every left-y parents' dread that their kids will rebel against them by becoming Young Conservatives, Born Again Christians - or doing a degree in Marketing.  

But when my daughter led the student walkout from her school yesterday, my feelings went way beyond relief. Not because she simply joined in the protests but because she used the full  force of her teenage smart-arsery (which we are usually on the receiving end of)  to challenge and  face down the authorities at her school.  We are all slightly nervous of what the repercussions of  this might be today - some teachers are taking a principled stand in supporting the students - but the spiteful wrath of humiliated authority cannot be underestimated.

Fingers crossed on that account. She  has already experienced the arbitrary and naked misuse of power when she, along with thousands of others were kettled by the police for eight hours on the coldest day of the year. I had given her some advice about how to handle being in a situation that like - but nothing in all my years of demos and protests has come close to that experience. It is a conscious tactic to intimidate protest. And I suspect to create situations - such as the unsurprising trashing of a police van conveniently 'left' in the middle of the kettle  - which will make good media stories to de-legitimize protest.

Someone I spoke to this morning told me that I was irresponsible to encourage my daughter (as if she needs any encouragement). I said that the day had more genuine educational value than any school trip to the Houses of Parliament to learn about our political system or so-called 'civics' lessons - and watching the manipulated news coverage is worth any amount of 'media studies'.

Here's to the future - there's still hope ...