Tag: police

Can’t Pay, Won’t Pay

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If there’s one thing I’m good at it’s being distracted from the current book I’m reading with another. I envy these fast readers who can sit down and complete a book in a few days. I’m more of a few weeks to a few months depending on the distractions around me type of person. There’s one book I’ve been reading for nearly a year now, I really enjoy reading it too so it’s not as simple as it may seem at first. I wonder if I’m a victim of how we process entertainment these days. I’m not sure I like calling myself a victim but more I’ve allowed myself to get caught up in the culture of short bitesize moments of pleasure.

I love a website called Aeon – which I’ve written a piece on here about before – that has some incredibly interesting articles. They’re not always a light read, not difficult but sometimes they require more effort than something on a website devoted to football. The articles on there are usually about three to four thousand words and despite knowing they’re interesting and that I can learn from them; a combination of the effort involved in the length and with the mental effort required slightly above minimum, I’ll not always bother. I prefer fiction books to non-fiction even if the topic in the non-fiction is potentially really interesting. Partly this is because I genuinely enjoy stories and the way meaning and message can evolve in this style.

The more I write about this I suspect I’m just lazy and ill disciplined. Aeon requires a bit more effort than football news and non-fiction potentially more than a story to follow and get into. I am leaping from one extreme to the other though, this is never a black and white argument unless I generalise which I seem to have been doing. This piece today was going to be another review and as seems to be a bit of a trend it was going to be a play. Dario Fo‘s Can’t Pay, Won’t Pay to be precise. I’ve mentioned Dario Fo in a previous review of one of his plays, Accidental Death Of An Anarchist. He wrote political and social plays on the whole and this is a large part of what has drawn me to him. Take into consideration everything I have mentioned and you can see what leads me to a play. Something that’ll take me one to two hours to read followed by that rosy sense of accomplishment.

Can’t Pay, Won’t Pay is the story of two couples caught up in different situations in which people push the boundaries of stealing. The prices in the supermarket increase once more so the women riot and take what they want, only paying a minimum compensation to the shop. “I paid half price for half my goods”. While the husbands get caught up in similar as the canteen at work increases the prices and the workers simply serve themselves. Unlike the wives though the husbands take a stance against this seeing it as stealing. What ensues is a comedy involving fake pregnancies, avoiding the law and hypocrisy, all as Fo dissects the moral arguments behind whether there can be such a thing as justifiable theft.

The varying levels of hidden meaning in stories is what draws me to fiction. We can analyse what the playwright or the author intended with certain bits. I may not have appreciated it much at school but it is something I certainly enjoy now. For example, despite not having the most flamboyant of styles, I enjoy Sartre’s fiction far more than his non-fiction, even though they’re both variants of his philosophical discourse. Maybe lazy and ill disciplined is in itself a lazy understanding of something which as I’ve already mentioned is not a black and white issue. Interpretation for me is everything, and can’t pay won’t pay, I suspect I know what I would do.

The Rabbit Hole

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It appears our police tried a George Floyd. After embracing the Yanks and rejecting Huawei we’ve gone all out and taken the knee. Unfortunately that’s no joke as it involved another man’s neck. To add further insult said man was black. I have experienced the British police, not on a regular basis, but I have, and certainly in no way people from poorer communities, be those black or white, have. They’ve been both friendly and truncheon friendly. I won’t defend them. Having been in foreign lands I’ve also experienced foreign police from numerous cultures and I will hold my hands up, the Brits are not the worst. They are not the best, whatever that is, but there are worse out there.

I’m not sure what I make of this kneeing incident. With everything going on this must be possibly the worst moment to do something like that. I wonder what he was thinking, was he conscious of the action or not. The man was handcuffed and restrained, only the policeman will really know whether he felt scared enough to feel it was warranted. And how often do police officers in this country feel it is a necessary action. I genuinely don’t know. How often do security guards or bouncers outside pubs do similar. What I don’t like about this, apart from the obvious, is how we now go about responding to it as a society.

Protests and riots in America were necessary after George Floyd. There was an outpouring of anger and grief. It was the only way anyone in power would listen and anything would happen. Long term let’s see if it all just get’s forgotten about but in the short it shook society to the core. I imagine there will be protests here, how big I don’t know. He didn’t die thankfully otherwise it would have kicked off already. Maybe it has. The police have already chosen their approach by seemingly condemning the act with the Deputy Met Police commissioner describing it as ‘disturbing’ while reiterating of course that it’s not standard police practice or part of training. There are a lot of things they do that aren’t trained, that doesn’t mean they don’t do them regularly.

But then there was a quote on the BBC by a witness; “I was worried he was going to get executed. That’s just how George Floyd got killed”. If the media could come up with a better quote it would win awards. He wasn’t being executed. Words like that are serious, people get executed by police every day around the world. This was not that and to throw something like that out is not only irresponsible, it’s sensationalist and stupid. It’s also how we appear to react to anything in this day and age of outrage. That’s not one spectrum or another, it’s seemingly everyone. I just hope this is debated seriously and we can have conversations which actually lead to something other than a carpet and a brush. I don’t trust the media not to go wild and sex it up for ratings but I just hope we can ignore that long enough to not use it as some kind of societal endorphin hit. I don’t know how much faith I have in this. We appear too far down the rabbit hole already.

Let’s Dance

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Today got a little tetchy then. It seems like the far-right turned out to defend memorials, fight and prove something. I thought it might kick off this weekend, admittedly it’s still only Saturday so plenty of time, but I never thought right wing knuckle draggers would be the ones to do it. I’m quite pleased they did actually because it only makes them look bad and strengthens the moral arguments of the Black Lives Matter movement as well as other anti-racist groups. These people have gone out onto the street to defend memorials, got drunk and kicked off. I don’t know if they planned on kicking off in advance, there is talk of it being discussed on message boards, or if the alcohol took over. I have to be careful here though because there have been times I’ve defended violence from anti racists and anti fascists, and while I see a difference it’s possible that difference only exists in my mind because of the prism I like to view the world through. I’m sure there will be elements of the media who will try to portray it as such but is it the same.

I have mentioned that you risk losing the moral high ground when you commit violence in certain situations. This doesn’t necessarily mean I think anarchists throwing petrol bombs at riot police is morally wrong but certainly it can be spun that way by the media and lead the average person to see it as wrong. Yet I don’t condone these thugs behaving as they did today. I guess we need to try and understand why they were really there and what their aim was. I know why anarchists do it but I’m not quite sure why groups like Britain First and The English Defence League do, or why they really do. They suggest they are defending British or English culture but in reality I don’t know what that means beyond white protestants, which is not the entirety of British culture. If the anarchists intention is ultimately to liberate people these people are about subjugating them. How can you argue that with any moral validity. There were apparently a few Nazi salutes done when defending the Churchill statue which suggests they miss the point and have no actual idea who Churchill was and why he is revered. Football firms apparently came together and clashed with police which would suggest the intention was violence. I just don’t get what they were trying to achieve and I’m trying not to be a patronising arsehole who thinks he’s better than others but I suspect I’m also overthinking their thinking.

There has been a lot said about these protests being born in the perfect moment as everyone looks for something to do after being confined for so long. I don’t doubt there is sincerity behind these anti-racist protests but it’s possible there is such interest and energy because of what has happened over these last three months. Why would it not be exactly the same with the far-right. They feel they have an excuse to be outraged and they’re being outraged in the only way they know how. Perhaps that is why they behaved as they did, they don’t know any other way. If violence has solved everything before why would you try a different approach. But maybe I’m overthinking all of this, maybe I’m giving them too much credit.

Perhaps they’re just angry, ignorant and bored, add alcohol to the mix and it’s the perfect storm. But that could be underestimating them and that’s very risky. So no answers then. Not unless I’m willing to suggest they have an argument based on anything credible. If an idea is so flawed it’s impossible to debate constructively with; then it’s not an argument and their actions are not based upon anything defensible. They become the indefensible. Well it was hardly going to turn out any other way here let’s be honest.

Strange Times

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We’re living in strange times. It’s Thursday today if anyones curious I discovered this earlier, I lost a day, somehow it isn’t Wednesday. Isn’t it great when we realise how little the structure of the week matters and how it isn’t actually real. Once Sunday needed to exist so we could all go to church and pretend we liked God, or use Sunday to rest from the drudgery of our failed work life balance. If God can rest then so can you. Then it appeared God developed a drinking habit because we all started needing it for enduring hangovers.

Some disgusting and healthy members of society of course love posing for photos with their dogs on hills but thankfully these freaks seem to keep to themselves whenever possible. Especially now the Police drones are after them, not to mention those machines they use to film them from the air. Now well, who knows, currently Sunday doesn’t really exist unless we take Don’t Call The Midwife or Dr Who seriously and I have no idea whether they’re even on anymore. I doubt anyone does now that we have tigers and murderers online. These days it’s anything and everything whenever we feel in the mood, porn at the drop of a hat.

And no football of course. Clubs, organisations and fans all trying to juggle the moral dilemma of how they can get the entertainment they want even though it will be like a shit training match in an empty stadium. One which must be shown as nobody wants to repay the billion pounds the sports channels pay to prop up the footballers lifestyles. Don’t forget social distancing. Two metres at all times. Gives a new meaning to contact sport.

Seventy-one year Prince Charles has recovered in a few days from his bout of the virus. It appears that while healthy twenty year old are keeling over, the old reptilian blood is still pumping. If madness, syphilis and inbreeding doesn’t take them down, you bet a little cough won’t even register. Doesn’t say much for his relationship with his wife Camilla though if she didn’t test positive. That or it doesn’t say much for this virus. I still fully admit to being completely confused by everything that is going on.

I have a healthy instinct to not trust the actions of my government or the bellowing of the media but people are dying. I don’t know how old they are because unless you’re young they don’t seem to report or give any kind of average age. For perspective people are still dying more from alcohol related illnesses each day but they insist the bottle shops are ‘essential’ and even more again are dying from smoking related illnesses but this is still highly legal. Let’s not even start on suicides, and don’t even dare mention the probable increase in suicides when people realise they have no future now that their businesses won’t stay open and they can’t feed their kids on £94 per week let alone pay off their toilet roll debts. But then the figures would be much worse if we didn’t have a lockdown and it has most likely stemmed the spread of the virus to a degree. I just don’t know anything. Everything is unknown right now. What an interesting moment in our evolutionary existence.

It is good to see the government admit after ten years of saying cuts are the only solution to saving the economy and society that no actually spending billions we don’t have apparently is instead. And don’t forget to clap your local nurse who you actively voted against by voting in this shower of incompetent, corrupt and dithering shite last December. Yes you fuckwit, you’re a hypocrite and you’re stupid. But anyway as I said strange times.

With Crisis Comes Change

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And just like that the attacks have begun. The government has been accused of all things recently, ‘inept‘ being an unfortunately common one when it refers to their response to a pandemic. Generous certainly isn’t one despite their attempts at passing off a £330 billion pledge to businesses and small businesses as some kind of benevolent offering to their subjects. The fact people are going to have to pay it back, and at a higher rate in line with inflation, suggests they vary considerably to the charitable offering made when the banks were bailed out during the last recession. We’re all in this together apparently but don’t forget nothing is for free, unless you’re part of the international banking cartel or have friends in high places.

But back to the attacks which I managed to digress from almost immediately after raising their existence. There has been a lot of talk about governments using current events to push through legislation they would have previously been unable to. Milton Friedman, the father of Neoliberal free-market economics, and the man therefore responsible for this shit show of a world economy, suggested it was. “Only a crisis – actual or perceived – produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around”. It appears some of these ideas that have been waiting around are being given their moment to be pushed through. In the US Trump has been suggesting payroll tax cuts which will destroy social security. In Israel proposals have been pushed through to monitor peoples phone much more easily using legislation usually reserved for post terrorist attack hysteria.

And now in the UK the government are attempting to push through the Civil Contingencies bill which will give police and immigration officers more powers to detain suspected carriers of the virus “to take them to a suitable place to enable screening and assessment” for an as yet unspecified amount of time. If someone is clearly ill and a danger to those around then it is fair for them to be taken somewhere they can get help and prevent them from harming others but this bill is dangerously ambiguous. Throw in the rather alarming length of two years that it will be in law, considering very worst case scenarios for this virus stand at eighteen months, and considering it could simply be put up for renewal each month as it’s required and the cocking of your head starts to feel justified.

This bill like everything currently in Parliament is being pushed through without debate and without being voted on. In times of crisis we need to strengthen democracy not weaken it, and certainly not use it as an opportunity to empower and enrich those already holding a disproportionate amount of power and wealth. It may be worth keeping an eye on what isn’t reported or perhaps what is whispered between the hysterical shouting. You may just start to spot a few new ideas that look as if they’ve suspiciously had a layer of dust blown off them. There’s nothing like a little crisis for some change after all.

A Three Point Piece

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I suspect I’m going to attempt to talk about too many things in this piece, three to be precise, but I’ll try anyway. I should probably stop wasting words telling you this though. To start with I feel it necessary to be critical of yesterdays piece. My issue is that there seems to be a certain immaturity to how I write about politics, and most likely when I talk about it too. This is evidenced I feel by an excessive amount of rhetoric and the danger with this is that not only is it, in my eyes at least, a sign of immaturity but is also a sign of a bad argument, a lack of understand an argument suitably in depth and also perhaps a sign of being a bit of an idiot. I hope I’m not an idiot but I know theres a good chance I would accuse others of such things were they to write in such a manner. Ultimately I’m not happy with it. I could have written it better, made better points and made them in a more evolved way. The problem with not publishing these yet is that I am unable to get your (constructive) feedback, but if anyone ever reads back on these I would love to know what you have to think.

The second thing and third actually were inspired by my avoiding writing this and procrastinating on facebook. Greece is burning again and having lived there for three years, give or take, on and off, I feel a connection to it and a sadness at the continuing trauma that is the Greek tragedy. I may have lived in Exarchia, the anarchist run neighbourhood in the centre of Athens, but it truth I never really integrated and always lived fairly anonymously within it. The new right-wing government has seemingly followed through on it’s threats and has spent the last six months closing down squats. Tonight is the eleventh anniversary of the murder of a 15 year old boy by a police officer, who was coincidentally let out of prison a couple of months back, so expect the streets to be a war zone once more. I love Greece but it’s run by dangerous morons, who are elected by scared morons. Nations seem to repeat events and behaviours throughout their history, Greeks have spent the last hundred years killing and suppressing each other. I said Greek tragedy, but perhaps it’s more of a black comedy. Just not for any of those involved.

And finally, a meme I quite like and thought worth mentioning. Quote ‘The deer isn’t crossing the road, the road is crossing the forest’. It is all about perspective and until we change our perspectives on how we view each other, the world around us and the natural world we are a part of we are going to continue missing the point. Missing the point of our own existence and dragging down the remnants of the harmony that we not only stopped seeing but refuse to see and seemingly have lost the ability to even comprehend anymore or ever again.

That is all.