Eurovision or Chucklevision?

 

When it comes to the UK in Europe there are two inevitable scenarios which loom like the Brandenburg Gate over reunification. One – that Tory leaders will meet their Waterloo over the EU and two – that ‘Team GB’ (whoever that may be) will languish at the bottom of the Eurovision voting board. Quelle horreur! Well, plus ca change, really.

Do we think Dave Cam can survive the political year? Can Bonnie actually bring back the trophy? Will they hook up for a duet ? ‘Believe In Me’ could have been written for Dave’s current situation… much better than his probably preferred ‘Heaven knows I’m miserable now’…

So Dave – here’s my advice to you – on Saturday night crack open the Chateau Lafitte, put your feet up and just accept your (and GB’s) destiny.

Nb: For us non-governing plebs who can afford to stage an Aldi rioja and cheesy Wotsits party in front of the telly on a Thursday night – check out the second instalment of the Eurovision semi-finals on BBC 3 tonight. Talking of which – well done for the uber-camp-but-sincere-and-intelligent-at-the-same-time pairing of Scott Mills and Ana Matronic. Go girl(s)!

 

 

Worth the Trek

Went to see the latest Star Trek film the other day. Hugely enjoyable. As with most action movies these days it gets the obligatory terrorist attack set piece out of the way pretty early on. And while it touches on the issues of US involvement in other lands – whether to be an observational, peace-keeping presence or a regime-changing force – it moves along at such a rattling good pace you don’t get enough time to pontificate on whether America really should be wherever doing whatever. Captain James T is still that big lug with a head – and possibly brain – the size of a planet, an audacious but flawed line in leadership and a preference for one-night stands with a variety of species (hmm… maybe he is meant to be America but let’s not go there..)

Spock, of course, provides the (un)emotional counterpoint to Kirk. But shock, horror it looks like he’s well on the way to letting the human override the Vulcan with the climactic scene of the film…well it was on the cards with him hooking up with Uhura, wasn’t it? So, as Spock starts to exhibit his emotional intelligence it’s left to brand new superbaddy Benedict Cumberbatch to rock the ice-cool detachment.

What’s particularly good though is there are no out and out villains (well maybe the Klingons but they don’t have enough screen time to present a back-story). The crazed-genius-scientist is driven by a desire to play the long-game to achieve inter-planetary peace. And Khan has been shaped by colonisation (it’s a nice twist that he’s played by a Brit but the yanks don’t have to worry about opening old colonial wounds with GB, do they?) But as I’ve said there’s no need to worry about political symbolism – just sit back and enjoy the big inter-connected, inter-racial, inter-species, roller-coaster ride. Oh, and Simon Pegg is brilliant, by the way – although he is more Glaswegian than the original Aberdonian Scotty. A case of ‘Ye cannae change the laws of genetics’?

Vive la meme chose!

How ironic that I chose to end my last post – all about hatred, intolerance and distrust of people ‘not like ourselves’ – with the French phrase: Vive la difference! Because what happened the very next day in the land – and in particular the city – of Jean Genet and where Oscar Wilde fled from homophobic persecution? Ridiculous scenes playing out with the worst examples of knuckle-dragging, drool-dribbling, Jurassic-Park-like creatures seen since – well – last week at Thatcher’s funeral… Protests about same-sex marriage? Get with it, guys! I know, I know the majority of French people are up to speed with such modern day concepts… but you have to do something about those dinosaurs… comprenez?

Who is the Enemy Within?

I suppose you can’t blame Boston residents taking to the streets to celebrate the capture of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev (the sense of relief that the culprits weren’t white supremacists/anti-govt patriots after all was palpable) what is less than edifying however are the triumphal chants of ‘USA! USA!’ Surely that’s what causes awful scenes of carnage in the first place – nationalism, partisanship, sectarianism – call it what you like, it’s all hatred and a case of ‘well, they started it…’ It doesn’t really matter what it’s done in the name of either, whether it’s national boundaries, ethnic determination, religion – ah yes, religion – that old excuse. Look what’s happening in Burma for example: Buddhism – the ultimate laissez faire religion of choice for those who don’t do guilt – advocating the burning of fellow human beings (Muslims in this case). Vile… especially when spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, can’t actually bring himself to utter a few words of condemnation… However I’m getting sidetracked again with the whole religion thing which I should know by now is just a fig-leaf for human greed, expansionism and subsequent retaliation.

So what’s the answer? As the song says: ‘Imagine no… etc’ or the gospel: ‘Turn the other cheek’ – well maybe when everyone’s had a couple bottles of wine and are in ‘I love you man’ mode, but I’m too much of a realist to believe that’s an option. I have an idea though – just when you start thinking in terms of ‘them’ and ‘us’, or national boundaries or that raising a flag might be a good idea – look at the people you share a country or a nationality with, even people in your own family, do you necessarily feel more connected to them than – say – someone you’ve been communicating with on the other side of the world? It ain’t necessarily so – because there are good people and there are dicks of every nationality and in every walk of life, and it would seem unlikely that all the good people are in your own backyard. That’s why I’m uneasy about the whole independent Scotland thing – at best, I refuse to believe that we can confine all our woes to one side of a land border and live in a Brigadoon-type idyll – and at worst, buy into a ‘them and us’ mentality. Vive la difference!

Back to the Eighties!

I was just saying the other day – before THAT story gripped the nation – how apathetic people had become. Gone were the days of public protest, demonstration, standing toe to toe on picket lines, nailing political colours to the mast – it seems that we’ve cosied down with our Sky packages and tablets (of both kinds). What do we have to be angry about? Then, suddenly we were all transported back to the eighties.

It’s strange because when I first heard the news and friends around me were whooping and breaking open the Barolo I felt quite detached from it all. After all it was the demise of an elderly woman who cut a rather pathetic figure towards the end. It wasn’t until all the retrospectives it all started coming back to me and I realised I had been living in denial. It was a bit like those people who are abused in childhood and then bury the experience deep within their psyche and it’s only later when encouraged to regress that they realise the full and lasting effect it has had on their lives. So – for me – this is how it goes: Thatcher was the wicked stepmother or governess who indelibly marked my upbringing but it was such a long time ago and other monsters in evangelist’s clothing have come and gone. Ah, yes – I mean you: Tony Blair. Surely he is a worse monster than Thatcher? He’s certainly responsible for more deaths. But then again, Thatcher beget Blair… (Keeping up the analogy – Blair is like the down-with-the-kids vicar who starts off with a bit of abuse and then goes on to napalm the whole village)

So, at the end of the day, with the countless words that have been – and will continue to be – offered up about the woman’s legacy, does it all matter? Of course! She transformed the UK but that’s not to say that it wouldn’t have changed without her. A lot has been made about the way she kicked the shambling old duffers of the old boy network up the arse but to replace them with (new) money obsessed barrow boys made good – was that really progress? And besides, what do we have today? Privileged rich boys masquerading as the barrow boys they desperately want to woo. Another ‘positive’ trundled out by her fans is that she paved the way for women in politics when in actual fact she has probably made it impossible for any woman to hold the office of British PM ever again, such is the – if not out and out hatred – deep rooted distrust. But then, she was a woman who didn’t seem to like other women – and didn’t seem to like great swathes of the population either… her legacy is all about ‘her’ and not about people ‘like her’.

So – as a working-class woman, a Scot, a European, citizen of the world, an environmentalist, an artist, someone with a conscience – can I think of anything positive to say about the whole Thatcher legacy thing? (I refrain from making comment about ‘Thatcher the woman’ or ‘Thatcher the person’ as I have no experience in that field, plus I find the ‘heart-warming’ tales of her personal kindness on a par with hearing Hitler was kind to his pet dogs). Yes! I think I have finally found something – the way that she has brought together sectors of the country to protest and proclaim – ‘Yes! There is such a thing as society and we haven’t forgotten. And you noncey boys who are no better than Thatcher in a suit – you can shut up your hypocritical traps too!’

There, that does feel a lot better! So however you feel about the whole thing – take something positive from it all – raise a glass, shout and scream – but don’t let it drag you down, don’t let it make you less of a person. We’ve had enough of that already.

Margaret Thatcher is dead.

Reblogged from Lone Head Records:

Just heard the news that Maggie Thatcher - the milk snatcher has died after having a stroke aged 87. While no one should be happy at what is sad news for her family - I know across the UK there will be celebrations taking place. The communities that suffered under the Thatcher Government will no doubt be raising a glass in honour of her passing.

Read more… 155 more words

Regarding the main news story of the moment - I can't put it any more eloquently than my friends at Lone Head Records have already done.

A Grand Day Out or National Shame?

What is it about this time of year when our thoughts on one hand are turning to green shoots, rebirth and celebration of life in general but on the other hand there is the inevitable bit of wanton cruelty and sacrificial killing. Don’t get me wrong, a bit of memento mori is always a good thing but not when this involves the goading or slaughter of some poor unfortunate animal. Now, as far as we in the UK were concerned this was always quite straightforward as it was always ‘those filthy foreigners’ who had a penchant for publicly torturing a donkey or pushing a goat off a tower. Oh yes, we Brits could sit back quite smugly and tut tut at the latest red-top headline presenting single cases of animal cruelty for our prurient pleasure whilst dismissing the whole area of fox-hunting and field sports as ‘something for the toffs’. But where would we Brits be without our staggering sense of hypocrisy?

Which brings me to the Grand National – the annual gore-fest masquerading as a cute and cuddly national treasure whereby ‘ordinary people’ are encouraged to have a flutter. Actually most people in this country have seen sense and have no interest in it, so it’s been left to the ‘I’m-worth-it’ brigade: women teetering on Jimmy Choo copies, with Asda fascinators, sipping prosecco; the blokes tanking up on over-priced lager and moronically betting on anything that moves. A little bit of the toffs’ lifestyle packaged up in digestible chunks for the working classes. Because that’s what it’s all about, eh? The ‘lifestyle’ as presented by the media.

But who would want to promote this tawdry and increasingly unpopular spectacle? Step forward Channel 4, giving themselves a break from showing programmes about diseased body parts with titles that would have been rejected by the Sunday Sport. My god, I didn’t think they could sink any further but they certainly have with their incessant and tasteless-in-extreme trailers for not only the event itself but a series of ‘specials’ that make the Carry On films look like Ibsen! And what glittering roster of talent do they have on these ‘special’ programmes? Well, it looks like a round-up of the current usual suspects hoping to showcase their latest book/TV show/contents of their handkerchief… Most bizarrely of those – or maybe not – is ‘vegetarian and Buddhist Russell Brand’. Hmmm… well it’s not for nothing that they say Buddhism is the perfect pick ‘n’ mix religion for showbiz folks… It’s like when they hastily erect a screen round the latest equine casualty and the focus shifts to another part of the ‘grand day out’ as a distraction – but do Channel 4 really think this shoddy piece of tinsel is enough to take our minds off a cruel event that if it played out on the streets of an Italian town would have our own tabloid hacks going into xenophobic overdrive instead of offering a free bet? Tell them to stuff it and support the anti-National petition or support Animal Aid in their campaign.

<script type=”text/javascript” src=”//dingo.care2.com/petitions/embed.js”></script><div grabbed=”1″ rssPath=”http://www.thepetitionsite.com/xml/petitions/115/135/965/feed.rss&#8221; adSize=”300×250″ publisherID=”1249″ flags=”#000000″ buttonColor=”#22489c”></div>

http://www.animalaid.org.uk/h/n/AA/HOME/

An existentialist’s take on Easter

It’s a funny thing, but even though I eschewed religion quite a few years ago there are some deep rooted feelings that still linger. Is it because these things were learned at an early age or is there something particularly potent about the whole Jesus story? All the elements: political agitator – a bit of an outsider, prefers the company of the dispossessed to the rich and powerful, kind, mystical, intense – dies a gory death, and then there’s the heartwarming and supernatural final twist. It’s a screenwriter’s dream and even if it isn’t ‘the greatest story ever told’ it’s pretty close! And even though I’m a bit of an old cynic and am still convinced that the miracles and the resurrection bits are too far-fetched – they are still clever and timeless dramatic symbols. I didn’t think that they had fluenced me that much but when I came across a short story that I had written for the start of 2000 I can see they definitely did. So, in tribute to a historical figure who – if nothing else, made martyrdom a powerful political tool that has been repeated down the ages, from Joan of Arc to Jan Palak to the many martyrs of the Arab Spring – here is my take on the Jesus tale. I know the setting is a bit unseasonal but then so is our current weather… hmmm – I wonder what JC’s take of global warming would have been? Anyway – take five/ten minutes out – turn your framed picture of Richard Dawkins to the wall – and enjoy!

Mhairi woke at 8.20 am 01.01.2000. Probably not that many others doing that at this time she thought, probably sleeping off the excesses of the night before. Well, in Britain of course and in Europe. It would be a lot later and a lot earlier elsewhere. Mhairi didn’t really want to start working out who would be doing what and where. She had her own problems just being able to get up out of bed.

The arthritis had hit her badly, triggered by the car accident ten years ago. She had been on her way to her first proper “do”, a New Year party as it happens. The road was icy and the driver in the other car was four times over the limit. Paul, Mhairi’s boyfriend and the one who was driving the car she was in didn’t make it. Death was instantaneous said the Coroner at the enquiry. Mhairi took some comfort at this along with the pink beaded dress, spattered with the blood of her lost love, she had kept – Jackie Kennedy fashion – in a box at the back of her wardrobe.

She often took the dress from it’s box to caress it and cry into it, the jagged little sequins and beads offering no comfort to her tear reddened face. Once or twice she had tried the dress on but she was horrified at the sight of herself in the mirror. Apart from her twisted limbs she had a deep scar down one side of her face. She remembered herself at eighteen, getting ready for that fateful night, how new and exciting everything seemed then. She also remembered how Paul had raised his arms to protect her face from the flying shards of glass and how she had held his lifeless bloodied hands in hers. Now she was left with her memories which were vague and getting more and more distant with time. Why should she look forward to a new year or millennium? She would rather go back than look to the future.

She sighed and got up from her bed. Without washing she pulled on some old clothes on top of the leggings and T-shirt she had been wearing in bed. Mhairi lived alone, her parents were distraught at first when she told them she wouldn’t stay with them after the accident but they came to respect her feelings. What really did hurt them was that she refused to spend the Millennium Eve with them.

Mhairi liked being alone and she found that her physical condition was a good excuse for not going out and socialising. She often went out walking under the main bridge on the High Street. A lot of homeless people slept there and she would talk to them, she found them honest and non-judgemental. “ Or perhaps they’re just so wasted they can’t even see straight and see what I look like,” she would laugh to herself. This particular morning there weren’t many people under the bridge. “ The local Council tidying them off the street in time for the Hogmanay bash, giving them shelter for a couple of nights at Christmas and New Year, big deal!”

Mhairi hurried along, dragging her foot as she went. It was icy cold and she wanted to get home. In her hurry she almost tripped over what she thought was a bundle of rags. “I’m sorry,” she stammered, reaching down to help. “It’s all right,” said a kindly voice. Mhairi looked down, the face she saw was both kind and strangely familiar. It was an unwashed face, as was the long matted hair, but a light seemed to shine from his eyes. A light which seemed to envelop her and warm her against the cold.

“I’m really sorry,” Mhairi repeated. “Please let me buy you a cup of tea.” Her words sounded almost flirtatious and she blushed at her own boldness. “I’d like that,” replied the stranger, rising from his crumpled heap without any discernible effort, “I know a little cafe nearby, it should be open, it’s always open.” And sure enough along by the train station there was a little greasy spoon open for business. A few people were dotted around, sitting at the Formica tables. People who worked no matter what day of the year it was. The young man went straight to the counter, got two teas and brought them back.

Mhairi felt slightly embarrassed that he should be spending money on her. But she said nothing. She felt that social niceties such as who should pay were made redundant, she felt totally at ease with the stranger, like friends who had known each other for years. And so she found herself telling him all about the accident, her solitary life, all her innermost feelings. She hadn’t talked so much in years and she marvelled at the sound of her own voice, speaking eloquently and incisively about how she felt. When she had finished speaking the stranger looked deep into her eyes, “I understand how you feel, but everything is not always as it appears.” He paused, “Would you like to come with me now and see what I mean?”

No sooner had Mhairi heard his words than they were standing on the doorstep of one of the grand Georgian houses in the city’s New Town. The door was answered by an elegantly dressed woman in her fifties who seemed genuinely pleased to see them both. Mhairi drew her scruffy overcoat tightly around herself . The older woman gently pulled Mhairi’s coat and it fell to the floor. The woman whispered “My dear, you look lovely” and steered Mhairi towards a full length hall mirror . She did indeed look lovely, her hair was washed and brushed framing her radiant face. Her scar was still there but it paled into insignificance against the luminosity of her eyes. Her limbs were still twisted but instead of being hidden under shapeless clothes they appeared in defiant beauty against her pink beaded dress which she was amazed to find herself wearing, in pristine condition.

Mhairi started to move around the large drawing room where a party was taking place. Everybody at the party was dressed in fine expensive looking clothes and they all seemed so beautiful even though everyone of them had a disfgurement of some kind. Scarred faces, lost limbs, pink blistered skin which had once been charred. They all moved so gracefully as they talked and laughed together. Mhairi had the feeling that she knew everyone there but was sure that she had never met them before. She was touched by their kindness as they asked her about herself. A lot of them complimented her on her dress and stared at the places where the blood stains should have been. She looked around for the stranger who had brought her to the party. He was sitting on the floor in the corner surrounded by a group of people who hung on his every word. Mhairi felt a pang of jealousy, quickly followed by an overwhelming feeling of pride. She watched as he spoke in hushed tones. Soon everyone drifted away and she was left alone with him.

“Come with me,” he whispered. He led her out onto a balcony which seemed extremely high up. “Look down there,” he said, directing her gaze to the street. It wasn’t the quiet , wide Georgian street which they had entered the party from. It was instead a narrow, teeming motorway with cars nose to tail inching along through a pall of heavy exhaust fumes. Some people were getting angry and shaking their fists at each other, although most sat in quiet resignation staring blankly through their fogged up windows. Mhairi switched her gaze from the cars to a large glass and chrome office block beyond. There too people stared out as if imprisoned. They were looking out for something, but what?

“These people, they’re not going very far, are they?” He pulled her around gently and looked deep into her eyes. She felt she had known him for a hundred years.

“Do you know who I am yet?”, he asked. “I think so,” and with that she started to cry. He quietened her by kissing her. “You’ll have to go soon, won’t you?”, she said. “Yes, but I’ll always be with you. You can keep a lock of my hair and wear it around your neck, or a scrap of material from your dress and sleep with it under your pillow. But you don’t need these things to remember me by, or to give you the power to go to places and to do things. Believe in yourself, that’s what you must remember.” She looked up at him, her face stained with tears, and asked: “And should I believe in you?” “If it helps,” he replied. She touched the rough scars on the palms of his hands and with that he was gone.

J’accuse! – The Joker and Monkey Man

Some old war criminals just don’t have the good grace to lie down, do they? Here we are on the 10^th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq and the main architect – Tony ‘The Joker’ Blair opens his trap to spout off about how to make the world a better place… presumably by bombing the hell out of it. On the face of it he’s talking about Syria but we all know Tony better than that. So it’s not long before he’s bringing it back to Iraq and asking – nay, demanding – vindication for his actions. Ah, Tony, you haven’t changed – have you? And while we may have had the tiniest, most miniscule, grain of sympathy if he actually appeared to show a similar measure of remorse… he never does – his war mongering rhetoric is still wrapped up in that disgusting evangelical zeal. Or maybe if it appeared that the ghosts of the murdered haunted him and made him wander Lady Macbeth-like, trying to scrub the blood from his hands – not a chance!. There he is, cool as you like – still talking in that way that seems to reprimand us for not sharing in his bloody vision.

I actually saw the other half of the ‘partnership of evil’ – George Bush Jnr – and what he’s doing these days – on a Channel 4 news report. Apparently he spends his days ambling along, doing charitable work in the community and taking on dog portrait commissions. You couldn’t make it up.

So where should old war criminals go if they’re lucky enough to escape the victors’ noose or bullet? Which is less distasteful – disappearing from the public eye and making like it never happened – or continuing to plug away, using every new conflict as some kind of redemptive comparison? Either way it still feels like salt being rubbed into the wounds. But while we shouldn’t forget Blair and Bush, today is the day for remembering the thousands who have died – and the many more scarred and wounded – because of what these two started.

Looking for Rachel… ?

Just to let you know about a great new blog dedicated to The Rachel Redemption – character descriptions, casting notes, reviews, excerpts from the book and coming soon… music and spoken word downloads. Wow!

http://therachelredemption.wordpress.com/