Showing posts with label Adele Reynolds. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Adele Reynolds. Show all posts
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Welcome back Adele
Just a quick post to note that Adele Reynolds is back in the blogosphere with her new blog, Adele's labour blog. I look forward to many an argument!
Friday, July 07, 2006
One year on
Inevitably there's one event dominating the blogosphere today. Amongst the many blogs discussing it are, in no particular order, Anorak, Keeping the tab on the tabloids, Slugger O'Toole, Dodgeblogium, An Englishman's Castle, Politics through the eyes of a teenager, Jo's Journal, Mars Hill, Kerron Cross - The Voice of The Delectable, Take back the voice, Paul Linford and Iain Dale.
My own memories of the day are mixed. The night before a friend had been crashing at my flat as he had been working too late to return home to Coventry. I think this was the first time I alerted him to existence and usefulness of the Gospel Oak to Barking Line which allowed him to travel from Holloway Road to Forest Gate (the stations are Upper Holloway and the misleadingly named Wanstead Park). Otherwise his route would have taken him via the Piccadilly through King's Cross and the Circle Line at Liverpool Street. The next morning he set off at about 08:20 and I got a bite to eat, then flicked on the television at about 09:00 to catch up with what was going on. Later I planned to go down to Mile End to do some work in the library.
It was around this time that reports were coming in of widespread problems across the tube due to "power surges". I thought to myself how lucky it was that I'd told Joe about the railway line, otherwise he might get caught in a tunnel (the GOBLIN mainly runs on viaducts above the street). I then went to tell my flatmate there were problems as, unusually, he had to go into central London that day en route to a course somewhere in Reigate and he might need to leave some extra time. Then I heard the television announce the problems were more serious and there had been explosions.
I sat down at my computer (next to the television) and opened up a mass MSN window with every single contact I had online. For the next few hours I just stayed in the flat, alternating between catching up on the television, making phonecalls to check friends were okay and sharing information online.
Maybe it's my degree, but I think I'd realised before the announcement that this was a terrorist attack. The "power surge" story just rang hollow - I couldn't understand why several explosions had occurred in very different parts of the network all at once. No this was clearly a co-ordinated attack by terrorists on London.
Much of the rest of the day passed in a blur. My flatmate and I set things up to use one phoneline for the internet and the other for phonecalls so we could keep in contact. I received a few "are you okay?" calls and sent out some emails. My flatmate had his course rescheduled because of the travel problems.
The thing that worried me the most was the number of people I knew who either worked in Bloomsbury or who could have been on one of the trains hit. Whilst the actual attack hadn't shocked me as I could remember the last IRA campaign all too well (at the time I was at school in the City and we regularly had bomb alarm drills), the possibility of those I knew being caught in them was concerning. Fortunately I was able to reach everyone eventually, but the difficulties of ringing to and from mobiles that day made many anxious.
It was one of those days when one felt London had pulled together. The emergency services were magnificent in their response and there was a real sense that all communities were united. What was saddening was to hear people like George Galloway being given airtime so they could dance on the victims' graves and use the event as an excuse to make their usual rants. Fortunately very few listened.
One year on I'm not sure much has changed. Maybe people are a little more cautious about abandoned packages and cases but has London stayed together? Current tensions and fears, especially both towards and amongst the Muslim community, enhanced by the notorious innocent shootings, have shown that the metropolis is still deeply divided and there are times when I think things are getting further apart. That would be to let the terrorists win.
My own memories of the day are mixed. The night before a friend had been crashing at my flat as he had been working too late to return home to Coventry. I think this was the first time I alerted him to existence and usefulness of the Gospel Oak to Barking Line which allowed him to travel from Holloway Road to Forest Gate (the stations are Upper Holloway and the misleadingly named Wanstead Park). Otherwise his route would have taken him via the Piccadilly through King's Cross and the Circle Line at Liverpool Street. The next morning he set off at about 08:20 and I got a bite to eat, then flicked on the television at about 09:00 to catch up with what was going on. Later I planned to go down to Mile End to do some work in the library.
It was around this time that reports were coming in of widespread problems across the tube due to "power surges". I thought to myself how lucky it was that I'd told Joe about the railway line, otherwise he might get caught in a tunnel (the GOBLIN mainly runs on viaducts above the street). I then went to tell my flatmate there were problems as, unusually, he had to go into central London that day en route to a course somewhere in Reigate and he might need to leave some extra time. Then I heard the television announce the problems were more serious and there had been explosions.
I sat down at my computer (next to the television) and opened up a mass MSN window with every single contact I had online. For the next few hours I just stayed in the flat, alternating between catching up on the television, making phonecalls to check friends were okay and sharing information online.
Maybe it's my degree, but I think I'd realised before the announcement that this was a terrorist attack. The "power surge" story just rang hollow - I couldn't understand why several explosions had occurred in very different parts of the network all at once. No this was clearly a co-ordinated attack by terrorists on London.
Much of the rest of the day passed in a blur. My flatmate and I set things up to use one phoneline for the internet and the other for phonecalls so we could keep in contact. I received a few "are you okay?" calls and sent out some emails. My flatmate had his course rescheduled because of the travel problems.
The thing that worried me the most was the number of people I knew who either worked in Bloomsbury or who could have been on one of the trains hit. Whilst the actual attack hadn't shocked me as I could remember the last IRA campaign all too well (at the time I was at school in the City and we regularly had bomb alarm drills), the possibility of those I knew being caught in them was concerning. Fortunately I was able to reach everyone eventually, but the difficulties of ringing to and from mobiles that day made many anxious.
It was one of those days when one felt London had pulled together. The emergency services were magnificent in their response and there was a real sense that all communities were united. What was saddening was to hear people like George Galloway being given airtime so they could dance on the victims' graves and use the event as an excuse to make their usual rants. Fortunately very few listened.
One year on I'm not sure much has changed. Maybe people are a little more cautious about abandoned packages and cases but has London stayed together? Current tensions and fears, especially both towards and amongst the Muslim community, enhanced by the notorious innocent shootings, have shown that the metropolis is still deeply divided and there are times when I think things are getting further apart. That would be to let the terrorists win.
Monday, April 17, 2006
The rise of the British National Party
Adele is rejoicing that in some areas the British National Party is in electoral decline but today a report suggests one in four voters say they "might vote" for the party. It's also shocking to remember that the BNP came very close to getting elected to the Greater London Assembly in 2004 - had it not been for the rule requiring parties to get at least 5% of the vote (and as it was they were only about six thousand votes short of crossing that threhold) they would have received one top-up list member. It was the only time that the fruitcake has done the world any good.
All the main parties have tried to expose the dangers of voting BNP but I'm increasingly of the view that the standing methods are a flawed strategy. At the moment the standing of politics, especially "establishment" political parties, is incredibly low and these attacks just play into the BNP's claims to be an anti-establishment party with a message the political classes don't want to hear. Some believe that the BNP should be "starved of the oxygen of publicity" and that "No Platform" policies should be erected. I used to be inclined towards such a course but now I feel that all this does is to play into the BNP's hands by allowing them to portray themselves as martyrs. It would be much better to confront the BNP output head on and expose it as nothing more than incoherent hate driven lies. Many BNP activists and candidates have criminal convictions and few are able to express themselves coherently. Rather than throwing them a golden opportunity by pushing them to the margins where they can seek the support of those alienated from politics, it would be better to take them on directly.
Furthermore the mainstream parties need to do a lot more to tackle the issues that the BNP thrive on. And this is far from just issues relating to immigration, asylum and a multi-cultural society. Whether it's corruption in politics, a failure to maintain the streets, rising crime and so forth, the mainstream parties need to both have answers and take them directly to the people. It's in no way as easy as this paragraph may seem, but only by tackling and removing these sources of tinder will the BNP flames be extinguished. Also political parties and activists need to stop devaluing terms. Both "racist" and "extreme right wing" are bandied around for not only the BNP but other parties as well, to the point that they lose all value when trying to get a message across. (It's also a rather dubious claim - many of their policies are heavily statist.)
Rather than just creating yet further divides between the concerns of the people and politicians, pushing yet more towards a party of self-proclaimed "anti-politicians", let's stop dividing the nation and instead unite it. The disease in our politics is not the BNP's successes. It is the circumstances that lead to the BNP's successes.
All the main parties have tried to expose the dangers of voting BNP but I'm increasingly of the view that the standing methods are a flawed strategy. At the moment the standing of politics, especially "establishment" political parties, is incredibly low and these attacks just play into the BNP's claims to be an anti-establishment party with a message the political classes don't want to hear. Some believe that the BNP should be "starved of the oxygen of publicity" and that "No Platform" policies should be erected. I used to be inclined towards such a course but now I feel that all this does is to play into the BNP's hands by allowing them to portray themselves as martyrs. It would be much better to confront the BNP output head on and expose it as nothing more than incoherent hate driven lies. Many BNP activists and candidates have criminal convictions and few are able to express themselves coherently. Rather than throwing them a golden opportunity by pushing them to the margins where they can seek the support of those alienated from politics, it would be better to take them on directly.
Furthermore the mainstream parties need to do a lot more to tackle the issues that the BNP thrive on. And this is far from just issues relating to immigration, asylum and a multi-cultural society. Whether it's corruption in politics, a failure to maintain the streets, rising crime and so forth, the mainstream parties need to both have answers and take them directly to the people. It's in no way as easy as this paragraph may seem, but only by tackling and removing these sources of tinder will the BNP flames be extinguished. Also political parties and activists need to stop devaluing terms. Both "racist" and "extreme right wing" are bandied around for not only the BNP but other parties as well, to the point that they lose all value when trying to get a message across. (It's also a rather dubious claim - many of their policies are heavily statist.)
Rather than just creating yet further divides between the concerns of the people and politicians, pushing yet more towards a party of self-proclaimed "anti-politicians", let's stop dividing the nation and instead unite it. The disease in our politics is not the BNP's successes. It is the circumstances that lead to the BNP's successes.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
LinkWithin
