Sky, fields ...and carrots.

A little flag update. I found out this morning that the flag of the Romani people is very similar to the one I knocked up a few weeks back. In fact, in its original bi-colour form it's almost identical except for the specific shade of colours used. It even takes its inspiration for those colours from the same basic concept of earth and sky.

(The commonly used Romani flag,

with the red cartwheel or chakra)

(In its apparent original form

 - Wikipedia)

The flag consists of a background of blue and green, representing the heavens and earth, respectively - Wikipedia

(The one I'd came up with to

represent the Earth)

I now feel like I'm tapping into some kind of eternal zeitgeist :)

Apparently it's Gypsy Roma Traveller History month - I saw the flag this morning thanks to a post on Twitter. It's obviously quite fitting that a flag representing the Earth would be used to represent people that travel across it. So it's all quite neat. Reading further about it on Wikipedia I discovered that it's been associated with open borders in the past. Again, this makes sense with gypsies being a travelling people. Though often of course thinkers and intellectuals will take these folk meanings and attach a wider political vision to them (as I'm doing now I guess :p).

The charter adopted then suggested that green stood for "land covered in vegetation" and a "world without borders", with blue as a stand-in for "cosmos and liberty".

I might have shuddered at the communist undertones of such a statement just a few weeks ago, but I'm trying now to be less partial when looking at the overall picture. I want to marry the ideals from all sides, from left and right, into something that's good for everyone. Communists and other people I disagree with on issues generally want what's best for humanity, even if their methods are a bit meh. I need to keep reminding myself of that.

Obviously if another statue gets pulled down or something in the next few days I'll no doubt have another whinge xD - we're all somewhere on the political spectrum in regard individual events and issues. So I think it's good to speak your mind too and not just completely sit on the fence, attempting to be polite and impartial. It's just balancing the carrot with the stick 😅

Living Space Addenda

Just a few little addenda to that last post. I'll be super quick.

Firstly, living space in someways can be seen as analogous to, or an extension of, personal space. Something we intuitively respect in regard other people. So that's a good avenue to go along when arguing in favour of it.

Secondly, the 'government' taking land or space and just giving it to people gratis sounds a little bit in the realms of communism. Or land re-distribution. (In fact, I guess you could say I'm trying to marry the ideals of communism with the ideals of property ownership here - an individual rights based communism in a sense xD). However, although it sounds very leftist in tone, the concept of living space rights would actually enshrine property rights further. Your home would be deemed unassailable.

Also, it would in a sense create a distinction between a person's primary residence and their further properties. Though people would be entitled to own land and property just as they do now, their primary residence - where they actually live - would be considered sacrosanct. Of course, in today's world we have things such as compulsory purchase where states can forcibly reclaim property from the individual as it's deemed in the greater public interest. Normally in fair societies a distinction would be made between say an abandoned property and a lived-in property anyway, but theoretically there's no limit. With living space rights someone's primary residence would be completely untouchable.

Another thing worth mentioning is that such a project wouldn't require that much land/space anyway. As the 'basic', freely given (or cheaply sold) homes would be very small. Plus there is also plenty of publicly-owned land available already, so such a scheme would in no way require any sort of land redistribution that would impact the individual directly.

Finally, given I'm arguing for a basic, specified minimum amount of living space an individual has a right to, I wonder if there could also be a maximum size. (I'm beginning to sound very communist here aren't I xD). There perhaps could be some type of calculated ratio that takes into account the overall amount of land and the overall population.

The total amount of land - (the population x the minimum sq metres of space per individual) = the maximum land that could be owned by any one individual

??

Perhaps you could begin by first of all removing an ascribed proportion of the total land for public space, national parks, etc.

Let's say half.

The total amount of land/divided by 2 - (the population x the minimum sq metres of space per individual) = the maximum land owned by any one individual

In reality that maximum amount would be owned by lots of individuals combined of course.

//////////////////

And finally, finally. I may start calling this concept Universal Basic Space. What with it being similar in theme to Universal Basic Income.

Living Space: the Ideal and the Practical

So, housing. This follows on neatly, and naturally, from the blog post where I stated you can't grow an orange on a laptop.

Once again the focus is space. This time living space. Now I've argued before online that everyone should be entitled to at least some living space, and that this should essentially be considered a birthright. By this I mean that everyone should be entitled to some space that belongs to them.

Of course, normally we refer to these 'living spaces' as homes - as in a property or a building. However, by thinking in terms of space it really helps to elucidate how unnatural our attitude to housing is. If you're fortunate enough to own your own home then great - you have your own space. However, if you don't, or are still in the process of paying for your home, then you're in a very unnatural situation.

You're essentially paying to have somewhere to exist.

A space to sleep at night. Somewhere to breathe in and out. Paying every week or month to simply have somewhere to be. It's like living in a hotel room, but we just accept it as normal. Animals don't have this problem. They're not paying another animal to be where they are. To be in the lake or up in the tree. They just find a spot and build their nest or whatever it is they do.

Their primary focus is spent on finding food and raising their young. Whereas our primary focus is to pay the rent. In order to then have the very space in which to do those things in. This is why humans are in a constant state of anxiety, because they're constantly worried that next week they may not have a space (a home) to exist in. This is why we can never just relax and live in the moment, at one with nature. We can never just be.

..and it's not just that we have to pay for the space we exist in. We pay a lot of money for it. For most people the rent or mortgage will take up a huge chunk of their income. They work long hours to pay for the space they sleep in when they're not working. It's insane when you really think about it.

Living Space: the Ideal and the Practical

Anyway, I've been thinking about how we could fix this situation. I have a loosely fleshed out ideal - a Utopian vision I guess you could say. Then also a more practical, halfway house solution. I'll begin with the ideal.

Ideally I would create a world where everyone was simply given a bit of space when they reach maturity. Theirs to own. To possess, i.e. somewhere to live where they need not pay rent or mortgage to anyone. ("What? you can't just give people a house!" I hear you say. Well, I am :) ..and if you really don't like this idea then don't worry, there's the more 'practical' plan coming up next, which isn't quite as heady and radical).

So how much space should someone get? What's the baseline?

I'm not too sure about the exact amount of space, but obviously it would be small. Enough to cover the basics. I wouldn't like to put a square metre figure on it, but basically a bathroom, bedroom, living room, kitchen type amount of space. A one person apartment essentially. Though you could theoretically quantify it by the metre if you wanted to get really technical.

I would then have a few rules.

1) Only someone who doesn't already own a property would be entitled to one.
2) They would have to be sold (or simply relinquished) when or if the owner buys another property.

..and I'm including the second rule here just in case it's needed, as I would imagine that under such a system it would be largely redundant anyway. Because..

a) Someone buying a larger property would naturally want to sell their little 'basic' home to help fund that purchase

and..

b) There wouldn't be much value in holding on to it as in a world where everyone already has a rent-free basic home there would be few people wanting to rent such a place. (Though there would perhaps be some market for people wanting to rent a second home, etc).

2 become 1

Another attractive thing about this scheme is that if two single people get together between the two of them they will effectively have a 'two bedroom' place. A small family home. Perhaps there could even be a way where such people could trade or swap their separate 'basic' apartments so they could get two that were next to each other or attached.

In a place with an extra bedroom you can raise one or two children. If you can afford to buy a larger home then you can have more children, but if not you would be limited by your basic means.

(Obviously I'm idealistically assuming that people would be responsible and live within their means here. So it's a little fanciful, but nevertheless I think most people would deem such a situation quite fair. Plus, after all, in modern societies people tend to have fewer children anyway. So it would suit people fairly nicely.)

the Orange Economy

This housing situation would also work in tandem with the idea of giving people access to creative space, as in the orange on a laptop article - i.e. space as an economic resource.

People would be entitled to a basic living space to live in, and likewise access to a certain amount of public space to create in. Grow food, etc. Like an allotment, or studio.

Make it happen..

Obviously this is all quite an ambitious plan. The state doling out homes to people fee, rent and mortgage free is a big ask. There are also no doubt numerous holes that can be instantly picked in this idea by anyone caring to read thus far. However, if it could be made to work it would surely beat living in a world where ninety-nine percent of people spend their lives struggling to pay for the bit of space they lie down in at night. So we owe it to ourselves and others to at least try to envision and enact something better.

It would be interesting to trial something like this in a small city or country. Get the government to build enough tiny 'basic' homes for an up and coming generation of people - say everyone who turns 21 in 2030 - then see what happens. See if it works. (I'm saying 21, but I think 25 or 30 would probably be a more suitable age to begin such a scheme, as younger people would just party in these places if the opportunity fell to them xD). It would be super-difficult to insulate such a trial from the wider world of course, but it could be done perhaps in the same way that Universal Basic Income trials are done.

If we can give people free money, why can't we try giving people free space?

The More Practical, Halfway House Solution

The more practical solution I promised I would share is pretty much the same as the above ..but this time the homes (or the spaces) are not free. They're just super cheap.

In fact, this is what I would do now were I in government. I would mass build lots of these basic homes or apartments. Massively subsidise the endeavour, and then sell them very cheaply. With the stipulation being that only people who aren't already home owners can get the discount.

When I say super cheap I mean basically the price of a car - i.e. the amount of money an average person can easily save in a year. So in this regard, even though the space would not be a free birthright, it would at least be affordable, and wouldn't require a lifetime of payment and toil. Once the process was started it would then create a conveyor belt effect, moving more and more people onto the property ladder.

Given an increasing number of people are on welfare of some sort these days it would also make sense for governments in the long run. As at the moment they're often the ones paying the rent or housing benefit anyway. If everyone has a rent-free bit of space then there is no rent to pay. So the burden would diminish and eventually disappear.

Likewise, once the initial 'basic' housing stock is built up to sufficient levels the need to build more diminishes. As noted earlier, if an owner of one of these properties then chooses to buy a nicer or larger home they can then sell the basic property on. In this halfway, practical situation they can sell it on to another person, or they can sell it back to the government.

In the 'ideal' scenario, where everyone is already guaranteed one of these rent-free homes, the government would simply buy it back, and at a nice cheap price because there would be little wider demand. It would then be ready to be doled out to the next generation.

So space, but not as we know it.

The Ballitical Sphere?

Hhh..well, I've just finished watching the return of the Premier League, and yes, it was very heavily politicised. With both the Corona narrative and the Black Lives Matter agenda pushed front and centre. It was actually very difficult to watch for the first 60 minutes or so. It really annoyed me lol. I almost turned it off in fact. The combination of the politics and the empty stadiums making me really lament what they've done to football. Our beautiful game.

It annoyed the hell out of me. Of course, once we got into the actual games it wasn't so bad (..especially as my fantasy team did quite well). I was also slightly comforted by the fact that there seemed to be a bit of a backlash against this politicisation of football on social media. Though there was also the usual large number of brainwashed sheep, fluffing up the sentimentality and chastising anyone complaining as 'gammon' or 'right wing'. I even ended up getting blocked by someone after I pointed out the hypocrisy of people using the term gammon - a term based on skin colour - in order to argue for racial equality.

[On a side note it always amuses me when I get blocked 😅 I think it's such a strange thing for someone to do. Don't get me wrong, I can totally understand it if someone is getting repeatedly harassed or something like that, but just blocking someone for disagreeing with you. It seems so babyish. I really can't imagine ever having the urge to do it.

It does seem a very common thing online though these days. So perhaps it's just me that doesn't block people. I always get a cheap laugh when it happens though, so I can't complain too much xD]

Anyway..

..this whole thing has got me pondering a fork in the road when it comes to the strategy for dealing with this increasing politicisation.

Is it better to argue against the politicisation of football full stop?

(Which is traditionally how football is supposed to be, though that's never strictly been the case of course).

Or is it better to just accept that football is now a political battlefield and get stuck in there?

The former option is the most attractive and sensible. It would be nice to just let football be football. It's also a somewhat purer message, and allows you to take a moral high ground. You don't have to argue your case, you just have to point out that football isn't the correct arena for these debates to be happening.

The downside with this though is that;

a) The people now politicising it might not listen.

In fact, they currently make the argument that things like BLM "aren't political". Which is a bit sneaky and disingenuous, and obviously isn't true, but they do it anyway and it gives them cover. Though I'm maybe being a bit unfair on them here, as often they're so self-righteous in their views that they genuinely believe this to be the case.

b) On a personal level I'm not actually sure if I believe these things should be considered apolitical.

If a footballer wants to take a personal stand about something in an interview or after scoring a goal am I against that? And if so where is the line drawn? Where does the professional life end and the personal life begin?

It's a tricky one. My main overriding concern is the one sided nature of things at the moment though. Some opinions are not only acceptable, but actively promoted. Whereas others are considered so taboo that careers may be ended if someone simply expresses them in a private conversation. The balance is all wrong. So it's very tempting to try to adjust this balance by hijacking football in favour of the demonised side.

Obviously though, when you do start openly bringing politics into sport in this way the danger is that you just end up with a whole heap of trouble. Ruining things even more. Which is what we're beginning to see at the moment.

Something has to be done however, as the current status quo is simply unfair and unacceptable.

So what strategy??

Argue in favour of removing politics from football in the hope that these current campaigns can be neutralised.

Or, just forget about all that peaceful "leaving politics on the doorstep" stuff and just go all guns blazing.

The second option might be more fun :) ..but the first one is probably the way to go. Again though, I'm not quite sure.

football, a break from politics ..or not

I'm going to have to take a little break from my space blog posts today ..the Premier League is back. So I have to focus on my fantasy premier league team. I've got my priorities right. It's a nice break to be honest. Only marred by the fact that football is so heavily politicised today. I'm dreading to see just how much politics we'll have rammed down our throats as things kick off this evening. Hopefully it won't be too bad.

This week we've had the Marcus Rashford school voucher issue too. Obviously it's hard to disagree with children getting meal vouchers. Plus Marcus Rashford seems like a sincere young man. However, it's nevertheless frustrating watching the media once again drive the narrative.

It's good to actually see some football though, so I can't complain too much.

You Can't Grow An Orange On A Laptop

After last night's pitifully mild eureka moment I thought I'd follow today by commenting on that LSE article a little bit more. It should then offer a nice segue into a post about housing. (I should really create tags for these posts so I can clump them all together).

The article stated;

If the Bank [of England] announces a further monetary policy stimulus of £200bn, that equates to £3000 for every person in the UK.

It then went on to state that this could be given to people in monthly instalments of £250 over a twelve month period.

I very much like the fairness of this idea. I also like the way it would stimulate the economy from the bottom up, and in proportion to the population of a given area. However, the obvious worry is inflation. Of course, you could argue that the Bank of England injecting money is inflationary anyway, but I would suspect that the unfairness of how it's generally injected now guards against this a little bit. If the money is just handed over to 'normal' people then all of a sudden those normal people buying bread, milk and everything else will be able to pay more for those things. Meaning prices will automatically rise. With the current way of doing things the majority remain just as poor as they were the day before though, so basic everyday commodities are kept in check.

This is why I'd probably be much more cautious were I to begin introducing something like this. I'd really trickle the money in. Ideally in quantities where the recipient barely notices the change in their bank balance. So as not to radically change spending habits. Then gradually over time build things up from there.

To be resourceful ...you need resources

This brings me on to the main point of this blog post. It's all well and good giving people more money, but if the real world situation doesn't change then inflation will just eat away that extra cash. People need actual resources. To be resourceful you need resources, and money isn't really a resource in the true sense. It's more just a way of measuring real world resources.

The most important resource in my opinion is space. Not outta space :) ..just normal regular space. To build or create something you need a space to do that in. To grow food you need space to plant things. To set up shop you need premises to do that. This is the major thing that people lack though, so to make the economy flourish we need to find a way to allow people the space to do these things.

I always compare it to online creativity. There is infinite online or digital space, and consequently we have a blossoming of digital produce. Just look at all the memes, music, YouTube videos, etc that get created on a daily basis. We have a super-abundance of digital produce. An enormous harvest.

Society has been given online/digital space and tools and it's been incredibly industrious and productive with them. Take blogs alone for instance. There are thousand of people going to the effort of doing what I'm doing right now. I'm ten a penny sadly (!) There's no shortage of it. You could read new blog posts every day and never run out.

Now imagine if people had the same opportunity to create when it came to producing food, clothing, furniture, etc. I'm sure if the opportunity was opened up we'd likewise have a super-abundance of produce. Especially when combined with the digital tools we have. Making things requires actual space though, you can't grow an orange on a laptop. You need real actual space and real actual resources ..and this is what most people do not have access to.

We need a way of giving people space - ideally rent free. If not, then super cheaply. After all, it's not like we don't have it. We have empty high streets galore (even more so after Covid). We have de-industrialised areas lying stagnant and derelict. Printing money alone will not link industrious and creative people with these spaces.

And when I say give people space I don't necessarily mean it has to be for a rigid 'specific reason' either. Or even to specifically make money, such as opening up a shop for example. I mean just allow people the space to do stuff, anything - create, play around, experiment. Whether for their own pleasure or need, or for some more ambitious reason. Exactly as we do with online space. Minecraft these derelict areas. Sure, some people will idly waste time, as happens online, but many will do things that make us infinitely richer. Mirroring the online wealth and abundance we produce.

QE + space = oranges

..money and housing

I was just in the shower and it occurred to me that I haven't done much of this over the last week or so..

Yes, my plans for world domination. This was my flag, remember it? So I thought I better do a little update.

(Why is it that baths and showers get the mind ticking over? Got some type of Archimedes thing going on here.)

It's probably too late to start going into too much detail, so I'll just bullet point a few things I need to get working on.

• housing
• living space rights
• money

Those are the three big ones at the moment. Whilst in the shower it dawned on me that my ideas aren't actually too different to the globalist vision. I think I'm just coming at things from a different angle. I saw an article earlier from the London School of Economics talking about direct cash payments to households from the Bank of England. It's not a million miles from what I've suggested before in regard monetary policy, though ironically I think I'm probably much less radical with it.

I think I should probably lay off the day to day politics a bit more (though there's so much happening) and focus a little bit more on this stuff. I have some ideas on housing in particular, but I'm just too lazy to get them down into writing. Might be a good time to get started.

Autonomous Automatons

I've been catching some of the stuff coming out of CHAZ - this is the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone in Seattle, USA. Where protesters, well funded and backed by the mainstream media, have set up shop and declared some kind of state of independence. Of course, if normal people - i.e. people not supported by the mainstream media - tried anything like this they'd quickly be dealt with and arrested. So it's pretty clear something very purposeful is going on here.

The thing that springs out most to me is the name. It reminds me of how Russia is divided into regions. "Autonomous okrugs" and so forth. So perhaps we have yet another echo of communism that we can add to our recent list. Apparently the name has now been changed from CHAZ to CHOP - Capital Hill Occupied Protest 😄 It doesn't quite have the same ring to it, so it probably won't catch on.

From what I've seen so far it pretty much looks like Glastonbury, but without the music ..and with guns. Apparently the Seattle mayor has stated it could become a "summer of love". Which goes to show that this is the realisation of the dreams of the boomer generation. Not the spontaneous outpourings of the youth.

I keep worrying that we may be seeing another round of communism. The Russian Revolution re-run in the 21st century, complete with all its devastating consequences. However, the more I think about it the more it occurs to me that it might in fact be the death of all that. The dying whimper of the hippie-commune mindset that saw its cultural high point in the 60's. This hippie generation, that are now in power themselves, are trying to rule by protest and activism. It's dated though, and most people simply do not want it.

London Riots 2020

Well, we had the inevitable clashes yesterday in London. It was a bit sad and frustrating to watch the 'football lad' violence as it didn't really help anything and simply conceded the moral high ground to the other side. It was really like Christmas come early for the statue-destroying activists - and the remain Remoaners it must be said too, who are essentially one and the same it seems. They spent the day gleefully tweeting footage of the 'alt right' idiots and hooligans. Feeling smug in the belief that those few hundred trouble causers somehow represent the millions of normal Brits that are aghast at the destruction of their property and history.

Why do I get the feeling these people are enjoying watching our country go to ruin?

Of course, the same people completely ignored the violence committed by the BLM and Antifa activists. Some of which was arguably more serious (knife attacks for instance). They also failed to make note of the clear difference in police reaction. When statues were being defaced a few days ago the police were submissively 'taking the knee'. This time they'd come prepared in full riot gear.

It was all pretty bad though. So no side can come out of yesterday with any real sense of virtue. Hopefully it's not a sign of things to come. It is a real dilemma though. If people were trying to pull down a statue in my home town and I wasn't confident the police would do their job and protect it then I think I too would go and stand guard. These are important pieces of our heritage that we won't get back. Of course, I wouldn't be yobbish about it. However, how can you stop yourself from being tarred with the same brush as other yobbish people who do turn up - be they just general idiots or agent provocateurs of some description.

We really need an intelligent solution. Usually in civilised countries we solve this problem by employing police to do this job 😅 So it would be nice if we could just get back to that.

On a lighter note I doodled a little image of Captain Cook last night.

It doesn't look like him in the slightest, more like some 17th century smuggler, but his face at least captures the 'fed up' mood of the nation. Watching our history get smashed to smithereens.

The Great Revealing

Just a bit of idle commentary today. I've just been on Twitter (it's all about Twitter these days isn't it). Anyway, I was struck by just how many people were openly stating that Black Lives Matter is a Marxist front organisation. This is pretty incredible really. Obviously I broadly share this opinion. However, I always expect that I'll be in something of a minority with these type of views.

Not today though it seems.

I don't really have anything more to add at the moment. It just feels worth noting. In fact it feels as if things are coming to the surface. Like everything is out in the open now. Very strange days.

Defending Caligula

They've had to put up boarding around some of the statues in London. They now look like big grey tower blocks. It must feel quite embarrassing for some of the protesters. It's the equivalent of putting child proof locks on something. Hopefully it might make some realise how bratty they're being.

Again, I've said this before. I have sympathy for some of the younger activists. It's very easy to get whipped up into idealism when you're young. It's only natural to be rebellious and politically outraged over perceived injustices. The older people and the ring-leaders though, ..jeez. It's frightening that some of these people are actually in positions of power and influence.

Of course, online the arguments often descend into debates about the historical person in question. "He was a racist!" "...no he wasn't!" However, for me all that is missing the wider point. These statues are part of our heritage regardless of that. They have a cultural, historic, aesthetic, and dare I say it, even a monetary value. They belong to us all. They are our collective property.

In the civilised world we don't just vandalise art. I've just replied to one iconoclast on Twitter by pointing out that just because I disagree with the politics of Caligula doesn't mean I think trashing ancient Roman busts and statues would be a good idea. Thankfully plenty of sensible people are beginning to make this point. The usual one being that the pyramids were said to have been built by slaves and we're not knocking them down.

Hopefully these arguments win out before any more damage is done.

..narratives

Well, I've been arguing with people on Twitter again. (I'd really hate to add up all the hours I've spent doing this over the course of the year). This time the topic has been the toppling of the statues. Obviously it goes without saying that I'm totally against this. In fact, the protesters are even beginning to target monuments dedicated to Captain Cook, who was born in my home town. So it's getting very personal. I can't help but feel though that while this is all happening I'm taking my eye off the ball in regard the lock down.

At the moment we're seeing the media spin this line that "..if only we'd have shut down earlier we'd have saved so many lives!". Wheeling out Rory Stewart who was pushing quite aggressively for a lock down from the start. Of course, the reality is quite different in my opinion. I would argue that it's the exact opposite, and that the lock down has undoubtedly killed more people. The virus itself being little more than a standard flu variant.

Right now everyone's focused on the rioting and vandalism though, so it's a good opportunity for the mainstream media to nudge the Covid narrative back on track. So I'm a little bit concerned we're seeing the stage being set for round two, or 'wave two' rather, this autumn.

..as I'm typing this I can hear my phone going off with Twitter notifications, haha. Better get back to the arguing 😅

Sir John Hawkins - Erased by the Mob

It's late, but I'll post tonight. It'll save me posting tomorrow morning I guess. I'm actually a little bit sad. Obviously today we've had yet more protests over statues. The main focus being aimed towards the statue of Cecil Rhodes in Oxford. He's survived so far, but still, it's pretty depressing stuff. The main thing that has gotten to me though is that I've just found out that they're renaming Sir John Hawkins Square in Plymouth because of all this.

(Portrait of Sir John Hawkins,

National Maritime Museum, London)

Now, yes, John Hawkins did trade slaves, but he lived over 400 years ago! We're talking Elizabethan history here. On top of this it's so far back in history that we can't even be entirely sure what that history was. I actually finished reading Hakluyt's Voyages not too long ago, which is a compendium of sailing accounts from this era. It was all a bit sketchy and everything was written in ye olde Englishe. So we're talking very old stuff here. Hawkins, being something of hero, featured fairly heavily. If I recall correctly his main focus was competing with the Spanish.

Occasionally when reading I'd come across accounts of him and others catching a slave or setting fire to a Spanish settlement, and I'd think, "Oh, that's a bit brutal." However, shocking though it was, I understood that I was reading something from a far distant era, when life was very different. In fact, it wasn't at all uncommon for Christians to be captured and sold into slavery back then too. So it was a very different world. Of course, that doesn't excuse horrendous acts, but nevertheless it does require that a bit of context be applied. I'm a vegetarian, so I deem eating meat pretty savage, but I don't go around viewing all meat-eaters as evil people. I understand the context.

Perhaps one day society as a whole will move away from eating meat full stop. Will we pull down statues of anyone who ever ate meat at that point?

I find it quite concerning seeing Elizabethan history being stripped away like this. Again, as with Hakluyt's Voyages above, there's not a great deal of it. In fact, much of the information you'll find on Hawkins' Wikipedia page, which Marxist revisionists are now gleefully waving as evidence, come largely from these few written accounts. So the local ties and folklore attached to places like Plymouth really are important links to this history. It's not just simply a question of changing a street name.

Also, much of this history carries with it an aesthetic quality. So far no one has really mentioned how beautiful some of the statues are for instance. Why would we want to make our country more ugly? Surely people can appreciate the beauty of something even if the subject is flawed in other ways. Or are these people simply incapable of dealing with ambivalence?

(My battered copy of

Hakluyt's Voyages)

Defund The Crazy

Yesterday I spoke of the hysteria in the UK. It's nothing compared to what's going on in America at the moment. The footage of Nancy Pelosi 'taking the knee' was really quite something. I normally don't like to question the sanity of the people I disagree with. I think it's pretty unfair, and a slippery slope. However, this does look quite deluded. It's hard not to see it as some sort of collective mental breakdown.

(Quite crazy o_O)

We've also had the calls to 'defund the police', with Minneapolis City Council already heading down that road. Which again is quite mad. As I type I'm sat listening to Fox's Tucker Carlson who's arguing that it's all a big power play. The Democrats essentially taking a scythe to the broadly Trump-supporting cops in order to replace them with their own leftist enforcers.

Of course the constant talk of 'public safety' is quite reminiscent of the French Revolution.

The Rites and Fervour of the Religious Left

So the mob tarred and feathered a statue yesterday. Throwing it into the river to round it all off. It was like some sort of May Day rite where folks would cast the 'corn-spirit' into the river to cleanse the village of evil and ensure the harvests. It could've came straight out of James Frazer's The Golden Bough.

The mob are dumb, but the people stirring up the mob are quite clever. As taking down the statue of Edward Colston, though an act of lawless vandalism, is something that it's very difficult for law-abiding folk to argue against. What with him being a horrible slave trader an all. So you can effectively be dismissed as a racist if you express even the slightest horror at the hysterical carnage.

(Edward Colston ..thought I better save

this just in case they burn the original)

I feel slightly sorry for the younger people taking part. It's very easy to be whipped up into a frenzy against what you perceive to be the establishment. We've all been there. It's often only as you get older that you realise that things are much more nuanced. So some of the younger people will no doubt grow to lament what they've taken part in. The media figures and the university departments that are leading this charge I have much less sympathy for though. Either through stupidity or design they're partaking in the destruction of western civilisation. Quite literally.

In civilised countries we don't just tear down statues. However bad the person depicted may be. We have discussion and debate, we go through processes. If we deem that the statue should be removed we don't simply destroy it like barbarians. We perhaps move it to a museum where we can showcase it in a context more fitting to our values. Or even just put it in storage so it at least remains accessible to academics and future generations.

In fact, on a similar topic, a few weeks back I was speaking to a friend about how civilisation had been shut down because of the corona-panic. I was jokingly saying they didn't shut down the renaissance to stop syphilis. We've shut down 2020 and lost a year's worth of art and sporting events. Imagine they'd simply shut down entire years back then. Would you shut down 1507 if it meant losing a Raphael?

(Saint Catherine of Alexandria

- Raphael, c. 1507)

I think a lot of the people pushing these protests and shut downs see themselves as saviours of humanity, but in reality they're just trashing our world.

Facebook Riots III

Well, good mood today. Yesterday I spoke to the woman I'd offended with the Black Lives Matter post. I apologised. All is now good. So that's one thing fixed.

It might be wise if I give people a break on Facebook for a while. I'm probably just shouting into the void half the time anyway. It's frustrating seeing how media-manipulated people still are. Having had three months of this you'd think they'd have learnt to be wary of the media flame, but they keep going back. It's almost like they just copy and paste their opinions from elsewhere, with zero critical thought. Monkey see, monkey do.

I've always believed, I guess in an idealistic sense, that everyone is capable of thinking for themselves. Sure, not everyone is blessed with the same intelligence or ability, but nevertheless I've always had faith that given enough time everyone is capable of getting there in the end. After all, it's not like we're taught to think critically in school. If anything incessant questioning tends to get heavily frowned upon. So I suppose you could therefore say I'm a big believer in nurture over nature in that regard. That it's a case of creating an environment that encourages critical thought.

However, watching the last few months does make me wonder 😅 Perhaps a certain percentage of the population will always just follow the crowd and the loud voices leading it. Whatever the circumstances.

..returning to normal??

I'm in a weird mood at the moment. I instinctively feel like we're over the hump with all this Coronavirus stuff. I've no doubt it'll continue rumbling on in various forms, but I feel like the wind is out of its sails. I can't really imagine where it can go from here to accelerate the narrative. Contrariwise though common sense tells me that things will ramp up again as we approach the US election in the autumn. It's been such a busy year it would be naive to think otherwise.

So I'm in limbo a little bit. I could do with actually getting a job and focusing on my own life. Perhaps it's time to get back to normal.

Worldwide Trends Are Not Trending

I've just discovered that the 'worldwide trends' option on Twitter has been removed. Apparently they removed it on May 1st. It very much sums up the attitude of the 'liberal' globalist mind. Believing in one-world globalism ..but only when it suits them.

Obviously it's easier to manage the information people consume if you can keep them compartmentalised. With people ignorant of what's going on in other countries. Conversely, of course, it doesn't stop them from pushing the global hashtags they want us to see and embrace.

(Today it's World Environment Day)

In fact, this was what inspired me to check the worldwide trends this morning. I thought "what else is going on around the world?", but no, it seems I can't do that now.

I published an article on here a good while back titled Globalism vs Globalism. Stating in effect that we're seeing a battle between two world visions. Rather than a battle between globalism and nationalism, as it's often portrayed. In this case the 'globalists' at Twitter clearly prefer national boxes when it comes to what information we can explore.

Facebook Riots II

I'll post again today. This one can count as tomorrow's. It follows on nicely from my earlier post where I was talking about losing Facebook friends because of arguments over lock down and the BLM riots.

Anyway, it's happened again, another casualty. I actually feel much worse about this one. A woman I used to work with - a lovely woman, very nice person - sided with the guy who'd essentially implied that I was a racist for not supporting the Black Lives Matter campaign. She hearted one of his comments (how dare she!) and then left a comment on another post of mine saying she supported 'taking the knee'.

Of course, I replied. I tried to be nice, but I also argued my case fairly strongly. Basically saying that BLM misrepresents black people, that lots of black people don't support it, and that the media push it to effectively pit black and white people against each other to push various agendas. I kind of regret doing this now though, as not long afterwards she deactivated her account. She'd been sharing quite a lot of Black Lives Matter stuff, so I guess she was quite invested in it and found the criticism a little too harsh. Again, the other guy just unfriended me - he was always a bit of a self-interested person - but she's far too nice to do that. So I guess she's just took a break and deactivated in a fit of pique.

I feel a bit bad. Then again though it does really irk me when people imply that you're racist. Especially when they know you in real life and have firsthand experience of you being a decent person. Of course, the way these things are loaded up by the media, with very slick and emotion-heavy campaigns, it means it's hard not to come across as some sort of heartless bad guy when you counter the overall narrative like this. So I guess it's totally understandable why people get like this. It's really not their fault.

It's one of these things where it's hard not to wonder if you're doing the right thing in voicing your opinion. Is it really worth breaking so many eggs when the mainstream narrative is so dominant?

It was the same with the election before Christmas. It was certainly no fun promoting the Brexit Party when people were so quick to throw the "racist" label at you because of it. It definitely had a personal cost. Of course, with these things there's also often a quite large group of people out there who may agree with what you say, but who don't raise their heads above the parapet for this very reason. So maybe someone has to voice these things out loud. Perhaps it is the right thing to do after all. Hopefully the woman will return to Facebook and I can apologise to her. I think I'm running out of rope with people though. I'll be all out of people to proselytise to if it keeps going on this way. 2020 really is quite a brutal year.

Also, to add, it was announced today that from June the 15th face masks will become compulsory on public transport in the UK. Which is disappointing - though not in the least bit surprising to me. If I have to wear one myself at any point it will severely dent my pride. It's an act of submission. Like taking the knee in fact. I understand only too well what it signifies. I'm actually not even sure I'll physically be able to wear one. I fear my pride will kick in and I'll just point blank refuse. Good job I like walking :)

Then again though, given my recent defeats on Facebook, I'm now beginning to think it might just be better to keep my head down, stop causing trouble and just accept the semi-slave status we're all being conditioned into. I can claim the UBI, get myself a nice plush micro-pod, and then purchase a high-end cybernetic girlfriend. Maybe I can get a black one to prove to everyone how un-racist I am.

Facebook Riots

Well, unsurprisingly we had some rioting in London yesterday. It's easy to see how much this is being stirred up by the media. Sadly though too many people are too dim to see this, so get carried along for the ride. I'm beginning to fear for the rest of 2020.

I always try to help dampen these things down on Twitter, Facebook and elsewhere, but it really is a thankless task. I effectively got accused of being a racist yesterday, or at least of being "ignorant" in that regard, by a former work colleague after I'd posted something disparaging about Black Lives Matter. We had a bit of a back and forth, and it finally resulted in him unfriending me 😅

I really do wonder if it's worth it. I lost a few arguing over the lock down too.

Perhaps I have to streamline my tactics a bit more, and be a bit more nuanced. Either way I think it's probably best I take a break for a few days 😅 I'd love to have my own desert island where I wouldn't have to deal with all these people.

Bend The Knee

I've just seen an article suggesting that Brits should 'take the knee' on their doorsteps tonight at 6 pm to show solidarity with Black Lives Matter. I'm constantly reminded of Daenerys Targaryen from Game of Thrones. Wanting everyone to bend the knee, and threatening to torch entire cities if people refused.

Of course, it's very much akin to the doorstep clapping for the NHS. Choreographed Soviet mind slush.

Sit. Good dog.

News at Ten

I also watched ITV's News at Ten last night. Normally I don't watch the news in this way, so it was a novel experience. I only caught it as the TV was on that channel when I turned it on. Anyway, I was shocked by just how biased it was. Perhaps it was always this bad and I've just lost my immunity to it. Either way it was pretty galling.

• The US protests and riots covered with a distinct anti-Trump bias.
• Then the Black Lives Matter issue in the UK mixed in with the idea that 'BAME' people are more likely to die from Coronavirus. Talk about fanning the flames.
• Then it moved onto Brazil's Coronavirus response and how terrible Bolsonaro is (there are of course anti-racism protests there now too I see).

It was quite incredible. Not just for its bias, but also for its blatancy and lack of intelligence. I think even the dimmest of people would gauge that there was some kind of political agenda at play. In fact, this lack of intelligence does give me some hope actually. The mainstream media, like the Democrats in America, are so truly incompetent and lacking in self-awareness that even with the odds stacked in their favour they'll still somehow misplay their hand.

Also, on a side note, the fact that BAME people are more likely to "die from Covid" is simply due to the relative poverty. Poorer people die younger. It's similar here in my area. The local media point at certain locations and say "this postcode has a higher than average rate of Covid, etc". It's always the poorer areas. So this is another thing that illustrates that we're just dealing with something approximating a regular flu here. Likewise with the age of the those dying of Covid (I've moved from calling it Coronavirus to Covid here in this article haven't I lol - I can't make up my mind). The average age of death tends to hover around the average age at which people normally die anyway. Again, showing everything is in fact quite normal.

Outside of the media induced hysteria that is.

..the riots and whatnot

Nothing much to post today. Just as well really. The big thing is the trouble in the US - the riots and whatnot. It angers me a little seeing what's going on there. It's clearly all about going after Trump (at least in my opinion). The people fanning the flames in the media and elsewhere don't give a damn about the people caught up in it all. It's pretty bad.

I've been arguing about it a little on Twitter today. I'm not sure whether I should be doing it or not, but I feel like if I can make even just a few people think twice about going out and rioting it might make a difference. I always fear that I may just be making things worse though. Obviously there may be things going on beyond my knowledge or understanding. Especially given it's happening all the way across the sea in America.

Also, my pinned tweet at the moment has a little bit of a Christian theme. I think one of the people I was arguing with thought I was some kind of fundamentalist Christian because of it.

This was posted in relation to the way Covid has forcibly separated people. It was part genuine sentiment, but also a deliberate attempt on my part to remind anyone visiting my profile that there are higher and more timeless things in this world. That all power and legitimacy doesn't begin and end with government.

I might need to change it now though, as a "religious fundamentalist" look probably isn't going to help if I'm going to be arguing with Trump-hating atheists. I might have more influence if I take on a more classically European appearance. Try to garner the appearance of an intellectual 😅

We Need Drunk-Rollerskating Laws

Hopefully this'll be a nice short little post. It's just more getting my ducks in a row type stuff. Here goes.

Begin.

Regarding the Coronavirus one argument that repeatedly pops up when you're arguing in favour of civil liberties is the drink-driving one. People will often say;

"..but we infringe people's civil liberties to stop them drink-driving because it's too risky. Do you want to make drink driving legal again??"

(Oftentimes they will use "speed limit" laws instead of drink-driving, but it's essentially the same point.)

This is quite a good argument to be fair, and it can be a difficult one to counter, as pretty much everyone agrees that drink-driving should be illegal. So it then sets the precedent for laws to be set based upon a "potential" risk to other people. As opposed to normal laws that essentially forbid people from directly transgressing another person's liberties.

Live and let live is the usual rule of thumb ..BUT, we can't just let people drink-drive as it's clearly too dangerous to others. So we put aside this rule and use force against a person to forbid them from doing it. Even though they haven't actually done anything to anyone else yet.

So it's a tricky conundrum. We want to uphold live and let live to the maximum, but it's very hard to make a case against drink-driving laws in all good faith. Of course, there are plenty of issues like this, where we may want to prohibit certain things "to protect" society. So usually it's a balancing act. We try to offset the wider benefits for society against the infringements they place upon the individual.

So what about the lock down laws?

On the issue of balance it's quite easy to contrast the drink-driving laws with the draconian lock down laws. Not being able to drink whilst driving is a very minor and specific infringement. Not being able to leave your home or meet your friends and family is a major and far reaching one. I tend to use the word egregious when arguing with people :) I think it's very much justified.

Another is the process by which such laws have come about. Has there been due process, are there adequate checks and balances? Again, the difference is quite striking. Laws regarding motor vehicles have developed over time. We've had debates and arguments over decades that have led us to this point. Whereas the lock down laws have come into effect pretty much overnight. With little real debate. They're also completely unprecedented in this country. Likewise when you remove basic rights like this it makes it difficult for people to hold their governments to account. Not being able to drink-drive doesn't impede me from taking action to keep my government in check. Not being able to leave my home most certainly does. So it increases the "risk" of tyranny and all the bad things that may follow from that.

The above arguments are the ones I've generally been using when confronting this. They're fairly good and sensible arguments, but if you're debating someone who literally believes Covid-19 is the end of the world it can be difficult, as they believe the scale of the threat justifies the severity of the infringements.

Another argument?

However, there's a further argument - the reason for this very post in fact. I'm not quite sure how useful it is just yet, or how I'd work it into a compelling response, but it's worth exploring. So I'll run through it here. It essentially centres round the fact that a vehicle accentuates the powers of the person driving it, and hugely limits the other person's ability to "avoid" that person.

Normally, using the live and let live rule, we can make the argument.

"If you don't like what I'm doing you can just stay away from me".

So as a libertarian it's quite easy to make your case. In fact, the reason opponents choose the drink-driving example is because many of the other examples are easily batted away like this.

The other classic example that comes up is the smoking ban, which is fairly weak. Firstly we don't actually ban smoking outside in public. So even that classic case of nanny-ism doesn't come anywhere near the Corona strictures. Then on top of that it's easy to make a case for why businesses and venues should be allowed to have smoking. Again, no one's forcing anyone to go into a bar where people are smoking. If you don't like it don't go. Let people who are happy to take the risk enjoy themselves.

The same applies to most "risky" choices. Of course, I would apply it to face masks too :)

"If you don't like the fact that I'm not wearing a face mask you can avoid me. No one's forcing you to come near me!"

With cars though the power and speed of the vehicle accentuates things so much that it's much harder to make this argument. If you're walking down the road and a car comes veering at you at 80 mph then yes, technically, you're free to move out of the way, but the speed of the car makes it near impossible. A human can't compete with a car. Plus the force of the car means that if it does hit you you're highly likely to die or be seriously injured. So these things help to justify the preemptive or "preventative" nature of laws forbidding drink-driving or excessive speed.

The car in a way gives the human driving it an agency beyond what a human would naturally have. So it's a bit of an unnatural situation. It's a little similar to the argument about gun rights in that sense. Another issue that very much falls into this category of debate. Lock down lovers could raise this argument in the UK too, but oddly they haven't so far. Perhaps they fear their opponents might argue in favour 😅 ..I'm quite tempted to myself given the imposition of this lock down (!)

So anyway, perhaps it's technologies that amplify human agency to an extreme extent that really give libertarians a headache.

For instance, we don't need laws against drink-rollerskating as the speed and weight they add to the person skating isn't especially excessive. We can keep out of their way, and if we can't it's probably not going to be the end of the world. (Though I'm sure in this age of health and safety there are no doubt numerous rules and regulations about where you can and can't roller skate, and under what circumstances sadly.)

So maybe I can develop an argument that plays upon this unnatural extreme factor.

... Wow, I've been going quite a while. I always say "hopefully this'll be a short post" but that never happens. I better draw a line under things before I go on for any longer.