Euros during the Euros

I've been watching a documentary series about the Blair/Brown years. It's hard not to be impressed by Gordon Brown. Weighty, intellectual, that dour Scottish sense of moral purpose. I can't help but like him when I see this younger footage. Even when he's doing things that I don't agree with, like making the Bank of England independent.

Blair, not so much. Though, even with Blair, you have to admire the sheer will to power.

Watching the series just reminded me how much the issue of Europe figures in each political era though. In this case Blair having a zeal for taking us into the Euro. Of course, as ever, no one actually voted for this. The issue becoming visible only after the landslide win ..a win that was all about a "New Britain," not a "New Europe."

We see the same in the Major era. The ERM was all about streamlining European currencies in preparation for the Euro. The public, again, weren't told that was the case. The line was that it was good for the economy - that pegging ourselves to the Deutsche Mark would instil economic discipline. In the end it crashed the pound and cost the country a lot of money. Yet, despite failing, less than ten years later the Euro was fully underway regardless. Fortunately, without Britain (in my opinion).

It's incredible to watch so many politicians throw away so much political capital on this ideological vision of a new world. It's unceasing. And politicians that don't believe in this vision - who just want to deliver for their voters - constantly have their hands tied, as they're having to fight a constant rearguard action. How much time and money and effort have we all spent just to keep Britain as Britain? Just to hang on to the status quo, in the face of this undemocratic undermining of the nation state.

And it is undemocratic. Nobody ever voted for an EU flag, parliament and anthem. It's always a constant salami slicing; shaving off our sovereignty bit by bit. Inching us ever-onward into the EU. Before you know it the family silver is halfway out the door, and when you realise it's going you're told that somehow you'd agreed to this - and that you're just making a big fuss in trying to stop it.

Just this morning I saw a tweet from Rory Stewart urging Labour to re-join the EU Customs Union after they win. Stating, in capital letters, it's NOT the same as re-joining the EU. Again, that salami slicing. Feigning that this will be the last cut ..after that, no more. We know - from experience - this is never the case though. That people like Rory Stewart want us fully in the EU, in spite of their protests.

Likewise, it needs to be reminded, that not only did the British public vote to leave the EU, and vote Boris in at the last election to Get Brexit Done, but, even now, Labour have to pay lip service to this as re-joining remains so unpopular. So, again, as in the past, whatever they do, they will have no mandate for it, and will have sneaked it out the door once again.

Finally, this is another thing that's so annoying (I've talked about this on here before). The constant word twisting. Endlessly we're asked "What are the tangible benefits of Brexit?" This idea that sovereignty and who governs us and how aren't that important. That pro-EU advocates are just so much more pragmatic and realistic. It's such a dishonest line though, as the EU advocates are just as invested in an abstract ideology. As the history above shows, they're obsessed with building their vision of a new world. And it doesn't matter what the economic risks are, or how much political capital they waste on it. They're just much less upfront about this. They pretend they don't believe in the EU project, as they endlessly pursue it.

When you look at the big picture (as you sit watching these political documentaries) it's impossible not to see this, but many people on Twitter live only in the latest TV moment. The argument reduced and fixated on the latest little salami slice.

The Alchemical Election

Go home, return to your farms and villages. The battle is lost..

Here we are, in an election campaign, and so far, I've posted nothing. Normally, in times like these, I'm posting daily, charting the action. So, what's up?

What's up is we're in praying for a miracle territory. Labour are heading for total victory, and our forces are fleeing in disarray - divided and betrayed. The Tories, either by incompetence or design, have surrendered parliament, and Reform have stepped onto the battlefield like Viking berserkers, swinging swords in all directions, sparing not even the most ardent of Brexiteer Tories.

Peter Hitchens, like a wise wandering druid, has been begging people to vote tactically, to block Labour, but no one is listening. (Actually, I'm sure some people are listening, but I'm being melodramatic - let me have some fun.) Whilst the online right cry for "zero seats," all bloodlust and mindless emotion.

Obviously, as you can see from my framing of things, I think Peter Hitchens is broadly correct. However, at the same time, Reform can, no doubt, win some seats -- and that would be a huge breath of optimism in an otherwise bleak, black fog. So, now the chaos has begun, I'm not quite sure what to state publicly.

With that in mind I'll just state what I'm doing personally.

Farms and Villages

Where I live there are two constituencies: Middlesbrough and Thornaby East, and Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland.

Middlesbrough and Thornaby East, which is my constituency, is a super-safe Labour seat. So, consequently, my vote will probably make very little difference. Middlesbrough South is a little more interesting however. That seat flips back and forth. Currently, it's Conservative, and Simon Clarke is the MP. As far as Tories go, he's one of the better ones. So, if I lived there, I would definitely vote Conservative. In fact, on election night I'll probably be paying more attention to this seat than my own.

As for my own, I'll likely vote Reform. Also, as a side note, my current MP is Andy McDonald, which adds another minor tactical dynamic. I don't like Labour and have plenty of criticisms, but he's a bit more of a Corbynite than a Blairite, so potentially he could be a thorn in the side of Keir Starmer at some point over the coming years. And, he is at least sincere in his views, as much as I would disagree with them. So, if both seats stay the same, I would happily take that as a win right now. Making my vote even more of a free spin.

Re-Farm

I actually donated £50 to Reform a day or so before Nigel Farage announced he was running. When I did it I felt a little bit like an alchemist throwing mercury into the fire. With the writing seemingly on the wall regarding the election it just felt like it needed something. Obviously, £50 in the grand scheme of things isn't very much. However, I think all the donations people made that weekend did make a difference. It seemed like Reform were testing the public mood to see if the support was there, and it seems it was.

Ever since then I just think, "alchemy," whenever I tune into the election. There's no overall narrative, you just hope that somehow people get things right in their own constituency. That somehow we get a bit of magic that upsets the apple cart. I always believe that, if you give the British public options, they'll get it right more often than not. I'm not especially optimistic this time round - we could end up with a bit of a nightmare. We do at least have a bit of fizz in the cauldron though now.

This is partly why I'm not as mouthy and vocal as I normally am. All you can really do is just go back to your farm, village or constituency and cast your vote ..and trust people in other parts of the country to do the same. It's very difficult to tell other people what to do when the options they have locally may be completely different to your own, and when things may be changing in ways that make it difficult for outsiders to grasp the vibe in a particular area.

I know where I live. I might, over the next few weeks, take a deeper look at some of the other seats on Teesside. Beyond that I really don't know ..and I definitely don't trust polls enough to start painting by numbers.

Orange Orchard Economics

This is just a quick post to distil my views on the empty high street problem.

Partly thanks to online retail, highstreets and city centres are dying - this is something pretty much everyone agrees is happening. Though pointing out the problem is easy, solutions aren't as forthcoming. Here's my plan:

1) Accept that we need less high street shop space. i.e. stop trying to artificially prop-up retail space that simply isn't needed in this online age.

2) Make it as easy for people to sell things on their local high street as it is to sell things on eBay. That is, create a public market space where people can hire kiosks/shop space by the hour, for a small fee. In effect, a local market place open daily, and open to everyone.*

3) Retail space that isn't needed repurposed. With some sold for new housing and some earmarked to become public parks and orchards.

4) More allotments. A greater emphasis on meeting demand for allotments in town planning. Viewing towns not just as spaces for housing and retail, but also as spaces for gardens, nature and food production. In summary, recreating the village green in macro.

*If the idea of selling things on your high street as easily as you would on eBay sounds strange, pause and think about it for a moment. Why is it so hard to sell things in the very town or city where you live? Is it really any wonder high streets and local economies are dying when they're so inflexible and difficult to enter as a seller. Perhaps if politicians stopped trying to strangle and regulate the online world, and instead tried to imitate it, local economies would re-bloom. After all, originally, in earlier times, it would've been perfectly normal for individual people to turn up at their local market place and flog their wares. It's only over-regulation that has stopped this organic process from continuing into our current era.

Again, you can list a bunch of items for sale very easily on eBay, or sell your homemade arts and crafts on a platform like Etsy. So why is it so difficult to take these very same items down to your local high street or town centre and do the same? Why is it so difficult to set up a stall, or book a slot of space on a morning or an afternoon?

Preserving Folk Memories

A few weeks ago I went to a folk night. In a small, little pub. All older folkies singing their traditional ballads, and younger art school types picking up the mantle. I feel I need to put it down in writing as it was such a snapshot of Britain as it is at this moment. I really felt like I was sat in an Adam Curtis documentary. The jarring mesh of imagery, along with the the music, creating a sad dystopian cinema reel. The people being filmed, here only by my eyes, having no awareness of how transitory their culture was. Or how lost and peculiar their world would look to anyone watching back in ten, twenty or thirty years' time.

The people at the folk night were all very left wing. Some had little Palestinian badges on their jackets. At points the traditional folk songs were slightly reworked to include lines about Palestine. One young girl sang an acapella song about immigration, the theme being that the people arriving are no different to you or I, and that they should be universally welcomed.

What I found most interesting about it though, was that everyone in the room was white.

It was such a stark contrast to my journey there. To get to the little pub I walked through Middlesbrough. From the sprawl of council estates in the east, past Albert Park, then the long, lazy walk down Parliament Road. My nanna lived near Parliament Road, and my mam grew up round there. Consequently, that journey is a journey I've made a million times before. I have memories of being pushed in buggies down those roads. Of getting ice creams and lolly pops from the shops along the way. I remember pubs that aren't there anymore. The White Rose, which is now gone, and the huge - to my infant eyes - Westminster Hotel. That building still stands, but it's now home to a takeaway and minimart.

As a child it was the scale and imagery that impressed me. I never once stepped foot in those pubs, I just remember the signs. "Why is there a picture of Big Ben on a pub sign?" I would wonder. "Why does Yorkshire have a white rose?" I would ask. It's all minor stuff, but it colours the landscape.

Anyhow, now things are different, and as I walked through the area I was naturally aware of this massive change. In my childhood, in the 1980s and 90s, the area was still mainly white English. Sure, the town centre was always a bit more diverse than parts of the town further afield, but still, it was majority English. Now, however, the demographics have starkly shifted. On the evening of the folk night ninety percent of the people I passed were non-English. There were two English drug addicts sat on the floor outside the shops. The odd English person coming and going, but aside from that it was totally non-English.

And I'm not making the point here that this is good or bad (I really am past the politics of it all now), I'm just stating that it's impossible not to notice the sheer change.

So, anyway, I made this familiar journey, mindful of how much things have changed ..then I stepped into a little pub, and suddenly found myself in a room full of white English people -- white English people that were all singing traditional English songs, no less. It was like a little cocoon.

How could I not notice this stark contrast?

And, likewise, how could I not notice the irony? That these left wing people were singing in favour of open borders and diversity. Yet, they were choosing to spend their free time surrounded entirely by other white people. Singing traditional English folk songs. It was revealed versus stated preference, illustrated perfectly in the wild.

I mentioned this to one of the people I was with, "Don't you think it's weird that they're all singing about diversity, yet every single person in this room is white?"

He looked around, "Yeah, that's true - I didn't notice that. It never even occurred to me."

"This is probably the most conservative thing you've experienced in a long time," I pushed on, "..a room full of white people, preserving their white folk songs, cocooned from the changing demographics outside ..but they're all left wing."

Of course, as I pushed on, I only pushed myself towards the, "Is he a racist?" bracket, and I could see some of the eyes apprehensively thinking, "He's one of those right-wingers, isn't he." Like I'd rolled up my sleeve to reveal a swastika tattoo or something. I tried explaining that I wasn't making a judgement about the changing demographics, just an observation of it, and an observation of some of the hypocrisies and muddled thinking surrounding it, but alas, it's a hard topic to navigate. Especially when you've had a few pints of some weirdly named ale, and it's slowing your judgement.

I felt a little sad and emotional listening to all the people singing their folk songs - that was probably partly the alcohol too. They were all really nice people, and they all sincerely meant well. It wasn't really the place for my disruptive, dragon-like observations. As I sat there I couldn't help but wonder if people would still be singing those songs in fifty years' time, or even twenty. Again, it was very much like an Adam Curtis documentary, where you're watching rare, old footage, of a world that once was. Grainy film of some middle-aged English woman, singing her gentle folk ballad - interspersed with footage of the changing world outside. The discordance as the camera pans over a kebab shop, as some folk balladeer warbles in the background.

Sadly, I couldn't capture it on film, so I can only capture it in writing.

Welcome to lifejak

This is what happens when a scene becomes bigger and women start getting involved..

It's like being in a band. You're seventeen/eighteen/nineteen and you start a band. There are three or four of you. You're all mates and you're into the same music. You have your little in-jokes. Everything is about the music, and you all share the same dream. You start rehearsing, you write a few songs. You maybe get a few gigs. Everything's going great

..then one of the band members gets a girlfriend.

Let's say it's the lead singer, and the girl is "Chloe". Suddenly she's hanging around all the time and giving her opinions. Then, one day, you come into rehearsal and the singer says, "We've got a new band logo, we're gonna put it on all our fliers." And ..or course, you can't say anything, as the logo was designed by Chloe. She just took it upon herself to make one. You're then in the position where you either just accept this, and allow the aesthetic of the band to be ruined. Or, you say something, cause a big drama, and look like a bad guy. As Chloe was "just trying to help." Plus, "She's spent all this time making it, and it looks great!" The singer blinded by his infatuation, even though, deep down, like everyone else, he knows it's just not that good, and that if anyone else had made it he'd be much less enthusiastic.

Anyway, this all has that vibe.

And before any woman reading this gets completely irked off, I'm not saying women can't be in bands, or can never be part of the gang. If you're in a band and you need a drummer, and someone says, "Michelle's a drummer, she's looking for a band," that's different. In that situation Michelle is playing drums because she wants to, and she's now in the band because you need a drummer. It's not a boy/girl thing, and Michelle is being judged by the same criteria any other drummer would be judged by - i.e. is the music good, is the vibe there.

It's similar with memes. Obviously, everyone - male and female - is free to draw memes and upload them online. The problem here is that women are getting a free pass, because men are attracted to them. So we have a situation where more women are entering the space, plus more people in the space are getting wives and girlfriends. So, like the singer, they're allowing their boy/girl tendencies to skew their judgement. It's understandable, but it's not aesthetic, and someone needs to say it 😠

Normie Swarm

It's also got to be said that the meme popularity is partly a consequence of more normal people entering the space. There's nothing wrong with being normal, most people are normal, but if you like things to be a bit more interesting it's not so good. As everything ends up a bit Facebook or Saturday Night TV.

Earlier memes were good because they were insightful. Like the soyjak meme was good because it distilled down to a meme a type of person we were all familiar with, but didn't have a name or clear archetype for.

For instance, I remember the first time I saw the meme. It wasn't even the actual soyjak, it was just an image where someone had cut and paste together lots of people making that face.

My natural reaction was, "Ha, that's true, those people do actually make that face."

I'd seen people making that face before, but had never actually thought about it. It was only when I saw the meme - that is, when someone else pointed it out to me - that I consciously noticed it. And this is the thing. It's easy in hindsight to see these things, but it takes a bit of insight to be the first person to see it. To be the first one to notice the pattern and then point it out to other people, in a way that's easily communicated.

It's like stand-up comedy. A good comedian makes an observation about life, articulates it, then we, the audience, get the, "Haha, yeah, that's happened to me too." It's like a little lightbulb is turned on in your head, where suddenly something becomes much clearer. Thanks to the comedian's craft and insightfulness. Lesser comedians tend to be derivative though. Repeating familiar, well-trodden observations or formulas. So there's less originality and true insight.

Like when Peter Kay originally became massive. "GARLIC BREAD! ..Garlic? ..Bread?!" It was funny because he was original and he had his own style. He was the first person to do that sort of stuff in that sort of way. So we'd never seen it before. However, five or six years down the line, when you then get second tier, copycat versions of Peter Kay, doing that same sort of stuff if just gets tired.

It's the sort of, "Remember this from your childhood..", or, "My family member does this.." stuff you see getting shared on Facebook every day.

These memes, likewise, are just, "My wife says this..", only with a wojak in the picture.

Again, there's nothing wrong with this. Most people like familiar things. We can't all be on the cutting edge of the zeitgeist 24/7  ..and yes, I'm definitely being a bit of a dick pointing all this out. If people are enjoying it I shouldn't be whinging about it. No one's forcing me to join in. Plus, everything runs its course. The era of wojaks was never going to last forever.

I guess it has to go down as a win too really. Didn't we want the normal people coming round to our way of thinking? Wasn't that the hope?

I just wish it was on Facebook and not on my Twitter feed.

I'm Expanding My Water Portfolio

My anger about the potential fluoridation of our water has subsided somewhat. (That's not to say I'm now content to lie down and accept it. It will remain a key pivot going forward.)

Most of my annoyance stemmed from the fact itself: that the government have the nerve (and think they have the right) to medicate me against my wishes. This was amplified by the wider observation that so few other people seem to care. The post-Covid barnyard effect everywhere to be seen. Demoralised and confused people. Heads in the sand. "La la la, if I pretend this doesn't matter, then it doesn't matter" attitude. It's not that they are pro-fluoridation; that I'm right and they're wrong. It's that they don't have an opinion. They literally do not care what comes through their taps every day and into their bodies. Like a dog at its bowl, oblivious to how the water got there.

Obviously, I'm being very harsh here. Clearly my anger hasn't completely gone :)

Still, noting this though, I've moved on to doing what I do best - looking out for number one. My attitude now being, "Okay, I'm forced to live in this barnyard nation, how do I minimise the impact on myself?".

Water Diversification

My thinking is just to diversify things more. I already do this to some extent anyway. I drink bottled water at work and tap water at home. My rationale being that they'll somehow offset each other. The plastics in bottles can't be good, but at the same time how much faith can you have in tap water. So instead of going all-in on one option - the fear being that you'll pick the worst of the two - I mix it up. Hedge my bets. I think all things in moderation is probably a good general rule. I'm sure the body can cope with some degree of impurities and toxins. You just don't want to overdose.

Obviously (at least in my opinion), the addition of fluoride makes tap water less attractive ..and less trustworthy. So if we do get fluoridated I won't completely stop drinking it, but I will drink less. That means more of the portfolio will need to be dedicated to other sources. The easy thing is just to drink more bottled water, and to start buying bottled water in glass bottles too.

In fact, one of the things that currently limits the amount of bottled water I drink is my guilt about the impact it has on the environment (see, it's not all about looking out for number one!). Buying yet another bottle of Evian feels a little indulgent when I can just turn on a tap and fill a cup or water bottle. If fluoridation comes the guilt goes though. So it'll move from luxury to everyday essential.

I've also been looking online at water filters. That too is a potential option. Instinctively it doesn't appeal to me. Partly because of the hassle. It's one thing going to the effort to do something when the novelty is there, but once that wears off you'll soon get lazy. Good lifestyle habits should be as easy and as seamless as possible I think. Also, though filters undoubtedly remove stuff from water, you wonder what's added. So I definitely wouldn't want to go all-in and start getting 100% of my drinking water that way.

Perhaps it could be 10% of the portfolio.

Finally, I've even be watching a few YouTube videos from people who drink rainwater. I think it's unlikely I'll be drinking rainwater anytime soon, but it's always worth thinking outside the box. After all, it does fall freely from the sky. So in a world where money becomes tight, or other options are restricted, it would at least be an alternative.

Perhaps 2% of the portfolio ..growing to 50% when society eventually collapses.

Fluoride vs Teesside: We might be Socialists, but we're not Communists.

So, the government are planning on fluoridating the local water supply. Middlesbrough and Stockton. Amongst other currently non-fluoridated parts of the North East. Needless to say, I'm not too happy about this. It really is something of a red line for me. Personally, I think it's fundamentally wrong to medicate people en masse via their drinking water. And that's before we even consider any possible negative health consequences.

It's bad enough that we live in a country where it's essentially illegal to buy a loaf of bread that hasn't been fortified with chemicals. With tap water now joining the bread, the march of state interference has well and truly intruded into the most basic aspects of life. Of course, as I'm writing this, it's Easter Sunday (Happy Easter! 🐰🥚), and also the day that the clocks have went forward an hour for British Summer Time. So bread, water and time itself have all been tampered with by bureaucrats. (1)

A Crystallisation

Crisis is often an opportunity, so, annoyed though I am, I do see it as an issue that brings things into focus. I think the people that have re-opened this can of worms think we're still living in the 20th century. In the 20th century the fluoridation of water was normalised. This precedent has left some people with a current sense that medication via tap water is somehow acceptable. This is not the case. Back in simpler times people were much more enthral to their TV sets, and the painted association of anti-fluoride with "conspiracy nut" was very effective. However, things are very different now.

What instantly springs to mind when thinking back is that classic scene from the Stanley Kubrick movie, Dr. Strangelove. Where the paranoid general, "Jack D. Ripper," claims the Soviets have been fluoridating American water supplies to pollute the "precious bodily fluids" of American citizens. It was a great movie, and was incredibly effective at shifting public perception. Modern Hollywood movies aren't quite as good now though, and the momentum of history is very much in the opposite direction.

(General Ripper, telling a bemused Captain Mandrake,

played by Peter Sellers, about the Soviet plot)

In the movie, the narrative was portrayed as a far-fetched "commie plot". A conspiracy, believed only by conspiracy theorists and other crazy kooks. Looking back however I would argue that it was literally just communism that led to fluoridation. Plain and simple. With little need for Russians. A mass medication of the population for the supposed greater good. With complete disregard for any notions of individual freedom. The scientist, the bureaucrat, the communist. The rule of experts, who simply know better than the child-like, or barnyard animal-like, population. Every man, woman and child reduced to numbers on a myopic chart or table.

In fact, this is the real difference between communism and socialism. In common American parlance the terms are often interchangeable. However, in practice there is a clear and important difference. (And I'm talking about the general sense of the terms here, as used in everyday British life. I'm not really interested in the dictionary definitions.)

In essence, a socialist is someone who sees a person without a home and wants the state to provide a home for that person. (2)

Whereas a communist sees a person without a home and not only wants the state to provide a home, but also wants the state to have a monopoly on all homes.

So the communist wants to abolish private homeownership, whereas the socialist just wants the state to build state housing. That is, they're not necessarily against private property. They might even actively believe in it to some extent.

And this distinction likewise applies to other political issues.

Hence why fluoridation truly is communism. A socialist wants the state to provide medication to those who need it, and who seek it. Free dental treatment, free dental products, etc, for those who want them. The communist, alas, forces this upon everyone ..and leaves no room for any individual seeking their own private alternative.

So, I must drink fluoridated water in the world of the communist, whether I want to or not. Whether it's good for me or not. As it is in 'the greater good'.

Now, in reality, it must be said that you can't really have state socialism without some degree of infringement and compulsion. Most notably that we're compelled to pay taxes to pay for all this. Still though, the socialist is capable of moderation and balance. Their desire for state intervention can be tempered by their appreciation of other values, such as liberty.

But the communist is unbounded. In their pursuit of utopia they will not even respect an individual's right to choose how they drink a glass of water.

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Notes:

(1) It's also 'International Transgender Day of Visibility' today. Obviously, Easter naturally moves around on the calendar. Whereas these modern political days of worship are fixed on a certain date. So it's been amusing to me to watch the accidental collision of the two. The Labour Party tweeted out in recognition of the day. A clear mistake politically. They're stuck in a position where they're trying to straddle two horses though, so this has forced them to confront the fact. lol

(2) I say state, but we could also think in terms of community. We're so ingrained with this 'state versus individual' worldview that we often see no other possibility. Communities can provide for members through means other than the state though. Cooperatives, charities, churches. Taxes can be voluntary, like voluntary church tithes, as opposed to compelled. Imagine if everyone on a local estate put £1 in a community pot each week, instead of buying a lottery ticket or a scratch card. The lack of imagination we see in politics is a little disappointing. It would be nice to see some actual alternatives explored.