It's been over a year since I've updated this blog, and the main reason is that this year I've done very little in the way of activism. I've been a little involved with Extinction Rebellion, but that is as far as I've gone. I feel quite ashamed of this, and if anything if I'd kept up with this blog it probably would have focussed and inspired me a bit more. Here's to better work in 2020!
But... I have to talk about this election.
In 2017, I was terrified. I was certain that Theresa May would get her supermajority, that climate change would destroy the world, that all our services would be destroyed... and so on. I was so terrified I honestly considered suicide during that campaign.
And then... it didn't quite happen, did it? May lost her majority, I went for a big breakfast at my favourite vegan cafe, met a lovely mental health worker and her parents and thought about all the good things in the world.
But somehow, the Tories managed to cling to power, as they do. The fact that they've been unable to fully bring in any controversial legislation over the last two years has been the only consolation... something that by rights I shouldn't be celebrating as it means we've lost two years, but given this particular party's history I'd rather have lost two years than have the world subjected to the horror of the alternative.
And now we're at it again. We have Boris Johnson in power, and a similar situation to last time around really. And again, I'm terrified. I'm slightly more hopeful than I was last time, but that hope makes me terrified again. And the thing that terrifies me most is that I honestly think that this is our last chance. If the Tories win this one, it will be boundary changes, ID at polling stations, trade deals that future Governments cannot undo, more corporatism, more austerity, more deaths... If you want to read more about this there is SO MUCH OUT THERE. Go on They Work For You, see what our cabinet has voted in favour of. Check out news articles. Hell, read Wikipedia. This stuff isn't difficult to find. It's frankly frightening.
If you're lucky enough to be one of the people who owns their own property and has a lot of money in the bank, fantastic. Think of the most vulnerable people you know. Think of the homeless person you pass on the street. Think of the child from a working family who relies on charitable donations to food banks. Think of your own children and grandchildren, because climate change will affect us all, no matter how much capital you own.
And then, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, vote Labour.
I'm voting Labour in this election. I have never done so before - I've always gone for the Green Party. As the son of a prominent Green campaigner, I feel quite bad not doing so this time, particularly in Bristol West where the Green Party has a good chance of winning, and candidate Carla Denyer (who I know personally) is far superior to incumbent Labour MP Thangam Debbonaire. But unfortunately, on this occasion, I feel that the Green Party as a whole has let Carla down too much for me to vote for her. There are many reasons for this, but the central one is that in many seats the Green Party has stood down for the Liberal Democrats, and vice versa. I don't feel that the Liberal Democrats are at all trustworthy, especially under Jo Swinson - they weren't a valid alternative in 2010, and they aren't a valid alternative now. At this election, my opinion is that there is only one valid alternative, and that is Labour under Jeremy Corbyn.
We can do this. It's not too late. Tomorrow's election has not happened yet, and there is still time to make your voice heard. Don't just vote. Ring friends, text, message them on Facebook, or go the old-fashioned way and talk in person. If polls are telling you Labour are a lost cause - ask yourself, are the polls always right? Forty years since Thatcher came to power, we MUST stand together and fight the system, because if Boris Johnson is still Prime Minister on Friday, we are in for some very, very dark nights. Read the Tories' history. Ask yourself, why would they promise to do better if they haven't done for the past nine years? Then read Labour's manifesto, or listen to my song again. Even if they only achieve half of what they promise, that's still better than the Tories achieving half again of the cruelty they've inflicted on the most vulnerable.
Below is a post from one of my favourite singers, Grace Petrie, addressing the most frequent criticisms of Labour and its leader. May God have mercy on our souls.
'Here we are, days from the election of a lifetime and folks still have questions for me about Corbyn. In the interest of not boring them in person, I have decided to bore them in writing. This is not an exhaustive list of the criticisms I hear, but I hope my perspective might offer some clarity if you are someone who is struggling to reconcile wanting to vote for Labour with support for Corbyn. I offer this in genuine good faith, not the belief that I am right about everything or anything, but that if you want my opinion, and some have asked for it, here it is.
Q. Jeremy Corbyn is an anti-Semite?
A. Before anything else, let me say that nothing has ever shaken my faith in the Corbyn project as strongly as this accusation. I have never dismissed it. I have never (and I would never) call it a smear. My personal politics, I deeply hope, would instruct anyone who knows me to accept that there is no political movement I would support if there was a racist or any type of bigot at its helm and I have interrogated this as rigorously as I can and read from a spectrum of different perspectives to reach an opinion. That opinion that I believe in my heart is: no, he is not an anti-Semite. If he was, he has been so deeply undercover for so many decades that he’s done the cause of anti-semitism much more harm than good, from signing motions condemning it as far back 1990 to organising the clean up of Finsbury Park synagogue after an anti-semitic attack in 2002, long before the notion of leadership was a glint in his eye. Do I believe that he has always been as vigilant at recognising anti-semitism as he could and should have been? No. But I can hardly criticise that knowing that five years ago, I would not have been as good at spotting the codes and tropes and dog whistles that anti-semites use as I am now. I was uneducated. I have looked to educate myself further and I will continue to. I believe Corbyn has and is doing the same because I believe he wants to understand and fight racism. I do not believe that, in his numerous condemnations of anti-semitism, he is secretly courting those who pursue it. I do not believe that he means harm to Jewish people in Britain BUT - and this bit IS SO IMPORTANT - if anything happens under a Labour or Corbyn government that would pose any risk to Jewish people in anyway, they have my total solidarity and my unconditional, unmitigated promise that I will be the first person to oppose it whoever and wherever it comes from. I would and will be your comrade in this fight whoever your oppressor is. In my heart, I don’t believe Corbyn poses a threat to you. That is my sincere and well examined view.
Q. Corbyn’s spending will tank the economy?
A. No it won’t! The manifesto is fully costed. You would be amazed how much more money we would have if insanely rich people were paying taxes properly, but in any case - how many people have you walked past sleeping on the streets this winter? Do you honestly regard that as a “working economy”? Do you think that the thousands of children living in poverty is a moral, justifiable price to pay for what you might think of as balancing the books? Even though we invented the books, we invented money, and we did so as a way to organise our resources? Do you think that we are organising our resources successfully if there are people dying in our streets for lack of food? Real human people? While there are people at the top of society who have more money than they will ever need, and aren’t contributing fairly to the collective pot? The economy is ALREADY broken.
Q. Britain wants a centrist option! Labour under Corbyn are too left-wing!
A. I mean - Ed Miliband was hardly a communist, and he only managed 232 seats in 2015, opposing a deeply hard-right Conservative in David Cameron. Corbyn’s most media-ready challenger was viewed by many as bright young Blairite Chuka Umunna, who you may remember split off to form Change UK as a credible centrist option in February. (Yes, February this year. I know. 10 months is a long time in politics.) Change UK instantly evaporated in the polls and Umunna jumped ship again to join what we are contractually obliged to call Jo Swinson’s Liberal Democrats, whose brand of nuke-happy centrism doesn’t seem to be winning the hearts and minds that many commentators might have predicted. Meanwhile Labour under Corbyn has gained 150,000 members. For context, at the height of Blairism in 1997 the party had 400,000 members. We are now on 485,000. The numbers of people inspired to canvass for Labour in this campaign are unprecedented. So you must forgive me for not believing that there lies within the heart of the British electorate a thirst for centrism that never turned out for Miliband and doesn’t seem to be turning out for Jo Swinson (or Tim Farron).
But even if that were true - this Labour Party isn’t even that leftwing! Ask yourself where you got ideas of “hard leftism” from. We are talking about funding the NHS, ensuring that social care meets need, giving schools the funds they need to run properly, and taking ownership of public services so that they are not run incompetently for the grotesque profit of private billionaires, but efficiently with public service as their aim. Tell me what is too hardline about that for you?
Q. Look, I like the policies but he’s just unelectable. How can he win?
A. An honest question in return. Who is more electable? Jeremy Corbyn has spent over 35 years in parliament, and with every single element of the British establishment digging for dirt for four long years, nothing so much as a dubious expense claim has been discovered in his closet that they can find to attack him with. He doesn’t drink. He’s vegetarian. He makes jam. He speaks Spanish to his cat. He has been on the right side of every political issue that he has faced. The worst they can find on him is he doesn’t watch the Queen’s speech at Christmas (spending it instead by volunteering at a homeless shelter), and they have fought tooth and nail to make a news story of it. Meanwhile Boris Johnson, the most racist, homophobic, obnoxious, philandering, dishonest, untrustworthy mess to ever embarrass Britain on the global stage is more publicly liked. Do you see nothing wrong with this picture?
Please make no mistake that anyone who only wants power in order to radically change who it belongs to will be subjected to every bit of misinformation, vilification and distortion Corbyn has been. Yes, even Jess Phillips! “Electability” is a made up concept and is decided by the media. The game is rigged to protect the interests of the rich and anyone who poses a threat to that will be discredited in a co-ordinated and deliberate manner. This is something that we all basically accept as true AND YET! I see so many people saying they see through all that “but, but, but a different leader....” THE GAME IS RIGGED. The only type of leader they would give an easy ride to would be one on their side; in short, one not worth electing.
Q. So how can we possibly win with all that against us?
A. Because we are bigger than the establishment. Because we can be louder than the media. Because we all have a voice and we can use it to be heard above the system that is relying on us not working that out. Because 4 million people signed up to vote. Because we can control the narrative if we decide to take it away from the papers and the BBC. Because people power is what the Labour movement was built on and you still have 6 days to bring the idea to every doorstep in this country not just that things could be better - but that they SHOULD be better. That we live with absolutely incredible levels of corruption and we have thought it’s normal for so long that we have forgotten to imagine a better life.
I don’t know what is going to happen on Thursday but I know it is the choice of a century, the choice between kindness and compassion and giving a fuck about each other, versus fear and division and turning our backs on the people in the street, trying to forget that they could be us. That they ARE us. Whatever happens, whatever the result, I need to know, for the sake of every one who needs this change much more than I do, that I did everything that I could.
Vote Labour pls.'
No comments:
Post a Comment