'Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth'
Attributed to Joseph Goebbels
'Corbyn is unelectable'
Numerous
A little later than planned, here's my blog analysing exactly what caused Labour's major defeat on Thursday. Such analysis is very much necessary in order to learn from the problems, and I've spent the last several days reading thoughts from all sides of the political debate to further my own understanding.
The most common explanations that come up in the media over this are 'Because the public don't like Corbyn' or 'Because the public don't want another EU referendum'. Whilst I think there's an element of truth to both of these theories, they are incredibly simplistic and don't take into account the multitude of circumstances that caused this collossal defeat. Another thing that we frequently hear is that 'Labour has moved too far to the left', which would be laughable if it wasn't so horrifying. Labour's manifesto is highly popular when presented blindly without the party attached to it; it cost the Tories their majority in 2017 and has actually caused the Tories to be slightly less bad than they otherwise would have been - there are some things in the Conservative manifesto that are weak imitations of Labour's, which is quite significant given that in 2015 Ed Miliband's manifesto tried to bring a few things from David Cameron's. Things have shifted in politics, a long way, and I want to try to make sense of exactly what that is.
There are so many reasons it's difficult to know where to start, but given that everyone is expecting me to pull out excuses, I'll be fair and start with the things I'll admit Labour is at fault for. Given that Brexit is so frequently considered to be the big political topic of our time, let's start with that.
Brexit
Labour's Brexit pledge, despite what many in the media will have you believe, was fairly straighforward: negotiate the best deal possible within six months, then put it back to the electorate in a confirmatory referendum (and remaining as the other option), with the Prime Minister staying neutral as to which option should be chosen. This was the one major change from the 2017 election, which occurred shortly after Corbyn whipped his MPs into backing Article 50 (I was very angry about this at the time, and even wrote this open letter to Corbyn to object to it, but I want it on record that I no longer believe what I wrote, and I now feel that in the circumstances triggering Article 50 was the only choice to make). I think Labour probably messed up the Brexit pledge. I used to be a People's Vote campaigner, but I've changed my mind on this. This isn't because I think a second referendum would be anti-democratic (it wouldn't) but just because I think it would be harmful. David Cameron was incredibly keen on calling referendums on things that he didn't agree with personally (the EU referendum was his third in six years) and it's not a good way to answer complex political questions that the majority of people don't have in-depth knowledge of. The first referendum was utterly toxic; why would another one be any better?
I am still a Remainer, but I honestly can't envisage any outcome of that which would make things less divisive. My way of sorting out Brexit would be to bring the country back together and find some kind of compromise that everyone can live with, and that doesn't come from us all going back to the polls in another roll of the dice. (That said, I still think Labour's position was more mature than the other parties', because Labour did at least try to see both sides of it, but it didn't work, and wasn't going to work. Whichever we voted for, we're sick of talking about bloody Brexit, and want to get it over with.)
Unfortunately, a lot of people seem to interpret 'getting it over with' as 'leaving as quickly as possible'. That's not how it's going to work. The faster we leave, the more difficult it's going to be to make the proper arrangements to get by outside the EU. Even that is assuming the Government is actually going to try to make those arrangements in a way that will benefit ordinary people the most, which given that this is Boris Johnson I have no confidence in them doing. This won't be over for a long time.
Seemingly unfeasible policies
Note the word 'seemingly'. The policies in Labour's manifesto were not unfeasible or irresponsible; the Financial Times reported that 163 prominent ecomomists backed them. Labour's 2017 plans were fully costed, as were their 2019 ones.
However, in 2017, Labour's policies were concise, clear and most importantly had been seeded. Things like free broadband and cheaper rail fares are totally feasible, and are always going to be popular with the public - or at least, a public that believes you'll actually deliver it. Prior to the announcement of an election, when did you ever hear Labour talking about many of these issues? The way they were announced came across like a bunch of pie-in-the-sky promises, and the electorate were a bit too sceptical for their own good. The election may have been in December, but a manifesto is not a Christmas list. Tom Clark of Another Angry Voice notes that the majority of people don't really understand economics in detail; a country's budget is still commonly perceived as working like a household budget, without acknowledgement of the fact that in a country's budget, public spending doesn't just lose the money; it puts it back into the economy, creating a win-win situation. You cannot make a bunch of election promises that people don't expect you to keep, even if you are entirely capable and willing to keep them.
Electoral pacts
This is something I think other parties hold more fault for than Labour, which I'll discuss in more detail further down the blog, but I have to express my concerns with Labour's rigidity, and unwillingness to agree to electoral pacts with other parties, thus splitting the left-wing vote. I recall in 2017, they were quite heavily criticised for not standing down in Jeremy Hunt's constituency of South West Surrey, even though Louise Irvine of National Health Action was standing against Hunt for the benefit of the NHS. Labour tends to be quite archaic about things relating to electoral reform generally (something I disagree with them quite strongly on) and I'd really like to see them do a bit more progressive with ideologically similar parties such as the Green Party.
However, I also think there was a lot outside of Labour's control that seriously sabotaged the campaign, as follows:
A huge part of the issue for Labour, for me, lies with the behaviour of the Liberal Democrats. There was once a time when their forerunners, the Liberal Party, were the official opposition to the Conservatives, and around the time of New Labour had quite a strong opposition vibe. In 2003 under the late Charles Kennedy, the Liberal Democrats opposed Tony Blair over the Iraq War, whilst the Conservatives largely voted in favour. However, since Nick Clegg I feel the party has become very opportunistic and quite careerist, and Jo Swinson, who in Government was more loyal to the Conservative whip than Jeremy Hunt was, is the epitome of this. During this campaign and before it, Swinson was seen to be far more critical of Labour than she was of the Conservative Party, continuously saying that she'd refuse to work with Jeremy Corbyn under any circumstances - and avoiding the question about working with Boris Johnson. The Liberal Democrats' insistence on standing on the single issue of ignoring the 2016 referendum result (despite the fact that such a thing is neither liberal nor democratic) helped Boris Johnson immeasurably in keeping the election firmly about Brexit, and disregarding all of the very important austerity reversals that Labour was promoting. Ideologically, the Liberal Democrats are (supposedly) closer to traditional Labour than they are to the Conservatives - not on this evidence they aren't. When the Conservatives were dying and unable to get anything through Parliament, Jo Swinson enthusiastically and arrogantly backed an election, ignoring the fact that her brand of politics is nearly as unpalatable.
But it's worse than that. Ben Gelblum in the London Economic writes that through tactical strategies, the Liberal Democrats had a tendency to position themselves, not Labour, as the tactical voting choice in constituencies where Labour didn't stand a chance. This strategy caused some fantastic Labour MPs in marginal seats, such as Westminster's Emma Dent Coad, lost their seats to the Conservatives - because the Liberal Democrats had falsely led voters to believe that they'd be better off voting for them, which split the anti-Tory vote. This tactical approach extended to supporting other alternative parties, such as the Green Party and Plaid Cymru, but not Labour or the SNP. Before anyone comes back with this argument, I know Labour is a bit too rigid on election pacts - I've acknowledged that earlier in this very blog. But in the circumstances, that shouldn't matter. Last week, I canvassed in the Totnes constituency for Labour candidate Louise Webberley, standing against Tory-turned-Liberal Democrat Sarah Wollaston. I was appalled to hear the amount of pressure Louise had been under to stand down for the benefit of Wollaston, from everyone to the Green Party and even from Extinction Rebellion. Wollaston was a Tory in all but name! Being opposed to Brexit doesn't change the fact that you voted through all the ghastly, horrific things the party has done in the last nine years. I was particularly disappointed by the Green Party, who I have voted for in the past and who I generally support. This was the main reason that in my own constituency I chose to re-elect Labour's Thangam Debbonaire over the Green Party's Carla Denyer, despite knowing Carla personally and having far more faith in her than in Thangam. I felt that in the circumstances, I could not support a party that was making alliances like this, even if I liked the specific candidate.
I really hope that in the wake of this, with Jo Swinson having lost her seat along with all of the Labour and Conservative MPs who defected to the Liberal Democrats, this causes the Liberal Democrats to change their ways a bit and become more opposition material. I can't say who I would like to see lead them, but in my mind it must be someone who wasn't there from 2010-2015. I think the Liberal Democrats are still reparable (after all, Labour was hardly better than them under Miliband, but I think they have at least learned their lesson) but they have to acknowledge their past errors and move on if they have any realistic future.
However, I feel that the real culprit in this is the constant, disgusting smear campaign against Jeremy Corbyn. This was a problem in 2017 as well (if it hadn't been I think Labour would have won a thumping victory in that one) but in the last two years this has been ramped up significantly, including by the supposedly impartial BBC, which this time went as far as editing an interview with Boris Johnson to make it sound as if one of his statements was greeted by applause, rather than laughter. We hear so much - 'Jeremy Corbyn is friends with terrorists!' 'Jeremy Corbyn is anti-Zionist!' 'Jeremy Corbyn shared a platform with a Holocaust survivor who believes this!' 'Jeremy Corbyn will turn us into socialists!' (People who shout the last one tend not to be quite sure what socialism is.) And I'm afraid that this is something that has been caused on purpose, including by people who are supposedly left-wing. We have Polly Toynbee and Jonathan Freedland in the Guardian talking about his supposed 'lack of charisma' (a claim anyone who has ever heard him speak can refute). We have people claiming everything from misogyny to terrorism, from being too weak to being too heavy-handed; the general aim has been to throw as much mud as possible in the hope that something sticks, even if it completely contradicts itself. When it doesn't work, they just claim that Corbyn is 'unelectable' - despite his incarnation of Labour completely turning things around in 2017 and losing the Tories their majority.
I think all of the smears have collectively had an impact, but by far the most significant one is the supposed anti-Semitism claim. I think this probably originated from Corbyn's public support of Palestine (which incidentally is NOT anti-Semitic - I've been accused of anti-Semitism myself for this, ignoring the fact that anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism and that huge numbers of Jews are also on this campaign). Shaun Lawson writes this wonderful article outlining how anti-Semitic the anti-Corbyn narrative itself is - I've heard non-Jewish people publicly referring to Jewish Corbyn supporters with the slur 'self-hating Jew', without being picked up on this. I have also heard people claim that to be anti-capitalist is to be anti-Semitic, which is incredibly anti-Semitic in itself because it relies on the age-old trope of Jews being associated with banks and financial industry. Let me be clear: I have no doubt that there have most likely been occasions on which anti-Semitism in the Labour Party hasn't been handled as well as it should. Mistakes have surely been made, and they shouldn't be overlooked. But that does not mean that Labour itself is inherently anti-Semitic, especially when its main rival openly brags about its 'hostile environments' and actually congratulates itself when being accused of Islamophobia. The truth is that Labour was accused of this constantly, and the narrative didn't even take into account all of the facts - for example, Andrew Neil's 'Just apologise!' interview neither specified precisely what Corbyn was meant to be accepting responsibility for, nor took into account Corbyn's continued campaigns against anti-Semitism. His Parliamentary history includes numerous condemnations of anti-Semitism, resistence to the National Front, demands to accept Jewish refugees from Yemen... how often do you hear this reported in the media? The worst thing about this cynicism is that it undermines genuine claims of anti-Semitism. It's The Boy Who Cried Wolf in action, because not every allegation is untrue.
I hope that Labour doesn't come away from this feeling that it has to radically change its positions on things, because there's nothing wrong with Labour's actual policies - as I said above, they are realistic, costed and it's not even as if the public don't agree with them. I don't believe that the people of Scotland actually hold markedly different values than the people of England and Wales, as pundits tend to claim - apart from possibly wanting independence, but can you blame them? I don't want Scotland to leave the union at all, but if it does I will shake its hand and wish it luck - if I were a Scot, I'd hate England and Westminster as well. But in the meantime, Labour must prove an effective opposition, as it didn't under Ed Miliband. I think in some ways Labour under Corbyn did win the arguments about some of its policies, because in 2017 the electorate took some hope and positivity from the campaign, and I sincerely wish this to continue under the next leader. We cannot return to the days of abstaining on workfare. If anything does change with Labour, I hope it will be in the form of supporting an alternative to First Past The Post. The Tories actually received only around 270,000 more votes than in 2017, but our archaic system meant that this time it equated to +48 seats.
Before I conclude (and I realise this has been a very long blog) I'd like to say something about social media. I was really sad to see Lily Allen delete her Twitter account the other day, because she's a great campaigner and it was always a pleasure to see what she had to say. Her argument was that social media is toxic, caused the election result and other things such as the election of Donald Trump in the US. Although I think she has a point, I would say that social media is neither good nor bad. I liken it to a hammer; something that can cause someone to be severely hurt or a beautiful structure to be built, but neither is done directly by the hammer, but by the person wielding it. More importantly, we've created a world in which social media is necessary. It has some very serious flaws, but it's the one part of the media where independent voices have a chance to be heard, where Rupert Murdoch's power is curtailed. We can, and must, use it.
The establishment said that Corbyn was unelectable; I don't believe he was at the time, but sadly they've made him so, and he will go down in history as the best Prime Minister we ever nearly had.
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Tuesday, 17 December 2019
Friday, 13 December 2019
Mourn, then organise
I was born on Tuesday, 19th October, 1993. As of the day of me writing this (13th December 2019) I have been alive 9,551 days. I can truthfully say, without being dramatic, that yesterday was the worst day of my life.
Before anyone asks, this wasn't just because of the election results - it was just one of those days where everything that can go wrong does, from a minor annoyance (my boyfriend lost his hat) to a pretty frustrating irritation (I had lunch in town, and it wasn't very nice) to something that worries me professionally (I had a phone conversation with a professional contact, and it didn't go the way I hoped it would). But of course, if Labour had won the election it would have made all of those things better. They spectacularly lost, making a pretty shit day into an utterly catastrophic one.
As I write this the evening after, I am pretty tired, having only really spent three of the last 36 hours asleep. I had prepared myself for it to be bad, but nothing had ever prepared me for it to be that bad. Before the results, I was really anxious but kind of feeling that a Labour win might happen (perhaps backed up by the SNP, but I could live with that). I had resigned myself to thinking that the Tories could cling to power again, or even increase their vote share and get a majority. But it was far, far worse than that. Labour did so badly that the Tories got what on air was referred to as 'a thumping majority'.
There are all sorts of reasons for this which I'll go into in more detail in tomorrow's blog when I'm less tired and can formulate a sentence better. This one is more about how to avoid despair.
I was absolutely gobsmacked at the result. My poor boyfriend had to cuddle me for hours, and even then I wouldn't settle. Normally I sit up all night, but this time I was convinced to go to bed at around 3am (a bit pointlessly, because of course I couldn't sleep). But thankfully, I have spent the day thinking to myself about how I'm going to deal with this.
When David Cameron's Tories were re-elected in 2015, I was in the second year of my Creative Performance degree in Colchester. My University experience was not a happy time and my memories of it are a bit blurry, but I did write these two quite positive blogs on the election. They've been interesting to re-read (they're a lot less cringe than I was expecting!) It has been fascinating to see how much has changed, but I think most of what I wrote then is still relevant to today.
I can honestly say that I'm far more frightened now than I was in 2015. In my previous blog, I said that I believed this to be the last chance to get change - and in truth, I still believe that. I know this isn't a nice thing to hear, but realistically I think we've lost the battle now. I believe that so much damage will be caused by Boris Johnson's administration over the next five years that it will be irreversible - things like dodgy trade deals, environmental destruction and boundary changes in constituencies aren't things that even the best future Government can undo. Not that I think there will BE a good future Government - with the departure of Jeremy Corbyn comes what to me feels like the departure of the Labour Party's belief that an alternative and positive politics is possible or desirable. I have been wrong in the past, many times, and I'll be wrong again in the future. I sincerely hope that this is one of those occasions on which I'm spectacularly wrong, and that one day on a subsequent blog I'll link back to this one and laugh at how doom-mongery I was at 26. I hope that will happen, more than anything else.
However, I will not be all doom and gloom. I've had this blog since I first got involved in political activism, when I was a fresh-faced sixth-former determined to do some good in the world. My earliest blogs are so cringe-worthy I can't bear to read them - but at least I updated it more regularly then. This last couple of years, I really haven't been good with it. I haven't really done any activism since my very highly-publicised work on transgender rights in mid-2018. I don't know quite why this is - I have often thought about it and planned to do things, but I never seem to quite get around to it. Honestly, I feel I have lost my nerve. I'm much more frightened by the police and the establishment than I once was - probably because now approaching my late twenties, I'm settling down and maturing. A good thing by all accounts, but I think I've lost a bit of my old spirit.
BUT... I'm getting it back. I have to, and so should you if you're reading this. The reason is that this Government is going to be the most horrific we've ever had. I'm sorry to be that frank, but I cannot sugar-coat it. The Conservative Party is the most spiteful and divisive it has been in living memory, and this is the most successful election it has had since the time of Margaret Thatcher. I don't know how much of what it does can be overcome, in all honesty. But we must try. If we don't, it will be even worse than it inevitably will be. Every time we make it so that someone doesn't suffer as much as they otherwise would have, we've won a battle. We can only resist this divisiveness with kindness, caring and compassion.
Thankfully I have some great contacts that I've been talking to about creating a kinder politics, and I'm going to start by throwing my hat into the ring and making a pledge to update this blog every evening. I won't promise that for certain, because we all know that in the past I've had good intentions like that and I haven't always managed to keep up to them. But I'll do my best. Mentally, I'm more focussed on what is going on and how I can help when I'm writing on here. I will keep you updated about all the work I'm doing, and other people are doing, to counter the suffering that this horrible Government is inflicting. I will send you links and keep you motivated. I'll advertise protests, and discuss how they went afterwards.
This is our life calling. I'd rather not be living in an era where our livelihoods depend on how daring we are, but that's hard luck. The Government is counting on us not being organised - let's make sure we are.
Before anyone asks, this wasn't just because of the election results - it was just one of those days where everything that can go wrong does, from a minor annoyance (my boyfriend lost his hat) to a pretty frustrating irritation (I had lunch in town, and it wasn't very nice) to something that worries me professionally (I had a phone conversation with a professional contact, and it didn't go the way I hoped it would). But of course, if Labour had won the election it would have made all of those things better. They spectacularly lost, making a pretty shit day into an utterly catastrophic one.
As I write this the evening after, I am pretty tired, having only really spent three of the last 36 hours asleep. I had prepared myself for it to be bad, but nothing had ever prepared me for it to be that bad. Before the results, I was really anxious but kind of feeling that a Labour win might happen (perhaps backed up by the SNP, but I could live with that). I had resigned myself to thinking that the Tories could cling to power again, or even increase their vote share and get a majority. But it was far, far worse than that. Labour did so badly that the Tories got what on air was referred to as 'a thumping majority'.
There are all sorts of reasons for this which I'll go into in more detail in tomorrow's blog when I'm less tired and can formulate a sentence better. This one is more about how to avoid despair.
I was absolutely gobsmacked at the result. My poor boyfriend had to cuddle me for hours, and even then I wouldn't settle. Normally I sit up all night, but this time I was convinced to go to bed at around 3am (a bit pointlessly, because of course I couldn't sleep). But thankfully, I have spent the day thinking to myself about how I'm going to deal with this.
When David Cameron's Tories were re-elected in 2015, I was in the second year of my Creative Performance degree in Colchester. My University experience was not a happy time and my memories of it are a bit blurry, but I did write these two quite positive blogs on the election. They've been interesting to re-read (they're a lot less cringe than I was expecting!) It has been fascinating to see how much has changed, but I think most of what I wrote then is still relevant to today.
I can honestly say that I'm far more frightened now than I was in 2015. In my previous blog, I said that I believed this to be the last chance to get change - and in truth, I still believe that. I know this isn't a nice thing to hear, but realistically I think we've lost the battle now. I believe that so much damage will be caused by Boris Johnson's administration over the next five years that it will be irreversible - things like dodgy trade deals, environmental destruction and boundary changes in constituencies aren't things that even the best future Government can undo. Not that I think there will BE a good future Government - with the departure of Jeremy Corbyn comes what to me feels like the departure of the Labour Party's belief that an alternative and positive politics is possible or desirable. I have been wrong in the past, many times, and I'll be wrong again in the future. I sincerely hope that this is one of those occasions on which I'm spectacularly wrong, and that one day on a subsequent blog I'll link back to this one and laugh at how doom-mongery I was at 26. I hope that will happen, more than anything else.
However, I will not be all doom and gloom. I've had this blog since I first got involved in political activism, when I was a fresh-faced sixth-former determined to do some good in the world. My earliest blogs are so cringe-worthy I can't bear to read them - but at least I updated it more regularly then. This last couple of years, I really haven't been good with it. I haven't really done any activism since my very highly-publicised work on transgender rights in mid-2018. I don't know quite why this is - I have often thought about it and planned to do things, but I never seem to quite get around to it. Honestly, I feel I have lost my nerve. I'm much more frightened by the police and the establishment than I once was - probably because now approaching my late twenties, I'm settling down and maturing. A good thing by all accounts, but I think I've lost a bit of my old spirit.
BUT... I'm getting it back. I have to, and so should you if you're reading this. The reason is that this Government is going to be the most horrific we've ever had. I'm sorry to be that frank, but I cannot sugar-coat it. The Conservative Party is the most spiteful and divisive it has been in living memory, and this is the most successful election it has had since the time of Margaret Thatcher. I don't know how much of what it does can be overcome, in all honesty. But we must try. If we don't, it will be even worse than it inevitably will be. Every time we make it so that someone doesn't suffer as much as they otherwise would have, we've won a battle. We can only resist this divisiveness with kindness, caring and compassion.
Thankfully I have some great contacts that I've been talking to about creating a kinder politics, and I'm going to start by throwing my hat into the ring and making a pledge to update this blog every evening. I won't promise that for certain, because we all know that in the past I've had good intentions like that and I haven't always managed to keep up to them. But I'll do my best. Mentally, I'm more focussed on what is going on and how I can help when I'm writing on here. I will keep you updated about all the work I'm doing, and other people are doing, to counter the suffering that this horrible Government is inflicting. I will send you links and keep you motivated. I'll advertise protests, and discuss how they went afterwards.
This is our life calling. I'd rather not be living in an era where our livelihoods depend on how daring we are, but that's hard luck. The Government is counting on us not being organised - let's make sure we are.
Wednesday, 11 December 2019
2019 election
Before we start, have a watch of my song. I wrote it myself (with a little help from my boyfriend and one of our friends), with vocals by my wonderful friend and activist China Blue Fish:
Hope you enjoyed it! Was fun to write.
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.'
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.'
Sunday, 2 December 2018
Dialogue should not go against protest, but alongside it
'We are far more united and have far more in common than that which divides us'
Jo Cox MP, 1974 - 2016
It has been seven months since my last blog, and this specific one I've been putting off all week in the interests of keeping things personable between myself and some of my comrades, because things have got quite heated and I partially agree with two completely conflicting perspectives. It has taken me quite a few days to get my own opinion coherent enough to write about.
Earlier this year, The Rebel Without A Clause took off significantly after I took part in a protest at a Bristol venue called the Jam Jar in defence of the Gender Recognition Act (if you don't know about this feel free to read my blog about this protest, as well as the exclusive interview with a trans rights activist that I conducted mainly to answer some of the questions I was receiving on social media). I don't know quite what it is about this subject that gets people so worked up. My readership is tiny (I'm lucky to get over 200) and yet for this brief period it reached into the thousands. I had a heck of a lot of contact, both on here and on Twitter, some of which was very supportive, some of which was quite abusive, but I did my best to take it all in stride and respond as politely as possible.
Just over a week ago, our protest was featured in a documentary on Channel 4 called Trans Kids: It's Time to Talk, which included a featured interview with me (I confess I have only seen the parts of the documentary that I'm in - I hear it's really not very good and contains a lot of erasure about trans and non-binary issues, but here is the On Demand link if anyone wants to watch it). I think that I myself came across quite well, but the protest generally was naturally edited to look a lot more violent than it actually was, which is of course to be expected if you're a left-wing activist. Shortly after this programme was broadcast, another featured activist, Esther Betts (whose identity was obscured at the time) has written an article in the Guardian identifying herself, openly regretting and apologising for her actions and suggesting that we use a different approach to achieve this goal. Having read the article, I think Esther makes several extremely compelling points. This article has provoked a very, very wide range of responses from both trans rights activists and from people opposed to what we do. I'll go into more detail about that later, but suffice to say that on both sides there are people applauding Esther, and people who utterly condemn the way she has handled this. There are activists feeling she has betrayed them, and TERFs (and I myself still use that word freely) feeling that this apology is not genuine and only an opportunistic attempt to capitalise on being portrayed in a negative light on national television.
As someone quite involved, I've been questioning myself as to how much I agree with what Esther writes. The first question to answer there is: do I myself regret my actions at that protest?
The short and simple answer, no.
Not even slightly.
There are two reasons for this. The first is that although other activists may have had a different agenda, my protest was not really aimed at the speakers (I really don't consider certain people such as Venice Allen, who was asked to leave a Labour Christmas party for transphobic behaviour towards the first transgender women's officer, to be worth my time or energy fighting) but at the venue. I felt providing a platform to Allen and others of that ilk was counter-intuitive to the Jam Jar's aim of supporting and promoting grassroots culture and creativity - which in my view is about allowing people to be themselves, free from the sort of persecution that certain invited speakers have been known to precipitate. I had myself witnessed one particular organiser, Matthew Strange (who I had known and got on well with prior to this), speaking in an extremely arrogant, dismissive and patronising way to concerned individuals, and to me. I think it is certainly possible to have a reasoned discussion about sex and gender, but this was not it as it was clearly intended to prioritise a certain intepretation, and Matthew himself did not seem willing to take on board other points of view.
The other reason is that I've been a left-wing activist since I was 17, on many different issues. Things can get very heated at protests, and if you attend as many as I have you develop your own moral code. There is a line that I don't cross - for example, there's a chant that commonly comes up at anti-austerity demos: 'Build a bonfire, build a bonfire, stick the Tories at the top; put Labour in the middle and we'll burn the fucking lot.' I choose not to take part in this particular chant, because I think threatening to burn people alive, even if it is tongue-in-cheek, does not put across the message that I want to put across. I'm quite a peaceful activist, but I am still an activist. I'm not cool with threats of violence, but when circumstances demand it I am cool with damage to property, civil disruption and breach of the peace. I've stood outside supermarkets that stock products sourced from warzones shouting into a megaphone, and I'd do it again - because a minor bit of disruption to someone's shopping is worth it if it means customers are educated about what to avoid, and supermarkets are incentivised to take a stand. But I don't think anyone has ever felt frightened for their personal safety because of me, and that is where I draw the line.
At the Jam Jar protest, I don't think I crossed my self-imposed line at all. For most of it, I stood outside with a banner, talking openly to people and explaining my reasoning, and my exact words if anyone asked if I was preventing people going in were, 'We respectfully ask you not to.' At a later point I was part of a large crowd that forced its way past security to attempt to gain access to and disrupt the event. Had I managed to gain access to the room, my protest would have been much the same as how I behaved outside. I should mention that Esther mentions in her article that there were plans to let off a smoke bomb; I need to make clear that I was not made aware of this at all, and would not have played any part in that. I wasn't watching Esther at every second of the demonstration; she may well have done something that broke her own moral code, and if so it's at her discretion to apologise for that. I do not feel that I did. I'm proud to be a Trans Rights Activist, and would do the same thing again if I thought it was important.
So I think it's clear that I firmly disagree with quite a lot of what Esther says in her article. I think there's an indication that confrontational protest achieves nothing, and I utterly refute that. The rights we have now did not come without a struggle, and nor will the ones we don't have come easily in the future. Having said that, I don't really have much of a moral issue with her having written it. This seems to be quite a problem for a lot of people - as I said at the start, Esther has faced signficant levels of criticism for this. Read any comment thread, and you'll see numerous accusations from TERFs claiming that Esther's apology is only damage limitation because she was caught out on TV, and is a thug crying crocodile tears to fool the gullible (these tend to be the ones who use the wrong pronouns for her). But it's not just from political opponents - a lot of the negative reaction has been from fellow trans rights activists, including some good friends of mine. I spent quite a long time talking to a friend and comrade of mine, who felt utterly let down by this; who had considered Esther a close friend, and now feels that she has sold out everyone who was at the Jam Jar and let down the cause. Although this is not my feeling, I can relate; if one thinks back to one's schooldays, I think everyone can remember how it felt when your best friend ditched you for the school bully. I don't actually think that was the intention, and I think that trying to find some common ground with your political opponents can be a constructive thing - but if those people have threatened you and try to find out where you live, then on a personal level an ally trying to get on with them is quite a bitter pill to swallow and feels quite backstabby.
So I see and sympathise with both sides, and as a cisgender man I'm probably not qualified to say who is right. However, what really annoys me about this is that they cannot see one another's side. And to me, that is the problem here. The left-wing activism community is really close-knit - most of us know each other, if not in person then by reputation, and the word 'comrade' is thrown around in a way that it isn't in any other field. There's good reason for this; we need each other. We need to discuss strategy and ideas, otherwise we're not a collective, we're just a bunch of individuals shouting at the world because no one is listening. And in a collective, not everyone will think exactly alike. It's hopelessly naive to think that everyone who believes in the same ideals as you will have the same methods as you - as above, I spoke about moral codes. Some activists are a bit more confrontational than I am, some are a bit less so. I respect them whatever, and talk to them openly to try to create a better world. Because even though I may disagree with them on certain things, they are still my comrades, and I'd rather they were with me than against me (or worse, discouraged and sitting at home with the XBox).
We live in a world that is utterly divided, on every level. Two and a half years ago, a week before a referendum that split this country down the middle, a wonderful Labour MP was murdered because of her ethics, kindness and empathy. I've shared a quote from her at the top, which was true when she said it and it's true now. The fallout from 2016 still hasn't abated, and my frustration about Brexit goes way beyond Leave vs Remain; it's not about what people believe, but about why they believe it. We should not have had a referendum that was split right down the middle, because ultimately our frustration is the same - we're all sick of the exploitation of this world, but instead of dealing with it we're fighting amongst ourselves about who has caused it. And it's for this reason that I cannot stand left-wing activists fighting amongst themselves. Guys, we're on the same side. Our methods might be different, but we want to achieve the same goals. There are enough people out there who hate us, and are forcing us to fight them - why are we wasting time fighting amongst ourselves instead of dealing with the problem?
My position, which probably disagrees with both people I've been talking to, is that protest is not the antithesis of dialogue. Protest is the moment when you take to the streets, to show the world how angry you are - and that's important. Dialogue is the moment after that, when you talk to whoever will listen to you and reach a conclusion that suits everyone - and that's important as well. It's not a binary, either/or, mutually exclusive choice. They work together, and if some people choose to prioritise one area more than another, we should support them and help them, even if our own skills are better somewhere else.
Dialogue + protest = activism.
Jo Cox MP, 1974 - 2016
It has been seven months since my last blog, and this specific one I've been putting off all week in the interests of keeping things personable between myself and some of my comrades, because things have got quite heated and I partially agree with two completely conflicting perspectives. It has taken me quite a few days to get my own opinion coherent enough to write about.
Earlier this year, The Rebel Without A Clause took off significantly after I took part in a protest at a Bristol venue called the Jam Jar in defence of the Gender Recognition Act (if you don't know about this feel free to read my blog about this protest, as well as the exclusive interview with a trans rights activist that I conducted mainly to answer some of the questions I was receiving on social media). I don't know quite what it is about this subject that gets people so worked up. My readership is tiny (I'm lucky to get over 200) and yet for this brief period it reached into the thousands. I had a heck of a lot of contact, both on here and on Twitter, some of which was very supportive, some of which was quite abusive, but I did my best to take it all in stride and respond as politely as possible.
Just over a week ago, our protest was featured in a documentary on Channel 4 called Trans Kids: It's Time to Talk, which included a featured interview with me (I confess I have only seen the parts of the documentary that I'm in - I hear it's really not very good and contains a lot of erasure about trans and non-binary issues, but here is the On Demand link if anyone wants to watch it). I think that I myself came across quite well, but the protest generally was naturally edited to look a lot more violent than it actually was, which is of course to be expected if you're a left-wing activist. Shortly after this programme was broadcast, another featured activist, Esther Betts (whose identity was obscured at the time) has written an article in the Guardian identifying herself, openly regretting and apologising for her actions and suggesting that we use a different approach to achieve this goal. Having read the article, I think Esther makes several extremely compelling points. This article has provoked a very, very wide range of responses from both trans rights activists and from people opposed to what we do. I'll go into more detail about that later, but suffice to say that on both sides there are people applauding Esther, and people who utterly condemn the way she has handled this. There are activists feeling she has betrayed them, and TERFs (and I myself still use that word freely) feeling that this apology is not genuine and only an opportunistic attempt to capitalise on being portrayed in a negative light on national television.
As someone quite involved, I've been questioning myself as to how much I agree with what Esther writes. The first question to answer there is: do I myself regret my actions at that protest?
The short and simple answer, no.
Not even slightly.
There are two reasons for this. The first is that although other activists may have had a different agenda, my protest was not really aimed at the speakers (I really don't consider certain people such as Venice Allen, who was asked to leave a Labour Christmas party for transphobic behaviour towards the first transgender women's officer, to be worth my time or energy fighting) but at the venue. I felt providing a platform to Allen and others of that ilk was counter-intuitive to the Jam Jar's aim of supporting and promoting grassroots culture and creativity - which in my view is about allowing people to be themselves, free from the sort of persecution that certain invited speakers have been known to precipitate. I had myself witnessed one particular organiser, Matthew Strange (who I had known and got on well with prior to this), speaking in an extremely arrogant, dismissive and patronising way to concerned individuals, and to me. I think it is certainly possible to have a reasoned discussion about sex and gender, but this was not it as it was clearly intended to prioritise a certain intepretation, and Matthew himself did not seem willing to take on board other points of view.
The other reason is that I've been a left-wing activist since I was 17, on many different issues. Things can get very heated at protests, and if you attend as many as I have you develop your own moral code. There is a line that I don't cross - for example, there's a chant that commonly comes up at anti-austerity demos: 'Build a bonfire, build a bonfire, stick the Tories at the top; put Labour in the middle and we'll burn the fucking lot.' I choose not to take part in this particular chant, because I think threatening to burn people alive, even if it is tongue-in-cheek, does not put across the message that I want to put across. I'm quite a peaceful activist, but I am still an activist. I'm not cool with threats of violence, but when circumstances demand it I am cool with damage to property, civil disruption and breach of the peace. I've stood outside supermarkets that stock products sourced from warzones shouting into a megaphone, and I'd do it again - because a minor bit of disruption to someone's shopping is worth it if it means customers are educated about what to avoid, and supermarkets are incentivised to take a stand. But I don't think anyone has ever felt frightened for their personal safety because of me, and that is where I draw the line.
At the Jam Jar protest, I don't think I crossed my self-imposed line at all. For most of it, I stood outside with a banner, talking openly to people and explaining my reasoning, and my exact words if anyone asked if I was preventing people going in were, 'We respectfully ask you not to.' At a later point I was part of a large crowd that forced its way past security to attempt to gain access to and disrupt the event. Had I managed to gain access to the room, my protest would have been much the same as how I behaved outside. I should mention that Esther mentions in her article that there were plans to let off a smoke bomb; I need to make clear that I was not made aware of this at all, and would not have played any part in that. I wasn't watching Esther at every second of the demonstration; she may well have done something that broke her own moral code, and if so it's at her discretion to apologise for that. I do not feel that I did. I'm proud to be a Trans Rights Activist, and would do the same thing again if I thought it was important.
So I think it's clear that I firmly disagree with quite a lot of what Esther says in her article. I think there's an indication that confrontational protest achieves nothing, and I utterly refute that. The rights we have now did not come without a struggle, and nor will the ones we don't have come easily in the future. Having said that, I don't really have much of a moral issue with her having written it. This seems to be quite a problem for a lot of people - as I said at the start, Esther has faced signficant levels of criticism for this. Read any comment thread, and you'll see numerous accusations from TERFs claiming that Esther's apology is only damage limitation because she was caught out on TV, and is a thug crying crocodile tears to fool the gullible (these tend to be the ones who use the wrong pronouns for her). But it's not just from political opponents - a lot of the negative reaction has been from fellow trans rights activists, including some good friends of mine. I spent quite a long time talking to a friend and comrade of mine, who felt utterly let down by this; who had considered Esther a close friend, and now feels that she has sold out everyone who was at the Jam Jar and let down the cause. Although this is not my feeling, I can relate; if one thinks back to one's schooldays, I think everyone can remember how it felt when your best friend ditched you for the school bully. I don't actually think that was the intention, and I think that trying to find some common ground with your political opponents can be a constructive thing - but if those people have threatened you and try to find out where you live, then on a personal level an ally trying to get on with them is quite a bitter pill to swallow and feels quite backstabby.
So I see and sympathise with both sides, and as a cisgender man I'm probably not qualified to say who is right. However, what really annoys me about this is that they cannot see one another's side. And to me, that is the problem here. The left-wing activism community is really close-knit - most of us know each other, if not in person then by reputation, and the word 'comrade' is thrown around in a way that it isn't in any other field. There's good reason for this; we need each other. We need to discuss strategy and ideas, otherwise we're not a collective, we're just a bunch of individuals shouting at the world because no one is listening. And in a collective, not everyone will think exactly alike. It's hopelessly naive to think that everyone who believes in the same ideals as you will have the same methods as you - as above, I spoke about moral codes. Some activists are a bit more confrontational than I am, some are a bit less so. I respect them whatever, and talk to them openly to try to create a better world. Because even though I may disagree with them on certain things, they are still my comrades, and I'd rather they were with me than against me (or worse, discouraged and sitting at home with the XBox).
We live in a world that is utterly divided, on every level. Two and a half years ago, a week before a referendum that split this country down the middle, a wonderful Labour MP was murdered because of her ethics, kindness and empathy. I've shared a quote from her at the top, which was true when she said it and it's true now. The fallout from 2016 still hasn't abated, and my frustration about Brexit goes way beyond Leave vs Remain; it's not about what people believe, but about why they believe it. We should not have had a referendum that was split right down the middle, because ultimately our frustration is the same - we're all sick of the exploitation of this world, but instead of dealing with it we're fighting amongst ourselves about who has caused it. And it's for this reason that I cannot stand left-wing activists fighting amongst themselves. Guys, we're on the same side. Our methods might be different, but we want to achieve the same goals. There are enough people out there who hate us, and are forcing us to fight them - why are we wasting time fighting amongst ourselves instead of dealing with the problem?
My position, which probably disagrees with both people I've been talking to, is that protest is not the antithesis of dialogue. Protest is the moment when you take to the streets, to show the world how angry you are - and that's important. Dialogue is the moment after that, when you talk to whoever will listen to you and reach a conclusion that suits everyone - and that's important as well. It's not a binary, either/or, mutually exclusive choice. They work together, and if some people choose to prioritise one area more than another, we should support them and help them, even if our own skills are better somewhere else.
Dialogue + protest = activism.
Monday, 28 May 2018
Politics within the Eurovision Song Contest
'First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win'
A quote, commonly attributed to Mahatma Gandhi, though there is no evidence that he ever said it. Which doesn't alter its accuracy.
Despite its tackiness, corporatism and overly superficial songs, I must admit that like millions of other people around the world, I love Eurovision. I don't love it enough to follow the various stages, but for ten out of the last eleven years, I have made an event of watching it, more often than not with lots of fizzy pop and crunchy snacks that I wouldn't touch with a bargepole at any other time of year. There's just something about Eurovision, you know? I have always done my best to avoid getting involved in the politics of it - I always vote based on my opinions of the acts and nothing else. But this year, there have been two things that have caused me to acknowledge the political impact of Eurovision, and as one of them is really quite serious I will devote most of the blog to that.
I will start out though by talking about the stage invasion during the UK's entry. For anyone who didn't watch it, a man ran onstage during the UK's performance, snatched the singer's microphone and shouted: 'Nazis of the UK media, we demand freedom, war is not peace', before being restrained by security. The stage invader is known as Dr AC, and he is a rapper and political activist who has a history of storming stage performances. I was going to write a full blog on this, but recent events have meant that issues with Palestine and Israel have had to take precedence here, with this incident relegated to the opening paragraphs. As a left-wing activist and social commentator, I quite frequently have people making certain assumptions about me (only yesterday, I had someone I didn't even know ask me if I 'look for attention like the standard pansexual, feminist, non binary and all that other bullshit sort of people do'). Anyone who identifies as any of those things should of course be happy and proud to do so, but there are some (supposedly) left-wing activists who really do lower the tone of how we are perceived. This Dr AC is one of them. Anyone who interrupts an artistic performance, no matter how corporatist the event is that it is being performed at, really needs to take a good hard look at themselves. There are two reasons for this: the first is that it's very unfair on the artist, and the second is that it gives the right-wing media the excuse to diss you. Just as an example, the rapper Dr AC has been labelled in the press as a 'Corbyn supporter', which will no doubt stand in people's minds as another reason to doubt Jeremy Corbyn, even if though he had nothing to do with it. The thing that annoys me particularly about this is that I think it's completely reasonable to cast doubt on the state of the UK media (I frequently do myself) and the way that Dr AC approached this protest delegitimises any attempt to have that conversation.
Despite its tackiness, corporatism and overly superficial songs, I must admit that like millions of other people around the world, I love Eurovision. I don't love it enough to follow the various stages, but for ten out of the last eleven years, I have made an event of watching it, more often than not with lots of fizzy pop and crunchy snacks that I wouldn't touch with a bargepole at any other time of year. There's just something about Eurovision, you know? I have always done my best to avoid getting involved in the politics of it - I always vote based on my opinions of the acts and nothing else. But this year, there have been two things that have caused me to acknowledge the political impact of Eurovision, and as one of them is really quite serious I will devote most of the blog to that.
I will start out though by talking about the stage invasion during the UK's entry. For anyone who didn't watch it, a man ran onstage during the UK's performance, snatched the singer's microphone and shouted: 'Nazis of the UK media, we demand freedom, war is not peace', before being restrained by security. The stage invader is known as Dr AC, and he is a rapper and political activist who has a history of storming stage performances. I was going to write a full blog on this, but recent events have meant that issues with Palestine and Israel have had to take precedence here, with this incident relegated to the opening paragraphs. As a left-wing activist and social commentator, I quite frequently have people making certain assumptions about me (only yesterday, I had someone I didn't even know ask me if I 'look for attention like the standard pansexual, feminist, non binary and all that other bullshit sort of people do'). Anyone who identifies as any of those things should of course be happy and proud to do so, but there are some (supposedly) left-wing activists who really do lower the tone of how we are perceived. This Dr AC is one of them. Anyone who interrupts an artistic performance, no matter how corporatist the event is that it is being performed at, really needs to take a good hard look at themselves. There are two reasons for this: the first is that it's very unfair on the artist, and the second is that it gives the right-wing media the excuse to diss you. Just as an example, the rapper Dr AC has been labelled in the press as a 'Corbyn supporter', which will no doubt stand in people's minds as another reason to doubt Jeremy Corbyn, even if though he had nothing to do with it. The thing that annoys me particularly about this is that I think it's completely reasonable to cast doubt on the state of the UK media (I frequently do myself) and the way that Dr AC approached this protest delegitimises any attempt to have that conversation.
And now I come on to what I must devote the majority of this blog to, which is the political significance of Israel winning the Eurovision Song Contest and what that means within the region. The case of Israel's position within the world is something that is complex, and something that I differ sometimes even with my fellow Palestine campaigners on. There are some who say that Israel doesn't even have the right to be there, and I disagree on that because I'm a supporter of diversity wherever possible, people from all backgrounds and all walks of life living alongside one another, and I believe that in the region as well. What I don't agree with is that Jewish people have a God-given right to inhabit that region at the expense of all other groups of people. I am an anti-zionist. There are many who will conflate that with anti-Semitism, which means prejudice against Jews. They are by no means the same thing. Anti-zionism is a political opinion, one that many Jews share, and for myself at least, is something that I would extend to all circumstances and all groups of people. On planet Earth, I don't believe that any specific group of people have a monopoly over any specific piece of land, in the same way that I don't believe that humans have any more of a claim to this planet than any other life form.
I don't think many people (or at least, people in power) actually believe that anti-zionism and anti-Semitism are interchangeable. It's really more of an attempt to justify the unjustifiable by painting those who oppose it with the racist brush, which generally is quite a lazy way of arguing a point. It's the same mentality as those who complain that if you're against war, it means you must be against the armed forces, and if you're against the armed forces you're showing an unacceptable lack of respect for those who lay down their lives - quite obviously, this is not true, but by saying it like that you prevent anyone from questioning the agenda that you're setting forward, agendas which many powerful people from around the world have a vested interest in. Anti-Semitism aside, no one would reasonably accept the actions of Israel being committed by any other country. To put this in perspective, since the United Nations Human Rights Council was founded in 2006, it has resolved almost more resolutions comdemning Israel than the whole of the rest of the world combined. Think about that for a moment.
The occupation of Palestine started with the creation of Israel in the late 1940s, increased significantly in the wake of the six-day war of 1967, and has been increasing ever since. I'm sure most of my readers will have seen this map at some point in the past, but in case you haven't here it is:
It is worth bearing in mind that this particular incarnation of the map only goes up to 2005, because in the last thirteen years the divide has increased significantly. Palestine is being wiped out, and across the last week and a half, tensions in the region seem to have increased once more.
Last week, Donald Trump and his daughter Ivanka opened the new US embassy in Jerusalem, in what seems like a deliberate attempt to escalate tensions in the region. In recent years, US presidents have generally been less than exemplary when it comes to Israel, but this just takes the biscuit. Jerusalem is not recognised as the capital of Israel by any country other than the US, Russia and of course Israel itself. The western half has been occupied by Israel since 1948, the eastern half since 1967, and the United Nations Security Council Resolution 478 (passed in 1980) declares Israel's Jerusalem Law to be null and void. Palestinians living in Jerusalem are in legal limbo, not being considered citizens of Israel, Palestine or nearby Jordan. They are constantly at risk of having their residency revoked. In short, they are treated as foreign immigrants in a city that many of them were born in and have lived in all their lives.
Israel, on the other hand, does not even avoid apartheid when it comes to the Jewish people, much as it claims to be the Jewish state. Jews in Israel are not equal. They are divided into three groups - Ashkenazi, Sephardic and Mazrahi, and the Ashkenazi Jews (meaning those who arrived from Europe in the late 19th and early 20th century), whilst not necessarily having any specific advantages within law, are generally more accepted within Israeli culture and have greater access to things like education. The Al-Jazeera article I have linked above focusses in particular upon the distinctions between Ashkenazi and Mazrahi Jews, but I remember hearing a podcast called Bombs, Badgers and Bigotry back in September (the Israel bit starts at about 34.40) where Nancy Mendoza talked with Emily Apple, John Ranson and Tamara Micner about her own experiences of anti-Semitism, her opinions of Israel and her status as a Sephardic Jew, which would mean that she would be unable to claim all the benefits of living in Israel that are supposedly open to all Jews. I bring this up because it is important to note that Israel as an apartheid state does not even limit that apartheid to the people it claims it is limiting it to (as bad as that is in itself); even groups that Israel supposedly considers to be its own people are not treated equally within its borders. It is worth bearing this in mind, because I think it emphasises even more plainly that this whole discussion is not really about Jewish identity, as much as it is the fact that the powers that be in Israel make decisions that are harming (and ending) people's lives for political gain.
Aside from accusations of anti-Semitism, the other thing I hear constantly from Israel apologists is attempts to blame Hamas (which controls the Palestine Government) for Israel's actions, saying that they have provoked them and aren't being diplomatic enough at resolving things. I'm not sure how much truth there is in that, and in honesty I don't really care. I find Hamas a pretty irrelevant distraction actually, for a few reasons:
1) Hamas was formed in 1987, whereas this conflict has been going on in some shape or form since the Second World War, and has been ramped up on Israel's part since the mid-60s;
2) Given how outspoken I am about the Conservative Party, the idea that the people deserve what is coming to them because of the actions of their representatives is something that I cannot give any sympathy to;
3) The bottom line is that it is not Hamas actually holding the weapons that are killing Palestinians.
It is truthfully quite astonishing to see how far people will go to absolve Israeli forces. Over the last few weeks, I have seen the condemnation of Palestinians go beyond Hamas to the Palestinians themselves. When children are being arrested and even killed by Israeli soldiers, I have actually come across people in all seriousness suggesting that it is the fault of the child's parents for living near the Gaza strip. Obviously no one would volunteer to live in a place where they and their kids' lives were under threat, but surely the more important question is, where have we come to in the world where we hold a child's parents more responsible for threats to that child's life than whoever is actually causing the threat? When children were put in the gas chambers in the concentration camps in the 1940s, was it the fault of the Nazis, or of the kids' parents for not hiding effectively enough?
Clearly, the whole thing is a double standard. In the minds of a lot of people, it matters less exactly what is being done, and more who is doing it, and that extends beyond just Israel and Palestine, it is a phenomenon that occurs with virtually every issue in the world. I could probably talk about the root causes of this for hours, but in the interests of not extending this blog even longer, I shall move on. Donald Trump's decision to open the US embassy in Jerusalem was clearly not an attempt to achieve peace, as achieving peace generally tends to be done by working alongside the international community, and as stated above, there are only three countries in the world that officially recognise Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, and that includes Israel itself. One does not achieve peace by opening up old wounds or by resorting to inflammatory comments on Twitter. One achieves it by making a concerted effort to work out a solution that results in freedom for everyone. That is not what Israel is trying to do, and it is not what those sucking up to Israel are doing either.
I want to finish off by returning to the title of this blog, which is the impact the Eurovision Song Contest has on political allegiances with its position on the world stage. Israel won the Eurovision Song Contest (incidentally, with a performance that irrespective of my political views on Israel, I thought was appalling) and will therefore be hosting next year's contest. I will stay true to my views that fans of the contest should vote purely on which act is the best, irrespective of their political values. And if a country with a history of very serious human rights abuses happens to win, by convention they still have the right to host the following year's contest. (It's questionable whether they should have been allowed to take part at all of course, but that ship has sailed.) What I do find is that Israel's current position within the contest gives anti-zionist activists a really good opportunity to further the campaign. There are already numerous companies I refuse to buy from because of their involvement with Israel, (the Boycot, Divestment and Sanctions movement has an awful lot of information and I encourage anyone who hasn't already to look into it). Most importantly, this campaign is having an effect. In America, there has been talk about making it illegal to boycott Israel, which when one thinks about it is ridiculous and impossible to enforce - everyone has a right to choose which brands they buy. But this sort of reaction from those in power would not be happening were it not having an effect. And with next year's Eurovision, there is an opportunity for the BDS movement to increase its boycotting even further.
There is a year to make this happen. On a political level, a celebration of Israel is not what needs to happen next year, and boycotting Eurovision would send a very powerful message that if you want to take part in what should be a fabulous celebration of art and music, you will only be accepted if you stop committing war crimes. I highly doubt halting next year's contest is feasible, or even desirable. But what we can do is make it clear how controversial this is, take advantage to show the world exactly what the nation hosting their favourite music contest is guilty of (if we could get even one country to refuse to participate, that would really be the icing on the cake) and that would undoubtedly improve things. Israel only gets away with what it does because the rest of the world lets it, and as I have demonstrated will go to any length to excuse its actions.
And I will just concluse by reiterating what I said at the start - quite apart from my opinions on Israel, the reason I feel so strongly about this is that despite its flaws I love Eurovision, I watch it every year and I think it would be amazing if it stood up in the international community and said, 'This is wrong'. So often, the songs (though they avoid specific political references) have themes based around love and peace - time to give that some meaning, yes? So I shall leave you with the song Love Shine A Light by Katrina and the Waves, the last UK winners, which I think embodies everything.
Peace!
I don't think many people (or at least, people in power) actually believe that anti-zionism and anti-Semitism are interchangeable. It's really more of an attempt to justify the unjustifiable by painting those who oppose it with the racist brush, which generally is quite a lazy way of arguing a point. It's the same mentality as those who complain that if you're against war, it means you must be against the armed forces, and if you're against the armed forces you're showing an unacceptable lack of respect for those who lay down their lives - quite obviously, this is not true, but by saying it like that you prevent anyone from questioning the agenda that you're setting forward, agendas which many powerful people from around the world have a vested interest in. Anti-Semitism aside, no one would reasonably accept the actions of Israel being committed by any other country. To put this in perspective, since the United Nations Human Rights Council was founded in 2006, it has resolved almost more resolutions comdemning Israel than the whole of the rest of the world combined. Think about that for a moment.
The occupation of Palestine started with the creation of Israel in the late 1940s, increased significantly in the wake of the six-day war of 1967, and has been increasing ever since. I'm sure most of my readers will have seen this map at some point in the past, but in case you haven't here it is:
It is worth bearing in mind that this particular incarnation of the map only goes up to 2005, because in the last thirteen years the divide has increased significantly. Palestine is being wiped out, and across the last week and a half, tensions in the region seem to have increased once more.
Last week, Donald Trump and his daughter Ivanka opened the new US embassy in Jerusalem, in what seems like a deliberate attempt to escalate tensions in the region. In recent years, US presidents have generally been less than exemplary when it comes to Israel, but this just takes the biscuit. Jerusalem is not recognised as the capital of Israel by any country other than the US, Russia and of course Israel itself. The western half has been occupied by Israel since 1948, the eastern half since 1967, and the United Nations Security Council Resolution 478 (passed in 1980) declares Israel's Jerusalem Law to be null and void. Palestinians living in Jerusalem are in legal limbo, not being considered citizens of Israel, Palestine or nearby Jordan. They are constantly at risk of having their residency revoked. In short, they are treated as foreign immigrants in a city that many of them were born in and have lived in all their lives.
Israel, on the other hand, does not even avoid apartheid when it comes to the Jewish people, much as it claims to be the Jewish state. Jews in Israel are not equal. They are divided into three groups - Ashkenazi, Sephardic and Mazrahi, and the Ashkenazi Jews (meaning those who arrived from Europe in the late 19th and early 20th century), whilst not necessarily having any specific advantages within law, are generally more accepted within Israeli culture and have greater access to things like education. The Al-Jazeera article I have linked above focusses in particular upon the distinctions between Ashkenazi and Mazrahi Jews, but I remember hearing a podcast called Bombs, Badgers and Bigotry back in September (the Israel bit starts at about 34.40) where Nancy Mendoza talked with Emily Apple, John Ranson and Tamara Micner about her own experiences of anti-Semitism, her opinions of Israel and her status as a Sephardic Jew, which would mean that she would be unable to claim all the benefits of living in Israel that are supposedly open to all Jews. I bring this up because it is important to note that Israel as an apartheid state does not even limit that apartheid to the people it claims it is limiting it to (as bad as that is in itself); even groups that Israel supposedly considers to be its own people are not treated equally within its borders. It is worth bearing this in mind, because I think it emphasises even more plainly that this whole discussion is not really about Jewish identity, as much as it is the fact that the powers that be in Israel make decisions that are harming (and ending) people's lives for political gain.
Aside from accusations of anti-Semitism, the other thing I hear constantly from Israel apologists is attempts to blame Hamas (which controls the Palestine Government) for Israel's actions, saying that they have provoked them and aren't being diplomatic enough at resolving things. I'm not sure how much truth there is in that, and in honesty I don't really care. I find Hamas a pretty irrelevant distraction actually, for a few reasons:
1) Hamas was formed in 1987, whereas this conflict has been going on in some shape or form since the Second World War, and has been ramped up on Israel's part since the mid-60s;
2) Given how outspoken I am about the Conservative Party, the idea that the people deserve what is coming to them because of the actions of their representatives is something that I cannot give any sympathy to;
3) The bottom line is that it is not Hamas actually holding the weapons that are killing Palestinians.
It is truthfully quite astonishing to see how far people will go to absolve Israeli forces. Over the last few weeks, I have seen the condemnation of Palestinians go beyond Hamas to the Palestinians themselves. When children are being arrested and even killed by Israeli soldiers, I have actually come across people in all seriousness suggesting that it is the fault of the child's parents for living near the Gaza strip. Obviously no one would volunteer to live in a place where they and their kids' lives were under threat, but surely the more important question is, where have we come to in the world where we hold a child's parents more responsible for threats to that child's life than whoever is actually causing the threat? When children were put in the gas chambers in the concentration camps in the 1940s, was it the fault of the Nazis, or of the kids' parents for not hiding effectively enough?
Clearly, the whole thing is a double standard. In the minds of a lot of people, it matters less exactly what is being done, and more who is doing it, and that extends beyond just Israel and Palestine, it is a phenomenon that occurs with virtually every issue in the world. I could probably talk about the root causes of this for hours, but in the interests of not extending this blog even longer, I shall move on. Donald Trump's decision to open the US embassy in Jerusalem was clearly not an attempt to achieve peace, as achieving peace generally tends to be done by working alongside the international community, and as stated above, there are only three countries in the world that officially recognise Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, and that includes Israel itself. One does not achieve peace by opening up old wounds or by resorting to inflammatory comments on Twitter. One achieves it by making a concerted effort to work out a solution that results in freedom for everyone. That is not what Israel is trying to do, and it is not what those sucking up to Israel are doing either.
I want to finish off by returning to the title of this blog, which is the impact the Eurovision Song Contest has on political allegiances with its position on the world stage. Israel won the Eurovision Song Contest (incidentally, with a performance that irrespective of my political views on Israel, I thought was appalling) and will therefore be hosting next year's contest. I will stay true to my views that fans of the contest should vote purely on which act is the best, irrespective of their political values. And if a country with a history of very serious human rights abuses happens to win, by convention they still have the right to host the following year's contest. (It's questionable whether they should have been allowed to take part at all of course, but that ship has sailed.) What I do find is that Israel's current position within the contest gives anti-zionist activists a really good opportunity to further the campaign. There are already numerous companies I refuse to buy from because of their involvement with Israel, (the Boycot, Divestment and Sanctions movement has an awful lot of information and I encourage anyone who hasn't already to look into it). Most importantly, this campaign is having an effect. In America, there has been talk about making it illegal to boycott Israel, which when one thinks about it is ridiculous and impossible to enforce - everyone has a right to choose which brands they buy. But this sort of reaction from those in power would not be happening were it not having an effect. And with next year's Eurovision, there is an opportunity for the BDS movement to increase its boycotting even further.
There is a year to make this happen. On a political level, a celebration of Israel is not what needs to happen next year, and boycotting Eurovision would send a very powerful message that if you want to take part in what should be a fabulous celebration of art and music, you will only be accepted if you stop committing war crimes. I highly doubt halting next year's contest is feasible, or even desirable. But what we can do is make it clear how controversial this is, take advantage to show the world exactly what the nation hosting their favourite music contest is guilty of (if we could get even one country to refuse to participate, that would really be the icing on the cake) and that would undoubtedly improve things. Israel only gets away with what it does because the rest of the world lets it, and as I have demonstrated will go to any length to excuse its actions.
And I will just concluse by reiterating what I said at the start - quite apart from my opinions on Israel, the reason I feel so strongly about this is that despite its flaws I love Eurovision, I watch it every year and I think it would be amazing if it stood up in the international community and said, 'This is wrong'. So often, the songs (though they avoid specific political references) have themes based around love and peace - time to give that some meaning, yes? So I shall leave you with the song Love Shine A Light by Katrina and the Waves, the last UK winners, which I think embodies everything.
Peace!
Wednesday, 25 April 2018
An exclusive interview with a trans rights activist
Wow! I have to say, I was not prepared for my blog about the protest at the Jam Jar to take off quite as much as it did. I've been getting a lot of responses on Twitter, and have responded to as many as I can. I think a lot of the time, being male and cisgender, I haven't really been the right person to answer their questions, much as I have done my best.
So, in a first for The Rebel Without A Clause, I have an exclusive interview! My interviewee wished to remain anonymous, but she's a young woman living in the UK, who very kindly agreed to sit down with me and have a frank discussion about the Gender Recognition Act, the importance of transgender women being able to access safe spaces and whether or not free speech can have any limits on it. Some of the questions are my own, but I did my best to pass on anything I've been asked by people on forums and on Twitter as well. I really hope everyone likes the interview. (My lines are in normal font, hers are in italics.)
Hi, thank you so much for giving this interview to The Rebel Without A Clause!
It's no trouble, really! Happy to talk.
I'm going to start with a question that I think is fairly general, but it seems to be very divisive for a lot of women (and men, but women's opinions are more relevant): what does it mean to be female?
This is an interesting question, with no concrete answer as of yet. I personally do not use the term, because it tends to confuse gender expression with what genitals someone has, and neither of those really fall anywhere on a binary. Because it conflates womanhood with, say, having a vagina, I do not use it, and I know a lot of other transgender people avoid it, too. It's also a very reductive way to talk about cisgender women - because it implies that her genitals are a defining part of her as a person.
Interesting - so is there a term you use instead?
To refer to a woman? I use "woman".
Was there a specific point you came to realise you're a woman?
I think the realisation came, for me, when I started taking HRT medication (acquired via the internet). I found that it made me feel much more at peace with my body and mind. It's a very difficult feeling to describe. I found that, with both HRT medication, and presenting myself to the world as a woman, I was much more confident about myself. I started to like myself. This happened around 5 years ago, now.
Just to be clear to anyone who doesn't know, what is HRT medication?
Hormone Replacement Therapy. This type of medication is given to people, both trans and cis, who have some sort of problem with their body's own hormone production. For trans women, it involves blocking testosterone production, and introducing oestrogen.
I think that realisation is something that a lot of people go through actually. I mean I've had it, and I'm cisgender. I can tell you the precise date I realised that I'm a man. I guess for a cisgender person, it's more of an age thing than a gender thing, but it's probably something similar.
Possibly! I can't really say for cisgender people, because the only time I really felt like I knew who I was, was when I took HRT. For me, puberty was not pleasant.
Can you tell me a bit more about that?
The introduction of male hormones made me feel anxious and stressed, and as my body changed, I started to hate it more and more. I think it's important to stress that I didn't really know why. Some trans people know early on. Some don't. I think that's one of the reasons why we need education on this.
Is education improving at all?
Not specifically, from what I can tell. I think there is a bit more awareness in society in general, which kids might pick up on, but as far as I know things are still pretty limited. And even if they did gain an understanding of who they are, what can they do about it? The press shrieks at the very idea of transgender kids.
I did come across a book in Waterstones recently called The Art of Being Normal, which deals with two transgender teenagers, one boy and one girl, one of whom is already in the process of transitioning and the other being in the early stages of realising it about themselves. It has received a lot of praise, there isn't much young adult fiction on the subject.
Yeah it is very scarce, although even then, I think there is more out there since I started transition. I hope more is coming, in spite of the opposition.
I really hope so as well. Moving on, how much abuse do you receive?
In person, I've had a few incidents. Mostly shouting from drunks, or not-very-subtle snide comments. One of them from a UK Border Agency guy who was checking my passport. I have yet to be the subject of physical violence, although the idea is always in my mind.
Do you think social media makes it easier to bully people?
Oh definitely. You can abuse people via social media and face very few, if any, consequences. Not just bullying, but also harassment. You can simply make a throwaway account and, for example, post doxxed information with it. Maybe it'll get shut down for abuse. Maybe it won't. Either way, nothing much in the way of consequence. Certainly legal recourse is almost impossible.
This 'freedom of speech' thing... I want to talk about that. Because there's a strong argument that to support freedom of speech, you can't have a limit on that, otherwise it's not freedom of speech anymore. I remember hearing Germaine Greer saying once, 'Whether it hurts people, or offends people, speech must be free.' She wasn't talking about transgenderism, she meant more generally, and at the time I heard it I 100% agreed with her. And of course, Greer is another one of those people whose comments have caused issues to the trans community. What are your thoughts on this notion, as a general principle?
First of all, I want to make it clear: Freedom of speech, as a concept, only applies to the government restricting your rights. Most of what is called an "assault on free speech" these days is people getting a backlash for what they're saying, not the government stepping in and clamping down.
So, in a first for The Rebel Without A Clause, I have an exclusive interview! My interviewee wished to remain anonymous, but she's a young woman living in the UK, who very kindly agreed to sit down with me and have a frank discussion about the Gender Recognition Act, the importance of transgender women being able to access safe spaces and whether or not free speech can have any limits on it. Some of the questions are my own, but I did my best to pass on anything I've been asked by people on forums and on Twitter as well. I really hope everyone likes the interview. (My lines are in normal font, hers are in italics.)
Hi, thank you so much for giving this interview to The Rebel Without A Clause!
It's no trouble, really! Happy to talk.
I'm going to start with a question that I think is fairly general, but it seems to be very divisive for a lot of women (and men, but women's opinions are more relevant): what does it mean to be female?
This is an interesting question, with no concrete answer as of yet. I personally do not use the term, because it tends to confuse gender expression with what genitals someone has, and neither of those really fall anywhere on a binary. Because it conflates womanhood with, say, having a vagina, I do not use it, and I know a lot of other transgender people avoid it, too. It's also a very reductive way to talk about cisgender women - because it implies that her genitals are a defining part of her as a person.
Interesting - so is there a term you use instead?
To refer to a woman? I use "woman".
Was there a specific point you came to realise you're a woman?
I think the realisation came, for me, when I started taking HRT medication (acquired via the internet). I found that it made me feel much more at peace with my body and mind. It's a very difficult feeling to describe. I found that, with both HRT medication, and presenting myself to the world as a woman, I was much more confident about myself. I started to like myself. This happened around 5 years ago, now.
Just to be clear to anyone who doesn't know, what is HRT medication?
Hormone Replacement Therapy. This type of medication is given to people, both trans and cis, who have some sort of problem with their body's own hormone production. For trans women, it involves blocking testosterone production, and introducing oestrogen.
I think that realisation is something that a lot of people go through actually. I mean I've had it, and I'm cisgender. I can tell you the precise date I realised that I'm a man. I guess for a cisgender person, it's more of an age thing than a gender thing, but it's probably something similar.
Possibly! I can't really say for cisgender people, because the only time I really felt like I knew who I was, was when I took HRT. For me, puberty was not pleasant.
Can you tell me a bit more about that?
The introduction of male hormones made me feel anxious and stressed, and as my body changed, I started to hate it more and more. I think it's important to stress that I didn't really know why. Some trans people know early on. Some don't. I think that's one of the reasons why we need education on this.
Is education improving at all?
Not specifically, from what I can tell. I think there is a bit more awareness in society in general, which kids might pick up on, but as far as I know things are still pretty limited. And even if they did gain an understanding of who they are, what can they do about it? The press shrieks at the very idea of transgender kids.
I did come across a book in Waterstones recently called The Art of Being Normal, which deals with two transgender teenagers, one boy and one girl, one of whom is already in the process of transitioning and the other being in the early stages of realising it about themselves. It has received a lot of praise, there isn't much young adult fiction on the subject.
Yeah it is very scarce, although even then, I think there is more out there since I started transition. I hope more is coming, in spite of the opposition.
I really hope so as well. Moving on, how much abuse do you receive?
In person, I've had a few incidents. Mostly shouting from drunks, or not-very-subtle snide comments. One of them from a UK Border Agency guy who was checking my passport. I have yet to be the subject of physical violence, although the idea is always in my mind.
A lot of places on the internet are a nightmare if you're an out trans woman, where transphobia is often taken as "freedom of speech". Facebook's moderators, for example, seem to have no concept of transphobia. The mainstream gaming community are particularly toxic.
Of course, this is only the abuse that is individual, not systemic.
Do you think social media makes it easier to bully people?
Oh definitely. You can abuse people via social media and face very few, if any, consequences. Not just bullying, but also harassment. You can simply make a throwaway account and, for example, post doxxed information with it. Maybe it'll get shut down for abuse. Maybe it won't. Either way, nothing much in the way of consequence. Certainly legal recourse is almost impossible.
This 'freedom of speech' thing... I want to talk about that. Because there's a strong argument that to support freedom of speech, you can't have a limit on that, otherwise it's not freedom of speech anymore. I remember hearing Germaine Greer saying once, 'Whether it hurts people, or offends people, speech must be free.' She wasn't talking about transgenderism, she meant more generally, and at the time I heard it I 100% agreed with her. And of course, Greer is another one of those people whose comments have caused issues to the trans community. What are your thoughts on this notion, as a general principle?
First of all, I want to make it clear: Freedom of speech, as a concept, only applies to the government restricting your rights. Most of what is called an "assault on free speech" these days is people getting a backlash for what they're saying, not the government stepping in and clamping down.
This is an important distinction.
Freedom of speech is, indeed, useful for political freedom and academic freedom, because it lets you say things that are unpopular. It is effectively there to protect you from powerful institutions, like the government, religion and capitalism.
But while you might have the freedom to say something, I also have the freedom to criticise - and I do not have to be polite. I can protest what you're saying.
I also do not have to give you a platform to say it. No one is entitled to an audience, you are only entitled to speak.
And even then, we as a society agree on limits to free speech. Indeed, even the often cited champions of this concept, the American founding fathers, imposed limits on free speech. The common example of "crying fire in a crowded theatre" is a good idea of where these limits come in.
Free speech in the true sense, is only for ideas that are unpopular, but not harmful to people's safety. This is why we have hate speech laws, and why leftist spaces forbid things like racism and transphobia.
You can criticise the government and other institutions as much as you want. But if you say something that can incite violence against or repress marginalised people? No. If you think about it, that sort of thing serves no potential positive benefit for society, at all. It does not promote discussion, it only seeks to suppress people who already have less of a voice.
Yeah, I completely get you. I always say that no one has rights without responsibility. The right to be able to say what you like comes with the responsibility not to abuse that right, otherwise consequences will occur - not exactly threat of your right to free speech taken away, but more people not wanting to listen to you, people calling you out and the result potentially being harm to your reputation. Is that fair?
Yeah. People with opinions on the marginalised are often quick to demand the right to say what they're saying, and rarely want the responsibility for saying it. To demand to be able to do something without responsibility is, in my view, childish.
Now with regards to the most recent debates about the protest around the Jam Jar, is there anything that you think the TERFs may have a point about?
I think their question of the safety of women in certain spaces highlights a general lax attitude towards abusers, that I think should be corrected in a way that does not involve shutting out entire classes of women.
One thing I said in my previous blog was: 'We did contribute to the discussion. We contributed by showing everyone exactly what we think of the way that this talk was framed.' And someone on Twitter came back at me by saying, 'There isn't a way of framing it you'd be happy with except not talking about it at all!' What would you say to that person?
As I said, a couple of the fears that people have about self identification are really just fears about bad filtering and protection against abusers - of all genders.
Yeah, I completely get you. I always say that no one has rights without responsibility. The right to be able to say what you like comes with the responsibility not to abuse that right, otherwise consequences will occur - not exactly threat of your right to free speech taken away, but more people not wanting to listen to you, people calling you out and the result potentially being harm to your reputation. Is that fair?
Yeah. People with opinions on the marginalised are often quick to demand the right to say what they're saying, and rarely want the responsibility for saying it. To demand to be able to do something without responsibility is, in my view, childish.
Now with regards to the most recent debates about the protest around the Jam Jar, is there anything that you think the TERFs may have a point about?
I think their question of the safety of women in certain spaces highlights a general lax attitude towards abusers, that I think should be corrected in a way that does not involve shutting out entire classes of women.
One thing I said in my previous blog was: 'We did contribute to the discussion. We contributed by showing everyone exactly what we think of the way that this talk was framed.' And someone on Twitter came back at me by saying, 'There isn't a way of framing it you'd be happy with except not talking about it at all!' What would you say to that person?
As I said, a couple of the fears that people have about self identification are really just fears about bad filtering and protection against abusers - of all genders.
However, the talk itself and the politics of the people involved was inseparable from the assumption that transgender women are, in fact, men. And, no, that's not only scientifically incorrect, it's flat out bigotry. You can't re-frame that sort of conversation in a way that makes it respectful to trans people, because then the conversation wouldn't really be about trans people any more - we'd be talking about how to make spaces safer in general.
I think pretty much every bigot in history has had some genuine injustice behind their bigotry. It's like the UKIP voter who complains about 'immigrants stealing our jobs'... they're right to be angry with the exploitative nature of the capitalist system, they're just blaming the wrong person. The response I gave to the person who said that was to say that I don't think anyone would object if the discussion about been framed as 'How can we do more to protect women?' without any distinction between transwomen or any other women. That sort of talk would take into account any legitimate concerns without misgendering people.
Yeah it makes more sense to focus it on women's safety. Which it ostensibly was about, but obviously was not, because they don't include transgender women's safety in the discussion.
I think that's quite a problem with quite a lot of interpretations of feminism actually, and it goes beyond transwomen into all sorts of underprivileged women. Our BFF Julie Bindel, for instance, is a staunch opponent of decriminalising sex work, and I can't understand how any feminist can hold that opinion because it harms women. It means they're less empowered to report abuse by employers and lots of other things. I'm not the biggest fan of the sort of feminism that focusses primarily on the gender pay gap and female representation in boardrooms, because (although I accept that those are important issues) the women it benefits will mostly be the ones who already have professional qualifications, therefore more privileged than your average girl on the street.
It's the sort of feminism that's acceptable and, therefore, does not challenge society. Getting more privilege for those relatively privileged to begin with (at least, compared to a lot of women) is easier than lifting up those at the bottom. In my opinion, it is a lazy form of feminism, that demands that white cisgender middle class women only need to think about the problems of white cisgender middle class women.
I think pretty much every bigot in history has had some genuine injustice behind their bigotry. It's like the UKIP voter who complains about 'immigrants stealing our jobs'... they're right to be angry with the exploitative nature of the capitalist system, they're just blaming the wrong person. The response I gave to the person who said that was to say that I don't think anyone would object if the discussion about been framed as 'How can we do more to protect women?' without any distinction between transwomen or any other women. That sort of talk would take into account any legitimate concerns without misgendering people.
Yeah it makes more sense to focus it on women's safety. Which it ostensibly was about, but obviously was not, because they don't include transgender women's safety in the discussion.
I think that's quite a problem with quite a lot of interpretations of feminism actually, and it goes beyond transwomen into all sorts of underprivileged women. Our BFF Julie Bindel, for instance, is a staunch opponent of decriminalising sex work, and I can't understand how any feminist can hold that opinion because it harms women. It means they're less empowered to report abuse by employers and lots of other things. I'm not the biggest fan of the sort of feminism that focusses primarily on the gender pay gap and female representation in boardrooms, because (although I accept that those are important issues) the women it benefits will mostly be the ones who already have professional qualifications, therefore more privileged than your average girl on the street.
It's the sort of feminism that's acceptable and, therefore, does not challenge society. Getting more privilege for those relatively privileged to begin with (at least, compared to a lot of women) is easier than lifting up those at the bottom. In my opinion, it is a lazy form of feminism, that demands that white cisgender middle class women only need to think about the problems of white cisgender middle class women.
The issue surrounding sex work is something that is very dear to my heart, as well. Not just with what's going on in the States right now, but also my own history.
Understandable. Are there any situations in which you think it's fair for cisgender women and transgender women to be treated differently? For example, a couple of people online have asked me what I think about sex divisions in sports if they're segregated because of issues with weight - and I refuse to answer that one, because it's too specific an issue for me to have an informed opinion on.
So, currently the issue with sports, is that organising bodies can discriminate, but must provide a reason for doing so, and they must demonstrate that exclusion was the only way to make the even fair. Personally, I think sports should desegregate and look at other ways of pairing athletes up. Separating based on gender is completely arbitrary, but we do still need ways of getting fair competition.
Understandable. Are there any situations in which you think it's fair for cisgender women and transgender women to be treated differently? For example, a couple of people online have asked me what I think about sex divisions in sports if they're segregated because of issues with weight - and I refuse to answer that one, because it's too specific an issue for me to have an informed opinion on.
So, currently the issue with sports, is that organising bodies can discriminate, but must provide a reason for doing so, and they must demonstrate that exclusion was the only way to make the even fair. Personally, I think sports should desegregate and look at other ways of pairing athletes up. Separating based on gender is completely arbitrary, but we do still need ways of getting fair competition.
Other than that, the only one that comes to mind is in terms of healthcare. It makes little sense for a cisgender woman to, say, visit the gender clinic at Charing Cross, right? And services specifically for trans health and advocacy. It just doesn't make sense for cis people to need those things, why would they? For other health related issues, pregnancy already crosses gender lines, with trans men giving birth, and with the prospect of wombs grown from stem cells, transwomen will be able to as well. A lot of health stuff already makes sense for both cis and trans people, or soon will.
Apart from that, I can't really think of anything off the top of my head. Things that are currently gendered can either be left as is, or altered in ways which, I think, makes it better for everyone.
There was something I meant to ask you earlier, but we moved on, and I want to go back to it because I think it's one of the most important things. You said that the event at the Jam Jar wasn't really about women's safety because the safety of transwomen wasn't considered. How much does it harm transwomen's safety to not be allowed into women's spaces?
It harms us a lot. It means we have very limited, or not access, to spaces for women who are abused. If a transgender woman is in an abusive relationship, where do they go? This sort of thing can be lethal.
There was something I meant to ask you earlier, but we moved on, and I want to go back to it because I think it's one of the most important things. You said that the event at the Jam Jar wasn't really about women's safety because the safety of transwomen wasn't considered. How much does it harm transwomen's safety to not be allowed into women's spaces?
It harms us a lot. It means we have very limited, or not access, to spaces for women who are abused. If a transgender woman is in an abusive relationship, where do they go? This sort of thing can be lethal.
Another one is trans women not being able to use, say, women's changing rooms in shops (there was a whole "protest" about this from TERFs). Does this mean we have to use the men's facilities? Do you think any trans woman is going to feel safe getting undressed, knowing how prevalent transphobic abuse is in our society?
And something as simple as a toilet. How many women would be happy being in a men's toilet? Again, both misogynistic and transphobic violence is always a very real problem in this case.
I think it's fair to say it harms cisgender women as well, isn't it? I have noticed the TERF crowd go very silent when anyone asks how they intend to distinguish the two.
Oh yes, definitely. It's already affecting cisgender women, in fact. There have been a few cases of more "butch" presenting women being misgendered and thrown out of toilets and other spaces. That is obviously very frightening and humiliating to them, as it is to us. If more restrictions are put in place, this will only get worse.
How important is it to have cisgender allies on campaigns like these?
It's vital. Transgender people are a very small minority. In Britain we make up 0.5-1% of the population. We simply do not have the numbers to make much change on our own. Additionally, transgender people are often economically marginalised, which means we are often poor, and not positions of power. In spite of the bizarre claims of the existence of a "trans cabal" by transphobes, we ourselves wield very little power. To maintain our rights in society, we need the help of cisgender people who actually care about us.
Is there any difference between having male cisgender allies and female ones?
Honestly, I don't think so, but I think a nice mixture of both is good. Transphobia comes from both men and women, and often people who hold low opinions of us are more likely to listen to someone they can relate to.
I mean, I've been thinking that if I were a woman I might be able to do a better job backing this campaign. I've had so many responses to my last blog - to put it in perspective, the spike in views has gone from about 50 on a good day to thousands. I'm also receiving a lot of comments, and I try to reply to as many of them as I can. But a lot of them are on the lines of, 'Bloody man, what the hell does he know?' And I can't really blame them for that... some of our female allies might be able to frame it in a way that a man can't.
That's true. We could probably use more cisgender women as vocal allies, especially when it comes to countering online abuse. Also the tactic of using your gender to ignore your criticism is a typical shutting down technique. It's also hypocritical seeing as the TERFs are talking about trans women as if we were men. If the subject, to them, involves men, and they want a "rational" discussion, shouldn't they listen to you too…?
That's a good point! Thanks for that. Given all the points about abusers, and the fact that you can't tell who is going to be an abuser until they've hurt someone, how rational is the worry about abusers potentially invading safe spaces? And if it is rational, what's the solution?
In general terms? If we're talking about women's refuges or spaces that otherwise help women with abuse, we already know the abusers.
I think it's fair to say it harms cisgender women as well, isn't it? I have noticed the TERF crowd go very silent when anyone asks how they intend to distinguish the two.
Oh yes, definitely. It's already affecting cisgender women, in fact. There have been a few cases of more "butch" presenting women being misgendered and thrown out of toilets and other spaces. That is obviously very frightening and humiliating to them, as it is to us. If more restrictions are put in place, this will only get worse.
How important is it to have cisgender allies on campaigns like these?
It's vital. Transgender people are a very small minority. In Britain we make up 0.5-1% of the population. We simply do not have the numbers to make much change on our own. Additionally, transgender people are often economically marginalised, which means we are often poor, and not positions of power. In spite of the bizarre claims of the existence of a "trans cabal" by transphobes, we ourselves wield very little power. To maintain our rights in society, we need the help of cisgender people who actually care about us.
Is there any difference between having male cisgender allies and female ones?
Honestly, I don't think so, but I think a nice mixture of both is good. Transphobia comes from both men and women, and often people who hold low opinions of us are more likely to listen to someone they can relate to.
I mean, I've been thinking that if I were a woman I might be able to do a better job backing this campaign. I've had so many responses to my last blog - to put it in perspective, the spike in views has gone from about 50 on a good day to thousands. I'm also receiving a lot of comments, and I try to reply to as many of them as I can. But a lot of them are on the lines of, 'Bloody man, what the hell does he know?' And I can't really blame them for that... some of our female allies might be able to frame it in a way that a man can't.
That's true. We could probably use more cisgender women as vocal allies, especially when it comes to countering online abuse. Also the tactic of using your gender to ignore your criticism is a typical shutting down technique. It's also hypocritical seeing as the TERFs are talking about trans women as if we were men. If the subject, to them, involves men, and they want a "rational" discussion, shouldn't they listen to you too…?
That's a good point! Thanks for that. Given all the points about abusers, and the fact that you can't tell who is going to be an abuser until they've hurt someone, how rational is the worry about abusers potentially invading safe spaces? And if it is rational, what's the solution?
In general terms? If we're talking about women's refuges or spaces that otherwise help women with abuse, we already know the abusers.
In terms of other spaces, I don't see that the fear is really all that rational, seeing as we already, in effect, have self ID for trans people. At no point on entering a toilet are you required to produce identification. The purpose of the recent push for changes to the law was to make self identification explicit and to ease our access to healthcare.
Ireland, in fact, already has a full legal implementation of self ID. I didn't hear any TERFs at this event complaining that they can't go to Ireland any more.
If there are any TERFs reading this, what would you say to them?
Neither history nor science are on your side. Listen to how similar your talk is to that of homophobes of 30 or 40 years ago, or how lesbians were treated by the feminist movement of the 1960s. You can learn from it, or you can repeat it. Either way, we will come out on top, with or without you, as so many others have done in the face of bigotry.
Neither history nor science are on your side. Listen to how similar your talk is to that of homophobes of 30 or 40 years ago, or how lesbians were treated by the feminist movement of the 1960s. You can learn from it, or you can repeat it. Either way, we will come out on top, with or without you, as so many others have done in the face of bigotry.
Finally, trans women are women.
Just one more question. I know you want to remain anonymous so feel free to take care not to reveal anything that says who you are, but just to get an impression of the woman behind the activist... if you were to wake up tomorrow and suddenly all the problems were solved, no one misgenders you anymore, you're considered a legitimate woman by everyone and you've achieved your goal… what would you do with the rest of your life?
If we're including breaking off the constraints of capitalism in this? I'd like to learn to be a pilot. I've always wanted to fly!
Fantastic! Thank you so much for doing the interview, it's been a pleasure to talk to you. Genuinely, all the best for the future.
No problem! I hope this is useful and people learn something!
Just one more question. I know you want to remain anonymous so feel free to take care not to reveal anything that says who you are, but just to get an impression of the woman behind the activist... if you were to wake up tomorrow and suddenly all the problems were solved, no one misgenders you anymore, you're considered a legitimate woman by everyone and you've achieved your goal… what would you do with the rest of your life?
If we're including breaking off the constraints of capitalism in this? I'd like to learn to be a pilot. I've always wanted to fly!
Fantastic! Thank you so much for doing the interview, it's been a pleasure to talk to you. Genuinely, all the best for the future.
No problem! I hope this is useful and people learn something!
Friday, 20 April 2018
Why the civil rights of a minority are more important than the 'freedom' of the majority
When I came home last night, it was to find that 'feminist' Julie Bindel had described me on Twitter as a 'bellend', an 'orange-fringed brat' and an 'aggressive, spoilt, privileged, posh identifarian'. This was due to me attending a protest at a venue in Bristol called The Jam Jar, which was hosting an event called We Need To Talk About Sex, in which the Gender Recognition Act, and by extension the rights of transgender people (particularly transwomen) to use gender-exclusive spaces, was being debated. (I'm gutted that Bindel has since removed the tweets, but thankfully I saved them and they now happily reside in the 'Testimonials' in my introduction section.)
This debate had provoked an awful lot of discussion, in ways that are actually more diverse than most protests I have been at. There is a strong argument that if you support freedom of speech, which I do, then you have to support the venue hosting an event like this and the people taking part in it. 'I disapprove of what you say, but I defend to the death your right to say it', and all that, which is something I frequently quote myself. I know at least two comrades from other campaigns who have taken against this protest for that reason. I completely understand where they are coming from, having spent quite a lot of time in the hours leading up to the protest debating it with myself for that reason. But I want to debunk a little of this here, because ultimately I came to a different conclusion.
I'm a cisgendered man, and have become increasingly aware about trans issues over the last few years, having become friends with a few transgender people. I'm entirely supportive of trans people and people of a trans background* being able to self-identify, and believe that no one has the right to dictate anything otherwise. But, if you are cisgendered it tends to stop there. It's quite difficult to talk about trans issues without offending someone - not because people are just hyper-sensitive, but because if you are lucky enough not to have been there you can't fully empathise. Even as a trans ally, I'll hold my hands up and admit I don't understand trans issues at all. The more you talk to transgender people, the more you realise how ignorant you really are. So I try my best to only talk directly about transgender issues using other people's words who are more informed than I, and when I am with transgender friends, to keep quiet, listen to what they say and not to dominate the discussion. I think I'm quite a domineering person even when I don't want to be, but one can only try one's hardest.
The simplest antidote to the freedom of speech argument is - yes, they have a right to say what they like, just as everyone else has a right to object to this. That is really the crux of it. We did not object to the right of people to have this debate. We have not asked the Government to say, 'You must not say this'. We didn't even (contrary to what some may tell you) prevent anyone from accessing it; we held a banner over the entrance, but people were always allowed to pass by and enter the building. What we are objecting to is people choosing to have this debate. Something that came up a lot is, 'Why don't you just come in and contribute to the discussion if you have an opinion?' A lot of my friends have responded to this by saying that the reason is that they aren't prepared to debate with TERFs (Trans-Exclusionary Reactionary Fuckwits) because TERFs by definition are oppressing the rights of trans people, questioning the validity of their existence and causing harm to them within society. One friend who is both transgender and Jewish likened it to suggesting that Jews have an open discussion with Nazis. You cannot have a reasoned discussion with someone who objects to the very terms of your existence. (One of my friends in particular makes some really eloquent points on social media, and I'd love to publish some of them on this blog, but at the time of writing she has not given me permission to do that - if she does subsequently, I may well put something up from her in a following blog.)
Whilst I agree with these points, I actually think it's even more simple than that. I will go out there and say: we did contribute to the discussion. We contributed by showing everyone exactly what we think of the way that this talk was framed. If people wanted to hear the alternative views of transfolk, they heard them outside the building on the way in. As a cisgendered man, I learned a whole lot more outside than I would have done had I been inside. I heard the people aggressively challenging the transfolk standing next to me, telling them that the freedom of speech of the oppressors was more important than the safety of the oppressed. I became aware of my own male cisgendered privilege when both media bodies in attendance approached me for an interview before anyone else - at an event about transwomen, the opinion of a cisgendered man such as myself was considered more important than the opinions of actual transwomen. If you're a cisgendered person who wants to learn more about the trans community, the most effective way to do that is to listen to them. To stand with them at demonstrations like this. To watch as the police are called on them. To storm buildings on their behalf and risk arrest on their behalf.
Because these are the sort of struggles that people in our society are going through. And within 24 hours, I have gone from being somewhat conflicted about whether or not I have to support events like this in the name of freedom of speech, to realising that it's far more clear-cut than that. This is not really about freedom of speech; this is about wanting to silence one of the most oppressed minorities without receiving any criticism. This is what I try to challenge every day of my life, and what I think everyone should try to challenge. And we should be bloody proud of those who are.
*I met a man last year who said that having successfully transitioned, he no longer considers himself transgender, but rather as someone who has a trans background who has since become cisgender. I shall use the term 'transgender' fairly broadly in this blog in the interests of being clear in what I am saying, but I am aware that some people aren't comfortable with the term applying to them.
This debate had provoked an awful lot of discussion, in ways that are actually more diverse than most protests I have been at. There is a strong argument that if you support freedom of speech, which I do, then you have to support the venue hosting an event like this and the people taking part in it. 'I disapprove of what you say, but I defend to the death your right to say it', and all that, which is something I frequently quote myself. I know at least two comrades from other campaigns who have taken against this protest for that reason. I completely understand where they are coming from, having spent quite a lot of time in the hours leading up to the protest debating it with myself for that reason. But I want to debunk a little of this here, because ultimately I came to a different conclusion.
I'm a cisgendered man, and have become increasingly aware about trans issues over the last few years, having become friends with a few transgender people. I'm entirely supportive of trans people and people of a trans background* being able to self-identify, and believe that no one has the right to dictate anything otherwise. But, if you are cisgendered it tends to stop there. It's quite difficult to talk about trans issues without offending someone - not because people are just hyper-sensitive, but because if you are lucky enough not to have been there you can't fully empathise. Even as a trans ally, I'll hold my hands up and admit I don't understand trans issues at all. The more you talk to transgender people, the more you realise how ignorant you really are. So I try my best to only talk directly about transgender issues using other people's words who are more informed than I, and when I am with transgender friends, to keep quiet, listen to what they say and not to dominate the discussion. I think I'm quite a domineering person even when I don't want to be, but one can only try one's hardest.
The simplest antidote to the freedom of speech argument is - yes, they have a right to say what they like, just as everyone else has a right to object to this. That is really the crux of it. We did not object to the right of people to have this debate. We have not asked the Government to say, 'You must not say this'. We didn't even (contrary to what some may tell you) prevent anyone from accessing it; we held a banner over the entrance, but people were always allowed to pass by and enter the building. What we are objecting to is people choosing to have this debate. Something that came up a lot is, 'Why don't you just come in and contribute to the discussion if you have an opinion?' A lot of my friends have responded to this by saying that the reason is that they aren't prepared to debate with TERFs (Trans-Exclusionary Reactionary Fuckwits) because TERFs by definition are oppressing the rights of trans people, questioning the validity of their existence and causing harm to them within society. One friend who is both transgender and Jewish likened it to suggesting that Jews have an open discussion with Nazis. You cannot have a reasoned discussion with someone who objects to the very terms of your existence. (One of my friends in particular makes some really eloquent points on social media, and I'd love to publish some of them on this blog, but at the time of writing she has not given me permission to do that - if she does subsequently, I may well put something up from her in a following blog.)
Whilst I agree with these points, I actually think it's even more simple than that. I will go out there and say: we did contribute to the discussion. We contributed by showing everyone exactly what we think of the way that this talk was framed. If people wanted to hear the alternative views of transfolk, they heard them outside the building on the way in. As a cisgendered man, I learned a whole lot more outside than I would have done had I been inside. I heard the people aggressively challenging the transfolk standing next to me, telling them that the freedom of speech of the oppressors was more important than the safety of the oppressed. I became aware of my own male cisgendered privilege when both media bodies in attendance approached me for an interview before anyone else - at an event about transwomen, the opinion of a cisgendered man such as myself was considered more important than the opinions of actual transwomen. If you're a cisgendered person who wants to learn more about the trans community, the most effective way to do that is to listen to them. To stand with them at demonstrations like this. To watch as the police are called on them. To storm buildings on their behalf and risk arrest on their behalf.
Because these are the sort of struggles that people in our society are going through. And within 24 hours, I have gone from being somewhat conflicted about whether or not I have to support events like this in the name of freedom of speech, to realising that it's far more clear-cut than that. This is not really about freedom of speech; this is about wanting to silence one of the most oppressed minorities without receiving any criticism. This is what I try to challenge every day of my life, and what I think everyone should try to challenge. And we should be bloody proud of those who are.
*I met a man last year who said that having successfully transitioned, he no longer considers himself transgender, but rather as someone who has a trans background who has since become cisgender. I shall use the term 'transgender' fairly broadly in this blog in the interests of being clear in what I am saying, but I am aware that some people aren't comfortable with the term applying to them.
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