Last post on Gove's Bible nonsense (probably)

Education has continued to become a more horrible place to work since I last blogged. The proposed changes to Ofsted mean that everyone has to desperately revise the way lessons work in order that we can tick the new boxes that mean you know how to do your job. This is even more tedioius and time consuming than you can imagine.

On top of that, the failure of all the teaching unions to keep a coherent strike strategy to stop the pension tax thus far means we're stuck with being screwed even more for at least a while.

And now Gove's managed to find some rich Tory fucks to pay for his narcissistic Bible project. I think I'll see if the English department want ours, since it's fuck all use in RE - as I've mentioned before.

Now Dawkins has chipped in with something fatuous.

I am a little shocked at the implication that not every school library already possesses a copy. Can that be true? What do they have, then? Harry Potter? Vampires? Or do they prefer one of those modern translations in which "Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, all is vanity" is lyrically rendered as "Perfectly pointless, says the Teacher. Everything is pointless"? That is Ecclesiastes, 1:2, as you'll find it in the Common English Bible. And you can't get much more common than that, although admittedly the God's Word translation provides stiff competition with "absolutely pointless" and the Good News Bible challenges strongly with "useless, useless".

Where to start? Labour decided that not all schools need a library any more and the Tories apparently agree. So the first sentence should probably read 'I am a little shocked that not all schools have a library,' which is a sentence I could agree with wholeheartedly. As it stands, it's little more than petulent whingeing. Our school library doesn't have a copy of Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five, which is surely a crime against literature.

Then the further whingeing - 'they don't have a 17th century version of a book that is available in many more accessible versions but which I have a nostalgic attachment to because it reminds me of the old days at public school, but I BET they've got some of those books kids actually enjoy like that Harry Twilight fellow, eh?'

I suppose what's getting to me is the way that this whole issue seems to have become a faux-battleground where middle-England can indulge its nostalgia for some mythical Jennings/Mallory Towers-era of education (a world without If... and with no memory of Kes), and engage in yet another defence of white middle-class privilege against the evil hordes of philistines with their 'pointless'es and their 'useless'es on their Klout Twitterbooks - why, public school-educated white men are the *real* oppressed class!

And this is the battle they pick? Honestly, what do we all actually, in the sense of 'how does this help education' rather than 'how does it make Mail readers feel', gain from Gove's vanity project, other than the chance to bury a book (with his name printed in gold on the spine, no less) at the back of the stockroom?

It's not relevant to Key Stage 3 English or RE. It's not part of any of the major GCSE RE specs and is highly unlikely to form part of the English or Eng Lit GCSE specs either, I suspect. It's not useful for A Level New Testament study either, for the twin reasons of unreliability and inaccessibility. What a pointless, pointless act to become a national priority that requires the intervention of the Secretary of State and multiple comment pieces in newspapers.

So that's it. The only national story relating to RE in my memory and it's a bunch of fatuous reactionary dicks belly-aching about whether people should be made to read more 'thees' and 'thous' than they would be expected to if they aren't from Staffordshire. And RE is NOT ABOUT THAT.

Trust me, I'm a Marxist RE teacher.

The Louise Mensch Beverage Scale of Permitted Capitalist Criticism

Following Louise Mensch's remarkable revelation of a new form of critique of political economy on Friday



I have reflected on this remarkable insight. If she's right, then whilst the liberal left are 'swooning at her brio' we're missing valuable research time. As Marxists we are bound by our own credo to rigorous materialist analysis, and beverage consumption is such an obviously materialist habit that it deserves close attention. Let's elaborate this remarkable theory, I thought to myself in my secret underground Marxist lab at Proletarian Towers. And to that end, I have devised the 'Louise Mensch Beverage Scale of Permitted Capitalist Criticism' heretoforeafter referred to as the Mensch Scale.

The Mensch scale is a comparison scale between 0 and 4, where a level 4 subject is permitted full criticism of capitalism up to and including promoting anarcho-syndicalism as an alternative means of the self-reproduction of society, and level 0 represents someone whose consumption of beverages enmeshed in the capitalist system of production should just keep their fucking mouths shut, the ingrate serf scum.

Like the Beaufort Scale, we must have examples so that if we are in conversation with someone we know exactly the point at which any criticisms of the capitalist system or any of its constituent parts goes beyond the permitted maximum. As soon as this point is reached, the correct response is to raise your hand firmly and instruct the vagabond to halt their discourse. 'Cease your mimsy prattle, fool,' instruct the presumptuous ignoramus, 'for the way in which liquids that trickle through your digestive tract AS YOU PRESUME TO PEDDLE YOUR CRITICAL MIND-TURNIPS THIS DAY were produced preclude your being given an attentive ear.'

THUS WILL CONSERVATIVE DISCOURSE TRIUMPH.

As an alternative, you may use the classic 'T' symbol beloved of basketball sportspersons to indicate a 'time out'. In our case of course, the 'T' will stand for actual tea.

Enough elucidation - I realise that you must be gagging to classify yourself, family and friends!

Level 4
Permitted criticism of capitalism = Total. Academies, Goldman-Sachs, concentration of capital, etc.
To achieve level 4, you must drink untreated mineral water collected yourself from a babbling mountain brook near your hermitage. Of course, you must not boil the water before drinking it, unless you mine the metal to create a kettle yourself. Purchasing so much as a camping kettle with one of those little whistle cap thingies on it basically takes you right back to the level of the Koch brothers.

Famous Level 4s: none.

Level 3
Permitted level of criticism of capitalism = TNCs, sweatshop labour and the military-industrial complex.
To achieve level 3, you are allowed to drink water from the tap, despite its being produced by privatised water companies. You *must not* add Robinsons' Barley Water to it to make a weak lemon drink, however.
Famous Level 3s: basically, this is John Harvey Kellogg.

Level 2
Permitted level of criticism of capitalism = privatised train networks, quality of the gifts in Kinder Surprise.
To achieve level 2, you may drink tap water and fairtrade tea and coffee. On no account must you purchase this coffee from some kind of franchise or drink Ribena. THIS WILL RENDER YOUR UNHAPPINESS WITH TRAIN JOURNEYS NULL AND VOID.
Famous Level 2s: Lucy Mangan, probably.

Level 1
Permitted level of criticism of capitalism = the speed of service in Nando's. AND NOTHING ELSE.
Level 1s will drink Fentiman's lemonade at National Trust gift shops, then think NOTHING of washing it down with R Whites. Why don't these people just FUCK OFF AND DIE? They probably drink Ty-Phoo, the despicable BASTARDS.
Famous Level 1s: YOU. If you're LUCKY.

Level 0
Permitted level of criticism of capitalism = What on earth makes you think you can criticise capitalism, you insignificant, smelly turd? IT PROVIDES YOUR BEVERAGES.
Level 0s would drink Coca-Cola at a Showcase Cinema, EVEN IF SOMEONE WAS WATCHING.
Famous Level 0s: given the size of the sample, it was hard to narrow it down, but here's two:

Luis 'Chile' Eduardo, Columbian Sinaltrainal union official working with employees of Coca-Cola bottlers, who routinely receives messages like this:

The Paramilitaries of Magdalenena Medio, The Black Eagles, call on the terrorist Coca-Cola trade unionists to stop bad mouthing the Coca-Cola Corporation given that they have caused enough damage already. If there is no response we declare them military targets of the Black Eagles, and they will be dealt with as they prefer: death, torture, cut into pieces, coup de grace. No more protests![1]

Erol Turedi, one of the Coca-Cola Icecek (Coca-Cola Turkish subsidiary) workers sacked for asking for a wage increase and organising union representation in their workplace. At a demonstration where 200 sacked workers walked into the Dudullu plant,

'1,000 police [were] drafted in to cope with the 200 protestors. The Cevik Kuvvet - 'robo cops' in full body armour - mass outside and are deployed into the building in groups. They fill the corridors. They occupy the balcony. They take the floor above the workers. Hundreds of police appear in the atrium, with riot shields and batons at the ready. The police charge nets six arrests and forces the protestors into a corner, the women and children huddled at the back by the walls. The men stand in front of them. They have linked arms together in an effort to protect themselves and their families, but when the assault finally comes their efforts are proved to be instinctive rather than practical. In front of them are 1,000 police and behind them the children have started to cry.

Finally Coca-Cola's managers agree to talk to the union. So while the police corner the families downstairs [union] President K and the union lawyer go upstairs for talks. It is late afternoon when they gather in a meeting room, which is small. Around a table, which is large. Alongside the managers, which is essential. And next to the police ... which is baffling.

... If events were going badly upstairs, events downstairs took an unexpected turn for the worse. On the frontline Erol looked out at the police - 'they just pulled down the gas masks and that was when we knew.' ... Their eyes widen as they tell of stumbling into each other in panic and blindness, gasping for breath. Thye curse the polie as children were separated from their parents and the men beaten with riot sticks. And they hold out their hands when they talk of being bundled into the police wagons outside, of reaching up to the small windows to gasp for fresh air - only to be sprayed in the face by the police.[1]

Shut up! You drank Coke! What do you think you're doing, Level 0s?
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[1] Mark Thomas, Belching Out the Devil: Global Adventures with Coca-Cola, 2008

Just so we're clear...

This is a BAD idea:

Ministers are scrapping a requirement for teachers to record instances when they use physical force, as part of a wider move to "restore adult authority" in the wake of the riots in England.

Here are some reasons why neither I nor any teacher I know thinks this is good:

1. Pupils should not be afraid of their teachers, as this is a barrier to their learning. If you are afraid of your teacher, you are less inclined to view your education as an opportunity, and more likely to view yourself in opposition to it.
2. There are plenty of alternatives to force in dealing with classroom behaviour issues. If you do need to use force, you have already lost your authority.
3. The link with the riots is specious. It is not a coincidence that the riots happened in the most deprived areas of London. The underlying cause is inequality, not a lack of caning.
4. I didn't get into this job to beat children. However annoying it is when a lesson doesn't go to plan, grabbing hold of a kid is not a solution to the problem.
5. This whole thing feeds into the right-wing myth that the primary cause of bad behaviour is a lack of discipline. This is part of the whole hang 'em, flog 'em, dose of national service bollocks. As Lenin recently noted: Greece has national service. It is not 'discipline' that is the problem. Discipline is an issue for the army and a prison, not a free society. Yes, we need a certain level of co-operation to do our jobs, and yes there needs to be an understanding that there are consequences for poor behaviour, but this has to be based on the understanding that co-operation and good behaviour are beneficial to the individual students and their peers, not 'cos I'll give you a clip round the ear if you don't. Which can be complicated and tedious, but has the benefit of not being neolithic.

As you were.

How Not to Get a Good Night's Sleep

I was about to go to bed when I thought I'd check up on Lenin. It turns out he's had an article in today's Graun about the Murdoch implosion, which obviously I'm finding satisfying on a number of levels. Specifically he was commenting on Ed 'Twat' Miliband's decision to stick the boot in now the beast is wounded*.

Point is, much though I enjoy Richard's writing, CiF becomes an even worse bearpit than usual under his articles. A brief survey of the comments suggests at least 3 sub-species of Trollus Cryptofascistus.

• The 'cynic'. This is a common troll endemic to CiF threads. Cynics usually acknowledge that something is not good but then proceed to offer up whatever banal platitudes they use to ensure they don't actually have to do anything about it and lets them drown out the little squeals of guilt that occasionally erupt from the dustier layers of their reptilian hindbrains. These trolls' comments usually have the effect of siding with the aggressor against the victim - ach, you see it every day in the playground, bless them. Typical examples include iamaliberal:

Labour - the party with the bravery to kick someone when they are already down.

• The 'clearly a hack'. Typical examples include Ilohan:

Whilst the media, liberal commenators, Ed Miliband etc get in a hysterical tizzy about events that happened years ago and are, in any case, a side effect of having a free press....1000s of people are losing their jobs in Derby cos we have no meaningful industrial policy**...

But some dodgy phone tapping is a national crisis...

I don't know...but have we al lost our minds?

• The 'Sir Thickington Thickalot'. These are generally just your examples of either pig-ignorance or outright barefaced lying. Possibly a witches' brew of both. Examples include flatpackhamster:

Did you know that Richard Seymour, the author of this article, is an active member of the Socialist Worker's Party? Did you know that his party campaigns for totalitarian rule and glorifies the Soviet era?

The last ones do at least have comedy value. However, it brings out the worst in me.

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* For the record, it's great that he is sticking the boot in, long may it continue. However little confidence I have that it will, should Murdoch manage to pull something out of the bag to stop the rot and begin reinflating his rancid bladder of a media empire. Maybe he could do something about his unfortunate tattoo whilst he's at it.

**PS - it's not because 'we have no meaningful industrial policy' - at least, not in the sense I suspect Ilohan means. It is, as ever, because of the way capitalism runs industry. And if you want to stop the job losses, there's a public meeting next Tuesday.

UPDATE: Having grabbed a few hours sleep, I've come to the conclusion that in fact this is a pretty normal CiF crowd. And in some ways, isn't that the biggest disappointment of them all, eh?

Something to make teachers angry

If you're a teacher and you're being balloted about whether to strike, there's a handy thingummy here that will allow you to calculate exactly how much you're being screwed by proposed Government changes to the pension scheme.

For example, I'm going to lose over £166,000 over my working life. In other words, a house.

I don't like Tory scum for many reasons, and few of them have to do with my personal situation as a worker under attack, but this is a nice illustration of the viciousness of what they want to do to me and thousands like me.

If your union hasn't yet balloted, speak to your rep and put pressure on them to do so. Together, we are strong. Divided, we will be screwed by total and utter bastards.

Remember, we're not all in this together - they are attempting to make us pay for their fucking crisis.

I dunno, stuff I guess.

I have my own version of SMGW. It's called The Good Wife.* It's truly dire. From the fact that every black face turns out to belong to a twat, to the bizarre moral righteousness from a character that works for someone everyone admits to be a heroin-dealing murderer, to the explicit right-wing politics, it's utterly terrible.

Tonight I saw the episode where it went beyond mental. Well into Ally McBeal dancing baby mental. It had this bizarre schtick where the courageous bastards cunts who I'd quite happily stab for a period not greater than, but approximating to, eternity, decided to 'do' international politics.

Cheers Ridley (but I'm guessing mostly Tony) Scott! It's one thing where your mental idea of reality coincides with Chicago. It just doesn't work if you're trying to involve your vehicle for the ex-ER woman in the real world.

Here's my take on this shitfest. It's quite fun to watch Americans being dicks. Everyone expects Americans to be dicks. The bizarre bit is when you pretend that American politics has anything to do with reality. Hell, it's weird when you see a show that is happy to pretend that the way that the USG presents its foreign policy has much to do with what actually happens in the world. Is this what it's like to read the Sun?

I have to love the whole 'working for a dictator' line. I am not a Chavez fanboy but the idea that he's a dictator is particularly nice. It goes with the bizarre storyline that one of the lead characters is having to do some eye-rolling because his daughter's off to a kibbutz (in the US it's still that period in 1963 when you could ignore the Naqba and go on about equality in the commune whenever Palestinian suffering rudely interrupted). In fact the way the two reality-denying storylines mesh is nothing short of fucking spooky. Both involve an inversion of reality (socialist elected president = dictator; Occupied territories = socialism) that neatly mirror each other. It's so carefully done I have to assume it's on purpose.

I'd reward that with kudos if it weren't so retarded.

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*Those with taste may safely look away now.

**Hey, what are you lot still here for? oh......

There is literally no snark left...

I've not updated for a bit, partly because I've been to busy with ... you know ... stuff ... and partly because I generally want to post on here in order to snark at news stories that make the little veins in my eyes start throbbing with greater urgency than a diarrhoetic in a 10 items or less queue at Boots*, but the absurdity event horizon seems to have passed me by. I mean, look at this:

George Osborne said he would be watching oil companies "like a hawk" to make sure there was "no funny business" following his budget decision to cut 1p from fuel duty.

Honestly, where do you start? It's times like this I am painfully aware that I can never make a great satirist. I can't see it with ironic detachment. It's just a matter of - this is utter, nonsensical madness. What's the right response to this? A clever gag, a series of bullet points explaining the various levels of hypocrisy and untruth at work, or what?**

I know everyone else has pointed this out as well - if even the shadow chancellor's got it then it's a fair bet few are fooled, but Jesus. They really do think we're a Burkean mob, don't they?

We'll see how well this 'stability' that Gideon's created works on Saturday I suppose...

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*Yes, at Boots. Look, if they were in Tesco's how would you get the cue that they were buying imodium? Look, just forget it.

**Note how I avoided the obvious 'a series of bullets' line there. Never go for the easy punchline, kids. Unless it's funny to do so, obviously.

Funny Thing...

... but I've become so familiar with the sleazy, dishonest ways that the Fail does business that I now only have to read as far as the words 'the author, James Slack' to know exactly what's coming next.

How long before he becomes an entry in the OED?

Slack, vb. To repeat casually racist and factually inaccurate tropes about asylum, immigration or brown people for the purposes of meeting tabloid deadlines and reinforcing readers' prejudices about 'foreigns'.

'Hey, are we meeting Tozzer down the Dog and Hammer later?'
'I dunno, it'll just be another Slackfest.'

When in doubt, blame the victim.

A classic right-wing move when one of their policies turns out to be very bad for people is to blame the victims of that policy. There are probably a gazillion examples but when I saw IDS's nauseating plans, the first one that leapt to mind was Norman Tebbit’s ‘on yer bike’ attitude at a time when Thatcher’s policies had just cut 2 million jobs from the economy.
It is an exact replication of the same calculated idiocy (by which I mean that if you look at it for a moment you can see how stupid it is, and assume that the ministers responsible are cretins rather than what is actually the case: they are committing deliberate acts of evil in public), whereby employment secretaries conveniently forget that we don’t live in an industrial democracy, and most people don’t have much choice about work, and assume that the reason there is so much unemployment must be because there are so many unemployed. Therefore, goes the ‘thinking’, if you make life hard enough for people who have 'chosen' to be unemployed, this will incentivise them to find the work that 2.5 million of their comrades also seem to be a bit too lazy to find.

Actually, a more accurate title might be: When in doubt, don't just blame the victims. Beat them up a bit more. 'Hey you, you haven't got a job! That makes you basically a criminal, yeah? Here's a bin bag and a rubber glove. Off you go.'

I think what sickens me most is that it’s not even new. I’m assuming that when drawing up the policies, one of the remaining civil servants/photographers were sent round to get some clippings from a 1981 copy of the Times.

Sky News in admirable lack of bias outburst

Niiiice.

For a slightly more useful take on the current dispute see here and here.

I forgot just the one thing...

At the time of the Terry Jones Qur'an burning idiocy I was a bit blase about it. He was so obviously a massive wanker that there didn't seem to be anything much to say about it. In fact I was fairly thoroughly agreed with the Daily Mash on the subject.


But I forgot. The most basic lesson. The one that anyone who's had contretemps with racist organisations should remember.

Idiots. Copy. Each. Other.

Six men arrested after Koran burnt on 9/11

One man in a grey Adidas tracksuit and white trainers, who has a blue cloth wrapped around his head as a burka-style mask, makes a series of obscene gestures towards the book as it burns.

Laughing, the tracksuited gang shouts “This is for the boys in Afghanistan. September 11, international burn a Koran day, for all the people of 9/11.

“This is how we do it in Gateshead, right.”

One man then attempts to add more fuel, but instead sets the plastic petrol can on fire. He then kicks the book across the yard, leaving a trail of flames which he is forced to hastily stamp out.

For the record: no it isn't, you twunt. That's why you got arrested. For an encore, the EDL turned up to an SWP branch meeting to try and assault my comrades, and assaulted two Irish Centre members of staff for good measure.

What a bunch of twunting twunty twuntbags.

In short: copycat crimes are a symptom of people who haz teh dumm in the worst kind of way.

So anyway, I was just wondering...

Let's not worry for a second about the ex-Nazi* whose office (Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, formerly known as the Holy Inquisition) was not exactly enthusiastic about pursuing allegations of child abuse but still lays claim to a billion followers complaining about the 'marginalisation' of Christianity. I was more thinking about his now legendary speech yesterday. Just after the Nazi reference. This bit.

As we reflect on the sobering lessons of the atheist extremism of the twentieth century, let us never forget how the exclusion of God, religion and virtue from public life leads ultimately to a truncated vision of man and of society and thus to a 'reductive vision of the person and his destiny'

Now I've already had a dig at his Nazi past, as has everyone else on the internet. Just thought it might be worth mentioning that Italy and Spain were both heavily RC nations in the 20th century, and, well you know what bastions of human freedom they became. So you don't need to look as far afield as ... well one doesn't want to appear indelicate, does one? As far afield as You-Know-Who to find a place for the Vatican at the fascist table. Phew, I think I managed to avoid Godwining this piece. Close call - that Ratzinger and Nazism, it's just going to dog him like a child-sex allegation at the Criminal Records Bureau, isn't it? Sorry about that.

Damn, I mentioned them! Three times!

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*Yes, I know it was the law when he joined the Hitler Youth and I know he was only a teenager, but in fairness, he started it.

Reasons to Hate Newsnight Review, Pt 94

I stopped watching Newsnight Review back when it was still called Newsnight Review*. I should've stopped when this was first broadcast but I let myself casually drop into it occasionally back when I still was capable of watching Newsnight itself without wanting to kick the screen in. So about 5 years ago.

Anyway, it came on last night when a DVD finished and I was subjected to the mutilated horror of it all for a minute or two. Couple of things:

1. Something called Clemency Burton-Hill is a fucking idiot.
2. Jesus Christ, SHUT THE FUCK UP ALL OF YOU. SHUT THE FUCK UP. WHENEVER YOU SPEAK IT'S LIKE DROWNING IN A LAKE OF SMUGNESS. I SINCERELY WANT YOU TO DIE.
   

To explain point (1), I refer you to the review of Tamara Drewe (a strip so incredibly dull I never successfully navigated a complete edition of when it was in the Graun's Review section. In fact it was probably the reason that I now open it at the back, read Doonesbury, then stick it in the recycling). Here is Clemency, looking like every annoying fucking Rah that I would see hanging around Hatfield at uni, apparently doing nothing whilst waiting to be appointed part of the Establishment when they graduated.

'Isn't it amazing to see the middle classes depicted on film like that, I mean, especially a UK Film Council-backed film? I mean we're talking about Shane Meadows later and they're much more likely to back a film like ... This is England, and I found that fascinating, though sort of rather uncomfortable as you say, kind of I might have that [inaudible due to scratching of absurd rah hairdo] I quite often see Jim Naughtie at literary festivals, I'm complicit in this as well.'

Yes, if there's one thing the British media needs more of, it's portrayal of the lives of the average ordinary member of the middle classes who live in Arcady-By-The-Waitrose. We just don't see enough of these people, do we? FUCK OFF.
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*It is apparently now called The Review Show.

The Taunting of Floridian 123

Just because I'm looking for a distraction from doing some actual work, here's a random fucking idiot from CiF.*

Background: Charlie Brooker wrote about the 'Ground Zero Mosque' nutters , in which he pointed out that it's not a mosque and not at Ground Zero, although oddly he didn't do the obvious and make it clear that there shouldn't be a problem if it was either or both of those things, as it would be rather like saying that Oscar Romero is the same as Alexander VI. Anyway, here's a particularly cretinous comment from some stupid bloody wingnut.

First of all that building was close enough to have the falling landing gear of the plane Muhammad Atta was on damage it. Secondly, they said they will hold Friday nite prayers in it so of course it's a mosque. This is not about religious freedom. It's about LOCATION. Do you think the Russians would be happy about a mosque being built in Beslan near the school where over two hundred kids were raped and shot in the back by terrorists? One more thing, I seem to remember a super mosque that was supposed to be built in London just in time for the olympics. The people protested about it and now the mosque isn't being built. Rather hypocritical of you isn't it?

The governor of New York wants to meet with them to suggest an alternative site but they flat out refuse to even consider it. Their present position is "We are going to cram this peace loving, bridge building mosque down the throats of you Americans whether you like it or not."

So, let the taunting commence!

First of all that building was close enough to have the falling landing gear of the plane Muhammad Atta was on damage it.

You're saying that these terrorists were willing to risk damage to one of their own buildings*? How evil is that! Like TOTALLY evil. We're through the looking glass here, sheeple!

Secondly, they said they will hold Friday nite prayers in it so of course it's a mosque.

Or, is it a cultural centre with a prayer room in it?

This is not about religious freedom.

Or, is it? Because it kind of sounds like you're saying that people can't use their own building to worship in their own way and use that building to promote understandings between other people exercising their religious freedom in the way they want to. So, it kind of is about religious freedom really, isn't it? Just a little bit? Maybe?

It's about LOCATION.

Hmm, don't know about you, but if I was trying to think of anywhere for people to build some hope and understanding between faiths, somewhere near an awful reminder of what happens when people have an intolerant attitude towards others might be, oh I dunno, the perfect place to put it?

Do you think the Russians would be happy about a mosque being built in Beslan near the school where over two hundred kids were raped and shot in the back by terrorists?

Hey, Floridian, have a look at this:

Here are some Terrorists:


And here are some Muslims:

P.S. Islam is the second largest religion in North Ossetia-Alania, an independent republic within the Russian Federation, not actually in Russia. But wait, you don't want the great US of A to be judged by the standards of the RUSSIANS, do you, Floridian? Why do you HATE AMERICA?

One more thing, I seem to remember a super mosque that was supposed to be built in London just in time for the olympics. The people protested about it and now the mosque isn't being built.Rather hypocritical of you isn't it?

I have to admit, I'd never heard of this story, but then I don't live in that London, and anyway it does seem a tad racist to assume that Charlie Brooker would have opposed the Mosque because he is British. Presumably the Muslims who wanted to build the thing in the first place were British as were the community groups that opposed it. Not sure this is actually hypocritical in any way at all. Hang on a sec...
Nope, doesn't seem to apply. Perhaps hypocrisy doesn't mean what you think it means?

The governor of New York wants to meet with them to suggest an alternative site but they flat out refuse to even consider it.

What, you mean they don't see why they should move from their own building just because some hysterical racists are shouting at them? They won't back down from a project whose explicit point is to combat idiotic ideas like yours? I wonder why ever not?

Their present position is "We are going to cram this peace loving, bridge building mosque down the throats of you Americans whether you like it or not."

Or, 'we're not going to let a bunch of hysterical racists stop us'? Sounds kind of, you know, courageous to me. Also, Veiled Penis Reference, too.

But anyway, in conclusion Floridian, you thought building a mosque was insensitive? Check THIS out.
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*It's OK to read CiF if it's for Charlie Brooker, it's like eating a sandwich whilst you're walking.

**I just found Floridian 123's dictionary. I see the problem, because under 'Mooslem' it just says 'See terrists'

The Unconcealed Millionaire*

Yesterday a war criminal tried to buy his way into heaven. I'm sure you know this already, and the whole incident is covered in some depth here. The whole thing is deeply disgusting on a number of levels, and it's interesting that no one seems to be buying it, (apart from the RBL, who I can't say I really blame for their 'delighted' quote - although if I worked for them I'd probably be privately comparing it to a customer in a fireworks shop offering to pay for the damage in the branch they just burned down).

The Guardian's sub-heading on their piece about the response to the donation is slightly odd:

Armed forces charity delighted to accept book proceeds but opponents of war say it will not change their views on former PM

I love the 'but' there. I assume the Graun weren't actually expecting Stop the War to pack up on receipt of this announcement, with a collective 'Oh, that's alright then' and a shrug of shoulders. The consensus building is that this is 'guilt money', which is a politer word than 'blood money' I suppose, but in the context of Blair almost certainly inappropriate. As one of the anti-war protesters interviewed by Sky says: Blair couldn't even say sorry at Chilcott, in fact he insists he has nothing to feel guilty about.

This may or may not be how Blair actually feels of course, but let's assume that it is for the moment. If it's not guilt then what is it?

To me it's a symbol of one of the uglier successes of Thatcherism: the return of philanthropy. In the nineteenth century, capitalists who'd grown fat on the suffering, poverty and dangers they exposed their workers to would build a park or a meeting hall with some small portion of the wealth they'd expropriated, and in return for the generosity of foisting their opinion of what the working masses needed on them, the amenity would have their name on it somewhere and an official expression of gratitude would be made.

This kind of patrician attitude began to wither after the second World War as a more egalitarian consensus was gradually formed. This phenomenon has come to be known as the 'end of deference' and it was brought about in an era where workers gained huge increases in standards of living, unions were strong and the modestly redistributive economic model of Keynesianism was in vogue.

Thatcher of course changed all that. Capitalists were now, in an Orwellian turn of phrase that operates in stark contrast to the way economics actually works, 'wealth creators', and over the next two decades ideas like 'society', 'public service' and 'equality' were chipped away at, undermined, until shows like Dragon's Den and Secret Millionaire could appear on our screens without shame.

Blair shows the brazen apotheosis of the return to philanthropy. With one gesture he seems to believe that his calumny can be mitigated, that people will remember that he's a 'pretty straight guy'. The invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, the squandered lives and resources on misbegotten imperialist adventures, the antagonism, hostility and nationalistic fallout, these are as nothing, because he has the thing that makes everything go away, that makes it all better. 'Here's some money.'

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*I wanted to call this piece The Book, The Thief, His Life and Their Millions, but he's only a thief in the sense of having stolen hundreds of thousands of people's lives, which of course makes him a murderer. And 'murder' doesn't scan.

Wingnuts and Neologisms

'Well, it's quite simple, really.' Henry leaned forward and threw another log on the fire. ... 'The trick is to keep doing outrageous things. There's no point in passing some scandalous piece of legislation and then giving everyone time to get worked up about it. You have to get right in there and top it with something even worse, before the public have had a chance to work out what's hit them.'

- Henry Winshaw, What a Carve Up! by Jonathan Coe (1995:313)

A frequent guilty pleasure of mine is Sadly, No!, a US-based snark-blog that takes the piss out of American wingnuts (whose 'grassroots' movement actually called themselves teabaggers, then blamed Urban Dictionary for making it sound naughty). The gift, and the trauma, of American wingnuttery, is that there appears to be no bottom to the barrel. It reminds me of the everlasting pint of Guinness in the old gag, and just like that magical pintpot, it spews forward a gusher of foul, sticky, black bile that turns the stomach.

Take, for example, this, in which a man spends 5 pages calling Shirley Sherrod (the woman who lost her job after a wingnut edited a video to make her look like a racist) a liar because she described the racist beating to death of one of her relatives as a 'lynching'.

Plain as day, Ms. Sherrod says that Bobby Hall, a Sherrod relative, was lynched. As she puts it, describing the actions of the 1940s-era Sheriff Claude Screws: "Claude Screws lynched a black man."

This is not true. It did not happen. How do we know this? ... [quotes from Supreme Court judgement on the case] Hall, a young negro about thirty years of age, was handcuffed and taken by car to the courthouse. As Hall alighted from the car at the courthouse square, the three petitioners began beating him with their fists and with a solid-bar blackjack about eight inches long and weighing two pounds. They claimed Hall had reached for a gun and had used insulting language as he alighted from the car. But after Hall, still handcuffed, had been knocked to the ground, they continued to beat him from fifteen to thirty minutes until he was unconscious. Hall was then dragged feet first through the courthouse yard into the jail and thrown upon the floor, dying. An ambulance was called, and Hall was removed to a hospital, where he died within the hour and without regaining consciousness. There was evidence that Screws held a grudge against Hall, and had threatened to "get" him.

Yeah, Jeff, right on! How dare she call that a lynching? What was she thinking? She's like worse than Obamhitler.

But anyway, I thought that was going to be the vilest thing I read all week. But somehow, the EvilGuinness keeps pumping away, delivering new globs of devilfoam to parts you thought it could not possibly reach. Here's a man called Dan Popp.

Let's broaden our campaigns to keep not only our sports stars, but all our rich neighbors in the neighborhood. Let's not discriminate against white CEOs just because they can't jump. Instead of vilifying the rich and forcing them to justify their success, irrationally presuming that it must have come at the price of someone else's failure, let's embrace all those who bring value to our society.

If you're with me on this, please go to the nearest window, stick your head out, and shout:

Rich people, we're sorry. We've committed the sin of envy, the sin of covetousness, and the sin of slander. We have believed the lie and borne false witness against you. Forgive us for the nasty things we said. Please don't go. We want you here. We are all better off with mega-successful neighbors. We're going to tear down the "Keep Out" signs. We're going to stop robbing you of the rewards you've earned, confiscating your wealth as if you were convicted criminals. Please come and do what you do: increase the quality of life for all of us.

Now, I don't know what your reaction to reading that was, but *clever reveal* THAT'S THE POINT. I don't know how to describe my reactions to these pieces. On the one hand, there's a sense of disbelief, as though you've just witnessed someone chowing down on their own chod bin contents and pronouncing it to be as delicious as the finest Haribo. On the other there's a depressing element of 'where do you start' - it's so many kinds of wrong at once, like moving into digs previously occupied by students armed only with half a pack of J-cloths and Happy Shopper polish. It's an unequal struggle, is my point.

It's virtually impossible to comprehensively describe. There needs to be a new set of words to describe the emotional response to reading one of these articles. I've tried to make a list:

1. Anger
2. Annoyance
3. Animosity
4. Disappointment
5. Disorientation
   
6. Despair
7. Ennui
8. Flaberghastliness (already a compound emotion)
9. Irritation
10. Sarcastic
    
11. Shock
12. Slaptacular (yet to make it into the OED, nevertheless a perfectly expressive word)
    
13. Superior, in a somewhat pointless and hard to defend way
    
14. Weariness

Plus about 7 others I don't have a name for. It's one of those times that you wish English lent itself to compound nouns as easily as German does. It would mean that wingnuts have achieved something - the response to their madness would have outpaced antidisestablishmentarianism with ease, and make a good go for Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch.

In the end though, it just makes me wish I was the sort of person who only made the same mistake once. The lesson is clear: don't get out of the boat. One day, perhaps I will learn this.

Quick! You DO NOT WANT TO MISS THIS!

The Daily Mail's latest 'Teh Kidz r In THEIR ROOMS DOIN STUFF!!111eleventy!' piece is brilliant.

First, there's the Brass Eye nature of the piece itself. But more importantly, the commenters have invaded and totally Speak You're Branes'd it.

You DO want to get out of the boat for this one. Quick - before the mods figure out what all the kool kids are talking about and delete it all!

I-Dosing: How teenagers are getting 'digitally high' from music they download from internet

They put on their headphones, drape a hood over their head and drift off into the world of ‘digital highs’.

Videos posted on YouTube show a young girl freaking out and leaping up in fear, a teenager shaking violently and a young boy in extreme distress.

This is the world of ‘i-Dosing’, the new craze sweeping the internet in which teenagers used so-called ‘digital drugs’ to change their brains in the same way as real-life narcotics.

Thank you, Daniel Bates, for this sterling work. Comment samples:

When I started I-Dosing a year ago it was just for fun. I had an otherwise normal life. Fast forward to now... I've been layed off, I lost my car, and I I-Dose every chance I can get. To pay for my fix I rob unlocked cars and a couple of times prostituted myself, just for the iTunes money. I'm probably losing my apartment soon, but I don't care, all I need is my iPod and my headphones. Can't wait to iDose again...

- Stuart Miller, Sheboygan, USA, 21/7/2010 13:51

I was at a local basketball court in Philadelphia and some friends and I were playing a game. A couple of guys came down the street and they were listening to headphones. They were talking crazy and started fighting. Turns out, they were "dosing." My mom was so upset she sent me to live with my aunt and uncle here in California.

- F Prince, Belair, US, 21/7/2010 13:17

They're probably high on Cake too.

- Harry, Glasgow, 21/7/2010 11:45

I've just tried i-Dosing and I'm TOTALLY WASTED!!!

- Harold Bishop, Queensland Australia, 21/7/2010 3:31

Of course, this being an internet and, worse, a Daily Mail Internet, there's always some cretins who don't get it but do manage to sound like massive wankers...

This is crazy! Soon there be private grants to study this, then the government grants. Soon anyone who dissagrees will be labeled "insenative" or worse. The lawyers will sue for the "victims"; welve step programs, support groups and the new defense for mass murders. The music made me do it.Political pressure will be brought to bear and our now government controlled heath system will require all health insurance to cover it. Hundreds of millions of dollars will be wasted on a fantisy, money that could be used to treat real disease.

- William Tyson, Laguna Woods CA USA, 21/7/2010 5:16

In the end though, I'm forced to come back to robii of Loughborough, who seems to have spotted what Daniel Bates apparently didn't.

This story is nonsense

- robii, Loughborough, UK, 20/7/2010 20:23

Nevertheless I URGE you to check it out. I mean, look at the capital letters - I must MEAN IT, mustn't I?

Is Alexander Chancellor the world's most pointless human being?

The Guardian employs a lot of idiots in its comment pages. Probably so that gullible fools will write long, angry rants about their idiocy, thereby increasing their webtraffic. But Alex has been writing for years and years - way back when dead tree was the norm and interwebs were for porn, I remember finding his column in G2 and wondering if, having read the title of his articles, it would be possible to sue the corpse of CP Scott to get my time back.

Still, Al, as I'm sure he hates to be called, Al, who has perfected the art of bringing mediocrity to a new middle over many years (sample titles: 'It's looking quite clement out' and 'Everything's all electronic nowadays isn't it?'*) has managed to be quite stunningly offensive today.

Raoul Moat: Why the police should stop flattering him

Fugitive gunman is getting a lot of public sympathy

I have to ask: how is it possible to type this, without your own medulla oblongata realising what must be done for the good of humanity and ceasing respiratory functions immediately? This is the worst thing since Al's autobiography Is it time for tea yet? and other amusing incidents from my life.**

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*Probably.
**Almost certainly.

A Straw-Man Pissing Contest? How Very Gauche.

Ante-Script

A while ago I found a solution to the problem that certain displays of idiocy tend to push my rant button, resulting in the counterdispaly of a blogpost that itself displayed my compulsive need to respond to certain types of fuckwit in print rather than just my internal monoshout.

That solution was: stop visiting CIF.

Don't get me wrong, I love a good rant. But it was interfering with my life of lounging around on taxpayers handouts that, as a leftie, I almost certainly do.

Anyway, today I got out of the boat. Hence the following.

Script
So, every so often, people who were once broadly on the left, drift to the right in their old age. In Mark Steel's case this meant leaving organised Trotskyism for free-wheeling Trotskyism. More usually it marks a more drastic break with your past. Classic examples include: Christopher Hitchins, David Aaronovitch, and of course, Nick Cohen.

Today Peter Bracken* has decided to join this band of bluster and, as is traditional, he has bravely launched an attack on a strawman. There seems to be an inherent need when these people defect to vociferously attack some perceived holy cow, as though the Tories (who in this situation might be analogised to the big kid in the playground who's got all the Transformers to Peter's weedy but needy asthmatic) will welcome them into the Kool Kids Klub once the ritual beating of the little kid (who, as we thankfully reach the end of this oddly over-written analogy, is whatever right-wing idea about what the left is this time, or if the motive is sectarian, something that can be attributed to the many tentacled monster that is the SWP) is complete.

Of course, if you're going to do this sort of thing, it's vital that your screed attack some version of your enemy that everyone with 'common sense' (a term which in politics is an effective simile for 'ignorance') can agree to dislike.

In Peter's case, this is

the section of the left denies the mainstay of the authentic left's agenda: liberalism.

Which is of course, rubbish. Liberalism is not a left-wing position but a centrist, and crucially, non-ideological one. Liberalism is pragmatic and comfortable with the wielding of power over others, the left is revolutionary. Even the right-wing of the labour movement, the aim is to alleviate the effects of inequality and the worst of poverty, a sure recognition of the desire to change the status quo, that cannot be authentically called liberal. Liberalism is distinguished from reaction largely by its recognition of and compassion for the poor. To the extent that one attempts to change this situation it is a left position, because that is the extent to which the existence of class conflict is recognised and arms are taken on behalf of one side against the other. You will look in Marx in vain for support of the Whigs, but you can see the faint ghost of Marx when liberals defend the minimum wage.

Anyway, having made a mess of his political categories, Peter goes on.

a left that aligns itself against the west cannot be a progressive force, especially one which vents its opposition by finding cause with the grotesque illiberalism of theocratic and proto-fascist regimes

Of course, the left aligns itself against capital and its forces, not 'the west'. And who are these lefties that align themselves with theocrats? Well, Peter provides a list, but unfortunately they do not seem to mean what he thinks it means. 'The Left' (a mysteriously monolithic beast to someone who claims to be on the left and should therefore know better), is guilty of

morally depleted rationalisations that "explained" 9/11 (the US had got its comeuppance).

Funny, cos the article he links to says

there is also the feeling that all the ‘civilised world’ (a phrase which Western leaders seem able to use without a trace of irony) is paying the price for its glib definitions of ‘terrorism’ and its refusal to listen to what the ‘terrorists’ have to say. There are very few people on the planet who devise carnage for the sheer hell of it. They do what they do for a cause; because they are at war. We might not like their cause; but using the word ‘terrorism’ as an alibi for thinking what drives it will get us nowhere in stopping the violence.

which actually seems to be saying "if we mindlessly use the word 'terrorist' we will have no clue as to how this event happened." How terribly glib. Of course, Peter is in no way being glib by suggesting that the US did nothing to anger anyone, and conflating the US Government with its people (an error he has in common with Al Qaeda).

The rest of his bobbins isn't much better, I'm afraid. Having made his exceedingly palpable hit by finding Comrade Beard's secret communique to the Supreme Soviet, outlining Teh Left's Like Totally Universal Position on 9/11, he moves on to attack people who support the Palestinians. This isn't really worth bothering to come back on, as it's a permanent feature of these kinds of articles that you have to side with the aggressor against the victim: it's all part of the posturing. Notable that he doesn't provide a link for that one though.

The ones that there are links for are so misrepresented that it's easy to see why he couldn't even quotemine them. For example, he complains of

the fanciful opinion – expressed only recently by Seumas Milne – that China, far from being an exemplar of human rights abuses on a colossal scale, is in fact an exemplary bulwark against a rapacious, capitalist hegemony.

Curious, as the article is about the strikes that have undermined the state recently and what this means for the economy. At no point does he defend Chinese state repression. Seriously, go read it. I'll wait.

Done? OK, so next up is an attack on Zizek and Callinicos. Fine, except that again, he just displays stupidity. When Zizek says

The problem is that such a simplistic liberal universalism long ago lost its innocence. This is why, for a true leftist, the conflict between liberal permissiveness and fundamentalism is ultimately a false conflict.

he does not mean, as Peter implies, that the Iranian government doesn't kill people, he's saying that calling your society a liberal democracy does not wash the blood off your hands. You'd really have to be remarkably obtuse not to see that.

Amazingly he then manages to be even more facile.

Alex Callinicos himself is a member of Socialist Workers' party, which implores Iraqi insurgents to "use whatever means necessary" to defeat the western coalition. He is a supporter of an organisation, in other words, that apparently condones the use of terror to destabilise a fledgling democracy. An honourable opposition to the war in Iraq is one thing; an express wish to see Islamist insurgents prevail is quite another.

Here's why this has teh stoopid:

• If you're opposed to the war in Iraq, it is in no way inconsistent to support the Iraqi people against their occupation. In fact it seems, if you're genuinely progressive, the obvious response to the unchecked aggression of a superpower. Peter doesn't like the word 'imperialist' when applied to the US, but if he can think of a more appropriate one, I invite his submission.
  
• A genuinely leftist critique of Iraq would have to talk about the nature of the invasion and its effect on the people, otherwise it is not leftist or even political, but handwringing drivel.
  
• It ignores the consistent, genuinely terrifying use of terror used to both topple the Iraqi government and then to impose a neoliberal nightmare of the occupiers' choosing.
• The use of the phrase 'Islamist insurgents' is particularly telling. 'Islamist' is in no way implied by support for the Iraqi people. 'Insurgents' is a funny way of talking about Iraqis. If there are insurgents in Iraq it is surely the foreign military powers that are imposing the new political order. Foreign fighters in Iraq even at the height of the 'insurgency' were relatively few, though a flood of arms into the country did seem to be noticeably present. You know, in amongst all those American invaders.
• Fledgling democracy is a lovely turn of phrase, but in the context of Iraq can only mean the successful imposition of a regime approved of by the victors. The Iraqis did not make a revolution against Saddam and they did not choose the form of their new government. They are being asked to participate at gunpoint.

He then has the nerve to call those on the left who genuinely support self-determination for the Iraqis 'nihilistic' and claims for himself the mantle of defender of freedom. Sometimes, one is tempted to think that some people would really benefit from a bit of extraordinary rendition, if only to remind them of what 'support for a fledgling democracy' really means.

To conclude:
I didn't like this very much, and I don't think much of its author either. This is a reductivist, dishonest and ignorant account that wears its simple-mindedness on its sleeve.
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*No, me neither.

Football

Anyone who watched Mock The Week last night will have seen the weird spectacle of Russell Howard stealing Richard Littlejohn's material.

Now, I really don't know much or care about football*. But for fuck's sake: it wasn't a war, it was watching 11 millionaires not be very good at their jobs. After all, it's not the first time we've seen that recently.

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*Just to be clear, I don't hate football, some of my best friends like football etc. It's just very dull to me. And I don't like displays of nationalism at the best of times, least of all in sporting events, because I can't for the life of me see what the point is.