I SMELL A RAT

For a few days now there has been am elusive unpleasant odour floating around the kitchen.  Just occasionally I'd get a whiff of something that smelt a bit like an old dirty vacuum bag with cheese in it.  Or was it some festering mouldy food behind the cooker?  Was it the condensed water that sometimes leaks from the fridge onto the carpeted kitchen floor?  I don't like carpets in kitchens - who the hell ever came up with that idea?  For about a week it seemed to be getting worse.  I wondered if it was me.  Were my feet rotting?  Was it in the clothes from the washing machine?  Did I have Coroni and he was messing with my smell?  It was faint but remarkably putrid and disturbing.  I cleaned out several cupboards and checked the vegetable rack.  The olfactory delight continued to linger longer.

I live in an old house with a sewerage system that would be illegal today.  It is simply one underground pipe that runs from the back door down the path and out to the street.  All sinks and plumbing and sewage simply fall into the same pipe.  There is a junction half way down the pathway where the neighbour's sewerage connects to ours.  The junction is known to cause a blockage sometimes and I dutifully swill the sewer out regularly to prevent severe blocking and occasional sewer odours emanating from the plug hole in the kitchen sink.  I thought it was about time to swill out the sewer today and so I set about filling sinks and jugs and buckets and getting prepared to launch a tsunami down the tube.

I went outside and lifted the sewer cover plate.  There was a blockage, which is not uncommon, but this looked weird.  A dark poop, so large it couldn't possibly have vacated anyone's bottom, was blocking the junction.  I don't spend an inordinate amount of time examining the content of the sewer and I went inside and released the tsunami to sluice the sewer and went back outside to make sure it was successful.  That large unidentified object was refusing to budge.  I peered into the sewer opening a little closer and this object seemed to be furry, but it was covered in thousands of tiny flies giving it a slightly wriggling writhing glistening sheen.

I decided to give it a poke with a stick - as one does.  It was heavy and resistant.  I eventually prodded it along the pipe a bit as the backlog of sewage oozed slowly along behind with an increasing level of damned water attempting to leave the premises.  Quite suddenly things began to move.  The large wriggling putrefying biological blob was lifted off the floor of the sewer and rapidly gained momentum as a ton of sewage and water chased it down the pipe with a great gurgling and swilling sound like some alien monster enjoying its lunch.

I replaced the cover plate, returned to the kitchen, turned off the taps, washed my hands (as you do) and enjoyed the delights of a sweet smelling kitchen.  It may sound like a dreadful task but it was a pleasant relief and procrastinant (from the inventor of new words) from having to deal with the still offensively active putrefying remains of the NHS and their genuinely harmful assaults on the health and well being of my daughter and me.  I find this whole experience of a rancid odour from a rotting corpse, polluting and poisoning the atmosphere and destroying the healthy life supporting activities of cooking and eating, a very good analogy for the toxic transformation of the welfare state and the NHS.

I gain some hope that, although the current desecration, stagnation, and evil toxic purification, of British society seems entirely unstoppable and destined to catastrophic unrecoverable disaster, it is possible that one day we might, with enough effort, shift the festering cadaver of neoliberalism and hear the welcome sound of gurgling and belching as the corpse of disaster capitalism and selfish greed is wrenched from this otherwise delightful planet. 

SLOWLY CHOKING TO DEATH

I was trying to get myself to do the right thing and contact a doctor.  I am a bit confused about what one is supposed to do nowadays.  So I started by going to what is euphemistical called "my surgery's" web site.  I'm reading through lots of stuff which sounds like promotional sales talk like "we are working hard to care for you, and to keep our staff and patients safe", and "Your health and wellbeing matters to us".  Then I came across this:

"For your protection and ours, if you are invited to the surgery for an appointment, you MUST provide your own face covering, a mask, scarf or something smilar [sic]. We are no longer in a position to issue face masks to patients."

This is where I stall.  I know some people ridicule and belittle me for getting upset about things like this.  I have to try to understand how to cope with that attitude.  Am I little (meaning a bit pathetic) and stupid?  If that were the case, is it something I can do something about?  I think what they think they mean is that I need to be "brave" and walk into the thing I am frightened of.  That makes sense when working on a ship and you have to do things that hurt or are frightening.  I could, I suppose, ignore what I perceive to be a threat and carry on.  But my experience in life is warning me of something bad here.  So I think some more.

It is ridiculous that they come up with phrases like "Your health and wellbeing matters to us" because they are supposed to be a medical centre and they are stating the obvious.  Maybe they think some people don't know they care and they feel the need to reassure them.  But there are other possible motives such as that they are lying.  I think most people are aware of the problem when someone says "trust me".  It begs the question "Why wouldn't I?"  Some would suggest I am being paranoid but I am not - I am simply trying to understand what is going on.

When their focus of attention goes from the patients' health to their own bank balance that might cause them to perceive the need to reassure their patients that they care about them.  If someone wants me to write some software I negotiate a fee because I cannot go around writing software for no pay.  Once a fee is negotiated I pay full attention to the quality of the software.  If I am "incentivised" to write the software as quickly as possible to maximise my profit then the quality of the software is compromised.  The same applies to medicine.  So the very wording on the surgery's web site does not inspire me with confidence, and actually does the reverse.  People sometimes feel they don't know how to detect scammers and I think herein lies some of the clues.  When someone spends disproportionate time and effort trying to convince you they care about your wellbeing you should get suspicious.  The significant word in the last sentence being "disproportionate".

Having clarified some of what causes my alarm bells to start ringing I then encounter that statement saying I have to provide my own face covering.  That is absurd to the point of being insane.  When I read irrational insanity coming from someone I am relying on to have expertise that I don't posses, it becomes an affront, let alone very worrying.

There are multiple issues at play here.  The first being that they are the medical experts and should know exactly what benefits there are from wearing what sort of masks in what circumstances.  Their expressed requirement indicates no such consideration, awareness, or knowledge.  They are simply mandating "a mask, scarf or something smilar [sic]"  As a complete non-expert it has become clear to me that there are important practical differences between different materials used as masks, let alone other issues such as how they fit.  Can I turn up with a motorcycle helmet on?  If that sounds ridiculous (as it is meant to) then by what criteria am I supposed to judge an efficacious mask.  If I turn up on a warm day like this wearing my lovely woollen winter scarf wrapped around my face and sit in a waiting room I will overheat and risk passing out.  If I could acquire an N95 mask I will suffer breathing difficulties, and I might pass out.  (I have COPD and high anxiety - "For people with COPD, face masks are in fact intolerable to wear as they worsen their breathlessness." [Kyung SY, Kim Y, Hwang H, et al. Risks of N95 Face Mask Use in Subjects With COPD. Respir Care 2020;:respcare.06713.  doi:10.4187/respcare.06713])

Then there is the issue of supply.  Where do I find a mask to purchase?  If there is an outlet with an adequate supply why can the surgery not get a supply for their patients?  It would make more sense, if cost were the issue, to purchase the available supply and to sell masks to patients.  Of course, given that that is not the reason, they would risk instigating an unnecessary problem of dissent and criticism if they charged patients at the door for equipment they were demanding they wear.  All of which should soon illustrate, even to those who haven't considered the issues yet, that any of these possible arguments presented so far, are irrational and vacuous.

Give that we are supposed to believe there is some medical rational for wearing a mask and given the budget for the surgery including the property, staff, equipment, and services, in what way could they possibly justify not supplying masks for patients?  I can't see any other reason except the pretence of cost.  If they presented the justification that it was about the cost then not only is that ridiculous and unacceptable but there is a contradiction in that they say they don't care what sort of face covering you use.  If it doesn't matter what sort of face covering you use then there is no suggestion of any significant cost if they supply cheep paper masks.  Surely no one can make coherent sense of this.  They say "We are no longer in a position to issue face masks to patients."  Why not?  Were they providing masks for patients previously?  That sentence implies they were, so I really want to know what has caused the change.

Then there is the issue of power, control, and hierarchy.  What they are saying really is that, quite regardless of any efficacy, they demand that you wear a mask to symbolise your agreement to do whatever they demand.  They are actually demanding evidence of my subservience to them.  This is exactly what was going on as the Holocaust gained traction in Nazi Germany.  Wear this colour triangle.  I do worry that people may think I am making a mountain out of a mole hill, but actually I am trying to figure out what this is all about.  I am not particularly concerned about this one issue in isolation; I am concerned to put the various pieces of the jigsaw together to begin to understand the bigger picture.

When someone phoned me from the surgery some years ago saying that my daughter needed to come in for her vaccinations I asked which ones.  Their response was "all of them".  I enquired further saying she had had some vaccinations so which ones are they talking about.  It got to the point of me asking the nurse(?) what vaccinations are on her medical records and I was told that was irrelevant because their records were not complete.  I suggested I come in and discuss these (apparently VERY important) issues with the doctor.  The nurse{?) reacted by saying "I can't deal with people like you." and put the phone down.  If no one can deal rationally with the question of vaccines then who is going to tell me, with any real knowledge, authority, and integrity why they can't supply masks?  They have made it explicitly impossible to trust them.  They have created a layered structure of hierarchy where the people at the bottom (you understand that hierarchy of wealth that we have acculturated - it used to be that the doctors and nurses were at the "top of their profession" and the likes of managers were "lower" in the hierarchy) - the medical staff -do not know or understand the reasons for the orders and edicts being handed down to them.

I understand to a significant degree how all this junk happens psychologically and sociologically but I do not know what to do about it, nor why so many people fall so enthusiastically into ridiculous compliance to keep their job when the rules and edicts are evidently stupid even to them.  This situation is declining rapidly and hanging on to notions that things will get better is delusional.

I genuinely believe there is no way out of what is befalling us except via a most terrible holocaust.  Although I could wish people could effectively wake up and begin to push back against the insanity, all the evidence suggests they cannot or will not do that.  It was only six months ago we had a general election and the Labour Party went to the trouble of presenting an exceptional and detailed manifesto and a costing model which clearly outlined highly practical ways to stop the decline.  The majority of people did not read that manifesto.  Instead they preferred to vote for a well known liar and charlatan called Fucko the Clown.  Fucko the Clown and his circus presented no plans of any scope or substance - just "Get Brexit Done".  It was clear to me they were aiming for a dictatorship at the time, and the evidence is unfortunately continuing to support and strengthen that interpretation.

I will not be attempting to steel myself to walk into this particular battery cage today.  I prefer to sit here bleeding and in pain.  I am far too distressed and poorly to attempt to see a doctor today.

Afterthought:  Having re-read this muse I feel a lot of people might summarise it in their mind as a "mask, don't mask" issue related to medical health.  It is not.  The questions and issues around the medical efficacy of masks is a totally different subject and I would like to feel confident in the experience and integrity of experts to advise me on that matter.  The above reveals the utter incoherence of the actions currently being taken by medical centres up and down the land.  It is about the difference between someone informing and helping me, and someone ordering me about for their benefit at my expense.

MURDER HORNETS KILL MORE THAN COVID-19

I was going to use the headline:
41 DEAD AS MURDER HORNETS RAMPAGE CHINESE PROVINCE
But having written this perusal around the manipulation of figures I decided "MURDER HORNETS KILL MORE THAN COVID-19" was even more indicative of how ridiculous headlines can be.  It is true, because murder hornets did kill more than Covid-19 in Shaanxi.  It is true, but it is so extraordinarily misleading that it is, effectively, a lie.  These things can be fun to play with, but they are becoming a death knell for humanity due to social media, psyops, asymmetric communication, and an intellectually and emotionally damaged population.

The 'headline' for this blog post was gleaned from the most dramatic single statement I could find in a Wikipedia article about the Asian giant hornet, or vespa mandarinia, which is currently being called the Murder Hornet in Click Bait Press.  The actual statement was "In 2013, stings by Asian giant hornets killed 41 people and injured more than 1,600 people in Shaanxi, China."  The first thing to consider is that that is an extreme case so we can deduce that the situation is probably far better than that.  It is also in a particular location where the wasps are relatively common, and it is likely that people go looking for them because they like to eat their larvae.  The second thing that comes to mind is a comparison with the distorted and dramatised figures relating to Covid-19 deaths.  Covid-19 appears, by all accounts, to be significantly more dangerous and deadly to humans than giant hornets.  But it still remains extremely difficult to get any clear or meaningful idea of the significance and impact of Covid-19 from the persistent click bait headlines distorting the very meaning of the information presented.

Shaanxi province has a population of 37.33 million, so 41 deaths equates to 1.1 deaths per million per year.  That extrapolates to 85,800 deaths in the world population in 10 years or 858,000 deaths per century.  Assuming the human population might rise then one could speculate that over 1 million people could die of killer wasp stings in the 21st century.  Of course with this kind of manipulation of figures one could attempt to reduce the target population to specific named areas where more deaths have occurred.  Maybe 20 of those 41 deaths occurred in a village of 2,000 people raising the 'deaths per million' rate to 10,000.  It's not long before you arrive at a figure of 100% of people killed by killer wasps die.  It is equally true to say that there is a very high probability (not one I am about to work out now) that 0% of people you know will die from a wasp sting.  I wonder what quantum probability wave function collapse might tell us about this - or what this might tell us about probability wave function collapse.

Maybe I could find a way to justify the headline "Quantum physics predicts everyone will die from Killer Wasps".  Or better still "Science predicts everyone will die from Killer Wasps".  All I have to do is write a small article explaining that in multiple universe theory there is one universe where that is true and I can claim the headline is factually correct and get some lucrative advertising revenue from my click bait science article.

Taking this to extremes it is true to say "Murder Hornets kill more than 10 times as many as Covid-19" or maybe "Murder Wasps 10 times more deadly than Covid-19".  I just have to explain in the text that 3 people have been reported to have died in Shaanxi province from Covid-19 whilst vespa mandarinia killed 41 people in the same province in 2013.

Warning: Stay Alert in Click Bait World - It's Dangerous Out There.

LOCKDOWN, DON'T LOCKDOWN?

Somehow the narrative is still distorted.  People are rightly criticising the government for relaxing the lockdown.  But they talk about it in terms of it increasing the spread of the virus and consequently being a threat to people's health.  Those are important factors, but the implication is that the lockdown should continue.  There is something wrong with that assumption, and it is that the lockdown was correct in the first place.  I'm not suggesting there should or shouldn't be a 'lockdown', but it is clear the government's version of 'lockdown' was a complete shambles and a failure.

The idea of a lockdown is part of a bigger plan to test, trace, and isolate (amongst other responsible things).  It is also important, if you want to protect people, not to throw them in front of a bus to prevent them being run down by a bicycle.  Money, for some good reason, is a dirty word in our culture.  People actually need money to live.  It is too often banded about as some sort of superfluous gift from heaven.  But it is absolutely necessary, it is vital, to have money to live in the UK.  Cutting off someone's money supply, or revenue stream, can kill them.

For an individual it is better to take some risk to get money to live than to take no risk and no money and die.  Any lockdown should be planned to provide the resources necessary to survive.  A lockdown can't work successfully without that provision.  That is the equivalent of shovelling people into concentration camps, but in this case into their own homes as opposed to expensive 'concentration' camps.  What can then follow is the perception that the prisoners are expensive and non-productive.  A government that can execute an un-planned lockdown cannot conceive of how to fund it.  This inevitably leads to what the Third Reich called "the final solution".  It wasn't planned, but they had painted themselves into a corner.

The functionality of a lockdown is to mitigate the risk of a high death toll from the virus.  If it causes more death than it prevents then it is clearly a bad idea.  Continuing the lockdown, without the rest of the plan in place, is already proving to be more harmful than the problem it was supposed to mitigate.  The government seem to present an image of being almost hard done by, and elicit the most extraordinary sympathy from some of the least educated people in society.  They appear as if they are ordinary individuals who have been unfortunately presented with a very hard problem.  That is not reality.  The government is a massive organisation with almost unlimited resources to prepare, plan, and execute sophisticated social management.

It should now be clear that the government is populated almost entirely by ministers who were motivated to enter politics because of the rich pickings available.  When confronted with an urgent task they are like a drunk captain in charge of a ship in a storm.  In maritime law it is correct to relieve the captain of his command in those circumstances.  These politicians, motivated by wealth, have occupied their time rearranging laws to dilute their own responsibility and to make their job of acquiring wealth easier.  This is exemplified by how they undermined the fabric of the NHS to channel funds to offshore accounts.  They forgot to maintain the ship, and they casually ignored the navigation charts, whilst they revelled in the opulent benefits of the country's wealth and resources.  They are not looking after their 'customers'; they are robbing the bank.

The members of the current government simply do not have the available neurological pathways to conceive of a way to deal with this crisis for the benefit of all.  They are drunk on their own success, and are incapable of understanding that the way to have people remain at home is to fund that move.  Funding it correctly, so that they can test and trace and eliminate the largest part of the problem quickly, so that people can return to work, is simply not something they can think of.  Their first insane thought is "Who will pay for it?"  Really - that is how stupid they are.

The individuals perpetuating, and even fuelling, the crisis of this pandemic do not have to worry about the devastating consequences to the social condition of the UK.  They have plenty of resources to leave the wasteland or simply live in expensive gated communities protected by intelligent and weaponised aerial drones backed up by militarised private security forces.  Take a look at the favelas in Rio de Janeiro alongside the most opulent communities protected as described above.  Take a look at the city of Hebron and its disconnected society in the occupied West Bank of Palestine and how the poor and unwanted population are handled by the Israeli government and their forces.  Then ask why the British military and police are sent for training to Israel.

Any lockdown is only beneficially functional if it is part of a coherent plan.  Simply locking away the plebs whilst hoping that will stop the virus is completely unserviceable.  Given that the government are incapable of handling this crisis, other than to look after themselves, then perhaps another way to create a lockdown would be as a proactive and organised assault on the government.  A national strike maybe.  Somehow take action that is directed in such a way as to produce the necessary response from the government.  But, in truth, I don't see that happening.  The plutocrats have such powerful control over the medium of communication that they can, and do, distort any communication for their own benefit and to the detriment of the people who want to communicate.

I am a problem solver but I cannot solve this problem.  All I can do is keep examining it and attempting to understand some of the inherent issues and contradictions.  There is one fundamental reason I can't solve this problem, and that is because the solution has to be a collective endeavour.  But the public debate about 'lockdown' or 'don't lockdown' is obscuring the underlying problems that this government is creating, by incompetence or design, of not working effectively to mitigate the problem of the pandemic.

AN EXCERPT FROM 1981

I left the forest and walked along the narrow street between the tall white walls.  A ladder, still wet from the rain, was the only intrusion in the otherwise empty and endless street.  I had no other option, but whether or not that influenced my decision I do not know, and I climbed the ladder.  I entered a large room that was filled with plump working women.  A row of them stood working, with their arms engulfed to their shoulders in sockets in the wall.  The sockets had gloves attached.  A similar arrangement to that used by scientists when handling radioactive material - except that these women could not see what they were doing.  They believed themselves to be cracking large coconut-type fruits and the milk was running into a trough which ran along the wall, where, at the end, the fluid was collected in urns.  There were other women who collected the fluid and others who drank it around a table.  All the women seemed to spend some time doing each activity.  As time went on I began to detect hints of a concept much vaster than the apparent system I observed.  I sensed something monstrous, something devious and malicious.  I listened more and more to the women's chatter and slowly the concept became clearer.  There was some insidious essence behind the wall.  A heinous writhing being.  What the women were cracking was the skulls of their own children to satisfy this hideous monster's appetite.  The fluid was provided in order to support the illusion and to sustain the women.  The monster delighted in being fed the blood of children by their unwitting mothers.  I tried to explain but was rebuked.  I realised that all my knowledge of this situation had come from the women's chatter.  The hidden lie was within their own minds.  I thought on this and began to realise that in order to maintain the flow of food the women could not admit to themselves their activity as they would have to stop, and deep in the unreachable depths of their minds was the imperative defence that they could not possibly cease to perform this ritual and allow their children to live, as it would be a greater tragedy for them to experience such a wretched and debased existence.

Joe Glasman: "Happy Chrismukah!" 2019

Joe Glasman

Joe Glasman issued a video message for Christmas 2019.  It is highly 'emotive' but what did Glasman actual say?  By way of attempting to learn more about the highly complex subject of Judaism and antisemitism I transcribed the video.  It is interesting to find out what phrases like "mazal tov"  and "kol hakavod" mean in English.  I also find it interesting to research some of the history of Hanukkah which commemorates the Maccabean Revolt of 167 to 160 BCE against the Seleucid Empire, and to look up the original source of the phrase "to beat swords into plough shares".

The more I looked into what Glasman was saying the more disturbing it became.  He is clearly an ideological fanatic and has all the hall marks of a paranoid megalomaniac.  The suggestion that he and his dedicated army of Maccabees were the main cause of the destruction of Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party is of significant concern.  I am sure a detailed analysis of this speech could uncover all sorts of complex and convoluted insanity, but one of the central puzzles I am left with is to try to understand what Glasman thinks he is promoting.  The only message I got was one of extreme and selective literal interpretations of some obscure texts to fabricate an intense hatred of some "other" to legitimise anger, vitriol, and destruction.  I see no indication of anything positive or useful except, perhaps, the act of destruction.  What is Glasman advocating?  If he achieved what he claims, then the consequences seem to be an extraordinarily right wing government in the UK.

I was not impressed.

Here is the transcription I made for academic purposes.

---------------------------------------------------------
Glasman's eight minute video begins with a still image of him facing the camera and the title words "Happy Chrismukah!" across the screen.  It then cuts to him lighting what appears to be the first candle (other than the helper candle) of a Hanukkah menorah on a box of drawers with a red bus in front of it, all sitting on a sideboard.
The words on the screen are:
"They Tried to Kill Us (Again)"
"We Won (Again)"
"Let's Eat (...even more?)"
He walks from there to his chair facing the camera and the words are replaced by: "How Corbyn Canifinish"
He sits down and the words are replaced by:
"took on British Maccabeans"
and then
"and got finished"
and then
"....and a personal thank-you"

Hey.  Er, my names Joe Glasman.  Some of you know me, but whether you do or not I just wanted to take this moment at Hanukkah to say a purely personal thank you [Screen text - A personal thank you] to every single person out there [Screen text - to everyone out there ...] who actively resisted [Screen text - who actively opposed] the antisemitism of Corbyn and the Labour Party [Screen text - the antisemitism of Corbyn's Labour Party] and say well done, mazal tov [Yiddish phrase meaning "good fortune"].

Um, just to put me into context if you don't know; I'm a volunteer [Screen text - volunteer at Campaign Against Antisemitism] at Campaign Against Antisemitism where I head the political investigations team which, amongst other things was responsible for our successful submissions to the EHCR [Screen text - EHCR...], but today I'm not speaking in that role, I'm just speaking as one more person [Screen text - to all the other volunteers like me .....] who volunteered like you.  Because the Hanukkah miracle has happened [Screen text - Nes gadol hayah shum!!]; the beast is slain [Screen text - slaughtered!] and I have an urge to express my love [Screen text - from me and my family:] and personal gratitude to every single person, [Screen text - THANK YOU!] some of whom I've never met, who've played their part, and wish them Chanukah, or maybe Chrismukah Sameach [Screen text - CHANUKAH SAMEACH - Merry Christmas].

I did think of making a list of everyone to thank, but, well, I noticed a few weeks back that a Twitter account called [sounds like - shaina maidel] tried to compile one which resulted in the longest thread of broigus [meaning - feud] [Screen text - BROIGUS ALERT] over who was left out.  As one activist, David Toum said in it "This is the most Jewish thread ever".  It reminds me that I once thought of creating a Jewish Facebook App that instead of sending you congratulations for staying friends with people would do the opposite like "Congratulations; you haven't spoken to Jessica for fourteen weeks".

This has been a real Jewish gescheft, a business where there are still people out there not talking to each other.  I've loved the fact that we've even made our non-Jewish allies a bit more disputatious.  And yet, despite all that, every single day we rolled up our sleeves and fought for the same cause.  Kol hakavod [meaning - all the honours], I take my hat off to all of you.  You're all people who've had a natural and unshakeable moral understanding of what needed to be done.  And we all know our non-Jewish allies deserve extra thanks.  We stood up for our community - you stood up because it was the right thing to do.  And then there are also the quiet activists, certainly numbered in my amazing team at CAA, who are the modest people who've applied themselves with the same determination as any of us, but who have never sought public plaudits. And, no, Cobynistas, they're not secret Mossad spies; [Screen text - Hey Chris W ...] they're just ordinary people, [Screen text - mossad offices next door ->] fantastic people.

And Hanukkah is the perfect time to celebrate our victory because, to me, Corbyn and Hanukkah are a comedy combo.  The sainted Jeremy is always pictured lighting the Hanukkah candles [Cut to photo of Jeremy Corbyn standing next to a Hanukkah menorah] and you really do wonder if anyone bothered to tell him that this is a two millennium old celebration [Screen text - Maccabean revolt: 167-170 BCE] of a Jewish military victory to re-establish Jewish national and religious sovereignty in Jerusalem.  I wouldn't have thought that was Jezza's favourite party invite but, hey, Jewish studies may not be his forte.

I don't think the miracle of Hanukkah was so much about the oil. [Screen text 'MO MORE WARS FOR OIL']  I think the real miracle was that we were free to be Jews again, and if you've got two more minutes [Screen text including images of alarm lights - TWO-MINUTE DROSHE WARNING] listen to Rabbi Joe's droshe, ['droshe' is Yiddish דראָשע meaning sermon or speech] I'll tell you why.

You see, academic historians of Hanukkah tell a slightly different story.  They tell the story of a dominant power trying to force their universal world view on Jews. [Screen text - Seleucids under Antiochus IV]  Back then it was gyms, the body beautiful, [Screen text - =Hellenists hence 'Greek'] Olympic games, demigodness.  Here's the twist: Up in Jerusalem there were the favoured Jews who were co-opted, who wanted in, learning to wrestle naked in the desecrated Jewish temple.  Writer Dara Horn calls them 'the cool Jews' who wanted to assimilate so badly it's said they even tried to reverse their circumcisions.  Ooooooh [Screen text - Ooooooh.... ...Jeremy Corbyn] Jeremy Corbyn.  This is the type of antisemitism where Jewish culture is attacked first and co-opts Jews as a weapon.  It was replicated by Christianity by Marxism.  In the Soviet version there was Yevsektskiya [Screen text - Yevsektskiya] where atheist Marxist Jews were sent to undermine Jewish communities as well.  Think about as 'Jewish Voice' for Stalin [Screen text - '@JVoiceStalin ...'] because a century later the Labour Party set up a perfect replica in Jewish Voice for Labour to undermine us in the very same way, except now in TV studios.

Yeah, we've had to deal with those 'cool Greeks', [Screen text - (you know exactly who I mean .....)] young Corbynista Jewish outriders desperate de-circumcisers [Screen text - desperate de-circumcisers] who try to cast people like ME, who used to vote Labour [Screen text - casting Jewish (ex-)Labour voters] as some kind of right wing Trump fanatics [Screen text - as 'right-wing' ... 'Trump fanatics'] robbing the poor of a better future [Screen text - - obstacles to 'a better world'].  And just before the election dawn, the Guardian wrote a truly dark editorial saying that despite the 'shameful' antisemitism, that Labour remained indispensable 'to progressive politics'.  As the historian Tom Holland explained, at the together against antisemitism rally, Christianity made it possible to be, both a good Christian and someone who hated Jews.

Now it seems that in modern Britain you can be a good progressive and hate Jews.  So Corbyn was not Haman or Hitler, he was [Screen text - ANTIOCHUS THE EXTREMELY HUMOURLESS] Antiochus the Extremely Humourless, and we defeated him.  And really, if we could see off the might of Ancient Greece it's not surprising we could see off what Stephen Daisley called [Screen text - ".....a rancid Tony Benn revival act"] a rancid Tony Benn revival act. [Screen text - Stephen Daisley]  Inevitably those Greeks, as they did then, will come back for Jerusalem.

So none of us should be ready to beat our swords into plough shares yet.  But Macabees - we did it.  By word and deed, by protest and tweet, by our spies and intel, by our fab celebrities and our anonymous volunteers, by pleading, by rigorous research and gathering of evidence, by incredible video making, by interminable hours combing through tweets, by prayer, by dramatic speeches and street protests, by lorries carrying huge billboards, by writing and shouting and taking the mick out of the most humourless bunch of people this country's politics has ever made us suffer and [Screen cuts to a picture of Jeremy Corbyn looking angry] ... can I finish? by shear bloody mindedness we metaphorically took the temple back.  [Screen text - and if Jerusalem "is builded here ...]  And if Jerusalem is builded here  [added screen text - in England's green and pleasant land....."] in England's green and pleasant land, then just for now at least, we have our Jerusalem back.

Macabees: At ease.  They tried to kill us - we won - let's eat.  And to quote our other Jewish festival of liberation, not leaning too far to the left, l'chaim. [In Hebrew "L'Chaim" is a toast "To Life"]

End titles state:
Joe's Chrismukah thank-you
Hum Music Production
---------------------------------------------------------

Glasman originally made his video private on YouTube with password access only.  The content of his video is clearly of national significance to the UK public, and, as such, must be available to the public.  Glasman has had several copies of his video removed from YouTube, presumably on the grounds of copyright law, and consequentially it can be hard to find a copy.  I have provided some links to sources currently available as I write.  They may also suffer illegitimate interference or censorship.  [I do have a copy in my safe.]

Glasman's video --->
The Electronic Intifada on YouTube:
https://youtu.be/evSj4S4AC4Q

Glasman's video --->
Momentum Barnet on Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=781491542317247

Here is an article on The Electronic Intifada citing the video
https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/asa-winstanley/we-slaughtered-jeremy-corbyn-says-israel-lobbyist

And here is an interesting article on the subject of Glasman's video by Deborah Maccoby
http://normanfinkelstein.com/2020/01/05/corbynism-and-chanukah-a-response-to-joe-glasman-guest-post-by-deborah-maccoby/

LIRA'S ARBITRARY THREAD OF CONSCIOUSNESS

Lira woke at about 4 in the morning and went to the loo and collected a couple of chocolates and two biscuits.  She returned to bed and ate the biscuits, lay down, turned off the light, and was imagining she was going to fall asleep.  But there was something in her mind.  As if she was very near to understanding something that otherwise seemed impossible.  It seemed inextricably linked to her current disastrous relationship.  As if, if she could just understand that one bit, so much more would suddenly fall into place.

She had an idea that every other event has something in common that has mislead her to expect it is true of the one event in which she is involved but can't explain.  It's as if Harry is accusing her of doing something, and his reasons for believing his conclusion, seem equally convincing to Lira.  It is one thing Lira seeing how he has interpreted the world, and another thing for her to have to interpret the world the same way.  For a fleeting moment she had an evanescent comprehension of how things, which appear improbable or impossible, are actually quite easily understandable.

Lira suddenly remembers that between going to the toilet and collecting chocolates and biscuits she had stopped at the kitchen sink and filled a glass with cold water and drunk about 75% of it?  She wonders if that seemingly insignificant event just may become important later.

So then Lira finds herself lying down attempting to sleep.  The time is now about 04:48 and she hasn't got as far as turning the light off because her mind is trying to hang on to an invisible virtual Ariadne's thread of an insight into the imagined manifestation of a scenario which reveals the complex arrangement that explains how something that appears to be exactly impossible would obviously mislead anyone into thinking it could not be true and that therefore the exact same pattern of relationships, that can be seen in everything else, when applied to this otherwise impossible arrangement, would conclude that she did it.

What is it?  What is this thing that she thinks she can see?  And it reminds her of the hidden tape recorder that she found in Desmond's office, and how she realised that Mavis was lying.  There is something sitting there.  There is some arrangement, in her neurological network, which momentarily revealed an otherwise hidden pattern, which, when overlaid with this mysterious something, would explain it.

Lira wondered what she could possibly write in her diary to hold the set of things that she currently perceives that leave her with the belief that she can see something behind them.  If she can't recall that fleeting insight just now, what can she leave on paper to record the current arrangement such that she gets the chance in the future to return to her diary in the hope of piecing the mystery together at another time.  It is as if she wants to take a 4 dimensional snapshot; she wants to put the virtual reality on hold; she wants to pause the game and save it to disk, so that she can pick it up and carry on at some future time when she doesn't need to be continuing in the way that she now has to proceed and which is obscuring the reality, the real reality, from view.

Lira was also telling herself, or at least she was at around 04:48, that there is something equally mysterious about her multi-base machine.  It may even be that there is something she is missing, which relates directly to the mystery she has failed to adequately describe to herself earlier, which relates to a similar mystery about her multi-base machine.  Maybe she could, she muses, use the multi-base machine to unravel the other mystery.  Perhaps if she solves the first mystery it will reveal how she could successfully utilise her multi-base machine for the purpose of materially improving the quality of her current relationship.

Being a biological blob that self formed from a magical mixture of rather weird oozing and throbbing other blobby stuff, Lira finds herself consistently distracted from the task of comprehension and realisation by the continuing need to process the biological blobby stuff and the environment from which it is formed.  She was endlessly frustrated that she had to interrupt her stream of consciousness by something as mundane as going to the loo.

It has happened so many times before that it comes as no surprise this time that, having performed the compulsory ablution, Lira has not only dropped the thread of Ariadne which she was so desperately hanging on to, but has moved along the corridor of time to a place where there is so much more light stimulating her awareness with such an intensity that what was previously perceivable in the half light has effectively been swallowed up by the relative darkness of the tunnel that is now behind her.

Lira muses that one of the intriguing things about writing stuff down in her diary is that sometimes, when she goes back and reviews it, it then appears evident that she knew something which she didn't know she knew at the time.  "So what the hell was it," she demands of herself, "that I woke up knowing in the middle of the night, that I am so anxious to hold, in some conscious form, that I am compelled to sit freezing at my desk attempting to put some words in my diary to describe adequately the state of affairs that might give rise to that comprehension again?"

Lira recalls that earlier she remembered turning the light off but later recalled that she hadn't got as far as turning the light off.  She can hear Harry in her head asking accusingly "So which is it to be?  Did you turn the light off or not?" with the explicit implication that she's guilty.  "Guilty of what?", she asks the Harry in her head.  "Guilty of whatever I want to describe you as guilty of."  "Guilty because something is wrong and we don't know what it is." "And you steal our conscious attention because you are so mysterious, magical, bright, light, beautiful, and full of promises of our everlasting life in a state of perfect harmony and bliss."

"You are guilty of not being our saviour." Harry continues to accuse.  "You came here and mislead us that you would make everything alright.  You would bring meaning and purpose into our lives.  You were the purpose of our lives.  But you have failed.  You are a treacherous deceiver."  "You, you, you ..." he shouts as he points his bony fingers at her and with lips curling in vile hatred he screams in her face "You are the manifestation of evil."  "It is you who have ruined our lives and turned them from their pure potential into a meaningless experience of pain and suffering."

"You are the problem.  You are the destroyer of worlds.  You are guilty.  You must die, and we will sacrifice you to appease our angry God.  We will torture, humiliate, desecrate, and murder you.  And then we will know our true God.  The God that will save us.  The God that loves us unconditionally.  The God that pats us on the head and soothes us saying 'There, there, little ones.  I love you and you are truly valuable even if you are sinners and do bad things like maliciously torturing and murdering your children.' "

But it only gets worse.  He hates Lira watching him doing it.  He hates the reflection of his own existence in her eyes.  He accuse her of seeing him as evil but she doesn't.  Lira only sees him as beautiful but he is manifesting his pain in front of her eyes.  Her eyes that are filled with tears of profound sadness at the demonic violence and destruction that he has become.  Her beautiful eyes that are so perfect they reflect the truth of his debased and vacuous existence.

And yet, for all of that, there are several possible alternative explanations.  It is possible when she thought that she thought she had turned out the light that she had.  And that later, and therefore later in the chronological order in which she had thought the thoughts, she was thinking about an earlier time in the timeline of the events being recalled, when she had not turned out the light.  This is necessary, in her understanding of the proposed reality being recalled, in order to make it possible and logically consistent, for her to have turned the light out in her earlier recollection which was later in the proposed timeline.

It is also possible that she was simply mistaken and she never did turn the light out but had simply assumed she had because she had assumed she was trying to sleep.  Having grasped at her past by pulling on the thread which Ariadne gave her, in an attempt to understand what lies deeper in the tunnel from which she is emerging, instead of a neat ball of string, which it possibly once was, Lira finds she is staring at an impossibly tangled heap of useless string.

It is as if she has somehow hung on to the umbilical cord of her mother and in her desperation to stay connected to the safety of her past she has pulled and pulled on the cord and disembowel her mother turning her inside out.  She finds herself immersed in a pile of warm heaving steaming entrails that threaten to suffocate her and can offer no nourishment to her bestial existence.  She is simply left to contemplate the utter disaster that is her life.  Lira's tortured soul continues to imagine she immerged into this material universe as a self replicating mechanism of resonant consciousness only to find herself not emerging from the darkness into the light but rather transitioning from the light into the darkness of hell.

She prays in her head to some imaginary deity "Oh sublime and beautiful all loving omnipotent God, thank you for this wondrous experience that brands your love with a burning iron into what little consciousness you afforded me.  Thank you for honouring me with the privilege of being your foil, your defining otherness, your coiled distorted twist of gripping lick, your trunked and garbled ugly fuck.  Thank you oh great magnificence."

And Lira ponders that the drink of water didn't turn out to have any meaningful significance after all.  But was its significance ever going to relate to this excerpt of her life?  Maybe it is part of a different story.  Maybe it is part of the bigger picture.  Maybe it is the clue, the rainbow, the promise, the breath of life, the ingredients of love and truth that finally seals the eternal circle of her love.

BREXIT DEAL IN 60 SECONDS

BREXIT DEAL IN 60 SECONDS
(or: A Pact with the Devil)

There is obviously a lot of work going into Theresa May's public relations interface.  Every time I log on to Twitter I see a post from her account.  Today I saw a Tweet "The Brexit deal explained" with a 60 second video.  The video is a simplified bullet point list of 10 items.  To be specific there are 11 items but I think the first could be called the heading.

I am appalled when I see this kind of overt deception.  I was brought up by Conservatives and I swear I cannot feel sure that they are aware of how deceitful they are being.  I have a tendency to imagine they actually think they believe what they are saying.  And I mean that I 'imagine' because it doesn't sit well with me.  Something isn't right when I imagine them believing what they say.  It feels to me that no coherent neurological network could feel an inner equilibrium with the ideas they present sitting together in one brain.  I do, however, think that they are stupid enough to believe themselves.  They are dead enough, dull enough, anaesthetised enough, to blunder on, insisting they know what they are doing as they lurch and stagger about, whilst all the objective evidence is clear they are just frightened individuals attempting to appear to know what they are doing for fear of being told off, ostracised, punished, or even killed.  This is what authoritarianism does, it bends and distorts your brain until it no longer functions correctly.  That is why these Tories are all incapable of thinking imaginatively or even truthfully.

I thought I would at least give the video a fair trial.  I tend to avoid the toxic vitriol emanating from this Tory Government and all those who think in stereotypical conformist union with them.  They have done a lot of damage to my brain already and I seriously need to limit the damage.

Here are the header and 10 bullet points in the video:

The Brexit Deal explained in 60 seconds.
⚫ Ending free movement once and for all, with a new skills-based immigration system.
⚫ A free trade area with the EU for goods, with no tariffs, which protects jobs.
⚫ No more sending vast sums of money to the EU, meaning we can spend it on our NHS.
⚫ The end of the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice in the UK, meaning we control our own laws.
⚫ Protecting the rights of EU citizens living in the UK and UK citizens living in the EU.
⚫ The ability to strike trade deals with other countries.
⚫ A close relationship on defence, tackling crime and terrorism to keep people safe.
⚫ Leaving the Common Agricultural Policy and Common Fisheries Policy.
⚫ Leaving on the 29th March 2019, with a good deal for every part of the UK.
⚫ Now is the time to come together to build a brighter future.

I will deal with each one individually.

The Brexit Deal explained in 60 seconds.
So I started watching.  I was interested and even amused that there was a timer ticking down in the top right corner of the screen and I am naive enough to imagine that since it started at 60 they would be right that this video was 60 seconds long.  Well, I haven't timed it and I am not going to, but I would not be surprised to find that they stretched it and every second counted down is actually 1.1 seconds of real time because I have well over half a century of experience of their relentless greed.  I was amused also that the timer starts after this header.  I have to concede that is fair.

⚫ Ending free movement once and for all, with a new skills-based immigration system.
That has to be a bad start for me.  I know there are rather thoughtless, parochial, and even unkind people who think of the 'other' as undesirable and so ending free movement is interpreted as ending 'their' free movement.  A good technique for analysing the significance, meaning, and value of many assertions is to swap them around and to see how they look if you change the gender, the age, the subject etc.  So "ending free movement" is simply dreadful per se.  Ending it "once and for all" is dictatorial and monstrously oppressive.  This is typical codification from self-centred control freaks.  They are actually telling you and me, and those who think they agree with them, that they are going to stop our free movement.  It is a convoluted message and only fools fall for it.  At best it assumes the reader believes themselves to be in the same team; at worst it is a clear message of what they intend for the future.  And the second half of the statement is as sick as they come.  Skills-based immigration is inhumane and will afford privilege to those who currently have some benefit for the Tories.  Not only is it destructively prejudicial, it should also be clear that it dismisses those with less to offer who already reside here.  So if you are British you will be sidelined, put out, dismissed, invalidated, by an onslaught of preferred gift bearers, sycophants, and worshippers of the Tories.  Oh yes, we so live in a Christian culture; an Old Testament Christian culture.  Skills based immigration is not only overtly inhuman it will also have a negative effect on wages and current residents internal employment opportunities.  If you are sick, disabled, under educated, old or otherwise less than perfect you are not worth much by these standards.

⚫ A free trade area with the EU for goods, with no tariffs, which protects jobs.
I don't know enough details about the current legislation to comment in any detail but the attitude is foreboding.  I notice it does not say "goods and services" which worried me in a service based economy.  It does sound like an appeasing platitude rather than a meaningful communication.

⚫ No more sending vast sums of money to the EU, meaning we can spend it on our NHS.
I simply don't believe the implication of the first part let alone the evidently false claim in the second part.  Most money sent to the EU comes back in one form or another.  Simple things like controlled airspace are paid into for the benefit of all and to opt out of the club, so to speak, leaves you paying individually for the collective benefit of those still in the club.  But the complications of the net payments in and out are beyond me but the last part of the sentence is evidently a lie.  First of all it actually suggests that all of the money saved can go into the NHS which is nonsense.  Secondly the Tories have long term plans to privatise the NHS and have treated it as their own personal cash cow for all the time they have been in Government.  They are lying again.  They will not even put back what they have stolen and who could be naive enough to imagine they would also start funding it properly.  In fact it is probably impossible for them to put right the damage they have done.

⚫ The end of the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice in the UK, meaning we control our own laws.
Need I comment?  This was the earth shaking statement that struck terror into my heart.  This is THE statement hidden in plain sight.  This IS the declaration of intent.  I know this in my soul.  The Tories have already destroyed the fabric of British Justice.  The Law Society, groups of Judges and Barristers, and numerous analysts and observers have spoken out about the damage being done by Tory policies so I need not pour out lots of supporting evidence since it is there to be found in ample supply on the internet.  The Tories persistently make laws to benefit themselves and to remove justice from the poor.  That is what they do, and they will not change.  This is the prize they are drooling over.  This is what bothers me about what are sometimes described as knuckle dragging thugs who support the Tories.  Are there not enough suicidal and homeless ex-soldiers to illustrate how the Tories treat the gullible who, albeit in good faith, think they are being honourable to serve the masters of this country.  I don't have a final view on the pros and cons of the army but I do know the Tories have never been honourable towards those in their own team.  They are as vile to their own as they are to those they subjugate abroad.  I can only imagine the less well off who support the Tories are deluded enough that they think their masters will look after them.  History informs us otherwise, as should anyone's heart.  If for no other reason anyone should oppose May's deal for this reason.  There is an overt and conscious intent to take over this country as a dictatorship.  They'll be more sensible than to rename the post of Prime Minister as the post of Führer but it is the construct they intend to manifest.

⚫ Protecting the rights of EU citizens living in the UK and UK citizens living in the EU.
That is simply laughable.  The European Court of Justice was a serviceable protection and they want rid of that with promises they will do the same.  No - there is no previous evidence and they will not protect people's rights in the future.  One wonders why they included what should be self evident as a benefit in a 60 second summary.

⚫ The ability to strike trade deals with other countries.
As far as I understand it there is no effective obstruction to independent trade deals from within the EU so one is left wondering what fire we might be jumping into as we jump out of the supposed frying pan of the EU.  This feels like flack and waffle.  Given only 60 seconds to summarise the most complex legislation this Government has attempted this indicates they neither know what they are doing nor do they intend to divulge their real intentions.

⚫ A close relationship on defence, tackling crime and terrorism to keep people safe.
That is just another feeble attempt to sooth the more anxious in society.  Without any doubt they are causing net damage to the cooperative actions of defence and policing across Europe.  So at best this should read that they intend to mitigate and reduce the damage caused rather than presenting it as a plus.  So this is quite obviously a negative factor.  Again, with only 60 seconds didn't they have more of a constructive nature to report?

⚫ Leaving the Common Agricultural Policy and Common Fisheries Policy.
Again I am not the expert to comment on this but as the world's ecosystem is collapsing and with all the reports and analysis that I have seen to date this is an attempt to appease whilst being an admission of harm.

⚫ Leaving on the 29th March 2019, with a good deal for every part of the UK.
A meaningless repetition in the age old tradition of repeating something often enough to make people believe it.  And there is no evidence to even suggest it is a good deal for 'every part' of the UK.  Quite the opposite is already evidenced to be the case.

⚫ Now is the time to come together to build a brighter future.
This is a trite attempt to imitate genuine collective feelings and views.  The phrase "for the many not the few" evolved out of the left of the Labour Party because it was how people were feeling.  This is more typical Tory attempt to imitate what appears to them to be successful for their opponents.  They simply don't understand.  It is sickeningly saccharine and disgustingly tacky from the woman who created the 'harsh environment'.

SUMMARY

Overall I was delighted to see this 60 second summary because I was afraid they could find 60 seconds worth of actual benefits and improvements to report.  But instead it is full of transparent deception, overt distraction, and meaningless pretence.  I am now convinced that May's 'Deal' would be a crime and a disaster.  Whatever Labour might negotiate would necessarily be better than the Tory's hard line, ruthless, protectionist, and, frankly, fascist deal.  Failing that we might have to stay in the EU.  But we cannot safely leave on May's terms.

HOW LIFE IMITATES ART

The muse of Recoil

Western culture has a profound problem and it is of the nature of imagining itself a superior observer of an essentially inanimate and lifeless universe.  This leads to a sense of entitlement and domination.  I have often wondered whether the Abrahamic religions are a self fulfilling prophecy or an observation of the inevitable.

I made the film Recoil as an expression of the profound self destructive nature of humanity or even the universe itself.  I summed it up once as God creating the universe and recoiling at the devastating catastrophe that it had created.  As with feedback it takes only one deviation from the universal void to observe itself and thereby become something more.  There is all the potential for this process to be beautiful in its resonating harmonic interaction.  But it can become mechanistic, aggressive, and self destructively violent, like a cosmic reaper destroying everything including its own soul.

As Carl Jung was at pains to point out the psyche is real.  His astute assertion was that an unreal thing cannot change the real world and yet this planet is littered with nuclear bombs.  His perceived dilemma was born of Western philosophy and its manner of separating the soul from the world as if we somehow possess the consciousness that is in fact the universe itself.

Recoil was designed to suggest the sublime potential of creativity whilst becoming the antithesis of itself and violently chewing itself up from the inside out.  It was intended to be extremely disturbing and difficult to watch.  It was an expression of my own sense of utter despair at the abhorrent cruelty and nihilistic behaviour manifest by humanity.

Turbulent distortions

It is supremely ironic that in the process of renovating Recoil a small deviation of negativity arises to extend its tentacles of discontent into any unwitting or available fissure to spread its virulent toxin of angst and despair.  Like negative feedback it attempts to ravage and consume its host to overwhelm and destroy all creativity returning the world to the bleak and meaningless void of darkness whilst echoing the words of Vishnu "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds."

It seems one individual insidiously insinuated himself under false pretences into the project for personal kudos and financial gain.  Having interfered to the point of causing unnecessary problems it seems the pathological response was to embark on an excessive smear campaign of defamation and slander to hide from the embarrassment of self realisation.  This individual has put a lot of effort into his crusade to whip up discontent, spread seeds of doubt, and muster a hue and cry apparently with the hope of forming a lynch mob.  The tirade of relentless harassment, abuse, stalking, and trolling has currently culminated in him inappropriately and illegally uploading a copy of Recoil to YouTube.

The vast majority of people who contributed to the project to rescue Recoil have remained either unaware of the disruption or silent on the matter.  It has been suggested that I might perhaps respond to this turbulence.  I am reluctant to be dragged into someone else's dysfunctional dilemma and resist the temptation to indulge in malicious gossip, fuelling flame wars, or feeding trolls on social media.

Calming Balm

Since the hideous Kraken from the deep has attempted to cast doubt in some people's minds I will reassure the crew that although these perturbations may feel a little disturbing they will pass and the voyage will continue on its charted course to its desired destination.

Recoil is a film whose time appears to be dawning.  It is a personal priority for me to make this film available to the public.  The fact that the film was created in the fertile artistic environment of the early 1980s in the northern industrial city of Sheffield and that the sound track was produced in conjunction with Stephen Mallinder of Cabaret Voltaire in their Western Works Studio and credited to myself and Cabaret Voltaire makes it especially interesting to music lovers and historical archivists of that era and genre.

Many enthusiastic friends and interested parties have generously contributed to the material costs involved in realising the restoration of this rare and otherwise obscure material.  As many people are aware, much work has already been done and the film has been digitised and restored successfully.  The process of producing DVDs is continuing.  As a labour of love there never has been any doubt in my mind that this project will be concluded successfully in spite of numerous unforeseen difficulties.

Due to my limited time and capacity there can be no assured deadline and all I can say is that I continue to put a lot of my available time and effort into the project.  I heard rumours that the project was dead but these are simply the voices of naysayers and false prophets of doom blowing on the wind in the parched and lifeless valley of death.

When a copy of Recoil was illegally uploaded to YouTube recently I immediately submitted a copyright infringement claim to get it removed because although I am keen for anyone and everyone to see the film it is not fair to those who have contributed financially to make the film publically available on YouTube before they get their DVDs.

MY LIFE IN THE SMOG OF GRUNGE

Once upon a time I was living in Oxfordshire developing noxious gas analysis software for a company that rents it to power stations and other exhaust emitting industrial plants.  I am meticulous and consequently slower than most, hence why I was only earning about £12,000 per annum.  My software is, however, superior and exceptionally bug free.

15 years pass by and I have endured an unbelievable divorce that makes the Skripal Novichok affair look like child's play.  I have been a single parent and spent 18 months struggling to defend my daughter, my nephew, and myself from a hideous eviction orchestrated by my erstwhile siblings (four harpies and a Napoleonic pretender) who cruelly coerced my mother to sign the most disgusting toxic narrative for their solicitor to present in court.

The three of us eventually landed in rented accommodation that we cannot afford sitting precariously in every respect on the banks of the Haven in Lincolnshire.  The stress and anxiety, caused primarily by the Tory's destruction of the fabric of society, proved unendurable for my nephew who attempted to take his own life before being whisked off to Wales.  This left my daughter and me rattling around this house, unemployed, disorientated, and ostracised by society.

For over a year now we have taken to strolling along the banks of the Haven which is tidal and fed through a sluice from the River Witham.  The Haven meanders its way out to the mud flats and sand banks of the Wash before finally reaching the North Sea.  Part of our walk takes us round an odorous sewage works and along a littered path called the Havenside Country Park.  From here we have been watching the construction of some monstrous industrial plant on the other side of the river.  Yesterday it started belching toxic exhaust and I assume someone is very happy to see their investment burst into life.

A search on the internet reveals the new cathedral for modern man to be a multifuel gasification plant.  Apparently these gasification plants process wood, industrial waste, and sometimes human body parts.  So I expect we will soon be able to fill our lungs with the slightly smoked aroma of charred foetuses and gangrenous toes.

And I ponder the intricate harmony of the complex circles of life that bring me to being near destitute whilst staring across a cold bleak river watching body parts incinerated for profit and belching noxious exhaust which is most likely being monitored by sophisticated software that I wrote all those years ago.

DECAYING IN THE TOXIC WASTE OF HUMANITY

One week into January 2018.  In that week it seems I have lost two friends.  They've not died, just deserted me.  On one level it hardly matters but on another level it is profoundly upsetting.  It is upsetting because piece by piece the connections with some group, some history, some society, are being eroded and severed leaving me adrift in a world which makes no sense and one which I clearly don't belong to.

I can sense the fear.  It seems to be what often happens to children when their parents divorce.  Their friends at school, usually with no awareness of why, simply don't want to associate with them anymore.  They become ostracised and isolated.  It is not long before they become the object of criticism and cruelty.  It looks like an animal instinct of avoiding the sick, the weak, or the injured in the group.  These erstwhile friends are shunning me as a consequence of the breakup of the family.  In part they don't want to be associated with me lest they end up on the wrong side of the fence with the outcast, the leper, the mutant disease of the family.

We all have a diverse range of emotions and to some degree we need to express them.  I have a good friend with whom I can vent my frustration and fury about the state of the world.  There is a kind of adult consent.  For a while the internet provided an outlet for that rage.  I could make my criticisms of the social structure, the conventional norms, or the downright misconceptions of the culture.  In part the reason was anonymity.  By having a pseudonym, a Nom de Grrr, people who knew me didn't have to read it.  And there are people out there, the minority of course, who feel the same way.  They appreciate the expression because it begins to create another group of like minded people with which they can identify.

Another point that needs to be brought into this mix is that in needing someone to understand and accept us, parents all too often seem to think their captive innocents, their children, are some God given gift that they are free to abuse.  A plain sheet of paper upon which to spill their darkest ink.  Our culture has created the isolated family home, the hidden back room where torture and abuse can be played out with impunity and no one outside has the right to interfere or even express an opinion.  It is rife in our culture to the point that all institutions in the hierarchy from the education system to the government, rely on, utilise, and protect, this secret inner chamber of horrors.

The internet is facilitating the breakdown of the medieval castle and as it collapses the horrors and turmoil are spilling across communities.  The facade of respectability defends itself with expressed outrage at the crimes being exposed and attempts to bolster the charade by publically decrying the evils.  But these hideous writhing creatures emerging from the depths of the rubble are mere scapegoats and whipping boys for the monsters still compelled by the urge to dispose of their distress by injecting it into others.

My mother used to lock me in the porch "And you'll stay there until your father gets home." It wasn't as nightmarish as it sounds because the porch was cold but I was allowed a dressing gown and my father would just send me back to bed when he came in.  I would spend hours in that porch most often for something I had not done.  The internal dynamics of dysfunctional families are complex and unfathomable.  I don't recall the girls being punished in this way, just the boys.  Maybe my mother felt righteous in beating her daughters but was somehow inhibited from beating her sons lest it break their manhood.  Who can tell what is going on in the minds of these disturbed individuals.

But now I feel imprisoned and isolated in the porch of my life.  Those on the outside dare not break the spell, they dare not question the current arrangement, the power structure that appears to maintain their survival.  They collude with, and protect, the hideous abuse lest they get singled out and dragged screaming and undefended to the torture chamber within.  They know, by their own acceptance and compliance, that no one would come to their defence.  They know it is wrong but they are caught by their own sense of guilt at being party to it.

Of course we will continue to vote for and support, hail and promote, the most hideous, the most stupid, the most judgemental authoritarians amongst us, because it protects the failing hierarchical structure which currently appears to sustain us in our secret guilt.  We are victims of our own inhumanity.  We will rally round those opposing authority in other lands because it is a proxy for our own resentment whilst we dare not stand against our own oppressors.  We are tragic cowards clinging on to a life with no meaning, no substance, and certainly no value.

I have no desire to be here on this planet in this form.  I am isolated, scorned, blamed for others' failings, and deprived of any reasonable existence.  But I am here, with a daughter who I would not desert even to save my own soul.  My most sincere regret is that I was in any way responsible for bringing her into this conscious material existence.  All I can do, contained in the porch of my life, is hope that what I imagined might be possible can still happen for her.  Maybe humanity can turn some corner, maybe collectively we can alter course from this insane decent into hell.  Maybe another world is possible.  I might never know it, but if she finds herself in a good place, all of my suffering will have been worthwhile.

I am trapped in an echo chamber ringing with the cries of the lost souls around me.  I am immersed in a pit of their disowned failings and guilt.  I am smothered by their failure to deal with their own problems and choking on their desperation to hide it from themselves.  I am decaying and dissolving in the corrosive waste of humanity.  Roll on 2018.

RECOIL

Still image from the film Recoil.

Recoil is an abstract non-narrative film possibly more relevant today even than it was in 1981.

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Recoil is a short 10 minute film made by Nik Allday in 1981.  The concept originated with raw material of video feedback and some sparse nuclear bomb footage available at the time.  The idea was to represent in abstract form the cruel chaotic dysfunctional nature of the human condition with all its potential for self destruction.  It was conceived as a manifestation of wretched anger, fury, and regret.  A story board was constructed and the diagrams created and slowly the concept began to take shape.

Title screen.

The sound track needed to dynamically compliment and substantially echo the tortured demonic soul of the film.  Cabaret Voltaire seemed like a natural choice and so Nik approached Stephen Mallinder with the project to see if he would be interested in assisting in creating the audio component.  Cabaret Voltaire inhabited part of an old factory in Sheffield at the time called Western Works where they had their sound studio.  Mal seemed to like the idea and so work began and multiple tracks were laid down.  With Nik's conceptual perspective and Mal's creative talent and technical skills a masterpiece of distorted, rhythmic, cacophonous, soundscape was manifest and mixed down to a master quarter inch tape.

Some credits.

All the raw visual material was transferred to high contrast black and white film and the editing began.  It took many weeks of dedication and endless late nights to cut the film, coordinate the sequences, and to meld the abstract construct into the contiguous, throbbing, undulating, violent, distorted, and nihilistic masterpiece that is Recoil.  At the time of its initial release there were various reactions some of the more memorable being that it should have a health warning and that it would be better called the migraine machine.  There were one or two voices that claimed it was a work of genius too.

Apart from a few private viewings in the late 1980s Recoil slowly vanished into obscurity languishing in some inaccessible oblivion.  Life continued and Recoil became a distant nostalgic memory alive and well in my mind but out of reach in the real world.  Until, one day, I found a worn out copy in a box in a garage.  The hunt was on.  I searched through the rotting mass of furniture, collapsing cardboard boxes, old art work, and even a decaying cat corpse, and eventually located several almost archaeological remnants of the original material for Recoil.

16mm optical sound track in good condition.

I was delighted when I found the original quarter inch tape of the soundtrack but to my horror it had degraded and was suffering what is called "sticky-shed syndrome".  This appears to be a problem with a limited batch of tape produced in the late 1970's which used an unstable binder.  Fortunately I eventually located the original master 16mm optical track along with the original master 16mm visual film.  On further inspection these masters, shown above and below,  were well protected by their inner wrapping and appear to be in almost perfect condition.

16mm film only with no sound track.

I managed to get some equipment to view the rather worn out combined film that I found first and have extracted some still images as shown bellow.

Stills gleaned from the film.

Having contacted a variety of archive film experts it appears the two separate masters can be digitised and combined into a digital master and reproduced for a fee.  Help bring this piece of Art History back to life; contribute to this project now and please share this page because it's the only way other people get to hear about it.  You can donate by clicking the link below.

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I DON'T THINK THESE THINGS - I SEE THEM

Woke up in a unique fabricated illusion.  It's mine.  It's what is loosely referred to as "me".  But I am not the illusion.  If there were an "I" then I am the perspective.

What is Art?  Give me a fucking huge grant and a prestigious position in an international Art Institution then I'll tell you.  Annie Lennox singing Sweet Dreams springs to mind.  "Everybody's looking for something."  I can't give everybody what they want because everybody is looking for something different.  Some of them want to abuse me.  Some of them want to be abused.

Finding an anchor point, a rock to stand on, a fixed perspective, is nigh on impossible.  It's all relative and any reference point is relative to something else.  It is nice when you can hear someone shouting abuse at you and you can see their trauma instead of feeling their pain.  It is good when you can remain calm in a tumultuous sea of despair.  There is a world of difference, however, between a sanctimonious privileged hypocrite condescending feigned stoicism and a calm spiritually centred mystic.

When people altercast at you they are simply projecting their trauma.  They are falsely holding on to a fixed reference point putting any disturbance or deviation down to you.  They are like a snake that needs a fixed object as leverage before it can crush you to death.  But being human inside these volatile circumstances it is not possible to be a static external unmoved observer.

So when the pressure increases and your family turn against you and your government slowly destroys you and every which way you turn you cannot find anyone with any influence who is not going to conspire with the cultural consensus to cut off your oxygen and suffocate you to death it all begins to feel hopeless.  I'll commit suicide.  That'll teach them.  Then they'll be sorry.  But that's been done before and it won't teach them anything and they'll probably be glad to be rid of me.  I know; I'll take out a few "innocents" with me.  I'll go into the Council Offices with a bomb and blow the whole place up.  That'll make people wonder what the fuck was going on.  No it won't.  It's been tried before.  I know ... I have a better idea, I'll kill my daughter.  That will really fuck with their minds.  That'll make them realise how hideous they are.  That'll make them sorry and finally they will pay attention to me and stop trying to kill me.  Hmm ... That won't work either.  They'll just blame it all on me and walk away muttering to themselves about how dreadful I am and why I should be terminated.  There must be a better way.

HALLELUIAH - I'VE GOT IT!

What I'll do is send my daughter into the world to be abused by them.  I'll let them pursue her and hound her and accuse her and finally murder her.  Then everyone will be shocked.  Then they'll realise what they're doing.  Then they'll feel sorry for me and try to make reparations and worship me and adore me and love me in a desperate attempt to atone for their demonic crimes.  Then I'll have them under my thumb.  They'll never be able to forgive their own despotic, ruthless, bestial, cruel, vicious nature.  They will forever be under my control.

There's one small problem with that.  It's been tried before.  When everything else fails send your son into the world and create such a fucking humungous guilt complex that for thousands of years humanity will suffer in the hell of its own insatiable guilt.  They'll escalate you to a God and worship and adore you forever.  They'll even repeatedly commit genocide for you and in your name.  How's that for success?

Oh well - I guess I'll meander off and think of something more creative to do with my time.