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.

CLAPPING FOR ATOS

Clapping is the new school star chart.  It is a form of social coercion.  As soon as I heard the first clap for the NHS I knew what was happening.  It has taken ten weeks for NHS workers to begin to combat the collective pathos of the clap and to feel brave enough to attempt to point out that it has some inherent problems.  They need respect and decent working equipment and conditions.  Clapping has been encouraged by the privateers and the neoliberal oligarchs.  It creates a false environment where workers are under more pressure to not complain.  It is putting them on a precarious, and cheap, pedestal.

Until the intentional deconstruction of the NHS, nurses and doctors had serious respect in society.  They worked hard for it too.  It has been a deliberate policy to downgrade them and to create a degree of discontent in the population.  This weakens their position in society and facilitates the narrative of privatisation.  Were there any meaningful appreciation of their role their pay would have immediately risen.  Their working conditions and, significantly, the tools of their trade, would have been upgraded and reinforced.

I understand completely that for many individuals it is like signing a petition - it seems the only thing they can do to show their support.  I don't object to that at all.  It's why I forgive Jeremy Corbyn for joining in - but at least he makes it overtly clear they should be paid better.  Have people learnt nothing from the hijacking of Remembrance Sunday and the social coercion to align with the official authoritarian militarised state by wearing a red poppy.  It took people with guts, genuine insight, and some serious creativity, to come up with the White Poppy initiative to oppose the hijacking of what should be, and is for many, a profound reminder of the sacrifice of so many people and the tragic death and destruction of war.  Seeing the likes of Thatcher and Blair, both overt war mongers, at the Cenotaph should really give most people a clue as to where the problem lies.

If you like war, if you believe in violence as a way to deal with life, that is your prerogative and I am not complaining about that here.  I am complaining about the social coercion which is deliberately fomented and manipulated by nefarious individuals for their own ends.  They are preying on the naive and innocent peace loving people.  It is predatory and oppressive.

This is why I find it so worrying that the next kudos cart is clapping for bin men.  When did we stop knowing they are doing an invaluable job?  We stopped as neoliberalism infected society with Thatcher's selfish ideology.  We stopped when we started respecting stock brokers and bankers as role models for success.  We stopped when we became immersed in a society of individualism and began to aspire to selfishness because it denoted success.

Neoliberal ideology has even usurped charity and turned it into a revenue siphon to extract money from well meaning people into the pockets of offshore privateers.  Charity given to the NHS goes in at the top; part of it goes off shore via secretive corporate trust funds, some of it goes into the pockets of extremely well paid executives like Simon Stevens, what is left is shared out to well paid 'business' managers to keep them on side, and none of it goes to underpaid staff.

Unfortunately the majority in the UK do not appear to understand what these rapacious vultures have been building for the last forty years.  Most people think the NHS is what it once was, and are still being told it is: a collective common resource provided by the people for the people; but it is no longer that.  Of course the people that do the work are valuable and doing a good and important job.  But clapping them in this somewhat mishandled crisis will not improve the NHS.  It will not improve the working conditions - as this government has already shown, if you have been paying attention, by, for example, maintaining the freeze on nurses pay right in the middle of this crisis.
One thing this clapping could achieve is to heighten the population's awareness of the crimes being committed against humanity by these pirates and privateers.  But I see little sign of that, or that it will adversely affect the people and corporations orchestrating this robbery.  Clapping is one thing, but it needs serious anger at the crimes against these invaluable and heroic workers, and it needs real action.

If we are not careful we will find ourselves clapping weakly for the unemployed, the disabled, the homeless, and eventually the suicide victims of the broken welfare state.  It could yet start with clapping for Atos.  You think that sounds ridiculous - just wait and see.  The population is being quite deliberately psychologically manipulated - and you are one of the chickens.

NO HOPE FOR HUMANITY

I was talking with my daughter when out of the quiet evening sky I heard the sound of prisoners rattling tin cups against the bars of their cages.  Pots and pans being banged and jeering noises behind the cacophony.  Then it dawned on me.  This was not a prison riot, it was the collective neurosis acting out some bizarre ritual of solidarity with the public display of the collapse of civilisation.  People were stepping outside of their isolation cells to clap and cheer to an audience which was themselves.  Like a distortion of an orchestra playing on the deck of the Titanic or a disturbing inversion of Jewish prisoners singing on their way to the death camps.

This sycophantic pathos, this kowtowing to the angel of death, this obedient display of appreciation for the tortured circus animals, is disturbing in the extreme.  I wondered what the third world war would look like with modern technology and the sixth domain of operations and here it is.

The plutocrats have dissolved the fabric of society, like gallium embrittles aluminium, destroying the inherent strength and integrity, whilst leaving it with all the appearance of being intact.  They tested the system in 2016 with 'Exercise Cygnus' and were completely satisfied that all they had to do was to sit and wait for the next inevitable influenza pandemic.

They had established that there were not enough hospital beds, there were not enough ICU beds, not enough ventilators, not enough testing and tracing capacity, not enough Personal Protection Equipment, not enough trained staff, not enough joined up procedures and protocols, and, pertinently, the health service would collapse.  And incidentally there was no capacity to cope with the cascade of corpses, but that wouldn't matter at that stage.

This was clearly good news for the architects of the controlled demolition of the UK.  So much so, they kept schtum about the findings and, rubbing their bloody hands with glee, proceeded to do nothing but sit and wait.  No wonder they were so keen to stop Corbyn from repealing the Health and Social Care Act 2012, which would put responsibility for the people's health back where it belonged, with the government, with the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care.  Currently the government is not legally responsible for people's health anymore; it is only responsible for providing a health system - whether it works or not.

The doctors and nurses and porters and cleaning staff are underpaid, undervalued, and the majority are struggling to eke a meagre living whilst many have to resort to debt and food banks.  They are on the front line like soldiers in the First World War.  They are decent people who have been wilfully betrayed by their government and the facade of a National Health Service which is infected with the likes of Simon Stevens.  Stevens, who is the CEO of NHS England, works for private insurance company interests and not for the benefit of either the NHS staff or the population that has been deceived about the ethos and meaning of those three letters which are deceitfully still emblazoned on private ambulances and private hospitals - the NHS.

Clapping like trained seals in the streets for the victims of abuse who are still struggling on because they have no choice, is a bizarre exhibition of delusional madness.  I know 'the people' don't know they are cheering the slaughter of innocents by plutocrats waging their own wars for their own interests and entertainment, but that is the reality.  Of course the fact is we are stuck in our homes attempting to reduce the catastrophe that is befalling the UK.  Of course the health carers and auxiliary staff are heroes under these circumstances.  But to be corralled into vacuous clapping by the architects of this disaster is abhorrent.  It is dim witted and ignorant.

I recall an advert, many years ago on the television, of cartoon pigs skipping with joy as they promoted some brand of sausage.  What I would suggest to these cartoon pigs, these clapping seals, these somnambulised troglodytes, these voluntary anchorites, is go back indoors and read about the intentional and planned privatisation of the NHS "by stealth".  Start with Oliver Letwin's 1980 book "Privatizing the World: A Study of International Privatization in Theory and Practice".  It's a shallow and pernicious self aggrandising pretence of sociopolitical economic theorising, but it appeals to neoliberals who are interested in how to run pyramid marketing scams and corporate scale Ponzi schemes.  He then teamed up with John Redwood to co-author "Britain's Biggest Enterprise: Ideas for Radical Reform of the NHS" in 1988.  A pathetic and appalling piece of economic theorising based on limited and prejudicial anecdotal nonsense.  But highly influential amongst right wing politicians gagging for favour from their plutocratic sugar daddies.  You could then put your feet up with some popcorn and soda and watch "The Great NHS Heist" by Drew McFadyen and Dr Bob Gill.  When you have finished that you might want to extend your education by watching "The Dirty War on the National Health Service" by John Pilger.  Once you get the gist of things you might want to brush up on what neoliberalism is really about by watching the exceptional four part series by BarakalypseNow called "This Is Neoliberalism" on YouTube.

If you do begin to realise the scale of this political manoeuvring, this cynical materialistic manipulation by a bestial cabal of self serving psychopaths, the betrayal of humanity itself by these toxic horsemen of the apocalypse, you may just begin to get angry.  And next time you step outside your door to make your presence known you might weep for the sacrificial lambs who are caught up in this manufactured crisis.  You might scream your fury at this government for an unforgivable crime against humanity.  You might promise each other you will never rest until these criminals are held to account and locked up for life.  You might commit to opposing this materialistic culture and vow to never let it happen again.

Or you might just clap because who wants to be the first to stand out from the crowd.

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/

JUST ONE MORE

Mr. Creosote from Monty Python's The Meaning of Life.

My first impression of this attack on Syria is that it is a desperate attempt to muddy the waters to spoil any evidence, or lack of it, of the purported chemical attack in Douma.  Given that Syria has been working with the OPCW to destroy or dispose of all chemical weapons capabilities or stockpiles then the likes of the CIA and MI5 will be fully aware of any chemical plants that exist and what they contain.

I don't know if that scenario is accurate.  But it is crystal clear that they don't want the wider world to know what is going on.  We are expected to believe that they are serious minded people dealing with complex world problems and that they are doing what is best.  All of my life experience informs me that our culture and the majority of people go along with that manner of perception.  We are endlessly told by parents and teachers and politicians to not worry about the details and to just 'believe' them.  I don't mind doing that to an extent but my mind remains open and I continue to wonder and even ask questions.

Of course all of the troubles in the Middle East are complex and nothing that happens occurs for simple singular reasons.  Issues as different as world economics and individuals' personal pragmatic attempts to survive impact on each and every event.  No one could possibly understand exactly what is going on or how it all comes to pass.  But it is clear to me that this behaviour of the UK (in cahoots with so many other actors like the US, France, Israel, Saudi Arabia, and who knows who else) is clearly wrong.

It is wrong for several reasons.  To start with it is violent when there were alternatives.  It is also self contradictory on many levels not least of which being the espoused morality of violence being wrong.  The UK is laughably a Christian country which is clearly contradictory since Christianity, regardless of Augustine's nonsense, is non-violent.  It is contradictory that evidence is needed prior to a conviction and yet, in the midst of current concerns about fake news, the government decides to use a most ridiculously inconclusive video that arrived from their pals in Syria (their 'terrorist' pals) as conclusive evidence of whatever they want to conclude.  There was no evidence of a chemical attack in that video.  It was an interpretation placed on it.  Had there been a chemical attack the individuals with the cameras would have had the opportunity to film far more conclusive scenes.  And there is the nonsensical claim that in the very days Assad is taking control of the area he decided to attack it with chemical weapons.

And who, reading this, is aware that 8,000 civilians, all known to the Syrian government and the UN, have gone missing from Douma?  Jaish al-Islam (the ill-defined conglomerate of ideological 'terrorists' supported by the West) were holding Douma where the alleged chemical attack took place.  They had informed the Syrian authorities years ago of at least 8,000 named and identified hostages in Douma.  The various authorities like the UN are apparently aware of this information as are Western governments.  There was an agreement in place that the terrorists could have safe passage out of the area in exchange for the hostages.

As far as I can piece this together only a day or so before the exchange the terrorists fired missiles from Douma into greater Damascus and the Syrian forces fired back at two known sources.  It appears one building was hit and there were civilian casualties which were taken to the 'field hospital' where the video was sourced.  This is where at least one cameraman entered the hospital and shouted out that it was a chemical attack and began filming the scene which then included people dousing themselves and some children with water.  There were also people applying breathing masks to children.  This video was then supplied instantly to the Western governments who have asserted it is proof of a pointless and meaningless act of a James Bond style evil madman to murder children with frightening 'chemical weapons'.

Soon after this relatively insignificant event (relative to the current murder and mayhem around the world) the terrorists were given safe passage out of Douma but it then transpired there were less than a hundred of the hostages left.  In all likelihood the hostages have been starved and murdered by the Western terrorists because they needed food and water which was in short supply for the terrorists.  The White Helmets (who always appear well fed) have been embedded with these 'friendly' terrorists for years but have never managed to get any news out of the 8,000 people being starved and murdered.  They have had nothing to say about what was going on in Douma except to report a few real or alleged attacks by Assad.

When I think on these things I imagine myself as a terrorist in Douma.  Not a nasty terrorist but someone caught up in events and siding with people who are now engaged in violent resistance and revolution.  It's not hard to imagine given that if there were a civil war in the UK I would end up on the wrong side because I would be opposing the Tory government and they have all the power and weapons.  It really is not hard to imagine how, trapped in a suburb for years with very little food and water and with only hostages to stop the government flattening the place, that the hostages would be the first to go.

Most of us, when we are being honest with ourselves, recall moments in life where we have ended up doing something we felt was wrong because at the time we were desperate and could see no other way.  It takes a certain perspective to allow someone to hit you because you claim your own autonomy and will not be drawn into a fight.  Many people, when forced to act against the paradigms and conceptual constraints of our culture, cannot put the pieces together either before or after the event and end up feeling bewildered and wracked with what feels like unjust guilt.  This is because they conscribed to the rationale and moral framework of society by way of cooperating and co-existing with the people around them.  When they break these rules they still have the moral framework in their brain and they know they are 'wrong' but they know it was not their fault.  In extreme cases this can lead to attempted suicide and eventually the death of either themselves or someone else who appears to them to embody the malevolence of the social paradigms that are constantly constricting their ability to be autonomous.  We are all subject to these forces.

It is not too hard to understand that the terrorists would kill off the hostages on account of their belief that they would die otherwise.  They are so embedded in the wrong behaviour that a little more must seem par for the course.  And, importantly, they could not tell anyone since once they had killed the hostages there would be nothing to stop their enemy obliterating them.

It seems quite plausible that the supporters of these terrorists would be in cahoots with them to dispose of, or obfuscate, the evidence and run.  The UK, with all their other gang members, have done everything in their power to prevent the fall of Douma and, in the event of Syria liberating it, they have repeatedly tried to distract attention by pointing the finger at Russia and Assad with what they know will provoke outcry or, when that is failing, to resist and oppose any and every attempt to have a proper investigation.

It doesn't matter if my analysis of one aspect of this disastrous affair is correct or not, only that it is entirely consistent with events, it is plausible, and the UK government has done everything in their power to prevent anyone from ascertaining if this could be the case or not.  So whatever is going on it is at least as malevolent as this or worse.  But it is certainly not better.

And who, in the lower echelons of wealth in the UK, who is watching what is going on, can be in any doubt that the same mode of operation is being applied by the Tory government on the population of Britain.  We are literally their hostages and they are in the process of killing us off.  The dismantling of the welfare state and the health service along with public services and education are all destroying society in Britain.  This is without looking for specific references to numerous reports from various organisations naming and numbering the people actually killed as a direct result of the Tories actions.

The behaviour of the West is psychotic.  Psychosis is loosely defined as a person perceiving or interpreting events differently from the reality of the events around them.  We all suffer some degree of psychosis - we couldn't do otherwise - but it becomes a problem when the divide between perception and reality becomes severe and harmful.  It is typical behaviour based on unresolved historical events.  Western culture has, for hundreds of years (but rooted in thousands of years) focused on an egocentric interpretation of reality.  I don't mean the Freudian ego so much as 'central to the observer'.  We have so assumed the validity and importance of 'me' the observer that our entire cultural, scientific, religious, and philosophical frameworks assumes us to be real and alive and meaningful in an unreal, dead, and meaningless universe.  This has brought us in the West, not only to personal existential crises, but to a collective and cultural existential crisis too.

The powers that be are simply echoing the distorted interpretation of the culture.  That is why their overtly incorrect behaviour is supported by so many that they get away with it.  The population, along with various dynamics of conceptual interpretation of the world including cultural Stockholm Syndrome and cultural Cognitive Dissonance, are interpreting events in a way that seem more in line with their current paradigms.  Those paradigms are false and deviating at an ever increasing rate from the actual reality.  The existential crisis will cause the West to destroy the world rather than face the fact they don't exist.  Of course they do exist but not according to their distorted egocentric interpretation of the world.  The West is imploding and liable to explode.  China, Russia, and a few other observers are sitting on the sidelines hoping the catastrophic failure will not harm them too much.

The West is like Mr Creosote just about to eat that last wafer thin mint with Russia, Iran, and China looking on nervously from the next table.

CRAIG MURRAY DOES IT AGAIN

See below for video.

Craig Murray once again clarifies some of the deliberate obfuscation surrounding the Novichok incident.  To be really pedantic I don't believe the government, or even Boris Johnson, have ever categorically stated that they have proof the Novichok was manufactured in, or even delivered by, Russia.  But they have attempted to imply that assertion so strongly that they have definitely got too close to the fire.

In fact they are being hoist on their own petard in this respect.  They attempt to treat the British public, and indeed the rest of the world, as so stupid that they will fall for the intended effect of allusion and implication as if it were the facts.  In other words they have relied on people's reasonable need to have the truth summed up fairly and correctly.  They have abused their privileged positions as ostensibly 'respectable' and 'honourable' Members of Parliament.  The ever increasingly fine lines being used to divide the truth from deception are becoming fractured and meaningless.  The actual effect of these deliberate deceptions is that the public are getting fed up by the relentless lies.

Of this interview Craig Murray says: "Here is some hard truth. And to those who criticise RT as a medium, I should be delighted to tell this on BBC, Sky or ITN but they do not allow people with credible experience telling truths which run counter to the propaganda."

ISRAEL ENGAGES IN OPEN CHEMICAL WARFARE

Israeli chemical drone warfare 30 March 2018

Israel joined the United Nations 11 May 1949.  The OPCW (Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons) is one of a number of Specialised Agencies within the UN.  There has been a Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) since 1675 when France and Germany agreed to prohibit the use of poisoned bullets.  The current UN OPCW CWC was agreed and entered into force on 29 April 1997.

There are two notable anomalies relating to this convention.  The first being that Tear Gas, or lachrymators in general, are prohibited from being mass produced, stored, and/or used in warfare but not for internal State use for the purposes of crowd control.  Had it prohibited internal State use then the Convention would likely never have been ratified.  The second anomaly is that although Israel has signed the CWC they have not ratified it.  This essentially means it is one of a very few countries who will not accede to inspections or verification by the UN OPCW.

On Monday 12 March 2018 a report appeared in The Times of Israel claiming that an unmanned aerial vehicle UAV (a quad copter or drone in common parlance) had been used on Friday 9 March 2018 to drop Tear Gas on protesting civilians in Gaza.  That was the first known use of this technology for chemical attacks on civilians.  A spokesperson for the Israel Defense Forces said the UAV was not operated by the army but by the Border Police.  The Border Police declined to answer any questions.

It is now widely reported that on Friday 30 March 2018 Israel has again used UAVs to drop Tear Gas on protesting civilians in Gaza.  Not only is Israel crossing a very dangerous line in terms of a general consensus of good and bad behaviour but they are clearly in breach of International Law.  It seems, on the surface, a mere convenient distraction that it is the Border Police as opposed to the Israeli Army that is operating these drones.  It is tantamount to a blatant admission of the seriousness of their breach of International Law by attempting to imply this is an internal matter involving the police rather than the army.

However, Gaza is not within the State of Israel.  For all the deliberate ambiguity about the international status of Palestine as a sovereign entity it is certainly not part of Israel.  It follows that Israel have launched chemical attacks outside of their own country which is an act of War.  According to the UN OPCW CWC this is a grave breach of International Law.  Israel's hope that they can defend themselves by claiming this act is internal and therefore not prohibited by the CWC is entirely incorrect.  Although Israel have not agreed to allow UN inspectors to examine their chemical production or stock pile they are, as signatories to the CWC, still bound by its prohibition of the use of Chemical Weapons in War.

For many years it has been understood by those who look into these matters that Israel develops a range of sophisticated methods for population control and oppression.  It is also interpreted that they use Palestine as a kind of laboratory for practical experimentation and to prove the efficacy of their products.  It is well understood within interested circles that weapons sell significantly better when proven in the field of operation.  Israel's market invariably grows each time they provide evidence of the successful application of their products.  One most dreadful case (amongst many) was their use of flechette missiles against children in UN protected hospitals in Gaza in 2014.

Israel is the world leader in drone development.  US and UK police and military regularly attend training and education courses in Israel run by the IDF.  US & UK finance Israel to a ridiculous level and although on the surface it is said to be to help them 'defend' themselves from external threats and terrorists it can also be seen as a research and development budget for population control products.  It is a strange thing that for all the rampaging of ISIS over the last few years they were never any kind of a threat to Israel.

The profound warning for the UK and US populations is that as Western economies are collapsing the powers that be are very concerned to impoverish and control the now redundant population.  Not only is Israel in breach of International Law and this is dangerous on the global stage but this technology has to be sold to someone and the biggest investors to date are the US and the UK.

Israel is indulging in chemical warfare.

WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE ANYWAY

Christ of Saint John of the Cross by Salvador Dalí [detail]

People were horrified that ISIS were destroying works of art, cultural heritage, and historical buildings.  But denigrating and destroying a mural representing capitalism living off the backs of the oppressed and demonising anyone who is not demonstrably outraged by an imposed interpretation of it, is perfectly acceptable in Britain today.

It won't be long before art galleries are searched and pictures removed and burnt in the streets if they depict a hint of anything that may be considered offensive to Jews.  Gerald Scarf will be up on the public gallows in front of a jeering crowd with Roger Waters beside him.  Pink Floyd, along with Wagner, will be banned in the UK in solidarity with the Jewish State of Israel.

No one will notice until it is too late that we are repeating history with a different set of pawns.  The most startling thing about this anti-anti-Semitic hysteria is the hysteria itself.  If people were less prone to exhibiting their fear via conveniently provided conduits there would be no issue.

Although we talk about the thought police and nefarious operators controlling what we think, there are very few people in the world who understand how it works.  The new connectivity via social media enables powerful interests to control the landscape and artefacts of your conscious thoughts.  They control what you are thinking about, what you are afraid of, what you are indignant about, and where you direct your pent up anger.

The anger is plentiful and, like pollution and the national debt, is still being fomented by a dysfunctional oppressive authoritarian culture.  Like water backing up behind a damn the potential is mounting and social media provides the valves and penstocks for powerful corporations to direct the energy to the desired turbines converting it into kinetic energy to power their own ends.

This latest outburst in the mass media is like involuntary projectile vomiting.  It is indicative of profound cultural distress and a societal nervous breakdown.  Those with obscene wealth in the world can do nothing else but utilise this convulsing to their own ends because they know nothing else.  It is simply another readily available resource to commodify for their own benefit.

Blaming the rich and powerful will never resolve the profound division that is destroying humanity.  If the proverbial meek are to inherit the Earth it is not by overpowering the powerful over them.  We have to begin to resist being manipulated.  The only power 'they' have over us is that their fear is satiated by provoking our fear.  We literally hand over our power by being afraid.  In childhood there is no option, but in adulthood it is arguably an obligation to come to terms with our own fear and not to feed others with it.  With good friends with honest hearts this is not such an impossible task as it appears.  After all - we're all going to die anyway.

IGNORANCE WILL DESTROY HUMANITY

Jonathan Goldstein falls off his horse outside the Houses of Parliament.

Or: Not the first JC to be crucified.

I've just heard Jonathan Goldstein, the Chair of the Jewish Leadership Council, interviewed on Radio 4 about a demonstration planned outside Parliament today objecting to anti-Semitism in the Labour Party.  There are so many things wrong with that.

Only yesterday the BBC were claiming that hundreds of people had marched against Brexit.  Apparently it was tens of thousands.  This is clearly state propaganda deliberately intended to pervert the public perception with shameless bias reporting.

Today the BBC see fit to highlight a petty entitled demonstration by a minority group ostensibly about an offensive mural because it contains a monopoly board.  Goldstein seemed to want to extend his complaint to include banking cartels creating global poverty and rogue states developing flechette missiles to kill children in hospitals.  I was only surprised he didn't want Shakespeare, Wagner, and Captain Pugwash put in room 101 too.

Humour aside this is a ruthless attempt to polarise a deliberately traumatised population in order to cause division and infighting to distract from the real problems that face Britain and humanity at large.  Goldstein is clearly a provocateur and a warmonger.  He does not, in reality, represent Jews, or even the Jewish community, but rather he represents what is possibly the most powerful and dangerous definable collective ideology on planet Earth.

There are so many issues converging in this misconstrued and misrepresented notion of anti-Semitism it would be hard, if not impossible, to delineate them.  There is the current surge of objection to abuse which is distorted and cynically exploited by the abusive hierarchy to fracture society for its own purposes of power over others.  There is the geopolitical power balance shifting like tectonic plates between the West, Russia, and China threatening all out nuclear destruction.  Humanity is facing the catastrophic collapse of its own ecosystem by innumerable irresponsible types of pollution.  We are also contributing to our own devastating demise by the wealth divide and extensive poverty, starvation, and death across the globe.

Of course there is a story about Jews.  There is a story about Christians and Muslims too.  There are stories about science, technology, power, and wealth as well.  In which story would anyone prefer us to frame our pointless and destructive arguments?  If Mr Goldstein and his mindless supporters had any integrity at all they would be demonstrating against the manifest injustices in the world and not the ones imagined and feared by a powerful elite.  Mr Goldstein is debasing and abusing the history and memory of those Jews, and many other oppressed groups, who historically have suffered at the hands of ruthless megalomaniacs.

Mr Goldstein's actions are profoundly dangerous and misguided.  This is not about the genuine injustices of anti-Semitism and that is clear.  This is ignorant and wilful power play.  This is about the powerful attempting to emotionally manipulate the weak for their own benefit.  This is one of what will turn out historically to be a discernible sequence of events attempting to terrorise the population into supporting the most hideous war as Western Culture insanely attempts to take out humanity in its final and resentful death throes.

I would suggest Mr Goldstein and his cronies have a trot along the road to Damascus in the hope of being provided with some enlightenment as to the real problems facing humanity; it's happened before apparently.  There is a lot of work to be done to feed the starving, house the homeless, and tend to the sick, but then perhaps Mr Goldstein regards Jesus as anti-Semitic too.

A MINISTER FOR TOE NAILS

The idea of a Minister for Loneliness is profoundly sinister.  The Tory Party is transmogrifying at an ever accelerating rate.  I have a view, a sort of general theory, that we, as humans, are in a continuous process of becoming consciously aware of the truth of our existence.  Part of this seems evident in the way that we persistently reveal our unconscious existence, via the material world, to our conscious mind.  It would be a bit heavy duty to try to justify that argument here but I see it continuously in the arena of abuse.  The more people hide from their own pain by attempting to deny it any conscious recognition then the more they behave in a manner which externalises their worst fears for all to see.

This idea is not new.  It is referenced (chronologically) in the I Ching, by Pythagoras, Plotinus, the Talmud, Rumi, Freud, Jung, and most schools of psychology since.  It is an axiom of much philosophy echoed in ideas such as that by discovering more about the world we are actually discovering more about ourselves.  This whole crystal ball of revelation includes what we experience both as good and evil.  It is almost the raw bones of existentialism and linguistic philosophy.  We are interpreting a world that mirrors ourselves.  A beautiful poetic illustration of this idea is summed up by Plotinus "Never did eye see the sun unless it had first become sunlike, and never can the soul have vision of the First Beauty unless itself be beautiful."

So what exactly is going on with our good leader, Theresa May, appointing a Minister for Loneliness?  We know she doesn't give a damn about the people, the actual living people, in this country.  What?  You disagree?  In order to avoid too much digression I will clarify that by saying that she may have sentimental feelings which she interprets as caring about people when she is at home with friends or drifting off to sleep at night but as Prime Minister of the UK she continues to interpret the world in such a way that she promotes and advances policies that evidently erode the social fabric and escalate the harm caused to the least well off in Britain.  She continues to support the wealthy and their tax havens as they pillage the country of all its wealth with the help of her government.  You don't need examples such as Grenfell and Carillion to prove the case but they do a fine job of highlighting the effects of her and her Party's policies.  Her government, and May specifically, vowed to re-house the survivors of Grenfell within three weeks.  Why?  To externalise her desire to appear, maybe even to herself, as a caring and compassionate human.  But they are still not re-housed.  She helps the Saudis bomb Yemen in secret whilst publically exhibiting serious concern for the devastating consequences for the people in Yemen.  But there are too many ways to illustrate that May's evident purpose is to convince the public that her concerns reflect their concerns; that she is what she thinks they want her to be.  It is the act of attempting to convince people rather than the act of being genuine.  It follows that she does not care, in any meaningful way, because it is an evident pretence.

I am not sure what world she lives in but mental health has risen on the political agenda in recent years.  It has risen largely because of the increasing number of problems becoming evident in that domain.  Those problems are mostly a consequence of a fundamental breakdown of a sense of social security.  This is clearly created and illustrated by the most horrible regime of the DWP and the privatisation and profiteering by vetting doctors assessments with corporate tick box exclusion mechanisms with targets.  I won't go on at this point but suffice it to say that Ken Loach's "I, Daniel Blake" will forever stand as a cultural indictment against this government and their ruthless democidal extravagances.

The Tories are clearly losing ground in the political tug of war and there have been numerous attempts recently to increase their share of the public vote.  They have even announced their intent to impress more people with very feeble and flawed policies they say are addressing the concerns of the younger voters such as housing and green issues.  But it is all vacuous, smoke and mirrors, and bluster.  They are perversely attempting to analyse the reasons for Jeremy Corbyn's popularity and Labour's rapidly increasing demographic reach with the sole objective of imitating them to steal their thunder to gain power to continue their ravages against the population of this country for their own benefit.  They are genuinely hideous parasitic beasts.

In attending to the welfare of people in this country the Tories have succeeded in even alerting the UN to their criminal inhumanity.  All their actions with respect to helping the poor have been aimed at getting rid of the poor.  They are not concerned with helping the poor out of poverty but in riding this country of poor people.  They do it in a number of ways including changing definitions and measuring points by which we count poverty.  They devise complicated methods of removing people from categories such as unemployed by fuelling what is called the gig economy, by advancing tax credits, by obstruction using sanctions and what has been judicially cast as slavery in their demands that people do voluntary work for their euphemised 'benefits'.  They encourage and enforce zero hours contracts to remove people from the status of unemployed whilst they are still receiving nothing for their efforts.  Their utter destruction of support for disabled people is almost beyond belief.  These policies are no accident.  These policies are well crafted methods of shrouding their greed and cruelty with a veil of good intention.  These policies are not made up in a back room but rather they are the sophisticated results of studying psychology, sociology, and methods of manipulation and controlling the populations.

We look back in recent history and begin to realise how the two World Wars were driven by the industrialisation of robbery with violence.  The world has moved on and it is less successful to pursue those obvious and transparent industrial methods and so more clandestine ways must be found.  Britain moved from its industrial base to a service economy during the 1980s and what I believe we are seeing is the evolution of the methods of these criminals to something akin to a service based approach to render their objectives of rape, pillage, death, and destruction for their own warped and demonic aspirations.  So the impetus to address mental health issues, for example, has rendered what is described by some as oppressive coercion by putting counsellors in every school, installing 'work coaches' in job centres, and establishing 'talking therapies' as the only available psychological assistance which is designed primarily to keep the chickens quiet whilst they are having their necks wrung.

What continues to happen is that people raise legitimate issues and concerns and the Tories process these topics through their tragically egocentric cognition and render an illusion of addressing the matter whist materially benefiting themselves.  They see this as good business; "What's in it for me?"  The culture, meanwhile, is so distorted by these egocentric authoritarian paradigms that, so far, the majority of the public are clearly fooled by these warped and distorted interpretations and proposed political policies to address the issues in the world.  All the time the evidence is mounting that the rulers are criminally insane and so, inevitably, their attempts to disguise reality are compelled to escalate to a new level.  You really can't criticise someone who wants to help lonely people so obviously the Tories want to appear to be concerned about lonely people.  They are so up their own backsides, to coin a phrase, that they create a Minister for Loneliness to impress the ignorant plebs (to use one of their own terms).

Altercast people as lonely with a feigned concern for their condition and they will interpret their own condition as lonely and will have no choice but to be grateful for the meagre cold bowl of companion gruel they are offered.  There is no accident here.  These are well studied methods of sociopolitical control.  This is the utilisation of information technology, metadata, and complex analytical algorithms, as a service based approach to creating mass ontological insecurity to the point of destroying the manufactured poor.  It is a self consuming, self contradictory, parasitic, and very sophisticated manifestation of the cruelty which the perpetrators are pathologically compelled to deny within themselves.  They are externalising their pain by projecting it onto others in order to manifest it in the world to be seen and acknowledged.  This is the very worst of humanity.

It is perhaps worth bearing in mind that what causes this 'evil' is the simple act of denying reality in the first place.  The evil is the imbalance, the distortion, the deviation from what is good.  It is not that we, as humans, are fundamentally evil and wish to deny it, but rather that we are vulnerable, sensitive, and creative and dare not own it because we are afraid of our own power.  It is actually the denial of the reality that is the evil.  But evil it is.  And, as far as I can determine, the denial of reality is most prevalent in the minds of those who wish to judge, demonise, and control others.  It is inherent in the Tory mindset to cling on to an internal construct of what the world 'should be' and to scream, fight, control, damage, and destroy all evidence in the real world that threatens to counter their desperate internal construct which is, by definition, a delusion.  In their denial of reality they are destroying reality and the evidence is clear for anyone who is looking with their eyes open.  We, collectively, are raising our subconscious knowledge into our conscious awareness and whilst we deny reality we deny ourselves.  Whilst we destroy reality we destroy ourselves.  All of this is only the consequence of a refusal to be what we are.  So we end up experiencing the denial instead of the reality.

Tories are now hoist by their own petard insofar as they have to maintain the illusion of their own goodness reflected in the magic mirror of their distorted world.  They have no choice, they are compelled, they are inevitably and inextricably drawn by their own denial into ever more ridiculous demonstration of their goodness.  It is clearly nonsense to have a Minister for Loneliness since that is one small category of emotional distress which is a mental or emotional health issue which comes under the auspices of the Department of Health and Social Security which they dismantled in the first place.  They cannot 'help' the lonely and will only make matters worse by attempting to force them to integrate with the Tory mindset which is probably a significant cause of the problem in the first place.  They will also attempt to draw people out from the shadows who are hiding from the dysfunctional Neoliberal State in order to coral them into the convenient pens for future slaughter.  The next thing, of course, will be to demonise them for costing the tax payer too much.  This nonsense, which is off the scale of toy town politics can only end in disaster.

I can't think of any other example of such trite, fatuous, and glaringly nonsensical government stupidity.  How utterly ludicrous to create a Minister for Loneliness.  What next?  A Minister for fucking Toe Nails?

A LETTER TO THE CEO OF THE COUNCIL

Social cleansing and democide.

Dear [Chief Executive Officer]

As a child I was bewildered by images of Nazi death camps.  How could ordinary people end up building railways, infrastructure, and camps to oppress and murder swathes of other people?  I have given this phenomenon a great deal of thought over the years.  There is a lot that has been studied and written about this aspect of the human condition.  Many perspectives contribute usefully to a better understanding of how these disasters come about.  Those perspectives involve psychology, sociology, political theory, statistical analysis, mathematical theories, emergent behaviour, complex systems, fiscal policies, and so much more.

Having found myself financially vulnerable I naturally turned to the Council (amongst others) for whatever assistance was deemed reasonable in today's society in Britain.  I have been attempting to deal with Boston Borough Council for over a year now and I am deeply shocked at what I have encountered.  I refer you to my letters of 10 April 2017 and 8 June 2017 to remind you of some of the issues that are currently impacting upon me.  It seems that the Council's attempts, with their current methods and paradigms, to address and ameliorate the situation are, in fact, exacerbating matters and peculiarly escalating the convoluted, inconsistent, deceptive, and harmful mode of operation.  It seems analogous to a fermenting decomposition that is out of control.

Being somewhat knowledgeable and experienced in software development it is interesting to note that there is a phenomenon referred to as software decomposition.  It occurs when software is constantly altered in an attempt to remove what are called bugs.  Without a proper overview and a deep understanding of the underlying structure the net effect is that the "fixes" increase the complexity and throw up more unexpected and unrelated errors.  The software begins to decompose.  From my perspective in dealing with the Council this phenomenon is quite evidently occurring within the Council.

At the start of this letter I referred to that old cultural icon of the Nazi death camps.  My reason for that reference was to draw attention to the decomposition of British society today.  We are building a sociopolitical infrastructure which is emulating the guiding of the most vulnerable people via procedural railways to virtual incarceration and ultimately psychological and physical destruction.  Grenfell Tower was not a random accident.  No amount of looking for someone to blame is going to resolve the problem.  That would be akin to thinking you could have stopped the Aberfan disaster by finding the one stone that started it all.

So what has brought me to writing this letter to you?  What scale of disaster could possibly have occurred that is so serious I should be writing to the Chief Executive of the Council, my Doctor, my local MP, and others alluding to social cleansing and democide?  It is a remarkably minor incident.  I have been sent a Summons.  Taken out of context, as if everything else were functioning well, the Summons could be viewed as a minor incident which could be handled perfectly satisfactorily in its own right like a parking ticket.  Taking it out of context, however, would be to deliberately ignore the underlying problem and consequently be aiding and abetting the catastrophic context in which it exists.

What is remarkable about this Summons is how small and inconsequential it is in itself; like a small stone in the Aberfan disaster.  I don't know if it is normal practice for the Council to Apply to the Courts immediately the first month of Council Tax becomes overdue but it certainly seems extreme and ridiculous.  It is all the more surprising that the Council, who not only know I do not have enough money to live but have written to me acknowledging that fact and we are in discussions about the situation and I have been assured this would not happen, that they instigate this procedure attaching £75 of costs thereby increasing the debt they wish to impose by 284% for being a month overdue.  Wonga springs to mind and I didn't even borrow the money in the first place.

What could possibly be the meaning of discussions if the Council ignore the content of the discussion and carry on as if nothing had occurred?  In fact it isn't even that is it?  This action is clearly a consequence of those discussions.  It has somehow been unusually prompted by the current events and communications between myself and the Council.  It is, in fact, a startling "up yours" announcement from the Council.  And the disturbing thing is, it is done with legal instruments.  The Council are using the law to actively abuse me.

Not only have the Council hounded and assaulted us for over a year but I have written to explain that.  The Council, for fear of being exposed, immediately addressed the issue albeit insufficiently.  The Council have driven one of us to the point of attempting suicide.  [Dave] has consequently left the area because he cannot survive in this town and has found a more supportive community in Wales.  So the Council didn't quite succeed in killing him but they did get rid of him.  On a national scale this is social cleansing which is not only recognised internationally as a crime against humanity but it is also, in specific cases, clearly counter to any and all espoused and postulated values and intentions.

It really is quite stunning to any sentient, conscious, or rational entity that the Council could have caused such harm to a member of the community and, having been informed of the consequences of their actions and recognising their part in the events, they should not only continue the same behaviour but escalate it to the point of lying to me in a meeting and consequently scraping the bottom of the barrel for any trace of the same mechanism of assault available to them by issuing an Application to the Court for the paltry sum of £40.77.

It really is as if they are entertained by the harm they are causing.  Their behaviour is reminiscent of a child poking an injured bird with a stick.  It has an air of being so innocent, so child like, it lacks even the faintest trace of personal responsibility.  It is fundamentally institutionalised sociopathic behaviour.  It is attempted murder by any general sense of the meaning of that phrase quite regardless of any delineated definition in statute law.

The bigger issue here and what equates to the same constructs that give rise to genocide is that the DWP are also failing and the medical profession is hamstrung  with respect to addressing or dealing with the catastrophic harm being perpetrated by this current Government through its various bloodsucking tendrils via institutions like the Council.

I will be a little harsh here by way of attempting to convey my position clearly.  You may, and certainly some do, find it amusing that I would get so distressed by such a petty bureaucratic vexation.  But the malicious humour would only be a disguise for the inherent inner knowledge of the fundamental transgression against what it is to be human.  Nothing but a human could snigger or scoff at such a self evident, self contradictory, and cruelly harmful state of affairs.  Not only are you party to killing us but you want to hide that fact from public view by way of hiding it from your own conscious awareness.  You want impunity to continue to destroy those around you.

The current limited paradigms by which our culture attempts to interpret these events are now the cause of the problem.  Somehow we have to move beyond this simplistic, rather ignorant, anti-intellectual, dogmatic, authoritarian, oppressive, and catastrophically destructive mode of operation.

To conclude by bringing this letter to what could be interpreted as a more practical level I will explain what needs to happen.  The Council, in line with their purported intentions, need to pay the full rent on our current home.  They need to clear us of any Council Tax Liability.  The DWP need to provide whatever is required to meet the financial demands placed on us by this society to have the bare essentials to live in a half way civilised manner.  The NHS needs to put some serviceable resource into attending to the psychological and now physiological damage that has been inflicted on us by the actions of the Council and the DWP.  Then we could achieve a stable situation in which my daughter and I could recover and begin to be a productive asset to this community.  Failing that, your only justification for being employed is to continue to do harm to us to keep your job.  It is a salient observation that it cost this country well in excess of £20,000 to deal with [Dave] for the three weeks following his attempted suicide because you couldn't afford him his statutory pittance to live.

Do something creative and humane about this please.

Yours sincerely

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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