Matthew Carr's Blog, page 36
July 28, 2016
Óscar Martínez: A History of Violence
Many years ago, in 1993 I visited the bombed out ruins of the town of Aguacayo, the former ‘capital’ of the FMLN-held liberated zone in Guazapa Province during much of El Salvador’s 12-year civil war. It was just only one … Continue reading →
July 27, 2016
The Atrocity Factory
At first sight, keep calm and carry on might seem like a rather banal piece of advice, faced with the seemingly endless and unstoppable conveyor belt of atrocities that is unfolding before us on a weekly and almost daily basis.. … Continue reading →
July 23, 2016
Boris Johnson’s Big Day Out
Politically speaking, schadenfreude tends to be a consolatory emotion, whose pleasures are generally ephemeral and often sharpened by defeat. Even so the humiliation of Boris John last week was worth the price of admission. I’m referring, of course, … Continue reading →
July 16, 2016
Nice and the Spectacle of Terror
Yesterday evening I was driving to play a game of tennis and listening to the radio, when I heard the sounds of of screaming people being mown down by a truck in Nice. I immediately turned it off. This isn’t because I … Continue reading →
July 15, 2016
Mayday! Mayday!
I’ve just returned to Brexitland after a week in the Aragonese Pyrenees with my daughter. During that time we continued to follow the tumultuous events that have convulsed our tormented island: Chilcot; the PLP’s viciously inept coup; the rapid extinction … Continue reading →
June 30, 2016
Labour Plotters: Stop your Sobbing
I’m sorry to hear that some of the MPs who have turned on Jeremy Corbyn these last few days have been crying. Angela Eagle looks weepy every time she appears on tele, and now Margaret Beckett has cried on air … Continue reading →
June 28, 2016
Liars’ Ball: the Unbearable Lightness of Brexit
There’s a tendency in some fringe political circles at both left and right-wing political circles to imagine that the ‘system’ we have is secretly or overtly controlled by an all-powerful and all-seeing group of malevolent men who are able to … Continue reading →
June 27, 2016
Taking Our Country Back: Brexit and the Seeds of Hate
There was a time, in the country that so many Brexit voters would like to take ‘back’, when it was commonplace to have signs in the windows of rented accommodation that read ‘no dogs, no Blacks, no Irish. ‘ We … Continue reading →
June 25, 2016
Freaky Friday
In the Jamie Lee Curtis comedy Freaky Friday, a mother and teenage daughter wake up to find themselves trapped in each other’s bodies as a result of a magic spell. Yesterday I underwent a similar but even more disturbing transformation. … Continue reading →
June 19, 2016
Murder in Farageland
The brutal murder of Jo Cox has added a seemingly random note of tragedy and horror to this appalling, dispiriting and utterly venal Referendum campaign. And the brave and dignified words of Cox’s husband and sister have only shown us … Continue reading →
