Jay Stringer's Blog, page 6

Rape Culture, Huh? Let’s Solve It With Nail Polish.

Trigger warning. A serious one, because I’m pissed of and likely to swear and crack angry jokes. 

I just read a piece from the Washington Post that starts, “When’s the last time you got a manicure that could also prevent date rape?”

It’s not an isolated story. I’ve picked on it only because of that first line, there are many others. That’s just one of the many news stories that popped up on my screen when I started to look into this. There’s a good chance you know this already, because my readers are often better informed than I am.

Some students have come up with a nail polish that can detect a date-rape drug. In short, it’s being talked about as the latest thing that women can do to solve the fact that men are assholes.

Sometimes I write lengthy essays from this platform. Once I get going, I can take thousands of words to make my full argument. Today is one of those days when I hardly need any words at all; All I need is no.

I might expand that to; fucking no, stop being idiots, you fucking world. 

Men are the issue here. And we continue being the issue. In small ways. Whether we’re pretending that it’s down to women to make themselves safer, whether we’re taking up valuable, potentially life-saving time, by arguing that it’s “not all men,” instead of asking what we can do to help, or whether it’s spending time developing some fucking nail polish. I hope they come up with different colours, because we know how them womenfolk like to accessorise and how often they might change their minds about their nails before going out. We wouldn’t want them getting all raped and shit because they couldn’t remember which colour polish was the one that would save them. Maybe they can come up with one that saves people of colour from racist abuse, too. That would be fun, because that’s another group who really aren’t doing enough to protect themselves from a world that hates them.

Just for once, for one moment, can we grow the fuck up as a culture and stop all of this nonsense?

Who can make the biggest difference in rape culture? Men. Who can make the biggest difference to stop violence against women? Men. We need to grow up and accept responsibility. And as a culture, we need to stop spreading the idea that men are simply violent animals who can’t help themselves, and that it’s on you, dear woman, to stop wearing skirts or to get the right kind of nail polish.

Men; howsabout no. Howsabout we stop the culture of talking about how women should be able to detect date rape drugs before we talk about how men shouldn’t use them. Howsabout we talk to each other, we stop the crass jokes and start actually discussing these issues? We have so, so, far to go on this issue and the worrying thing is that we don’t even want to start. 

What’s wrong with prevention, the argument will go. We use seat belts, don’t we? I’ve seen that argument used already today. We use seat belts to counter the fact that cars are big metal things that run along at high speeds while combusting petrol in an engine. Anything can happen in a car. Of course, we also spend a long time training people to drive cars. We licence cars. We road test cars. The seat belt is really just a sensible last resort to cover for the fact that, even when you’ve done everything else you possibly can, it’s worth having that last little bit of cover. Seat belts are not there to cover for the fact that we do nothing else to counter the danger of cars, or because cars go out of their way to kill people.

Rape is not to be compared to not wearing a seatbelt. Rape springs from a culture of making it okay to do so. Where we only blame the man after we’ve run out of ways to blame the woman, and even then we come up with new ways that the law can protect the man.

To paraphrase a line from a politician on a completely different topic, the most striking thing about this problem, is the ease with which it could be solved. If only we valued women enough to do so.

That’s my rant. I don’t have a form for it today. I don’t have a third act because I’m still pissed off about acts one and two.

Scottish Independence: The Positive Case For ‘No.’

Warning. I’m not making a positive case for ‘No.’ This is a dirty rotten trap, is what it is. 

I’ve been asking -on this site and on my social media hangouts- for the positive case for the union. I’m not going to pretend that my mind can be swayed by hearing it. By the time of the vote, I’ll have been in Glasgow for eight years. I was a NO voter by default for seven of those, before the better arguments of the YES camp swayed me, and so it’s unlikely that a quick argument now will turn me back in the final month.

But I still want to see that argument. I still welcome it, here or anywhere else. I’m about to trash Labour on here, but if a Labour person wants to write a guest post making their case, I will run it unedited. Please give us the positive case. I’ll explain why I think it’s important at the end.

But firstly, to todays business.

I was sent a link to a piece written by Douglas Alexander that claims to be the very positive argument I was looking for. It fails on every level.

Firstly, Douglas Alexander uses “nationalist” many times to refer to those of us in the YES camp. Sigh. At least change to a new dirty trick, eh? One of the most persistent smears is to pretend that only one side in this debate between two forms of a nation state involves nationalism. A campaign whose name is “Better Together,” which is actually stating that one version of a nation state is BETTER than another, has no place invoking the word “nationalism” to slur the other side.

And what’s more, Labour people should know this. In truth, I believe they do know this. In joining the Better Together campaign, they are sharing a podium with the Tories and UKIP. Both of those parties want crack downs on immigration to different degrees, both want to lessen (or cut completely) our ties to Europe. The Tories are talking of promoting “British Values” in schools, sending vans around England telling immigrants to go home, and are currently trying to spin the history of World War One into anything other than a tragic bloodbath. And Labour stand with these people. They know that the word “nationalist” has become so loaded in the British psyche that using it often enough will guarantee a certain amount of votes for their side out of simple reflex.

Douglas Alexander says that an independent Scotland would mean “Austerity Plus for decades to come.” Which is a way of saying “Scotland is too poor” without actually using those words. Hardly positive. Scotland can afford independence. Even the Financial Times have made that abundantly clear. That case has been settled. I can accept those arguments from people on the street who haven’t read up on it, but from a Labour politician it’s simply disingenuous. It ties into the manic glint in their eyes when the subject of the currency union comes up. Or rather, when they raise the subject of the currency union. They know it’s not important. They know there are bigger issues. And they also know -or I hope they know- that a real Labour party wouldn’t be trying to scare people based on individualism and the contents of their pockets, but they’re going for it all the same.

The most telling part of Alexander’s argument, to me, is the extent to which he uses “solidarity” as an argument for voting NO, and also invokes the spirit of internationalism as a reason to hold the union together.

It saddens me to see modern Labour fail to understand “solidarity” and “internationalism” to such an extent that they think those are positive arguments for living in the same country as the people you are showing internationalist solidarity with. I’ve argued this in print, Kieran Hurley is arguing this from platforms across the country. Yes, working class people in Govan or Paisley have more in common with working class people in Manchester or Walsall than they do with rich landowners in the highlands. But they also have more in common with working class people in Spain, Italy, Germany, America or Brazil. There is nothing, absolutely nothing, about internationalism or solidarity that argues we all have to be in the same country to work together or benefit each other. In fact, the spirit of internationalism would say the power is gained by being in different countries, people across nations and borders uniting to reach a common goal.

So if, like Doulas Alexander, you are walking into that booth on September 18th driven by solidarity and internationalism, there is only one way to vote. Yes. 

What this article really confirms is just how much we are being let down by Labour in this debate. I don’t hold the belief in unionism against the Tories, UKIP, BNP or Lib Dems. I know that, for my few Tory friends, their belief in the union comes from the same place as their conservative ideals. Believing in one dictates believing in the other. I disagree with them, but I can at least see they are being true to their core principles. But just what exactly are Labour these days?

They’re in such a muddle that they genuinely don’t seem to know what left wing arguments are, nor how to make them positively, let alone how to express a progressive vision. They are a party who will jump into bed with the Tories over the union, who will allow the bedroom Tax through parliament now while making promises that they will fight against it in the future.

If you tell them that the NHS is the single most compelling argument for independence, they will say, ah, but devolution gives the Scottish Government control over that already, and they’re doing a fine job. In that moment, they are arguing against giving Scotland total control over it’s own affairs by pointing out that Scotland is better at managing it’s own affairs. They’re also avoiding the inconvenient truth of the Barnet formula, and that, as the UK budget is cut by Westminster, so the proportion of that budget going to Scotland is also cut, and so the NHS can be strangled to death at any point once the referendum is out of the way.

The SNP may be the majority government in Scotland at the moment, but I still believe that Labour represent the majority of the electorate up here. And therein lies the problem. That is the smoking gun that they are holding. We all have a right to expect better from Labour. I’m not saying they should automatically be supporting YES, but if they believe in NO they should be doing it in a genuine, honest and positive way. They should be giving the voters clear facts, clear policy, guarantees, and a substantive argument. They should be campaigning as Labour, not as this weird modern thing.  As it is, they’re happy to spend the campaign spinning lies, misinformation and fear. NO is ahead in the polls because it represents the status quo, and because it only takes a little bit of fear to keep that going. And Labour, the party who are meant to be of the people, are happy to work with that fear.

If the end result is a NO vote, it will be Labour that have made the difference. And ask yourselves, are they the people you will want to work with in the state that exists after the referendum?

The people who tell you that Scotland is too poor, while pretending that’s not what they’re saying? The people who pretend to be progressive while supporting the retention of Nukes? The people who ignore all of the financial evidence that Scotland can support itself to keep telling people on the doorstep that it can’t?

I was once a Labour voter. I once believed in that party, and hard. Then I became one of the many who drifted away from voting. The generation who see no honesty, no positivity, in the modern political system.

I came to YES because, for the first time in my life, there was a grassroots political movement in the UK that was making a progressive argument. An inclusive movement, one that doesn’t care where you were born, only what you want to do with your time. One that says we can build something, we can start something. One that offers a clear policy on the removal of nuclear weapons, and makes an open and positive argument for immigration.

And this is why I feel it’s important for Labour to try and salvage something of themselves in the coming weeks. Because the grassroots of YES contains many, many people like me. People who are getting actively involved in the political machine again. People who are expressing hope. And what we’re seeing from Labour at the moment is a great dark weight pressing down on positivity. A complacent political machine that knows it doesn’t actually need to make a progressive argument to win the referendum, all it needs to do is whisper to fear and doubt. And what are they expecting afterwards? If they win, if Labour manage to win the referendum on behalf of the Tories and hand the mandate for total control back to Westminster, are they expecting that all of us will want to work with them? Are they expecting we will forget what we saw, as if we didn’t know they were the ones loudly throwing the shit around in the swimming pool?

No. Labour have a choice here and now -regardless of the referendum result- to either embrace a new generation of politically active people through a positive argument, or to alienate them, and create another lost generation, while the political class once again vanish over the hill.

I feel confident in saying that they won’t take that chance. And that is a damning indictment of the state of Labour.

Scottish Independence; 8 Questions For NO Voters.

At this point I have not seen a progressive argument for voting NO. I’ve not seen a positive case for the union. The closest I’ve come across is a form of argument saying, “there’s no guarantees a YES vote will improve anything.” That’s not exactly a winning stance, rather, it’s something bred out of the current failed political system, a mutation of  the “lesser of two evils” form of debate that now only reaches for, “better the shite that you know than the maybe-shite that you don’t.“

I was once a NO voter. Then I was NO by default -by way of not intending to vote at all, which amounts to NO in this one instance- holding out to await for any kind of positive argument for the union. Really, any. Any single one might have kept me on that side of the fence for long enough, and I discussed this with many NO supporters, awaiting that argument, but it never came.

So here are a few questions to maybe bring about that positive case. I welcome honest and clear answers to these questions. Back in February this site hosted a lengthy and polite discussion on the referendum, and in that vein I will not delete any comments.

 

1. If we vote NO, what is the timetable for removing nuclear weapons from Scotland’s shores?

2. If we vote NO, what is the timetable for closing or replacing the House of Lords?

3. If we vote NO, what is the timetable for closing Dungavel Immigration Removal Centre?

4. If we vote NO, how long is the UK guaranteed to remain in the EU?

5. If we vote NO, what is the timetable for removing the bedroom tax?

6. If we vote NO, what is the timetable for introducing a written constitution for the United Kingdom?

7. If we vote NO, what additional powers are guaranteed to Scotland as part of a cross-party agreement and-

8. If we vote NO, what is the timetable for those additional powers to be granted?

One Day, Son

One Day, Son.

 

One day, son, none of this will be yours.

Not the hills or the valleys, or the cities or the streets.

Not the fields or the houses or the health care for free.

Not the sick pay or the benefits, better watch you don’t fall.

If someone does stumble, we won’t help, stop, or pause.

 

One day, son, none of this will be yours.

Not the railways, or the bridges, or the roads that you made.

Your universities are ours, you don’t make the the grade.

Your land is for fracking and fox hunting Dukes.

Your coasts will look better with a load of our nukes.

 

One day, son, none of this will be yours.

Not the government, not the media, not the banks or broadsheets.

Not the oil or the money, that’s saved for tax cheats.

You better face facts, you’re too stupid, too small.

And the shirt on your back, we’ll have that an’all.

 

One day, son, none of this will be yours.

 

Salmond Vs. Darling; The Real Results, The Real Lies.

 

 

The televised debate went exactly as all televised debates do. Neither side really managed to claim a clear victory. Both parties pressed home on some of their opponents weaker points. Salmond left himself over-exposed on the currency issue, which is creating a needless weak spot in the YES campaign. Darling was exposed for being unable to make a positive case for staying in the union or to categorically list extra powers that would be granted to Scotland.

Salmond mentioned Trident, but Darling didn’t engage on the issue and it has been swept aside in the analysis that followed. The media would rather keep pandering to the idea that there are “too many unanswered questions,” despite an abundance of answered questions, rather than enter into a real discussion about a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to vote for nuclear disarmament in September.

And there is a reason for that avoidance, But I’ll come back to it in a wee while.

Firstly a trip down memory lane. Back in 2010 there were three televised debates in the run-up to the UK general election. David Cameron and Nick Clegg both had a chance to show their stuff against the defending champion of fail, Gordon Brown. The only person to really shine across the debates was Clegg. He raised his profile by (approximately) a billion percent and used the screen time as a springboard into the election. Brown, for his part, gave the viewers a fair amount of substance and policy, but showed himself to be uncomfortable in front of the cameras and gave off the impression of a man who was going to have a wee cry in the toilet as soon as the lights went out. David Cameron was pretty weak throughout. He was out-styled by Clegg and out-substanced by Brown.

The odd thing that happened was that the media announced Cameron to be the winner of each debate. The following days newspapers, read in workplace canteens, on the buses, or even scanned in passing in the shop, all declared David Cameron to effectively be the most competent of the three. The debates themselves didn’t matter. They most likely played a part in getting Nick Clegg into a position to make his deal with the devil, but nothing else that happened on that stage mattered and the people who watched it didn’t sway the election.

What did change it was that media response. This is where elections on this scale are won and lost; the people who don’t watch the debates but who read about them in passing at work the next day. The people who vote based on popular assumptions and common knowledge. And no amount of televised debates, no amount of chapping on doors, is going to change that.

It’s not what happened that counts. It’s what people are told happened.

So, back to the present. Back to last night and the debate on the Scottish Independence Referendum, between Scotland’s First Minister Alex Salmond, and between the head of the Better Together campaign, Alistair Darling. It was an odd combination on any logical basis. Either the Prime Minister of the UK, David Cameron, decided he was above debating with the First Minister of Scotland, or it was accepted that the head of Yes Scotland, Blair Jenkins, wasn’t worthy of sharing the platform with his opposite number on the campaign trail.

There’s no point me going into an extended analysis of what went on. People know my bias in this. I’m voting Yes. Despite not being a supporter of the SNP and not having any great like for Alex Salmond, I still predictably feel that he came out slightly on top in the exchange, and people reading this who lean towards a No vote will most likely lean towards Darling as the victor.

None of that matters.

What matters is that there was a poll conducted immediately after the debate by ICM. If you didn’t know the details of the how or the why, by now you will have seen a version of the results. Every media outlet picked up on it. After the debate I sat through an hour of televised analysis on STV that was framed around the results, and around the notion that the poll named Darling the clear winner. How much of a setback, the analysis is asking, is this for the Yes campaign? Has this become Salmonds “Waterloo,” as Blair McDougall stated on STV (because if there’s one thing Better Together like more than bashing “nationalists,” it’s talking about patriotism and likening the election to military victories.)

So what are people in workplaces, on the buses, and in newsagent going to see tomorrow?

“Darling wins round one,” says the Daily Record. “Alex Salmond flounders,” goes the line in the Daily Mail. The independent declares that it was “First blood to Alistair Darling.” The New Statesman confidently declares that, “Salmond needed a win, but it was Darling who triumphed.“

All of this is backed up by the proof that the ICM poll showed Darling to be the clear victor. The New Statesman piece states that Darling won by 56 to 44 which (and this should already ring alarm bells about the data) equates to the nations current split on the referendum issue. The Daily Telegraph quotes the same figures. As do the Guardian (though, that should be obvious) and the Daily Mail. Wherever you read the news, you’re seeing Darling’s superiority supported by the findings of that poll.

Well, there’s a problem here. It’s simply not true. But since all of these news outlets put such stock in that one poll, I think we should only play fair and draw our conclusions from the same document.

Let’s take the results from all respondents first, which usually includes people who are unlikely to vote or who won’t share all or some of their intentions.  (Red bits added by me)

 

Incase that isn’t clear, what we have here is the question; “As far as you are concerned, which one of the two leaders do you think won the debate? Please put aside your own party preference and your view on whether or not Scotland should become an independent country, and thus base your answer ONLY on what you saw and heard during the debate.”

Let’s get the obvious bit out of the way. People who identified as Yes before the debate said that Salmond won by 67% to 17% and people who identified as No before the debate gave it to Darling by 78% to 12%. I know, shocking, right? People who have an opinion stuck by that opinion. Both candidates took a tiny bump from people who were now supporting them after the debate.

But here is what you won’t find being talked about in the news. People who identified as undecided before the debate said that Alex Salmond won to the tune of 44 to 36. People who identified as undecided afterwards gave the contest to Salmond by 40 to 14. Leaving a fairly hefty 46% of people who both identified as both undecided on the referendum and on who won the debate.

The next section in the poll results is when they work their political hocus-pocus. Voting intention surveys often show a set of results that exclude people unlikely to vote or who won’t disclose intentions. These are the results are meant to give a clearer idea of intentions as they’re from clearer answers. But then, there are people who pretend this is an actual science and also people who pretend that frozen yoghurt is a good thing. Just roll with it, is what I’m saying. I’m only showing you both sets of results for the sake of a more complete picture.

Again, red bits by me.

 

People who started out undecided say that Salmond won the debate 55% to 45%, which is a fun reversal of the headline stat that the media are using to label Darling the ‘clear winner.’ But then, the fun part, is that people who were undecided even after the debate, the people who still just don’t know which way they’ll vote, even they said that Salmond won, by 74% to 26% Holy crap, No voters, but even the people who still don’t know seem to think your guy lost.

It’s not going to matter, of course. Because the big advantage that Better Together have is that the media are with them. The newspapers and television stations want a No vote. And just as they told the nation that David Cameron won three debates, so they’re now telling Scotland that Darling was the clear victor.

And that matters. Television debates don’t matter. Polls don’t matter. Stats don’t matter. Almost nothing that I’ve written here actually matters. What does matter is that what will be going out into the workplace, into the shops, onto the trains and the buses and into common knowledge, is the stark lie that Better Together won the debate.

And why are they doing that? And why won’t they engage on the Trident issue, as I said earlier? Because of this, because of the one stat from the poll that really matters.

 

 

There are still so many people who are undecided. Anybody who is telling you right now which way this referendum is going to go is simply guessing. There are people out there who will absolutely swing this one way or another. And what they’re going to be seeing are the lies. The spin. The front pages of newspapers.

All of our online waffle is fun and it shows how clever we are. All of the door-chapping is fun, but gets only to people willing to open the door. It’s going to be won or lost in those places I keep mentioning. The discussions at your workplace. On your commute. In your pub or restaurant or comic shop or wherever the hell you find just about anyone who is willing to chat and debate with you.

People who can be told that they have a chance to vote to get rid of nukes from their doorstep. People who can be told they have a chance to vote for the closure of the Dungavel refugee detention centre. People who can be told that, yes, voting for independence does bring big risks. But has any nation that has ever gone independent from Britain ever asked to come back? Did the founding fathers of the United States stop and play nice simply because it was a bit of a risk?

Never talk about religion or politics, the old saying goes.

Well we’ve seen the world that creates.

Fuck that.

We’ve got six weeks.

Talk. 

 

 

 

 

A Conversation On Scottish Independence

 

This will probably be my last word on the independence ‘hing. I’ve talked about it a lot already. Here’s a script I wrote with the intention of making a video, either to run as one long piece or to break up into small chunks that could be linked to on twitter. But there are already many great options out there, and everyone should check out Aye! Talks for my current favourite thing. The talk by Kieran Hurley is possibly the best thing I’ve heard during the whole debate, and he makes many of the points I made in this script, except he makes them better.

Anyway, here we go….

***

 

A talking heads interview between two figures, possibly in the style of alternating Skype of video conferencing screens.

First person, Scottish Unionist. Patronising and dismissive. Labour? Tory? Difference?

Second person, Englishman voting YES.

 

UNIONIST

See, this whole ‘yes’ hing? It’s all about Braveheart and Willie Wallace, tin pot nationalist stuff.

ENGLISHMAN

I’m not a nationalist. I’m English, and I’m voting yes.

UNIONIST

Aye okay. Just because the SNP have bribed middle-class people like you, with free prescriptions and all this promise of milk and tartan honey…

ENGLISHMAN

I’m not a fan of the SNP, actually. I don’t vote for them.

UNIONIST

**confused face**

ENGLISHMAN

And I’m not middle class, though I’m from the midlands, if that helps?

UNIONIST

Aye, well, there you go then; do you not think working class folks in Glasgow have more in common with people in Manchester or the Midlands than they do with the land owners in the highlands?

ENGLISHMAN

I think working class folk in Glasgow probably have more in common with workers in Spain, America or Uruguay than they do with land owners in the highlands, but we don’t all have to be in the same country to work together.

UNIONIST

So you’re really comfortable to walk away from the rest of the UK?

 ENGLISHMAN

You know the island’s not actually going to go anywhere, right? We’ll still be here.

 UNIONIST

Aye, but maybe with a border…

 ENGLISHMAN

Why would there be a border?

 UNIONIST

**confused face**

 ENGLISHMAN

Seriously? Why? There’s a common travel area between the UK and Ireland, and that works fine.

 UNIONIST

Well, the UK could decide-

 ENGLISHMAN

Ah, here we go. The UK government could decide they want a border. Just like UK government decides it doesn’t want a currency union.

Just as it decides not to pre-negotiate any other terms. Are we seeing a pattern here?

 UNIONIST

Well the UK government has to act in the interests of it’s citizens

 ENGLISHMAN

Which, as far as I know, also currently includes the people of Scotland, so why all this scare-mongering?

 UNIONIST

It’s not scare mongering to simply point out the risks…

 ENGLISHMAN

The risks created by your side.

 UNIONIST

What about the NHS?

 ENGLISHMAN

It’s being run better in Scotland than it is in the rest of the UK.

 UNIONIST

But there are just so many unanswered questions

ENGLISHMAN

Like what? Ask away

 UNIONIST

There are just so many

 ENGLISHMAN

Hit me with one, we’ll see what the answer is

 UNIONIST

What about Doctor Who?

 ENGLISHMAN

Is that the best you’ve got?

 UNIONIST

Okay then. Here’ the biggie. Pensions. What are you going to do about pensions?

 ENGLISHMAN

Yep. That ones a challenge. But it’s a challenge for everyone, whether we stay in the UK or not.

 UNIONIST

See? It’s an unanswered question

 ENGLISHMAN

Okay, so how are the UK going to deal with the pension crisis?

 UNIONIST 

Well, there’s going to be a range of options-

 ENGLISHMAN

Wait, is that an unanswered question? About the union? Here’s another. Will the NHS Act be repealed?

 UNIONIST

That depends which party wins the general election

 ENGLISHMAN

Is The UK still going to be in the EU in five years time?

 UNIONIST

Well, that’ll be decided when we have a referendum

 ENGLISHMAN

There are just so many unanswered questions.

 UNIONIST

***Frustrated face***

 ENGLISHMAN

Here’s one you can answer. Do they have Doctor Who in America?

 UNIONIST

Yes

ENGLISHMAN

Do they have it in New Zealand?

UNIONIST

…..I think so

 ENGLISHMAN

Then why wouldn’t Scotland get it?

Here’s another question. I have nuclear weapons 30 mins from my doorstep. Will Westminster remove them?

 UNIONIST

No

 ENGLISHMAN

Will the dreaded nationalist SNP Remove them?

 UNIONIST

They’ve said they will, but they’ll change their minds.

In the union you can have the best of both worlds. You’ll have the safety net of being in a larger economy, but more powers to Holyrood.

ENGLISHMAN

One. just name one extra power that’s been guaranteed with a NO vote.

UNIONIST

Well, that would depend on the General Election.

 ENGLISHMAN

I’m only asking you to name ONE that’s GUARANTEED.

UNIONIST

You’d be walking away from the oldest and most successful political union in history. It’s really worked for the benefit of everyone.

ENGLISHMAN

Really? Your side keep saying this, but I don’t see any proof. One in four children in Birmingham is living in poverty.

You want to tell them the union works?

The life expectancy in the east end of Glasgow is ten years below the UK national average, you want to tell them the union works?

UNIONIST

Well, no, but-

ENGLISHMAN

The place in the UK with the highest poverty rate at the moment is London, on the doorstep of your beloved westminster.

The West Midlands is right behind them. The place where it’s falling fastest? Scotland, where a devolved government is defending the NHS and free education.

UNIONIST

Aye but you can prove anything by throwing around a few facts.

ENGLISHMAN

At the last general election, the majority of the electorate of the whole UK voted against the Tories, yet we’re being run by a Tory government, is that the way the union works?

UNIONIST

Now, that’s not fair…

ENGLISHMAN

I agree. That’s why I’m voting yes.

The union serves the needs of about nine million people out of seventy. It’s time for something new. For all of us.

 UNIONIST

Look, the world is getting smaller. Our lives go beyond borders these days. We all want to be a part of that, working together.

 ENGLISHMAN

….You know we’re not all moving to Mars, right? This wonderful small modern world you’re talking about? That’s all the more reason a country like Scotland doesn’t need to fear independence. We’ll still be part of that world, but the decisions will be made by people who can point to Scottish towns and cities on a map.

UNIONIST

But what about England?

 ENGLISHMAN

Well, what about Wales and Northern Ireland? People keep forgetting to mention them. But okay, let’s talk about England. It has a proud old tradition of civil disobedience and progressive values. The current system has stifled that, made people forget how strong they are. Breaking up the UK will allow us all to start again. People on both sides of the border can stand up and move forward.

UNIONIST

Now you’re talking like William Wallace again.

ENGLISHMAN

That’s the second time you’ve mentioned him. Your side seem a bit obsessed with nationalism.

UNIONIST

Aye, well you’re the one defending a nationalist government.

 ENGLISHMAN

Really? Westminster is draping itself in the union flag, is talking of reducing it’s ties with Europe, is talking of reducing immigration and saying things like ‘British jobs for British workers.’ Westminster is considering banning the hijab in schools, is keeping weapons of mass destruction armed and ready on our shores, and is forcing through an agenda to have only British literature taught in schools. Which side are the real nationalists?

UNIONIST

***Frustrated face***

***Dismissive face***

You just don’t get it.

(muttered)

Bloody nationalists.

On Nationalism. Again.

 

“Your flag flyin’ over the courthouse, means certain things are set in stone; Who we are, what we’ll do and what we won’t.”

-Bruce Springsteen, Long Walk home

 I often get things wrong. I often change my mind. Sometimes loudly, sometimes quietly. Back in 2011 I wrote an essay on nationalism. It’s an essay I’m proud of. There’s plenty of good writing in there, and some of my best little moments of trouble making. But I was wrong about one central issue, and I’ve been wrong about it a lot. The odd thing is that reading that essay back now, I see that I was kind of right, even though I didn’t know it. In there, I talked about the many aspects of “Englishness” that I was proud of, that I would want to identify with, even while I thought I was making a loud point about not liking nationalism.

I never publicly tie myself to one particular political ideology or another, but long term readers will have identified certain anarchist tendencies in much of what I write. I like less rules, not more, and I like to think internationally rather than nationally. As such, there’s still a large and troubling aspect of ‘nationalism,’ that I object to. Call it patriotism, call it nationalism, call it what you like; the attempt to imbue yourself/myself/ourselves with distinct properties because of the patch of dirt we were born on. The idea that somehow our skies are more worth killing for than someone else’s, that our way of life should be exported regardless of merit, or that a flag is something worth fighting for (or holding any kind of pride in.)

In 2011 I wrote this;

From Morrissey to Roger Moore, from Margaret Thatcher to Tony Blair, I’m of a generation who have had both the British and English ‘story’ told to me over and over again. Whether it’s the NF, The BNP or the EDL, the dark heart of nationalism has always been on view in England, whereas it gets to hide itself away in Scotland and pretend to be cuddly. It colours the issue, taints it, and makes it harder for people like me to hold a conversation on the issue and try to dig out some value.

Not for the first time, I think growing up in England is part of the problem. It colours things. Back home, there was a form of nationalism that was very visible, and very risible. We could call it Nationalism, with a capital N. The flags, the tattoos, the bigotry, the entire blindness to history. The very identity of those of us on the left was, in large part, formed out of a rejection of every single one of the things that these people stood for. I’ll never stop rejecting them.

I also think the 20th century frames our debate. So much of the conversation about Britishness and patriotism is still done along the lines that were drawn up during and after the second world war (as opposed to, say, the mood between the wars of a working class revolution and a bold internationalism).We view the word ‘nationalism’ only as that dark thing that wars were fought over, as an ethnic drive, a push for purity, an exclusive and murderous campaign. Just as we start to double down on terms like “socialism” and “communism,” even on “conservatism” and “capitalism,” so we lock another word to a single meaning, we narrow the terms of discussion.

But if we step back -as with on a great many other issues- we see that the English opinion, and the British opinion, exists in something of a bubble. Almost a position of privilege. We have views about the world that we are able to have. I remember a couple of years ago talking to a friend from Ireland, and I gave one of my epic speeches about how nationalism was the enemy, and flags are evil, and it’s never worth fighting over such things. My friend looked me in the eyes and said, “you’re not from Ireland.” Ouch. Point taken. I’m also developing an ever deeper passion for reading about the founding of America, of the push for independence and the debates of what it would mean to be American. The declaration of independence, the drafting of the constitution. We can all be snide and British and crack jokes about the failings of America (ignoring that many of them were actually the failing of Britain that simply got handed down like a family heirloom) but that is also to ignore that they founded a secular democratic republic. There has been one time in history so far, only one, when someone stood up to fight for the ideal of a country “of the people, by the people and for the people.” And you know what? That’s nationalism.

Are we going to tell the founding fathers of America that we hate all nationalism? Are we going to tell the people who rose up on Easter, in 1916, taking those bold steps for freedom from oppression, that all nationalism is bad? Sure, we can point to the ways that America didn’t follow through on it’s own promises, we can talk about the way the Irish independence movement allowed itself to be co-opted by a dark, ugly and murderous sect. I’d say to do either of those, though, we would have to also accept that Britain played the antagonistic part in both of those developments. Our views on the evils of nationalism are, in part, forged by people’s reactions against what ‘we’ were doing to them.

Look at any of the countries who have struggled and fought for liberation, via violence or democratic means, and you find a form of nationalism. Next time there is a struggle between two states, or a struggle over one annexing or breaking away from another, and ‘we’ intervene; It won’t be us picking a fight against nationalism in favour of something else, it’ll be us choosing between two different forms of nationalism and taking a stand.

Furthermore, all of our current political leaders are nationalists of one form or another. If we’re going to say that Alex Salmond is a nationalist because he wants an independent Scotland, then we have to say that exactly the same debate makes David Cameron a nationalist too, except that his nationalism is for a United Kingdom. Neither party are saying they don’t want to have a country, they’re simply haggling over what that country is. Hidden away in the very name of the no campaign, “Better Together,” is a form of seedy patriotism; the implication that, by staying together, one country can be deemed better than either of the separate countries should we separate. It’s simply nationalism in favour of the UK.

At the top of this piece, I quoted Bruce Springsteen. I chose that passage for a reason. It’s long resonated with me, as have many of his other lyrics on the same theme, and it’s only now that I understand why. It’s also been in the last few months that my admiration of/obsession with Thomas Paine has really started to make sense. I wrote an essay about him at Christmas, where I talked about his role in two revolutions and his bold ideas about founding new democratic states, at a point when I was still clinging to my idea that all nationalism was bad. How did that make sense? It didn’t. As with my previous essay on nationalism, I was right while being wrong. I protested too much on the issue. These things matter.

I can’t imagine a time when I will feel comfortable wrapping myself in either the British or English flags. I can’t imagine wearing the three colonial lions, or cheering for a national football team. Simply put, there is a version of Englishness that we are sold, and I can’t imagine ever subscribing to it.

But if we strip away the crap, the media, the myths and the British ruling class that has occupied our capital for so long, if we forget the flags and the bunting, and the dark heart of nationalism, there is still something there.

We need to keep digging. To remember the Thelwalls and the William Cobbetts. To talk about the women who were willing to step in front of horses, the school children who are willing to stop traffic, the pamphleteers who will publish a document liable to get them hung.

What I’ve learned -and I’m very late to the party on this one- is that there are many forms of nationalism, just as there are many forms of socialism, anarchism, communism, liberalism. A nationalism that is based on inclusion. A nationalism that the good part of America fights to preserve, and that many people in Scotland have been trying to make me see for years. One that isn’t about “being Scottish” or any real national identity (though the UK media still wants that to be what the YES vote is about,) but is about living in Scotland. It’s simply a conversation about what it means to live here, what we want to achieve, what we want to stand up for, what our common goals are. So far (though this could change after the first elections in an independent Scotland,) it’s about protecting the NHS, about keeping education free, about absorbing the Westminster-imposed ‘bedroom tax’ into the budget to protect people. There are dark sides, too. I’m deeply unhappy -to the point of killing the chances of me voting for them- with the SNP’s treatment of football fans and freedom of speech. I don’t like the way they plan to cosy up to corporations, and they are asleep at the wheel when it comes to dealing with the social issues that lead to sectarianism. But those are all winnable debates, and I look forward to them.

I’m aware that much of this post has carried an anti-British sentiment to it. It can seem as if I’m washing my hands of the country I come from. The exact opposite is true. I’m getting more and more vocal about the part of England we should fight for, and of the chances we have to get something very right in Scotland. I believe deeply that both sides of the border can embrace the change and stop hiding away from certain issues. We can have the conversations over who we are, what we’ll do, and what we won’t.

And let’s face it; after a decade that has seen ‘us’ wage an illegal war, demonize immigrants, strip disabled people of their income, leave students high and dry, and increase child poverty to unprecedented levels, I think it’s about damn time we lived in a country where we agreed what we won’t do.

The Death Of Voting

Apparently the whole of the United Kingdom rose up on Thursday and lodged a protest vote for UKIP.

Or not.

Firstly, despite what the BBC like to keep forgetting, there are other countries involved in the United Kingdom, and they were not taking part in England’s local elections. Secondly, once again despite what the BBC want us to think, not that many people voted for UKIP. There are many stories that could be told from the election results, but instead the media seem bent on inventing one.

We’re told there was a “political earthquake” and that the elections showed that UKIP have arrived to be taken seriously as a political force. UKIP took control of exactly zero councils. They took an additional 161 seats across England. Labour -the largest current opposition party- gained 338 seats. In fact, Labour’s currently holds 2101 council seats in England, which is  more than both the Conservatives (1359) and Liberal Democrats (427) combined. There are two strong stories to be told here. We can point to the conclusion that the people of England en masse decided they would rather have Labour in control than either of the parties who make up the current UK government. We could point to the even clearer conclusion that, in losing a combined 538 seats, the current UK government have collapsed in local politics. But no, all we’re hearing is that UKIP, the party who came fourth, ‘won.’

This is how the “political earthquake” of UKIP’s results would be represented on the richter scale;

Ignoring the BBC’s frankly bizarre fetish over Nigel Farage, thursday’s  election wasn’t about the rise of UKIP, it was about the death of voting.

Voter turnout was at 36%. Compare that with the much talked about Indian elections last week (national rather than council, but still…) which had a turnout of 66.38%. That’s over 500 million people turning out to vote. Compare UKIP’s 163 seats to the total potential electorate of England, and we quickly see that it amounts to nothing more than a very small minority. At this point I’m upset that I wasted the tumbleweed joke so early.

The press are talking about UKIP’s results representing ‘protest votes,’ and the leaders of all three main parties have stood in front of cameras saying, with their most serious faces, that they will listen to the electorate and learn the lessons from people choosing to vote for the English equivalent of the Tea Party. What they are proving, each time they deliver one of these speeches, is that they’re not going to learn the lessons at all. And the media reinforce this with all this rubbish about protest votes. Let’s talk about this honestly, let’s take off the platitudes and the varnish; people who vote for UKIP are voting for a party who use bigotry and play on the politics of fear. But those voters will always be there. In all countries, in all societies, there will always be a minority of people who will vote for those issues. The difference in this case is that the minority views are not being dwarfed by the views of the rest of the electorate. Or rather -they are being dwarfed, but not in a way that the media want to talk about.

Just as there will always be a percentage of people who want to vote for the extreme views, there will also always be a percentage of people who simply don’t vote. People who don’t have any interest. And -though it can be annoying to think about- it’s something we can accept. Anyone who has ever arranged a wedding knows the difference between the amount of invites you send out, and the amount of RSVP’s you’ll get back. And within that, there’s the difference between the people who say they’ll come, and the people who actually turn up. There’s a drop of rate in everything.

But a voter turnout of 36% doesn’t represent those people. It represents the basic truth that people are simply sick of it.

Back in February I wrote the following;

At every single election since 1955 (when Scotland also voted conservative) the majority of voters have opted for somebody else. If we ignore ‘first past the post’ and the current system of parliamentary seats, and look at the actual number of votes, the Conservatives never win a majority. This includes the height of Thatcherism. More people vote against them. They get in because of the way the electoral system is rigged, and because the left wing of Britain splits into different factions that steal each other’s votes. Year after year, election after election, the people are voting for something different and not getting it.

Is it any wonder that young voters in England are drifting away from the political system? If you express your voice through the correct means at every election, to no avail, where do you go next? These frustrated progressive voters start to look for a home in Anarchism, or Libertarianism, or Stay-At-Homeism. Politicians want to blame the electorate for not turning up -a move that you couldn’t get away with in any other job- rather than engaging with them. In a decade that has seen the largest mass demonstrations in British history, we are told that the public suffer from apathy.

Twitter and Facebook on Thursday was awash with moral high-grounds and soapboxes. Every few minutes people were being reminded to vote. people were being told they were idiots or lazy if they chose not to. People were being told they have no right to an opinion if they choose not to vote (because that seems to be how democracy and freedom of speech is applied- selectively.) But I’m never convinced that patronising people, or calling them lazy and stupid, is really the best way to engage in a dialogue or change minds. Whilst I understand the motivation of these vocal people -I genuinely do- they must understand that they represent an ever decreasing group. In the wake of such low electorate turnouts, some of my friends on the left will start to mention that some countries make it compulsory for people to vote. I don’t really see that as a solution either. Taking a basic democratic freedom, and taking away the freedom, seems flawed, to me at least. Just as freedom of speech is about defending people’s rights to be wrong, so the right to vote -if it is to mean anything- has to be the right not to vote.

What we’re doing is letting politicians and the media off the hook. In blaming the electorate for not engaging, we’re blaming movie-goers for choosing not to see a film, we’re blaming readers for not picking up a book. Politicians have no real interest in listening to people, or representing people, because they don’t have to. They can rely on us feeling like it’s our duty to vote, even if there’s nobody on the ballot that we want to vote for. I’ve debated this point with activists for both of Scotland’s biggest parties and the result is the same -it’s the people who are to blame, not the politicians. Activists are energetic and passionate, and they manage to find the time to fight for their causes and knock doors for their parties, so they don’t see why other people can’t do the same. But is that any different to the cliche of the ”working class Tory done good,” the person who has made money for themselves and climbed the ladder and doesn’t see why other people can’t do the same. The people in politics in the modern day rarely seem to be in it to change anything. The politicians are there to keep things the same (with different colours on the ties) and the activists are there to tell people why they are right. People aren’t there for change, they’re not there to listen.

(There are exceptions, of course. I’m sure that one of the reasons I drifted towards the YES movement in Scotland is for that reason; To embrace politics of hope and change.)

We no longer look at our politics or our media and see “ourselves” represented. The working class faces in Westminster now are only those of the “I-done-it-so-can-you” sell-outs, eager to pull the ladder up after themselves. The BBC draws from the same ‘talent’ pool as the political parties. There’s always been a class system, of course. Those at the top have always tended towards coming from an elite niche in society, but in the past there was at least an illusion of more, there were faces, voices and accents that represented the people. There were people, to quote a superhero film, who had “tasted desperate.“

There was a time when the English working class was one of the most politically active in the world. So much so that the state had to be constantly creating laws based around treason and sedition in order to keep a lid on people. But generations have gone by now, with the media pumping inane bullshit into living rooms. We only have to look at our story-telling. Our folk-heroes used to be anti-establishment outlaws like Robin Hood, Hereward The Wake or Dick Turpin. But once those in charge were left to tell the national story, it became about authority figures working to protect the status-quo. Police procedurals, government agents or child bullies (The Doctor bucks this trend like the lovely, impish, smiling rebel that he is.) America gets stories about people who take on the system and win, or who work outside of the system for the greater good. Britain gets stories about people who will fight to put the Empire back together again.

The right-wing of English politics went to war with the working class in the 80′s. Thatcher and her Conservative parcel of rogues took on the unions because that meant taking on collectivisation, it meant breaking the spirits and the hearts of a whole class of people. There are regions of England that have been haunted with defeat ever since. The polling booth isn’t the only way to effect change, and some of the most important achievements in our political history have come through civil disobedience, but that notion died when Thatcher crushed the social contract. The notion that the working class can work together to get what they want died a decade before Tony Blair strode into Downing Street with the idea that the working class didn’t even need to be represented or listened to.

And -as my quote above illustrates- even if people bought into the idea that the only way to make change was to do it through the polling booth, they soon learned that they wouldn’t be listened to there, either. Election after election, the popular vote of Britain was against Thatcherism. Decade after decade- through both Conservative and Labour- all we had was varying shades of the enemy. Scotland has a voice, and a chance this summer to break away, but what has happened to the millions of ignored, abused and abandoned people in England? They’ve stopped believing the lies. They’ve stopped voting. But, after decades of the system working their magic, people have also forgotten they can make the change themselves.

So, yes, there is a huge problem in English politics, but it has bugger-all to do with a few people voting for UKIP. It has everything to do with a political (and media) class that simply doesn’t do anything to engage or represent the 67% who chose to stay at home. And those of us who do argue, and do care about politics, are too busy being high-minded and patronising to try and fix anything. We need to rebuild. Start again. People need to be engaged. People need to trust. People need to be reminded that working together is the key. UKIP will thrive by default for as long as the 67% stay away, but let’s remember the difference between cause and effect, and let’s stop letting the politicians off the hook. We need to be talking about why people stay away, and we need a media and political class that will try and engage with them.

What Farage Really Means

 

First things first, I’m assuming you’ve all seen the brilliant take-down of Nigel Farage. If not, I’m going to be you best friend, because here it is;

 

There are a great many things to celebrate in this video. One of the problems with UKIP has been that the media has been running scared. They only ever get questioned on the one central issue on which they feel strong, and when other topics come up they are allowed to change the subject. There are many reasons for the rise of UKIP. One of them is a failure of the left  and another that isn’t being talked about is the rise of English Libertarianism.

I like to avoid easy assumptions, and I genuinely believe the vast majority of UKIP voters are not racist or bigoted. What I believe is that they are those frustrated working class voters who feel ignored by the current political system, and that many are this new breed of English Libertarians. I may disagree with the anti-EU ideas of the former, and I strongly disagree with the Libertarianism of the latter, but that doesn’t mean I can just assume they’re racist simply because I disagree with them.

But that’s why is is all the more important that we have a media who hold the UKIP leadership to account, and to expose that they are not the party that those voters are looking for. While the Libertarian strain of their electorate support may cheer on some of their polices -such as privatisation of the NHS and the abolition of maternity pay- the frustrated working class voters who are making the difference may recoil in horror to see some of these things exposed, and things that, until this radio interview, were being left totally unchallenged.

Farage is not what he wants people to think. He’s not from outside the establishment, a rogue maverick trying to bring down the system. He was educated at a Dulwhich College, an expensive public school (American readers note- due to our very open and easy to navigate language, ‘public school’ actually means ‘expensive and private school.’) He worked in London as a commodities trader, and was active in the Conservative party until leaving them in 1992. The party he fronts, UKIP, are funded by bankers and -in large part- the donations of another former member of the Conservative party, millionaire Paul Sykes. Positions they have argued for include relaxing employees rights and cutting welfare.

They are not anti-establishment. They ARE the establishment.

There were two major wins in the interview. The first was exposing his simple hypocrisy. I’m not a fan of dragging politicians families into  the public discourse, so I’ll leave the details of Farage’s hypocrisy for you to find in that interview, but it’s a very revealing and basic level of dishonesty. It’s the second  major win that I’m really here to talk about. In a segment of the interview near the end, he is pressed on his comments that he would be concerned if a group of Romanians moved in next door. When the interviewer pressed him on whether there was a difference between Germans and Romanians moving in, Farage responded “you know what the difference is.” In one simple reply he has exposed all that he seeks to hide from the public. A very nasty, very old fashioned, form of racism.

The media has jumped on this. Many of the same newspapers and outlets who have themselves failed to press Farage on his views are now celebrating that somebody else has done their jobs for them. They are lining up to kick him, and to show varying degrees of solidarity on the central point that it it totally unacceptable to hold such bigoted views against Romanians.

But there’s something there that is not being discussed.

Farage isn’t really talking about ‘Romanians,’ as in, people from Romania. There are a great many working and middle class people in Romania that he probably has no issue with at all, save for the fact that admitting that publicly would dent his election hopes. No. The group of people that he is really talking about are the Roma. The Gypsies. Earlier in the interview he makes the distinction. He refers to the Roma by name, and talks about them in relation to poverty and crime. But later, as he became flustered, he started to talk again simply about Romanians, and in doing so he’s let everyone off the hook. It’s his views about Romanians that are being quoted, not his views about Roma.

Anti-Gypsy racism is alive and well. It is the great unchallenged bigotry. The one that people don’t get called on. In 2014, a person can expect to be challenged by nice, polite, middle-class activists if they express views against just about any group of people, be it for their ethnicity, religion, sexuality or gender. But if a person spews bigotry against “a dirty gypo’” it’s likely to go unchallenged.

A nation that loves to watch shows like “Big Fat Gypsy Wedding,” or to buy The Sun newspaper as it throws bile and filth at “Gypsy Gangs.” A nation of people who suddenly become very aware of their wallets and purses in their pockets when they see people who even resemble Romani. The time it takes people to start phoning Police and the council if caravans appear on any unused land in the area. Britain -all the corners of it and whatever form those corners take after September 18th- likes to pride itself on being tolerant. It likes to talk about the progress made on sexism, racism, homophobia, and the chase for the perfect cup of tea. We all like to join in this myth, because it makes us feel good.

Looking at the wider picture, we see France deporting Roma. We see an Italian Minister making bigoted remarks about the Roma and the Sinti. We see organised violence against Roma in Ukraine. We see a world that is very happy, and very comfortable, in it’s bigotry. It’s almost odd that Nigel Farage wants to pull away from this wider world.

Nigel Farage exposed himself with his words. Hopefully that means that a great many previous UKIP voters, who aren’t all the same as him, have realised what the party stands for and are backing away from them. But the stark truth is that, as long as even one group is facing such total discrimination, we are as racist as a people now as we have ever been. And the more criticism thrown at Farage for his views on “Romanians,” the more we ignore what he was really saying and ignore the abuse hurled at the Roma, the more we continue to give license for this racism to continue.

I get the uncomfortable feeling that people are grateful for that. If he’d used the right word -if he’d said what he was really thinking- people on the left, the right, the centre and the media would have been forced to face up to the idea that, maybe, just maybe, they’re all racist too. Because I don’t see the great swathes of support for the Roma community. It’s simply not there. It’s the one racism that people are still allowed to hold, and I’m not sure that says anything nice about us as a people.

Fictional Facts: The Reality Of Writing

So this happened.

After I read it -and played a very small violin- I started to think about what it was saying.

The world is nasty. Writers used to be able to live off writing alone, but since the credit crunch they’re all broke. Life aint what it used to be,

You have to admire it. It’s a really solid piece of fiction. Really solid. It should win an award.

Much of the piece centers around Rupert Thomson. I want to make it clear here- I’m not mocking him. He’s a fine writer with a strong body of work. It’s a real shame that he’s finding himself at 60 with no safety net or pension. No doubt things haven’t worked out as he thought, and nobody should ever feel the right to pour salt on that.

But to the piece as a whole? How much salt you got?

There are many myths involved in writing. Some feel that the work is easy. Some feel that writers sit around all day doing nothing (huh, well…..sometimes.) Some feel that the life of a writer is all plain sailing and laid back doodling. I don’t mind those assumptions because they don’t affect me. If people want to think this job is easy, fine, let them try it. The grass is always greener on the other side so I don’t hold any grudges from anyone who thinks my field is verdant.

Plus, I’ve done my share of hard jobs. Manual work. Dialler work. Retail. Debt collection. I’ve done jobs that are physically hard and ones that drain your soul and, compared to them, sod it, writing is easy. So no harm, no foul.

But the assumptions that annoy me are all about the very things this article raises. being an author, it’s all about money, it’s all about your books selling by the thousand and you making enough from one book deal to keep you comfortable. These assumptions, I think, are dangerous. These set people up to potentially have a good run of things for a while but then find themselves at 60 without a safety net. I’ve had well-meaning friends and family who, when I’ve talked about my next project or impending deals, will crack jokes about me being able to look after them in their old age. And the jokes come from something. They come from assumptions. And the reason these assumptions annoy me, is because we’re guilty of inflating them. Us. The writers. We like to have a little glamour and mystery attached to what we do and so we don’t talk about the hours we put in at other jobs. We don’t talk about the friendships or relationships that get damaged by devoting our ‘spare’ time to writing. We don’t talk about pensions or savings or mortgages.

Let’s take one line from the piece;

 ”roughly speaking, until 2000, if you wrote a story, made a film or recorded a song, and people paid to buy it, in the form of a book, a DVD or CD, you received a measurable award.”

Roughly speaking? Measurable? This quote speaks to the fact that even as he put the words down, the writer knew he couldn’t define this argument or back it up.

Writing has always been an uphill financial struggle for most writers. The majority of working musicians have always been pushing the rock up the hill with very little to show for it. Film is an outlier, with huge sums of money always lining the pockets of the headline talent, but that distracts from the many people working on a film for scale, for peanuts or to meet the bare needs of a mortgage. Noticing that life can be difficult for writers based on a few established names hitting hard time, is like noticing that record sales are down if Bruce Springsteen has yet to sell a million copies of his latest album.

And the expectation -often from writers- is that once you’re “in the club” as a published writer, then you have some universe given right to always earn your money from writing. I saw a lot of this a few years ago when I was railing against the way Alan Moore was being demonised simply for sticking to an ethical line he had drawn in his career. He said he didn’t want DC Comics to continue to use characters he had created and writers screamed blue murder, “how dare Alan Moore tell writers they can’t earn money.” As if that was anywhere near what happened. Writers can earn money writing something else. and you know what? If writing isn’t paying all of your bills, flip a burger. Deliver some mail. Work in a shop.

Of all the writers I know, and all the ones I’ve spoken to over the past decade, the ones who earn all of their money from writing are in a very small minority. And good luck to those that maintain it. They’re there through hard work. But the rest of us? We have other jobs. The article itself compares Rupert Thomson to Elmore Leonard. Leonard worked full time for many years before he could leave the day-job. And in many other ways the article doesn’t do Thomson any favours. We’re meant to feel sorry for someone who can no longer afford to rent an office in London? For someone who has been forced to commission a builder  to make him an office? Seriously? As I said at the top, we shouldn’t crack jokes at the expense of anyone who finds themselves in tough times, but the articles author does Thomson no favours here.

For what it’s worth, writing accounts for about a third of my income. I work a day job, full time. Sometimes that’s six days a week. I don’t go on expensive holidays (the only time I’ve been abroad in the past ten years was to attend a writers conference.) I write my novels in whatever time I can fit in between the day-job and being sociable with friends and family. I have a very understanding wife. I also can’t afford to rent an office, certainly not one in the city. My first two published books were both written on the sofa in the living room. It wasn’t until the third book of a three-book deal that I had a writing desk. Two years ago we moved to a new flat (rental) to get a second bedroom that I can use as an office. That spare room, by the way, is roughly the same size as the “garret” mentioned in the article, and I wouldn’t be able to pay a builder to make it for me. We are currently saving a deposit for a house, and the switch to a  mortgage over rent might give me some freedom to get away with working less hours at the day job, but it will also bring 30 years worth of a different kind of stress. And I do all this as someone with a learning disability that makes my chosen career the hardest one I could possible have gone for.

And this is in a period of my life when my career has been going well. I’m happy with my sales. I’m happy with the work the publisher did on them. I’ve made friends off the back of it. I’m optimistic about my next few projects. I have half a plan to try writing full-time at some point in the next year, dependent on book deals and weather I get something good written. But if that plan goes away? I’ll continue to work at a day job. If I go full-time but then the money dries up? I’ll go back to having a day job. There is no existential crisis here for the soul of the author.

If you’re out there reading this and you’re thinking of getting into writing or publishing, ignore the myths. Prepare for long hours. Prepare for challenges in making ends meet. Prepare to strain a few friendships and skip a few breakfasts. Prepare for a job that is built around uncertainty. Prepare for needing a back-up plan and a mortgage, and for the fact that the writing income can go away at any time.

And prepare for the fact that none of those things will stop you- you write because you love it. You write because every word that you put on the page is a victory over all of the demons that tell you to stop.