Blaaady Frogs

As a Europhile and Anglophile I am becoming ever more anxious about what the EU elections will bring next month. I have just spent the last 20 minutes or so going round in circles on YouTube watching Nick Griffin interviews, commentary and BNP rallies. Every time there is a local election there is always a tabloid driven fear that they may grab something, but in the end it never happens – that is, until the BNP got a seat on the London assembly. The number of candidates and the number of voters are on the rise – both have risen slowly since the mod 80s – but have really swelled under the leadership of Griffin. I’m interested in the BNP for many reasons and I am interested in the attraction – ultimately what type of people vote for them. Why do they do it? What do they hope to achieve? Do they really understand the BNP and what it stands for? My favourite grenade to throw in to a talk is the story of Nick Eriksen, one of the candidates for last years London Assembly election. Nick, writing on his blog stated that Rape is pure poppycock – ‘women are like gongs, they need to be struck once in a while’. Nice.

When the membership leak came out last year I nearly wet myself with pleasure. Who are these people? I immediately searched the list for old primary school teachers, friends and family. I searched street names, towns and postcodes. No one came up of course but then this list was all but a few of BNP membership. Now though I am scared. Unlike a lot of people I mix with I do know some semi BNP supporters, wannabe Nicks I call them (at the very least I know a fair few people who will defend Nick Griffin). My fascination comes from here. I know the mindset of the BNP supporter. Maybe not the average mindset, but it’s certainly a popular and growing one: ‘I don’t like foreigners coming here, stealing the jobs taking the benefits and faaahking off back home’. BNP supporters in my eyes have gone beyond race (whatever that is) and colour. It is about nationality and culture nowadays. The second root of my interest is that I know these blaaady foreigners. I am the only English person living in the 4 floor house I reside in. I went to multicultural university where, again, I was the minority. I have heard first hand what people think about England and more importantly the experiences they have had in England. With these two mixed together with a general understanding and belief that 90% of the British media is corrupt I am scared that the BNP will grab a seat in the European Parliament.

Last week I went to see English People Very Nice at the National Theatre. The central theme to the play that’s set in Bethnal Green is that the UK is built on immigration -from the Romans to the French - from the Russian Jews to the Commonwealth countries and EU free movement of today. Everyone in the audience (including me) slapped their knees and laughed loudly with their big teeth at the anti French jokes that were made by one of the central British characters. I laughed at the Jewish jokes and stereotypes of the Indian and Pakistani characters that cavorted on stage. The mainly middle class white audience however drew eerily silent when the play reached the 1980s, which took on the birth of the National Front (one of the main characters falls for an Indian man). It grew even more still when the topic of post 9/11 came up (daughters of immigrant moderate Pakistanis turn fundamentalist). I too went quiet and realised that the play was not a simple satirical jab at immigration or a grotesque stereotype fuelled script - it was an excellent reflection of what we are witnessing today. It confirmed in my head all that I have ever believed about being English. I understood that we, as a collective, who were just 20 minutes ago laughing at the cheap French gags were watching a razor sharp manifestation of the current climate. On the one hand we are of course a lovely, quiet, reserved and gentile nation (‘after you love’) and a frustrated and disillusioned nation on the other. We don’t mind ‘them’ coming over here – just as long as they don’t live next door to us.

Bringing this back to today and the BNP - this is what is worrying. The ‘just as long as they don’t live next door to us’ is not the only issue of today, it is beautifully combined with recession, immigration (on a scale that the UK has never witnessed before) and most importantly with a disillusionment with politics and England itself.

I dont really have much to say towards the protest that was held today in London. I was at the weekend protest which was silly and disjointed and I was at Trafalgar Sq. today with my lunchtime sandwich, which again was silly and absurd. The thing that has caught my eye today and really sums up the mess that the world is in right now was the parking of one certain gentleman's car. For me this says oh too much of where my thoughts are right now - the absurdity that is uber-masculinity. The video is too good. I love the way the chap conducting the driver moves the woman out of the way, as if to say 'hey, outta the way here comes a big car to save the world' whilst she goes on to prune herself ready for the presidents arrival. Every man at work today was talking of 'the Beast', its brilliance, its style (?), panache and that it can even withstand a nuclear war'. Okay. So this is where we are at after thousands of years of civilisation? Great!! All hail the car!

He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past

I Was going to save this update fro when I finished Down and Out in Paris and London by Orwell but tonight I discovered something far too good to resist. Currently I'm halfway through this book and on my third of six Orwell books that I want to read. In essence I am in Orwell land. Down and Out is a book that i have wanted to read for ages but I am glad I have left it until now as it is about being poor - hopelessly poor. I am not poor by any means, in fact I bought a book case from Ikea this morning (procrastination in its purest form - three modes of transport across London just so I had an excuse to not do any work or look for a job, read the depressing news or procrastinate in obvious things like washing up). But back to my discovery. Well, if you type in my postcode into google (or any London postcode) you will get a red blob with the letter 'A' inside it. Click on that A and you'll get a few links. Click on 'Street View' and you will see my salmon coloured terrace house in the summer sun. On the steps next door you will see some lovely people from the homeless refuge that's been there since 1968. On the steps leading up to the salmon terrace you will see my flatmate - shades on, can of four becks under one arm, guardian under the other - smiling to the camera. For an example of what I am talking about here is where Orwell worked and based his (presumed biography) book 'Keep the Aspidistra Flying'.

The relationship my discovery tonight has with Orwell is, for me, overwhelming. The reality that he dreamed up in the 1940s is oh too true today...however I don't want this update to turn into a Daily Mail execution so I will leave it there.


My personal Big Brother watching over me.

Errrrrrr....

At 1 minute and 19 seconds Gordon's hands are actually making a 'heart' shape. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7922135.stm

Skint

I've just come back from the 'big' Sainsburys in town with £4.70 in my pocket. Money that was this morning a pot of 5ps, 2ps and pennies sitting on my desk. I am officially skint. Skint at least until friday. This week I have had to literally survive on all the rubbish that has been left in the fridge, cupboards and freezer. Ive cycled pretty much everywhere and pretended to be asleep on trains where need be to avoid the ticket man.

It all begun on monday when I had to buy a new power supply for my laptop which blew my budget out of the window. The honest truth is that it has been a refreshing few days. Knowing that you cant buy this or that shows you what crap we usually buy (usually in excess).

Of course this is how I should live my life all year round but I know that Friday lunchtime I will be in Eat in Holborn biting into a brie ham and cranberry baguette.

Snow!

Dogs

Hampstead Heath

Jesus's House

Bertie outside Jesus's house

A hill

Some cars

Jardin de la paradis

Out in the cold

I have never really been interested in EC competition law (or law in general?) but this year its hard to ignore. The feeling is reflected at university and whilst teaching I've been shocked at the amount of emails and that people are willing to stay an extra 10 minutes to talk about the economy and Europe. Well, ever the eurocentric, whats going on?

Well, I just saw a bit of the darling Peter Mandelson on BBC breakfast talking about the 'strikes' with the ever annoying & patronising Bill Turnball/Sian Williams duo trying to make him say 'yes those bloody Italians are taking the jobs and we're all very upset and an awful government - so much so that I will whip myself silly when I get back to my Kensington Palace'. Now then, I want to believe that this is purely a knee jerk reaction from a few xenophobic (and upset) workers in various international companies but I also want to believe that this is part of something much bigger - that the EUs 'laissez faire' approach is now starting to crumble. As much as the Daily Mail will attempt to amplify and indeed exaggerate the current state of play as something new-the reality is that its been going on since the 1960s (or possibly since the middle ages?). The EU operates on free movement ideology - the core foundation with which the institutions work with. Free movement of goods means that we get cheap(ish) Food, CDs, DVDs, books and clothes and all other kinds of delightful consumerist products. Free movement of capital entails those cheap holidays in Spaaayne* and Rhooadz. Free movement of persons translates to the notion that I can go study/live/work in any of the 27 EU member states meaning that for every picture of an dirty Italian using his middle fingers to express affection to the British paparazzi - there are British workers working as Hairdressers or Plumbers in Mallorca and lawyers in Brussels. So theres a bit of a strike that has something to do with foreign workers. Now then, aside from this one of my favourite past times is to look at the Daily Mail comments pages - these reflect what the 'real man' of England thinks and here you can find some real corkers:

Does Brown McBean and Nu-Lie-bour not realise that the majority of people in Britain do not want to be in Europe ! Oh, he didn't give the British people the referendum he promised, so he doesn't know then does he. I must be really thick !!

- John UK tax payer, Ex Pat, Bangkok, Thailand, 2/2/2009 4:52

Ahhhh...John the ex-pat who lives with his Thai-bride, so frustrated was he that he took his fat arse over to Bangkok to moan to the good people of Thailand about how crap Britain is whilst bolting down an English Breakfast (extra bacon please!). But John's got a point which I guess I have been to proud to admit. The UK does need a referendum. 'The people of Britain' need to have a voice and to once and for all make a decision. But really I am intrigued. What would happen? We would pull out, lose our free movement status, have no control on the budget, no access to state aid, no funding for research (especially when we're leading the way in Climate Change!). Essentially we'd fall into decay like my rotten back teeth - thats what would happen (but we'd have our paaahnd and sovereignty!).

I dont have the answers and I never pretend that I do but one thing that I have learnt in my short pathetic existence is that most people reject things because they dont understand them. They're ignorant as to whats going on across the pond. I should know as I was for some time thinking the exact same way - as do many people who are the the product of a working class family in the UK. So what to suggest? Well, maybe it would be good if schools started to teach a class along the lines of 'what happens outside of the UK/other white countries we have conquered'. At school we were taught a subject called PD or CIS...or something... which was basically citizenship. This was OK up until the fact that it only encompassed the UK and what the UK is about...and how you can claim benefits.... but why not throw in what the United Nations stand for - or what the EU does... hell, why not teach da kids a bit about the world rather than making us draw (and remember) what the inside of a British WWI trench looks like?

Ok, I have gone off on a tangent but my point is that the WildCat strikes that are taking place at the moment in the UK can easily spin out of control and turn into some kind of pseudo xenophobic/racist attack on our fellow Europeans which will feul the already anti EU press. What needs to be realised is that these strikes are the consequence of free liberal markets that have dominated the EC for four decades and something that we have benefited from (Auf Wierdersehen Pet!, Basildon/UK ex-pats in sunny Spaaayne). But we are really at the cross roads here: more anti EU sentiment will only push us further away from the EU (and interestingly Obama's America) - we need the EU more than ever before (Look to our Nordic Neighbours Iceland).

Beyond all of this, the real reason for the bitterness is a mixture of the obvious economic downturn, but also the deep thorn in the UK's side which is that we do not lead Europe - and when the UK doesnt lead in something it loses interest and the public turn against it... this has happened with all of our Commonwealth 'friends'. Nonetheless the EU is changing - probably (and hopefully) the biggest since its birth in 1957. There will be a new Commission and new elections in Parliament. There are climate change deals, economic deals and that silent Treaty who will eventually creep up and bite Gordon Brown on the bum... but the big issue is whether we bother to participate and discuss what the EU is about or do we continue with the same 'Tony, Ex-pat builder/taxpayer/daily mail reader who lives in Torremolinos' attitude.


*Spaayne rhymes with Wayne