The Politics of Dancing

'After successfully campaigning to have old school author Jane Austen appear on the UK's ten-pound bill, Caroline Criado-Perez has been swamped with death threats and rape threats on Twitter. She reports seeing "about 50 abusive tweets an hour for about 12 hours," describing the reaction as having "stumbled into a nest of men who coordinate attacks on women." The advocate has responded by retweeting the threats, which include promises of violent action, demeaning remarks, and plans to find her.' http://gawker.com/man-arrested-over-twitter-rape-threats-to-activist-961266470 A significant portion of men are afraid of women, this fear breeds hatred, and this hatred translates into both threats of violence and acts of violence that knows few bounds. The statistics on domestic violence alone are chilling:- ‘…over two women per week are killed by current or ex-partners …one in four women in the UK will experience domestic violence in their lifetime?’ [1] ...

On the television this morning Trevor Phillips, former head of the Equalities Commission, lambasted the liberal left over its attitude to events in Egypt . "The Egyptian army’s ousting of Morsi," he opined,  had been a military coup and should be named as such. "Countries often elected people ‘the West’ did not care for," the will of the majority had to be respected. "Just because many thousands of people had assembled in Tahir Square calling for Morsi to go did not mean this represented the will of the people." Now I do not know, any more than Mr Phillips, whether the majority of Egyptians supported Morsi’s removal; I do know that in a field in which the only opponent was a former Mubarak crony he received 51% of the vote. It is also clear that a very great many Egyptians were alarmed by the steady attempt to turn Egypt into an Islamic state, in particular that Morsi, less than a year in office, had already attempted to subvert the constitution. ...

There are no lines in the national anthem as follows: ‘Innocent and powerless Long to reign over us God save our queen.’* In reality I think the majority of people would think it strange if it did. Yet this is one of the basis on which the monarchy is sold to us; along of course with the line about bringing in the tourists. Incidentally this latter point is almost certainly untrue. Royal free Paris is the most popular destination in Europe , and of course tourists would still flock to the UK if they could enter and view the royal palaces as interesting museums. [1] Getting back to the national anthem the reason that no such verse exists is that it would be untrue. To quote the organisation Republic:- ‘The Queen certainly does have power, including the power to sign international treaties and deploy British troops abroad. It’s true that most of these “royal prerogative powers” are today exercised by government, but that in itself is a serious problem. These power...

I. Mobs haunt 19 th   Century literature. In the shadow of the French Revolution petty bourgeois writers lived in fear of the lumpen proletariat storming the bastions of 'civilised' society. In the growing sprawling metropolises of cities like   London ,   Glasgow ,   Manchester ,   Liverpool   and   Leeds   the existence of this great mass of the unwashed could no longer be denied. The question was how to channel the passions of this populace away from the dawning radicalism of the age. Nationalism and the Church seemed to provide a solution. Monarchy, Church and state were the three great pillars holding the existing order together; [1]  whilst the three great demons were identified as republicanism, atheism and socialism. Respecting monarchy the first mass marketed monarch was   Victoria , out of whose reign a narrative was formed of an extended 'family' of empire, with the Queen Empress at its head. In the emerging popular press, ...

As I write this a particularly cruel fate is being prepared for an unborn child. No matter what this child’s hopes or desires, whatever they might wish to do with their life they will be prevented from so doing. The rigid tramlines have already been laid, the child will be compelled to follow a rigid path, in time to become head of state; incidentally in all probability wasting away the best years of their life waiting in the wings to take up this role. This is feudal and unspeakably cruel. Yet we are all supposed to celebrate this fact. As I write these words crowds are assembling in central London to shout and cheer the news that a child has been born into slavery. If this alone were not cause for protest there is the little matter of my own rights being infringed here. Of course I am outraged that this appalling cruelty is being visited upon a child, that their free will is being stolen from them; however it has been decided for me that this unborn child is destined to be my ...

 Undercover The True Story of Britain's Secret Police. Rob Evans and Paul Lewis, Faber and Faber 2013 I. In his novel ‘The Man Who Was Thursday,’ G K Chesterton has a character infiltrate an anarchist cell, only eventually to discover that everyone else in the cell is also a police spy or an infiltrator of some description. This novel is mentioned in the book in the context of the McLibel case, in which a tiny fringe protest group was flooded with private detectives hired by McDonald's  in addition to the already embedded police spies. It is also arguable that one anarchist group collapsed after the prime mover and shaker of the group, a police spy, was withdrawn. There is an old English expression, “I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.” However whilst it is true that some of the events described in this book verge on the farcical it is far from a fun read, indeed I felt deeply depressed on reading it. II. Espionage has always intrigued the reading...

I suppose the following item in Tuesdays Guardian really does not require any further comment. 'In its latest attempt to keep up with the times the Vatican has married one of its oldest traditions to the world of Social media by offering "indulgences"* to followers of pope Francis tweets.' The belief a) in the existence of an actual place, purgatory, b) that this is a place that you can be condemned to spend time after you die, and c) that through the intercession of the church this time can be shortened, exists at the same level as the belief in Santa Claus. That the Pope believes that there are significant members of his faith for whom the above statements are true, and sadly I suspect his belief to be correct, speaks volumes about Catholicism and the levels of superstition and ignorance that it chooses to foster. * Indulgences reduce the time Catholics believe they will have to spend in purgatory after they have confessed and been absolved of their sins. ...

LONDON LETTER JULY 2013 I. When Daniel Bell was completing his series of essays The End of Ideology, he did so sitting in his study in the University of Columbia, one of the universities that was about to erupt in the great ideological struggles of the 1960’s. If he had not had such a tin ear he might have discerned the coming struggle by paying attention to what was happening in the southern states of the US which were already experiencing the struggle of the civil rights movement. I have been thinking about Bell a lot recently, and all the end of ideology crowd, from Francis Fukeyama to all the other triumphalist right wing    commentariat, as I am currently reading Paul Mason’s ‘Why is Everything Still Kicking Off Everywhere? ’ A truly inspirational read for a jaded old leftie like me who have got so into the mindset of thinking that resistance could only be defensive. The book is proof, if ever it was needed, that history is always what happens when you are bu...

I am currently taking a short break in Shropshire , which is basking in July Sunshine and the murmur of summer content. London is not England and many a foreign traveler has made the mistake of imagining it to be so. Here in the local papers one gets the feel of the reality of most people’s lives, for the local press, unlike the national, is actually filled with news. True it is not the news of war and revolution, but of by-pass proposals, petty crime and fires in which nobody is hurt; consequently it feels closer to reality than the national press. Though here I now, the first time in a while, I have regular access to The Daily Mirror. The Mirror historically stood apart from the rest of the tabloids, being of the left. During the 1960’s it enjoyed a reputation for radicalism. Now, befitting a paper recently edited by that self promoting fraud Piers Morgan, it resembles all the other tabloids and adopts the same tone. The tone of the tabloid press in this country is a curi...