Wanting young people to suffer: the new sadism

It starts out as a seemingly harmless thing that most of us have heard from our parents or grandparents: "Young people today! They don't know they're alive! They know nothing of the suffering we went through as kids..."

Hell, as I become an increasingly old hack, I'll roll my eyes at journalism graduates when they baulk at having to make a phone call or look aghast at the days of heavy reliance on fax machines or dial-up internet only being available on one computer in the office. But I'd like to think that I'm not a bitter sadist, mercilessly wishing we could all go back to the paste-up era of newspaper production, or wanting to deprive young journalists of the convenience of fast internet to teach them a lesson.

But the cries of young people not knowing true suffering now go beyond the jocular overtones of the "Four Yorkshiremen" sketch or laughing at trigger warnings supposedly demanded by the snowflake generation. There's a nastiness, a disdain for comfort, a yearning for good old days that were actually terrible, a desire to see young people have as hard a life, or harder, than previous generations, rather than wanting to see the next generation be more successful, more comfortable and more prosperous.

Misplaced nostalgia for WWII is a good example of the new sadism, and it is particularly embarrassing when it comes from people who were not alive during the horrors of WWII or have never served in the military. Someone who courageously tweets anonymously as Brexit Stonking Majority Tory tweeted the following miserable nonsense:

In 1941 teenage RAF pilots were flying old MK1 Hurricanes & putting their life on the line against Luftwaffe veteran pilots in the brilliant ME109F.
Remainer teenagers today.... #marr

The image is a still from a video of a pink-haired teenager dancing joyously in support of the UK staying in the EU rather than spending his youth bombing neighbouring countries in a war that we won with the help of European allies (but don't tell Brexit Stonking Majority Tory that...).

We've had almost four years of Brexity blathering along the lines of: "We got through two world wars, we'll survive Brexit!" to jolly people along in the face of evidence of a forthcoming recession, increased prices, bending to US standards to get a trade deal with Trump, job losses and anything else that indicates that the leave campaign's grand promises turn to dust upon any contact with reality.

The reality is that leaving the EU will most likely lead to hardships - because Brexiters can't refute this, they are instead revelling in the possibility of suffering, getting their pitiful excuses in early, saying it'll be a price worth paying for some intellectually bankrupt notion of sovereignty, rather than preparing to take any responsibility for any hardships which might come as a result of their vote.

Wishing another war on young people to somehow harden them up is appalling. There are already plenty of young people across the world suffering the horrors of war on a daily basis. Adding more young people to their number won't make anything better for anyone. 

Liz Kershaw joined in the sadistic idiocy last month in an awful attempt to squash the notion of period poverty, that anyone in the UK was suffering from a lack of access to sanitary products. She tweeted:

Sorry if this is gross.
But #periodpoverty FFS?!
My mum had to use old rags which my grandma boil-washed and she re-used.
How did she ever manage to get a scholarship to grammar school, go to Uni or become a headteacher without free tampons???

The most charitable reading of this tweet is that Liz Kershaw is an eco-warrior, calling for more widespread use of reusable sanitary products, but she's really just advocating a time when things were harder, especially for girls and women. There are certainly very good reusable sanitary pads on the market today but they are not cheap and they do rely on access to good laundry facilities. A return to shoving any old rag in in your pants is a return to, at best, the risk of a humiliating bloodstained accident and, at worst, the risk of infection. Liz mindlessly generalises from the example of one person and glorifies suffering as a result. She is the same woman who twisted the 430 job losses in East Anglia as a result of the closure of the Philips factory as some kind of Brexit benefit so you'll have to forgive me if I fail to see any altruism in her sadistic period tweet.

Still, the good news for anyone crowing about the possibility of young people suffering or wishing hardship on them all is that their sadistic dreams are coming true. There are measurable examples of things getting worse rather than better for the next generation.

Last year, the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries reported that life expectancy in the UK is declining and it is a trend rather than a statistical blip. Compared with 2015 figures, the institute now expects men aged 65 to die at 86.9 years, down from 87.4 years, and women aged 65 are likely to die at 89.2 years, down from 89.7 years. While this is not on par with Chad, with a life expectancy of 50.6 years, it's not something we should be celebrating either as it reflects a decline in healthcare, living standards, individual affluence and the overall economy.

The Learning and Work Institute projected last year that the UK will drop four places in world literacy and numeracy rankings by 2030 - so the good news for the sadists is that we're apparently less healthy and less educated.

Housing is becoming less affordable too, even if those pesky kids quit spending their deposit on avocado toast. A report released by the Office of National Statistics last year revealed that on average, full-time workers could expect to pay an estimated 7.8 times their annual workplace-based earnings on buying a home in England or Wales in 2018. The figure was 7.6 times annual earnings in 2016 and 3.6 times earnings in 1997. And these figures are based on people in full-time employment - this does not take into account the gig economy or people languishing on zero hours contracts when they would love job stability.

This is not catastrophising or being what Boris Johnson, a man who cares little for facts, stats, details or nuance, would call a "doomster and gloomster". This is modern reality.

So, well played, sadists! Take a fucking bow. You're achieving your dream of the next generation having it worse than you did. If this is what you need to do to feel proud, I feel sorry for you - but I feel even more sorry for the young people who are genuinely suffering, even if you're deluding yourself that they're all pampered softies living a life of luxury.




Photography by kai Stachowiak

Nuance: the first casualty of war

Nuance is in very short supply at the moment. All over the place, sledgehammers are being used to crack walnuts. Binary thinking is commonplace. Seeking a sensible middle ground is out of fashion. Extremists at either end of the political spectrum gain traction. We are truly living in pathetic times.

And this brings us to the disgusting spectacle of Assad gassing his own people once again in Syria. This was followed by Donald Trump ordering airstrikes without the permission of Congress, although this latest intervention has now received conditional bipartisan support. This is in sharp contrast to Trump's campaign rhetoric about not dragging the US deeper into war in the Middle East. But apparently he saw some distressing footage of gassed "children of God" on telly and now it's bombs away!

This, in turn, caused further astounding spectacles. Trumpian cheerleaders, such as Milo Yiannopolis, Paul Joseph Watson and Ann Coulter, all felt betrayed by their phlegm-haired father figure and swiftly announced their disappointment to the world. They seem genuinely stunned that Trump changes policy like he changes his socks, even though it was clear before the election that his foreign policy was always going to be a hot mess. The poor little snowflakes.

Then there was Friday's Stop The War debacle. Stop The War should perhaps be named Stop The War If It Is Waged By The West But Let's Never Call Out The Crap From Tyrants We Cravenly Apologise For Particularly As Our Chairman From 2011 Until 2015 Is Happy To Cash Cheques from Iranian State TV And Russia Today, but honesty is seldom catchy. @STWIIIWBTWBLNCOTCFTWCAFPAOCFTUTIHTCCFISTART is a rubbish Twitter handle,

For an organisation that professes to believe in dialogue instead of bombs and guns, and claims to support the rights of refugees, they were shockingly disinterested in constructively engaging with Hassan Akkad. He approached the protesters to ask them why they weren't protesting against the Assad regime but he was shouted down.

It was a disgrace. Megaphone-wielding, placard-waving fools, the lot of them. Some tosser yelled: "Keep chanting!". Because that is all these people have. They are part of a particularly loud but pointless element of left, and they are as devoid of nuance as Trump's one-eyed fanatics. And, just like Trump's disciples, they hate constructive discussion and seek to silence anyone who might have a different take on things. They are ferociously pro-censorship unless it's something they agree with, something else they have in common with alt-right lunatics.

Hassan Akkad is a Syrian refugee living in the UK. He has been imprisoned and tortured under the Assad regime. He knows first-hand that Syria is not a triumph of secularism, an offensive and ludicrous claim made by many an Assad apologist.

Akkad is an intelligent man who is worth listening to. Here he is sharing the story of his escape from Syria:

Everyone who howled him down at the Stop The War fiasco should watch that video, hang their heads in shame, and personally apologise to him for failing to engage in dialogue or to even try and understand the story of a refugee. Everyone there was a hypocrite.

The protesters refused to listen to a word he had to say. Akkad knows that Trump has no great affection for the Syrian people. He knows that Trump has his own agenda. He also knows that to oppose Assad is to not be an automatic jihadist. And he understands that destroying the airbase in Syria from above is not necessarily a bad thing. Unlike the Stop The War protesters, he is capable of nuance.

Click here to watch the video he tweeted, where he articulately explains his version of events from the protest.

The simple truths are that Assad and Daesh both need to be stopped. A military campaign solely made up of airstrikes will not achieve this. I am not going to pretend that I am sitting here at home in London holding all the answers to the appalling situation in Syria. War is awful but I do think boots on the ground are needed to wipe out Daesh and quite possibly to help the oppressed people of Syria overthrow Assad. Indeed, it has been reported today that US-supported rebels in Syria, with Jordanian and US support, fended off a Daesh assault. The very nature of the conflict, of the geography, of the joint enemies of Assad and Daesh, mean any military action will be long and grinding.

A humane solution for the people displaced by the conflict is also essential. Syria has degenerated into a place where it is hard to tell who the bad guys are and anyone who whines about young, able-bodied men fleeing the conflict would do well to remember this before shooting their damn fool mouths off from the comfort of countries that are not currently war zones.

Boris Johnson has done the right thing by cancelling a trip to Moscow and attending a G7 meeting instead. Anyone who thinks Putin is not in bed with Assad is either naive or stupid. Johnson is in no way suited to the job of foreign secretary, although at least this means he is not behaving like Basil Fawlty in Brexit negotiations. Whether the G7 meeting will lead to a ceasefire and whether any ceasefire will last longer than a New York minute remains to be seen, but it is better than kissing Putin's arse.

Dialogue is essential, military intervention will be a necessary evil, nothing will happen quickly. And if we listen to the experiences of people like Hassan Akkad, people who have lived through the long-term horrors of life under Assad, it might become clear that removing Assad from power and neutering the outrageous influence of Russia are essential to this tragic, horrific process.





  

Image by zio fabio/Flickr

In defence of John Bercow

Poor Donald Trump. When he visits Britain, he is going to be no-platformed everywhere he goes, the media will completely ignore him, nothing he says will ever get reported, and the people of this country will have absolutely no idea he is even here. Poor little Donny won't have any freedom of speech.

Except that will not be how it pans out when he takes up Theresa May's embarrassingly fast invitation to pop across the pond and say hello. His visit will dominate the news cycle for days. His views will be heard by millions. This is a man who makes global headlines every time he tweets. He has more platforms than an Olympic diving team.

But none of this has stopped Trump's British apologists from demanding John Bercow resign. This is all because Bercow plans to use the power he has as speaker of the house to not invite Trump to address MPs in Westminster Hall. Please note that Bercow has not called for Trump to be refused entry to the UK or to never speak to anyone or for press conferences to be called off.

All he has done is refuse Trump an invitation to speak at Westminster Hall as a statement against Trump's racism and sexism, and to send a message of British support for equality before the law and an independent judiciary, both concepts that seem to elude the wit of Trump. Bercow had the opportunity to take a stand, to speak out on behalf of British values and he took it. He can look back on this in years to come and be very proud. Good on him.

Bercow's upholding of support for an independent judiciary is particularly important. This week, a 44-year-old man from Hertfordshire was arrested at Gatwick Airport on suspicion of planning a terrorist attack when he disembarked from a flight from Iraq. British idiots, who are apparently experts in US constitutional law, started saying that this was proof that Britain should copy Trump with travel restrictions for people with passports from Iraq - except that at this stage we don't know if the arrested man had an Iraqi passport.

It is entirely possible that the arrested man only has a British passport, in which case a travel restriction would not work. And even if he does have an Iraqi passport, he has been arrested before committing a terror attack on British soil. This would indicate that we don't need to copy Trump because our intelligence services and police are already being effective.

The same idiots who called British judges "enemies of the people" for ruling that our democratically elected MPs should have a vote on triggering Article 50 for leaving the EU are siding with Trump instead of the independent judiciary on the issue of the travel restrictions yet, curiously, they also have a lack of respect for our counter-terrorist forces, even when they do their job properly.

Trump's apologists have also pointed out this week that Bercow has shaken hands with leaders of such undemocratic regimes as China and Saudi Arabia. This is true but these leaders were not invited to speak at Westminster Hall. In any case, plenty of people who are supporting Bercow have also publicly objected to the human rights abuses of both countries and plenty of others with whom Britain breaks bread.

Barack Obama only got the opportunity to address Westminster Hall in 2012, after he had already served an entire term as president. Aung San Suu Kyi has addressed Westminster Hall, which made a powerful statement against the despotic forces in Burma that have imprisoned her and attempted to silence her over the decades. Nelson Mandela has also had this honour. While there are debates as to whether he was a freedom fighter or a leader of thugs, it is hard to argue that he was not a towering figure in ending the official policy of apartheid in South Africa.

In this historic context, for Theresa May to offer Trump a state visit within moments of his election is desperate, premature and completely embarrassing. In the wake of public pressure as well as an outcry that has transcended party politics, it looks like Trump will still be coming over here but his visit will be scaled back.

The latest news is that instead of London, the visit will move to Brexit heartland of the Midlands and Trump will use the opportunity to raise funds for British veterans. Oh good. So basically Trump is employing the same tactics of far right hate group, Britain First. They gained a lot of social media traction by posting things many people who are by no means extremist will agree on, such as support for our troops when they return from war zones and memes about not being cruel to dogs. But Britain First, like Trump, also holds plenty of despicable views. It would appear they are both playing the "But I support the troops!" card as a distraction and in an attempt to mislead people.

In any case, charities such as Help For Heroes should not have to exist in the first place.

If a government sends men and women to war, to risk death and life-changing injury, the least they can do is ensure that injured veterans are housed and do not slip into abject poverty. If Trump was going to schedule a meeting with the defence secretary on how the US and British governments can better help injured veterans when they return home, that would at least deserve some respect. The latest reports indicate Trump wants to host a mass rally with tickets at £10 a head.

Trump can expect protests wherever he goes. Moving the visit away from London won't stop that. People will travel to make themselves heard and it is simply wrong to assume that everyone in the Midlands will be delighted about Trump turning up in their neighbourhood. If anyone wishes to exercise their right to protest when Trump arrives, that should be respected. This will not impede Trump's right to freedom of speech.

Peaceful protest has long been a hallmark of British democracy. With the latest anti-Trump protests, there have certainly been some potty-mouthed banners, especially in Scotland, but peaceful does not mean colourful language is verboten.

In any case, Britain has outdone itself in the last few weeks with the most polite online petition ever.

At the time of writing, 1,853,814 people signed up to the following: "Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen."

To say that Donald Trump is free to visit this green and pleasant land but that it should not cause embarrassment to an elderly woman is adorable. And, if Trump doesn't get to meet the Queen, that will really grind his gears. But it does not mean for a second that his freedom of speech is being denied. Seriously, Trump apologists of Britain and the world, get a grip.








Photography by Matt A.J/Flickr

Reflections on a visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau

"For ever let this place be a cry of despair and a warning to humanity..." These are the opening words on the inscription at the memorial to people murdered by the Nazis at Auschwitz-Birkenau. And despair is the operative word for it is hard to imagine anyone leaving this place without a pall of despair hanging over them.

A visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau is a visit to a place where the banal and the horrific intersect at every turn. At the Auschwitz site, my first thought was that the infamous "Arbeit macht frei" sign over the gate, a grotesque misrepresentation of what it means to work for living, was not as imposing as it appeared in my high school textbooks. Indeed, the whole Auschwitz site, at first glance, was not particularly terrifying and it is easy to imagine why countless innocent people may have been lulled into a false sense of security upon arrival. I felt a sense of guilt when I noted the stylishness of the art deco exterior lights on the buildings, which were formerly army barracks. But it somehow compounds the horror, that a place with elegant 1930s architectural detail still intact was also a place so unspeakably awful.

And once inside, it becomes clear that the buildings, which served as prisons, offices, laundries, execution facilities and even a brothel are very close together. The mundaneness of the laundry was being done next to a building where people died in starvation cells or were punished by spending all night in a standing cell, measuring just 90cm by 90cm, with three other people, before having to work all day the next day. The vile inventiveness of such inhumanity was overwhelming.

The display of thousands of shoes confiscated from prisoners on arrival was another incidence of the banal meeting the horrific. The sheer range of shoes piled high behind glass on either side of a darkened corridor was astounding - shoes in every size, men's shoes, women's shoes, children's shoes., boots, bedroom slippers, shoes that were meant to be worn to parties - along with all the household items people brought with them to Auschwitz-Birkenau, it becomes clear very quickly that these helpless people thought they were going to be resettled rather than sent to be summarily executed or worked to death.

Again, I felt guilty when I spotted a pair of shoes in that tragic pile that I would choose for myself. But then that's the whole point of this sort of display. In different circumstances, it could one day be any one of us forced from our homes, gathering whatever possessions we could in the pitiful hope that our oppressors might just let us live peacefully somewhere with the people we love. The room full of household objects the prisoners took with them is heartbreaking testimony to the fact that, despite what the Nazi regime had already done, many still thought they were simply being resettled.

If I had been rounded up into a ghetto then bundled onto a cattle train in the early 1940s, then had to face selection - to be sent to the right to be sent to gruelling work or to the left for extermination - I'm pretty sure the guards would take one look at the scars on my club feet, and note that my feet were swollen from days of standing in the train and I was struggling to stand, let alone walk, and send me to the left. At the Birkenau site, a few minutes drive away, we traced the terrible path so many people took from the train to the gas chambers.

Like other genocidal regimes, the Nazis were fond of getting rid of educated people, the people they considered the "elite" - the writers, the teachers, the people who might question the brutality, the anti-semitism. Eliminating such people eliminating press freedom was essential for the enforcement of a cruel statist regime where conformity and mindless obedience would help ensure survival or even promotion.

When people today, from the left or the right, slag off the "elite" but actually mean educated people, it seems facile to cry "Godwin's law!". But visiting Auschwitz-Birkenau throws the whole notion of Godwin's law - the internet adage that the longer an online discussion takes place, the higher the likelihood of someone making a comparison to Hitler or Nazism becomes - into a tailspin.

Dark, gruesome extremes kept reminding me of things that are obviously not nearly as bad as Hitler or Nazism. The standing cells denied workers even the basic right to sleep and, absurdly, this made me think about what might happen if UK workers lose the protection of the European Working Time Directive. The whole place made me think about what a post-Brexit Britain may mean for human rights.

Hitler's effective censorship played a big role in keeping the media to his message, with little room for deviation or dissent. Our guide at Auschwitz-Birkenau spoke about Nazi control of the media. I kept thinking about all the people, especially those on the left, who constantly make attacks on a free media. Calling for the BBC's Laura Kuenssberg to be sacked (which I think is an utterly appalling thing to do) or the more unworkable bits of Leveson's recommendations are not quite the same as the Editors Law of 1933, where registries of "racially pure" journalist were kept, journalists had to register with the Reich Press Chamber and editors were legally bound to redact anything "calculated to weaken the strength of the Reich abroad or at home". But the obsession with an ideologically "pure" media - as in a media that never dares print anything you might disagree with - is dangerous and anti-freedom. It is still a mentality that has at its heart a desire to control what newspapers print and what radio and TV broadcasts to suit a single agenda.

It also made me think a lot about how a united Europe is surely better than one that is fragmented and, as is the case now, moving in multiple places towards the far right. Incidences of people being singled out on the basis of their race or religion are still happening, and seem to be happening more at the moment, with police stats bearing this out across parts of the UK.

On a global scale, ending the atrocities of Nazi Germany did not mean an end to genocide. Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia all happened since 1945. Human rights abuses didn't come to an end. Racism didn't stop. Singling out people on the basis of race and religion carries on unabated. There are still anti-semitic morons who deny or downplay the holocaust.

The cry of despair on the memorial's inscription remains, utterly depressingly, a cry in the dark that has, in many corners of the world gone unheeded in many ways. And that is the biggest tragedy of all.



Photography by Paul McMillan

Learning from history? It'll never catch on...

Imagine this scenario if you will: People in England, including the leaders, consider the country to be under threat by the "other religion". The fear of the "other religion" may not be entirely unreasonable when one considers that countries where this particular faith is the state religion have already been involved in wars with England, and these countries represent an ongoing threat of future wars against this green and pleasant land.

England, with the able assistance of government propaganda, is gripped by a fear of an invasion by the "other religion". People are genuinely fearful that the "other religion" will become the state religion and the principles of this religion will form the basis of English law.

The leaders deal with this perceived threat by throwing vast sums of money at the military in case there is an attack on English soil. They also go apeshit with surveillance and censorship. Spies are operating in England as well as in the countries that support the "other religion". Texts and other paraphernalia from the "other religion" are forbidden. Adherents of the "other religion" are forced to worship in secret and can even be arrested under the guise of national security laws.

Ironically, most adherents of the "other religion" in England go about their business peacefully, practicing their faith privately. They are ordinary people doing ordinary jobs or running businesses. For the most part, they are not remotely interested in proselytising, even though such evangelism is part and parcel of the "other religion".

This is what happened in England in the 16th century. The leader of the country was Elizabeth I. The countries that threatened England included France and Spain and the threats were real and did indeed result in war. The spies of Elizabeth I infiltrated people's private lives. The punishment for practicing the "other religion" included execution for treason by some of the most hideous means imaginable. The "other religion" was Catholicism.

There was even a massacre in Paris at the time - it is estimated that 3,000 French Protestants were killed in Paris on St Bartholomew's Day in 1572 and an estimated 70,000 more were killed across the whole of France. A grim religious civil war gripped France and Huguenot refugees fled the country in fear for their lives, with many finding a safe have in England.

It all sounds a bit familiar.

Despite the horrendous bloodshed - or possibly because of it and the growing popular discontent with a bloated and distant monarchy - the French Revolution ultimately came about in the 18th century and plenty of its seeds were sown with the events of 1572 onwards. From this, a secular France was achieved and freedom of speech was one of the principles of the revolution.

Except now we have a fearful French leadership, a France that, for now, is banning public demonstrations in the wake of the terrible events on November 13. It was heartening to see people in Paris defying this stupid ban this weekend, refusing to be as scared as Francois Hollande appears to be. Excellently, 10,000 people who planned to be part of the global climate marches placed their shoes at the Place de la Republique instead. Regardless of your views on climate change, if you love freedom of speech, this is something to be applauded.

Meanwhile, here in the UK, some people are calling for banning the burqa and increased surveillance even though neither of these things stopped the latest Paris attacks. Over in the Netherlands, Geert Wilders is moronically calling for the Quran to be banned even though banning books is not just profoundly anti-freedom and propagates ignorance, but is as useful as a fishnet condom now we have the newfangled internet. Then again, Wilders is also calling for Jordan, a country that has done some heroic things in terms of coping with Syrian refugees, to be renamed Palestine, so he is not to be taken seriously.

And it's not as if the world is even capable of learning from very recent history. Raqqa, the current target du jour for the west, was bombed by Syria last year. I don't know whether you've noticed but it achieved sod-all.

If I genuinely thought airstrikes would be an effective way to stop those pathetic Daesh losers, and if airstrikes didn't keep killing innocent civilians just as Daesh does, I wouldn't have a huge issue with it. But I am not convinced they will do anything more than create more radicalisation and add to the refugee crisis. And there are reports that Daesh is now encouraging their pitiful fans to travel to Sirte in Libya instead of Syria, where they are also entrenching themselves. It is a grotesque game of whack-a-mole and not one that we can simply bomb our way out of and expect peace at the end.

Airstrikes are generally popular with people who are highly unlikely to be standing underneath one. Attacking from on high comes across as a sanitised form of warfare, like a big video game, one where you don't have to look the people you are killing in the eye. It could well be that boots-on-the-ground warfare, the kind of warfare that has a more targeted approach, will prove more effective in breaking up oil supply lines, in stopping weapons getting into the hands of Daesh, in retaking the Syrian oil installations than flattening Syria - and no doubt Libya next - from on high.

And then then there is the paucity of discussion about an endgame. What should Syria look like if Daesh is ever neutralised? What sort of government should be in place? Are there any plans for job creation and rebuilding the shattered economy?

After Turkey shot a Russian plane down, people seemed to divide into Team Turkey and Team Russia, as if either country has covered themselves in glory of late, and as if the issue is so simplistically binary.

We have Turkey, a nation unfit to be in NATO and certainly unfit to attain EU membership any time soon, complicit in the sale of Daesh oil while continuing their campaign against the Kurds.

And we have Russia, whose leader, Vladimir Putin, is more interested in keeping Assad in power, particularly as he will uphold the 2013 oil and gas deal which is great for Russia but would deny Syria the opportunity to achieve greater energy self-sufficiency.

Energy self-sufficiency would be a tremendous thing for Syria if it ever attains its dream of democracy that started out in 1945 and has been comprehensively shat on ever since. Energy self-sufficiency would also mean Syria is not dependant on Saudi oil - and it is dependence on Saudi oil and revenue from weapons sales that keeps the world passive when it comes to dealing with that absurd kingdom's violent, conservative, oppressive Wahhabism, the very ideology that Daesh spreads in its bid to recruit people.

I don't claim to have the answers to this unholy mess but I am sure that failing to learn from centuries of human history and pushing for simplistic solutions are not going to make the problems go away any time soon.

Airport whining and perspective failures

How do you know when a load of Australians has landed at Heathrow? You can still hear the whining long after the plane has landed. Yes, very droll. But airport whining is not restricted to people from the country where I was born.

On November 2, I returned to London after a weekend in Newcastle and picked up a copy of the Evening Standard at Kings Cross station for the tube ride home. The front page and a spread inside were dedicated to the "chaos" caused by thick fog at Heathrow airport. While the story was a change from their usual worship of Boris Johnson, it was just a compendium of first world whiners. Even Olympic cyclist Sir Chris Hoy joined in the moaning.

Apparently, the airlines and the airport could have done more. Nobody seemed to have any concrete suggestions about what could be done to fix a weather event beyond human control, but "more" of something was apparently required. The gripes centred on not receiving texts or emails from airlines in a timely enough manner. People were furious about turning up at the airport - presumably they travelled to the airport with their eyes closed, oblivious to the pea souper that shrouded the nation - only to be stunned that fog delayed their flights. Aside from the texts and emails warning passengers of likely delays and cancellations owing to fog, I'm not sure what else the airlines could have done. Tried to blow away the fog with giant hairdryers? How the hell did these overgrown babies cope with air travel before the advent of texts and emails?

Cancelled flights suck but flying in a plane where the pilot cannot see beyond the nose cone is hardly a reasonable alternative.

And this week, we've witnessed endless news time gobbled up by footage of British tourists stranded at Sharm el-Sheikh after the Russian plane crash and complaining that they just want to go home. I get it. Even after an idyllic holiday, there comes that bit at the end when you've packed up, headed to the airport, and your thoughts turn to being reunited with your own bed.

But, seriously, being stranded for a bit longer at a secure resort - and the resorts have stepped security enormously since the 2005 terror attack - is hardly the worst thing in the world. If I had to take an enforced extended Sharm holiday while I was waiting for a safe flight home and a news channel rocked up at my resort, I would happily appear on camera. I'd be thrilled to give a big up-yours to the terrorists by letting them know I was not scared of their murderous bullshit, that, despite the tragedy of the plane crash, I was determined to enjoy some bonus time in the sun, wearing a sinful bikini and drinking cocktails. Hell, it is only the fact that I am happily married that would stop me from adding fornication to my list of haram behaviour.

Of course, as soon as last night's Dr Who showed a scene where a plane was shot down, a Twitter fauxrage erupted. When I tweeted that the show is fictitious and the writers are not actual time-travellers who were to know that a plane crash, possibly linked to terrorism, was going to happen that week, some random internet stranger accused me of showing no respect to the Britons stranded in Egypt. Said internet stranger made no mention of dead Russians, just people stuck on sun loungers for a few more days.

This is the pathetic level of analysis going on at the moment - misplaced sympathy and kneejerk reactions to an episode of Dr Who. Of course, if the people who freaked out about the scene of the plane being shot down bothered to watch the entire episode, they would have seen it in its full context, which was a powerful allegory about the sorry state of the world and the futility of attempting to achieve peace with more war.

It was a stellar piece of acting by Peter Capaldi, it rose above such flinty noise as people whining in airports, and it was entirely appropriate for this Remembrance Sunday weekend.


Photography by Luisa Mota

IS and the Turkish conundrum

Is Turkey our friend or our foe in the battle against IS? Unsurprisingly, there is no simple answer to this question.

At the time of writing, IS fighters are still besieging the Syrian town of Kobane near the Turkish border. It is still unclear what level of military support the Turkish government is prepared to give the allied forces who have made a piffling start to an already uncertain campaign with airstrikes. We're at war now and boots on the ground are the inevitable next step.

But Turkey's position is a conundrum. While it is easy to criticise the lack of military action by Turkey thus far, the country has taken in more than one million refugees, in particular Kurds (albeit begrudgingly...). Given their noisy neighbours, Turkey's unfortunate geographic position made this situation inevitable but they are doing their best with this situation. Sadly, their best is not enough and international help will be required to ensure refugee camps in Turkey do not descend into disease-ridden disaster areas.

As well as 22 refugee camps, refugees escaping the horrors of IS are also living in temporary accommodation,  such as schools, mosques and parks. Turkey has only received 25% of the funding it requested as part of the 2014 Syria Regional Refugee Response Plan. Something has to give.

Turkey's reluctance to jump into bed with the US is the inevitable result of the country's delicate balancing act between secularism and Islamism. When the modern day Republic of Turkey was formed in 1923 with Mustafa Kemal, better known as Ataturk, as president, it was created as a secular state. It was, and still is, a country where the majority of people are Muslim, either nominally or observant, but other religions are free to exist. You can see mosques, churches and synagogues in the same street in Istanbul, and constitutionally there is no state religion.

However, in recent years, the tide has been turning towards a state that favours conservative Islam over the official secularism and, as such, Turkey's leaders have been reluctant to offend neighbouring Muslim countries. Yet, at the same time, there has been an element of desperation for Turkey to join the EU. For those who would like to see Turkey join the EU, the bad news is that I cannot see that being feasible any time soon.

In the 11 years since I first visited Turkey, much has changed. When I first visited, the currency had recently changed from the Lire to the New Turkish Lire. A whole bunch of zeroes were knocked off the denominations so it stopped being one of those confusing currencies whereby western tourists go to ATMs and are unsure whether they are withdrawing enough cash for lunch or to buy a house. This helped give the currency credibility and some shops started accepting Euros as well - all good if a country wants to be a serious contender for EU membership.

During my first visit, our hire car was pulled over by corrupt police and Stuart, the friend who was driving at the time, was given a speeding fine even though he was not speeding. He was, by far, the most sensible driver of the four of us. The whole situation was bent, I was threatened by a police officer when he caught me trying to sneak a photograph of the situation, and because Turkey was on an anti-corruption drive at the time, we made a complaint when we returned home to Australia. It was dealt with quickly and efficiently and the officers responsible were suspended. This was also promising stuff for an EU aspirant.

But on the same trip, Lorraine, another of my travelling companions, and I went shopping in Istanbul's Taksim Square. Our outing was interrupted by a student protest - nothing unusual in that in many a major city - but what was disturbing was the posse of snipers on top of a tall building, rifles trained on the marchers. The locals took it in their stride but a peaceful protest overseen by snipers is not a hallmark of a country that has completely matured.

The last time I visited Turkey, it was 2009. My then-boyfriend-now-husband and I were taking a long weekend break away from the restrictions of Ramadan in Abu Dhabi, and we enjoyed being able to eat and drink beer in public in broad daylight. We could hold hands in public, it was a nice respite from Ramadan in an officially Muslim country. And Turkey is still a fun place to visit but there are many reports that suggest that under the current government, the temperature has changed and it does not feel like the same secular state that rightly filled many Turks with immense pride.

But within the EU, Turkey's dark side has emerged with the occupation of Cyprus. This has gone on since 1974. About one-third of the country has been annexed by Turkey after a military invasion. It is absolutely astounding that this situation has not been reversed in 40 years. The photo at the top of this blog post is of me looking out to Famagusta, in the occupied part of Cyprus. It was once a popular holiday resort town of about 40,000 people. Like unoccupied Cyprus, Greek Cypriots formed a majority but Turkisk Cypriots lived alongside them.

Since 1974, Greek Cypriots were driven out of their homes, people went missing, journalists have been killed and Famagusta has been left to rot. Byzantine churches which should be protected for their historical significance are in ruins, the only new buildings are mosques but even they are largely empty. As I looked out to Famagusta from a cultural centre rooftop, I did not see another living soul through my binoculars. There were Turkish military checkpoints and buildings, a UN checkpoint that looked about as useful as a fishnet condom, and the rest of the buildings were the homes and businesses that have been left to decay.

Just as the UN High Commission on Refugees has been embarrassingly ineffective in helping Turkey manage an increasingly overwhelming displaced persons situation, the UN peacekeepers and negotiators have not really done much to ensure Turkey stops their absurd occupation of a sovereign nation. And it's not as if all of occupied northern Cyprus has become some sort of IS-endorsed Islamic wonderland - a lot of money is being made there via casinos. It is a tragic farce.

I understand Turkey feeling caught between a rock and a hard place with the looming threat of IS, an awful refugee situation and a growing anti-American element. But if they are at all serious about having any credibility as a major international power, they need to get the hell out of Cyprus. Their soldiers have far greater battles to fight closer to home and they are not just of the military variety.

We're at war with IS. So what now?

We are at war again. Gulf War Three. Because nothing much was really made better with Gulf Wars One and Two. But here we are again, starting with air strikes because they are more palatable to the public. Air strikes are very good at killing innocent people but don't worry your pretty little heads about that. After all, Bush and Obama have both been pretty prolific with their drone attacks over the last 13 years. This is nothing new. What are a few more planes between allies, eh? You can't make an omelette without breaking a few eggs and all that.

But the reality is that there will be boots on the ground. We can share pictures on social media all we like of the Emirati woman who pilots a fighter jet, we can rejoice in the poetic justice of a woman dropping bombs on vile excuses for men whose attitude to women is stuck in the Dark Ages, we feel comfortable with air strikes as a sanitised form of warfare. It is just like a computer game, isn't it? The fighter pilots don't look into the eyes of the people they kill. But air strikes are just the start in the war on IS.

If you have an appetite for this war, you need an appetite for the realities of ground offensives, of deadly foot patrols, hand-to-hand combat, guerilla tactics, of soldiers playing the awful balancing act of gaining trust among terrified communities while not trusting those who seek to destroy and maim us. This is what we are signing up for when we join this war.

The war against IS will not be quick and it will not be pretty. Given that air strikes did not root out Saddam Hussein from a pitiful hole in the ground or see off Osama bin Laden in a house in Pakistan, this latest conflict is bound to be more than a few planes dropping bombs. It could be argued that killing Saddam and bin Laden was a mistake as we will never know what intelligence died with them, but it's too late to reverse those decisions now.

Do we trust that this time things will somehow be different and the allies will be able to eliminate IS leaders and completely disable this latest evil? I don't know and I don't think our leaders do either. With the Syrian situation muddying the waters, it will make the job of determining who to trust and who to eliminate even tougher.

But in the meantime, we need to be far more reasonable closer to home. If I was a Muslim who had no desire to kill people - and I would include every Muslim I know in that category, both observant and nominal - I would be sick and tired of the constant calls for "moderate Muslims to speak out against the violence." As a religion of 72 sects, no one Muslim can speak out for all Muslims any more than one Roman Catholic or one Presbyterian speaks for all Christians.

And, secondly, here in the UK more than 100 Muslim leaders issued a statement to the Independent newspaper calling on IS to release Alan Henning, who we now know has been beheaded, as well as condemning the previous executions and challenging the IS interpretation of jihad.

So if any newspaper, TV or radio programme wants to interview someone who can offer a moderate perspective from the Islamic community, you have a list of more than 100 to choose from. Knock yourselves out. Get your underpaid researcher to find their contact details. Surely one of them will be available for your time slot.

Do not instead trot out Anjem Choudary yet again. I am starting to think both Choudary and Nigel Farage have their own dressing rooms at the BBC.

Choudary's hateful views get a ridiculous, unbalanced level of airplay and he is a very effective radicaliser of young people, a fine recruiter for IS. This is because he is charismatic, articulate and smart. You may not agree with any of his awful opinions but he is not an idiot. He knows exactly what he is doing and he does it well. He makes extreme views sound reasonable to vulnerable minds. He remains calm, he smiles, he gives politician's answers to simple questions, he answers questions with more questions, he lets the interviewers become agitated. He appeals to disenfranchised young people who feel they have nothing to lose and, equally, he appeals to privileged young people seeking to rebel.

He exercises his right to free speech at public demonstrations all the time. If other Muslim leaders were allowed his level of exposure, we might have a sporting chance at a more balanced dialogue here. Anjem Choudary is a troll, a warped Islamic version of Ann Coulter. They are two sides of the same extremist coin and they are effectively silencing other voices.

And while this noise carries on, remember, we are still at war. This will be our reality for a long time yet. And if it comes with the soundtrack of Anjem Choudary's analysis, the end will really be nowhere in sight.


Photography by William Morris.

One state? Two states? ISIS? IS? What's going on in Syria? It's never simple in the Middle East...

Another day, another broken ceasefire, another attempt to get Israeli and Palestinian leaders around the table, another round of futile arguments on social media... And so it goes on and on. It all reminds me of a Facebook argument that broke out on my Facebook page in about 2008 about Israel and Palestine which led to me defriending someone after he started out arguing eloquently for Israel but ended up throwing an ugly racist insult at another friend. Six years on, the same arguments are cropping up on social media and it seems just as pointlessly circular this time around.

But what is interesting is that I have observed with the 2014 round of social media debates is that many people from across the political spectrum are advocating a one-state solution rather than the well-worn "we support a two-state solution" rhetoric that politicians, safely away from the threat of either Israeli or Hamas rockets, like to trot out in a weedy attempt to look fair and balanced.

The obvious problem with a two-state solution is that no matter how borders are drawn, yet again, there will be angry, unhappy people, there will be more displaced people, there will be people left homeless and possibly stateless too. Any attempts to draw boundaries for two states will highlight that this conflict goes beyond religion because everyone will want their land to include the fertile parts, the pretty tourist draw cards, the bits with natural gas reserves and so on...

As the images of death and destruction from Gaza have become part of our living room furniture yet again, it is clear that the constant retaliation from both sides is not doing anything to get the Middle East anywhere near a lasting peace. The hatred is palpable and it not concentrated to the battered shred of land that is the Gaza strip.

Horrible outbreaks of anti-semitic and anti-Islamic sentiments, all of which reduce religions to stereotypes and ignore the diversity that exists within both faiths, are not helping anyone. So many ridiculous and awful things have happened that it is hard to know where to start with calling out the bullshit behaviour - Hamas hiding weapons in supposed places of safety, images of Israelis getting comfortable with a few brewksis to watch attacks on Gaza, George Galloway declaring Bradford an Israeli-free zone, Joan Rivers declaring that Palestinians deserve to die, the banning of a Jewish film festival in London, and the banning of an Edinburgh Fringe Festival show by an Israeli group that promotes Jewish-Arab co-existence, IDF soldiers leaving racist graffiti, urine and bowel movements in Palestinian homes... All these things are terrible and moronic and it just goes on and on and there doesn't appear to be any end in sight.

Today, we have a lack of enthusiasm for Egypt-mediated peace talks which, given they are about as neutral as Liberace's living room, is entirely understandable from all sides. But if a one-state solution emerges from this mess as a more realistic prospect, it is interesting to speculate on what this might look like. It'd be amazing if everyone around the negotiating table could even agree on a name for this new state, and even if they did, its citizens would probably refer to themselves as hyphenated nationalities, like Italian-Americans, but I digress. We are not even close to that level of nitty-gritty detail today.

Do we dare to dream of a secular state where everyone is free to practice their religion in safety, where churches, mosques and synagogues can exist in the same street without violence erupting, where atheists are allowed to get on with their lives without interference from any religion, where your sexuality is not a criminal offence, where tourists can visit and roam the whole country in total safety, where children are not raised to hate anyone, where my friends with Palestinian passports but have never set foot in Palestine can finally return home, where everyone has equal access to education and opportunity, where women can dress as they please, where there is no need to conscript young people in an army and imprison them if they conscientiously object?

But who should try and negotiate such a solution? For starters, probably not any of the nearby Arabian Gulf nations. The combined economic might of the Arabian Gulf nations could pay for a Palestinian Iron Dome and then some, but these states instead pay lip service to supporting Palestine and send aid such as blankets and medical supplies. The leaders of the UAE, as well as Saudi Arabia, choose their words very carefully when it comes to speaking out on behalf of Palestine. After all, there are alliances with the US that they do not want to jeopardise. And if their leaders were seen to be calling for a new secular state with democratic elections and freedom of religion, that would reignite the pro-democracy campaigners who stuck their heads over the parapet during the Arab Spring only to find themselves silenced or imprisoned or lashed. It has been suggested by many analysts that Qatar, among others in the region, supports Hamas (and the US sells billions of bucks worth of weaponry to Qatar so, once again, the moral high ground turns to quicksand...).

I could muse on who the hell can fix this this all day long but it would only be a matter of time before someone chimes in with: "OK, Gaza is a bad situation but what about ISIS?". ISIS, or IS as they are now being called in today's new bulletins, is completely appalling. Horrific. Beyond vile. A tragedy for Iraq and beyond. They are all about a ruthless land grab achieved through the mass killing of Muslims who don't strictly adhere to their narrow interpretation of a faith that has 72 sects, and of Christians, of children, babies, anyone who gets in their way, basically.

IS is such a revolting organisation that it doesn't actually matter that the stories of forced, mass FGM were never proven - their heinousness is such that there is no shortage of appetite for airstrikes to blast them off the face of the Earth. Of course, nobody is saying the the Kurds, who as I write this, have, with the help of the US, managed a victory over IS fighters in two Iraqi towns, have one of the biggest problems with FGM in the region. But nothing is ever simple, nothing is ever black and white in the Middle East. Equally, the situation in Syria has created unholy alliances as intervening nations try to decide what group is the least dreadful.

And while all this is going on, while my Twitter and Facebook feeds continue to fill up with more and more arguments that will never be seen by Benjamin Netanyahu, Khaled Mashal, Mousa Abu Marzouq, Mahmoud Abbas, Tzipi Livni, Moshe Ya'alon, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, Bashar al-Assad, Zahran Alloush, or anyone else who can actually do something about any of this crap, innocents continue to be killed, families separated, people displaced, and, hey presto, we have another refugee crisis on our hands.

Perhaps a one-state solution could honour the original spirit of the creation of the state of Israel and be a safe haven for refugees displaced by these latest Middle Eastern conflicts, regardless of religion. There is a long way to go before that idea is even remotely feasible but, as far as aims go, it sure beats the aim of obliteration in anyone's name.

Reflections on Anzac Day, 2013

April 25 is Anzac Day. This is the day when Australians and New Zealanders remember those who have died in war. As with Remembrance Day on November 11, it is important to not only honour those who have died but to look ahead, to try and forge a world where war is always the last resort, where better solutions might be found. But in a world where nations have a stunning inability to learn from history, I grow evermore cynical that this ideal may ever be achieved.

My maternal grandfather, Lindsay Gordon Wright, served in Papua New Guinea and Japan during WWII. Over the years, he was quick to share funny stories about condoms ("passion rations") being used to keep water out of rifles, practical jokes played by mischievous Australian soldiers on British officers, and his disdain for military police. But it really wasn't until the last decade of his life - he passed away in 2010 aged 89 - that he really spoke of the horrors he witnessed.

"War is just old men sending young men to die," was his succinct summation of it all.

Serving in WWII changed Lindsay. He was among an incredible group of Australian soldiers who set an amazing example by spending two years in Nagasaki after the war to help rebuild a city devastated by the dropping of an atomic bomb. He learned to speak Japanese, he came home with a deep respect for Japan and its people, which was unusual in his generation, and he refused to pick up a gun again. This was also unusual as he was a farmer and one of the ongoing arguments of the Australian gun lobby is that farmers "need" guns.

True to his word, Lindsay never touched a gun again, he was a strong advocate of gun control ("I've seen what a gun can do to a man," he'd often say) and he never spoke ill of the Japanese. And every time another war started, he'd shake his head in despair.

The invasion of Iraq over WMDs that were never found made him particularly angry. Iraq is a major buyer of Australian wheat and my grandfather was a wheat farmer While it's easy to dismiss his objections as being motivated by vested interests, that misses the bigger picture. War destroys economies as well as lives. Unless you're an arms dealer.

Meanwhile, every year there is a pilgrimage by Australians and New Zealanders to Turkey for an Anzac Day dawn service among the war graves. April 25 marks the anniversary of the landing of Anzac forces at Gallipoli - an event that was to start months of futile fighting over not much territory at all. It was disastrous with lives lost not only through fighting but also disease and suicide.

Over the years, there have been news reports on Anzac Day about the disrespectful behaviour of young visitors to Gallipoli with footage and photographs of drunkenness, empty bottles and cans left behind, people having sex in war cemeteries not uncommon. Thankfully, that doesn't seem to have happened this year - the reports in years gone by offered an awful mix of jingoism and ugly Australian behaviour that made me glad I visited Gallipoli in October 2003 instead. It was peaceful, there was time and space to contemplate it all in the war cemetries for Anzac troops as well as Turks, and the whole place is a lesson in the futility of war.

At a museum, there is a heartbreaking monument to an entire class of Turkish medical students all killed in Gallipoli in 1915. We will never know what world-changing potential was lost from that particular slaughter. There are graves aplenty of teenagers. It is horrific.

Amid all this, there was a moment of bonding between my father and our Turkish taxi driver. They hugged and they agreed that the soldiers on both sides were all victims while British generals removed from the action made life-altering decisions. "British generals with their gin-and-tonics!" was the insult levelled at soldiers' superiors by the taxi driver. But it was still a moving moment.

There is a more nuanced memorial at Gallipoli with the words of Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey:

"Those heroes that shed their blood and lost their lives...
You are now living in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies and the Mehmets to us where they lie side by side here in this country of ours...
You, the mothers, who sent their sons from faraway countries wipe away your tears; your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace, after having lost their lives on this land they have become our sons as well."

They were Ataturk's words from 1934. They still resonate today as we refuse to embrace each other, to accept differences and to rejoice in what we have in common . As too many of our sons (and daughters) return in coffins from war zones, blind patriotism does not behoove any of us. Solutions that do not involve guns, bombs, drones, tanks, landmines, grenades, mortars and so on and so forth are still, it would tragically appear, to be light years away. Lindsay would shake his head.

Lest we forget. But may we also learn.




  

A conversation I had at the bus stop today

As I waited at the bus stop wondering where the hell the 293 was, an old man sat next to me. At that moment, a group of about 40 schoolchildren and their teachers walked past us. The kids were laughing, happy, well-behaved. The teachers seemed to be enjoying their job. Some of the kids smiled and waved at us and said hello.

Then the old man spoke.

"I can't imagine why anybody would want to kill children. Imagine that, if someone came out now with a gun and shot 20 of them. I just don't understand. America needs to change its attitude to guns, the whole culture is wrong."

So said a man who knows a thing or two about guns. He told me he was called up to fight in WWII, starting his military career in Ireland and Scotland before ending up in Italy. He was away from friends and family from 1939 until 1946. I told him how my late grandfather in Australia fought in Papua New Guinea before ending up in Japan, helping rebuild Nagasaki after the atomic bombs was dropped. When he returned to Australia in 1947, he was an avowed pacifist who never picked up a gun again and refused to have one on his farm.

"My grandfather told me: 'War is just old men sending young men to die.'" I told the old man. He nodded in agreement.

The 293 finally arrived. We got on the bus together and I sat beside him. He told me he had three children, five grandchildren and "six-and-a-half" great-grandchildren.

"I am so glad none of my children or grandchildren or great-grandchildren have ever had to go to war," he said.

And we agreed that we were glad to live in a country where people don't feel the need to be armed to prevent government tyranny. And a country where a group of laughing schoolchildren can walk down the street with their unarmed teachers without a care in the world. That's a microcosm of a world to which we can all aspire.

Peace.


Image courtesy of www.kozzi.com