Sorry there haven’t been many entries these last few days. Something happened friday night which I can’tt go into, but needless to say it was one of the worst events of my life. Lyn and I are both fine, and have had lots of support from PAs, friends and family. My normal ranting should resume soon, but in the meantime bear with me.

I would encourage everyone reading this to go an watch ‘Posh and Posher’, a political program with Andrew Niel.It vividly illustrates just how corrupt our politics has become: we have turned our back on meritocracy and returned to the bad old days where only the privileged few can rule. The program points out that most of the current cabinet went to schools like Eaton or Westminster, and universities like oxford? How is that fair? How can that give us a government representative of the people??? niel suggests that thee institutions produce so many o our prime ministers because they are the best and can therefore teach kids the best, which i indeed problematic, but i’d go a step further. it is not because these institutions are the best, or just happen to have the brightest kids. it is more about the maintenance of power and wealth in certain families. it is all about keeping up the class system. camoron did not become tory leader or prime minister because of his intelligence or merit; he got to where he is because the tory upper class thought he was one of them, and was just about nice enough too woo voters. in other words, it is all about the maintenance of wealth and power by the upper classes.. the current government has nothing to do with merit and everything to do with greed and cronyism. it appalls me that we are returning to a pre-1960 style status quo, and i think it will continue unless we get etonian assholes like camoron and clegg out of power. it’s not far and not right.

I just got this, appropriately enough, from one of my friends on facebook. I have used facebook many times to organize things and arrange stuff – a week ago, for example, I used it to tell one of our PAs that our PA for that day had not arrived when he was supposed to. Lyn was stuck n bed, and I was getting worried. However, I have not had to use it to get help in a major emergency, as the man in this story had to do. I suppose it’s testimony to facebook’s behemoth status on the net that such things can happen.

We were watching a program on TV last night about pleasure and pain. Unsurprisingly, the thing that gives most people the most pleasure is their loved ones, something which I can certainly say rings true. But the thing that caught my eye the most was a section where they did an experiment to see which minority could take the most pain. They had a group of people, subdivided into gender, one group swore, one group all had ginger hair, and so on. They all had to dunk their hands into freezing water for as long as possible. I forget the result, and I don’t think it matters that much anyway, but it occurred to me: what if they had a group of disabled people. By and large – although this is a huge generalization – we tend to take more pain than more than others. Those with CP fall and knock themselves; those with other conditions put up with huge amounts of pain. I’d have been very interested to se weather we differ from the ‘norms’ in any statistically significant way in our tolerance to pain.

It has been a long tiring ay, full of meetings and things to sort out. I think bed is soon to beckon. I order to relax, I was looking through some of my old entries, reminiscing to myself about times past. I found this entry, about my last few days as an undergraduate, where I write: ”Time never ceases – there will be other people to meet, other places to see. If uni has taught me anything, it is that there are no barriers.” I was struck by how prophetic those words were – of course time has not ceased, but has brought me to the new places and new people I wrote of. I did not, mind you, envisage these specific new people and new places: who would have known, just three years after writing those words, that I’d be happily engaged and living in south-east London. But the optimism in those words held true – everything is indeed possible, and it still feels as if the world is my oyster. University opened my eyes to so much, and lyn opened them further still. Those days felt like the end of something, and I remember how sad when I wrote some of these words. But that sadness was unfounded, as those days were, in retrospect, a beginning.

Reading my entries of that time back, particularly this one and this one, I remember the sense of optimism I felt for the future. Everything seemed possible to me, and it still does, but I wanted to impress that idea on the kind of young person I once was. I suddenly thought of the young people I work with at school: of course, they are in rather different circumstances to those I was in, yet I see no reason on earth why they too should be constrained, why they should not go to university, or why the world should not be their ouster too.

I have been putting off writing about this for some time, as, like my entries on cricket and politics, it has nothing to do with disability. That is to say, I cannot contribute anything unique too the subject. But must say that I feel severely annoyed at the idea that London’s Olympic stadium could be turned into a football-only venue after 2012. To me it seems very short sighted that after the Olympics this site of national pride should be only used for football. What really pisses me off are Tottenham’s plans to knock the stadium down and build a football pitch in its place. Does it strike anyone else as arrogant on the part of the footballing fraternity that they think they are entitled to do such a thing? After all, not everyone in this country likes football; some of us enjoy other sports more.

Indeed, if you ask me, it would be better to convert it, t least partly, into a cricket pitch – it is, after all, an oval stadium, a shape more suited to cricket. You could even keep he running track by simply covering it with some sort of astro-turf when there’s a cricket match on. This would probably make for quite a fast outfield, but I think that’s a compromise worth taking. This, to me, seems a far better use for the stadium than simply converting it to yet another football pitch. There is far too much money in football, making for some over-inflated egos; it just seems to me that they think they have an automatic right too this stadium, and can do with it as they alone please. It just gets me angry that football takes priority over all other sports and uses, even to the obscenely stupid extent that they propose knocking it down to make a football-specific stadium. How can anyone seriously propose that in the age of austerity? Surely this is a sign of how stupid and arrogant the football industry has become.

I was very glad I put tights on under my trousers yesterday. We needed to go shopping in the evening, and it had turned bitterly cold. I told this to Lyn and our PA, Marta, and they agreed. There are definitely advantages to being a trannie sometimes. The thing is, it suddenly occurred to me that I can only dress as I do because I can communicate, and Lyn can only be lyn because she can too. I had to ask Marta that morning ‘please can you help me into a pair of tights’.

It seems to me that we often forget how important the ability to communicate is. It is, in my opinion, the most important facet a person has, and the most taken for granted. If I did not have that ability, I wouldn’t have gone to university, met lyn, moved to London or done anything. Someone can be as intelligent as anyone else, but if they can’t communicate their thoughts and ideas, they are treated as non-people. I mean this in the most literal sense: at the school I volunteer aft there are kids with no ability to communicate whatsoever. The are treated like babies. It seems to me that the most fundamental difference between them and me – indeed, the only difference really – is that I can communicate and they cannot.

I don’t think I’m going anywhere with this. I’m just recording what seems to me a fascinating contradiction: that the ability that is moist important and is most central to us as people is the one we take most for granted.

It has now been just about a year since I moved down to Charlton. It feels good to write that; for a guy who, up until the age of about twenty, was determined never to leave home, I think it’ pretty good going. I really enjoy life in London – the entire city feels like my playground, and there’s so much to explore and see. Mind you, I haven’t been beyond the M25 all year, and I think it’s time I did so: part f me is still a country lad, and misses the fields and lanes. Mind you, google maps works much smoother on my new Mac, so I can take a virtual walk whenever I want. Nevertheless, I think Lyn and I both want to take more trips out of the city this year, and I think at least one of them will be back up to Cheshire.

Well, here’s to another great year.

I am now officially a mac user. After years of taking the piss out of those who use macs, I have given in and joined the dark side. Truth be told its a bit of a relief: my old PC had started to crash quite frequently, and its good to have a machine hat is a bit more stale on the other hand, I now have to get used to an entirely different type of computer with a new set of quirks and new ways of doing things. For example, wile we have plugged in my extended keyboard, the mac doe not seem to respond to it very well – it keeps missing letters. This is the type of thing which could improve with time, or else I’ll grow accustomed to it, but for now it’s fairly irritating.

There was another big change yesterday: Natalia and Andrzej had their last day working for us. It was rather sad, as we had all grown rather close. They shared Christmas with me, Lyn and my family, which was rather special. They are returning to their native Poland for personal reasons, so we had a bit of a farewell party. Life goes on, I suppose, but I really hate goodbyes. At let it means the next time we meet it will be as friends rather than employers and employees.

Lyn and I decided to cook last night. We actually cook quite often, as opposed ti putting two ready-meals in the microwave or going to get a take-away. Lyn is a good cook – she tells our Pas what to do and most of the time produces delicious meals. Last night we decided to use some of the vegetables we had in a roast with some mince. The thing is we weren’t sure how to make roast potatoes, and they turned out fairly hard. So hard, in fact, that I found them difficult to chew. Hell, Andrzej struggled to cut them up! I was trying my best to eat them, when I remembered when mum and dad used to liquidise my food. I absolutely hated it at the time; I wanted to eat the same thing as my brothers, and not mushed up slush. However, the irony is the idea of turning the spuds into mushed up slush last night seemed a good one, but Andrzej refused, pointing out that it would look more like puke than it already did. I persevered and finished my dinner as it was, but it just strikes me as ironic that last night I saw the logic of something I once thoroughly resented.

I have been asked to write a play for the school I volunteer at. To be more precise I kind of volunteered. It has been ages – around four years in fact – since I wrote any script, so initially I relished the prospect. Of course, I write prose quite frequently, but writing script is a completely different kettle of fish. I learned just how complex it is when I worked alongside Ricardio back at university. I gained a great respect for him as a director, and directors in general, watching him fashion his adaptations of solitude and The outsider. I started writing yesterday, and almost immediately came across an interesting problem: I tend to write lots of dialogue, but the students at school can’t handle that much, so I must break my old writing habit and waffle less. In other words, I must alter what I write, in terms of both style and content, to accommodate the performers. It’s quite an interesting test for my writing skills; one I’m bound to learn from.

Well, this play won’t write itself, so I better crack on. I’ll let you know how it goes.

There are a great many things I could write about today, although none of them have much to do with disability. A week ago, of course, I was celebrating England’s ashes victory, and considering whether to gloat at the Australians. Gloating, however, would not be appropriate: although the ashes tournament can sometimes turn vitriolic, the fact is there is a great kinship between England and Australia. They are our worthy adversaries on the field of play, and our brothers off it. I have watched with horror the footage of the terrible floods in Brisbane and other cities. I have been to Brisbane, and it is a great city. I really hope it can recover quickly. I’d like to express my solidarity with my Australian friends, and in the spirit of friendship send you here.

Friendly competition is one thing, vitriol is another. Of course, it is when that vitriol spills over into hatred that we need to worry. Unlike in cricket, I think politics is doing just that: it is spilling into acrimony and hatred. I think this is especially so in America; I’m as guilty as anyone – possibly more guilty than most – of getting worked up and hurling abuse at politicians. I may sometimes muse at the idea of killing some of them. But while I’m serious about wanting the Tories removed from power, I would never do anything to harm any of them physically. Politics is a matter of discourse and debate; like cricket it is a game, and like any good game it should never spill over. Whatever your political beliefs, after the debate is over there should always be friendship and respect, just as pomms and aussies should always be able to drink together at stumps. That’s why I, like any sane, rational person, am horrified to see how heated American politics has got: it is spilling into hatred and violence, and I don’t see how it can come back from the brink.

I am currently feeling rather happy. not only did England win the first twenty20 match against Australia this morning, but it was announced the next bond film – number 23 – has been given the green light and scheduled for release in 2012. These two things have made my day. I can’t really explain why I’m such a big bond fan: I know I shouldn’t be. Artistically, bond represents the corporate side of film-making: they churn out big-budget action film which they know will make money, caring little about film as an art form. Politically, Bond represents both imperialism and male dominance: he is a misogynist who sees women as disposable pleasures and a cold blooded killer. How he would react to me, a cripple who likes little more than slipping into a pink tutu, I shudder to think. Yet, despite this, today’s announcement has me filled with childish glee: one of my favourite heroes is going to make another appearance after an economically-educed hiatus, once again to seduce women, drive these fast cars and order martinis ”shaken,, not stirred”.

In retrospect I suppose it was not so much of a big deal, but something happened yesterday afternoon which really annoyed me. I was short of cash, so I popped down to Woolwich to get some. I was in my building society. I’ve been going to that branch for just under a year now, and I think the staff are used to me, so I decided to communicate using my voice rather than my Lightwriter. I love my lightwriter, but sometimes you just feel the urge to vocalise. Sometimes it just feels more comfortable. I also thought it was about time I introduced that particular cashier to my natural voice. So that is what I did: I tried asking for a mini-statement using my natural voice, but rather suddenly the woman serving me told me to use my Lightwriter. It felt like a command – an order. I was quite taken aback, even offended. I was talking quite clearly I thought, but it seemed as though the woman couldn’t be bothered to try to understand me. Granted there was a queue, but surely I have the right to choose how I communicate my requests, and the right not to be ordered so forcefully. After all, I’m not a child. After I got my statement I left as quickly as possible without saying a word,

I suppose looking back it’s hard to say what was right and what was wrong, but I must say in that moment I felt very angry indeed.

It gives me great pleasure to announce that Lyn, my most wonderful fiancee, now has her own domain. She’ll be writing about things related to music and macs; it promises to be a fascinating read. Please go here.

I have not posted a picture on here in ages, but this one made me laugh. [for some reason my blog won’t let me upload it, but it’s an image of a cashpoint displaying cockney rhyming slang. I’ll upload it onto here ASAP, but a copy can be found here. I found it on Facebook: someone around here as a sense of humour. It is a cashpoint up in Shoreditch which someone has apparently taught to use the local vernacular. I don’t own the copyright to this image, and I’m not sure who made it, although I think it was my friend John. If it is legitimate it’s awesome. Mind you, I wouldn’t be surprised if this turned out to be an authorised mod by a bank trying to make it’s cashpoints more accessible to the locals, or a ploy by the government to try to make sure the economy keeps afloat.

I am still in a state of euphoria concerning the cricket. After 24 years of disappointment, it feels great to have beaten the aussies in Australia: for, as the great Bill Shakespeare put it, ”Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer!”’ Yet just as the TV News has already moved the Ashes victory off the main article slot, and pictures of sunny Sydney have been replaced with those of overcast London, so must I return to more grave matters. It is now apparent that the government aim to cut disability benefit by twenty percent, something I am now very worried about: both Lyn and I get higher-rate DLA – it is our main source of income as neither of us have paid work. The benefits we get are enough to get by on, but only just, so if DLA is cut I’m not sure how we will cope.

I’m sure many people with disabilities will have the same fears. I guess we are, in a way, fortunate as both Lyn and I obviously qualify for benefit. However, I’m concerned for those claimants whose cases aren’t so clear cut. These cuts will no doubt push some very vulnerable, fragile people off benefits and try to force them into work when they may not be ready. In other words, these cuts will fuck up peoples lives, and for what? To appease the bankers, so that tax can be cut! This is an example of how uncaring the Tories are. These cuts are criminal, and will hurt some of the most fragile people in society; this is wrong, and we shouldn’t put up with these Tory arseholes fucking up our lives.

It is summer in the southern hemisphere, and it has been glorious; but here it is winter and it is going to be one of great discontent.

England just won the ashes! I stayed up for the victory. For the first time in my remembrance, we have won the ashes down under. I was there in Australia three years ago, and witnessed the drubbing England got first hand. But as much as we deserved that five nil farce, we deserve our three-one victory, and it makes it all the sweeter. I wish I could have been there, in Sydney, this year, but I cannot really complain. As an English cricket fan, and a proud member of the Barmy Army, I cannot be more happy. well done England!

Today I would like to address a few of the notions found in Chris’ reply to my entry yesterday, as his responses demonstrate pretty much all that I feel is wrong about the conservative position. Without wanting to resort to base insults, I must admit that I am increasingly coming to suspect that conservatism is not simply another point of view but, to be frank, a type of stupidity, or at least a willing disregard for certain facts. I know this sounds harsh and even arrogant, but let me clarify it.

For example, Chris writes ” Fair is equal treatment for all. It’s only people who want preferential treatment that think otherwise. “I think he should pay more so that I don’t have to” how is that fair?” I would just like to pull apart a few of these notions, starting with the words ”fair” and equal”. Everyone believes that everyone should be treated equally, and this constitutes fairness. But I do not believe that this is always the case. Say two students were taking an examination: common sense states that for the exam to be fair they should have equal time and that they should be tested under the same conditions. Yet this is, of course, not always the case: mercifully my days of exams are long gone, but when I used to take them I used a computer, sat in a room to myself, had a scribe and had extra time. This was, of course, to compensate for my CP, yet it brings into question the idea that everyone should be treated equally to be fair. If we take equal to mean the same, if I had taken my exams under equal conditions to those of my able-bodied peers, I would doubtless have failed them all, never have been to university and the last seven years of my life would never have happened. Thus equal does not mean the same, and to treat everyone the same is far from fair.

We can start to see that equality and fairness are subjective notions, and that to be fair the same rules cannot apply for everyone universally. Thus for Chris to state that ” ‘ Fair is equal treatment for all. It’s only people who want preferential treatment that think otherwise” seems to me to be far too simplistic. It is not that people want preferential treatment, but that they want the playing field to be levelled. Because I could not physically sit my exams in a normal way – hell, I can’t even write with a pen – for the exam to be made fair I needed to sit it under different conditions. Similarly the same economic conditions cannot be applied to everyone because the playing field is not level. I believe class, in both the social and economic sense, plays a huge role, and that to treat people from different backgrounds inn exactly the same way is just as illogical as making me do an exam with a pen. The problem is, those on the right like to pretend that socioeconomic class does not exist in order to justify their dominance of it. They say that class does not exist, that poor people are simply idle and therefore should be treated equally, by which them mean the same as everyone else.

As I wrote in my first reply in the comments yesterday: ” Those on benefit are not just lazy scroungers. I am sick of those Tories who justify the removal of state benefits for those they claim are work-shy. there are reasons why people are unemployed, many to do with implicit or explicit oppression. to justify the reduction of benefits on the grounds that most claimants are just work-shy is to create a nice little narrative with which you justify your selfishness”. There are many reasons why some people may have lower incomes than others, and why some claim benefits, none of them concerned with laziness. The class system exists because of divisions in our culture and the separation off our education system into two tiers. For many years, the eleven plus perpetuated the class system: those with certain types of knowledge and who used language in specific ways went to grammar schools, and those who did not were dimpled into secondary moderns. That system had nothing to do with how clever you were or how much you knew; what counted was how you presented and used that knowledge. The examiners loaded the questions which would advantage those from specific backgrounds over those from poorer families.

While the eleven plus is now a thing of the past, I believe the streaming system still exists: the education system favours certain forms of language and types of knowledge over others. If you’re in the system already, you don’t notice it: you get used to writing in certain ways and presenting knowledge in a set manner. But, if you think about it, that knowledge set is artificial and arbitrary and culturally loaded to favour those from certain socioeconomic backgrounds. This is how the class system is perpetuated, and how those from other backgrounds can continue to be repressed and used.

That’s why I believe that higher earners should pay more proportionally, as a means of levelling the field. Class should not exist, but it does. All cultures in our should be valued equally: why should certain types of knowledge be favoured over others? Free-market capitalism with low taxation keeps money in the hands of the wealthy, so the cultural tropes associated with wealthy people are favoured over those of others. Money allows people to send kids to rich schools, gives them time to teach them the favoured cultural tropes, and thus the class system is perpetuated. However, if all forms of culture were valued, this divide would vanish – that’s what I mean by the implicit repression of the poor at the hands of the rich.

Of course, there are other factors involved than education and language, but you can see that the Tory idea that everyone is equal so should be treated and taxed equally is far too simplistic. Everyone is of equal worth, but this means, rather paradoxically, that people must be treated differently, depending on a variety of factors including background. To treat everyone the same, to judge everyone by some universal criteria, would perpetuate the divisions in society. This is why yesterdays vat hike is so stupid. I feel that those on the right do not understand the factors behind the divisions in society, nor the fact that it is their very beliefs that perpetuate them. I find it rather ironic that by pretending class does not exist and thus expecting everyone to pay equal tax, the Tories widen the gap between rich and poor.

It is also ironic that what is needed to narrow the gap is the type of investment in infrastructure we saw under labour over the last thirteen years. They invested in schools, guaranteeing a good education for kids regardless of background.This meant that students from what I hesitate to call the ‘working class’ could go to university and become teachers, in turn helping to rectify the bias towards middle class cultural values in education. Yet this investment required a high rate of taxation for the wealthy in society, which had the Tories up in arms. So, even though those on the right speak of treating people equally and wanting equality, they would rather not invest in the means to narrow the class divide. This is another example of Tory philosophy doing exactly the opposite of what it claims to do, and an example of how self-centred those on the right are. It’s as if they see things only in terms of themselves and what policies will benefit them rather than in terms of the benefit to the wider society. I really do not like calling them stupid, but the Tories don’t seem to understand the complexities of class division or the implications of their actions.

I think I’ve written enough for today, yet I’ve only just scraped the surface. I think I’ll be returning to this subject soon: there’s a lot more to cover, especially when you factor in writers like Foucault and Derrida. I mostly used Marx today. I am concerned, though, by how little of these concepts those on the right seem to either understand or acknowledge.

No Tory or Tory supporter should have the right to use the word fair, as it is clear that they don’t know it’s meaning. Toda, economic lightweight George Osborne has put VAT up to twenty per cent. So, rather than cutting the deficit by getting funds from those who can best give, he has chosen to tax everyone, which will, obviously, hit the poorest hardest. The price of everything with VAT on it will go up, from cat food to communication aids. I fear that the poorest families will suffer the most, as well as those with disabilities, who already have too pay out more for stuff like extra washing powder, specialist equipment and so on. On the other hand, richer people – those more likely to vote Tory – will feel this pinch less as they can afford this rise. In other words, by imposing this general tax, the Tories are making the poor pay disproportionately more; the Tories are making the poor pay for the crimes of the rich. It is morally wrong, and almost criminal. Why should we put up with having these selfish bastards in power? if I hear them try to claim that this is anything like fair or necessary, I think my blood will boil.

I suppose this Christmas has been one of meetings: I met Lyn’s brother, paul; Lyn met most of my family; and we both met Adrian. Today was no different. This afternoon, we went to see Lyn’s friend, mark, and a few of her friends near Lewisham. Of course – and I seem to have written this sentence a lot recently – I was a bit apprehensive, but I needn’t have been. Just as my family greeted us on Christmas day, we were greeted warmly. In all five or six people were there: Mark’s mum, Mrs R, is a most hospitable person and makes a damn fine stew. I got talking to a guy called Kieth, covering subjects as diverse as the merits of Star trek Voyager to Foucault. Mark himself seems a very awesome guy whom I look forward to striking up a friendship with.

It has, once more, been a great day. I feel I’ve made some valuable contacts and friendships. Sorry my entries have been largely diary-like recently, when I should be writing about the imminent threats to the benefit system, but this Christmas has been a very good one for me. Besides, I suspect the people I met today will become the dramatis personae of future entries; I certainly hope so anyway.

I do not have much to write about today. We spent new years eve here, drank a bit and watched TV. It was quiet, and nice. I know you can’t really compare such things, but I really think this Christmas has been one of my best; it’s up there with the Christmas I had down under. This was largely because it was my first Christmas with Lyn, and because my Christmas day itself was so special. This Christmas has reminded me how lucky I am – I have a great family and a wonderful girlfriend.

I’m really looking forward to the new year. I like my little ‘job’ at school, and there’s a possibility that I might start working at a local youth radio station, but I’ll write more about this if and when it materialises. There’s also our wedding to plan, and, with any luck, a morocco trip to look forward to. All bodes well for 2011 – happy new year everybody!