I was watching Mock The Week last night when I was struck by a thought. I’ve almost finished Lee Ridley’s book (I know it has taken me a while). On the whole I think it’s a very good piece of text with lots of valuable insights into the world of people with cerebral palsy who use communication aids. In fact I’d go as far as calling it quite seminal, given how  Ridley uses gentle humour to introduce people into what you might call ‘our world’. (Of course, it’s not without it’s faults, and I could say a lot more about it, but perhaps I’ll leave that for another entry).. Last night, though, a thought came to me: could it now be possible to see a communication aid user like Ridley on a topical news show like Mock The Week? How cool would that be? After all, ‘we’ have as much to say about the issues of the day as anyone else. Thanks in large part to people like Ridley, communication aid users are gaining a bigger and bigger foothold in the mainstream media. I didn’t watch it, but Francesca Martinez also apparently made an outstanding appearance on Question Time last   night too. With guys like Lee Ridley and  Ted Shires on the assurgent, surely it’s only a matter of time before we see them going toe to toe with the likes of Ian Hislop and Paul Merton.

If you ever wondered who invented smoking weed, according to this, it was the Chinese about 2500 years ago. I suppose it had to originate somewhere, but that doesn’t mean the Tories can blame them for their failings.

If you’re as worried as  I am about the erosion of minority rights in the current political climate, I recommend checking this Owen Jones article out. Truth be told it’s a tough read, but jones outlines how the human rights of LGBTQ people are gradually being worn away and how homophobic and transphobic attacks are becoming more and more common. What vestiges of equality that had been achieved was hard fought for, but due to the resurgence of populism, the clock  is being pushed back.

As Jones puts it:  “Join the dots, look at the direction of travel: progress in LGBTQ rights has not simply ground to a halt, it is screeching into reverse. This is Pride month, but let us not have commercialised parades, pinkwashing dubious corporations, celebrating “progress”. Let’s have rage, courage and determination – because LGBTQ rights are under threat, and history shows that the only remedy is to fight back.”

Whether you’re LGBTQ or not, whether you’re a member of a minority or not, I think we should all be worried about the direction western culture is currently heading in.

Something tells me this will be well worth checking out when it airs on Channel 4 next week. A new adaptation of Catch 22, staring George Clooney, is on it’s way, and I must say it feels very timely indeed. What more fitting reaction could there be to an utterly absurd era than a story about the most absurd era of them all. In a way we are all currently in Yossarian’s predicament, trapped in an insane situation, unable to escape. Claim to be mad, and you must be sane. That’s certainly true: then as now, how  could any sane  person not recognise real madness when they see it?

As depressing and bleak as it is, I’d be a negligent blogger if I didn’t flag this Guardian article up. In it, Francis Ryan argues  that  the rights disabled people fought so hard to gain, from accessible public transport to independent living, are now being  eroded under the guise of austerity and  helped by the distraction of Brexit. ” Longstanding cultural prejudice around disability, combined with the demonising rhetoric of austerity, has exacerbated a sense of difference in society; an othering that perpetuates the idea that disabled people aren’t quite normal, or don’t want a life, a family, a home or an education like everyone else.” Sadly, I fear she is right

What is a city? What differentiates a city from a town, or a town from a village? I used to think London was enormous until I visited Delhi; and I used to think Manchester was huge before I moved to London. What, then, defines a city? And what makes a city great? Could it be it’s population? It’s architecture? It’s culture? To be honest I find such questions fascinating; it’s part of the reason I love to travel. Every city across the world is unique; each has it’s own character. I daresay this may have been what the great Walter Benjamin was getting at, at least in part.

What, then, defines a city, and what makes a city great? What makes a city stand out to the world? Think Paris, London, New York. Everyone knows about such cities, even if they have never visited them. What is it about these places which makes them such world cultural centres? I have been thinking about this quite a lot recently, and I think we need to celebrate such things more. Every city is unique and astonishing; we need as a community to celebrate that. The olympics pull the world’s focus onto one specific city through sport every four years; perhaps something similar can be done through culture. Of course, a city can be great without ever hosting the Olympic games – New York being an obvious example – but why can’t we let the world explore itself, one city at a time? Each metropolis could show itself off to the world through an artistic and cultural festival, televised across the planet. Perhaps then we would all see how similar we are, as well as how wonderfully diverse.

Every city could put on shows and events; there could be opening and closing ceremonies. Such events could function as a type of joint world exploration, with audiences brought into each city and shown what it contributes to the world culturally. They could happen every four years or so (probably not the same year as the olympics, though). The olympics is fine, but whereas it focusses on running and jumping and stuff, I reckon we need to establish an artistic equivalent alongside it, just as big, but dedicated to a city’s creative side. After all, art holds just as much cultural value as sport, if not even more. Such an event would also have the advantage of requiring less custom-built infrastructure, as most cities, especially larger ones, will already have theatres and cinemas in place.

Yet such events shouldn’t be just confined to the big metropolises. Cities like London and Tokyo get to host the olympics because they’re rich. This cultural olympiad, or whatever it will be called, will probably be much cheaper to put on, meaning places which might not be quite as wealthy could participate. Imagine how fascinating it would be to celebrate the culture of a city like Delhi or Cairo or Havana.

Of course, this is just another of my crazy ideas: how such an event would work practically would be anyone’s guess. Would people watch it without the thrill of competition? Would cities want to participate?  If other countries are to send delegations, as they do in the Olympic games, what would they contribute? Yet surely the idea of bringing everyone together and drawing the world’s focus onto a city in order to explore and celebrate it’s culture is a cool one.

I don’t give a rat’s ass what drugs Gove or Johnson claim to have taken in their effort to look cool,  more human or whatever stunt they’re trying to pull.  The fact is they’re still trying to force the far more  serious crime of Brexit upon us; trying to strip us off our consumer rights and turn the uk into a neoliberal hell. No  matter how much they try to distract us, no matter how much they attempt to appear personable, approachable, ‘down with the kids’ or whatever, we must not forget what these arseholes are trying to force upon us.

East London is beginning to feel more and more like Manhattan. I took myself up to the Olympic park today, just for my usual Saturday afternoon walk. I still like going up there, but what used to be a relatively green, open space is now a building sight. The plan is apparently to establish a new community there, complete with schools and shops, but I can’t help thinking that would make it just like any other part of London. The Olympic park should have remained a park; the area is now completely different to how it was  in 2012. The same goes for the area around North Greenwich. Of course a city is a city, and I must remember that such perpetual redevelopment is part of it’s nature. Yet it still seems a shame that an area which felt like a nice open park not long ago now feels like just another high-rise housing estate.

I know I shouldn’t just flag articles up without saying much about them, but I think everyone should read this today. It’s quite a long economics article in the Guardian, and I feel it reflects what I’ve thought for years: the premise of low tax  economy is inherently unfair and does not withstand scrutiny. It’s author  goes through the various moral and economic arguments spouted by those on the right for low tax economics, showing the logical flaws in each. The reason why some people are rich  and some are poor essentially boils down to luck; in  a civilised society, there is  no moral justification  for allowing some people to hoard vast amounts of wealth while others are left to go hungry. The author of the  piece articulates these ideas far better than I can so I won’t try to add much, save to say that having a physical disability probably gives me a slightly  different perspective on this:  I see myself as a part of society; I try to contribute to society in whatever ways I can, although I cannot have a regular job. People like me make a contribution to society,  so shouldn’t society support us? after all, if we all just cared for ourselves and forgot the whole idea of belonging to a society, all the infrastructure we need to function would fall apart. For guys like me to be able to make a contribution to society, then, we need society’s support – support which would not be there in a right-wing ultra-low tax hell the outists seem  to be pressing for.

We are currently marking seventy five years since the D-Day landings, in  which thousands of people died to liberate Europe from right-wing nationalism.  At the same time, the UK is  trying to leave the European Union, an international body set up precisely to prevent such  military operations ever being necessary again. I doubt I  am the only one who sees a monstrous irony in that. It is utterly tragic. Here we are as a civilisation, decrying the folly of nationalism in one breath and cheering it’s resurgence in the  next. The EU was created in the wake of the second world war to create a Europe-wide forum in which countries could settle their differences peacefully: how can we be even contemplating leaving it and going back to a situation where such barbarities are possible, and where countries see theirselves as  rivals rather than friendly members of a federation? I’m sure many others  will be making this very point today, far more articulately and perceptively than I can (see this for example); but it just staggers me how we, as a society, can be stupid enough allow such nationalism to resurface.

A terrible pun, I know, but it amused me enough to steal it. The question is, will it be Boris, Michael or Dominic July?

I should have taken my coat today, but it looked so nice and dry when I left for the  protest  this morning that I didn’t put it on. I got up to parliament  square at about half passed eleven, and the place was already filling up with my fellow Anti-Trump protesters. I try not to go up there too often these days for fear of getting too angry, but today I thought I’d chance it: it’s not every day that the buffoon currently calling himself the President of America comes to town, and  I just had to go up there to show my revulsion for him.

Seventy-five thousand other people had the same idea, apparently. In  spite of the weather, it was a massive event in parliament square, with a very carnivalesque atmosphere. I spotted one or two pro-Trump people, but the vast, vast majority were there to oppose the embarrassment to humanity. I tried to engage a few people in conversation, but kept finding that as soon as I had typed my sentence into my Ipad things had moved  on. That happens sometimes, especially at high energy, fast moving events like today’s.

I was  there for a few hours, first watching the crowds gather then  listening to the speeches. Luckily, they let me go to the front  so I got an excellent view  of the speakers; I especially liked David Lammy’s. Of course, it’s anybody’s guess what effect, if any, a protest like today’s will have, but we nonetheless have to try. What is now happening in the world vis a vis  things like Trump and Brexit can be seen as the return of a form of fascism. If that is true, then surely we must do something – anything – to try to stop it.

I know I shouldn’t laugh, as advocating violence shouldn’t  be encouraged, but this has me chuckling into my morning coffee. The band Killdren has been blocked from their Glastonbury gig this year. “A band criticised for calling on members of the Conservative Party to be killed have had their Glastonbury Festival booking cancelled.” I know it’s wrong but reading that tickled me. How hilarious would it be to see so many people  dancing away to songs about killing twits like Gove or Johnson? I suppose it’s  just a reflection of  the time, both in that society is now so politically furious that we  get bands singing songs about murdering politicians, and in that we’re now so insecure that we can’t allow people to listen to them at festivals.

I still think we need some kind of massive cultural movement  to counter Brexit, History teaches us that the best way to counter any kind of oppressive or occupying force is through some kind of nonviolent civil action. It is now quite clear that Brexit is that kind of force, and must be opposed. Surely the best way the country can show it’s opposition to the utter stupidity of brexit is through some kind of enormous cultural movement. It’s now obvious that if we don’t act, we can kiss goodbye to the NHS and will be eating chlorinated chicken before you can say ‘human rights’. Surely there must be a way for us Remainers to get together to create art and events to show our opposition to what is happening.

What I  have in mind would be massive – it would  need to be: festivals, events, music and film. Perhaps it could even be on the same epic scale as the London 2012 Olympics  (and London, being such a staunchly Remain city, might make an excellent host). Surely there must be some way to mobilise the vast swathes of actors, directors, writers and artists opposed to Brexit; and presumably most people in the mainstream media industry can see it  for the mindless fascism it is too. We need to get everyone together  to tell the government that we vehemently oppose what is going on, otherwise something  absolutely nobody knowingly voted for will be forced upon us. The only question is, how can we  get such a cultural movement going?

This afternoon I had the same problem I noted last Saturday, I just got in from a  nice long stroll to Woolwich and back. It’s Saturday, so once again I’m wearing  my Charlton football  shirt. The problem is, as I’m rolling along in my powerchair, people I pass – strangers,  usually men  – suddenly shout things like “Come on addicts!”  at me, completely out of the blue. The first time it happened, roughly here, it scared the living shit out of me. It took me a couple of seconds to realise what he was talking about  and remember that The Addicts or Addics is the nickname for Charlton Athletic FC.  I was a little more prepared the second time it happened and didn’t jump quite so high, but I must remember what happens the next time I put this shirt on. I mean, what am I supposed to be addicted to anyway?

Why, with the nation’s economy like it is. are we going to the extremes detailed here to set up and police the visit of a failed businessman and total jackass, just because he claims to be the president of the united states? Almost any other world leader would be most welcome, but Donald Trump is a joke – an egotistical moron with no right to be where he  is. The longer America calls him it’s president, the more of a joke it becomes.  For  us to join in their absurd game, probably because we need to suck up to  America because we’ve completely screwed ourselves through Brexit, just makes the UK look even sillier.

Just to counteract the feeling that everything and everyone is sliding into bigotry, I think this is well worth flagging up. It’s a short BBC film about a family whose father transitions into womanhood.  The family are open, honest and accepting. At a time when social tolerance seems  to be becoming more and more rare, and  fools who decry political correctness are lorded for speaking  some sort of suppressed reactionary truth, it’s good to see that some pockets of open-minded  liberalism remain.

The film is called When Dad Became Charlotte. Since I nabbed that title for this entry, I better just clarify that that refers to neither my dad or my friend Charlotte, although if those  two somehow metaphysically exchanged places it would certainly be interesting. 😀

Yesterday was quite a cool day, and what I tried to deride at first quickly became a welcoming, fascinating place. Manchester might not be a metropolis (but then,  compared to Delhi, neither is London) but maybe I’m tired of metropolises. Yesterday John and I explored the city a bit, meeting Charlotte for lunch before getting the tram to Media City to see a stage adaptation of Little Miss Sunshine. To be honest what I found most cool was the tram network: inevitably, perhaps, I found myself comparing it with London’s tube, but I found it brighter and cleaner, and far less hassle to get onto. All you have to do is go up a ramp onto a raised platform in the street and the tram can take you anywhere in town city. No lifts, no inaccessible subterranean stations.

I seem to be getting all over the place recently: India one week, Normandy a few weeks later, and today finds me in Manchester. John suggested a trip up here when I got back from France last week, and I can never turn down a good voyage of exploration. Even though I was born and grew up in the north west, the truth is I don’t feel I have ever really explored Manchester; I don’t know it like I now know London. Moreover a further truth is I’m starting to think about places I can move to after London: almost ten years in a vast metropolis can be quite wearing. Thus I want to get a feel for how Manchester compares in terms of infrastructure, public transport etc. More to the point I want  to see how much fun there is to be had up here.

Just when you thought things couldn’t get much worse

Mind you, even in that photo, Johnson is obviously posing: he’s been told beer drinking is good for his image, so is trying to look as if he’s thirsty for it, but has obviously never held a beer or been into a pub in his life.

I have got into the habit of wearing my charlton football shirt every Saturday. I bought it for when my cricketing friend James and I go to matches at The Valley, but it seems apt to don it every Saturday. While I don’t take any particular interest in the football scores, I like showing I’m part of the local community. The only thing is, from time to time it means random people- men usually – shout things like “come on Charlton !” at me as I’m going along the street. I suppose that isn’t too bad, but once or twice people have shouted abuse at me, I guess due to recent football results and where I am. It has never been too bad but it does take me aback, especially if it takes me a couple of seconds to twig why I’m being shouted at. I suppose it has to be expected if I’m going to wear a charlton football shirt, although I better not wear it if I ever go to Millwall.

Theresa May has resigned, it would seem. Given that way all knew this news was coming, I don’t think there’s much I can say on the subject. As happy as I am that the useless cow is going, the only thing which concerns me is who will replace her. Every candidate with their name down to get into Downing Street is even more of a scumbag: either they’re a self serving numpty, as in Boris Johnson, or they’re a fascist in all but name, as in Jacob Rees-Mogg. Either way they’re an outist set upon serving their party’s needs rather than doing what’s obviously right for the country. When oh when is the country going to grow up, get a grip, and call an end to this utter, utter farce?

It may only be just over a minute, but I am suddenly very, very excited. Check this out! The captain, it would seem, has returned!

One of my favourite actors is Sir Ian McKellen. I loved his portrayal of Gandalf as well as his appearance at the 2012 paralympic opening ceremony. As he turns 80, friends including Derek Jacobi, Janet Suzman, Michael Sheen, Bill Condon and Stephen Fry pay a well earned  tribute to him here. Happy birthday Mithrandir!

My parents just dropped me off back in Charlton after a long drive from Normandy to some great news. The podcast version of my university memoir, Sweet Home Alsager, is now online. All eight chapters can now be listened to here. Enjoy!

My brothers have now both gone home. Mark and Kat left us yesterday, the children needing to go back to nursery today; and Luke and Yan set off back to the uk this morning. Today is dads birthday, so we have spent a nice leisurely day, first visiting Mont St Micheal then reading in the back garden. Mont St Michael is an ancient monastery standing on an island not far from here. It kind of reminded me of the temples we saw in India, only when you follow the causeway out to the island you find it’s ancient winding roads edged with modern shops. I found the juxtaposition of medieval and modern commercial most striking. It felt like a cross between Hogwarts and the Westfield shopping centre. The problem was the paths were very steep, so at times we found ourselves wishing my friend John was with us to help push my chair.

I have always enjoyed listening to my dad read to me, so this afternoon he has been reading some of Lee Ridley’s I’m Only In It For The Parking to me. It’s clear that Ridley is a very talented writer and that I was stupid to be so bitter and cynical. What he has written is probably a seminal text on disability. I’ll post a full review when i have read it all, but I have never heard what I recognised as my world discribed so well, or with such an astute balance of seriousness and humour. Not only is it clear Ridley knows what he’s talking about, but he knows how to explain it in a way that is accessible and understandable to everyone. I’m now looking forward to reading the rest of the book; the only problem is I’ll have to get my own copy as I gave the one we have to dad for his birthday.

This weekend has been the first time I’ve had chance to spend time with my nephew and niece, O and E. It has been very special. At 5 and 2, they’re both bundles of energy, full of fun and laughter, apart from the occasional paddy. Hearing my brother mark being referred to as daddy has been quite amusing; but it really is obvious that fatherhood is second nature to him, as he discusses science and world affairs with us adults in one breath and reasons with a toddler over the consumption of breakfast in the next. Mind you the children still seem a little apprehensive about their uncle Matt: I have tried to spend time with them, such as joining in a football game last night, but O especially seems not to know what to make of his wobbly uncle. Of course the remedy for that is just time, and I’m now really looking forward to the coming years, to watching them grow and develop. Given that they’re both already bright as buttons, I can already tell they have astounding futures ahead of them, and they will bring their parents and the whole family a great deal of joy.

This entry finds us in northern France, and by us I mean my family, ie myself, my parents, both my brothers and their respective families. I drove down yesterday with mum and dad, to a beautiful old medieval farmhouse in Normandy. It’s wonderful to see everyone together again, and to meet my young niece and nephew. Judging by the breakfast we just had, it will be quite a few days. We haven’t been together properly like this for such a long time I think it was certainly overdue.

As  chilling as it is, I  think I ought to flag this Guardian piece up today. Focussing on  a new exhibition in Berlin, Martin Kettle writes about how  ”[t]he political landscapes of Brexit Britain and Weimar Germany are scarily similar.” History, it seems, is repeating itself:  as in Weimar Germany,  ”[h]ere, also, there is a surging narrative on the right about national betrayal, which seems likely to score heavily in the European polls next week. Here, more than half the public, according to a recent Hansard Society survey, says it supports “a strong leader willing to break the rules”. Here, racism of various kinds is on the increase. And here too we have experienced political assassination (also from the far right), public threats of violence against politicians, and official warnings that MPs are no longer safe.” This is a warning which I fear we can ill afford to ignore

I still have a Google alert set up to bring me daily news about Patrick Stewart’s return to Star Trek, and what I’ve been reading recently is that he will be playing a very different Jean-Luc Picard. The reports are that this will be a much more introspective, psychological series than Next Gen, and that Picard is going to have changed. That made me wonder, how much can characters change before deviating too far from the original? If they go too far and change Picard too much, fans will react badly. On the other hand, many well-established characters have evolved and changed throughout their history: think Sherlock Holmes or Hercule Poirot; but perhaps the most obvious example is James Bond. Bond as played by Roger Moore and, say, Daniel Craig are completely different, but both are essentially 007, and both contribute to the character’s legacy.

The question then is, can it be the same case with Picard? Is the character capable of withstanding similar changes? The obvious difference is, he will still be played by the same actor, Patrick Stewart, so there might not be as much scope for modification that there might be were they to get a new actor. Then again, I daresay fans, including myself, wouldn’t stand Captain Picard being played by anyone other than Sir Patrick. Of course, it’s logical that he will have changed over time, but go too far and they risk ruining the Picard fans love and admire.

As long as he gets in the occasional ”Make it so” and drinks his Earl Grey Tea hot, though, I don’t think they can go too wrong. Like James Bond and indeed any long running character, the Picard character has a set of iconography which helps to define him; a set of attributes writers and directors include whenever a character appears, and which viewers come to expect. Thus Bond is expected to drink his martini ”shaken, not stirred”, wear expensive suits and introduce himself like this. I have little doubt these attributes will reappear when Picard returns; the question is, how much room is there for the producers to play with everything else?

Of course, one should stick to the principal that, in a court case, a defendant should be presumed innocent until proven guilty, but having just read the final paragraph of this Guardian article, I think there might be exceptions to that rule. Boris Johnson is being sued for misconduct in public office by a group of private citizens for lying in the Brexit referendum. Next week a judge will decide whether to summon Johnson to court. He’s being brought to book over the famous 350 million quid bus claim. The article ends by saying that the legal team ”wish to stress again that Mr Johnson has not been charged with any criminal offence and is at all times presumed innocent until proven otherwise.” But then, they have to say that,  don’t they? How can Bojo be anything other than guilty? We all saw the bus; we  all  know the claim was complete poppycock, and any vaguely sentient person can deduce Johnson et al must have known it was bull before it was painted on the bus. It’s obvious Johnson is guilty. How  can he be anything other than guilty? Mind you, you could say the same about Donald Trump.

I knew I had good cause to be proud of London. The Evening Standard is reporting that seven in ten Londoners now back remaining in the European Union. Of course, the outist p’tahks will say it means the  capital is full of snobby cappuccino-drinking poshboys, but to me it just reinforces my fondness for this outward-looking, forward-thinking metropolis.

I am beginning to think I have a  serious problem with my rages; they are worse than ever. These days, even the simplest thing can make me go ballistic. I have known that my CP effects my emotional control for a while now, but it is really getting stupid. I get wound up over the simplest things: it’s what brought on that rather juvenile blog entry about Lee Ridley a couple of days ago; and whenever I see anything pro-brexit online, I go baserk. It’s reached a point where I’ve been waking up at night and winding myself up so much that I end up banging my mattress with rage. I have quite a bit on my mind at the  moment in my personal life, and I’m worried about my future, but even if they last only a few seconds, these rages cannot be healthy. For a few moments I think the whole world is out to get me, or  that I have enemies  who have screwed me over and whom I must find and kill. It really is getting ridiculous. I really need to chill out.

I’m afraid to admit that I’m not at all surprised by this news.  ”Online disability hate crime has hit record levels in England and Wales, surging by a third in one year, figures show.”  As  alarming as that is, I’m afraid it’s  just a sign of the times: everyone seems to be getting angrier  and angrier, lashing out at minorities including those of us with disabilities. Arseholes like Trump and Farage have given the green light, in some, to express prejudices which would previously have been frowned upon, so that these uneducated, unthinking trolls now think  its big or manly to call people names and resort to the most  base, disgusting insults. The result is increased anger and hostility all round. With everyone getting so angry, especially online, I dread to think where this is heading.

There’s no denying the country is currently utterly divided, possibly more divided politically than it ever has been. Brexit has torn us in two, and, despite Corbyn’s laughable attempts to straddle the fence, I don’t see the country coming back together anytime soon.  Now, this might be a silly idea, but it seems to me that what we could do with now is a great big party. Think back to 2012, when the country was all cheerfully united behind London  (the Lib Dems recently invoked the same  idea in a recent ad). I wish we could get some of that united feeling  back. As much as I despise Brexit, this current widespread hostility isn’t good for anyone.

What we all need, then, is a great big party. I  think this is what the tories were getting at with there widely-ridiculed ‘Festival of Britain’ idea. But cruising around a rainy Woolwich yesterday,  I had an idea: what if Crossrail had an opening ceremony? We’ve all been waiting ages for this new zarking tube line, so we might as well have a party when it finally opens. Why not? It could be a big,  grand affair; and since one of it’s main termini will be up in stratford, why not put the show on in the olympic stadium.

The only question is, what would be in the show and who would direct it? I recon it should be on similar lines to the 2012 opening ceremony, although, given old Liz would be at least eight years older by the time Crossrail opens, and 007 will probably have another actor playing him, reusing this film might seem a little dated. Even so,  just think what could be in it   and what a party could be thrown. I definitely think it should include at least one rendition of this song. The  only thing is, it would have to steer clear of politics: if it appeared to  celebrate Remain or Leave, it would only deepen already dangerously deep divisions. Better just celebrate trains, tunnels, and stuff we all agree about.

I think this is worth  flagging up today. A large proportion of musicians with disabilities are being denied work because they can’t   access venues, or their disabilities can’t be accommodated in some other way. To be honest I’m not surprised. The flip side of the coin, of course, is that  we disabled punters can’t go to a lot of gigs because the venues are still inaccessible. Having said that, things have improved vastly from how they  were, especially in London. My trip to India really drove home how good London is for accessibility. Sure there’s still quite a long  way to go, but having visited a  place where I would have struggled to get anywhere if I had not had a PA like John, I now think london is quite advanced in terms of accessibility.

I honestly don’t know what to make of this. The beeb are running a competition to find the best use of David Attenborough’s voice in a piece of electronic dance  music. When I said we ought to have some kind of awesome  national tribute to  Sir David Attenborough, using his voice on dance tracks isn’t quite what I had in mind. At first glance, I thought it might be a cool idea, especially given  the article says the music uses Attenborough’s early audio recordings for Zoo Quest; but, having listened to the tracks  and not being a fan of trancey-dancey music  anyway, I can’t say I’m that enthusiastic about it. Mind you,  I know at least a couple of people I could  encourage to enter.

Edit, 19 may 2019. When I first heard that Lee Ridley had published a book, I got quite jealous and made a lot of stupid assumption. Having finally got round to reading the first chapter of the book itself, I’m quite frankly furious I ever wrote such a bollocks entry. I’ll try to write a full review when I’ve finished it, but I’m Only In It For The Parking is shaping up to be a seminal text on disability. It is both informative and funny. It has a type of self knowledge ideally suited for introducing  nondisabled people to what I instantly recognised as my world. Ridley is clearly a very good writer indeed I’m embarrassed that I was ever so childish and arrogant.

Yesterday afternoon I came across a reference to a film called Denial, drawing links between it’s subject and contemporary attitudes and events. The film, the Facebook post said, was about a historian who tried to deny the holocaust, but the post attempted to draw a parallel between it and Trumps attempt to rewrite history over the size of his inauguration crowd. Intrigued, I decided to look the film up, and I found what I saw very interesting indeed.

When I say interesting, in this case, I do not wish to imply the film is not troubling: what Denial deals with – the deliberate rewriting of history for political purposes – is obviously very troubling indeed. It is a BBC film from 2016, directed by Mick Jackson, which concerns a court case between Deborah Lipstadt, an American holocaust scholar, and David Irving, an arrogant holocaust denier who has built a career trying to rewrite history. Irving is suing Lipstadt for libel, accusing her of defaming him as an academic. Because the burden of proof lies with the accused in the UK, it is up to Lipstadt and her team to demonstrate that irving knowingly lied about the holocaust.

Back in my third undergraduate year at university, our cultural studies course was on Heimat, a german television series which dealt with the cultural fallout of the holocaust. Some of the background reading we needed to do touched upon the historiography of the holocaust, and the philosophy of history as a discourse. Ever since then I have been rather interested in what history actually is and how we know what happened in the past actually happened. It isn’t as certain as one at first assumes. All one has to go on are contemporary records and accounts, accounts which, of course, are invariably subjective and open to scrutiny. Rather than being fixed, then, history is open to revision and change.

When it comes to highly emotive, political issues like the holocaust, however, you can see how that can become very problematic. Bigots like irving who want to redraw figures like Hitler claim that documents confirming the holocaust were somehow falsified by the allies; they seek to let the Nazis off the historical hook. Some claim it is a jewish conspiracy made up in order to justify the creation of Israel. It then falls to people like Lipstadt to show they are actively and dishonestly trying to deceive us. History is always going to be subjective; the danger comes when people try to use that subjectivity for their own political advantage. The murder of six million jews must never be forgotten to history, but there are people who want it erased from the historical discourse in order to justify their own views. It falls to the rest of us to remain true to the overwhelming evidence and see that the past is not rewritten.

I think I can see what the post I initially came across on Facebook was getting at. Of course, holocaust denial and the size of Trumps inauguration crowd are two entirely different kettles of fish; but in both cases we find powerful forces trying to reshape and redraw what we think happened in the past, for their own ends. While you can go too far in trying to liken Trump to a Nazi, he nonetheless seems to want to dispute what the rest of us know to be fact: we all know that his inauguration crowd was nowhere near the biggest in history, and there are photographs confirming that. Like people like Irving, he would have us believe something other than what we know to be true.

In the film, David Irving is played excellently by Timothy Spall as a smarmy, obnoxious arrogant arsehole. He has a massively overinflated ego, and thinks he is far more important than he actually is. The world seems saturated with people like that at the moment, Trump, Farage and Rees-Mogg being just three. They are full of their own importance, and seem to demand a respect they are by no means owed. Thus, while it was set around twenty years ago, Denial seems to speak to the contemporary political world, about men who think they have the power and the right to reshape our perception of reality. Just as Irving was set on portraying himself as a great historian trying to rewrite history, a david against the Goliath of the political elite, twats like Farage and Trump like to depict themselves as political underdogs up against a so called liberal elite. The irony is, they are highly privileged white men out to maintain their inherited social and political dominance. Thus in irving we see a forerunner of what we see now: smarmy white male liars trying to distort reality for their own ends.

The frightening thing is, Trump and co seem to be succeeding where Irving failed. People are falling for their rewriting of history, believing what they are told rather than going back to the evidence. Hence in some areas, Trump has succeeded in rewriting history: some people believe his outrageous claims, in spite of all the evidence to the contrary, just because it was Trump who said it. This strikes me as very dangerous indeed. It implies a personality cult the type of which we haven’t seen in years. Just as people like Irving go to great lengths to exonerate Hitler, so people perform astonishing acts of self delusion to believe the bullshit Trump spouts.

I daresay that may be part of what Jackson was trying to point out in making this film three years ago: the human capacity for self delusion is staggering. Yet in spite of the fact that access to information has never been so easy, now more than ever people are willing to believe what they are told against all contrary evidence, simply because they favour the person telling it. Thus the fragility of the historical discourse and the notion of historiography have never been so relevant. Certain people seem to think their gender, ethnicity and wealth means whatever they say should hold more authority than any other contribution to the discourse, historical or political. People like Irving, Trump and Farage would bend history to their own ends, perverting people’s perceptions simply to add to their own power; it is up to the rest of us to see that they don’t succeed.

I took myself to watch Tolkien yesterday, the new Biopic of one of my favourite writers. I had been looking forward to it, and whizzed down to the cinema as soon as I could. Now that I’ve seen it, though, I can’t say I was that taken by it. JRR Tolkien was a great writer, philologist and intellectual, no doubt about it; but that does not necessarily make a good subject for a film. I find myself agreeing with the good Dr. Kermode here: the film felt quite pedestrian and dry, without much inherent drama to it. Of course, there was an attempt to dramatise Tolkien’s relationship with Edith and the loss of his friends in world war one, but such stories could also be told about many other men. As Kermode says, had Tolkien not been the writer behind what is now one of the greatest cinematic franchises ever, it’s hard to see this film ever being made. Don’t get me wrong, it was a lovely tribute to a man once deemed ”The creative equivalent of an entire people”; yet rather conservative, religious oxford dons don’t necessarily make the best subjects for cinematic spectacles. Perhaps a second viewing would help, but until then I am not as enthusiastic about this film as I hoped I would be.