About this blog:
Sometimes a bloke needs to vent. This is my place for it. It will be variable, sometimes drunken, sometimes thoughtful, sometimes contradictory. I will try to make it readable and interesting.
About me:
I am a bloke in my mid to late thirties, living in the south Pennines in a slightly rundown town which rhymes with 'chiefly'. I have a wife, kids and dog, a cheap house, a disability, and more education than brass. I have two good feet and enjoy taking them out to explore the local moors and dales, and a love of good beer.
Politically I'm a mixed bag; I read the Guardian and the Telegraph; I despise bad manners, political correctness, illiberal state nannying and wilful ignorance. I think open EU migration has been a disaster for those at the lower end of the labour market and some of the frustration coming out of affected communities is more than understandable, though I have no problem with those who have come, and some of them are great lads - they just want to get on after all, it is hardly their fault as individuals that they can afford to live eight to a house for a couple of years, sending spare cash home, while locals need paying properly. But it shouldn't have been allowed to happen at the speed and scale it has. On multiculturalism I lean towards integration being preferable to encouraging folk to transplant their 'old ways' to Britain and living alongside their 'hosts' rather than becoming part of the wider community. This is the root I believe of many of the race relations problems we have in areas of the country with a large Pakistani population in particular - a long standing reluctance on both sides to bridge the divide and find common ground, leading to suspicion and ignorance of each other, retreating into segregated activities and the radicalisation of the minority in some Muslim communities. Not exactly toeing the Guardianista line I suspect, but as anyone who browses CIF will be aware the liberal commenters can be just as blinkered and shrill as the most swivel eyed Daily Mail reader, just following a different sheepdog.
But I also find the callousness, dishonest representation of and utter lack of empathy shown towards the less fortunate displayed by the Tories, the right wing press and their spineless LibDem enablers abhorrent, and frankly stupid. Demonising those who need some form of state help to make ends meet is lazy and ignorant, most people just want a decently paid job, or if they can't manage that, dignity. There are a minority of folk out there only too happy to take what they are offered and do the bare minimum they can in exchange for it. And we call some of them MPs. And the ideological shrinking of the state in the name of cutting the deficit is going to cause more misery than it is worth (and it isn't even working) - do they really think by slashing away public sector jobs, tens of thousands in south Wales, Northern Ireland or the North East will suddenly find work in a revitalised and dynamic private sector, freed by the rolling back of the big state? That the NHS will magically become better and more efficient by hiving off services to the lowest bidder, with the corner cutting and creaming off the profit that entails? Or that forcing councils to slash their services will simply be a bloodless exercise in trimming the fat, without trashing many people's quality of life? So I find myself angry and frustrated, trapped between a coalition of heartless and incompetent twats enabled by liars and a confused opposition who won't stand up and present a cogent alternative, and like telling folk what to do with their lives even more. Who represents decency now?
Enough already. Enjoy the blog.
BS
No comments:
Post a Comment