A rant

[alexsarll]

In spite of London Transport's best efforts, I made it to the Good Ship last night in time for Lullaby Oscillatrix, and The Icebergs, and The Angry Bees, three very different new musical adventures involving my endlessly creative chums (OK, 'musical' might not be quite the right word in the case of the Bees). And the faff en route did at least mean I could pretty much finish off Anna Minton's Ground Control en route. It's a book I've been trying to read in public not just for the normal reason of it being nicely pocket-sized, but also as my own small rejoinder to the situation it describes in which, as that review is headlined, "they sold our streets and nobody noticed". The current government has encouraged councils to privatise public space, to sell off assets which were bequeathed to local communities in perpetuity (if not legally, then morally, this is clearly theft), to design cities in accord with unproven and pernicious theories. There's so much here I didn't know. Just one example: since 2004, compulsory purchase orders no longer need to show public benefit in any terms other than monetary ones. Needless to say, the idea that said money will benefit the public relies on our old favourite, trickledown economics - because in the short term it's going straight to the developers. Shameful. Also, it would seem, inescapable. This all took place under a nominally Labour government, which is shameful and ludicrous, but it's not as if it would be reversed by the admitted Tories, and I no longer even have any confidence in the Lib Dems.
In 1821, John Hunt was imprisoned for an article describing MPs as "Venal boroughmongers, grasping placemen, greedy adventurers and aspiring title-hunters...a body, in short, containing a far greater proportion of Public Criminals than Public Guardians." Obviously a lot has changed since then; now MPs realise that prosecution only makes martyrs and the system ticks over nicely if you just ignore how much the public hates the whole damn pack of you, so critics can make high-profile TV dramas like On Expenses which essentially advance Hunt's point over an hour of docudrama (the usual disclaimer admitting that some details have been compressed then turns around and reminds us that "mostly, you couldn't make it up") with a fine cast including Brian Cox and Anna Maxwell Martin...and nobody bats an eyelid, and MPs complain that they can't be expected to travel in standard class with the proles, and they use slave labour in breach of the minimum wage laws they passed themselves, and we head towards an election which is once again going to beat all the records for low turn-out because nobody's fool enough to believe any result would accomplish anything, especially not after we saw that even if we had a genuinely inspirational politician like Barack Obama - which we clearly don't - then, like Obama, he would probably be incapable of achieving anything if he got in, not with the system arrayed against him.

Comments

[atommickbrane.livejournal.com]

That's a bang on 200 word sentence at the end there, did you plan on that Barry?

I was just planning to update "good grief I need a pint", which I think probably sums your post up quite eloquently :)

And yes, I did paste that into Word to check. I'm having a rotten day! Can you guess?

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

Wow, I can normally write 150 word reviews pretty much dead on through practice...but 200 isn't a length I normally need, so that's quite a surprise.

Pints. Yes. Thank heavens for Poptimism, eh?

[carsmilesteve.livejournal.com]

but you can't say "mps shouldn't have expenses" and "mps should pay their staff properly" in the same sentence. where else would they get money to pay staff? or should all mps be independantly wealthy?

ha, good to see that phil willis is doing the right thing though!

(and, as the article says, unpaid internships are RIFE across every vaguely interesting career)

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

And they are illegal across every vaguely interesting career, as they should be, because the concept would be disgusting even if it didn't often result in paid staff being sacked in favour of unpaid skivvies, which it does.
Except that law never gets enforced because the lawmakers are in breach of it themselves.

And I've nothing against the concept of them getting legitimate expenses, but this should be better administered to ensure that the money is being used to do things like 'pay a sensible number of staff a sensible wage'. I realise some belated, stumbling steps are being taken in this direction, but I want more, faster, and with some vague impression that more than 5% the people telling us how to live our lives have some fragment of honour in their lousy carcasses.

[carsmilesteve.livejournal.com]

they are equally abused, yes. there are hundreds of ppl getting nothing for working in magazines, design agencies, fashion etcetc.

the tories response or "supply and demand dear boy" was strangely typical...

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

Yes. As in, it was basically the same as the Labour response but minus the bit where they pretend to care.

It amazes me that the whole concept of internships isn't a national scandal. Back when students were properly funded, it made some kind of sense, but now it's obscene.

[carsmilesteve.livejournal.com]

oh totally, and i wouldn't mind so much if these were students, but these are graduates trying to get a first step on a ladder...

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

I suppose it's our own fault for believing in that quaint old 20th Century concept, 'social mobility'.

[angelv.livejournal.com]

It's creeping in everywhere. Someone who has come to work here recently, a graduate of last summer who wants to work in publishing, said she was even having trouble getting internships. Publishing has always been a difficult area to get into by virtue of its popularity but it's a very recent thing to start not paying the staff but still expecting them to fight for the role. But noone seems to mind, and it is really weird that noone minds.

My brother's company (big media company) recently laid off Thomas' intern minion as part of a cost cutting exercise, so harsh!

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

What, was he getting expenses? Or just to save wear and tear on the chairs?

Of course, they never realise that cost-cutting often becomes revenue-cutting as well, because you can't realistically expect people to "do more with less". So contracts get lost, so more costs get cut...and down the spiral we go.

[miss-newham.livejournal.com]

Ooh, that was the book I gave you, wasn't it? I'm glad it was worth reading, if not exactly cheering...

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

Yes, I used the 'another depressing book' tag as my bookmark, and it was a fair summary, but also something I would definitely encourage people to read. Thank you!

[amuchmoreexotic.livejournal.com]

A while back I sent my MP a form email about libel reform and the Simon Singh case. Today I got a letter saying that he agrees with my concerns and will vote for the relevant Early Day motion. He's a Lib Dem, mind, and I think he was going to vote that way anyway, but I was still quite impressed.

I'm sure the Lib Dems "party of relative reason" shtick is a function of their lack of power. If you're not McDonald's or Burger King, then you might as well present yourself as a wholesome alternative. I'm sure if they became a second party they would quickly be corrupted too.

Still, you can't really blame MPs, because every policy they fight for is going to be presented through a stupidity/hysteria filter. If the public don't know or care about most issues, and do care about an imaginary paedophilia epidemic, then why not just concentrate on lining your pockets?

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

Regrettably true. Once, they were ahead of the curve on things like decriminalising homosexuality - now, they're at best ahead of the pack on hysterical nonsense.

[vertigoranger.livejournal.com]

Hi, I'd like to friends list you because you write about interesting stuff. That okay? Please be more gracious than the gobshite I told that to the other day who replied "You don't need to ask permission to add me. I'm under no obligation to add you back. OK?"

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

Yes, by all means!