okay, i’m all riled up because i’ve been hearing some otherwise smart women saying some very dumb things, so i’ve just got to get one point off my chest:

women being in positions of power is not feminism – even if they got there on the back of feminists, and even if they appropriate the term “feminist”.

feminism is, at it’s heart, about ensuring equality for *all women*. there are two fundamental principles which must be central to embedding equal opportunity for all: the ability to control one’s body, and protection from discrimination on the basis of sex. feminists may debate many other factors and values around oppression and inequality, but without those two core rights, feminism as a movement, essentially has no meaning.

so you can be a powerful woman, and you can be independent, driven, educated, successful, capable, and equal to any man… but unless you act in ways which advance, at a minimum, those two fundamentals, you are not a feminist, no matter what you choose to call yourself.

to paraphrase jessica valenti: i can call myself an astronaut – that doesn’t make it true.

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“france’s lower house of parliament has overwhelmingly approved a bill that would ban wearing the Islamic full veil in public.”

i’ve mentioned here before numerous times that i live in a largely muslim neighbourhood. every day i step out my front door, i see many women in some form of traditional Islamic dress – most often that’s just long sleeves and hijab, but a niquab, or even full burqua, is not terribly uncommon. as an atheist feminist, i’m the first to admit that it makes me uncomfortable to witness, both the disconnect from the westernised culture we both live in, and what such dress represents about a woman’s place in that socio-religious context. it’s something i find symbolically oppressive, even when it is the woman’s fully informed choice to dress that way, as i believe it tacitly condones those (patriarchal) frameworks which exclude choice for so many other women.

but what makes me even more uncomfortable, is the idea that any (largely white, largely male) government should think they are entitled to dictate what a woman does or does not wear.

if i’m feeling charitable, i’ll ascribe these actions to some benevolent impulse – but what all those well-meaning lawmakers miss is this: that to proscribe a certain form of religious dress by specific law, is just as dictatorial as any religion proscribing westernised dress. the attempted imposition of westernised mores on women by telling them they cannot wear the veil, is just as oppressive as any religious requirements telling them they cannot show their hair. because when it comes down to it, the rationale may sound different, but the motives are the same: both embody an attitude of moral superiority, and a belief that society not only has the right to, but an obligation, nay, an *imperative*, to “protect” women through dress code.

when you put the religious clerics and the lawmakers side by side, they all think they know what’s best for the women, who are viewed through a lens of passive participation in their own lives and closets. and whether it’s through religious dictum or democratic law, women are stripped of any agency to *choose what is best for them*.

do some women choose to electively wear the veil? i’m sure many do, even as many do not. is it a choice i would make or agree with? not at all. but under no circumstances would i believe the have the right to tell them that they shouldn’t – just as i don’t believe they have the right to tell me i should. even worse, the targets of this law are people who are already (in many cases) dispossessed of the ability to exercise their will – and yet the lawmakers have banded together and singled them out for special attention and regulation. would any of them dare to dictate what a westernised woman could not wear?

established democracies must be committed to upholding freedom of religious expression, even if it’s an expression we find intensely uncomfortable. in a free society, we must uphold the right for women to make choices, even if those are choices we disagree with – otherwise we engage in perpetuating a power imbalance where women do not decide for themselves. i acknowledge that in some religious contexts, many women may not decide for themselves, and that continues to be problematic – however one set of clothing commandments does not, and cannot cancel out another. we may all feel better not having to see women wearing veils, but it doesn’t change a damn thing that’s going on behind them.

in the end , we cannot change people or their religion simply by changing their clothes, and it’s foolish to try. i think that if we want women to opt out of a religious mandate which views them (and requires them to dress) as lesser beings, we can only hope to incite change by exemplifying freedom, choice and tolerance ourselves.

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so the new government has over the last few weeks, been rolling out their “big new ideas”, both at the national and local level. of course, so much of this is not new at all, simply old Thatcherism given a shiny new patina of glossy technology and lingo. in particular, they’ve combined two key messages: partnering the ideas of paring down waste with massive public consultation.

we’ve been prepared for massive spending cuts to the public sector – well, no surprise there. they’re tossing around figures of 30% or more. but what is new is that they are inviting public sector workers to help propose which areas should be cut. they even have a snazzy new website where you’re invited to help “re-think government to deliver more for less”. all very well in theory, unless you happen to be a public sector worker.

as a public sector worker who manages a small team of 9 in a local authority, right now i am (and all my colleagues are) being asked to justify our existence, whilst looking around and knowing that in a year or so, 1-in-3 of my team members (or i) will likely be gone. those of us who remain will all be on pay freezes for the foreseeable future.

the reality is we’re all fighting not to be downsized, and like anyone else, if there’s a viable alternative that gives me and my team a chance at escaping the very real axe hanging over our head, well, i wouldn’t be shy about offering it up – and i don’t think there are many who would do differently. but it’s a sickening experience to know that in order to save your own neck, you must willingly participate in in the sacrificial offering of someone else. and in the end, they will do what they want anyway, but as one of the crabs in the pot, i’ll bear some of the guilt.

but instead, we’re supposed to go to the website and presumably contribute ideas like:

• sack council busybodies
• deport all refugees – “i am not a racesist nor am i a facshist if they are still under threat of death if they where to go back fine help them out but most of the conflicts they where running away from are over so send them back to rebuild there own countries”
• 10% paycut for all civil servants
• tax non-eu immigrants “to raise enough money to ensure the immigrant is providing enough funds to the Government to cover the extra strain on the nations infrastructure”
  
• kick scottish m.p.s out of westminster
• stop housing “deliberately” pregnant teenagers – “Don’t have children if you can’t afford them off your own back”

those are the kind of savings ideas they were looking for, right? because that’s what they got.

another public consultation exercise being undertaken is the new “your freedom” website. in theory, the government wants to scale back the rule of what came to be called “the nanny state”, so they’re asking people to propose laws and regulations they want to see scrapped. they’ve established a website for public proposals and commentary. again, if you’re truly committed to smaller, more libertarian government, then i suppose it’s a fine idea in principle.

the problem is that it takes almost no imagination to realise such a website is bound to quickly devolve into a sloppy free-for-all of intolerance, idiocy and blatant racism. some of the ideas floated thus far include:

• getting rid of speed bumps as they infringe on civil rights
• getting rid of the human rights act so the british taxpayer doesn’t have to support murderers on benefits
• religeous (sic) freedom for christians – “the Christian way of life should be respected and should not be ‘brushed under the carpet’ just to accommodate other religeons so as ”not to offend them”
• forced adoption of children
• immigration – “every Tom, Dick and Abdul that takes it into his/her head to come to Britain and live like leeches on the backs of the taxpaying public”.
• restore civil liberties – which apparently means “Ban homosexual and lesbians from advertising that their lifestyle is normal. It is not normal and they should not be allowed to tell our children that it is. Stop anyone who does not have a national health number or who does not speak English from benefiting from Free treatment in our health service, take a leaf out of the rest of the worlds health systems for ALL non residents. Stop anyone who cannot speak english from receiving benefits. No English NO CASH”
• ladies (sic) sanitary wear – tampons should not be taxed with vat as a luxury item. now i actually agree with this, but it’s probably not what the site is meant for
• allow people to own guns – because “Hand-gun training and possession teach self discipline and self control. Shooting is one of the few sports in which men and women, able-bodied and physically impaired can compete on equal terms. Being forbidden to own hand-guns implies lack of trust by the government, fear of it’s own people, that the people are immature and also makes us a laughing stock.”
• remove the ban on Roman Catholics taking the throne
• housing for people with mental ill-health – “the law states that, because they have ‘mental health problems’ they have more rights than the other residents, which means rights to create absolute hell for other people and not be evicted. the ‘Community Mental Health Team’ ( who really would be best dispensed with altogether!) act like a hysterical bunch of do badder do gooders by foisting their bizarre services often at the whim of a faceless bureaucrat in a housing association on the wrong people and leaving the really ill folk seriously alone”
• and take ian huntley off suicide watch because “if he wants to kills himself, why not let him?”

and that is just from a quick perusal of the postings submitted *today*. such vile, contemptuous opinions are being hosted on state-sanctioned websites which i, as a taxpayer, help pay for.

let’s not be daft: there is absolutely no way the government will action any of these proposals, whether spending cuts or legal repeals – even if there were a genuinely good idea hidden somewhere in the pile of shit, it would be a nearly impossible logistical task to even trawl them. these websites are simply technological lip service to mollify voters who got stuck with a “coalition” that absolutely no one is happy with.

is this really the best, most effective way to solicit public opinion that this short-sighted government could come up with? have they never read internet comment forums before? have they never scrolled to the bottom of an op-ed piece? it’s the equivalent of an electronic slam book.

but the pretence and expense of this is all the more baffling considering we *just had an election* whereby people presumably made their political priorities quite clear. it’s simply not possible to have effective collective rule, and in fact doing so risks de-prioritising those who are most vulnerable and fewest in number. the role of government is to balance the needs of all its constituents, not just those of the majority. which is, after all, why we elect leaders to act on our behalf… or at least, that’s how i thought it worked?

in the meantime, the great ill-informed masses will get to continue to graffiti the websites, in the name of democracy. on my tab. i’m tempted to submit my own e-proposal that cameron-and-clegg simply unplug the servers that host these pages, and do the jobs we pay them to do – come up with and implement smart, considered ideas.

and i would, if i thought there was a prayer in hell that anyone would actually get a chance to read it.

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i did it!

my edinburgh marathon official time was 4 hours, 33 minutes, 34 seconds – my second best time.

it was hot (25C and blazing sun! just killer, really) and painful – my hip started hurting at 2 miles in, and i thought for sure i would never make it to the end. when you’re doubting yourself, 20 minutes into a race, it doesn’t bode well – my only goal was to finish.

so let’s just say my use of painkillers would not win any medical seals of approval – i took 3 ibuprofen before the start, 1 dicloflex at 10 miles, 4 more ibuprofen at like 15 miles, and 2 cocodamol at 20 miles. i’ve probably put a hole in my stomach and permanently shrivelled my liver.

i drank and drank and drank. the punishing sun beat down on my face. i forced down nasty energy gels. i passed some runners, and was passed by others. at mile sixteen, there was a course dogleg – seeing the advanced runners already heading toward the end, knowing you still have two and a half hours to go, was incredibly disspiriting.

but somehow, (perhaps because i was concerntrating so hard on putting one foot in front of another) it passed pretty quickly, and before i knew it, i was at the 18 mile mark. that’s when i knew that i would finish for sure, and my goal became to finish without walking.

at some point, i looked at my watch and realised that actually, i was doing an okay time, and that perhaps there was even a chance of finishing strong.

i cranked up the music in my ears, put my head down, and started chugging. ” i will not walk, i will not walk, i will not walk”.

19 miles, 20, 22.

that’s when it got really hard. my hips were aching like rusty ball sockets, and my thighs began to burn with the fire of built up lactic acid. my face was coated with a layer of salt that got into the cracks of my sunburnt lips. my legs seemed to be pulled down by a separate force of gravity.

the 24 mile marker came into view and i pumped my fist in the air with a loud, “yeah!!”, startling nearby runners. i turned up the music even more and began singing aloud.

i wanted so very badly to stop. i began to think about all the reasons i was so desperate to run another marathon – the challenge, the accomplishment, the cause. the 25 mile marker crept up like molasses on a cold day in february. “i will not walk.” i sang even louder to drown out the insistent complaints from my quads, my legs crying out for mercy.

finally, the finish was visible and i let the emotion of the moment carry me across the line. nearly three years since my last marathon, 10 years since my first, i finished marathon #4.

and i was reminded why i do this, why i spent 3 years trying to do this – because each and every time i get beyond the limitations of my fears and doubts and exhaustion, whether that’s at mile 6 or mile 26, it feels like a triumph. there are millions of runners faster and stronger than i – but i can guarantee you, none of them ever have, or ever will, feel better crossing the finish line.

it’s a truth of all runnners: even if you are racing against others, you are first and foremost running against yourself. it is *you* that you have to face every time you lace up your running shoes, and *you* that will always be your biggest supporter. it is *you* who sets your own goals, and *you* that lives up to them.

a huge thank you to everyone who donated to the elephant nature foundation – your money means so much to the rescued elephants, and a tremendous amount to me as well. a massive shout out to my friend fiona, who kindly massaged me post-race.

several days later i’m already pondering what’s next on the agenda. my cousin and her husband (who do ironman triathalons), have been inspiring me to reach for a new goal, and i’ve just got the book “born to run”, so who knows… i have this idea for running 1000 miles in 2010. already got 400 under my belt, so we’ll see.

in the meantime, this was my 25 mile song – it worked wonders to lift my feet and my spirits through that last unending 1.2 miles.

my hero – foo fighters

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so a week ago, the conservatives and the liberal democrats agreed to rule the country as a coalition government under david cameron as prime minister. it was heralded as an unprecedented change.

coulda fooled me.

the new government? looks suspiciously like a lot of old government – read: almost exclusively white, upperclass, male.

the number of women in the cabinet (not to mention ethnic minorities) is not only completely unrepresentative, it’s completely *insulting* – talk about tokenistic.

columnists and feminist bloggers have, quite rightly, been taking our new overlords to task over a leadership profile that looks like something out of a 1950s sitcom. and much of the commentary response has been along the lines of, “well that’s who people voted for!” and “if there aren’t as many women and ethnic minority members of parliament to choose their cabinet from, that’s not their fault.”

bollocks. it’s a sad fucking state of affairs when the ‘old boys network’ in power expects to lay the blame at the feet of women and ethnic minorities for not being invited to the party in the first place.

it could not be clearer: if your party representatives are almost exclusively white, upperclass, male, that’s because your party is *exclusive*. if you don’t have women and people of non-white backgrounds representing you in parliament, it’s because your party doesn’t represent women and people of non-white backgrounds. if you can’t get women and non-whites to stand for you, it’s because of what you stand for.

in other words, not having a pool of women/non-white members of parliament to choose from, doesn’t let you off the hook for not engaging and involving them in your government. in fact, what is does is point out only all-too-clearly, that the way in which you develop your party policies and politicians is sorely, sorely lacking. anachronistic. retrograde, even.

exclusive.

do something *real* about the gender wage gap. do something *real* about police profiling. do something *real* about urban crime rates. do something *real* about the midwife shortage. make real progress on the multitude of real issues that face women and ethnic minorities, and i guarantee you, you will have absolutely no shortage of them willing to get involved in politics at the local and national levels on your behalf.

because not having a representative leadership does not allow you to just throw up your hands and whimper, “well there’s just not a large enough pool of women and minority mps!”, because if that’s the case, it just means you’re not trying hard enough. nor does it exempt you from responsibility for actively striving to represent all your constituents – including the 50% of the country that is female, and the 10% that’s non-white…

…and even the ones that didn’t vote for you.

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i got my race number yesterday!

so far i’ve been trying not to talk a lot about my training, for fear of jinxing it. and things were going pretty swell until my 18 mile run – since then my hips have been complaining loudly. however i managed my 20 miler, and have been trying to mostly rest and do physio exercises, in the hopes of making through this marathon with my legs still attached.

i only know that one way or another, i will complete it. painfully, slowly, or otherwise, i will get to the finish line. i’ve never dropped out of a marathon yet, and i don’t intend to start now.

so it seems like as good a time as any to remind y’all that i’m trying to raise a few bucks for one of my favourite causes – the elephant nature foundation. you can read my lyrical waxing about it here and here, but suffice to say it’s an amazing place doing amazing work. can you spare a bit to sponsor me? it would do so much good towards saving an abused elephant.

big thanks for all those who’ve donated so far – your support means a lot to me and to the ellies

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when i first arrived on these shores back in march of 2003, i was fleeing. i was deliberately running away from a government under george w. bush – the most uncritical, unthinking, intolerant, knee-jerk, fundamentalist, warmongering president i’d ever had the misfortune to live under.

so what a relief it was to find myself in a country lead by labour. a flawed labour, with blood on its hands and a disturbingly overzealous nannying bent to be sure. but still, fundamentally a left-leaning, socially liberal, welfare supporting labour.

over the past seven years, i’ve had my problems with labour policy: i.d. initiatives, immigration crackdown, civil rights infringements, to name just a few.

but still – it was reassuring to know that on the most essential principles of protecting the poor and disenfranchised of society, issues of equality and diversity, and human rights… underneath it all, still labour.

and as of today, i find myself once again under right-wing rule. i don’t yet know enough about david cameron to draw any parallels between himself and george dubya… but i know that the conservative ideas about how the government, social services and the economy should be run, are in complete diametrical opposition to my own.

when george w. bush was first elected, as depressing as the prospect was, i remember thinking, “we’ve lived under republican presidents before – how bad could it really be?” i could not in my wildest dreams have imagined just how bad it would be.

the last conservative run of governance here in the u.k. was the thatcher/major era.

doesn’t inspire a lot of confidence, does it?

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while i was home visiting my family, i got to spend a lot of time with my niece p, who is rapidly approaching the ripe old age of 5.

she’s got a lot of toys – not nearly as many as most kids these days, but a lot nonetheless. i guess once you have a kid, these things seem to multiply of their own accord – toys are gifted, handed down, left behind accidentally.

and being that my niece is a five year old girl, she is at that age where she has a plethora of pretty pink plastic princess toys. these computer-chipped, pepto bismol coloured, tacky disnified toys. much to my sister’s chagrin, i couldn’t seem to keep my mouth shut. part of me thought they were hilarious in their grotesqueness, the other part of me thought they were noxious – sexist and consumerist in the extreme. this one in particular, was the most odious.

it’s a disney princess cash register/till. disgustingly pink, it features all the stereotypically sexist disney princesses (snow white, belle, ariel, cinderella etc.) and buttons which say things like “cosmetics”, “toys”, “shoes”, “handbags”. it apparently also comes (when new) with plastic credit card and makeup.

it says this:

i think my sister felt i was critiquing her parenting by criticising these toys. “if you don’t make a big deal out of them, they’re not a big deal jen!”

and to a large extent, i know that that is true. after all, there are few well adjusted adult women who expect to life to replicate a disney fantasy.

but think about how many women who epitomise shopping as a feminine hobby, or who expect to be “treated like a princess” by a man, or who profess a love of all things pink – not an insignificant number. when these are the kinds of behaviours little girls find attention and reward in, it gets harder to dismiss these kinds of toys as being innocuous.

yet they are almost impossible to avoid – even i, a non-parent, can see that. even if my niece’s life were to be purged of all this consumerist pink princess crap, it’s what her friends play with at their houses. it’s in television and movies, it’s in the books and dvds at the library. it’s postitively insidious, creeping in from every angle. so why wage a war against something you can’t win?

i understand that. i do. and i’m not criticising parents, who are essentially helpless to prevent this invasion.

i’m criticising the corporations. it’s infuriating that so much of a little girl’s childhood is for sale – that there are people who make money by specifically targeting an avalanche of consumer goods at little girls which tell them in a million different ways they are most valued, most feminine when they conform to stereotype. that there are people who get rich by making sure little girls are tied up with a pink ribbon – it’s crass and amoral and, yes, damaging. because if you’re a little girl, the stereotype that you are being continually assaulted with is that all little girls like pink plastic princesses, and their parents like little girls who like pink plastic princesses, and therefore you must like them too.

it’s enraging that little girls and their parents have to battle these messages at all. and it’s disheartening to know so many of them won’t.

my sister says if you don’t make a big deal out of it, it’s not a big deal, and i want to believe that. sure, today my niece’s favourite colour is (predictably) pink. but maybe tomorrow it will be purple or green. she has that putrid pink princess register, but rarely plays with it – one of her current favourite toys is a wooden workbench. and if indeed, the most direct influence on molding and shaping a young girl is the role model of her mother, then my niece is one extremely lucky girl indeed.

i only wish all little girls could be so lucky.

pretty in pink – the national

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tomorrow is the uk general election – the first i’ll have been eligible to vote in since moving here. the system of electing a uk prime minister is vastly different to electing a us president – both have pros and cons, and i’m realising there are things i like better about each.

things i prefer about the uk election:

• pre-election campaigning is largely limited to a month. the official election period began at the start of april, and it’ll all be over with by the 6th of may.
• three genuine major parties. you’ve got the conservatives, labour, and the liberal democrats, who, whilst not as big as the top two, play a significant and important spoiler role. plus lost of smaller parties who (theoretically) stand a chance of winning a seat in parliament.
• less emphasis on personality. with 3 party leaders who couldn’t charm their way out of a wet paper bag (and a prime minister who perpetually looks like he’s got a bee up his bum), uk elections are much less about what the candidates look like and how they come across on television.
• less television campaigning. the uk recently held its first televised leader’s debates – much ballyhooed as becoming “more american” in the way in which elections are conducted.
• no silly electoral college.

things i prefer about the us elections:

• held on a regular, predictable day, at regular, predictable 4 year intervals. none of this waiting for an announcement stuff, as if it’s some kind of electoral surprise.
• voting for a leader, not a leading party. the last election, people voted for tony blair’s labour party, and then halfway through, got the bait-and-switch gordon brown. that irks me.
• less paper waste through my mailbox, fewer people campaigning door-to-door. i know i shouldn’t begrudge them my time, but when i’m constantly answering the buzzer during dinner, it gets annoying. and *all the trees* being killed by parties trying to get me to vote for them. at least television adds don’t clutter up my recycling bin, and robo-calls can go straight to voicemail.
• less emphasis on class background. there are no real parallels in the us to the uk class distinctions, but people in the us do not generally expect their leaders to have come from the same socio-economic background as themselves
• term limits

even with all the differences, i’ve got a dreadful sense of deja vu building in my stomach. most pundits seem to think the tories/conservatives will be in power by friday – it all feels a lot like the 2000 us elections, when the incumbent/heir to the throne *should* have had an easy ride to the polls… but somehow managed to pull defeat from the jaws of victory. there are lots of similarities – both felt to be too serious, too out of touch with the public, with the long shadow of misconduct by their predecessors still looming in the background.

there’s a groundswell of sentiment that labour (who’ve been the party in power since 1997) have outlasted their usefulness, and with the liberal democrats having a late surge in popularity, we may be looking at a big upset.

we’ve had to declare a truce on political discussion in this household – it is a true test of our marriage that we’ve not yet come to blows over this election. suffice it to say, however, that i’m voting strategically tomorrow, specifically to cancel out my husband’s vote.

whatever will happen in the rest of the country will happen. i’m hoping for the best, but bracing for the worst.

i only hope that the fallout (for the sake of britain and the rest of the world), is not nearly as bad as the george w. bush years.

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the other day i turned on the television to one of the “women’s” network cable channels that i never visit, only to stumble upon a show called “a baby story”. that’s right, a whole show dedicated to someone having a baby. i was intrigued to see what kind of plot twist there would be: perhaps this was a special messianic baby, or the birth was complicated in some way? but nope – this was just a garden variety birth, thoroughly sanitised, without even any bloody bits or drama. ordinary at best, dull at worst. and yet here was some middle-class lady with her legs in stirrups, eager to share her ordinary birth experience, presumably with some clamouring audience that had an overwhelming desire to watch almost nothing of note happen. but the gushing, glowing accolades about motherhood after the baby was born? well they were just unreal – you would have thought she was the first woman to ever successfully procreate.

it got me to thinking: when did motherhood get to be such a big deal?

now i’m not saying that it’s not individually a big deal for each mother. of course it is, and rightly so. i have a mother, we all came from mothers. mothers are important, we love mothers. i totally get that.

no, what i fail to understand lately, is the elevation of all things mother-related to near-sainthood. it’s become a cult of motherhood – one where all mothers are revered. all mothers are idolised, and mothers-to-be are feted. everything mother-related is viewed as being enveloped in a golden halo. motherhood itself is seen as the highest calling any woman can aspire to. mothers of multiples are practically worshipped (see: “Jon and Kate Plus 8″, the “Octomom” obsession, and anything and everything to do with the Duggars). society is obsessed with mothers. there are faddish “yummy-mummies”, and mommy blogs, and doom-laden warnings about postponing motherhood, and television shows, and acronyms for “SAHM” or “WOTH” mothers, and “soccer moms”, and “mommy wars”, and “helicopter moms”, yadda yadda yadda.

mothers sacrifice, mothers are wellspings of giving and devotion, mothers toil uncomplainingly and unendingly. giving birth is a miracle, nourishing a new human inside and outside one’s body is the ultimate act of creation and caregiving. raising a child is the most rewarding thing you will ever do.

all of which is true… but so what? 99% of all women will become a mother – why all the media hype?

it didn’t used to be this way. when i grew up in the 70s, mothers were just… mothers. (ooops, did i just say that?)

and yet we’ve fetishised it of late. and i would argue, we’ve done so to the detriment of both mothers *and* fathers alike.

(yeah, fathers. remember them?)

these days the cult of motherhood is so all pervasive, so all consuming, so all-idealised that there is overwhelming pressure on women to be something they can never be: the perfect mother. i know several smart, strong, capable women who’ve been reduced to a quivering mess because they fear “doing it wrong”. because attachment parenting doesn’t work for them. because they didn’t breastfeed long enough. because they breastfed too long. because they didn’t breastfeed at all. because they didn’t get their “pre-baby” bodies back as quickly as the next person. because they don’t have the wherewithall to enroll their child in private school. because they (*gasp*) can afford to stay at home, but don’t want to, and feel guilty about it. because they *do* want to stay at home, but can’t afford to, and feel guilty about it. because they let their child watch television. because they let their child eat sugar. because they got their kids vaccinated. because they didn’t. because they only have one child and their kid will be lonely. because they have a few kids and they don’t all get individual attention. because they spend too much time on the internet. because their kid doesn’t hit developmental milestones fast enough. because they don’t eat organic. because they don’t cook enough. because they buy their kid’s halloween costume at a store instead of hand-sewing one. yadda yadda yadda.

because they are under the weight of a society’s gaze that is all-idealising, all-critiquing, all-consuming, all-motherhood-all-the-time. and they are bound to disappoint. society has raised the bar so high, painted the halo with such a wide brush, that no one can possibly wear it.

and remember the fathers? in a society that is all-motherhood-all-the-time, they are relegated to the sidelines as ostracised bit players. we exhort men to be more equal, involved partners in parenting – but only mothers get the recognition.

and with a culture that is so skewed towards mothers, is that a healthy message to pass on to the children in this equation?

it seems to me that we have turned motherhood itself into just another obsessive pursuit of the unobtainable female ideal – just as damaging as any photoshopped model in a magazine. instead of viewing the “normal” and “ordinary” as worthy of quiet respect and appreciation in their own right, we obsess over and venerate a hyper-glossy and warped version of the female form, until women everywhere are killing themselves to conform.

and in doing so, we miss out on recognising the work of everyday mothers, doing everyday mothering. not extraordinary, perfect mothers who only exist in the careful editing of reality television shows. not sainted, virgin mothers who birth the son of god. just everyday mothers – who do it all without the limelight and veneration…

…and sometimes with a little help from a father.

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through my letterbox today….hrmmm, what’s this then??

huh.

i flip it over.

ah right. it’s time for the metropolitan police’s annual spy on your neighbour campaign! not that you’d know immediately from reading it that it’s from the met – what’s with the almost invisible logo?

as i may have mentioned, i live in a heavily muslim community. coinkydink that these are being distributed here?

good thing then, that i live directly next to this.

yup. that’s dozens of bottles of propane, and big sacks of fertiliser. oh, and they flytip too. perhaps i should call? i’ll “let the specialist officers decide” if the fact that it’s next to a hardware store is important. after all, “we don’t believe any call is a waste of time”, and don’t let that 13% terrorism conviction rate fool you: terrorists live amongst us.

(eta: i’d like to point out that i spent some serious time googling to find any evidence on whether this kind of scaremongering has lead to substantive police leads or arrests. i could find none. i suspect because there is none.)

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this is me. just back from a 13 mile run the other day.

would you say i’m “underweight”, “normal weight”, “overweight”, or “obese”?

moreover, why on earth would you care?

there’s been so much “concern” lately about those who’re overweight. from michelle obama’s concern that her kids were getting chubby, to howard stern’s invective of “concern” over gabourey sidibe’s obvious obesity.

seems whenever anyone is overweight, the general public now think they have a right to be “concerned”. for their health, of course.

but let’s be honest and call it what it is: it’s not concern – it’s repulsion. we’re repulsed by fat people. we’re repulsed because we believe that the physique of someone’s appearance is a reflection of their behaviour. behaviour we find repugnant, and ascribe morality judgements to: lazy, weak, slovenly. and therefore we feel free to discriminate, punish and openly mock.

think about that for a minute. when it comes to physique, we believe someone’s *appearance* reflects their behaviour. how fucked up is that? we would never ascribe morality judgements to someone’s eye colour, skin colour, or height. we would never ascribe morality judgements to someone who had a different number of legs/arms/toes.

i hear you saying already, “but weight is different! weight is something that can be controlled by behaviour!” and maybe sometimes that is true. maybe sometimes it is not. but do we make morality judgements about people who are underweight? do we express concern?

we do, in fact – but in a very different way. we may call them “sick” or “scary” out loud… but we glorify them in the media and express admiration in lots of other ways. we may call them “sick”, but we are *attracted* to them. we think of them as strong-willed, disciplined, in-control. we’re often secretly jealous of their habits. in fact, as a society we *encourage* the disordered eating of the underweight by giving them lots of money to act, model, or sing. our “concern” is often the equivalent of high praise.

and the way in which we express “concern” about the overweight doesn’t even correlate to other public health issues, like drugs, smoking, drinking. walking down the street we may see lots of people smoking cigarettes but we don’t think, “ugh, i bet they can’t even run to catch the bus”. we see people drinking themselves into oblivion in the pub, but we don’t think, “they should drink more water!” we see people addicted to heroin and we don’t think, “if only they had more willpower – they shouldn’t shoot up between meals.”

people we don’t know kill themselves in front of us every day on drink, drugs and tobacco. people who overuse drink, drugs and tobacco don’t get publically stigmatised in anywhere near the same way as the overweight, and yet we feel perfectly comfortable judging strangers we think are too heavy.

we don’t look at a fat person and see someone who may be poor or disabled. we look at a fat person and think, “if only they would *educate* themselves. if only they would eat less and move more. if only they had some willpower.” we look at a fat person and intuitively believe we know something about their values, their hygiene, their work ethic.

we look at a fat person and are repulsed.

which brings me back to the question: why do we care so much? why are we so “concerned”? why the knee-jerk condemnation? what the hell does it matter to you or me?

a person’s health is between themselves and their doctor, if they so choose. a person’s weight is their own business, not yours or mine. a person’s eating or exercise habits are something we are not privy to. and yet we judge.

i’ll tell you why we care so much, why all the “concern”.

1. it makes us feel better about ourselves. the same old reason we made fun of people back in the schoolyard as children – we get an ego boost by putting others down. it makes us feel superior, self-satisfied to think at least *we* are not fat. if someone else is lazy, weak, or slovenly, then we, by comparison are energetic, strong and disciplined. feels good, don’t it?

2. it’s so easy. the thoughts are already planted there, the stereotypes are have been around since forever – we don’t even have to think up new ones. every fat joke, every snide comment about weight, has always been right out in the open. it’s no longer acceptable to say bigoted things about people of other races, but a fat joke has always been a guaranteed laugh. hear or see enough of that, and eventually it starts to sink in.

3. cloaking our “concern” under the rubric of “health” gives it a veneer of validity. of *course* we just want people to live long lives and be healthy. what’s so wrong with that? (never mind the skinny people living on cigarettes, diet coke and cocaine.) so we come up with platitudes like “eat food, not too much, mostly plants” and reassure ourselves that it’s not that hard to be healthy, and healthy people are not overweight. cool, that lets us go back to #1.

4. it’s easier than thinking about and finding solutions to the root causes. trying to think about what it might be like to live in a neighbourhood without a supermarket is so hard. trying to think about what it might be like to be unable to exercise because you’re working two jobs and taking care of children is so hard. trying to think about how to change the industrial food industry which injects high fructose corn syrup into everything because the u.s. subsidises farmers for excess production of corn is so hard. trying to think about how to fix the economy so that one-in-five children don’t experience hunger growing up is so hard. trying to think about how to change the infrastructures of cities and suburbs which make it difficult to walk/bike places is so hard. trying to figure out how to reduce the prevalance of childhood asthma is so hard. trying to change the societal structures which make us more sedentary and less active is so hard.

in other words, we continue to be “concerned” about overweight people because it is easy, a cheap ego boost, and intellectually lazy to do so.

so when you looked at my pictures above, which category did you put me in?

the answer? i’m 5′ 3″, and i weigh 137 lbs. (62 kilos, 9 stone 11 lbs). that gives me a bmi of 24.3. put 3 more pounds on me, and i’m officially “overweight” at a bmi of 25.

not that it’s any of your goddamned business, of course. why, are you “concerned” about my health?

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last night jonno and i watched “avatar”. not at the cinema, after paying £20 and dealing with the crowds and transport on a saturday night, as one might generally expect, but from the comfort of our living room.

yep, we download. and i don’t even feel a little bit guilty about it.

in fact, i’m quite glad after seeing “avatar” (which i found trite, formulaic, and downright corny [not to mention insulting on some levels]) that i did not spend an hour plus getting to and from the theatre. i’m quite glad that i didn’t have to worry about us not getting seats together. i’m glad i didn’t have to sit through a full *quarter-hour* of advertisements, and another 15 minutes of previews. and i’m quite glad that i didn’t fork out £20 for the ultimately disappointing experience.

all of these are factors which hold more and more sway in my decision about my movie-going (or not going) habits. it’s all become such a hassle. it’s all become so shamelessly overpriced (£10 for a ticket and another £5 for some popcorn and soda?!). it’s all become more about the marketing than the actual movie.

and it’s a model which no longer works. it’s outmoded. twentieth century. the idea that the filmmakers have a god-given right to hold you hostage and milk you for every penny in order to subsidise ever more ridiculously budgeted movies – well in the age of the bit torrent, i resent it, and i don’t have to put up with it. i’m voting with my bandwidth.

as are millions of others. a few years ago, bit torrents were the domain of the technically savvy. today, bit torrents are completely mainstream. sure, the enforcement agencies continue to try to crack down on torrent sites, with some success (mininova and the pirate’s bay having both recently gone under). but like a many headed hydra, more spring up to take their place.

and it’s not a new conundrum – the music industry has also faced the same issues. so one might ask, do i also download music?

no. and why would i? why would i spend time searching through dozens of torrent sites for a single well-seeded torrent of an album when all i want is one or two songs? why would i use peer-to-peer programs which are rife with bloatware and malware? why would i take the risk of downloading a virus from some unknown computer out there?

why would i do any of that when there’s itunes and amazon and emusic that allow me to easily download exactly the songs i want for an extraordinarily reasonable and addictive 99p per song? without risk, without hassle, without a second thought.

so here’s what would make me stop downloading movies: a digital rental of up to £5, that allows me to decide if i want to stay in to watch a film, that allows me to watch indie movies which i might otherwise have to wait for mainstream distributors to release on dvd to see, that doesn’t leave me feeling ripped off if i actually didn’t care for the movie, and that doesn’t try to fleece me with millions of unwanted adverts. and where nearly everyone has an “on demand” feature from a cable box, or has the ability to stream content over their computer, there is absolutely no reason this model can’t be done. it would cut also down on piracy and give the independents a wider audience.

what it *wouldn’t* do is force me to subsidise the next £300 million James Cameron piece of rubbish.

and i’m okay with that.

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so they say the third time is the charm.

this is the third time i’m entered to run the edinburgh marathon, taking place on 23rd may. twice previously, i became injured and had to withdraw – last year, just a few days before the race.

however with the help of some physiotherapy and my natural stubborn streak, i am running again, and determined to complete my fourth marathon.

and as i’m going through all the trouble, i thought i’d try to fundraise some money for an organisation very near and dear to my heart: the elephant nature foundation.

those who know me well, know just how strongly i feel about the work that the elephant nature foundation does. Lek and and her team work tirelessly to save the asian elephant, rescuing one ellie at a time. Lek is also a brave and outspoken advocate of eliminating traditional abusive training methods.

having seen first hand the dedication work of Lek and her team, and having experienced the beauty of an “elephant haven” where ellies can spend their days just being the gorgeous creatures they are, i cannot recommend this organisation highly enough.

lek and the elephant nature park have been recognised for their work by the humane society of the united states, national geographic, and time magazine.

but don’t just take my word for it – read more about Lek and her respected foundation in the news here. watch videos of the ellies they have rescued here.

a hundred years ago, there were 100,000 elephant in Thailand. today there are fewer than 4,000 Thai elephants left.

if you haven’t already read about our experience at the elephant nature park, you can do so here, and see more pics here.

they are magnificent, sentient beings, and lek’s commitment and drive are an inspiration to me. if she can dedicate her life to saving the ellies, in the face of incredible odds, then i can certainly try to run a few hours and raise a few bob to do my part.

a world without these amazing creatures is not a world i want to live in. please consider sponsoring me at my justgiving page.

thanks in advance.

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valentine’s day sucks. there, i said it.

it all starts out innocently enough. in early grade school i remember the required annual arts and crafts projects, where we’d all fashion giant envelopes out of stapled manila folders, sloppily glue on red construction paper hearts and glitter, add our names in big block letters, then hang them off the sides of our desks. in the weeks before the holiday, we’d have to have our parents take us to buy a box of cheap drugstore valentines – the pressure to select the “right” kind weighing heavily. the teacher would have already distributed a list of class names, and in an attempt at inclusion, we were supposed to write a card out to each and every child. some did, some didn’t, and those of us whose parents made us write one for everyone on the list would still allocate the “worst” of our cards to the kids we disliked. on valentine’s day, we shoved them all into a big box on the teacher’s desk at the front of the room, hoping desperately that at least a few in the pile had our names on them. finally, late in the afternoon, we’d have a party, eating cupcakes and crisps at our desk while the teacher distributed the cards into everyone’s named and decorated folders.

to see some kids’ folders bulging with cards, while some kids’ envelopes held just a few token, parent-enforced valentines … that’s where my dislike of the holiday began. it was a popularity contest, pure and simple. i was always somewhere in the middle, but i always feared being one of those kids whose thin folder told the world they were a loser.

in middle school and high school, it only got worse. the schools (in a brilliant stroke of fundraising) offered carnations (or for high-schoolers, roses) that you could purchase and have sent with a note to your “valentine”, for the whole school to see. as in grade school, there were always some girls who went home with their arms full of flowers, and many, like me, who felt hopelessly uncool because we had none. the pressure to be “in a relationship” on the day, just so someone would be obligated to send you a flower, was intense. if you weren’t “dating” someone, you were unsophisticated and inexperienced. and god help you if you happened to be gay – the social isolation already experienced by those kids was only brought into sharper focus by a holiday which emphasised just how different they were. they weren’t just shy and inexperienced – they were outcast non-participants.

as an adult, all the gut-instinctive things i hated about the holiday as a kid have only been reified. the obligation to spend money, the perpetuation of heteronormative stereotyping, the portrayal of women as wanting/needing to be showered with prescribed gifts of diamonds/chocolates/roses/childish teddybears, the pressure to publicly display affection, the cheapening of genuine sentiment by demanding it be expressed on a given day, and the social exclusion of people who are either not in a typical monogamous romantic relationship, or (horrors!) not in a relationship at all… it all adds up to a big giant yuk.

so i’m boycotting valentine’s day. we don’t need more flowers, cards or chocolates in this world …we need more real love, understanding, and acceptance.

and what i want to know is, where’s the holiday for *that*?!

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i pass this poster every day, twice a day. plenty of people see this and think it’s a sensible advert.

i see it every day and it makes me irate.

it reminds me of this wonderful advert that the police put out at holiday time:

it is not my job to make sure unlicensed mini-cab drivers don’t rape me. that is the job of the *fucking police*.

funny, i don’t see any drinking or mini-cab adverts aimed at warning men. and if there’s an expectation that men should be safe drinking, and taking cabs, and can do so free from assault, then shouldn’t we hold the same expectations of safety for women?

we don’t make people or society safer by telling women they shouldn’t do what men do. you know, drink. and take cabs.

in a nutshell, this is the problem with ads like this: you *cannot* make women reponsible for “protecting themselves” without also implying that the corollary is then also true – namely, that if you *don’t* “protect yourself”, then you are somehow responsible if something happens.

it does not make sense on any logical planet to say, “we’re not victim blaming… but just in case, you should avoid becoming a victim”.

even worse, trying to scare women into never taking cabs or never drinking *does not make us safer*. it does not put rapists behind bars, and it does not innoculate us from harm.

i’m sick of seeing horrible, sad depictions of women who “should’ve known better”, crying with regret and shame because they didn’t heed the warnings, and now have been raped. (after all, don’t they know if they’d just been more cautious, they would’ve been safe ? but they were too brazen! and now look – they’ve been violated instead! look at them scream!)

vomit.

no. what i want to see is rape conviction rates that make it into the goddamn double digits. what i want to see is women who are unafraid to do the same things men do – walk the streets at night, drink (sometimes too much, even), take cabs alone. what i want to see is a society that no longer tells women they need to protect themselves from potential rapists, but that demands laws and policing that truly protect *everybody*.

take every last penny put into “sensible” victim-blaming adverts like these, and put that money towards stopping rape.

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one of the things i have come to truly appreciate about the u.k. is that it is, by and large, a pretty secular country. that’s not to say that people here do not practice religion – but that even without the benefit of any constitutional provision about separation of church and state, religion plays a infintesimally small (if any) role in politics, policy-making, and the public conversation at large.

and that’s just the way brits like it.

even so, i’ve been utterly surprised at the size of the furore over the pope’s recent comments in advance of his imminent visit to the u.k. the pope strongly criticised the u.k. equality laws which are designed to prevent discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender… even in the employ of the catholic church.

The pope said: “The effect of some of the legislation designed to achieve this goal [of equality] has been to impose unjust limitations on the freedom of religious communities to act in accordance with their beliefs. In some respects it actually violates the natural law upon which the equality of all human beings is grounded and by which it is guaranteed.”

turns out, the british public very much dislike being told what to do by a figurehead of another country, much less a roman catholic one. see, britain’s official church is the church of england – they did away with the pope a while ago when he and king henry had a falling out over the granting of his divorce, and haven’t had much use for him since. between a quarter to one half of the country consider themselves to be of “no religion”, depending on which poll you believe.

additionally, given the perceived influence of the catholic church on the recent u.s. healthcare reform palaver, and the general distaste for the role religion plays in so much of u.s. policy (stuff like “don’t ask, don’t tell”, the abortion wars, and fundamentalist congressional evangelism just do not happen here), and the pope’s comments have made him almost instantaneously persona non grata.

the backlash and condemnation has been swift and loud.

and immensely, immensely gratifying.

as an atheist who grew up in a tradition of church and belief, i understand how and why people want and need religion in their lives. i may not want or need a religion, but i would never begrudge others theirs. i understand how people feel divine guidance is important in their daily existence. while i haven’t believed in a god for many years now, i understand what it feels like to do so.

what i do not, and have never understood, however, is a belief in any higher power who views some individuals as lesser humans because of who they are. what i do not, and have never understood, is the need to try to dictate others legal rights based on a very personal spirituality (or lack thereof). what i do not, and have never understood, is the sheer hubris of those who believe that *their answers* to the greatest of life’s mysteries are *the* answers to the greatest of life’s mysteries. what i do not, and have never understood, is the audacity of those in positions of power who would use their belief systems to reinforce their power by stripping others of theirs.

so i have no love for the pope, who seems to feel threatened because our laws take away his right to discriminate against gays, women, and people of non-catholic persuasion. i have no love for the pope who uses his bully pulpit to tell our government how to run our country. i have no love for the pope who as the leader of billions of believers, still espouses a hurtful message of exclusion.

and for once, i am surrounded by compatriots who feel the same.

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(see here for my blog for choice entries from 2009, 2008, 2007)

“This year, we are dedicating Blog for Choice Day 2010 to the legacy of Dr. George Tiller. Dr. Tiller often wore a button that simply read, “Trust Women.” As we reflect on Dr. Tiller’s contribution and the current state of choice, our question to you is this: What does “Trust Women” mean to you?”

this really resonates with me. last year, in the wake of dr. tiller’s horrific murder, i found myself arriving at some surprising conclusions – that “trust women” extends far beyond the issue of abortion rights.

to live in a fully realised egalitarian society means that we must trust women:

-to control their own lives
-to control every aspect of their own bodies
-to make decisions that are right for them
-to make decisions that are right for their families and relationships
-to exercise the same kinds of autonomy, freedom and choice that are afforded to men

..and trust that doing so will lead to stronger societies for us all.

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you know, i guess i’ve been pretty lucky so far – for as long as i’ve been a massachusetts voter, i’ve had the luxury of knowing that my two congressional senators were champions of most the things i hold dear as a self-avowed bleeding-heart liberal. i’ve known that my two senators were in favour of women’s rights and choice, social services and benefits for the poor, environmental causes, full civil rights for all races/sexualities/gender identities, and protection of individual’s rights to privacy and speech. i knew, without even checking, that ted kennedy and john kerry were always on my side of the vote.

and now, i’ve been lumped with a representative whose politics i not only disagree vehemently with, but who will be actively voting against my interests as a woman, as a progressive, as a humanist. that sets me on edge just thinking about it.

worse than that, though, is that this vote was a proxy vote for the rest of the country. and that fills me with despair. it has taken nearly seven years living outside the u.s. to realise just how conservative and insular so many americans are. they don’t care about healthcare for all, they care about taxes. they don’t care about gay rights, they care about protecting their own hetero-normative mythologies. they don’t care about women’s rights, they care about their own patriarchal religious beliefs. they don’t care about global warming, they care about not spoiling the view from their condo with wind turbines. they don’t care about the american dream, they just want to make sure someone’s not stealing their dishwashing jobs.

ted kennedy must be turning over in his grave.

i was there for the obama election. i dared allow myself to hope that people wanted a kinder, gentler society. i’ve often felt alienated from my countrymen over the past seven years, and i’ve often thought that because of that, i could never go back. turns out, one-in-five obama voters supported brown.

today, what i know is this: there is one less vote for the kind of america i want to live in, and my hope was too fragile to sustain this kind of blow.

so fuck you, massachusetts. if you don’t care about me, why should i care about you? a friend recently posted this on their facebook profile, and it’s so apt that i’m quoting it here:

“elections belong to the people. it is their decision. if they decide to turn their back on the fire and burn their behinds, then they will have to just sit on their blisters.” ~ Abraham Lincoln

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under the bush administration, i used to hear from a lot of people who said they wanted to move to the u.k. because they thought it was “more enlightened”.

to those of you who imagined that britain is some sort of liberal utopia, i present to you three news items from today:

5 convicted in Britain over protest at parade

LONDON — A court found five British Muslim men guilty on Monday of harassment and using insulting language during a protest they had staged at a parade welcoming British troops home from Afghanistan. The men had shouted slogans describing the soldiers as “murderers,” “rapists” and “baby killers.”

The highly unusual trial, in a district court in Luton, a town with a large Muslim population 30 miles north of London, was seen by the defendants’ supporters as a rare test of Britain’s liberal free speech laws. Lawyers for the men argued during testimony last week that they had been justified in the words they displayed on placards and shouted at the soldiers because they were speaking “the truth.”

But the district judge, Carolyn Mellanby, found five of the seven defendants guilty of offenses under Britain’s public order laws, specifically of using “threatening, abusive or insulting words” and of “behavior likely to cause harassment and distress.”

now here i have to take exception with the n.y. times characterisation of britain’s free speech laws as “liberal”. in fact, as i’ve pointed out here many times before, there is no such thing as “free speech” in the u.k. – only that speech which has not been made illegal. and “hate speech” which is thought to be unduly inflammatory or potentially provoking violence, is illegal.

which brings me neatly to exhibit b:

britain moves to ban controversial islamic group

LONDON (AP) — The British government banned an Islamist group notorious for glorifying al-Qaida and tied to terror plots at home and abroad, but its Lebanon-based spiritual leader promised to reorganize under a different name.

The group, Islam4UK, will be banned starting Thursday after its British leader, Anjem Choudary, threatened to bring hundreds of people marching in protest through the streets a small market town known for honoring the British soldiers killed in Afghanistan.

The latest ban puts the group in the same league with terror organizations such as al-Qaida, and the Tamil Tigers. It could lead to the arrest of anyone meeting under the Islam4UK name or using the group’s insignia.

The group, previously known as Al-Muhajiroun, was banned before only to change its name and resurface again.

nope, no freedom of assembly here either! setting aside the obvious inanity of “banning” something which can simply reform the following day under another name, you’d assume that if they were actual terrorists, they could be arrested under the terrorism act (rather than just oh, “banned”), right?

oh, wait. someone already said that.

“‘Shouldn’t we, as a democracy and a country which upholds the rule of law and order, be banning individuals who break the law rather than banning organizations?” spokesman [for The Muslim Council of Britain] Inayat Bunglawala said.

and speaking of the terrorism act:

stop and search powers of the terrorism act ruled illegal by the european court of human rights.

Police powers to use terror laws to stop and search people without grounds for suspicion are illegal, the European Court of Human Rights has ruled.

The Strasbourg court has been hearing a case involving two people stopped near an arms fair in London in 2003.

It said that Kevin Gillan and Pennie Quinton’s right to respect for a private and family life was violated.

Home Office Minister David Hanson MP said he was “disappointed” and would considering whether to appeal.

those are the same laws which have in the past few years pretty much allowed any police person to stop and search any person anywhere without reasonable cause… as long as they record it in a notebook. they’ve made excellent use of this law – using it for everything from trying to get knives off the streets to harrassing climate change protestors to intimidating news photographers and tourists from taking photos of tourist attractions… but not actually catching many terrorists.

so tell me again what kind of “enlightened” society i live in?

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a british man in china was convicted of drug smuggling and put to death this morning.

that, in itself, is sadly not shocking in the least. china has long had a history of summarily executing people for non-violent crimes – something which the international olympic committee chose to overlook last year, and which most western countries, even those with the death penalty themselves (united states, i’m looking at you), choose to excuse in the name of global economics (or indebtedness – united states, i’m looking at you).

what i’ve found shocking is the number of britons who are either apologists for it, or chiming in with agreement.

the comments in most op ed pieces, or online polls, are truly shocking. to me, anyway.

here i thought i lived in a country which (along with the rest of the EU) had long since condemned the death penalty as a barbaric practice which has no place in modern society. and outwardly, politicians will tell you that’s true. but scratch the surface of that genteel british veneer and you find people saying stuff like:

“I’ve seen the dark side of drugs and what they do to a community. There is NO punishment too harsh to counter the evil that comes with drugs — especially heroin.”

“A dose of chinese justice would not go amiss in the treatment of drug smugglers in the UK. This execution will benefit sick chinese people who will receive vital organs transplanted from the criminal. No damage to the vital organs is ensurred by a precise shot to the back of the neck. Thus out of evil some good is obtained.”

“They should do the same thing with murderers over here in my opinion, for the same reason – it sends out a powerful message that there are some offences that are so bad that, if you commit them, you will pay the ultimate sanction.”

“the chinese made the RIGHT decision. pity the british government dont follow suit and make a dent in the uk drug problem!”

“Maybe if we had a legal system like China we’d have less problems with ferral drug addled layabouts in this country.”

“A good drug smuggler is a dead one.”

(and lest you think these comments are culled from the right-wing daily mail or sun, they’re from the guardian and bbc websites, every one of them.)

now, perhaps that’s not representative of the british public at large, but i have to say that my sense is that it’s more representative than i would like to admit. much like the backlash which has garnered the bnp so much support recently, i believe the same is happening here.

people are dissatisfied with the status quo – and expressing it in some truly ugly ways.

it’s typical, really. when we can’t figure out how to really solve a societal problem, we revert to advocating the most simplistically crude and unthinking course of action possible: killing.

it’s so discouraging – i thought that having left the u.s. (where the popular alternative of locking up drug users and dealers alike en masse is nearly as stupid and useless) i would no longer have to endure the kind of bloodthirsty and vengeful arguments for the death penalty that are so common there.

more fool i. the public are disgusted with their government. people are clamouring for change. and the pendulum will continue to swing to the far right until they have it.

* and the post title is a nautical saying to remind sailors which side to keep of the buoys, but it sprang to mind today as being alliteratively apt.

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