Mob Rules

 

Favourite New Books (by People Called Owen)

I would just like to bring your attention to two new books that I think are well worth checking out. The first is “Chavs – The Demonization of the Working Class” by Owen Jones. This book has had a lot of press over the last few weeks, although some of it has missed the point somewhat by concentrating on the word “chav” and whether or not it is an offensive term. This is certainly touched upon in Jones’ book, but the subtitle is more representative of the contents – the idea that the working class has been stigmatised, both by the media, and by the policies of both New Labour and the Conservatives.

A Pillar of Poplarism

The Memorial to George Lansbury on the corner of Bow Road and Harley Grove, Tower Hamlets.  The inscription reads:

“GEORGE LANSBURY

1859-1940

Member of the Poplar Borough Council 1903-1940

Mayor 1919-20 & 1936-37

Member of Parliament

Member of the Crown

Privy Councillor

A GREAT SERVANT OF THE PEOPLE

The house which stood here was his home for 23 years and this garden was created in his memory by public subscription 1955.”

A Gentle Saturday Stroll Through the Capital

There’s been a lot of press and conjecture in the last few days about the events of last Saturday, March 26th.  Half-a-million ordinary folk who turned up to register their displeasure with a government waging class warfare.   You’d think that would be disastrous for the ConDem coalition less than twelve months into its term of office, right?

Well it should be, but that’s not what has grabbed the headlines.  Instead the media, much to the obvious delight of the government, have decided that there was a far more important story happening.   The third estate, in its esteemed judgement, has decided that one of the biggest ever post-war demonstrations on the streets of the capitol was of trifling importance compared to a few incidents of petty vandalism and the entirely peaceful occupation of a high-end department store.  Instead of holding the ConDems to account for its package of swingeing cuts, the news media of this country has instead decided to put the boot into the few thousand representing UK Uncut,  a peaceful protest group, and its favourite bogeymen (after immigrants, welfare-claimants and Muslims), the “Black Bloc” anarchists.

I’m not going to pass opinion on UK Uncut or the others that have borne the brunt of the media’s attacks; rather I am just going to recount the day’s events as I experienced them.  I wasn’t present at any of the day’s major “flashpoints”, but I still believe I have come away from the day with a clear understanding of events.

Woop! Woop! That’s da Sound of da Beast!

In response to the monumental exaggeration of “violent” incidents at Saturday’s anti-cuts protests in London (which saw a massive 0.0003% of attendees arrested) Home Secretary Teresa May has “asked the police whether they feel they need further powers to prevent violence before it occurs.”

This would be the same police that on Saturday’s protests in London:

• Tricked protesters into mass arrest. These were protesters that a police spokesperson has admitted 95% of were “non-violent and sensible.”
• Placed plain clothes officers in the crowd to smash windows and incite violence.
• Provoked a major confrontation at a previously peaceful gathering at Trafalgar Square after a protester was “caught trying to place a sticker on the Olympic countdown clock” (update: the clock story may not be true, however the Police behaviour was even worse than I had initially believed as this video proves).

So, nothing to be worried about then.

Et Tu Brutalism?

I am currently reading Owen Hatherley’s ‘A Guide to the New Ruins of Great Britain‘ and I’m angry. I’m not angry at the book, quite the contrary – it is a scathing yet humorous attack on the architectural and urban planning legacy of New Labour that has sullied our inner cities by filling them full of areas rebranded as “quarters”, ubiquitous property hoardings containing words such as “vibrant” and “opportunity”, and square kilometre after square kilometre of empty office space and uninhabited flats.

I am angry at the destruction of social housing in order to artificially inflate property prices, and the transformation of entire working-class neighbourhoods into “desirable modern living” for the professional classes.  I am angry that when it came to its housing strategy, New Labour abandoned its principles in favour of a neoliberal approach, embracing the free market and the Private Finance Initiative, exactly as it did in other spheres of government policy.  But most of all, I am angry at the architecture.

Sheffield is Not Sexy

An academic paper on Sheffield’s attempts at cultural regeneration which is of particular interest to me as it is written by Stephen Mallinder of Cabaret Voltaire renown.  I assume that this was part of his PhD in Music and Popular Culture at Brighton University, where he now teaches.

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