The weakness in me

As masculinity goes, i’m no Charles Bronson. I don’t like violence; I’m a pacifist; I like imaginative language such as that of Jack Kerouac and John Keats; I read a lot; I don’t particular like any Sport (even though I used to adore football and boxing); i’m horribly clean; any talk of animal cruelty annoys the life out of me, angers me, frustrates me more than most; my World philosophy is based on love; i’m overly protective of people I think seem naive or easily manipulated; and i’m constantly in search of that hidden entity that brings me such deep inner peace; which at the moment exists for me, only in the indefinably mellifluous sound of the ocean waves at dawn, in the small town of Dawlish Warren, South Devon.

Despite this apparent mutated masculinity, I do have certain traits that one could refer to as “manly!”…. The Sopranos is my favourite TV show; I wont back off from a debate even if i’m being threatened; and my one monumental, incessant weakness is my inability to resist the charms of attractive and intelligent women. By those standards, i’m slightly more masculine than previously suggested.

However, that slight glimour of masculinity; that light of manliness in a forest free from it, was soon reduced to darkness again when Stacy (my girlfriend) and I went to the cinema this weekend, to see the film “Marley and Me”. We’d originally planned to go for a meal, and then to a bar, in celebration of our three years of being together. A meal and the bar had to do; I peaked in the arena of amazing boyfriends when I took her to Rome for our first year anniversary. So anything after that, was going to be difficult to top. I failed at topping it this year, but was a lovely evening nonetheless.

We finished the meal – which by the way was lovely – at the new Chinese Buffet Restaurant in Leicester’s High Cross Shopping Mall (new, in that it’s a bit bigger…. it still has the same crap shops you find in every other city in the Western World… other than Camden), and decided to go to the brand new Cinema. We chose Marley and Me because neither of us knew too much about what it actually was about.

The film is based around a family and their dog. It’s that simple. But within two hours of knowing this dog – Marley – you cannot help but fall in love with it. And suddenly, you’re almost a part of this fictitious family, watching it grow from the side lines. By the end of the film, most of the audience was in tears. I myself never cry at films, and I had to really concentrate on those damn deceivingly lugubrious eyes of mine, to make sure that although I thought I was in control of them, they wouldn’t just explode in a fountain of Jamie tears at any given second. Luckily I managed to keep them dry, but that was purely down to being able to think about something else, rather than the incredibly emotional scene being shown on the big screen. I fought those tear ducts, they wanted to burst open, but I was having none of it! The film finished just in time, because another five minutes, and i’d have been an emotional wreck on the floor of the cinema.

If you’re male, and you’re goal in life is to be seen to be masculine and strong; an Adonis of the human race; Zeus of post-modernity…… it’s probably best that you don’t go to see Marley and Me.

The Britain in “Tate Britain”

It isn’t a feel, it isn’t a tantalising smell, it isn’t a mellifluous sound, it isn’t a piercing glance. The truly underlying concept of what Britain is to me is that there is not a static concept of “Britishness”. It is not a finger print that never changes. Britain is forever changing to meet different challenges and expectations. We are black, we are white, we are gay, we are straight, we are rich and we are poor, we are business minded, we are family orientated, we are liberal, we are conservative, we are moody, we are loving. Britain is constantly changing, updating, and moving with the times. We are a dynamic nation, and whilst we hold slight conservative principles we are essentially a liberal nation. That which may be “British” to me, may not be a wholly “British” ideal to the next person, and so the true concept of “Britishness”, as a static concept, just doesn’t exist. I set out to investigate this with regard to the “Tate Britain”.

Strikingly, the exterior of Tate Britain; the stairs leading up to the pillars that heroically support the entrance of the building, had a profound affect on me, that is to say that I felt that for a building named “Tate Britain” there was very little “British” influence. As ones eyes start scrupulously scanning the building from the bottom upwards, there is an air of Roman-esque influence and so consequentially, Greek influence. I was reminded of The “Temple of Saturn” in the Roman Forum. A broken building with merely the supporting pillars remaining. “Tate Britain” is like looking into the past and experiencing the power of an empire, a fully functioning ‘Temple of Saturn’ with its history and it’s power. And so this led me to consider the concept of power and the past.

Britain itself has deep Roman roots, dating back to the Emperor Claudius invasion of Britain in 43AD. And so British Ancestry is drowning in Roman influence. Furthermore, the pillars themselves are a universal symbol of grandeur and power. Suddenly, I was linking a Roman-esque style building, the the power and influence of the British Empire. Perhaps the exterior of “Tate Britain” was much more “British” than previously considered. The multiplicity of influences on the building itself stands as a beautiful metaphorical reminder that our culture is actually a multiplicity of cultures, from Roman, to Anglo-Saxon, from Catholic to Protestant in the 16th and 17th Centuries, to the influx of Islam, Hinduism and other influences we see today.

On entering “Tate Britain”, and noting the boring lackluster interior, I wanted to see some real British artwork.
I took myself immediately to the Turner Prize exhibition. I felt that I had failed immediately in recognising the significance of the work of, for example, Turner Prize Nominee Cathy Wilkes. Her mannequins and shopping conveyor belts did little but confuse me. I turned to the description on the wall, which dubiously read ……
“Wilkes’s installations apprehend an end point in our understanding. A point in which words become insufficient and the naming of objects is disconnected from our experience of them.”
With this, I realised that I wasn’t at all confused; I was merely outside of the circle of modern artists whose very consumerist essence acted not to show me the brilliance of British contemporary art, but more like a used cars salesman pretentiously trying to sell me a heap of junk as something of profound beauty. The “deeper meaning” for me, was nothing but the artist asking “I wonder what I can get away with calling art.”

However, considering my deep disapproval at the Turner Exhibition, it further cemented my belief of Britain as a Liberal, ever changing culture. What one may see as art and beauty, someone else will see as nonsense. And seemingly vice versa. Everyone, although in essence we have similar traits, is different entirely with regard to our preferences in life, and nothing sums this general feeling up as perfectly as “Tate Britain” it is the very essence of liberal Britain. Nothing is guaranteed. It doesn’t promise masterpiece, it doesn’t promise grandeur. It isn’t the National Gallery in that respect.

Contrasted with art work in the Vatican Galleries, which one expects to be strictly religious and Catholic in origin. “Tate Britain” one would expect to find British flags, portraits of Henry VIII and Churchill, the National Anthem constantly on loop throughout, football fans everywhere, Shakespearian actors quoting lines from Hamlet, cups of tea laying around the place, senior citizens complaining about the youth of today, and the French. I expected anything stereotypically British. But what “Tate Britain” manages to do, is break convention, break stereotypes, to say “Britain isn’t a static concept, it’s progressive and free” and it succeeds masterfully.

The Francis Bacon exhibition shows an art form trying to advance with the times. Portraiture that doesn’t act in the same way that Photography acts now; Francis’ portraiture is different and very unique. And so the argument that Britain is not a mere static concept grows ever thicker. Francis seems to want to connect to the essence of his subject rather than just what he sees on the outside. Something as different and unexplored as perhaps the Renaissance artists of old attempted to depict Saints and holy figures as mere mortals. Breaking convention and charging down limits. Slashing the very essence of what “Portraiture” means. And in doing so, adding to the notion that Britain is ever changing and updating, nothing is ‘absolute’.
At worst “Tate Britain” represents the idea that art “superiors” are aware of something within a specific art work that the rest of us aren’t, which gives them ample opportunity to condescend those of us outside of their circle, the same can be said for Government, for business, for the media, and so certainly represents Britain in that way. At best, “Tate Britain” through the essence of the building itself, to the surreal and unexplainable works (unexplainable to me) exhibited for the Turner prize, to the seemingly progressive nature of portraiture from the 2006 “Tate Britain” exhibition of the works of “Holbein” such as the infamous piece “Henry VIII” through to the 2007-2008 exhibition of Francis Bacon and his surreal, progressive, and unique “Portrait of Henrietta Moraes”.

As suggested previously, “Tate Britain” does not promise you works of art that you will find incredibly masterful. In most cases, I found the works in the Tate to be contrary to that. They appeared nothing more to me, than a waste of perfectly good canvas. The Tate doesn’t promise any different. It promises differences in opinion and values. Differences in attitudes toward art works. And above all, differences in that which each individual person, whether a British national or otherwise, considers in their own unique way, to be an idea of “Britain”.

Immigrants: We need them!!

This blog will argue that immigration is much needed. I’d appreciate genuine arguments against my blog instead of the usual “fucking muzzies coming to our country with their fucking burkas, fuck off, you terrorist scum”.

INTRO:
I’m becoming increasingly uneasy about the level of animosity toward anyone who happens to have an Asian skin complexion in this country, particularly in the City I live, Leicester. Whenever someone says “I’m not racist but….” you can guarantee they’ve been reading the Daily Mail, and are about to spew some disgusting out of date bile.

I’ve said before, the majority of British Nationalists, who insist that they love our Country and see immigration eroding our culture, have absolutely no knowledge of our ‘culture’ other than the fact that they like to drink a lot, fight a bit, and be a bit racist. Our culture consists of historical events like the Protestant Reformation during Henry VIII, Edward and Elizabeth’s reigns, the Civil War of the 17th Century, art movements like Gothic, Renaissance Realism, pop art and post-modernism, the horrors of the Great War that saw the deaths of millions of people for less than a square foot of land. The fight for liberalism, as Churchill’s army of warriors defeated the destructive force of Fascism. This is our culture, and the Nationalists are the ones responsible for trying destroying it.

We have a large Asian community in Leicester. One of my friends tried to suggest that the white man is in the minority in Leicester now. He went on to suggest over 70% of the City must now be foreign. I disagreed. He laughed and decided to insult my intelligence some more. It annoyed me quite deeply. He suggested that if I look around, it’s like “spot the white man”.
Firstly, even if that was the case, why is that a problem? If I were the only white guy living on my street, what’s the problem? As long as they don’t treat me like shit, why should I care? It’s a skin colour. It does not go deeper than that.
And secondly, I was fucking right. According to Leicester City Council, the White race accounts for 63% of the population of Leicester. So to sum that up, I was right, he was wrong.

I’d now like to argue against those who believe Immigration should be cut off, and we should “keep Britain White”.

AGE:
During the 1950s, after the War, we in Britain had what is described as the “baby boom”. Soldiers coming home and starting families. Between the 1980s and today, we have a “baby slump”. Hundreds of thousands of more women are starting careers early and not having children. Which means, we have an ageing population. The baby boom generation is getting old. The younger generation need to support the pensions of those ageing majority. This is known as the “dependency ratio”. Given that there aren’t enough younger people to deal with this, if we took the BNP line and stopped immigration completely, we’d have the worst pensions crises ever. If this extended to Europe, according to the author Philippe Legrain, the population of Europe would fall by 60 million by 2050. This creates a worker shortage, meaning businesses close, deflation sky rockets. An economic disaster. You need immigration.

The Welfare State:
I refuse to give a response to the awful “they come over here, taking all our benefits” whilst in the same breathe muttering “they come over here, taking all our jobs”, it’s an old outdated argument that no one has been able to prove.
The majority of immigrant workers come to Britain (according to Home Office Stats) in their 20s. They then start to work, they pay taxes.
Those workers have not been to British schools and so they have cost the tax payer nothing, whilst they pay back into the tax system. Which means more investment into public services like The NHS. So actually, we benefit, not them.
Many then start up a business, paying more into the tax system. Perhaps they’ll then have children, who will go to British schools, on the money pumped into the tax system by their parents, which is fair and just. All the time contributing to an ageing British population.

“GO HOME!!”
Many immigrants come here for a better life. If you lived in a Country where you feared for the life of you and your family every day, wouldn’t you jump at the opportunity for a better life elsewhere?
The Phillipines has began calling those people who leave the country, to work abroad “heroes”. This is because the workers, after paying tax in America for example, then send some of their earnings home, which boosts the local economies, allowing the National economy of these countries to grow, lifting millions out of poverty. It has no damaging affect on America. It’s a boost to the poor nation’s economy, and it’s much needed. Otherwise we get rich, whilst the poor get worse and worse, and that’s simply wrong. It also then means the poor countries are able to create new opportunities, new jobs, new exports, which benefit us directly.

Job Creation:
“Stealing all our jobs” seems to be suggesting that there is a static number of jobs, limited in presence, and that immigrants are fighting the British born Whites for those jobs. This is simply ignorance.
When an immigrant comes to live here, he’s going to need a house, a car, a bed, a bath, a towel, a mug, a photograph frame, sugar, a carpet, and every other luxury you can possibly imagine. When 200,000 come here, there is a sharp rise in demand for such objects, which means production needs to increase, which means new jobs need to be created for supplies to meet demand, which means instead of stealing all our jobs, immigration create jobs. It’s basic economics. If we denied these people access to our country, demand would fall sharply, prices would deflate, wages would dramatically decrease because the pool of unemployed would get bigger and bigger as businesses everywhere shut up shop.
We’d all be worse off.

“This Country is a mess!!”
To suggest the country is now a mess, is to compare it to a previous time when it wasn’t a mess. I’m not sure that this has ever been the case. Was it the 1900s during a needless war in which parents watched as their children were sent to their deaths for no good reason? Or the 1920s during the Great Depression? Or the 1940s and World War, when kids were sent away from cities and their parents? Or the 1950s/60s when women were treated as 2nd class, gay people were imprisoned simply for their sexuality and racial prejudice was rife? Or the 1970s when our binmen went on strike leading to the winter of discontent? Or the 1980s when the miners went on strike and 60% of Liverpool was unemployed? Or the 1990s when The Spice Girls topped the charts?
When was the World and in particular Britain, perfect? It wasn’t.

My conclusion:
A Nation is simply a line on a map. A meaningless flag. A place where those who have deep Patriotic feelings can get together and proclaim just how wonderful their Country is compared to the rest of the World.
We are all citizens of the same Planet. We all benefit each other economically. We all bring with us knowledge and cultural awareness that can benefit each other both socially and for our own mental strength. Only by mixing and interacting, sharing and understanding, can there ever be anything near to peace.