Other writing: poetry etc

This is a dumping ground for some odd bits of political poetry (or something...) that I have written, some of them a long time ago, some more recently. It is kind of scary making them public, but you never know, some of you crazy kids might want to read them. 

The voice of TINA (There Is No Alternative)/ The End of History

This was something I wrote in answer to a lecturer I had at Imperial College who shouted at me “the days of big government are OVER and you can stick your head in the sand or you can deal with it”. And in answer to Francis Fukuyama. And the rest of em. I stole a line from Watership Down. Hopefully the black rabbit will forgive me.

Inside everyone who is bullied, humiliated or oppressed there is a small, insistent voice. It whispers something. If they are a child, it whispers loudly. If they are an adult, it whispers more softly.

‘What is, is what must be’ it whispers. ‘This is the natural course of things, the only course of things. And what fool rages against the fact that two plus two equals four? Thus you deserve this. Thus you are worth as much as you are sold for, and no more’.

And because no one can live peacefully who feels they are worth as much as they are sold for, and no more, then ever after they will always be at war with themselves, and with the whole world. They will identify only with the boot that kicks them. They will cheer it on. They will have only contempt for anyone who would treat them any other way. And they will do to others what was done to them, again and again.

There is only one way to free themselves which is to shout from the rooftops: that I do not accept it. I will never accept that what is, is what must be. Because of the compassion that is due to me. That is due to all people. It is compassion that makes me stand with my fists and say: this way is not the natural course of things; it is just one possible course of things. And it happened this way but it could have happened another way. And I will not give my bones to be ground to cattle feed because any theory deems it necessary, to feed the supply, to stimulate the demand, so it will trickle down to my descendents in a few generations time, so you say. This is the only way, you say. This is the natural course of things. I say: I will keep my bones.

For me to live as a human being I must proclaim this: if history is an alter on which we must all be sacrificed to an-powerful bloodthirsty god, then I will not lie on it. Not willingly. And I don’t care if I lose this battle or every battle, because the moment I proclaim this I’ve already won. If history is over, Mr Fuck-you-ama, then we have outlived it. And as long as we are here there will always be everything to play for.

So let history stand aside. We will walk on.