What with Greenbelt and all, Anita Roddick is busy this year, looking at the what's on's in this month's Resurgence. Speaking at the Alternatives to War conference in July. And promoting trade justice with Christian Aid.
She's also written an interesting article in the current issue. Recalls George W Bush being asked to name his favourite philosopher. He said, "Christ". She regrets,
"If only it were so. If Christ were Bush's philosophical model, he would not be inviting money-changers into the temple. He would not be turning ploughshares into swords. He would not be making arrangements that the rich might inherit the earth."
Roddick suggests that Bush's philosophy bears closer relation to George Orwell. The writer who promoted misinformation, 'newspeak', 'doublethink', as leadership methods has a keen student in Bush, she says. In 1984 Orwell's repressive regime asserted: "War is Peace". In the run-up to the present illegal military action in Iraq, Bush said, "If you want to keep the peace, you've got to have the authorisation to use force."
"Orwell was concerned with the power and persuasion of language and how, in the wrong hands, words could kill, blind, destroy, disempower, enslave, and undermine civilisation. For a man not known for his mastery of the English language, George W. Bush makes an unlikely but powerful case that Orwell was right."
I have discovered a free software which shows the cover of the cd which is playing on the computer ........in the scale of things it is a little pleasure in a life which both the scars and joys are to be lived .......so a bottle of champagne given to me today for my birthday is well.. well.. well ....welcomed.
Feel I have not blogged much this week ..... have had many vivid experiences and always want to work them through and usually on paper. I can go back 30 years and see my notes from an evening of working with young people.
Usually start with listing the feelings. Some major. Some which linger and need dragging out. Others about people who do not concern me but I have some puzzle in my soul about their behaviour. Or reaction. Or passiveness Or non-verbals to another human ,if not me.
The new work is giving me new challenges. One is ......I drive or train away from the work and in that time I evaluate and by the time I get home I have 'done' and have not used the pen and paper and actually recorded those 'feelings' followed by 'thoughts' followed by 'action or options'. I need to get into new habits to get to those actions because, otherwise, I will be going into the people work situation without a strategy and I am determined not to be reactive but proactive and strategic. I always have two words in a picture frame on my desk or within memory jog view ......saying
strategic
priorities
Am I strange?
A few people bothered me this week. Got a couple of putdowns. Usually they are statements which start with the word "you......... " It is a finger pointing word like 'should' and 'aught' ......I never use those two words on principle.
Also there are people who are warm and I want them to develop ......I yearn .......that they can be warm with others of differing natures and personalities. To love the lovely is great. To love the unlovely is a real challenge to all of us in our development.
hmmmmm .....I notice those I warm to,and others not as easy, so principles kick in.
I am off .....the fingers cannot keep up with the mind ....but I love .....lurve ....the music playing so close as I type to you ......so ..............
-wish-you-wonder-
bhp
The 2001 Adbuster’s calendar included a photo, which at first glance appears to be a typical main road. However, something about it is different. It takes a minute to put your finger on it, but suddenly realisation dawns – this a street stripped of all advertising.
Gone is the bombardment of the visual sense that characterises our experience of 21st century urban living. No billboards, no huge petrol station logos, no ads on the side of taxis, no painted buses…not even a sponsored roundabout!
The public space has been freed, restored…the pedestrians are returned to being citizens rather than consumers.
I like this street. I wish I knew a real one like it.
Sadly I suspect our future does not lie down this road. Instead the vision Steven Spielberg presents us with in Minority Report of adverts calling our name as we walk past, seems more likely. Marketing reduced to niches of one.
The Résistance is out there however; a group of jammers are regularly active in my Manchester neighbourhood; subverting the billboard ads that dominate. Their revised ads invariably make me laugh.
I wonder what they would make of the Cheshire Leisure banners that I passed today. Never ones to shy away from a poor play on words (the clues in their name), the people who previously suggested “Into Camp-anolgy? Give us a Bell!” are once more declaring to the good folks of Warrington that “Now is the Winter of Our Discount Tents!”.
Surely there should be a law against such behaviour?
Especially in May…