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As of tomorrow I’m booking myself in for a Digital Detox.
And to enjoy life in the slow lane I’ll be kicking back to The Unthanks…
Why not join me?
Instead of wasting you life in front of a computer screen why not learn that instrument you always wanted to play? Or kiss the next person who makes you smile? Life is short. Enjoy it.
Stay sexy.
See you soon 😉
This Saturday there will be a protest against the BNP in Morley, Yorkshire. This is an important event, as Folk Against Fascism say…
Nick Griffin believes Morley & Outwood is the BNP’s top target in Yorkshire. And for good reason. BNP member Chris Beverley is already a councillor in the area — and in the 2008 local elections, the BNP polled more votes than any other party.
Morley & Outwood Day of Action
Saturday, 17 April, 2010,10:30 AM – 3:30 PM
Unity Hall, 2 Commercial Street, Morley, LS27 8HY
The proposed Digital Economy Bill is nothing more than a form of collective punishment that will disproportionately effect the poorer sections of society – which unfortunately includes me! This legislation goes against many of the core values on which our justice system was founded – innocent until proven guilty anybody? In reality it is designed to protect the interests of large multi-national monopolies who have been fleecing people for years; now the big boys would like to use our government to protect – and expand – their ill-gotten gains. Anyone who professes a love for liberty should take a stand against this travesty of justice – before they decide to make pirates of us all!
It was legendary priest turned pirate, Caraccioli, who observed:
‘that every Man was born free, and had as much right to what would support him, as to the air he respired… that the vast difference betwixt man and man, the one wallowing in luxury, and the other in the most pinching necessity, was owing only to avarice and ambition on the one hand, and a pusillanimous subjection on the other … ambition creeping in by degrees, the stronger family set upon and enslaved the weaker; and this additional strength over-run a third, by every conquest gathering force to make others, and this was the first foundation of monarchy.’
Nowadays our government has become such that it protects the strong at the expense of the weak – it has abandoned the principles of liberty and justice to appease those latter-day monarchs, the corporations and the bankers. Once again the only reasonable course of action for those of us who possess a freeborn heart is piracy! – or at least a bit of Wi-Fi sharing 😉
'The Massacre of the Innocents at Bethlehem' by Matteo di Giovanni
Nowadays it seems as if our children are either being targeted by marketing men or demonised by the media, but we once celebrated them on at least one day of the year.
I’m not a Christian, but I do have a soft spot for the holidays, traditions and rituals which used to make the English year so much more interesting. I can’t help feeling that we would help both our community and our sanity if we slowed down and observed some of the old customs – especially when they offer a marked change to our everyday expectations.
Childermas, also known as’ Cross Day’ or ‘Holy Innocents Day’, commemorates the time when, according to the Bible, King Herod ordered the massacre of all children under the age of two in Bethlehem in an attempt to thwart the prophecies surrounding the infant Jesus. Matthew 2:16-18…
When Herod realised that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled: “A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more.”
The tragic nature of this event, commemorated in England on December 28th, led to the belief that the day itself was unlucky; so much so that the day on which Childermas fell would be regarded as unlucky throughout the year – with Childermas falling on the dreaded back-to-work Monday this year a lot of people will sympathise with this belief. It was said that anything started on this day would be doomed to failure. A popular saying for failed ventures was “It must have been begun on Cross Day!”
But Childermas was also a time to celebrate children and childhood. And it is for this reason that I believe we should revive the custom.
On December 28th children were given a degree of freedom that was denied them the rest of the year. They were allowed to play in churches and were not allowed to be chastised by anyone (Daily Mail* readers may think that this is a normal state of affairs for children in the 21st Century, but Western children live in a culture which is so physically and psychologically restricting that it’s no wonder that some of them go off the rails – maybe they need to be allowed to be children rather than consumers?). Giving our children free rein on at least one day of the year would not only help them develop a healthy taste for liberty, it would remind us of the freedom that we ourselves have lost.
Spend a day letting your children call the shots and I guarantee that you will have a day to remember. Their pace of life is as hectic as our own, but it is far more human – where our day is ‘filled’, there’s is ‘fulfilled’ 🙂
As his finest biographer, Richard Ingrams observed, ‘William Cobbett urged parents to make their childrens lives as ‘pleasant as you possibly can’:
I have always admired the sentiment of ROUSSEAU upon this subject. ‘The boy dies, perhaps at the age of ten or twelve. Of what use, then, all the restraints, all the privations, all the pain you have inflicted upon him? He falls, and leaves your mind to brood over the possibility of you having abridged a life so dear to you.’ I do not recollect the very words; but the passage made a deep impression upon my mind, just at the time, too, when I was about to become a father … I was resolved to forego all the means of making money, all the means of making a living in any thing like fashion, all the means of obtaining fame or distinction, to give up everything, to become a common labourer, rather than make my children lead a life of restraint and rebuke.’
If we, for but one day, can match Cobbet’s resolve, then we may well do our children the greatest service any parent can hope for, we may instil in them an independence that so many of us will never get to enjoy.
HAPPY CHILDERMAS!
*The Daily Mail is a bitter and vitriolic daily British newspaper which is so authoritarian in its philosophy that it once described the leader of the black-shirted British Union of Fascists (BUF – how homoerotic is that?), Oswald Mosley, as “a leader of genius”.
For various reasons (largely work related 😦 ) this blog has been pretty quiet recently. But after re-reading Paul Kingsnorth’s ‘What England Means to Me’ post I have been reminded of the reasons why I created this blog in the first place. I cannot be the only person to LOVE ENGLAND, HATE FASCISM, so from now on I shall endeavour to try harder – i.e. post more blogs and actively fight for the English Libertarian cause. In the meantime here’s Paul’s excellent post…
What England Means to Me
Paul Kingsnorth
A few years back, I found myself in a narrow valley on the border between England and Wales. There are some landscapes – fewer as time passes – in which it seems that time has, if not exactly stood still, then been hijacked by some outside force for its own ends. There are some landscapes in which you can sense the ancient heart of the place in the air. This was one of them.
It was a landscape of scattered hill farms, high moors, hedge-lined holloways and winding brooks. Save for the odd industrial shed tacked on to a farmyard, or barbed wire fence, there was little of contemporary England about it. There were few cars. And everywhere, there were textures.
The textures of this valley became more and more noticeable as I walked its length. I took out my camera and began to photograph them at close quarters. Robbed of their wider context they look, when printed, like abstractions. The jigsaw bark of an old tree; white air bubbles on the surface of a blue pond; another tree’s bark, glossy this time and mottled; green moss on a purple gravestone; tree roots snaking through the dust; the parallel lines of a corrugated iron roof.
A legion of textures, colours, surfaces, pictures, crowding in on one another; the patchy, unplanned, diversity of place. This is what England means to me. Place, above all, is what makes my England. A small nation, shaped by humans for millennia, has no place which does not bear the mark of that shaping. Contemporary England is a patina; a palimpsest of historical eras, of times, of peoples. Everywhere there is colour, culture, history.
But England means something else, too. England means the rise of capital; the birthplace of the industrial revolution. England means enclosure, and empire. England invented much of the modern world, and what it invented is now destroying it. England is eating itself.
Look around you. Where are those textures? What is happening to them? Where I live, the texture of place is rapidly being overrun by the corporate non-places which our economic progress apparently requires of us: the malls, the motorways, the clone stores; the faceless ragbag of globalised, plasticised corporate clutter which allows us to “grow” and “compete” and remain players in a global economy which is spiralling out of control. It is an economy which eats up colour and character and spits our conglomeration and control. In the Brave New World of flexible labour markets, 24-hour consumerism and £5 air tickets, belonging to a place and having any feeling for it is a serious stumbling block on the road to the future.
But what England also means to me is the spirit of its people: a spirit which has at its heart a contradiction. One the one hand the English are – frustratingly – some of the most obedient people on Earth. Their pubs can be sold off for executive flats, their landscapes ripped apart by motorways, their folk culture scorned, their community gathering points shut down in the name of Health and Safety, their high streets scoured out by Tesco – and most of them will just shrug their shoulders, moan about the government and head for the out-of-town shopping centre. Sometimes, the English could do with being a bit more – well, French.
And yet there is another English spirit too, which arouses in me hope rather than despair. It is the spirit which marches to save Post Offices; which ties itself to bulldozers to save beauty spots from destruction; which saves its local pub and fights yet another shopping mall development in its historic towns. It is, perhaps, the spirit channelled by Gerrard Winstanley, John Ball, John Clare, William Morris – and William Cobbett, who railed two hundreds years ago against “The Thing”. The Thing is still with us. It’s bigger now, and greedier and it eats texture, patina, place and peculiarity for breakfast. But maybe – just maybe – England is beginning to wake up. I hope so.
Paul Kingsnorth’s book Real England is published by Portobello. www.realengland.co.uk
Important news for beer lovers…
Pub Revolution are…
…a growing army of Tenants and Leaseholders who have quite frankly had enough of the constant bullying and blatant theft of the Pubcos. United we stand and divided we fall, at the current rate of 53 a week and rising. Waiting for the outcome of all the government enquiries and ludicrous spin will be too late for us all. We have decided it’s time to take control of our own destiny, become empowered and take our trade back for ourselves before this great British institution becomes a thing of the past. The stark reality is that our cash is all that is enabling the bullying Pubcos to survive. If they didn’t have OUR money they wouldn’t exist. Let’s do it. Let’s have a PUB REVOLUTION and finish them off! Join us now, if we can get mass support up and down the country then on a date TBA, we will all stop paying them rent and buying tied products – all at the same time. It will:
a) cut off their cash flow sending them under
b) enable us to reduce our prices for the consumer across the board getting them back into our pubs
c) allow us to pay our bills
d) enable us to earn a living again
e) we can pay a FAIR rent to the administrators
f) give us the cash to carry out essential repairs that the Pubcos should be doing, but aren’t
g) give us freedom of product choice, great for the consumer and small brewer. Even the big boys will get a better price from us!
h) even the machine operators will be better off-they won’t have to pay the Pubcos royalty fees.
i) No more trumped up invoices for rating appeals
j) No more emergency delivery charges
k) No more Brulines gestapo
L) and no more useless BRMsThe list is endless. Please feel free to add to it!
What can they do? Take us all to court? Not without our money they can’t, besides, it takes on average 3 months to get ONE leaseholder into court for none payment so imagine how long it would take to get 10 thousand into court. They wouldn’t survive one month if we all stopped paying! How long would we stop payment for? As long as it takes!
Pledge your support now and let’s take control of OUR trade, OUR livelihoods and OUR lives.
Once we’ve taken care of Publican Enemy Number1, addressing all the other issues that have created the perfect storm will be a whole lot easier!
Sign up and pledge your support now, bring on the PUB REVOLUTION NOW!
If, like me, you have a passion for real ale, then you owe it to yourself to try and help to turn back the tide of pub-closures which has been brought about largely by the greed of Pubcos. Join Pub Revolution today!
For more information visit the PUB REVOLUTION Facebook page or email ukmassbeercott@aol.com
After a rather long wait the Folk Against Fascism (FAF) website is now up and running and I’m pleased to tell you that it’s even better than expected 🙂
Apart from news and information there’s a nice selection of tunes and a blog, which is currently being written by Jon Boden of (among many, many other things) Bellowhead fame. Boden sends a very poignant message in this post where he talks about the late, great Peter Bellamy and the problem of politics in folk music…
Politics should only become an issue when political groups attempt to annexe traditional folk music/song/dance/custom to their own political agenda and attempt to restrict participation on the basis of background, politics, colour etc. This is currently the case with the BNP, and resisting that attempt is where Folk Against Fascism comes in.
Because I want to keep this blog focused on folklore, storytelling and the history/traditions of the everyday English, I have set up another site dedicated to my belief in anarchy (without adjectives – I believe diversity is the key to survival!) and my commitment to ‘practical politics’.
It is my hope that ANARCHY in ALBION will balance political philosophy with ideas for practical ways in which to live in accordance with my beloved anarchist ideals.
'Albion Rose' by William Blake
Once upon a time, in the golden age of chivalry, fair play and feudalism, there was a Knight who’s name was Gnord.
Brave Sir Gnord, as he liked to call himself, was Lord of Grendale, in the Kingdom of Ethel. Lord Gnord did not win his lands through bravery; he hadn’t even owned a suit of armour before he became Lord of Grendale. Nor did he attain his estate through popularity; old Gnord could barely raise a smile, let alone a band of loyal followers. In truth Sir Gnord was granted the lands of Grendale and the title that went with it because nobody else wanted the job. Every knight in the court of King Bifron was afraid to go to Grendale, because in Grendale there were monsters.
Grendale was a borderland so wild that much of it wasn’t even on the map. The earth was barren and farming was poor and the revenue from the taxes was hardly worth the trouble, but Grendale was the only thing that stood between Bifron’s kingdom and the Great Wastes, and the king knew that he must be seen to be in control of this region if he was to discourage the conquering forces of the Dark One. So he decreed…
“Whomsoever shall become Lord of Grendale shall be awarded 10,000 gold pieces per annum.”
There were no takers. So he further decreed…
“Whomsoever shall become Lord of Grendale shall be awarded 10,000 gold pieces per annum and my youngest daughter’s hand in marriage.”
Still no takers. And so he even further decreed…
“Whomsoever shall become Lord of Grendale shall be awarded 10,000 gold pieces per annum, my youngest daughter’s hand in marriage and a go in my fabulous golden carriage.”
At this Gnord stepped forward. He actually worked in the king’s Counting House and was not a knight, but he had always admired the king’s fabulous golden carriage.
“Your highness, if I may be so bold,” said Gnord, though he had never actually been bold in his life. “If no brave knight will come forth, then perhaps a humble accountant may be called upon to save the day?”
And so it was that ‘Gnord the Money Counter’ became ‘Sir Gnord of Grendale’, faithul subject of Bifron the Methodical, King of the Ethelish.
The first thing Gnord did after receiving his knighthood was to go for a ride in the king’s fabulous golden carriage (which turned out to be less fabulous – or indeed golden – on the inside as it was on the out). The second thing Gnord did was build ‘Grendale Castle’; an imposing fortress with a huge tower. And from the top of this tower Gnord looked out over his lands, lord of all that he surveyed.
One day some peasants from the furthest border region came to his castle with desperate news.
“My Lord, my Lord. We have desperate news.” they said. “A Ferocious Fangtoothed Fargleblaster has come to Grendale and it is about to attack our village!”
Lord Gnord stood up and placed his hand on his hip as if to draw a sword. But when he held his hand aloft all that was in his palm was a telescope.
“Come peasants. To the tower.” he bellowed.
Sir Gnord – followed by his advisers, his priests, his bodyguards, his stylist and the peasants – slowly climbed the stairs to the top of the great tower. Gnord raised the telescope to his eye and peered southward to the borderlands. Gnord had built his castle as far from the border as possible, so in truth he would have needed a spy satellite rather than a spyglass to see the border (which, of course, wasn’t possible in a time when the stars were still little more than holes in the dome of heaven). But Gnord made a play of studying the far off horizon. For a moment or two he ummmed and for a moment or two more he ahhhed. And then he boomed…
“Thou art mistaken peasants. That is no Ferocious Fangtoothed Fargleblaster.“ he declared, closing the shiny brass telescope with a sharp snap. “That is a Devilsome Thangaroo.”
Now on a scale of 1 to 10 (with ’10’ being a “Giant, hell-spawned, nine headed hydra with nine fire-breathing, fang-filled mouths and eighteen eyes that shine red like hot coals; which dribbles hot lava-snot from seventeen nostrils (one is blocked with some rather nasty black bogeys) all over you as it slowly tears into your flesh” and ‘1’ being a “mean, but small, barking dog”) a Devilsome Thangaroo would probably score a 7 or 8, whereas a Ferocious Fangtoothed Fargleblaster is more like a 9. So the peasants, being simple and loyal to a fault, were put at ease by this news.
“Thank you, oh wise and insightful Lord Gnord.” they bowed.
And so the peasants returned to their border village where they were promptly eaten by the Devilsome Thangaroo (which looked suspiciously like a Ferocious Fangtoothed Fargleblaster) along with their kith, kin and livestock.
The next day more peasants arrived at the castle with grim news.
“My Liege, my Liege. We have grim news.” they implored. “The Devilsome Thangaroo has now come to our village. And it looks mightily miffed!”
So Sir Gnord – followed by his advisers, his priests, his bodyguards, his stylist and the peasants – made his way to the top of the great tower and again raised the spyglass to his eye. This time he could make out a tiny black shape on the horizon, which he assumed to be the beast in question. It was moving among some tiny white squares, which he assumed was the village in question. For a moment or two he ummmed. For a moment or two he ahhhed. Then he snapped the spyglass shut.
“It seems I was mistaken.” he declared.
The advisers, priests, bodyguards, stylist and peasants all gasped in unison; were they actually under attack from a Ferocious Fangtoothed Fargleblaster after all?
“What a fool of a tyrant I am.” contunued Lord Gnord. “That is no Devilsome Thangaroo, tis a Gargling Ganoot as I live and breathe.”
A Gargling Ganoot would have to be suffering from tooth ache to score higher than a 6.5 on our monster meter, so the peasants were delighted. With a spring in their step and a blush on their cheeks they returned to their village and to certain death.
Over the next few days peasants from villages that stood ever closer to the castle came and went; each reassured that the beast was not as terrible as they thought. What was once believed to be a Ferocious Fangtoothed Fargleblaster was downgraded each time the peasants paid a visit. One day it was a 5 point scoring Needlenosed Higglesniff, the next it was a Beastly Blattwort, which was barely a 4 by anyone’s reckoning.
As the creature inched closer to Grendale castle it became easier to see with the naked eye and Lord Gnord’s advisers began to ask questions.
“Sire, I may be wrong, but I’m sure that a Pitted Dragulsnuff does not stand thrice as high as a rowan tree.” said one.
“I’m quite certain that an Evilish Ugan cannot fit a horse AND rider in it’s mouth in one bite.” said another.
And so it went until Sir Gnord was forced to address his entourage…
“Dost thou think that it would be better to tell the peasants the truth? Would widespread panic and prayers really be preferable to an orderly death? Verily, I say unto you that truths should be spun like braies* in a washtub and then rolled through mangles until they better fit the desires of the wise and worthy. What need have the peasants for truth? I shall paint a world that gladdens the weak hearts of my people; not to misinform them, but to protect them!” bellowed Lord Gnord banging his fists on the castle’s large oak dining table. “Henceforth, any that question my judgement shall suffer the rack before feeling the bite of the executioner’s axe and my steel-clad boot up their never regions!”
So when a Nibbly Fluff (rated 1.5 on the monster meter) smashed down the outer walls of Castle Grendale, nobody mentioned the fact that a Nibbly Fluff should only have the strength of a spring lamb. Likewise when the Nibbly Fluff tore Sir Gnord’s personal bodyguard to shreds nobody took the trouble to point out that this particular Nibbly Fluff has monstrous claws rather than the usual mole-like paws of it’s brethren. And when the Nibbly Fluff flapped a pair of monstrous leathery wings – that it really shouldn’t possess – and took to the air – like it really shouldn’t do – nobody bothered to ask why a burrowing animal was floating high above their heads like a fart upon a breeze.
“I think it wants to play.” shouted an adviser as he slid down the monsters throat.
“So it would se…” said the stylist as it bit off his head.
Even when the monster breathed fire into the tower, making it glow like a bonfire log, nobody spoke out of turn. How could they? For every man and every beast but Lord Gnord himself was reduced to ash and ruination.
Presently the Nibbly Fluff stood before a cowering Sir Gnord pausing only to decide whether it wanted to eat him or light him up like a candle. It chose the latter. And as Gnord’s armour melted into his soft flesh; and as Gnord’s 10,000 gold pieces became a trickling yellow stream; and as Gnord’s last breath was sucked from his lungs by the heat of the Nibbly Fluff’s fearsome breath the knight said…
“Maybe I am mistaken after all? For I am sure that Nibbly Fluff’s are not known for their halitosis.”
THE END
Anti-©
This is an abridged version of a story that will appear in a forthcoming project called ‘Tales for Our Times’. As such it can be copied, quoted, altered and generally plagiarised as anyone sees fit.
*A braies is a medieval undergarment.
If I had as many lives as I have hairs on my head
or drops of blood in my veins,
I would give them all up for this cause,for the Liberties of England!
John Bastwick (as quoted on Rev Hammer's 'Freeborn John' album)
These are troubled times both for Liberty and for Democracy; each of these concepts is, of course, meaningless without the other. Liberties that took 500 years and countless lives to secure are being rolled back in the name of ‘security’ by a self-serving political elite who treat the democratic process and the electorate with undisguised contempt. To cite security as a reason to deny liberty shows that the politicians – on both sides of the Atlantic – have learnt nothing in the 250 years since Benjamin Franklin famously wrote…
“They who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
from the title page of An Historical Review of the Constitution and Government of Pennsylvania. 1759
In truth it is not just the years that divide today’s politicians from their enlightenment forebears. There was once a commitment – in philosophy at least, if not in practice – to the belief that government should be no more than a tool that exists to guarantee and protect the basic freedoms and liberties of it’s people so that each person might live as full a life as possible. This sentiment was best summed up in the motto “That government is best which governs least” (often attributed to Thomas Jefferson or Thomas Paine, but actually made famous by Henry David Thoreau’s 1849 essay, ‘Civil Disobedience‘ wher he paraphrases the motto of The United States Magazine and Democratic Review: “The best government is that which governs least.”).
But modern governments are all too willing to try and control every aspect of human life and few of us today feel that government and politicians are acting in the interests of the people.
The Liberties of England should be our proudest achievement; the social, economic and legal rights enshrined by Magna Carta (both the Great Charter and The Charter of the Forest – see Peter Linebaugh’s ‘The Magna Carta Manifeston: Liberties and Commons for all.‘) have had a global influence beyond the imagination of the Barons who drafted them – and I believe that they will continue to be of immense symbolic importance as we enter the third millennium. These documents were cited during the English, French and American revolutions and were even mentioned during the 1994 Zapatista uprising, but in today’s Britain the basic liberties of habeas corpus, trial by jury, the right to silence, due process and the right to free speech are all being threatened by the government’s supposed attempts at fighting ‘terrorism’ and ‘organised crime’.
The legal system of England and Wales has never been perfect and is far from impartial, but rather than attempt to democratise the judiciary the Labour government has chosen to bypass it altogether. A fundamental principle of justice is that the same person or authority that brings a criminal allegation against an individual should not then decide whether that person is guilty – i.e. the police make an arrest and then the courts decide upon guilt. This is essential if we believe that a person is innocent before being proved guilty. But the government’s Anti-Social Behaviour Order (ASBO) and subsequent related laws have effectively made the police- and, worse still, local authorities – judge, jury and executioner regarding a large number of offences. And despite the Labour government creating over 3000 new criminal offences since 1997 violent crime (all crimes against the person have to be considered the worst possible crimes in a humane society) has risen by nearly 80%.
![Knife Crime[6]](https://wynfrith.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/knife-crime6.jpg?w=490 "Knife Crime[6]")
Lady Justice - now dumb as well as blind!
In relation to ‘crime’ and the ‘terrorist threat’ we are also witnessing a widespread and ongoing abuse of the basic right to privacy. The famous 16th Century barrister, Sir Edward Coke helped to revive a general interest in Magna Carta and his work would heavily influence both English and American revolutionaries. Coke’s best known statement is arguably…
“For a man’s house is his castle, et domus sua cuique est tutissimum refugium [and each man’s home is his safest refuge].”
…from whence we get the quote “An Englishman’s home is his castle”. But today our ‘castles’ are being stormed (or at least placed under seige…) ‘for our own protection’ and privacy has become yet another victim of security.
The sad truth, of course, is that the more we are denied our hard-fought liberties the weaker our democracy becomes; which, in turn, undermines the government’s claims that the ‘war on terrorism’ is a battle for democracy and freedom. Marcus Aurelius said “The best revenge is to be unlike him who performed the injury.“; if we give up an ounce of liberty then we ourselves become an enemy of democracy. Not that we English have much democracy left to lose…
In Britain government (both national and European) is becoming ever more invasive and is slowly creeping into every corner of our lives whilst giving us fewer and fewer opportunities to influence, oppose or even debate important political decisions. In England the situation is even more bleak; since devolution we are the only county in the EU which does not have it’s own parliament or national assembly. For better or worse decisions that directly effect the citizens of England are not solely in the hands of English citizens. The following quote cited by The Witanagemot Club shows the worrying extent of this problem…
Encyclopedia Britannica : England
Outside the British Isles, England is often erroneously considered synonymous with the island of Great Britain ( England , Scotland , and Wales ) and even with the entire United Kingdom . Despite the political, economic, and cultural legacy that has secured the perpetuation of its name, England no longer officially exists as a governmental or political unit—unlike Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, which all have varying degrees of self-government in domestic affairs. It is rare for institutions to operate for England alone. Notable exceptions are the Church of England ( Wales , Scotland , and Ireland , including Northern Ireland , have separate branches of the Anglican Communion) and sports associations for cricket, rugby, and football (soccer). In many ways England has seemingly been absorbed within the larger mass of Great Britain since the Act of Union of 1707.’ — Encyclopedia Britannica, 2004.
This is known as “the West Lothian Question” after a 1977 speech by Tam Dalyell, the then Scottish Labour MP for West Lothian, in which he stated…
For how long will English constituencies and English Honourable members tolerate… Honourable Members from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland exercising an important, and probably often decisive, effect on English politics while they themselves have no say in the same matters in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland?
This situation is further exacerbated by the fact that local governments – which should be on the front line of democracy – have been robbed of any real power. In all but the smallest councils the committee system – which helped local residents have at least some say in local government – has been replaced by dictates from central government, ‘elected mayors’ (or ‘strong leaders’), quangos and/or almos – all with the minimum of accountability. In 2006 a report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s POWER Inquiry concluded that the deep rooted problems with British democracy are “systemic not personal”; in general neither the public nor the politicians are guilty of apathy(though it is the politicians who have the most to gain from the current state of affairs), but the present system creates a high level of political alienation combined with extremely low levels of confidence which, in turn, leaves both the public and the politicians feeling powerless. English Democracy – which has existed on and off in one form or another since the 7th Century – may not be dead, but it’s in a critical condition.
Unfortunately no single political party or independent politician is in a position to single-handedly change this worrying state of affairs even if they wanted to. What’s needed is the most far reaching constitutional change to be seen in England since the Civil Wars or the Act of Union! (I am stressing the English problem as the population of England are in a rather unique political situation; citizens of Wales and Northern Ireland are only marginally better off – remember we’re talking solely about democratic rights here – and the citizens of Scotland are in the best position, relatively speaking. But Britain as a whole remains in crisis with regard to liberty and democracy – so Britain as a whole must work towards a solution).
Luckily we are beginning to see the first signs of a much needed people’s movement for change. The aforementioned Joseph Rowntree Trust have just taken over the Real Change campaign which was launched (originally as ‘Magna Carta 2.0’, which I personally thought was a better title) by members of openDemocracy to try and encourage…
- An intelligent self-governing citizens’ movement for much better democracy and liberty in Britain
- A serious debate about the future of modern democracy, liberty and human rights, drawing on the best of international ideas.
The Real Change site says…
We aim to bring this movement into being through a new group: Real Change: the open politics network. The parties and politicians cannot be relied upon to deliver real change for us [sic]. Citizens have to be in the driving seat. Recent pronouncements by the Prime Minister and the leader of the opposition offer little more than vague and cosmetic changes. “Reform so as to preserve” is still the mantra of the political elite, who hope the wave of popular outrage will once again crash and dissipate into passive acquiescence.
Blogland is awash with people of all political persuasions drawing much the same conclusions. Old differences are being set aside as people realise that ideology will count for nothing if we do not address the current crisis of democracy, liberty and human rights. But this fight will not be won in cyberspace; if we are to protect the Liberties of England we must endeavour to bring the campaign to the people.
What I am about to suggest is not a campaign in it’s own right, it is simply a strategy to get people talking. We need a highly visible, non-partisan, popular symbol to signify a heartfelt commitment to regain, preserve and expand our aforementioned democracy, liberty and human rights. (We also need non-partisan democracy, but that’s another story – or rather another blog post.)
I want to re-introduce the sea-green ribbon as a symbol of liberty and democracy.
Sea-green ribbons were worn by members and supporters of the Levellers during the English Revolution. The movement began in July 1646 when people came together to petition parliament in an attempt to free John Lilburne, England’s greatest unsung hero, from the Tower of London where he faced the death penalty on grounds of ‘treason’ (Lilburne remains the only man to be tried for treason by both the crown and by parliament). Known as ‘Freeborn John’, Lilburne is admired across the political spectrum because his life physically embodied a sense of freedom that remains an inspiration for us all.
The Levellers were a short lived movement (thanks mainly to the duplicity and cruelty of Cromwell), but their legacy remains relevant even today. As we can see from their main documents (see Richard Overton’s ‘An Arrow Against All Tyrants‘, ‘The Agreement of the People‘ and ‘An Agreement of the Free People‘) and transcripts of The Putney Debates the Levellers believed in the Liberties of England, equality and social justice. Among other things, Tony Benn (speaking at the annual Levellers Day event in Burford, Oxfordshire) has cited a few central beliefs that he believes would be of significance today (please do not take this as a nod to ‘the left’, I have already stated that the crisis of liberty is such that it is more important than political allegiance – to which I am ‘left-libertarian’)…
The Levellers would uphold the rights of the people to recall and replace their parliamentary candidates because of the inalienable sovereignty of the people which no Parliament has any right to usurp.
The Levellers would demand a far greater public accountability by all those who exercise centralised civil, political, scientific, technical, educational and mass media power through the great bureaucracies of the world, and would call for the democratic control of it all.
The Levellers would warn against looking for deliverance to any elite group, whatever its origins, even if it came from the Labour movement, who might claim some special ability to carry through reforms by proxy, free from the discipline of recall or re-election.
The Levellers would argue passionately for free speech and make common cause, worldwide, with those who fight for human rights against tyrants and dictators of all political colours
Also the Levellers called for an elected judiciary and an end to both elitism and elitist terminology with regard to the law. So I do not believe they would have been wholly satisfied with our current legal system and they certainly would have been horrified by the law-making powers of our unelected and unaccountable Brussels commissioners.
With this in mind I feel that the use of the colour Sea-Green as a political/philosophical statement would give provide us with a highly visible and unified identity. Sea-green could easily be adopted by any individual or group who is committed to fighting for the protection and expansion of liberty, democracy and human rights. Now, has anyone got any sea-green cloth?
Further reading
A. C. Grayling ‘Towards the Light: The Story of the Struggles for Liberty and Rights That Made the Modern West‘
A concise history of how people fought and died to secure our liberties.
Dominic Raab ‘The Assault on Liberty: What Went Wrong With Rights‘
How we have lost basic liberties and rights in recent years.
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