David Porter » Entries tagged with "politics"
Downing Street Is More Than Merely the Prime Minister’s Residence
Number 10 and neighbouring buildings make up an iconic part of the both the “Westminster Village” and the world’s view of the seat of British government. To date, fifty-two men and one woman have entered the famous black door of No 10 as Prime Minister. It has been their family home; nerve-centre of governments and nation during war; and in times of political difficulties, ‘the bunker’ of beleaguered premiers. It’s the soap opera of the nation. The front masks a rabbit warren of rooms and passages, a mix of styles and periods, including the very latest security technology. TV crews are almost constantly camped outside, across the cul-de-sac, facing the door. Who comes in and out could be newsworthy. Ministers, visitors, officials, celebrities: the arrival and departure of everybody tells … Read entire article »
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Political Movies Tell the Truth Some of the Time About Politics
If life reflects art reflects life, does political movie-making reflect politics? Does political cinema reveal truth? Does it matter, if they’re good films? Film is a medium that lends itself to dramatising conflict, espousing causes, harnessing opinion and satirising opponents. Political movies need that material. It’s been utilised in TV series, such as The West Wing from the U.S.; In the Thick of It, which spun into In the Loop (2009), a movie; and House of Cards and Yes Minister /Yes Prime Minister, classics of civil service/politician tensions. The British mini-series State of Play became an American movie (2009) about investigative reporters and government corruption. It’s a broad category, political film. Citizen Kane (1941) was a thinly disguised biopic about publishing magnate William Randolph Hearst who had an unsuccessful run for New York … Read entire article »
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Protest Theatre Is Everywhere: Past, Present and Future
Protest by performance (protest theatre) is as old as mankind. It seems that In an age of future conformity, there’ll always be protesters somewhere breaking boundaries. What artists in all genres choose to protest about/against, how they seek to effect change, is open to different interpretations, from geographical to racial, from historical to social and from environmental to economic. After the 1960s, Bob Dylan denied his songs were part of the protest movement (war, nuclear bomb, drugs, youth), yet clearly, songs like Maggie’s Farm, Blowin’ in the Wind, Hurricane, Oxford Town, With God On Our Side, for instance, convey messages strong enough to stir emotion against injustice and prejudice. That is just what protest theatre does, whether it be on stage, in song/dance, through paintings, movies or speeches declaimed like Martin Luther … Read entire article »
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The Politics of the Great British Weather
UK’s most talked about topics are weather & politics. Put together, they can be a potent barometer of public opinion, ignored by politicians at their peril. Bob Dylan sang: ‘You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows,’ (Subterranean Homesick Blues, 1965), but in politics, those who keep an eye on the weather usually do themselves big favours. British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan (1894-1986) is attributed with warning in response to a question from a journalist about what is most likely to blow a government off course: ‘Events, dear boy, events’. The weather is the ultimate event. When sporting events go well at a national level (like England winning the football World Cup in 1966, tennis doing better than normal or Olympic golds coming home), politicians bask in the … Read entire article »
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My Brother’s Keeper: The Reality of Filial Affection
Brotherly love is often used as justification for all sorts of loyalties, sacrifices, pressures and decisions, but is blood thicker than water in the end? Ed Miliband grabbed the leadership of the British Labour Party in September 2010 from under the nose of his older brother, David. He was not predicted to win, but did by a wafer-thin margin. It excited the media, made people wonder about ambition and brothers and exposed family divisions to public gaze. Trades Union members traditionally call each other ‘brothers’, as an equalizing, left-wing address, so no one is of higher importance than another. A joke runs that they hug and pat each others’ backs only to find the best spot to put the dagger in. In Christianity, ‘brothers and sisters in Christ’ speaks to the belief that … Read entire article »
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A Life in the Day of a British Member of Parliament
As maligned as tax collectors, traffic wardens, estate agents and the media, British MPs’ work and lifestyles are often misunderstood and underestimated. Fuelled by media reports and frequent lapses of common sense, MPs are perceived by many as self-serving, egotistical riders of the gravy train/scrapers of the pork barrel, anxious only to secure re-election and submit expense claims. As many lost their seats in the 2010 general election and seek to build new livesoutside Westminster, there is little public sympathy for their plight. Even some who were re-elected may have had their hopes and ambitions of office dashed by the resulting hung parliament and a coalition government. Again, most people faced with economic and other difficulties of their own are less bothered about MPs’ situations. Local Issues and Work An MP’s life is divided … Read entire article »
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The Tyranny of Consumerism and Other Modern Ailments
People’s behaviour has long been conditioned by dictators, time, crowds, addictions. Now fashion, shopping and consumerism join the list of life’s traps. Dictators have subjected/enslaved others for as long as humans have lived in tribes. The tyranny of crowd behaviour at sports, grabbing the latest must-have (like Cabbage Patch Dolls in 1978) or lynch-mob gladiatorial responses like at executions, is well documented. The tyranny of the urgent is addressed by ACTS International from a Christian perspective, citing Ecclesiastes 3:1-8: ‘There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, a time to kill and a time to heal … a time for war and a time for peace’, as … Read entire article »
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Plain Language is the Holy Grail of Communication
If people would say what they mean, instead of speaking/writing/hiding in cliches, jargon and obfuscation, might understanding be greater? The Free Dictionary gives meanings of the little-used but useful word, obfuscation. To obfuscate is to make so confused as to be difficult to understand, to dim, to darken, make indistinct or obscure, often used of the truth. Expanded definitions include bafflement, befuddlement, bemusement, disarray, mystification and confusion. All the nuances can be wrapped up in how some people and organisations communicate written/oral information/instruction, and how many people respond. Plain English, Plain Language The Plain English Campaign is a commercial editing and training firm based in the United Kingdom, ‘fighting for plain English in public communication’. They oppose ‘gobbledygook, jargon and legalese’. Once, the language they oppose was found mainly in legal documents; nowadays … Read entire article »
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National and International Days, Weeks, Years Around the World
The UN designates special days, weeks and years to celebrate something or somebody, or raise awareness about a cause. They’re not alone. Others cash in too. The United Nations designates dates ‘to draw attention to major issues and encourage international action to address concerns of global importance and ramifications’. For financial reasons and to avoid ‘trivialization’, they don’t name every year or day, but when other organisations do it too, their impact may be diluted. UN ‘Years’ Since 1959 First, was 1959/60, World Refugee Year; 1965 was International Cooperation Year; 1967, Tourism and 1968, chiming with the political zeitgeist, International Year for Human Rights. Then followed 1970 with Education; 1971, Action to Combat Racism & Racial Discrimination; 1974, Population; 1975, Women; 1978, Anti-Apartheid; 1979 was Year of the Child; 1981, Disabled Persons. 1982 … Read entire article »
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Post-Democracy and Post-Modernism: What Comes Next?
With widespread disillusion in the west about politics & politicians, local & national democracy, tax & spend, is the end in sight for the current system? ‘Post-democracy’ has come in the past decade to describe governance which subscribes to democratic rule, but where power and application have become progressively limited, concentrated in the hands of elite government officials, police, civil servants, bankers or media-brokers, most of whom are indifferent to public opinion, determine their own salaries and pensions and are separated from those they ‘serve’. Different Commentators, Varied Views British commentator, Peter Oborne, believes current political disenchantment is a postmodern design of agendas and programmes that deny ‘independent reality, where truth gives way to mere credibility, a narrative is created for events and claims of acting in good faith within rules that allow … Read entire article »
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