Why I Think I am The Way I Am.

I suppose this blog is about a lot a lot of things.
One of them is why we need to end this system, this way of life, this ratrace to ruin and start to build Utopia.
One of them is to try understand our universe.

One of them is to ruminate on odd things I observe, odd thoughts pop into my head.

And one of them was for me to come to terms with whatever it is drives me.

To add to that small circle of people with whom I'm comfortable actually discussing personal things with. Me, basically.

My parents are not in that circle of people. I've made sure they've stayed at arms length all my adult life. I've devised a life strategy that involves using a small group of people who've constantly proved their worth to me over the years and making them my self chosen family who will care for and protect me.

Because they do. And I realise- or have realised since I started writing this blog, why it is they have proved themselves and I really couldn't live without them, because I couldn't cope. They understand me. In a way I don't- or didn't. They make allowances, they unconsciously treat me in a certain way.

And I realise now what that is.
Basically, the people I trust all unthinkingly just make a whole series of assumptions, because they understand the mentality of the person they're dealing with, and once you understand that, they really always do treat you with love and affection.

Because I do. I'm very affectionate, tactile and trusting with my friends.

They treat me as you would a precocious child.

Now that's complicated.

What I mean is, you can't treat me as a child. Wouldn't work. So many of the women in the past who I've had relationships with kept trying to do exactly that, because the way I am encourages a certain type of women to want to get all mothery over me.

But the thing is, you don't treat a precocious child as a child. You can't. The precocious child doesn't believe in the tooth fairy. He knows man evolved from the apes and he knows how oral sex is performed.

So for most purposes, the way to deal with a precocious child is to treat as an adult.

But in a few areas, you have to remember they are still a child.

OK. Now imagine that precocious child is somehow Dorian Gray. He has a picture somewhere that becomes an actual adult, but he never does. He has all that life experience of a thirty year old- in fact a lot more than most sixty year olds- but he remains a precocious child.

I've been able to face this basically, by adding to to the list of people I'm actually comfortable seeing how my mind actually works.
In RL, that's four people.

But I think, now there are at least four people online who seem to have that strange knack of just figuring out exactly what the four people in RL instinctively seem to know in how they relate to me.

It's about adolescence. It's about the days when you pick a life strategy.

I was at a party recently where a beautiful black psychologist and I were discussing Freud.
And then came the off-baller.
'So how would you describe your relationship with your mother?'

Ouch.

I suspected a trap. Am I that obvious? Am I so obviously a man who's obvious total fear of commitment is possibly linked to never really having felt close to their mother?

Which was what I said to her.

Anyway, I was honest. I'm fond of my mother. But say the word 'mother' and I don't think of her. First image I have, is of the Virgin Mary.
Which possibly explains a lot. Again, early conditioning. I suppose a lot of my filial instincts are actually tied up in the unknowable Father and virgin Mother of the Catholic faith.

And then, there's the bizarre adolescence.

The failed experiment.

Ok. I don't like to talk about anything in my life before uni.
Here's why.

Basically, I was sent to one of those private schools which believe in 'educating children in classes arranged by ability, not age'.

So, at eleven years, I was stuck in a class of thirteen years old.

And no one seems to have stopped and thought what sticking an eleven year old child in with a class of thirteen year olds and a couple of fourteen year olds might actually result in.

The experiment would have meant me doing A-levels at sixteen.

And it was aborted. Because what actually happened was what any sound observer of behaviourial logic not with their head in dusty academia could have told you would happen.

I became a sort of class mascot. All these little adolescent rituals that were now being explored by a group of pubescents were things I was seeing when most my age still play with toys.
And I mentally jumped to thinking about girls and drinking and all the illicit things.

And believe it or not, is is true that the motor which sets off adolescence is often related to peer groups.
I had my first shave a month after I turned thirteen, and had long since graduated into the earliest vice most of us come across.

So I couldn't be bothered with schoolwork.

I don't think my parents ever understood this. Or anyone really. That unfortunately, I'm now thinking in cognitive terms and social terms like someone much older, but totally lacking in the other developments of a fifteen year old. This is where I was at thirteen.

So I returned at thirteen to the more comfortable water of our Comprehensive system.

But I'm not on anyone elses's wavelenth.
And thirteen is SO a bad time to be in that situation.

And this, I guess is when I started building the system which has now become a way of life.
The ultimate strategic defence strategy.

For example, I was perpetually marked down as an underachiever. Not in a threatening way, just that I was coasting my way to red brick, not grafting my way to Oxbridge. And this was mystery both parents and teachers battled with. For some bizarre reason, secretly I wanted to do this. The bare minimum. I just did what I wanted and no one could get to me. Inside, there was just me. I was walled up against the world.

I was a prefect though, which is interesting. And I was actually on report when they made me one.

I realise that one of the things that can make people wary of me if they know me better than casual acquaintance, but don't know me as well as I've described above is how hard and direct acting I can be if really provoked.

Because I realise that I come into that certain category of males who people don't provoke, if they know you. I don't get into fights ever. And that's partly because I'm usually good at defusing such situations, but also because if provoked, a person good at the signs can see what type of person I am if I'm pushed. And those who've seen me blow, remember it usually. Because it's rare, but when it happens, it's real.

And that's the difference. Desmond Morris says there are two ways people get angry. Red face and white face.

Red face goes red, shouts and blusters, lets it all out, then is easily calmed. The red is him letting off his muscle tension by a series of gestures designed to defuse the situation by intimidating so the threat of violence leaves. Red face doesn't want violence, he hopes the display will work.

White face doesn't. White face simmers.

If I'm getting angry, REALLY angry I won't be raising my voice. I will probably be getting slower and softer. I will probably be getting briefer in my responses. I will probably be staring fixedly at something. I will probably start to get ironic. Expect a lot of it 'Is it now?' 'Is that a fact, now?' 'Ah, of course. It would be.'

Expect me to be chewing my bottom lip. I might start playing with my curls. To me, my body has stopped. It's still. I can hear a pin drop. I can feel it coming. The display you're about to get, isn't my way of blustering. It's my way off saying 'Back off. Or I'll go for your neck. I mean it. Back off.'

And that's often the difference. Because anyone looking in to my eyes during the display that will follow will know that at this particular minute in time, I'm someone who if they move to punch me, will launch their fingers on either side of their windpipe.

Because I've got faster reaction times in this frame of mind. And if you get one punch in, it's over. I have to win it in one shot, one all or nothing blow. So I'm just going to put you out.

And it's that, it's having that edge that enables you to walk into any room like you own the place. No one is going to start on you.
Going through life knowing that, always give you an edge.

And knowing you don't care if they do.

I went through adolescence funny. A strict home life led me to invent a double one. While I was doing my A-levels I worked at a hotel. Evenings and Weekends. I wasn't home much. And I just used the job to cover everything.



I learned to perfect so much. While others where learning to fall in love, go through the trauma of tentative relationships, etc, etc, I was learning how to do what I built a life on doing. Selling.

Selling myself, like a prostitute.

Basically, it starts with trying to tout for tips. Learn to build up quick relationships with customers. Your aim is to charm your way in to their wallet at bill time when they're drunk and euphoric at one AM and the bill needs paying.

I learned how to talk, how to purr, how to move.

I learned how to be androgynously, but non-threateningly sexual in every move I made, every word I said.

Little things. Like how to stand when apparently doing nothing.
One foot about a foot in front of the other pointing toe to heal. One arm folded across the chest, other arm folded up, hanging near the shoulder.

The way a woman stands when they're smoking.

Trust me, it's psychological. Generally, only women stand that way. Which is why it instinctively makes women see it as sexual, and men as somehow something they trust but don't know why.

And learn how to walk with a slight swing to your shoulders, a slight wiggle, and if someone calls as you pass by, learn to turn slowly, with a slight flick of the shoulder, raising one foot from the ground in so doing and fix them right in the eye, raising and dipping your eyelids at the same time.

And learn exactly what voice to use on who.
Know when to talk in your coarse vulgar Brummie speak and know when to bring out the honey tone seductive lilt, when even the word 'extension' can be made to be a come on.

Soon I did more than just earn tips. I did a lot of things that weren't hotel policy. And I accepted cash offers from customers to turn a blind eye to a lot of things.

I lived a double life. I often finished work and went clubbing. I took several of the Polish waitresses out shopping and then went on for a few drinks then back to the staff hostel for a quick one and then home before the Duty Managers caught me. I got two staff warnings for being caught. So my introduction to all that, was fairly casual, already quite cynical and businesslike.

I ended up at a red brick- and that in itself shows how bizarre it all was. The grades I got were the grades Oxbridge ask for. But in those days you get offers on the basis of predicted grades. And the lack of time I spent at sixth form, and the even tinier portion of that I spent doing any work, I wasn't predicted very good grades.

I guess, by the time I went to uni, I'd developed a life strategy which had only existed in double life form, but here it became my full life.

And it was a life strategy that worked. It did what life strategies are supposed to do- protect us and keep us safe.

And I had earned myself three years of sex and drugs at someone elses's expense. And a piece of paper saying 'Bachelor of Arts' for as much actual effort as I now have to spend in one week to earn a salary.

And this of course, is where I met The Baker and The Chimney Sweep.

So they saw the years I kind of 'polished myself', as The Baker puts it.

The Baker always says it would be much easier for people to understand me if they'd seen the unpolished version which everyone remembers from those years.

Best characterised by the Bizarre situation which everyone who knows about it calls 'Cruhed and his slave.'

What it was, was I kind of kept a personal sidekick. And that is how people describe it. And these days I'm honest about the fact that's what it was.
He was like a kind of Baldrick.

He was a source for money- unlikely to be returned. he was a source for alcohol. He did my laundry. He cooked me meals sometimes. He would come for a drink when summoned. He would type up my essays. He wasn't even allowed to pull unless she had a fit friend who felt like putting out easy. What's his was mine, and mine was...mine.

And I did some pretty not-mate-thing-to-do things in his case. Like shagging his ex the night after they split up. I didn't exactly always behave very well where he was involved. Not really.

The Chimney Sweep doesn't see what the slave got out of this.

I told him. He got a life. He took a break from the trajectory written from birth of being the son who never leaves home and stays forever a data inputter with a blue chip corporation. He got in, for three years, in a sex and drugs lifestyle he'd never otherwise have had and I gave him that way in. In a sense, being honest, I also think looking back he had a huge gay crush on me.

The Baker points out that at uni I was just far more blatant about the characteristics that now I've learned to polish.
I'm pretty much a control freak. I have major OCD about systems and control.

I fear control and won't let anyone near me unless I can be sure they cannot force me to surrender any control over myself in any way.
And my best way of preventing this against those I don't trust is to go on the offensive.
So I adopt a simple strategy of trying to sell me. I want to get on with as many people as I can, bring people in, make them my allies in life. And make sure I keep those I can't away from territory I'm guarding.
Basically, I look like a fairy, but I think like a predatory carnivore.



And you have to know me really, really well, and I have to be able to trust you really, really, well, before I'll let you beyond that.

To the precocious child beyond.

Who jumped mentally straight from childhood to adulthood and lost something along the way.
And be someone who can take that into account in judging the ruthless, cynical, harsh, secretive, untrusting, embittered, worldly wise, sometimes callous, explosive, interior that lurks under the surface of the charming, self confident, sociable, personable, passionate, open, candid (in the sense of not holding back on opinions or preparedness to tell the most shameful anecdotes about themselves kind of way), intelligent, somehow mesmerising persona that is how I present myself.

But behind all those barriers, I am the person those I trust, know how to relate to.

And for those who make it that far, it's worth it.
It's why those who do get that far, stay.

Those I let in, never go.

New Year's eve, 2006.

The Baker and I were sitting in a club called Subspace in Manchester.

It was about half eleven.

I said, 'Come I want a good spot on the dancefloor come midnight. Preferably right up on the front of the stage. Fucked if I'm not having my choice who's throat I have my tongue down at midnight.'

BAKER: Crushed. Chill. Let me finish my drink.

CRUSHED: Cool.

BAKER: I just want to say this. You've been probably my closest mate over the years, you and (another mate of his), both of you, my real brothers if you like, closer than my real brother, and you know, sometimes it really annoys me sometimes when people get you wrong. Like don't get you. Some people think you're a total bastard and that upsets me, because, I mean the times I've spent with you, some of the defining moments of my life, the days we've spent just really talking about stuff, really worthwhile times, and just a valuable part of living, I guess, sometimes it annoys me when people don't see that you. If anyone ever went for you, I'd take a pasting for you, you're that good a mate.

CRUSHED: (Well, no, sometimes you don't know what to say) Thanks. I feel the same about you.

(pause)

Dancefloor!

That's me.

That's the author of this blog.

Official Announcement- Appointment of Official Blog Stalker

Due to recent events, a position has become available as Official Stalker to Crushed by Ingsoc.

All applicants had to be considered on their own merits.

However.

It has always been the position of this blog that the man and woman in the street are inadequetely recompensed for the labours they put in.

I realise that the previous blog stalker had far too much of a workload, and thus, the new stalker will not be expected to fulfill such functions.

Future stalkers will not be expected to;

1. Contact every single commentor at this blog and notify them of their existence.
2. Ring my home number and when it clicks through to voicemail, keep ringing, up to twelve times at a time until the phone is answered.
3. Barrage me with e-mails.
4. Comment on every blog I comment at two comments after mine and leave defamatory comments.
5. Send offensive e-mails to other female bloggers attempting to twist the knife in on matters close to the heart of those female bloggers.
6. Find out the number of my grandmother in the old people's home and make 'Sleeping with The enemy' style phone calls to them.
7. Find out the number of my parents and yell abuse down the phone at them.
8. Work nights. If I've gone to bed, there really is no need to stay up till 4.30 AM to leave stalker comments. In future, this part of the job is being removed.
9. Oh, and take workdays off too. No need to leave stalker comments when you KNOW I'm in meetings.
10. Compulsive lies to sad middle aged divorcee male bloggers, especially those who try to present a holier than thou image but in fact type one handed for a very good reason.

Basically, much as I enjoyed lieing on my bed in tears because of how good a job the previous holder of the role was doing, I really don't expect the same of the next. Some people are just so good they can't be replaced.



So, it's a new, trimmed down stalker role we have recruited for.

The new demands are much easier.

And that, I believe is why we found such an excellent candidate.

She applied, her application was considered and though she would not have suited the old role, due to lack of psychotic characteristics, she fits in ideally to the new trimmed down role.

Starting immediately, with the responsibility of providing regular guest posts and being a full and positive part of this blog, may I introduce you to the official Crushed by Ingsoc blog stalker- Crashie!

He Was Honest With Her

He had chosen the right spot to sit. He had made sure of that. She sat on the stool, fidgeting, looking down at her coke.
He sat back with one foot on the table, his cigarettes in front of him, swilling his pint, as he always did. Over her shoulder the TV was showing Sky Sports. Not that he cared about the game, it was Chelsea against Arsenal. A lesser of two evils game, in which he would narrowly side with Arsenal, but the real point was to have an excuse to look away if he felt uncomfortable, to pretend to be so mesmerised by the game he had lost track of the conversation.

He was out of his depth and he knew it. He had told her, told her how he felt and he wasn't sure who was most uneasy. Her, at the moment, he figured. But nothing had changed and that was the most important part, that everything still seemed hunky dory, that she was carrying on as if he hadn't said those three words.

And right now 'Ok' was good enough for him, neither a rejection nor a requital. Just a guarantee that nothing was ruined.

He'd had a few already which was why he was able to talk in this vein. Sweet talking was for customers. You just don't say these things when you actually mean them. Too dangerous. You let these cats out of the bag and they might drag you to Hell.

He took a swig of his beer and decided to broach the topic again.

HIM: To be honest, it's probably better this way. It took many months and much alcohol to get me to say what I did, I think if you'd had anything more to say than you did, it would have been way too much for me to deal with. I suspect I'd have freaked out totally.

HER: I know.

HIM: As it stands, things are pretty much ideal, it's not like it actually affects the here and now. We could carry on, conceivably for ever like this, I don't see why not. In many ways, I quite like it like this. I'm never going to lose you from my life and I guess that's what really matters. At this stage, I'm not sure I could deal with more than that. At one level I want it, but I'm not sure I've quite got my head round the implications of what it is I want.

HER: Well, it may fade by then.

He smiled a sad smile and drained his glass. He shook his head and mouthed 'no' before heading to the bar. He flirted shamelessly with the barmaid, for no particular reason except he didn't know how not to and went outside for a cigarette as she poured the drinks. The entire cigarette lasted three deep, nervous drags. He picked up his drinks and returned to the table.



HIM: You needn't worry. I'm certainly not going to try influence you. This actually isn't something I want to sell. I spend too much time selling stuff and when it comes to women, I usually end up wishing they hadn't bought the patter. If for whatever reason, you do one day decide you feel the same way, I want you to actually feel it, not just think it was a good idea to try, or feel some kind of obligation that I was trying so hard you should at least give it a go. Giving it a go is always shite. Never works. Done it all my life, giving it a go. It's actually ten times worse to be loved by someone you just can't love than it is to love and not be loved back.

HER: I wouldn't know.

HIM: Well, I just feel that in this case, if this really IS my ideal of perfection, then it really shouldn't be forced. Besides, as things stand, I'm not sure if I could deal with you reciprocating my sentiments. I'd probably need a month or two to get my head round it.
My guess is IF you ever decide you reciprocate my sentiments it would be far enough in the future for me to be comfortable with that.

HER: So right now, its just me being uncomfortable.

HIM: Yes, but you certainly have the chance to return the favour. I guess if it ever happened, you'd be comfortable by then- and you'd get to make me uncomfortable.

HER: It would also be a completely hopeless situation.

HIM: I had thought of that, don't worry. I mean, I suppose the point is, that we'd cross that bridge when and if we came to it. Even if we ever got to that bridge it would be stupid to start making unrealistic plans. You have your career, I have mine. You would never leave your home town, I would never leave mine. I want children one day (I think), you don't. These things aren't strictly speaking reconcilable. But I don't see any point worrying about any of that at this point, and in fact, I would say that if we reached the bridge just mentioned, then there would STILL be no point worrying about those things. That's where everyone goes wrong.

HER: So what WOULD you suggest in such a situation?

HIM: Nothing. Nothing at all. Go with the flow. I mean, whatever happened we'd have to spend weekdays working- in totally different geographical locations, and that would never change. But we could spend weekends together. I guess I might even feel OK giving you a key to the flat.

HER: That's what you envisage, is it?

HIM: Yes, pretty much. It would be the best way forward until one of two things happened.

HER: Being?

HIM: You got bored, or one or other of us found it unsatisfactory and wanted more. And if that happened, we'd deal with that then. But that is so hypothetical I don't see any point worrying about it. After all, even allowing for things getting to that level, even if everything followed the course I've just described, we are talking years away now, I guess.



(Pause)

Are you Ok with everything I've just said? As I say, I don't think we need worry about any of it now. All of it is up to you, really. I'm easy with whatever you're easy with. Whatever happens, let it just evolve naturally. Sod rules. To me, this is too important for me to give a damn about someone else's rules. One step at a time, eh? With you in the driving seat. It's up to you what you want to take up, or if you want to take up anything at all. And don't forget, all this stuff scares the shit out of me too. You Ok with that? With everything I've just said?

HER: Ok.

HIM: And do you know whatever happens, whatever life choices you make, I want us to always be friends?

HER: Yes.

He smiled.

What more could he ask for?
What would be, would be. And whatever it was, would be for the best.

(I'm sure I don't need to point out this piece is a work of fiction)

Whither Canterbury? The Blogging Pilgrims Say...

The Canterbury Tales is, I guess, as important a piece of social history as you can get.
Literature? For sure, though in some ways it has less value on that front than most people realise for the simple reason that a good third of the stories are purloined straight from Boccaccio's Decamerone, and few of the remainder are original.

Not of course, that that necessarily detracts from it's literary merits. But where, I suppose, it's real import lies, is in it's depiction of a pilgrimage to Canterbury. In other words, it's not so much the tales themselves that matter, as the social observations concerning the pilgrims.
I guess- and I defer to Crashie here- a Muslim who has done the hajj can feel something on reading it that maybe a secular European fails to quite get. Because the whole point of a pilgrimage, is that it is a once in a lifetime experience; it is a journey.
Perhaps the end doesn't matter so much. I guess in many ways the secular west creates it's own pilgrimages; the gap year, perhaps, being something along those lines.

Because the characters of the Canterbury tales aren't holy people. They aren't devout or saintly people. They are ordinary people looking for something on the journey, as much as they hope for enlightenment at the end. And the Canterbury tales is about people from all walks of life, people who have never before in their lives been thrown together in such an unlikely grouping, learning from eachother, laughing with eachother, learning to understand eachother.

And we can't help feeling that the mouldy old bones of Thomas a Becket they will find at the end won't be half as much a prize as all of them have found on the way.

And I think it is so with blogging. Everyone's complaining how slow blogging has got- indeed, many seem to be dropping off. Because yet again, the medium seems to be going through a phasal shift. Because I think those of us who devote such large amounts of our time to this curious pastime have discovered that we are all indeed, kind of pilgrims. We come to tell our tales, but we come to listen too, and as with the Canterbury Tales, we learn as much- if not more- from the prologues (in this case comments) than we do from the tales.
We're all on a journey together. A journey to learn from eachother.

Anyway. A couple of fellow pilgrims have decided to favour this pilgrim with their largesse. So for tonight 'The Salesman's Tale' is taking a break.

I'm going to start with this charming little award given by Nunyaa- charming because no bank in their right mind would ACTUALLY issue me with a gold card, so this one is as close as I'm likely to get.



Now the rules to this are simple- It has to be given to four old friends and one new- the new being from another part of the globe.

Four old? Well, that's easy enough. I wouldn't give you free rein to post on my blog if I didn't value both your friendship and what you write.
Step forward Crashie, Eve, Heart and Oestrebunny.

And the newcomer from overseas? I had to think about this, but I felt the best person was the man now on a real life pilgrimage across the United States- Mr Fusion of Finding my Way.

So, here you go pilgrims. Don't spend it all at once.

A second such gift has come winging my way from the teller of 'The Nurse's Tale', jmb of Nobody Important



Now I must admit, I had to think hard about the criteria for this. How do you decide whether a blog is brilliant? And I suppose the honest answer, is how much in a rush are you to see if the author has updated. Because you know damn well, you're going to get a good read.
Well, I suppose the only way to really do this was ask myself which blogs will always get read immediately I know they've updated. Now I'll let you into a secret- I've finally given way to the tide and got Google Reader. As is my usual way, I've got it, stuck a few blogs in there, then kind of left it. I keep meaning to add a load more in, but as yet it's just the ones I want to be able to see instantly at work.

And so it is here we must go for our Brilliant list- blogs a post on which will not be missed- or so the theory is meant to go.

Helen of Helen's first Language
Princess Pointful of And Hijinks Ensued
X-Dell of the X-spot
Jim Callaghan the artist formerly known as the Tin Drummer
Sparsely Kate who has changed the name of her blog yet again
Cherie of Cherie's Place
Kimba of The Love Quote

I should add that all those awarded with the other, are likewise read as soon as I know they've posted, but I didn't want to duplicate. However, I'm going to break the rules in one instance. Although the rules on the Brilliant award say only seven, I'm going to break it (rules are there to be broken) and nominate Oestrebunny for this one as well.

Because she deserves it.

Enjoy folks!

Pass on the goodwill, pass on the vibes, get giving, get posting, get commenting!

Spread the love!

Savour the journey!
Or enjoy the ride, if you prefer :)

They Comforted You...

Back row: Justlikekip, Tweetypie, Sylvester, Jolly.
Middle Row: Owlie, Cedric, Nutter, Jimbo.
Front Row: James the Frog, Teddy, Tom.

I used to have a lot more soft toys than this as a child. But these are the ones I still keep.
These are the ones which have a kind of significance.

The significance kind of varies, but I guess each one represents a certain part of childhood and growing up.

Teddy has no name apart from Teddy. I'm told he's my oldest toy. I have no idea how old he is, he may be older than me by decades. Presumably he sat in my pram with me. I don't really remember playing much with him as a child and he doesn't seem to have any clear personality associated with him either. He belongs to my pre-cognitive years.

Jolly and Tom are the next oldest. Jolly is Italian for Jester, because he comes from Italy. He was given to me by one of my Mum's au pair friends (that's how my Mum ended up here, she came over as an au pair).
They kind of have personalities.

I guess you have to remember, I was an only child up until I was four. I look back now on thoughts I remember having then and they often shed a light on how people generally develop.

It's always been my view that we often forget that our development as human beings isn't just our own growth- it's the assimilation of the views and knowledge of those around us.
Someone asked me the other day 'Yes, but how can you PROVE the big bang. No one REALLY knows'
'That's actually not true' I said 'The Big Bang is remarkably easy to prove'.

And I explained red shift, cosmic background radiation, etc.

Because it is easy to prove. But one human being starting from scratch could never have come to such conclusions. Easy as it is for one man to prove the big bang now in a five minute conversation, he can do so only because of the inherited knowledge and thoughts of humanity.

And thus, I think it is with soft toys. I remember wanting to believe that Jolly and Tom were somehow alive, just as our ancestors wanted to believe the Idols were alive.

And I think at times it was a concept I wrestled with. Because you sensed that adults didn't quite think they were alive. And yet you WANTED to believe.
I remember my Dad coming into the room at the house I was staying at to tell me I had a brother. I replied 'Will he have a real face, or will he have a plastic face like Jolly's?'

I'm not sure quite what that says. That I knew Jolly had a plastic face. But that people with plastic faces were somehow living entities.
I don't know. I was not quite four years old.

James the Frog burst on the scene at about six years of age. James was most certainly a product of a different stage of thought. I still thought he was real- kind of- except he couldn't talk without my help. My existing toys were just inexplicably silent. This curious condition James had of needing me to operate him was somewhat of a mystery, but not one I struggled to find the answer to.

My Mum never liked him much. Because let's be honest, he was noisy and irritating. And being a frog, he had a tendency to just jump at people's faces squeaking as loud as he could. He was a strange character really.

My brother once decided he was so annoying he should go back in the pond with all the other frogs.
Fortunately, he was only filled with plastic beans, not something that might smell.

Nutter, Jimbo and Owlie all come from a similar era. Nutter is called Nutter for the simple reason that he used to nut people. I guess I was getting to that awkward age of excess energy where I frequently had to be shouted at.
Anyway, Nutter used to avenge me by creeping up on people (my parents mainly) and nutting them.
Jimbo was his brother, picked up at some fair or other.
Owlie, not sure where he came from. He still seems in relatively good condition.

Tweetypie and Sylvester come from when I was probably getting on for eleven or so. Probably the last ones I got before I threw them all out, except the chosen survivors shown here.

So what of Cedric and Justlikekip?

Well Cedric was actually my Mums. But I caught chicken pox as an early teen, and when you get it at that point it's quite bad. In fact, I was pretty much delirious. I still have scars from it now. My Mum gave me Cedric at this point to keep me company.

I suppose that kind of explains the odd relationship we had. Because otherwise all my soft toys had long gone into a box at the back of the wardrobe. Cedric was different. He kind of stayed sitting on top of the night storage heater and never left, just sitting, looking wise.

And as my teen years progessed, Cedric developed as a silent source of strength. He never said anything, just looked sympathetic and thoughtful. When I left home, it was Cedric who came with me. And he's been with me ever since. The rest I collected years later when I went back for my childhood things, but Cedric has sat at the end of every bed in every home I've ever had. Along with Justlikekip.

Justlikekip was actually sent to me at uni, along with a whole album of dog pictures. The reason was I really wasn't missing home at all. Except one thing. Kip. I badly missed Kip. I had got used to sleeping with the dog and was finding not sleeping with the dog to be pretty strange. Some would say that I did sleep with a lot of dogs at this point in my life. Maybe. But the stuffed one always sat at the end of the bed.

Interestingly, I found over time, I wasn't the only one with such mementos. The Baker had this manky monkey at uni, one ear missing, and a chewed up plastic banana in his hand. And I'll always remember how genuinely angry The Baker was when I hanged it. I think it had been with him since his early years and in his head, it had a persona, which his adult mind knew wasn't alive, but a part of him, that childhood that lives in all of us, still sees as a friend that needs protecting.

Cedric's role in life has been funny. He's just- there. I've never really paid him much attention, I just like him to sit at the end up the bed. Because he always has done. Various women have expelled him to cupboards or spare rooms on the grounds he looks freaky. I've decided that in future, the next women who decides that she will only get into a bed devoid of Cedric sitting at the end, clearly has no place in that bed.



Justlikekip, on the other hand, can never satisfy the fact that I want a real dog and due to my single life, will probably never be in a position to keep one. But from time to time, I can pat the stuffed one on the head and think about having a real one. And having adopted one with Dog's Trust also goes part way to satisfying that yearning.

So, the picture's took, you read the post, the rest of the stuffed critters return to the back of the cupboard, Justlikekip returns to the sofa, and Cedric to sit at the end of the bed.

They may be made of fabric and plastic, but they have played a role in my life and will be on open display in any place I call home, in the same way I display the Proclamation of the Irish Republic on the door to the living room.

Are they totems, are they comfort blankets?
Maybe a bit of both.

But home wouldn't be home without them.

Inspired by Eve

Crushed's Sounds of the Seventies

Enjoy!

Basic Lies At The Heart of The System- The Story of Your Enslavement

Capitalism is, of course, founded on a number of obvious deceits.
Deceits so obvious that you can't ignore them, so they just fool you into arguing them away.

The classic one is to convince you that relative poverty doesn't matter.
Only absolute poverty.

In other words, we're all materially better off than our ancestors were two hundred years ago.

So the relative gap between rich and poor doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter that our share of the gains has been disproportionately small- because at least we've gained.

But relative wealth matters.
Because- duh!- relative wealth is relative power.

And you have proportionally less of it than a peasant farmer of the seventeen fifties.

And the point of this post, is to explain how. To explain the definition of wage slavery.

Basically, it has to do with the fact that capitalism had its origins in the days when for most people, life was based on a subsistence economy.
Most people provided for themselves, and if they didn't, they starved.
Capitalism offered them a deal. It took away the risk of starvation.

And in return, the masses sold their birthright.

They agreed to have their share of the gains frozen at a fixed rate.

What exactly do I mean by this?
Well, I mean that the people, in the space of a couple of generations, sold THEMSELVES.

At the start of the eighteenth century, everyone is kind of self employed.

The peasant farmer has to spend ten hours a day tilling his field to provide the three turnips his family will eat and the fourth turnip the family will exchange for other necessities.
The weaver has to spend ten hours a day spinning the cotton to purchase enough turnips to feed his family.

Eighty percent of the population pretty much live on turnips. If you keep a cow, you milk it, and only when it is old do you enjoy that rare luxury- meat.

Well, none of this sounds much of a life you say. Ten hours work a day to live in a hovel eating turnips.

But the point is that the overall production cycle, from the point of view of the peasant farmer/weaver, remains something under his control; he controls the value of his labour.
And the point is, if a scientific/technological/agricultural advance occurs that makes it possible to produce twice as many turnips in the same furrow within the same time- what happens?

The peasant farmer gets more free time. He can choose just how much of that free time to put into extra labour, or not, as the case may be. If everyone used the advance simply to do less work, than progress would carry on at the same slow rate it had done for centuries. If however, everyone continued to use the freed labour to carry out more work, the pace of advance would accelerate.

So what was put in place at the end of the eighteenth century, was a system designed to do exactly that. A system designed to ensure that whatever the advance, the vast majority had to labour exactly as hard as before.

Wage slavery.

The interest economy is based as much on continual devaluing of labour, as it is of money.

How does this come about?

Well, in two related swoops, the late eighteenth century seizes two social changes which remove from the average human being the right to determine the value of his efforts.

The enclosure acts kill off the peasant farmer- he now becomes a farm labourer.
Before, he laboured ten hours to produce four turnips.
Now, he will labour ten hours to produce five turnips- and will be paid better, the cost of five turnips. Further more, since he is being paid for his labour, he gets the price of five turnips day in, day out. He is guarded against off days. In the short term, this new life is less precarious.

The weaver too, leaves his cottage. With other weavers, he spends his ten hours producing more cotton than they would have done singly, this pooling of resources gets more cotton spun. And they are paid at the end of the day, more than they would have made from their own efforts.

So initially, everyone is better off, not just in relative, but in absolute terms.

And the motor for rapid technological advance is in place.

Because what happens next, is that soon the former cottage weavers, are spinning three, four, five times as much in their factories as their labours would have done twenty years previously. Thirty weavers produce enough cotton to pay for six hundred turnips every day. But each is paid enough to buy five turnips a day. His labours produce more, but his share of the advance has been set at a limited rate. Because he doesn't sell the cotton that has been produced, he simply sells his labour. And the price for that has been fixed.

Put bluntly, an exchange rate has been set for labour- one we still pretty much follow.
It equals; one hours unskilled labour= one eighth of the tokens needed to purchase a subsistence existence for the day.
The value of the labour can increase if skills are added, but it is the labour time put in that is sold as a commodity, and not the product of such labour.

And this is so much more significant than first appears so. The sale of actual labour as an actual commodity in itself, rather than rewards being issued for the products of such labours has consequences long term that the system hopes you cannot see.
Because the long term consequences are the curious logic of today's society, with that twisted peculiarity that most people have been brainwashed to ignore.

The technology paradox.

The technological advances of today mean that we have much much more labour going begging than we know what to with, in real terms. It's just badly organised. The amount of human labour needed to produce six hundred turnips now is a minimal fraction of what it was two hundred years ago.



Technology. Thats the key. Over two hundred years we have built an infrastructure that actually means, that we can enjoy a standard of living beyond the wildest dreams of the eighteenth century peasant farmer. And the amount of human effort needed to be put in to achieve that, is much, much less.

So there is a problem. Your labour in one sense, is worth so much less. But in another, it's worth so much more.
What do I mean by this?

Bluntly, much less of your labour is needed. But your labours achieve so much more.

Let's cut the old and children out of the equation.

Let's assume 2 billion people working to put a roof over their heads every day.

We do not actually need 80 billion man hours a week to keep our society going and not just keep it going, but keep it advancing perpetually.
The point is, the amount of man hours ACTUALLY needed to maintain the status quo, continually decreases.

In fact, we do not need 80 billion man hours a week to keep the entire globe living in a lifestyle the residents of Bel Air would envy.

So what is the point?

Power.

The point is the maintenance of wage slavery. It's not to keep the down the OBVIOUS poor.

But you and me. The ones who THINK we're doing OK.

We think we're the professional middle classes.

In absolute terms, we're well off, compared to the peasant farmer of the eighteenth century.
In relative terms though, we're no better off.
In fact, we're worse off.
Because we don't have the stake in our society that he did. We have far les control over what we get back for our efforts than he did.

We look at all we've got and think we're better off. No. Human culture is more advanced. But our share of that advance, in real terms, is disproprtionately small.

Because in the seventeen fifties, most material wealth was in the hands of people. Some were rich, some were poor. Of course there was a gap between rich and poor.

But today, the real location of much of that wealth is cleverly hidden.
Corporations.
Its hidden, because those in control keep much of the wealth locked in the corporations.

But it means much the same. The bulk of the wealth of the world is in the control of a handful of people.
One shouldn't just look at the salary these people pay themselves, but the actual wealth under their control. And when you do that, you realise that the gap betwen the wealth under the control of a member of the Board of directors of HSBC and YOU, far exceeds the gap between the wealth under the control of George III and a peasant farmer.

The sinister point is this. Wage slavery IS slavery. Of course it is. Hidden cleverly, but the whole point is to keep you controlled by the token system. And not giving your share. By not giving the people the power to determine how their efforts are used, but by fastening as many support structures on to the treadmill as is possible.

The capitalist system has built itself on this premise; work forty hours a week, get the basic necessities. Put a lot more in, we'll give you more.
Not too much more though.

The problem is, what to do with your forty hours.

And the answer is; create a wastage economy.

We don't need 80 billion man hours a day. We could probably maintain things in the appalling condition they are on about 10 billion. If we did a bit of sensible global restructuring, we could all live as the most affluent in the West do, on 20 billion man hours.

The system carries on ploughing towards its own destruction, because it rests on several basic necessities.

The basic premise to remember, is that we do have to feed everybody. But we also have to retain the fixed exchange of labour put in to materials got out.

The point is, to find ways of wasting human energy. One hour's work is not going to give you back a share of what that one hours work has meant to the human infrastructure, it will give you back a set of tokens ultimately linked to how much material goods you need to subsist.

So for a start, we write off a certain fraction of human energy. I suppose we might as well be honest and say that it is, most often the least skilled. We decide that the least useful section of the human race shall labour not. The rest of us shall take on their workload, but they shall still be fed, on subsistence levels- or what, in our modern world, we see as subsistence levels.

The rest of us shall get more than subsistence levels- we shall get tumble dryers, more TV channells, bigger cars- but to do so, we shall still accept the sale of our labour. And it will take us forty hours of labour a week at least to achieve this.

And the labour isn't needed. So the system favours labour wastage. The economy actually needs ways to use up what is, effectively, cheap labour.

Here's one for you- the workerless factory. It is pretty much possible now to have factories with next to no employees. But the technology involved costs more than using people.
Good thing, you say. At least it provides jobs.

Ah!
Now we have it.

Provides JOBS.

Can't you see????

You've fallen for the trick.

You have to work to get fed.
You have to work eight hours a day to get fed.

DO YOU NOT BELIEVE THAT ONE DAY HUMAN KNOWLEDGE AND TECHNOLOGY ALLOWS FOR THE POSSIBILITY THAT, NO, WE DON'T?

We deliberately create waste. We create as much packaging as we can. We move things around as much as we can. We centralise production and at the same time fracture it in such a way as to actually use as much energy as we can- and the main reason given is that it keeps labour costs down.

Using up as much ENERGY as we can for the LEAST amount of tokens.
That's the trick.
To waste energy.

We keep most of the world in as poor a state of development as we can. You can talk all you like of the developing world. As it stands, it ain't going to get any better. Why? Because we can't find enough to do with our energy in the west, we produce far too much junk to find a home for, we don't need the other 80% of the world doing the same. So keeping it as it is, is the best solution.

Let the villagers of Darfur be raped and pillaged. Let Mugabe murder his own people. Let the whole continent tear itself apart.

Let them consume, but not produce.



Never forget, Iraq uses up energy. Bottom line is, that's partly why we're there. It's good for the economy.

And they waste our energy too.

Because so much of what we produce is produced to keep the system going, not the infrastructure. The trade system. To furnish commercial premises so they can carry on selling. To maintain us living in individual homes when living in communal hotel blocks would actually make more sense in today's world.

I work in a building where twenty companies are based. All with photocopiers, phone systems, printers, fax machines.
All produced to use up energy. All USED to use up energy.

Marketing companies, recruitment agencies, mortgage brokers, consultancies.

Wastage.

I live in a street of about forty homes.

Each with their own cookers, micro waves, washing machines, tumble dryers etc. Do we all use these things continuously?

Wastage.

Capitalism cannot take us forward.

Capitalism will not terraform Mars.

Only when we the people ourselves control the human infrastructure and resources are allocated properly, in proportion to contribution put in, on terms democratically agreed by the people themselves, will we truly live in an efficient society that can truly handle the problems of the twenty first and twenty second centuries.

The problem is, the only people who benefit from keeping things as they are pay for the adverts that punctuate the news bulletins that tell you what to think.