Echoes of the past

I'm currently reading Simon Schama's magnificent Rough Crossings: Britain, The Slaves and The American Revolution. It is in equal measure the most harrowing and most uplifting book I have read for many a year. Schama's academic rigour and his seemingly natural gift for story-telling shine in this potentially most bleak of subjects. As a reviewer of his BBC series A History of Britain remarked, if all school history teachers were like Schama, we'd all be historians.

To a twenty first century lefty, the very idea that people, and thousands of people at that, could be traded as goods, stripped of all dignity and humanity is abhorrent. Britain's role in the whole sordid business is often underplayed. While the majority of slaves were taken to the southern states to work on the cotton and tabacco plantations, a large number also worked in the British owned sugar plantations in the West Indies. The actual trading of the slaves from their capture and transportation across the Atlantic to the auctions, where a 'stout Negro' could be bought for 30 guineas, while weaker ones were piled onto giant scales and literally sold by the pound, was almost entirely a British operation. We had the most advanced navy in the world, the best ships, the most cunning businessmen. Many a British stately home, including Harewood House, close to where I used to live have their foundations built upon this brutal commerce.

But how far have we come in the intervening 200 or so years? One of the most famous and most disturbing images from that time is that of the stowage of the British slave ship Brookes under the Regulated Slave Trade;



nearly 300 souls crammed onto squalid shelving, chained in place. It reminded me of something. Something much more recent though just as abhorrent;



The government of land of the free and the home of the brave (sic) clearly remembers and sees fit to once again treat people as cargo, as numbers to be moved from one place to another without any thought for humanity or decency. Once again, Britain has a role in this transportation of souls from freedom to bondage, if not to slavery. The US Supreme Court has only today ruled that the Bush administration does not have the authority to try terrorism suspects [in Guantanamo] by military tribunal. It is surely time for the concentration camp at Guantanamo to be consigned to history. If it takes another revolution I am sure that it will be better received over here than the last one.

My senses have been stripped

"A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and gets to bed at night, and in between he does what he wants to do."

I’m not a huge fan of the word enigma, especially when related to a person. Surely there are enough adjectives in the English language to describe anyone, everyone? But I’ve spent the last 20 hours trying to think of a better word and I’ve failed.

Bob Dylan is an enigma.

I saw him last night for the first time and I’m yet to stop smiling, yet to come down from my high.

Bob can’t sing. He never could. Now at the age of 65 he really can’t sing. He has little stage presence; he doesn’t speak at all during the show except to introduce his band. No hellos, no thank-yous, no goodnights. He didn’t play his guitar last night instead he almost hid behind his little keyboard, harmonica glinting in the top pocket of his black suit. Under his black hat his lined face barks out the lyrics, his poems, so familiar but sounding so different live. If the show had been on the radio many people would have turned off.

None of that matters though. Not a jot. Last night I stood only yards away from Bob Dylan – Bob fuckin Dylan – while he sang Maggie’s Farm, Stuck Inside of Mobile, Like a Rolling Stone, All Along The Watchtower….. & many, many more.

My love is undiminished. It is stronger. It is renewed. I can guarantee that winamp will be playing nothing but Bob for at least a fortnight. Seriously, everyone, listen to Uncle Phy, if Bob comes to your country, make the effort.

Bob Dylan.

Enigma.

Legend.

Jenn

When I started blogging back in January last year, the one thing that surprised me and indeed pleased me the most was getting comments. I was, I still am always so very pleased that anyone even bothers to read what dribbles out of my brain; that others think it is sometimes worth a word or two back just thrills me.

I’ve made many new friends through blogging. One of those friends is Jenn from following my fish who died last week. Jenn was one of the first people to comment here, she was a regular and she never failed to make me smile. I’ll miss her terribly. All of my love goes to Jenn’s family, to Ben and to Mysfit.

Be safe

There are huge updates available at Opera, ZoneAlarm and Microsoft. If you can't be good be careful.

I will start posting again after the World Cup. I promise

Update: If you have ZoneAlarm, don't bother with the new version just yet. I installed it on Saturday and it proper messed up my PC. Some problems with the vector victor or something. I've reinstalled the previous version and will update again in a couple of weeks when, hopefully, the problems will have been ironed out.

Murderous morality

I try not to think about the Bush administration too often. It stirs dark thoughts within me of creating a super-bomb and razing Washington, annihilating the political establishment in one joyous flash of instant sunshine. No good will come of it. The thoughts that is.

But Colleen Graffy’s comments on the suicide of three men imprisoned in the USA’s concentration camp at Guantanamo Bay are heartless even for that barbarous regime.

Guantanamo suicides a 'PR move'

A top US official has described the suicides of three detainees at the US base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as a "good PR move to draw attention".
Colleen Graffy told the BBC the deaths were part of a strategy and "a tactic to further the jihadi cause", but taking their own lives was unnecessary.

But lawyers say the men who hanged themselves had been driven by despair.

A military investigation into the deaths is under way, amid growing calls for the centre to be moved or closed.

Suicide as a PR ‘stunt’. The callousness of that comment chills my blood. Suicide is not a ‘stunt’ whoever or why ever it is done. Making a speech on a warship in front of a big banner saying “Mission Accomplished” – that’s a stunt; Saddam Hussein’s show trial – that’s a stunt.

The decision to commit suicide is never one that is taken lightly. It is a decision born of despair and hopelessness, of seeing no future, no point in your continued existence. Is it possible that their despair was bought on after spending nearly 5 years in a concentration camp without charge, without legal status and without any recourse to justice? Trying to deflect criticism of Guantanamo by describing the suicides as PR or acts of war illustrates perfectly the true value that Bush’s ‘christian’ White House places on a human life. We’ve seen his administration kill indiscriminately from Fallujah to New Orleans. Life is cheap to a neo-con. I only hope the karma police have something suitable lined up for George.

Mondial

The World Cup starts in 4 hours!!!!!

Hurrah!!!!

This is the 700th Phylotopian post.

Hurrah!!!

Come on England!!!

Ctrl+Z Undo

Here's a thought I had in the shower just now. If you could un-invent anything, what would it be? Once un-invented, that thing would play no more part in the history of man, and anything it's done previously is erased.

My first thought was weaponry. But then I figured that if we hadn’t invented the gun we’d probably only have come up with some other devilishly fiendish way of killing one another.

So I’ve though of something else. Not telling what yet. What do you think?

Ultimate showdown

All the superheroes.

Genius.

Thanks Mzza.