Quotes from Raymond Williams, playwright and political thinker

Occasionally I read a quote that just leaps out and sticks with me. Often these are from quite unexpected sources - like when I read an article written by the Welsh health minister, Mark Drakeford, which included this quote:

“To be truly radical is to make hope possible rather than despair convincing.”

I liked that. In the political narratives around us, it all seems to be about despair - extremists, the pressures of migrants, the NHS at breaking point, the economy. Every party, or factions in parties, seems to be trying to convince us that the other side will bring ruin upon us. And we seem to be buying into this. The despair has become convincing. Hope seems impossible.

I've been called a radical a few times for my politics and theological world view. It's not a label I would use to myself. But then if I am going to be regarded as a radical, I want my lived out beliefs to be a radicalism that makes hope possible.

The person who said “To be truly radical is to make hope possible rather than despair convincing.” was a playwright and political thinker, Raymond Williams. This particular quote was from a book called Resources of Hope, which was published posthumously in 1989.

The internet - that great reservoir of quotes - has some more interesting thoughts from him, many of which I agree with, and some that have made me think about things, if nothing else. Raymond Williams was very interested in class and society, and also the moral bankruptcy of unalloyed capitalism, all of which I am interested in. So, here are some more thoughts, in his own words:

“Culture is one of the two or three most complicated words in the English language.” (Keywords, 1983)

“Real independence is a time of new and active creation: people sure enough of themselves to discard their baggage; knowing the past is past, as shaping history, but with a new confident sense of the present and the future, where the decisive meanings and values will be made.”

“We all like to think of ourselves as a standard, and I can see that it is genuinely difficult for the English middle class to suppose that the working class is not desperately anxious to become just like itself. I am afraid this must be unlearned.” (Culture and Society, 1958)

“What breaks capitalism, all that will ever break capitalism, is capitalists. The faster they run the more strain on their heart."

“It wasn't idealism that made me, from the beginning, want a more secure and rational society. It was an intellectual judgment, to which I still hold. When I was young its name was socialism. We can be deflected by names. But the need was absolute, and is still absolute.”

Word of the week: obesogenic

I've been helping promote Champions for Health in work, recognising that my being unhealthy and working in the healthcare sector is incongruous.

Today we had an update day for people involved in the campaign (I went along to interview them). I heard a brilliant word - apparently we live in an "obesogenic culture", i.e. an environment that makes us put on weight by letting us eat more calories than we need.

Now there are two responses to that. You can either accept it and say 'Well, I'm overweight, but what do you expect? I live in an obesogenic culture." Or you can say "I'm not going to let living in an obesogenic culture define me."

Being involved in Champions for Health has been fun. Last year I even ended up on the ITV news.

The idiots are winning (but they'll still lose)

What gets me most about this news story about councils banning Latin terms is that most of the Latin terms they mention are now accepted English usage, like ad lib, for example. Most people wouldn't even think of it as Latin.

And as for the comment "the ban might stop people confusing the Latin abbreviation e.g. with the word "egg". " Well, maybe, but realistically, people will have to learn at some point that you spell egg with two gs.

This does seem to me to be mollycoddling people in their ignorance, rather than educating them to a position of knowledge. But maybe councils prefer keeping people in the dark, rather than empowering them with understanding. Knowledge is, after all, power. And councils don't like empowering their tax-paying citizens. It's so much easier to keep people under your thumb when they don't know they have alternatives...

Christmassy Echo headline

I could tell it's nearly Christmas today when we drove past the papershop and one of the headlines on the Echo boards was "Man has tongue bitten off in assault."

Now obviously that's horrific. But it did make me wonder what the full story was - which I suppose is the point of the boards. I wondered if the assaulter was a man or a woman, because it's bad enough if a member of the opposite sex bit off your tongue, but, as a bloke, to think there's a french-kissing thug roaming the streets waiting to pounce on another victim is even more worrying.

And then there's the aftermath. You can imagine the reporting being something like this: "The victim described his attacker as 'mmmth phththth mmphthfth'."

Which wouldn't be much help really.

Online philosopher

Check it out - I'm now a news commentator!

Maddening

The latest revelation in the Madeleine McCann saga is that "friends of the McCanns" saw a man carrying (possibly) a child, which could have been Madeleine. And the papers are full of it again - the McCanns are back on the radio - when will this ever end?

I don't know how many people I've talked to about this, but it seems most people reckon there's something fishy about the whole thing. And the verdict on the media coverage is that 'Kate and Gerry', as they're known to Daily Mail readers, benefit from being middle class and reasonably photogenic. Or at least Kate does. It was a single mother friend of mine - bizarrely also called Madeleine - who said "Now if it had been me who'd left my child alone, the papers would have had a field day and I'd be in prison right now."

As far as I can see there are four main possibilities.
1 - while 'Kate and Gerry' were out eating their meal, an unidentified intruder siezed the chance to snatch a child and either a) killed her, or b) is holding her hostage still over four months later [you decide which is the most likely scenario]
2 - while 'Kate and Gerry' eat dinner, an unidentified intruder, wrongly assuming no parent would leave their children alone for the evening, broke into the apartment to nick stuff, was surprised to find the children there and then had to do something because Madeleine woke up, and so either a) killed her, or b) is holding her hostage still over four months later [again, you decide which is the most likely scenario]
3 - 'Kate and Gerry' drugged Madeleine, even though they've now denied the accusations of sedating their kids, but cocked up the dosage, then cooked up the abduction as a way of avoiding jail, while disposing of her body themselves
4 - Madeleine is safe and sound somewhere and the McCanns know where she is, but, hey, they're famous now and got to meet the Pope etc. etc. So they keep the whole mystery going.

I honestly feel exhausted to the point of boredom with this whole case. Deep down, like most people, I think a little girl is tragically dead. We don't know what happened; we might never know. The McCanns might know, although I think they don't. What they do know is what we know - the guiltiest parties in this are the parents who abandoned their daughter so they could go out for a meal.

Satire

This very clever post from Newsbiscuit (the doyenne of reportage that should be true...) made me laugh:

"A young man has abandoned his weblog after coming to the conclusion that no one was interested in the every day details of his life.

‘I was really excited when I started my blog’ says computer repair specialist Aaron Bagshot. ‘I felt really amazing to think that I was sharing my life and thoughts with millions of people. That all around the world people were reading the everyday details of my life. Except that they weren’t.’"
Read the rest

For those who haven't discovered the genius that is Newsbiscuit, here's five classics you ought to read...

Paperclip from Word quits Microsoft for Apple
Trident’s replacement to be provided by Ryan Air
Wasp flu reaches Britain
Tinky Winky dies following drink-induced coma
EU rule that Germany must have shorter nouns

Be my Valentine

One of my favourite Valentine’s Day experiences was a few years ago now, when my little brother was till at Uni. We were traveling back from the far North and stopped off to see him because he’d just been dumped and was feeling miserable. We took him out to tea at Pizza Hut where we were the only table for three in the place and the incredibly cheap candles sputtered wax all over the table in artistic patterns.

Why does this stand out? I think it’s because people can be so selfish on Valentine’s Day. It becomes all about you as a couple. I’d like to think that Cathy and I have a relationship that’s bigger than just the two of us – yes, we want to spend time together, but not at the exclusion of people who need some TLC.

Cath’s exciting gift today was a framed set of US stamps with the word “love” on; presented to her by a Mr Potato Head (which I’m sure will remind her of me). She gave me a mug that told me I was “the cat’s pajamas” – a mystifying turn of phrase that made me feel good nevertheless. Tonight our hot Valentine’s Date will be going to our life group where we’ll each be discussing a news story that’s caught our eye in the past few days.

Without wanting to spoil the surprise for anyone, my story is going to be about boffins finding the scientific equation to determine the “beer goggle effect” that makes women appear more attractive when you’ve had a few. I think the principle that I’ll draw from the story is “isn’t God great to give us beer to make ugly people more pleasing to the eye!”

Prawn madness

Occasionally certain news stories catch my attention and bug me. Like this story about how prawns caught of the coast of Scotland are going to be shipped 12,000 miles to Thailand to be shelled, before being shipped back and sold in Scottish supermarkets. Why? Because it's cheaper to pay somebody in Thailand to shell prawns by hand than someone in Scotland to shove them through a machine.

In fact Time magazine makes the comparison that it costs $12 an hour to pay a Scottish worker (which with today's exchange rate works out at about £6), while a Thai hand-sheller only gets paid 50c a day. And the environmental impact is mad too - as Friends of the Earth put it: for the sake of a few extra quid, the prawn sellers are destroying the world.

I don't know what's the saddest aspect of this whole tale. That workers in Thailand are on 50c a day. That half a tonne of carbon will be pumped into the atmosphere for every tonne of prawns shipped round the world and back again. Or that someone somewhere has the job title 'Director of Scampi' on their business card.