It's been a bloody hell of a horrible week if your a human being with a soul (otherwise it's been business as usual for you lucky sociopaths). I have had real trouble with writing this blog entry. The topics of the week have been quite vile and, especially in the third points case, the responses to it have been quite sickening to the point where I've slipped into a dark and nihilistic mood. It is because of the level of horrendous events that this blog entry will appear rough and unfinished until I can find the energy to add the polish.
I feel very drained. The last two weeks I (and more so in particular one of my close friends) have suffered what feels like sailing through an emotional shit storm. No - a maelstrom of shit. We've battened down the hatches and pulled in the sails . . . and though the storm is now mostly over there is a LOT of cleaning to be done. The name poop-deck has never been more literal.
It should be noted that I've listed these in order of how difficult I find each of them to talk about, from easiest to hardest. It's not due to a lack of caring, if anything I just . . . can't bring myself to talk about it without lapsing into a somber melancholy state. I simply cannot grasp how human beings can be so disgusting cruel to each other.
First of the topics I wish to highlight (and with the least amount of horror, for it is now expected of them) is the continued attacks upon the poor by the English Tory government.
By trend the English will vote for a Labour government during economic boom and a Tory government during economic bust. Honestly, I don't know how people can be so easily duped into believing that this is a good idea or why they become upset when the Tories act like Tories.
Somehow, the belief that the Labour government are frivolous spenders and the Tories are sensible purse-pinchers became lodged in the public consciousness and stuck there like a bullet to the brain. It's absolutely no secret that the Tory government believes that the state of the economy is more important then the well being of its citizens, or to be more exact, that the needs of the "money-makers" outweigh the needs of the poor, sick or disabled - and yet the masses keep voting for them despite the lessons learned of the past. This instantly should invalidate any stereotype that english people are somehow more intelligent then our american counter-parts. Both sides of the ocean seem to believe that people who have money some-how make the money...
In England the government is practically obsessed with cutting the national debt. What they have never mentioned is that every country has a national debt, an always has done, because the capitalist system does NOT work off spending money but off creating enforced social contracts through debt. Debt itself was once a form of currency. It seems somewhat pointless to pay off this debt when other countries have simply written them off and a slap in the face when our government refuses to do the same.
Not only that but the Tory pledge to pay off the debt by the end of their term in power seems increasingly futile as the economy flat-lines over and over and over... not a SINGLE economist has come forward and said that this strategy is a good idea for paying off the debt (borrowing has now INCREASED), improving the economic recovery (we've have TWO recessions, otherwise known deliciously as a 'double-dip') or improving the standard of living (everything has become worse). Except if you are rich it seems.
One of the important means of cutting the deficit was to tackle unemployment. A reasonable tactic given that without jobs for folk to under-take there is a decline in the standard of living and capital fails to circulate throughout the system - like anemia, the body needs moving blood to survive or risks vital organs dying out followed by systematic shutdown. Except that's not whats happened...
The government decided that instead of creating industry that the private sector would solve all our problems, they needed a way to convince the public that getting people to work for FREE was actually a really, really good idea. This is NOT slavery - slaves got a roof over their head and food given to them, no the public would have to work for free AND pay at the same time. There was only one way they could do this and that was to blackmail the dependent on state benefits into working for no actual pay, thus the great Workfare scandal began.
In a master-stroke of absolute genius and mixed propaganda they managed to claim that the number of people on benefits was too high (true - people were being made unemployed at an alarming rate) and that tough measures would be needed to reduce the debt the country owes (not so true).This gave legitimacy of public consensus to tackle both these things SIMULTANEOUSLY, as if the two were intrinsically tied to one another and would be solved by each other. In other words, the Tories renewed their attack on the poor and jobless as they do EVERY SINGLE TIME they are in power. This opened the door and every window in the house to on-mass benefit cuts justified by restrained state spending on public services as though there was less money to spend (taxes have actually INCREASED).
Back in 2005 the LABOUR government decided to hire a private company (Atos) to take on the State responsibility of determining who was actually physically fit to work and who would receive state-benefits, a policy that the current Tory government has continued and replicated in other areas of state-public relations (A4e and G4s being the biggest companies to screw up current public employment services and security during the 2012 Olympics).
This week one Mr Mark Evans (50 years old) of Daubhill in Bolton was deemed fit for work by Atos and had his state-benefits cut by two thirds (from £660 p.m. down to £220 p.m.). Mark Evans is an amputee who cannot walk by himself and struggles to talk because hes also brain damaged. The reason he was deemed eligible to work? He couldn't make it to his court appeal process hearing in Cumbria, over 126 miles away from his home. It will be another three months before Mr Evans can appeal the process a second time.
To put some of this into prospective, I myself am currently on J.S.A. (Job Seekers) and H.B. (Housing Benefit) and completely able-bodied. I receive £76 per week in J.S.A. and £360 a month in H.B. - that's a total of £664. I am frugal and get by - I don't buy new clothes or luxurious food or go out drinking.
I once had a job where I was paid £400 a month (and instantly laid off another a months work) - thus lost all my benefits, leaving me with enough money for rent and £40 for bills or food. I could not afford both. I was cold and hungry for an entire two months, I lived off the generosity of my friends once a week. Misery doesn't cover it. I've never felt so desperate in my life. I have absolutely no idea how Mark Evans has any hope of surviving off half of even that amount I had access to.
This is not even the first time that Atos have come under public scrutiny. Atos are infamous in England for contributing to the sudden and sharp increase in suicides among physically and mentally disabled claimants because their benefits were fully revoked after being deemed fit to work. But Atos stretched understanding of able-bodied does not end with those able to object. In January this year one man was deemed fit to work and had his benefits axed - the problem? He was in a COMA.
 |
| Lazy benefit scrounging BASTARD! |
Atos claims that it uses (part of) the £3.1bn in government contracts to train doctors, nurses and physiotherapists to use their clinical knowledge to apply the government politics and criteria to each assessment but obviously not very well. So, whilst Atos was not hired by the Tories they were not dismissed nor scolded for their approach to judging work eligibility but are actually simply following the governments orders.
A government spokesman from the Department of Work and Pensions has said that the old incapacity system "condemned" people to a life on benefits. "Now, people who can work will be given help to find a job while those who need unconditional support will get it..."
Unless, of course, you are in a coma. I also really don't understand their use of the word "condemned" either.
People are condemned to a life on benefits if they are physically or mentally incapable of getting work, not because they are ON benefits. That doesn't make a lick of sense!
And how exactly does bullying people get them work? And how does stopping the flow of money to the poor help their local economies not crash and burn? Do they not see how this would perpetuate a cycle of poverty through job redundancies, or they simply not care?
Today I received a Council Tax bill for the first time since I was employed. From now on I will be a further £17 a month worse off and so will my local economy.
Secondly, The Daily Mail are up "Shit Creek" again - this time because one Ms. Lucy Meadows committed suicide three weeks ago after being bullied in the national newspaper for being a transgender school teacher. The culprits responsible for this needless and sick attack on a human being are non other then resident columnist and self-righteous verbal puss-fountain Richard "Little" John * and editor Paul Dacre.
To further how fucking despicable these two cretins are the Daily Mail website has been SCRUBBED of all references to the subject.
I highly recommend this blog for further information/citation. I'm chasing not to link away on this topic mainly because there is no further need for elaboration past what this writer has put: http://freethoughtblogs.com/zinniajones/2013/03/trans-woman-commits-suicide-after-being-bullied-by-the-daily-mail
Thirdly and finally, there was this: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/mar/17/steubenville-football-players-guilty-rape
With a very large public out-cry being to blame the girl for being raped. Think about that...
"It's YOUR fault you got raped."
She was so drunk she was unconscious and it's HER fault that two boys engaged in sexual acts upon her whilst she was helpless. Not their fault, they obviously were not in control of the situation, HER fault.
What. The. Bloody. FUCK. Is. Wrong. With. People?!
----
* Cheeky, I know. But like all scum we must scrub our finest wears clean of him and his ilk.
No comments:
Post a Comment