Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
And so i bid you all a merry whatever and a happy new year – a lot of people seem to want to see the back of 2016 but I’m not sure why…ok, so it seems the dark forces have taken over the world, racial hatred, xenophobia, inequality, terrorism…all on the rise, innocent lives no longer protected, violence, genocide and murder rife in various hot spots around the planet…I really don’t see what the problem is. This is just the human race doing what it has always done. Don’t forget this is from the species that brought you the holocaust, slavery and the extermination of most of the other species on the planet bar the ones we want to eat – so what’s the surprise here? What are we so horrified about? Its just business as usual. Look back at our history – its always been like this. You can take the human out of the jungle but you can’t take the violent hirarchical ape out of the human. Its just won’t go away.
Although to counteract my own argument (someone’s got to cos its just depressing and this is supposed to be a goodwill xmas message) it feels like we are making no progress as there is so much hideous shit going on but what we have to remember is that it is only being done by a tiny section of any population. The majority of any population are basically non-violent bods who just want to go about their business. I know it doesn’t seem that way if you watch the news but that’s because the moderate masses aren’t in the news. The news is full of violent extremists, both personal and political, and I include world leaders in that group. Its just this tiny demographic creating all the chaos. The rest of us, the moderate masses, don’t really care where you’re from or what you do as long as you don’t fuck with our shit..or anyone else’s for that matter. This is a positive.
Its just a shame our lives have to be dictated by the minority when most people are basically alright. There is a wave of populist racism on the rise seemingly everywhere which isn’t so great as it whips normal folk up into hate-fuelled hot heads but I read recently that this has always happened throughout history in the first five years after a financial crash and generally subsides after 10 so if we are still feeling the effects of 2008 it will be over by next year. This is also a positive. Maybe I’m clinging on to hope that things are going to improve and they will and also we must remind ourselves that for most of us, life isn’t riddled with the misery so intertwined in some people’s lives.
So over the festive season, when your relatives are annoying the tits off you and your presents suck, just celebrate that you are with people who aren’t trying to kill you, suppress you, torture you and destroy your way of life. If none of this is happening to you, and you actually have a home and a family who love you (even dysfunctionally) you are winning. Most of us live in the good part of the jungle and won’t ever have to encounter anything more horrendous than our ical being on the blink but you don’t have to feel guilty…you just have to feel grateful.
See you in 2017 people…lets mebbe try n make it a wee bit better than this year’s shit show…and if someone could try and clone bowie that would be lovely…