Nick, Stephen and Neil

I'm not really an Observer fan, have yet to find a Sunday paper that I click with completely, but I generally buy it for Nick Cohen's insightful articles. But today's edition was a real let down - a muddled piece on education, with no clear thesis and a conclusion that appeared to implicitly support grammar schools - at least if you go by the title: "Long live grammars".

He starts well, taking as his starting point the slightly odd debate on selection at the Professional Association of Teachers conference (well, what would you expect of a trade union pledged never to strike?), and moving on to rehearse the statistics about the relative social mobility of the 1958 and 1970 cohorts. (BTW, I've never understood why there wasn't a 1982 cohort and a 1994 cohort, and why we aren't preparing for the 2006 cohort - they're so useful for all sorts of things, and policy formulation, not least education, labour force and teenage pregnancy policy, still relies on findings from studying them. I'd be much gratified if someone could enlighten me on this.)

Back to Nick. So far, so good. And, indeed, I don't disagree with anything he's saying until, with a jolt, I've reached the end without finding the advocacy of grammar schools promised by the title, that I was so looking forward to vehemently disagreeing with. Is this just an example of sexing up headlines by subeditors at the Observer? The drink-soaked trots have a variety of examples from today's Observer here, so it could be. I hope so.

There are some implicit threats implied in the article, not least in the highlighting that Tony Blair's Downing Street Policy Unit are actively considering the problem. I suppose I should get less paranoid, but since when have education reforms coming from number 10 meant good things for those of us who care about equality and social justice? Having said that, though I'm still cross about the watering-down of Tomlinson and I'm not sure about the whole Academy programme, I do like one academy-ish idea - schools selecting by banding, where there is a committment to taking a certain number of children from each band. I used to be an advocate of children going to their nearest school, and that still appears to work in Oxford, but I don't see how how that would combat the moving to get in the catchment area that is gerrymandering the idea of a "local" school.

And so to Stephen - Pollard that is, who I don't normally read but came across earlier today. Was slightly surprised to find him through Bloggers for Labour, as after reading a few posts he seems not Labour at all for me, but maybe that's a symptom of the sad breadth of my party these days.

He says:

It is precicely because educational opportunities which are currently the preserve of the better off should be based not on wealth but merit that the grammar schools debate is so important. And it is those who believe in selection by ability, rather than the cheque book, who are the real progressives.

No, the real progressives are those of us who don't believe in selection at all, Stephen, not by ability nor by cheque book, but who value the potential of every child. This is not a defence of the status quo, which, through the failure of some authorities to implement the comprehensive changes, the underfunding of Thatcher's years and yes, some trendy and discredited teaching ideas, failed a generation of young people. I know, I was at school in the 1980s, and my generation were failed. But we are turnign that tide now - through literacy hours and numeracy hours and preparation time and better pay for teachers and many other great differences a Labour government makes. It's not fast enough, and we still have a disgraceful number leaving with no qualifications, but I cannot accept that the way to solve this is a bridge out for the few whilst thousands of young people are consigned to the rubbish heap at 11. We can do better than that.

Finally, to Neil - Harding, at Brighton Regency Labour, undoubtedly proper Labour, though with odd views on PR. To be fair to Stephen and to Nick, Neil, I don't think that either said that SureStart and Working Families Tax Credits were "slowing the process of redistribution" - Nick's prose is tortuous, but his point is that they merely slow down the widening of the gap between rich and poor.

But I love this idea, Neil - I'll suggest it to college next time I visit:

The best and simplest solution I have heard is that every state school in the country (around 3000) gets a place at Oxbridge for their brightest pupil. This would mean that middle class parents would no longer have the incentive to concentrate their children in a few schools. They would have to take an interest in all schools as the best way of getting their children to the top universities. This would mean all children will benefit.

There's more to come on this topic - gotta run now.

Sunday hamster blogging

Yet again I've managed to prove that maybe the discipline of blogging isn't for me by failing to post for a week. Sorry loyal readers (all three of you). Maybe the answer is to buy a laptop of my own, as it appears that in a contest between Jo and me for our current laptop (she'll say her laptop), I always lose, usually by dint of waking up later than her and going to bed earlier than her. Just don't have the tenacity, it would appear.

Maybe getting a pet would help. I'd like to be a Friday dog blogger. Or, at a pinch a Friday cat blogger. That would give you a guaranteed Friday post. Unfortunately, property prices and landlords being what they are, I can't. So I'm always pleased to see photos of other people's pets up as Friday fillers. And now, in a prime example of blogs creating topics to be blogged about, and the MSM (that's American for "mainstream media", but I don't think it means the Guardian) eventually deciding to look like it gets this brave new world, the New York Times is talking about cat blogging and why cats are more popular on the internet than dogs. I can't currently remember my NYT password to look at it again, but it was worth a read the first time.

Amanda, as usual, gets to the heart of it:

Why are cats and not dogs the major pets of the internet? Because cats are inside animals and it's a lot easier to get a decent cat shot than a dog shot. ... But dogs aren't as easy to photograph. The very thing that makes dogs great pets--they love you more than life itself--makes it really hard to catch them doing something cute or funny with the camera. Why? Because when you point your camera at the average dog, they get so excited that you're looking at them, they quit doing whatever they are doing to come over to you to say hi.

So, in lieu of me having anything interesting to say to you, or indeed me having a dog or a cat to photoblog, here's a Sunday hamster blog. She's called Honey, by dint of being honey-coloured, and is, in fact, an illegal immigrant, as she lives in a land (our flat) where such four-legged creatures are prohibited. Don't worry, she's not claiming benefits and is, in fact, existing on mine and Jo's charity, which runs to two palatial cages and an unending supply of chocolate (yoghurt) drops. I don't think we'll be seeing her on the front page of the Daily Express any time soon, though her family have featured, famously, in the Sun:


So here she is, and yes, those are my hands and a bit of my chin!

Recommended reading

So for the past weeks, I've been reading mainly trash, and Harry Potter. I normally get ideas for reading by wandering around Borders, and by reading the review pages of the Guardian, Observer and New Statesman, but none of these sources are inspiring me at the moment. I'd like some suggestions about what to read next from the limited number of other people who read my thoughts.

Despite having left formal education four years ago this month, I'm trying to keep my mind sharp (or if not sharp, at least not entirely dulled by the distance from Dr Miriam Griffin and her politely-concealed but reasonably evident disappointment in the bright female ancient historian who spent her time otherwise than in the Bod.) Working with youth workers, you get used to their cycle of reflective practice; I'm not sure what one looks like for a full-time campaigner and part-time Labour activist, but I guess having a full library of books exploring human ideas and influence must help.

As a guide, I like non-fiction about political figures, movements and ideas; history - but definitely not biographies about "great men"; society, anthropology, women. I may well have missed some great feminist books published in the last few years, particuarly those working from the practical viepoint of trying to find a 2000s feminism. Ditto politics - my rather haphazard political education may have missed vital books. More superficially, I like paperbacks, modern typefaces and striking covers, though I daresay I should attempt to retreat from my prejudice against anything written in a serif font in favour of more considered judgements on content.

Has anyone got any ideas?

(Not) uniting against terror

So it seems that the unite against terror statement has provoked a little discussion in the blogging community. It’s definitely worth reading the discussions at Jo’s and at Perfect, both the original and subsequent posts.

I find it all very interesting. On the one hand, I feel uncomfortable at the outright pro-war-ishness of some of the views of those who signed the statement. On the other, I feel outright frustration at the visceral anti-Labourism of some of those critical of UAT.

I’m still a member of the Labour party. It’s not easy, after the war, after everything, still being Labour. But I’m certain that the only way to create that equal, democratic, even socialist society which is our aim is through the Labour party.

But to do that means re-engaging not just the working class who feel that Labour doesn’t care about their issues anymore*, but also anti-war people who’ve given up on us as an engine for socialist change. I’m not advocating fighting every seat in the land, treating Muswell Hill as of much importance as Hackney – on the contrary, having fought OxWAb in May, I don’t think Labour candidates should do much more in non-heartland seats than turn up and smile. I am advocating a critical dialogue with non-organised (by which I mean not those in another fringe party) socialists outside Labour. I had hoped that LFIQ could do that, bringing together lefties inside and outside the party in a spirit of solidarity with the emerging Iraqi trade union movement, but maybe I’m wrong.

* NB - that “not just” might make you think that I think re-engaging the working class is an easy or a less important task – it’s not either of these things. Although we’ve had some great results recently in places like Becontree and Northfield Brook, where the Labour message was less about immigrants and more about quality of life, ending anti-social behaviour and improving housing and facilities, we’ve by no means cracked that one yet either. (Although I’m not going to say that just yet to the Oxford Labour campaign team, whose euphoria last night was so great that I really think we might soon see t-shirts emblazoned “were you up for Northfield Brook?”!)

UPDATE: Tim Worstall has pointed me towards this post by a guy going by the name of Lenin about the statement. Never calm, it rises in tempo to this disgraceful point:

I’m afraid I haven’t gone far enough. The Palestinians are right to fight the Israelis, and I support their being armed with the tanks and helicopters that their opponents have. The Iraqi resistance is right to fight the occupiers, and I support attacks on UK & US troops. The resistance in Chechnya is right to fight the Russians, and I support attacks on the Russian army. I am a supporter – nay, glorifier – of terrorism. Potentially, under new legislation, I could be locked up or deported – if only my skin were brown and my face bearded.

Some thoughts (half-formed) on a justified rant

Over at Normblog, Alan Johnson of Labour Friends of Iraq after having a justified rant about apologists for the London bombers, asks a number of interesting questions.

He's talking to "the community of bloggers that cluster around HP / Engage / normblog / Labour Friends of Iraq", and I'd count myself as one of those, admittedly usually a rather silent one.

So far, so good: I've signed the Unite Aginst Terror statement, I'm a member of LFIQ, I've earned my spears in battle with the SWPers and shouted at the radio when some idiot blames Israel; this is making me angry with the apologists, but not challenging me so far.

Then something happens that makes me a bit queasy:

"Now, with words that will lose me my last remaining friends, I guess, let me say this. I agree with every word of Blair's speech. It's a bloody marvellous speech. Just what needed to be said. I could hardly say much else, could I?"

Maybe it's brave for an anti-war Labour member like Alan to admit to this; certainly it's not fashionable. I hope that I'm not as closed-minded as to dismiss anything that TB says because it's him saying it. I certainly believe that by staying an active member of the Labour party and putting myself up as a candidate for that party, I have demonstrated that I'll run with what Labour do right (which they do the vast majority of the time), and make clear my objection when they go wrong. (And just because he may be right on this, doesn't mean that I've forgiven him for Iraq, or, for that matter, for privatisation, a rightwing immigration agenda and selling off council housing.)

But I question the use of Unite against Terror if it is to become a cheerleading squad for government policy. I got involved with LFIQ precisely because it offered another way for those of us who opposed the war, but don't believe that pulling out of Iraq right now does any service to those struggling for democracy there - if you like, a middle ground between pro-Islamists and uncritical cheerleaders for Bush and Blair.

I'm lucky enough to have a great bunch of real-world friends to argue these issues through with, Dan, Jo and Tamanou, and what I'm saying is unashamedly influenced by them, particularly by this post at Trees for Labour.

I don't think that it is apologising for the terrorists to say clearly that I do think that the war in Iraq contributed to a situation where the events of the 7th become a possibility, in that the mobilisation against the war played a part in radicalising young Muslims. The blame for the tragedy undoubtedly lies with the bombers and those who trained, equipped and encouraged them.

So, what were these questions? They're here in full, and certainly the answer to many of them must surely be because we spend too much time talking to each other and not enough time talking to people whose views we might sway but who at the moment are just getting their opinions unchallenged from the large variety of apologist mouthpieces. The most interesting question is this:

• Why has the Labour Party stopped doing politics? If it's because the party goes to sleep in government, well, listen up... It's. Not. The. Normal. One. Term. Deal. Loosen up. Speak out, give interviews, write columns, organise vigils. Wake Up!

Firstly, I think you're doing the party members a slight disservice. As a student, finding out about politics, I was involved in campaigns about student funding, against our local asylum detention centre, for LGB and women's rights. I joined the Labour party because in each of those campaigns, the people who were most active and who I was most inspired by were Labour party members.

And that's still the case - in Oxford at least, which is where I know best. Labour members propping up the credit union and the Close Campsfield Campaign and the local trades council and 1001 other local campaigns and committees. Yes, we've forgotten how to campaign as a party except around elections, but we created that party by our desire to win those elections. We told ourselves that "discipline" and "restraint" and "loyalty" and accepting leaders and policies that weren't quite good enough, well, those were sacrifices that were worth making. Which another reason why the adulation of TB seems odd to me, because he's the architect of that emasculation of local CLPs, and a policy that seeks to re-engage members with reasoned political debate and the struggle for democracy needs to reach out to those very people that some pro-war leftists profess to despise - the members and no-longer members who are still furious with TB.

So I guess I've come full circle. Is praise of TB the right tactic to win the support of those we need to? And politically, given the diversity of views on other issues, not least the war, from which LFIQ members come, is it right? And when, in all the criticism then praise of TB and the praise then criticism of Ken, are we going to realise there is no wonderful leader on a white charger who will show us the way? That it's always going to be up to us?

Okay, so having got that off my chest, now I'd better get out for the evening shift for today's bye-election.

Good news from Sedgefield

Another blow for democratic control of social housing, from the Guardian:

"Voters in Tony Blair's constituency have rejected government-backed plans to transfer Sedgefield's council houses to one of the north-east's biggest housing associations. ... Nearly 60% voted against the transfer."

Glad to be an activist for a city party committed to no sell-offs of council housing.

If you're interested, there's lots more info at Defend Council Housing.

Iraqi women to lose rights

So what happens when on the one hand the UK and US are trying (imperfectly, but they are trying) to promote autonomy and democracy for the people of Iraq, and on the other, said autonomy and democracy leads to things like this?

A working draft of Iraq's new constitution would cede a strong role to Islamic law and could sharply curb women's rights, particularly in personal matters like divorce and family inheritance.
The document's writers are also debating whether to drop or phase out a measure enshrined in the interim constitution, co-written last year by the Americans, requiring that women make up at least a quarter of the parliament.
The draft of a chapter of the new constitution obtained by The New York Times on Tuesday guarantees equal rights for women as long as those rights do not "violate Shariah," or Koranic law.

Recently, our local SWP accused me of using women's rights as a figleaf for supporting Bush and Blair against the supposedly anti-imperialist "resistance"; I guess now it's even more important to support the women's movement and trade union movement in Iraq.

A little bit more American politics

Jo says that I have to expand the range of topics I write about on my blog, because I'm probably the only person interested in abortion, young people, sex, women's stuff and American politics almost exclusively. So I will try, presently, to do just that. But for the meantime, please indulge me posting about a few US things that have caught my eye today.

Over the past few weeks the American bloggers have got really exercised about the leaking of a CIA agent's identity, apparently from the White House staff, apparently because they didn't like the stated position of her husband on the war in Iraq. I must admit I've been skipping over the details a bit - I know there are big issues involved, but it all seemed a bit process to me. But now I get it - why? Because those clever guys at the Swing State Project have turned it into an episode of The West Wing:

So play this out. Let's say there's an episode of The West Wing where Josh is accused of treason for outing an undercover CIA agent. In such an episode, we know some scenes that would be included. There would be the scene where Leo yells, "Get Josh in here" to find out why Josh got caught in such a petty political smear. There would be the scene with Tody prepping C.J. for the White House press briefing. There would be the scene where President Bartlett asks Leo what is going on.

Also at Swing State, I found out that yesterday was the second annual Blogosphere Day, when the US progressive bloggers get together to give money to an election campaign for a Democrat running somewhere unlikely. Last year the beneficiary was Ginny Schrader, who was the subject of the attack ads I saw in Philadelphia. This year they've raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for a guy called Paul Hackett who is running in a bye-election in Ohio's second district - apparently he got $105k from the internet in a day. Pretty bloody impressive.

Finally, GW has announced his nomination for the supreme court - it's John G. Roberts, as I'm sure everyone reading this knows. Worth looking at his Wikipedia page, which is changing all the time as enterprising investigators delve into his life and opinions.

Fewer facists in the world

Hurrah.

Why people should have voted for me

Evan Harris re-opens that can of worms. Cheers mate.

Boycott the Guardian, and why it's Israel's fault, of course

Eric at drink-soaked trots for war says that we should be boycotting the Guardian because of the unusual and distinctly unpleasant views of one of its trainees. I get your point, Eric, but what are us underpaid overworked non-profit employees supposed to do without Wednesday's tonic of vacancy pornography? Can I just buy it once a week for that? Well, I suppose the Oxford Mail has all the news I really need...

Meanwhile, on Today, Bernard Crick says "these kinds of protests have been going on since the failure of Israel to follow the United Nations resolutions after the 1967 war...it is nonsense when the government denies that there is a political as well as a perverted religious dimension." So London was a protest, was it? At least it's a comfort to know that we can just blame Israel.

Youth does matter

So I seemed to be pretty much right about the youth green paper, which was published about 9am this morning. I've only skim-read it so far as have been out all day. At first glance I'm pretty pleased with the support for disadvantaged kids - keeping the system of PAs for young people who are particularly disadvantaged might have been one of the things that was missed out, but it's there. Local authorities should be worried, though - there's a clear challenge to them in terms of the expectation that "unpopular" services will be remodelled or closed, and the move away from grant funding to consumer-led funding is as expected.

More info here.

What I really didn't like was the spin on the radio this morning - it was all about ASB, as in "new government plans to tackle anti-social behaviour will be announced today". What a missed opportunity.

Unite against terror

I've signed the statement. Have you?

Thanks Evan

Glad you're so liberal and leftwing as to support a woman's right to choose. Your mates at the BMA rejected shortening the time limit, didn't you hear?

This Tuesday, Dr Evan Harris, the Liberal Democrat MP, will call for the government to set up an inquiry into whether the upper abortion limit should be lowered to 22 weeks.

In a Commons debate, he will argue there is evidence that the age of viability of the foetus could have changed because premature babies now survive at just 23 weeks gestation.

More in the Sunday Times.

Youth Matters - tomorrow?

With any luck, the long-awaited youth green paper will be published tomorrow, after being delayed for nearly nine months for god-knows-what reason.

This could be a great oppportunity for a Labour government to complete the transformation of services for children begun by the SureStart agenda and Every Child Matters - making sure that the next generation of young people, who get excellent support from birth, don't lose all the progress they have made in their teenage years, because there's nothing on offer after school, at the weekends and in the holidays, support for the most disadvantaged is, to use a horrid cliche, a postcode lottery, and careers advice is pretty non-existent.

And I really hope it's going to be good, but I fear it won't. Why do Labour governments have this nasty habit of disappointing me? This could be so popular - if you ask anyone with children or who lives next door to children on any street in any town, I'm sure at the top or near the top of many people's list of complaints is "there's nothing for them to do round here". Excellent youth services are such a win-win - less anti-social behaviour, something for young people to do that they could enjoy, a chance to reinforce messages about citzenship, sex and relationships, drugs and alcohol etc which may go in one ear and out the other at school, and a chance for young people to have some fun and enjoy being young people.

So, what do I reckon will be in "youth matters"?

• with any luck, a requirement for local authorities to provide youth services. At the moment, they're not statutory, so LAs like Tory Oxfordshire get away with cutting and cutting, and then pretending the needs of young people in the plummy villages are the same as those on the estates in East Oxford, justifying a really thin spread of the jam of funding. Dan's got more on this topic, if you're interested.
• less good, a system of credits, awarded for school performance and volunteering, which can be topped up by parents, and which young people can use to "pay" for activities. I am sceptical, because it will be less likely to benefit disadvantaged young people, who aren't as likely to do well at school or volunteer, but who need the support of positive activities even more than middle-class kids. I daresay there will be a government contribution on a sliding scale to the cards of young people whose parents are least well-off, though. I also dislike this because it will bring a market into youth provision, make funding dependent on individual young people's choices to attend each week, making the jobs of youth workers more insecure and badly-paid and the likelihood of doing intensive continuing work with young people more remote. It'll also put pressure on youth providers to provide more "sexy" activities, which in the long term may be less valuable and impactful for young people's development. It'll also emphasise again the individual rather than the community aspect of excellent youth work. Frankly, I'd rather large chunks of government money didn't go private providers, but then I would say that. Our learning from the way childcare has been rolled out is that private providers only operate in better-off areas, despite government encouragement, and that unless childcare in poor areas is heavily subsidised, it's not viable for private providers. I'd hate to see a situation where choice for young people in North Oxford got better whilst young people on Rose Hill and Wood Farm missed out because there was no money to be made.
• finally, a real focus on diversionary activities - keeping young people out of trouble. That's something I fully support, don't get me wrong, but young people deserve something better than endless rounds of football and basketball, which is pretty much what the Positive Activities for Young People programme has become - great for lots of boys and some girls, not great for some boys and most girls. I'd like to see young people involved in the design of programmes from the start, and a recognition that whilst activities are great, young people should also get the chance to do nothing - chat, hang out, listen to music etc - somewhere safe and off the streets. Which is why I'll be really sad if there's no great investment in the infrastructure - buildings and facilities. Why can't we have a youth club in every area as well as a children's centre? If it has to be in schools, then so be it, although I'd thank government for recognising that school isn't always a happy place for many young people.

If you want to know more, there was a leak of a draft to Community Care - the link is here. Oh, and I guess I'd best say that these views are my own, not YWCA's, in case you were confused. Anyway, we'll see tomorrow (I hope!)

UPDATE: It is out tomorrow. Trailed in today's Observer, and my predictions are pretty spot on, unfortunately.

Drumming

The lovely Jane Tomlinson has sent a photo of me drumming on Thursday. Proper action pic!

Harry Potter, abortion and abstinence

Yes, I will hold my hands up, I am a Potter fan. Potter made me late for canvassing yesterday morning, Potter has been the main topic of conversation in our house for the last few days. Oh well. I'm not going to put up any spoilers for those of you who haven't finished it yet. I finished it at about 5pm, hence the bloggage of the last two hours.

But this, from Jesse at Pandagon on Friday, made me laugh:

I'll let you in on a few secrets about the year's most anticipated book hours before you can get it in your hot little hands.

• The Half-Blood Prince...is actually Prince.
• Hogwarts replaces Defense Against The Dark Arts with abstinence-only education. Hermione excels at the class, but after she and Ron decide they're mature enough to handle the consequences of sex, she ends up preggers for the last year of school.
• Draco Malfoy is gay, gay, gay, gay, gay.
• Gay.
• Lord Voldemort's latest attempt to destroy good wizardry is revealed when he uses a concert by rap supergroup Sugarhill Gang to pollute Hogwarts minds. Believe me, it comes off better than it sounds, I swear.
• Cho and Harry hook up, and Rowling uses this as a chance to explore the world of erectile dysfunction. For two hundred and ninety one pages.
• Who dies? I'll have to keep that secret until tonight, but suffice to say that horror movie rules apply, so watch out for the first black character introduced in the book.

And that piece provides a very tenuous link to the next two links. Feministe pointed me towards the shock revelation in the Washington Post that abstinence-only education in the shape of a US government website for parents misleads young people.

And about abortion, Marie Stopes has made a valuable contribution to the debate about late-term abortions by looking at the reasons why women opt for them. And suprise suprise, it's not because women just changed their minds. More at the Guardian.

Seminar on blogging and campaigning

Okay, so my latest resolution about how my life is going to be involves no more lazing around in Oxford, but a determined effort to go to all the interesting seminars and events that pass across my desk but I fail to get to because they involve an hour on the train. See what I mean by lazy?

Started by getting myself and Jo to "Weblogs: a powerful voice for campaigns?", organised by the Hansard Society and Crisis in Portcullis House on Wednesday night. It was all about discussing whether blogs were about to become the latest indispensable tool for voluntary sector campaigners, particularly looking at their example of working with a fomerly-homeless man, Jamie McCoy, to set up Jamie's Big Voice, which was about giving a voice to homeless people and homelessness issues during the general election.

The speakers were Mark Flanagan, Campaigns Manager from Crisis, Sandra Gidley MP and Jamie himself. As a voluntary sector campaigner and a blogger myself, I was particularly intrigued to see how an NGO managed the loss of control that comes with supporting an individual service user to speak for themselves through an unmediated medium like a blog. Mark said that Jamie was "more than a case study", and I guess that for me is the point - Crisis managed to get heard the authentic voice of a group who, as Jamie pointed out, are effectively voiceless. Having said that, I don't know if I could do it with YWCA's service users. The very strength of a blog is the interactivity, the ability to start a dialogue with one's commenters and readers, and, although Jamie and Crisis were obviously disappointed that he didn't get more comments on his blog, they were lucky not to be trolled extensively. Homelessness , whilst it carries a strong stigma, does not attract the opprobrium of, for example, teenage motherhood, and I'm not sure that I could effectively support teenage mums blogging as a campaign tactic because of the inevitable negative comments that they would get. How could an organisation which is about building self-confidence in disadvantaged young women put these women in a position to be shot down? Yet, without comments, in what sense does a blog add value to a traditional case study, such as these, from our most recent campaign? I'd love to see an independent blog from a teenage mum about her experiences, though.

Mark gave a great, enthusiastic speech - though I think the word "empowering" is becoming meaningless by overuse. His six key lessons for vol orgs thinking about blogging as a tool are worth repeating:

• find the right blogger (Crisis clearly struck gold with Jamie)
• find the right partner (I couldn't quite get my head round why Crisis needed a partner except for technical expertise, but Mark explained it to me afterwards - it was about giving Jamie an independent source of advice and a sounding board removed from Crisis' campaigining priorities)
• maintain close contact with the blogger
• think wider than your own issues (it was only when Jamie moved away from blogging exclusively about homelessness that the blog attracted wider attention)
• extend the audience
• relax!

Sandra Gidley MP seemed an odd choice, although she was a last minute replacement for another MP who had to pull out. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy Romsey Redhead and respect her as a politician, even if not one sharing my politics. It's just that she didn't seem to know much about blogging - she didn't know about bloglines, for example. The panel would have felt much more complete with a speaker who knew far more about blogging and the blogosphere - perhaps Tim Ireland, who put together Tom Watson's blog, or an American blogger with experience of their much more developed political blog world? The accompanying pamphlet also seemed to have been written by someone without much experience of reading or writing blogs. I was also disappointed that the event didn't turn into something like the US real-world bloggers' get-togethers. The only other blogger there that I had heard of (and I read quite extensively) was Perry de Havilland from Samizdata.

But, all in all, I really enjoyed myself. Well done Jamie and Crisis.

Been busy

So much to do this week, so sorry for no posts. Combination of a bye-election in Oxford, my annual staff conference at which I had a trade union AGM to organise, four sessions to facilitate and a presentation to give, as well as drums to bang (photos to follow), a research report launch tomorrow for which my ministerial speaker has cancelled because of the delayed publication of the Youth Green Paper, also my concern, also tomorrow, a new Harry Potter to read - finished it an hour ago - a drinks reception and a seminar to attend, both in London. I guess I also wasn't ready to blog about anything other than London, but had nothing new to say. So no blogs. Please understand.

More London

Am I missing an LCLGR meeting and Lola's leaving do because some nutjobs tried to take out the tube? Am I fuck.

Some links to interesting stuff:

Currybetdotnet, who works in new media for the BBC, has posted about trying to keep the site up on Thursday.

The New York Times is talking about citizen journalists taking photos and posting their stories about the bombings, and how they ended up in the the mainstream media.

Tom ponders what to call Thursday's events, amongst other things.

Stoicism and the idiot tendency

Been wandering around the internet trying to make sense of things. What some people have been writing has been making me cry; some made me angry; and some convinced me that the best possible thing I could do was nothing. Going to Tesco's tonight? Going to a friend's birthday party in London tomorrow? Don't change your plans. Last night was as normal a Thursday evening as I could manage under the circumstances - door-to-door on Blackbird Leys for our city council bye-election, pizza for tea and then to the pub.

Patrick gets it down to a T:

"And where the virtues of other countries fetishise a Romantic, Wagnerian heroism, those of England are unassuming: decency, carrying on, and in direr hours humour, stiff upper lips, and the ironic, benevolent wit of fellow-sufferers talking to one another. These are adult virtues, by comparison to which the others seem adolescent; by them one might live a daily rather than a cinematic life, share pints with friends, and when public duties call, do what they require with quiet steely determination and self-effacing humour. In unglad moments, these are sterner stuff."

Of course, for hollow laughter, you can't beat US conservatives. Thanks Amanda for directing me to this guy, some fella called John Podhoretz. Remember that scene in Farenheight 911 when Bush is told about the attacks and for an awful length of time keeps reading the storybooks to the children? Well, apparently Blair's reaction yesterday presented something of a challenge to Podhoretz's idol, Dubbya, who was in danger of being shown up:

"Tony Blair's shellshocked appearance during his initial statement earlier this morning offers the best rebuttal yet to the sleazy Michael Moore-style attack on President Bush's behavior on the morning of September 11. It would have been a disaster for Bush to have spoken as the choked-up Blair was. This is intended as no criticism of Blair, who was clearly under a far different sort of burden at the G-8 than Bush was sitting in a classroom in Sarasota. But Blair is not the leader of the free world, Bush is, and had he seemed unable to collect himself -- as would surely have been the case in that first hour after Andy Card told him about the attack on America -- I can't imagine what the day would have been like. Not that the president's first words on 9.11, an hour after the attacks, were strong and focused. But they were more controlled."

Daily Kos has noted that a Fox News reporter made a bit of a slip-up on air, talking about the terrorist who bombed London:

"That these people are, If necessary, prepared to spill Arab blood in addition to the blood of regular -- of nonarab people living in London."

Nice to know that the fastest-growing news channel of our closest ally gets what this freedom bollocks is all about.

Here in the UK, the fight against the idiot tendency goes on. Alan Johnson at LFIQ (an organisation of which I'm increasingly proud to be a member) has penned a great letter to a comrade, along similar lines to Harry's.

"But to large parts of the left, yourself included, the terrorists of Al Qaeda were no more real than were the rats of Oran to the dreamy city-dwellers in Camus’s allegorical novel The Plague. You used to quote Michael Moore at me, a man whose appeal to you is beyond me. Moore said ‘There is no threat! Repeat after me, there is no threat!’. Well, there was, and there is. I recall you would also repeat other words Moore (words I thought demented). ‘The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not “insurgents” or “terrorists” or “The Enemy.” They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow — and they will win’. Do you still believe all that?"

Dan hits the nail on the head here:

"And the link to Iraq isn't the one which George Galloway says, that it is some kind of retribution - the only link with Iraq is that the same people who bomb and murder innocent people in London are the same people who murder and bomb innocent people in Iraq."

Tamanou (Tim?) in the same vein: Galwegian, the language of hypocrisy.

Lots of people have linked to Norm on the enemies of humanity, but this post is so great I have to as well. Go and read it.

Blog reactions

Thanks Harry.

"The responsibility for the murders of my fellow Londoners is the murderers, and those who supplied, assisted and supported them: not the Government."

From the London News Review:

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?
This is London. We've dealt with your sort before. You don't try and pull this on us.
Do you have any idea how many times our city has been attacked? Whatever you're trying to do, it's not going to work.
All you've done is end some of our lives, and ruin some more. How is that going to help you? You don't get rewarded for this kind of crap.
And if, as your MO indicates, you're an al-Qaeda group, then you're out of your tiny minds.
Because if this is a message to Tony Blair, we've got news for you. We don't much like our government ourselves, or what they do in our name. But, listen very clearly. We'll deal with that ourselves. We're London, and we've got our own way of doing things, and it doesn't involve tossing bombs around where innocent people are going about their lives.
And that's because we're better than you. Everyone is better than you. Our city works. We rather like it. And we're going to go about our lives. We're going to take care of the lives you ruined. And then we're going to work. And we're going down the pub.
So you can pack up your bombs, put them in your arseholes, and get the fuck out of our city."

They flee you because you tell them how they should live

Ken speaks for me:

"This was not a terrorist attack against the mighty and the powerful. It was not aimed at Presidents or Prime Ministers. It was aimed at ordinary, working-class Londoners, black and white, Muslim and Christian, Hindu and Jew, young and old. It was an indiscriminate attempt to slaughter, irrespective of any considerations for age, for class, for religion, or whatever.

That isn't an ideology, it isn't even a perverted faith - it is just an indiscriminate attempt at mass murder and we know what the objective is. They seek to divide Londoners. They seek to turn Londoners against each other. I said yesterday to the International Olympic Committee, that the city of London is the greatest in the world, because everybody lives side by side in harmony. Londoners will not be divided by this cowardly attack. They will stand together in solidarity alongside those who have been injured and those who have been bereaved and that is why I'm proud to be the mayor of that city.

Finally, I wish to speak directly to those who came to London today to take life.

I know that you personally do not fear giving up your own life in order to take others - that is why you are so dangerous. But I know you fear that you may fail in your long-term objective to destroy our free society and I can show you why you will fail.

In the days that follow look at our airports, look at our sea ports and look at our railway stations and, even after your cowardly attack, you will see that people from the rest of Britain, people from around the world will arrive in London to become Londoners and to fulfil their dreams and achieve their potential.

They choose to come to London, as so many have come before because they come to be free, they come to live the life they choose, they come to be able to be themselves. They flee you because you tell them how they should live. They don't want that and nothing you do, however many of us you kill, will stop that flight to our city where freedom is strong and where people can live in harmony with one another. Whatever you do, however many you kill, you will fail."

Explosions

Today, more than ever, I'm a Londoner. All my family are safe, can't speak for all my friends.

Liberals ready to abandon US right to abortion

Have just seen this article from yesterday's Observer.

Last autumn, in the midst of a presidential election, America's Democrats were fighting furiously to protect what they described as a constitutional right - to have an abortion. But in an extraordinary turn of events, some argue that it is the single issue standing in the way of their election prospects. They are daring to say what once was regarded as heresy - that it is time to let the argument go.

WHAT THE FUCK? Don't you dare, not for a minute, abandon my sisters in the US to life without control of their fertility, Democrats. If you don't stand for the poor, the disadvantaged, the powerless - the very women who will not be able to access abortion rights by slipping a bung to their family doctor or by travelling to the few enlightened states that keep the right to abortion - then who do you stand for? Are you really willing, in your land of extortionate inadequate health coverage, to watch women dying from botched backstreet abortions?

Conservative New York Times columnist David Brooks argued that 'unless Roe v Wade is overturned, politics will never get better'. Liberals, he believes, have lost touch with working-class Americans because they rely on the courts to impose their views and have never had to debate 'values' with those voters.

I have a feeling I may have said something a few days ago about relying on the courts to win arguments for you rather than going out and winning it at the ballot box...

After everything, it's still going on

I was profoundly disappointed over the weekend to read that the Met police had lost a case at employment tribunal which said that three white officers had been "hung out to dry" by the commissioner, Sir Ian Blair, when he questioned why they had escaped punishment for arguably racist (or at the very least bloody insensitive and unprofessional) remarks.

The Guardian has a piece by Hugh Muir about it here, and an interview with Sir Ian here, in which he estimates that one in ten of his force are profoundly opposed the goal of rooting out institutional racism in the Met. I just don't get it - at one point, even the Daily Mail was on board, and yet now we've totally lost the consensus that a modern police force must challenge institutional racism and reflect and be sensitive to the needs of the community it serves.

Let's remind ourselves why it's not just overt obvious racism that needs to be challenged, but also that pervasive insitutional racism. (I suppose I need to point out that I'm white, and have no personal experience of racism, so this is from others' experiences, and from my experiences as a woman and a dyke - groups that also suffer from institutional discrimination, such as sexism, homophobia and heterosexism).

The Macpherson Report, set up to look at why the Metropolitan Police failed to effectively investigate and prosecute the murder of Stephen Lawrence in 1993, put forward the following definition of institutional racism:

“The collective failure of an organisation to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their colour, culture or ethnic origin. It can be seen or detected in processes, attitudes and behaviour which amounts to discrimination through unwitting prejudice, ignorance, thoughtlessness and racist stereotyping that disadvantage ethnic minority people. It persists because of the failure of the organisation openly and adequately to recognise and address its existence and causes by policy, example and leadership. Without recognition and action to eliminate such racism it can prevail as part of the ethos or culture of the organisation.”

Eitzen and Baca-Zinn (Social Problems, Allyn & Bacon, 1994, p174) describe institutional discrimination as

“the customary ways of doing things, prevailing attitudes and expectations, and accepted structural arrangements [that] works to the disadvantage [of a particular group]."

Institutional discrimination is present because of a failure to take into account the particular needs of a disadvantaged group - so a "colour-blind" policy could be institutionally racist, as it doesn't look at the circumstances of groups within the larger group of employees, for example. This is the point that so many of the anti-"political-correctness" crusaders fail to understand - that the way to equality isn't treating everyone the same, but ensuring that factors which in the past might have disadvantaged that group are no longer doing so.

Of course, what I'm not saying is that every police officer is racist and might as well go and join the BNP. Sometimes institutional discrimination develops without any conscious discriminatory intent - it can operate because of stereotypes and received wisdom which people simply regard as ‘normal’ or 'commonsense'. It continues through unexamined action - because we don't think about our attitudes.

These attitudes are even found amongst very young children. In an episode I saw in January of Child of Our Time, the BBC TV series following children born in the millennium year at every stage of their development, there was a fascinating section on prejudice. Five year olds were given pictures of four children of different ethnicities. When asked who would be the cleverest, children of all ethnicities and all backgrounds pointed to the picture of the white child. When asked who would be most likely to be naughty, all the children pointed to the picture of the black child. It was a horrifying demonstration of our unthinking prejudices. The only child who didn't hold these prejudices was a lone black boy, Tyrese, whose mother, Marie, conscious of the disadvantages faced by black boys, was determined to create for him a positive black identity, taking him to New York to do the black history tour and making sure that the books he read and TV he watched included positive black role models. Such care could be dismissed as ridiculous political correctness, but more and more I am beginning to think that without such attention to getting rid of these myths and unconscious stereotypes early on, we have no hope of creating a more equal society.

Insitutional discrimination can also be built into the unwritten rules and habits of an institution. An example that a speaker used at a conference I attended recently really drove home the point to me - for years, it was the norm, though not written into any law, that the police should avoid interfering in a row between man and wife even if it turned violent because this was a ‘domestic’ matter. This, of course, denied many women protection under the law – a very damaging form of insitutional discrimination. And it was and is part of everyday conversation - a "domestic" is an inconsequential spat between a man and a woman, which further undermines the seriousness of institutional discrimination against women through the endemic nature of male violence against women.

But the fact that much discrimination is unintended and the effects aren't realised for what they are does NOT mean that it can be excused any more than that which is intended. After all, institutional racism in the UK means that black people get lesser justice from the police and the legal system than other communities - just ask Doreen Lawrence, who has never had the sad satisfaction of seeing the men who killed her son gaoled for it. No-one should argue that insitutional racism is any less dangerous or harmful to equality than direct discrimination - the climate created by institutional discrimination legitimises prejudice, lets racist murderers get away with it and has created a situation where black communities are overwhelmingly poorer than white communities.

But if we all have unexamined attitudes, then I guess dealing with insitutional racism can't be a matter of accusation, but of understanding why it is created, educating and creating the clarity which challenges bad practices. This isn't being soft on racist attitudes and practices - I think we need to be tough on them and require a real degree of self-examination from anyone wanting to enter public service. Interpersonal discrimination - racist language, direct discrimination such as not letting a room to a black family - must be challenged, there and then, but we need different tactics with institutional discrimination. Speaking for myself, though I've obviously thought a lot about sex, gender and sexuality, I'm not sure I have ever sat down and really properly thought about and explored my attitudes to race and ethnicity, which is clearly a failing, if unexamined attitudes are indeed at the root of institutional racism. Maybe I hold inappropriate attitudes, and certainly I'm not as aware as I should be of what Amanda at Pandagon calls my privilege - the ability to go about my life untroubled by racism and differentia treatment because I'm white and just don't see it, for example, unlike young black men, I don't get regularly stopped and searched by the police. Even at work, despite working in political change and campaigning - an apparently progressive sector, I don't think I've ever been offered a more systematic structured opportunity to examine race, ethincity and my attitudes, alone or in the company of my colleagues.

So, I'm sad to see the efforts of the Met to do just that - force its officers to examine unexamined attitudes - backfiring. In this case, it is clear that the challenge to bad practice didn't happen effectively in the case of the three white police officers. In an atmosphere of mistrust, where this tribunal result may make some officers feel that they have grounds for a persecution complex, maybe the job of ending racism in the police force will be harder than ever. Good luck to Sir Ian in his work - I think he's got a job on his hands, if as he says, he has "20% who are deeply and firmly committed on [his] side, 70% in the middle who are watching and 10% who are opposed." He needs our support on this.

Trees for Labour

Is a new, excellent, Labour blog. Go visit it. Trees for Labour.

My favourite post is this one, on the lack of rational informed argument against the bill to introduce a new offence of incitement to religious hatred:

"To take a specially egregious example, one of the more slow-witted politicians ever produced by Oxford University, Dr Evan 'Two Planks' Harris for the Liberal Democrats said "The government's measure would stifle religious debate and feed an increasing climate of censorship". It, errm, doesn't look like that if you read the bill. ... Gamma double minus, Dr Harris. I'll be having a word with your tutor."

Live 8 Philly

I know the lovely American city of Philadelphia a little (if you don't know why look here), and all day have been enjoying the odd glimpse of the Philly skyline and weather reports for PA courtesy of Five Live.

I don't know whether anyone is liveblogging the London concert - can't find anyone on google - but there's a few livebloggers over in the US. Chris Bowers usually blogs about Philadelphia politics, but there are some great photos up at My DD. Albert is blogging about his experiences as an almost-official credentialled blogger at Philly Future.

What does your coffee say about you?

Just cos it's Friday. Does this sound like me?

Personality type: Ass-clown
You tell people that you're an executive at your company. You think that your repeated references to being "addicted" to caffeine make you seem intriguing and dangerous. People think you're a sucker because you spend 60% of your annual income at Starbucks. Everyone who drinks grande one shot latte ends up addicted to crack.
Also drinks: Zima
Can also be found at: Karaoke bars

Of course nothing in this description reminds me of my beloved:

Personality type: Lame
You're a simple person with modest tastes and a reasonable lifestyle. In other words, you're boring. Going to Starbucks makes you feel sophisticated; you'd like to be snooty and order an espresso but aren't sure if you're ready for that level of excitement. People laugh at you because you use fake curse words like "friggin'" and "oh, crumb!" Everyone who thinks America's Funniest Home Videos is a great show drinks grande latte.
Also drinks: V8
Can also be found: On the couch at home

Find out about yourself here.

The Supremes

Sorry for the sneaky reference to the best episode by far of an appalling season five of The West Wing.

Well, it's finally happened: a US Supreme Court justice has retired, giving GW a chance to fill their place. It's Sandra Day O'Connor, a moderate / centrist and the first woman ever nominated. He's been waiting five years for this chance, the first vacancy since 1994.

People for the American Way say

With Justice O'Connor providing the swing vote on critical 5-4 decisions regarding privacy, reproductive rights, affirmative action, government neutrality toward religion, and more, we cannot overstate the profound impact her replacement could have on the direction of American law and society.

With President Bush saying that he most admires Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas from those already on the court, it's pretty clear he wants a hard-right nominee, though the question is wheter he'd get it through the Senate, having had some considerable trouble over judicial nominees in recent months.

Meanwhile, the liberal left seem to be taking up the tactic of getting in early to try to influence him to pick a moderate like this guy. Unbelieveably, MoveOn already have TV adverts airing tonight about the issue - although I guess they've had some time to prepare.

So, there are some great things about the American system (and if you're ever in Philadelphia, the National Constitution Centre is one of the best museums I've ever been to and an eloquent advocate for checks and balances), but one of the things that I hate is that instead of the American left winning the political arguments to gain new rights, they come about through the courts. Not so bad when you've got them, not so great when the replacement of one person can put those rights in jeopardy, and when winning the issue in the courts becomes an alternative to winning the argument. Give me the UK system where my rights are voted on by my representatives (albeit imperfectly) anyday.