Just a quick one. Quote of the century- from David Mitchell in todays Observer.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jul/19/david-mitchell-cricket-air-travel
When I was about 7, Radio Rentals took my mothers television back. Apparently, they were upset that she hadnt fulfilled the ‘rentals’ part of the bargain. And at this tender age, I was introduced to the longest, most fulfilling, sustained relationship, I will ever have.
Now, it wasnt love at first listen. Radio 4 when you are that age, really isnt that exciting. I did however learn to love the perky theme tune of the Archers, and was very surprised that you could listen to ‘telly’- even plays, game shows, and people being funny-even if I didnt quite get the joke.
The separation from telly, was a shortlived one. While I was intrigued by Radio 4, my mother was definitely an ITV girl. And to be fair, what was she supposed to point the furniture at, if there wasnt a telly? The gas fire?
I was given my first radio cassette player when I was about 12, and while I dutifully listened to Radio 1, and pressed play and record for the entire duration of the Sunday chart(when the tapes were played back, they were quite good, until the top ten, when you would hear nothing but me screaming for absolute quiet, in case I missed something..), I would sneak the dial back to Radio 4, when no friends, sister, or mother, were there to mock me, for preferring the occasionally very dark plays, and the joy that was Woman’s hour.
In my late teens, Radio4 became a ticket to cool- as 6th formers competed to show how grown up they were, and how cerebral they were, in preparation for university. Eschewing the pop of Radio 1, and the grandad cheese of Radio 2, to appear clever and urbane.
But still the television took pride of place, with its paralysing, apathy inducing blend of adverts and terrible drama- with the furniture pointing at it, and its dominance in conversations at work, about what we had done in lieu of having a life. The televisions got bigger, they were on longer, there appeared more and more channels, and the cost of keeping this habit going became more expensive, with a husband happily parting with cash to that icon of virtue and free media, Rupert Murdoch-in return for 24/7 football news, MTV for the kids, and endless repeats of classic american comedies. Any request that the TV be turned off, was met with incredulity-surely it must be something serious if we were to expect the box in the corner to turn black.
As a social worker- trying to get people to turn off their football pitch sized plasma screens(bought from the modern day cross between Radio Rentals and Shylock!), and choose to speak to me about the welfare of their children-was seen as the ultimate in the interfering nanny state. Yeah, take my kids- but god forbid I have to turn off the television.
As I got partway through my marriage, I began to resent the constant intrusion of noise and pictures. The effect on me(if the television was on, I could happily sit and watch absolute shit for hours, because the effort to change the channel, or turn it off was too much), the effect on my family(asking someone to do something to assist in the running of the household- when competing with Malcolm in the Middle-is just unreasonable)- and the fact that I would effectively spend evenings alone in the same room as my husband, while he watched the same match that he had seen every other day of our marriage.(The one with a green pitch, 22 blokes, in various colours of shorts and t-shirts, where the it either ends in a win/lose/draw).
I longed for peace and quiet- and when everyone was out, it would be turned off, and I would wallow in silence. Or switch on Radio4 and welcome back the calm, authoritative voice-which soothes and informs, but doesnt intrude, or prevent you getting on with your day.
When I moved out of our marital h0me- the fact that I hadn’t bought a television was of some concern to people. My stepson worried so much that I couldnt afford one, that he obtained a television for me. I accepted, because when you have a 20 year old being so thoughtful, you do not crush them by telling them you dont want it. The television sat there in the corner, gathering dust, apart from the Hollyoaks Omnibus on a Sunday morning(Cant stand the Archers…need something to stare at). By the time I realised I was paying my license fee to watch merseyside girls wear very few clothes, in in increasingly bizarre storylines, on a Sunday morning- I had had enough.
My relationship with Radio 4 has blossomed into a full blown marriage. From the righteous indignation that starts the day with the Today programme, through to the company offered by my beloved Women’s Hour, to the incomprehensible jargon of the shipping forecast, and the weird, dark, and wonderful plays, which outclass anything seen on television.
We take each other for granted, my spouse and I. I tune in and out, and get on with my life- occasionally paying attention, but mostly just treating it as soothing authoritative background noise. Occasionally, this partner, that I admit I take for granted, surprises me, outrages me, or makes me laugh hysterically. It is still identifiable as the same Radio 4 I was introduced to at 7, and if you looked at the schedule, you would see that aging has not changed it- apart apart from a few minor noticeable laughter lines, andvecoming a bit less rigid, to reflect the society it is in.
While I winced at the grief tourism and death for sale of Jade Goody, and Micheal Jackson, with funerals that should have been covered by OK. When Clement Freud or Alistair Cooke passed away, I nearly shed a tear, and felt there had been a loss.
And so here and now, as I have my radio off for the only time in the week(Archers again)- this is me saying thankyou, and I love you- to my oldest sustained adult relationship. Radio 4, I love you. (Apart from the Archers, and really, there should be enough digital channels now, so that you can stick that somewhere else…we could have Any Questions and Any Answers repeated on a Sunday morning…I might start a facebook group).
(Warning- before reading this- please note that this post is a rant in two parts, and if you do not feel particularly in the mood to hear me ranting, I suggest you close the page down)
The first part of my rant is aimed at Dr.Denis Walsh, whose comments about women who ‘don’t fancy the pain [of childbirth]‘ and who should be prepared to ‘withstand pain’, were repeated across my sunday morning media.
Now, I understand the sentiment that inspired these comments. Of course labour should be a natural process, I wince at the medicalisation of childbirth, and the taking away of control of birth experiences from women, instead handing it to the ‘experts’ in the medical profession. I am lucky enough to live in an area where the local birthing centre meant that I didnt have to see a single doctor, in the whole time I was pregnant- conscious that I was going through a normal process, not an illness that needed to be presided over by a doctor. Instead receiving support in making MY choices, about delivering MY baby.
However, as a woman, who when refused drugs by a helpful midwife, launched the gas and air mouthpiece at the midwifes head, and demanded my husbands phone to obtain my own drugs- I have to say, I have a teensy weeny problem with this mans statements. Debates about the medicalisation of childbirth, seemed irrelevant as I bargained in my head that death could not possibly be worse than this-while my daughter remained stuck and refusing to budge(yeah she was stubborn before she was born!).
And quite frankly Dr.Walsh- when you have shat a bowling ball, without anaesthetic, or stretched your front lip over the front of your head, as a new fetching winter hat- you may tell women they should just ‘deal with it’.
When doctors are telling people to have broken bones, and severe burns treated, without pain relief, because that pain will teach them a valuable lesson and enable them to process the trauma better- you may tell women to just get on with it, and stop whinging about pain.
Support women in their birth choices, teach them about natural pain relief techniques(loved the birthing pool, the tens machine..assaulting my husband…all fine, until was bargaining with a god I didnt believe in, begging to not be in pain and tired any more)- but telling women to just get on with it? To expect women to just grin through complete agony- implying that they are simply being ‘soft’ for wanting to manage their own labours in a way that isnt traumatic- makes me want to hunt you down and spray paint graffitti on your house.
I would quite like for women to be able to use the only imposition on childbirth, which benefits women, without it being implied by the profession that is supposed to be helping them, that they are just not ‘hard’ enough to cope with what nature throws at them.
Which links me nicely onto the subject of Afghanistan. Well, it doesnt, but it has also been bothering me this week.
I have this friend Sid. He isnt really called Sid. We called him that because his dad was a village bobby, when we were teenagers. Sid, Sid, the coppers kid. Sid was one of my best friends, when I was a rebel without a clue 16 year old. We would skive school, and go to my flat and smoke dubious cigarettes of low quality weed(which I am sure was more boot polish than anything else..).
In our early twenties, Sid joined the army. It came as a surprise to me, but on consideration, as I had been bossing Sid around since I was 16, and everyone else had too, I suppose it was a logical step.
Last year Sid came back from Aghanistan. He had returned unscathed from a tour in Iraq, and on paper he returned from Afghanistan the same way. But the stress of whatever he saw out there, had taken my beautiful boy, and changed him. I hope not forever.
I stood in Leeds train station, on the day of 9/11. THe station was more or less silent, although packed. People all of a sudden knew who Osama Bin Laden was, and who the Taliban were. Within days, people who weeks earlier had professed ignorance, when I talked about the treatment of women in Afghanistan, were talking in detail about Islam, and reciting a glossy understanding of this countries history- helpfully served up and spun by our media.
This clear criminal act, perpetrated by a an organisation, was being discussed as an act of war. We started a war, in a country, on the basis that they harboured a criminal, and because ‘terror training camps’ existed within it. We bombed the people of a country, where they were already experiencing poverty and hardship that we cant imagine in the West, with bombs with more financial value, than the markets and towns they hit. We have been fighting in that country now, since September 2001.
Now pardon me for being simplistic- but I was a little concerned at the time that we were bombing a country, for essentially harbouring a criminal. Given that we regularly harbour war criminals, and that we have criminals being harboured in probably half the countries in the world- was declaring ourselves at ‘War’ with terror, and bombing this poor country back to the stone age really the best way of approaching this?
We didnt define what terror was. We liked having a catch all umbrella term, that could justify almost any atrocity we cared to carry out. By declaring war, we legitamised criminals, and made them combatants. We radicalised the youth of an entire faith- by treating them with hostility, and by placing them on the opposing side of a war-with atrocities carried out, which were only matched in scale by the rhetoric of democracy, and fighting oppression, which glossed them over and repackaged them.
We have created a quagmire- and now politicians are worried- because we arent winning and we cant get out. We cant win- because there was never anything to win. You cant measure success if you never had an objective in the first place. And you cant bomb a country into the stone age to satisfy blood lust, and a right wing agenda.
We sent boys in to do the dirty work. Boys like my friend Sid, who were sent out, ill prepared, ill equipped, with little or no understanding of the country they were fighting in, and a half cocked illusion about what they were fighting for. When these boys, and they are boys- look around at the reality of where they are. The illusion shatters, and they realise the lies that are being told about what they are doing. Only they are in a country where they are barely equipped for the geographical conditions, never mind to fight an enemy they cant even identify. They are the targets, and they deal with the consequences of the agendas of those who started this. They arent even safe in the knowledge that they will return home heroes, because they are fully aware of the way this ‘war’ is perceived.
This week, we had one of the worst weeks in Afghanistan since the conflict began. With more boys dying, and no end in sight. I have heard comment from politicians, using words like ‘winnable’, and waxing lyrical about womens rights in Afghanistan-like that was even a contributing factor to our actions. On Friday it took every bit of restraint I had, while listening to Any Questions, not to throw the radio at the wall- as a response to the glib lies and platitudes about this ‘conflict.
I was in Vietnam a few years ago. In Ho Chi Minh city, the rickshaw drivers are those who collaborated with America, in the 11 years that they tore that country apart. They have an official status as outcasts, and are not allowed to eat in certain places, their lives are spent as a permanent reminder of their collaboration. They tell horrific stories of what happpened when America withdrew- leaving those who they claimed they were ‘helping’ to face the consequences of being on the wrong side during a war that should never have been fought.
We will be forced to do the same, when we leave Afghanistan. The soldiers out there know how little we are achieving, and they know that the country we have spent the last 8 years tearing apart, will have to deal with the consequences, as our leaders come up with a hastily devised, ill thought out exit strategy. Will we help those who risked everything to help us in our misguided confused aims? No, of course we wont. Tales are already pouring in from Iraq, about the consequences faced by those who did our translating, and our driving. People who have been rejected in their applications to come to the country they worked for, even though they are at risk of death without our protection.
The aim of this exit strategy will of course be to appease British Voters, rather than a consideration of the needs of the country we have destroyed.
I daresay this exit strategy will be sold to us like a victory for democracy, and like Russia, we will consign our 8 years in Afghanistan to the drawer of history. Trying not to dwell on it. In the meantime boys like Sid, and the people of Afghanistan will be living with the damage done.
My bed looks like any one of a million beds across the UK today- newspapers strewn and crumpled,various food recepticles with remnants of tea, danish pastries, and roast beef sandwiches. THere are rizlas, a smelly snoring cat, and laptops. There is a boy occasionally checking his soundcloud account- to see who has played and downloaded the tunes he released. I have punctuated the morning with naps(one took place between writing the first and second paragraph- does that indicate this is a dull dull read?), writing obscenities on Twitter, checking facebook, and browsing through the RSS newsfeeds on my toolbar-which digest the worlds news.
The Sunday papers, is a long held tradition- that I have realised this morning is fading quickly into the past. My dutiful trip to the shop to pick up The Observer, is one that has been repeated since I was 17 years old..but after I had seperated out my sections(Main Paper, Music Monthly, Review, Escape, Business then cherry picking anything I have missed- in that order) consumed my newspaper with inky hands-I realised this ritual was being usurped. I found myself getting confused as I went through my RSS newsfeeds- as I realised I wasnt having deja vu, I was just reading the same article again online, but that with each article I read, I could immediately go to a related article, in another publication. I could respond immediately and directly to the articles which raised my ire, through comment sections- and I could intersperse this with random comment on twitter- and talking to my friends.
I will probably take the papers, as I always do, and put them in the kindling bag next to the fire downstairs. And I daresay, I will continue to buy my paper on a Sunday, for quite a while yet. But today, I have realised this is a relic of a Sunday morning tradition- There was nothing in there, that I couldnt get more effectively anywhere else, and I am sure that at some point I will let go of my need to spend Sunday with inky fingers, and to have actual paper cluttering up my house..and accept that this shiny box I am typing into, has usurped it, as it has usurped my need for a stereo, stacks of cd’s, a television, a phone, and the need to collect endless piles of paper bills/payslips. Which is a shame, as without stacks of newspapers, clunky old media, and paper, I am not sure what my house will look like. Boyfriend has suggested buying a Kindle reader- but if am honest, I am not sure I want overpriced, clunky, paper books, usurped in the same way.
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