From pillar to post…

Listening to Vivaldi waiting for my call to be picked up by a human at the benefits centre while watching the seconds tick away…. Automated voice tells me that “all the advisers are talking to customers and if I prefer I can phone back later”… Is that ever a good time to phone the benefit office (possibly dead on 8am)? Eventually a voice responds. I tell them that I have received a letter this morning informing me that I qualify for contribution based Job Seekers Allowance and was wondering when I would be paid. After the usual security questions I was told that when I signed on last week it hadn’t been properly inputted on their system therefore I needed to contact the Jobcentre. Did I was told….. quicker response in answering the phone but sheer confusion.

Indeed they inputted the last signing on date on my record but when I asked about a “fast track payment” I was told, “We don’t deal with that as we are only a smallJobcentre”. Told to ring the the benefits centre. More Vivaldi. More waiting. Eventually got through and the date of my last signing on had been dutifully inputted. I told the adviser that Jobcentre didn’t deal with fast track payments. I could hear a sharp intake of breath, then a sigh and a suppressed laugh, “It is their responsibility”! They made a note on my record and told me to …… yes, you can guess, to ring the Jobcentre. Spending over an hour on the phone losing the will live…. I duly rang the number and spoke to someone who took my details and yes……

“It’s the benefit centre responsibility for payment”..

Me: “I am confused myself as I gone around in circles and being told so much misinformation”

Them: “Sorry about that but it is their responsibility”

Me: “Well, who deals with the fast track payment”?

Them: “Payment department”

Me: “OK, will I be paid then”

Them: “I will pass the information onto the department. Give me a phone number where they can contact you in the next 3 hours”

My head hurt as it felt like being bounced backwards and forwards, from pillar to post and none the wiser! About an hour later I got a phone from the payment department.

“Yes, you will be paid in the next couple of hours. Unfortunately, Jobcentre was bloody late in inputting your last signing on date. Sorry about that”…

Indeed they paid me. But what a palaver. What bureaucracy. Nobody taking responsibility in paying me. The advisers were polite and helpful but nobody could specifically tell who the hell was meant to be dealing with this.

The unbearable harshness of benefits….

The devaluing of paid work continues. Unemployed people are helping to deliver patient care in hospitals.

The trust said all participants in the initial pilot were CRB-checked and received two weeks of training at Sandwell College before carrying out their tasks in hospital wards, involving “general tidying, welcoming visitors, serving drinks to patients, running errands, reading to patients and assisting with feeding patients”.

Putting aside training, qualifications, experience, expertise, health & safety and so on…what amazes me is that unions agreed to the proposal initially as they believed it would be a way for the unemployed to “gain experience”… Really?

But they said they had not agreed that the jobseekers would “play a direct role in patient care” and said they were very worried about the prospect of this happening.

Didn’t it occur to them that this would be the case? Give managers an inch and they were take more than mile. This is exploitation pure and simple and the unions should have known that.

ConDems go on about being better off in work yet workfare contradicts that assumption. People are facing one big monumental economic crisis. Personal insolvency is on the rise, unemployment, homeless has jumped by 14%.

The outlook is bleak and now with the reforms in the Welfare Reform Act kicking in and giving a kicking too. Unemployment declined by 45,000 in the three months to March and cue Chris Grayling’s excitement about it being a step in the “right direction”…There’s still high unemployment and a rise in part-time work as finding full-time work is problematic. But what Grayling fails to ask is where exactly have those 45,000 gone? Furthermore, number of people receiving jobseeker’s allowance, had also fallen, by 13,700 in April, to 1.59 million. Again, where have they gone? Where’s the statistical analysis? Just because someone has stopped claiming JSA doesn’t automatically mean they have found work. How many people have fallen through the net, fallen off the radar? How many are seeking financial support through other means? How many are utterly destitute? And today, 124,000 single parents whose youngest child is five or six were moved from income support (IS) to jobseeker’s allowance (JSA); they were told only eight weeks ago.

From 30 April 2012 until now I still have no benefits. How am I classed? Last week I applied for contributory JSA, I filled in my form at the Jobcentre but I got confused and garbled information about my old ESA claim that was still “live” due to being credited NI contributions. Today, seeing another adviser who told me to immediately contact ESA and tell them I have switched benefits and claiming for JSA as while my claim is still “live” for ESA they won’t process my JSA application (and I still don’t know whether I will receive it).

Nobody truly explained this until today, so I have “lost” a week, a JSA form lying around somewhere not being actioned because another benefit I no longer get is still “live”. Contacted the Jobcentre, ESA department and they have said they have closed the claim and will contact JSA. Indeed without the severe prodding of bureaucratic departments the left wouldn’t know what the right is doing…Even the adviser said sardonically, “They don’t communicate”!

It seemed glaringly obvious when I attended the Jobcentre last Monday, there was confusion along with staff whispering about ESA and JSA regarding what to do. I just wonder how in disarray these departments are in especially when the civil service is “downsizing” as well?

It doesn’t take a genius to work out the emotional impact of lack of funds. Independence fizzles away to dependence on your nearest and dearest. I am fortunate I have a partner but his salary doesn’t stretch that far. What about people facing this predicament who have no way of getting money? How to describe this experience is devastating and despairing.

ConDems sermonise about being “better off in work”… What about the impact of decreasing finances? Not being able to pay the bills i.e. phone bill = lose your broadband = not being able to search for jobs. “Ahhh, you could still search for jobs at the Jobcentre”! says the ConDem. Indeed… but about bus fares? My local one is 4.5 miles away and no doubt they expect you to walk there and back (I have walked the distance but not everyone can).

Over two years ago I was in work. Had energy, vim and vigor. An organised routine. Now there are days I can’t face the world, just stay in bed staring blankly at the curtains listening to bird song and classical music. It’s safe and cheap. Governments don’t care about the changes, trauma and upheavals colliding into your life. It’s all about knee-jerk reactions, vilification and demonisation. I used to have nightmares when I was OK of me being gripped by anxiety and depression in my waking life affecting my work and whole being. And this experience is one big nightmare, suicidal feelings have leeched through my consciousness. I wonder what was going through the mind of this man who slashed his wrists in the Jobcentre? How many more people will plummet to the depths of distress and see suicide as the only way out? Along with massive knocks to confidence and morale they expect you to have the energy and interest in applying for work.

There are times I feel embarrassed, self-blame and shame (I know better and these feelings are so contradictory) due to being unemployed and penniless. Unemployed and disabled people are scapegoated and chucked onto the scrap heap for an economic crisis they had nothing to do with and now we are paying for it emotionally and financially. Blaming the powerless in this society is a favourite sport for this callous and cruel coalition, they have blood on their hands.

Review of “Fifty Shades of Grey” and why Katie Roiphe is wrong….

Katie Roiphe describes “Fifty Shades of Grey” as watered-down, skinny-vanilla-latte version of sadomasochism and that’s the only part of her article on the matter I agree with. The rest? She’s got the hump over the fact women have been buying this book in droves. Her analysis is not only wrong it’s very patronising.

If you are willing to slog through sentences like “In spite of my poignant sadness, I laugh,” or “My world is crumbling around me into a sterile pile of ashes, all my hopes and dreams cruelly dashed,” you must really, really, want to get to the submissive sex scene.

Indeed the language and dialogue is leaden, stilted unoriginal, and derivative. Yet I feel an overwhelming need to defend the book. The woman protagonist, Ana, constantly exclaims inwardly or outwardly, “Holy cow”! or “Holy fuck”… Her character’s runs the emotional gamut of all that is holy! While with Christian Grey it is all based on his physicality who has a need to control and emotionally unreadable. So derivative. A smoldering Mr Rochester and Mr Darcy (sprinkling of Tess of the Derbevilles” for good measure) all rolled into one and served up for a 21st century readership who meets an Jane/Elizabeth. It’s not unsurprising that the trilogy has been dubbed “Mills and Boon S/M”.

Synopsis:

Woman (Ana) meets very rich man (Christian). Woman attracted to man’s physicality but is put off my his controlling mannerisms. Woman is attracted, so is man. They peruse each other. Man introduces woman to his S/M room. Sex ensues. Man proposes woman sign a contract to become his sub. Woman refuses… initially. Woman experiences spanking. Not sure about it. Changes her mind. Not sure about it. Confusion abounds. Woman tries again. Wants more from the man i.e. commitment, love etc. Man wants to give more but is emotionally wounded haunted by demons from his childhood (who isn’t?!). Woman willing to enter the S/M room and take her “punish”. She does. Ends up telling him where to go. Leaves.

Fin… Not really as there’s two more books…

So why does Roiphe get so hyped up over this book? Actually, I am one of the many women who bought this book, mainly because I was curious and whether it broke new ground in this specific genre. It doesn’t. Instead it gives S/M a soft-focus. There’s isn’t much submissiveness in the book, the spankings are few and far between. And the list of “Hard Limits” actually sets the pace and limitations of the sexual content. You know what to expect from their transgressions. I’ve read “Belle de Jour” and “Girl With a One Track Mind” other (in)famous books I was curious about and those two books went beyond “Fifty Shades of Grey”.

Roiphe, I don’t think, quite understands fantasy and the complexities of behaviour. She equates submissiveness in the realms of S/M but what about sexual relationships overall? What about submissiveness in non-S/M sex, such as vanilla? If you find sexual pleasure in being spanked does that automatically translate into devaluing and demeaning yourself? No, it doesn’t. Yes, inventive forms of imaginations are needed but different strokes for different folks. If women find the book titillating, erotic, fascinating turn on… so what..? It may also represent women crying out for erotica/pornography, an expression of need. That old question, what do women want? Well, not Katie Roiphe, that’s for sure who believes you are less of woman who submits herself to the realms of the sub. There’s nothing wrong with dirty transgressive filth including S/M. And there’s a damn sight more than the soft focus “Fifty Shades of Grey”…

There still is this hierarchy of “acceptable” sexual behaviour being created (good sex/bad sex).Is it just too demeaning to be kinky, sadomasochistic, and transgressive?! Sexual pleasure comes in all packages, and humans are sexual beings. I find Roiphe’s sermonising trite, moralistic, and “thou shalt not” irritating.

I remember the furore over “9 1/2 Weeks” and the picketing of cinemas (never joined in as I believe it was wrong) yet the Basinger character leaves at the end.  I have to say that when I saw the film “Secretary” it left me cold and disengaged. Not because I disapproved of the S/M but because the story didn’t quite gel (also I found it odd they equated self-harming to S/M … but that’s for another post). And I saw aspects of “Secretary” and possibly “Sex Lives and Videotape” in “Fifty Shades”… (and on both male protagonists are played by James Spader) such as non-committing sexually/emotionally cold stand-offish, perverse individuals… Controlling and dominant male characters who once stripped away emotionally lose that control usually by a woman who changes their outlook (Yes, the love of a good woman.. yada yada). That too gets jaded and tired. But in saying that, “Sex Lies and Videotape” is still one of my favourite films of the 90s.

Just because the book deals with sexual submissiveness doesn’t mean queues of women are joining up to experience spanking and nipple clamps. There could be whole myriad of reasons why women are buying the book…. And ….so what?! Escapism? Distraction from reality? Soft S/M? Testing the boundaries of sexuality? Curiosity?
I don’t generally read erotica as I am usually bored and find myself visualising the scene in my head where I find myself questioning it i.e. “Is that psychically possible”? Also I have a tendency to giggle like a school kid when “S-E-X” is graphically described (it’s got worse as I’ve got older…). And there’s only so much you can go with this genre. The Ana character intrigued me as I wondered why EL James created her as a virgin before she met Christian. Is it because once she develops a sexual relationship with Christian she has no comparison no past to refer to? James/Christian is creating some kind of sexual tabula rasa?

Again, there is the emphasis on the traditional/stereotypical roles men and women are expected to behave like in straight relationships, this is echoed in the book. Ana, who is emotional and seeks commitment and love while Christian control and seeks to fuck. But, inevitably, they impact on each other in ways either of them expected which creates confusion and fear.

It’s one of the those books you can read in half a day, for me it was a good distraction from austerity and gloom, an easy read. Chewing gum for the eye, content is cheesy soft core hype, you just garner enough information about the characters and their circumstances. But it’s a pleasant Sunday afternoon read. And I certainly do need a distraction from the misery of this coalition of cruel fools.

But what should concern Roiphe more than the issue of submissiveness is the fact some public libraries in the States have banned the book because it is “sexually explesive” yet some of these libraries such as Georgia (Ana’s hometown), Florida, and Wisconsin) some, laughably, stock the Kama Sutra. Double standards? Indeed. Censorship…. nows that something to get angry about!

Brighton…..

See as well Flickr page for more pix

The LRC at Brighton Fringe 2012: In Conversation With Tony Benn

I attended the LRC at the Brighton Fringe yesterday, “In Conversation with Tony Benn”. It was a sell-out event regards to tickets. Speakers included, obviously, Tony Benn, John McDonnell MP and Owen Jones. I did the filming for the event, see below for videos of the main speeches.

 

May 10 strike day …….

PCS, UCU, RMT (Royal Fleet Auxiliary) and Unite health were on strike today. ConDems are intent on destroying pensions and therefore unions balloted members for strike action. I attended a picket outside St Thomas’ Hospital, speakers were disappointed that this was not a public sector wide strike. Speakers spoke about cuts, privatisation and the fact it looks like we will have to work until we drop!

I joined the march (as a Community Unite member) to the rally at Westminster. Today thousands of cops were marching and they passed us in Westminster. Many strikers were cheering and clapping as the cops marched past. I wasn’t part of that as they are agents of state with a political ideological to prop up. I stood and chanted with the “Defend the Right to Protest” the names of people who have died in custody, their response was to jeer and laugh at us exposing just want a bunch of lumpen racists they are. They showed no shame!

One striker shouted about the cops violent behavior during the ’84 Miners’ Strike. Indeed… Wapping! Last year’s student protests, G20 protests, kettling… violence and more bloody violence. So no, I won’t clap and cheer these people. They aren’t interested in solidarity with all public sector workers they are just doing it for themselves. Cops on duty were also laughing and joking with cops on their protest while staring at us chanting scribbling in their notebook. The cops aren’t workers in uniform they are the class enemy!

Later I joined the rally, missed most of Bob Crow’s speech and videoed a couple of speeches. What was prevalent in all the speeches is that we need to keep the momentum going and build for more strikes hopefully with other public sector unions.

The repugnant, repellant and repulsive face of the Tory Party….

Tories got trounced on Thursday during the local elections. Drubbed, conquered, thrashed and trashed along with their LibDem yellow Tory friends (unfortunately the Bullingdon buffoon won a second term in London). Ian Duncan Smith, when confronted about loss of Remploy jobs, sneered:

Is it a kindness to stick people in some factory where they are not doing any work at all? Just making cups of coffee?

How does IDS know that’s what workers are doing? The Tory mask slipped and we are confronted with the same old vicious and nasty dross.

Furthermore

You don’t produce very much at all.

And

Asked why the disabled were being robbed of a choice between a segregated or mainstream workplace, Mr Duncan Smith snapped: “How far do you want to go with the idea that you can choose to do exactly what you want?

Why can’t people choose what they want?! Indeed the Tories want to force people to do any old job, no choice just coercion and compulsion.

IDS is a sneery contemptible taunting little Tory twit. The sooner this hideous alliance disintegrates  altogether the better!

May Day – solidarity with workers’ globally!

May Day – Solidarity with workers’ globally

Spring….

Awwww.

Goslings…..

Parakeet eating lunch

Coot and 2 young chicks

Heron with young chicks. I have been hoping there would be some chicks as for the past couple of weeks been watching this heron sitting on eggs.

Two young cormorants having a face off….

My ESA finished after one year….

I wrote this post for False Economy on losing my ESA after one year.

Also read this post by Creative Crip on the same issue. Depressing, and harrowing but an honest account of the realities of losing ESA.

I hate this coalition, despise, deplore and detest them. And I don’t think much of Labour either. They are showing NO opposition!