don’t panic! life and what to do with it now that orange is the new black - a sermon from the good reverend

such a title will hopefully bring in at least three more people than who read my last blog…thus doubling my readership in one foul swoop - up your bum and suck my wang, clickbait! (genuinely, i have no idea who reads this stuff, it’s just a necessary brain fart that’s better out than in).

so here we are, then. didn’t see this coming? really? no, neither did i. but after this and brexit it’s becoming increasingly clear that no-one knows a fuuuuuckin’ thing. we’re in the upside-down, if you want a crap and trite-but-topical analogy. it’s easy to say now in hindsight, and there were enough warnings at the time, but someone like bernie sanders probably could have given trump a much closer run, or perhaps even trumped the fucker. the elites have been misbehaving for way too long, and in trying to serve themselves, again, by putting forward such a lame and flawed duck as clinton, they were gambling in a very big way. people are pissed off with a system that has done nothing but consistently and deliberately increase hideous levels of inequality, and with people so angry, unbelievably misinformed, and their frustration heartbreakingly channeled in the wrong direction(s), we now find ourselves ‘racing toward the precipice’ just a little bit faster.

(keep going, there’s an easily-digestible list coming up)

the excellent, intelligent and very reasonable sam harris has spoken many times at length and better than most at just how bad trump is, but this argument has fallen on deaf and angry ears. noam chomsky has warned since last year that trump’s success in the election would be a ‘death knell for the human species’. strong words, and here’s why. despite the deeply worrying trend towards nativism, an inability to be able to openly discuss the need for reform of a certain religion without fear of reprisals (ranging from immediately being labelled a bigot or racist to receiving death threats if you’re prominent enough), and a ton of other issues like nuclear weapons, isis etc (wow, ‘isis etc’) to click on and read about scroll through quickly, we are now about to welcome to the stage a man who not only denies that climate change exists (“it’s a bullshit hoax”), but openly says that he is going to do nothing about it, and worse promises to cut all federal spending on the issue (that’s worth reading twice, good people). in fact, the republican party (and all of its presidential candidates) share that view, vetoing deal after international deal to reduce carbon emissions and keep the temperature below end-of-species levels. so you’d think, wouldn’t you, that this issue would have been top of the pops in the election, but mind-blowingly it hardly got raised. and now the republicans have a majority in the senate and the house (i just did a bit of sick).

but hang on. now that the all-consuming and frankly ludicrous spectacle of an election ‘rollercoaster’ has finally come to an end (and gone off the rails completely, that’s no hyperbole or exaggeration), we find ourselves with a nice chance to take a much-needed giant step back from it all before he’s confirmed to office and we see what he really means and does, instead of continuing to scream in our own wee echo chambers to no avail.

here is your handy guide to the next few weeks and months before he takes the reins.

1. stay strong. be present. look out of your window - nothing has changed yet
2. write a list of your favourite 20 things you like doing, and the last time you did them
3. (big one) turn off social media and stop reading news for one week. there is nothing you will miss that won’t get through to you anyway if it’s important enough
4. use the free time to do something from your list
5. still be friendly to everyone. really. it’s the only way. even the prick on the bus who smells
6. watch eddie izzard shows from back in the 90’s when he was funny
7. (deep breath now) all those people who voted brexit and trump? let it go. the world is divided into people who think they are right, and strength of conviction doesn’t make a difference. on a very basic level, most people want the same things….
8. watch hypernormalisation by adam curtis, and point your (metaphorical) guns in the right direction 
9. stop being angry. as annoyingly platitudinous as all of this is no doubt sounding, i mean it sincerely and deeply. i spent way too long being angry at things, without understanding where it all came from each time
10. look into the wim hof method, of which i will soon be an instructor (ahem), it’s a game-changer for health, strength and happiness
11. tell me to go fuck myself with this patronising list of bullshit, and then realise that that’s an angry reaction made of poo and from a bad place, and that my intentions are pure and good (the opposite of poo)
    

finally: don’t mistake any of this as a plea for apathy. organise, vote, discuss and listen! just try and get offline and take a step back from it all more and know that it’s just a ride, to paraphrase bill hicks, one that you can step off at any time. the most valuable things in life are physical and mental health, creativity, and friendships/family. thankfully they’re pretty strong in most that i know, last time i checked. so, #getofftheride, if you will.

as usual, some nice quotes to finish and ponder on…

“the opposite of consuming is connecting” - eve ensler

“irony and cynicism are the killers of possibility” that bloke from swans 

“we always do the best we can by the light we have to see by” - unknown (appeared on another blog post, but really worth saying again in the current climate)

Me and EU

Like a few other (million) people across Europe, I woke up last Friday morning and went straight online to find out which way the vote had gone. When I saw the result and the reality kicked in, to my own shock I realised my eyes were welling up a bit. It's not helpful to get emotional and then project it online, is it, so I watched and waited as a spectator to see how things played out over the day, both online and in my own head.

It takes time to process and understand things, but the body is a good indicator and never lies. I now realise that I wasn't angry or disappointed with those who voted to leave, with their feckless sap Union Jack outfits and flag-waving idiotic pomp (ok, slightly angry), just super sad at their reasons for it.

We always do the best we can by the light we have to see by. To wit: just what information were people being fed with on that septic isle, to make such a shocking and atrocious decision?! And what does it matter, when the mass propaganda plastered proudly on the side of buses (EU funding will instead go to the NHS), was immediately backtracked on the morning after, to no surprise whatsoever. Naomi Klein wrote a while back of the shock doctrine, whereby politicians pass controversial laws and make backtracking comments at the precise moment people are in such shock from an (albeit normally) unrelated event (e.g. 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, the Iraq War), so as to almost go unnoticed and, crucially, unreported on. In reneging on these promises so quickly and so openly, Duncan Smith and that smug belligerent fuckwit Farage took things to a new low. Or am I blind in my faux-outrage, and it's utterly systemic?

Apparently plenty of British families have fallen out across the age divide over which way to go. To her credit, my own mother made a genuine and concerted effort to read up on as many neutral texts as she could find, in order to help make what was for her a very difficult decision ("I've never been so undecided in my life"). In this uncertainty it's fair to say she represents a chunk of people over 40 (tho nobody knows how she eventually voted, she won't say), and yet how was it really so tough for people to decide, given the overwhelming academic evidence that forecast serious instability? Kate Hoey, a pro-leave (twat) MP, when asked on The Daily Politics if she could name one reputable study that showed that Britain would be, if not worse off, then at least the same as it is now after leaving, was left looking very foolish as she stumbled around her own mouth, her brain visibly overheating as she floundered and tried to change the topic. As (mostly young) eyes rolled on social media, I was left to think what dark den of iniquity the shoddy arguments to leave were drafted in. (On a side note, Boris Johnson's farm looks ramshackle as fuck…)

But back to the light (we have to see by). Judging by the spike in google searches you've all read about, asking about the possible effects of the ludicrously-termed ‘Brexit’ after voting closed, you could say that the light wasn't even switched on. Apathy? Laziness? The beginning of an argument that the general public shouldn't be allowed to make these decisions? Redundant. Neoliberalism and capitalism-gone-wrong had long since played their part, and how. Hats off. Profit and consumerism as ideals of success and happiness, and a fear-mongering corporate media peddling these ideologies for decades mean we've become so indoctrinated with....hang on! Come back! Ok, ok...let's not go there...

Well, alright then, quickly if you insist. A big hip-hip-hooray for all those abject racists that now finally have the courage to step out of the shadows (and daub abuse at night), as if the vote to leave now somehow justifies their position- well done to you! But then again you're not special, you're everywhere aren't you? A couple of years ago I cocked my ear in defiance at Noam Chomsky's claim that Europe was 'extremely racist and always has been', nowadays I wonder at my own naïveté with yet another public shrug.

But enough of that dreary world-weary stuff. I bore myself as I write sometimes. To today's developments then. Politics is fun, isn't it?! Watching a Tory party split and vie for power is a bit like watching a load of fat pigeons fight to sit on the edge of a rooftop already covered in their own shit, so let's turn our attention instead to how the Labour Party are dealing with things….oh.

Poor Jeremy Corbyn, and his supporters (hey, that’s me). A long-plotted coup and vote of no confidence isn’t quite where I saw this going.

Watching Britain implode from a safe distance is no less comforting, not from a sense of national pride you understand - those who know me as a self-titled European could have worked out I had been supporting Iceland well before last night's hilariously predictable outcome - but what it means for the future as well as the burning question of the week: do I really have to shell out €255 for a German passport?

On the subject, I was recently interviewed for a New York Times article about dual citizenship and changing nationality, and because my name's in such esteemed print, I must know what I'm talking about. You may now also refer to me as Mr Ayling, thank you very much (scratches belly and belches). What I said there I'll paraphrase: I don't care if on paper I'm British, German, Portuguese, Icelandic, Balinese (I could go on), the terms of my national identity must allow me to travel, live and work as I please, and in fact currently do (I pay my taxes where and when appropriate), and any infringement on that makes said passport worth less than toilet paper (the material would be quite tough I imagine), and can any of you really take issue with that? (me being happy, not wiping my bum with my own face). I hope not.

Moving quickly on….the finish line approaches.

No one knows a thing at the moment about how things will turn out, you can safely ignore anyone who says they do. Clearly: since the NYT article was written on Sunday I've received new information about having both British and German passports: I was hoping to keep both but now there is no guarantee that I can have dual citizenship (registering before the vote had absolutely no impact sadly, as it will always depend on the law six months from your registering date...get your melon round that concept if you can) and it could well be that one day I have to choose between being British or German. Hmmm. Tough one. 

But what's the rush? Let’s see what the circus has to offer tomorrow, and the day after, before making any silly financial commitments I would then like to go back on. At the very least, it all makes for compelling viewing, doesn’t it, and offers welcome distraction from the other, equally undignified European exit of late.

To borrow from John Oliver, “The United Kingdom, whose very name after this week’s events is beginning to sound a bit sarcastic”.

Britain, I slow-clap you.