Sunday, July 24, 2005

Any colour you like

Some pontificating, when I should be doing writing I was meant to have finished on Friday.

Had a very nice day at a wedding yesterday, chatting to people I've not seen in ages and people I'd not met before. There was some excitement at Baker Street on the way, though, with the police trying to keep people out of the way as they dealt with a group of violent, shouty blokes. We assumed BNP - though comparing notes with other likewise delayed wedding guests, it wasn't an exclusively white group. There's something particularly brilliant about the BNP being a multi-cultural organisation...

But just why? As the Doctor said, this is hardly what the police or London in general needs just now. Assuming it was all some sort of response to terrorist bombings... Well, what is it we call people whose sole purpose is to spread a little more misery and fear?

What makes me most angry about this and all the shit over the last few weeks is that it's easy to make things worse. Any fucker can hit out, smash stuff, damage other people. Mending them again takes years of dedication and exams and long hours doing shitty placements as a junior doctor. Making things better needs effort and brains and compassion and all the kinds of virtue you'd think were essential to anyone's utopian vision. But bollocks to the idea that al-Queda and the BNP are working for a better world. Vicious tantrums yes, practicable ethical framwork? No, it seems it's always the easy option.

It's no show of strength to break things, it's a sign of weakness.

Bah.

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