Dreams of a life is about Joyce Vincent, a woman in her late 30s who died in 2003. Her body was found decomposing in her flat 3 years later, amid wrapped Christmas presents with the TV still on. The plot is compelling, why did no one notice? How on earth did it take 3 years to discover her body? The story becomes even more intriguing when you learn that she was in fact, a bubbly intelligent woman who met Nelson Mandela and dated Gill Scott Heron’s manager. Everyone who knew her was shocked that she died alone.

Given the rich subject matter (and my tendency to like gritty documentaries) I was a little disappointed by the film. The dramatization felt unnecessary, and  detracted from the story – we didn’t need to see Joyce’s hypothetical last moments. Using an actor made Joyce Vincent seem even less like a real person, perhaps this was the intention of the director, but for me this did not sit right. It also seemed that Dreams of a Life was missing large chunks of information, and at times I felt that the film would have benefited from narration.

Perhaps there wasn’t enough material for a feature film, perhaps the haunting element of the film is that her story was not extraordinary enough. I accept that the very reason that this story is compelling is because it is essentially mysterious, and there was a lot to commend the film for. The interviews were fascinating, and Morely had obviously gone to great lengths to gather information about her subject which can’t have been easy – I just wish she had stuck to a more traditional documentary form and let the story speak for itself, rather than attempting to make it more cinematic.

Despite my criticisms, it is nonetheless a compelling documentary. The fact that people so close to her could have not known about her death forces you to think about all the people you have been close to, but no longer have regular contact with. It is a haunting film, which makes you want to get more information about Joyce – her life and death, I just wish more of that information had been in the film.

Lashings of Ginger Beer are putting on a Panto and having a big feminist party at the East Oxford Community Centre on February 11th. I will be hosting some poets in the bar beforehand, and doing a bit of my own material. I’m really looking forward to it – you should come along.

You can find the facebook event here.

I recognise I have been pretty lucky this year, despite losing a job that I loved, I found another good one in only 2 months.  Even though I have moved to the dreaded south, turns out – some people there are pretty awesome – and don’t seem to mind being friends with me despite the amount I complain about how it’s not as good as Scotland.  With all that’s going on in the world, I know I have quite a lot of privilege to ease the struggle, not to mention many excellent friends.

Anyway, with all this in mind – here is a list of highs and lows of 2011 as experienced through my own individual consciousness.

An Arbitary number of High points

• March 26th and the huge trade union march and actions in London were the first high point of the year for me.  I came down on a bus from Glasgow, with a few friends, my sister, some drunken Glasgwegian Trade Unionists who could have stepped right off the set of a Ken Loach movie and THE BEST COACH DRIVER IN THE WORLD.  Going down to anything in London from Scotland is great because people think you are amazing just for showing up ‘You came from GLASGOW, how on EARTH did you get here’.  I marched, I went to Oxford street and watched the high street get shut down by rage and then I went home and spent the whole journey in adrenilien fuelled revolutionary conversations with students, trade unionists and the best coach driver in the world ever.
• Gig with Lashings of Ginger Beer at Feminist Cultural Action event in York One thing that people always forget about preaching to the converted, is that it’s really really fun. I did this gig in York a mere 3 days after finding out about my redundancy; I was a bit of an emotional wreck but it went down like a house on fire – lots of intellectual types came and read more into my material than was ever there in the first place.  I also met some ace people and got to drink feminist themed cocktails AND I had my travel paid SCORE.
• Radical Seder at Occupy Glasgow  I might be a gentile,  but going to this with two close friends, eating food, drinking wine and thinking and reflecting was quite a high point this year. Also the occupiers of Glasgow University went on to win all their demands -wooo
• Shared Planet 2011 Ew, a work one! Still Shared Planet this year probably was one of the highlights of my new job, hurrah!
• Meeting lots of ace new people in Oxford Fairly self explanatory that one! Who knew the seat of elitism and privilege would also contain lots of ace people committed to social change?
• My cousin had a baby – who is cute as a button, cuter really ( I find buttons overrated).

An equally arbitrary number of lows…

• Losing my job. I was well gutted about getting made redundant – I told my former boss that it felt a bit like being dumped, which it did (you know it’s not your fault, you kind of feel like it is, your life changes quite drastically and your main coping mechanism is to go and drink until you puke)
• The NHS Bill passing   I went to block the bridge because I really believed that the NHS bill is a massive mistake, it passed anyway -which shouldn’t have been a shock ,  but still -woe.
• ‘Activsim and #memes I am a little bit tired of activism as a thing that people do, and I have a lot of sympathy with this article, which complains about ‘activists’ becoming an elite category of people.  I’m bored of witty placards and in jokes BORED – more than that,  in jokes depend on a large proportion of people being outside them, which is shit.Also there have been times this year when all the awesome radical stuff has fallen short of what it needs to be.
• Comedy For a lot of boring reasons that I can’t be bothered to waffle on about, I haven’t done enough of this in the latter part of this year. Ditto blog writing,  if I was in school my report card would read ‘could do better’ on both of these.
• The fucking tories No explanation required. Low points include, everything they said and everything they did.

Anyway, I will probably write an equally indulgent post of resolutions for next year soon – but till then, Happy Hogmany from Liztopia

The day was amazing from a personal experience point of view; walking around a city with pickets everywhere you turn, Oxford was transformed and the usual barriers we put up between us were replaced with an impulse to talk to everyone with union flags and stickers.  Estimates for turnout in Oxford were between 4 thousand and 6 thousand – in OXFORD, hardly union heartland. The strike felt like something big, an escalation in struggle, a key moment, which is why it’s frustrating that Jeremy Clarkson is getting more attention than the strike itself.  My partner has described Jeremy Clarkson as an internet troll, but in real life. This strikes (HA) me as pretty apt, here he is sucking out the intelligent important conversations about industrial action and replacing them with the sort of discussions that end with people screaming FREEDOM OF SPEEEEECH at the top of their voices. Nevertheless reading Dave Gorman’s response did make me want to write about it from the point of someone who obsesses over what you can and can’t say for comic effect.

Dave Gorman’s argument went along the lines of ‘we shouldn’t try and get Clarkson off air for this, because we might end up with Stewart Lee/Charlie Brooker off air and in conclusion Bill Hicks’ (Some of Bill Hicks material is pretty misogynist, but hey, let’s save that for a discussion about sexism on the left). I disagree with Dave, and I think it’s all about context -  who Clarkson is and where he was.  Clarkson is a rich white man, saying that working class women should be shot – he is someone with a lot of power inciting violence on a weaker group. It’s fundamentally different from Brooker saying that Bush should be shot, it’s even different from people wishing Thatcher dead.

In terms of where he was, he was on the One Show, not known for it’s satire or being a comedy venue. I have to be clear here, I wouldn’t think it was ok for a rich white man to wish school cleaners dead if it was in a comedy club, but it would be a different context, and location is an important part of the context of what you say.

Jeremy Clarkson incited violence, and did this on a publicly funded channel. We have a right to punish him for this, and it’s not just about not liking his ideas.

I think it’s interesting to compare Clarkson’s comments, to those of a loud working class woman on a tram, who we have all rightly been shocked by this week. Tram Lady, for me is the new Jade Goody – someone who crudely expresses views we are supposed to find objectionable, so that we can express outrage in order to prove that we are not racist. Tram woman and Jade Goody allow us to frame racism as an aberration, rather than something deep within the structures of society.

Tram woman is working class, and was directly violent to the people around her, Clarkeson is bessi mates with DC, he is being silly, he gets to keep is high paying job – despite the fact that arguably his words will be heard and taken seriously by a greater number of people.

It’s who you are, and where you are which determine your treatment. The BBC won’t get rid of Clarkson because they think Top Gear is important for their ratings, surely flawed when strike support was high. Many of the people who supported those strikes must also be drivers; we had a poster that said ‘honk if you support the strikes’ which we took around with us. Turns out drivers don’t all agree with Clarkey, and it wasn’t just Skoda drivers we had toots from a newish Merc and someone with quite a hot vintage convertable BMW. So there.

One thing I have noticed about working 9 to 5 is that it gives you precisely enough time to come home, make some dinner, watch an hour of TV, faff on the internet for another hour and then sleep. Sometimes this routine is disrupted by a meeting or social occaision, but that is more or less my routine. I have thus started watching some pretty dubious television -

Made in Chelsea was introduced to me by a comrade watching series 1 for at least the second, possibly the third time.  I spent the first hour protesting ‘this is so fake’ and ‘these are just the knobs from Uni, why would I want to watch this’, by the second hour I was hooked. Each episode is more or less the same, they go to some social occaision, there is some flirting/will they or won’t they/scandalous revelation and then there’s a few scenes in Francis Boulle’s ‘buisness’ where you wonder what the hell he actually does. Francis is more or less consistently portrayed as the buffoon of the piece, though you can’t help but think that maybe he is more savvy than he lets on, after -all Made in Chelsea was his idea. Made in Chelsea does, I think, reveal a lot about the world that the 1% inhabit. Their lives are actually pretty boring and samey. Yes they can buy and do whatever they want, but all that ever seems to be is drinking and shopping in various spots around London.. yawnfest. I have a rather wealthy friend who once told me that all her family do on holiday is stay in luxury hotels and watch TV.  These people make being rich seem incredibley dull. Don’t worry, this does nothing to dampen my revolutionary zeal – if anything, the fact that the uber wealthy have boring lives is pretty offensive. If the benefactors of the capitalist system, which enslaves so many of us, don’t even have the decency to wear awesome extravagent clothes and lead outrageous lives – what’s the point?

Speaking of knobs from Uni, I have also been watching Channel 4′s University based sit com ‘Fresh Meat’. It’s watchable in so far as it is not completely objectionable, but it’s really not great. There are 6 main characters, 3 male and 3 female. There’s female A, swotty pretty girl English student, female B swotty ‘kooky’ (she’s welsh!)  pretty girl dentist student and female C the interesting, badass, (only)non -white less pretty girl student. Male A – white  pathetic, kind of cute every man, Male B  loud annoying dense yah boy and Male C who is basically a lazy rip off of Mike from Spaced. The female characters are better developed and infinately more compelling than the males, which is unusual in this kind of sit com. It’s the sort of thing that I will probably continue to watch to see if it gets any better, in the same way that as a student I repeatedly ate disappointing food in this one pub because it was cheap.                                                                     

I just finished reading Alison Bechdel’s Dykes to Watch Out for, for a second time. Bechdel is more famous for her autobiographical ‘Fun Home’ which is also very good. Dykes to Watch Out For is notable for inspiring the Bechdel test (where a character demands that if  a film doesn’t have 2 named women in it, who speak to each other about something other than a man, she’s not interested). Bechdel’s characterisation of a particular right on, radical community of women is totally compelling. I don’t think you need to be a part of that kind of radical group to enjoy it because it is basically a well developed comic soap opera. Reading ‘The Essential Dykes to Watch Out For’ has the added bonus that it chronicles life from 1987 to 2008, allowing the reader to experience recent history through her ensemble cast of radical lesbians. It’s also really well drawn.

I went to see Contagion, because I like diseases, and feel that a box office smash pandemic movie is  long overdue. Sadly, this wasn’t even as good as Outbreak (a childhood favourite of mine) as it lacked a coherent story arc. It tried to do far too much , with too many characters, without really developing narratives for any of them. This was a shame, partly as mentioned above because I like diseases, but also because it had such a good cast. Kate Winslet’s performance stood out where Jude Law’s ‘conspiracy blogger’ was utterly woeful ‘I have 12 million unique hits on my website’  – who talks like that? We have lived with the internet as a mainstream thing for more than 10 years now, why are people who write screenplays so bad at incorporating it into their scripts in a realistic way?

On Monday I saw Patrick Wolf at the O2 (formerly the Zodiac, a fact Patrick pointed out with nostalgia more than once).  It was utterly excellent. Wolf is like Morrissey, crossed with Robert Smith, crossed with Rufus Wainwright (with maybe a little bit of Mika in there) but like, more talented.  Wolf had the audience as putty in his hands, me included. Came away buzzing and slightly regretting not buying one of his ridiculous T shirts.

On Friday night I went out for dinner in Glasgow with a friend I hadn’t seen there for a while to The Butterfly and the Pig on Bath Street which I heartily recommend. It’s quite a grand old building, and the décor sits halfway between pub and twee tea shop. Their thing is ‘high tea’ which is £12.50 and includes a main course,  a slice of cake and a pot of tea. The fact that pudding is a assumed won me over immediately, sitting in pretty glass cases the cakes look like something from Great British Bake Off.   The fact that the building is quite rough around the edges and the food is such good value makes the twee nature of it seem charming rather than off putting.  I had the fish and chips, which was tasty, though the mushy peas could have done without the vinegar. My friend had a chicken and bacon pie which was delicous and came with loads of roast veg, mash and gravy served in a tea cup.  I had the courgette and pistachio cake which was beautiful washed down with a pot of tea. They stop serving at 8pm so you have to get there early, but well worth a visit I reckon.

Today I very nearly had a chance to do the best gig of my life, alongside comedians I admire the hell out of to a massive receptive audience. At first I thought it would be too forward to ask to be on such a bill, I mean who the fuck am I? Then I thought I would go for it, seize the day- and I was added to the list of performers. Cue butterfly tummy and an hour of wondering if it would be ok. Was my one funny thing actually funny? Would I be able to speak with any degree of eloquence and charm? In the end, there wasn’t time and I felt a little deflated after getting worked up.

I tell you this completely self involved story because it is an analogy of how I felt about the wider experience of block the bridge. We go, decide to be audacious, get worked up- make a stance and then leave, after feeling so much hope about achieving something. I don’t want to downplay it because that was the biggest act of civil disobedience in the anti-cuts movement here so far, it is bound to make some people take notice- but call me old fashioned, I still think a general strike is where it’s at.

I hope we can defeat this bill, I think occupation of public spaces is a good tactic, but it is just a tactic, which if fetishised and left in isolation won’t become anything greater than hopeful posturing. I don’t think full on attacks on the state are the answer at this stage either.

Anyway I am sure I’m not saying anything that hasn’t been said already by loads of old school lefties about strike action, and a lot of people on the bridge i’m sure agree that uncut tactics need to be used alongside strikes and workplace organising. I guess it’s easy when you’re a young pink haired 20something to get caught up in the excitement of occupation,guerilla comedy and other fluff- it’s much more fun than the coal-face- or whatever the post thatcher equivalent of the coal face is (dole-face?).

Post script, next day – a far more positive account can be found here on Bright Green. In some ways I think block the bridge did work as a big publicity stunt, and in that sense was successful, I guess it’s about expectation and the desire to block infrastructure, and what people want from a protest that can lead to these feelings of deflation. Perhaps right now, getting the bill in the media through what essentially was a giant publicity stunt will make something of a difference.

I am going to Uk Uncut’s block the bridge action on Sunday. I am a bit concerned about how the police will treat us, but to be honest I am more concerned about losing the national health service – if you can come too it would be great to see you there.

Tonight I will be mostly thinking of ways to involve House MD in anti-cuts sentiments, especially as there is a character on House called ‘Cameron’.

Aside from the fact that a fluffy coat, and Euros Childs are objectively good things – the urge to buy stuff at night, and the ability to do so very easily is quite unerving. David Mitchell wrote a fairly dull piece about how we should shop on the high street more, and not online. I don’t really think that’s likely when in 5 minutes I can buy really cool stuff I would never find on the high street. Buying things online is ideal for a certain kind of consumer. The kind of consumer who will buy a Topshop outfit from a charity shop but would refuse to enter the store, those for whom conspicuous consumption is a bit gross. With online shopping, anti-consumerists can shop in secret and the items magically appear at your door, erasing all hints that a transaction ever took place. It is a kind of guilty consumer masturbation – we all do it (I think – I cannot be sure), generally late at night alone – and we definately don’t talk about it. I know there have been times when I wake up and think, ‘damn, I really didn’t need to buy that navy blue lipstick last night’.  It’s late at night though when for me, consumer desires and a lack of rationality take hold, when I can imagine the fun I will have with a new board game, or a new outfit. The voice that says ‘you don’t need that’ is much quieter, often silent.

I was thinking about this and shopping habits in general, and tendencies to look down on shopping as a past-time.  This sort of conspicuous consumerism snobbery came sharply into view when the riots were happening (ie, they just go shopping, they are too consumerist that’s why it happened blah blah).  As a teenager shopping was probably my main hobby at weekends, but to call it shopping really is a misnomer. What it involved generally was going to town (Leeds for me, most of the time) hanging about, trying on things we were never going to buy and laughing for no reason. I remember laying on the floor of C&A changing room for ages laughing, probably at nothing. I also remember going around Harvey Nicholls and going ‘look this is £500′ in loud voices, daring each other to try clothes on. In German they have a term ‘in der stadt bummeln’ which means hanging around town,  which is a much better term (also it has the word bum in it HA). In many ways this is conspicuous consumption, we called this activity ‘shopping’, but in terms of the activity it was more about having fun with your friends than Ebay binges ever will be. It was also cheaper.

What is my point?  Possibly that the ease of buying things online isn’t great, it allows shopping to creep into your evenings when your defenses are down.  Also that sometimes inconspicuous consumerism, is more dirty than the conspicuous kind – bear that  in mind when you get all ‘oh it’s so depressing people spending their saturdays shopping’.

But anyway – I probably shouldn’t buy this coat should I?

(I’m not going to. unless it’s like £2.49, then maybe – I definately won’t go above £3.67)

It occurred to me yesterday, that sometimes, the things that really get up your nose are the tiny little bits of ‘every-day’ sexism. The massive tragedies of patriarchy (of which there are many) can inspire rage and grief in equal measure. Those things are like gaping wounds, you can feel a  bit helpless in terms of how to treat them.

Today’s moan is what I am henceforth going to christen ‘mosquito bite misogyny’, a small irritation that hints at a bigger problem (in the same way that a mozzie bite may hint at endemic malaria or dengue fever I AM GOOD AT ANALOGIES)

Thames Water released some research that kindly let us know that the biggest wasters of water are women, when they shave their legs. You can tell me that women chose to shave their legs till your blue in the face, we do it because of patriarchal beauty standards – we are blamed when we don’t do it, and now we are being blamed when we do! Thanks Thames Water, for putting the responsibility for looking after the environment on women. Women who in general (particularly in global terms) are least responsible for causing the problem, and who will suffer most from the consequences. THANKS FOR THAT.

Seems someone at The Guardian has called them on it – though not from a gender perspective.

Anyway, here it is – I urge you to read it.

‘Alienation is the precise and correctly applied word for describing the major social problem in Britain today. People feel alienated by society. In some intellectual circles it is treated almost as a new phenomenon. It has, however, been with us for years. What I believe is true is that today it is more widespread, more pervasive than ever before. Let me right at the outset define what I mean by alienation. It is the cry of men who feel themselves the victims of blind economic forces beyond their control. It’s the frustration of ordinary people excluded from the processes of decision making. The feeling of despair and hopelessness that pervades people who feel with justification that they have no real say in shaping or determining their own destinies.

Many may not have rationalised it. May not even understand, may not be able to articulate it. But they feel it. It therefore conditions and colours their social attitudes. Alienation expresses itself in different ways by different people. It is to be found in what our courts often describe as the criminal anti-social behaviour of a section of the community. It is expressed by those young people who want to opt out of society, by drop outs, the so-called maladjusted, those-who seek to escape permanently from the reality of society through intoxicants and narcotics. Of course it would be wrong to say it was the sole reason for these things. But it is a much greater factor in all of them than is generally recognised.

Society and its prevailing sense of values leads to another form of alienation. It alienates some from humanity. It partially dehumanises some people, makes them insensitive, ruthless in their handling of fellow human beings, self-centred and grasping. The irony is, they are often considered normal and well adjusted. It is my sincere contention that anyone who can be totally adjusted to our society is in greater need of psychiatric analysis and treatment than anyone else.

They remind me of the character in the novel, Catch 22, the father of Major Major. He was a farmer in the American Mid West. He hated suggestions for things like Medicare, social services, unemployment benefits or civil rights. He was, however, an enthusiast for the agricultural policies that paid farmers for not bringing their fields under cultivation. From the money he got for not growing alfalfa he bought more land in order not to grow alfalfa. He became rich. Pilgrims came from all over the state to sit at his feet and learn how to be a successful non-grower of alfalfa. His philosophy was simple. The poor didn’t work hard enough and so they were poor. He believed that the good Lord gave him two strong hands to grab as much as he could for himself. He is a comic figure. But think, have you not met his like here in Britain? Here in Scotland? I have.

It is easy and tempting to hate such people. However it is wrong. They are as much products of society and a consequence of that society, human alienation, as the poor drop out. They are losers. They have lost essential elements of our common humanity. Man is a social being. Real fulfilment for any person lies in service to his fellow men and women.

The big challenge to our civilisation is not OZ, a magazine I haven’t even seen let alone read. Nor is it permissiveness, although I agree our society is too permissive. Any society which, for example, permits over one million people to be unemployed is far too permissive for my liking. Nor is it moral laxity in the narrow sense that this word is generally employed ~ although in a sense here we come nearer to the problem. It does involve morality, ethics, and our concept of human values. The challenge we face is that of rooting out anything and everything that distorts and devalues human relations. Let me give two examples from contemporary experience to illustrate the point.

Recently on television I saw an advert. The scene is a banquet. A gentleman is on his feet proposing a toast. His speech is full of phrases like “this full-bodied specimen”. Sitting beside him is a young, buxom woman. The image she projects is not pompous but foolish. She is visibly preening herself, believing that she is the object of this bloke’s eulogy. Then he concludes – “and now I give … ” then a brand name of what used to be described as Empire sherry. The woman is shattered, hurt and embarrassed. Then the laughter. Derisive and cruel laughter. The real point, of course, is this. In this charade, the viewers were obviously expected to identify not with the victim but with her tormentors.

The other illustration is the widespread, implicit acceptance of the concept and term, the rat race. The picture it conjures up is one where we are scurrying around scrambling for position, trampling on others, back-stabbing, all in pursuit of personal success. Even genuinely intended friendly advice can sometimes take the form of someone saying to you, “Listen, you look after number one”. Or as they say in London, “Bang the bell, Jack, I’m on the bus”.

To the students I address this appeal. Reject these attitudes. Reject the values and false morality that underlie these attitudes. A rat race is for rats. We’re not rats. We’re human beings. Reject the insidious pressures in society that would blunt your critical faculties to all that is happening around you, that would caution silence in the face of injustice lest you jeopardise your chances of promotion and self-advancement. This is how it starts and before you know where you are, you’re a fully paid-up member of the rat-pack. The price is too high. It entails the loss of your dignity and human spirit. Or as Christ put it, “What doth it profit a man if he gain the whole world and suffer the loss of his soul?”

Profit is the sole criterion used by the establishment to evaluate economic activity. From the rat race to lame ducks. The vocabulary in vogue is a giveaway. It’s more reminiscent of a human menagerie than human society. The power structures that have inevitably emerged from this approach threaten and undermine our hard-won democratic rights. The whole process is towards the centralisation and concentration of power in fewer and fewer hands. The facts are there for all who want to see. Giant monopoly companies and consortia dominate almost every branch of our economy. The men who wield effective control within these giants exercise a power over their fellow men which is frightening and is a negation of democracy.

Government by the people for the people becomes meaningless unless it includes major economic decision making by the people for the people. This is not simply an economic matter. In essence it is an ethical and moral question for whoever takes the important economic decisions in society ipso facto determines the social priorities of that society. From the Olympian heights of an executive suite, in an atmosphere where your success is judged by the extent to which you can maximise profits, the overwhelming tendency must be to see people as units of production, as indices in your accountants’ books.

To appreciate fully the inhumanity of this situation, you have to see the hurt and despair in the eyes of a man suddenly told he is redundant without provision made for suitable alternative employment, with the prospect in the west of Scotland, if he is in his late forties or fifties, of spending the rest of his life in the Labour Exchange. Someone, somewhere has decided he is unwanted, unneeded, and is to be thrown on the industrial scrap heap. From the very depth of my being, I challenge the right of any man or any group of men, in business or in government, to tell a fellow human being that he or she is expendable.

The concentration of power in the economic field is matched by the centralisation of decision making in the political institutions of society. The power of Parliament has undoubtedly been eroded over past decades with more and more authority being invested in the Executive. The power of local authorities has been and is being systematically undermined. The only justification I can see for local government is as a counterbalance to the centralised character of national government.

Local government is to be restructured. What an opportunity, one would think, for decentralizing as much power as possible back to local communities. Instead the proposals are for centralising local government. It’s once again a blueprint for bureaucracy, not democracy. If these proposals are implemented, in a few years when asked “Where do you come from ?”, I can reply: “The Western Region”. It even sounds like a hospital board.

It stretches from Oban to Girvan and eastwards to include most of Glasgow conurbation. As in other matters, I must ask the politicians who favour these proposals – where and how in your calculations did you quantify the value of a community? Or a community life? Of a sense of belonging? Of the feeling of identification? These are rhetorical questions. I know the answer. Such human considerations do not feature in their thought processes.

Everything that is proposed from the establishment seems almost calculated to minimise the role of the people, to miniaturise man. I can understand how attractive this prospect must be to those at the top. Those of us who refuse to be pawns in their power game can be picked up by their bureaucratic tweezers and dropped in a filing cabinet under “M” for malcontent or maladjusted. When you think of some of the high flats around us, it can hardly be an accident that they are as near as one could get to an architectural representation of a filing cabinet.

If modern technology requires greater and larger productive units, let’s make our wealth producing resources and potential subject to p1ublic control and to social accountability. Let’s gear our society to social ~-need, not personal greed. Given such creative re-orientation of society, there is no doubt in my mind that in ” few years we could eradicate in our country the scourge of poverty, the underprivileged, slums, and insecurity.

Even this is not enough. To measure social progress purely by material advance is not enough. Our aim must be the enrichment of the whole quality of life. It requires a social and cultural, or if you wish, a spiritual transformation of our country. A necessary part of this must be the restructuring of the institutions of government and where necessary, the evolution of additional structures so as to involve the people in the decision making processes of our society. The so called experts will tell you that this would be cumbersome or marginally inefficient. I am prepared to sacrifice a margin of efficiency for the value of the people’s participation anyway, in the longer term, I reject this argument.

To unleash the latent potential of our people requires that we give them responsibility. The untapped resources of the North Sea are as nothing compared to the untapped resources of our people, I am convinced that the great mass of our people go through life without even a glimmer of what they could have contributed to their fellow human beings. This is a personal tragedy. It’s a social crime. The flowering of each individual’s personality and talents is the pre-condition for everyone’s development.

In this context education has a vital role to play. If automation and technology is accompanied as it must be with full employment, then the leisure time available to man will be enormously increased. If that is so, then our whole concept of education must change. The whole object must be to equip and educate people for life, ne solely for work or a profession. The creative use of leisure, in communion with, and in service to our fellow human beings can and must become an important element in self-fulfilment.

Universities must be in the forefront of development, must meet social needs and not lag behind them. It is my earnest desire that this great University of Glasgow should be in the vanguard initiating changes and setting the example for others to follow. Part of our educational process must be the involvement of all sections of the university on the governing bodies. The case for student representation is unanswerable. It is inevitable.

My conclusion is to reaffirm what I hope and certainly intend to be the spirit permeating this address. It’s an affirmation of faith in humanity. All that is good in man’s heritage involves recognition of our common humanity, an unashamed acknowledgement that man is good by nature. Burns expressed it in a poem that technically was not his best, yet captured the spirit.

In “Why should we idly waste our prime,” he writes:

“The golden age, we’ll then revive, each man shall be a brother,

In harmony we all shall live and till the earth together,

In virtue trained, enlightened youth shall move each fellow creature,

And time shall surely prove the truth that man is good by nature”.

It’s my belief that all the factors to make a practical reality of such a world are maturing now. I would like to think that our generation took mankind some way along the road towards this goal. It’s a goal worth fighting for.