Tag: UK Labour

Be worried, Sir Keir- it isn’t just lefties who are concerned about your leadership any more

By Daviemoo

Yesterday, I went to return some books to the library as the Saturday of easter weekend is the only time the library is open. As it was a British “nice day” for March I decided to wear my customary “Anti Tory” top (which I got from SadGirlStudios on Instagram, for those who wonder).
Normally I get the odd glance, smirk or frown when I wear this top but nobody has ever actually spoken to me about it- until yesterday, when I had a conversation I think should alarm Starmer and his loyalists.

There I was, holographic anti tory slogan on display, wondering if I should have fizzy water or a coffee. Whilst I was queuing a very nice man and his wife stopped me to ask “do many people argue with you about that”? He pointed at my top and I smiled and said “you’d be surprised to be honest”. He said “surely at this point nobody sane can be backing them”. I laughed and said “again, it’d shock you, some people will defend anything”. We smiled at each other, then he paused and said conspiratorially, “mind you… Labour don’t seem to be much better these days, do they”. I shook my head, quietly surprised that this conversation I was told never happened in real life and was just a figment of my chronically social media addled brain was playing out in real terms.

“Seems so” I said, stating that I was disappointed with Labour myself. He and his wife agreed readily and then we all went our separate ways.

It should probably bring concern to labour loyalists that this discourse about labour not really making themselves distinct from conservatives is spreading to daily discourse. I have tons of political discussion and when it comes to the ant farm tunnelling that is internet discourse I of course hold prudence, sure that just because a few people agree with me about my revulsion for labour’s direction doesn’t mean that’s a wide sentiment. But it seems that as that fateful election looms closer, public opinion is souring on Labour.
Of course the usual white knights of Starmer will ride to their defence and give me the usual storied repeats of why it just HAS to be this way. It doesn’t, and I’m tired of people who call themselves politically savvy and literate trying to repeat defunct talking points.

For many, Labour’s pathetic stance on Palestine has been a bone of contention for months. The usual response to this was originally to repeat the Israeli state spin that’s been so roundly debunked that the famed purveyor of it, Elon Levy is currently scrolling LinkedIn to find a role where he won’t profoundly embarrass Netanyahu by lying on the internet and being easily called out for it by politicians like Alicia Kearns. My personal favourite response to mass dissatisfaction with Labour’s take on Israel is to metaphorically ball up and start snivelling “but Labour aren’t even in power yet”.
If nothing labour says matters until they’re in power, it’s no wonder we have a party offering poor take, position and promise on so many of the key areas of the UK state who still seem to embody the largest pool of support.
Labour’s stances on Palestine, NHS funding & resolving the wait list, their stances on tax, green energy, infrastructure & economic reform and more have been woeful- supply side reform and private investment or enmeshing public entities with private capital, again. Where have we seen this before?
Waiting until it’s too late to encourage a change in stance to something better that will also be effective is ridiculous! It’s the same trite nonsense as “you haven’t seen a manifesto yet”. By that logic I haven’t seen the tory one so maybe I should just let them say any old guff because ItS NoT In A MaNiFeStO. I’m judging them by their actions and telling you I find them wanting.
I have by the way read what apparently is Reform UK’s prospectus- it reads like Elmo’s “how to really finish the job of gutting the UK”, where the sweet red puppet has decided to offer tax cuts but promise economic growth, with one stitched paw knowing nothing about what the other is doing.

People too readily assume I am pulling for one of the parties opposed to labour- I’m actually pretty set on joining the greens, and as much as people will decry that as perpetuating FPTP I have nothing but scorn for people who seem to think being part of the winning team is good even when they bankrupt most of the reasons why they should win in order to get there- not to mention, engaging in the fantasism of brexiters, thinking they’ll be able to change labour for the better by enabling Starmer’s cabal by supporting him unabated and pretending you’ll turn into an activist post election.
Ultimately, even today I found a video of an ex member of the party who worked internally talking about her experiences of corruption under Starmer- from dropshipping favoured candidates and suspending those with credulity to the local electorate and even questions of the closed door vote counting done to choose candidates, it’s all well for people to look to the Forde report (which I reread two weeks ago) to point at the obvious ineffectual nature of a party torn apart by two warring factions, but to posit that an improvement is ruthless silencing of leftists in the party by the right of labour is absolutely comical.

The question people need to ask is as simple as this: if Labour have moved to the right – which if you don’t agree they have there’s very little point in us discussing this- exactly how beneficial is their win for us?

We’re told to be pragmatic, so let’s do that. If labour’s intent to allow private entities greater use of NHS facilities and increase what I would call unseemly practices like insourcing to upscale staffing shortages, rather than make the NHS better through funding and targeted campaigns to attract talent, it’s just allowing the NHS to lean on a private service that then is all which stabilises it- no moves to bring the NHS up to demand whilst, or without, this private entity investment, means the NHS becomes unable to stand on its own and will fail.
In terms of labour playing into the rhetoric of tories on queer people and small boats crossings, it’s doing exactly what Phil Moorhouse of Labour social implied in his recent video about Rachel Reeves perpetuating the nonsense of country budgets being similar to household budgets. The line seemed to be “Reeves has to say this stuff because other people said it first, so she’s not responsible for the lies she’s saying- she’s just continuing it”- which has all the exculpatory flavour of “I didn’t murder him, I just held up an axe and let him run into it til he was fricasseed”.
When it comes to green investment- which an enormous number of polls indicate people want, Labour have more than halved their intent to upscale green investment, which ties us further to the fossil fuels which we can easily link back to some of the unseemly actions of politics we see now- including their maddening stance on Palestine. It’s clear that western powers hope that having a stronghold of sorts in Israel ensures energy security. Trying to move us away from dependency on fossil fuels would mean an overdue ceasing of deference to regimes like Saudi Arabia whose human rights records are appalling, all so we can purchase the oil that’s burning the world. Refusing to invest in these vital initiatives is a flat refusal to create jobs, stimulate the economy and start to move us away from the fossil fuel reliance that ensures future generations will pay for our lassitude in innovation. Support for Israel seems less bent on the belief in Zionism and more on strategic need to ensure safety in the Suez and in our steady exchange of unfathomable capital for fossil fuels.

The point here, is that many who have fiercely clung to Labour as the salve to cool the wounds of tories are starting to zoom out and question what we’ve been cautioning all along- perhaps the time is ripe to think about what comes after the election, because the idea that we’re in a state of emergency that will end on day one of a new primacy is simply not useful thinking- whilst it’s vital we purge the poison of tories, replacing it with more poison does little. And the fact that more are becoming truly aware of how much danger uncritical backing of Labour is putting us in should terrify the avatars of Starmer’s leadership.

It is natural for the Labour Party to veer slightly left or right in ideology. The never ending irony is that many will state that the Starmer cabal’s actions are necessitated by Corbyn’s dragging the party to the unelectable left. Odd then, how the same people asking for pragmatism and gentle, small shifts in national politics also seem to cheer an extreme turnabout of party rhetoric?
Is it moderation we need or an extreme change? Seems odd to push for both and not one specifically.
The problem isn’t a general realignment of labour with center right voters- it’s the determined and ongoing refusal to adhere to the broad church rhetoric we’ve heard for so long.

Here’s the rub- perhaps I’m talking nonsense and the UK is actually just a conservative country that likes the Starmer rhetoric. It doesn’t seem to based on polling of what matters to the electorate, nor the party members considering their utter flippancy over PR or voter reform, or commitment to repealing the tories ridiculous voter ID law that reports stated were tantamount to totalitarian silencing of the electorate.
I don’t believe the UK is conservative- I believe the UK’s populace is forced into indenture under the guise of democracy. We don’t want supply side reform if it means suffering more austerity, whether in or out of the EU we want better ties to smoothen trade and give the economy a much needed boost, people want green investment, people want a move away from culture war guff and an unequivocal calling out of Israel’s disgusting war crimes, people want PR- are we being offered this, or are we being proselytised to by a Labour Party convinced by old Blairites that they know better in the face of the taciturn base currently poised to lubricate the doorway for labour to squeeze into power. that doorway narrows every time Labour refuse to offer these reforms and refuse to fall back into the very important order we need to restore- that politicians are public servants, that parties are consolidations of public will. We are not here to have our politics cut out and pasted to us by a party- we are here to form or coalesce around a party which offers us a vision of better- be it ways to bring long neglected private utilities back to public control, either through stealth, competition or legislation. We are not here to let labour offer us static instead of policy that will remediate our suffering under the conservatives. And it’s not just the tofu cultivating lefties amongst us who think so now- for even labour supporters are voicing their displeasure, however late that may be coming.

So many times now I’ve written articles just like this that I feel like I’m going insane, chiding and appealing to and reaching out to labour’s supporters either enthusiastic or coquettish, begging for reason to be seen. Labour is not part of your identity- it is a party, which should be in thrall to its members: Starmer is rumoured to have tilted the scales, removed the oversight and taken away the democracy from within, and whilst you may want to look at Corbyn and blame him, the end result is backing a party which refuses to play by the rules of plurality it has loudly claimed to abide by publicly for years. The time is beyond perfect to muddy the waters, demand more and better- every poll indicates a towering lead for a Labour government. Threatening to dent that unless they offer you something isn’t political realism- it’s weakness. Time to get strong.

The Great Liberal Lie Machine

By Daviemoo

I feel like I’ve been swindled.

In 2016 I remember trying, through the haze of a depressive breakdown, pushing people in my life to vote against brexit. 
I’d sat and watched the government decimate public finances with the transparent aim of a financial package to refloat an economy dragged into the depths by bankers. I watched a foolish prime minister in David Cameron arrogantly assume he knew the depths of misery that austerity had caused turn around to a nation of people who’d suffered economically for six years under his cuts- always, naturally, under the sleight of hand of right wing media pundits like Boris Johnson, selling the idea that the reason we were miserable was the EU and their silly little straight banana laws. Cameron’s solution was to ask the nation “shall we carry on as we are, with you all miserable under this financial garrotte or shall we do some change nobody can define but that might be better than this”- and a slim majority of people snapped his hand off for the chance. 

It’s been fascinating recently to see excerpts of books written by the likes of crack journalists like Emily Maitlis and James O’Brien prompting the shocking theory that brexit was caused by wealth inequality- something that literally almost any working class political activist in an underfunded constituency figured out in 2016; the need to only talk about, not to, real working class people is a long-standing issue of the British media, regardless of how closely they thread the dividing line of centrism.

I remember watching agog as America decided to elect Donald Trump as he’d somehow convinced millions of Americans that he, born into a wealthy family, architect of a failed empire and a pussy grabbing misogynist prick, was somehow the one to fight against a system he’d continuously played to remain wealthy in the face of his own stupidity. 

I remember the pandemic beginning and watching a slow motion bank transfer of a collective BILLIONS from the poorest in society directly into the already bulging pockets of the rich. I remember during the pandemic, the government calmly declaring  to my disgusted self that disabled people should be under DNR orders because why resuscitate a disabled person when abled people need it too?

Most of all, I remember posting , outraged, the story of Ahmaud Aubrey- shotgunned in the gut for having the nerve to jog whilst black, then reading about Breonna Taylor, gunned down in her own bed- then the killing of George Floyd and I remember watching with respect, awe and admiration as black and brown people in America flooded the airwaves, streets, social media, with their stories of entrenched inequality in society as it stood. I listened in horror as the rotten guts of our society were exposed. 

And now I remember every dead Palestinian I’ve seen- a dozen legs stuck out from under a collapsed building, disassembled limbs, a limp four year old in his fathers arms as he screams for his son to come back, a man kissing his granddaughters corpse goodbye after looking in her blank eyes one more time, a little girl begging to be rescued shortly before suffocating in rubble. 

I committed those stories to memory, I promised I’d do better, that I’d learn about society, about inequality, about what we’d done wrong so I could fight for what’s right. 

And I feel swindled.
How few of us were there watching these transparent demonstrations of how unequal, how debased, society as it stands is and who actually meant what we said? Who was stood with the masses in marches and demonstrations against authoritarian legislation who would roll over and accept it if it came from a party they traditionally viewed as ok?
How few of us did the reading, listened to the people, really examined society from the lens of the long feared other, and who saw the value in their words? Who else reads stories from Arabic queer people who tell us the glories, trials, tribulations of their lives and understands that it’s not so simplistic as West good, everywhere else bad? Who else got sunburn going to BLM protests, pro queer counter-protests, who listened to their mate with cystic fibrosis cry about society’s willing to throw her to the dogs so they could go to McDonalds in a pandemic, and was sincere when they said “this isn’t working”?

I did what we all said we were- I read, I listened, I took in – and now, when push comes to shove I’m told to disregard all I learnt. I’m told the utter lack of policy to support and uplift disadvantaged people, to tackle inequalities- all of that is fine because tories and Trump?

Years I have spent trying to listen to those who are oppressed and now when the time comes to collectively stand for them- I am told to forget those lofty ideals of tackling intrinsic wealth inequality – they are pipe dreams. I’m told people who’ve been waiting for as long as I’ve walked the earth for their equality, for the abolition of their misery- they will have to wait longer. It’s all about realism, the lesser of two evils- never about aspiring to be one of the many fighting for the changes we’ve all spent years talking about and intellectualising.

It utterly baffles me that this is where we’ve gotten to as a society- though it amuses me that people of colour were right all along that people will nod and feign empathy for empathy points or click and likes but will always fail when it comes to action. But that worst of all, there is now an established blame system in place that will exculpate the true failures, our political figures. Joe Biden is fine to support, fund and arm the genocidal actions of a right wing Israeli state, all because Donald Trump is worse. Trump is offering fascism to offset Biden’s authoritarianism. Biden has done nothing to address the long standing concerns of people of colour, even condoning the long term detention UNDER TERROR LEGISLATION, the people who protested against Cop City. Remember that we’ve spent many years predating the BLM uprisings watching footage of the corruption, ocean deep, of police who unfailingly close ranks when misdeeds come to light. How dare we want that to stop. He’s enacted legislation to prevent even a tangential protest against Israel’s actions by refusing to allow boycotts to take place on a market level.

Biden has done nothing to entreat the disenfranchised to vote for him beyond not being Donald Trump- and this vacuum space where legislation to attract these voters should be is instead filled with the threat of fascism under Trump, and only threat.

Many of the center left commentators invoking minorities to vote for Biden have watched in horror as he eye rolled over the overturning of Roe V Wade- they have seen him shrug indifferently over anti queer legislation that has seen trans people flee entire states. They now see him sign off a financial package of millions and throwing in weaponry to boot, to help Israel claim the sliver of Palestinian land they’d penned Palestinians into for years.
What have these progressive voices done to hold Biden to account for these failures, or to ask for him to perform any redress against them? Nothing but head shakes and sighs and promises that it’s the republicans wot done it, and not that Biden has done nothing to level the playing field legislatively. And this has led me to realise something.

I was one of vast swathes of people who said we were listening, who knelt, fist in the sky as black people outlined how difficult society was for them to navigate. I was one of many who heard disabled people beg for consideration as a pandemic that had been ineptly handled ripped them in their dozens from family. I was one of legions who has stood at pro-queer counter protests, singing songs of peace or menacing quite literal fascists, laughing at their absurdity as they accuse us of trying to indoctrinate their kids when our experience is almost entirely that we are born as we are. And I now feel, along with select others, I was one of the only people who meant what we were saying. It wasn’t window dressing to me.

When we listened to disadvantaged people tell us how their lives were, some of us really did mean we needed to change society from the macro to the major- when we saw how unequal some amongst us were, we meant the words we said confirming we’d fight for peoples’ betterment. When we read the words of authors past and present who promised us there was a better way that we had to fight directly for, instead of leaving it for some other future generation to suffer their way through and possibly out of, we listened, took it in- those words became us, became our actions. The words of dissenters, and poets and revolutionaries past and present became our future, spiralling out through our bodies. We became the promises we made to stand for them in a way nobody had previously.

The rest? They nodded, they frowned, they heard the inequalities and they decided, when push began to become shove, that they weren’t the ones to fight for the equality they protested for. They decided that it’s enough to shake their heads dejected at anti LGBT+ legislation and to do nothing else. They tell disabled people their fight for marriage equality is worthy- not worthy for them to pursue, but worthy. They look at legislation which is decidedly anti black and POC in nature being enacted and decide that yes, the detainment of their fellows is a worthy price if it means their comforts- because their political activism is reduced to chiding those who can’t vote for a genocide enabler as a lesser option to fascism.

They ask “What are we meant to do” and when answer is given- listen, use your status to uplift others, organise, threaten your political leaders to act lest they lose your vote and the vote of the minorities they spurn- they snort derisively, tying themselves to the broken wheel of our system politic as it turns.

Some genuinely believe that change is not possible now- to those I entreat, your reluctance is the only frayed string holding us back from overthrow, from fighting for better. YOU are the cause of your own- and our- misery, because you’d sooner cling to the familiarity of a hierarchy you stand upon than throw it over.

Some know it is possible but understand the hierarchy of society as it stands- and they maintain it wilfully, knowing that they benefit from the minoritisation of others. They are the worst amongst us, those who claim to use their voice for good, to speak for minorities, but who rail all the same against the change that would help those voices live. Their activism rings hollow, a painted bauble to hang in their window to be seen but not to aspire to and it is this group whom I have truly begun to loathe- wishing for the street cred of being a progressive without actually fulfilling the actions that would make them so. I’m painted a radical sometimes now- the difference between me now and me then? I’m doing what I said I would. So action is radical, and inaction is… liberalism.

Once you become aware of the inequalities of a society, if you aren’t doing anything real to push for that- writing to your representatives, lobbying for it, joining groups, sowing seeds, writing, talking, whatever you can- then you become a willing co-conspirator of that inequality. Worse still, if you speak against that inequality loudly but quietly condone it, you are a pillar that holds it up at best, or a ladder climber hoping to benefit from it at worst. 

It is your decision to make as to whether you think disabled people, black and brown people, women, trans people ,queer people at large, can continue to live in a society that disadvantages them for the benefit of those who wish to harm us all, but understand that many of us will remember, down the line in another day, whether you were railing against the politicians who commanded us to fall in line- or railing against those of us calling this flawed existence out as it is and asking for, demanding, more. 

Reading this article back, it probably sounds like I’m sucking my own dick for being a decent person- the frustration being, nothing I’ve done is special. Protesting against fascism is something any normal person should do- but they didn’t. Listening to black people talk about how shit a racist society is, pretty bog standard, no? Nothing I’ve done deserves applause, I am not a special person, I’ve never felt special, I’ve always maintained I am a distinctly average person. And yet society has become so radical that half the leftists I know think I’m a paragon of good because I shit talk about politicians on a social media app and half the people I used to be friends with think I’m a pariah because I’m not backing a politician who has offered nothing but a return, again, to that dreaded moniker- “sensible conservatism”.
I’m sick of it- society is fucked, and pretending we don’t need to change it benefits only those who want to pretend it isn’t hierarchical but also want to be given support for being a progressive in name only. You say the shit I believe then don’t do it and you want applause for dimming the voice in your head telling you you’re a good person really you just have other priorities than other people.


If my articles offend you, good! That’s your innate humanity trying desperately to smash its way out of the cage you’ve locked it in to continue to believe in this flawed system which fails so many. Rather than demonise me for calling your bullshit out, rather than being angry at black people, or muslim people, or queer people, or disabled people for telling you they won’t vote for your shitty leaders- be angry at your leaders for being shitty, for offering the sort of policy that will make your curls bouncier and your skin smoother at the continued expense of the people you’ve been performatively “listening to” for years.

I’m not a perfect person, nobody is- but I can go to bed at night knowing that when I went to those marches, those protests, those events, when I bought those books, when I read them, it wasn’t so some dipshit liberal would say “nice video bro” in the comments of my internet existence- it’s because I believed it.


Do you?

Surely at this point the “lesser of two evils” IS a revolution?

By Daviemoo

Societies globally are failing- can we just be honest about that? In my opinion this is in no small part due to a collective human obsession with conservatism- a brand of politics whose key tenets speak to resisting social change- in a world as fast moving and rapidly changing as ours. But it’s not just conservatism- it’s the creaking, archaic way we disseminate politics.
We see our financial institutions riven with corruption, shadowy billionaires and millionaires puppeteer media outlets behind the scenes, political parties abandon traditional voter bases to appease those who voted us into this mess and now we have multiple genocides occurring simultaneously- and through it all, the unfailing liberal diffidence to society “as is” is preventing us from hopping the fence, from leaving behind governments that have largely abandoned any pretence at democracy or protection.

It’s currently 5.58am and I’ve been awake since 4.13am. I was having a dream that somehow I was a press agent, questioning Joe Biden on his foreign policy- my exact words were “why should minority groups come together again to drag you over the line when, under your leadership, they’ve faced more misery than any time during recent history”. Even my brain is trained to toe the liberal line because I was dragged out without an answer and woke up with the memories of some of the horrors I’ve seen coming out of Palestine and the DRC playing in my head.

I turned to social media to distract me only to be confronted by a great video of a creator named Crutches & Spice whose platform is entirely uplifting disabled, queer & black voices calling out a liberal named Harry who I’ve seen repeatedly fall to the same tactics as the MAGA crowd, shaming and threatening people into voting how he wants, and I genuinely am still at a loss as to understand how any political savant worth a damn can think “vote how I want or the bad guys win and then you’ll suffer” is anything but a declaration that your vote matters enough for them to threaten you for it but somehow not enough to offer you anything for it.

Often, for Americans, the shadowy Project 2025 is touted as a reason that black & brown minorities should vote in their droves for Joe Biden (even as he and other democrats are being threatened with legal action- their financial protection package for Israel is being touted as abetting genocide by worldwide advocacy groups). What many of the liberals who do this fail to understand is- project 2025 is already some of those peoples’ lives.
Many people say America has gone insane before our eyes, but when exactly was America sane?
The more I’ve learned about the US and the UK’s colonial history, the shadowy deals we do in the background which arms insurgents to remove democratically elected governments so we can keep ourselves in oil & gas, the more I’ve watched people come together to win an election for Biden only to be met with the exact threats they were pressured to vote against- abortion access removed, discriminatory laws, hate crimes spurred on by right wing podcasts- the more I’ve wondered whether the asylum never existed to be taken over by the lunatics. No offence to Americans meant – but if you have to pay for healthcare in a country where they keep deregulating gun ownership… I can only come to one conclusion.

That said, it’s hardly like things are going swimmingly in the UK. The conservatives have, for thirteen years, stuck their dirty fingernails beneath the floorboards of British decency, excavating the nation’s living standards, enacting laws which are shockingly regressive, tearing at the threads which let us coexist in a somewhat peaceful state. Maybe it needed to happen- maybe a world where even the ignorant cant hide from our dark past and our seemingly similar future was required in order to prompt better from us. Fresh off an illegal war we were treated to a global financial catastrophe created and exacerbated by politicians who failed to safeguard against the foolishness of bankers like Sunak. We has austerity under Cameron, Brexit under Cameron, then May, then Johnson, continuing (briefly) under Truss then worsening under Sunak. We saw the truly entitled vision of Brits with the Brexit referendum as if it was ever about anything other than what we have now- a naked fight for a lack of oversight and scrutiny from the EU in terms of employment law, taxation of the rich, money laundering and oppressive legislation.

We’re not asked but told we have to vote for labour as an antidote to the conservatives and Labour loyalists are quick to point out the disparities between the parties- but what of the parities?
Both anti rejoin despite efforts to realign with the EU being an obvious fix to the chaos brexit wrought. Both anti trans (labour and the conservatives declined to declare any support for trans rights in a recent request by Pink News to offer a supportive statement). Both want greater infiltration of the NHS by private entities (palantir have just taken a contract for the tories, Streeting is designing a “temporary contracting” NHS which will simply weaken the NHS’ existing infrastructure). Both want to spend less money on green initiatives, both want to be “tough on benefit claimants”, both are reluctant to tax the rich, both are in favour of the legislation crafted by the tories around protest- whilst Starmer has made some noise about repealing some of the tory legislation, I suspect the man will decline to remove the anti protest legislation created by Patel & Braverman in fear that his government will be harangued without it. When I’m calmer this is normally when I suggest we zoom out, because the parties as they stand are a symptom, not the illness- but both are still malignant.

We’re told consistently that labour is a great option, thank goodness we can get rid of the tories. But what of those similarities in actions? Or one of labour’s most senior advisors declaring the party to now be the natural home of conservative voters?

In honesty, labour loyalists have somehow been swindled into endorsing a Conservative Party under a different name, and genuinely think they’re doing good by entreating you to vote for the same bullshit policy that the tories have foisted on us because at least this policy comes from someone who occasionally pulls a pride flag that still has the creases from where it was folded out of their desk drawer.

Disabled people in the UK and the US live a half life- unable to marry their partners without losing benefits because clearly you stop needing financial independence when you meet someone you love as a disabled person.
Disabled people will be the target of this current raft of benefit cuts by the tories, and labour responded by chiding the conservatives for… not going far enough.
Disabled people are maligned by tories and labour, by democrats and republicans in the US, forgotten unless their vote is needed- but don’t ask for anything, just give it to us. They are discarded unless they can be used as a wedge issue- somewhat ironically, this post could very much seem like the same thing but I hope if it does anything it makes disabled people’s frustrations feel heard and makes liberal words about supporting disabled people feel like ashes in your mouth.

We’ve had havoc wreaked on us all collectively by MAGA extremists and by the various factions of conservative numb brains in the UK- and all we’re being offered as an alternative is an anaemic party gutted of any spine- labour would rather kick people like me out of their party because I don’t blanche at the term socialism than people who voted enthusiastically for Boris Johnson and brexit.

Starmer’s been particularly pathetic throughout the entire chaos of the Palestinian mass slaughter. I’ve watched media commentators and pundits, people I respected, descend into genuinely laughable talking points- “oh, it wouldn’t matter whether they voted for a ceasefire or not”- except it probably would have sent a message though? Pressure doesn’t start at 10, it starts at 1- or is “we only vote for things when we’re absolutely sure we can win” more important than sticking by actual principles?
Ah, wait, I can hear you moistening your lips to start banging on about ThE RiGhT WinG MEdiA already. If you’re going to let labour say absolutely anything because the media might be very mean and nasty, what are you even voting for? How do you know what their actual positions are if you have to translate everything out of the conservative gibberish they consistently spout to supposedly appease the right wing media but apparently don’t mean?

But let’s zoom out- because like I said, the problem isn’t the parties or their leaders- it’s the system.

Begging us to keep partaking in a system that’s broken is insane, when you offer no incentive beyond threats. In fact, all I want is some nice, refreshing honesty. “Please vote for Starmer’s labour because if you don’t, I might be as uncomfortable as you are” would be insulting but at least it’d be honest. I’ve seen multiple neoliberals declare solemnly that they won’t survive another tory term– said to invoke sympathy from minorities who will quite literally die under cuts to benefits planned for action or continuation under both UK main parties.

I’m asked so often “well what’s your plan” and when I tell them revolution, they balk immediately- what an unthinkable idea! Why would we want to revolt under this wonderful system, one which has systematically failed to address peoples’ actual genuine problems over and over- wealth inequality, insecure work contracts, horrific rent hikes, unmanageable property prices, escalating bills, food inflation, increasing radical rhetoric about our existence.
We see posts all over social media of energy companies making record profits, more money than they’ve ever seen only to read articles titled “are millennials responsible for inflation?”
And we’re asked by these people to continue to respect that system, a system that’s even beginning to fail them. It makes no sense, and yet this is the world we’re asked to walk, where people beg us to lend them our votes for nothing but a continual slow decline by a society that is unable to deal with us as humans.

I mean, I have to ask- do people really think Starmer or another four years of Biden are going to absolutely transform these problems? Will Starmer be passing some huge vital act to enforce fair rent prices? Or doing anything to deal with the eternal problem of people buying houses 35 years ago and holding onto huge capital- great investment- but that coming with the side effect of locking the next generations out of being able to buy those homes for themselves? Will Biden make real terms change to the disgusting, parasitic healthcare system of the US or will be let it continue unabated because both dems and republicans make money from healthcare PACs?
But most pressing of all- do you really think you can keep turning around to minorities you offer absolutely nothing to and telling them “stand with the party I like who offer you nothing at all because the other guys are worse”?
Some liberals see the uplifting of truly downtrodden minorities as an attack on them- I have met these people, those who will Hashtag BLM all day every day, those who march in prides who will privately voice those all too familiar concerns about trans inclusion, because god forbid someone with a dick go into a toilet cubicle next to you. I get told it’s reasonable for people to be concerned about penises in things like rape support groups- and as a person who went to a queer rape support group and sat next to a trans guy and discussed my experience with other gay men, non binary people and lesbians, I have to ask why you’re focusing on genitalia and not the fact that people are also seeking support for rape, you fucking ghouls- why does your pain, your humiliation, your fear outweigh, cancel out, become more important than, theirs– And they deny it, of course. Far too many people are terrified of a society with robust protections for black people or trans people or even disabled people because they think it would all go too far– that there’s a reasonable level of underclass that minorities should just accept – a place where they personally feel comfortable continuing to benefit from a society that coddles them as a direct inverse to pressing down on the necks of those already suffering.

I cannot imagine, now I’m on this side of the fence, how I ever fathomed that it was appropriate to turn around to people who will suffer under whoever we elect and telling them “just vote for the one that hurts the least”. I cannot imagine wanting to continue a form of nationwide governance that so brazenly fails people in droves and then castigating those disadvantaged people for not just quietly doing what I want then going back to suffering.

Listening to disabled people, especially disabled women- listening to queer people and black and brown people about their fears has made me see that revolution isn’t just necessary- it’s vital. For too long we have governments who have pandered to moneyed people, business and to disgusting practices like colonialism- and yes, it is still going on, it’s why children are mining cobalt for our phones in the Congo- and we’re told it’s normal, necessary, noble to keep partaking in this system.

Let me be clear here, I’m not saying don’t partake in the system, don’t vote- that’s stupid. For as long as that’s the system in place we can, should, must, partake in it smartly- but we should also be working actively to rip out the nuts and bolts of a society that simply isn’t working and the faster we do it the better.
I’m telling you- this system isn’t going to keep working. The reason the UK and US governments are caught in the orbit of fascism is that everyone can see how exploitative and failure ridden the system as it stands truly is, and the fear of change is leading to increasingly hardline stances- Trump’s inevitable re-election will be blamed roundly on the scores of people who fail to show up for Biden, a man who was voted in by them and did nothing specifically for them- and rather than rebel against a system that offers you a deluded senile fascist or a center right bumbling man who spent four years ignoring the evil legislation he was elected to prevent, people will just grudgingly accept it because god forbid we fight back against BOTH of those options. We’re told those who don’t want to partake are endorsing fascism when, if the system offers you fascism as an option, you reject that system and forge a new one where fascism isn’t a possibility!

In the UK, Starmer will be elected and scores of people will be excited at the possibilities! And four years will pass in which Labour do cosmetic things to improve some affairs- and he’ll no doubt do things to benefit the disillusioned ex tory voters- just to keep them on board of course, he doesn’t mean it- and the “leftists” who desperately campaigned for him will shake their heads, knowing he just has to keep babying the right or else he’ll lose and that’s why he’s sensibly enacting all this bad policy. Then comes the next election and of course, we have to vote labour again otherwise we get those nasty, nasty tories and we can’t have that! But what policy will Labour have enacted to help the people you entreated to vote them in? Can’t think of one? That’s ok, just threaten them with what will happen when the tories get back in… and so the wheel- the broken political wheel will continue to turn. Because too many people think this– this flawed, bleeding, blighted system is more important to maintain than starting to forge towards something more decent.