Weekending

The new Con-Dem austerity is beginning to hurt. Locally (in Lewisham), there are plans to close half the libraries in the borough, including my local one in Crofton Park. Details from Brockley Central and Blackheath Bugle. Other proposals include job cuts in the Early Years service, less youth workers, less refuse collections and job cuts among bin men, and replacing pay and display parking with a pre-pay system.

On the brighter side, the Overland train allows people in my neighbourhood to get to Tayyabs easily - although Tayyabs, in my view, isn't as good as it used to be.

Also on the bright side: BBC 6Music has been saved. A victory for people power and Web 2.0, or was the announced closure just a clever marketing ploy?

Loads of great stuff this week at Raincoat Optimist: Iranian law and the case of Sakine Mohammadi Ashtani; The troops and the ‘good muslim, bad muslim’ narrative: A reply to Richard Seymour; Philip Hollobone and the (il)logic of the burka debate. I think this post on Moazzam Begg and the left would be brilliant too if it was typed, but I can't handle the vlog formatI'm afraid. Am I old-fashioned?

Unrelated: The radicalism of the American revolution, with superb musical accompaniment. Pinkwashing Israel (relates to this/this).

Comments

Anonymous said…
I'd be more than happy to type it up then. I had complaints from others because I wasn't wearing a top; I shan't be vlogging any more in bed :)

Is the drink next week still on?
Bob said…
Drink still on. Didn't mind the bed aspect - just have trouble engaging with talk on screen.
Matt said…
There is something to this "pinkwashing" debate. Both sides try to portray gay rights as incompatible with the other side. There's really no recognition that there are gay Palestinians who prioritize their Palestinian-ness or gay Israelis who have a different set of priorities. The most significant group, from a certain, strictly rhetorical perspective, is gay Mizrahim, and they tend to get completely erased from the discussion. You can see how toxic this discussion is, and that's at a place that prides itself on being a safe space for minorities. And where the Deputy Editor is the one making the most basic and ghastly mistakes. Right-wing Zionists do this and anti-Zionists do as well, but it's the Left, "anti-racist" anti-Zionists who really ought to know better.
bob said…
Matt, I completely agree. This is an interesting and complex issue. Aeyal Gross  captures something of the complexity in this post at Bully Blogger, although his article has a fair quantity of queer theory and anti-Zionist jargon and cliche. See also Judith Butler 1 – Homonationalism 0 by Tavia Nyong'o and Celebrating Refusal: The Complexities of Saying No by Jasbir Puar for the undistilled version, and the anti-Zionist Pinkwatching Israel. From the other side, see Stand With Us on being banned from the US Social Forum (and a pro-Zionist report here).
Anonymous said…
http://raincoatoptimism.wordpress.com/2010/07/12/moazzam-begg-is-no-friend-of-the-left/

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