S. Faulks

'"My love died." You've heard people say that, haven't you? With sincerity and self-regard. "Love" is a force by which most people would claim to regulate their lives. Yet if you stop feeling it, then it no longer exists.'
'And?'
'It's like fear or envy. One day you feel jealous of someone else; another day, for no discernible reason, you just don't. Sometimes you're frightened in a car; other times with the same driver, you aren't. "Love" is like that. You feel it, you don't feel it. Nothing wrong with that. But surely that makes it too unstable to be given a privileged position in life - let alone used as a foundation.'
'To what have you given a privileged position in your life?'
This was a good question
'Accuracy,' I said.
'What?'
'Integrity of fact.'

Im an oven baked cushion

I wish I was a security panda and could spend my time patrolling the dead sea. For then I would be free. Slipping on a cap with the securipaw insignia, I would stroll about the perimeter and keep my eye watchful for unwanted bathers. It would be my responsibility, but a burden I would be happy to bare. Deadpan expression. For I would be a security panda. The pothole that caught gods tears would be my stomping ground and I would have complete control. No surface to air missiles would be needed, no artillery of any sort. For I would be a security panda. The black and white guardian of a mystical land. A warrior for the good of no one but my translucent brethrin. No banana hammock wearing cunt is going to soil your salty liquid mass oh quiet abyss of my dreams - would be my constant, unwavering internal dialogue. For I would be the security panda...

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/minette_marrin/article1942934.ece

I would like to congratulate you on being one of the worst journalists I have ever had the displeasure to read an article of. There is not one ounce of objectivity or validity employed in your article, and being that this is an issue with which the media seem to be particularly keen to publicise, this is tantamount to professional negligence (and I use the word "professional" loosely). The lack of evidence you provide in your article to substantiate your claims is truly astonishing. Do you have no idea the damage this sort of journalism can have? Online journalism is meant to be a new medium, a beacon of democracy if you will, and all that you have offered here is an article with no background information or any substance. You criticise without providing solutions of your own. Truly contradictory. You speak of "multiculturalism" having dentrimental effects, when in fact it is sloppy journalism such as yours that has torn this country apart for years. Your supposed prestige is laughable.

there are 2 sides to every story

This is a well known saying but perhaps not a widely adopted thought process. It seems to me that the more I read and the more I speak to people, the more I seem to find people reluctant to be fluid in their ideas about certain situations. Acceptance of your ignorance is the first step to your enlightenment (write that down).


Only by speaking to people who have more knowledge about particular subjects can you possibly ever hope to have a greater knowledge yourself - simple idea I know, but it seems to be that not many people are able to adopt it. For example, first impressions. I met a girl recently who told me that she has a lot of faith in her assumptions about people when she first meets them. Of course, first impressions are important as we all know but can we really be sure that these initial judgements are going to be accurate in the long run? Its perfectly natural to formulate an opinion on someone from a limited contact (god knows I am guilty of this), but it seems a little ridiculous to write someone off without really giving them a chance. The girl in question has gone one stage further than this, however, and has actually decided what kind of a person an ex-boyfriend of a mutual friend was before she had even spoken a word to him! That to me is simply ludicrous. Given the barrage of information (mostly negative) that all who have encountered this mutual friend have received about this lad, we all have enough material to write a rather hateful biography, but to mark someone out in this manner really showed a lack of experience of life in general.





This example is not a great one, as most (if any) who read this blog will not have any idea who it is referring too, but the point I'm trying to make is hopefully clear. People are guilty, in general, of letting their perceptions be influenced in a whole manner of ways. If you tell someone something enough they are bound to believe it. My aim is to try and reserve judgement of a situation or a subject or a person until I have had properly dealings with it. I realise that this is not going to be rocket science to some but increasingly I find that people are small-minded in their judgements. "Theres no smoke without fire" - all that shit is just ridiculous.





The media is the prime example, on a much larger scale, of this kind of "small-town" behaviour. People seem to think that just because something is printed in an attractive font and mounted onto a impecably designed background that it is a mark of higher knowledge or certain fact. Actually, the majority of people that I speak to about issues made public by the mass media have no idea what an informed opinion really is. Collection of knowledge, in the widest sense, is a full time job. You are not an expert on a matter because you have sat down every lunch time for the past 15 years and read the Daily Mail. A true "understanding" is only found through attention to detail and a will to venture further than the tabloids, or even the broadsheets.

dirty habits

We meet in electronic spheres of limited gravity,
Where we are but celestial entities of movement.
Touched in thought as time hurtles passed,
Falling, body contorting to a reverberation we cannot grasp.
Now grounds contract to experiences of buoyancy,
No loyalty but to self, closed in a gated sanctum.
Souls absorbed in a facade of security,
Serene capsules of continuous noise shatter illusions of frozen picture books,
Where smiles seem empty like glasses,
But radiate importance as faces pull away from pillows.
Truly awake now as light is manipulated so days are not so bright,
Im dancing through shadows not rainbows...

drugs are bad?

In yet another late night conversation with my housemate/now life partner, inevitably I found myself embroiled in a discussion about drugs. Whether I love them or hate them is not the point, and not the focus of this discussion. Everyone has had some sort of experience with narcotics, and of course everyone has brought away from these experiences different ideas, especially about the place that they should have in our society. As a teenage tearaway I had the usual attitude towards drugs, especially cannibis, which was that they should be legalised (how very unoriginal). However, as time went on and I was able to see first hand how these plants, pills and powder effected the people around me, my liberal leaning wavered somewhat. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for personal choice (and believe me I had no problem with defiance), and in an ideal world we should all be allowed to do whatever tickles our giblets, but it seemed to me that legalizing these intoxicants would send out the wrong message to usually law-abiding youngsters.

I'm very dubious when it comes to politics, and I definitely don't have a lot of faith in the people in powers' ability to control such a situation with any degree of rationality. The effects of drugs can be huge, both positively and negatively, and peoples' lives can be changed beyond recognition over night by even a slight indulgence. My view was (although that I do aspire to be flexible and listen to others' viewpoints) that it would be wrong for drugs on mass to be decriminalised, due to the widescale effects that this could bring. I would now like to openly change my mind on this subject, due in part to the discussions that I have had with my friend on the subject, and perhaps deeper ponderance. Drugs should be legalised. Obviously this is not a move that I think should be instantly implemented, nor one that should be undertaken lightly, but it is definitely a decision that needs to be made. In order for there to be a greater understanding (a concept that seems to bewilder the majority of people, I have found) about the effects that drugs can have on the people that take them, and consequentially the people around them, we must strive to provide a more comprehensive education for everyone, other than the "certain death" rhethoric that seems to plague every story about narcotics. The effects of drugs are not all bad. If they were then surely the tales of the first adventurers to consume them would have served up a much more hard hitting message than any that could be formulated by some sociologist with a governmental advertising budget. These positive aspects of drug-taking should be shared with everyone, closely followed by a more comprehensive guide to the downsides of drug-taking. To simply patronise the next generation with videos implying that one line of coke is going to hook you for life or that one disco biscuit is going to send you straight to the morgue is no longer sufficient. In order to really win this "war on drugs", we must stop pretending that they are not a part of every day life, and indeed every day people, and promote knowledge on the subject. If this education is not provided, and resources are applied only to stopping distribution, then how are we really going to be able to help the people whose lives are being massively effected by drugs? To demonize something that, quite frankly, EVERYONE is going to try in one form or another, is to cause further segregration, fear and ignorance in our society. The general public has to appreciate that drugs are something that happens to people (cheers Jez), and they don't necessarily have to be people who live in a recylcing bin or whose parents didn't love them enough. The hypocrisy in this area is quite unbelievable, but then again not really. How are we going to overcome these fears that have been imposed on us without a radical rethink of how to approach them? It should not just be left up to Frank when it all goes wonkily, pear-shaped at 6 in the morning.

People are going to take intoxicants regardless of what laws are in place to stop them from doing so (I mean shit, its not as if the vitamin D provided by the sun in this country is going to give us a spring in our step). Curiousity is the mistress that pinches everyones backside and, in a time where the government is desperate for us all to sheath-up, shouldn't we all be equipped with the information thats going to afford us the opportunity to make an informed decision? Without such knowledge and understanding, the unfortunate people who suffer from drug addiction or battle with drug-related mental illness will continue to be ostracised and outlined as creating a problem for the whiter-than-white general public. The media has a lot to answer for in this debate (but thats another subject altogether), but surely there has to be a counter to all the misinformation that is being bandied around...

Don't get me wrong, I would never advocate drug-taking or encourage people to parttake in such activities but I do believe that people should at least be allowed to make up their own minds about it. If the government was to make the decision (something that will never happen, but this is my party so I'll cry if I want to) to legalise all drugs, then time could be spent instilling a base of knowledge in people, aside from the unfortunate circumstances of raving-casulty Lea Betts, and less time filling out arrest reports. Drugs have a myriad of effects, both positive and negative, and it should be a priority of the powers to be to make everyone aware of them. The unknown is a lot darker prospect.