Hi. It is monday now and I shall tell you all about Saturday. On that day, I got up at 8:00 or something crazy, got dressed etc and went to get a bus to London from our Uni Guild so I could join the anti-war demo. woo-hoo. Twas a cool day all around. We (my whole household) were on a coach largely full of local socialists against the war. We were on Kim’s coach. She, I discovered later, is a member of the SWP, which explains her over enthusiasm at the whole thing. She tried to sell me and Nathan copies of Socialist Worker and wondered why we weren’t as excited as her.
Typically, we arrived late (it was made extra hard to turn up on time as the march was started early) and we could not even drive to our official start point and so walked from Baker Street to Piccadilly Circus where the two (possibly three) marches alll converged. We could hear them from half way up Regent Street, the noise was amazing. When we saw them it was even more extreme. You could see three streets full of people with banners all united in voice merging into into one. Twas way cool. We then joined them and marched slowly down Piccadilly to Hyde Park. Again, it was cool. So many people. We just walked along marvelling at the people from all walks of life, each with own banners, people from all over the country, from every religion and class- fantastic. We also spent much time laughing at the humerous banners (eg: War is Crap; Bush Is Just Another Word For Cunt; Who wants wars? Dinosaurs! Use Brain Not Brawn).
Once at Hyde Park we went within and wandered across to the rally. I really wiah I had climbed a tree just to see how big the crowd was. I never got a clear view of the stage itself and where we were we could not even see the screens very well, and these were a good few hundred metres back from the stage itself. The speeches were good, espeicially Harold Pinter, jesse Jackson and Ken Livingstone. Pinter kicked ass, I believe his opening line was “American barbarism will destroy the world,” and he continued in this vein, coming out with similar slogans that drew cheer after cheer. Jesse Jackson (he is a black preacher and once ran for American President) made a fantastic speech, though a bit long-winded about stopping all kinds of predjudice and promoting peace. He later returned to dance with Ms Dynamite. Ken Livingstone also made a fine speech having a great dig at George W. Bush. At one point, someone (possibly Ali G…) invaded the stage yelling “Stop the congestion charge, this is a hijack.” Ken responded by saying how lovely it was to walk through London without having to contend with traffic.
After Ms Dynamite sung a song, we left to find our coach. When we got back to the entrance, people were still pouring through the gates (In between speeches it transpired that people were still at the start points and that around 2 million was the estimated amount of people in London that day). One of the highlights of my day came at this point when we saw the Iraqi Communist Party marching into Hyde Park plus a banner imploring Cherie blair to stop war by stopping having sex with her husband- this banner then ended by simply saying Lysistrata- I was quite impressed and laughed a lot.
That’s about it, though it took about one and a half hours to find our coach, but we were back by ten and so could have a pint, go home and watch Match Of The Day. Huzzah for all, and STOP THE WAR!
cheers
james
(Beforehand:
2/14/2003 - Hey!
Woo-hoo, Valentine’s Day! Stayed up until 2am writing things that will never be seen! Stoopid ideas! I got an idea for a book/series of books while having a lab class on primate skulls. I want to be a writer and spend all day writing.
An extract from the IoS Sunday Review interview with Robert “3D” Del Naja and Damon Albarn:
“The Conservative Party probably wish they had asked Del Naja’s permission to play “Man Next Door” at a policy launch in 2000. It didn’t, and Massive Attack sued, releasing a statement which pulled no punches. “We’re completely fucked off with the Tories,” it said. “how dare they use our music to promote their bullshit?”
Indeed. Life OK, still boring. Dissertation occuring. Grm is a weirdo and nothing he says makes any sense to me. Not really, but that blog concerning The Sun and france really made no sense to me in parts and seemed to contradict itself. Heigh-ho. Interesting stuff about to occur. My gym induction is this afternoon. I am hoping not to have a heart attack of any description. Tomorrow I am going to London in order to walk around a bit, possibly ending up in Hyde Park. My entire house is going (well, all the people who live in it- including our Jewish refugee) and we are getting a coach there and back for a mere ?6- I only wish that they were running every time I wanted to go home! Anyway, I am looking forward to that. That is all really, I will update on Sunday or Monday with Saturday’s news. Till then, I shall bid you good morrow.
Love
James
Demonstrate!
“If the government has any sense of democracy,
then they will listen to their electorate”
As with the firefighters I feel
It?s my only democratic right,
The only way to have my opinion,
My voice, heard by the centre.
For I cannot suggest new laws,
Changes to the system of govt.
I cannot even second them,
Or ever really hope to do so;
And I certainly cannot, or will
Ever be able to, pass them.
All that I can do is walk
As part of an organism
In the name of millions and
Under banners, slogans, words
Expressing how we think on this.
Together we?ll stride confidently,
Meet in two separate places,
Before joining in a circus
And march united in song
To drive a stake right in,
A spanner into their works.
But will our voice be enough?
Over one million could be there.
77% according to a Mori poll.
If that doesn?t change anything
Then something is very wrong indeed.
The OED my have shuffled to suit
But I?ve no intention of following suit.
I?ll do what I can until I feel I
Live within a true democracy:
Some sort of mix of this and Athens,
More than one person in No 10,
Ways to level it all out again,
Bit like I may have said before:
Dreams of ?06 to ?11 and ?45 to ?51.
If they do not listen, of they ignore,
The British Government needs to
Be answerable to the electorate.
No longer an oligarchy able to
Shy away and act all on its own,
Able to hide in London and do
Its (and America?s?) bidding without
A second thought as to the
People that put them there.
Meetings with the Queen should
Be papers printed and made
Available free of charge on the net,
And in every daily newspaper.
Even trying each and every PM,
MP and Lord in a court of law
Post-office would not be a bad thing.
Whatever, if they do not listen
To a voice that is a majority
Then we should all move house.
And so we?ll march to stop war,
Stop their march to kill innocents
And s search for what came from us
Or will only be found at home.
March as the electorate of a nation
With a message for our government
Who; if they?ve sense, will listen.
(9), 12-14/2/2003
copyright james atkinson
cheers
james
