Priorities and permanence: The lost lives of war.

A great deal has changed in the eyes of the world since I visited Calais a mere month ago: One thing that is noticeable is the amount of cameras that are present now; before I saw only a couple of journalists in the week that I was there, now every fifty yards I was able to see the fluffy end of a microphone boom amongst earnest, animated faces.

This, in turn, has helped: I saw four rental vans from the U.K with open rear doors handing out donated toiletries, clothing and food, even a minibus belonging to a primary school was parked near the entrance, driven to Calais on good intentions and empathy.

The overpass that stood as a gate to the Jungle no longer does so; tents now sprawl from underneath it and out into what was the approaching road. The reasons being that more refugees have arrived and land within the camp has been lost to water. On arriving I sought out the art tent, in which I had previously found it so easy to talk to people, but it seems to have been moved or shut as the area it was in is now rancid and waterlogged.

On the left is where the Art Tent used to be.

I circumnavigated the camp, past what was a large expanse of sand that was now two hundred yards of water, leaving only a narrow path that two people could not simultaneously pass. As I bore right it became apparent that the whole map of the Jungle had altered in my absence; where there previously paths there were now ramshackle gatherings of shacks, where there were dwellings and open ground are now large pools of stagnant water.

The camp is certainly more inhospitable than before, even some of the road wide thoroughfares are now unnavigable despite the day being a warm one. A sea breeze thankfully relieving the smell that settled over the camp during the still hot summer.

I was walking towards the church and the books in the Jungle tent, a small library that had a dozen books and a leaky roof on my last visit. It was locked up and looked very similar to before, perhaps there are more books inside now, but whether added permanence to the site is positive is a question which nags at the back of my mind, not quite identified at this point.

There is a throng of people by the church, a huge pile of battered footwear is piled neatly at the door. The church has grown in my absence; a large canvas wall surrounds it and murals adorn the outside wall. Within the makeshift walls of the churchyard a large grill is set up, people sit around on the floor eating rice dishes from polystyrene takeaway cartons. As I line up to take a photograph of one of the new paintings a man sits down on the floor to my right holding his food; he kisses the yellow tray and then taps it gently with his forehead, repeating the process three times before opening the lid. Even as an Atheist I am made thoughtful by how grateful people can be no matter how little they have.

Time spent: by someone with nowhere else to go.

I leave the makeshift gates of the church, opposite this there are two people building a platform on wooden stilts, the idea being to move their dwelling on to it to avoid the rising water that will quickly follow the first days of autumn. This, along with elaborate decorations on the church, seem to indicate that many people here see no end to their state of affairs.

I was doubtful there would be anyone at the school, but set off in that direction, moving to the edges of what was the path to navigate numerous litter strewn pools. In the middle of a dry section stood a small girl looking disconsolately down at a brimming bucket of water. I asked her if she wanted help and she stood straighter and nodded, examining my face. We both held the handle and bumped gracelessly along as I asked where she was going. She pointed with her free hand at a group of buildings not far in the distance.

She was an eleven year old from Eritrea, and had been in the Jungle for two weeks. I asked what she thought of the place, she managed a shrug. "It is safe." She conceded eventually. "It is the only place I know that is safe." Her perspective on the world was a dark one and I reeled slightly from it, although I can see why to her it is a valid one. Her father had fled with her to avoid conscription or imprisonment, a choice with no positive option. He is the sole guardian, her mother, like many women, never had the chance to leave Eritrea.

I tried to shake off the melancholy feeling that follows me whenever I walk around the Jungle; it had been emphasised by the last meeting and is not helpful. I stomped toward the school once more along what had in August, been a path. There was a hut in front of me, two men sat outside it in the gentle afternoon sun and heating an open can of beans on a small fire. They waved me to a halt as I passed.

Where an eleven year old girl lives with her father: An hour
from the British Library.  

"You can not get through that way." He pointed to a path back to the wider road. "You have to go that way." There were large white words painted on the door of their canvas shack: Kamal smile please. "Why are you going there anyway? There is nothing
good over there."

He was smiling as he spoke. The other man pointed to where I had walked from.
"There is nothing good over there either." They both laughed and the nearest slapped me on the back. They were both Syrians and had been on the camp for nearly two months, both now in their early twenties they had fled the civil war in their teens. I asked about the words that filled the door.  "Do you know who Kamal is?" The first speaker smiled mischievously and I shook my head. "I am." He said, poking himself in the chest. "After three weeks here my brother painted it, he was bored of me being sad."

"Did it help?" I asked, Kamal shrugged and produced a half smile, curling his bottom lip under his upper at the silliness of the conversation.

"Sometimes it is the small things." There was a sadness still in his eyes, but he seemed determined not to let it show. I sat with them for a while, they occasionally poked at the can of beans with a fork as we chatted and asked me to write down the link to my first article for them. "When you are famous we can say we met you." Kamal's eyes smiled with his mouth this time. We shook hands once more and I wandered off towards the school.    

The school was closed but surrounded by people nonetheless, I continued past as everyone looked busy and focused around cameras without me getting involved. A high metal fence stood on my right and the entirety of the camp on my left as I navigated pools of water and passing bicycles. There were more signs and decorations than my first visit, as people tried to make things more like a home in the face of the circumstances.

From the art of the jungle (Look it up on Facebook) to the poems and the paintings, the planned stilted housing and the assistance of everyday people, the entire situation has altered from refugee to migrant and from crisis to permanence.

We are unable to repair the political situation in Eritrea, I cannot see a way to make peace in the Sudan, there is certainly nothing that can be done for Syria, especially if we continue to bomb it. These are not practical solutions for a separate symptom. Spend all winter on the coast of Dover in a shelter you have manufactured from waste wood and canvas, then picture your children perpetually living there.

Everyone wants to go home, somewhere one feels safe, a place to retreat to. For some children and young people the Jungle is the safest place they have ever been; as a result it has become their home. This is their time, their memories, their childhood and in this case not providing is as bad as taking away.

Welcome to the Jungle: The lost people of the Western world.

Before I begin I will arrange my footing slightly; hopefully making the stance of words slightly harder to push over. I do not believe in an open door policy on immigration in the U.K, there are sixty four million people here and it is not a large land mass; from a basic perspective it is matter of space and resources.

When I first walked into the Jungle I was concerned that I would be of interest, which was foolish and it quickly turned out that quite the opposite was true. It was very infrequent that anyone paid any attention to me at all, if I did make eye contact with anyone I received a bonjour or a small wave.

The smell of the air is physically oppressive and begins a mile from the overpass that acts as gate to the camp, long before the beer kegs of the depot and the dog training centre; the atmosphere clings to the roof of the mouth in a thin coating and makes it uncomfortable.

Although it is quite easy to get lost in the camp, it has a rough circular outside route which is webbed through inwardly, with interweaving paths through brambles that lead to smaller circular encampments made up of differing nationalities and ethnicities. The road around the outside is just mud trampled firm in the heat, but retaining water from the night’s rain in deep holes. The road is clear of the detritus that otherwise covers the ground, where it is in large piles and scattered so it is nearly always underfoot elsewhere.

I realised that I was approaching the tall canvas church, which I had already done, so I headed towards a fenced organised looking area. I saw the hospital, which consists of two tents; next to this there was a white canvas labelled the Art Tent. When I ducked inside four young men sat drawing and colouring, another, who looked in his early twenties, was strumming a guitar in the corner.

A young lady in a white waistcoat with a medical logo on the side of it greeted me, and invited me to sit. I sat at the rickety camping tables and began to draw low quality cartoon animals; I was informed that there were three doctors and they could not be there all the time. The lady I was talking to was a therapist, a great deal of the people that arrive are traumatised.

She asked me, not unkindly, what I was doing on the site: I explained that I wanted to teach some English but I was interested in writing an article, I was told where the school was and that it was run by volunteers.

“You will be the next Van Gogh.” Said the tall man next to me, patting me on the shoulder. “Everyone knows these are green.” He added as he began to colour in the walrus. A bearded man stuck his head through the flap and asked to see the doctor, he was pointed to the next tent which was the triage section.

The guitar did not seem to be frustrating the man trying to play it, but he had been patiently trying to tune it since I had arrived. He occasionally squinted down the length of the neck. He asked me to play, and mostly through luck, I was able to tune the chipped old acoustic. I taught him some chords and he, on his part, listened attentively as we passed the guitar between us, although he never smiled. He fetched a crayon and marked out chord diagrams of what I had shown him. After about an hour I excused myself to find the school; he whispered thank you without looking up.

Outside the tent there stood the man who had asked about the hospital, his brow was furrowed and his hand was on his hip as he looked at the tents. I said bonjour in such a way that he asked me if I was English. I said yes and asked him how things were, he told me he wanted to see a doctor, as he was sick. “They cannot see too many people in a day, they are good, there just aren’t many of them. “You work in England? I said I worked in a school and he nodded. “I am a mechanic, is there much work in England?

Atifibrahim.

“Not really no.” I told him. “A couple of hundred at least apply for each new job vacancy.” He rolled his eyes.

What is England like?” He asked without enthusiasm. I shrugged.

“Good and bad, I guess. You want to go there?”

“Not really.” He shrugged expansively. “Would it be better than here?” He gestured at the jungle with an outstretched arm.

“Probably not.” I was forced to answer. He clapped me on the back and held out his hand.

“Atifibrahim.” He said. After the introductions he told me that he was from the Sudan. “When the politics went wrong I was arrested as I had opposed the government, some of my friends disappeared and bad things happened to their families. “Bad things.” He repeated as he grimaced into the distance. “We had to leave.”He shrugged a gesture of glum acceptance. “What would happen if I went to England? Would I be allowed to work?” I shook my head.

“You would be kept in detention.”
“How long for?”
“Until they review your case.”
“And that takes a long time.” He stated.”It takes a long time here too. Would I be with my family?”
“Probably not.” I turned my face away as he raised up his palms and his eyes filled up quickly. “Mainly the children are separated.”
“Then what do I do?" This was clearly news to him, he was genuinely upset.
“Germany seems to be letting the most people in.” I said, stuck for words. He patted me on the back gently.

"We all dream.” He said. “All I want is peace for me and my family. He looked over the camp in the distance. “I think that winter will be bad.” I spoke to Atifibrahim a few times over the next couple of days, after a couple of days he allowed me to take his picture and after three days later was able to see a doctor.

The school was about twenty by thirty feet inside; mismatched desks filled it from edge to edge, apart from the small aisle down the centre, which was occupied by a narrow tree trunk that supported the centre of the roof.

The improvised school was full every time I visited.

The room was full of students with their elbows down so that they could write in such close proximity to each other. A petite woman at the front taught French in a motivated fashion. I waited until the end of the lesson and spoke to the teacher; she gave me the name of someone to speak to about teaching English but I would have to return the following day.

I walked around the orbiting path, past the church again and then the tents that act as cafes and shops; cooked chicken stood exposed in the sun amongst the cans of Sprite and bags of potatoes. I headed back to the art tent; I was going to leave the camp for the day and thought it best to say goodbye. The young man was still practicing guitar and I made a positive comment; he shrugged without looking up.

The next day it was raining heavily; one benefit to this is the smell of the camp is not present until you are actually there. This turned out to be of little comfort; the mud got everywhere. Puddles of ten foot diameter and unknown depth had to navigated, along with the industrial metal that sticks inexplicably and immoveable from the sludge. The stand pipes that provide water now stood in such deep mud that no-one on site could possible get clean. I couldn’t find the woman that I had been told to speak too, so I headed for the shelter of a tent with music coming from it.

The end of the tent was curtained off, a friendly bearded man stood in there chopping onions. The rest was taken up with tables and chairs made from pallets. I asked for a coffee; I was told it was Arabic coffee and given a circled finger and thumb signal of recommendation. I sat at a table and a tea pot and a shot glass were brought to me.

A lady with red rimmed eyes was sat at the other table; She asked me for cigarette, where I came from and what I did, then told me everyone calls her Baby because her brothers are all older than her.

“I don’t normally smoke. But in the circumstances.” She laughed a little and made a gesture at the sky. “You like England?” I shrugged. “I liked Ethiopia. But there are problems there.” The coffee was thick and soup like. “I was a lawyer, and thought if I protested about the killing of women then there would be a change.” She shrugged and and shook her head. “Some of my friends that just turned up at the protest started to get sent to prison, some for five years. Maybe it would have been better to stay.” She watched the rain silently pour into the already waterlogged ground of the camp. I asked her if her family were there. “My husband is in Libya, it was very bad there when I left, I was pregnant so he made me go when I could. Even without him. Sometimes I think he might still be alive.” She looked at the ground for a while.

“Do you have trouble raising the baby here?”

“I lost the baby when I was arrested Paris.” She apologised as her shoulders shook slightly. “I have hope because god knows that I am strong.” Her words sped up. “I had a drink some days ago, and was angry because I was weak. God will forgive me if I am strong. I don't know if my husband is alive or dead. There is always hope, but I am lost in the Jungle like everyone else. Baby let me write down what she said and really didn’t care if I took her picture or not.

Baby

I headed back to the school and was informed by the woman that I was told to talk to, to talk to the other one, as no-one seemed to be in charge. I agreed politely to return the next day as I was a little exasperated but determined to teach if I could. I was receiving more waves, hellos and friendly shouts of Englishman than I had before as people got used to seeing me around for a little more.

There were very young teenagers hunched around the small tables in the art tent; I drew cartoon landscapes for the others to colour in. I explained to the therapist that I might not be able to teach as I might not have time to organise it. She told me just teach then and there; to the people that were present at the time. I managed to teach my name is and I am from, before a queue started to form outside and they went to see what it was for. Despite the pouring rain a long line had formed: It was for socks and books of the gospel.

Lots of people had retreated under shelter so I went back to the café. Baby was still there, crying quietly. I sat at the only other table, which was also occupied by two boys. They spoke to me about England and asked if the schools were good. They asked if they would be allowed to go to school there, they told me that they had not been to school for a long time. They both looked like they had already been crying.

Michael claimed to be 21, which I would have questioned as a barman, his brother, Sian, to my left was 16. I didn’t know whether brother meant being from the same country, someone one trusts or being actually related, but I had learned within the camp that it made little difference. Sian sat staring at the floor, if I did make eye contact with him he quickly looked away again.

“Why are the English government so cruel?” Michael's voice became louder and he began to cry. “Can I sit on a train in Germany like a human being? Without anyone hitting me?” We cannot go back to Syria, me and my brother cannot go back to Syria, they are still fighting. Me and my brother know that most of our family are dead.” He paused, looked at his brother, who looked at the floor. “We want to go to school and people hit us and spray us." He paused. "I want to sit on a train.” He repeated. “Why do all these things happen?” He genuinely seemed to be asking me. He just sat looking at me; making me wish I had an answer. “You must have hope.” I offered feebly. His whole body slumped and he looked exasperated and at me as though I was mad.

“Where is there hope? Every country should have human rights, where are they?” He sat and looked stunned for a moment. “Where am I?” His face did not expect an answer. They both stood and I asked where they were going.

“To the train station.” I asked them not to get hurt; there didn’t seem a great deal else that I could do. They hadn’t wanted me to take a picture of their faces, but dismissed me taking one as they walked up the track. I looked for them each day at the camp, but never found them again. I doubt very much they made it to the U.K.

Michael and Sian in search of a home.

The following day was incredibly hot and Calais proper had some impressively armoured police swaggering around it; I didn’t pay them more than a passing thought as I headed to the camp.

It was about midday: I was talking with a Syrian who laughed and shrugged as he told me he did not know if he was 21 or 22; Ahmed Kino told me he was hoping to stay in France.

“I have sent off the paperwork.” He did not look overly optimistic. I asked him how he felt about migrants being told to go home. “My home is a hole in the ground, it is gone, and still they fight over it.” He smiled a little and shrugged, even trying to find the humour in this.

“The papers are supposed to take three months aren’t they?” I was curious as I received varying reports, Ahmed looked at me as though I very naive.

“There are many people that have been here longer than that.” He looked at me quizzically: “A whole universe and I am not allowed in some of it. Are these places special? Why are they special?” He looked around the camp distractedly. “I worry though.” He looked at me again. “Sometimes, when people are poor you see the animal in them.”

There was a chattering, near the gate, more quick and active than the normal background atmosphere of the camp. There was a shout from the direction of the underpass and Ahmed and I went to look. The police were on the road of the overpass and on the road to the left leading up to it. There were more in the distance. Ahmed headed back to the camp.

“This won’t help.” He said. “It won’t help me.” He put his hand on my shoulder briefly before heading back into the camp.

Some people were walking up the embankment and blocking the overhead road; I went around the embankment, so was behind a thin line of police who were stood before an equally thin line of protesters. Behind me were many vans with plenty more. A chant of “We are not animals” was clearly audible from where I was.

The number of protesters swelled until there were between thirty and forty, including some of the aid workers that I had previously been speaking to. It escalated and calmed down very quickly; I noticed that people were jumping the fence sliding back down the embankment.

Riot police had approached from the other side sandwiching the thin line of protesters between the authorities, despite the fact that the protesters had not tried to move. A plume of tear gas arose on the right hand side of the road and caught me on the left hand side of the face. I slid into the foliage down the slight incline of the embankment and out of the way.

I went back to the entrance, people were chanting, but none made any further move to occupy the road. Among those having their faces wiped and being told to close their eyes I saw the sixty year old white woman who had made the sharing sign. I spoke to a 41 year old wedding planner from London called Liz; her face was red and I asked if she had been gassed. She hadn’t.

“When the police hit the refugees protected me. I feel quite humble. I wasn’t expecting the police to do that.” She looked very distressed. “Everybody deserves to be happy and safe.” She began to cry again.

I wandered back into the camp and two people from the Sudan asked me what was going on: They were not the only ones. I explained over and over again too many faces that an English minister was inspecting security in the camp but not the camp itself. Most shrugged; I saw none join the protest as a result. Many people were fixing tents and queuing for the hospital as though nothing was happening. The protest remained in the gateway and out of the way for the rest of the day. Thirty to forty people had protested out of a possible three thousand. They had been kept out of the public eye both physically and by being ignored by the media. Despite the poverty, none had shown the animal in them.

On my last day in the camp I had a beer in the café tent and looked for Michael and Sian, but without hope and to no avail. I was walking up past the church and was thinking about leaving for the last time. I heard my name called and I turned.

“You taught me guitar the other day. You remember?”
“Of course. Have you practiced?”
“The owner took it away. Sorry I did not speak much, some days I am sadder than others.”

“Like everyone.” I shrugged. “Are you trying to get to England?” He shook his head. “I have applied for paperwork In France and I never wanted to come here.” I asked how that had happened. “I left Darfur after our car was shot and we crashed, I broke my leg, but we were very lucky. We were not rich, but I had work as a vet, we had food and we were safe. I lived better than this in my country, but they killed my friend and said that they would kill me. So I went to Khartoum, the people of Khartoum don’t like the people of Darfur, in the same way that people of other countries don’t like foreigners.

The police beat me and burned my arms with cigarettes, they told me they knew where I slept and if they saw me they would kill me.” He shrugged. “I had to leave there too. Italy would not help me, nor Greece. You have to move on.” He looked at the floor for a while. “I wish these things had never happened.” He looked as though he might cry. I asked him how he felt about English politicians not trusting the people of the Jungle.

“David Cameron needs to ask himself if there are bad people in the jungle why did they not stay and be bad in Syria, Darfur or Afghanistan, or Iraq? There are plenty of opportunities to be bad people in these places. There is very little that can be done here, good or bad.” He shrugged and looked as though he might cry. I said goodbye to Rashid, he firmly shook my hand and I left the Jungle.

I said at the beginning that I didn’t agree with open door immigration, but that has nothing to do with what is happening in the Jungle. When these people fled Eritrea, the Sudan, Darfur, Syria and Iraq they were refugees and worthy of help. Now they are near our borders, they are migrants and worthy of nothing but contempt.

There are children without enough food, clothing and completely missing their education along with adults who are willing to work, from backgrounds that many English people would struggle to empathise with. They are deep in filth, despondency and an hour from London.

L'apartheid

From the protest that most people in the camp didn’t know of and that most people in the U.K never will. As we examine the firmness of the fences and the ferocity of the dogs we force mere children to take risks that we would not wish upon ourselves.

If there is to be pride in your nation, it is to be taken only in the behaviour of the inhabitants themselves; there is no reason not to be proud of your forebears, the actions of your grandmother and father in times of difficulty. The question is only this: would they, and will your grandchildren, be proud of us?

As I button up my shirt and go to work on Monday, I will look at my reflection in the window of the bus as it ponders through suburban Wokingham. As the rainy season approaches what is normal for others simply should not be. If we do nothing but ignore the suffering of the innocents, whatever reason we give, we are the lost people of the western world.

History and mindless cock-waving; never the twain shall meet...

Schools continue to teach what seem like completely random and sudden occurrences that have no basis; this provides some people with a slightly askew perspective. Attacks on the U.K are a shining example of this; if you are in school then the Vikings, the Spanish Armada and the Normans all attacked simply on the basis that they are a bunch of pricks. As if the Vikings just went waaarrrg at some point, sailed over here and started twatting people on a whim, the Spanish were just here because good and evil are real and the Spanish are not to be trusted, not in anyway due to the cult of Protestantism intrinsically clashing with the cult of Catholicism.

Vikings: They'll bum you because that's what they do.

The Independent article by Patrick Cockburn is definitely a victim of this mode of thought; http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/the-vikings-were-feared-for-a-reason-9241032.html the article is under the impression that raids were what Vikings did as part of their basic existence. The concept of the Vikings being directly comparable to the SS is one point made in this article that I don’t think has not been made before; I would suggest that there is a reason for this, in fact there might be more than one.

This is an example of isolationist history; taking historical events and placing them without past, cause or future, this has been used in recent months on The Great War which was portrayed as a clear battle of good and evil that lacked any real origin other than the misdeeds of the cruel.

Let us stride fourth and cast off these trousers of naivety and be gently caressed by the warm summer wind of knowledge; people act and react to environment and circumstance, so what were the circumstances of the Vikings?

Who was in the U.K at the time? The Anglo Saxons, an icon of Englishness that crawled from the ocean onto Brighton pier as a long distant ancestor of the millipede they were not; like everybody else here they came from somewhere else, in fact the same as everybody everywhere they came from somewhere else. People were from somewhere else before the imaginary lines that indicated where they were actually from had been imagined.

English people: Always been here mate, always. 

 This of course does provide us with a comparison between the SS and the Vikings; they were both the owners of legs.  

The occurrences around a certain people depend upon the people around them and their actions; the Christian Francs were on the move, and had attacked areas of Germany and Scandinavia; this is why Vikings had a great number of boats, because everyone else had lots of boats. Take into account the method used was a form of raid and the raiders pillaged. There was a Christian raid on Friesland, north-west Denmark in 734 ad; where as the Viking raid on Lindisfarne was in 793 ad, this provides a context for behaviour and a history for the occurrences.

In 768 Charlemagne took his position as the Francish king; he proved to be very pious and less than patient when others were not quite so fervent, this meant that the expansion of the empire brought compulsory Christianity. This was demonstrated in the massacre of Verden, near contemporary Bremen; 4500 people were forcibly baptized and, once the holy water had rolled off their purified heads, the heads were removed. Saxon refuges fled to nearby Denmark and the Vikings were aware of the massacres and rapes that were taking place during what had become a guerilla war.

Charlemagne: Proper shifty. 

 King Widukind of Saxony visited the Danes for moral and, he hoped, practicable assistance; this was news in Norway as once an area was absorbed into the Franco Empire all power was taken from the resident leaders and Charlemagne applied new laws, leaders and faith. The threat of abolishment spread across Europe and Denmark allied with Norway; it was not feasible that one of the two countries could separately succeed in defeating the Franco army.

Another alliance formed in 793; that between the Christian Francs and the English, in 793, which rings a bell as it was the same year as the raid on Lindisfarne. What was Lindisfarne after all? Not simply a Christian structure, but a Franco Christian structure.

The eleven monks that were killed was an atrocity, but compared to the four thousand five hundred at Verden and the associated power grab in Saxony it was minuscule; and the previous massacres had given the Vikings a good idea what Christian conquerors had the capacity to be like.

I now refer directly to the essay by Patrick Cockburn: Before I refer to what it contains I shall refer to what it does not, any history of history or to use another term, context. The fact that the Vikings attacked due to being violent and, for want of a better word, rapey, is puerile and mindless. The fact that they killed monks because they were barbarians and this is simply what barbarians are prone to doing is as foolish as labeling the outbreak of The Great War was the result of Germans doing what Germans do.

 I shall now refer to what is in Patrick Cockburn’s essay in regard to Viking atrocities: The pro-Viking lobby claim this is exaggerated stuff and there is no proof of such Viking atrocities. But the absence of evidence is scarcely surprising. The invaders, themselves illiterate, were so destructive that almost no writings survive from the conquered Anglo-Saxon kingdoms.

What exactly is the pro Viking lobby? I doubt very much they have meetings or a news letter; This echoes more of the corralling of contradictory opinions into one subconscious happy place where disagreeing parties have a set agenda and one conspicuous eyebrow.

More worryingly, the idea the lack of evidence indicating in no way indicates the lack of occurrence. The Saxon refuges spread the word of atrocity quickly enough through Denmark and Norway, despite, as Mr. Cockburn maliciously points out, the populace being illiterate. The lack of evidence does not mean the necessary lack of occurrence, but it most certainly does not mean the opposite. It sounds like some sort of anti Viking lobbying, which would exist for no reason whatsoever.

Magical sky picture: If England and Germany are the holy Roman Empire
then you can see why others would be nervous. 

Unless of course one of the institutions of the time were still in existence and felt that Christians should not be seen to be behaving in a barbaric fashion.

Historical isolationism is a wobbly misleading strut of unnecessary contemporary patriotism; the idea that we were fighting a just war is absurd in the era of conquest within which the Viking raids took place.

 The direct comparison between the Vikings and the SS is a peculiar one that is not in anyway substantiated; especially if you one looks closely at the comparisons of religious genocide; if one were to make a comparison between the SS and one of the involved parties of the Viking raids whom would it be between?

There are some comparisons between the time periods; Charlemagne was reimaged under the Third Reich as a German hero.

In closing; the idea that the Scandinavians should apologies for the behaviour of the Vikings, which was over 1300 years ago, is bizarre. It certainly wasn't any contemporary residents of Norway that killed any monks.

I am very certain that there are far more recent events that need to be apologized for, preferably ones of which the perpetrators, victims, or both are still alive and there is in fact some evidence of wrongdoing.

History should be taught as what it is; a series of connected and motivated actions by people as capable of conceptual thought as any modern day resident; history is very prone to the biased elements of its own sources, but without context it is open to contemporary bias and can easily be used as mindless cock-waving patriotism that it very rarely genuinely supports.

In response to Mr. Gove.

Michael Gove has stated that we need to learn about the history of the Great War in the right way; but from the perspective of whom?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2532923/Michael-Gove-blasts-Blackadder-myths-First-World-War-spread-television-sit-coms-left-wing-academics.html

The idea that Britain before the Great War was an icon of liberty is a bizarre one, only someone without any level of rationality and the tiniest concept of the history of the country could possibly entertain it.

If you observe the traditional version that the war began due to the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand, which was a catalyst and is reasonable place to start, but once a modicum of thought has been applied to it, it was clearly not the sole reason for global conflict. 

Control of the Middle East played a large part; the new warships both England and Germany were building in a race against each other were in great need of oil. Germany desired a train line into what is now modern day Iraq and the British would not allow such a project. 

The tensions between key members of the house of Saxa Coberg were also key to the conflict; Is Michael Gove under the impression that the people ruling Germany and the people ruling England were actually differing families?  That the British were good and Germany bad? This puerile thought process does not apply to any historical conflict; if reviewing the battle of Hastings one does not say that the noble king Harold was cruelly defeated by William the bastard. This is because we are fully aware with the benefit of hindsight that they only fighting over power, with elements of ego, and were both Scandinavian anyway.    

Gove refers to the ‘ruthless social Darwinism of the German elite’ who, as previously mentioned, are the same family as the German elite; what with Kaiser Wilhelm being the grandson son of queen Victoria, the first cousin of King George and the second cousin of Tsar Nicholas who was temporarily in charge of Russia. This in itself disables the goodies and baddies argument, but it is not the only indication that this was not the case.

You do not need to study history or Machiavellian thought to know that empires generally are not good at fighting for truth, liberty and honor, but none the less quite good at fighting; the 19^th century was just as war-some as any other period. We were still fighting the French at the start of it, which ended with the largest ever turnout of British troops at that point, they fought on the Somme. We moved on to fight the Russians in the Crimea, which was a notably murderous affair even for a war. We fought the Boer because of a shitload of gold, simultaneously inventing the concentration camp and committing genocide. A young Winston Churchill was a war reporter there at the time.

Churchill: A firm believer in
Eugenics, which is what Gove
is accusing the Germans of. 

The late 1800’s saw the British invade Afghanistan, only it was not called an invasion, we were freeing the people and we were there to install a friendly government. The motive behind this was because Russia might try and invade India through it, which would be rude as it clearly belonged to us. The British lost a lot of men and failed completely due to an insurgency of anti British troops and a memorial was put up in Reading.

 The chances of all these wars being just, or indeed noble, are very slim, in fact in a historical context we know that they were not. The chance that they all led up to a great war which was just does not follow logic or common sense. Gove actually said something clever recently; that history is not taught in a way that allows for a comprehension of consecutive events, which is a problem, because that is what it is. One fucking thing after another was a particularly good answer to the question; what is history? But as any one who is allowed to go to the shops by them-self is fully aware; one fucking thing happens because of the fucking thing that happened before it.

 Gove puts forward the idea that the well informed populace went on to defend King and country, and attack his cousin; they were committed to defending the western liberal order. The volunteers that joined up in 1914 were all around or under five foot tall; this was due to malnutrition which indicates how the working class lived. Many joined because there was food and many surviving private letters confirm this was the case.

Part of the English literature curriculum goes cross curricular with history in the tenth or eleventh year of secondary school, this involves the contemporary poetry of the great war. This clearly demonstrates the existence of anti war feeling at the time; Wilfred Owen would be a key example of this. We know that the British authorities kept public opinion and that of the soldier’s on the front separate for the reason that they were very similar. King George was concerned that things might go the way of the Romanovs; he didn’t want what happened to his cousin to happen to him.   

Looking at the battles that have taken place on the Somme River; if a peasant archer at Agincourt had not attended, would victory or loss affect his circumstances at home? It is hard to see how it would. This can just as easily apply to an infantry man not at Waterloo or a Tommy who decided that Kitchener probably didn’t need him all that much. The British troops in Afghanistan in the 1800’s certainly would have benefitted from not being there, but would victory matter to them if they were not?  which raises the question of the ones still there.

 

Waterloo: Another battle of the Somme. 

The assumption that we won being the best possible outcome is bizarre from a historical standpoint; obviously it may have been as we cannot predict what may have happened. However the Second World War is direct result of the first; the treaty of Versailles caused the Weimar hyper inflation, in turn leading to poverty and suffering on a massive scale. We lied to the Arabs, did not return their land as it was also promised to the Jews, causing a major conflict which is still very active in the present day. After world war two we divided India and those two countries have fought bloody wars ever since.

 We are very aware in the 21^st century that good people don’t come from one country and bad people another, yet this is the history that Gove appears to want to us to teach and exactly the kind thing more commonly believed by the poorer elements of society at the turn of the twentieth century. It is precisely this false knowledge that makes it so easy to send them to fight in a war that would not affect them in its absence. It is the propaganda that allows a person to change their name to Windsor and pretend they are not related to the person they are sending everyone to fight because they have fallen out with their fucking cousin.

Taking British students to the Somme and informing them it is where brave and noble Tommies beat the nasty Germans will benefit no-one. Michael Gove says he sees patriotism as a virtue, and we know who that is normally a virtue of, but is he vicious or simply completely unaware of what he is talking about?      

The concept of history having goodies and baddies has no place in modern culture or thought; that a grown man in charge of education can miss the point of learning history by such an extensive margin, while in the process of telling everyone how he thinks people should learn it is startling.

The reason we should not teach Gove’s happy flag waving version of the Great War is because it isn’t true; I think it might be the only reason we need.

Sex, Scientology and God as the history of racism.

My girlfriend has her own chair in our flat and there is a perfectly valid reason for it; she is unclean. I have never sat in the said chair, my girlfriend and I have lived together for many years and I am certain that she has sat there by the window, watching the birds at the feeder, while menstruating. What annoys me is she will continue to innocently read or play games as though there is nothing wrong with what she is doing; why does she have no sense of guilt?

Women having their legs shrink-wrapped: This avoids the
contamination of the air around them.

The news that Nelson Mandela has passed on has not escaped anyone; obviously God would be aware of it, but would he be impressed by the work that the mortal carried out? The entire different races living together section of the Old Testament is scattered throughout the delightful work, but nonetheless firmly implanted into its pages and incorporates some of the most memorable and well loved mass deaths.

In the U.K this week scientologists have been allowed to marry in their own mad way bless them; the religion has numerous overpaid and undereducated members but is widely labeled as a cult. The difference between cult and religion is a fine and meandering murky soup which is in no way helped by what the differing variations of what the word actually means. 

Are these three concepts connected?

The U.K has been having a few disagreements between the various island dwellers on the topic of segregated university lectures for the benefit of those who, for their own reasons, might not want to sit next to somebody with a different set of genitals to them. The reasons given for this are religiously motivated; obviously, this unfortunately means that women will not be seen in a context of equality, because in any religion connected to the Old Testament, they never are. 

I am not sure that religious protocol melds particularly well to all formats of further education; in the study of astrophysics or in the field of evolutionary science, it might seem slightly amiss to claim verbally that none of the things that you are studying are true because the world has a big dome over its flat surface and that nothing evolved. One would not have to declare verbally that the lecturer was lying as the option not to sit next to a woman because god said would infer the associated belief that whatever you were studying were false. 

Brian Cox concludes his lecture:
 'Why women are manky.'

The segregation of women only exists in the theology because women are dirty and inferior; this is the reason for gender segregation, this and no other. The reason not to pander to the beliefs of others is the fact that some of these beliefs are complete arse: Talking shrubs and animals are in the children’s section, the degradation of women and the keeping of slaves should be in the history department.    

Apartheid, now firmly recognized as a bulging sick bag of human idiocy has its corpulent arse roots clinging vehemently to mouth of the creator. The concept of Apartheid was drawn up and implemented in South Africa by the Dutch reformed church; if one believes in Big Sky Beardface then that would certainly be the only way to run the place. 

The skywanker indicates clearly at the destruction of Babel, when the silly humans look above their position and try and improve upon themselves, that they shouldn't. All are scattered and given differing languages because they are achieving without the assistance of God and he gets all shirty. In Genesis he observes that: ‘If as one people speaking the same language, they have begun to do this, nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.’ Presumably he made these comments in a big booming voice due to his ethereal sky testicles. 

God: Easily annoyed. 

None the less if people achieved then they would be proud of their own achievements and turn their back on God; so everyone gets a different language and some theologists believe this how we ended up with separate continents. Theologists do, geologists however are flipping a coin between that and tectonic plate movement.

So we are not to integrate; we did and God flooded the earth, the only sin for this massive crime, for murdering every air breathing beast on the land, is that there was the mixing of race on the surface of our flat planet. Indeed this made it clear to the founders of a new home in the South of Africa that people should live apart, and not mix the seeds all in one field. So they didn't and God did not flood South Africa, so they must have been right.

Unfortunately if you have been praying for Nelson Mandela you probably shouldn't; I don’t think God agrees with him about integration. Nelson Mandela lived until his mid nineties and didn't drown, so maybe god isn't real after all.

In conclusion if there is one; Scientology is a bizarre and oppressive cult with no basis in reality; the problem is that so are Christianity, Judaism and Islam. Can we judge Scientology until we judge the others? Scientologists may as well get married if they want; I for one will not be influenced by their evil ways; even as we speak I am rubbing a goat’s ovary onto a dream catcher which is also a powerful defense against interracial marriage. 

Remember people, use goose fat to lubricate the gimp suit this season, or it just isn't Christmas. Jesus is the saviour and the safety word is Jesus. 

Wogan, wanking and please read the end bit. Otherwise it looks bad.

Children in need was awful, the images of suffering children and half arsed dancing soap opera actors performing like dogs on Britain’s got talent was exactly comparable to being sick to the point when you can vomit no more and there is nothing left but the vile taste of bile clinging to your tonsils and making you retch further despite the futility of the abdominal heaving and the wanting to die.

I apologise for the lack of punctuation but it all sort of came out at once.

These facts aside; there was no attempt to discourage people from having things in need; which one would imagine would be a far better thing to promote. There are too many grown ups and far too many of their squealing offspring. If contraception were more widespread at an earlier stage then Terry Wogan might not be on the television at all and certainly would not be on for three solid days like an inconvenient stool. If contraception were more widespread at an earlier stage then Terry Wogan might not exist at all. Many women would not be sick every morning and I would not have been sick on Friday night. Actually I would, but I am unable to honestly suggest that the two things were connected.

The compilation of this and the news that Christianity is apparently on the verge of extinction came as a

It didn't have to come to this. 

shock. I began to imagine fleetingly that Warsi had an orifice toggle option as to the origin of her speech and her settings may be, ever so slightly, awry.

This is based around the fact that there are 2.13 billion Christians in the world, roughly, not including the ones that are unsure, which is more than there are ocelots. Which is a shame. Besides, Christians are only becoming extinct in ‘some places’; if you are extinct in some places then you are not extinct, you are merely absent. There are no crayfish in my pockets, and yet none the less, in the canal twenty yards away they continue to exist.

 My favorite bit, the tiny little hornet in the jockstrap, is the statement; ‘There isn’t an intrinsic clash between different faiths....’ I may have reason to question these sources; the Koran and the Bible, and the basis of both of them, the Torah, do imply a slight ambivalence towards those who suffer from a differing form of madness. As we are able to tell by current affairs, and an unimaginable amount of previous ones.

Obviously in Kosovo where 200, 000 Muslims were killed by Christians was over the album ‘Automatic for the people’ by REM; Muslims had flocked to buy ‘Waking up the neighbours’ by Bryan Adams the year before and felt it was the best album released in that financial year and that the song ‘Night swimming’, an

obvious filler track, was a load of pretentious shit. We all know the outcome.

Look at the happy elves dancing on my pointless head. 

In affiliation with this; Palestine is entirely orientated around a drunken brawl based on the sexuality of Cliff Richard and the crusades was an argument about jam.

Three days of television about the suffering of children without once mentioning the remedy and news that believers in the Old Testament do, in fact, like each other, and everyone else should help them get on. Despite the elementary fact that all of these believers are aiming at death as it is, in fact, a sort of promotion. All Christians, Muslims and Jews are going somewhere better, in this context genocide can be seen as being helpful and should be accepted with the good grace with which it was given.

 

There has been a long history of positive religious
interaction. 

Until contraception is realized as a solution to the global problems that we face then the only way we can possibly hope to feed the planet and maintain a consumable water supply is if these psychotic murdering idiots continue to murder each other for no apparent reason. We should give them all a hammer each and herd them into stadiums to get it out of their systems.    

The real problem is that last bit isn’t true; because they are not going somewhere better, they are merely being killed. All they become is a dead apes; until we realize this and control the amount of apes that need feeding then our problems as living apes are far from over.

If you are in danger of conceiving there are numerous helplines that will help you to masturbate. In the long term contraception can be acquired entirely for free from your G.P. Absolutely no religion sees this as a solution. 

Porn, popes and a loose grip on reality.

Madness has apparently become infectious; everyone has caught the whiff in recent weeks apart from the clergy; because they said so and they should know. Meanwhile in the wave of sexuality that hasn't existed in every single mammal that has ever lived apparently sweeps over the children of the U.K. turning them into rampant sex beasts.

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/437543/Religious-people-not-mad-Welby

The archbishop of Canterbury has declared that he, and other people that believe in spiritual things, are in no way mental. A sign of mental illness is hearing voices in ones head; as a voice for the ultimate deity one can only assume that Justin Welby can not only hear voices but presumably he knows who is doing the speaking.

There is a fair amount of religious people, they seem to be all over the place at times; statistically, even if one assumes that the majority of them are sane, there will be a certain remaining demographic that has a more tenuous grasp of reality. It might be less of a leap if one believes, for example, that an ethereal being demands the removal of a body part that he created for the benefit of the owner, to step across the threshold into the realm of the genuinely crazed.    

People who think they are Jesus might be mad, presumably they are also religious; it would be going to far, possibly, not only to declare yourself as Christ but then pointing out that you don’t exist either. Or perhaps you do exist; you just aren't the son of God, how did you come back?

The Archbishop of Canterbury: 'If you say I'm mad I'll cut
you, I'm imagining it now.'

In 2011 Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hemandez declared himself as Jesus and fired an AK47 at the Whitehouse, the motivation for this is the fact that Barak Obama is the antichrist. Which is fair enough as far I’m concerned; religious freedom in a developed country means that people should have the right to act according to their beliefs and worship in their own special little way; even if it means rocking back and forth and shouting ‘I hate blacks’ at the top of their voice. 

 To emphasize the sanity that dwells deep in the mind of the spiritual; here is an article written by a person of sound mind indicating Dungeons and Dragons causes people to behave irrationally, which is true, usually by continuing to play it. The problem being it also encourages people to become genuine sorcerers, which is where the argument might fall down. I, however, think that the problem of the youth of today training to be mages and wizards and altering reality to achieve their own evil ends may have been solved for us in advance.   

http://www.chick.com/articles/frpg.asp

At this point in the article it becomes apparent that no one has actually accused the Archbishop of Canterbury of being mad; he is just shouting ‘I’m not mad and neither are the others’ without any provocation. This is generally viewed as a bad sign.

Earlier a leader of an earlier religion observed that ‘society was losing the plot’ altogether and everyone was mad for not being Jewish. God is going to be very cross with one of these men as they both believe in very different hats; all being well he will make them fight.

 As madness displays a strong absence amongst the religious fraternity it is clearly evident in school policy. An astonishing decision to combat the sexualization of children by telling them about it when they don’t need to know and aren't interested has taken place. By telling the children about porn, which they don’t know about, they will then be safe from what they haven’t seen and as a result not be influenced by it.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-24476860

The role of the parents in this is clearly underestimated as they should be casting a cursory glance on what their responsibility has access to; the chances of children having access to hardcore pornography in a primary school seems fairly limited. Or it was, until someone had this frankly stupid idea.

'Where do you put this at the point of orgasm?' U.K
students are put through their paces. 

There is a hypocritical element; presumably the parents of these children did become sexualized at some point on the premise that these children exist at all, unless all the children are Jesus. Perhaps if we can make sure that no-one becomes sexualized then we would not have to teach the children how to be a mammal, no-one would pictures on facebook of their wrinkled offspring or put a pram next to me in a restaurant, the latter being firmly in the top five arguments for contraception.   

Perhaps the best idea would be if people were only allowed to breed by Immaculate Conception; we would pay less tax, restaurants would be quieter and if Jesus did turn up we would know it was him.

Pope Francis spoke openly on the topic of child safety and faith on Thursday in an interview with Elrond Lord of Rivendell: ‘I don’t get why people keep connecting pedophilia and Christianity’, the pontiff stated, ‘Jesus hated bald pussy. Mary Magdalene had a thatch like a Boney M afro and he was up her inner thigh like a spider monkey. The apostle Paul used to tell an anecdote in which Jesus set fire to Mary’s pubic hair to see if it said anything.’