New year omens

Posted on | January 2, 2006 |

You might have caught this story in the Saturday papers. I’ve been trying to find the incredible image published with it, but instead stumbled upon a flickr account which shows the action in a bit more context.

In light of events like these, I’m finding this week’s predictions genre in the on- and offline media more than a little discouraging. If the arbitrary date of a new year acts as a time of reflection for many people, it also offers a moment to make some personal commitments which seems to me a lot more important than trying to be the first to predict what others will do. The world doesn’t change if we are right or even optimistic; it begins to move when we recognise our own complicity in its present formation. And that’s the same no matter what you take ‘the world’ to mean.

2005 seemed to include an inordinate amount of platitudes from those who enjoy the safety and security of homes - let alone the ostensible luxury of cooking theory in them - for the many who don’t. In 2006 I plan to spend a lot more of my time learning about and helping to improve the opportunities for those whose lives continue to be affected by the historical circumstance which makes race, religion, geography and gender so implicated in the current distribution of health, hope and happiness.

What do you plan to do?

Category: Politics

Comments

5 Responses to “New year omens”

  1. clif
    January 3rd, 2006 @ 3:49 pm

    good luck with that. sounds like a tall order for the new year :) did your article get published? hope so!

  2. melgregg
    January 4th, 2006 @ 1:55 pm

    You know I have always been ambitious Cliffy! Looks like I may make it in through the back door with the opinion piece… stay tuned I guess!

  3. Christian McCrea
    January 4th, 2006 @ 4:51 pm

    This is only somewhat related, but a bulletin on the 4.30 news reported that political correctness led to the 2001 London race riots, only then qualifying the report as being ‘according to a book published by a right-wing think tank’, which went on to say that British councils did nothing to break up ghettos.

    As a kid, I saw the Brixton / Coldhabour Lane riots, which were far more racially charged than the literature about them now suggests. It was actually the way that history wrote up those events that made me interested in academia more than anything else, even though history had ‘liberalised’ events, it was deeply disturbing to see these things cast off as being about class, largely to the benefit of left-wing politicians.

  4. Mark Bahnisch
    January 4th, 2006 @ 11:05 pm

    The world doesn’t change if we are right or even optimistic; it begins to move when we recognise our own complicity in its present formation. And that’s the same no matter what you take ‘the world’ to mean.

    Amen to that!

    Happy new year, Mel! :)

  5. Mark Bahnisch
    January 4th, 2006 @ 11:06 pm

    In 2006 I plan to spend a lot more of my time learning about and helping to improve the opportunities for those whose lives continue to be affected by the historical circumstance which makes race, religion, geography and gender so implicated in the current distribution of health, hope and happiness.

    And amen to that as well!

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