We are all accountable, by someone, in the end. Thoughtlessness is evil.
Same story reported in The Independent
Photo by Martin Hübscher [EU National resident and paying taxes in GB]
© 2018 MHPhotography
Cat © 2018 CAT Citizen of Nowhere/Everywhere
‘All in the golden afternoon
….
In such an hour,
Beneath such dreamy weather,
To beg a tale…
“There will be nonsense in it!”‘
Lewis Carroll, preface to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, 1865
Thomas Gainsborough Landscape with a Woodcutter and Milkmaid 1755
Oil on canvas
“Nostalgia is denial. Denial of the painful present.
The name for this denial is Golden Age thinking – the erroneous notion that a different time period is better than the one one’s living in – it’s a flaw in the romantic imagination of those people who find it difficult to cope with the present.”
Midnight in Paris, 2011, film written and directed by Woody Allen
“Say not thou, What is the cause that the former days were better than these? for thou dost not enquire wisely concerning this.”
Ecclesiastes, Chapter 7, Verse 10, King James Bible, 1611
John Constable (1776-1837) Coast Scene at Brighton: Evening, oil painting, ca. 1828
© Victoria and Albert Museum, London.
“….colours from the sunset take:
From something of material sublime
Rather than shadow our own soul’s day-time
In the dark void of night.”
(Keats, Epistle to John Hamilton Reynolds)
“Set yourself on fire with passion and people will come for miles to watch you burn”
attributed to John Wesley (1703-1791)
Thomas Gainsborough (1727-1788) Wooded Landscape with Herdsman and Cattle‘And now the tale is done,
And home we steer, a merry crew,
Beneath the setting sun.’
Lewis Carroll (1832-1898), preface to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, 1865
The tarts of the Internet, the sublime opportunists of the home, the pragmatic survivors, the most independent inhabitants of the Kingdom, the cutest of the Cute, the choosiest of the Choosy, don’t want a hard Brexit, and anyone who knows cats knows they will get their way.
Protesting Puss
British cats in every home are telling their humans to
over 300,000 people have signed already
The Universe, O my brothers, is flinging wide its portals for the Levee of the GREAT HIGH KING.
Thomas Carlyle, THE FRENCH REVOLUTION
After the attrition of thirty humdrum years, he no longer loved her for her human qualities. He still found her attractive because she was as self-possessed as a cat. Observed or unobserved, wherever she was, she behaved the same, with the same rhythm and attention, a graceful selfishness, true to herself, if not to him.
He was as absorbed in her as she was in herself. Watching her brushing her hair, applying ineffable creams to her face and body, swiping her tablet as if it were a mirror to her other, secret selves, or eating her small helpings of balanced meals at the same table as him without once looking at him, he felt he barely existed. He was not offended. He admired her independence and indifference to other people’s petty jealousies. When she came home in the small hours, without telling him where she had been, he knew better than to ask.
She was her own damned cat.
On balance, he suspected that she wasn’t having sex with anyone else. She felt entitled to go where she pleased and would despise him for thinking badly of her.
Honi soit qui mal y pense. Showing his age, he thought of the ancient chivalric motto as translated by Sellar and Yeatman in his grandfather’s bent and faded paperback copy of 1066 And All That. He murmured it aloud: “Honey, your silk stocking’s hanging down”.
Though she barely listened to a word he said at the best of times, allusions and non sequiturs, messages from the spaces in between, were catnip to her, and she smiled at him.
Noëlle Mackay, HUMAN RITES
Well, it all comes to this, there’s no use trying to live in other people’s opinions. The only thing to do is to live in our own.
L.M. Montgomery, EMILY CLIMBS
Christmas Comet Photo © MHP 2017
Orpheus and Euridice by G.F. Watts c. 1890
Humans are selfish by instinct, like all animals. We are narcissistic, like no other animal. We reason, like no other animal. We squander our natural gifts, like no other animal. We are cruel, like no other animal. We have more regrets than any other animal. We cannot bring the people we love back to life but we can make at least one sensible decision for the common good before we die. (Noelle Mackay)
We, the people, must demand another chance to let our true voice be heard, not the one manipulated last year by a reactionary, zenophobic, racist coup d’état.
We must be able to accept or reject the deal being negotiated to Leave the EU.
And, we must be able to reject Brexit entirely. No reasonable person could claim that the EU is perfect; no reasonable person could claim that leaving the EU under the present conditions is anything but catastrophic.
It is time to stop separating personal from universal destiny. We are all implicated.
Whether you voted Leave or Remain, this Brexit is a mess. I’d have written “a dog’s breakfast” for a cheap laugh if it wasn’t an insult to dogs. There are too many cheap laughs in this world at the expense of things we should value. “Only connect”.
Gainsborough, Pomeranian Bitch and Puppy c 1777. © Tate Gallery.
Is there nothing else than the love of cute animals that can unite people?
Does humanity loathe itself so much that it will extinguish itself?
Only the delusional, or right-wing billionaires planning to turn Great Britain into Little Englanders’ Tax-Haven Ltd, could still want it. The hopes of idealistic Leavers have been betrayed, the worst fears of Remainers have been exceeded by reality.
It is still legally possible to reverse Brexit. Common sense and self-preservation demand it. “In a healthy political culture, this would be a moment for reappraisal” Ian Dunt.”
Horse Frightened by a Storm, watercolour by Eugene Delacroix, 1824. Image source: WGA
Our democracy should serve the national interest, not destroy it. If our representatives in Parliament don’t have the guts to revoke Article 50 themselves, we must advise them ourselves through another Referendum – not a second referendum, but the third since 1975.
Last year’s referendum was advisory. A responsible government would never have allowed the public a vote on an unfeasible option. No government is infallible. Nobody is infallible. History will condemn the political leadership of our times – that doesn’t let the rest of us off the hook.
If history is about ordinary people, not who and what kings and queens had for breakfast, ordinary people must show the future what a human being should be.
Sovereignty lies in Parliament, not the “Will of the People”, a meaningless slogan unless it includes the right to change our minds. If anyone insists that the 2016 Referendum was binding, then they should consider that the 1975 Referendum to stay in the EU was also binding.
Never again should an elected representative of the people have to say, as Margaret Beckett did, “I believe this will be catastrophic for my constituents, but nonetheless I feel duty‑bound to vote for it.”
In future, recanting MPs might have to put one of their hands in the fire before they betray the interests of the people.
Our generation is seeing the British dream turned into a nightmare created by ourselves. STOP IT. Brexit will be the worst mistake ever made by a modern democratic nation.
Bored with Brexit? Tough. I’d have given up this blog, ranting at an audience of two, if it wasn’t for the biggest cause of in our lifetimes. It’s not just British lives that Brexit will ruin. The fate of nations is in our hands.
Stop Brexit, I’ll stop boring you.
Rippl-Rónai, Girl with Cage 1892 Oil on canvas
Magyar Nemzeti Galéria, Budapest.
Image: WGA
“Will of the People”: a potential leader for Stay in Europe.
King Charles Spaniel by Édouard Manet, oil on canvas, c. 1866. Image source: Wikipedia
The Brexit Government’s smooth ride, trampling over NHS, education, Welfare and human rights in its hurry to get to the Kill, has been jolted at last.
Over-excited by their gallop, Tory MPs forgot they represent an animal-loving electorate when they voted down the animal sentience amendment in the EU Withdrawal Bill.
For one brief moment, Leavers and Remainers in the country were united in patriotic indignation.
The Government had been stupid enough to expose the weak spot of all Conservative Administrations: being perceived as uncaring.
Instantly, damage-controlling directives went out to Tory MPs to Be Compassionate.
One Tory MP posted a video of himself Loving his Dog. The dog, Poppy, was not consulted or asked if she was reassured her rights were safe.
If Remainers elected a dog or a cat to be their leader today, Brexit would be stopped by the Will of the People tomorrow.
Stealing off;—or—prudent Secesion by James Gillray, etching, 1798.
Image source: Wikipedia
OR
Unreasonable Withdrawal; – A Brexit minister realizes that the EU Withdrawal Bill
is a mistake, 2017
The problem for a Government on the run screaming FAKE NEWS is the inherent danger of self-incrimination. As politics is all about presentation, using the FN plea is an admission of incompetence, at best.
In this meta-weary world, we have got used to the duality of Truth in the modern democratic State. The wonder of Trump is not that a lying, racist, pussy-grabbing bully was elected, but that so many people don’t care that the leader of western democracy is a lying, racist, pussy-grabbing bully. The panto villain and the demagogue are indistinguishable.
The confusion in the UK over animal sentience confirms that Fake News, not Real News, is the radar for Zeitgeist – it reveals the conscious and unconscious fears of both the public and its rulers.
It is unreasonable to argue, as Zac Goldsmith did, that there is no need to integrate the EU’s specific recognition of animal sentience into English law on the grounds that “self-evidently animals are sentient”. Self-evident truths are not legally binding. Like unalienable human rights, they need protection in law.
The first indisputable fact is that MPs voted to exclude the clause regarding animal sentience from the EU Withdrawal Bill.
The second fact is that, for a couple of days, Leavers and Remainers, including Conservative voters, were united in believing that the Brexit Government was capable of denying that animals feel pain and emotion. We were shocked, but not surprised. That’s not a vote of confidence in either the Government or Brexit. We believed that we were seeing the unspeakable in full pursuit of the untenable.
Self-evidence is distressingly nebular, too often confused with subjective truth. It is not self-evident to everyone that Brexit, and specifically this Government, is against the national interest.
The problem for resolute Remainers is to prove the link between the Government’s incoherence and the sinister consequences of Brexit itself. Certain unalienable rights are already under threat. The damage to the economy and quality of life of the average working person is in plain sight.
We marvel at the desperation of asylum seekers risking their futures in unseaworthy boats – and that is exactly what the prosperous UK is doing by getting on board unfeasible Brexit. Self-evidently, leaving the EU is wasting money better spent on NHS, housing and education; it will not solve our deteriorating social problems, or strengthen workers’ rights, any more than it will improve animal welfare.
Géricault, The Raft of the Medusa 1818-1819 Musée du Louvre, Paris. Image source: WGA
In the Brexit shipwreck there are still absolute truths to cling to, but we are running out of time. The Referendum result is not binding. Article 50 is reversible.
We should be uniting against a Government that is betraying the ideals of Leavers, and surpassing the worst fears of Remainers, a Government so incompetent that it cannot control its own wrecking ball.
Truthfully, Brexit must be stopped, for the Life, Liberty and Pursuit of Happiness of everyone in our country.
Ambrogio Lorenzetti Bad Government and the Effects of Bad Government on the City Life 1338-40
Fresco, Palazzo Pubblico, Siena. Image source: Wikipedia
“The Government’s refusal to accept this amendment [to EU Withdrawal Bill] is simply absurd – and their continued insistence that sentience is covered in Animal Welfare legislation is wrong. Britain been forward thinking animal welfare over the years, which is why ditching this provision would be such a backwards step. The UK Government led on introducing this EU protocol in the first place, and it’s only an obsession with refusing changes to the EU Withdrawal Bill that’s stopping Ministers adopting this amendment now.” Caroline Lucas, co-leader of the Green Party of England and Wales
The Brexit Government, irrationally consumed with hatred of everything EU, is treating animal rights the same way it is treating the rights of EU Nationals living in Britain.
The Government should confirm their existing rights under EU law now.
Van Dyck, The Five Eldest Children of Charles I 1637. Royal Collection.
Image: Wikipedia
The problem for a Government on the run screaming FAKE NEWS is the implicit acknowledgment that it’s at least partly true. As politics is all about presentation, anyway, using the FN plea is an admission of incompetence, at best.
In this meta-weary world, we have got used to the duality of Truth in the modern democratic State. The wonder of Trump is not that a lying, bullying, pussy-grabbing monster was elected, but that people don’t care that he lies, bullies, pussy-grabs.
The political hue and cry in the UK over animal sentience confirms that Fake News, not Real News, is the radar for Zeitgeist – it reveals the conscious and unconscious fears of both the public and its rulers.
The first indisputable fact is that MPs voted to exclude the clause regarding animal sentience from the EU Withdrawal Bill.
The second fact is that, for a couple of days, Leavers and Remainers, including Conservative voters, were united in believing that the Brexit Government was capable of denying that animals feel pain and emotion. We were shocked, but not surprised. That’s not a vote of confidence in either the Government or Brexit.
The problem for Remainers is to prove the link between the incoherence of this incompetent Government’s policies and the unfeasability of Brexit itself.
Truthfully, Brexit must be stopped.
“Man is the reasoning animal. Such is the claim. I think it is open to dispute. Indeed, my experiments have proven to me that he is the Unreasoning Animal….His record is the fantastic record of a maniac. I consider that the strongest count against his intelligence is the fact that ….he blandly sets himself up as the head animal of the lot:
whereas by his own standards he is the bottom one.”
Mark Twain, The Lowest Animal, 1896
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