Cambridge politics
Posted: September 20th, 2002, by Olliejust read ross mcgivern’s column on iraq. very informative, and very important. i’d love to say that i was off down to the demo next saturday, and spend my time doing something i really believe in, rather than being my usual indifferent self. but i really don’t think i could bring myself to actually take part in something like that, and i blame it solely on where i live.
cambridge can be a great place to live, but, like many other things, political demonstrations have very little meaning to me any more. and it’s all the student’s fault. in years gone by i felt i could relate to the “alternative” crowd, the section of society (often students) with the messy hair and the torn clothes and “radical” ideas, but things have changed. maybe i’ve just seen one too many dreadlocked rich kids blowing whistles heckling police, thinking they’re the baddest thing since bob dylan (yeah, i blame the hippies too), but i cannot even begin to take any kind of demonstration seriously any more. this is a truly bad thing, because it’s just to easy for myself, and no doubt many others to assume that real beliefs and views are the last things on these people’s minds. maybe it’s a phase a lot of people go through when they reach a certain age. they suddenly realise that they can go around making a racket and disturbing the straights, therefore they must.
please don’t assume i’m saying that anyone who chooses to go out and voice their political beliefs are simply charlatans. i agree that there’s a great number of things in the world that must change. but there are too many people who just cannot grasp the responsibility they are undertaking by sitting in the road yelling about animal testing. i don’t like the idea of animals being hurt and killed any more than you, but if it was going to save my life, or the life of someone i care about, i wouldn’t give a second thought to what had happened to make this treatment available, and neither would you. these days too many people protest simply because they can, and all it does is undermines the work of those who really are devoted to their cause. there are people in the world dying every day for what they believe in, and you’re worried because you saw some pictures of little bunny rabbits, or because roads are the scurge of the earth. people go to protests as a social event in cambridge. who cares what it’s about, you can go and smoke a spliff and the police won’t care! not only do these people undermine those who really are protesting about the lives of the millions of opressed people in the world, they even undermine the people who fight for student grants to be reinstated. why should the government pay for you to develop a bloated sense of moral decency for four years? answer me that, you fuck.
christ, sorry. went a bit off track there. but to sum up, i deeply dislike people who manage to damage the hard work of others, so that they can feel like they have political beliefs.
any feedback is welcomed :)
Ollie
Ollie lives in Cambridge and puts on gigs as part of Crushing Death and Grief.
http://www.myspace.com/crushingdeathandgrief