Events

Its been a dramatic Christmas this time. Sam's illness caused major plan changes and gave us all a shock. However on a personal level this has been a great year and Christmas has been no different.

James was delighted with the bike Santa brought him. Despite his tired and emotional expression here!






Sophie was completely non plussed by the staggering array of soft toys and other baby goodies she received. A typical comment being, Gooo...eh eh!

Any way hope everyone has had a really good one time and here's to a rocking '06

Grandad

I am incredibly proud to announce the arrival of my first grandchild, Emily Faye Dickinson.

She was born at 1842 on Saturday 3rd December at the General Infirmary in Leeds weighing in at 7lb 8oz

Below is a picture of the proud parents, Mark and Sarah (my daughter)

with Emily of course.

This one is of the girl herself. She is a real beauty.

Finally the proud Grandad, the bemused 4-year old uncle and the lovely Emily Faye

Don't know what else to say, it all seems very strange but wonderful.

Martyn Joseph - Awesome (trumpet player?)

We had an Erics band trip to see singer songwriter Martyn Joseph last night. Dave, Linda, Sam and myself have all seen MJ before - Phil and Sam's partner Jill were the virgins.

Describing music is difficult, part protest, part folk, part infused with a gentle God bothering (but not enough to make Sam feel uncomfortable), part David Gray, part Bruce. All delivered acoustically with exceptional guitar playing behind a wonderful voice which, though not the best I've ever heard, he uses to both move and inspire the crowd.

When the performance starts it is clear from the off that this guy knows his craft. New songs are interspersed with old favourites. He also has the intersong patter and anecdotes off to a 't'. Stand out for me were a new song about the life of African American activist and Singer Paul Robeson (as Martyn said - if you dont know who he is...you really ought to!), the classic Cardiff Bay and an extraordinary virtuoso acoustic guitar fest called Wake Me up.

We also got covers of Piano Man, Stuck in Moment and One of Us. Dave loves this guy and was close to tears on a number of occasions. All of us left raving about the performance and I would like to think a little inspired and less cynical.

Finally in a Vic and Bob style misunderstanding, my knackered drummers ears mis heard Jill as she said "theres the Horse and Trumpet" (pub) as "He's an awsome trumpeter" For a few moments I thought she knew something about MJ that I didn't!! Guess you had to be there.

Great night.

Sorry its been a while since I have posted a blog message.

Sophie's arrival has led to much happiness, but also much fatigue as we all adapt to new routines. Experience leads me to suspect that this 'tired' stage has a couple of months left to run, so I apologies in advance for my lack of posts.

This picture opposite, is of my son James. It was taken as we were on a pony and trap ride during our 'lads only' trip to Ireland in July. We visited my sister Helen (Brother in law Mark and nephew Ben) at their house in Co. Tipperary. Although it is a long way (tee Hee) we have been able to visit them often over the years and James and I love it. Ruth was gutted as she was unable to travel due to pregnancy.

Learned a few items of really sad news over the last couple of weeks. It is always particularly difficult to know what to say to people you know or know of, when it is clear that nothing can really be done (by you) to ease the pain of their situation. It does lead to a reappraisal of your own life and realisation of how precarious many of the things we take for granted are. But for those in difficulty I find myself with an increasingly fustrated feeling of helplessness. I confess that I do say a prayer for people. I realise It might be futile but it cant do any harm. Perhaps it just makes me feel a bit better? Well, much of the time it seems like all I can do. My head tells me that we are all able to move on eventually, but the thought of the ordeals that people I know have had to face in their lives gives me an all too familiar sick feeling. In the song 'stuck in a moment Bono says:

And if the night runs over
And if the day won't last
And if your way should falter
Along this stony pass
It's just a moment
This time will pass

Not much help in the deep pain we can feel in the harshness of a really bad day, but perhaps something to think on when we're ready to face tomorrow.

I have been working lot of overtime at work as this month (Nov) is paid in December. I realised during one of my Saturday shifts, that I am lucky to work with a decent bunch of young people. Iam the oldest in the team. At 46 I am nearly twice as old as most and could easily be the Father of all of them. In a future post I will describe some of the characters in detail and expalin how my confidence in the future of the country has been restored by these people.

Readers of Phils blog will know that The Erics are haveing a band outing to see Martyn Joseph the singer songwriter this month. Phil has said that his favourite MJ song of the moment is 'he never said' I will end this post by writing out the chorus and will leave it to you to work out who the 'he' is in the title

He said

Answer a strangers cry for help
love your brothers as you love yourself
you only need to seek and you will find

Forgive your enemy and drop that grudge
Dont judge others and you wont be judged
only push and the door will open wide....open wide

I love the Harry Potter books.

I started reading the 5th installment - Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - because someone left it hanging around at my Mum's house. Within 15mins I was hooked. I went on to finish it in around 3 days. I usually read very little fiction but Jk Rowling has such a great storytelling style I just cant put her books down.

I quickly read the first 4 books and settled down (with millions of others) to await the publication of 'Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince'. I was in Ireland at my sisters when it was released. But I got my copy at 9:00am on the day of publication!

What I wasn't prepared for was the emotional roller coaster that I was embarking on. I won't go into the plot as it might spoil the book for others, but I was utterly blown away by the relationship which develops between Ginny Weasley (pictured above) and Harry. There had been much speculation on Potter websites about who Harry would fall in love with, but the way this story was written surpassed any thing anyone had predicted.

From the moment they got together to the moment Harry has to tell her that it couldn't go on, was story writing at its best. I was so gutted at the end of the book that I cried. Not a little but a lot! Ruth said I was in a mood for about a fortnight. Hard to believe this twice divorced cynic could be so moved by a story of 16 year olds in love, but I was. Now I have to wait 2 years to find out if all will end well in the final installment.

In the meantime there is the November movie release of 'Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire' or GoF as us Harry Potter chat roomers like to call it. Can't Wait!!

More Pics of our little Princess

As can be seen from the above piccies Sophie is doing well. I am back to work on Monday (24/10) as my paternity leave, courtesy of Gordon Brown, is now over.

Ruth is intending to remain on maternity leave until Easter or later. James has had a good report on his first half term at school, so all is well in Richardsonworld.

Back To Life back to Reality

Things are settling into something of a routine now. Ruth and I , inhabit a strange twilight world between 3 or 4 hourly feeds.

Between 3 and 5 in the morning is a particularly strange and challenging time as your body is at its lowest ebb (blood sugar low etc).

However we knew it would be like this so no complaints.

Sophie seems to have a sweet nature and most of the time when she's awake she looks round quizickly. When she does cry its more of a whimper at the moment, although as a Richardson I'm sure there will be more to come on the voice front!

James has mostly sailed throught the addition to our family. He has realised though that things have changed. Yesterday he asked, not where do babies come from but why do they come! I can see that he may well be leading one of our online debates before too long.

Paul xx

We are home now. Sophie is settling down well (although she is just 30 hours old!!).

Thankyou to everyone for there best wishes. Ruth was filling up as she read through the comments here and on The Erics site - cheers guys.

It is a joy for me to know that Sophie will be surrounded by the kind of people who are in our circle of friends as she grows up.

I hope to see you all soon.

Thanks again x

FREE AT LAST!

This is my new daughter Sophie Jasmine she was born 06/10/05 at St James Hospital in Leeds at 1745.

Ruth (who had full pain relief with James - endured labour without it this time) I am so glad I'm a man!!
Sophie is a little cold to start with so its skin to skin time to warm her up (this works on me too!!)

James is very pleased cos Sophie brought him a present (will he be as pleased when he finds out she having his room?)

Many thanks to the Staff at St James - Sophie should be home late on Friday.

Well we are still waiting.

Came home from work early today, as Ruth seemed to be showing signs of early labour. However as I write this at 715pm it seems that the panic is over.

If nothing else happens Ruth will have labour induced at StJames hospital sometime on Thursday (06/09). I may have been moaning about the waiting recently, almost as much as Ruth , who in fairness has something to moan about! Readingf Sams blog post about Meg has put things in perspective.

It amazes me as I get (a bit) older how often this happens. Just as I am getting all tired and pi**ed off with my lot, Smack! a healthy dose of perspective. This country and many ot the people who live in it could do with a double dose. Especially the person who rang me up at work to complain that because his insurance documents were a day late, he was unable to pick up his Ferrari as it couln't be taxed without it and the garage wouldn't let it go. The car was worth £135,000.

First of all I find it obscene that anyone can spend that can spend that amount on a car. Secondly, how can a person moan about waiting one extra day? people around the world have waited a lifetime for justice and never got it. Most of them in dignified silence. Or what a yound girl with her life ahead of her, the hopes and dreams of her parents, suddenly plunged into doubt and fear?

In future I will be tempted to direct complaints like this to Sams post on Meg.

They probably wouln't see the point though, bastards.

What a friend we have in Tony

Please read the following interview with Tony Benn. Although it was done before the Gulf war started it is loaded with wisdom.

Also I believe it shows how the secular and religious traditions helped to inspire and guide a man who is a hero to both Sam and myself.

More especially it tells me that I should widen the areas of life which I think a bit less about pie in the sky and a bit more about making the earth as it is in heaven.JOHN CLEARY: Well let’s talk for a moment about Saddam Hussein. Notwithstanding the denials he offered in your interview with him, do you believe Saddam has weapons of mass destruction?

TONY BENN: Well I didn’t know what to believe. I’d seen him before in 1990 when he released all the British hostages just before the Gulf War, and I wrote again last September when it was obvious that President Bush wanted to invade Iraq, asked for a televised interview, and I decided to ask him five straight questions: Do you have weapons of mass destruction? Have you got any links with al Qaeda? What problem with the inspectors? What about Iraqi oil? And What about the UN?Now on the question of weapons of mass destruction, I didn’t try and do a Blix on him. I asked him and he said, ‘No’. And the purpose of my game was to allow people to hear what he was actually saying. On al Qaeda, he has no links. Indeed bin Laden the other day called upon the Iraqi people to overthrow him, so there’s no links there. But on the weapons, I don’t necessarily believe him, but then I don’t believe Colin Power or Mr Blair or Mr Bush. I think the only person I really believe is Blix himself and he has said ‘We’re making progress, give me time.’ And that was really what I think we should be doing now.

JOHN CLEARY: So you were in an exercise essentially of time-buying? What else was the point in your going?

TONY BENN: Well it was really to give people a chance to hear the argument, because it’s not so very shameful to go and see him. I mean Donald Rumsfeld, the Secretary of Defence of America, went there in 1983 when Saddam was a huge ally of America, and they were arming him when the Americans were supplying him with chemical weapons. And that’s the hypocrisy of it really, that Saddam was a hero in Washington until he got too strong and then he’s now somebody who’s got to be invaded. So I think some balance in the understanding of the argument. After all we hear Bush and Blair every day and Howard too, but we don’t hear Saddam, and I thought it was important for the peace process, in which I believe, that we should hear his arguments.

JOHN CLEARY: What do you believe was achieved for the peace process in your going to see him?

TONY BENN: Well I’m told there’s a possibility that Nelson Mandela may go, and when I went before you see, just before the Gulf War, Willi Brandt, the former Chancellor of Germany went, Ted Heath, the former Prime Minister of Britain went, and I went with the goodwill of a large number of people you know, as was demonstrated last Saturday in London and Melbourne and Sydney and all over the world, of the peace demonstrations. I mean the Pope, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster, the Moderator of the Church of Scotland, Jimmy Carter, former American President, huge peace movement, and to hear the argument from a different perspective was helpful. I’ve no doubt about that, I don’t mind being hammered because I’ve lived through that all my life, you have to do what you think is right and take the consequences.

JOHN CLEARY: Yes, your trip to Iraq has been portrayed by those who wanted to caricature you as as foolish as Chamberlain’s to see Hitler.

TONY BENN: Yes but that’s a load of rubbish, because in the case of Chamberlain and Hitler, Chamberlain supported Hitler. I’ve got hold and have got at home the captured German Foreign Office documents reporting what Lord Halifax, the British Foreign Secretary, said on behalf of Chamberlain to Hitler. He said, ‘I’ve come, Herr Chancellor, to congratulate you on destroying Communism in Germany and acting as a bulwark against Communism in Russia.’ I mean Saddam knows my views because in the House of Commons I’ve attacked him time and time and time again, but I’m not going to be party to killing up to half a million innocent Iraqis, many of whom dislike Saddam, just to see that America gets the oil, I’m not prepared to do that, I’m sorry.

JOHN CLEARY: Given the track record of Saddam, why are you particularly opposed to this war?

TONY BENN: Well, do we live in a world where any country can attack any other country because of its civil rights record? I mean could the United States attack China, because there’s never been elections, and China’s got weapons of mass destruction and has been interfering in Tibet? I mean this is the law of the jungle. Because of my age, I remember the Charter of the UN. I came back as a pilot in a troopship in the Summer of 1945 and I heard the words of the preamble: ‘We the peoples of the United Nations, determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war which twice in our lifetime has caused untold suffering to mankind...’ those words are imprinted in my heart. I’m not going to live in a world where the United States, which has bombed 19 countries since the war, and has weapons of mass destruction in the empire, the biggest the world has ever known, be allowed to impose its will wherever it likes in the name of humanitarianism. There’s no democracy in Saudi Arabia. Women have their heads cut off with a sword in Riyadh in the capital of Saudi Arabia, for adultery. And there’s no democracy there. Why don’t they go in and do it there? No, it’s nothing to do with human rights. It is America wishing to assert its power in the Middle East and in particular get control of the oil and Sharon wants it because he wants to evict all the Palestinians and set up a Greater Israel, driving all the Palestinians into Jordan. I mean that’s my interpretation. Anyway I may be wrong, but that’s what I think.

JOHN CLEARY: You say your life has been lived and shaped by the great causes of internationalism, such as the birth of the United Nations; the Americans are mounting, as one of their major arguments, that this action against Saddam is needed to preserve the integrity of the United Nations, and if this action isn’t taken, the United Nations, like the League of Nations before it, will lose its integrity.

TONY BENN: Well I heard President Bush at the General Assembly and he gave an ultimatum not to Saddam, he gave an ultimatum to the United Nations. He said to the General Assembly, ‘I am going to attack Iraq. Come with me if you want, but if you don’t, I’m going alone.’ I mean actually Saddam is guilty of disregarding UN Resolutions, like Israel, but Bush and Blair are contemplating tearing up the Charter of the United Nations, the whole basis of it. But Blair in London said he would not accept what he called ‘an unreasonable veto’, i.e. he would not accept a vote in the Security Council against a war. So we’re faced with, in my opinion, an attempt by Bush not to save the United Nations, but to destroy it. I feel that very, very strongly.

JOHN CLEARY: What of those who say of Blair’s stand that he’s actually doing what he’s doing in order to keep close to the Americans for two reasons: 1. So that the UN framework won’t fall apart; and 2. To maintain the pressure of the bluff. Because if your enemy doesn’t believe you, there’s no point in making the threat.

TONY BENN: Well on the question of preserving the UN, I don’t wear that. I think Blair and Bush are prepared to tear up the Charter and go back to naked Victorian imperialism. That’s my interpretation of their speeches. They both indicated they have no intention of abiding by a Security Council Resolution if it doesn’t go their way. On the question of bluff, well if wherever a denial of human rights you’re prepared to shed a quarter of a million troops and threaten nuclear weapons, because they have threatened nuclear weapons, then I mean we could abandon any hope of our children and grandchildren living in peace. And the whole purpose of this UN was to bring about the peaceful settlement of international disputes. And what about the arms trade? Selling their weapons all over the world, to both sides in many conflicts.I think we’ve forgotten that the world has been taken over by people, the World Trade Organisation, the IMF, multinationals, who have no democratic accountability whatever, and in the case of Bush, who was supported by the oil industry in which he’s had a part, and I’m not really sure that this presentation of this as a great democratic advance against barbarism has got any relation to the truth at all. It is an imperial power seeking to extend its influence. I mean after all I know about this, because I was born in an Empire, and at the end of the war when I was in Egypt as a young RAF pilot; I’ve still got my identity card about a foot from where I’m sitting, and it says ‘This man is exempt from Egyptian law’. Why? Because Britain occupied Egypt in 1882 and we were still there in 1945. You know, you have to know a little bit of history to understand what’s happening.

JOHN CLEARY: Tony Benn, let’s talk about that ethos which shaped you, for just a few moments. Let’s look though at the circumstances in which you grew up. You were born on the site which is now occupied by Labour Party headquarters, in fact next door to the house of Sidney and Beatrice Webb.

TONY BENN: That’s right.

JOHN CLEARY: As great Fabian Socialists and there was a whole milieu in that environment, in which your father mixed in those days, we’re talking about the days of Lloyd George, of your father moving from the Liberals to the Labour Party, we’re talking about Churchill moving from the Liberals to the Conservatives, we’re talking about the ferment of people like the Webbs, and Bernard Shaw, of H.G. Wells; how much did these stories and these people colour your childhood?

TONY BENN: Well not quite so much, because you see the dissenting tradition from which I came was deeper and older than that. I mean my Dad left the Liberal Party because Lloyd George became leader, because he regarded Lloyd George as totally corrupt. I met Lloyd George myself in 1937 and he was very friendly to my Dad on that occasion. But my Father regarded Lloyd George as the man who destroyed the Liberal Party. Churchill I knew of course, and my Dad served with him in Parliament when they were both Liberals before the First World War. No, my roots come from the dissenting tradition in religion, that’s to say what my Mother used to call ‘the priesthood of all believers’; you do not need a Bishop to help you. Everybody has a hotline to the Almighty and that of course was a tremendously revolutionary idea because out of that sort of Methodist, Congregationalist tradition, came the idea that we had the right to build our own world, to meet our own needs and not just wait to be patted on the head by a Bishop and told by the Bishop, ‘If you do what I tell you to do, you’ll go to heaven; if you don’t you’ll go to hell’. You know, it’s a very, very different and very important and very radical idea. My Great-grandfather was a Congregational Minister and my Mother was a Bible scholar, and I was brought up on the Bible, that the story of the Bible was conflict between the kings who had power, and the prophets who preached righteousness. And I was taught to believe in the prophets, got me into a lot of trouble. And my Dad said to me when I was young, ‘Dare to be a Daniel, Dare to stand alone, Dare to have a purpose firm, Dare to let it (be) known.’ Now these are very, very powerful influences. It wasn’t mixing with the Webbs and Wells, and Lloyd George and all that, they were very much of a different sort of intellectual tradition which is not really me at all.

JOHN CLEARY: I’m reminded when we look at your life, of another great quixotic figure that comes out of the Congregationalist tradition in the 19th century, and that’s the great editor, W.T. Stead, editor of the Pall Mall Gazette, the Review of Reviews, and his great crusades against child prostitution, for early internationalism, he was one of the people who moved for the first moves towards international order. There is a great dissenting tradition which involves a great era of reform in the late 19th century.

TONY BENN: Oh yes, well you see if you go right back, and I’m not a proper historian, but if you go back to the old texts in 1381, there was a man called the Reverend John Ball, and he was preaching in support of the peasants and their revolt. And he said ‘This will not go well in England till all property is held in common.’ And he was hanged, drawn and quartered, which was the punishment they had in the old days for dissenters. And there’s been a tremendously strong radical tradition linked to belief in God, but not exclusively linked. I mean there were humanists who said that in the English Revolution in the 17th century there were people who said that we were created by reason, and we therefore had a capacity to think things out for ourselves. But these ideas go back a very, very long way, and intellectual socialists who did play some role in the early part of the last century, they were not necessarily a part of that tradition. They sort of thought it all out in a rather academic way and the passion of the dissenting tradition is something which escaped them and which fortunately keeps a fire alive in my belly.

JOHN CLEARY: I had the opportunity to have a chat with Roy Hattersley, a former deputy leader of the British Labour Party a year or so ago when his biography of William and Catherine Booth, the founders of the Salvation Army came out. He’s recently written

TONY BENN: That’s right. Well you see Mrs Thatcher’s most dangerous statement was when she said, ‘There is no alternative’. She said to people, ‘Whatever you do, whatever you think, however hard you work, you’ll get nowhere, don’t even try.’ And it paralysed a lot of people, and they said, ‘Oh well, what’s the point?’...They said ‘The Left has become obsessed with private power struggles’, that is, it’s the feminists against the environmentalists, against the educationalists, against all these private power wars going on, and there’s been a loss in the belief in universals, a sort of post-modern relativism has crept into the Left. Where are the seeds of the Left’s failure?Well I think post-modernism is a throwback to the Victorian period you see. What’s called modernisation which is what Blair was talking about, is to push health and education back to the market, cut away the right to a pension as of right, and so on, and I think people are beginning to see that. The word ‘modernisation’ means the destruction of what we came to understand was right in the reversion. And thank God, literally, he hasn’t started modernising the Ten Commandments, because I could imagine what would emerge from New Labour, ‘Thou shalt not kill unless President Bush asks you to’. You know, I’m making fun of it, but I think New Labour is Thatcherism entrenched and combined with sort of European Federalism under a bank, and the Transatlantic control under the White House. And people are beginning to see that. You see this is the funny thing about my own position; having said what I’ve said for a long, long time, I now find that most people in Britain seem to agree, and I think for the first time in my life, public opinion is to the left of what is laughingly known as the Labour government, it’s actually a New Labour government, but people do want decent pensions, they don’t want students loaded up with debt, they don’t want the Public Services privatised, they don’t want war, they care about the environment. I mean there has been a sea-change in public opinion, and to that extent, insofar as I’ve tried to argue that case for a long time, and I’m an optimist, but I know it’s going to be a struggle, it always is a struggle, it never has come easily.

JOHN CLEARY: It’s one of the problems that the parties of the Left and the Right have ultimately sold out to a narrow, materialist definition of human progress. And once the field is vacated to materialism, then all you have left is arguments about economic efficiency and the amount of dollars in your pocket; that you can’t really make arguments about the wider issues of justice and ethics in the world.

TONY BENN: Well I think there’s something in that. If the Archbishop of Canterbury in his Dimbleby Lecture which he gave, I listened to very intently on the BBC the other day, really argued that point. He said a market-related society ignores the deepest moral values that we need to live in peace. I mean it was said very delicately. I know my Dad used to say to me ‘The trouble with the Prophets began when they stopped spelling P-r-o-p-h-e-t-s, and put an ‘f’ in instead.’ And I thought that summed it up very well. The worship of money you see, is the most powerful religion in the world. The worship of money is more powerful than Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism and the Business News we hear on the hour on the television, I’m sure you hear it in Australia, is the worship of money. We’re told what’s happened to the FTSI and the Dow Jones and the dollar and the pound, as if it was a sort of guide to the success of our society, and the management consultants come in, and lay people off. And I find this new religion is the one that’s gripped us.

John Cleary: This is the religion of Mammon, which Jesus spoke about.

Tony Benn: Yes well again Keir Hardie said at the beginning of the 20th century, We should either choose to worship God or Mammon. We quite obviously worship Mammon. And this for example on the News every hour, instead of telling you what’s happened to the FTSI and the Dow Jones, they told you the up-to-date figures for unemployment, how many people have died of asbestosis, how many people unemployed, how many people homeless and so on, people would say, Oh Gosh, well now we know what we ought to be doing. But I do think we worship money, and if I had any musical talent I would compose a hymn in which the words of the Business News would be incorporated. ‘And the Dow Jones has fallen 3 points tonight’, you know what I mean, because this is a total Capitalist control of our mind, and yet it doesn’t conform to what it is we want. After all, people don’t want much, they want a decent home, education, good health care, dignity when they’re old, and peace. I mean it’s not an awful lot to ask in a world where the technology available is in such a scale, you could solve, not all, but many of the problems of poverty if you diverted it from Stealth bombers and Star Wars and bunker-busting nuclear weapons, and moved it into the issues raised by the Johannesburg Summit.

John Cleary: We’re getting to the end of your most generous offering of your time to us. Let me ask you a couple of other questions. You’re now at a point where you say you’ve been a voluminous diarist through your life, where you can reflect on a life, but you’ve also got to assess your life and also think about ultimate meanings. What has your life meant, and what has been the motivation for it? Do you think there is any sense in which your life, (to use the phrase I’ve used before) is about transcendent values, and how are they passed on? Do you see this being connected to any spiritual ultimate reward?

Tony Benn: Well what I’ve heard in my life is the most marvellous family. My Mother and Father, remarkable couple, my Dad died 40 years ago, he was 20 years older than my Mother, but he shared all the things, I mentioned to you ‘Dare to be a Daniel’. And he said to me once, ‘Never wrestle with a chimneysweep’, and I didn’t know what he meant when he said that. But what he was saying is if somebody plays dirty with you, don’t play dirty with him, or you’ll get dirty too. I mean all his phrases come back to me. My Mother brought me up on the Bible, as I mentioned. She said once, ‘Death is God’s last and greatest gift to the living’, and I thought of that when my own wife died of cancer just over two years ago. It was such a release to see her after years of suffering, released. My Grandmother said ‘The great thing about your last journey is you don’t have to pack.’ And that gave me comfort, because I’ve got a house of boxes full of archives to leave to someone else to sort out. My wife, who was brought up in the same tradition, she came from the Huguenot family who escaped to America in the 17th century, and the same religious background that I had, and a good Socialist, and she wrote about Keir Hardie, she concentrated on education, she was my main friend and advisor right up until she died. We’ve got four children and ten grandchildren, and they all live in London, I see lots of them. One of them’s a Minister in the Blair government. Both my Grandfathers were Member of Parliament too, so that’s five members of the family in four generations, five members of the family in three centuries all in Parliament, so we’ve got a sort of connecting thread. And I’m just a very, very happy man. I keep a Diary I think for these reasons. My father, who was born in 1877, was a Victorian, and he said, ‘You have to give an account of yourself.’ So on the Day of Judgement when the Almighty says ‘What did you do with your life?’ I shall give him a CD-ROM with 17-million words, and say ‘Well here’s what I did’, and I think I am motivated by this very powerful requirement to account for how I spent my time. It may sound funny to you, but it’s kept me going night after night when I’d rather go to bed. As I did last night, I was terribly tired and before I went to bed, I did my Diary, and that’s why it isn’t history, it isn’t memoirs, it isn’t an autobiography, it’s what happened that day, put down before you forget. And I find it very useful.

John Cleary: Tony Benn, it’s been great to speak with you. Thanks so much for being so generous with your time.

Tony Benn: Thank you very much, I’ve really enjoyed it, it’s the best cross-examination, and the most sensitive and understanding and scholarly one I think I’ve ever had from the mediaThis interview was first broadcast on ABC local radio's Sunday Nights With John Cleary, 23 February, 2003.

Debate

There is a debate going on in the band about theology/atheism/faith. To be honest I love it because it has allowed me to re-examine what I believe myself.

Sam chose a song called 'Dear God' by XTC as one of his top 5 songs. This has led to a re-kindling of the fires on this subject. I therefor open up this post for comments on the above as it is better conducted here than on The Erics main site. Come on guys lets get to it? I want to see you all in Church next Sunday!!??

Here is what has been said so far:

Sam :I really do need to take you to task (intellectually) on the song by XTC. Perhaps my blog will be a better place for the discussion. I have been working on an essay/booklet/book? entitled 'What I believe I think I believe', my riposte will be contained therein.ps great list with a couple of suprises!!
9:58 AM
Sam Hirst said...
Bring it on Richardson, you don't scare me......Hope Ruth is ok and not sprogging just yet old bean.......
10:18 AM
Phileric said...
Sam - you don't have to take the Bible literally - or believe in it at all to have faith. Have an open mind matey - accept that there may be things that cannot be explained and may never be able to be explained - neither by scientist nor religion.
5:39 PM
Sam Hirst said...
God, it wasn't a detailed analysis, just a comment on the song! And to me, faith is based on a judgement. And for me to have faith in a god means there has to be something to make an opinion on, like various scientific facts, mathematical equations, or findings, ie something to assess it on and then make a, get this, qualified decision, not just blind faith. Now, I think that is as open minded as you can be, who is to say Darwin or Stephen Hawking is right? But, I have faith that their decisions are based on evidence, and their judgement may be right or wrong. In the case of religious faith it is entirely based on faith, no facts, figures, or findings for me to make a considered view.
5:46 PM
Phileric said...
I don't want to push this on your site but I had to laugh at the way you opened your last comment with 'GOD.'
1:46 AM

Paul Richardson said...
Ey up Sam,Just wanted to say that I can readily agree with the thrust of your last post. That is much more in line with the comments you regularly make on this subject. Of course we all realise that it is impossible to prove a negative ie prove that God doesn't exist. I also have a lot of time for evidence based solutions to the questions which trouble and interest us all. Faith though, will always have a lack of evidence at some level. Otherwise it wouldn't be faith it would be certainty. It requires faith for me to believe that Darwins theories really do fully explain the evolution of the species,or that Einsteins theory of relativity really does completely explain the behaviour of super massive objects in gravitational fields or at close to light speed. Even with my science training there is an element of faith that they got it pretty much right as I dont fully understand a lot of what they said and wrote. Martin Luther King said that faith is simply taking the next step without seeing the rest of the staircase.The trouble with the song is that it is (probably intentionaly to provoke people (ever an artistic ploy!!)) athiest dogma. Some of the lines ie about war and killing being the fault of God are worn out.As a song I respect that it is one of your favourites but as a reason for being an atheist it doesnt fit with the rational line you have usually taken.love Paul xx
10:43 AM

Paul Richardson said...
CAN WE TAKE FURTHER DEBATE TO MY SITE?? THER IS A POST THERE TO START THE DISCUSSION. ANYONE ELSE WHO WANTS TO JOIN IN PLEASE DO BUT GO TO TO PAULS SITE ON THE LINKS FIRSTTA paulxx
10:56 AM
Sam Hirst said...
For f*cks sake, would that have been better as an opener? You knew what I meant, I understand the irony of using god, but its not important is it? It was my mild way of showing my irritation that the issue was jumped on here! Final point, my argument is utterly logical and well reasoned on the issue, and I defy anyone to say otherwise. Well, anyone? Thought not. FFS.
11:16 AM

Paul Richardson said...
Are you a bit tired you grumpy old sod.paulps sorted my brake light -and lets take this to my site - you know you love the argument (when grandads had more sleep)
11:25 AM

ONES THAT DIDN'T QUITE MAKE IT

Here are a couple of songs that I love but aren't in my top 5

I Want You Back- The Jackson 5

What an opening riff. Pure pop. Then a brilliant bass line (even Dave would struggle with it!!). The chorus and middle eight (I want you back OOOOOO I want you back etc) are magic. What ever happened to the little lad who sang lead vocals? So sad.

A mate at work (Laith) who remixes dance stuff did me a personal remix of this which is ace. If you would like to hear it, just ask at a gig.

I also love ABC, I'll Be there and Can You Feel it by the same artists.


Born to Run- Bruce Springsteen

This one only just missed out on top5dom. It will be played at my funeral. The Spectoresque wall of sound production speaks for itself. This is an song on an epic scale. No one produces stuff like this anymore. Live it is a good song, but it never quite hits the spot in the way the album version does. If you dont feel like joining in by the end you must be dead already.

One of my fondest memories is seeing Bruce on the stage in Roundhay park looking out at 82000 people, the band where playing the cresendo bit after the stabs in the middle of the song, he prowled the stage urging the band and audience on until he stopped at the mike and shouted 1, 2, 3, 4 . the ground seemed to shake from then till the end of the song. Brilliant!!

WAITING

The baby is due tomorrow (22nd). Ruth has really had enough and is desperate to get it over with.

I have started on my top 5 best songs of all time, which will appear on The Erics site shortly. I will post some of the ones that didn't quite make it on this site over the next week or so.

James (my son) has had his first run in with authority. Ruth was asked to have a word with his teacher about James' anwering back when told to line up for lunch!! 4 years old and out of control already.

Cricket

Cricket.

We English have more to proud of in this game than just the winning of the Ashes.

This game is what England is all about.

Hard but fair, respect for your opponents, great performances without necessarily winning. Going for a draw if a wins is not possible (sweet moderation heart of this nation….as Billy Bragg correctly said!). Losing with dignity.

Fans can booze all day but you rarely see any trouble.

A team game with room for individual excellence which relies on partnerships but cant be played successfully unless all players perform. Matches which take place over a long enough period to sort out the flash in the pans from the true champions.

Rain and bad light can stop play, even when no-one quite understands why! The rules are written down but it takes a lifetime to interpret them correctly.

It is a sport which can  unite India and Pakistan, Australia and New Zealand, South Africa and the West Indies. It even keeps Zimbabwe in the news!

Norman Tebbit (an old tory to**er ) once said that ethnic minorities should be put to  a ‘cricket supporting test’ to see if they had integrated enough to stay in this country. Well I know one thing as I watched the Ashes celebrations on television with my son. I saw wildly happy faces from many cultures and races joining in the euphoria. It has to be the most hopeful thing I have seen for a long time.

As for the Australians – they took their defeat well. They will be a different propostion indeed in two years time!!

So there it is, I rest my case. Cricket is like England. It has all the eccentricity, complication, tradition and class based classlessness that infuriates and fascinates us about our home.

And did those feet in ancient times walk upon………………

Article by Salman Rushdie

Article by Salman Rushdie.
I reprint here an article I read in The Times a few days ago. It is by a man who has more of an axe to grind with religious fanatics than most of us. When I first read it, it occurred to me that this approach should be made to all religions and indeed all political movements around the world. This is a great man writing!
The article starts with a quote from a respondent to an earlier article by the same author.
Dr Shaaz Mahboob, of Hillingdon, Middlesex, pointed out that: “There are hundreds of thousands of Muslims in Britain who do not follow their religion as strictly as do the older generations . . . We are the mainstream Muslims who are keen to live in peace and harmony with other faith groups, feel proud of being British and are patriotic . . . I know of no organisation that represents the secular and liberal Islam that the vast majority of Muslims follow.”
Several writers challenged me to take the next step and hypothesise the content of such a reform movement. The nine thoughts that follow form an initial response to that challenge, and focus primarily on Britain.
It may well be that reform will be born in the Muslim diaspora where contact (and friction) between communities is greatest, and then exported to the Muslim majority countries. It would not be the first time such a thing has happened. The idea of Pakistan was shaped in England, too. So were the history-changing characters of Mahatma Gandhi, Pakistan’s founder Muhammad Ali Jinnah and the pro-British Indian Muslim leader Sir Syed Ahmad Khan.
British Muslims, who are mainly of South Asian origin, should remember their own histories. In India, Muslims have always been secularists, knowing that India’s secular constitution is what protects them from the dictatorship of the (Hindu) majority. British Muslims should take a leaf out of their counterparts’ book and separate religion from politics.
Remembering history, part 2. Within living memory, Muslim cities such as Beirut and Tehran were cosmopolitan, tolerant, modern metropolises. That lost culture must be saved from the radicals, celebrated, and rebuilt.
The idea that all Muslims are kin to all others should be re-examined. The truth is that, as the bitter divisions between Iraqi Sunnis and Shias demonstrate, it is a fiction, and when it deludes young men such as the British 7/7 bombers into blowing up their own country in the name of an essentially fantastical idea of Islamic brotherhood (few British Muslims would find life in conservative Muslim countries tolerable), it is a dangerous fiction.
Pan-Islamism, part 2: the people most directly injured by radical Islam are other Muslims: Afghan Muslims by the Taleban, Iranian Muslims by the rule of the ayatollahs; in Iraq, most people killed by the insurgency are Muslims, too. Yet Muslim rhetoric concentrates on the crimes of “the West”. It may be that Muslims need to re-direct their rage against the people who are really oppressing and killing them.
In the 1970s and 1980s the politics of British peoples of South Asian origin were largely organised around secular groups, mostly run by activists of Left-Marxist persuasion. The Black/Asian unity of that period was broken, and then replaced, by the mosque-based, faith-determined radical Islam that grew in part out of the protests against The Satanic Verses. That ground needs to be reclaimed (not necessarily by Left-Marxists) by creating truly representative bodies. Then the increasingly discredited “leaders” of the Muslim Council of Britain can be relegated to the fringes where they belong.
Reformed Islam would reject conservative dogmatism and accept that, among other things, women are fully equal to men; that people of other religions, and of no religion, are not inferior to Muslims; that differences in sexual orientation are not to be condemned, but accepted as aspects of human nature; that anti-Semitism is not OK; and that the repression of free speech by the thin-skinned ideology of easily-taken “offence” must be replaced by genuine, robust, anything-goes debate in which there are no forbidden ideas or no-go areas.
Reformed Islam would encourage diaspora Muslims to emerge from their self-imposed ghettoes and stop worrying so much about locking up their daughters. It would emerge from the intellectual ghetto of literalism and subservience to mullahs and ulema, allowing open, historically based scholarship to emerge from the shadows to which the madrassas and seminaries have condemned it.
There must be an end to the defensive paranoia that led some Muslims to claim that Jews were behind the 9/11 attacks and, more recently, that Muslims may not have been behind the 7/7 bombings either (a crackpot theory exploded, if one may use the verb, by the recent al-Jazeera video).
Not so much a reformation, as several people said in response to my first piece, as an Enlightenment. Very well then: let there be light.
Again it occurs to me (paul that is!) that there is real intellect oozing from this article. In Britain today it is actually frowned up on to be an Intellectual. Popular culture tries to pigeon hole people who think deeply and study as ‘geeks’ many join in for fear of being similarly labelled. Pol Pot would love it. His idea of an intellectual was anyone wearing glasses!! (Remember the film ‘the Killing Fields’)
For the sake of our children we must stop this. Encourage people to think. Allow people to change their minds without seeing it as a weakness. Accept that no one has a monopoly on what is right and what is the truth!

Ashes Fever

Havent had the chance to post much over the last few days. I have had a bad case of cricket obsession. thankfully England pulled off a brilliant victory and I am feeling much better today. More on why Cricket is so important in future posts.

Phil has joined the land of the bloggers www.phileric.blogspot.com (phil is good mate and guitarist in The Erics). I'll put a proper link on here soon.

Still waiting for new baby (due date 22nd sept)

any way more thought provoking stuff coming up especially after I readagreat article, by Salman Rushdie in The Times yesterday. If I can reproduce it here I will.

Day of Rest?

Thursday is my day off – So today I got to take James to his new school for the first time. He is still a little misty eyed when the time comes for his line to march into class. I am confident that he is enjoying the experience though. He better do as he has, at least, 11 more years of it ahead of him!

I do intend to continue to use this blog for posting my personal stuff, as well as for the discussion stuff which seems to have taken off amongst The Erics chattering class.

As we have been discussing morals etc I thought I would introduce this:

The Golden Rule –

Treat others the way you wish to be treated

Here is a short essay from http://www.jcu.edu/philosophy/gensler/goldrule.htm
About the golden rule.


The golden rule is endorsed by all the great world religions; Jesus, Hillel, and Confucius used it to summarize their ethical teachings. And for many centuries the idea has been influential among people of very diverse cultures. These facts suggest that the golden rule may be an important moral truth.
Let's consider an example of how the rule is used. President Kennedy in 1963 appealed to the golden rule in an anti-segregation speech at the time of the first black enrollment at the University of Alabama. He asked whites to consider what it would be like to be treated as second class citizens because of skin color. Whites were to imagine themselves being black - and being told that they couldn't vote, or go to the best public schools, or eat at most public restaurants, or sit in the front of the bus. Would whites be content to be treated that way? He was sure that they wouldn't - and yet this is how they treated others. He said the "heart of the question is ... whether we are going to treat our fellow Americans as we want to be treated."
The golden rule is best interpreted as saying: "Treat others only in ways that you're willing to be treated in the same exact situation." To apply it, you'd imagine yourself in the exact place of the other person on the receiving end of the action. If you act in a given way toward another, and yet are unwilling to be treated that way in the same circumstances, then you violate the rule.
To apply the golden rule adequately, we need knowledge and imagination. We need to know what effect our actions have on the lives of others. And we need to be able to imagine ourselves, vividly and accurately, in the other person's place on the receiving end of the action. With knowledge, imagination, and the golden rule, we can progress far in our moral thinking.
The golden rule is best seen as a consistency principle. It doesn't replace regular moral norms. It isn't an infallible guide on which actions are right or wrong; it doesn't give all the answers. It only prescribes consistency - that we not have our actions (toward another) be out of harmony with our desires (toward a reversed situation action). It tests our moral coherence. If we violate the golden rule, then we're violating the spirit of fairness and concern that lie at the heart of morality.
The golden rule, with roots in a wide range of world cultures, is well suited to be a standard to which different cultures could appeal in resolving conflicts. As the world becomes more and more a single interacting global community, the need for such a common standard is becoming more urgent.

Is this what we are looking for? An over arching moral code? I certainly try (and usually fail) to live by it.

Here's a picture of Sam and I been daft. I was still dying my hair then!! ( 18 months ago)

Anyway first up - Sorry for the crap spelling in my posts (especially on the comments) I get so 'into' the writing I dont bother to review or spell check what I've put.

Here is a website that those interested in the religious debate might like to look at.
www.shipoffools.com especially look at Gadgets for God and the Biblical curse generator.

Oh and following on from something that Richard Fell(y) said - How many of us have had our kids Christened? Got Married in Church? and how did we deal with all the turning from Satan stuff?
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Here's A Joke!! (well perhaps it is)

Jesus came upon a small crowd who had surrounded a young woman they believed to be an adulteress. They were preparing to stone her to death.To calm the situation, Jesus said: "Whoever is without sin among you, let them cast the first stone."Suddenly, an old lady at the back of the crowd picked up a huge rock and lobbed it at the young woman, scoring a direct hit on her head. The unfortunate young lady collapsed dead on the spot.Jesus looked over towards the old lady and said: "Do you know, Mother, sometimes you really piss me off."

Ok , firstly thanks to Sam, Phil and Felly for their contributions so far. I do find it hard to join the comments during the day as I am not supposed to use the internet as part of my duties as pondlife first class for the uk's largest general insurer. However I will do what I can, when I can.

In an attempt to push our discussions on, I thought I might post on a few different topics over the coming days and people can either comment on ignore them as they see fit.

So here goes.

Martin Luther King (probably my greatest hero (and I have a few!!)) said "the arc of the moral universe is long but it tends towards justice".

Is he right, is there a Universal moral code (here I mean universal in both senses of the word) could people from all cultures, countries, eras and perhaps even planets(!!??) agree on what is right and what is wrong. How many times do we hear 'I know whats right and wrong' trotted out by people?

From my previous offerings I guess it will come as no surprise that I do think there is an overarching moral core to the reality we exist in. I base much of my thinking in this area, on books I have read by Richard Holloway, the former bishop of Edinburgh. He is well worth a read on most subjects but this is his area.

If like me you think that we as humans have a natural instinct for right and wrong, than where does this instinct originate? Is it in the genes from evolutionary developments or is it an inescapable byproduct of our unique(to Earth at least) consciousness? or is it something else?

Connected to this issue is an old challenge which I have had thrown my way many times over the years.

If I could travel back in time and in doing so met a young Adolf Hitler, would I kill him knowing what we know now of his future. Well I must say that I would be very very tempted. However in the end I don't think I could do it. but if anyone harmed my family.............

Just to say that I am really please with the reaction of my mates, Sam and Phil to this blog. You will need to read the debate raging over the multiculturalism post to see what I mean.
These two have always had an edgy relationship, they have a tendency to wind each other up easily. However they are amongst the very best people I have met. I trust them both completely and value their advice and great friendship

A Picture of my kids. Sarah at the back (24) Anna in the middle (22) and James (4)

I love em all

Multiculturalism.

Sadly, in recent years, any sort of critique of multicultralism has been the domain of BNP idiots and the right wing of the Tory party. In other words a cover for a thinly veiled racism. In much the same way as the modern fascists use attacks on 'Islam' as a way to legally abuse Asians in general.

I must say right from the off, that I have a number of issues with Islam, (could I be inviting a fatwa here??) almost as many as I have with Christianity! But I shall address these at some other time, lest this become an over religious blog.

However, having said all that, I do feel that the kind of multicultural approach which was in vogue in the English education system over the last 20 years or so does seem to have backfired some what in the light of recent events. The strategy seems to have been to bring people together by increasing their understanding of each other by celebrating particular aspects of their cultures. Thus reducing fear and separation by breaking down barriers to understanding and tolerance.

It all sound very laudable, but there seems to have been a problem, for many people it seems that these 'celebrations' have simply amplified differences between us. Many of them are based on religious festivals and it has to be faced that most 'ordinary' people in the UK are turned off by religion at the best of times. I myself have heard parents muttering about celebrating eid in schools and nurseries whilst Christmas nativity scenes are being taken down in charity shops, so as not to offend other faiths. These people might just be dangerous racists, or perhaps they actually have a point. What really binds people in out inner cities together? Faith, festivals? Well I for one think it is poverty and lack of opportunity and hope.

Perhaps our multicultural approach should have focused more clearly on what people have in common. People in (mainly white) Gipton have far more in common with people in (mainly black) Chapletown and (mainly Asian) Harehills than they do with people in large parts of Wetherby and Boston Spa. The trouble with this approach is that it will lead to questions being asked about the nature of our society as a whole. Marx's solutions may have been proved to be simplistic and in some cases just plain wrong, but his analysis of the world we in the west live in remains as cogent today as ever it was.

The vested interests in our country and indeed in the world will not come up with solutions to problems which involve them losing any power or priviledge. This isn't dangerous lefty talk its common sense. No one ever sees themselves as the problem, or that getting rid of themselves might be solution.

The question I now ask myself, when watch inner cities tearing themselves apart or sad fundimentalists justifying their murder or bleeding heart politicians crying crocodile tears over flood victims, is how can this be changed? Is it just that I am older and less inclined to direct action. How many more summers will I waste my time praying in vain for a saviour to rise from these streets? (thanks Bruce)

Its my son James first day at School today. Ruth took him in his smart new uniform. I felt saddened that I could not be there my self.Instead I sat nervously wondering how he was going on, whilst trying to sort out the insurance problems of the great British public!

Thankfully Ruth sent me a reassuring text message at 0915 along with a picture of the little man marching off the school.

James school is in the next village to ours.It is a Church of England school.We chose it on its academic reputation and the Ethos we observed on our visits. The fact that it is a 'faith' school was not really on the agenda (especially for Ruth).Although I have to say that I'm glad. I went to a CofE infant school and it didn't do me any harm.......all things bright and......

I want to vent my thoughts and feelings on this site.

I should therefore state right from the start that all the statements, links and views on here ARE MY OWN.

They should not to be taken as those of my family members or my fellow band members.

So here is a start.

Despite my distrust and often open dislike of organised religion (including Islam and Christianity), I do believe in a God (of love) and regard myself as a follower of Jesus of Nazareth (or where ever in the now middle east he came from).

To quote Bruce Springsteen, "when I look at my self I don't see, the man I wanted to be. Somewhere long the line I slipped off track, one step and two steps back". So I guess I would say that in religious terms I accept that I am a 'sinner' and long for some kind of forgiveness.

However, I am a qualified scientist and accept fully that the best way to describe and to understand the vast majority of what is around us (including us) is through science. I include in this Human evolution all the way to Stellar evolution (yes we are made of stardust folks). So if God made us (s)he made us just the way Darwin, Newton, Einstein and Carl Sagen have described.

contradictory?? Doesn't add up?? Just like life really.

Here am I along with my brother and sisters. I am they grey haired one third from the left.
.

It is a lovely day here in Castleford. My wife and I have been sitting on the patio while our son James plays in the neighbours paddling pool. We have been reading the sunday papers (The Sunday Times and The News of the World). What a depressing world we seem to live in yet.......in our tiny corner all seems well.

We were supposed to be playing at a pub called the CHEMIC tonight. Arrived with our gear to find the place was minute. We had to let the guys who booked us down gently but secretly I am pleased. Ruth is now 37 weeks pregnant and any time I'm away from her I spend convinced that she is about to go into labour. So it will be a quiet Saturday night.

Thinking about : New Orleans, Islam, Charles Darwin and Sleep

Every Journey Begins With a Single Step

Well this is my first post on my own blog. I have been doing most of the posts on The Erics blog for quite a while now. However I now feel the need to have a place to post my own personal musings and rants. So this will be it!