An image from the NASA website depicts Briton Piers J Sellars working on the ISS (International Space Station) during an EVA (Extra Vehicular Activity, more commonly known as a space-walk). Sellars had some difficulty during his second EVA yesterday, when his emergency jet thruster back-pack came loose from its tether. Fortunately his colleague Mike Fossum was on hand to secure it in place.
A close examination of Sellars suit reveals a graphic of an astronaut, drawn in the style of Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man. I love this kind of witty design thinking. Its also an appropriate symbol – The multipurpose logistics module being delivered to the ISS is called Leonardo.
Page 292 of 328
There is a word I know exists but cannot remember. One applies it to a piece of art, which inspires in the viewer those things described or otherwise portrayed by that art. Jack Kerouac’s On The Road provokes a spotaneity that emulates Dean Moriatry’s anarchic carpe diem. I read Nick Hornby’s Fever Pitch immediately before the 1998 World Cup, and I recall it had the effect of making a football obsessive out of me, when I hadn’t been before.
Whatever the name of this trait, I find it also applies to Terry Gilliam films. Fear And Loathing in Las Vegas is the best example for obvious reasons, and today I am beginning to think Brazil may be another. I saw it again on Saturday evening, and by Monday morning I was seeing totalitarian beuracracy everywhere.
So: Is it just me, or is the government’s threat graph designed for the sole purpose of striking fear into the population? It is very difficult to see what use it can be.
First, the system just gives a status, a ‘threat level’. It will not give any specifics, so the proles will not know where on these isles is at risk of attack. Second: In what ways should we act differently in the event of a heightened alert? If we are at Level 1, does that mean I can ignore those suspicious packages I find on the train? At what point should we stop using public transport altogether? Without context, it is useless information.
Most importantly, though, is that this system does half of the terrorists work for them. The system of threats without information will only serve to strike fear – terror, if you will – in the minds of the populous. At the very least, it will cause massive inconvenience for those trying to go about their daily business, to say nothing of the effect on commerce. To announce to the country that a terrorist attack is imminent, but then give no information as to its possible form or location, will surely breed suspicion and uncertainty in the financial markets.
The parallels with dystopian fiction are so startling, I’m surprised that Ministers aren’t more self-aware as they trot out lines from Brazil and its ilk. Ministers go on TV and announce banalities such as Vigilance Saves Lives. Then (as happened on BBC News 24 this morning) they talk about what their system will report when terrorists attacks increase (not if). And all the time, anonymous terrorists move among us. We don’t know or care why they might be attempting to blow us up, just that it could happen at any moment. When it does, we are told to “carry on as normal” and remained unbowed, despite the fact that ‘normal’ is now synonymous with a threat rating of ‘severe’.
The publishing of these threat levels is yet another desperate action of a government that has lost the trust of the people. Whatever the pronouncements of Lord Hutton, the Kelly inquiry proved that intelligence service decisions are subject to political interference. When caught doing this, the politicians are without contrition. Jean Charles De Menezes proved that the security services make mistakes, and that when they do, no-one will take responsibility.
Does the government imagine that this system will be trusted? Do they really think that we will use it for anything other than rueful satire?
Edinburgh Castle, 9pm.
Plenty of discussion on the blogs and in the media about the london bombings, this time last year, notably from survivors such as the irrepressible Rachel and the idosyncratic Dave Taurus.
The bombings were a terrible punctuation to a bizarre week. The previous Saturday, I had worn white and joined the Make Poverty History march, along with thousands of others. It was a hot day, and we stopped half-way round to have a pint on George IV Bridge. We chatted to a couple who had taken a bus from Bristol to join in the event. The G8 summit was about to start, and there was a feeling of optimisim in the air. It was genuine.
Watching the ‘Live 8’ highlights on TV that evening, and later that week when another concert was staged at Murrayfield, it seemed to me that those events had a certain falseness. Jonathan Ross and his interviewees kept talking about what an historic concert Live 8 would be, before it had even begun. The whole event was a paean to the original Live Aid concert, a consolation prize for those who had missed it first time around. I remember saying that you cannot package and market those moments that will define a decade, and that history has a certain spontenaity – it does not take place at a pre-arranged meeting point.
Of course, the following day four guys went straight ahead and made some real history, at their own pre-arranged meeting point. Not only did they destroy lives and property, but they destroyed the sense of optimism, a rising tide of political activity and awareness, that had been swelling over the previous week. And do you know what? One year on, I don’t think we have regained that momentum. Instead we flounder in scandal and misdirection.
This was my shortlisted entry into the Ben Pimlott Essay Prize. The winning entry, by Rowland Manthorpe, was published by The Guardian last week.
Read close, o my best beloved, and picture the scene. It is a cold and idle weekday in February. The dance-floor at L— Nightclub is barely a third full. The clientele are young, but in this light it is difficult to be sure that they are over eighteen. Many wear those jumpers with hoods you will have seen in photographs. Thin girls in white denim dresses have braids in their hair. Three youths in turbans lurk in the corner, by the dirty pillar that blocks the view from the bar.
Chunky hip-hop performer ‘Sway’ saunters on stage with the arrogance of a MOBO winner (for that is what he is). Behind him bounces his accompanist for this evening, DJ Turkish. They are both wearing Union Jack tea towels over their faces, like patriotic bank robbers. “These rappers couldn’t see me coming if they were vaginas with spectacles,” shouts Sway, before telling us a story about the mysterious Land of Harveynicks. The entertainment has begun.
We are in Edinburgh, Scotland’s capital – yes, you know it well, my friend! – in the shadow of the famous castle, where legions of tourists flock each summer to watch the tartan fuelled military tattoo. It is a place where English residents of the city complain that, these days, it is being over-run by Australians. It is a place where a man with a Ghanaian name is reciting American-inspired slam poetry, to a beat hammered out by a Turk from North London. And what of this young audience? Believe me when I tell you, if you were to conquer the countries of their parents, then truly the sun would never set upon your Empire.
Let us be clear, so we make no mistake. Your task in 2009 will be to unite all these people: The tartan tattoo day-trippers, the snobbish English students, the sullen Sikhs… and Sway, who waves the Union Jack proudly, just as you asked. You must convince them that they are one people, and that they all belong to the same privileged club. You must describe the values and the traditions that they must learn to love.
Continue reading