The propaganda of ‘the economy’

 

This is the lie the neoliberals want us to believe:

Schools and workplaces must remain open for the well-being of all. Schools and workplaces are essential for the economy. A healthy economy such as the one we had before the pandemic was good for everyone. Humans who can’t attend school or work will suffer mental health problems. Without school, children will become lazy, undisciplined and dumb, without jobs adults will become lazy, unproductive and dependent on government welfare.

Here are some truths:

Schools and universities have been slowly but surely evolving into training institutions to produce workers that are useful for the economy. Workplaces have slowly but surely been de-unionised for the sole purpose of profit which is not shared with the workers. The economy we had before the pandemic gushed money to the top, the trickle down only kept workers one or two paydays away from defaulting on mortgage payments to the banks or rent payments to landlords. The fear of losing the roof over your head is the main cause of mental health issues arising from lockdowns. Children are naturally curious learning machines and for eons, long before the invention of ‘the economy’, humans have cooperatively worked together to efficiently and creatively meet their needs and wants and solve the problems of surviving and thriving.

Don’t be fooled by the propaganda.

Bricks and Mortar

Book Face at Erina Fair, NSW, Australia

Gnostic Forest at Woy Woy, NSW, Australia

My short story collection, “Dead People Don’t Make Jam”, is now available for sale at two outlets on the Central Coast of NSW, Australia. If you’re a Coastie, or in the region, drop in and support our local Bricks and Mortar retailers – nothing like a real shop.

Looking ahead, not getting ahead

Sunday 14th June, 2020

5.58am

It’s raining again. 100% humidity in winter. Mobile phones warn of moisture detected. It’s hard to recall the feeling of that last hot dry summer. The royal commission into the bushfires publishes testimonies of unimaginable horror and analyses of inadequate preparations and responses, yet,  I can’t fully remember or reimagine what it was like, back then. There is the present to deal with; a new set of dramas unfolding. Disease and the economy. Systemic racism being exposed in our institutions. Not even our beloved artists are exempt from this new revision of history and culture. People are massing. Lip service from politicians representing governments that fail to enact the recommendations of repeated inquiries will no longer suffice. Do something, we scream. People now demanding change. COVID -19 a trigger point, the historians of the future will write. The real issues have nothing to do with a biological virus and everything to do with social justice. If the world is not ending just yet, it feels that the era of unfettered individualism has run its course. The “human race”, that ridiculous scramble to “get ahead”, is over. Who do we want to get ahead of? Our brothers and sisters? The other team? Some other state or nation? There is no fundamental right to “get ahead”. We survive and thrive as a society, not as billions of individuals racing against each other. The fires and the droughts and the relentless ocean and the mutating viruses remind us that money and fame, titles and degrees, and beauty and personal health, mean nothing when mother settles the score.

I Protest!

My poem, “Wake Up and Smell the Humans”, has been published in an anthology of poetry of dissent.

Ginninderra Press have just released an anthology of poetry, “I Protest!”

“In these poems of protest and dissent are to be found anger, anxiety, compassion, insight and sharp observation, expressed in the way that is the special gift of poets. There’s humour too, to leaven the more serious poems. I Protest! once again demonstrates the Australia-wide breadth of talent in the ranks of poets who have been published by Ginninderra Press. This is a collection to savour, to ponder and to celebrate.”

The book is available for purchase from the publisher’s website: HERE

Note that Ginninderra Press currently have a 20% COVID discount available.

Interview: Flash Frontier

A big thank you to the editors at Flash Frontier, originally for publishing my flash fiction piece, “Foundation Song”, and now interviewing me about my writing and new book, “Dead People Don’t Make Jam”.

 

Click on the image below to go to the latest edition of their magazine:

 

Click on the image below to go to the interview:

Painting by Oliver Jeffers

 

Click on the image below to find my story “Foundation Song”, first published in Flash Frontier in April, 2015:

Allen Forrest, German Expressionism revisited

So

Long Jetty, NSW, Australia, Southern Hemisphere, Earth, Solar System, Universe

 

 

So, the world keeps spinning

it hasn’t slowed one iota.

Though the rumbling has subsided,

so say the seismologists.

 

So, consequentially,

due to such spinning,

the sun still rises and yes it still sets.

She never stops moving

either,latitudinally by the season,

or, longitudinally by the hour

 

So, we get out when we can,

to bathe in the reddened light,

and the digital cameras still work

for the moment that is.

 

So, in the light of the day,

when totally lost in the wonder of just being,

when unrushed and unharried,

don’t feel tempted to hug the nearest stranger,

lest you be called a silly so and so.

Juicy Worms

Since I recently came out as an author, people have been saying to me, “Well this whole corona virus thing must be providing you with lots of material to write about.”

The problem is that I spent a good fifty years living, working and pondering the world before I understood it well enough to scratch out a story or seven.

Essentially, I see the world as a winner take all capitalist economy that pretends to be a civilisation. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not a pessimist. I also see the world chock-a-block full of decent, kind, generous, hard working, funny and creative people, who everyday punch out loving and meaningful lives.

Now, everything has changed. I haven’t got a clue what to write about.

Now that I know firsthand how long it takes to write a book, then edit the thing, then get it accepted by a publisher, and then for the publisher to get it out in print and/or e-book, I’m thinking, “Hell’s Bells, what on Earth will the world be like at that point in the future!”

I do have another collection of short stories I was working on for my second book. But will they be relevant anymore, after the pandemic? When people are permitted to un-isolate themselves, who knows what decisions will be made about the economy? Will it, as I fear, be a simple matter of kick-starting the beast back into action. Business as usual. Back to work folks, debts to be paid off, got to keep the economy growing. Or will we wake up a bit and understand that a growing economy is the problem and not the solution?

In the meantime, I’ll scratch around a bit. The chooks out in the backyard have taught me a few things. Don’t stop scratching, there’s a juicy worm or two out there in the dirt.

Uncertainty Reigns

I’m not sure what I am going to be allowed to do tomorrow.

Things are changing rapidly.

There are new rules for Australia everyday and then there are the rules for NSW. When the day dawns, this Monday, I’ll turn on the transistor radio to get an update. This may, or may not, enlighten me as to whether or not I’ll be working later this week, and, if walking to the beach for a swim will be banned or frowned upon as NON ESSENTIAL.

But here’s something I do know:

from 23 March to 30 June Ginninderra Press are offering all customers 20% discount on purchases made through the Ginninderra Press website – just enter COVID in the coupon code box.

It looks like this:

Click on image above, or HERE, to take advantage of this fabulous reading opportunity.

Shameless marketing of my own book, I know! But, you can of course buy any book you desire from the fabulous collection of Australian Literature published by Ginninderra Press.

Take care everybody.

Apparently

Image courtesy of

David Clode

Apparently, now is the time to get on with all those creative ideas that we’ve had bubbling away on that back burner in our brain. Because, apparently, up ‘til now we’ve been so occupied by sprinting flat out in the human race to get ahead, that there has been no spare time or energy left over for pursuits, such as writing or sketching or nurturing a garden.

Apparently, we are so programmed to achieve, that even in lockdown, or self isolation, we need to still be productive!

Or, what about being nice to others, and reconnecting with family and loved ones. Apparently, we haven’t be doing enough of that while we’ve working, or searching for work, to keep that roof over our heads and food on the table.

Now, if creative pursuits or human relationships aren’t your thing, apparently, according to fifty squillion emails in my Junk folder, the winding down of the rat race is the perfect time to make a small fortune with bitcoins! Apparently, even while a microscopic life form is teaching us an important lesson about the dangers of exponential growth, the economy still trumps everything else.

How about we just have a rest? Put up the feet and shift the nervous and endocrine systems into neutral. Do that for as long as required. Let our own minds and bodies decide when we’re ready to go again. Apparently, that could be good for our health.

Happy Leap Day

This date only happens every four years. Is it called Leap Day? I could check on Google but that would take me away from writing and I want to write, not Google. Let’s call it Leap Day.

So, I wrote a story:

Life and Death Are Not Simple Matters

On Leap Day, it is traditional to move around the place in small leaps and to eat frog legs for dinner. Frog leg eating has been banned due to the severe lack of frogs, due to the severe lack of reliable weather, due to the severe lack of humans doing anything about spewing mega tonnes of carbon dioxide into the air.

Read the rest HERE