Kmflett's Blog

Beard Liberation Front

PRESS RELEASE 30th October

contact BLF Organiser Keith Flett 07803 167266

Tory MP Jonathan Gullis voted Scary Beard of Halloween

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, which campaigns against irrational prejudice against the hirsute, has said that the crypt has creaked firmly open on the Scariest Beard of Halloween 2022 poll with Tory MP Jonathan Gullis shaving GB News presenter Neil Oliver for the annual Award

Laurence Fox and Ted Cruz won the first round of voting and were joined by Neil Oliver and Jonathan Gullis in the final Follicle Frenzy round. Gullis shaved Oliver 46%  to 28%

The title, awarded each year on October 31st, takes a wry look at Halloween festivities by identifying the scariest beard in the public eye. The winner often wins by the narrowest crack of a squeaky floorboard.

The BLF does not generally believe that beards are scary, a view promoted by generations of pogonophobes.

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, facial hair is part of Halloween tradition. We aim every year to subvert some of the pogonophobia that lies behind that,  while looking in a light hearted way at ‘scary’ beards. Jonathan Gullis lost his Ministerial job this week so hopefully he will see his victory as a consolation

Scary Beard of Halloween 2022

James Corden

Richard Branson

Laurence Fox

Ted Cruz

Neil Hamilton

Jonathan Gullis MP

Neil Oliver

David Warner

Jack’O’Lanterns, Pumpkins & the Hobgoblin of Communism

The pumpkin of course is a relatively modern part of Halloween, the invented tradition originating from America.

The doesn’t mean that there was no tradition, although until the twentieth century it seems to have been confined mainly to Ireland, Scotland, Wales and Somerset(see Ronald Hutton, Stations of the Sun). The vegetables used traditionally for a jack’o’lantern were either turnips or mangel wurzels.

Hutton notes that they were ‘carved out with grotesque faces to represent spirits or goblins’.

In that context its worth keeping in mind that the opening line of the Communist Manifesto talks of not a ‘spectre’ haunting Europe but as the original English translation by Helen Macfarlane in the Chartist Red Republican paper in November 1850 had it, a ‘frightful hobgoblin’ stalks Europe.

On reaching State Pension Age (66). Thanks to the NHS

Indeed I am 66 today, being born on 31st October 1956 as the Russian tanks swept into Budapest & just as Britain, France and Israel were starting the debacle that was Suez.

Clearly I learnt my politics at birth.

I’m not a great fan of birthdays, although they are statistically significant-as I now qualify for a State pension, but as an historian one does note the passage of time.

Reaching 66 is something of a landmark since there were at least two occasions earlier in the year when it was more likely than not that I would not. Thanks to all at the University Hospital Cardiff and perhaps in particular to a nurse called Cerys for bringing me back to the land of the living on the second occasion. As the consultant noted, if I was a cat I would have used up one of my nine lives then.

My partner Megan has helped a lot to restore me to something like working order since I was discharged from hospital in mid-July

Hopefully the coming year will not be so eventful health wise. I remain working as an elected union officer because even at 66 there is no home but the struggle.

Anyway on my birthday I’m in Cardiff,(but I still live of course in Tottenham)

In addition the beard is still flourishing

I may have a beer….

Beard Liberation Front

30th October

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has congratulated the left candidate Lula on his victory in the second round of Brazil’s Presidential Election.

Lula shaved fascist opponent Bolonsaro with 50.71% of the votes cast.

The campaigners say that while Lula has been accused by some of trimming his beard has survived years of State barberism.

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, congratulations to Lula. Ultimately clean shaven fascists like Bolsonaro are always bound to lose

When the BBC banned the Monster Mash

The Monster Mash by the Crypt Kicker Five is one of the most well known Halloween tracks, albeit it is quite light hearted by modern standards.

However when it was first released in 1962 the BBC banned it on the grounds it was ‘too morbid’ Hmmm.

Times change, the Sixties happened and by 1973 it was unbanned and reached No.3 in the charts

The quite lengthy story of the song is on Wiki

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monster_Mash

As interesting as the ten year ban is how Bobby Pickett has kept the song current in popular culture for sixty years. A story of changing times where themes and imagery appeal across the decades.

Alternatively if you like the similarly named popular snack the answer is pickled onion

Ambridge Socialist

30^th October

Plans for Hunt Ball protest

Mia on induction training at Lower Loxley has noted that rich people have too many coats. The BBC has failed to report the Stop the Borsetshire Hunt plans for a protest outside the forthcoming Hunt Ball, backed by the Ambridge Socialist. However it did report Mia and Brad discussing a protest which form part of the wider action. We plan unity talks

Halloween in Ambridge

Kate has got Lilian to play the witch in the Ambridge Halloween activities, based around the rewilding project. In the view of the Ambridge Socialist witches are good people. At least Kirsty has condemned the commercialised American Halloween, while of course then re-enacting it in Ambridge

Kate is back

As pleasant as normal

Chelsea, Ben, Beth and Roooth too

Chelsea is to have an abortion next week. Ben is going through a crisis which has impacted Beth and now Roooth has become involved. As Ben often notes Chelsea is the key person here and we might usefully hear from her more in the coming days. In the meantime Beth and Ben need counselling, although unfortunately in Ambridge this often means a chat with Kenton in the Bull

Marx at Halloween: capitalism & vampires

Capital is dead labour, that, vampire-like, only lives by sucking living labour, and lives the more, the more labour it sucks. The time during which the labourer works, is the time during which the capitalist consumes the labour-power he has purchased of him.

Marx, Capital, Volume I, Chapter 10 (1867)

Tory Ministers places at Oxbridge threatened by ‘fist pumping’ Wokerati

New figures from the Sutton Trust (Times 27^th October) have revealed that 65% of Rishi Sunak’s Cabinet were educated at fee paying schools. 45% of the Cabinet went to Oxford or Cambridge Universities as Sunak did himself. Sunak is the fifth Premier in a row to go to Oxford.

However there could be trouble ahead. The Daily Telegraph (29^th October) has revealed that Oxford and Cambridge Universities have taken steps to reduce students from fee paying schools and take more for comprehensives.

Melvyn Roffe who is head of the Headmasters and Headmistresses Conference, which promotes fee paying schools, has claimed that Oxford University admissions tutors are ‘fist bumping in glee’ at taking fewer fee paying pupils. It is not reported as to whether they were tofu eaters or not.

Surely this is what Tory policy calls ‘levelling up’

In the interests of transparency the author went to Alexandra Park Comprehensive School, Muswell Hill  and obtained a PhD from University College London

E P Thompson on the clocks going back & time discipline

Clocks have gone forward or back in Britain to mark summer or winter time for around a century. There are debates about how daylight is lost or gained as a result and the impact of this and these continue.

Behind that however lies an industrial obsession with time and the market capitalist idea (also in a related sense an idea of state directed capitalism, in terms of how much could be produced and how quickly) that time is money.

A common theme of the clocks going back for winter is that those who are not working overnight will get an extra hour in bed. The subtext there is perhaps whether an extra hour not doing something is necessarily a good idea.

EP Thompson’s Time, Work Discipline which appeared in Past and Present in 1967, almost 60 years ago, remains a foundation text.

To give a brief flavour, he writes of ‘Smilesian snippets about humble men who by rising early and diligence made good’. He continues that as workers secured reductions in working hours moralists became concerned that ‘manual workers after concluding their work were left with several hours in the day to be spent nearly as they please’.

How time is used or not used is political

London Socialist Historians Group

Socialist History Seminar Mon 7^th November 5.30pm. ‘Mrs McCheyne’ a forgotten activist in the East London Federation of Suffragettes

Jane McChrystal and Anne Padfield. The Splendid Mrs McCheyne & the East London Federation of Suffragettes.

Free on Zoom

Register: https://www.history.ac.uk/events/splendid-mrs-mccheyne-east-london-federation-suffragettes

Jane McChrystal writes “The Splendid Mrs McCheyne and the East London Federation of Suffragettes” tells the story of an unsung heroine of ELFS who worked tirelessly in the “back room” supporting brave women such as Nellie Cressall and Annie Barnes, whose names have lived on, in their struggles on behalf of the women, men and children of the East End. Sylvia Pankhurst wrote this about her: ” All the ELFS’ members know Mrs McCheyne, for she was one of our first recruits in East London, and has always been one of our hardest workers, having served on the ELFS Social Committees and in many other ways as well as Joint Honorary Secretary in Bromley”.

I first came across her name in the minutes of ELFS’ committee meetings and was struck by how often she attended and, yet, how infrequently she spoke or was mentioned there. Intrigued, I resolved to find out whatever I could about her. In the course of my investigation, I was fortunate to be put in touch with her relative, Anne Padfield, who was able to tell me all about her origins, family and the life she led after ELFS.

Sylvia Pankhurst left behind a record of her years as the leader of ELFS in her collected papers, which proved an invaluable source of background material for “The Splendid Mrs McCheyne”. My own research into the key political and social changes in the late nineteenth century and first half of the twentieth century provides an historical context for Rosaline’s life and work, while an interview with Anne Padfield gives a fascinating insight into the woman her family knew.