Screenshot: Delegate from Northumberland at Labour Party Conference. <\/i><\/p>\n
It\u2019s great that DiEM25 and I say this because I want to talk\u00a0 \u2013 not so much about the direct threat posed to Operating across boundaries is at the heart of this She contrasts this with the way that rightwing populists and The truth is that the Bannonite leaders of Europe cannot Take a recent classic example from For This Of course inequality creates far too many victims in our In renewing our democratic culture, our strength will never \u201cThe That is why I urge you tonight, in your Call to Action, don\u2019t That is a pluralist democratic culture, one sorely needed back \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 ***<\/p>\n I end with a suggestion. I don\u2019t know if any of you saw that \u201cDelegates \u201cI Here\u2019s Let\u2019s It Screenshot: Delegate from Northumberland at Labour Party Conference. It\u2019s great that DiEM25 and DiEMVoice, our arts platform, are here at Central Saint Martins tonight. I\u2019ve been looking at your Creative Unions response to the triggering of Article 50. And I think this call to demonstrate that creativity must operate across borders and boundaries couldn\u2019t be…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1044","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1044","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1044"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1044\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1044"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1044"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1044"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nDiEMVoice, our arts platform, are here at Central Saint Martins tonight. I\u2019ve
\nbeen looking at your Creative
\nUnions response<\/em> to the
\ntriggering of Article 50. And I think this
\ncall to demonstrate that creativity must operate across borders and boundaries
\ncouldn\u2019t be a
\nbetter starting point for us. <\/p>\n
\nour beleagured democracies by what Yanis rightly calls the nationalist
\nneofascist international \u2013 as about its challenge to a cultural politics of
\nself and other that I believe is all around us.<\/p>\n
\nchallenge. As Inna
\nShevchenko, the exiled Ukrainian leader of FEMEN says, \u201cDemocracy is not
\nonly about counting silent hands\u2026 it is about allowing the confrontation of
\ndifferent opinions; many, many voices; about public debates, discussions and
\ndisagreements too.\u201d\u00a0 These are
\n\u2018discussions and disagreements\u2019 where people listen to each other, and may
\nchange their minds about what is the right or the winning position, because, as
\nShevchenko says, \u201cWe all have multiple identities and we also have multiple
\nanswers.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nextreme nationalists aim instead to divide society \u201cby reducing people to only
\none identity, only one adjective; by creating clashes between groups, groups
\nthat live in the same way, think in the same way, practise their religion in
\nthe same way. Then, they claim to represent these groups, manipulating
\nsocieties by playing on the fear and insecurity of individuals.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nthrive in societies that are confident about crossing borders. \u00a0If \u201cBrexit means Brexit\u201d, it is because the
\n\u2018people\u2019s will\u2019, this unitary sovereign will they are so fond of invoking, must
\nbe beyond question or change. The Bannonites only thrive in a profoundly
\nunequal Us and Them society, secured from its enemies without and within by the
\nstrong man who can act with
\nimpunity, breaking all the rules on behalf of the \u2018real people\u2019, people who are
\nonly readily convinced that they are winning if someone else is losing out.<\/p>\n
\nItaly. This August,
\nusing his loudspeaker, a train conductor ordered \u201cgypsies and molesters\u201d to get
\noff the train on the grounds that they were \u201cpissing off\u201d the other passengers,
\npresumably the \u2018real passengers\u2019. \u00a0As a
\npublic official he was picking up on the wishes of Deputy Prime Minister
\nSalvini, who had recently announced his intention of opening a file on the Roma
\npeople, regretting having \u201cto keep\u201d ones holding Italian citizenship, as he put
\nit. Matteo Salvini now promptly returns the compliment on his Facebook page, by
\npublicly naming the passenger who had reported this discriminatory act, and calling
\ninstead for support for the official. As a result, the passenger received more than 50,000<\/em> messages \u2013 the usual
\nmixture of sarcastic, intimidating and menacing.<\/p>\n
\nDiEM25, the passenger operating across boundaries is the imaginative democrat here,
\na victory in itself against the Nationalist International. But what of the
\n50,000, a force proliferating enemy images and en route<\/em> to violence? If we are to reinvent our democratic cultures,
\nwe need the skills to be able to reach out across those boundaries and change
\npeople\u2019s minds. And for that, my premise is that we need a culture of \u201copenness
\nand generosity\u201d that acknowledges vulnerability as a strength. <\/p>\n
\nis why I am concerned at the shift in the meaning of the \u2018safe space\u2019 that has
\ntaken place in my lifetime. During the euphemistically-called \u2018Irish troubles\u2019,
\na \u2018safe space\u2019 was the place where brave Catholic and Protestant individuals,
\nand the very brave people who brought them together, would meet to work out a
\nbetter way forward than violent conflict. In these conflict resolution spaces, whatever
\nthe power imbalances between the parties, and regardless of the conflict raging
\noutside, for the duration those present were equal. They were mutually vulnerable,
\nface to face and crossing boundaries to overcome the enemy images and change
\neach others\u2019 minds. \u00a0How different is the
\n\u2018safe space of today\u2019? \u2013 an identity politics that demands recognition and
\nstate protection for socio-economic groups unjustly marginalised, by securing
\nthem from the Other<\/em>, in a borderless
\nspace free from threatening conflict, criticism, or too unsettling debate.<\/p>\n
\nsocieties today, but this victim culture worries me. Because the nationalists
\nand the xenophobes are all too quick to capitalise on the worst aspects of a securitising
\nrelationship to the Other, with its repertoire of anger, authenticity,
\ntruth-speaking and public presence and its retreat to \u2018people like us\u2019.
\nWrit
\nlarge, under their leadership, we can see in country after country the
\nemergence of aggrieved majorities<\/em>,
\nencouraged by their political representatives to perceive themselves as the
\nreal people, the \u2018National
\nUs\u2019, unfairly victimised by some Other \u2013 let us say a few thousand migrants
\ndestitute on European shores whose arrival has triggered a major political
\ncrisis throughout the European Union.<\/p>\n
\nrely on force, whether the force of numbers or the strong man with his warlike
\nqualities, but in sharing time and time again the creativity, and yes the
\npleasure and joy that is released in that moment when we are not frightened of
\nthe multiple identities and multiple answers in each of us. Theatre people surely know
\nthis in their core, because theatre happens in those spaces between the
\ndifferent worlds that people are. \u201cEven in political theatre\u201d, as Harold Pinter
\nsaid in his famous Nobel
\nlecture: <\/p>\n
\ncharacters must be allowed to breathe their own air. The author cannot confine
\nand constrict them to satisfy his own taste or disposition or prejudice. He
\nmust be prepared to approach them from a variety of angles, from a full and
\nuninhibited range of perspectives, take them by surprise, perhaps, occasionally,
\nbut nevertheless give them the freedom to go which way they will.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nmove too swiftly to what binds us together in the Creative Union. Let us
\ninstead freezeframe the previous precious moment, which is the crossing of
\ngeographical borders, social borders, borders of all kinds \u2013 that openness to
\nwhat is different when the outcome hangs in the balance for all, when \u2013 as I
\nbelieve creatives know \u2013 whole new worlds can appear.<\/p>\n
\nhere in Brexit Britain, where two aggrieved majoritarian National Us\u2019s have
\nbeen so busy tearing our political fabric apart.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
\ninteresting moment at Labour Party conference when a young delegate from Northumberland, confronting a sea of
\nenthusiastic Remainer activists fresh from an impressive demonstration on the Liverpool seafront, was the first speaker to come out clearly against the People\u2019s
\nVote. He said: <\/p>\n
\nshould remember what people feel about a \u2018people\u2019s vote\u2019 in places like my
\nconstituency in Blyth Valley where we
\nvoted overwhelmingly to leave<\/em>.<\/em> I am not against
\nEurope. I myself am a European, from a third generation Polish refugee family
\nexpelled after the war. But now I believe the European Union to be a capitalist
\nclub that is for the few, not the many.<\/p>\n
\nimplore you all, come to Blyth Valley, go to Bowes Court where the buildings
\nare crumbling behind St. Wilfrid\u2019s Catholic church. Go to Cowpen ward. Tell them<\/em> why you want us to remain, and go
\nto Kitty Brewster, where for too long they\u2019ve felt marginalised like they have not had their voices heard<\/em>.\u201d
\n(my italics)<\/p>\n
\nmy idea. Why can\u2019t we say, yes? Let us cross the boundaries between Us and Them,
\ngeographical, class, age barriers and so many other borders. Let\u2019s bring the
\nmetropolitan Remainers to Bowes Court, St Wilfrid\u2019s Catholic church, Cowpen
\nward, so that we can all get to know each other better. <\/p>\n
\nask ourselves why neither side in the Brexit debate and none of the main
\npolitical parties, have ever thought to propose and enable this \u2013 why they
\nincite us, scare us or maybe just manage us \u2013 but never invite us onto the
\nstage of history to meet each other and change each others\u2019 minds, confident
\nthat our differences can be mutually revealing and that we Leavers and
\nRemainers can build a better future together? <\/p>\n
\nis my belief that we will never renew our democracies until we the people, in
\nall <\/strong>our diversity, come onto that
\nstage of history in our own right, once and for all. I\u2019m hoping that you will
\nagree that this is a job worthy of the best creative minds. And thank you for
\nlistening.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"