The following words I can only apologize for, they are the result of too much festive wine, too many conversations in the early hours. 

What does it mean to be single and in you're 30's?  What are the causes of this condition? I think about this often as I'm about to turn 32 and I'm still single. Its not that I can't get dates, I can, I'm just shit at them. What makes it all the more frightening is that a friend told me last night to pull my finger out because I'm only getting older. My looks wont last and I'll end up in my 40's still single and less likely to have that all important date because wrinkles are having an orgy on my face. I've quit smoking because I'd thought about that myself, I've been hitting the gym and toned up quite nicely.  I still talk shit over a coffee though. We seem to be spending so much time on the exterior. Maybe I should start reading Austen...I've always hated all that and maybe thats what needs to change. I killed my romantic self debating empiricism and economics. I've stopped watching soaps, romance movies, most TV in general and I think this might be the problem.  I have no frame of reference with other people. This is insane since I'm supposed to be a social scientist. I spent years pouring over kinship arrangements, folk tales...lives. One of the things social science does not do these days is look at our current narratives as shared narratives.  We try to read into the current economic climate, wax lyrical about feminisms, multiple family structures and deconstruct gender norms. We never watch life for how it expresses itself. Yes there are power differences between those who write, perform and broadcast Eastenders that should make us doubt its authenticity but millions of people watch it. I think I'm calling for an anthropology of the soaps.  How much could be learnt from exploring people's reactions to narratives?  Quite a lot, I think. It might also help me find a man.  Maybe I can learn something about myself by exploring subjectivities as performed for mass consumption and debate. Does the latest drama in the Vic or the Rovers Return effect how people behave? How many have become closer friends through debating the finer points of Mitchell family morality?  Who has had their romance levels increased as a result of soap born inspiration? 

What would be the narrative of the single 30's gay man? That question makes me queasy because it means I'd have to look at the pre 30's years.  Its demanding a Freudian exploration of the self to try and stop the record of singledom repeating - an effort to hit the shuffle button just as you're settled into routine. The soap 30's single gay man is still a pretty rare breed. We had Queer as Folk of course, Stuart Allen Jones, the slag of Manchester.  Well thats not me, I don't have the confidence for that. Vince? Probably, but with more wine consumption. The problem is that if you're a gay man in the soaps, your plot tends to be about finding acceptance. This means to some large degree conforming to 'heteronormativity' as a way of lowering the threat level you pose to the rest of society. A more recent example is that presented in Eastenders.  Here there are two issues of character and culture playing with - quite literally 'square' life - machismo and Islam. Syed Masood and Christian Clarke dance the dance of both sets of restrictions in their own ways whilst in reality Marc Elliott and John Partridge are anything but those stereotypes. However, so much of what it means to simply be with another man (or not) at this age is lost to these two great monoliths. Being single in your thirties is hard, and actually contravening the 'square' life of heteronormativity. 

There is something not quite 'normal' about it.  If you were a descent person, you'd have found someone already.... Its that constant suspicion of society and of ourselves that drives our singledom. Our space is waiting for us but the inability to find someone to walk into it with us makes the doors seemingly close on our own futures. Both society and ourselves are slamming those metaphorical doors shut. Is being single radically 'Queer' or just radically stupid? Do we have a choice?

Remembering a different fallen.

I wrote this piece for Goldsmiths 'Smiths' magazine in 2010.  I put it here now as the US pulls out of Iraq. So many died needlessly on all sides and its easy to forget them, this was how I got my reminder. 

After spending nearly two months on the same bus going to St Paul’s every morning and back every night I had gotten particularly sick of the caustic yet monotonous voice announcing the same stops over and over again. This particular morning however I noticed that I hadn’t even noticed the voice at all, enveloped by the News Quiz on my ipod. Sandi had drowned out bus woman, or had I simply stopped listening, had I become one of those blank public transport faces I recognised as ‘A Londoner’? Gone were the days when only a few weeks before I would nervously listen out for ‘Fetter Lane’ and walk downstairs far too early, announcing to all and sundry that I didn’t know where I was going, I was new at this, a 172 ‘newbie’. Not any more, and I comforted myself with the fact that despite my 'knowingness', I was not yet faceless. People looked at me bewildered, as I chuckled with the Radio 4 audience.

This morning the traffic was gone, the schools were out and Fleet Street was slowing down for Christmas. It was early, it was a weekend and Fleet Street is the stone park of London at the weekend, you can actually breathe here. As I walked down towards the mighty dome of St Pauls I noticed another Church on my right. St Brides, I was struck by the beauty of the spire, the wedding cake levels desperately reaching skyward from within the strangle hold of finance and big business. It could almost have been a minaret and as I stood there I expected to hear the adhan, but it never came. The gates were open and I decided to take a look. At first glance the church looked old enough, although the cement façade decorated to resemble stone blocks gave away its relative youth, but the feel was unquestionable, this was old, the gates were old, the square was old, the paving leading to it was old, and I preferred ‘old’. On inspection the church had been demolished by a bomb during the blitz and re-built due to the kindness of business and royalty alike.

The building was deserted, no tourists, no worshippers, no clergy and, beautiful. In a way you almost feel as if you are violating the space when a church is this quiet. I say hello to God in my head, to break the silence, my foot-steps ringing in the naive. As I walked down the body of the church I noticed names on the pews, people I’d never heard of, bankers, journalists, sponsorships from various companies, impersonal to me. On approach the Lady Chapel was simple, alter and a rail to pray on etc. Then I noticed the wall to the left, names again, listed in the fashion of World War memorialisation, from the blitz? But dates were wrong. They were recent. People who had died in Iraq. People from the BBC, NBC, Al Jazeera, and more. A friend had been fretting about his partner (a journalist) going on hostage training, being a hostage. Personal. All night vigils had been held here for John McCarthy and Terry Anderson. I saw Daniel Pearl’s name and remembered the video, fear, nausea and a palpable chill enveloped my neck. It was supposed to. Then, on the alter, just behind a gathering of anonymous faces who were quickly gathering personality, you could see him, Daniel Pearl, looking back at you. For some reason this was shocking to me, the eyes were bright, happy and young. Somehow it felt wrong to see his face, I felt ashamed, we had seen him die. There was a heat behind my eyes now, the sea of faces, old and young, that had been searching for truth, were now searching my eyes.

I heard laughter from my earphones, it cracked the silence. I gathered myself and left, faceless, ashamed, proud.

Polly Put the Kettle On.

Its a cold November night and I was in the pub after a successful march on Westminster, the first time I have ever felt compelled to march for anything other than my sexuality. The tv switched to Sky News and there before me was something I had only seen in my childhood, people standing up to a Conservative government. The debate at the table quickly led to the morality of smashing up a building, then it became a desire to witness the event. After seeing some of the fallout of earlier disobedience in the 80's I was a little reluctant to go, but go I did.

The police number was higher than had been on the tv but the high visibility jackets you saw on the news were gone aside from those in the courtyard, this was a brigade decked in black. We walked past them hiding round the corner and spoke to some of the people still hanging around the front, one man in his 60's has just come out to get some tea. The athmosphere was calm, maybe a little confused, people taking in what had just happened.

Then they started to move. At first preventing passers by from entering the area as we had just done. They moved out from the side of the building then along the river wall, silently trapping us in. It was at this point that I realised why the G20 had gone wrong. Standing there faced with a wall of annonymous shields and battons is intimidating, you cannot get out now and they are coming for you. Its a classic fight or flight complex, yet nothing happened. They did not move and after the initial shock of being penned in people began to chat, some over the phone, others to strangers and friends on the other side of the wall. Concerned as to what was going to happen I went with a friend to ask one of the officers what was going on. They did not know was the response, they were told to hold us in place and that was all for now. Their orders were incomplete, thats part of the power complex perhaps and they seemed quite happy not knowing, they are used to not knowing, they hadn't put the kettle on after all.

As we stood there talking and waiting the 'kettle' got smaller and we got to know each other,we had begun to 'bubble,' there were students, members of staff and members of the public, we were a mix, Goldsmiths, SOAS, Sussex and quite a few retirees . It was a networking opportunity and many people siezed it. As the waiting drew on people began to get restless, needing the toilet was a major concern that received no sympathy. So to pass the time the students and police began talking. One of the officers I spoke to was bewailing the second hand equipment they have, apparetly their CB's are ex BA, they were used to strikes at least. Then one by one the police from the other side of the line began picking people out for questioning and searches. The kettle got smaller still as the crowd pressed to that side, eager to be let out. The freed began chanting our rights not to answer questions or be searched or photographed. One man showed his business card to the police at the edge and began shouting legislation to us about our rights, he was escorted further away and taped off, away from us.

After over two hours confined my turn came and even though the police had been polite I was cold, desperate to piss and hungry, I was in short, maliable. This is the purpose of the exercise, they wanted information. They did not know who had been a 'criminal' and who hadn't. The good thing was I had not been involved and so couldn't give anything away, I had nothing to hide. If they were trying to match my face to cctv at least thats time spent on nothing I thought. Speaking to my questioning offer I finished by pointing out that whilst maybe it had gone a bit far, the banks were a more deserving target as they were holding the purse strings behind the whole thing. The officer smirked, placed a finger to his lips and quietly said, 'I know, but I can't say anything.' I was marched on to the video camera,

'Name and date of birth..'

'Daniel Nield, 22 of January 1980.'

'Turn around'

I did a twirl for them and I was free, but I was cataloged. I'm a model of dissent now and to be honest I feel like a fraud. I broke nothing, but maybe in that one officer I did break something, maybe the kettle has sprung a leak...

The real problem is all around us.....

On the 9^th December 2010 we have seen the most violence from both sides of the student/police divide but having spoken to people on both sides and having witnessed some horrendous injures I question the logic of this stand off at all.

In previous protests I've noticed that the police were in some instances sympathetic to the students, and that they too are feeling the pinch of the cuts. This was again the case today and perhaps despite the violence, more so. One officer spoke of his personal wish to be in support of the students, at this point I asked why he was standing on the police side of the line if that was the case. He said that they had to uphold the rule of law. The counter was obvious, I pointed out that if he didn't agree with the current vote for many of the same reasons as the protesters then he couldn't agree with the system making the law he was protecting, namely Parliament and MP's. He laughed but it was an awkward laugh, he knew.

The outline is simple and more focussed because of the subject; education has always in some way given preference to the rich and this transfers into who holds power. Today those who pushed the vote to increase tuition fees are on the whole millionaires and public school educated people. I am not speaking of all MP's of course, what I am noting is that even if an MP wishes to vote against a bill and their own government, the system allows that government to bully them into compliance. It is no coincidence that the vast majority of the cabinet are of the mega rich ilk, they control the whips and thus the vote, wallet and livelihood of their MP's and their constituents. You think you are voting in an individual, don't, you're voting in a servant. By extension too the police are being bullied, they have to pay their bills. It makes it easier to hit a child over the head when you know its helping you to feed your own perhaps? The police are fed an ideal of the fairness of the law, its their self protecting discourse, through this they hide from reflection. Yet as that officer who laughed knew, their law is put together by a group of people who practice little more than economic apartheid and also coincidentally, either directly or indirectly manipulate their bills and way of life though commerce as well as law.

What should be happening now is to find a way for all of us to work against a system that has fundamentally trapped everyone. One option is to turn on the systems of capitalist life that trap us and we need to do it together: the banks, the corporations, the marketing, the landowners, the law and of course, parliament. I'm not saying riot, since 'we're all in this together', I'm saying make them explain everything, administer them, slow them down, cost them money, make them pay for every inch of their power whilst at the same time helping each other. Students have been calling this movement the 'The Big Society' and they are right, I have seen more kindness and community in these past few hours than I have in years, strangers feeding each other, clothing each other, picking each other up off the floor and people simply talking; across gender, age, class and race. It takes guts to start questioning what goes on everyday but we have started and we need to do it more, argue every bill, start asking shops where their produce comes from and how much the workers get paid, mend your old clothes, write to the papers, blog, lobby your MP's and councillors, anything, but just simply keep talking and keep questioning, keep challenging.

This system is flawed from top to bottom, the only way to reflect on how to change it is to stop it working properly. No-one can debate a capitalist system on equal terms; no exchanges, campaigns, governance, protection or even education can be equal under this regime. (That’s perhaps the point). There is an ideological chasm between capitalism and equality because capitalism favours property over people and seeks to own individuals in turn. Even the people who's job it is to make London a 'safer place' cannot reflect openly on it, thats too dangerous and as a consequence life is only ever made safer for the few who are taking our liberty, tax dodging companies, Mp's who block the poor out of education and privileged landowners. Students have in fact been educated to realise that their futures are deemed by the powerful as less valuable than windows, this they know for sure and if Nick Clegg thinks that is living in a 'dream world', then where does he think he was tonight? Certainly not on the streets feeling dreadful about beating children like that policeman, no, he was in a palace and I for one know he's dreaming if he thinks people will ever forget that.