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Black Lives Matter

May 31, 2020

I make no apology for the strength of feeling or language I may use in this post.

The murder of George Floyd is undoubtably a tragedy. You wouldn’t be human if you didn’t feel horror towards this situation. As I write this I feel pain, a great sadness. To black and minority folks across the world who suffer as a result of the great injustices that are happening because of racism, I am with you in solidarity. My heart goes out to George Floyd’s friends, family and indeed all communities who are suffering and have suffered from this and other, abhorrent, murders because of systemic racism.

There was a part of me who did not, and is still not comfortable about writing this. Why? Believe it or not I can’t stand conflict and controversy. I hate the psuedo-intellectual “debates” on social media. I hate the gaslighting by racist individuals trying to claim that black people are, by their own genetics, criminals with some dodgy statistics. I hate the lies and I hate the hate. I was brought up with the idea that we were past this kind of behaviour. I recognise this was a result of growing up in an area choc full of white privilege. Over the years, the haunting reality is that racism is still a problem, an awful one – to put it mildly.

I feel if I do not speak out or write something I would be a hypocrite to all the black artists whose music I have enjoyed, learned from and continues to inspire me. Even at a base level, I was named after the legendary Jazz artist, Miles Davis. I wholeheartedly agree with Mrs Smith that the very community the music I play birthed is the same community that is suffering today – “Electric guitar music is black music“.

This song, written almost 100 years ago, is still sadly relevant today.

From the end of 2018 to around this time last year, I was in Atlanta, GA. The very place where today, we are seeing mass protests against racism. During my time out there, I saw and heard things that made me uncomfortable. I was not silent about this. I made it very clear to folks that I thought it was not only strange to me, but also excessive that to pull over a black man in a pickup truck it took two police cars and four police officers to just talk to the guy (I was in a car driving past at the time). I made my views clear that it was NOT OKAY for someone I knew to use racial slurs to express their road rage (N****r and C***k to be precise). When I first got there in November 2018, I was fortunate enough to go to a “birthday show” by Emmanuel “Chops” Smith. Upon leaving the excellent show, a white man came up to me and said “Bet it feels weird to be in the minority, huh?” I replied “I didn’t even notice and now you mention it – what’s the problem?” without hesitation.

The scourge of racism is not unique to America, even though the whole country was founded on racial oppression. We here in the UK have our own problems with race, extremist Far-Right terror organisations hellbent on white supremacy have already murdered an MP (Have we forgotten Jo Cox?). Whilst also expressing solidarity with communities in the US, we must also do better ourselves too.

As I wrap this up, I want to make clear that my intention about this article is to speak out about racism and quite frankly I couldn’t give a flying shit about your dissenting opinion because Racism is never justified.

Black Lives Matter.

“Yes, all lives matter. But we’re focused on the BLACK ones now, OK? Because it is very apparent that our judicial system DOESN’T KNOW THAT. Plus, if you can’t see why we’re exclaiming #BLACKLIVESMATTER – YOU ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM” – (A protestor’s sign in the USA)

Green vs Labour Part 2: Progressives need a Party for Social Movements

March 26, 2015 — Leave a comment

Socialist Campaign for a Labour Victory

This is the second of a four-part debate on the subject of whether left-wing activists should participate in the Labour Party or the Green Party. This first part argued for the Labour Party and was written by James McAsh, a member of the London Young Labour Executive Committee. This response makes the case for the Green Party. It is written by Peter McColl, Scottish Green Party Parliamentary Candidate for Edinburgh East.

Green politics is the greatest threat to capitalism in the 21st Century. The attack on Green politics reflects this status. Capitalist elites, having captured social democratic parties over the past 25 years, need to find ways to capture or neutralise Green politics and the parties that it represents. The arguments about how capitalism has destroyed people’s lives and the environment that are required to sustain them have little to refute them. So instead, we see corporate funded climate conspiracies, attempts to…

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Just because you do not take an interest in politics doesn’t mean politics won’t take an interest in you.

August 1, 2014 — Leave a comment

I’d like to start by apologising for my lack of updates from this site, I’ve been taking some time off from the last election and my exams. I’m just coming off my relaxing period. So here goes!

I’ve just been on the BBC Site and I’ve been listening to Tim Stanley’s take on “Young People” in politics. I can safely say that his anecdote is something that is quite common place within parties like Labour. He said that young people are “immature” and that they are often on the “fringes” of what the party stands for.

While that is true he seems to not pay attention to the fact that, unlike pre-internet generations, we have the capabilities to get information at our fingertips. We can read into the history of organisations, people and such things. So, like the rest of society, us “young people” can make an educated decision based on the positions we support and what parties we align to.

Being involved with The Warsash Residents’ Association, the Police Support Volunteer Executive Committee, the Itchen Student Union and it’s body of Governors – I’ve learned and adapted skills to ensure that when I make a decision or put forward my viewpoint it is well informed and that it considers other people’s point of view/circumstances. 

The Green Party have been such a welcoming party to enable us “young people” to flourish and rationalise our passion for change and our ambition to help make society fairer and more equal. 

So am I immature? I don’t feel it – my mum says I should have been born 50 years ago! 

Do I feel like I have the answers to everything? No, but I’d like to try with a few ideas and see what people think.

So reader you’re about to see the few words strung together I’d thought I’d never use, I’m with Ann Widdecombe on this one, but I go one step further. Young people should be actively involved. If they can teach Religious Education at Primary and Secondary level, why can’t they teach politics or something similar?

It’s sad to see people of a similar age whinge more over the change of the Facebook layout than a hike in tuition fees. 

Thanks for reading,

 

 

 

miles

Miles

Take your fingers out of your ears and listen to us!

April 2, 2014 — Leave a comment

The title explains itself, we need some councillors who will actually listen to us and represent our interests. Unfortunately this is not what we’re getting. Two key issues keep coming up every time I speak to someone in the street, in local pubs or indeed into/from college. Buses and Parking.  The major issue in Warsash is that you will find it an absolute pain to get to Whiteley, you will find it an absolute pain to work around those once-every-two-hour buses. If you also needed to get to Fareham Community Hospital from Warsash and you couldn’t get a lift or afford a taxi – there’s no bus service to the hospital. It was cut because it was deemed “not commercially viable”.

I know what we’re fed up with councillors who are just blaming the bus companies for this lack of services. So I know that if I am elected, I will definitely make sure that there’s an improvement in the bus services to Whiteley from Warsash and also Fareham Community Hospital’s route being reinstated. It’s just getting ridiculous!

Sign the petition HERE to tell Hampshire County/Fareham Borough Councillors that you’re fed up with being ignored. 

 

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“Get the bus service  YOU  deserve “Vote Green May 22nd

 

 

We’ve all had enough, we want more buses.

March 14, 2014 — Link — Leave a comment

We’ve all had enough, we want more buses, Sign the petition HERE.

Someone has to say it, enough of us talk about it. Whether we’re stood waiting for a bus, or we’re having a pint down the local, one issue keeps coming up every day – we want more buses. It’s purely common sense, if the developers at Whiteley had any serious thought of making the site a success you would have at least thought they’d work hard to get more buses to the precinct? Well unfortunately not, buses are on average two hours apart and they don’t even run on a Sunday! (Here is a link to the timetable) But there is one service that is desperately needed and it’s quite frankly disgusting how it was originally cut because it wasn’t “commercially viable”.  It’s amazing how places like Queen Alexandra Hospital and Southampton General have buses going right to the door and yet that is something that is cut when it comes to Fareham Community Hospital.

Is Fareham Borough/Hampshire County Council and the bus companies waging war on the sick and the elderly residents of the Western Wards?  I’ve contacted Friends of Fareham Community Hospital regarding their petition and I think that actually this socially necessary service needs to be reinstated, fast.

Thank you for reading,

Miles

Go Green

Go Green

Rise and shine!

March 9, 2014 — 1 Comment

It’s just over 11 weeks till election day and I can feel the momentum going, Warsash may not be quite as safe as some people seem to believe. Every day we go canvassing more and more people like our message – that fair is worth fighting for. Fair is something the people of Warsash deserve, and it’s something that isn’t being delivered. We live in a Borough where councillors seem to have this notion that if you get an opinion expressed by well under a percent of the population then that is the green light to go ahead with an idea and say that you’ve “done a proper consultation” and to me (at least) that seems like utter rubbish – Warsash deserves better than this!

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Article from Monday 3rd March 2014

 

You know I must admit, it might be a sense of Deja Vu but I’ve seen that response from the school of Nav’ before! In fact when I was younger that was pretty much their “stock answer” to any query regarding parking. Could they just simply not care? Someone said to me once, when I was talking about canvassing, “Surely you could fight bigger battles?” and I simply said “No, these are local issues – what people tell me about and really if I want to get anywhere with making the slightest difference, these are the issues I must deal with”. Big or small these sort of things (like yellow lines) affect people’s daily lives, and someone has to take them seriously… might as well be me!

 

Thank you for reading,

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Follow me on Twitter @MilesGrindey
Like my Facebook Page: http://facebook.com/GoGreenGoGrindey

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Miles 

 

Snoring Tories

February 14, 2014 — Leave a comment

This Wednesday, just gone,was the first meeting of the Western Wards Community Action Team. On behalf of the WWPV me and my colleague attended – and it seemed rather dead, mainly due to the weather. We were greeted by Mayor Susan Bayford (also Councillor for Locks Heath) who asked us how we found about the meeting, I said that I had been politically active since I can remember – and had been attending these meetings for a year. I seemed to have shocked her through my answers to her questions – she seemed quite shocked when I said MP for Fareham and tried to deter me from aiming for that by telling me I needed “life experience”. Well I guess I should’ve videoed this, I told her exactly what I did – and here is the list:

  • Member of a Local LitterAction Group, which I appeared on Radio Haslar for last year. 
  • Member of South-East Hampshire Green Party, of which I am the Media Officer and Website Editor.
  • Member/Committee Member of the Warsash Resident’s Association.
  • Founder and current Chair of the Western Wards People’s Voice

The meeting proceeded, and there was a very interesting presentation done to update the residents on the situation regarding the weather – which was all well and good until questions from the audience were taken. A man, quite rightfully, asked “Are you proactive or reactive?” and the person (from Fareham Borough Council) replied “To answer your question – We are proactive, and we are reactive” – ironically that didn’t answer his question. There was an update from the police regarding crime in the area and apparently everything has gone down statistically speaking. Despite this the issue regarding parking in Warsash popped up and according to the PCSO the council and police were doing everything the best they could to help with the situation, this was one of two things that was quite common – the other being neighbor disputes.

When it came to planning for flood defences in the area, the long (and I must admit it was rather boring) and necessary meeting seemed to tire the Councillors – whenever I looked over there seemed to be at least 3 awake at any one time, you couldn’t make it up! The important part of “other issues” came up, and one man raised the fact that the council needs to put more cycle lanes in as a way to reduce congestion – I agree with that, to often have I been sat on a college bus stuck in traffic when I and others could cycle in. The other issue was the speculation regarding yellow water coming from the development – something I’m not too sure about but if it was proven I wouldn’t be surprised. There is simply too much development going on, it needs to stop.

How long before Titchfield becomes Atlantis of Fareham, do we have to keep ignoring the devastating amount of development leading to these floods?  It is ridiculous now. I opposed the expansion of the Locks Heath Free Church, and I still do – any new major developments being planned now must be made with environmental concerns taken into account first. I was told by one of the goers of the aforementioned church that all I cared about was the environment. I hate to break it to them, but without the environment we live in – there wouldn’t be a church to go to. Is this the current attitude of their church “Forget the environment, as long as we’ve got a big enough space to show Jesus how much we love him”? Maybe if it floods as a result of the development, or the foundations collapse, its a sign from God? 

We’ll see. 

 

Green means GO!

November 9, 2013 — Leave a comment

There is a great deal of cynicism in the UK these days, and quite rightfully so! I mean who wouldn’t be cynical about politicians, political parties and indeed candidates after all that has happened, the lies, the deceit and the overall “Image” over “Substance” culture? Many of the people who go to my college seem to think that Green Party (or Greenpeace Party as someone thought it was) is just a bunch of vegan hippies trying to put up wind farms all over the place.

The Green Party is not JUST about the environment, it’s a party that prides itself on inspiring social change, a party that so desperately attempts to improve social justice wherever our members are in power and it’s this great deal of ignorance and lack of insight that is allowing the elite in politics to have their way with the public and push people who genuinely want to do good to the side. 

Over the past couple of Sociology lessons my class watched Michael Moore’s great documentary “Capitalism: A Love Story” about how banks and lobbyists had invaded their political system and indeed how alienated people WERE (emphasis) feeling disenfranchised with the whole system. I was surprised to see two things, one the distinct lack of interest from the majority of the class about what has happened to OUR society and two the fact no one (apart from myself and perhaps a couple of others) felt anguished by how easy these people with a ridiculous amount of money were able to get away with it so quickly!  All in all I feel as though I’m the only one willing to do anything about it. While it is true that I am standing in the Local Elections next year and that my issues will be purely local ones, but to bring about sustainable change it must be achieved through baby steps. One foot at a time. 

To get politics across to college students is a very difficult struggle, with many accusing the likes of me doing this for personal gain.  It is these accusations which, if it weren’t for my thick skin, would cut me deep so much that I’d give up my dream. I am determined no matter what to do something different, big or small – I want to do something that will enlighten people of all generations to fight the system when it doesn’t go our way. We are supposed to alter the system to fit our needs, but nowadays we’re being shaped to fit the needs of the system. Where did we go wrong? The short answer for you is “I’m not entirely sure”. This culture of either spouting hate at everyone with a rosette, “bending over and taking it” or following the trail of thought of “Mummy and Daddy” is highly damaging. I don’t blame people either, in the last 30 years we’ve lost people who mean what they say and say what they mean. I think that an ever growing proportion of people are forgetting how to think for themselves and that their whole thought process comes from adverts and what the media tell them.

One thing from my experience is that if you want to see change, think of things as a traffic light. Labour (Red) is stop, the Lib Dems are something you probably shouldn’t chance and Green means go! 

Thanks for reading,

 

Miles Grindey

 

Democratic Revolution

November 7, 2013 — 2 Comments

Some time has passed from the famous Brand-Paxman interview and I can’t help but comment on the response and debate it has triggered across the country.  I myself hold the view that the only way to get things done is to fight the system by using the system, but how can we if we can’t clearly see who is doing things for political gain, or doing things to genuinely help better society?  My response is, look at the people in your area. If you can see people in the local paper, online newsletter or just out and about doing things for the community who then turn out to be a candidate in the next local/general/euro/whatever election then you’ve got to ask yourself a very basic and fundamental question “to what gain is this person doing this?” 

I can PROMISE you that what I do in the community comes from loyalty to where I was brought up. For too long I think that people have been trodden on, walked over and spat on by political elites. The issues are being told to us, by the media or by politicians who just want to make a quick buck off public opinions. I believe that people who genuinely take their time (no matter how inconvenient it may be to the people in the area) to go out and talk to residents in the area, no matter if they can or can’t vote yet, about what concerns them are the people who should be considered “true politicians”. 

Whether we like it or not we live in a representative democracy, every so often we must do our duty as citizens and vote to our hearts content. It may very well be “the lesser of two evils” but with each cross on a ballot we are expressing our opinions without having to tell a single person. Each cross is a written bullet, fired towards whoever is in power (or in some cases in opposition) to tell them “I don’t like what you’re doing” and with that written bullet we can annihilate an entire Government without actually killing a single person. I remember hearing something similar by former Labour MP Tony Benn, who if you know me or read the Portsmouth News piece about me, is my inspiration for getting involved.

The thing that bothers me is the fact that in secondary schools there are lessons called “Citizenship”, now these lessons are supposed to educate people on how society functions and what people can do to help out and how the system works, and indeed how people can shape it. Now… did we ever learn that? I can tell you now that in my time in Secondary Education not once did I know what “First Past The Post” was or even that there were 650 MPs sitting in Westminster. We spent our time quite literally chatting about who was seeing who and watching films, a pure WASTE of taxpayer money and indeed valuable time. 

I propose that we replace Citizenship lessons with Electoral Studies, something where people at a young age can learn about how they can shape society and how they can really “stick it” to the man! This is something that I have discussed with friends, family and indeed my own teachers. It’s something that people have reacted warmly to when I propose this idea and in fact something that Michael Gove should consider if he’s serious about making education better. In my opinion he has desecrated Education, I’ve stood on the picket lines with my teachers (present and former) and they have all given their experience of the last 3 years of this Coalition government and how much they have been, screwed, by the Ministry for Education. 

It’s not fair that even teachers, people who have devoted their lives to shaping the minds of the young and inspiring a whole generation, are feeling alienated and disenfranchised with the system. It’s something that has been bothering me personally and quite frankly I’ve decided to try and defend the system, because it’s not too late. We can save it, we can really do something. I’m not saying “YES WE CAN” like a certain US President and then end up killing people with drone strikes, I’m not saying “We must stop the bankers” and then give them a huge bailout. 

I’m saying is that, we need to get involved, really tell the people at the top that we’ve had enough. I’m only involved myself because I feel that if we are united in believing that there’s something wrong, then why don’t we do something about it? Why can’t we just pull together despite the cynical attitudes and the pessimistic viewpoints of our democracy and fire those who we feel have wiped the floor with us by going back on promises and things they’ve campaigned on!

Like in my previous post, I said “get involved” and there is a great deal of caution when it comes to that phrase. People seem to be under this illusion that it means “Stand as a candidate” or “Join a political party” and I don’t necessarily mean that (although that being said it’d be nice to see some new faces at local meetings now and again) I mean keep your ear to the ground about local happenings, find out who has said what and find out, before the official list is published, who is standing in your area. It’s all about accountability and if you choose not to vote, the turnout declines further and further. The day when turnout is below 20% nationally is a day when things start to seem a little authoritarian and we get screwed even harder. It’s something we have GOT to avoid. It’s something we must fight against and band together.

I feel I’ve said enough but I’m open to hear what you’ve got to say.

Thanks for reading,

Miles Grindey

 

Fighting for tomorrow

October 30, 2013 — Leave a comment

I came back from a Green Party meeting last night feeling really inspired and feeling like there was going to be some sort of change in the next year. All my life I’ve heard people complaining, suggesting how they’d do things, what they feel is wrong with society and when I turned 18 earlier this year I decided that I was going to do something about this.

When I was 11 I remember meeting like minded people (I kid you not) who were fed up with the current local government (Tory dominated) and how we’d do things differently. Fast forward to seven years later and I’m getting involved, but are they? The answer is no. They are not, but they aren’t the only ones who aren’t.

The local area has many opportunities for people of all ages to weigh in on local issues, ways to get involved and do something like the Western Wards Community Action Team (CAT) meetings or Warsash Resident’s Association. The problem however is that the main turnout for these events are usually retired pensioners. Not everyone in the area is aware, what we are missing at these events are parents, teachers, doctors, nurses, teenagers, basically the rest of the population.  I reckon there isn’t enough in terms of awareness of these events, if I were a Councillor for the area I would actively go to schools and talk about the electoral process and how with a single vote you can destroy a government without killing a single person, contrary to what Mr Brand believes.   

I do whatever I can with the resources I’ve got to get people involved, and to really (in the words of Jack Black in ‘School of Rock’) “Stick it to the man”. There’s a common misconception going around that when someone says “Get involved” it means “Stand for an election”. Now I would love it if there was hundreds of people queuing up to be a paper candidate, but at this point in time we just need people – members or not, supporters or friends to help us show the political elite what we mean when we say we, the people, want change!

I would argue, ideally, that people should ignore the media spin on politicians. That not everyone who is on a ballot paper isn’t just in it for the money/power but some, like Aristotle would argue, some are in it to make a difference and genuinely make life better for everyone.

I will be standing for election again in Warsash next May, where the Local & Euro Elections will be held.  We can make this idea a reality.

 

Thanks for reading

 

Miles Grindey