If Wilfred Owen had a blog...
....would the First World War have dragged on for four years? Truth is the enemy of those who wage war. Britain would not have lost 150 lives in Bush's war in Iraq if Parliament had known the truth.
The blogs and e-mails from British troops in Iraq and Afghanistan are scything a path of light through the foliage of propaganda. Basra and Helmand are now missions impossible. It is almost certain that every soldier who perishes in both campaigns dies in vain in the same cause of futility and stupidity as the mass slaughter of Wilfred Owen's war.
This past week, four British soldiers were killed in Basra and six in Helmand. We can ask Owen's question again,
"Shall Life renew these bodies? Of a truth
All death will he annul, all tears assuage?
Or fill these void veins full again with youth....
But the British public knew nothing of Owen's poetry until after the war. Only four of his poems were ever published before his death at the age of 25. The propaganda machine was still pumping out the myth of a glorious heroic struggle against a brutal nation. The truth of Owen and the other war poets was silenced.
The Minister of Defence have now introduced sweeping new guidelines to restrict serving military personnel from speaking, faxing, e-mailing, texting or blogging about the hellish truth of Basra and Helmand. There is mounting angry reaction from soldiers' websites. If this is an attempt of censoring the truth it will fail. Communications now are immediate, vivid with authenticity that cannot be challenged.
A new book on Wilfred Owen's work, Mapping Golgotha has just been published by gregynogpress.co.uk. (01686 650625). The message from 90 years ago is powerful and moving and precisely reveals the truth of our times.
Drugging the old
Not one of the interviewers on today's dodgy report by Age Concern
asked who funded it? Yet that is the only worthwhile question.
It sounds like a new try at medicalising society. Getting old is not good. It makes people sad. Nothing can change that. But drug companies want to offer the snake oil of anti-depressants. They give a brief boost but can also increase depression, the suicide rate and be addictive.
Some doctors, Age Concern complained, thought depression was part of the ageing process. Good for the doctors. Some Pharmas insist that we take their expensive pills if we do not have a euphoric smile on our faces from cradle to grave? It's good business for them. But bad medicine for millions.
When will someone ask whether Pharma money paid for this report?
Carrara and Gramsci
Today, I returned from an 8 day family holiday - the first for many years. Thanks to Fern and Jayne for continuing this blog on a daily basis with some favourite bits from my books.
One day of my stay in Italy was spent in a visit to Cararra the city that was a seething hotbed of Italian
socialist and anarcho-syndicalist movements. The Duomo is built entirely out of marble that has been quarried the mountains that cradle the city, leaving gigantic white scars that dominate the skyline. One of the city's main monument is dedicated to the workers who perished tearing the marble out of the hills.
The main town piazza is named after Antonio Gramsci. He was the socialist leaders arrested because of his opposition to Mussolini. He was sent to a camp for political prisoners at the age of 35.
During the trial, Mussolini said about Gramsci: "We have to prevent that this mind continue thinking."
He spent almost his entire life in prison. Although his ideas play little part in modern politics, his sacrifice and those of followers remains an inspiration. The working people of the city of Cararra suffered dreadfully at the hands of Mussolini's fascists and the occupation by the German army.
A stroll around the richly marbled streets show that radical movements are still thriving. A left-wing rally will be held shortly close to the monumental tributes to those died in an idealistic cause.
Recent Comments