DEMOCRACY by Crows Nest Zine

CROWS NEST Crows Nest Zine Two

DEMO

CRACY editors Eloise Hendy

Contents

@EloiseHendy

Figgy Guyver @FiggyGuyver

contributors Gemma Batchelor Chris Belous Jamie Delves Patrick Garratt Tess Glen Jack Guariento Figgy Guyver Dom Hale Eloise Hendy Lene Korseberg Hannah Oliver Hannah Philp Harriet Protheroe-Davis Sam Reed Colm Summers Guido Vermeul

2 Crows Nest

PEOPLE OH The People excercise your rights excercise your agency grab the stubby pencil by the horns and put a cross in the box like Jesus. THROW OFF YOUR CROWN OF THORNS. People OH The People. yes WE can, YOUR country needs YOU. ‘YOU’. a call to “ALLWAYS HISTORICISE” Blast this BLAST that. GET UP OFF YOUR SEATS AND GROOVE WITH ME get the parties moving wewillfightthemonthebeachesforhardworkingfamiliesforournhsforthequeenforputtingbacononthetableofhardworkingfamiliesastrongereconomywithinmidafairersocietybetttertogetherfairersocietyecareaboutthewelfarestateandthestateofwellbeingitseverythingyouareeverything. everything

going

ok.

(the editors)

May

YOU

MUST Read This

If You Read Anything

Today

Most Realest

This Is The Explanation. Don’t Read If You JUST CAN’T HANDLE, Because This Will

BLOW

S uch certainty.

Such

YOUR MIND.

capitalisation (pun intended).

It works, this sort of headline. The evidence is in its prevalence on each Facebook homepage. Just the right amount of Short and Snappy, Superlative, 2nd Person and Personal and Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a trending article/blog/open letter/heartstringing Vimeo video. When did the headlines become about you? Sorry, You? Are/Is “You” news? Social media is changing the nature of journalism. The scroll-box on the top right corner of Facebook’s homepage was once called ‘News Articles’ and is now called ‘Trending,’ because the personal and the general have begun to merge. Like personalised newspapers, Twitter and Facebook news feeds literally feed in the information you want – or that forums think “YOU” want, and want you to want. A selfie of a day at the zoo by Nobody may easily get more likes than Louis Theroux’s investigation into psychiatric hospitals. Is this a viable reason to believe that the first is newsworthy and the other is less so? Because journalism cannot be extricated or distinct from social media. National newspapers have pandered to it because to be without is to be disadvantaged. Hard copy circulation for institutions including The Guardi-

less than half what they were five years ago and still in decline. They need sharing platforms and share feed space with forums indigenous to twenty-first century media: the likes of Upworthy, Humans of New York and Buzzfeed are the true heroes of the homepage. These latter disseminators of information are very different to the former. They present themselves as neutral and non-political. They are curated not by institutions but by individuals. The implication this has had on style and content is obvious. Cryptic and/or emotionally charged images, text that often does no more than narrate the video it accompanies, soundbited and life-affirming quotes concerning quotidian and/or current issues; what is deemed generally interesting enough to be reported on “Your” homepage is neither breaking news nor particularly reve-

an, The Independent and The Sun are without exception

latory. Rather, the emphasis is on the uplifting and

the reporting of the generally informative has become the importing of sentiment. Sentimentalism itself is not new(s). In the eighteenth century, when the upper echelons of society abruptly had to contend with a new class of ‘middling sorts’ – a class who had suddenly the time and panache to create culture – the sentimental man was the hero of the written word; the sentimental lady was the most tasteful, most covetable, most fashionable. Whosoever could cry longest and hardest at a public reading was cultural royalty. This man of feeling was, quintessentially, ordinary. He did not need status, lineage or money to be revered. His politics, in the polarized Britain of the 1700s, were on first impression inconsequential. Anybody literate could write of him, and anybody who could read or listen could know of him. Most importantly, his presence in culture was institutionally subversive, for emotion is not exclusive or privy to education, finance or gender; it is the province of Every(wo)man. Anybody could be him. Power to the people. A middle finger to the landed gentry. Here s/he is again, on the same page as media moguls that are centuries old, and possessing the same leverage, the

“Emotion is

not exclusive or privy to education, finance or gender; it is the province of Every(wo)man ”

same potential for dissemination as the best of them. Grassroots, democratic, extraneous from institutionalisation. All s/he needs is a good, viral share, and that article/blog/open letter/ heartstringing Vimeo video will have “YOU” on the verge of tears feeling life-affirmed/outraged/reassured that humans are all right, really. But can this sentimentalism really be depoliticized when it is being played on fields of political background and battleground? Using political rhetoric? Rallying troops? Brandon Stanton, the photoblogger behind Humans of New York, claims no political standpoint even so far as to say his blog is anti-political. Yet the greatest personal struggles, achievements and social commentaries of his subjects often are political. In fact, he chooses his questions to this effect and, as an individual,

mediates and moderates an entire New York population for a vast readership, and to an agenda which he claims does not exist. His blog, whilst generally interesting and often highly emotive, offers no method or reason to

change the status quo. This would be fine should “YOU” not then choose to value, to like and to share, a photograph of a twelve-yearold spontaneously hugging a policeman during a Ferguson protest, over a news article on a twelve-year-old fatally shot for carrying a BB gun. It is easier to continue sipping your coffee, clinging one-handed to a handrail of the Tube, this way. It is essentially sentimental in the face of something far more difficult to understand, or to know how to change. But the photo will not alter the statistical likelihood that within a couple of years this twelve-yearold, who is black, may well be viewed as a high-risk citizen by the same police battalion unit that was surveilling his peaceful protest. The eighteenth-century man of feeling lasted around thirty years, before culture and the public looked back on him in abashed comedy, feeling slightly outdone and patronised by a cultural movement that claimed political neutrality in the decades of the Jacobites and the run-up to the French Revolution. Once the question of use and validity begins to appear, it is difficult to shake.

BLOW MY MIND Which One, Really, Will Be The Best Thing I Read Which Facebook Link Will More?

Today?

And Who Is The Writer To Claim Such A Thing

Over

ME?

Why Can’t The Headline Tell ME What The Article Entails And Let Me Decide For MYSELF? Sincerely,

“YOU.”

WORDS: Hannah Oliver

ARTWORK: Eloise Hendy 6 Crows Nest

how to deal with boggarts: Take a trigger warning: drugs Make a snigger warning: pugs TW: household abuse SW: spouse sold for booze

TW: power, status and corruption SW: sour coitus interruption

TW: descent into addiction SW: indecent fan-fiction

TW: racism and hate speeches SW: faeces in my mate’s breeches

TW: manic depression SW: Hispanic impressions

TW: homophobia and fear SW: how bout try and go be queer?

TW: anxiety disorder TW: non-doms don’t bother Conservatives SW: sobriety is boredom SW: no condoms nor other preservatives TW: PTSD SW: LSD

TW: institutionalised, unrepentant rape SW: tasty infusion of fermented grape

TW: high society SW: bye propriety

TW: silencing SW: off-licencing TW: voiceless generation SW: choice dress recommendation TW: ruining the welfare state SW: got so ruined I’m elsewhere mate TW: tragedy SW: farce

WORDS: Sam Reed May

parliament governMENt

never thought I would question that we lived in a democracy. Hearing people who do so usually makes my brain resound the deafening David Icke “CONSPIRACY THEORISTS” alarm. Yet now I’m sat wondering about the next general election and who I have the option to vote for it’s making me think – who actually represents me in parliament? Is this the type of democracy I would ideally want to live in? When I look at parliament I see an old room bathed in prestige and full of white, economically To add insult to comfortable injury, there are men. I don’t more men with tend to see a knighthoods who whole lot of people like me, are heads of British which leads companies than me to ask: who in parliament there are women” represents my interests? If we look at who owns most of the world’s wealth, it is predominantly men. If we look at who are elected to the highest positions of political authority, it is also usually men. For example, at the last G20 summit there were only five women elected as heads of states, out

“

8 Crows Nest

of twenty-five officials. If we look at who head the biggest financial institutions they are, again, predominantly men. The Guardian recently reported that the number of women as heads of companies in the UK can be counted on two hands; there are seven of them. To add insult to injury, there are more men with knighthoods who are heads of British companies than there are women. Currently in the House of Commons there are only 148 female MP’s out of a total of 650. Evidently women are shut out of positions of power and thus are shut out of major debates surrounding their lives. If we are going to live in a democracy that is representative, of not just a group of white old men, then we are going to need to look at why there are so few women in parliament. Women are expected to perform the role of primary carer; this is usually due to our conception of a woman being “biologically” more loving, compassionate and caring than a man. This is something evident within the jobs market. If we look at the type of work that women typically do it is public sector work and lower paid work. Statistics from the TUC claim that ‘around 17.2% if men in work are low paid, compared with 28% of women workers, with those women who work part time the most likely to be in low paid employment.’ So not only are women forced into

fessions”. Women are also statistically more reliant on the welfare state, due to them being expected to perform the role of mother/ caregiver, and as a result they are more likely to be in part time low paid employment to juggle the expectations of being a carer and earning money. In light of this dependency, if the decisions of the welfare state are only ever arbitrated over by an old, un-representative, stuffy room full of men then it can reasonably be argued that the current governmental set up is a place in which men predominantly decide the lives of women. It is very easy for those of us fighting for gender equality to fall into seeing oppression as all-encompassing – a wall too big to even know which tool to strike it with. But there are the beginnings of a practically tangible movement to join: The Women 50:50 Campaign.

The Women 50:50 Campaign is a campaign demanding the introduction of gender quotas into parliament. It might seem as though gender quotas are a boring topic of feminist organizing, but I would argue on the contrary; quotas enable us to create a space of infiltration to the historic and cultural stranglehold that the masculine has on politics. Quotas enable a variety of experiences to enter into politics. This variety then, in turn, will help challenge how we have always perceived politics or “the political” and this is what is at the heart of Women 50:50. Women 50:50 are asking that we move from the traditional politics of binaries and move forward into fluid understanding of the political. Women 50:50 are at the beginnings of a battle and we need as many people interested to join, provoke and help organize for a society that is both relevant and equal.

WORDS: Harriet Protheroe-Davis May

10 Crows Nest

subliminal poem sustainable voices

hello to the farmers of tomorrow our green-fingered of hey banks the future hello to the farmersfriends of tomorrow buygreen-fingered more all petrolfriends the whole our wowcuts banks of the future of beef wepetrol use all milk buy more allthe theorganic whole cuts throw offorganic buildings collect all of beefwe weyourself use all the milk the throw free range eggsoff webuildings crack collect we yourself andthe in free the cells squawking all the freedom all rangeofeggs we crack foodinpork this isofnot an institution and the cells squawking all thespeaking freedom we source is british irish so comewe on food pork this is not and the government all youisbudding farmers brownon fields are burning source british and irishthe so come theyou nation’s farms need you all budding farmers the brown fields are burning sourcing heyfarms the dead the nation’s needrising you like fierce steam from seventeen and a half thousand sourcing wow the dead rising like fierce steam from seventeen the foundations from and a half thousand of airports and supermarkets from the foundations british andand irishsupermarkets farms throw of airports yourself that’s british and irishwhat farms throw WORDS: PHOTOS: makes mcdonald’s yourself that’s what makes mcdonald’s

Dom Hale Gemma Batchelor May

Queering the election

identify under the queer/LGBT+ umbrella as a bisexual cis woman with a fluid sexuality. I am enfranchised and will be keenly voting in the 2015 UK Elections. But, what’s my queer vote going towards? What, if anything, can queers expect from the major parties who may end up in office? UKIP and the DUP don’t mention queer issues. Both parties have a well-reported horrendous record of homophobia; this probably accounts for their silence. I don’t personally mind, as I would never give my vote to these parties, but there are right-wing queers out there (yes, really). They deserve representation too. The Conservatives barely pay us lip service. Even then they mainly focus on the most palatable pleasantries that will offend the fewest number: the posthumous pardoning of gay men convicted for ‘gross indecency’, which was started with Alan Turing in 2013. Words like ‘gay’, ‘lesbian’ and ‘transgender’ are thrown around like buzzwords, but nothing is said about what they would do for anyone other than gay men. The Liberal Democrats don’t do as badly. They list several promises: tackling homophobia in schools, reviewing rules around blood I don’t feel like donations from men who have I have good role sex with men, models in UK pushing for widpolitics, so it’s er international recognition of hard to feel ensame-sex marcouraged to get riages. Beautifully ‘main- more involved” stream’ queer policies, nothing radical. Shame they don’t mention trans issues at all, but hey, they do have a pretty graphic about the chronology of LGBT+ rights, which is cool, I guess?

12 Crows Nest

“

Labour do okay, though they don’t do much. They want to carry on with their work tackling homophobia and the worldwide decriminalisation of homosexuality; they plan to set up an International LGBT Rights envoy to push for this. Sounds lovely. It’s just not a lot, and – yes, I will keep saying this – there is no direct mention of trans issues. The SNP – who do great on gender equality – don’t have much on queer rights. The only manifesto promise was almost identical to Labour’s promise to set up Words like ‘gay’, ‘lesbian’ an International LGBT Rights enand ‘transgen- voy. I doubt I’d der’ are thrown ever vote SNP but I admire around like them deeply and buzzwords” I am in love with Nicola Sturgeon, so I have to say this near-silence hit me a little personally. Come on, SNP. You were doing so well. Plaid Cymru astonished me. When I looked at their manifesto and saw a quite comprehensive section on queer issues, I had to take a moment. It’s good. They talk specifically about tackling biphobia (!!!) and transphobia. They actually name and talk about promoting safe spaces and promise to look into a Primary Care Service specifically for trans and intersex people. Compared to the decent but unexciting policies of the other parties, this is revolutionary. The Greens have a lot of space dedicated to queer issues; they’ve even got a separate section specified for it in their contents page. It’s great. They concentrate on the rights of queer asylum seekers, they push for more anti-discrimination work with the EU, and they want to push for trans rights. They want to tackle health inequalities for queer people and they want an inclusive definition

“

of the family in EU policies. This is a solid todo list. So, two parties have impressive policies; three parties pay some minor attention to queer issues; one party has a pretty graphic (which obviously means they should win, right?); two parties fail to mention queer issues at all. It’s just not enough. It’s saddening that the parties most likely to have real influence in the next elected Parliament aren’t concentrating enough on us. A big issue is representation. There are lists of queer politicians in mainstream UK politics, and there really aren’t very many. Why? It’s vicious cycle. There isn’t enough queer representation in UK politics, so queers feel disenfranchised and underrepresented, and don’t vote, because the (justified) feeling is that nothing major will change for them whether they vote or not. Same-sex marriage? Lovely, but buys into a super capitalist traditional view of family that a lot of queers don’t ascribe to, so it’s not the final victory to be won. Tackling homophobia, biphobia and transphobia in schools? Sure, but you can’t do that without better, compulsory sex and relationships education (SRE) which takes into account all issues surrounding gender and sexuality; why isn’t enough work being done to enshrine this in policy? So queers don’t vote. So their voices aren’t heard, so there is nothing to vote for because no one is creating policies around them – so queers don’t vote, so their voices aren’t heard and so on, and so on. Queer people aren’t exactly encouraged to stand for office, either. Often, if they want to fight for queer rights, they are better off at the grassroots, organising action to create queer support networks and lobbying the government from the outside rather than from within. I don’t feel like I have good role models in UK politics, so it’s hard to feel encouraged to get more involved. I don’t get much when I try and queer our May

I don’t get much when I try and queer our democracy, and I don’t know what to do about it. I almost feel like there’s not much to be done about improving structures which just don’t seem to operate with us in mind. There are queer groups within political parties, sure, and a lot of them do give queer issues a mention, yes, but I don’t feel empowered by my queer vote. I don’t look at the policies of the most powerful parties and feel inspired. I don’t feel cared about. I love you, Greens and Plaid Cymru, for your policies, but is it worth giving you a vote, when the proportion of seats you are likely to gain is so minimal? The rest of you (Labour and Tories in particular, since you are the two remain the most dominant) I’m not sure. I’m not sure how much is tokenism, how much of it is hollow rhetoric. I’m not sure how much of what you do will really get to the core of the oppression that queers are facing. Perhaps I am naïve to hope that my vote as a queer woman will mean much for queer rights, or that this will ever change. I won’t deny, we’ve come so far in the past decades with the legalisation of homosexuality and same-sex marriage in most of the UK (good luck, Northern Ireland!) but our school education on queer history and queer existence is still pretty basic, rights and health care for trans people are still pretty appalling, and homophobia, biphobia, and transphobia are still. every. day. realities. For now, we have to keep organising, we have to keep pushing, and I hope one day, maybe even in my life time, we might have the queer representation in our democracy which we really need.

WORDS: Chris Belous ILLUSTRATION: Tess Glen

14 Crows Nest

May

PHOTOS: Colm Summers 16 Crows Nest

pros and contract s

emocracy. Arguably one of the most interesting words there is. In and of itself it is a word that carries with it an ocean of connotations, some outright positive, some more problematic. Most of us would probably deem democracy to be a good thing, at least in theory. In practice, sadly, events over the last couple of decades have made our relationship with the term more troubling, especially when considering actions proudly carried out “in the name of democracy”. Yet we still tend to cherish democracy over We can hardly other forms of govgather up the ernment, and perhaps seven billion rightly so. It supresses the power of the tyrant people that live and it opens up for diin the world vision of power and popular choice. After and make them all, democracy means consent to every the “rule of people”; it decision at any expresses a sacred pact given time.” between a subject and his master, one that removes the superiority of the latter and replaces it with the equality of the two parties. Such an understanding reflects the idea of the social contract, the conceptual origin of democracy as understood in the Western tradition of legal and political thought; by consenting to give up some of their initial freedom to a ruling authority, the subjects get security and order in return. Or, as expressed in the language of democracy: by agreeing to follow the laws laid down by their elected repre-

“

sentatives the subjects are guaranteed peace and prosperity. For a humanity torn by war and conflict since infancy it is hard to deny that such a trade-off not only appears appealing, but necessary. The idea of the social contract is built on the consent of the governed. However, we can hardly gather up the seven billion people that live in the world and make them consent to every decision at any given time. We may therefore have to settle for the mechanism of hypothetical consent to solve our problems, along the lines of, “although I haven’t actually consented, I would have done so had I been given the opportunity.” Initially, this way of solving the democratic paradox appears to make sense. Although we haven’t actually consented to it, most of us would probably have consented to the creation of criminal law so that people can’t murder us in our beds. Along the same lines, although we haven’t actually consented to it, it is reasonable to assume that most people would have consented to the existence of building regulations, so that our houses are safe enough for people to live in. Even the existence of tax, an area much disputed within our society, would argua-

May

bly be consented to; although people wholeheartedly disagree on the level of tax that should be imposed upon the citizen, most of us would probably agree that a minimal level of tax is necessary in order to ensure some basic public services. So far, so good. Had There are good this been the end of the story this piece reasons for queswould not be worth tioning whether writing. Yet sadly, it the state now has isn’t. In an era where more and more decimoved beyond sions are made outside those powrs origthe realm of domestic inally granted by democratic process – through intelligence the social contract” efforts, NGOs, international organisations, and anti-terrorism measures to name only a few – there are good reasons for questioning whether the state now has moved beyond those powers originally granted by the social contract. Would we actually have consented to all the actions of government carried out in modern times? Would we actually have consented to the powers of surveillance granted to the NSA that allows access to our personal data? Would we actually have consented to the war in Iraq? Perhaps we would have. That is not the point. The point is that we haven’t. Democracy, although representing a glorious ideal, has many flaws, chief among them being that it’s utterly dependent on its subjects, the people, to ensure that the potential tyrant doesn’t arise from his lonely grave. I fear we may have neglected our duty as of late. This is not to say that politicians are evil or that people don’t engage enough with politics. My point is simply that we are in terrible trouble the moment we stop questioning and reflecting upon the basis on which our society is built. Now might be a good time to ensure that we don’t do just that.

“

WORDS: Lene ILLUSTRATION: 18 Crows Nest

Korseberg Tess Glen

decapitate hedonism Don’t decapitate hedonism, Party ‘til the end’s spasmodic chasm Opens up and has you; There won’t be an après, The Dionysian man feeds on chaos, Pathos is a human invention, Om mani padma hum, Still, They chant, still! Overcome ego, Everywhere that He knows, Located in the base of the spine bone, Not some celestial throne, Sexy back – called Thiasus. The fire’s lit, The sun and the moon Share the sky for a minute, Saluting, their relationship diminishes, One slumps, the other rises. Singing songs to mothers mourning sunrise, No more tequila, Beget before the sun dies, Afternoon delight during siesta, Leaving the Louvre, Experiencing a gluten high in the Guggenheim.

I can send another last-try love-cry, Instead of closure with a Luger, Pistorius’ shoes hurt Phantom pangs of a tumour, These mutated notes might move her.

I’m a minimiser, Tex-Mex dip diver, Coin collecting, what a miser, The Drums couldn’t buy you as a prize, huh? Nobody could; You loved me once, And perhaps still do, But if you don’t, Do you want to?

The timbres of a faulty trumpet Introduce three wise guys, in quest of stardust, Magic fruit on the floor of the forest, Fro-yo, in a ring, Go-pro on a chain, Up and down like a yo-yo, thanks to the bipolar, Ice to ice, Jehovah, we’ll stone ya.

20 Crows Nest

For one pool-ball to travel, it must be struck by another, Movement inspired by an impulse, brother, Hotbox the pulpit, Singe a monk’s habit, Skin a grumpy rabbit’s foot, Perish the thought; it’s moot, Luck’s out of fashion, Stored in an armoire, With the gin and the shagpile. So many queens it could be a cash register The atelier is dressed with morbid gargoyles, With their eyelids of lavender pressed shut To avoid seeing the slander, Whispering, if I were gay, I wouldn’t give a fuck, Well, okay, maybe to a man. There’s headbands on dead hands, Deft pens in waste lands, Double-cuffs for the merciful, Dodging incarceration, he flirts with the church girl, Thinking she’s cute, Although she’s abusing her angle to appear obtuse, Dumbing down her speech for the guise of looseness, She likes a bad boy in a bad suit. You can be Byron with a biro, Scrawling irony on Styrofoam With a trident as a quill, Bequeathing the soul of Poseidon To the paper, But the horizon evades your highness: As you try to find your feet In a world anew that now Tries to drink your spirit as you sleep, Your evanescent treasure Sinks closer to the seabed. May

The sillage of your perfume Haunts my nostrils, The bubbles, now milk, Open where you once lay, The water has lost its heat, Its cold waves kneed me, As I sit here alone, Waiting for you to pour More bubble bath in And turn the water back on. Mind the measure, The bartenders’ clench her, Imprisoning pleasure: A shot of yoke, As the sun begins to choke On the dust of us, In that magic hour, I see good Christians Become bad dancers, Saying: I’m a bad Christian, God’s gone and I don’t miss him – Jesus’ back, but I won’t kiss him. Faded elastic, Jaded romances, The stars aren’t so steady When constellations are anxiously Flexing and vibrating, Medicating myself with coffee And hoping a Calvin Klein model Might materialise to help me wallow, But no sugarcane on the clown mask, Abel’s down in the long grass, Bring your A-game and your AK, Shooting the shit with A.J. No, OJ, Pulp Fiction Under palm trees on the Cannes beach, The sea breaks, and the sand breathes, But they never really meet; Each wave is a new lover, From which no grain will recover. WORDS: Jamie Delves ILLUSTRATION: Figgy Guyver

Are you sitting

comfortably?

hen we speak of politicians empty phrases, we may generally tend to think of promises that are not kept. Our media-savvy generation, with our short-attention spans, our need for bite size chunks of topical information – sufficient to scratch the surface of politically rooted inequalities, but not enough to comprehensively unpick the underlying causes - are constrained more by empty, vague explanations from political parties. These limited explanations consequently lead to an equally limited understanding of the motives of the political parties. This may seem like a given. Yet, such a realisation becomes all the more daunting when you can witness, on a screen immediately in front of you, the comment threads on Facebook that are symptomatic of buzzwords, catchphrases and exhausted-sentiments from political parties that are not confronted. Rather, they are passively consumed, as if these views pointed to a wider reality that did not need to be challenged.

‘I’m not a fan of the Tories, but they seem to be doing a good job with the economy.’ It is not merely that such a view should be countered because the present government has fortified a society based on low-paid work, whilst concurrently, and disproportionately, rewarding the richest in our society, thus exacerbating already polarised levels of inequality. It is not that we should reject this view on account of Iain Duncan Smith, Our political dis- implementing courses are based on p e r n i c i o u s welfare measbite-sized chunks of ures upon news and polemics, the poorest where we can briefly in the UK, as a means turn on BBC News of ‘curbing’ 24 and ostensibly a deficit that understand events was caused by systemic within a five minute the flaws of the window” financial system, and the recklessly self-interested motives of some who worked in them. Naturally, these criticisms are valid. The issue however pertains not to the realities, but to perception.

“

May

Our political discourses are based on bitesized chunks of news and polemics, where we can briefly turn on BBC News 24 and ostensibly understand events within a five-minute window. The notion of reducing the deficit has plagued our news coverage, where we have consistently been presented with the binary distinction of a party who allegedly claims to be bringing it down, and a party who will seemingly do otherwise. Both the Conservatives and Labour reiterate their commitment to the NHS; yet, the former’s commitment to a ‘strong NHS’ does not clearly reveal the ways in which they have sought to dismantle the institution. Supporters of the Labour Party on Facebook have shared pictures stating the Twitter-friendly ‘Vote SNP, get Tory’. Although it may seem at face value that depriving Information Labour of seats overload naturally in Scotland will leads us to skim make it less likely that they will over the underattain a majority, pinning causes of such media-spin politically driven ignores the overinequalities” arching point that Ed Miliband does not need a majority to become Prime Minister. Labour will most likely have to enter into some form of de-facto coalition with the SNP, despite the outward protestations of Miliband. It is a matter of arithmetic based on seats the political parties are likely to win, but such an understanding cannot be gained merely by retorting the same spiel, that emphasises how a vote for Sturgeon will by extension allow the Tories to retain their seats. Information overload naturally leads us to skim over the underpinning causes of politically driven inequalities. Although we have formats for discussing these issues – newspaper columns, panel shows, even the pub – our understanding of political issues, if understood merely through the paradigm of the political parties, is reduced to vague employments of words

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24 Crows Nest

and catchphrases. This is why Russell Brand, despite his pretensions, should be thanked for his contribution in engaging young people with politics. It does not matter that he does not have an encompassing political philosophy, and that ‘Revolution’ doesn’t read like an inspired Rousseau tract. His dialogues with people matter because people can immediately recognise political grievances. Yes, his prose is immensely self-indulgent, but there is no ambivalence of purpose manifested in the language that he uses. Many realise the difference between these two parties, but to fathom the difference through the language used by them or the media, one would be left in a vacuous prism of understanding, whereby the electorate cannot easily conceive of where a party stands. We are confronted with the use of language which makes it less likely for those of us who are merely skimming the news, to understand the implications of a particular party’s policies. There is a danger that the duality between politicians’ messages, and the electorate’s understanding of their statements, will continue to sustain a shallow understanding of political issues, based on a fundamentally limited range of views and information.

WORDS: Patrick Garratt

PHOTOS: Eloise Hendy May

stocks / shares

weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re hooked up to the matrix grubby digits fingering our umbilical chords make sweet music out of me string me out and leave me high and dry the weight of this is blunting my shoulder blades or were they confiscated before i could shrug it off silver spoon mouthed lapping at the bowl of milk and honey swaddled in a wallet of bank notes and cheques made out to privilege white lines as a past time no tan lines to be seen aces spill from cuff-linked sleeves pass the spades down the chain others will hold the shovels on their tongues to dig a way out a six foot deep escape tunnel from the iron sky

26 Crows Nest

number crunches and dead lifts suns out and the guns were never put away the holsters are full of intellectual freedom they say the pen is mightier than the sword so we better keep them sheathed hollow out those words down with humour down with epic we’ve chosen the perfect bedtime story knights in shining armour gilded men in golden thrones with a glossy-maned mare to ride the good guys are having a hard time but they’ll pull through in the end keep it black and white keep the Bogeyman at the Bay suited and booted and live and kicking looking sharp cutting a mean figure can you keep up? is your number up? are you staring down the barrel hoping for another glass of the good stuff? its the age of taxidermy teeth gritted into grins steely eyed stares held up by puppet strings we’re clinging to the aprons of mother and father figurines what a freudian field trip therapist couch stain teenage angst wet dream depressed desires and anxious tendencies gender role calls register our shared OCD categories WORDS: Eloise Hendy

ARTWORK: Figgy Guyver 28 Crows Nest

vox populi vox dei Tell me, do you love me? In the inhale before dawn I went wandering Up to the door, up to the door I left a leaflet on your bedroom floor Tell me, do you love me? Ask me, do I love you? Follow my cursor, take up the bait Wake to the vehemence of my hate Fall asleep with my promise and prayer Ask me, do I love you? Tell me, do you love me? I drew you a box, blank white I made it last night A space for the cross of your legs Tell me, do you love me? Ask me, do I love you? Ask the box, ask the slot The space, yawning soft Awaits the blood beat of your heart. You know how to start. Come, tell me. Do you love me?

WORDS: Hannah Philp May

spectator sports Stop all the clocks, i-phones on silent, prevent the dog from barking with a juicy can of Pedigree™. Its time kids, put down your toys, are you sitting comfortably? But wait wait wait for Myrtle! Here she comes, down the stairs, drying her hands on her turquoise robe. She’s settled now, pesky girl – are we all here? Good, now let us begin. *click* And they’re off! Look, there child! In front of you – those technicolour rebels, in HD, Blu-ray and 3D. Oppression is being resisted, hip-hip hooray, three cheers for democracy! Pop open the champagne – solemnly – and a toast to the colourful masses! Clink your glasses and down your drinks; pour yourself another (this could take some time). Please tell Myrtle not to rustle her crisp packet, for it destroys the ambiance so and quick, quick! Look! The clatter of a narrowly avoided tear gas canister, it whizzed right past his face! Did you see that? Did you? Children, children gather round, for this is democracy, live on BBC 2! But now a lull in the violence, a scramble for the toilet door breaks the telly-induced silence and chitter chatter grows while little feet pitter patter on the linoleum floor out in the hall. ‘Over to you’ the telly voice says, and its back to the news presenter now – that old bore, his voice as dull as the shirt that he wears, his face as wrinkly too. The show is over folks, what a disappointment, what a drag. But did you see that tear gas canister? Shot straight past him – piewwww! That wasn’t bad, no not at all. Well, flick through the cannels, let’s see what’s on! Songs of Praise? Match of the Day? No, no, let us wait until eight, when there will be an exposé on the atrocities of the Syrian war with rare unseen footage, over on Channel 4. WORDS:

Jack

30 Crows Nest

Guariento

Would you like to be a part of Crows Nest? We are looking for submissions for our next issue. The theme will be â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;The Summer Bodyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;, so if you have any thought / words / photos / draws then please email them over. Our email address is crowsnestzine@gmail.com We like nest eggs.