This was a very interesting interview with Mark Morris, a Big Issue vendor of seven years.
When I was 18, like many British teenagers, I worked for two months on a kibbutz communal farm in Israel. Kibbutz, which means gathering, are managed by a collective committee, and all profits from working the land are put back into the farm. Members pay a small, subsidised rent for their homes, and work, eat, and celebrate communally with other members.
My kibbutz, Massada, is situated in North Israel, near the Sea of Galilee and Beit She’an. I recently revisited Massada, as well as the nearby Ein Harod kibbutz.
Ein Harod is established in both Israeli and kibbutz folklore as the centre of the earth. Its location beneath the mountain of King Saul, where he supposedly committed suicide, lend it a biblical importance. Migiddo, the place of Armageddon and the final confrontation between good and evil, is a few miles down the road.
Ein Harod was founded in 1921 as the first ever kibbutz, and was the ideological centre of the kibbutz movement. Its two sites – ehud and meuhad – came to symbolise those split between those kibbutzniks who went onto support communism, and those who didn’t.
But now the kibbutz movement has had to adapt to a rapidly changing economic landscape. Ein Harod, like Massada and many other kibbutz, is losing money. The movement has been undergoing a process of hafrata – privatisation. Non-members now pay to live on kibbutz properties. Workers’ caravans are being demolished and the land used to build houses.
No longer do young, international volunteers pay for a summer of sun with their cheap labour. Instead, since May 2010, they have been replaced by Thai guest workers. In Ein Harod, Arabs work the printing presses, olive and date groves.
The ideal of kibbutz life, once an symbol of Israel’s collective struggle and connection with the land, feels anachronistic. Many kibbutz buildings are crumbling, and their dining halls empty as members abandon the intensively communal lifestyle.
In the next ten years it is envisaged that most kibbutz will be in private hands. The founding ideologies of the kibbutz, like many of the ideals that define Israeli culture, are having to adapt to harsh social, political and economic realities.
Below are some images from day to day life in Israel – pictures taken in Haifa, Lake Kinneret, & Akko. The quote is from Israel’s Declaration of Independence. I use it to refer to all those who live within her borders.
Latest pieces from the Big Issue in the North; the potential closure of rehabilitation unit at Newbury House here and here; mental health cuts at Manchester’s Edale Unit here and here; & filmmaking homeless style.
Leo and Vasile, both 21, are Romanian Roma who work in Manchester’s schools translating and working as teaching assistants. They can now read and write three languages – despite Leo having a total of four months’ schooling (and soon to become a father of four). They were both recruited through the Migrant Impact Fund project; whose funding, sadly, comes to an end in November. For much much more on this new community, visit Ciara Leeming’s site for some fascinating words and pictures.
Latest pieces from Inside Housing available to read here and here
an interesting set of photos this, on many levels (they have come from the human endeavour photo collective)
firstly the shocking elevation of ideology above human need apparent in the design of much of these high-rise buildings is incredible – it seems in british life we believe that a notion of beauty will apprently civilise in the face of overwhelming social and economic problems. yet the theoretical dreams of academics are just that. they have no idea of the complex needs of nascent communities and how a space needs to organically grow to accommodate and assimilate people.
also, the waste. when will start to reclaim the thousands of vacant properties in this country and put people back to work refurbishing them? but not only doing the same superficial rendering work common to so many housing associations that seems to double up as ‘refurbishment’ but tree planting, landscaping, creation of usable public spaces, revitalisation of traditional crafts and refurbishment of original features for modern use……
there is a strange and eerie beauty in these buildings though. but that is because they weren’t built for people – only when empty can they shine. our cities are full of disconnected totems whilst our people struggle to find space in which to live. also the reclamation of much of the land by nature – degradation has allowed trees to grow and plants to thrive – allow you to imagine how they could look had builders worked with nature when these buildings were first created.
OK. These were taken between about 7.30 and 8.30pm this evening in Manchester.
Below is the story I wrote for the Guardian.
By Helen Clifton & Kevin Gopal
9.30pm: Large groups of young people have been running amok across the streets of Manchester for the past four hours, smashing windows and looting shops across the city centre.
The action started around 5.30pm, with shops in the New Cathedral Street area being smashed by a crowd of masked youths. One of the first targets was the Ugg shop; Louise Vuitton, Selfridges, Marks and Spencer and Harvey Nichols were then damaged.
Further down the road, King Street’s expensive boutiques also had their windows smashed, including Diesel, where looters were later seen carrying away window dummies. In the Northern Quarter, the Vans shop was looted – rioters had prised off the metal bars to smash the window.
There were stand-offs on Market Street and High Street between a crowd of around two hundred youths baiting police wearing helmets and shields. From there, there was an attempt to storm the entrance of the Arndale Shopping centre on Market Street; Miss Selfridges was set alight.
Police then made more concerted attempt to secure the area, first with tactical aid unit vans; then dozens of officers in full riot gear and on horseback arrived to disperse the crowds.
Following these skirmishes, looting began in the upmarket St Ann’s Square area; targeting the T-Mobile store, Links jewellery store, and Starbucks. Stalls set up as part of a food market were looted. The modd turned tense, with youths threatening photographers and journalists.
As the Swarovski crystal shop on St Anns Square was being looted, three cars carrying plain clothes police drove up to the crowd and waded into the melee with batons. Youths were wrestled to the ground; one appeared to have an injured leg as he lay amongst the broken glass.
The police then turned to guard their prisoners – and themselves – from a screaming crowd of rioters.
One young bystander said the violence was because young people felt they had no voice. “Things are really hard at the moment; there is a lot of frustration and tension. This is our way of making a point in as direct as way as possible. People don’t believe the Government anymore since the Iraq war. Now, because of the internet, they are able to think for themselves. This is a response to their frustation.”
Over 50 riot police arrived both with dogs and on horses from Cross Street, and the top of Market Street, to seal off the core of rioters around the bottom of Market Street.
Looting then drifted towards Deansgate; Patisserie Valerie was smashed, and Bridge Street’s Sainsbury’s was openly looted by people carrying out bags of groceries. As night was beginning to fall, fires burned on pavements in St James Square. And gangs of youths continued to goad each other to carry on the looting in Piccadilly Gardens.
My Guardian piece on the last night’s trouble in liverpool:
AT around 12.30pm last night, one Toxteth pub was still full as people enjoyed a late drink following their weekly quiz night.
But then the air filled with screams as bricks and sticks were hurled through the windows, showering drinkers with glass.
“I feel terrified. It’s soul destroying; we are only trying to earn a living. And this isn’t just my livelihood. It’s my home,” said the licensee as she cleared up the glass.
“You’ve just got to try and pick yourself up. All you can hope for is that it doesn’t start again.”
Last night hundreds of youths, some aged as young as 10, some masked, some not, moved down the High Park Street, burning and smashing cars and windows.
The Tesco Express store in Myrtle Street was looted of alcohol and tobacco by children; they also smashed the windows in the Admiral Street police station, burned a police van, and smashed several bus shelters.
“The police were down there looking after their own; they weren’t looking after us,” said one resident.
Earlier, the crowd had torched cars along Princess Road, scattering bin barricades across the broad tree-lined boulevard.
Grove Street, at the edge of the city’s genteel Georgian Quarter, was littered with over a dozen smashed and burned cars, while resident’s windows were smashed as they sheltered inside.
Steve McAnelly, of Falkner Square, watched helplessly as his Fiat Punto had a brick thrown through the window.
“I felt really, really frightened because of the multitude of people there. It was absolutely disgusting. There were no police at all. The fire brigade saved lots of lives; the mob were just laughing. It was like they saw it as a big joke. It was like a war zone.”
Student Ben Woodthorpe was in his first floor Falkner Square flat as bricks were thrown through the window.
“Everything was just orange as there was a taxi burning on the corner. There is a guy inside the house that was next to the burning cars with a disabled son; he could have been trapped inside. The first brick bounced off the window and then I decided to shelter downstairs. Some of them were as young as 10 or 12.”
Some residents were angry. Yeadon Marco, of Huskisson Street, said: ” They are just scumbags; this is nothing to do with cutbacks. It’s to do with a lack of discipline.”
Over on High Park Street, shopkeeper Adam Saleh served customers shellshocked by the events. He said he didn’t recognise any of the youths; they had come from outside areas, including Garston and Speke, and were directing the action via their mobile phones.
“You could understand if they were demanding something. But what is the point of this? To do this to local people and local shops is out of order,” he said. “There is no reason for this. We try to make life better for ourselves but Toxteth is getting ruined again. We always pay the price.”
a very cool kid on a bike at manchester health academy, where I am currently teaching.
Ahem.
I worked as a researcher on this Radio 4 documentary about assisted suicide way back in the mists of last September and have failed to upload it until now….here it is if you fancy a listen.
But I guess this post is now particularly timely. The thorny issue of euthanasia has reared its head once again, with Terry Pratchett last week presenting a BBC documentary of a very personal journey towards self-chosen suicide.
This radio documentary was made by the now defunct All Out Productions – whom I sure will soon rise phoenix-like from the ashes of their previous incarnation.
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