Do you believe in change?
We must combine an ability to both dare to dream and understand the fight we're in. To do this we need radical realism.
(apologies in advance for readers in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. I am going to talk a lot about England and as it is both my home and my country I will be referring to it as such)
It’s coming home!!!!!
It is statistically quite possible that it is coming home.
It’s definitely not coming home.
God I hope it doesn’t come home - people will be insufferable.
We don’t deserve it to come home because Brexit/Tories.
These seem to be the five basic approaches of English political Twitter to England’s winning a place in the final of Euro 2021.
Myself, I veer wildly between believing that we can do it and superstitiously worrying that this will therefore jinx the result (because what really matters in these things is the belief system of one fat, middle-aged woman in East London. That’s how this works right?).
I’ve spent a bit less time on Twitter of late. And I think it’s done me some good. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still on there a lot. If I hear of an event it’s basically what I search for news before anything else. But I haven’t been getting lost down rabbit holes of other people’s arguments about absolute bullshit lately.
I’ve also been thinking a lot about optimism, pessimism and realism and their role in politics and political discourse.
This is too simplistic but ultimately, I think it breaks down to this: Pessimism stops you from acting, optimism stops you from acting well. Realism is essential - but all too often is pessimism in disguise.
Pessismism is easy. It’s an easy trap to fall into. We can all look cooler when we’re the person in the corner with the world weary cynicism. It’s also true that almost as often as we try we may fail. That person is statistically likely to be right about our failure rate.
Pessimism is the best tool the status quo has in its armory. If they can rob us of hope for change then we won’t change anything. and Boy - do we need to change.
I interviewed two policy people who have written a book about what is needed to combat climate change this week and what struck me was how inadequate most of our politics are when it comes to this existential threat. Far too milquetoast, far too compromised and compromising.
I am not generally given to sudden radicalism. I am generally of the belief that moving to radical systems is something best implemented slowly without a shock - the boiling a frog version of politics. And if we had started acting when we first knew there was a threat from climate change, that might have been the way we could proceed. But we didn’t. We let a rapacious capitalism turn their opportunism into our pessimism. We strove hard to make the smallest, most incremental of changes and promises and then watched even those be broken.
So now, there will be a moment of radical action. But there is no guarantee that it will be the right one. It is - let us be very clear - far more radical to continue as we are and see the deaths of thousands, the loss of vast swathes of biodiversity and potential planetary death as a result of our inaction than it would be to take the kind of action that is required immediately to at the least slow the destruction. It is also far more likely. Because vested interests have created precisely the conditions to make any action against them feel either too radical, too unworkable or too unlikely. They encourage our pessimism because they know it will lead to inertia.
This is why I don’t get angry when I see groups like Extinction Rebellion making what look like clumsy interventions. Because my god we need a bit of their optimism that something can be done. All too often I am yelled at by those who believe themselves to be pragmatic for supporting the radicalism of such groups believing the public will never go along with them.
But we lost our chance to change in a non-radical way. There isn’t time for pragmatic both sides centrism anymore. If a gradual approach were going to work, it would have had to have been started 20 - 30 years ago. It wasn’t.
So now those of us who consider ourselves pragmatists are going to have to get our heads around what is *actually* pragmatically and practically needed to avert disaster.
Climate change is just one example of where pessimism disguises itself as pragmatism. Pessimism being the tool of the status quo it is often used to protect right wing institutions and norms.
But sometimes pessimism can backfire on the right. Take Tory MP Lee Anderson. He probably pessimistically thought that far from ‘coming home’ England would likely crash out in the early stages of the Euro tournament and his ridiculous stance on not watching the squad as long as they took the knee would cost him nothing and make him a go-to for the lucrative and profile-raising anti-woke circuit.
Boy has that backfired on him. No one else, literally no one, cares about the taking of the knee while the squad are also taking (and rarely conceding) goals. Our patriotism and our optimism have driven over Anderson’s pessimistic stance like a bulldozer leaving him out on a very stupid limb, doubling down even as he knows he looks like an idiot.
Let’s think about that. How the combined goodwill of a country made this culture warrior, who was supported by a vocal minority at the start with much discussion over ‘taking the knee’ three weeks ago, a pariah.
We can change minds if we do not let our pragmatism become pessimism in disguise.
We can use the optimism of movements to make practical, important and radical change as long as we don’t fail to spot the moments available to do so. We don’t have to fail.
Those people who have used today not as a reason to think about what we have in common as a nation in England but to wish those of us who want to see the team will poorly because of their own cause (be that being anti-Brexit or anti-Boris) are just looking like invest Lee Andersons now. It is perverse, and while it might get a few likes from your in-crowd, it will do nothing to further your cause.
We can believe that football is coming home tonight not because of a blind patriotic faith, but because of the excellent work of a committed squad of talented individuals whose values on and off the pitch have been exemplary. They are the anti-Lee Andersons of this world and politicians can and should learn from their pragmatic application of hard work and positive thinking. And if England can make or even win a final What else is possible that we never dared before to dream…
What I’ve been up to
Today is International Fringe Day. So what better opportunity to buy tickets to see No Cure for Love.
Inspired by the music of Leonard Cohen, this piece examines the truth behind love songs. Can love ever be like that? Would we want it to be? Does love age with us or do we always fall like teenagers?
Join musicians Scott and Rose backstage at the Broadstairs Folk Festival as they try to discover if there is - in fact - a cure for love.
This is a rare show about love, sex and romance between older people. We're jaded, but we still have appetites, hopes, dreams and romantic aspirations. But if we haven't found them yet - are we being realistic about what we want?
I am really proud of this play and the music for it. But put it this way - it’s only an hour long and above a pub. What have you really got to lose?
*****
This week I interview Mathew Lawrence and Laurie Laybourn-Langton about their book Planet on Fire: A manifest for Environmental Breakdown on House of Comments.
And Steve and I discuss The Parallax View on The Zeitgeist Tapes. An excellent example of seventies paranoia and exceptionally good hair.
I am aware that I left off the link to the Metro sex piece last week (probably desperate for Mum and Dad not to read it) so here it is. (Still don’t read this J2!)
This week I will be speaking at a Bristol Ideas event on the role of citizens in politics, patriotism and the common good.
Reading List
This is an interesting read from Cathy Newman on what Keir Starmer can learn from Gareth Southgate. It also exemplifies some of the response of the media to Labour’s unexpected in in Batley and Spen. The redemption narrative is ripe for the taking.
Questions, comments and arguments are very welcome. Insults will get you summarily blocked on every platform that no longer hosts Donald Trump. I’m at emmaburnell@gmail.com or on Twitter (far too often) at @EmmaBurnell_.