A very British coup

It's not even been a week since the results of the EU Referendum were announced, but in just a few short days the UK has descended into chaos. Pie Minister David Cameron announced his resignation shortly after the results were announced, then the internal divisions in the Labour Party sank to the lowest point in a very long time and it was announced that a motion of a vote of no confidence in Jeremy Corbyn was to be raised at the PLP meeting, then Shadow Foreign Secretary Hilary Benn was sacked for stating he didn't think Corbyn was up to being leader, following this the shadow cabinet lost a further 19 members, and the most recent news: 172 Labour MPs have voted in favour of the motion of no confidence in Corbyn. To be blunt, the political world is a complete shambles at the moment. I have already briefly spoken about the internal divisions in the Labour Party, but I wanted to discuss the electorate's relationship with Labour and the problems that arise from a two-party state like the UK.

The argument that we've been hearing for the past year since Jeremy Corbyn came onto the scene are along the lines of "elections are won on the centre ground" so "Jeremy Corbyn is unelectable" - but is that so? If elections are won on the centre ground, can anyone explain why the Lib Dems are yet to have won a single election? Or why Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband didn't manage to become Prime Minister? There are obviously other factors affecting election results, I'm not here to dispute that, but centrist politics are extremely damaging and a key component in creating political apathy and disillusionment.

When the two main parties are offering similar policies, we become shallow and fickle in choosing who we want to represent our country, we buy into the image, the appearance, the charisma of the candidate. This isn't true of all voters of course - for example, I can't imagine a scenario where I would vote Tory because it is my personal view that it is wrong to victimise poorer people, but we all have our priorities, maybe that's just crazy commie Bess speaking. It's the swing voters who can make or break the election result, and when it's hard to distinct between the two main parties because their policies are so similar, you're more likely to be captivated by the charisma. In addition, the apathetic belief that "all politicians are the same" is a direct result of centrism taking over in politics, why would you believe that politicians are offering you something new when realistically they're not because they share a lot of the same policies?

Centrism results in a cynical electorate because it is clear that the politicians are saying what they think the electorate wants to hear, they are making promises to the people but then when they get into power they try and pull away from centrist policies and implement the ones they genuinely believe in. Translation: they lie to get voted in and then don't come through on their promises, this results in people losing faith in politicians and becoming disillusioned. If you're disillusioned and apathetic, why would you vote? Why would you vote when "they're all the same"? This is why turnout is quite low, why would you vote when you feel like your vote doesn't matter? If the EU Referendum showed us anything, it's that we're in dire need of electoral reform - the turnout was about 20% higher than in the last General Election, people vote when they believe their vote matters and will make a difference.

In addition to this, the UK is essentially a two-party state. I'm not saying that's a good thing, but it's true, that's why parties like the Greens and UKIP only have one seat each whilst Labour and the Conservatives hold most of the others (unless you're in Scotland, in which case SNP are a pretty viable option). This means when we vote, you essentially have to make the choice between Labour and Tory. It is a lesser of two evils situation generally. My MP, for example, voted to introduce tuition fees and to bomb Syria just to give a couple of examples. I don't really feel adequately represented by him, but I would rather a Labour MP than a Tory MP which was why he got my vote. I would put money on the fact that most of the electorate vote in a similar way, my constituency represents that we don't support the Tories but it can't really be taken much further than that in this scenario. It it for this reason that the PLP are not truly representative of the electorate, 172 MPs in the PLP supported a vote of no confidence in Jeremy Corbyn and the New Labour sect of the party are using this as evidence that Corbyn has lost the support of the electorate. This is ignoring the fact that Corbyn was never insanely popular with the the PLP to begin with - he needed 35 nominations from the PLP to get onto the ballot paper for the leadership election and he only just got in with 36, but when you compare that to the actual leadership election where he won with nearly 60% which is a landslide, it's obvious that he's more popular with the electorate. For this reason, we cannot honestly state that the MPs are representative of the electorate and we cannot let this coup damage our support of Corbyn. Those who resigned are not worthy of the position they had, I mean every single one who resigned voted in support of or abstained from voting on the 2015 Welfare Bill which resulted in the poor and disabled paying for £12 billion more in cuts - are these the people who represent us?

The media and the right-wingers will have us believe that Corbyn is unelectable, but so many of us voted him in against all the odds, against all the Blairites and the Tories. We have to call into question why the media and the right-wingers are quite so opposed to Corbyn, the attack on him is very extreme in comparison to other party leaders. As Another Angry Voice pointed out, this is exactly the sort of response you would expect when a candidate is as anti-establishment as Corbyn is. I will continue to stick by Corbyn, and I hope you do so too. Do not succumb to the propaganda, remember we are the electorate and we have the power.

The importance of voting

Political participation is one of our most valuable human rights, but it is one that 7.5 million people in the UK are not utilising as they're not registered to vote in the upcoming EU referendum. We are socialised with this belief that one vote never made a difference, but if all of the people who believed that (like the 34% of registered voters in 2015 who didn't vote and that's not even including the people who didn't register), it could and would swing the vote.

I completely understand why political apathy is at an all time high, especially amongst the youth. The political discourse that's often presented to us is overcomplicated and saturated with buzzwords, it confuses people and I wholeheartedly believe this is deliberate, it is done in the hope that the generally more open-minded, empathic youth don't get invested in politics and so we develop a cognitive dissonance so we feel disconnected from the issues that are being discussed. This tactic is used specifically to maintain the conservative status quo - we all joke about it being old, white men in government but the situation is as it stands because they are trying to keep the youth from getting interested. Youths tend to care about people, and this directly conflicts with conservative ideology. Long story short, it's dangerous for Tories to standardise political education in schools because if the youths became engaged in politics and all voted, the right would crumble.

For true, representative democracy (I'm not arguing that First Past the Post is representative, but I digress) 100% political participation is ideal. If you don't feel like any of the options available to you represent your political beliefs, you can spoil your ballot which is in itself a political statement but do not under any means just abstain from voting. As Owen Jones often says "we are standing on the shoulders of giants" - from the Chartists, to the Suffragettes, people have been fighting for our vote, fighting for democracy, for centuries. If you don't vote, you are actively dismissing and discrediting everything these people fought for. We cannot allow ourselves to be marginalised, our voice matters and political participation is a right we should protect at all costs.

The deadline for registering to vote in the EU Referendum is the 7th June - you can register here, it only takes about 2 minutes at most and the outcome of this referendum will affect youths most.

The Tony Blair issue

Tony Blair - also known as former Prime Minister and leader of the Labour party, the man responsible for Blairism and New Labour, and one of the biggest red Tories out there. I try not to talk about Tony Blair if it can be avoided, I think ultimately the involvement of Tony Blair in current political affairs is counter-productive - let me explain. Tony Blair is not representative of the Labour Party or at the very least, he is not representative of what the Labour Party is now in 2016. We are moving past the times of New Labour and Blairism ('bout time) and entering the age of Corbynism, Labour are becoming reconnected with the grassroots movement, the links with the trade unions and socialist parties, that they began with.

The issue being that Tony Blair continues to make public statements about the status of the Labour Party and his opinion is still widely listened to and respected by people, the words he says still make an impact because of the position of power he once had. This wouldn't be such a bad thing if he was productively supporting the party he claims to be backing, but all Blair seemingly does when making statements about the Labour Party is complain that they've moved too far to the left since he left government which does nothing but undermine the party. When someone with that amount of political influence makes sweeping statements like it would be a 'very dangerous experiment' if Jeremy Corbyn's Labour with its 'populist policy-making' got into power, it is an outright endorsement for the Conservatives, they can and they will capitalise on the fact that a so-called Labour supporter (and not just any so-called Labour supporter but the one who just so happened to be Prime Minister for 10 years) isn't even supporting Labour under its current leadership, and that to me sounds much more dangerous an experiment than the idea of a Corbynite government.

Not only do Blair's statements endorse the far right, they also reignite support for New Labour which divides not just the members of the party but also members of the public. Division in the Labour party is feeding right into the hands of the Tories and we cannot afford to give them fodder in political discourse. It is vital that the Labour party are united under the common goal of defeating the Tories, and that cannot happen when red Tories are bringing down the party from the inside. What's being presented from that is that Labour's internal politics are not consistent, why would anyone vote for a party that can't unite and inspire their own members let alone the general population? Outside of the party, members of the public are reminded of New Labour and it's possible that they could defect to Tory because Blair is essentially saying that if Jeremy Corbyn's Labour party gets into power, it would be disastrous. It's blatant that Blair is telling us to vote for an alternative, and in this two-party state realistically the only alternative is Conservative. If members of the public who support New Labour take on board what Blair is saying, we may have possibly lost a huge chunk of Labour support - I repeat, we cannot afford to do that.

Another issue with Blair chipping in on these issues is that a lot of people don't respect his opinion and may completely disagree with him - myself included! This is a problem though, because if miraculously Blair does stop bitching about Jeremy Corbyn and gets behind Labour before 2020, this could be a negative endorsement for Labour and could result in people abstaining from voting. Jeremy Corbyn's tagline when running for leader was that he was advocating 'a new kind of politics' and a move away from centrist* Blairite policies. If Jeremy Corbyn is advertising a non-Blairite style of government and he is endorsed by the biggest Blairite there is, Blair, I somehow doubt that many people will be convinced that Labour are going to act any differently to how they have when they have previously been in power. Tony Blair's input in this discussion is not remotely helpful for the left, and Labour has and always will be fundamentally at its core a left wing party, so if Blair cares as much as he claims about the future of Labour, he would do the admirable thing and stop publicly making statements about Labour. It's counter-productive and Tony Blair should no longer have access to this public platform.

On a final note - Tony, if you want to talk about a 'very dangerous experiment', do you want to talk Iraq?

*BLAIRISM IS NOT CENTRIST IN THE SLIGHTEST. LET'S BE REAL. 

The white paper: what you need to know and why you should be angry

In 2010, there was public outcry over the tripling of tuition fees by the Con-Dem government. 6 years later, we're under a completely Conservative government and the higher education White Paper has been published - if you thought £9000 a year was bad, it's about to get a whole lot worse.

Photograph: Stephanie Kalber/Demotix/Corbis

The White Paper allows 'inflationary increases in tuition fees for institutions that meet basic standards in 2017-18', and this is 'ahead of the introduction of differentiated caps in 2019-20'. This means that by 2018, some Universities will be able to charge more per year than others and by 2020, Universities that score highly in terms of teaching quality will be able to raise their fees to whatever they like. The discourse used makes it seem on the surface like the Universities that offer the best education will be rewarded, but really it's a neoliberal restructuring of the higher education system to benefit the elite and exclude those from poorer backgrounds. On top of the fact that maintenance grants have been scrapped, it isn't hard to see that this is is a purely ideological tactic. The way it's heading, someone from a poorer background would have to take out an extortionate loan to go to one of these 'better Universities' and when they come out the other side, they'll have a bomb of a loan to repay. Whilst they may come out with a degree from a prestigious University and be more likely to get a job, it is still unfair when you remember that those from richer backgrounds will be able to get the same degree from the same prestigious University, and be able to get Mummy and Daddy to pay it back and that's only if they take out the loan initially which people from richer backgrounds don't always have to do because they've got the dolla in the first place. 

This all plays into the Conservative's ideological warfare, it is the principle at hand that the Conservatives are only fighting for the privileged few. Just a few months ago, George Osbourne announced his budget which directly targeted the disabled. A few years back, Iain Duncan Smith introduced the Bedroom tax which directly targeted the poor. The Conservatives are slowly culling off the groups that don't affect them, it's reinforcing hierarchy, it's reinforcing inequality, it's neoliberalism at its worst and it is wholly unacceptable.

Why Angela Davis is my political fave

For as long as I can remember, I have been proud to call myself a feminist. My Mum's a devout feminist and has never told me to afraid of the word 'feminism'. That being said, until the past year or two, I didn't feel wholeheartedly connected to the issues mainstream (white) feminism talks about.

Of course, I knew things like 'free the nipple' and letting girls wear short skirts and show their shoulders in school without being sexualised by male teachers were important issues, but I didn't feel like this mainstream feminism was particularly useful when it came to other forms of oppression. I didn't feel like this feminism was inclusive of other intersections, it became more and more obvious to me that this type of feminism didn't really fight for those who are oppressed because of their race or those who are oppressed because of their class. Becoming invested in 'SJW Twitter' definitely helped here and opened my eyes to the reality of white feminism and to the prospect of intersectional feminism. In short, white feminism is a branch of feminism focused on the struggles of primarily white and privileged women, this is basically liberal feminism which is centered around western ideals and liberalism doesn't really help the movement on a mass scale (but that's a topic for a different time). Intersectional feminism is a branch of feminism that encompasses all intersections because it claims that oppressive institutions are all intertwined, so the obvious one is sexism, but it also takes into account racism, classism, transphobia, homophobia, biphobia, ableism - you name an oppressive -ism and intersectional feminism is against that.

This is a picture of one of the walls in my Uni house - me and my housemate Megan adore Angela and wanted to order a poster of her, and then we received two in the post (at no extra charge) so we have two posters right next to each other, yep we cool.

So how does Angela Davis come into this? Angela Davis is one of the most famous intersectional feminists there are, just a month ago she said in an interview that feminism involves 'embracing but moving beyond gender'. In the 1960s, Angela Davis was a member of the Black Panthers, leader of the Communist Party in the USA, as well as being a member of the Che-Lumumba Club which was the all-black branch of the Communist Party. Being a part of groups like these meant she was not silent on classism or racism. She was (and still is) outspoken about classism and racism in the Suffrage movement, which we're told liberated all women when actually WOC were exploited by white women to push forward the movement. She's also spoken out about sexism in the Civil Rights movement and other socialist movements which resulted in the oppression of women being pushed to the sideline. Angela Davis also emphasizes the importance of women's rights being looked at globally in order for women to form 'a united, multiracial, antimonopoly women’s movement in order to aid oppressed women throughout the world'. 

I largely base my feminism on the likes of people like Angela Davis, people who are unapologetically anti-Capitalist (for a while, I was scared to say that I agreed with a lot of communist/anarchist ideals because you automatically get shunned as a fascist apologist - again, this is another topic for another blog post) and people who include POC, most importantly black people (again, colourism - different topic that I shan't go into detail about now), and encompass all of these issues into their feminism - this is the basis of my feminism, and as it is Women's History Month, I'd like to thank Angela Davis for being a big figure in helping me further my feminism, so thank you Angela - you tha real MVP.

Iain Duncan Smith doesn't deserve a pat on the back

On the 18th March, Iain Duncan Smith resigned from his post as Secretary of State for Work and Pensions in the Conservative Party resulting in cries of joy from lefties like myself, but whilst I can relish this moment, I have some opinions. I have seen all over my Twitter timeline and Facebook feed  that Iain Duncan Smith is a good person because he 'stuck to his principles' and resigned his post as he believed that George Osbourne's budget which victimised the disabled was, in his words, 'a compromise too far'. I gots some problems with this, so I'm going to dissect what his little letter said and explain why it is BS.

He opened with:

"I am incredibly proud of the welfare reforms that the Government has delivered over the last five years."

Really, Iain? You're going to say you're 'incredibly proud' of introducing Universal Credit which forces all low paid employees into desperate competition for casual work? You're 'incredibly proud' of the Bedroom Tax which charges the poor if they're given social housing with 'more rooms than they require', despite the fact that there is also a lack of social housing so tenants really don't have much choice in where they live so it's essentially arbitrarily charging the poor, you're proud of that, are you?

"Those reforms have helped to generate record rates of employment and in particular a substantial reduction in workless households."

Hm, are these jobs on zero hour contracts? Y'know those contracts whereby the employer has no obligation to offer work to the employees so the employee can't be certain they'll earn enough money to get through the week? Oh yeah, great job (pun not intended).

"I truly believe that we have made changes that will greatly improve the life chances of the most disadvantaged people in this country and increase their opportunities to thrive."

Is this some sort of sick joke? Just last week, Iain Duncan Smith was in full support of reducing the Employment and Support Allowance meaning that claimants would receive £30 less a week. Claimants include hundreds of thousands of sick and disabled people, such as sufferers of cancer, Parkinson's disease and mental illness - I mean, I could be wrong, these people are pretty disadvantaged and it seems like you're taking away what little opportunity they have to thrive, Iain, but that could just be me. 

"Together, we've made enormous strides towards building a system of social security that gets the balance right between state-help and self-help."

The Tories don't promote state-help, the concept of self-help is fundamental to Conservative ideology - so basically, every man for himself. This is why continually the Tories allow big businesses and bankers to avoid paying their taxes. This is why Iain Duncan Smith, like other Tory MPs, gets away with claiming expenses to buy a £39 breakfast, talk about scroungers, eh? The Tories literally take money from the poor to give other rich people like themselves tax cuts - the reverse Robin Hood effect.

"I am unable to watch passively whilst certain policies are enacted in order to meet the fiscal self-imposed restraints that I believe are more and more perceived as distinctly political rather than in the national economic interest."

Austerity is distinctly political and has been shown not to do much good economically (for a contemporary example, Greece was forced to adhere to strict austerity measures and this resulted in a deeper recession, mass unemployment, the widening of budget deficits, and a rise in debt levels). Austerity is purely ideological warfare used to target the poor and the vulnerable, it's used to restructure the state in a way that benefits the privileged leaving the poor fighting for scraps. However, I don't believe Iain Duncan Smith is against austerity like he seems to be suggesting. Let's not forget that he voted against raising welfare benefits, he voted against paying higher benefits over longer periods to those who can't work because of illness or disability, he voted for a reduction in spending on welfare benefits, he voted against spending public money to create guaranteed jobs for young people who've been unemployed for a long time, he voted against a banker's bonus tax, he voted against the mansion tax, he voted for reducing corporation tax, he voted for raising tuition fees, and he voted for academy schools - Iain Duncan Smith is not anti-austerity.

"You should be very proud of what this government has done on deficit reduction, corporate competitiveness, education reforms and devolution of power."

Okay right, George Osbourne inherited a debt of £1 trillion. By May 2015, the debt was £1.5 trillion. I'm going to really dumb this down for any conservatives reading, but £1.5 trillion is a bigger number than £1 trillion, have you got that? I know I'll end up just complaining about Capitalism with this claim of improved corporate competitiveness, but I'm just going to say is corporate competitiveness a good thing? Or is it just this capitalist mantra that greed and selfishness should be promoted? The education reforms like academisation of schools has done nothing but divide teachers' unions, pit schools against each other, and generally lower standards of education. For example, academy schools are given more money depending on how many pupils they have which results in overcrowded classrooms and a generally much poorer educational experience. Speaking as someone who went to a High School that became an academy, I did notice the teachers were generally a lot less happier, so much so that nearly the entire science department at my school left! Lastly, devolution of power is not a good thing, this is a neoliberal tactic to bow out of accountability. By devolving powers, the government can easily deny responsibility when they're faced with a backlash - basically, it's their get out of jail free card. So, no Iain, I'm not proud of what this government has done regarding the areas you've mentioned (I'm not proud of anything they've done to be frank, I'm not sure if you can tell) and I don't think you, or anyone else, should be proud either.

Let's talk about the EU

OKAY, so important political stuff here - PLEASE do not click away if you are from the UK and especially if you're eligible to vote this year (if you're not, y'know the EU is still interesting stuff). Even if you know you're voting to leave or stay in the EU in the upcoming referendum, if you can't say why pleaaaaase either watch the video or check out any of the resources because it's really bugging me that people have made a snap decision and don't know why because this is one of the biggest things to happen to the UK in a long, long time, okay?


TOPICS MENTIONED:

• Reintroducing full powers back to Westminster
• EU is a drain on the British Economy
• EU is undemocratic and unaccountable
• 'British Identity' and Economy
• Immigration
• Trade
• New World Order
• Tuition Fees
• TTIP 

RESOURCES:

• Should the left leave the EU? | Owen Jones talks...
• The European Union, Greek austerity and microwave safety | Owen Jones talks back
• TTIP - Why we have to stop the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership | Owen Jones talks...
• What is the English identity? | Owen Jones talks...
• EU referendum timeline: What will happen when?
• DebateWise - the UK should leave the EU (I based my main points on this link)
• WriteToThem - select MEP if you want to write to your representative on TTIP, but this website is helpful anyway to talk to your constituency's MP as well
• Prevent review - I am going to do a whole video on Prevent but this is where they state what 'fundamental British values' are
• The Truth About Cameron, Immigration & Our Media: Russell Brand The Trews (E172)
• Nigel Farage: It is 'bonkers' to stay in the European Union - just included this for an opposing view okay I hate Nigel Farage 

I hope you found this remotely useful, I just feel like a lot of people don't know what they're doing in the referendum and it's coming up this year, we don't have time to sit back and pretend it's not happening.

Political baking with a meme-ingful message

Recently, I helped host a little shindig for my feminist friends (a.k.a the combabes) and I decided to get a little political for the vegan treats I made.

So I made some vegan shortbread and whilst I started off just writing 'I hate men', 'girls rock', 'NB people rock' etc. I ended up with a hammer and sickle and 'kill all men' - they went down pretty well!

I didn't intend the writing to look like blood, more like a happy accident...

On the 10th January, we were blessed with a new meme and that is the phrase 'Davey Cameron is a pie', so what better way to commemorate it than with a literal Davey Cameron pie? I went for apple, even though I'm sure Cameron would've preferred pork. There's nothing more liberating than stabbing a Davey Cameron pie, as I'm sure our party guests would've agreed with.

Whilst this may not have been the most interesting post, I make myself laugh and I want as many people to know as possible than I not only bake vegan treats but I also bake vegan treats with a political message - thank you and good night.

Last hope for the lefties

This is probably one of the first posts I've ever done on UK politics, I've spoken about topics of social justice before and I've mentioned my hatred for the government and how sad I was with the General Election results but this is the first whole post I am dedicating entirely to UK politics, and this post goes out to the lefties - so if you're a Tory, you might want to bugger off right about now, although if you're a Tory I don't see why you're following my blog in the first place . . .

As you will probably know, the Labour Leadership election is coming and votes need to be in by September 10th. Anyone can join the Labour Party in order to be eligible for this election, and if you're a true leftie, you really should consider it because Jeremy Corbyn could be Labour's last chance to win an election ever again. People are tired of Tory lite/austerity lite, hence why the Tories have essentially won the past two elections. If the results in Scotland from the last election show us anything, it's that people want an alternative to austerity and that's exactly what Jeremy Corbyn is offering as Labour leader.

So what is Jez offering*?

1. On the economy, he wants an end to austerity, higher taxes for the rich, and protection for people on welfare. An end to austerity means protection to the public services that ordinary people, at some point or another, will depend on. The existence of austerity perpetuates this war on the poor that maintains and strengthens the patriarchy, so considering Jez is the only realistic alternative to austerity we have in this political system, that alone was enough to convince me he was the way forward.

2. On foreign policy, Jez wants to secure peace in the middle east by talking instead of invading - an approach that should regain those who became disillusioned with Labour under Blair. He's also spoken out many times on the oppression of Palestinian people and Israel's violation of international war.

3. On the EU, Jez wants to stay in but have a reform as the EU is precious especially regarding trade amongst other benefits like protection of workers, more jobs being generated, freedom for citizens to work, travel or study in any other European country, low prices of goods, a louder voice for the UK, and it aids in the development of economically deprived countries. He also outrightly disagrees with TTIP, which if it went ahead could result in the privatisation of the NHS, lower the standards of regulations on food and environmental safety (which could be pretty dodgy to say the least), give a hell of a lot more power to bankers, as well as resulting in a lot of unemployment, and it would introduce Investor-State Dispute Settlements (ISDS) which essentially means unelected transnational corporations could dictate the policies of democratically elected governments - so if I were you, I would definitely want someone opposing TTIP to be representing the Labour Party.

4. On education, he wants a national education service, and state-funded academies and free schools would be returned to local authority control as these systems divide the unions. He also wants to scrap tuition fees and he plans to do this by increasing national insurance for those who earn over £50,000 and a higher corporation tax - I don't know about you, but free or at least cheaper university sounds pretty good to me (especially since the Tories are getting rid of maintenance grants)

5. On housing, Jez wants rent controls in places such as Central London to help families on benefits pay their rent because obviously it's a lot more expensive there.

6. On defence, unlike the government, less money would be spent and Trident would be scrapped, which is a controversial issue in itself but I personally think this is a good move as it's an unnecessary, expensive deterrent - building and operating a new generation of nuclear weapons will cost the UK £97 billion, and the weapons are far too powerful for their own good. In fact, every submarine in Britain's Trident fleet carries up to 48 nuclear warheads, each of which is eight times more powerful than the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima**.

7. On travel, Jez wants to renationalise the railways which has a multitude of benefits. It would mean rail fares would go down, standards for rail workers would improve, customer service would improve, trains would be more likely to be on time, and the trains would be more clean and comfortable. Furthermore, railways are a natural monopoly which is bad because this means they can set any price that they choose and if it's not nationalised then its main priority is going to be profit, so this means higher prices than necessary. Secondly, a monopoly means that the business has no obligation to provide good service so they can provide inferior service and charge a high price for it because there aren't really any major competitors. There are more reasons than this why monopolies are bad, but these reasons alone are enough to show that it's vital for this natural monopoly to be nationalised. Plus, the benefit of having a state-owned railway means that any surplus, any profit, can be reinvested back into other public services, so even if you don't use the railways that often, it's still beneficial to you to have nationalised rails because other public services can be funded from any profit.

8. On energy, again Jez says he wants to renationalise energy. The reasons for this are basically the same reasons aforementioned on why monopoly is pretty bad, but essentially it's good to have nationalised commodities because any profit can be reinvested into other public services which at the end of the day benefits everyone.

If you want to sign up to the Labour Party in order to be eligible to vote in the Leadership election, you have to sign up by the 12th August at 12pm - so basically, y'all gotta hurry the heck up if you want to vote in this because time is running out. You can sign up as a member, like me and my brother did, and for us, it only cost £1 a year because we fit into the aged 14-19 bracket, or, like my parents, you can sign up as a supporter which costs as little as a £3 one off payment. There are other options for membership but you'd have to have a click around and see which one you feel would suit you most (this doesn't take long at all!) If you're a true leftie and want to see a socialist gain power of a major party, in my opinion this is the best thing you could do so sign up as quickly as you can - #JezWeCan.

Are you a member of the Labour Party?

*The basic information for Corbyn's policies was found on the BBC website 
** Source

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Lots of pizza, the apocalypse, and joining the Labour Party

one.
Diary of a Spendaholic/Miss Budget Beauty uploaded a video about her thoughts on PR samples and I wholeheartedly agree with her, I don't think there's anything wrong with where a product has come from as long you trust the blogger and also with sponsored posts, I don't think there's anything wrong with it as long as the blog doesn't become majority sponsored posts - just thought the video was worth a watch!!

two.
Think it's pretty safe to say that I've become nocturnal, seriously I'm falling asleep when the sun is up and the birds are chirping, and then not waking up until the afternoon - it might sound fun, but there's something about waking up in the afternoon that makes you feel like you're completely and utterly failing at life.

three.
I found this old video by The Amazing Atheist on YouTube on social anxiety and I think it's well worth a watch for someone who doesn't exactly understand what social anxiety entails, or if you're like me it's good to watch because it sort of tells you the feelings you're having aren't exactly true but not in an insulting way because it's coming from someone who's having that kind of experience.

four.
Jess from Rather Strange Blog did a video where she essentially recreated the videos she used to film of herself when she was about 9 and she danced to a bunch of the songs that she liked, I really loved the video, I liked how carefree in it which nowadays in YouTubing isn't something you really see too often - I really like Jess's YouTube channel and blog so do give them both a subscribe and a follow!!

five.
I've come to the conclusion that I'm a bit of an enabler, I didn't realise it before because usually if I go shopping with my friends they ask me what the bloggers general feel is on a certain product and I don't think anything more of it, but I went out with my friend Tanya just to buy a few bits and we went into Boots, Superdrug and Wilkinsons and I just realised how much of an enabler I am. She didn't really intend to buy makeup and she spent a fair bit more than she intended to based on my recommendations, whoops . .

six.
It was my brother's 15th birthday (cray, like I still remember the day he was born, well I think I do . . maybe I'm just remembering the bits we have on the home videos of that day) and we had a quiet day in, and we watched the Shaun the Sheep Movie. You'll hear about this in my next 'What I've been watching' post but my family is big on Shaun the Sheep like obsessed, but we didn't get a chance to watch it in the cinema but he got the DVD for his birthday and we watched it and it was so so good. Even my Dad who's not big on animated films quite liked it. We also ordered Pizza Hut and watched a few episodes of Peep show in the evening (slight change from Shaun the Sheep) but if you remember a few months ago, I was majorly obsessed with Peep show so it was nice to revisit that!

seven.
I've become obsessed with the app Fallout Shelter, it's a game set in a post-apocalyptic world and you pick up dwellers from the outside and get them to work in the waterworks, electrics or on food and you basically have to get these people to survive in this post-apocalyptic world. It sounds really bad, but it's so addictive - seriously, download it, because it's free and you'll be addicted in seconds . . because addiction is fun.

eight.
I joined the Labour Party! It's actually a pretty big deal for me because I've been quite interested in politics for quite a long time and the last election was the first one I could vote in and I was really upset by the Tory win (I actually captured by sadness via vlog if you want to relive the crushing defeat), but ever since Jeremy Corbyn has come onto the scene I've really become a lot more optimistic about the future of the Labour Party and I know a lot of people have been joining just to vote for him in the Leadership election. The way I see it, it's vital for Labour to move to the left if they're ever to win another election - this whole 'red Tory' persona adopted under Blair isn't ever going to work for them because they can't beat the Tories at being right wing so Corbyn is what the Labour Party need if they're ever to win again, and I personally don't think I could stand another Tory government in 2020 and I wanted to do all I can to prevent that happening. There's still time to sign up if you want to vote in the Leadership election so I urge you to join if you don't want another Tory government, it's only cost me £1 a year so I can't see a reason not to join . . . unless you're a Tory, but in such case you've got much bigger issues (but let's not get into that . . .)

nine.
I ate a pizza paid for by Noel Clarke . . . I couldn't quite explain, but long story short I was visiting a family member in hospital and I was suddenly alerted to the fact that Noel Clarke visits a lot and he had paid for a pizza party there. Sadly, I didn't get to meet him which is a shame as Mickey Smith is probably my favourite character from Doctor Who but alas we didn't get to meet him.

ten.
Hannah did a blog post on festival fashion and cultural appropriation which I feel is a subject a lot of people need to read up on. I feel like I'm fairly in the loop when it comes to cultural appropriation but I know a lot of people who aren't, so please give it a read if you're a bit unsure on what cultural appropriation is so you can avoid it.

How have the past couple of weeks been for you?

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Rad albums, phallic tattoos, and political YouTubers

one.

I reached 400 followers on this lil old blog and the thought confuses me a hell of a lot, that's nearly 4 times the amount of people in my year at school, what the heck (yeah I have a small sixth form but the point still stands!!)

two.

I've rediscovered the Is This It album by The Strokes - it's a consistently good album, and I'm glad I've rediscovered it because it's amazeballs.

three.

I went round to Isabella's to revise History with Ma'Suma and it was pretty cool, we watched The Other Boleyn Girl (relevant, it's the Tudors) and most of We Need to Talk About Kevin.. wow, we missed the beginning but talk about messed up (but also kinda great), we arranged how my ashes are going to be tattooed into them when I die, because you see, when I die I want my ashes tattooed into those closest to me in the form of a phallic doodle, hence the penis with my name under it.

four.

Bethan from the YouTube channel musicalbethan uploaded a video on dodgy sizing in shops (specifically in H&M) I've actually suffered an opposite problem and found that their sizing was far too big the last time I bought anything from them, but it's definitely something I've found in other stores and it's an issue that deserves a lot more attention because it makes shopping a lot harder and can affect people's body image in a really negative way, which obviously sucks.

five.

Rumbie from RumbieLove did a post about getting the right base for darker skin tones, and I just feel like this needs to be shared with the masses. If you watch my YouTube makeup videos, you'll have heard me complaining about my foundation shade a ridiculous amount of times, but posts like these are really helpful in knowing where to look - nice one Rumbie!

six.

I've recently discovered the app Dubsmash, and also wasted an immense amount of time on it - it's just so much fun recreating vines, totes #bantz.

seven.

Had a massive cringe because one of my Philosophy teachers from last year found my YouTube channel, and it was a really old video, and she didn't hesitate to tweet me about it from her school account. To be fair, she's a hella cool teacher so it's not too bad but I did spend a good long time cringing.

eight.

Russell Brand uploaded an episode of the Trews talking about the Queen's speech and he essentially summarised my thoughts about it, definitely worth a watch (as are all of Russell Brand's Trews)

nine.

Owen Jones has created a YouTube channel and he's just killing it, I already think Owen Jones is pretty fab journalistically and he's just generally so educated on political current affairs, but he's not at all pretentious or condescending. My brother described his YouTube channel as a better version of Russell Brand's, which is debatable as I love Russell's YouTube channel too, but my brother hates Russell Brand, and Owen Jones never told people not to vote so I guess he's marginally better. Anyway, I would definitely recommend giving his first video a watch about the direction Labour is headed in.

ten.

I have shared a few Button Poetry videos on these posts before but I've found another one that I just have to share, it's called 'Black Privilege' and it's just really moving.

How have the past couple of weeks been for you?

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Ten things and ten blogs #4

one.

I reached 200 followers on this blog which I find a bit crazy given that it feels like just yesterday when I was at 100, just want to say a super quick thank you to everyone following my blog (okay, cringey bit over now)
...
I wrote this at the beginning of the two week period this post covers, and now I've gone past 250, man that's cray.

two.
My brother informed me that according to this article Ed Miliband is the most lustworthy Prime Minister Candidate.. yes seriously. Don't get me wrong, I've decided on voting labour and I've known basically since I knew what voting was that I would vote labour, and, rather controversially, I think Ed Miliband is going to be a good Prime Minister, but I'm not sure lustworthy is the word I would use to describe him, and I can assure you that lust is not the reason I'm voting labour..

three.
So I found this video recipe for Nutella Cupcakes and I really really want to make them but I don't know when I'll have time to so I shall leave the recipe here for you to watch in case you want to make them - they look so cute!!!

four.
#BLACKOUT is one of the greatest internet movements I've seen in such a long time. I'm just immensely happy at how the black people of the web who may not have had the confidence to upload selfies in the past now have that and they're all so darn beautiful goddamn it, I know not everyone who's uploaded a selfie had low self-esteem of whatever but it just makes me so happy to go onto Tumblr and see beautiful black people everywhere. I'm also glad to say that no one I follow has participated in #WHITEOUT which is just a stupid cover-up for everyday racism, like literally people posting on that tag are white supremacists so if you see anyone posting on that hashtag even if they intend it to be a 'joke' - their 'joke' is enforcing racist ideals and attempting to eliminate the black community feeling good about themselves for once after years and years of internalised racism and white supremacy.

five.
I've sort of fallen in love with Hole. I've always been a Nirvana fan over Hole because I had listened to a few Hole songs and just didn't get into them, but for some reason I decided to give Hole another listen and I just think most of their discography is brilliant.

six.
I'm really annoyed because I filmed my Winter favourites video and it was about 30 minutes long, and I was out of focus the whole time. Looks like when you watch it, it'll be a re-filmed edition but dang it I'm just annoyed because it was such a good take!!

seven.
Jess did an interview with me for her blog, if you want to read it you can here!

eight.
I discovered that Morrissey covering Satellite of Love by Lou Reed is a thing, like as if that song needed something else to make it better!

nine.
I started reading Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell and I read well over half the book in the space of a day.. Using your deductive reasoning, guess how much I love it.

ten.
I made Mum a Victoria sponge cake for Mother's day which I haven't tasted yet but I enjoyed making it, I've been watching Great British Bake Off and I've been wanting to bake ever since it started up so it was nice to be able to do some baking.

blogs.
FashStyleLiv
Fashion and Beauty Tribes
Filthy Paws & Silky Drawers
The Elle Next Door
Lemon Freckles
Let's Talk Beauty
Style of Colours
Bean's Beauty Blog
Hummingbird and the Rose
Pretty Chit Chat

What's the best thing that happened to you over the past two weeks?

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