In my own little battle against modern day racism and extremism, I like to keep an eye on who or what is the cause of it. It was at one time a joined battle of the BNP (British National Party) which has since folded and the EDL (English Defence League) which as with the BNP, has folded.
They're not completely gone however. Literally over night these two forces came together to create "Britan First", which to the outsider may well seem like a possible political group, is actually these days one of the most racist groups you can find, with their actions being along the lines of those of the KKK in America, which yes, is still going strong to this day.
So what is Britan First?
Britan first has a fairly strong hold on social media, especially facebook, where they would upload pictures for people to share, these could literally be about anything, but it was getting the name out there and of course people agreeing with what the group was saying. Then, as they grew in numbers, the group began to show exactly what they were about. Standing up against immigration in full, saying that it is standing against terrorism and extremism, without realizing the irony that their own actions cause terror and are indeed extreme.
Britan first does NOT want to put britan first, it wants to put forward its own version of bigotry forward, first.
So what am I doing?
I'm taking my time to try and educate people on what britan first actually is, what it stands for, who its members are and what they are up to. They seem to say one thing, but then do another, which I guess they learned from the EDL, who would kick off because a poppy was burned on memorial day, but then at the memorial services of the first world war, they had several members urinating on memorials.... Yeah, that kind of thing.
On social media it is hard to push forward the education of who this is, unless you have a better platform than I do, so, who can tell you?
Hope Not Hate is a social media collection of people who aren't afraid to point to racist people and say "Shh". Almost daily, you can find them posting something about britan first, and to be fair, the news they post signals to me, that it is a group that is full of trouble makers, but will never really get anywhere, and as with the BNP and EDL, it will fizzle out as time goes by. If for any reason I say this, it's because the group are already in boiling hot water, for their use of the royal crown, without consent (which yes, is still a crime in the uk). Government bodys are now involved and action is soon to be brought about against the leaders of the group, should they (which they will) fail to co-operate.
You can click here to be taken to the Hope Not Hate twitter account.
To finish off, IF you see anything by britan first on your facebook, or twitter, use that space to educate people that storming a mosque during prayers is classed as an extremist action and that britan first is supposed to be against extremist actions. Educate people that the level of immigration into the UK is not the reason why the country is in debt, or got into debt, or why there seems to be so few jobs around. Use the space to educate people that they should look into what actual Islam is, instead of being afraid of the unknown, that muslims do not hate dogs, that they are peaceful people and that most importantly, most muslims do not support things like the Islamic state.
Saturday 30 August 2014
Monday 25 August 2014
Missed the point of Pride.
Recently Manchester celebrated it's annual pride event (it's always held over the bank holiday in august) and I've seen thousands of pictures and video's from it, but I can't help but think... most people who went have missed the whole point of us having a pride event.
What IS gay pride then?
There's several reasons why the gay community holds a pride event, anywhere in the world. It's to feel united for once, to take stock over the progress towards equality and what's happened in the past year, it's to get our brains thinking about what we need to do next in order to gain equality, it's a time to take a reflection about what has happened to the community over the past, it's to inspire.
Tonight, on the Monday, the pride will close and as always, it's a candle lit vigil in a park, where if you want, you can light a candle and join in the service, and to be fair, is one of the most beautiful parts of the whole pride week.
A week. Yes. That is how long pride goes on for in Manchester.
Not a lot of people know that, because it gets over shadowed by the "big weekend", where there's the parade, celebrity's and live music. It's the time that the pubs and clubs cash in on pride and of course these days, it's where pride makes it's money to help fund it through the year.
The big weekend helps people to come together, but there's nothing said about what has happened to the gay community over the past year, there's nothing about what we want to happen in the next year. While yes its all singing and all dancing, it's missing the point. Most people will only go to the big weekend, because they want a drink and a good time, they actually don't care about the gay community and the strives towards equality. Most gay people these days will say that they are treated equally, yet, look into the law, we've still got a long way to go.
Blood donation - Gay people still have to prove they've not had sex for a year before they can donate blood.... good look proving that.
Marriage equality - Gay people can now get married to people of the same sex, but look into the divorce side of things. Did you know you can't file for divorce if your partner has cheated with a person of the same sex?
General public safety - Any straight couple in the UK can walk down any street and hold hands, you try doing that with your partner of the same sex in most of the UK's council estates, you'll soon find yourself in hospital or a mourg.
Employment - While legally no, any employer can not terminate your employment in the UK based on your sexuality, they can and will look for other ways to get you out of working for them, if they don't like your sexuality, infact in many cases, you won't get the job at all if you "appear to be gay".
The wider community - In other parts of the world, people are still hunted down and killed because they're believed to be gay, as a gay community, we need to stand up for these people and push our MP's to make change happen, in places where they can't.
5 examples there of things we need to change, and yet, most gay people wouldn't know or care about these issues until it has an effect on them. Now don't get me wrong, there's people working behind the scene's to make these changes happen. Many organizations and charity's are trying to change laws and keep people safe... but you need to be aware of these issues in order to be safe.
Going to the big weekend at pride, because some good singers are on, is not going to change anything, nor does it educate people. So sure, wear the colours, shout out loud, be proud... but educate yourself at the same time.
Manchester pride and the people who work for it and support it, is brilliant, but I feel it's letting people miss the chance for education on what are still violent issues. Equality can only be reached by us knowing and dealing with the issues.
What IS gay pride then?
There's several reasons why the gay community holds a pride event, anywhere in the world. It's to feel united for once, to take stock over the progress towards equality and what's happened in the past year, it's to get our brains thinking about what we need to do next in order to gain equality, it's a time to take a reflection about what has happened to the community over the past, it's to inspire.
Tonight, on the Monday, the pride will close and as always, it's a candle lit vigil in a park, where if you want, you can light a candle and join in the service, and to be fair, is one of the most beautiful parts of the whole pride week.
A week. Yes. That is how long pride goes on for in Manchester.
Not a lot of people know that, because it gets over shadowed by the "big weekend", where there's the parade, celebrity's and live music. It's the time that the pubs and clubs cash in on pride and of course these days, it's where pride makes it's money to help fund it through the year.
The big weekend helps people to come together, but there's nothing said about what has happened to the gay community over the past year, there's nothing about what we want to happen in the next year. While yes its all singing and all dancing, it's missing the point. Most people will only go to the big weekend, because they want a drink and a good time, they actually don't care about the gay community and the strives towards equality. Most gay people these days will say that they are treated equally, yet, look into the law, we've still got a long way to go.
Blood donation - Gay people still have to prove they've not had sex for a year before they can donate blood.... good look proving that.
Marriage equality - Gay people can now get married to people of the same sex, but look into the divorce side of things. Did you know you can't file for divorce if your partner has cheated with a person of the same sex?
General public safety - Any straight couple in the UK can walk down any street and hold hands, you try doing that with your partner of the same sex in most of the UK's council estates, you'll soon find yourself in hospital or a mourg.
Employment - While legally no, any employer can not terminate your employment in the UK based on your sexuality, they can and will look for other ways to get you out of working for them, if they don't like your sexuality, infact in many cases, you won't get the job at all if you "appear to be gay".
The wider community - In other parts of the world, people are still hunted down and killed because they're believed to be gay, as a gay community, we need to stand up for these people and push our MP's to make change happen, in places where they can't.
5 examples there of things we need to change, and yet, most gay people wouldn't know or care about these issues until it has an effect on them. Now don't get me wrong, there's people working behind the scene's to make these changes happen. Many organizations and charity's are trying to change laws and keep people safe... but you need to be aware of these issues in order to be safe.
Going to the big weekend at pride, because some good singers are on, is not going to change anything, nor does it educate people. So sure, wear the colours, shout out loud, be proud... but educate yourself at the same time.
Manchester pride and the people who work for it and support it, is brilliant, but I feel it's letting people miss the chance for education on what are still violent issues. Equality can only be reached by us knowing and dealing with the issues.
Sunday 24 August 2014
Delay to Life With Bev on Youtube.
Yip.
What?
The title kind of says it all really.
Ok, you want the full story then? Well...
Earlier this year I had a really good laptop, an acer aspire 5058t or something like that, it was literally the bomb, nothing could go wrong with the software on it, it could knock out a 5 minute full HD video in under half an hour, it was perfect... But the laptop had been failing for some time in the physical sense.
Some screws had come loose in 2013 at the base of the screen, it had 2 metal arms that hold the screen to the laptop, so of course when several screws came out of one arm, it cracked the plastic screen frame and of course then put more pressure on the other arm, which after a few months, became detatched from the screen itself. I didn't have the money to get this fixed, so of course the antenna for wifi snapped, meaning it couldn't get much of a signal, the wires for the screen went, so the screen stopped working.... meaning I had to use an external screen.... which over the course of a few months, the connection for began to come loose.... It all came to a head when I opened up the laptop to try and fix it. A billion and one screws had to be undone and most broke due to the age of the laptop, and that's where the laptop is upto as we speak. It's in several bits.
Now, my facebook friends and twitter followers maybe, know that I'm now in a relationship, and with a guy who knows about computers a little bit more than me. So I borrowed my friends laptop and have since pimped it up with different versions of windows and of course, tried to get some video editing software put on it... which I managed to do on one version of windows... before it broke the laptop.
Because of all this, Life with Bev has been put on hold. I'll admit now, theres 2 episodes already filmed, so these should be coming out as soon as I can get some video editing software to work.
So the video blog of this, WILL be making a return.... just not anytime soon....
What?
The title kind of says it all really.
Ok, you want the full story then? Well...
Earlier this year I had a really good laptop, an acer aspire 5058t or something like that, it was literally the bomb, nothing could go wrong with the software on it, it could knock out a 5 minute full HD video in under half an hour, it was perfect... But the laptop had been failing for some time in the physical sense.
Some screws had come loose in 2013 at the base of the screen, it had 2 metal arms that hold the screen to the laptop, so of course when several screws came out of one arm, it cracked the plastic screen frame and of course then put more pressure on the other arm, which after a few months, became detatched from the screen itself. I didn't have the money to get this fixed, so of course the antenna for wifi snapped, meaning it couldn't get much of a signal, the wires for the screen went, so the screen stopped working.... meaning I had to use an external screen.... which over the course of a few months, the connection for began to come loose.... It all came to a head when I opened up the laptop to try and fix it. A billion and one screws had to be undone and most broke due to the age of the laptop, and that's where the laptop is upto as we speak. It's in several bits.
Now, my facebook friends and twitter followers maybe, know that I'm now in a relationship, and with a guy who knows about computers a little bit more than me. So I borrowed my friends laptop and have since pimped it up with different versions of windows and of course, tried to get some video editing software put on it... which I managed to do on one version of windows... before it broke the laptop.
Because of all this, Life with Bev has been put on hold. I'll admit now, theres 2 episodes already filmed, so these should be coming out as soon as I can get some video editing software to work.
So the video blog of this, WILL be making a return.... just not anytime soon....
Saturday 16 August 2014
Is it just me?
The world at the moment seems to be quite a mixed up and messed up place, and it's not looking as if it's going to get any better any time soon, infact, my gut tells me, war is looming.
We have religious based groups trying to take over parts of the world to enforce their version of the faith's rules upon us. We have the likes of Russia who resorted to shooting down a plane. We have public cases where racism shows it's head and that it's still alive within our police services.... all horrible stuff, and I've not even scratched the surface here.
You know what I find more disturbing? The fact that we can't just see people for what they are... people. The saying is true that we are all just human being's, trying to be. We are all equal and should be treated as such, yet, we're not, far from it infact.
When I look at a person, I don't see a race, I don't see a sexuality, I don't see a sex... I see a person, whom, until they piss me off, should be treated with the same respect that I expect to be treated with... and doing this for years, has done me quite well.
In short, I'm worried about where we are headed at the moment as a human race. Are we really going into a world war to try and end all wars? Are we really going to allow the murders of innocent people for much longer, in any part of the world and for whatever reason?
This has all got to stop.
3 rules to live your life by.
We have religious based groups trying to take over parts of the world to enforce their version of the faith's rules upon us. We have the likes of Russia who resorted to shooting down a plane. We have public cases where racism shows it's head and that it's still alive within our police services.... all horrible stuff, and I've not even scratched the surface here.
You know what I find more disturbing? The fact that we can't just see people for what they are... people. The saying is true that we are all just human being's, trying to be. We are all equal and should be treated as such, yet, we're not, far from it infact.
When I look at a person, I don't see a race, I don't see a sexuality, I don't see a sex... I see a person, whom, until they piss me off, should be treated with the same respect that I expect to be treated with... and doing this for years, has done me quite well.
In short, I'm worried about where we are headed at the moment as a human race. Are we really going into a world war to try and end all wars? Are we really going to allow the murders of innocent people for much longer, in any part of the world and for whatever reason?
This has all got to stop.
3 rules to live your life by.
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