Saturday 31 October 2015

Of all the ghosts...

These days, it takes a lot to scare me. I've done what you would call a "haunted maze" attraction, I've seen the different walk-through's there is to be done and while yes, a few make me jump, it takes a lot for me to be scared.

There's a few things though i'd like to share with you, experiences I have had in the past which to this day still don't sit quite right with me as being OK.

For example, near to where my boyfriend lives, there's a large hill with a large cross on the top as if to signify something. I asked my boyfriend what that was all about and he told me...

When there was an outbreak of TB in the UK, that hill was the base for an open-air hospital. It had walls, windows, but no ceiling, with the idea being that the TB could be cured and move away from the patients, with fresh air. Apparently, it worked and a small while later the hospital was brought down to the ground and a large cross remains, where the hospital used to sit.

Local legend still has it that the area is haunted by the infected. There's a number of tree's in the area and of a night it does make you wonder, who's hiding behind the tree?

That for me seems to be more scary than somebody jumping out trying to scare me, or something I could see on a big screen.

What manages to scare you then dear reader?

Why not let us all know below....

Friday 16 October 2015

Minority wars.

A small while ago I wrote on this blog about how we are all human's and should treat each other as such. We should all be doing what we can to find out what has caused hunger around the world, learn from the mistakes and begin to work towards a better quality of life for millions of people around the world.

During marriage equality and the whole talk of "gay rights" in the west, I would often come into the firing line from people who said I shouldn't compare gay people to black people, as they are different communities etc. To a certain point, they would be correct, but the struggle for equality is one that is so similar it should worry the world that it is STILL going on... but not for who you may think.

See, the reason I can compare the black community's struggle for equality to the gay community battles is because of a few things. Years ago (although again worryingly, not too many), black people were being told that they were different, that they couldn't marry who they wanted, that they weren't entitled to the same as the white man because the bible said so, as did the laws, usually followed by a white man pointing to some part of the bible and twisting the words to fit what they were saying.

When it came to the marriage equality thing, we saw the same thing happen against the gay community. Too many groups said how it was in the bible that man shall not lie with man... etc, that this is not what god would want etc etc etc. While theres some people that will go "ok, they're the same, but that is all", you're wrong again. How many times do we hear in the news about "a man was killed believed to be because of his sexual orientation" or "a man was killed believed to be a racially motivated attack" or something along those lines. You'll not hear too many cases of them, around the same time however because the media doesn't want to report too much of the same sort of thing happening to different groups of people because they fear the masses would find that boring etc.

It amazes me then, knowing what these two groups or communities of people have been through in the past, that they for one second would try to condemn the other. Knowing how it feels to be treated second class to the rest, always seemingly it's the straight white man who wants to hold on to all the power.

I will come back to this point later though, about the communities being against each other, because, well, that's kind of where I come to the main part of this whole blog post.

It struck me not too long ago about how we, as people, have been treating the muslim community as second class citizens for a long time now, myself included in this (much to my modern day shame to admit that though). I of course having been one of the people who used to believe that 9/11 was a muslim attack, still find pieces of work on my social media from the past where I've made jokes or spoken down about the muslim community, as if each one was responsible for the terrorism attacks through the world, which of course we all know... they're not.

It first dawned on me about the treatment of the muslim community not too long after 9/11. One of the media outlets here in the UK ran a story that a muslim community in New York wanted to build a mosque at the site of the world trade towers that were brought down. Of course as you would expect the story was greeted with the brilliant "fuck them" response, which I gather may have been what the media wanted from that story. I began to explain to my brother, during one heated debate about the topic, that we shouldn't hold a whole community responsible for the actions of a few. He seemed adamant that any mosque built near the world trade centre site would be a huge sign of disrespect for the 9/11 victims and their families and how dare I think the way that I did.

I withdrew from the argument and for a small while felt guilty that I had been so short sited as to want to cause any offense to anybody that was involved in 9/11. Only in later years would I do my own research and come to the conclusion I did about 9/11, which you can read fully about in other blog posts on here.

Not too long ago, I released a video on my BevRants channel on YouTube, which explained something I had noticed.


Interesting isn't it, when you think about the topic from my point of view.

So why would I write this post then?

I saw a video on my facebook timeline (posted by somebody else, i should add) which involves a black woman shouting at a muslim woman, in public, telling her that she isn't welcome in her homeland and should be sent back to where she came from. I sat there amazed at the video, because not even 60 years ago, people would have shouted the same thing at her.

Then it hit me.

We have a LOT of politics that go on all around us, 24/7, and it's stuff they don't want us to know about. So if we're busy arguing amongst ourselves, then they can get on with the politics and be as loud as they want about it... and we'll be dumb enough to allow it to happen.

See, when 9/11 happened, we began a passion of hatred against Islam and the muslim community and what happened? We were blinded, seeing red, when we supported action to go after bin laden, what happened? We started a war in a completely different country, where we KNEW that bin laden wasn't living! Support began to twindle after not too long, so what happened, 7/11 in the UK! we pushed then for more soldiers to go to fight against this terrorist group, without knowing... we were in th wrong part of the world to be going after their leader like we were supposed to!

We took out of power Saddam Hussain, because he was "evil"... he was never a threat to us people in the west! While i agree, he's not the prime example of a great leader of a country, it has to be said... we were the terrorists that went in to another country and killed millions of people!

So it's why i hate seeing about the Kardashians in the news, because at the time they're all running to the bedside of some alcoholic ex found almost dead in a whore house, the news should be reporting on how America blew up a hospital in Syria, claiming that they are fighting against the Islamic state, having been arming them and training them for however long they did.

You see where i'm coming from here?

The longer we hate each other, the more we are missing about the destruction of humanity as we know it and we need to wake up before it's too late.

America, the UK, we are at war in Syria. It hasn't been in your media because they don't want you to know that we are, incase you decide to scrutinise your countries actions and you're not happy with them, but trust me, we are at war and we are NOT the good guys.

So before it's too late, find out what is happening in your world, and as any holy scripture will tell you, love thy neighbour as if thy self.

Monday 5 October 2015

GoggleBox

We live in a very interesting time in the world at the moment. It hasn't been made official yet, but we really are not too long away from going in to a world war 3 situation and yet, you'd be amazed at how many people are ignorant to the fact.

My social media accounts are very interesting at the moment. Of course I still have my friends on them, who post and share content which will keep your mind busy for a while or bring out the caring side in you for a while, but then I have the other side to my social media. The side which manages to keep me informed as to what is going on around the world. It's how I have come to form many of my opinions on some of the topics I am very vocal about, like Muslim people being treated as second class citizens, to the current refugee crisis faced by the world at the moment.

It's why then, of late, when it comes to writing a piece like this, my mind boggles with the topics that I could talk to you about on here. While on the one hand I have a half ton of stuff going on in my life that I wouldn't feel happy posting about, there's topics of stuff which is going on in governments for example, that are that complicated, I am confused as to where to begin and how to explain it to people, forget trying to motivate them to take action as I would want all people to do.

I think I saw an incite into a friends life the other night though and it struck me as "this is what is wrong with the world".

See, the other week I was staying at my boyfriends house and I always like to sleep with the TV in the bedroom left on. At some silly hour like 3am, I woke up and couldn't get back to sleep, but on the TV was this programme, GoggleBox. It's a show I'm sure many of you will have heard of, where the concept is you sit and watch people who are sat watching tv. Apparently some of the people on the show are funny and I should enjoy watching, but as I was sleepy, I didn't stay awake too much longer to be able to enjoy this content that people have been raving about since the shows creation.

Skip forward a few nights and we come to when me and my friend got together. It's rare that we get together these days and have a few drinks and a laugh like we used to, we have both got a lot going on in our lives and sometimes, friends just don't get to see each other that much... we're at one of those fazes. It always makes me happy to see her though and so we began to pour out the drinks and sit on the couch ready for a night of putting films, shows and music on the TV and talk over all of them while the alcohol slowly takes effect, before sobering up with a cup of tea and the usual taxi being called etc.

As my laptop was having problems connecting with the TV, the TV kept putting on... GoggleBox.

My friend said we should watch it and I should give it time to be able to find it funny. We sat and watched for a while before the thoughts came into my head... this is what is wrong with the world.

Not the show itself, of course, its producers and makers are all doing very well at making a show, but I couldn't help letting my mind wonder about what was going on in the real world. For example, while i'm sat here watching people, watching tv, there's thousands of people on the run from a country which is now starting to look like the famous "no mans land" from world war 2. That the government is giving away billions of pounds in aid, while people in the UK are left to go without money, food, electricity, even housing, because the government "can't afford it".

It strikes me as funny, because my friend doesn't do politics. I always tell her to vote, but she, as do many other people, has a hard time connecting to politics and having an idea of what is going on, much less being able to think (as I do) differently to what the government says or does. For example, opposing a law coming in and how you can raise your voice to speak out against law changes etc.

It does make you sometimes, want to give up knowing what is going on in the real world. It makes you want to submit to a way of living I know wouldn't make me happy. It makes me want to stop speaking out when I see something wrong, because not many others I know are doing it.

When it was the turn of the UK to vote in the government elections, when you see how many people didn't use their vote, it makes me wonder why any of us bothered to vote at all. Surely all these people can't not understand politics, surely somebody, somewhere, must have seen a post by an activist and still not gone to vote...

So, sit back, enjoy the TV programmes, i'll go and make the cup of tea and question if it is worth getting worked up on real world issues anymore.

Thursday 1 October 2015

The smiler - latest news and my take.


Above, you'll see the video of when I took to the internet in shock to report the on-going's at Alton Towers after the crash which saw a ride train of people injured and some even losing limbs.

News has been coming out about the theme park all year since this incident as the british media try to stalk the park and make as much news as they can, but the most recent news to come out of the park has had people in shock.

The news broke not too long ago that Alton Towers wanted to re-open the ride, only a government restriction on the park meant that the ride remains closed to the public until the health and safety executive had concluded it's findings (I also believe they are close to coming out with their investigation details).

This news really did shock some people and I think it is possibly un-fair, but a failure is on the way for the theme park.

Going back to before the incident on the ride, the Smiler was a brilliant attraction and it wasn't too long before I had friends telling me of how the que's could often be almost 3/4 hours long just for 1 ride on this world first. Alton towers themselves had spent millions branding the ride and building it, only to have it plagued by problems, even before it opened.

So how are we all so shocked?

I personally am a little shocked at this news that they want to re-open the ride too. To be completely honest I feel they can re-open it, but it would not be welcomed back to the british public, its reputation is too tarnished and I don't see the ride having a long life-span, if it was to re-open. However, I cannot argue against it's safety if it was to re-open, since it would be the government to clear it to be open again, and let's face it, despite all it's set-backs and incidents, the ride itself has managed thousands of sucssesful trips and given thousands of people a ride to never forget.

What will happen if they re-open the ride?

It's possible that the Smiler could become a popular ride again, however the main perception of the ride to the british public now, is that it isn't safe, given the major incident earlier this year and of course we're still waiting to see what the cause of the incident was. That said, you may never see a long que for this ride again.

Would they consider closing it and removing from the park for good?

Of course. Alton towers owners (Merlin) have only said that they would like to re-open the ride, not that it WILL open. If the result of the investigation is of one that cannot be resolved, as in an actual floor in the rides design, then of course Merlin are not going to ever want to purposely put a customer's life at risk.

So what is the actual news of The Smiler? What is it's fate?

At the moment, not even Merlin know. There is no / will be no news officially speaking on the ride until the government's report is completed. Then and only then can Alton Towers make a decision on wether to re-open the ride and we can make the decision to ride or not ride.