Happy Democracy Day!

Communique number four

What is democracy?

I liked the bit when Liz Truss lost her seat. And Jacob Rees Mogg, that was really cool in a “are you still here?” kind of way.

I also enjoyed the bit when, early in the night, well before the results were coming in, the radio told me that Labour members were crying at the Bristol count. I mean, I had the grace to feel guilty about it, even as I chortled away at their entitlement denied.

What can I say? I'm a bad boy.

But look, what is democracy?

I'd say it amounts to people being able to live the lives we want to live and making important decisions collectively. For Lincoln it was “As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy.”

In other words, it's not what flavour of representatives sit in the big house and more about whether citizens have control over their own lives and communities. It's not about the government, it's about us.

To think of a couple of mundane examples; that means having workplace and trade unions rights – including the right to be a pain in the arse if enough of you feel like it. It means the right to protest without being locked up, beaten up or treated like a detriment to society. The squeaky wheel gets the grease and, man, do I like the grease.

You don't need rules to allow you to agree with the powerful, you need protection from being punished for stepping out of line – and each one of those protections exists because people fought for those rights. Sadly so many of those rights were going backwards under the last government with barely a peep from our new wheels.

It looks like there's about to be a bonfire of planning regulations.

It's great that the law is no longer going to stand in the way of new onshore wind turbines, but on housing that comes with a reduction in people's ability to stand in the way of the interests of developers when they want to bulldoze communities. It's going to be harder for councils to reject poor plans that barely meet regulations, and there's clearly a desire to carve off a slice of the green belt so that Barratt can fill its yawning pockets.

I'm just saying people should get an ongoing say in what happens to their communities, it’s important. That includes the right to say “hold on – is this the best way to achieve our common aims?” without a pathologically deaf government yelling at them “get out the way, dickhead, we got concrete to lay.”

Knowledge is not power, but no knowledge makes you a puppet

And lastly for now, I think it also means having informed citizens. We need a media that tells us important facts and airs different viewpoints. We've just elected four independent MPs who, I'm told, were motivated to stand over Gaza. That's unprecedented. I look forward to seeing them interviewed on news programs so I can learn more about them, just like Martin Bell was when he was elected as an independent. It's not happened so far but I guess everyone's been busy.

I worry that if that does not happen that gap in our knowledge will get filled in by racism and ignorance. They’ve earned a small slice of democracy cake, let them enjoy it. If that ecosystem of impartial news and education doesn't exist then isn't democracy just who has the greatest power to misinform us?

Anyway, my point is simple. I get that people are angry that a party that got five seats got more votes than a party that got 73. That's clearly crazy, not democracy and that system must change. But I'd like people to be ready and active to exercise the most fundamental element of democracy – to have your say, everyday, regardless of who's in government. To stand in the way when the way needs blocking and to cheer on everything that makes society a better place.

It's messy, but it's a fuller philosophy than putting a tick in a box occasionally and hoping someone else will sort it all out for us.

This poem is dedicated to the pile of campaign leaflets sitting in the entrance of my block now the election is over;

ruffled, the heaping feathers of twenty
discarded fliers spatter in the mould pit
stair well, incline even now to mulch.
while, from each upturned page, a dozen versions of a hopeful
face glares out at their imagined, impassive audience

in the courtyard, the magpies hail dance their
skyward screeches as they spot the walnuts I laid out 
along my windowsill, each one a fat filled little brain
that they cannot help but envy, curious as they scour the block 
for good neighbours and careless passers-by.

And finally;

Sticking to my format of text, picture, poem and a few links - here’s a few things you might be interested in;

• I’m in the upcoming edition of Lumpen with my article “Sorry Labour, it’s not about you.” It’s not quite out yet but it’s issue #13 on this link when it does.

• That zine “anarchism for dogs” looks amazing. I wish it was real. It is real. You can buy it here.

• Mary Oliver wrote a beautiful poem about elections. I read it in a book but I managed to find it online here.

• Also Brecht wrote this poem which I feel will be very prescient of the years ahead.

• And lastly, fourteen years ago the Bodega Brothers wrote this song as advice to the Greens. They finally decided to follow it. Enjoy;