From the wonderful folk at DPAC comes this – please read and share the original…
Source: 5th May We Support #ENILILDAY
Tag: Disability
SCOPE #endthebullshit!
From DPAC comes this excellent piece about SCOPE. I have history with this charity, having volunteered at one of their shops and subsequently been ignored when I applied for a paid position with them. Please follow the link below and read this piece.
Source: SCOPE #endthebullshit!
PUBLIC MEETING ON DISABILITY AND PROTEST AGAINST POTENTIAL CLOSURE OF THE FERMOY UNIT
Accounts of a public meeting about disability and a protest against the possible closure of the Fermoy Unit, enlivened with photographs. Read, enjoy and please share!
INTRODUCTION
I am treating these two events together because my attendance at each was connected, and I talked about one at the other. While I had strong personal reasons for attending both events, I was also motivated by not wanting to be in a position of “when they came for me there was no one left to speak out”. I will deal with the two events in chronological order and at the very end will also share some unrelated photos.
THE PUBLIC MEETING ON DISABILITY
This toom place at the Vauxhall Centre in Norwich on Thursday evening. After speeches from various prominent local campaigners came the keynote speech of the evening. This was Roddy Slorach, author of “The Politics of Disability”, talking about the ideas expounded in his book. After this there was time for contributions from the floor. It was during this period that today’s demonstration was mentioned, and more details provided by me as the second part of my own contribution following mentioning the Positive Autism Awareness Conference of the previous Friday. Here are some photos from that evening for you…
THE PROTEST AGAINST THE POSSIBLE CLOSURE OF THE FERMOY UNIT
I took custody of the National Autistic Society West Norfolk Branch banners and some NAS flags yesterday evening, and worked out a way to set up the banners that was suitable for them being on a march:
We assembled at the bandstand in The Walks at 12 noon, and Jo Rust who did most of the organizing introduced a few speakers, before we set off on our march around the town. Many people expressed support for us while we marched through town, and at least one person took the trouble to express their gratitude that NAS were represented on the march. The event then finished with a few speeches outside the Majestic Cinema. Although organized by the local Labour Party and the King’s Lynn and District Trades Union Council this march was not a party political event, and Sir Henry Bellingham MP had been invited to attend and to make a speech, an invitation that he spurned. The turnout was excellent, helped by bright sunny weather (yes there was a serious nip to the wind, but this is King’s Lynn after all).
I finish this brief account with a few photos…
SOME UNRELATED PHOTOS
I start this section with a photographic message for those who have reached this part of the post…
My remaining photos are presented as a’tiled mosaic’ – to view an individual image at full size click on it…
Adverts and Imaging
INTRODUCTION
The title section of this post refers to today’s activites at James and Sons, but I also have some important links and quality infographics to share. On the subject of sharing, I hope that some of you are encouraged to share this post.
ADVERTS AND IMAGING
Today was productive, but not as productive as it might have been due to the fact that my efforts on the imaging front were interrupted by the need to send a couple of very basic adverts to the Diss Express and the Bury Free Press respectively about collector’s fair. A copy of one of the ads is below and I will provide links to the original word documents for both…
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IMAGING
The imaging workload was nicely varied, featuring most kinds of item we sell save for militaria…
COINS
The coin lots I choose to share come in the form of high resolution scans…
STAMPS
The stamps were all in albums and hence required the use of the camera…
EPHEMERA AND TOYS
These items were also done with the camera, and apart from a few football programs I will sharing the full range. The items categorised as toys are actually as you will see collector’s models – not intended to be played with…
POSTCARDS
To end the section on today at work, some more scans, this time of postcards…
LINKS
I do not have as many links as sometimes, but they are all very important, starting with…
CECIL THE LION
This is a story about a self-indulgent rich bastard (I make no apologies for the strong language – I do not often resort to it) from Minnesota named Walter James Palmer and an African icon. The circumstances of this particular piece of “trophy hunting” – Mr Palmer apparently has a long history of such activities – have generated it vast international publicity. The lion was decoyed out of the protected area in which it lived by bait, shot with a crossbow and ultimately finished off with a rifle – all so a rich American could indulge his perverted sense of fun. I have two links for further information about the story:
1)This from avaaz
2)And this article in a newspaper not often cited by this blog – The Telegraph.
AN UPDATE ON “ROOSH V”
The campaign to prevent “Roosh V” from being allowed into Canada continues to gather momentum – here is the latest news.
VOTING REFORM
Just a single link here, to the Voting Reform Declaration.
VOX POLITICAL ON DISABILITY
Two excellent pieces from the ever reliable Mike Sivier today, both on the subject of disability:
1)This one about the assessment system as orchestrated by the vile American company Unum.
2)This horror story about a case of discrimination by association – sacked for being a family member of a disabled person.
A NEW DISCOVERY COURTESY OF A GREAT SUPPORTER
Autism Mom is a long standing supporter of this blog, and it was from her blog that I located the details of pucksandpuzzlepieces whose most recent post features tackling an assault course!
INFOGRAPHICS
My first infographic comes with a link this article on Discover…
Next, a return to the Telegraph – unlike the story which I am told was big and bold this correction was tiny and in the bottom corner of a page, so I am giving it a bit of extra exposure!
Finally to end this post two excellent infographics relating to the Conservative Party…
puc
Marxism 2015 8: Disability and Resistance After the Election
A very brief account of the meeting on disability and resistance at Marxism 2015, some links and a classic infographic courtesy of Jo Stevens, MP for Cardiff.
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to the latest in my series of posts about Marxism 2015, the five-day political festival in central London organised by the Socialist Workers Party. For this post I will be dealing exclusively with the first meeting after lunch on Sunday. After the main body of the post I have some links to share.
AN INSPIRATIONAL MEETING
A platform full of excellent speakers, some great stories and a packed out meeting room make for good vibes. The room used, Nunn Hall, had been reconfigured to suit this particular meeting, with an area cleared for wheelchair users, and a team of people set up to provide DSL.
It is in the context of this meeting, and the stories of protest contained therein that I choose to make my first mention of October 4th in Manchester, when we will be protesting outside the Tory conference and this protest should be built as big as possible.
LINKS
I am finishing this brief post with a few links, one of them accompanied by an infographic.
My first link is a facebook page about the horror that is TTIP.
My second and third links are both related to environmental issues:
1)From avaaz this call to protect our oceans from the rapacity of big mining companies.
2)From rawstory more about the consequences of fracking (see also my previous blog post).
Ending this post with a bang, this link and infographic courtesy of Jo Stevens, Labour MP for Cardiff.
Marxism 2015 5: The Middle Part of Saturday
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to the latest installment in my series of posts on Marxism 2015, the five-day politcal festival in central London organized by the Socialist Workers Party. Previous posts in the series can be viewed here.
RODDY SLORACH ON DISABILITY
In my last post I gave an account of the first meeting I attended on Saturday, in Nunn Hall. My second meeting was in the same venue, and the title was “Has There Always Been Disabaility?”
After this meeting, it was time for lunch, and I attended the Norwich SWP picnic (London food prices being well beyond my reach!).
WHERE WILL WE LIVE?
After lunch, my first port of call was the Drama Studio for a meeting on housing…
The speaker’s main focus was on the US, which he had recently visited, and where the housing situation is worse than in this country because there is even less social housing available. The meeting was structured around a slide presentation. I have experienced a large number of such presentations but only a very few good presentations – of which this was one. I will settle for displaying those of the slides I was able to capture…
A lively discussion followed. Having had an English born speaker talk at length about the USA we had a contribution from the floor from an American born Londoner talking about England…
HOW SHOULD SOCIALISTS VOTE IN THE EU REFERENDUM?
This meeting took place in Galleon room A in the Royal National Hotel (the suite which can be one, two or three rooms according to choice was divided into three, with rooms A and C being used for meetings and room B for entry and exit to prevent the two meetings from impinging on each other).
This was one of the most interesting meetings I attended. The debate on the EU referendum as currently framed is between two groups of right wing b**t**ds, one of whom want to stay in and the other whom want to leave for entirely nationalistic reasons. The task for socialists is to change to the terms of the debate by building a left wing campaign for a vote to leave the EU, offering no support to the racists of UKIP. A vote to stay in will leave an even bigger, even smugger smile on the face of David Cameron. A vote in favour of the EU would also be a vote in favour of what is being done to Greece and a vote in favour of desperate people being left to drown in the Mediterrenean.
To finish this post, my second of an eventual three about the Saturday, here are some more pictures…
Important Items to Share
INTRODUCTION
This post is going to be made up entirely of Links and Infographics (I have a lot of important and interesting stuff to share).
LINKS
TAX RESEARCH UK
Tax Research UK in spite of the uninspiring sounding name is often a source of good stuff, and today I provide links to two of their recent stories:
1)The need to eliminate competition from the NHS.
2)A piece about electoral reform, which connects to…
2a)This blog post from the Electoral Reform Society.
SCIENCY PIECES
My first piece in this section comes courtesy of Patheos, and just before highlighting the link I wish (as someone who is a very strong supporter of theirs) to criticise them for publishing under their banner a piece by Russell Shaw in which he has the nerve to claim the American Christians are being persecuted. The piece to which I include a link concerns the use in science classrooms in Louisiana of a book that has no place there.
My next three pieces are linked, both being concerned with countering environmental damage:
1) Faraday’s Candle on bees.
2) Oxfam on dumping coal into the dustbin of history.
3) An Avaaz petition about climate change.
SOME INFOGRAPHICS
DISABILITY, MENTAL HEALTH ISSUES AND AUTISM
This is my final set of links, starting with this piece from Jayne Linney. Huffington Post, a regular source of good stuff, provide this piece from Laura Roche. Although I am not an ebay user, and therefore not able to take direct action, I was of course thoroughly disgusted to come across this from Vox Political about disability hate products being sold via that site, and I urge those of you who do use ebay to complain loud and clear as VP suggest. This blogpost from Natalie Leal provides some shocking detail about deaths related to DWP sanctions. Finally, to end this section, a post from Autism Mom, which features Alan Turing.
CLOSING STATEMENT
I hope that you have all enjoyed this post, and that you have followed up some or all of the links I have shared. I encourage people to share any or all of this post.
aspiblog 