#National COSH

[workingclasshistory]

On this day, 23 April 1979, Aotearoa/New Zealand born teacher and socialist Clement Blair Peach was hit by police on an anti-Nazi demonstration in Southall, Middlesex, possibly with an illegal weapon, and later died. Peach had joined thousands of people in an area with a large south Asian and Sikh population to protest against a meeting of the far-right National Front in the town hall. After he was hit he was taken into a nearby house which an ambulance was called. He was then taken to Ealing Hospital with an extradural haematoma, and died shortly after midnight. A subsequent police investigation found that one of six members of the notoriously violent Special Patrol Group was responsible. The officers' lockers were searched, and illegal weapons discovered like a lead cosh. The officers also quickly cleaned their uniforms and changed their appearances after the attack, and several of them lied to investigators. As a result of the deception, the guilty party could not be identified. The investigator did recommend that three officers who had conspired and lied should be charged with obstruction and conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, but the director of public prosecutions appointed by the Labour government declined to prosecute them. Officials refused to hold the inquest into Peach's death in front of a jury, and despite multiple witnesses testifying to the police attack, the inquest returned a verdict of "death by misadventure". The coroner disregarded witness testimony which he deemed to be from people who were socialist, or who were Sikh, and according to him "did not have experience of the English system" to be reliable. Since at least the 1930s, police in the UK routinely have helped neo-Nazis organise meetings and demonstrations, attacking and arresting anti-fascists who protest against them. More: https://stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/9539/Blair-Peach-murdered https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=613495540823665&set=a.602588028581083&type=3

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

Published: Mar 13, 2024

In the western world at least, it is normal for new treatments to undergo rigorous testing before being accepted into mainstream medicine. Often, the complaint from those who might benefit from therapies is that approval takes too long. This ­excess of caution may be frustrating for those who need help but far worse would be a system in which patients became guinea pigs in unregulated mass experiments with potentially life-altering and irremediable consequences. Such is the case with puberty blockers which for years have been fed to children in this country who are confused about their identity and sexuality. The use of these substances to impede physical development in youngsters who question their gender, despite an absence of sound scientific understanding of the long-term effects, is a medical scandal of the first order, a reckless exercise in 21st-century quackery.

It is right, therefore, that the National Health Service in England has called time on the routine prescribing of puberty blockers after the horror story at the gender identity clinic within London’s Tavistock NHS trust. Yet children and parents intent on taking this dangerous path will still be able to access them through NHS Scotland and private doctors. The job is only half complete. This “therapy” needs to be reined in entirely across the UK.

Puberty blockers, which inhibit the development of characteristics like breasts and facial hair, have been prescribed for hundreds of under-16s on the NHS since 2011. Children were referred to the clinic in a decade when gender identity was taking on a more militant and ideological ­aspect — the NHS found itself under constant pressure from groups like the charity Mermaids, which promoted this radical intervention. At first, most of those referred for treatment were boys, ­average age 11. What should have immediately struck a chord with ­clinicians treating them was that many were from troubled backgrounds. More than a quarter had spent time in care and more than a third hailed from families with mental health problems. Autism was another common thread. Over time, girls replaced boys by a ratio of six to one, a strange, shapeshifting malady.

A sensible layman might have concluded that worries about gender identity were more likely to be symptoms of anxiety and depression rather than the cause of it. The natural concerns of youngsters coming to terms with their sexuality could also be misinterpreted by themselves and their parents as gender ­dysphoria — fear of being attracted to one’s own sex being mistranslated into unhappiness with one’s body.

The case for puberty blockers was that they ­allowed troubled children to pause while coming to terms with their gender identity. These ­hormone inhibitors were characterised as an on-off switch that could be flicked with impunity. This was a startling example of medical arrogance. ­Little was known about the effect of blockers — used also in chemical castration — on developing young bodies. It is now accepted that they affect bone density and, potentially, cognitive development. At the very least, this little-understood chemical cosh separates teenagers from their peers. Patients are frozen in time as their friends develop. Those lost years cannot be regained. And, far from being a pause, blockers tend to presage chemical and ­surgical procedures that are irreversible.

There will be a small number of people who will forever feel that they were born in the wrong body, and the option to change that is a right — for a ­mature adult. Children suffering gender dysphoria require kindness, understanding and, if necessary, mental health support. They should not be set on a path to a place from which they cannot return. There are still too many loopholes. Private doctors should be banned from prescribing blockers. The Scottish government, too, should consider why it continues to sanction this dangerous practice.

[ Via: https://archive.md/gABo3 ]

[wausaupilot]

Work safety advocates list Wisconsin lumber mill where teen died among ‘unsafe’ employers

The National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (COSH) put Florence Hardwoods on its 2024 “Dirty Dozen” list of “unsafe and reckless employers risking the lives of workers and communities.”

by Erik Gunn, Wisconsin Examiner April 25, 2024 A northern Wisconsin wood processor where a 16-year-old died after an industrial accident in June 2023 was one of 12 employers listed for egregious workplace hazards by a national advocacy group Thursday. The National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (COSH) put Florence Hardwoods on its 2024 “Dirty Dozen” list of “unsafe and reckless…

[thetrainingnetwork]

Grown ups

In 2006, the infamous Securitas robbery shook the nation as approximately £53 million vanished from their depot in Kent, marking it as the largest cash heist in British crime annals.

Back in 2006; the Securitas robbery… … around £53 million was stolen from their depot in Kent. The largest cash robbery in British crime history. Rumour had it, it was Sir Nigel Crisp, head honcho at the NHS, who was under the cosh from the Treasury, to, somehow get the service back into financial balance… otherwise it looked like Crisp was toast. He called for drastic action, ‘by noon on…

[thechildrensfilmfoundation]

Johnny on the Run is the first Children's Film Foundation offering that leaves behind the quaint and loveable and drifts into the realm of genuine quality. Directed by Lewis Gilbert, in the same year he directed Cosh Boy and Albert R.N. this is obviously a cut above from a director who would go on to a long, distinguished, and successful career.

Young lead actor Eugeniusz Chylek gives a genuinely moving performance as Janek/Johnny and the supporting cast, which includes Sydney Tafler, Michael Balfour, Moultrie Kelsall, Mona Washbourne and, obviously as it is set in Scotland, John Laurie are uniformly excellent.

There's a touch of Dickens about the criminal enterprises of Tafler and Balfour and, while the children of Edinburgh don't come out of it well there are some wonderful location shots of the city.

There are also some interesting factual stories that spring up from watching this film, not least the idea of a home in Scotland housing war orphans of all nationalities.

There's also Cleo Sylvestre as one of the kids.

All in all, this is in the highest bracket of Children's Film Foundation fare.

[nhlabornews]

Trump's Repeal Of Beryllium Protections Puts Tens Of Thousands Of Workers At Risk

Once again the Trump administration is using their power to steamroll workers and the health protections those workers have fought and died for.  This week, they announced they want to roll back the proposed OSHA rule on Beryllium exposure.

“More working people will die if the Trump administration rolls back OSHA’s beryllium rule,” said AFL-CIO President, Richard Trumka. “It also will mark the first time in history for the government to roll back worker safety protections against a cancer-causing toxin. The entire labor movement will work together to fight any proposal that takes away standards that keep us safe at work.”

Beryllium-rule rollback will literally kill American workers (see chronic beryllium disease): https://t.co/2AAnW8BES0 #WednesdayWisdom #1u pic.twitter.com/r4lORsBfPN

— RoseAnn DeMoro (@RoseAnnDeMoro) June 22, 2017

(Tweet from RoseAnn DeMoro, President of the National Nurses United.)

“Once again, the Trump administration’s Labor Department is taking us backwards and undermining the core principle that no worker should have to sacrifice his or her life for a job,” said Christine Owens, Executive Director, National Employment Law Project.  “Today, at the behest of corporate special interests, the Labor Department issued a proposed rule to loosen health protections for workers exposed to the chemical beryllium.”

Beryllium is a toxic metal known to cause fatal diseases such as chronic beryllium disease of the lungs and lung cancer, even when very low levels are inhaled.

“No matter where they work, U.S. workers deserve protection from exposure to hazardous – and potentially lethal – toxic materials,” said Jessica Martinez, co-executive director, National Council for Occupational Safety and Health. “The proposal announced today by the U.S. Department of Labor to weaken standards that limit exposure to beryllium for shipyard and construction workers is a step backwards.”

The proposal would eliminate the “ancillary provisions” of the beryllium rule that would have extended specific new protections to construction and shipyard workers, including exposure assessments, personal protective equipment, medical surveillance and protected work areas. These provisions were included in OSHA’s rule in response to pressure from labor unions and public health groups, including Public Citizen.

“Like other beryllium-exposed workers, construction and shipyard workers deserve to go to work without risking their lives,” said Dr. Sammy Almashat, researcher for Public Citizen’s Health Research Group. “By eliminating lifesaving protections for workers in these specified industries, the Trump administration is recklessly putting corporate interests above workers’ lives.”

“It is well documented that shipyard and construction workers can be exposed to beryllium.  They need the same protections as other workers – including monitoring and assessing exposure to potential harm and taking steps to eliminate hazards which can lead to life-threatening diseases,” said Martinez.

In a rulemaking process that lasted more than a decade, OSHA asked stakeholders to comment on whether its final beryllium rule should extend protections to workers in the construction and shipyard industries. After careful consideration, the agency determined that it needed to cover these workers with a lower permissible exposure limit of 0.2 micrograms per cubic meter of air. That limit is preserved in today’s proposal. But the agency also recognized the need to mandate specific protections for construction and shipyard workers. These ancillary provisions have been revoked in the administration’s proposal.

“To protect workers, consistent with its legal authority, OSHA set the lowest exposure standards that were technologically and economically feasible. But because beryllium is highly toxic, the Labor Department knew that workers could still get sick at these exposure limits. So it put into place additional protections—such as medical surveillance of workers near but below the exposure limit—to ensure that any diseases were caught at the early stages. The Labor Department initially projected that these additional protections would save 96 lives per year and prevent 46 new cases of disease,” explained Owens.

OSHA was right to safeguard these workers in its final rule, Public Citizen maintains. According to the agency, beryllium threatens 62,000 workers. OSHA’s own inspection data show that 70 percent of the 11,500 construction and shipyard workers who come into contact with beryllium while performing open-air abrasive blasting are, in fact, exposed to airborne beryllium that can result in debilitating lifelong illnesses and early deaths.

“If this proposal to weaken the beryllium rule goes into effect, construction and shipyard workers will die and be permanently disabled as a result,” said Emily Gardner, worker health and safety advocate for Public Citizen’s Congress Watch division. “The final beryllium rule issued at the end of the Obama administration must be reinstated immediately.”

Trump’s Repeal Of Beryllium Protections Puts Tens Of Thousands Of Workers At Risk was originally published on NH LABOR NEWS

[imagines-fandom-backup]

Up in Smoke- Chapter 1.6

Masterlist

Warning- Usual PB violence and swearing

Within the next few days, Arthur had returned back to normal. At least for now. Tommy walked into my room. My nose was too busy in a book to realize he had walked in. I finally glanced up.

"Hey, Tommy." 

"Check your gun."

"Why? What's going on?"

"We're doing it today."

"Doing what today?"

"Family meeting, half ten." He walked out. 

I walked down to the kitchen to sit with Aunt Polly and Ada. She was finally speaking to us again. We talked as her baby, Karl, was asleep. Aunt Polly smiled as she looked down at Karl. 

"Mine were terrors for the tit. Both of them. You girls never knew my children, did you?"

"I was a child myself then."

"No. Why don't you ever talk about them?"

"Never had a reason to. My heart breaks even when I think about them." She walked away from the basket Karl was sleeping in. "But today, I do have a reason to. Sit down, Ada."

Ada sent me a look as she sat down. I shrugged as we both turned our attention to Aunt Polly. "They were three and five years old. Sally was three, Micheal was five. Well, two weeks away from being six. It was Sunday morning. Uh, I was at church. 'You are not forgiven,' this pinch-faced bitch said to me. 'You are not forgiven.' You see, some sheets I had washed and hung on the line had the name of a hotel on them. They'd been stolen in a robbery and they said some porter at the hotel had been coshed. A woman from around here told the police about the sheets. Jealous, you see, of the new sheets. When the police came, they found a spirit still...making a few drops of gin." Her eyes started to gloss over. 

Her eyes darted around the room. She started to break down. "And for that, they took my children from me. They never told me where they took them. They did it because they could and because I was weak. But they will never take your baby away from you. Do you know why? Because Tommy won't let them. Tommy will not let them walk all over us. Tommy has brought strength and power to this family. Cause he knows you have to be as bad as the above in order to survive. I'm telling you this because I want you to forgive him."

"How can I? My Freddie is rotting in jail because of him."

"Ada, Tommy had nothing to do with this. He didn't tell the police he was here, I swear." I said as I looked over at her. 

Aunt Polly looked over at me, unsure if she'd believe us. "There's something about today you need to know." Aunt Polly went on to tell Ada what was going on today. We had to break away from this conversation here in order to get to the family meeting. Everyone was inside when we got there. Tommy stood in the front of the room with his hands deep in his pockets. 

He looked around the room at all of us. "I've brought you all here today because this is the day that we replace Billy Kimber. This is the day we become respectable. The day we join the official National Association of Race Course Bookmakers. But first, we do the dirty work. We've all known this day has been coming. I just haven't told anyone the date." He turned to look at the board behind him. 

"We're going to the Worcester races. The track opens at one. We'll get there at two. Now, Kimber thinks we're going there to help him to fight the Lee brothers. But thanks to the efforts of our John and his lovely new wife, Esme, the Lees are now our kin. So it'll be us and the Lees against Kimber's boys. We take them out but leave the bookies. I expect a swift victory which will send a signal all the way to London that we believe in letting legitimate businesses run peacefully."

"What about Kimber himself," John asked. 

"I'll deal with him. Any more questions?"

"Yes," Polly said as she walked towards the door. "Does anybody object if I bring a newcomer to the meeting?" 

I smirked as I watched them confusedly look at each other. Polly opened the door, "come on." She whispered to Ada who was on the other side with Karl. "I'd like to introduce the newest member of the Shelby clan." Ada walked through the door with Karl in her arms. Arthur started clapping when she walked toward the crowd. Everyone joined him. 

Tommy smiled as he watched them. 

"Welcome home, Ada." 

"We named him Karl. After Karl Marx."

"Karl Bloody Marx," Arthur joked as he walked towards them. "Let me get a look at him." "Here we go," John shouted. 

Arthur put his hat on Karl before holding him up. Everyone laughed. "Hey, look. He looks just like me."

"That's his ass that looks like you, Arthur." John joked. 

"He's all right. He's a Shelby." We all started to walk out of the room with him. 

We made our way to Garrison to have a few drinks. Well, the boys were going to drink. I preferred to stay sober for this. I had to watch out for Finn. Tommy seemed to be in a really good mood. He was even helping Grace pour drinks for everyone. 

"The next family meeting, I'll make sure you're there." 

"If I were family but I'm not."

"That could change."

"Tommy-"

"We'll talk about it more when I get back. Alright?"

"When will you be back?"

"Oh, is this how it's going to be? You waiting at home for me saying 'what time do you call this?'" He smiled at her as he chuckled. 

"The barrel needs changing." She walked to the back room. 

What the hell just happened? I thought they liked each other. He just told her he wanted to be with her. One of Tommy's friends, Jeremiah, walked into the pub. "Two vans are driving up Stratford Road. An old corporal of mine said he recognized some of the men. It's the Kimber boys, they're heading this way." My stomach turned as he stood there. 

None of this made sense. Someone betrayed us. Now, we were outnumbered. The Lees were on their way to the races. Tommy took off to tell Ada and Aunt Polly to get ready for anything. The phone in the pub rang. It was Aunt Pol. 

They had made the realization that Grace was working for the other side. She had been betraying us the entire time. Aunt Polly was going to deal with her. We had to get ready to fight Kimber and his boys. They were going to need everyone they could. Tommy walked up to us. 

"Alright men, you were mostly in the war so you know the battle plans always change and get fucked up. Well, here it is. Things have changed. We fight them here. Today. Alone. Now they're gonna come for the pub. They're gonna try and break us up for good. We'll have no help from the law today. That pub there is called the Garrison. Well, now it really is one. And it belongs to us, right?"

"Right!" All the men and Finn screamed.

"How many are there?" Arthur asked.

"Jeremiah says two Riley vans. I reckon we're outnumbered three to one."

"Fuck," I mumbled as I looked at the ground. 

"It's us, boys. It's us. The Small Heath Rifles. We haven't lost a fight yet, have we?"

"No!"

"All right. Jeremiah. I know you vowed to God to never pick up a weapon again. Can you ask him from me if you can help us today?"

"God says he doesn't deal with Small Heath, sir."

"Good man. Arthur, Scudboat. You'll take the flanks. Just like St. Marie."

"Curly, if any Shelby's die here today, you bury us side by side. Alright, we have about 10 minutes. Make your peace with whoever." I talked with John and Arthur for a few minutes. 

I headed into the pub to finish off our minutes with Tommy. He put his drink down on the counter to hug me. He rested his chin on the top of my head. I listened to his heartbeat as we stood there. "Tommy," I whispered. Tears started to prick my eyes. 

"If anything happens, I want you to know how good of a big brother you are."

"Don't get all sappy on me now."

"Whatever." I looked up at him with a smile. 

Finn bursted through the doors. "Tommy, they're here." Both of us headed outside. We made sure our guns were ready and loaded. The men came from the opposite end of the street. We were severely outnumbered. We started to walk toward each other. 

They all started to hold their weapons at us. They were showing us what they had. Once the groups got close enough to each other, they stopped. "All guns and no balls, right, Billy Boy," John shouted. It went quiet. "What do we do now? Just give the order," Arthur mumbled to Tommy. 

We were all waiting for something to happen. 

"It doesn't have to be like this Kimber."

"Too late for all that. You bit off more than you can chew, you little toe rag. And now I'm gonna take over this shit hole."

"Well...if we have to use guns, let's use proper guns." Danny and Freddie walked out of the garage next to us. 

Freddie looked like shit. He had a giant machine gun in his hand. "Sergeant Thorne reporting for duty, sir." Tommy looked back at Kimber. "You were saying something about being out-gunned?" Everyone held their guns up at each other. Well, everyone except for Tommy and Kimber. 

"Move," Ada's voice came from the back of Kimber's group. She pushed her way to the front. She was dressed in all black. She was pushing Karl in a buggy as she walked between us. Freddie shouted, 

"What are you doing?"

"I believe you men call this no man's land."

"Ada!"

"Shut up and listen."

"Have you lost your mind?"

"I said shut up!" Kimber turned to look at his men. 

He was just as surprised as we were. "Now most of you were in France. I've got brothers, a sister, and a husband here, but you've all got somebody waiting for you. I'm wearing black in preparation. I want you to look at me. I want you all to look at me! Who'll be wearing black for you? Think about them. Think about them right now. And fight if you want to, but that baby ain't moving anywhere...and neither am I." No one said anything. 

Freddie and Ada stood there staring at each other. I didn't think this would end things this easily. I did like the effort though. "She's right, you know." Kimber looked around at all of his men then ours. "Why should all you men die? It should just be them who's caused it." 

A gunshot went off. I felt a pain rip through my right shoulder as I nearly flew onto my back. I fell to my knees as everything turned into a blur. I slowly reached up to touch where it hurt. My whole hand was red. It took me a minute to process what was going on. I was shot, Kimber shot me. 

Another gunshot went off. I looked up to see both Danny and Kimber laying on the ground. Tommy's voice echoed through the street. "Kimber and I fought this battle one-on-one. It's over. Go home to your families." After collecting Kimber's body, they left. 

Tommy ran to me, carrying me into the pub. My body was numb. Well, it was numb until they started to fish the bullet out. They sat me down on a table before stripping off my jacket and half of my shirt. "I'm so sorry," Tommy looked into his eyes. Jeramiah took the end of a spoon to the wound. They all surrounded me as I screamed and wiggled in agony. 

They all cheered me on. "Come on, An. You can take it." After a minute or 2, he got it out. "There. I still have the knack." He smiled as he put it in a glass. 

"Have a drink," Arthur handed me the bottle. I took a swig before handing it back to him. "Deep breath." Before I realized what was happening, he was pouring it on the wound. I screamed as he held me still. "It's done, it's done," he took a step back. I took a few deep breaths as they wrapped it up.

Aunt Polly and Ada came into the pub. Aunt Polly was not happy. We all gathered in the private room to say goodbye to Danny. His body lay on the table. The only one who was crying was Curly. The boys all kept their composure. 

John lowered his head.

"We can bury him properly. In the grave, we dug for him."

"Yeah. It's high on a hill. He'd like that." Tommy held up a bottle. "To Danny Whizz-bang. May we all die twice." They all passed the bottle around to say their goodbyes. "Come on, the day is ours. Let's celebrate." We all left the room.

The pub started to get crowded as our party started. I had to sneak out for a second to breathe. Tommy was actually standing out there. None of us said anything for a second. I asked, 

"Do you think he shot me to get to you?"

"He knew my biggest weakness."

"Biggest weakness and pain in the ass." He laughed as he lit his cigarette. 

I headed back to the pub to finish parting after standing there for a few minutes. Slowly everyone started to go home. The only ones left in the pub were Aunt Polly, John, Arthur, and me. John and Arthur were too drunk to go anywhere. They were passed out together in a booth. The door opened and Tommy walked in. He went to see Grace before she skipped town. 

He walked into the pub with his head hung low. 

"There he is."

"Tommy," John called out.

"Drink?" Polly offered.

"Not whiskey. If you check behind the bar you will find a bottle of champagne."

"The one she bought." Aunt Polly placed it on the table. 

"Today was a good day. All of Kimber's men were busy here. The Lee boys took all their pitches at the Worcester races. It couldn't have gone better even if we planned it. Shelby Brothers Limited is now the third-largest legal race track operation in the country." He started to walk over to John and Arthur. 

"Cheers," Arthur and John drunkenly cheered. "Only the Sabinis and the Solomons are bigger than us, boys. And all my family is here to celebrate." He popped open the bottle. 

"To Shelby Brothers Limited."

"Shelby!" Arthur cheered before groaning. 

Tommy put his head on the counter. I rubbed the back of his head. 

"There will be others." Aunt Polly soothed. 

"To others."

"To others." The 3 of us clinked our glasses. 

He walked out of the pub without another word.

[dustedmagazine]

Toxic Waste — Belfast (Sealed Records)

Photo by John Campbell

Belfast by Toxic Waste

The mid-1980s were crushingly unhappy times in far too many places: El Salvador, Afghanistan, Soweto, Southwest Philly. And so on. But we shouldn’t neglect Belfast. The dominant narrative of the Troubles features a number of signal events from the period: the Bobby Sands-led hunger strike; the bombings at Hyde Park, Regent’s Park and the Grand Brighton Hotel; the Maze Prison escape. For the population of Belfast, everyday life was an ongoing experience of being under the cosh — of the S.A.S., of the U.D.A., of the I.R.A. (and the Provisional I.R.A., and the numerous smaller paramilitary groups espousing loyalty to Ulster, to the Republican cause or to generalized mayhem). Walled-off neighborhoods, guard posts commanded by men with heavy guns, regular patrols of armored vehicles—the city was a de facto warzone. Hence the name of the Warzone Collective, an organization run by a bunch of Belfast anarcho-punks during the mid-1980s and intermittently through to the present. Toxic Waste was a punk band active in the Warzone Collective, and Sealed Records has done us all a very serious solid by reissuing Belfast, an anthology originally released in 1987 that collects a number of Toxic Waste’s songs. It’s a terrific record, documenting some oft-overlooked music from a vital punk scene and its vigorously politicized response to the lifeworld’s chaos and violence.

The songs on Belfast are taken from two moments in Toxic Waste’s development: Side A has been selected from records produced in 1985 and 1986: From Belfast with Blood — The Truth Will Be Heard, a split EP with Stalag 17 released by Mortarhate (run by Londoner punks Conflict); and We Will Be Free, an LP compiling songs by Toxic Waste, Stalag 17 and Asylum, first released by the Warzone Collective. Side B includes tracks from a later session, featuring Toxic Waste’s Roy Wallace alongside members of DIRT, a London-based anarcho-punk band. There are sonic consistencies that render the sounds on both sides comparable, most notably the dual male and female vocals, though on Side A, founding member Patsy sings, and on Side B, you hear Deno from DIRT. For both line-ups, the influence of Crass is palpable, in the interplay of the voices and the relative simplicity of the songs’ constructions — and legend has it that Toxic Waste was created in the aftermath of a 1982 Crass gig in Belfast. 

You can draw a fairly direct line from Stations of the Crass (1979) to We Will Be Free to Nausea’s Extinction, from “You’ve Got Big Hands” to “As More Die” to “Godless.” That sort of genealogy building is informative and interesting, but the importance of the immediate social context of Toxic Waste’s music should not be reduced. The situation of anarcho-punks in a politically fraught conjuncture like mid-1980s Belfast lends the music a particular power. Songs like “Tug of War,” “Burn Your Flags” and “Religious Leaders” demonstrate the band’s continual symbolic and ideological displacements, to a marginal in-betweenness, then to a radically placeless outside. As anarchists, the punks in Toxic Waste weren’t Catholics or Protestants, Fenians or Loyalists, natives of Sydenham or of New Lodge. Their relations to Northern Irish identity were infernally complex. There’s this, from “Song for Britain”: “You take a look at Northern Ireland / And think it’s too far away to worry about / But it’s not that far / And you may have to experience what we’ve put up with for years.” That seems like a collective “we,” cutting across the country’s sectarian lines. But in a city so divided, where could that “we” live with any sort of stability? And from whence does the treat in that final clause originate? Then on “We Will Be Free,” you hear, “I am not Irish / I am not British / I am me / I am an individual / Fuck your politics! / Fuck your religion! / I will be free! / We will be free!” Shorn of national, religious and political markers, who is that “We”? Is it the same “we” that speaks in “Song for Britain”?

It’s impossible to say for certain, and all of those contingencies and fluidities make the music on Belfast volatile, always on the move, always riven with restless desire. Perhaps the most coherent statement of the intent driving Toxic Waste can be encountered in “Traditionally Yours” (present on the record in two versions, from the two iterations of the band — a double voicing that further complicates all the other double voicings): “The struggle became a movement / Human rights was its concern / ‘How dare they!’ cried the rich / We’ll see those fuckers burn!” The anarchist language embedded in the passage is as powerful as it is ambiguous. What do we make of the past tense? Does that indicate that the movement is moribund, undone by Northern Ireland’s violence? And what about that “we”? Is it spoken by the song’s lyric speakers, representing the anarcho-punks that sing? Or is that “we” the “rich,” expressing their outrage at and malign plans for the anarchist cause? The syntax remains unresolved, and while Northern Ireland’s worst armed struggles have receded, these songs remain explosive, messages from displaced people that systems of oppression would like to exploit, exhaust and cast aside. But even the most institutionally entrenched powers find that Toxic Waste isn’t so easy to dispose of. 

Jonathan Shaw

[corkcitylibraries]

Genealogy Series | Part 4

A step-by-step guide to researching your family tree by Senior Library Assistant, Johnathon Fehily

This is a four-part series, appearing every Thursday for the month of January. This week Johnathon looks at newspapers and directories and niche records.

Newspapers

Newspapers can be very good sources of genealogical information. Unfortunately, until the early decades of the twentieth century only the comparatively wealthy sections of society had birth, marriage and death notices inserted in the newspapers. If you have an approximate or exact date of death or marriage you will be able to check if a notice of the event was carried in a newspaper very quickly. Searching through newspapers can be very time consuming if you don't have at least an approximate date for the event in question. Many people though enjoy browsing through newspapers as they contain a wealth of information on other matters. You could easily find yourself distracted reading contemporary reports of the search for Jack the Ripper or reports on the openings of churches and theatres. Birth notices usually carry the least information; often they will not give the name of the newly born child. A typical early nineteenth century birth notice might read 'On the 6th last. to the lady Anne, wife of Captain James O'Sullivan, a son'

The Local Studies Department has a wide range of Cork newspapers from the middle of the 18th century. Some are in bound copies while others are on microfilm. The department also has complete runs of the Freeman's Journal and The Irish Times on microfilm. A useful index to biographical notices in Cork and Kerry newspapers from 1756 to 1827 is Rosemary ffolliott's Biographical notices primarily relating to Cork & Kerry newspapers 1756 - 1827. This is available on microfilm in the Local Studies Department.

Cork City Libraries maintains subscriptions with the Irish Newspaper Archives and British Newspaper Archives which are discussed below. Both sites are subscription based and are free to use by the public in house in any city library.

  Irish Newspaper Archives

The Irish Newspaper Archives is a commercial site specialising in the digitisation of national and regional papers on the Island of Ireland. The archive consists of over 6 million pages of newspaper content from titles North and South of the Irish border and through the newspaper obituaries Irish genealogists can search, retrieve and view births, deaths and marriage records from over 279 years’ worth of Irish publications. The search function of the Site allows for searches by surname and forename, however the more common a surname will mean that a approximate date range must be applied to have a reasonable chance of finding the original birth, marriage or death notice. With particular interest to Genealogists searching for Cork ancestors would be the Irish Examiner, Evening Echo and Southern Star papers; National papaers such as the Freeman and Independent are also available on the site. Please find a brief description of papers and date ranges available specifically to Cork researchers below.

 Cork Newspapers:

Irish Examiner (1841-Present) – The Examiner is the paper of note of Cork and is the most likely paper to have a notice printed.

Southern Star (1892-Present) – The Southern Star is a West Cork based paper with a nationalist outlook.

Evening Echo (1896-Present) – The Evening Echo is a Cork City based paper with many people born in the city choosing this as the paper of note.

Skibbereen Eagle (1882-1922) – The Skibbereen Eagle is a West Cork based paper. The Eagle was a paper with a unionist outlook and was discontinued after independence.

 British Newspaper Archives

The British Newspaper Archive is a new service which may be used free of charge within or without Cork City Libraries. All that is required to use the service is to set up a account on the BNA site found at: https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/. The British Newspaper Archive is a partnership between the British Library and findmypast to digitise up to 40 million newspaper pages from the British Library's vast collection over the next 10 years. The site hosts a number of Cork related papers which will be useful to researchers.

Cork Advertising Gazette 1855 – 1859

Cork Constitution 1826 – 1896

Cork Daily Herald 1858 – 1901

Cork Examiner 1841 – 1912

Skibbereen & West Carbery Eagle; or, South Western Advertiser 1861 – 1870

Southern Reporter and Cork Commercial Courier 1823 - 1870

  Directories

Street and trade directories are among the most useful sources available to you for genealogical research. In them you may find the list of the head of the household in each house in the principal streets of the relevant city or town, a list of those involved in trades, professions and crafts in the area, information on members of corporations and town councils and much else. A selection of Cork directories is available on the Cork Past and Present website here. Many of the directories carry advertisements for various shops and trades. These may be very informative and in addition are often visually quite attractive. A selection of advertisements from Cork directories may be viewed on the Cork Past and Present Website or consulted in person in the Local Studies Department.

The Local Studies Department has a wide-ranging collection of Cork directories from 1787 to 1945. There are gaps in the collection, especially for the early and mid-19th century.

  Griffith's Valuation

Griffith's Valuation (more formally The Primary Valuation of Tenements) was a systematic valuation of all property in Ireland. It was carried out between 1848 and 1864 and takes its popular name from Richard Griffith, the director of the valuation. The valuation for County Cork was done mostly between 1850 and 1852. Its main purpose was to value property to form the basis for various types of taxation. If the census returns for 1851 and 1861 survived it is doubtful that you would need to consult it. In the absence of these returns it has become a substitute for the missing census records, although it is a very poor one. The information given in the valuation is: Townland name (street name in urban areas), valuation map number, local number, householder's name, landlord's name (under the heading 'immediate lessor'), a brief description of the property, the area of the property in units of acres, roods and perches and the rateable value of the property. It is arranged by county, barony, civil parish and townland.

 The valuation and a number of indexes to it are available in the Local Studies Department. Most of the valuation for Cork is available in published volumes. The valuation for the entire country is on microfiche. Griffith's Valuation is now available online on the Ask About Ireland website found here: http://www.askaboutireland.ie/griffith-valuation/.

 You might be interested to know that Richard Griffith was also a distinguished engineer who built many roads in County Cork and designed the tunnel at Kent Station in Cork.

  Tithe Applotment Books

Until 1838, families were obliged to give a tenth of their income annually, a tithe, to the Church of Ireland. Tithe had been paid in kind until 1823, when a law was passed making tithe payable in money. A survey of the value of property was carried out from 1823 to 1838 to determine how much tithe each landholder would pay. The Tithe Applotment Books record the results of the survey. Their value as sources for genealogical research is limited. The information given varies from book to book but usually it includes the landholder's name, the landlord's name, the townland name, the acreage of the land and the amount of tithe payable. Payment of tithe was bitterly resented by Catholics and Presbyterians and led to the Tithe War from 1830 to 1838.

 If you manage to trace your family back to the tithe books you will have done well. It is extremely difficult to trace a family in Ireland further back than the early 19th century. There are exceptions of course, particularly for wealthier families and members of the gentry, but generally speaking 1800 or thereabouts is a cut-off point for tracing family history in Ireland. You can consult microfilm copies of the Tithe Applotment Books in Cork County Library and a digitised version at: http://titheapplotmentbooks.nationalarchives.ie/.

Niche Records:

Electoral lists

Electoral lists for Cork city are available in the Local Studies Department since 1942/43 and list all those eligible to vote in local, presidential and general elections. In more recent times they list those eligible to vote in elections for the European Parliament. They can be useful as sources for genealogy or even for finding out who might have lived in a house in a given year.

The municipal boundaries were extended in 1965. People in some of the suburbs, for example Blackrock, were living outside the city before the extension of the boundaries and will not be listed in the electoral lists for the city before 1965. The Boundaries of the City were once again extended in 2019 to take into account the growth of the city.

The Current year of registers can be consulted as well as registers of 30 year vintage and older.

 O'Kief, Coshe Mang, Slieve Lougher and Upper Blackwater in Ireland . Albert Casey (ed.) Alabama: Knocknagree Historical Fund, 1952-1967. 13 volumes.

If your ancestors came from north-west Cork or east Kerry, the area known as Sliabh Luachra, you should certainly consult Albert Casey's huge compilation of genealogical material from the area. It is impossible to define the boundaries of Sliabh Luachra exactly but its heartland would lie in the country between Abbeyfeale, Castleisland and Millstreet. The barony of Duhallow is in this area.

The Local Studies Department has 13 volumes of the work and the range of material included is extraordinary. There are transcriptions of parish registers, reprints of Smith's histories of Cork and Kerry, a reprint of an edition of the Annals of the Four Masters, transcriptions of gravestone inscriptions, copies of marriage and death notices from newspapers and Casey's own speculations on the origins of the Celts and on the relationship of people on the west coast of Ireland to other European peoples. It must be said that Casey's theories are very peculiar and at variance with current thinking in ancient history and anthropology.

O'Kief, Coshe Mang has a number of faults. Much of it is printed in a typeface which is very small and quite difficult to read without magnification. The records included in it are copied from the originals and errors will almost certainly have occurred during the transcription process. It is arranged rather haphazardly; records from one parish may be dispersed in different volumes. Despite these faults it is an extremely valuable resource for any one from the Sliabh Luchra area. Sliabh Luachra means 'the rushy mountain' in English. Cork City Libraries has made available an online alphabetical index of O'Kief, Coshe Mang.

 Estate Records

The vast majority of the Irish population prior to the nineteenth century were tenant farmers on vast country estates. The administration of these estates produced large quantities of records such as leases and deeds, rentals and account books, maps and correspondence. Many of these records have been placed in various archives across the state with the majority being held by the National Library in Dublin.

Estate records differ from once collection to the next but contain a wide array of papers on tenants. Documents can include information on tenants ranging from names, acreage, rent, land holdings, leases and agreements. In some circumstance’s letters may be in existence discussing various tenants, projects and events which may have taken place on the estate. With the sale and break up of estates overtime many collections hold information of the sale of land to individuals through Land Commissions or Encumbered Estates Court.

  Find My Past

Find my Past is a subscription based commercial genealogy website which can be accessed in the City Library on Grand Parade. Find My past originated as a Genealogy group founded in 1965 in the UK by a group of Genealogists and researchers known as Title Research. As the Internet boom took hold in the early 2000’s, FindmyPast became a major player in the proliferation of digitised genealogical material globally. The site contains a wide variance of materials compiled into a number of sections, namely:

Birth, Marriage, Death & Parish Records

Census, land & surveys

Churches & religion

Directories & social history

Education & work

Institutions & organisations

Military, armed forces & conflict

Travel & migration

Contact the Local Studies Department to make use of this Service.

Follow us here on Tumblr or on Facebook and Twitter to keep up-to-date.

[sciencespies]

Stunning Mosaic Found in England Shows Some Lived in Luxury During 'Dark Ages'

https://sciencespies.com/history/stunning-mosaic-found-in-england-shows-some-lived-in-luxury-during-dark-ages/

Stunning Mosaic Found in England Shows Some Lived in Luxury During 'Dark Ages'

The discovery of an intricately crafted Roman mosaic might not seem wholly surprising, but archaeologists say there’s something very unusual about the design seen at Chedworth Roman Villa in Gloucestershire, England: It dates to the mid-fifth century A.D., decades after the end of Roman rule in Britain and in the midst of a period popularly dubbed the Dark Ages.

Historians have long thought that early Britons abandoned Roman villas and population centers following the breakdown of the imperial administrative system. But the new find suggests otherwise.

“It has generally been believed that most of the population turned to subsistence farming to sustain themselves,” says Martin Papworth, an archaeologist with the United Kingdom’s National Trust, in a statement. “… What is so exciting about the dating of this mosaic at Chedworth is that it is evidence for a more gradual decline. The creation of a new room and the laying of a new floor suggests wealth, and a mosaic industry continuing 50 years later than had been expected.”

Archaeologists discovered the mosaic in 2017 but only recently used radiocarbon dating of charcoal and bone sealed in a nearby foundation trench to determine its age. They found that the mosaic must have been created sometime after 424 A.D. Papworth says the result was so surprising that the National Trust conducted a second radiocarbon test, as well as a pottery analysis, to verify it.

The Guardian’s Steven Morris reports that the mosaic reflects a decline in quality compared with fourth-century work found at the same villa and elsewhere in Britain. This may indicate that craftspeople’s skills were eroding at the time. Papworth notes that Roman soldiers and civil servants were either departing Britain or no longer earning wages in cash, leading craft and service industries that depended on their patronage to fall apart.

Despite some mistakes, the mosaic is a complex work of art, boasting an outer border of circles filled with flowers and knots. Per the statement, the parts of the mosaic in the center of the room are worn down, but those on the edges remain relatively well preserved.

The Chedworth Roman Villa is located in southwestern England.

(National Trust / Hazel Barry-Scott)

The end of Roman rule in Britain began in the late fourth century, when Rome withdrew many of its troops from the region. Then, early in the fifth century, ancient Germanic people known as the Teutons conquered Gaul, cutting Britain off from the empire. Though Romans remained on the island, they lost much of their power and influence. The new find, however, suggests that this process occurred more gradually than previously thought.

Papworth says it’s impossible to know who lived in the villa but posits that they may have been influential dignitaries or rich elites. He says the new find could reflect a slower decline in the quality of life for the rich in England’s southwest, compared with the north and east, where residents faced violent raids.

As Sara Spary notes for CNN, few documents from the so-called Dark Ages survive, and archaeological evidence from the period is limited. The new find was part of a six-year program of digs and research at Chedworth.

“I am still reeling from the shock of this dating,” says Stephen Cosh, a Roman mosaics expert, in the statement. “It will be important to research further sites in the region to see whether we can demonstrate a similar refurbishment at other villas which continued to be occupied in the [fifth] century.”

The National Trust has reburied the mosaic to protect it from the weather. The organization is now seeking funding to create an augmented reality experience that makes the new find, along with other mosaics found in the area, more accessible to the public.

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#History

[verypersonalscreencaps]

'I’ve never sought fame so I’m loving it ... I hope it lasts!': As she returns in the hit BBC sitcom Mum, Lesley Manville reveals how a surprise Oscar nomination finally made her hot in Hollywood at 63

By COLE MORETON FOR EVENT MAGAZINE PUBLISHED: 22:01, 27 April 2019

'I can’t believe this late flourish that I’m having,’ says Lesley Manville, beaming with happiness. ‘It just keeps on giving!’

She’s about to star in the third and final series of the brilliant BBC comedy Mum, playing the kind and loving widow Cathy, surrounded by a family of not-always-lovable fools, and slowly falling for her old friend Michael. It’s hugely popular, for reasons Event’s TV critic Deborah Ross explains below, but that’s not all. Suddenly, to her own astonishment, at the age of 63, Manville is Hollywood hot property.

‘I don’t really share this much, except to my very close friends, because you’ve got to let off steam to somebody about how extraordinary it is,’ says Manville, hand fluttering briefly as if to fan herself. ‘And the enormity of how it has shifted things. Everything has changed.’

Scripts and offers are flooding in since she was Oscar-nominated for her role in Daniel Day-Lewis’s 2018 film, Phantom Thread. After decades of working ‘under the radar’ – as she puts it – in the theatre, on television and in Mike Leigh movies such as High Hopes, Secrets & Lies and Another Year, Manville was thrust into the brightest spotlight of all. ‘I got to go to the Oscars with my sister and my son!

‘But, oh my God, it was a mad dash. I was on stage in the West End on the Saturday, got home at midnight, only had time to wash my hair and catch two hours’ sleep, then I was on a plane in the early hours.’ The Oscars were that Sunday night. ‘I got there with an hour-and-a-half to get ready.’

She rarely gives interviews and hasn’t talked about this publicly before, but there was something else remarkable about that night – her ex-husband Gary Oldman was also up for an Oscar, for his role as Sir Winston Churchill in Darkest Hour. The Hollywood media went wild at the idea of divorcees being nominated at the same time, and there was even talk of ‘fisticuffs on the red carpet’ – particularly since he had walked out on her in 1989, when their child Alfie was only three months old.

‘I had a son to bring up,’ she says, sounding matter-of-fact rather than bitter after all these years. ‘I was 32 and I had a baby. I wanted to carry on working and I did. I must have been knackered. I was up at dawn and looked after Alfie all day. Then my sister, who was working for me, would come and do teatime and bedtime. I’d go to do Miss Julie or Top Girls. Nice light plays!’

Somehow she gave her all to those far from light works. ‘I wouldn’t have had it any other way. I never wanted to stop working. And also I didn’t want to be a slovenly mother – not bothering, just phoning in motherhood because I was working. I wanted to be the best mother, with a proper meal on the table every night, and proper things in the lunchbox. All of that. And I’ve done it. That’s my biggest achievement, I think.’

Did she feel that way because Gary had abandoned them? ‘No, I’m just like that – I’m quite a perfectionist in my life and my work.’

That’s easy to imagine. Manville is friendly and engaging but happily describes herself as ‘a control freak’ and looks very much like she’s got it together in her chic, cream baggy pants with matching boots, Breton striped top and leather jacket. She speaks with the diction and bearing of someone who has spent a lifetime on the stage. Does Alfie appreciate what she did for him? ‘Oh, yes. We’ve got a really nice relationship. We do argue, but we’re very close.’

Oldman later admitted that work and alcoholism had made him ‘anxious, neurotic and hell to live with’ – but he moved in with the much younger Uma Thurman soon after taking off to America. His fifth wife, Gisele Schmidt, attended the Oscars with him, while Manville is single and walked the red carpet with Alfie, now a cameraman. So just how awkward was this public reunion?

‘Gary and I are fine. We’re friends. We’re more than fine. People wanted to make something of it that didn’t exist. Christ almighty, we’re 60. We’ve got a 30-year-old son. Come on!’ She does understand why there was such interest. ‘I even stayed sober for one night in LA at the Oscars so that I could do a live interview on the Today programme. Something should be made of it, for the sake of our son. Very few children have been to the Oscars and seen both their parents nominated. It was nice because Gary was there with his wife – who I get on with very well – his other two sons and my son. We’re grown-ups.’

In her eagerness to demonstrate that they’ve worked out their differences, Manville even reveals that the two former partners are planning to work together again.

‘Gary’s asked me to be in a new film he’s hoping to shoot soon. So of course we’re fine. It’s a film about Eadweard Muybridge, the man who invented film.’ The Victorian photographer devised camera techniques that laid the foundations for the motion picture industry. He also shot and killed his wife’s lover, but was acquitted by a jury on the grounds of justifiable homicide. ‘It will be amazing.’

And although she did not win the Oscar for best supporting actress last year (Oldman did win best actor), Manville says she has been almost overwhelmed by offers since then. ‘You get inundated with scripts and immediately I got offered a film with Liam Neeson, Normal People, that’s virtually a two-hander. It comes out at the end of this year.’

Neeson got himself in a lot of trouble earlier this year by confessing that in the past, after the rape of a friend, he had taken to prowling the streets with a cosh, hoping ‘some black b******’ would come out of a pub looking for a fight. He was actually expressing shame at having had those feelings and drew support from Whoopi Goldberg and the England footballer John Barnes, but others called for his films to be pulled. Did that put Normal People in danger?

Manville draws in breath, pulls back her shoulders and says: ‘I’m not going to talk about it at all... except to say that Liam is one of the nicest gentlemen I’ve ever worked with. And he’s a friend.’

Is she just like Cathy in Mum, who insists on seeing the best in people? ‘Oh, I don’t compare to Cathy. I’m kind, but I’m a bit more judgmental than she is. I’m from this chippy world of acting, where people are beautifully acerbic, funny, and sarcastic and cutting. I enjoy all of that. It’s banter.’

Still, she is firmly supportive of Neeson then quickly moves on. ‘Then I got a film I haven’t shot yet, called Dali Land, about Salvador and Gala Dali. I’m going to play Gala. Last week I was filming the new series of Harlots [in which she plays the madam of a high-class 18th-century brothel], then preparing for the film Let Him Go with Kevin Costner and Diane Lane.’

Does Manville thrive on all this new attention? ‘My sister can’t believe I’m not exhausted. It is overwhelming at times, but I do sort of feel I’ve earned it. I’ve put in decades of doing what I feel were the right jobs. I’ve never sold out. I’ve never sought fame. So I’m genuinely loving it and I’m hoping it will last, but it will only last if I keep turning out the work.’

Does she wish this had all happened before? ‘No. I’ve had an amazing, steady career. And I’m grateful for that. A lot of young people who get success very quickly come under huge pressure to maintain it and that is very hard. Especially if they’re good-looking, because if you’ve built a career based on your good looks when you’re young, it’s very difficult to carry on in a real and proper vein.’ Has she come under any of Hollywood’s infamous pressure to go under the knife?

‘No. I went to a lot of meetings while we were there, and the reaction I got is: ‘Oh, you’ve done nothing to your face, isn’t that great!’ If I suddenly started doing all that, it would make nonsense of this career I’ve had for 40-plus years. I’m setting myself up as somebody who likes to play characters. This Bible-bashing mad woman with a gun that I’m playing in Let Him Go isn’t going to have gone under the knife in 1963. Just leave it alone.’

Manville grew up in Brighton, where her father was a taxi driver, and at the age of 15 she started commuting to the Italia Conti stage school in London. She declined the chance to join the steamy TV dance troupe Hot Gossip. ‘I thought, I can’t wear stockings and a suspender belt on telly with my dad watching! He wasn’t a prude – it was more that I was a bit of a prude. I was a good girl. I never broke the rules.’

Just like Cathy in Mum, then? ‘I am a good girl at heart, so there is a bit of Cathy there, but the other side of me is very driven and single-minded.’

Her father couldn’t believe it when she gave up a perfectly good, lucrative part on the soap Emmerdale Farm to concentrate on theatre. ‘My dad was like, “What are you doing? Why would you want to do plays?”’ But Manville went on to have a truly illustrious and highly acclaimed career on stage, from her early days at the Royal Court through numerous leading roles at the National Theatre, The Old Vic and with the Royal Shakespeare Company to her performance in Ibsen’s Ghosts, for which she won the Olivier in 2014. This was the pinnacle of her career at the time, and she said: ‘Ghosts is my Olympic moment.’

There was no way of knowing that the Hollywood legend Paul Thomas Anderson, director of There Will Be Blood and Magnolia, would call her out of the blue, having seen her in the Mike Leigh films he loved.

But before that happened and she got really famous, the director Richard Laxton approached Manville in 2016 about making Mum, and had some persuading to do.

‘My only experience of comedy was 25 years ago, a series called Ain’t Misbehavin’ with Peter Davison,’ says Manville. ‘It was well written, but you had to be funny. I didn’t enjoy it. I wasn’t very good.’

Laxton sent a script and a box set of Him And Her, a series also written by Mum creator Stefan Golaszewski and shot in a very similar, low-key way. The actors play the drama and not for laughs, although they certainly come. In Mum, we see the craziness of the family from Cathy’s point of view as she tries to keep going, do her best and be kind.

‘Just the slightest twinkle from Cathy, and the audience knows what it’s going to mean,’ says Manville.

Series one began just after Cathy had lost her husband Dave. Series two saw her become increasingly – but very slowly – close to old family friend Michael, before she finally declared her love. Now, at the start of the final series, they are together, but haven’t broken it to her son or anyone else yet. ‘I love the way the writer does that,’ she says. ‘We last saw them tentatively holding hands. At the start of this series she just gives him a very casual kiss on the lips, when she’s showing him the bedroom she is staying in.’

The inference is that they have made love. ‘You don’t see them having sex. You don’t see them having passionate kisses.’ Is that a relief? ‘Yes. You wouldn’t want to go there really, but I knew they were going to get together.’ The pair have such joy on their faces, as if they can’t believe their luck.

‘I think younger people – 20- and 30-year-olds – don’t think of anybody aged 60 falling in love. They don’t really imagine that all those feelings an 18-year-old in love has – all those butterflies, uncertainties and insecurities, all that joy – is the same for everyone, whatever your age. That’s an emotion and a set of feelings that we never lose. Thank God! I love Mum for showing that.’

The characters are also very understated. ‘I love the fact that Cathy and Michael are not glamorous, they’re not thinking about how they look. They’re good, kind, thoughtful people. They’re intelligent. They’re very in touch with their own feelings and emotions and reality. They have a very acute understanding of the people around them.’ The cast and crew all stayed in the same hotel and found a local pub to eat and drink. ‘Lots of times, someone would spot one of us up at the bar – say Lisa [McGrillis, who plays Kelly] – and they’d go: “That’s her from Mum!” Then they’d turn around to see where she was taking the drinks and we would all be sitting there!’

How are people with her? ‘Mum is the thing I get stopped in the street most about. They say very kind things. They love the series. When I say it’s back in May but this is the last series, they can’t bear it.’

So why is Mum finishing? ‘Stefan wants to move on to other things. But it’s got a nice finite ending and why would you do any more? Either they get together or they don’t. Either way, that’s it.’ We don’t see so-called late love like this on the television much, do we?

‘No, but I think that’s shifting very slowly. Women and men of my age want to see themselves represented. And there are those actresses who are just carrying on – not just Judi Dench and Maggie Smith, but Helen Mirren, Meryl Streep, Annette Bening.... We are fronting films. And all those female-led films like Mamma Mia!, Quartet and The Best Marigold Hotel that have been huge box- office successes have made studios think: ‘We can have a film about a 50-year-old that people want to see!’

She says ‘we’, but those women are older than her. Thanks to her sudden Indian summer, Manville is now poised to lead a new generation of female actors taking on those kinds of roles. ‘Those actors have opened up the way for us, absolutely. I’ve always felt my life was a slow burn. I’m pleased with the way it has all turned out. Delighted, really. I can’t wait to see what happens next!’

The final series 3 of ‘Mum’ begins on BBC 2 next month. Series 1 and 2 are available on iPlayer.  

[ubongeh]

‘Action agenda’ for protecting workers released by National COSH

‘Action agenda’ for protecting workers released by National COSH

More than 90 other organizations has agreed and endorsed National COSH’s action agenda, Protecting Workers’ Lives and Limbs, released March 15.

National COSH and its supporting organizations say they will lobby members of Congress, as well as state and municipal representatives, to fight for enhanced safety and health protections for workers. National COSH delegations will visit congressional…

[ralph-n-fiennes]

Hey! Is there any chance you could post the entire interview from The Times here? Thanks

Sure! Here it is

Ralph Fiennes: ‘There is a kind of political correctness that’s in danger of becoming totalitarianism’

The actor and director talks about his new Nureyev film, the perils of mob justice, and why he’s tired of playing evil

Ralph Fiennes’s The White Crow, the actor’s third film as a director, is as fine a portrait of an artist as a young man as you will find outside the pages of James Joyce. Set in Paris in 1961, it is the story of the defection of Rudolf Nureyev from Russia, the climax of the Kirov Ballet star’s belligerent growing-up, and a big publicity coup for the West.

Its writer, David Hare, who has done a job as brilliant as The White Crow’s director, has said that he loathes the idea that Nureyev’s defection was a balletic “leap to freedom”. At the time, he points out, there was optimism in Russia after the death of Stalin and the accession of the more liberal Khrushchev. In microcosm it is true, certainly, that the man Fiennes plays, Nureyev’s teacher Alexander Pushkin, was no tyrant. Indeed, it is vaguely upsetting to see the much lusted-after leading man who, two decades ago, was the seducer in The English Patient, now at 56 play a bald professorial type, cuckolded by his protégé — although the real seducer in this case was, it seems, Pushkin’s wife, who cajoled the mostly homosexual Nureyev into her bed.

“Alexander was very kind and very, very gentle,” Fiennes says. He is in a suite at the Dorchester in London, dressed in jeans and coatigan. His long, floppy hair, I notice to my relief, has, in reality, suffered no more than some widow’s peaking. “People talk about his technique, which was to let the students discover their own mistakes. Now, I’ve seen ballet classes where the teacher literally comes and forces the arm and turns the head and wrestles with a student’s body.”

Fiennes agrees with Hare that it was claustrophobia, rather than tyranny, that Nureyev was fleeing and that his defection was a spur-of-the-moment decision prompted by the heavy-handedness of KGB minders alarmed at his carousing in Paris. Still, the urge had surely been building. “Subconsciously, for him there was a world elsewhere,” Fiennes says, quoting from Coriolanus, which he has starred in and directed for cinema.

Nureyev’s “leap” is performed at Le Bourget airport in front of a scrum of reporters, whose colleagues would pursue the dancer right up to his death from Aids in 1993, aged 54. Perhaps, I say, the film suggests that the dancer trades one form of surveillance for another? Fiennes, however, barely concedes the point even though his own private life — in 1996 he left his wife, Alex Kingston, for Francesca Annis, his co-star in Hamlet almost 20 years his senior — has suffered its share of scrutiny.

A newer form of western tyranny seems to disturb him more. In recent weeks he has offered his support to Liam Neeson, his Schindler’s List co-star, after Neeson said in an interview that he had once wandered the streets with a cosh hoping to be attacked by a “black bastard” so he could avenge the rape of a woman close to him. Fiennes has also stood firm by Michael Colgan, a former director of the Gate Theatre in Dublin, who has been accused of bullying and sexual harassment during his tenure. In the first case, Fiennes says that Neeson was attempting an honest confession. In the second, to be accused is not invariably to be guilty.

“I think there’s a kind of political correctness which has its strength, but is in danger of becoming its own sort of totalitarianism,” Fiennes says.

It is harder, perhaps, to argue the case for Sergei Polunin, the Ukrainian dancer with a supporting role in The White Crow who in January was dropped from a ballet in Paris after posting rants on Instagram, but Fiennes says that he was a joy to work with. “Basically, I ignore all the stuff that he said because I believe there’s the noise the human being can make and then there’s who they truly are as a person, and I think Sergei is a good man, a kind man.”

Fiennes, I observe, occasionally makes a bit of noise in his private life (in 2007 an air stewardess claimed that she had inducted him into the mile high club). “I’ve been guilty of shit,” he agrees. He is less ready to concede that his description of “the unpleasantness and ruthlessness” of the young Nureyev as he looked to “create” himself may have once applied to him.

“I’m uncomfortable saying an overt yes to that. I connected with aspects of his hunger to learn, I suppose, his hunger to absorb.”

Fiennes’s self-creation remains a fascinating subject. His career looked set to be in art until, enrolled at Chelsea College of Arts, he noticed a young New Zealand painter and the “fury” he had about his vocation.

“I thought, ‘He is driven and I’m here painting that bowl of fruit, but I don’t know what I’m trying to say.’ I think I had acted at school and there was some moment at college when the penny dropped and I thought, ‘No, I want to be an actor.’ It suddenly became very clear to me, certain.”

Was there fury about his acting? “I think there was a bit. There was a real sort of determination, but I remember one audition at one drama school. I came out with this RP voice and I think they thought, ‘Who is he? Is he pretending to be a Shakespeare actor?’ I felt maybe I wasn’t the kind of actor that was cool at the time.”

Rada recognised the real thing. Leaving in 1985, he was quickly taken up by the RSC and the National Theatre. By the time I last interviewed him, in 1995, he had already been nominated for an Oscar from his remarkable portrayal of the concentration camp commandant Amon Goeth in Schindler’s List, and was about to play Hamlet at the Almeida in London — which was where he would fall in love with Annis, who was playing the prince’s mother. There was no doubting his greatness. Of his range, however, there was less inkling.From Goeth, we knew he could play a particularly nuanced kind of evil, but who could have predicted his terrifying box-office turn as Voldemort in the Harry Potter films?“I did actually say to my agent, after Voldemort, ‘Please don’t send me any bad guys. I’ve done that now.’ And I don’t think I’ve broken that promise, unless you count David Hare getting me to play his version of Tony Blair in Page Eight.”A consequence of that resolution was our discovery that Fiennes could be wickedly funny on film — as the suavely savage Gustave in Wes Anderson’s The Grand Budapest Hotel and then that grab-bag of ego, the music producer Harry, in A Bigger Splash. However, this is also a serious actor who learnt Russian for the movie Two Women and speaks it beautifully in The White Crow, indistinguishable from Russian cast members speaking in their native tongue. His Bafta-nominated directorial debut with Coriolanus in 2011, meanwhile, was followed up by an impressive Dickens movie, The Invisible Woman.

There is an off-the-peg explanation for Fiennes’s overachievements. As a child, he had to compete with his siblings for attention, for love and to impress.

“At the age of seven, I was the eldest of six, and I probably had a little bit of special treatment, being the eldest, and then felt the competition coming up behind,” he says. “When we get together as a family, we laughingly acknowledge our need to have our space. Because we’re all quite close together in age, I think you define your territory. ‘This is my territory. This is who I am.’”

He says that his mother, Jennifer Lash, a writer known as Jinni, who was married to Mark Fiennes, a farmer-turned-photographer, inspired her brood with her love of words and performance. Two of his sisters, Martha and Sophie, became film-makers; one brother is a composer; and another is Joseph Fiennes, the actor.

“But it was frantic. She often felt huge distress. She wanted to write, and sometimes the pressure and the strain and the frustration of not being able to write, not having the time to write, the peace and the space to write, would explode, but the love was always there, incredible love.”

Jinni, who published her first novel at 23, died of cancer aged 55, when Fiennes was 30. He says that he still feels her presence, although that could just be his “own need to feel that something”.

Does he dream about her? “Sometimes. My father too. What’s so weird is my mother died in 1993 and my father died in 2004 and yet somehow in the brain they’re restored. In the dreams, if they come, they’re completely clear, completely present and as they were. Somehow the brain has stored the memory of the voice, the person.”

Do friends ever say to him that his career has been incredibly Oedipal? I am thinking not just of Hamlet and his leaving a wife of his own age for his Gertrude, but the mother-son dynamic of Coriolanus.

“Yes, people have commented on that, and I shouldn’t be ashamed of it. I mean, Oedipal is probably how we’re wired as the sons of mothers. I don’t feel any awkwardness about there being an Oedipal element in one’s self. I think that’s quite healthy. It’s part of who you are.”

Has he been in therapy? “I had what they call psychotherapy for a little bit. It was interesting.”

Did he go because he was unhappy or because he wanted to explore himself? “I was going through a time of crisis and emotional disturbance and upset.”

Can he say about what? “No, I don’t want to.”

Having come from a noisy, competitive family, I can see why he might, in his fifties, choose the apparent solitary life that he has, living in a studio loft in east London. Since his relationship with Annis ended in 2006, there have been rumours of girlfriends, but nothing, apparently, very permanent.

“There’s living alone and being lonely. They are different things. I feel quite content, living on my own. It’s funny, isn’t it? Some people say, ‘Don’t you want children?’ And for me it’s not a negative. It’s not a dislike of children. I respect that some people do.”

I quote something that Hare has said about Fiennes, that he likes to surround himself professionally with people who love him. I wonder whether film sets and theatre companies are his substitute families.

“I think you’re in a kind of parental mode as a director, and that is your family. As an actor in a company, you’re less parental, although if you’re possibly in a leading role, there is a leadership element.”

I like the idea that he joins families of actors and, now that he is older, he becomes their father. “Yes, although I haven’t consciously thought I’m achieving parenthood that way,” he begins. And then thinks of Oleg Ivenko, the 22-year-old Ukrainian ballet dancer from whom he has conjured up a light yet intense performance in the lead role in The White Crow.

“Oleg, you see, he was a totally inexperienced actor. That was definitely a version of creative parenting, guiding him through the requirements of a feature film and a main role.”

In loco parentis, as a teacher, Fiennes, we can assume, is a Pushkin rather than a Stalin. Papa Ralph. It has a ring to it.The White Crow is out on general release

[brygry]

Japan has always had republican leftists, and their prestige was at its height after the war, which they had suffered for opposing. They advocated an explicitly republican Japan; the chief effect of this was to cost them the public goodwill they might have been thought to have earned. This, in turn, immunized Japan from communism, a benefit that the “victorious” Chinese allies did not enjoy.

Colby Cosh: Indistinguishable from magic – on Japan’s new era | National Post

[nhlabornews]

Who’s Dirty in 2018? National COSH Opens Nominations for “Dirty Dozen”

Workers’ Memorial Week Report Will Highlight Employers from  Across the Country Who Put Workers, Communities at Risk Through Unsafe Practices

SAN DIEGO – The National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (National COSH), a nationwide training and advocacy organization for workers and families, announced today that nominations are open for the “Dirty Dozen” employers of 2017 and 2018.

“We’re looking for employers who are putting workers and communities at risk because of unsafe practices,” said Jessica Martinez, co-executive director of National COSH. “Unfortunately, there are plenty to choose from. Thousands of U.S. workers die on the job every year and millions more are injured.  Most – if not all – of these tragic events can be prevented when workers are free from retaliation and are empowered to recognize, report and remediate workplace hazards.”

Nominations can be submitted online at: tinyurl.com/WhosDirty2018 until Monday, March 5.  The final “Dirty Dozen” will be published in a Workers’ Memorial Week report from National COSH, to be released in April 2018.

Workers’ Memorial Week, which will take place this year from Monday April 23 through Monday April 30, is observed in the U.S. and worldwide by workers and their families, unions, worker centers, COSH groups and many others.  The event honors workers who have lost their lives on the job, those who have suffered preventable occupational injuries and illnesses and the families of these workers. It will be marked by candlelight vigils, memorial services rallies, the release of reports and other actions. Many observances will take place on April 28, which marks the day the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Act took effect in 1971.

The 2016-2017 “Dirty Dozen,” released by National COSH in April 2017, included companies in agriculture, food processing, manufacturing, retail, service transportation and other industries.

“We’re especially interested in companies where workers are joining together to fight for better working conditions,” said Marcy Goldstein-Gelb, also a co-executive director of National COSH. “We’re also taking a close look this year at employers who have failed to prevent sexual abuse and harassment in the workplace. Abusive behavior is a well-known workplace hazard and like other hazards, it can be prevented with education, training and rigorous enforcement.”

National COSH links the efforts of local worker health and safety coalitions in communities across the United States, advocating for elimination of preventable hazards in the workplace. For more information, please visit NationalCOSH.org. Follow us at National Council for Occupational Safety and Health on Facebook and @NationalCOSH on Twitter.

Who’s Dirty in 2018? National COSH Opens Nominations for “Dirty Dozen” was originally published on NH LABOR NEWS

[neweventmy]

NEWEVENT MALAYSIA added 6 new products on 20/7/2022

NEWEVENT MALAYSIA

July 2022 (2)

Malaysian Furniture & Furnishing Fair 2022 (MF3 2022)

KEMBARA: KONSERT PANORAMA JINGGA 1444 HIJRAH

August 2022 (2)

Malaysia-International Dental Exhibition & Conference (MIDEC) 2022

23rd Conference and Exhibition on Occupational, Safety & Health (COSH) 2022

September 2022 (2)

MSAVA National Scientific Conference, Exhibition & 32nd AGM 2022

Franchise International Malaysia 2022 (FIM 2022)