Cursed

 

As Millions struggle with a Cost of Living Crisis; Tory ministers react by ditching. its plan to ban foie gras. The nation is saved... NOT. It's barely credible that any sane human could vote Tory. .

There was a time when life felt real and dreams were something that loomed in the distance like carrots and guarded by ecstatic angels in a fettered carapace just out of reach of humans,

As reality drained. the shell has been cracked open to reveal a poisonous dystopian nightmare waiting to anoint greedy, compassionless, power driven and merciless strangers to integrity that could inflame the pits of hell. The concealed seeds are rotten to the core. They are perniciously packed with misleading labels designed to dupe and confuse. 

I am appalled at the catastrophic mess this corrupt government and their criminal Brexit have made to our country. I hope I live long enough to see the main  culprits behind bars. The Tories shame every decent person. If Keir Starmer is the only voice of opposition, we are all doomed. 

Switch of Light

After mighty wind blew wildly

Feel peaceful, take a deep breath,

Magic falls like leaves from a tree

Singing with swallows and dancing freely,

Along the star streamed path 

As the moon smiles wryly, 

Ever watchful on a world 

That continues to drift,

In a directionless course

Where the clouds are milked dry,

When daytime arrives 

The sun takes over,

And seizes the shift

With a silken shine,

Cementing the transition

From  night to day.

Marking 23 years of imprisonment of Abdullah Öcalan, the Nelson Mandela of the Middle East.

Today marks 23 years of imprisonment for Abdullah Öcalan (aka Apo)  the de facto leader of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) who has been held at Imrali Island Prison on the Marmara Sea, Turkey, most of the time in solitary confinement.Sentenced to death in 2002, his sentence was commuted to life imprisonment when Turkey abolished capital punishment as part of its quest for European Community membership.

Born on April 4, 1948, in Mardin Province of Southeast Turkey/North Kurdistan, Öcalan 's importance and significance cannot be ignored. Often called the Nelson Mandela of the Middle East, the treatment of Ocalan has many similarities to Nelson Mandela’s incarceration on Robben Island, yet, in the words of Mandela’s lawyer, Essa Moosa, “the isolation of Ocalan is worse than that of Mandela.”

Mandela was at least allowed to see his lawyers whereas since his abduction and incarceration Ocalan has been mostly condemned to complete isolation with little or no access to lawyers or his family.

As of now, no-one has heard from Ocalan since March 2021 when he was allowed a brief call with his brother, and between 2015 and 2019 he was not allowed to meet with his lawyers, have any visitors or any contact with the outside world.

The isolation of  Abdullah Ocalan is contrary to Turkey’s own constitution and to international human rights law bu is symptomatic and symbolic of the Turkish state’s war on the whole of its Kurdish population. .Solitary confinement is commonly regarded as a form of torture, one that Öcalan has had to endure since his arrest in 1999.Despite his continuing imprisonment he has made the whole world acknowledge the Kurds, and Ocalan’s ideas have inspired a major movement for grassroots, multi-ethnic secular democracy, and the respect in which he is held makes him key to a peaceful settlement for the Kurds in Turkey – an ideal for which he has strived repeatedly over the last two decades. 

 In Rojava, The Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria, Öcalan’s political thoughts are being implemented, negotiated and practised.

However since 2016 thousands of Kurdish politicians, teachers, journalists, activists and trade unionists have been jailed, many for numerous life sentences that reflect that of Abdullah Ocalan’s sentence.

Increasingly the charge of terrorism is used by the Turkish state to punish anyone who speaks out against it, and in particular those who speak out in favour of the ideas of Ocalan on peace, freedom and equality.

Abdullah Ocalan is a powerful symbol of the Kurdish people’s desire for peace. He founded the Kurdish liberation movement in 1974 in response to military oppression of the Kurds by Turkey, and although influenced by Marxist ideas he has since developed these ideas and transformed the politics of the liberation movement with new ideas based on women’s liberation, ecology, and grassroots democracy as an alternative to the nation state.

His philosophy of democratic confederalism has its roots in the international workers’ movement and offers a new solution of peace and democracy for the entire Middle East.

His ideas and vision have served as an inspiration for Kurds in Turkey, in Syria, for the Kurdish diaspora, and for left movements globally. 

His detention has been condemned by the Committee to Prevent Torture and other international rights organisations which say his treatment contravenes international law on the rights of prisoners.

Ocalan, held in prison under extremely inhumane conditions, is about as physically unfree as any human being can be. But his ideas run free among the Kurdish people exactly as they did when he was at liberty. 

Physically, Ocalan is silenced and prevented from speaking to any of his supporters, but through his powerful writings and within the collective memory of the people his words are as alive as if he was able to speak to an audience directly. Ocalan still exercises an influence like no other Kurdish political figure of modern times. This influence is undiminished because Ocalan articulates the main demands and wishes of the Kurdish people. A leader with such demonstrable influence clearly has much to offer and contribute to the future politics of his people and the region. He speaks for the Kurdish people’s aspirations for freedom from political and cultural oppression, for democracy and peace.

From his prison cell, Öcalan has led a campaign for peace and a democratic solution. He has written books explaining his ideas on how democratic peace can be achieved through a process of negotiation. His ‘Road Map to Peace’ has inspired millions of Kurds, in Turkey and beyond, to seek the democratic path to freedom within the existing borders of the country. 

' The Nelson Mandela of the Middle East' is a unique modern Kurdish leader whose reputation continues to grow. He has stood firm in his call for peace over all these years and has issued repeated proposals for achieving peace with Turkey and is the key to resolving the crisis in Turkey and the wider Middle East  and spearheaded the 2012-2015  ceasefire and peace negotiations between Turkey and the PKK. 

But his last contact with the outside world was a brief phone call in March 2021 to dispel rumours of his death, and his lawyers and family have just been informed it will be many months before they can hope to contact him again. The  campaign to free him  deserves our support as does the broader struggle for the rights of the kurdish  people.

Numbering some 40 million people, the Kurds are the world’s largest nation without a state. They have been subjected to massacres, oppression and the banning of their language and culture since the establishment of the modern Turkish state in 1923. For many years even the word Kurd was banned and they were referred to as “Mountain Turks.”

 During the 1990s more than 3,000 villages were burned to the ground and Kurds were forced from their homes and into large cities as part of state assimilation operations. An estimated 40,000 people have been killed in a bitter struggle, with Ocalan’s freedom central to a peaceful resolution to the country’s so-called Kurdish question.

 The fate of the Kurdish people in Turkey has become intertwined with the fate of Mr. Ocalan. Since its inception in 1923 the Turkish state has not accepted the existence of the Kurdish people and massacred over 250,000 Kurds; and also denied their right to representation and a leader. All Kurdish leaders have either been executed, murdered or imprisoned. This is why the freedom of Mr. Ocalan is a prerequisite for a political and peaceful solution to the Kurdish question.

 It is no no surprise that Nelson Mandela recognised the plight of the Kurdish people as a similar struggle to that of black South Africans and the struggle against apartheid. Addressing a conference in 1997 he said: “I am part of the Kurdish struggle. I am one of you.“We know what it means to be oppressed in your own country. We know the pain of a mother whose child has disappeared. We know what it means to have your nationality and culture insulted.”

Turkey benefits from the PKK being defacto included  on the terror lists across  the West, though no European court has even found that the PKK should be included on their domestic terror lists. Indeed worldwide it is only Turkey, the USA  and the EU which consider the PKK to be a terror organisation,  This happens at Turkey's request, to stifle legitimate debate or any attempt towards a resolution of the crisis in Turkey. 

You can support  the  Kurdish cause by signing the following petition calling for the PKK to be removed from international terror lists. 

 

http://justiceforkurds.info/Petition/

 

 And you can join  millions of Kurds and supporters across the world  who will be raising the simple demand: “Freedom for Ocalan.”

 
For more info: http://www.freedom-for-ocalan.com/

Alejandro Finisterre : Galician Inventor of Table football or futbolín (7/5/19 - 9/2/07)

 Alejandro Finisterre or Alexandre de Fisterra (born Alejandro Campos Ramírez; anarchist poet  and inventor of the  futbolín, a Spanish variant of table football was born on  May the 6th in 1919 in Finisterre, Galicia, one of 10 children of the telegraphist at the lighthouse at "the end of the world"  The family moved to A Coruña when Alejandro was five years old, and he left to study in the Spanish capital at the age of 15. 

It was apparent from a very early age that Alejandro would lead an extraordinary life. While at  school his headmaster put the teenage Alejandro to correcting the younger students’ homework in order to pay his school fees, when his father’ who had become went bankrupt. He  would go on to lead an adventurous life, working as a labourer, in a print shop, and even as a tap dancer in the company of Celia Gamez..

It was on the outbreak of the Spanish civil war in 1936, in Madrid where he was editing a literary magazine, ‘Paso a la juventud. his political idealism was realised, and when he first met the poet Leon Felipe, whose hatred of bourgeois society and his belief that poetry could revolutionise an unjust world Finisterre shared.

However, Finisterre, who lived in an anarchist stronghold in Madrid,, 17 at the time, was severely injured after a nationalist bomb exploded on his house and left him under the rubble in November 1936, at the height of the Spanish Civil war.

He was rescued and dragged from the rubble and evacuated, first to Valencia and finally in  Barcelona. where was taken to recuperate from his injuries in the Colonia  Puig de Montserrat hospital. Recovering, he saw many injured children, unable to play football with their friends. Being a lover of table tennis, Finisterre thought that if would play a kind of mini tennis with rackets and a green table, the same could be done with football and And so, inspired by the idea of table tennis, set about building a table football pitch or futbolín as it was called in Spain with  with a Basque carpenter called Francisco Javier Altuna,  using pine wood and steel bars created  a game even inured or disabled people could play.

A German, Broto Wachter, had invented a version of the game in 1930, but Finisterre used the realistic figures that are known worldwide today. On the advice of a local anarchist, Finisterre patented his invention in Barcelona in 1937. He also patented a foot-pedal that enabled musicians to turn the pages of their scores.

Fleeing to France at the end of the war, Finisterre's patent turned to pulp in pouring rain. Back in Spain, he completed a philosophy degree, but left for Paris in 1947.It was when he was in Paris in 1948 that Alejandro Finisterre heard that a friend from the hospital in Cataluña had patented the futbolín and it was being manufactured by a company in France. He claimed his right to the patent, and emigrated to Ecuador with the money he received from the company.
He founded the poetry magazine, Ecuador 0º 0’ 0”, and met the Guatemalan Ambassador at an event which was organised to present the magazine, who asked him to produce his invention in Guatemala. Alejandro Finisterre left for Guatemala in 1952, where his futbolín was hand-made in mahogany by indigenous peoples. His business went well – he even played some games against Che Guevara during that time – until the military coup in 1954, when Finisterre was kidnapped by Franco agents and put on a plane to Panama, with the aim of taking him back to Madrid. He managed to gain his freedom by wrapping a bar of soap from the toilets in silver paper as if it were a bomb, and shouting out, ‘I am a Spanish refugee, they’ve kidnapped me, and I know how to stop this plane arriving at its destination if I have to!’ This early act of air piracy won the support of crew and passengers and Finisterre was let off the plane in Panama.

For the next 20 years, Finisterre published in Mexico City more than 200 books of Latin American non-fiction and poetry and the work of Spanish exiles especially Galicians "I published what was forgotten by commercial publishers," .he said.

He returned to Spain after Franco’s death, and became the leading authority on his late friend, Leon Felipe who had died in Mexico City in 1968.Finisterre moved to Felipe's  home town of Zamora  The town  council promised to open a museum, when it didn't,  Finisterre in a final battle, polemicised in articles that the poet;s neglected legacy was decaying  in damp boxes, The situation became symbolic  of how "official "  Spain had ignored its exiled culture.

His enthusiasm for what he was doing and his drive,contrasted with many accounts of his very deep shyness.He also downplayed the fact that he had  been the creator of the wold famous football game. " Bah,, If I hadn't invented it, someone else would have invented it,"  

Though Finisterre himself wrote poetry, he thought of them as "just verses"  He considered like Jean Cocteau that "Poetry is always necessary, I don't know for what, but it's necessary." 

 A restless and combative cultural agitator, he dedicated his life to promoting other people's work. Now best remembered as the creator of a simple game for children which is still the most widely used in modern times, that continues to bring sustenance to a generation of young people, who are broken,and impacted by conflicts and war across the world, the popularity for Finisterre's invention has not gone away,

Alejandro Finisterre died a month away from his 88th birthday, on 9th February 2007 at his home in Zamora.and retained his idealism to the end: " I believe in progress: there is a human impulse towards happiness, peace, justice and love, and that world will one day arrive!" His ashes were scattered in the Duero River as it flows through Zamora, and in the Atlantic, off the coast of his homeland at the end of the world, Finisterre.

Frozen in Fear

Why are our bodies not immune from the cold

While our anger reaches boiling point?

And tears freeze, bellies hum with hunger

In Western democracy, not remote Siberia?

Dark times ahead, bleakness to fill days

Seasons of depression, as we turn off the lights,

Once we allow household bills to go up

They will never go down again,

While some get obscenely rich

Profiteers of misery, counting their cash,

Pushing us to an ever extreme edge

Stripping away structures of protection,

As icy homes feel the wicked winds that blow

Do we keep on swallowing poisoned medicine,

From people who want us to believe

That the gift of Socialism is really bad,

Bleeding the nation, bleeding us dry

They continue to rob us every hour,

We are running out of bloody luck

And the Government don't give a fuck,

We can't afford to give up, lose self respect

This system is a failure, we have to change her,

Give energy back to the nation, solidarity to neighbours 

Refuse the grasping hand of negligent corporations,

In order to survive, proclaim loudly our defiance

Stop menacing claws of capitalism, trying to kill us.

World Cancer Day 2022: ‘Close the Care Gap’

 

Finding out that you have cancer can be truly devastating, whatever the prognosis, and is likely to impact virtually every aspect of your life.

Those with a cancer diagnosis not only have to come to terms with the fact they may need surgery and ongoing treatment but must also deal with the emotional impact their illness has on them and their loved ones. As if all this isn’t enough, cancer patients also often find themselves under huge financial pressure if their illness means they’re no longer able to work.

World Cancer Day is celebrated on 4^th February every year around the world. The purpose of this day is to help prevent deaths from Cancer, and to be able to unite people and countries affected by Cancer and to raise awareness about Cancer, to strive to act to help improve knowledge and education about the illness and to help raise funds for Cancer initiatives., promote research, improve patient services, raise worldwide awareness of cancer and all the various impacts it can have, with the ultimate goal of reducing the millions of preventable cancer deaths.

The day was set up by the Union for International Cancer Control (UICC) – the largest and oldest international cancer organisation – and was first marked in 2000.

 2022 World Cancer Day has extra meaning in the UK, as it is also 20 years this year since Cancer Research UK was founded. Cancer Research UK has done amazing work over the 20 years and helped millions of people.

 Current statistics in the UK say that 1 in 2 people will be impacted by cancer in their lifetimes in some way.  That percentage is staggering when you consider the UK population is 60 million people.  When expanded to a global scale, it is estimated that 10 million people die per year as a consequence of cancer, with estimates increasing to 13 million by 2030.

 The theme for 2021’s World Cancer Day is “Close the Care Gap”and aims to expose significant barriers related to socioeconomic factors that prevent many people from accessing life-saving prevention services, diagnostics, treatment and care. The aim is that everyone should have access to life-saving cancer treatment and care - no matter who you are or where you live. The care or equity gap however means that 50 percent of the global population have a lack of resources and access to fundamental health services.
In terms of cancer, this includes basic care, prevention, diagnosis, and treatment, meaning that your place in the world can determine your chances of survival of cancer.

According to research done, 28% of employees who have been diagnosed with cancer said they did not receive support from their employers, or the support they were offered did not meet their expectations.

 Under UK law, Cancer is classed as a disability, which means employers cannot treat employees less favourably because of a cancer diagnosis.  Any employee who is treated less favourably over someone without a cancer diagnosis could bring a claim to the Employment Tribunal for discrimination.Disparity is not the only disparity of wealth; it can be inequality of healthcare too and it’s happening globally.It’s not only happening in third world countries, it’s happening in developed countries too.

The significance of todays theme lies behind the fact that like so many other diseases, cancer care also reflects the saddening inequalities and inequities of the world.

Half the world’s 7.9 billion inhabitants lack access to a full range of essential health services, including cancer treatment and management.

The Covid-19 pandemic has exacerbated the situation and two years on from the beginning of the crisis more than half a billion people have been pushed or pushed further into extreme poverty due to healthcare costs.

While scientific advancements are causing the survival rates for many cancers to rise exponentially, the effects are not being felt in developing nations. Many people in low and middle-income countries are unable to effectively access adequate cancer care, even when the infrastructure and expertise exist. This is what the Union for International Cancer Control refers to the “equity gap”, which is costing lives.While inequity is usually measured in terms of the unequal distribution of health or resources, there exists an array of underlying factors known as the “social determinants of health”.

These include income, education, geographical location, national resources, gender norms and cultural bias. Discrimination and assumptions based on a person’s race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, age, disability and lifestyle also play a part .and they lead to wide discrepancies in the risks of developing and surviving cancer.

The groups with the biggest disadvantages are also more likely to have increased exposure to additional risk factors, such as tobacco and an unhealthy diet.

Figures released by the WHO last year showed the stark differences in cancer care between nations in the Middle East and North Africa region.

 Nine out of 10 women who die of cervical cancer, live in low- and middle-income countries  where lack of HPV vaccination, lifestyle-related risk factors, delayed diagnosis due to the absence of screening programmes and unavailability of, or inadequate access to, effective treatment constitute as many obstacles to optimal patient care and outcomes.

Even in the UK, given the huge demands placed on the NHS by the pandemic, people could face lengthy delays for cancer diagnosis or treatment, which can make a worrying time even more distressing.

Although nothing can help ease the emotional or physical fallout from cancer, having some form of financial protection in place can at least help alleviate money worries, providing more choices and options to those affected. 

World Cancer Day 2022 comes as people are being urged to seek help for potential symptoms of cancer after it emerged that fewer are coming forward during the pandemic.

The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) said that the latest NHS data for England shows fewer people are being referred for help for lung cancer and urological cancers because they are not coming forward for help.

Cancer is a disease that causes  great physical and mental suffering, and yes death, and its management always requires great dedication in terms of time, investment, means and good organisation. Throughout the disease , may  unforseen  and delicate situations arise that require great individual adaption to overcome them.

Because of the pandemic added challenges have been added. We could not imagine that the pandemic caused  by covid-19 would affect cancer patients so much, fundamental tests and treatments are being put on hold such as radiology, chemotherapy, radiation therapy and surgery. All these changes are causing a significant delay both in diagnosis and treatment. An extremely stressful and anxious time for all concerned. 

Cancer is a  disease that will kill more than  eight million people worldwide this year . The world needs to unite against this disease that knows no borders and represents one of humanity's most pressing concerns.

Moreover , understanding and responding to the full impact of cancer on emotional , mental and physical wellbeing  will maximise the quality of life for patients, their families and care-givers. Every citizen should have access to  free treatment options and care.

 Many cancer patients and their families describe feeling a loss of control of their lives after a cancer diagnosis. Patients and families should be empowered to participate actively in decisions about their care and treatment plan which respects their individual needs and preferences. This can go a long way in helping individuals to regain a sense of control and preserve their dignity throughout their cancer experience.

 Like other wars, real and imagined, the war on cancer is a gift to opportunists of all stripes. Among the vultures are travel insurers who charge people with cancer ten times the rate charged to others, the publishers of self-help books and the promoters of miracle cures, vitamin supplements and various ‘alternative therapies’ of no efficacy whatsoever.

But most of all, there’s the pharmaceutical industry, which manipulates research, prices and availability of drugs in pursuit of profit. And with considerable success. The industry is the UK’s third most profitable sector, after finance and tourism, with a steady return on sales of some 17 per cent, three times the median return for other industries. Its determination to maintain that profitability has seen drug prices rise consistently above the rate of inflation. The cost of cancer drugs, in particular, has soared.

The industry claims high prices reflect long-term investments in research and development (R&D). But drug companies spend on average more than twice as much on marketing and lobbying as on R&D. Prices do not reflect the actual costs of developing or making the drug but are pushed up to whatever the market can bear. Since that market is comprised of many desperate and suffering individuals, it can be made to bear a great deal. The research that this supposedly funds is itself warped by the industry. When it comes to clinical trials of their products, they engage in selective publication and suppression of negative findings and are reluctant in the extreme to undertake comparative studies with other products

Taking political action is also key to us preventing, treating and diagnosing cancer earlier in order for us to achieve survival of 3 in 4 by 2034. For those living with cancer, now and in the future (and that’s one in three of the UK population), the biggest threat is the coming public spending squeeze, cuts in NHS budgets and privatisation of services will mean more people dying earlier from cancer and more people suffering unnecessarily from it. Even better survival rates will become a curse, as responsibility for long-term care is thrown back on families. A real effort to reduce suffering from cancer requires a political struggle against a system that sanctifies profit – not a ‘war’ guided by those who exploit the disease. 

The target for treating cancer patients within 62 days of  urgent GP referral has not been met for over 5 years, despite the pandemic, and surveys evidence suggests that people are experiencing lengthening delays in getting GP appointments. Longer waits are a symptom of more people needing treatment than the  NHS has the capacity to deliver,. we need the Government to tackle the cancer backlog or we will lose tens of thousands of additional lives.

 The Government has said they want to launch a 10-year war on cancer. This is welcome but they also need to ensure the 60,000 missing cancer patients are treated quickly and not left to suffer the pain of delays.

We should not forget the heartless uncaring hypocrites in government who are underfunding the NHS, that are continuing to put those that suffer from cancer further at risk. We must not forget to hold our Government to accountable further down the road . We must not cower from politicising the deficiencies in the NHS that the  pandemic crisis has revealed.

Care for cancer,, like so many other diseases, reflects the inequalities and inequities of our world. The clearest distinction is between high- and low-income countries, with comprehensive treatment reportedly available in more than 90% of high-income countries but less than 15% of low-income countries.

Similarly, the survival of children diagnosed with cancer is more than 80% in high-income countries, and less than 30% in low- and middle-income countries. And breast cancer survival five years after diagnosis now exceeds 80% in most high-income countries, compared with 66% in India and just 40% in South Africa.

Furthermore, a recent WHO survey found that cancer services are covered by a country’s largest, government health financing scheme in an estimated 37% of low- and middle-income countries, compared to at least 78% of high-income countries. This means that a cancer diagnosis has the potential to push families into poverty, particularly in lower-income countries, an effect that has been exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic.Fortunately, much is being done to bring quality cancer care to countries for which, up until now, it has been out of reach.

On World Cancer  Day and on any other day in fact, awareness  is so important, for the survivors and those who are not so fortunate, we should not be afraid to talk about it. For many affected by the disease it is a solemn one of reflection, a time to become aware of this disease's impact and what is being done to help effect change for millions it impacts. A diagnosis of cancer does not mean that you have to live a painful and miserable life. Their is hope and positivity to. But it is so important to keep up the conversations. 

Efficient and widely accessible cancer services will save countless individuals from a premature and often painful death. Greater equity in healthcare will also strengthen families and communities, benefit the economy with greater workforce participation and offer net savings to health budgets.

 The campaign website for World Cancer Day provides extensive details on the different barriers people are experiencing in accessing care, how this affects prevention, treatment, survival and support, and offers examples of actions that governments, organisations and individuals around the world can take to close the gap in cancer care.

More than a third of all cancers can be prevented and  lives saved if detected early but the fact also remains that Inequity in cancer care costs lives.People who seek cancer care hit barriers at every turn. The Care gap affects everyone, including you and your loved ones. These barriers are not set in stone. They can be changed. Everybody should have equal access to the practical, emotional and social support they need to live life as fully as possible with the impact of cancer.

Best wishes.

In Celebration of the Life of Langston Hughes (1/2/02 - 22/5'/67 )

 

Today is not only the first day of Black History Month in the USA, it is also American, writer, poet and social activist Langston Hughes birthday..

Born James Mercer Langston Hughea on Fevruart 1 February 1902, in Joplin Missouri. Hughes eventually became one of America's greatest and most prolific poets  

His parents James Nathaniel Hughes (an attorney) and Caroline Hughes (an actress and school teacher).divorced when he was very young. His father moved to Cuba, and then to Mexico,. while he was sent to live with his maternal grandmother, Mary Patterson Langston. in Lawrence, Kansas.  

Foreshadowing his career, in elementary school Hughes was selected as the class poet, about which he said, “I was a victim of a stereotype. There were only two of us Negro kids in the whole class and our English teacher was always stressing the importance of rhythm in poetry. Well, everyone knows – except us – that all Negroes have rhythm, so they elected me as class poet.” By high school he was writing for the school newspaper and yearbook, as well as beginning to write poetry and short stories on his own. Hughes attended Columbia University in New York, which he left after a year citing racial prejudice. However, this was his first introduction to Harlem, a primarily African American neighborhood surrounding Columbia, which would become his muse and home. He famously stated, “Harlem was in vogue.” Through his writing he explored issues of racism, injustice, culture and spirituality..

 Hughes was greatly impacted by African culture. He travelled back and forth from America to different parts of Africa for his job working on a boat during his lifetime. His experience with the culture there, combined with the culture he experienced in America, led to the poetry’s powerful nature. When art and culture were in flux, Langston turned from the classical Shakespearean format to the flow of folk stories and blues songs. He worked hard throughout his life to write about meaningful topics and make them accessible to as many people as possible. He made sure to use an easily understood,vocabulary and often recited his poems, giving people who couldn’t read access to his work as well.

While his work was affected by his race, Hughes was careful to keep mentions of his sexuality to a minimum. In his most obvious queer works, he does not align himself with queerness but rather shows his support for the queer community. In ‘Cafe, 3 AM’, for example, Hughes says:

“Degenerates,/some folks say./But God, Nature,/or somebody/made them that way.”

Despite his relative silence on the subject, speculation on his sexuality has always existed. Some theorists claimed that Hughes wasn’t gay but was rather uninterested in sex with anyone, regardless of gender. Others claim that he was a gay man, and any suggestion to the contrary is an attempt to hide an important part of his identity.

There is,  more than enough evidence that Langston experienced deep romantic attraction to other men. He wrote many unpublished love poems with their subjects being men, and he often found himself in the company of gay men, having many friends who were out, and being a part of the queer community at the time.Despite the community of relative support he was surrounded with, Langston Hughes never came out himself.

He would first gain the attention of New York publishers when attending Columbia University between 1921 and 1922. Releasing works in local publications, he soon became a permanent artistic and intellectual fixture of the emerging Harlem Renaissance. Throughout his life Hughes published numerous acclaimed poems, plays, novels, two autobiographies, and helped pioneer the jazz poetry style.

He along with his contemporaries in the Harlem Renaissance, made a point to speak to the lower strata of Black  people, focussing their art on opposing their social conditions, confronting stereotypes ND Re-imagining Black people's image of themselves. His cultural nationalism and racial consciousness was a great influence to many Black writers who followed in his footsteps,

Though the poet permanently settled in New York in 1929 after graduating from Lincoln University, he would still travel internationally as both a writer and reporter. In 1932 Hughes traveled to the Soviet Union, along with 22 African American artists, filmmakers, and actors to produce a film about African American life in southern states. Though the film was cancelled, Hughes remained in the USSR for a short time where he felt unrestricted by discrimination. He traveled on the Moscow-Tashkent express train to Central Asia where he witnessed the ethnic diversity of the USSR’s southern regions. Hughes would later find himself persecuted for his associations with the USSR and his revolutionary poetry

In 1937 he covered the Spanish Civil War as a reporter for the Baltimore Afro-American, writing on topics untouched by the white mainstream Western press such as the participation and leadership of African American anti-fascists in the war. During this time, Hughes would cross paths with Spain’s and Cuba’s outstanding Afro-descendant poets Federico Garcia Lorca and Nicolás Guillén. 

He also   he supported the Scottsboro boys, and strongly opposed the McCarthy witchhunts,

 Hughes’ first book of poems was The Weary  Blues , published in 1926. It included “,The Weary  Blues ” seen below in a performance with the Doug Parker Band in 1958. It also included his famous "The Negro Speaks of Rivers (first published in the radical Black newspaper The Crisis in 1921), which he reads in another video below.

 

 

 

 

Some of his other famous works are Let America Be America Again, Sweet Flypaper of Life (with photography by Roy DeCarava), Montage of a Dream Deferred and The Mulatto. 

In addition to poetry, Hughes wrote plays, and short stories. He also published several non-fiction works. From 1942 to 1962, as the civil rights movement was gaining traction, he wrote an in-depth weekly column in a leading black newspaper, The Chicago Defender.

Although Hughes had trouble with both black and white critics, he was the first black American to earn his living solely from his writing and public lectures. Part of the reason he was able to do this was the phenomenal acceptance and love he received from average black people. A reviewer for Black World noted in 1970: "Those whose prerogative it is to determine the rank of writers have never rated him highly, but if the weight of public response is any gauge then Langston Hughes stands at the apex of literary relevance among Black  people. The poet occupies such a position in the memory of his people precisely because he recognized that ‘we possess within ourselves a great reservoir of physical and spiritual strength,’ and because he used his artistry to reflect this back to the people."

On May 22, 1967, Hughes died from complications of prostate cancer. A tribute to his poetry, his funeral was filled with jazz and blues music. His ashes were interred beneath the entrance of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem. The inscription marking the spot features a line from Langston’s poem “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” which states “My soul has grown deep like the rivers.”

His Harlem home, on East 127th Street, received New York City Landmark status in 1981 and was added to the National Register of Places in 1982. Volumes of his work continue to be published and translated throughout the world.

He passed away on May 22, 1967 and his ashes are interred at the Arthur Schomberg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem.

As a sensitive Pan-Africanist, humanist, and anti-imperialist, Hughes would continue to the end of his life to write on African American and African efforts at cultural, political, economic, and psychological freedom.He bravely  confronted racial stereotypes, and protested social conditions whilst promoting the concepts of equality,freedom and  African American heritage, His work helped shape the future of American literature and even helped change politics. I remember his words, his legacy, his commitment to his art and his people, and his unwavering belief in the value and beauty of all Black lives. 

 

A Dream Deferred-  Langston Hughes

 

What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explod:?

 

Freedom- Langston Hughes

 

Freedom will not come

Today, this year

            Nor ever

Through compromise and fear.

 

I have as much right

As the other fellow has

            To stand

On my two feet

And own the land.

 

I tire so of hearing people say,

Let things take their course.

Tomorrow is another day.

I do not need my freedom when I’m dead.

I cannot live on tomorrow’s bread.

            Freedom

            Is a strong seed

            Planted

            In a great need.

            I live here, too.

            I want my freedom

            Just as you. 

Tired- Langston Hughes 

I am so tired of waiting, 

Aren't you, 

For the world to become good 

And beautiful and kind? 

Let us take a knife 

And cut the world in two-

And see what worms are eating 

At the rind. 

Boris Johnson, sorry is not enough.Time for you to go now.

Boris Johnson has told us pathetically today that he was sorry, that the public  will forgive and forget but he is seriously wrong. The public have some very painful memories and great sadness from the last 2 years, long memories.  We won't  forget,. 

 Lives were put on hold. Weddings were cancelled. Funerals of loved ones were missed. People across the country did their patriotic duty and obeyed the law. And all the while, the man who made the rules not only broke the rules but lied about doing so, taking us all for fools.

 Two thirds of voters (64%) want Boris Johnson to resign following the Sue Gray report. - 83% believe he broke lockdown rules - 75% believe he is not telling the truth.

In her inquiry into lockdown-breaking gatherings, senior civil servant Sue Gray condemned some behaviour as ‘difficult to justify’ but was not able to say very much in her interim report (because 12 of the 16 gatherings she investigated are now subject to police investigation). But what she does say is damning.

She is clear that there has been a serious failure of leadership and judgement in Number 10. Johnson is trying to convince us that we don't have enough evidence to hold him accountable but we do! It’s clear that Boris Johnson partied while the rest of us obeyed the law, and then he lied about it.

Opponents were critical of the limited nature of the report and renewed their calls for Johnson to quit. “Everyone knows Boris Johnson broke the rules and lied to the country,” said Ed Davey, leader of the opposition Liberal Democrat party.

Angela Rayner, deputy leader of the main opposition Labour Party, said she found the report “sickening”

“It is the most fundamental failure of any prime minister and I’m absolutely shocked that Boris Johnson can even show his face in Parliament today,” she told Sky News. “He should be resigning because he has lost the confidence of the British people.”

Boris Johnson is now under criminal investigation and speaker  It is telling that Lindsay Hoyle MP kicked out SNP leader Ian Blackford  in the chamber the only member of the House of Commons to suffer any consequences for Boris Johnson repeatedly lying to Parliament for speaking the truth  saying Johnson lied. The Speaker has made the Mother of Parliaments look ridiculous by ordering him out. Why can MPs not call a spade a spade? Are they representative of the public or not?Our democracy  is a  joke.

 Enough is enough.Failure of leadership. Behaviour difficult to justify. Any decent Prime Minister would have resigned by now but this man has no decency.Today proves beyond doubt that Boris Johnson a sorry excuse for a man, devoid of any shame without intellect or any respect but indulgent constructs so unfit for office. No  more bluster or distraction, Johnson simply must go.now.

Gŵyl Gildas Ddoeth/ St Gildas Day : Father of Welsh historians.

 

St. Gildas, Patron Saint of Welsh historians and bell founders. generally known as Venerable Gildas the Wise (c.500-c.570) feast day is celebrated today 

 He was probably born in the year when the Britons defeated the Saxons at the battle of Mount Badon (most scholars presume that this took place in the 490s near the city of Bath in Somerset). Though Gildas's own origins are obscure;  tales suggest that he was born in Scotland on the banks of the Clyde (possibly at Dumbarton), the son of a Pictish king, named Cau (or Nau) and, and he most likely had several brothers and sisters. 

In his youth St. Gildas was married but was later widowed. The saint became a close disciple of St Illtyd in South Wales in his famous Llanilltud Fawr Monastery in the Vale of Glamorgan. Such great saints as Sts. Samson and Paul Aurelian may have studied in Llanilltud together with him. St. Gildas is regarded as one of the principal apostles of the Orthodox faith and early preachers of Wales, though very scarce details of his activities in the region survive. He was one of the most influential fathers of Welsh monasticism in the sixth century. Some biographers even attribute to him the composition of a monastic rule.

He lived in a time when the glory of Rome had faded from Britain. The permanent legions had been withdrawn by Maximus, who used them to sack Rome and make himself Emperor.

Christianity had arrived in Wales at the height of Roman power and was banned initially by the authorities who were suspicious of its secrecy and exclusivity. At first it was an urban religion, and the first Christian martyrs in Wales were killed early in the fourth century at the legionnaires' town of Caerleon.

However it soon became tolerated. and by the end of the 4th century Christianity became the sole official religion of the Roman Empire.

Gradually Roman power declined in Britain, until finally in 410 AD Emperor Honorarius advised the Britons to organise their own defences against the Barbarian threat. The only account to survive from this period comes from  St Gildas.

Gildas wrote of the decline and ruin of Britain caused by its debauched and decadent rulers, with the pagan invaders being God's revenge for their spectacular fall from grace. The conflict, particularly with the Anglo-Saxons, created a process during the next two hundred years whereby a 'Welsh' people emerged out of the remaining Romano-Britons and native peoples, with their identity being chiefly based on a common religion and a common language.

According to St. Gildas  writing in about 540, the British Christians “received the faith without enthusiasm”, but nevertheless kept it “more or less pure right up to the nine-year persecution by the tyrant Diocletian” in the early fourth century. He goes on to describe that persecution, when lack of enthusiasm turned into great zeal: “Before ten years of this whirlwind had wholly passed, the wicked edicts were beginning to wither away as their authors were killed. Glad-eyed, all the champions of Christ welcomed, as though after a long winter’s night, the calm and serene light of the breezes of heaven. They rebuilt churches that had been razed to the ground; they founded, built and completed chapels to the holy martyrs, displaying them everywhere like victorious banners. They celebrated feast days. With pure heart and mouth they carried out the holy ceremonies. And all her sons exulted, as though warmed in the bosom of the mother Church."

Gildas was known for his piety and his education. He was not afraid to publicly rebuke monarchs who did not uphold Church teachings, even though rebukes were typically met with swords rather than Court penalties.

What is fiction and what is fact sometimes becomes blurred in the telling of many saints’ stories from the early Church. Such is the case with St. Gildas. There are two accounts of the life of St. Gildas the Wise, and it is important to note neither of which tell the same story. Both biographies contain irritatingly unchronological and misleading statements, which have led some critics to reject the lives as altogether valueless. 

The earlier one, from the 9th century, was written by an anonymous monk of Rhuys, at the monastery where Gildas ended his days. It is long, detailing Gildas' studies with St. Illtud and his work in Ireland, and emphasizing Gildas' work in Brittany. The second life, is by Welsh cleric Caradoc (or Caradog) of Llancarfan, from the 12th century. He was a friend of Geoffry of Monmouth (c. 1095 - c. 1155), author of a famous History of the Kings of Britain, one of the earliest sources for Arthurian mythology; besides the Life of Gildas and another of Cadoc (or Cadog), another Welsh saint, Caradoc is also claimed to have written a continuation of Monmouth's work. Caradoc's life emphasizes Gildas' ties to Wales, and it also connects him to Arthurian mythology, having Gildas meet King Arthur and forgive him for slaying one of Gildas' brothers,Cuil (or Hueil) nevertheless  no contemporary sources support that hypothesis. In truth however , we know little of the man beyond his name. The Life also includes the first mention of Meligaunt (here Melwas), an Arthurian villain who kidnapped Queen Guinevere. According to the most popular version, the future saint was born in Scotland, in what is now Dumbarton on the banks of the River Clyde, but according to another version, his birthplace was in North Wales.

In his youth St. Gildas was married but was later widowed. The saint became a close disciple of St Illtyd in South Wales in his famous Llanilltud Fawr Monastery in the Vale of Glamorgan. Such great saints as Sts. Samson and Paul Aurelian may have studied in Llanilltud together with him.

St. Gildas is regarded as one of the principal apostles of the Orthodox faith and early preachers of Wales, though very scarce details of his activities in the region survive. He was one of the most influential fathers of Welsh monasticism in the sixth century. Some biographers even attribute to him the composition of a monastic rule.

It is possible that for some time Gildas lived as  a very ascetic hermit on Flatholm – an island in the Bristol Channel, situated off the coast of Cardiff in Wales. A number of other ancient ascetics of South Wales used to live on this island as well.  There he established his reputation for that peculiar Celtic sort of holiness that consists of extreme self-denial and isolation. At around this time, according to the Welsh, he also preached to Nemata, the mother of St David, while she was pregnant with the Saint.

Gildas is noted not only as a prominent ascetic, preacher, founder of monasteries and teacher of monks, but also as a spiritual author. Gildas was not a trained historian. His book, De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae  (“On the Ruin and Conquest of Britain”), was written in c.540. In this work Gildas strictly reproaches his compatriots the Britons, for whose sins Britain was attacked and invaded by Angles and Saxons. In this book the saint gives an account of British history from the Roman period until his own time (which makes him sadly an invaluable source), describing the corruption and decline of faith among many of his contemporaries, including rulers and clerics. Gildas is scathing in his condemnation of clerics, but even more so in his criticism of the British kings during his lifetime, particularly those in Wales and the south-west of modern England. He seems particularly upset that these kings pay homage to an unnamed, but presumably pagan, ruler. Gildas veils his writings as metaphors and veiled allusions based on Biblical tales. Gildas saw the devastation wrought by Germanic invaders as the wrath of God visited upon the British for the sins of their churchmen and kings. Later this book was cited by such distinguished historians as St. Bede of Jarrow and the learned monk Alcuin. The writings of Gildas reflect his profound knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, works of some authors of antiquity (for example, Virgil) and even books of Church Fathers of East and West, like St. Ignatius the God-Bearer of Antioch and St. John Cassian. Unfortunately his book, leaves out just about everything we'd really like to know. Although that was the era of the legendary king Arthur, Gildas never mentions him. In fact, he ignored all too many names and dates. Mostly he was concerned to show how the sins of the clergy and nobles weakened the Celts and made them a pushover for the Saxons.

Sadly  almost nothing survives of the literary works of Gildas, except for a longer book, “The Epistle,” a series of sermons on the moral failings of rulers and the clergy. The book demonstrates Gildas’ vast knowledge of the Bible and classical works. and these books enjoyed great popularity in Wales, England and Ireland for many centuries. .

Gildas' reputation stood high among the early monks, but he is less esteemed by later and modern writers. Historians who have quarried his early chapters are understandably irritated that he did not provide a clear narrative with names and dates; and the extraordinary Latin-bias of his main invective seems tiresome, its purpose irrelevant to other ages. The narrative is unclear because it was written from oral memory, which is always defined by the direct limits of people within their own age - anything outside of living memory takes on a slightly unreal, or legendary air.

All Gildas understood of the Roman past was that it was orderly; although he knew two northern walls, he knew nothing of when or why they were built. Oral memory took him back to the wars and a dateless Vortigern but no further.

Through the missionary work Gildas did in Ireland, he converted many there, and may be the one who introduced anchorite customs to Irish monks. From Ireland, Gildas retired to Rhuys, in Brittany, where he founded a monastery. He wrote many works on running a monastery, but only the Penitential, a guide for abbots to set punishments, still exists.

 He is considered one of the most influential men in the early English Church.The influence of his writing was felt until well into the middle ages, particularly in the Celtic Church.Today this celebrated saint is venerated in France, Wales and Ireland, but above all in Brittany. One of the main centers of his veneration is Saint-Gildas-de-Rhuys (named after him) in the Rhuys Peninsula, Morbihan, Brittany where he is said to have died  around 571. The major relics of this saint were kept here in ancient times (and, according to later traditions, a portion of his relics was kept at Glastonbury in England where he may have labored for some time).

In the eighteenth century a part of his relics was said to be preserved at Vannes Cathedral in Brittany. The wooden monastery founded by Gildas in Rhuys was rebuilt in the eleventh century in stone and the large abbey existed there more or less until the French Revolution, and the saint’s relics healed the mental diseases of numerous pilgrims.

As far as historical accuracy goes, the accounts of Gildas must be regarded with a pinch of salt, but nevertheless his writing remains one of the few early written histories of Britain, and as such has remain a popular reference point in an age with few written records.and is quoted by Bede and Alcuin.. Two manuscript copies of his writings are preserved in Cambridge University.Whether completely factual or peppered with inspiring (and sometimes strange) myth, the legends of saints are still powerful and fascinating tales,

Holocaust Memorial Day 2022 : One Day

 

Today marks Holocaust Memorial Day, on the 77th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi concentration camp Auschwitz Birkenau,the largest Nazi death camp in occupied Poland. where 1.6 million men, women children were killed in the holocaust. Holocaust Memorial Day also commemorates as well as victims of later genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Darfur.

The day aims to remind people of the crimes and loss of life and encourage remembrance in a world scarred by genocide  and prevent it ever being forgotten.

 

“For the dead and the living, we must bear witness.” 

 

 These are the words of Elie Wiesel, a Romanian-born American writer, professor, political activist, Nobel laureate, and Holocaust survivor. He, along with 1.3 million other Jews, was held prisoner in the Auschwitz concentration camp during World War II, and he was also one of only 200,000 (approx) Jews who survived it.

Elie went on to write a number of books about his own personal story and that of the Holocaust (also known as 'the Shoah’ in Hebrew) in general, and his works — along with the likes of Primo Levi (author of If This Is A Man) and Anne Frank, whose diary is famous across the world — are some of the most defining stories of that era. They are books I would implore everyone to read, especially as a 2021 study found that over half of Britons did not know that six million Jewish people were murdered during the Holocaust, and less than a quarter thought that two million or fewer were killed.

And though it is easy to leave history in the past, events like The Holocaust must be remembered — they must be remembered out of respect for those who lost their lives, for those who overcame the most severe form of persecution and went on to become productive members of the communities in which they settled and for those who are yet to even step foot on this planet. We must, as Elie Wiesel says, “bear witness” to these events, and pass their stories and their lessons onto the next generation, so that we can avoid such horrors happening again.

There is no doubt in my mind that the Holocaust was the greatest crime of the 20th century because of the sheer scale of the premeditated and industrialized murder of six million Jews alongside the six million Jewish victims of Nazi persecution, hundreds of thousands of others were targeted by Hitler's regime - including trade unionists, lesbian, gay, bisexual and transpeople, (LGBT) gypsies, disabled people and the mentally ill, and others attacked for their race or simply being different. 

At Belsen, Chelmno, Revensbrul to name a few more among hundreds where the inhumanity of man to man was endorsed by the Nazi regime.It is the worst dehumanization that happened until today. It was industrial and they went all the way. They dehumanized them completely, to a pile of hair and gold. Survivors recount horrific examples of ethnic cleansing, torture, cruelty and savagery, often corroborated by the Nazi hierarchy’s meticulous recording of the whole truly awful scenario.International Holocaust Remembrance Day is a stark reminder of where hate and antisemitism can lead if not countered. Worryingly, this year’s commemoration efforts  will take place against a backdrop of rising antisemitism and Holocaust distortion all over the world.

 The theme for Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD) 2022 ,set by the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust (HMDT) is ‘One day’: looking at how a single day can change your life as a victim or survivor of genocide and persecution, and how we can keep telling the stories of genocide victims and survivors. 

Holocaust and genocide survivors also often talk about the one day in their life when everything changed, sometimes for the worse and occasionally for the better.

Additionally, the HMDT says that “it may be hard to pick out just One Day, as for many, to keep going through each and every day was a huge struggle, with no end in sight and no glimmer of hope that the next day would be any better”. 

It may be one day in our calendar but we commit every day to create a better future so that one day, all people are free from oppression and persecution. 

Increasing levels of denial, division and misinformation in today’s world mean we must remain vigilant against hatred and identity-based hostility. 

Rapid technological developments, a turbulent political climate, and world events beyond our control can leave us feeling helpless and insignificant.

The utterly unprecedented times through which we are living currently are showing the very best of which humanity is capable but also - in some of the abuse and conspiracy theories being spread on social media - the much darker side of our world as well.

The national Holocaust Memorial Day Trust’s annual UK commemorative event will be streamed online again this year, due to the pandemic.

It will run from 7pm to 8pm and at 8pm households across the UK are encouraged to safely light candles and place them in their windows in remembrance of those who were murdered for who they were, and to stand against prejudice and hatred.Those who are able to do so are encouraged to share a photo of their candle on social media, using the hashtags #HolocaustMemorialDay and #LightTheDarkness.

You can register to watch the ceremony on the HMDT website. 

We can all stand in solidarity. We can choose to be the light in the darkness. 

Holocaust Memorial Day enables us to remember – for a purpose. It gives us a responsibility to work for a safer, better, future for everyone. Everyone can step up and use their talents to tackle prejudice, discrimination and intolerance wherever we encounter them.

We must remember that genocidal regimes throughout history have deliberately fractured societies by marginalising certain groups, and how these tactics can be challenged by individuals standing together with their neighbours, and speaking out against oppression and all forms of racism and discrimination. The Holocaust is not just a Jewish tragedy, but it is a lesson to all of us of all faiths in all times and a continuing reminder to stand with “others” when their rights and freedoms face attack.

In the years leading up to the Holocaust, Nazi policies and propaganda deliberately encouraged divisions within German society – urging ‘Aryan’ Germans to keep themselves separate from their Jewish neighbours. The Holocaust, Nazi Persecution of other groups and each subsequent genocide, was enabled by ordinary citizens not standing with their targeted neighbours.
Let 's not forget  that the Holocaust did not appear out of thin air, it was built on hatred for "the other," politically weaponized by those seeking ever more power. As politicians today say never again, some are walking down that same path. Today there are still those that are stoking up increasing division in communities across the UK and the world, antisemitism, racism and Islamophobia are on the.rise again. We must oppose attempts to divide us along the lines of race, religion or ethnicity.
Far right and fascist forces are growing. Many of them deny the horrors of the Holocaust. and are whipping up racist scapegoating.Neonazi electoral advances in Europe are linked to anti-immigrant, Islamophobic and anti-semitic violence.

In recent years, Muslims and Roma have faced fascist hate, as new communities are victimised by the far right. As openly nazis appallingly revel in the crimes of the Holocaust, now more than ever, we need to stand together with others in our communities in order to stop division and the spread of identity-based hostility in our society.

Somehow  human beings around the world are capable of so much hate, we should work together to prevent this. Remember those who have resisted, shown bravery and courage. Remember all the victims of the Holocaust. Those who were murdered because of who they were, and reflect on the dark evils of Nazism, anti-Semitism and racism. While you do. please think about those people who are also facing genocide today; The Uighur Muslims in China, The Rohingya in Myanmar and also the Palestinian people too.

We should never forget where hatred and bigotry can lead. There can never be anytime for passivity, and we must  stand strong against the dark forces  of intolerance, bigotry, racism and division that create them.When we remember the Holocaust, “never again” must mean exactly that.

On Holocaust Memorial Day, Here is a list of some other  places  and people that the world sometimes forgets.

Cambodia,

Darfur,

Siebrenica,

Karabakh, 

Liberia,

Sudan,

Holodonor,

Armenia, 
                                 
the ethnic cleansing of indigeneous Palestinians,

The Indigeneous Peoples of  America,

Checknya,

Congo,

India

and the genocide of slavery

and on and on and on.

Sadly  there will always be individuals, organisations and regimes who want to exploit differences for their own ends and we must have the courage to speak out  against hatred and intolerance where we see this happening. In a world which is increasingly fractured, where we have some leaders that are more interested in promoting division than harmony, it is vital we remember that there is far more that unites than divides the human race, to prevent a repeat of the horrors of the past, lets strive to work for equality , peace and justice for the whole of mankind. Be the light in the darkness.

Through our collective acts of remembrance, we honour the survivors of the Holocaust and subsequent genocides and challenge ourselves to use the lessons of their experiences to ensure that, one day in the future, such atrocities never happen again.

First They Came - Pastor Martin Niemoller

First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the Trade Unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade Unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left To speak out for me.

Read more about Holocaust Memorial Day