Through the big window #22

I watched the 2nd test between England and Australia the other day and it left me breathless. No! it wasn’t Ben Stokes innings, a mix of consummate skill, technique, brute force and anger and not necessarily in equal measure. His innings a response to some antipodean skulduggery by a nation which has previous (remember Trevor Chappell’s underarm ball to prevent New Zealand beating them way back in 1981, or more recently Sandpaper-gate?) not illegal mind, although the excuse for the second one about making his granny a new walking stick didn’t wash, just not in the spirit of the game. His brother Ian was captain at the time and Trevor was just following orders. Where have we heard that one before? No, my depleted oxygen levels came about when listening to all that middle-class scapegrace bleating to justify such an action. Let’s not forget the Aussies can soon delete the past when required, I suppose that comes from their antecedents, and judging by the mind-numbing recent BBC drama ‘Ten Pound Poms,’ all the bloody idiots we sent over. After sitting through that tripe, I thought we would have been better keeping the Convicts and transporting everybody else.

Did you know there is a 29-year waiting list if applying for membership at Lords? I often wonder how they arrive at such a figure because at least half of those spectators in front of the Pavilion look as though they’d already passed on! And the rest are more than likely stood at the bar drinking G&T’s. The only time they realise they are at a match is on the odd occasion when the Corky ball comes crashing through a pavilion window. A recently published damning report stated racism in the professional ranks is rife, along with deep-rooted sexism, elitism and class-bias, the older gin-sodden pisspots even shouting out racist tropes in their sleep. They are not ashamed.

I was a keen cricket fan as a child, regularly watching Lancashire and the odd day visiting the Test Match with my schoolmate Alan Haslam in the 1950’s. Annually we would even be given free tickets by the school games teacher to go and watch the North versus South boys cricket match at Old Trafford. I used to chivvy Alan along by telling him he would be picked for the South one day because he was such a fine fast bowler, especially on the red gravel and undulating slopes of Beswick’s world famous Donkey Common; he was silky fast, and the opposing teams were usually terrified; the fact it was like batting on a Lunar landscape had some bearing on it I suppose. Of course, one could never guarantee which way the ball would fly after pitching due to the whole pitch made of red gravel, it of different size and grade crushed bricks, and deep trenches formed through rivulets of rainwater flowing west to east after heavy rain. One wouldn’t feel safe batting even in a suit of armour. I left that sporty school in 1959 and never knew what happened to my bowling partner Alan. For years I would avariciously peruse the cricket scores on the back pages of the Manchester Evening news or Chronicle seeking out the name Haslam but without success; it gradually dawning on me we were both born on the wrong side of the tracks, and although we personally knew of fellow schoolfriends training with local professional soccer clubs, as far as cricket was concerned, never! I seem to recall Alan went to a Grammar school after Birley Street, and a university placement would have helped his cause, but he didn’t own a Duffel coat.

Throughout the seven plus decades I have walked this Earth I have learnt many a lesson; some harsh, some tough, some difficult and many enlightening and enjoyable, but I am about to tell you the harshest lesson of all, the one which took the longest to sink in, and a lesson which I expect will make you nod your head in agreement as you yawn and think to yourself, ‘bloody get on with it George!’ I have been Gaslit. Gaslighting, the modern-day terminology to describe ‘manipulating another person into doubting their own perceptions, experiences or understanding of events.’ ‘Ingenious!’ my word to describe a clever, inventive but not necessarily original description of how we, the plebeian, proletariat, of which you and I proudly belong, are treated by those partners-in-crime, Government, Establishment, Media and the grasping employer-class who wear us down. We are like captives in the Stocks of old, pelted into submission not by rotten fruit but by repetition, soundbite, hackneyed phraseology and mass filch. I read about some imaginary glass ceiling preventing our rise and smile to myself, most of the glass I encounter in my everyday life is see-through not opaque. The ranks soon close whenever some outlier puts their head above the parapet due to gaining some unexpected wealth, stardom or even notoriety. Peep over or through, but as soon as five untrimmed fingernails grip above the imaginary line, a Jackboot heel of immeasurable pain will soon deter. To become one of them breeding matters, inter-breeding is even acceptable, the old school tie network a must and complete lack of common-sense perfection. Through lineage, longevity demands chinless wonders, stuttering buffoons and jelly-kneed tosspots who somehow creep through the filter system and are socially tolerated. The next time you visit a stately home, and it dawns on you they are all the same, break off from your Crocodile line of gawpers and seek out that ubiquitous locked door secreted behind cobweb laden velvet curtains and investigate. My tip is never knock, listen intently for a moment or two at least until the omniscient droning voice of your tour-guide tails off in the distance and scrutinize the door closely. If all is quiet, and a tray with a half-eaten meal is lay at the foot of the door you can be sure the inbred family half-wit inside is socially acceptable therefore trusted to come and go but only after midnight. But! If the door is triple bolted and padlocked from the outside, then beware, lean forward and hold your breath, cup your ear to catch the merest whisper or atmospheric drift, and be ready to evacuate, for inside is that long forgotten and most dangerous inbred mishap of all, a recently deposed Conservative MP. Scandalously, (his words) voted out of Westminster before he could ensure that all his secretly stashed and hidden offshore tax-haven banked accounts are filled to their limit and safe from prying eyes. As in this case we will call the reject Him, probably the most horrible, tortuous, unedifying sight one could imagine to encounter anywhere on the whole planet. A reject prepared to slash and burn, starve and eviscerate, tear limb from limb and then pick the bones clean of any person who attempts to get between them and their rightful inheritance; born to get rich by dint of breeding, old school tie and due deference; ours! I hope you now understand what I believe to be normality just isn’t normal, my mind is skewed by repetition in a concerted effort to brainwash me. Which, if you think about it, is probably why the population now answers even the politest enquiry at least twice, maybe even three times, we are conditioned that way.

Of course, I exaggerate (slightly) but that is how I feel having now understood exactly why my dad, a 2nd World War ex-commando veteran used to say, and this was virtually every single day, ‘Politicians, they should be taken outside and bloody shot!’ Now why didn’t I think of that? “They’re all the same, you couldn’t fit a single cigarette paper between the lot!’ Not forgetting ‘They’ve taken a rise out of us since we were born.” By this time the white foam would be coating the corners of his mouth, both fists would be clamped shut and his cap would be askew. All that venomous anger usually gave him a thirst and so he’d soon be off to the nearest boozer, a place where he would be amongst even more kith and kin, where most would be ailing with some illness or deformity and this their place to escape to, the alcohol numbing the pain. I recall on many an occasion ambling past any of the local corner public houses in the evening or at weekend wondering if my dad was inside; I would regularly get a treat off at least one of his mates if I popped my head in. The noise from inside was cacophonous, all talking at once, dad probably the loudest. No music, Jukeboxes weren’t introduced until the late 50’s, just somebody or other struggling to get their point across, his audience losing their hearing, their patience, their interest or even their short lives, probably suffering with some industrial disease or other not yet showing or being felt; how would they know? A visit to the Doctor the last thing on their mind, days off work ditto. Cigarettes lit and permanently dangling from the corners of busy mouths, one eye blinking at the drifting smoke, the rasping cough part and parcel of life. What would each give to be the person behind the padlocked door? His worries totally separate from yours. The one your Army mate Ted gave his life for, because Ted, unlike me, would never dodge his duty.

I suppose people get sick of my championing stuff in which I take pride. For example, my background, but I have a platform, and truly believe my voice must be heard, there is not a moment to lose. We of the working class, as a body of people have our faults, but my viewpoint is that hypocrisy is not a majorly issue. ‘Stay true to yourself Pointon,’ my favourite teacher used to regularly preach to me; and I grew older thinking we were of the same mind. Nor is cheating, unless cheating death of course whilst fighting our mother country’s battles counts. Then there is lying, everybody lies at some time or other you might well say, and I completely agree. But I can recall many an occasion when I was reminded as a child, ‘Tell the truth and shame the Devil,’ or ‘Lie, and your tongue will wither,’ or ‘the Devil waits for liggers,’ as my old Lancashire dad would say, hackneyed phrases rarely repeated today. I can also recall elderly folk, friends grandparents who would never think of lying, or cursing, reciting verses from the Bible should the odd swearie slip out, biting their tongue should children be present, even covering hand over mouth to prevent the merest reference. Mass communication changed everything, after all they are only words people would say, Barrack-room talk; the majority of which were more than likely populated by my type. Compare that to today, even in our very own Parliament nothing is sacred.

And so, the class system still rules in our ancient country, yet I suppose I’m okay with that. It’s other things that need to change, our rigged Political system and biased press for a start. The problem in wanting that is the high value my own class places on those who pay for their education but have no common sense. Because they talk with a Plum in their mouth only enriches diction, to me it’s a complete waste of money if all they then talk is a load of bollocks. I only crave one thing and that is fairness, ‘judgement free from discrimination or dishonesty,’ not a lot you would think, but obviously too much from those in power. So, in that case and seeing as it is the 75th Anniversary of our very own National Health service I might as well finish with a quote from the MP whose initiative it was, and who once famously said at a rally in Belle Vue, Gorton on the evening of 4th July 1948.

“What is Toryism except organized spivery, and all Tories are lower than vermin.”

Father of the NHS. Aneurin Bevan. Labour’s Minister of Health.

UK’s first NHS Hospital. Davyhulme, Manchester.