Saturday, March 07, 2009

25 Years

Way back in 1984 I was eleven years old and the coal miners of England were on strike. Well, some of them were.

Those who weren't would have their homes targetted, windows broken, grafitti daubed on walls: "SCAB BASTARD" is the one I remember. I wasn't sure what bastard meant at the time, but I knew it was not a nice word. Now, I can't understand how breaking a strike would question one's legitimacy.

The children of scabs would have to have police escorts to school. I'm glad my dad was not a miner. I saw some adults do some pretty hideous things to each other, and worse still, to kids. Even kids did hideous things to other kids, throwing stones at each other, putting excrement in emptied crisp packets and throwing them at each other. These were kids of eight or nine, kids in my class at school. I didn't get involved. My dad wasn't a miner. I hated what was happening. I didn't understand any of it, but I knew it was all wrong.

The riots of that time have been well documented and I choose not to write about them here, since I didn't experience them first hand. But others did:


6 comments:

Tabor said...

I hope this is not a sign of what may come in this global recession.

dan said...

Tabor, I think there will be lots of unrest as governments continue to give cash to banks when people are struggling to eat.

RC666 said...

Right, they need to got to give it to the people who will then give it to the banks to clear their debt..

eric said...

banks that aren't lending the money out too ...

dan said...

rc666, fucking good point.

eric, fucking further good point to what RC, mentioned.

dan said...

oh yeah, eric. good to hear from you.

i guess, in your line of work, you are slightly pissed off with maybe not being able to say what you feel, unbiased attitude and all that bollocks. if you want to vent, come here and vent some, i won't snitch on you. take care, man.