wee beautiful pict

2 amazing animations about refinding faith & heart after centuries of church & empire in britain

Two animations, by some of my chums aboot 

refinding faith and recovering heart & courage in britain

- enough to re-imagine alternative futures after centuries

of a church wedded to empire (and it's new kid: globalisation).

Fit de youz think?

Dreamday Scotland: can we paint a new picture of Scotland

 2009 being the 10th anniversary of the Scottish Parliament, Fee  and I thought we'd pop by the book festival to join the Beyond Devolution discussion. 

The panel: Tom Brown, Charlie Jeffery, Hamish Macdonell and Henry McLeish - chaired by Ruth Wishart. 

We setup #beyonddevolution feed in case any floating tweeters in the audience -as a quick way of aggregating any comments or quotes that stick out.

Some good quotes to set tone:

'The status Quo is not an option' - Hamish Macdonell

'Biggest challenge over next 10 years in Scotland - is for scots 

to go through deep attitude change' - Tom Brown

'80-20% inequality and constitutional questions are 2 main 

issues over next 10 yrs' and 

we scots have more memories than dreams - Henry McLeish

Boycott Scotland? I'm McSpartacus (re-edit 2)

The author of www.boycottscotland.com - which encourages 

U.S. citizens to do everything short of haggis and

shortbread burnings on the Whitehouse lawn, in response

to the release of the convicted Lockerbie bomber

Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi, may not have expected such a blistering 

response.  But the masked boycotter has stung something in scotland.  

Well, stung enough to unleash a stream of caledonian-style 'reposte' 

among it's twitter constituency anyway. 

From the witty:

 'aye, does that mean yer goin tae stop using yer TV's, bridges, 

tarmac, phones' 

to the devastating:

'ooh let me see now: US torturing =good, Scots compassion =bad' 

to the playful: 

'nae mair munching oan yer freedom fries and supersized burgers at 

mac'donalds’

to classics such as: 

‘..daft c**nts n bawbags and ...we'll boycott yer fat mamma’   

(for more hilarious examples: search #boycottscotland on twitter).

The most celebrated reposte came out of Glasgow in the form

of a website www.boycottscotland.co.uk, by local web developer

Aaron Bassett.   It apes the original in it's introduction and

 then skillfully morphs parody into absurdity- and is now, 

currently on a retweet roll, as I write this.   

 what can we learn from this I wonder?

I fell in love with John the Baptist’s severed head

Back from Rome - I had some big questions here .. blogging results over several entries: something like...

I fell in love with John the Baptist’s severed head

A Scotsman from the land of Calvin, Knox, and Brown goes on a journey to the ground zero of the old christian empire and asks: can anything good come out of Rome?

1. I fell in love with john the baptist’s severed head
2. Making friends with the UN
3. Eating jesus at the Vatican 
4. Catacombs and poppies: meeting the dead among the living
5. Filipinos and fascists: untangling  the Christ of catholic Roma from global empire
6.  Conclusion: John Knox meets John the Baptist and the reformer’s ghost asks the baptist’s bones: can anything  good come out of Rome?

god laughs at the self-righteous and the pompous and o so serious powers in their underpants

Been thinking a lot about laughter - lately.  

The older I get I notice that people laugh at things for lots of different reasons - which are not necessarily that obvious at first -particularly when they erupt in laughter at the 'powers that be' - where pomp and con and pretense suddenly seem absurd - and the o so serious and offended ones who fear them - is it relief of tension, or the shock of realisation that they have no clothes on - where those defending our social or religious class systems suddenly look naked and afraid. 

I laughed at my wee brother's funeral.  For those who didn't know me or my family - it might have seemed callous - but there wiz something about the 'pomp' and 'seriousness' and theatre of it all - that triggered my funny bone and to be honest it gave us a welcome sense of relief: jamesy had been suffering for 12 years with full blown aids - helpless tragic awful hearbreakin aye - but now he was finally free of it all and I guess we kind felt a stab o that freedom too - sounds awfy!  but suddenly we were allowed to see the funny side of it all.

fascists and those who love power and fear that which they cannot control- hate comedy, hate laughter - I've been told by those 'real' exorcists and those who work with those affected by severe abuse and torture - that which religious traditions call the 'shadow' of humanity  - in the realm of evil - do not understand 3 languages

1. love (language of exchange that puts people god and creation at the centre)

2. science (search for truth or what is real)

3. humour (the language of anti-empire and I would argue - god)

To attack and change dehumanising systems or practices - we need all 3. 

 

I sometimes have wished I could have been among the crowd at the temple in jerusalem AD 33 (ish) as jesus used language number 3 and shouted at the pharisees - calling them a bunch of snakes in front of the heaving sweaty spiritual scruff which they had spent generations trying to con and control and manage - in the name of god.

 and listen to the relief of centuries of pain in guffaws of hilarity and laughter as this god bent and browned by the earth and the city - but not beaten! walks among them.. 

aye!

jesus in govan, scotland

the big man: scotland's most innovative christianity comes out of its best well known housing scheme: govan in the VOICE of the urban gael grounded in some very particular PLACES and FOLK within glasgow - how many other cities around the uk have these hidden (from mainstream media and religion) histories growing from long thought dead taproots of an ancient-young story of Christ erupting off radar of government, corporations and middle class church - of, as the big man says: jesus entered the wilderness and loved the wild.. 

Aye: Jesus loves scotland; we need to love it too.   It's people's stories and old songs and wisdom of grannies fae oor scottish highlands and irish coasts - many in our cities have come from there via clearances and many cultures around world by sea, we are a mongrel people in haggisland - many threads make up these lifegiving stories of this land and this tapestry making continues today- but we ALL who share this 'place' are being reduced to slaves of transnational economic empires - old and new haggis eaters - ALL of us have been robbed - and we need to act now to mend it - projects like Gal Gael which Colin (above) have sought to mend 'places' - 

These stories and songs, work traditions, languages and essential home grown wisdom, the big man argues: have been bleached oot - leaving the people without the lifesaving roots and anchors and harbours where life can begin again and flourish on its own without charities and benefits and the acidic feeling of 'shame' they bring.   This violence - accelerating during the thatcher years- has robbed many in housing schemes of dignity and work ethic to be able to join the rest o society in task o helping wee scotland find its own future from the rubble of its nobles and chiefs love affair an empire that, in a real sense, has raped us all - of our friendship with: land, people and a god who likes jock tamson's bairns in the land of haggis, tartan and the white flower that breaks the heart - let's follow their example and tie up the monster of empire that spins its silly guff about economics and charity - and 

take back the land it stole from all of us- a land of good creative work, sharing economies and doing stuff as if people mattered and the honouring of auld elders and grandparents from the bens and valleys and their stories and wisdom here -who still walk at 3 miles and hour - the speed that Jesus o the gaels walks - aye

audio interview 

text 

warm vanilla oxygen in granton

Scotland in a heatwave today!  Hanging out with anneleen and tom and hearing feriel's ideas for linking up projects like underground in granton at her place - tea with Tom around the corner after and met his neighbour, who with other neighbours and kids who had built a huge shared holiday campish area with BBQ, mini football field and seating and umbrellas outside in their back yard- out of scrap and wood and bits n pieces.   Happy kids- Sheer joy- Brill!  

Survival skills alive and well here - estates can teach the rest of the city something about 'survival' in challenging times I can tell ye.  Walking home along water edge via Leith took gie longer than I thought it would - but..pink sunset over the city... the smell of the wild yellow bushes after a hot day ...its warm vanilla oxygen following and moving around me gently as I walk here.. aye the lad fae nazareth is alive and well in scotland today methinks...

Latest Edinburgh people and projects in action

latest projects and wild saints encountered on my travels around edinburgh over last week:

James Picardo (jubilee scotland) and Josiah lockhart (grassmarket project) and fee thomson (picnmix media) - at elephant house sharing udeas about action on: global meltdown, debt and grassroots solidarity

Margaret and margot - at malmaison talking about their latest fundraising project
Wendy ball - at renroc cafe talking about her upcoming photo exhibit
Anneleen at the lot cafebar in grassmarket- talking film and photography
Ayley at omni centre, leith walk, on various Edinburgh stuff and her new project down south

how empire works v how a jesus-economy works

It is a lie that we cannot understand how money works - how empires work - how alternatives to empire like the kingdom of god - an alternative which jesus talked about over and over again with his friends and anyone who would listen in his day - works.

economy - in its wide sense is a better word, these days, for kingdom - it has 3 components -

a guiding mechanism, 

a body  

an engine

old vested interests among the upper and middle classes in uk (the powers)- those rewarded by empire - have become colonised and in turn have taken their caste system, enclosure and the debt economy of the british empire (where clearances of people off land to increase profit as fast as possible was ultimate aim): 'landlordism' 'enclosure', and 'tenancy' - (rent, debt,) and unfortunately applied it to the body of christ over centuries and renamed them as: leadership, congregation/services (the sect) tithes from this popping of the hood we can see how states work: government nation tax economy where does this come from? if we turn back to ancient times- we see this 'way' played out in the temple economy across ancient roman empire (which infected the temple system at jerusalem in these 3 ways): priests (spiritual landlord) temple tithe/rent/offering economy ------------- jesus put a line under all this - right in his own back yard.. in his wilderness temptation, where he came face to face with the ancient intelligence behind empire (now at work in the temple) ...right until his death and after...until now..its as if he were saying - empire is finished! it stops here...with my own body and all those and creation in solidarity with me - we are the line in the sand.. 

we start anew.. from places of non-temple and non caesar, wild places where empire has no interests.. we build a test drive a new engine - and we'll call it God's kingdom; God's economy ...it is opposed to caesars economy by recasting all three components.. 1. priesthood of ALL gifts (jesus dislodges caesars default position at the centre of people's world) 2. ALL creation (jesus breaks down caesars walls that he uses to divide and conquer) 3. gift economy (no strings! - jesus strangles debt, the oxygen of empire)

in that light and with jesus verbal attack on jerusalem's pride and joy: the temple - '..not one block will be left standing..'

is it any wonder the powers that be moved to kill him... to shut him up!

and he warned if we followed in his footsteps same would befall us.. mmm?

will the 'powers that be' (and those that are rewarded by them) seek to do the same with us? here's an experiment...

point out that many of edinburgh's church buildings are built by proceeds from slave ships and plantations during the british empire.. they are a stumbling block to the rich -stolen from the poor, obscenely wasteful of time energy and resources and they are all coming down baby! .. see what happens..

compare the meerkat dot com: which is self-serving, which is releasing?

cost of Ps and Gs episcopal church glass bit built on to the side - £9 million

cost of releasing 35 small projects across edinburgh to make it a better place - £120,000

you can repeat this budget test with all kinds of things - you get the picture..

the poorest were cleared from the land long ago and much of middle class now have too - we are all working class, we are all debtors now.  So perhaps its time for all of us to draw that line in the sand like Christ - and do what he did.. and kickstart a jesus economy - as a direct challenge to empire in our time..

gifts of the many (not few)  

locality focus, (not congregational or institution or tribe focus)

gift based economy (no strings)

from scratch - build in your back yard with friends - road test and give it a run...

all the best

its not about what you do or say anymore, its all about: where you live!

latest happenings.. 

working class saints might just get their church back yet?- checkoot some hearty comments fae some bonnie saints hitting at what I believe to be ground zero of scotland's deepest pain - her st andrews fault:   can we, the working class, have oor church back please

schemie christianity - met with grambo in aberdeen- a mate with a heart as big as a frying pan from the same housing estate as me - aboot 'schemie christianity' 

the doors are open for building a new solidarity: we're a' debtors now -  fiona, josiah and me met this morning in edinburgh for chinwag wi james picardo about new possibilities of uniting eg. working people, estate folks & schemie christianity as well as lobbyist groups in a much bigger wider grassroots solidarity - around issue of 'debt' which affects us all (a smashin loon) fae jubilee scotland 

latest thought on my last post- 

the future of scottish christianity is not about what you do or say anymore - its all about where you live! 

Break down the walls: can we, the working class, have oor church back please?

I used to love seeing masel as part of the emerging church until about 4 years ago.  However, three things, began to crack and slowly dislodge my identification with all things emerging - in both church and the wider uk society, and propel me back out into scotland.  The resulting relationship between me, christianity and the land around me here has changed beyond all recognition.. my faith, my trust has returned again, not just in God but in my roots; the estates I grew up with, the place itself, the land, the people; its colourful mix of natives and newcomers, industries, even creation itself - lost friends regained - all of it is my church now.. 

the walls in my head may have broken down, broken down enough to feel trust, contentment, dignity,  happiness and freedom here and a warm security in God in this land, that I've not felt for a very long time - but what about other walls: the ones that enclose housing estates and the even harder granite ones inside christian heeds ?

For me, the cracks started here:

1. In November 2003 in the 2nd issue of www.emergingchurch.info - I wrote the short article: The E in emerging church  - about putting housing Estates (E) at the heart of Emerging church. Plenty of encouraging words ensued but little or no action and no evidence of it being a top of an emerging checklist anywhere.

2. Once it began to swell and the conversations multiplied, and coffee bars and websites began to echo with emerging this and that, I asked friends and family in some estates I know of in scotland: have ever heard of 'emerging church'? - answer: wha'? - nae me mate!

3. After years of involvement with just about every fad of christendom - from pentecostalism to church planting to wimber healing stuff to alternative club worship to partner projects with major church institutions like church of england and church of scotland.  I had a breakdown.  My body and mind completely knackedered, exhausted - a huge chunk of my past in estates and care hit me as if they were unleashed from the dungeons of hell.  A past that I switched off and hid away - partly so that I could fit in with my new friends at university and 'church' - right up until the emerging church scene.   I also came to the puzzling realisation that: none on my estates or working class chums neither wanted church OR wanted any of these new movements - I realised, to my shame, in that moment that I too swallowed the lie - this next new one was gonna reach em!  like Judas I'd sold out my friends and family of origin after the following dawned on me:

1. emerging church is completely irrelevent to the working class and the poorest in scotland... 

even worse came an even more shocking realisation No. 2 in the depths of my being that...

I am schemie AND I'm in love wi a Christ here at work in this bonnie scotland of ours - but I am painfully aware now that:

2. powerful vested interests as yet unchecked within the middle and upper classes have colonised and stolen the church from us in the uk:

Today 'they' are busy making church FOR us - why?  It is because it no longer belongs to us.. maybe it hasn't for very a long time - every revival, every eruption of God in the land was fired from working people.    In ancient times: christianity around Rome was reviled as a religion of: women and slaves - and around cottage industries and guilds - in earlier in the last century, men and women at the grassroots, fishing boats, cooperages, mines, crofts, obscure schools and estates - people you rarely hear of, have spearheaded eruptions of God throughout history: of Spirit ravishing experiences, desperate prayer, acts of justice, words of mercy and healing and transformation in places and among people often forgotten.

Even the sally army sparked off as a working class eruption coming out of sheer desperation and cries of the poorest that energised them to grapple with some of biggest things killing their freinds and families and kids:  drink, industrialised poverty and domestic violence.  It was eventually colonised by their 'betters' who flocked to 'help'.  Today the 'powers that be' continue (as in all christian organisations) to feed off the nativity birth of its working class roots.  Today they still raise money for 'serving the poor' (and attact some terrific saints and activists to its dream -again, to 'help') - yet they are the richest christian organisation in the uk and - their massive accumulation of land and money and use of power is beyond criticism in the uk - why?

I think it is because they are a white symbol of 'middle class' charity - it's biggest golden calf, its myth - in uniform (and in funky clothes among its new generation) - but few sallyers would admit that it was nicked from our foreparents, that the schemies were righteous and well capable of hosting God on their patch! the middle class vested interests stole their righteous garments to clothe themselves and to this day they have become amazingly good at it - if the sally army stumbles on to this myth about itself- it will crack one of the biggest myths driving this country, it goes something like this: 

societies (vested interests) - teaches that - we govern the country, we the professionals, activists and thinkers, artists, bosses, leaders, landlords - we are your betters, we own the land, you are the tenants, claiments and charity cases - you need us!

church's (vested interests) - teaches the same - we, the leaders, thinkers, activists, artists, creators, the spiritual landlords, govern christianity - we are your betters, you are the tenants, claiments and charity cases -you need us!

in the empire - and of the empire, has in the 21st century become highly disguised, and, become: not in the empire - but of the empire

They lie to themselves about this and yet they are really puzzled why we don't go to their churches and christian organisations - it matters not if its traditional or funky or Spirit zappingly good or its latest coalitions of middle class bohemian sainthood: emerging church.. who cares, its still not 'ours'

There are loads of christians - both trad and radical, doing stuff with housing estate folks - I've heard argue.. let them eat that cake baby!

True, there are a growing number of smashing people, christian groups and initiatives in estates yes - but look hard and you nearly always find middle class folks somewhere at the heart of it running things, talking, praying, talking, dreaming, talking, curating worship, sacrificially 'serving the poor' to exhaustion and then more talking - never local schemies, they can't do these things y ken - Oh and its always: we are just doing this temporarily until they 'learn' how to run things for themselves.  This is a serious blindness: they seem to have no idea that their misguided uncritical idealism - fired by this 'middle class myth' - this middle class golden calf in the camp- is in danger of keeping the whole dependancy cycle going for yet another generation... them and us, christians and the poor, leader and led.. landlords and their needy tenants - 

and the WALL - gets to stay up!! yet for another century 

Q. why don't poor folks like church? 

because it doesnae belong to them!  it doesn't come from their dreams, it 'isn't shaped by their priorities and isn't led by their hands and hearts

and come even closer so i can whisper britain's biggest secret:

schemies can do church without you - its you that need us more than we need you

what the heck do we saints of white middle scotland do then - I hear you cry? 

if you want to help bonnie saint - redistribute some of the  massive resources stored up in your townie church budgets and shockingly expensive buildings and wasteful use of land - we'll use just a tiny fraction of them very well to dig ourselves out of our 'slavery' in no time! and push some of these estate walls down from the inside - if you want to do something really helpful with your energy from the Spirit - attach chains to a thousand tractors and pull from the other side - I think there's a new round of demonising and scapegoating from politicians and media on its way.. since the credit crunch kicked in..

In that sense we do need you and you need us: we can fill in that aching hole of shame that sits at the heart of middle class modern britain in the 21st century and give a whole new colour, energy and lease of life to a whole landscape of christianity that it has grown and nourished and woven around itself - like some psychic ontological security blanket of righteousness - that is choking and paralysing it to death.

You pull, we push!, as lynsey hanley encourages at the end of her book: estates.   Crack the myth, crack the wall!   And when those old walls, constructed to hold up a british empire, come crashing doon - we will all get to finally see each other for the first time in centuries. 

And all of us- all the bonnie body of christ, and noone knows who we all are, most are hidden - will SEE,  that 'together', and only together -we ARE the fantastic patchwork multicoloured tartan body of Christ on this wee island.. arms legs, hands feet, doin some healing and loving on its country's ass - woohoo!...together.

so, in light of all this, can we have oor church back please...

global meltdown: what's in 'your' urban saint survival toolkit?

Feature Post: In this Scotland's 'Year of homecoming'  I'm using me blog to look at what's a happening around a scotland coming out of the mists of an auld world - a world where christianity was in bed with empire - into raging economic meltdown (thaw?).  Can this christianity be rehabilitated in time? it has a crackin story! can it be unfrozen from its entombment to stand before world empires in its robes of comedy and humanity?  

To kick off, here are 3 things we lost under the snow that are erupting all over the world right as acts of defiance and tools of resistance to empire in a global age:   1. outrageous prayer, 2.  gift-economy and 3. imaginative comic non-violent guerilla action... ring any bells with an ancient near east movement sparked off by a young activist called Jesus and brutally put down by the empire of their day?  check it oot!..

Protest 2.0: G20 Protest gets twittered

As world leaders head for London's G20 summit this year, twitter is finding new use among protesters: here are some Tweets collected on my iphone:

"Very good day with positive (and light) police presence" - sierrakim

"It's the end of the world as we know it ... and I feel cross" - chrisjords 

"This is the beginning of the fight for the next 20 years...neo-liberal capitalism is on it's knees and we must kill it off" - Mark Thomas

• Here are some G20 protest pics
• The Guardian's: Matthew Weaver gives us a live report using audioboo (audioblogging) here 
• Uk tech crunch reports on megamouth shouting out your 'tweets' as they come in- calling it protest 2.0
• Numbers: police estimates: 35,000 (bbc), protestor estimates (twitter): 50,000
• I'll be blogging on role of twitter in protest like as we approach G20 summitt on 2nd April

In meantime, why not catch up on latest tweets reporting from the rally, yourself: make sure to include the tag '#G20rally' somewhere in your tweet. That way it gets grouped together with everything that others are writing about these 'Put People First' rallys. 

For more info about how to setup twitter and report live from the event using it and your phone: go here 

rewind: christianity in Scotland: where next?

rewinding to 2007: christianity in Scotland: where next?  part 1 and part 2- I still agree with most but not sure I would word it quite like that now... an awful lot has happened since 2007;  a different feel to things now.  There's much more of a movement of saints and activists busy engaging on the ground; so many good people and projects around here now- and even more now since the extreme forms of capitalism (economic form of empire) have hit the wall and are being unmasked for what they are.   I'm feeling a heck of a lot more positive about stuff now - happy! 

Lesley Riddoch: Jade's legacy: a society that can no longer care

Lesley Riddoch: Jade's legacy: a society that can no longer care.  best critique I've heard yet - connects a bit with the reason why 'red nose day' rakes it in more in a recesssion and why other charities lose income - why? some thinking from friends suggests that it is because 'consumption' (both popular and illicit) increases and becomes even more central to many during financial quakes - not the other way..

Fiona T with Gibbons, tigers and loggers in sumatra

My wife - Fee - has been invited to volunteer her web biz skills to making a website with locals in a sumatran rainforest for 3 weeks.  Local people, ecology and wildlife have suffered from years of destruction due to logging companies.  Last I heard from Fee - she:                         1. Got the respeck of locals because she got covered in leeches while accompanying them wading through a river     

global meltdown: abyss opening or heaven coming down?

A series of ecological, economic and political shocks are rocking the world.    

Although the current crises are dreadful - they may be waking many up to the fact that 'empire' (economic or otherwise) may not be an inevitable 'way' of securing our future as we used to think - and that this reality shock could open up some amazing possibilites. 

happy new year - new music & saints urban survival guide

happy new 2009 one and all

aye it's been a while I know- but I've uploaded a new music track and mad christmas photo selection box

I thought I would dedicated the music/slideshow to ma wee bruv james - check it oot here 

edinburgh guerilla mince-meet action

- arranging 4 (mince -hah) meet ups at 4 venues at 4 times of the day around edinburgh on December 10th

- inviting a spectrum of wild saints, muddy activists and big-hearted artists to hear from each other about how their new funded and unfunded projects are getting on - over a laugh and some mince pies

- hit n run- marvellous

nothing is wasted

track history and watch god the fire move  

and empire follows to capture and use it

and after it is sated on our dreams and our blood

after we let it steal, kill and destroy us

- break the poor, scar our land in front of us 

the god of desert and slaves turns it all into something... 

b r e a t h t a k i n g

burnt autumn

 Ok then - on with the blogging. Here's me up ben ledi - translated as 'mountain of God' - the cold summer of 2008 has turned autumn into a thousand colours of red brown and gold - and sun setting over this mountain range was so stunning many of us couldn't bring ourselves to leave until it set turning mountains and lochs in every direction dark pink and burnt orange waiting till sunset not recommended usually- but I had my trusty headtorch.

global economic breakdown or breaththrough?

Breakthrough? Could this crisis - apart from scaring the heck out of everyone- also stir up and empower a new level of movement - where more activists, artists and saints - instead of shutting down (no money) get even more released, more project supporters and angels start taking pity on their cities - being enraged and alarmed enough to get out of their comfort zones and work together across denominational, industrial, cultural and political lines to take on some of its giants.   

what if it kickstarts a revolution of engagement with creative justice art and animate non-violent resistance to the forces of empire ..

wee beautiful pict: update August 08

Things have been mad busy here in edinburgh since spring. So many things have been launched, social justice projects, innovative stuff in arts, music, film/media, health, politics and thinking and action - I'm not sure whether this site is the best place for news & comment about all these goings on; this blog started off as a personal croak on all kinds political theological - all kinds o icals in a changing scotland- not sure if many people are reading this blog now anyway - bloomin facebook dagnabit!  So I'll leave it tae you... fit should I dae?

A. Carry on this as more o a personal journey or

B. start a new site with news and articles, views and  comments from around edinburgh/scotland. what do you think? phone lines are open now...

the manifesto

The Manifesto is a website just launched - which Anna Bryon was speaking to me about recently:

Creating a future scotland that is healed o its colonial sickness is definitely my bag.. this sounds really promising.. I like their 2 projects - 'africa & identity' and 'transforming scotland'

I like that they recognised the importance of critiquing power and economic relations of our tartan scottish colonialism in the past (and present) AND struggling to create a new haggisland that disnae play these same auld games in the future...

 in their ane words...

Iphone 3g

Got iphone 3g today so I can now post on the fly on my travels...

mad psychiatry: the doctor who hears voices

Just watched - 'the doctor who hears voices' on channel 4 - an approach to mental illness that regards existing medicating/hospitalising practices - as harmful - perhaps even making the illness worse.   

This non-medicating approach to  mental illness, explored here - is, to my eyes anyway, a kind of brave-hearted loving attempt at slightly higher-voltage 'exorcising' (higher voltage than much of the current mix of medicating/speaking cures anyway) of the destructive effects of these obsessive/accusing/demanding voices without referring to or without resources of religion/God. 

Big Edinburgh tARTan Peacepipe || tour - one kilt many colours!

edinburgh tartan peacepipe video part 1 -password: peacepipe  or for all 3 videos - go here

 

It is finished; scotland's empire is over: time tae detox, time tae shine!

Interview with the prophet haggis, wha bides on a wee abandoned island near the forth road bridge in edinburgh - the 3 giants that stalk scotland today, he says he thinks are: 

sectarianism, masochism and addiction.

the poorest parts & cities suffer most still, he says-

average death-age of males in glasgow: 59

can we fix her?, yes we can- by turning these 3 enemies into 3 friends - haggis argues.   

What is causing this old land pain..?  he asks
do we have an accurate diagnosis for her yet -so we can at least know where to aim at ? he continues, and not just put a plaster over the wound? he adds with a wee grin..