james|kieran

Yesterday, I had a slight anxiety attack. The standard thoughts for me came into my head: What if I’m just an impostor? What if I’m not good enough? What if I fail? It’s timing couldn’t be more strange. The previous evening, I’d been introduced to a few people where my reputation had preceded me. As soon as they heard my name, they connected the dots in a positive way.

But perhaps that’s one of the reasons for my anxiety – exactly what had been said of me? Was it accurate, or did it inflate or reduce me? Knowing the person, I know there would be no malaise in their words to describe me.

I didn’t know where this particular bout came from. Was it significant change I’ve created, the unknown future, the end of an era?

Two things helped though – the first was talking. As soon as this episode came on I reached out to speak with my brother. We talked it through and that released a lot of the anxiety.

Then, after work, I went to a swing dance class. I was toying with whether I should or shouldn’t attend. Would it be more beneficial to nap at home or to attend the class? In the end, I – despite myself – got off my butt and walked the fifteen minutes to the church hall where it takes place.

The very notion of occupying the mind on something which takes its full attention was a massive help. We learnt a piece of musical theatre choreography that was challenging – I did it no justice compared to everyone around me, but I enjoyed my mind being occupied entirely.

And though I find relaxing and taking time for oneself very difficult, I’m learning to let go, not take myself too seriously, and enjoy making a fool of myself.

On a tangent, I remember an ex of mine who loved karaoke. At the start of our relationship, I couldn’t understand why anyone could seek enjoyment in the obvious humiliation. Then, after a while when we were out with friends one night, I selected songs that I loved – though obscure to them (think Panic! at the Disco, Rocky Horror Picture Show, Elbow) – and after one line found myself revealing in the liberation.

Life is hard. The expectations I feel are heavy and constantly a burden. Creating interesting content. Starting to date people again. Changing my career plan. Seeing and investing time in my friends and family. Volunteering for two world-changing causes.

I know there was no single issue that caused my anxiety yesterday, but instead it was a cocktail. A concoction of thoughts on my mind each vying for attention and energy. I know I need to be better – by switching off, taking time to unwind and concentrate on something all consuming, even just for an hour or so, makes all the difference.

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about what I’m doing. Suddenly, I’ve gained a consciousness to the precious nature of time, and ensuring that it isn’t wasted. I’ve liberated myself, and jumped head first into the unknown.

And it’s scary. I have irons in the fire, but no definitive plan. I have potential options but no formal agreement. I am currently preparing myself to jump out a plane without a parachute (cue comparison to Brexit).

There is much I am trying to change, to create a better world that works, not only for me, but for each and everyone of us. Frankly, I am tired of not being able to make that difference. Tired of using my energy and resource towards something so transient and temporary.

So, on Monday, negotiation came to a close when I turned down my current employer’s offer and I decided to step back from the role and resign. I can no longer sit by and watch the world move in directions I’m uncomfortable with, in directions so polarised and decisive that in a few years our society will be unrecognisable.

It’s that typical cliché, ‘it’s not you, it’s me!’

I know that I am fortunate in the simple fact that I am able to do this. I lack any significant financial commitment and have no dependents to consider. Not everyone is so fortunate. If I was religious, I might use the word blessed.

However, do I know what the next year or so will look like? Will anyone? How do we decide what we’re doing? Do we ever truly find what we’re looking for?

In short, I don’t think so. Anyone who take the time to read this has too much conscious. But I do know that sometimes, and I’ve touched on this before too, you have to jump. To feel the plummet into obliteration, calculated of course, is something we should all do.

I keep coming back to a phrase, we mustn’t do simply what is easy, but instead do what is right.

This manifests itself in many different ways, and for each is a different calling. It might be career, it could be starting a family. It isn’t my job to define your achievements.

And maybe it’s because I was brought up by Church of England schools, but I’m humbled to remember that today, as I write this, it is Ash Wednesday – a day which celebrates the notion that we are little more than dust, and after everything, dust is what we are destined to become again.

What happens in between, regardless of how difficult a journey it may be, is down solely to you!

When one part of our community is dismissed, or separated, or attacked, we must all bleed. To share the burden of pain from said event in order that we rebuild, grow stronger and closer, that we are solidified in our family. So when people within a community start to use language in divisive ways, consciously or not, they must be educated and called out. We each have a responsibility to do this, no matter what communities we are a part of.

In the last week, I’ve seen people write the LGBT+ acronym in a way which divides us. They used a simple punctuation device which might make sense in the writers logic, but it categorically cannot be allowed to continue as it separates LGB and T.

I wonder what was going through that person’s mind when writing it? I wonder whether it was intentional or not? I wonder whether they’re aware of their privilege? Or whether they’re aware of the connotations.

The importance of this cannot be understated, and this division of our queer community cannot be allowed to continue.

You may think nothing of it, but you should. Through language society’s views change – if we fail to educate people now on this, we risk the conversation moving to a different, unacceptable place.

The queer community isn’t the only one to face these issues. Throughout Britain, were currently separated into three camps; Leavers, Remainers and the apathetic. Our media has sought to divide us along these lines as well as cultural, religious, societal lines as a way to gain readership. Politicians have done the same in order to drive people to the ballot box.

Within our community, certain groups have to be held accountable for their rhetoric – Trans-exclusionary radical feminists come top of mind. And certain groups need to be held accountable for their complacency and lack of action.

You, someone of privilege, may brush this off as a non-issue. Arguing about the semantics of how LGBT+ is styled may not seem like the most pressing issue, and about political correctness. This is much greater than that, and if you use the styling ‘LGB/T+’ regardless of motivation, you’re sending out a message that the trans community must stand on its own.

So next time you send a tweet, write a caption or publish an article, think about the connotation of your choice of language.

After all, today marks the end of LGBT+ (or Queer) History Month in the UK – we cannot and will not forget our community coming together to share the fight for equality, and we must move forward fighting for all LGBT+ and Queer people, whether that fight is based on an individual’s gender or sexuality.

You may be aware, or maybe not, that I’m adverse to the term LGBT+. To me it doesn’t function at all well because it heavily prioritises certain parts of the community. The acronym isn’t designed to cope when more characters are added and therefore I prefer the word queer, but even that isn’t perfect due to the negative connotations which make it difficult for some to reclaim and use with pride.

We talk about this on FO? FQ! Podcast, which also came out today. Go and listen on iTunes or Spotify.

What worries me most about contemporary society isn’t perhaps the sharing of extreme views that I fundamentally disagree with. It’s not the crap that is peddled by some, but the fact that people can be so primitive about an argument they are unable to judge evidence at face value and seem to take everything published as gospel (including on traditional and social media). These people cannot hold a debate so that every argument is broken down and understood before forming opinions around it.

Instead, they get angry over nothing, radical over issues that simply don’t exist, all because their networks become an echo chamber and they believe in an instant what simply doesn’t exist.

This isn’t an attack on the other – I’m just as guilty of falling foul of this. So then what can be done to tackle the spread of ‘fake news’ and ‘alternative facts’?

We live in an age defined not by our access to technology as some innovators of the internet would have wanted. Instead, our age will be defined by the fundamental distrust in reputable sources and a belief in the individual, self-published, first-person point of view.

It’s truly a development on the ‘No Win No Fee’ culture that propagates contemporary society. Each for their own, with no care for another. As long as I look out for myself, no one else matters.

Instead of tackling this head on, our media and politics distracts us – referendum to save a Conservative Party, emergency budgets to build walls, rounding up of communities to use as scape goats in some grand plan. Is it any wonder trust in our society feels so low?

This week, we saw some Labour MPs resign from their party and sit as a group of independents. For me, it’s the first piece of honest politics we’ve had in the UK for a long time, and the true fallout from such move is yet to be seen.

But what is clear is the need for collaboration. These MPs would have found a natural home in the Liberal Democrats, yet they avoided that. Although we share lots of the same values, joining an established party wouldn’t exactly be ground breaking, and if anything for former Labour members, the image associated with the Lib Dems is not a good one.

At this critical time though, we need to be coming together, celebrating our difference and not pulling away from each other. I don’t mean coming together under one ‘group’, but working collectively towards the bigger picture. I hope those with a centrist outlook collaborate with The Independent Group to help progress out politics.

In the queer world, it’s bringing together every community to be a part of something bigger, and understand each issue faced: tackling transphobia, racism, biphobia for example.

The most dangerous thing right now would to become individualist, each for their own. This regressive attitude towards society will only inhibit our freedoms, it will only further diminish our communities, and bring down an age of growth.

But as long as you are alright, I suppose...

I am aware that this is a self-published opinion piece, and the hypocrisy in my writing of it in some senses.  

I am seething as I write this. We’ve been led, forced to walk the plank under duress, by this Conservative premiership since day one. We’ve been kind and understanding, we (the public) have entrusted not only her, but our official opposition to debate Brexit like adults and put not the desires of their party donors before the national interest.

And yet, what we have is simple – a travesty of democracy where our two main parties, each funded by big business who can afford the losses or by protectionist trade unions, both backed by a nonsensical media to pull apart this country for the benefit of the few elite at the top. Exactly the opposite of what Brexit was supposed to be about.

We are, and always have been, in this together.

Today, our great leader told MPs that she’ll update them in fourteen-day’s time. It leaves a month to go before we walk, stumble blindly into the misty fog, all hands on deck as we attempt to bring HMS Lizzie back under control, navigating the waves we once proudly ruled.

The fog is thick, and where we’re headed there are no lighthouses to navigate by. The stars are all obscured and we’re told that it’s all for the best of Britain that we head onwards regardless, with little more than an OS Map of the south coast. But who’s Britain is that? It certainly isn’t mine.

Now is the time, more than ever – at least in my lifetime – to be political. To hold those who have contempt for common sense to account, withdraw power and support from a crumbling two party state and challenge the very notion of our politics.

We must ask difficult, fundamental questions of our political institutions ensuring that they aren’t cornered into thinking solely about the next election cycle as has become routine, but instead put this country’s long-term future firmly in the centre of all we do.

There is an immediate action that I am therefore unashamed to sit here and plead for you to take: revoke your party membership (if you have one) of a political party which has failed us all on Europe, whether that’s the Conservatives or Labour, and join a party which is standing up against them.

This is particularly prevalent if you are a Remain MP – do what is right, not what is easy!

These parties may seem too big to fail, but they aren’t. And it’s only by shifting the balance of power away from them that we will be able to redress the wounds caused by this awful state of affairs.

As it stands, we’ll be setting sail into an abyss, and we need our captain to quickly and radically rethink our course out towards the depths. I, for one, am trying to make sure that there are enough life jackets to go around – currently we’re short.

So I plead again for you to take action, stand up and be counted, and help us to protect our great nation from heading up Shits Creek sans paddle.

Enough of the maritime references...

There are times when I think, ‘what the hell am I doing?’ And then there are times when instinctively, I feel like I am exactly where I am supposed to be. I had a conversation with a friend this weekend about faith, about religion, about my role in the world, about standing up and being counted for perhaps the first time in my life.

Earlier today, I walked along the Thames, past London Bridge and I told my friends how I stood there at three in the morning with no idea of what I was doing with my life. I stood and watched the traffic pass and the water flow as I sobbed, being so lost in the world. I tried to imagine the cold of the water on my body and make it as inviting as I could summon.

How could I let myself get to that point? Why was I so damaged that I had no where to turn to? That all I was reduced to was waste? The most scary thing is that I don’t know whether you can fully recover from those moments. I will always be scarred by that memory, damaged and broken.

I think back to when I was at university, and I stood under a boiling hot shower as my world appeared in greyscale, trying to feel something. Or that time I went to a party as ‘blandman’, dressed in grey because I felt as if there wasn’t anything more to me, my person.

Our lives are shaped by our experiences, and I wouldn’t change the above, instead I’ve grown from it. As a queer, I wasn’t blessed with role models around me growing up. It feels like I only truly know myself, and my identity, in the last 6 months, which is ridiculous. It’s taken me over quarter of a century and I’m only just coming to terms.

With so much pain in the world, with so many issues that challenge the balance of society, with people being hurt for being different, there is work to be done. I resent that its taken me so long to be able to stand up and be counted, but here I am.

If we educate our children so that they understand, if we hold our neighbours to account and correct them when they make mistakes, if we love one another truly for each and every difference we behold, then we will be in a better place.

Instead, we squabble. We have ineffective politicians leading us into chaos. We have divisive media stoking the flames of civil unrest. We have an elite who put their own agenda before that of wider society.

I’ve written it before (most probably), but if it isn’t now, then when? if it’s not this issue, then what? And if it isn’t me, then who?

We each have a responsibility to change the world around us, and so as you read this, as yourself those three questions. If not now, then when? If not this, then what? if not you, then who? Because you, my dear, can change the world. You can make the difference. You will better the lives of those around you. You can do anything.

It’s Queer History Month, when we should take stock of where we’ve come from as a community, especially as this year marks fifty years since the Stonewall Riots. So on top of the questions above, take time to educate yourself – because if schools don’t teach LGBT+ history, we need to make up for that lack of knowledge.

And take that jump into the unknown.

I found myself dancing the Time Warp next to a statue of Riff Raff, a character from Richard O’Brien’s Rocky Horror Picture Show, in a sleepy Kiwi town on as we made our way through the country. The dance moves are emblazoned in a mural on the wall Riff Raff is facing: “It’s just a jump to the left!”

Looking at the surroundings of this homage to O’Brien, it’s not easy to work out why exactly it’s there, and as I spent more time in Aotearoa (the Māori name for the country) it became clear that the love for eccentric attractions was endless.

It turns out that Richard O’Brien had a connection with Hamilton. It’s where he’d spent time cutting hair and daydreaming, and the spot chosen was where the Embassy Theatre once stood. The plaque read: “Where we stand is the birthplace of The Rocky Horror Picture Show.”

Each small town we passed through seemed to have a claim to fame, and each marked it with a statue testament to it! It felt somewhat American, to have an attraction simply for the sake of tourism and building up hearsay about a town, and a concept slightly alien to me, a Brit. Our towns, villages and cities have all been too well established I guess, seeped in a history and tradition that is unshakeable.

But this isn’t a criticism. I adore the obscure and revel in the weird, and New Zealand certainly delivers on that. My guides, Vicky and her boyfriend Jesse, crisscrossed with me the North Island, Te Ika-a-Māui, to see as many of these curiosities as possible.

So along with Hamilton’s homage to the greatest cult film in recent history, we made our way to Tirau to see a visitor’s centre in the triage of a giant corrugated dog, sheep and ram, flanked by a corrugated Jesus. We visited Taihape, where travellers are greeted by an oversized ‘Gum Boot’ (or Wellingtons to Brits) made out of, you guessed it, corrugated.

Then there was the town of Bulls which, along with endless bad puns for each shop (i.e. the medical centre being called ‘cure-a-bull’), features proudly an oversized – you guessed it – bull. And after developing a taste for the country’s national drink, we took a pilgrimage to the home of L&P in Paeroa, of course with a shrine to this heritage in the form of an oversized replica bottle.

As we travelled throughout the North Island, I kept asking whether some eccentric project could be built in the UK. Imaging the horror if I were to build a huge can of cider in a Somerset village, or an oversized Melton Mowbray pork pie in Leicestershire?

That’s probably the best thing about Kiwi’s, their ability to not take life to seriously, as they wear jandles to the beach and get sand everywhere, and invite the world to throw gum boots across a field next to the railway, drinking a soft drink known only within New Zealand.

It’s a different pace of life, and one that I could get used to.

This is part of a series of posts about my recent trip to New Zealand and California which are coming out over the next few weeks and months. Follow @maketimelondon on twitter and instagram to keep in the know.

Yesterday, I landed in London after travelling to New Zealand and California, staying with friends, visiting museums and galleries, and avoiding any news for three weeks. Suddenly the intensity of UK and global politics came sharply into focus and it feels like I’ve been thrust back into the middle of it all.

I wouldn’t be the first, nor the last, to state that I am so fed up of the arguments in Parliament right now. The fact that our government have failed, and that our opposition have failed too. That we’re on course for further divisions within Britain.

And yet, instead of looking ahead, all our politicians keep talking about is Brexit. But then what? What next?

Note that I’m not against politicians talking about Brexit. It is the most fundamental shift of political power for a generation.

However, we need a government of national unity right now. A government which goes above party politics and the rhetoric of whether the UK should be led by one party or other. Instead, whatever the result of tomorrow’s vote in Parliament over the governments negotiated deal, the most pressing thing is bringing a divided nation together.

What is missing from all conversation is that there is compromise needing to be found. And there is a mid-ground where we all want the UK to succeed as a nation.

I fundamentally believe that we have a greater issue not with the question of Brexit itself, but with how politics works in this country.

On the radio this morning, the government said that if the voice of the British people is ignored by MPs in tomorrow’s debate, the trust in politics will be lost. To me though, this is pandering – trust in politics was already lost.

We, the people, need to tell our politicians that trust has been lost, that we demand a better way, that we want to have a more engaging political process so that the mistakes of Brexit do not and cannot happen again. We, the people, need to take back control by ensuring that new ways of electing representatives are pushed ahead, that our views are more actively listened to by parliamentarians, that our voice matters.

It’s going to be a big, ongoing battle, and Brexit doesn’t seem likely to be settled for a generation. Though promise me that in the back of your mind you’ll think about a political Britain post-Brexit, where reform is long overdue.

Our politicians need to be brave in calling for reform, especially the Conservatives and Labour who might lose the overarching power they enjoy under our current system.

But as I wrote on a wall of Te Papa Museum in Wellington, we have a choice: to do what is easy, or to do what is right.

As one year closes and another begins, I sit looking out to sea and it feels oddly familiar even though I’m as far away from home as possible. Being next to the water, listening to its waves crash and witnessing its endless promise along the shore, I wonder what will be around the corner.

This is the big milestone which everyone pins their hopes on – the passage of one calendar year to the next, as if it’s the only point that one has the authority to change things.

It’s a fallacy that we live by, that we measure things by the movement of time. Milestones become ambitions that sometimes are the only rivets holding things together. But in truth we shouldn’t wait for the opportunity of a new year, we should act on them now.

If you’re not your best self, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you have to change. And it might be the most difficult thing you do, and you might need to build a family of friends around you to help you get through it, but it’s ultimately on you.

We all go through shit, we have different challengers and obstacles to overcome. Some might look as if they’re swanning through life with not a care in the world, but they could be broken inside. Some have the privilege, the platform, the voice, but at the end of it, we are all the same.

So for the new year, I won’t be promising to change. Fuck ‘dry January’ or going on health binges. There will be no New Years resolution for me to be bound to. Instead, I will keep working on the things that mean the most, the things which can make a difference and change the world for the better, and I encourage you to do the same.

I’m excited to continue campaigning for a more liberal world. To introduce a new podcast. To continue writing novels and blog posts and poetry. To fall in love and to experience sorrow. To travel and challenge myself in ways I never thought possible. To be happy.

Congratulations for making in to 2019, here’s to the next passage of time!