Dream Cloud.

Track: Pokemon Theme

Artist: Billy Crawford

ALL lives matter

But black people wear weaves

Get over it

History can’t be changed

I never owned any Slaves

Why are you taking this personally imagining things that aren’t there

X out everything I have ever done for the black community and focus on this one racist thing I did to destroy my reputation

You are race baiting

A lot of people have no clue why Europe is currently in a state of uproar and the only word people seem to be saying is “Brexit” so here’s a not-so-quick and easy-breezy explanation on the past 24 hours of CHAOS that has ensued:

The European Union (EU): an organisation of European countries that follows similar laws, allows for freedom of movement/labour, easy travelling (@people who planned on doing Eurotrips, not sure if you can count the UK in that anymore!) and trade with each other. The EU is important because before it was formed, the European continent was ravaged by 2 world wars, and a division because of the Cold War. This organisation has provided all the stability we’ve seen in the past 40-odd years.

So what the heck is a “Brexit”? Basically, the UK has just voted to leave the EU. Now this doesn’t seem like a TERRIBLE thing, but there are some serious political and economic consequences.

Economic implications:

- The British pound crashed from 1.5 to 1.3 in 6 hours, the lowest value in 30 years, which in turn affected the US dollar which affects all other global currencies. I wish I was joking but I’m not: South Africa, Poland, Norway, Mexico. Hungary, Australia, Switzerland all saw their currencies plummet. Countries that don’t rely on exports as their means of production cannot have a devalued currency. IT’s not good. The Japanese Yen which has been strengthening reached an all-time high which is terrible because Japan is trying to reverse its deflationary state. The Bank of Japan is now out of options and Japan literally STOPPED TRADING IN BRITISH STOCKS/INVESTMENTS.

- A devalued GBP means that the Bank of England is going to have to hike interest rates to prevent inflation (domestic prices going up even further) whicH WILL CAUSE A RECESSION. SOUND FAMILIAR ANYONE? YEAH. FINANCIAL CRISES.

- The UK leaving the EU means its market has gone down a LOT in size making them a less attractive destination for trade partners/investors. They’re going to have to draw up new trade agreements with basically the whole world since all their trade was previously tied to the EU. This will be tricky because countries liked having a market with a population of ~500 million compared to the UK’s size of ~50 million.

- GDP will go down. Retirement income will go down. The British economy is in a state of panic. The global economy is basically, fucked. For now at least.

The thing is, given the precarious nature of the economy right now with markets out of control and stagnant growth practically everywhere, it was a really really bad time to have this referendum - a lot of countries have been banking on a “Bremain” before making their next move when it comes to monetary/fiscal policy. The IMF has predicted that 2016/2017 will see the worst years for growth, but we might see upward growth trends from 2018 onwards.

So how does it still get worse?

- Scotland showed an overwhelming majority of votes to remain in the EU. It’s likely that they’re going to call for a referendum (again) to leave the UK so that they can join the EU as an independent country.

- Northern Ireland also wanted to stay in the EU. It’s likely they’re going to join the Republic and join the EU.

- Not sure about Wales. They could go “haha fuck it mate” and potentially leave the UK too.

- David Cameron has just announced that he will be resigning in 3 months which means that extreme conservatives who managed to sway the vote in favour of Leave could come to power. That’s right. We’ll be stuck to suffer with the likes of Farage and Johnson. 

- Brexit triggered a lot of nationalist/extreme right-wing movements in the rest of Europe. Some leaders already calling for “Frexit” (France), “Itexit” (Italy) and..”Dexit” (Netherlands)? We may see more in the next few days.. A disintegration of Europe is risky business because Europe has not been able to remain stable until the EU was formed. This could give way for an aggressive Russia too, who would want to take advantage of weak/vulnerable European states. An aggressive Russia will trigger US skepticism and we all know how that goes. 

SO HOW DID THE GOVERNMENT LET THIS HAPPEN?

Basically David Cameron came up with the idea for the referendum because he was desperate to gain support from anti-EU parties like UKIP during the general elections last year. Except now he’s resigning. So. 

During the campaign, Michael Gove, Boris Johnson (conservatives) and Nigel Farage (UKIP) stressed on immigration laws if the UK leaves the EU because immigration/refugees have been a big problem for the UK as its reducing jobs being given to UK locals/residents and they think the UK is becoming “overcrowded” so the Leave campaign was like WE WILL TIGHTEN OUR BORDERS! YEAH! Except now they’ve displaced millions of UK citizens living/working in the rest of the EU. Let’s see how they figure that one out.

Additionally, they talked about the economic benefits because if the UK were to leave, they would be able to allot the money that goes to the EU to other things like the NHS (national healthcare) etc. The Leave campaign went on about how the UK spends 350 million pounds a week on the EU but actually it spends less than half of that, so really, their campaign was built on scaremongering and lies. 

Article 50, aka the means of exiting will be triggered in 3 months when the new Prime Minister is announced (most likely one of the extreme conservatives/Farage who are riding high on their “Independence Day” fuckery which is even more proof of xenophobic, colonialist bullshit) after which the UK will have 2 years to complete its official withdrawal so hopefully that will provide short-term stability.

But the world is in a dark place right now and everything is terrible. 

Mark: Whether I’m gay or not has no reflection –

Owen: No, it does. Just listen –

Julia: I don’t think that you have ownership of horror of this crime.

Owen: Can I just say, I find this, I find this astonishing.

Julia: I’m not Jewish and I’m not gay, I’m not French, but I still am equally horrified by these crimes.

Owen: This was a – I’m being yelled at, which is incredible.

Julia: Stop talking so [we hadn’t do].

Mark: That’s the headline: ‘Isil wages war on gays in west’. Now you share that view, that basically this was deliberately targeted on one part of the community rather than the freedom to enjoy yourself no matter what your sexual orientation is.

Owen: What are you talking about?!?

Mark: I’m talking about the coverage in the newspapers.

Owen: It’s not some abstract, kind of, he just picked a random club out of nowhere. He picked a club because it was full of people he regarded as deviants. That’s why he attacked the club.

Julia: It’s a hate crime, this is an act of terrorism, it was an attack on gay people, absolutely, it was horrific. However, my mind guesses this man probably would be as horrified by me as a gobby woman as he would – genuinely, genuinely – this is the thing. We don’t know right now. We can speculate, but we don’t know how much of this is motivated by just his homophobia.

Owen: We heard from his own father about his revulsion – why are we trying to deflect? Why are you both pick-

Mark: We are not trying to deflect. We are trying to reflect what is being said by the authorities here and –

Owen: Can I ask, what argument are you trying to pick here?

Mark: I’m now going to quote from what The Telegraph is saying…’his father said…[he] may have targeted the gay community after becoming angry when he saw two men–’

Owen: ‘May have’? He did! Why are you saying this?

Julia: ‘After seeing two men kissing in Miami some months ago’ – he may have been angered by many other things since then!

Owen: I’m sorry. I just find this the most astonishing thing I’ve ever been involved with on television. If he’d walked into a synagogue, and massacred dozens of Jewish people, you wouldn’t be saying what you’re saying now.

Owen: This bizarre attempt to deflect from this –

Mark: We are trying to draw parallels in terrorist attacks on people who are being attacked whether they are enjoying rock music in Paris, whether they are gay people in Florida enjoying a night out.

Julia: I completely accept it, as [Mark] does, that it was a homophobic attack, but for me the issue is there are going to be homophobic people, there’ll be people who hate black people, or who hate gay people, or hate Jewish people. There are going to be people, who are lunatics, who are fanatics –

Owen: Who are “lunatics”! Stop using these words, Julia!

Julia: Is it possible for me to finish one sentence?

Owen: If you stop using words like “lunatic” to talk about homophobic terrorist attacks!

Julia: Well thank you. Whoever these people are, and whatever their motivations are, the key thing is we’re always going to have mad and bad people in the world.

Owen: Mad and bad people. Okay.

Julia: And the key issue is, that they can’t do too much or any harm. When you have free access to assault weapons in a country like America, then they’re able to put their hatred of other people –

Owen: Yes! Obviously!

Julia: – into effect, and do damage. That’s the issue for me.

(discussion between Mark and Julia on gun control and the U.S. …Julia: It is absolutely absurd, if America were not going to do something about gun control after Sandy Hook in 2012, if you’re going to watch six- and seven-year-olds being massacred and you don’t think you need to act, they are never going to act.)

Mark: There’s something else here in The Telegraph coverage, which I think we need to bring up, Owen, in relation to your point. And that is, I think that we’ve got at least a call from a spokesman for Stonewall saying that people would be feeling vulnerable, and basically indicating –

Owen: Oh, you’re going to have an LGBT voice talking about it. Interesting.

Mark: Sorry?

Owen: Nothing, carry on. Go on.

Julia: Owen, seriously.

Owen: I’ve had enough of this. I’m going home. Sorry. No way.

Julia: Owen, genuinely, we’re trying to have a civilized conversation.

Owen: I know you’re having it, I don’t want it!

Julia: I know you’re upset, you’re very upset –

Owen: Yeah, I am, I’m very upset. I’m very upset.

Julia: Everyone’s upset and angry about this, but storming off a TV set –