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Sentenced to carry out 4 months hard labour in Newcastle City Gaol, Thomas Tweedy was found guilty of stealing money on 26 December 1872.
Age (on discharge): 20
Height: 5.4
Hair: Brown
Eyes: Blue
Place of Birth: Newcastle
Status: Single
Occupation: Labourer
Tweedy has four previous convictions listed on his particulars sheet covering the period 1863-1872, including a conviction in 1869 for stealing a toilet cover.
These photographs are of convicted criminals in Newcastle between 1871 - 1873.
Reference:TWAS: PR.NC/6/1/1166
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Hades
Sentenced to find their true Self
And some of the "Hell-Drivers" return - wise... :-)
HKD
Zur Selbsterkenntnis Verurteilte
Man kommt nicht nach dem Tod in die Hölle, die Erde, das Leben unter bestimmten äußeren oder psychischen Bedingungen ist die Hölle. Die glühenden Emotionen, die nicht ausgelebt werden dürfen und unterdrückt werden müssen, das ist die Hölle. Selbstverurteilung, Selbstunterdrückung und Selbstkasteiung, das ist die innere Hölle.
Die äußere Hölle erleben jene, die von Krieg oder Katastrophen heimgesucht werden. Menschen, die an ihrer Psyche leiden, die Psychopathen, sie erleben die Hölle. Manche vergessen in ihrem Leid, dass es einen Wiederaufstieg gibt. Die Auferstehung als Metapher ist eine psychisch erfahrbare Möglichkeit. Die griechische Göttin Persephone (Hades’ Gattin) zeigt in ihrem Mythos, dass man die eine Hälfte des Jahres in der Unter- und die andere Hälfte in der Oberwelt verbringen kann. Das ergibt die Weisheit der Tiefe mit den Freuden und Festen des Olymp. Gute Aussichten für Psychonauten und Unterweltreisende. Der unangenehme Spaß hat einen Sinn…
HKD
The 100 Strangers Project
"Kat and Dog"
Sometimes I'm not sure if I go to the outdoor art festivals to see the art or to see all the dogs and their people who frequent the event. The weather was perfect as I wandered the grounds and I had taken my little black pug along as she likes the adventure as well.
I was really taken when I saw this little Chihuahua with the big dark eyes and the poor little sweetheart was shaking even though she was cradled in her "Mama's" arms. So you know I had to stop and talk to her.
This is Kat and her dog, Cosita. Kat has worked as a veterinary tech and obviously loves animals. Cosita had parvo but Kat was not about to let that be her death sentence and she adopted her and Cosita came through the treatment with flying colors and has proven to be a very loyal and loving companion.
Kat put Cosita amongst the pumpkin display and she was just as cute as could be but couldn't figure out what this was all about. After all, some of the pumpkins were much bigger than she, and she only weighs in at about 3 pounds!
It was about then that I got the idea of asking Kat if she would mind being a "stranger" and after explaining the project, she was more than willing. But where to shoot? I wanted a simple background and headed towards a tree, but then, this piece of art caught my attention and I directed her over there and I do think it was a wise choice for a background at an art festival.
We tried several poses but I came to like this one best as it also showed off Kat's extravagant tattoos. When I asked her about them she said... "They are all mostly Texas related... and just some things my friends drew up. The worst was my elbow. It hurt horribly. I am not sure why I like them, I just do...and once you get one, you want another!"
Kat says she loves art, especially photography and clay sculpture.
It was delightful meeting Kat and Cosita and I thank you for allowing me to take your portrait.
To see more of the 100 Strangers Project go to:
One of the key characters on the English side during the Wars of Independence, was a Henry Beaumont. He was to participate in every major engagement, from the Battle of Falkirk in 1298 to the Battle of Halidon Hill in 1333. He comes into this story by virtue of the fact that he married Alice Comyn, who, following the death of John Comyn, 3rd Earl of Buchan, inherited the Buchan earldom. But while Henry Beaumont became Earl of Buchan, by right of his wife, he was to spend most of his life trying to take control of the earldom's lands - indeed he was to do more than anyone else to overturn the peace between England and Scotland, established by the Treaty of Northampton and bring about the Second War of Scottish Independence.
Henry first took up military service with Edward I while he was campaigning in Flanders in 1297 against Philip IV of France. When Edward returned to England the following year to deal with the after effects of the defeat of his northern army by the Scots at the Battle of Stirling Bridge, he was accompanied by Beaumont. In the ensuing battle of Falkirk, Beaumont was one of the young knights who had his horse killed from under him by the spears of William Wallace's schiltrons. Beaumont again attended Edward I in the Scottish wars in 1302.
Edward I died in July 1307, which allowed Robert Bruce to turn his attention from defeating English armies, to defeating enemies at home. Chief amongst his domestic enemies were the Comyns and the head of the family (since the murder of John Comyn) was John 3rd Earl of Buchan. Buchan survived his defeat at Barra, but died not long after, in exile in England. His niece and heiress presumably went to England with him and it was there in 1310, that she married Henry Beaumont.
The final act of the 1st War of Independence, was the Battle of Bannockburn - the English attempt to relieve their forces besieged in Stirling Castle. Henry Beaumont was there as a cavalry commander, which was perhaps fortunate as, on the second day of the battle, it enabled him to be one of those who accompanied Edward II in his flight from the field back to England.
In the November after Bannockburn, Beaumont was one of those affected by the sentence of forfeiture passed by the Scottish parliament against all those with land and title in Scotland who continued to fight with the English. This created a group of nobility, both English and Scots, that became known as the Disinherited. Although this group included men of greater standing, such as David Strathbogie, Earl of Atholl, Beaumont was to prove by far the most determined in the pursuit of his lost honours.
EPITAPH TO 2005:
LINCOLN CRIME BOSS BOWS OUT AS
"NUDE THERAPY" SHRINK'S SON'S
TEEN CANCER CHARITY PREVENTS NOTHING
After a thirty year career successfully failing to notice the mass dispensation of snake-oil medicine by unlicensed municipal dentists to every single resident, Lincolnshire's Crown Prosecution Service chief Alison Kerr is retiring with a rare bone cancer and some words to say about sentencing for dangerous drivers.
Meanwhile the son and daughter-in-law of Lincoln-population-fluoridating liar Councillor Dr Elizabeth Jenkins' long-since struck-off psychiatrist colleague John Harding-Price - famous for his naked mental health consultations - have set up a charity in memory of their son Matt who died of a, er, rare bone cancer.
If only young Matt had been able to recuperate in his grandfather's holiday property in Florida.
But by then the Court had made him give it back to his patient, "K", after a gruelling battle through the courts, during which time Harding-Price was first severely admonished for financial dishonesty, and finally cashiered by the GMC for a test-sample of bottom-slapping, underwear-moving and breach of confidentiality cases.
There was nothing else for it but to go and work in Ireland. Which he did, a couple of weeks later. He still occupies Hafod, the large house and grounds close to Lincoln's MRSA-infested County Hospital.
THE NATURE OF LINCOLN'S PSYCHO-SQUIREARCHY
Back in the 1970-80s golden age of Lincoln's St John's Giant Electric Mental Asylum For Yo-Yo-Knickered Ladies and Unwanted Relatives, Dr Harding-Price had probably quickly realised that it was the stress of overseas property management which had led victim K to seek his psychiatric advice, and relieved him accordingly.
But, showing scant understanding of modern psychiatric techniques, the trial judge eventually ruled that Harding-Price should return K's property for what he had originally paid for it - twelve years earlier - without interest.
The judgement cited the "undue influence created by the discrepancy in the price they paid K for the property and its value at the time of the transfer, together with the doctor-patient relationship between Dr Price and K."
A further appeal to the European Court of Human Rights by Dr Harding-Price and Mrs Mary Hazel Lowe, a Medical Secretary, didn't go to plan.
Between them, the two Lincoln health professionals felt that 1,353,842 English pounds and 37 pence would just about compensate them for the anguish and material loss which the fallout from K's treatment had brought about.
Instead they were awarded 1500 Euros each.
Matt died nine months later. But with an eerie sang-froid his Mum and Dad have worked out what teenagers with life-threatening illnesses need - laptops! Lots and lots of laptops. And so Lincoln's young Malcolms and Jocastas have been set to disco-ing away to raise funds.
I'm sure David Harding-Price's resemblance to his father is purely superficial. He declares a liking for McDonald's psychiatry - and from the size of him it looks like the patients are buying!
His advice to terminally-ill youngsters (within a 50-mile radius of Lincoln Cathedral) is of a practical stripe - "hassle your ward or community based nurse or your social worker" - for a laptop!
This will knock cancer for six, and is obviously a far more plausible type of medical assistance than shoving your hand down a bewildered teenage road-accident victim's pants or swindling some nutter out of his Florida real estate.
INDUSTRY GROWTH MEANS GROWTH INDUSTRY
Dying teenagers look set to become a growth industry. This year saw a Colgate-sponsored Harvard dentist investigated for saying some research showed no association between fluoride and bone cancer - when it said exactly the opposite.
What's to investigate? It must have done, otherwise we would be able to read it. So he's a liar. Investigation over.
As I continue to avoid the trusting backwoods yokels' miracle treatment, and to look younger and less fucked-up than everyone around me, I'm very sorry about my inability to prove from the above that contamination of the natives' water with radionucleides by Matt's grandad's best mate Dr Jenkins and her colleagues on the former North Lincolnshire Health Authority (and before that Lincoln City Council and the Lincoln and District Water Board) is responsible for this pandemic of rare diseases, involving the type of suffering which only laptops can alleviate.
Or that fluoride intoxication generally is a factor in Lincolnshire's extraordinary criminal behaviour on the roads and elsewhere.
This is not how we do statistics, and of course the idea that there is any link between the
intake of
must seem ludicrous to normal, docile, uncritical, conventional, authority-led, fluoridated people.
Mr Harding-Price Jr., now Chairman of the RCN Mental Health Practice Forum is, to his credit, something of an opponent of hardline government plans "that would have meant mentally ill people living in the community could be forced to take their medication, and dangerous people with severe personality disorders could be detained, even if they had not committed a crime."
All we need now is an end to forced medication for people simply because they may have dangerous teeth.
And the compulsory detention of deranged councillors and health officials whose megalomania is so severe that they end up prescribing fertiliser factory waste for the whole population, thus increasing the mineral and vitamin requirement of those they deludedly believe are their "patients" - i.e. everyone.
I'm sure doctors don't want to see health food shops benefit from their unqualified colleagues' actions.
And a spell drying out in a secure unit wondering when they can go home would do many of our local politicans a power of good.
JUSTICE OR JUST ICE?
The positive side to this for Lincolnshire's justice-mongers is that there is still time to halt the fluoridation of the Lincoln natives whilst allowing Ray Barber, Charlie Ireland and the other surviving perps to slither away as though a couple of generations of Texas-toothed minimongism never happened.
But I would say one thing to the Chief Prosecutor's successor...
You don't have to be Einstein.
Happy New Year, everyone!
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Ladli — which in Indian languages (Hindi and Urdu) means ‘beloved daughter.’
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LADLI - The loved one! campaign by SOCIAL GEOGRAPHIC
Photo: Firoz Ahmad Firoz
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"Worst of all, violence against women and girls continues unabated in every continent, country and culture. It takes a devastating toll on women’s lives, on their families and on society as a whole. Most societies prohibit such violence -- yet the reality is that, too often, it is covered up or tacitly condoned." (UN SECRETARY-GENERAL in International Women’s Day 2007 Message.)
“Almost every country in the world still has laws that discriminate against women, and promises to remedy this have not been kept.” (UN High Commissioner for Human Rights on the eve of International Women's Day 2008)
According to one United Nations estimate, 113 to 200 million women are “demographically missing” from the world today. That is to say, there should be 113 to 200 million more women walking the earth, who aren’t. By that same estimate, 1.5 to 3 million women and girls lose their lives every year because of gender-based neglect or gender-based violence and Sexual Violence in Conflict.
In addition to torture, sexual violence and rape by occupation forces, a great number of women and girls are kept locked up in their homes by a very real fear of abduction and criminal abuse. In war and conflicts, girls and women have been denied their human right, including the right to health, education and employment. “Sexual violence in conflict zones is indeed a security concern. We affirm that sexual violence profoundly affects not only the health and safety of women, but the economic and social stability of their nations” –US Secretary of State, Condoleeza Rice, 19 June 2008 (Read more about UN Action against Sexual Violence in Conflict www.stoprapenow.org/ ).
Millions of young women disappear in their native land every year. Many of them are found later being held against their will in other places and forced into prostitution. According to the UNICEF ( www.unicef.org/gender/index_factsandfigures.html ),Girls between 13 and 18 years of age constitute the largest group in the sex industry. It is estimated that around 500,000 girls below 18 are victims of trafficking each year. The victims of trafficking and female migrants are sometimes unfairly blamed for spreading HIV when the reality is that they are often the victims.
According to the UNAIDS around 17.3 million, women (almost half of the total number of HIV-positive) living with HIV ( www.unaids.org ). While HIV is often driven by poverty, it is also associated with inequality, gender-based abuses and economic transition. The relationship between abuses of women's rights and their vulnerability to AIDS is alarming. Violence and discrimination prevents women from freely accessing HIV/AIDS information, from negotiating condom use, and from resisting unprotected sex with an HIV-positive partner, yet most of the governments have failed to take any meaningful steps to prevent and punish such abuse.
United Nations agencies estimated that every year 3 million girls are at risk of undergoing the procedure – which involves the partial or total removal of external female genital organs – that some 140 million women, mostly in Asia, the Middle East and in Africa, have already endured.
We can point a finger at poverty. But poverty alone does not result in these girls and women’s deaths and suffering; the blame also falls on the social system and attitudes of the societies.
India alone accounts for more than 50 million of the women who are “missing” due to female foeticide - the sex-selective abortion of girls, dowry death, gender-based neglect and all forms of violence against women.
Since the late 1970s when the technology for sex determination first came into being, sex selective abortion has unleashed a saga of horror in India. Experts are calling it "sanitized barbarism”. The 2001 Census conducted by Government of India, showed a sharp decline in the child sex ratio in 80% districts of India. In some parts of the country, the sex ratio of girls to boys has dropped to less than 800:1,000.
It's alarming that even liberal states like those in the northeast have taken to disposing of girls. Worryingly, the trend is far stronger in urban rather than rural areas, and among literate rather than illiterate women, exploding the myth that growing affluence and spread of basic education alone will result in the erosion of gender bias. The United Nations has expressed serious concern about the situation.
Over the years, laws have been made stricter and the punishment too is more stringent now. But since many people manage to evade punishment, others too feel inclined to take the risk. Just look at the way sex-determination tests go on despite a stiff ban on them. Only if the message goes out loud and clear that nobody who dares to snuff out the life of a female foetus would escape effective legal system would the practice end. It is only by a combination of monitoring, education, socio-cultural campaigns, and effective legal implementation that the deep-seated attitudes and practices against women and girls can be eroded.
The decline in the sex ratio and the millions of Missing Women are indicators of the feudal patriarchal resurgence. Violence against women has gone public – whether it is dowry murders, the practice of female genital mutilation, honour killings, sex selective abortions or death sentences awarded to young lovers from different communities by caste councils, rapes and killings in communal and caste violence, it is only women’s and human rights groups who are protesting – the public and institutional response to these trends is very minimal.
Millions of women suffer from discrimination in the world of work. This not only violates a most basic human right, but has wider social and economic consequences. Most of the governments turn a blind eye to illegal practices and enact and enforce discriminatory laws. Corporations and private individuals engage in abusive and sexist practices without fear of legal system.
More women are working now than ever before, but they are also more likely than men to get low-productivity, low-paid and vulnerable jobs, with no social protection, basic rights nor voice at work according to a new report by the International Labour Organization (ILO) issued for International Women’s Day 2008. Are we even half way to meeting the eight Millennium Development Goals?
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Unite To End Violence Against Women!
Say No To Sex Selection and Female Foeticide!!
Say No To Female Genital Mutilation!!!
Say No To Dowry and Discrimination Against Women!!!!
Say Yes To Women’s Resistance !!!!!
Educate & Empowered Women for a Happy Future !!!!!!
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This portrait is representative of the spirit of the many older protesters who participated in the demonstration in Parliament Square against the proscription of Palestine Action on 6 September 2025. The state had deployed terror laws carrying prison sentences of up to 14 years, perhaps expecting to silence dissent. So it's not surprising that there were looks of understandable astonishment from officers who, after being ordered to make arrests, were confronted with the unflinching resolve of older protesters.
The woman's gaze is most certainly not one of apprehension or fear, but rather it is based on a profound and sobering knowledge. It is the expression of someone who has comprehended the daily horror of a plausible genocide in Gaza, where over 63,000 Palestinians have been killed. It is a silent, powerful testament to the conviction that when the state uses the law to enforce complicity, a citizen's highest duty is to break it.
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Protest and the Price of Dissent: Palestine Action and the Criminalisation of Conscience
Parliament Square on Saturday, 6 September 2025 was a scene of quiet, almost solemn defiance. The air, usually thick with the noise of London traffic and crowds of tourists, was instead filled with a palpable tension, a shared gravity that emanated from the quiet determination of hundreds of protesters, many of them over 60 years old, some sitting on steps or stools and others lying on the grass.
They held not professionally printed banners, but handwritten cardboard signs, their messages stark against the historic grandeur of their surroundings. This was not a march of chants and slogans, but a silent vigil of civil disobedience, a deliberate and calculated act of defiance against the state.
On that day, my task was to photograph the protest against the proscription of the direct-action group Palestine Action.
While not always agreeing entirely with the group’s methods, I could not help but be struck by the profound dedication etched on the faces of the individual protesters. As they sat in silence, contemplating both the horrific gravity of the situation in Gaza and the enormity of the personal risk they were taking — courting arrest under terror laws for holding a simple placard — their expressions took on a quality not dissimilar to what war photographers once called the “thousand-yard stare.” It was a look of weary but deep and determined resolve, a silent testament to their readiness to face life-changing prosecution in the name of a principle.
This scene poses a profound and unsettling question for modern Britain. How did the United Kingdom, a nation that prides itself on its democratic traditions and the right to protest, arrive at a point where hundreds of its citizens — clergy, doctors, veterans, and the elderly — could be arrested under counter-terrorism legislation for an act of silent, peaceful protest?
The events of that September afternoon were the culmination of a complex and contentious series of developments, but their significance extends far beyond a single organisation or demonstration. The proscription of Palestine Action has become a critical juncture in the nation’s relationship with dissent, a test of the elasticity of free expression, and a stark examination of its obligations under international law in the face of Israel deliberately engineering a catastrophic humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
To understand what is at stake, one must unravel the threads that led to that moment: the identity of the movement, the state’s legal machinery of proscription, the confrontation in Parliament Square, and the political context that compelled so many to risk their liberty.
Direct Action and the State’s Response
Palestine Action, established in 2020, has never hidden its approach. Unlike traditional lobbying groups, it rejected appeals to political elites in favour of disrupting the physical infrastructure of complicity: factories producing parts for Israeli weapons systems, offices of arms manufacturers, and — eventually — military installations themselves.
Its tactics, while non-violent, were disruptive and confrontational. Red paint sprayed across buildings to symbolise blood, occupations that halted production, chains and locks on factory gates. For supporters, these were acts of conscience against a system enabling atrocities in Gaza. For the state, they were criminal disruptions of commerce.
That clash escalated steadily. In Oldham, a persistent campaign against Elbit Systems, a key manufacturer in the Israeli arms supply chain, culminated in the company abandoning its Ferranti site. Later actions targeted suppliers for F-35 fighter jets and other arms manufacturers. These were no random acts of mindless vandalism but part of a deliberate strategy: to impose costs high enough that complicity in Israel’s war effort would become unsustainable.
The decisive rupture came in June 2025, when activists infiltrated RAF Brize Norton, Britain’s largest airbase, and sprayed red paint into the engines of refuelling aircraft linked to operations over Gaza. For the activists, it was a desperate attempt to interrupt a supply chain of surveillance and logistical support to a state commiting genocide. For the government, it crossed a line: military assets had been attacked. Within days, the Home Secretary announced Palestine Action would be proscribed as a terrorist organisation.
Proscription and the Expansion of “Terrorism”
Here lies the heart of the controversy. The Terrorism Act 2000 defines terrorism with unusual breadth, encompassing not only threats to life but also “serious damage to property” carried out for political or ideological aims. In this capacious definition, breaking a factory window or disabling a machine can be legally assimilated to mass murder.
By invoking this law, the government placed Palestine Action on the same legal footing as al-Qaeda or ISIS. Supporting it — even symbolically — became a serious offence.
Since July 2025, merely expressing support for the organization can carry a maximum prison sentence of 14 years.
This is based on Section 12 of the Terrorism Act 2000. The specific offense is "recklessly expressing support for a proscribed organisation". However, according to Section 13 of the Act, a lower-level offence for actions like displaying hand held placards in support of a proscribed group carries a maximum sentence of six months imprisonment or a fine of five thousand pounds or both.
Civil liberties groups and human rights bodies have denounced the proscription move as disproportionate. Their concern was not primarily whether Palestine Action’s tactics might violate existing criminal law. One might reasonably argue that they did unless they might sometimes be justified in the name of preventing a greater crime.
But reframing those actions as “terrorism” represented a dangerous category error. As many pointed out, terrorism has historically referred to violence against civilians. Expanding it to cover property damage risks draining the term of meaning. Worse, it arms the state with a stigma so powerful that it can delegitimise entire political positions without debate.
The implications go further. Proscription does not simply criminalise acts. It criminalises expressions of allegiance, conscience and even speech. To say “I support Palestine Action” is no longer an opinion but technically a serious crime. The state has moved from punishing deeds to punishing expressions of solidarity — a move with chilling consequences for democratic life.
Parliament Square: Civil Disobedience on Trial
It was this transformation that brought nearly 1,500 people into Parliament Square on 6 September. They knew what awaited them. Organisers announced in advance that protesters would hold signs reading: “I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action.” In doing so, they openly declared their intent to break the law.
The crowd was strikingly diverse. Retired doctors, clergy, war veterans, even an 83-year-old Anglican priest. Disabled activists came in wheelchairs; descendants of Holocaust survivors stood beside young students. This was not a hardened cadre of militants but a cross-section of society, many of whom had never before faced arrest.
At precisely 1 pm, the protesters all sat or lay down silently, cardboard signs raised. There was no chanting, no aggression — only a quiet insistence that they would not accept the criminalisation of conscience.
The police response was equally predictable. Hundreds of officers moved systematically through the crowd, arresting anyone displaying a sign. By the end of the day, nearly 900 people were detained under counter-terrorism law. It was one of the largest mass arrests in modern British history.
Official statements later alleged police were met with violence — officers punched, spat on, objects thrown. Yet independent observers, including Amnesty International, contradicted this. They reported a peaceful assembly disrupted by aggressive policing: batons drawn, protesters shoved, some bloodied.
www.amnesty.org/zh-hans/documents/eur45/0273/2025/en/
Video footage supported at least some of Amnesty's report.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZQGFrqCf5U&t=1283s
The two narratives were irreconcilable, but only one carried the weight and authority of the state.
The entire event unfolded as political theatre. The government proscribed a group, thereby creating a new crime. Protesters, convinced the law was unjust, announced their intent to commit that crime peacefully. The police, forewarned, staged a vast operation. Each side acted out its script. The spectacle allowed the state to present itself as defending order against extremism — while in reality silencing dissent.
The Humanitarian Context: Why Protesters Risked All
To see the Parliament Square protest as a parochial dispute over free speech is to miss its driving force. The demonstrators were not there merely to defend abstract principles. They were responding to what they, and a growing body of international experts, describe as a genocide in Gaza.
By September 2025, Gaza had descended into almost total collapse. Over 63,000 Palestinians had been killed, the majority of them women and children. More than 150,000 had been injured, many maimed for life. Entire neighbourhoods had been flattened.
Famine was confirmed in August, with Israel continuing to impose and even tighten deliberate restrictions on food, water, and fuel, a strategy condemned by human rights groups as a major war crime. Hospitals lay in ruins. Ninety percent of the population had been displaced.
It is in this context that the term genocide has been applied. Legal scholars point not only to mass killings but also to the deliberate infliction of life-destroying conditions, accompanied by rhetoric from Israeli officials dehumanising Palestinians as “human animals.” In September 2025, the International Association of Genocide Scholars declared that Israel’s actions met the legal definition of genocide.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cde3eyzdr63o
Major NGOs, UN experts, and even Israeli human rights groups such as B’Tselem echoed that conclusion.
For the protesters, then, the question was not abstract but immediate: faced with what they saw as a genocide, could they in good conscience remain silent while their own government criminalised resistance to it? Their answer was to risk arrest, their placards making the moral connection explicit: opposing genocide meant supporting those who sought to stop it.
The Price of Dissent
The mass arrests in Parliament Square were not an isolated incident of law enforcement. They were the product of a broader trajectory: escalating tactics by a direct-action movement, a humanitarian catastrophe abroad, and a government determined to suppress dissent at home through the bluntest of instruments.
The official line insists that Palestine Action’s campaign constituted terrorism and thus warranted proscription. On this view, the arrests were simple enforcement of the law. Yet this account obscures the deeper reality: a precedent in which the state redefined non-lethal protest as terrorism, shifting from punishing actions to criminalising expressions of solidarity.
The cost is profound. Once speech and conscience themselves become suspect, dissent is no longer tolerated but pathologised. The chilling effect is already evident: individuals weigh not just whether to join a protest, but whether uttering support might expose them to years in prison. Terror laws, originally justified as a shield against mass violence, are recast as tools of political management.
The protesters understood this. That “thousand-yard stare” captured in their faces was not only the weight of potential arrest, but the knowledge of Gaza’s devastation, the famine and rubble, the deaths mounting daily. It was also the recognition that their own government had chosen to silence them rather than address its complicity.
In a functioning democracy, the question is not why citizens risk arrest for holding a handwritten cardboard sign. It is why a state finds it necessary to treat that act as a terror offence. The answer reveals a narrowing of democratic space, where conscience itself is deemed subversive. And that narrowing, history teaches, carries consequences not just for those arrested, but for the society that allows it.
Candid street shot, Hoi An Vietnam.
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Candid shots don't give your subject time to compose themselves. So sometimes you get this sort of Mid-sentence look.
Kim Gore cries in Judge Robert Freehill's courtroom at the Orange County Courthouse in Goshen, NY on Friday, July 16, 2010. Gore is the Cuddebackville, NY woman who was convicted in March on aggravated vehicular homicide and second-degree manslaughter resulting from the crash which killed her 3-year-old daughter Sierra Gore in June 2009. She was sentenced by Judge Freehill to 8 1/3 to 25 years on the aggravated vehicular homicide conviction and 5 to 15 years on the manslaughter conviction, to be served concurrently. Gore was high on cocaine at the time of the crash. CHET GORDON/Times Herald-Record
Washington, D.C. (est. 1790, pop. ~690,000)
• Ford’s Theatre, site of assassination of U.S. President Abraham Lincoln
• theater’s site previously occupied by First Baptist Church of Washington (1834) [photo] • services held until 1859 • John Thompson Ford, Baltimore theatrical manager, leased the church bldg., converted it into a theatre • inaugurated Dec., 1861 as The "George Christy Opera House," presenting popular blackface troupe, Christy’s Minstrels
• following their final performance 27 Feb., 1862, further renovations made for presentation of theatrical (rather than musical) plays • 3 wks. later venue, renamed “Ford’s Atheneum,” entered Washington’s Civil War theater scene • presented excellent companies & first rate stars • Pres. Lincoln first attended Ford's on 28 May, 1862 • venue was profitable until the evening of 30 Dec, 1862, when it burned
• 2 mos.later, the cornerstone of a new theater was laid on this site by James J. Gifford, chief carpenter, architect & builder • the brick structure, modeled after the late Victorian design of Baltimore’s Holliday Street Theatre [photo], seated ~1,700 w/ 8 private boxes, two upper, two lower, located on either side of stage
• opened evening of 27 Aug., 1863 with “The Naiad Queen,” a "Fairy Opera" [photo] presented to a capacity audience • became one of the most successful entertainment venues in Washington —Ford’s Theatre, National Historic Site
• as Ford’s ventures prospered, a future competitor was making history • Mary Francis Moss was born, 1826, in Winchester, England • during childhood was a frequent visitor to the studio of "old man" J.M.W, Turner, the celebrated painter —The Life of Laura Keene [photo]
• married at age 18 to former British Army officer, Henry Wellington Taylor • 7 yr. marriage produced 2 daughters • husband was arrested for an undocumented crime, sent to Australia on a prison ship • to support her family, Mary Taylor became British stage actress Laura Keene, who made her professional debut in London, Oct., 1851 —Wikipedia
• in 1852, less than a year into her acting career, accepted an offer from impresario J.W. Wallack to travel to New York City, to audition for leading lady of the Wallack’s Theater stock company • became a popular star performer [photo] • began considering a move into an entrepreneurial role
• took over Baltimore's Charles Street Theatre, 24 Dec, 1853, w/ financial assistance from wealthy Washingtonian, John Lutz • managed it for 2 months, qualifying her as USA’s first female theater manager • Lutz became her business manager & by some unverifiable accounts, her husband, though she was still married to Taylor — Androom Archives
• moved to San Francisco & the Metropolitan Theatre [photo] • played opposite Edwin Booth, brother of John Wilkes Booth • toured Australia with Edwin, 1854
• by 1855 she had returned to NYC • retained architect, John M. Trimble, a theater specialist • the new theater, built to her specifications, was named the Laura Keene’s Varieties [photo], aka Laura Keene’s Theatre [photo], or Third Olympic Theatre • opened at 622 Broadway on 18 Nov., 1856 • managed by Keene until 1863 when she assumed the lease & took over D.C.’s Washington Theatre [photo] [ad] from lessee, manager & self-proclaimed “People’s Favorite Tragedian,” John Wilkes Booth
• in 1858, having returned to Laura Keene's Theatre in NYC, premiered Our American Cousin,” [script] a 3-act farce starring Laura Keene [photo], written by English playwright Tom Taylor, U.S./Canada rights owned by Keene • with a run of 150 nights, set new standards for New York theater
• synopsis: a coarse but honest American, Asa Trenchard, arrives at the British Trenchard estate to claim an inheritance as the last named heir • meets Lord Dundreary & other snooty relatives who are trying to keep up appearances & marry off daughters • servants gossip, villains emerge from the shadows, true love conquers all in the end, a farce satirizing pretension & manners —Helytimes
• this is the play Laura Keene chose for her 14 Apr., 1865 Ford’s Theatre engagement, a benefit & farewell performance [ad] for the beloved star [playbill] • “Our Leading Lady,” is a 2007 comedy inspired by Keene’s role in the events surrounding this performance
• Laura Keene would play her usual role as Trenchard’s wife, Florence • Harry Hawk [photo], a member of Keene’s NY company, was to play the boorish American, Asa Trenchard • the classic role of brainless aristocrat Lord Dundreary was given to Edwin "Ned" Emerson [photo], leading man in the Ford Stock Company, brother of a Confederate soldier killed in action in 1862 & close friend of John Wilkes Booth
"I knew John Wilkes Booth well," wrote Edwin Emerson, "having played with him in dozens of cities, throughout the East and Middle West. He was a kind-hearted, genial person, and no cleverer gentleman ever lived. Everybody loved him on the stage, though he was a little excitable and eccentric."
• while Ford's was presenting Keene's famous play, arch-rival Grover's Theatre aka Grover’s National Theatre, offered “Aladin and The Wonderful Lamp” • Leonard Grover advertised his theatre as the capital’s only “Union” playhouse, highlighting John Ford’s more “Secesh” (secessionist) sentiments • “Doubtless [Ford’s] personal sympathies were with his State and with that portion of the country in which he was born and reared.” —Leonard Grover
• according to Grover, during the four years of [Lincoln’s] administration, he visited his theater “probably more than a hundred times. He often came alone, many times brought his little son Tad, and on special occasions, Mrs. Lincoln.” The President also once told Grover, ”I really enjoy a minstrel show," • when Grover responded that Hooley's Minstrels [photo] were soon to appear, Lincoln laughed. "Well, that was thoughtful of you." • “[Lincoln] was exceedingly conversant with Shakespeare. He enjoyed a classical representation, of which I gave many” —Lincoln's Interest in the Theater, Leonard Grover
• the National’s policy of segregating blacks began when it opened in 1835 • a portion of the gallery was set apart for "persons of color" • it is not known how many black theatergoers were in the 5 Mar., 1845 audience for “Beauty & the Beast,” “Stage Struck Nigger” & the Congo Melodists, a Boston blackface minstrel group [photo], but Washington’s 7 Mar. “National lntelligencer” reported that the cause of the fire which had demolished the theatre on the 5th was "a candle without a stick left burning on a table by a negro...."
• although the Grover-managed version of the National also had its "colored parterre,” Ford's Theatre, excluded blacks entirely from its performances • the exclusion of black Washingtonians from public places in the nation’s capital helped secure the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1875 which, in 1889, the Supreme Court held unconstitutional. —The National Theatre in Washington: Buildings and Audiences, 1835-1972
• Mary Lincoln had tickets to Grover’s but preferred seeing Laura Keene in “Our American Cousin” • with little interest, the president said he would take care of the tickets • a messenger was sent to the theatre around 10:30 A.M. to secure the state box for the evening • the Lincolns’ son, Tad, opted for Grover’s, thus would not be with his parents at Ford’s that night
• General Grant accepted Lincoln’s invitation to join them in the Presidential box, but when Julia Grant objected to spending the evening with the sharp-tongued First Lady, he canceled • Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, Speaker of the House Schuyler Colfax & son Robert Todd Lincoln also declined before Clara Harris (1834-1883), daughter of New York Senator Ira Harris (1802-1875), and her fiancé, Major Henry Rathbone (1837-1911), accepted. —History Channel
The theatre as it appeared the night of Lincoln's assassination:
• the stage
• “Laura Keene was on stage with E, A. Emerson when the Presidents' party entered the theatre. As the party made its way, Miss Keene halted the play, Conductor William Withers [photo] led the orchestra in Hail to the Chief,'
and the audience rose and greeted the President with 'vociferous cheering.' President Lincoln came to the front of the box, acknowledged the reception, [set his silk hat on the floor], and the actors resumed where they had left off.
“The fatal shot was fired during the second scene of the third act. Laura Keene was standing in the first entrance (wing), stage right, facing the audience, awaiting her cue for the next scene
“On stage, just prior to the shooting, Mrs. Mountchessington was squelching Asa Trenchard: I am aware, Mr. Trenchard, you are not used to the manners of good society, and that alone will excuse the impertinence of which you have been guilty. (Exit)
“This left Asa Trenchard (Harry Hawk) alone on the stage… The audience was silent, expectantly awaiting the punch line from Asa. Miss Harris and Major Rathbone were ‘intently observing’ the scene on stage.The President ‘was leaning upon one hand, and with the other was adjusting a portion of the drapery‘ which hung at the side of the box opening. [photo]
“At this moment John Wilkes Booth stood silently in the shadows of the state box, four or five feet directly behind the President. Probably the last words heard by Lincoln were spoken by Harry Hawk:
“ASA: Don’t know the manners of good society, eh? Wal, I guess I know enough to turn you inside out, old gal — you sockdologizing old mantrap.
“The audience roared. Then penetrating the laughter was the distinct sound of a shot. A puff of smoke drifted from the box, and Major Rathbone “saw through the smoke, a man between the door and the President. He ‘instantly sprang toward him,’ but the assassin wrested from his grasp and slashed Rathbone with a dagger across the left arm. Meanwhile, Harry Hawk looked up from the stage to see a man, knife in hand, leaping over the balustrade of the President's box onto the stage apron. Fearing he would be attacked Hawk ran off the stage.’ Booth ran across the stage, [illustration] brushed past Miss Keene in the wings…
—Harbin, Billy J. “Laura Keene at the Lincoln Assassination,” Educational Theatre Journal 18, no. 1 (1966): 47–54
• Edwin Emerson: “…near the beginning of the third act… I was standing in the wings, just behind a piece of scenery, waiting for my cue to go on, when I heard a shot. I was not surprised, nor was anyone else behind the scenes. Such sounds are too common during the shifting of the various sets to surprise an actor. For a good many seconds after that sound nothing happened behind the footlights. Then, as I stood there in the dimness, a man rushed by me, making for the stage door. I did not recognize Booth at the time, nor did anyone else, I think, unless, someone out on the stage, when he stood a moment and shouted with theatrical gesture, ‘Sic Semper Tyrannis!' (So perish all tyrants!) Even after he flashed by, there was quiet for a few moments among the actors and the stage hands. No one knew what had happened.”—Find a Grave
• running from the stage Booth exited the building into Baptist Alley, a public alleyway laid out in 1792 • grabbed the reins of his horse & rode off, turning right on F Street to head for the safety of of the Maryland night
• James S. Knox, witness: “…The shrill cry of murder from Mrs. Lincoln first roused the horrified audience, and in an instant the uproar was terrible. The silence of death was broken by shouts of "kill him," "hang him" and strong men wept, and cursed, and tore the seats in the impotence of their anger, while Mrs. Lincoln, on her knees uttered shriek after shriek at the feet of the dying President.” —Library of Congress
• video: Charles L. Willis, J.W. Epperson eyewitness accounts of the assassination
• according to legend, Laura Keene rushed to Lincoln’s box w/a pitcher of water • cradled his head, staining her cuff w/ his blood.
• The Night Lincoln Was Shot: Minute-by-Minute Backstage With John Wilkes Booth at Ford's Theatre
“In the lobby of Grover’s, as Tad Lincoln awaited his parents' carriage to take him back to the White House, he learned that his father had been shot • Grover, who was in New York, received a telegram from his associate manager: President shot tonight at Ford's Theatre. Thank God it wasn't ours. C. D. Hess."
“[two doctors] now arrived and after a moments consultation we agreed to have him removed to the nearest house… I called out twice 'Guards clear the passage,' which was so soon done that we proceeded… with the President and were not in the slightest interrupted until he was placed in bed in the house of Mr. Peterson… During the night the room was visited by many of his friends. Mrs Lincoln with Mrs. Senator Dixon came into the room three or four times during the night. The Presidents son Captn R. Lincoln, remained with his father during the greater part of the night.
“At 7.20 a.m. he breathed his last and “the spirit fled to God who gave it… Immediately after death had taken place, we all bowed and the Rev. Dr. Gurley supplicated to God in behalf of the bereaved family and our afflicted country.” —Report on the Assassination of Abraham Lincoln by Dr. Charles Leale [photo]
• Secy. of War Stanton ordered guards posted at the building [photo] & future dramatic productions canceled • later that year, attempts by Ford to reopen the theatre aroused public indignation • War Dept. ordered it closed, Ford threatened legal action, federal government responded by leasing & later purchasing the bldg.
• American newspapers report the shocking news in a country still younger than some of its citizens
• Willie Clark, the Petersen House boarder who lived in the room in which President Lincoln died, wrote to his sister four days after Lincoln's death...
“The past few days have been of intense excitement. Arrests are numerously made, of any party heard to utter secesh sentiments. The time has come when people cannot say what they please, the people are awfully indignant. Leinency is no longer to be thought of. A new code must be adopted.
“They talk of the tyranical administration of Mr. Lincoln, but we have a man now for a president who will teach the south a lesson they will know well how to appreciate…
“…Everybody has a great desire to obtain some memento from my room so that whoever comes in has to be closely watched for fear they will steal something.
“I have a lock of his hair which I have had neatly framed, also a piece of linen with a portion of his brain, the pillow and case upon which he lay when he died and nearly all his wearing apparel but the latter I intend to send to Robt. Lincoln as soon as the funeral is over, as I consider him the one most justly entitled to them.
“The same matrass (sic.) is on my bed, and the same coverlit (sic.) covers me nightly that covered him while dying.
“Enclosed you will find a piece of lace that Mrs. Lincoln wore on her head during the evening and was dropped by her while entering my room to see her dying husband It is worth keeping for its historical value.
“The cap worked by Clara and the cushion by you, you little dreamed would be so historically connected with such an event.”
“They talk of the tyranical administration of Mr. Lincoln, but we have a man now for a president who will teach the south a lesson they will know well how to appreciate. — Remembering Lincoln
• Lincoln's death was not universally mourned by Northeners even though his decision to resupply Ft. Sumter forced the Confederates into firing the 1st shots, an attack that triggered anger, patriotism & widespread support from Northerners • nevertheless, some who thought him too dictatorial & some Radical Republicans who thought him too lenient toward the enemy welcomed his assassination • Congressman George Julian recorded in his diary that the “universal feeling among radical men here is that his death is a godsend” Michigan Senator Zachariah Chandler wrote to his wife that God had permitted Lincoln to live only “as long as he was useful and then substituted a better man (Johnson) to finish the work.”—History Channel
• In the 2 wks. following the assassination, hundreds were detained, questioned, & some imprisoned • nearly all the personnel at Ford’s (actors, stage hands, musicians, etc.) were arrested & questioned • John T. Ford was visiting Richmond the night of the assassination • he & 2 brothers spent 39 days in the Old Capitol Prison before being cleared & released
• the Old Capitol Prison [photo] gained an association with the Lincoln assassination when it lodged several (but not all) suspected Lincoln assassination conspirators who, by order of the Secty. Of War, wore cotton hoods —Smithsonian
.
• 5 days after the assassination, Laura Keene & 2 other cast members arrested in Harrisburg PA, returned to Washington & released by order of the Secretary of War the moment he heard of their unauthorized detention
• Louis J. Weichmann often stayed at the Surratt Boarding House, in contact with the Surratts, & John Wilkes Booth • arrested as a potential accomplice but became a star witness for the prosecution, his testimony helping to convict Mary Surratt
• Pres. Andrew Johnson & Secy. of War Edwin M. Stanton insisted on trying the conspirators before a nine-member military commission, where 5 of the 9 judges—rather than a unanimous vote like in a civilian trial—were required to establish guilt. 6 votes could impose the death penalty
• Federal authorities argued that because Washington, D.C., was a war zone in April 1865—Confederate troops were still in the field—the assassination was an act of war • opponents argued that a civilian court would allow for a fairer trial [photo]
• for 7 weeks in May & June 1865, nation’s attention riveted on the 3rd floor of Old Arsenal Penitentiary (now Fort McNair) [photo], where the alleged conspirators were on trial for their lives [photo]
• one of the first U.S. trials where “colored” Americans, e.g. Ford’s stagehand Joe Simms & cleaner Mary Anderson, were allowed to testify against white Americans in open court • their testimony was included throughout the trial —Ford’s Theatre
• accused were allowed by attorneys to question the 366 witnesses, but not permitted to speak on their own behalf —Ford’s Theatre
• All defendants found guilty, 30 June, 1865 • Mary Surratt, Lewis Powell, David Herold, & George Atzerodt sentenced to death by hanging [photo]
• Samuel Mudd, Samuel Arnold, & Michael O'Laughlen sentenced to life in prison • Ford’s stagehand Edmund Spangler sentenced to 6 yrs. in prison •all incarcerated at Fort Jefferson, off of Key West, Florida, pardoned by Pres. Johnson, 1869.
• following the assassination, [photo]Ford attempted to reopen on 7 July, 1865 but public outcry & threats forced him to cancel the performance, issue refunds & close the still-unfinished theater • bldg. seized July, 1865 by order of the Secretary of War
• interior torn out in August, 1865 • converted into 3-story office bldg housing the Army Medical Museum & Surgeon General • used for govt. purposes for several decades. —Ford’s Theatre National Historic Site
• 40-foot section of the facade collapsed from the 3rd floor, killing 22 War Department personnel, 1893 • alterations, including the facade, 1894 • building repaired, continued as government warehouse & storeroom until 1911 • vacant until taken over by Office of Public Buildings & Public Parks of the National Capital, 1928 • Lincoln museum opened 12 Feb., 1932, 123rd anniversary of Lincoln’s birth
• bldg. transferred to National Parks Service through executive order, 1933 —Ford’s Theatre, Washington, D.C.
• funding for restoration approved, 1964 • original building plans lost • relied on investigative work to extrapolate floor levels & wall locations from known “good” points in the building, w/ photographs & drawings providing supplementary detail • project supervised by Charles W. Lessig • restoration to its 1865 appearance completed, 1968 • theatre reopened 30 Jan., 1968 • following restoration, Presidential Box never occupied. —Ford’s Theatre
• externally west facade & north & south walls remain of the original theatre, although subject to modification, repair & remodeling over time • rear (east) wall, site of Booth’s escape door, is completely rebuilt—Restoration of Ford’s Theatre, Washington
• now a popular tourist destination & working theatre presenting a varied schedule of theatrical & live entertainment events • over 650,000 visitors/yr.
• Pennsylvania Avenue National Historic Site National Register # 66000865, 1966
• Ford’s Theatre National Historic site, National Register # 66000034, 1966
This photo is from the day we got partnered April 15th 2019. If it is possible, I am even more happy now than I was back then. You as a person Mun, have touched my soul and heart and made me a better person. Thank you from that my sweetheart. You are my daily dose of happiness even when it is at times limited to few sentences in a day ♥
Heavily inspired by Profound Whatever. I wish it were as neatly layed out, but I have neither his talent nor his graphics tools.
Alaa Abd El-Fattah has endured much of the last twelve years in some of the worst prison conditions anywhere for his brave work in promoting democracy in Egypt. He was last arrested in September 2019 while attending Cairo's Dokki Police Station and in December last year was sentenced to five years imprisonment for "spreading false news undermining state security." More precisely, he had shared social media posts explaining the hell-hole reality of Egyptian prison conditions.
PROTEST OUTSIDE THE FOREIGN OFFICE
When this photo was taken Alaa's two sisters, Mona and Sana'a Seif, were staging a protest in London's King Charles Street outside the British Foreign Office in the hope that the Egyptian government can be pressured to release him, as media attention began to focus on the upcoming COP27 conference at Sharm El Sheikh on Egypt's Red Sea coast.
UPDATE AS OF WEDNESDAY 9 NOVEMBER 2022
Starting from Sunday 6 November, Alaa escalated his hunger strike, and stopped taking water. His sister Sanaa Seif took a flight the same weekend to attend the COP27 conference at Sharm El Sheikh in a last-minute effort to save Alaa's life.
For the latest on Alaa's situation listen to his sister's Sanaa Seif's speech to journalists attending the conference on Tuesday 8 November - "They are very happy for him to die. The only thing they care about is that it doesn't happen while the world is watching."
www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqXibJ7PUTY
TORA PRISON - "A DAY HERE, IS LIKE A YEAR IN BELMARSH"
In April, Alaa began his hunger strike in a cell in one of the most secure sections of Cairo's sprawling and notorious Tora Prison - a maze of grim high concrete walls and watch towers, which strike fear into even the thousands of commuters who have to pass daily.
In 2012, one young Londoner confined to one of the least uncomfortable and most survivable wings of Tora prison, contrasted it with his own previous experience at Britain's high security Belmarsh. I can never forget his exact words. "A day here, is like a year at Belmarsh!" A little over 12 months later, he died of TB - the prison authorities had refused to listen to the pleas of his aunt, who fell on her knees during a rare visit, begging that he be admitted to the prison hospital.
ALAA'S HUNGER STRIKE CONTINUES AT WADI EL NATRUN PRISON
More than 200 days have passed since Alaa started his hunger strike. He has now been moved to the Wadi El Natrun prison complex in the desert north of Cairo, dubbed by inmates as the "Valley of Hell."
He may not survive much longer. However, as he holds British-Egyptian nationality, one would hope that the British government would be doing everything they could to secure his immediate release and it would be reasonable to suppose that the Foreign Office could get an immediate pledge in this regard, especially given that the British companies, including the likes of British Petroleum and BP, are the biggest investors in Egypt.
NO CONSULAR ACCESS
However, the British government have failed even to get him any consular access - think about that. That's an outrage. Even a convicted mass murderer, if British, would be entitled to consular access while in prison. That meeting would obviously not take place in his cell - but in a designated room in the prison or the highly supervised prison visiting area.
British men and women convicted of drug smuggling and other crimes in Egypt have received consular visits, so why not Alaa? The answer is because Alaa's crime is that he dared to tell the truth about Egypt, and the injustice both inside and outside its many prison walls. Nobody knows exactly how many political prisoners Egypt now has, but the number is estimated to be at least 60,000.
ALAA WAS ONE OF THE LEADERS OF THE MOST INSPIRATIONAL DEMOCRATIC REVOLT THE WORLD HAS EVER SEEN
Alaa Abd El-Fattah was one of the leaders of arguably the most inspirational democratic revolt the world has seen in the last hundred years. Although the first phase of the 2011 uprising in Egypt lasted just 18 days, and although it followed the toppling of the dictator Ben Ali in Tunisia - the streets and bridges around Tahrir Square became a deadly stage watched by the world, where protesters from every walk of life were pitted against Egypt's feared state security forces. Against all the odds, and at the cost of many lives, Egyptians refused to leave the square, sleeping in front of the tanks and fending off attacks from government militia.
The Egyptian people's initial success in toppling the dictator Mubarak led to further revolts not just across the Middle East (most notably in Libya, Bahrain, Yemen and Syria) - the highly organised Tahrir-Square sit-in provided the inspiration for strikes and workplace sit-ins against austerity across the United States and Europe and to the Occupy Movement of the same year. The people of Egypt showed that it does not matter how brutal, feared and authoritarian a government is, it can be toppled if people act collectively.
THE MILITARY BACKLASH
It's true that Egypt's flirtation with the path to greater freedom seemed to be only temporary - the Egyptian authorities deployed the usual divide and rule tactics - encouraging the less committed protesters to return home - and then rushed to elections without allowing time for genuinely democratic opposition parties to develop.
Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood won the presidential election in 2012 - the Brotherhood (contrary to the perception many people have here in the West) had genuinely progressive elements within it, but the chance for any transformative radical programme was prevented partly by the corruption and self-interest of some of the main political actors and partly by opposition to its democratic mandate from the deep state (the military, the Interior Ministry, State Security, the police etc.)
The army, seeing its chance, seized power in 2013, superficially in the name of the people, but in reality, to advance the interests of the generals. The new president, Abdel Fattah El-Sissi, moved quickly to crush all opposition, and ordering his security forces to attack Muslim Brotherhood supporters who had gathered in eastern Cairo at Rabaa al-Adaweya Square, killing at least 800 people - the bloodiest massacre of civilians in Egypt's modern history.
DON'T ALLOW EGYPT TO USE COP27 TO GREENWASH ITS REGIME - AND PLEASE SIGN THE PETITION TO SAVE ALAA
Now COP27 is scheduled to take place in Sharm El-Sheikh and Sisi has been given a golden opportunity to greenwash his murderous regime, which has also seen ever increasing levels inequality and corruption. While British representatives at COP27 will be given accommodation in the most luxurious five star hotels in Sharm El-Sheikh and fall asleep listening to the sound of the waves, another British citizen, Alaa Abdel El-Fatah is near death, on a painful hunger strike in the darkest of places - his dimly lit cell. The only thing he might hear at night is the desperate cry from some prisoner in another cell appealing for medical help which most likely never comes.
If we care for freedom, real democracy and justice, we can't allow the British Foreign Office to forget Alaa - especially if it's simply not to upset the highly profitable relationship British multinationals have with one of the world's most authoritarian and corrupt regimes - a relationship which only benefits the wealthiest of Egyptians.
If you live in London, please show your support at the protest at King Charles Street - and wherever you live please sign the petition -
www.change.org/p/help-free-my-brother-before-it-s-too-lat...
Charles Burns was sentenced to 3 months at Newcastle City Gaol for the crime - false pretences.
Age (on discharge): 19
Height: 5.5
Hair: Dark
Eyes: Hazel
Place of Birth: Liverpool
Status: Single
Occupation: Miner
These photographs are of convicted criminals in Newcastle between 1871 - 1873.
Reference:TWAS: PR.NC/6/1/1253
(Copyright) We're happy for you to share this digital image within the spirit of The Commons. Please cite 'Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums' when reusing. Certain restrictions on high quality reproductions and commercial use of the original physical version apply though; if you're unsure please email archives@twmuseums.org.uk.
To purchase a hi-res copy please email archives@twmuseums.org.uk quoting the title and reference number.
Convicts sentenced to hard labour at Folkingham House of Correction could expect back-breaking toil on the treadwheel or the crank. The power generated by these devices was sometimes used to grind flour or pump water ─ but the main function was the punishment.
Shot through thick, cloudy glass. Played with it in photoshop. The face came out decent There is noise on shoulder area. I just thought he looked so sad in his confined living quarters.
This is a creative commons image, which you may freely use by linking to this page. Please respect the photographer and his work.
[This set contains 8 photos] The J. Sidna Allen house (1911) in Fancy Gap, Virginia is a timber frame one-and-a-half-story Queen Anne on a brick foundation. Diamond-shaped shingles cover the upper portion of the building, and ornamental wood trim abounds. It has a cross-gable slate roof intersected by dormer windows and a hexagonal tower capped by a cone. The roof line is complex as a result of the dormers and tower. The Eastlake brackets and scalloping in the cornices correspond to the brackets and flat drops of the porch (best seen in image #6). The front gable roof and front dormer roof ridges formerly had a pattern of iron cresting them, which I assume will appear on the restored structure. There are two exterior brick chimneys and an interior one, each capped with a stone course, four stone insets and corbelled brickwork at the top.
The porch has a shed roof with shingles, brackets and scalloping; at one corner is a gazebo with a conical slate roof and a banquet of wood decoration. Above the front entrance, and connected to a door in the tower, was a balcony (missing at this time in the restoration process). The porch support columns and turned balusters are also currently missing. A small side porch on one side of the house shows a similar pattern of decoration. The entrance has sidelights and a rectangular transom. The molded trim, simulating piers, occurs as window surrounds as well. Most of the windows are temporarily covered: they originally were stained or leaded, many with intricate patterns. Some were 3-part, showing a classical Palladian influence. Some were decorated with a border of smaller colored panes in Queen Anne-style.
Steps led from the road up the hill to the front porch; at present, they are not there. It's easy to see the beauty of this home, even in its pre-restoration state by the Carroll County Historical Society. Architecturally significant, the J. Sidna Allen House was placed on the National Register of Historic Places July 15, 1974 with ID # 74002112
Allen and his wife, who designed their own home, enjoyed it for about a year before the state of Virgnia confiscated the property. Then occurred the Hillsville Massacre of 1912 involving the Allen family in a melee where the judge and some county officials were killed. Sidna Allen was sentenced to life imprisonment; two members of his family were executed. A superb discussion on the Hillsville Massacre and its cast is found at theroanoker.com/interests/history/hillsville-massacre .
An article about Sidna's brother Floyd and the family and trial is at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floyd_Allen
An article on the restoration of the house is at www.thecarrollnews.com/news/4668/undoing-revisionist-history
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License
“One may have a blazing hearth in one's soul and yet no one ever came to sit by it. Passers-by see only a wisp of smoke from the chimney and continue on their way.” ― Vincent van Gogh
Sentenced to 3 months, Catherine Kelly was found guily of stealing bed linen and was sent to Newcastle Gaol.
Age (on discharge): 17
Height: 5.1
Hair: Brown
Eyes: Grey
Place of Birth: Nottingham
Married or single: Single
These photographs are of convicted criminals in Newcastle between 1871 - 1873.
Reference:TWAS: PR.NC/6/1/1260
(Copyright) We're happy for you to share this digital image within the spirit of The Commons. Please cite 'Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums' when reusing. Certain restrictions on high quality reproductions and commercial use of the original physical version apply though; if you're unsure please email archives@twmuseums.org.uk.
To purchase a hi-res copy please email archives@twmuseums.org.uk quoting the title and reference number.
Warning: Nonsense and intentional use of run-on sentences below!
Oh and please remember... English: It's like a second language to me!
That's a joke. It's my only language.
Join the resurgence. This means you!
If you have ever had any inkling of toying with film, if you've been considering it for some time or even have had the briefest, slightest notion that maybe, just maybe there is a world outside of the discrete cosine transform used in JPeg compression. If you've even ever been a little bored with digital, now might be the time. You can do both you know, I do. As do many, many others who know a hell of alot more about it than me. My stronghold here as an amateur is enthusiasm and if you work with film you're going to need it. Because it will...
Piss...
You...
Off....
But it's worth it. Trust me.
Both work in different ways, film and digital. You don't have to be exclusive! Your digital camera won't lash out and slap you and then storm out of the house taking the kids and the Duran Duran albums with it. O.K. Yours might but mine didn't.
Perhaps as of late you find yourself researching (also known as shopping) for the latest and greatest High Megapixel, Super Duper Multiadjustable, Fast Returning, Finely Alternating, Double Jointed, with Nicely Burled Fleece Lined Twin Frequency Drives and Twirling Fosinators of a Dreamy Delight of An SLR Point and Spray camera. If you find yourself tinkering post production for endless hours at the computer screen adding various filters and effects until your bloodshot eyes vibrate then cross, and your nose flares then drips onto your keyboard whilst your other hand that has fallen asleep holding that chocolate milk relaxes just enough to slip from your fingers hitting the cat who growls and screams and jumps from your lap scratching both your thighs causing you to hemorrhage profusely and the heightened ability to create and combine like never before new four letter words until the climactic point it where it sounds like a disgruntled Romulan who just lost an eye in a game of Lawn Jarts - trying desperately to refine that capture you made - that capture that took all of 13 seconds as you sprayed the 360 degree horizon with the shutter button held at 3 foot pounds at 5 frames per second - filling that 32Gb SD card with juicy juice Raw Files we all so love (No offence- I've done this) - as you drop to one knee with hand on heart and pray to the Lord above and All THAT IS HOLY for a shot worthy of all your wishes and dreams and worthy of an upload then ---
NOW IS THE TIME TO DO IT.
Perhaps anyway. Or not, who knows? What? Me panic?
I say this NOT ONLY because I have just imbibed two , sorry, three vodka lemonades, but also because today I read that another of my favorite film manufacturers is CEASING PRODUCTION!!! I won't say who... But You Know Who You Are! Look, I like profit as much as the next guy but come on! Man! Dammit! I immediately got online and dropped 175 bucks on film. Just in cases. I am willing to bet whoever the CFO of this outfit is, is somewhere tropical and fancy, with a yellow or pink Polo shirt tucked into his khaki shorts and wearing black socks and docksider shoes, taking pics of his kids, and his mistress, on his yacht, with a 200$ Point and Shoot, while he snickers to himself... "Film is dead, film is dead! This is where it's at. Digital! Digital is the way and the light!". Look, if you don't like it and use it, for Gods' sake man, sell the company to someone that does! There are people out there who need film and lot's of it! Hungry, cold, tired people who just want a sandwich, I mean film. More film! That's right, It's an "artsy" thing. I can't completely define it. It's a "hurt so good" thing. Last week... When nothing came out and this was over exposed and that was under exposed and the other one was covered in dust, did I quit? No. I didn't, I said give me more please. Hit me again. Next time might be better.
And it was. Cause this week every single negative came out great, like never before, and I held them up to the bathroom light, cause it's unusually bright, and I was mesmerized. Mesmerized by the light that painted 12 moderately sized 6 cm squared images in a negative state of being onto my eyeballs, past my brain stem and down into my very soul. Beauty does exist! I exclaimed aloud to no one for I was alone.
And I had to wait to see if all the hard work that film requires paid off, I had to see, cause instant gratification and film don't mix see! One takes a picture and one waits. One doesn't view it on a 3 inch screen at 960,000 dots per square inch. One takes it and keeps it safe like Gollum would until he gets home to develop it. My precious. And I took them and scanned them and now they rotate one by one deep into the night on my computer screen for no one to see but me - or you - if I choose to upload them - which I may, soon.
So, I'm not expecting all film to instantly become a thing of the past, yet, but a reduction in makers and availability is clearly a symptom of the digital age and I do understand. Digital is easy. Digital is the cash cow. Kind of like cell phones. Every year there's a new one. Instant gratification. More, more, more. How many car companies, drug stores, do it yourself home improvement stores and banks do we need on any given corner? Yes I know, I know, online it's a global economy. Although locally - urban sprawl nearly follows me home at night. Convenient but ridiculous. The more successful company should eventually win out and our misfortune is a lack of choice and competitiveness which leads to higher prices and fewer options. Do we need 137 different makers of film? I don't know, probably not. Maybe we need only 20, maybe we can make do with fewer. But I would pay more for my favorite films, I would pay more for any film if the medium becomes so anorexic that there is little to no choice of style or selection. Camera makers only make money if we continue to buy whatever is their newest, latest release. Eventually the market will saturate, sales will drop, employees will be laid off. What then? Lens sales? Storage card sales? Not likely. I have a nice digital camera with the twin cams and the fancy center and I have a boat load of film gear, both are available online for never before prices. But the pendulum swings, the resurgence is here and time may be short. The pursuit of beauty doesn't go away, it's out there, it's always been out there, waiting for you, unattainable yet within reach. The impossible is happening even now as instant film struggles for a foothold. Color film, black and white, slide, negative, positive, paper, plastic, pinhole, 35mm, 6x6cm, 4x5 or 8x10. Sharp, dull, expensive, fast, slow, cheap, exciting? Yup. Always. Unexpected? Yup, that too.
So join in the excitement, join in the frustration, join in the resurgence, the more that do, the longer we have options. And more options means good.
Check out kickstarter!
tech:
1 minute 23 seconds at f45 which is pretty small but not as small as f64 which is really, really small (and kind of cool when you think of it), but that I didn't choose because I'm afraid too. There, I said it.
Graflex Crown Graphic with Schneider-Kreuznach Super Angulon 90mm lens
Arista EDU Ultra Black and White 4x5 film.
Developed in HC-110 at 1:150, stand for 1 hours.
A very slight levels tweak with Elements.
Negative scan.
This lady's name is Sonia.
When days slowly crawl into cloudy moods and cold temperatures, and the sentence "Winter is coming" is heard more often than not, a source of warmness and a splash of colour is something we feel instinctively drawn to, as photographers and human beings tired of grey hues and dull weather.
That would be the case for this woman who, working as a waiter for one of the restaurant/clubs in centric Plaça Reial, was clearly visible from the other side of the square with only a quick glance.
At first I didn't dare asking, and minutes later she was engaged in a lengthy conversation with a fellow waiter from a neighbouring business, so I took some time to circle the fountain and scout for other possible strangers, but nobody seemed to be more suitable than her. So I waited a bit more.
Eventually, as soon as she was available again, I jumped into her with a smile and asked if she could pause her job for a little while, and she gladly conceded me the privilege.
When asked about what she should do or where she should stay, I chose to place her against a rather symmetric background, between the porched archs of the square. Those were more suitable for a generous body portrait, covering her red trench coat, but when I tried a close up I realized the square itself lacked plain surfaces or neutral backgrounds, but I didn't want to move her to a dark area away from her workplace. I don't know if you'll find the umbrella and bokeh balls too distractive or not...
All in all, Sonia was very kind and gave me the couple of minutes I needed for the shots, apparently enough to make his work colleague a bit jealous because he'd never been asked for a portrait :-)
She gave me her email so I could sent her the pics (I captured her ring, which was massively awesome), but so far I've received no reply: unluckily it happens most of the time. Thanks for your time anyway!
This picture is #40 in my 100 strangers project. Check out the rest of the stranger street portraits in my project at the 100 Strangers Set or find out more about the project and see pictures taken by other photographers at the 100 Strangers Flickr Group page.
Forty Years On by Doreen Wallace
Probably the only post-apocalyptic dystopian novel ever to be set in the Isle of Ely.
Before I start on my travels, I will write a short account of my life before and after the cataclysm, for the interest of students of history in the Isle; for we are still fully educated and there is no reason why literacy should perish. (opening sentence)
Forty Years On was published in 1958. It is set after a nuclear war. The year is 1960, and the Russians have bombed England. The city of Ely and part of the Isle have survived, but are now completely cut off from the rest of the world by the flooded, radioactive Fens. The narrator records the birth and growth of a new kind of society in the Isle, culminating in the year 2000 when, as an old man, he sets off on horseback to discover what has happened to the rest of England.
I first became interested in Doreen Wallace's books after researching the Suffolk fascist Ronald Creasy, who had been elected as the British Union of Fascists councillor for Eye shortly before the Second World War. The Blackshirts were very strong along the Suffolk/Norfolk border, not least because of the local resentment at the Church of England imposing tithes, a kind of production tax, on farmers.
Doreen Rash (Wallace was her maiden name) was the wife of a farmer at Wortham, Suffolk. She had been born in Cumbria in 1897, became a supporter of the suffragette movement and was a brilliant scholar at Oxford, but her friends were dismayed when she married Roland Rash and moved to a remote East Anglian village. However, during her life she would publish fifty-four books, forty-five of which were novels.
The Rashes owned a farm which was subject to heavy Church of England tithes, but in common with many local small landowners they were non-conformists. The local Conservatives, always strong in East Anglia, supported the Church, and so without any political voice the Rashes and others took the law into their own hands. They withheld their tithes and were taken to court.
The British Union of Fascists took up the tithe-withholders' cause. They arrived in Suffolk to defend the farms by force against the bailiffs, who had to be recruited from the north of England as no local firms were prepared to take on the job. Famously, there was a standoff and a pitched battle between the police trying to impose the seizure of goods and the blackshirts defending the farms. Many blackshirts were arrested. A memorial to the battle still stands a few hundred yards to the west of Wortham church at the old entrance to Wortham Manor Farm.
Although not a prominent member of the British Union of Fascists, Doreen Wallace appeared on their platforms arguing against the tithes and seizures. Probably her most famous book, The Tithe War, was published by the left-wing Victor Gollancz press in 1934. Her activities, and those of another Norfolk-based writer and sympathiser with the blackshirts, Henry Williamson, author of Tarka the Otter, meant that there was much local enthusiasm, which contributed to Ronald Creasy being elected as a councillor.
In the years after the War, Wallace's novels were popular for their descriptions of East Anglian rural life, especially among the poor, and her sense of place, which owes more than a little to her champion Henry Williamson.
But as with Williamson, Doreen Wallace's national socialist political obsessions were not left behind in the 1930s. Again and again in her novels she railed against the power of International Money, which she saw as inimical to the lives of ordinary working people, and she regularly opposed organised religion as inadequate to convey the true transcendence of the divine, preferring a nature and land-based mysticism.
She attacked social inequalities faced by women, and although many of her books are romances they always feature strong women. And again and again, she described the harsh lives of the East Anglian rural poor.
Although Forty Years On owes something to Richard Jefferies' 1885 novel After London (Williamson was a great fan of Jefferies, and probably introduced Wallace to his work), the society she creates in a post-apocalyptic Isle of Ely has many echoes of Oswald Mosley's speeches and writings of the 1930s with its ideas about the need for authoritarian rule, eugenics, state corporatism and utopian socialism. As the poet Philip Larkin observed of his own father, Doreen Wallace was one of those people whom democracy did not suit.
Doreen Rash, née Wallace, died in Diss, Norfolk in October 1989 at the age of 92.
In recent years, Doreen Wallace has become something of a feminist icon, although I suspect some are wary because of her political activities and opinions, which have to some extent been suppressed, and sometimes her history has been rewritten. Her entry on the Norfolk Library Service's Norfolk Women in History site describes her defence of Wortham Manor Farm as a confrontation with local blackshirts.
Av. Mª Cristina - Barcelona (Spain).
Barcelona Harley Days: 18-19-20 Jun 2010.
Better seen in Fluidr.
Se ve mejor en Fluidr.
Love finished. The Spanish State finally does not accept the wish of the Catalan people approved by General Court and authenticated by himself in the ballot boxes.
Se acabó el amor. El Estado Español finalmente no acepta la voluntad del pueblo catalán aprobada por las Cortes Generales y refrendada por él mismo en las urnas.
ENGLISH
The Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia provides Catalonia's basic institutional regulations. It defines the rights and obligations of the citizens of Catalonia (Spain), the political institutions of the Catalan nationality, their competences and relations with the rest of Spain and the financing of the Government of Catalonia.
This Law was approved by referendum 18 June 2006 and supplants the Statute of Sau, which dated from 1979.
Catalonia is an Autonomous Community within the Kingdom of Spain, with the status of historical region in the Spanish Constitution of 1978. In September 2005, the Parliament of Catalonia approved the definition of Catalonia as a 'nation' in the preamble[4] of the new Statute of Autonomy (autonomous basic law). The 120 delegates of all parties (CiU, PSC, ERC, ICV-EA) with the exception of the 15 delegates of the Partido Popular approved this definition. In the opinion of the Spanish Government this has a 'declaratory' but not a 'legal' value, since the Spanish Constitution recognises the indissoluble "unity of the Spanish Nation".
The Generalitat de Catalunya is the institution in which the self-government of Catalonia is politically organised. It consists of the Parliament, the President of the Generalitat and the Executive Council or Government of Catalonia.
The Statute of Autonomy gives the Generalitat of Catalonia the powers which enable it to carry out the functions of self-government. These can be exclusive, concurrent and shared with the Spanish State or executives. The Generalitat holds jurisdiction in various matters of culture, education, health, justice, environment, communications, transportation, commerce, public safety and local governments. Catalonia has its own police force, the Mossos d'Esquadra, although the Spanish government keep agents in the region for matters relating to border control, terrorism and immigration.
Most of the justice system is administered by Spanish judicial institutions. The legal system is uniform throughout Spain, with the exception of so-called "civil law", which is administered separately within Catalonia.
The Statute has been legally contested by the surrounding Autonomous Communities of Aragon, Balearic Islands and the Valencian Community, as well as by the Partido Popular (the main opposition party at the Spanish Parliament). The objections are based on various topics such as disputed cultural heritage but, especially, on the Statute's alleged breaches of the "solidarity between regions" principle enshrined by the Constitution in fiscal and educational matters. The Constitutional Court of Spain is currently assessing the constitutionality of the challenged articles and its binding assessment is expected sometime in 2010.
The Catalan political arena has largely viewed this debate as a sort of cultural war waged by "Spanish nationalists" (espanyolistes in Catalan). In response, four of the six political parties represented at the Catalan parliament--Convergence and Union, the Catalan Socialists, Republican Left of Catalonia, and Catalan green party--reached an agreement to fight together at the Spanish Senate to reform the Constitutional Court of Spain, and hopefully nullify the possibility of an overturn of the Catalan Statute of Autonomy. This pact is particularly interesting because, aside from the fact that they all pertain to various degrees of Catalan nationalism, the four parties differ greatly in political ideology, and together, they form nearly 80% of the Catalan Parliament.
The June 28 of 2010, the Constitutional Court, in view of the resource of unconstitutionality presented by deputies of the Popular Party, and after 4 years of controversial deliberations, solved by 6 votes to favor and 4 against the constitutionality of most of the text, doing to observe the “legal inefficiency” of the Introduction (where the term consisted nation when talking about Catalonia) although the failure it maintains the definition of Catalonia like nation, and declared 14 inconstitucionales articles.
These articles treat about the language, the managing organs and judicial organs of the Generalitat of Catalonia, on competences in the matter of bank, savings banks and insurance and on the level and calculation of the participation of Catalonia in the yield of the state tributes and equilibrators and solidarity, that is, the basic axis of the self-government of Catalonia.
More info: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statute_of_Autonomy_of_Catalonia
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CASTELLANO
El "Estatuto de Autonomía de Cataluña" es la norma institucional básica de Cataluña que las Cortes Generales de España han aprobado en 1932, 1979 y 2006 para otorgar la autonomía y fijar los márgenes del autogobierno de este territorio. El Estatuto de autonomía de 2006 fue aprobado por las Cortes Generales y posteriormente refrendado por los ciudadanos de Cataluña el 18 de junio de 2006. Incluye, entre otros aspectos, el sistema institucional en que se organiza la Generalidad de Cataluña, las competencias que le corresponden y su tipología, derechos y deberes de los ciudadanos, el régimen lingüístico, las relaciones institucionales de la Generalitat y la financiación de la Generalidad.
El 21 de enero de 2006, el Presidente del Gobierno de España, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero y el jefe de la oposición de Cataluña, Artur Mas llegaron a un preacuerdo sobre la definición de Cataluña en el nuevo Estatuto y sobre el modelo de financiación. El nuevo Estatuto de Cataluña fue aprobado en el Congreso de los Diputados el 30 de marzo de 2006, tras lo cual fue remitido al Senado, que lo aprobó en la Comisión General de Comunidades Autónomas el 5 de mayo de 2006 y en el pleno el 10 de mayo de 2006. En la votación final, el texto contó con el apoyo de todos los grupos políticos, salvo del PP, que votó en contra, y con la abstención de ERC.
Tras entrar en vigor el 18 de junio de 2006, el Estatuto fue recurrido por considerarlo inconstitucional en siete ocasiones por siete instancias distintas: el Partido Popular a través de la firma de sus diputados y senadores contra 187 artículos y disposiciones ; el Defensor del Pueblo contra 112 artículos y cuatro disposiciones adicionales, y cinco comunidades autónomas (Comunidad de Murcia, contra el artículo 117, La Rioja contra 12 artículos y siete disposiciones adicionales, Gobierno de Aragón contra una disposición adicional, Generalidad Valenciana contra ocho artículos y cuatro disposiciones transitorias, Gobierno de las Islas Baleares contra lo que establece el Estatuto sobre el Archivo de la Corona de Aragón).
El 28 de junio de 2010, el Tribunal Constitucional, ante el recurso de inconstitucionalidad presentado por diputados del Partido Popular, resolvió por 6 votos a favor y cuatro en contra la constitucionalidad de la mayor parte del texto, haciendo observar la "ineficacia jurídica" del Preámbulo (donde constaba el término nación al referirse a Cataluña) aunque el fallo mantiene la definición de Cataluña como nación, y declaró 14 artículos inconstitucionales.
La ponencia fue redactada finalmente por la Presidenta, María Emilia Casas, y la votación se realizó por bloques: el primero respecto al Preámbulo, en la que se resolvió por 6 votos a favor y 4 en contra mantener el término nación, si bien se advirtío de su falta de eficacia jurídica, ya que no forma parte del texto normativo; el segundo bloque afecto a los artículos a declarar inconstitucionales, siendo una mayoría de 8 magistrados contra 2 los que han votado por la inconstitucionalidad de 14 de ellos; los otros dos bloques, que eran los preceptos ajustados a la Constitución y la interpretación de los artículos sobre los que existía conformidad, fueron avalados por 6 votos a cuatro. Cuatro de los magistrados, pertenecientes al denominado sector conservador, manifestaron que presentarían un voto particular: Ramón Rodríguez Arribas, Jorge Rodríguez Zapata, Vicente Conde y Javier Delgado.
El Tribunal Constitucional declaró 14 artículos inconstitucionales: el artículo 6 sobre lengua y nombres cooficiales, el 76 sobre el carácter vinculante de los dictámenes del Consejo de Garantías Estatutarias, el 78 sobre algunas funciones del Síndico de Agravios de Cataluña, el 95.5 sobre el Presidente del Tribunal Superior de Justicia de Cataluña, el 97, 98, 99, 100 y 101 sobre el Consejo de Justicia de Cataluña, el 111 sobre las competencias compartidas entre el Estado y la Generalidad de Cataluña, el 120.2 sobre competencias de la Generalidad en cajas de ahorro, el 126.2 sobre competencia compartida en materia de crédito, banca, seguros y mutualidades no integradas en el sistema de seguridad social y el 206.3 sobre el nivel y cálculo de la participación de Cataluña en el rendimiento de los tributos estatales y mecanismos de nivelación y solidaridad.
Más info: es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estatuto_de_autonom%c3%ada_de_Catal...
"Sentences" is a new project with Triplets (photo-philosophy.net/triplets/ )
From the journals of Raphael of Gannetgul, recorded during his time in exile.
“ I have walked for nearly two days now. My feet are raw and bloody, but my faith in Anora remains strong. This exile is a cruel death sentence. Though my people, my former kinsmen, like to believe themselves benevolent in their judgment they have a taste for the wicked. Beheading me for my supposed crimes would have been too swift for their liking, as would hanging. Even crucifixion would not have sated the detestable appetite of the fervent zealots. Instead, they saw fit to cast me out into this burning hell. To send me toward a slow and painful death that is as much meant to extinguish my physical form as it is my spirituality.
‘Heretics shall wander the endless sands, and by the Vastari they shall see the err of their ways.’ This is how the archaic law is written upon the moth eaten pages of the Tome of Judgment. A book my people supposedly abandoned nearly two centuries ago, yet here I am as evidence to the contrary.
I have been following the Myst Range due east. My parallel course with the sheer cliffs is a constant reminder of the odd geography of the Vastari Desert. The endless desert is like a bowl, bounded on the north by the Myst Range and the massive Gelder Peak to the east. To the west lies the Crimson Coast, a haven for marauding pirates and sea reavers. The south is where the only passage from this hell exists, and it only leads to a much fouler place… The Ruins of Mortia, the Kingdom of the Dead. The Vastari Desert teems with vicious life. Horrid slithering sand wurms, packs of blood-thirsty belgraks, and lumbering sand trolls all roam the ever shifting dunes. Not to mention the various orc tribes and warbands who will show no mercy to a lone traveler. More likely than not, thirst or hunger will kill me first in this oppressive oven of a landscape.
Up ahead, I see sun bleached banners and a glint of light in the distance. Underneath the rocky shade of the cliff. Ah, a skeleton, still wearing his sun-baked leather armor. What is that? A sword! Do my eyes deceive me, or shall this ghoul be my savior? The sword seems untouched by the ages! Not rusted nor dull. Surely Anora’s beneficent hand is behind this, delivering unto my hand from this corpse a blade of fine elven metal. I know not where you hailed from friend, nor of your once great quest, but know this… You are in Anora’s loving embrace now, and your sword… this blessed blade… shall continue to serve a righteous cause. Anora is with me, with this blade she has anointed me as her servant. Tomorrow I shall place this hero into a proper grave and continue on my way.”
For the entire story, click here... www.flickr.com/photos/10211834@N07/sets/72157635218437758...
For more information on the Vastari Desert, or to follow Raphael's progress... Click this link... www.flickr.com/photos/10211834@N07/9508632581/
Comments and feedback are always welcome!
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Locandina:
pad.mymovies.it/filmclub/2016/04/067/coverlg_home.jpg
variety.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/fiore_06.jpg?w=100...
www.nonsolocinema.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/MG_76...
amnc.it/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/perdialogocarcere_post...
www.italyformovies.com/film-serie-tv-games/detail/56/fiore
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click to activate the small icon of slideshow: the small triangle inscribed in the small rectangle, at the top right, in the photostream (it means the monitor);
or…. Press the “L” button to zoom in the image;
clicca sulla piccola icona per attivare lo slideshow: sulla facciata principale del photostream, in alto a destra c'è un piccolo rettangolo (rappresenta il monitor) con dentro un piccolo triangolo nero;
oppure…. premi il tasto “L” per ingrandire l'immagine;
www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards/winners-...
www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
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The municipality of Mongiuffi Melia (ME), not far from Taormina, is made up of two villages, Mongiuffi and Melia, separated by a valley, a bridge joins them, they climb up the opposite ridge of two mountains, looking at each other; in this municipality (defined as a "scattered municipality" for not having a single inhabited center), there are two patron saints, San Sebastian for Melia (his float was built with the money collected by Sicilian soldiers sent to the front, to fight in Greece during the Second World War, hoping in this way to receive His intercession to save their lives), and San Leonard di Noblac (or Abbot) for Mongiuffi; but in this municipality there is also the cult of the "Virgin Mary of the Chain", whose sanctuary attracts pilgrims from everywhere. I have made this description to introduce a singular coincidence that not everyone is aware of, and to do this it is necessary to describe the figure of Saint Leonard (a kind of Saint Francis), and that of the Virgin Mary of the Chain, trying to be concise. Saint Leonard was born in Orléans around 496 (and died in Noblac, on November 6 – the feast day – of 545 or 559), and for most of his life (very interesting) he lived as a hermit; one episode of his life in particular I would like to recall, he received from Clovis, king of the Franks, the privilege of being able to free those prisoners, who he believed had been unjustly imprisoned, so from that moment on, he incessantly committed himself to giving freedom to all those prisoners who were reduced to visibly critical conditions. Let us leave this Saint for a moment, the cult of the “Virgin Mary of the Chain”, this name given to the Blessed Virgin, derives from a prodigious event that occurred in Palermo in 1392, known as the “miracle of the chains”. In short, in August 1392 in Palermo, three men for a glaring miscarriage of justice, were sentenced to death by hanging, shortly before going up to the gallows a violent storm broke out, which forced the three unfortunates and the gendarmes to take refuge in the nearby church of Saint Mary of the Port, close to the sea, also called "Churc of the Chain" due to the presence of a chain that, when positioned, prevented the Saracen pirate ships from accessing the inside of the port; in this holy place, the three condemned, were tied with double chains, in the meantime the door of the church was barred, in fact the storm did not seem to stop and in addition night had come, clearly the execution was now postponed to the next day. The three desperate men, in chains, under the gaze of the gendarmes, approached the painting of the Madonna in tears, imploring her to intercede for them, a voice was heard coming from the painting, which reassured them of their new freedom, this while the chains broke, and the door of the little church was thrown open. From then on, the cult of the Virgin Mary of the Chain spread from Palermo throughout Sicily, and even beyond. Now let's get to the coincidences I mentioned before, both Saint Leonard and the Virgin Mary of the Chain (and also Her Child that She holds in Her arms) carry a long chain in their hands, in fact both the Saint and the Blessed Virgin have given freedom to prisoners, furthermore to access Mongiuffi Melia, coming from Letojanni, you have to pass through a tunnel, called "Gallery of Postoleone" dug in the rock in 1916, with bare hands or with pickaxe blows, as explosives could not be used, by 300 Austrian prisoners, during the First World War (and also on this occasion, in Mongiuffi Melia, there are prisoners forced to do forced labor). Finally, a curiosity, very often from the cult of the Virgin Mary of the Chain, comes a singular name, very common in these parts, both in the masculine with the name of "Cateno" and in the feminine "Catena" (to quote a well-known character, the writer Catena Fiorello). Furthermore, if it rains, whatever the religious procession-feast, with the float carried on the shoulders, the float with the saint does not come out, but if the rain arrives during the event, then the event becomes a source of strong psycho-physical stress for the devotee-bearers (not for the devotee-pullers or devotee-pushers...), as the ground made slippery by the rain (or perhaps, worse, by the presence of mud mixed with water) makes the route risky due to the possibility that one, or more, bearers, could slip, with the possible overturning of the float, and easily imaginable consequences.
The photographic story that I present here was created by assembling photographs taken on November 6, 2022, November 6 and 10 of this year 2024; the heart of the celebration-procession is when the priest hangs a large “cuddurra” (donut) on the hand of Sint Leonard, on that occasion small “cuddure” (donuts) are offered to the population (prepared by hand in the days preceding the procession); there are girls wearing a typical monk's habit-like dress, adorning their head with a veil, they belong to the congregation of the "daughters of Mary" (third order Carmelite); at the end of the procession, with the float that has returned to the church, we witness a rite that has the "affective" purpose of keeping it alive, it is done so as not to lose its memory, even if it has not lost its original meaning, what remains is now only a symbolic fact, it is the ritual of "weighing" (in some centers of Sicily, it has maintained its original meaning) a wooden board is placed "in balance" on one of the two beams that are used to carry the float with the Saint on the shoulders, at the two ends a child is placed on one side, and on the other side a sack with grain, filled until the weight of the grain reaches the weight of the child, and that grain will be given as a gift to the Saint, in reality the symbolic aspect of the procedure remains, and the donation is still made to the Saint, but in paper money.
Postscript: Our Lady of the Chain and Saint Leonard freed from chains, these as such, are not only physical, there are also psychic ones, and perhaps they are the worst….
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Il comune di Mongiuffi Melia (ME), non molto distante da Taormina, è formato da due borghi, Mongiuffi e Melia, separati da una vallata, un ponte li congiunge, essi si inerpicano sul crinale opposto di due monti, guardandosi l’un l’altro; in questo comune (definito “comune sparso” per non avere un centro abitato unico), si hanno due santi patroni, San Sebastiano per Melia (la sua vara fu costruita con i soldi racimolati dai soldati Siciliani mandati al fronte, a combattere in Grecia durante la seconda guerra mondiale, sperando così facendo di ricevere la Sua intercessione per avere salva la vita), e San Leonardo di Noblac (o Abate) per Mongiuffi; ma in questo comune vi è anche il culto per la “Madonna della Catena”, il cui santuario attira pellegrini da ogni dove. Ho fatto questa descrizione, per introdurre una singolare coincidenza della quale non tutti sono a conoscenza, e per far questo è necessario descrivere la figura di San Leonardo (una specie di San Francesco), e quella della Madonna della Catena, cercando di essere sintetico. San Leonardo nasce ad Orléans nel 496 circa (e morto a Noblac, il 6 novembre – giorno della festa – del 545 o 559), per gran parte della sua vita (interessantissima) visse da eremita; un episodio della sua vita in particolare desidero ricordare, egli riceve da Clodoveo, re dei Franchi, il privilegio di poter rendere liberi quei prigionieri, che egli riteneva fossero stati incarcerati ingiustamente, egli così, da quel momento, si impegna incessantemente a dare la libertà a tutti quei prigionieri che erano ridotti in condizioni visibilmente critiche. Lasciamo per un attimo questo Santo, il culto della “Madonna della Catena”, questo nome dato alla Beata Vergine, deriva da un evento prodigioso avvenuto a Palermo nel 1392, conosciuto come “miracolo delle catene”. In breve, nell’agosto del 1392 a Palermo, tre uomini per un eclatante errore giudiziario, furono condannati a morte per impiccagione, poco prima di salire sul patibolo si scatenò un violento temporale, che costrinse i tre malcapitati ed i gendarmi a riparare nella vicina chiesa di S. Maria del Porto, a ridosso del mare, detta anche “Chiesa della Catena” per la presenza di una catena che, quando posizionata, impediva alle navi pirata Saracene di accedere all’interno del porto; in questo luogo santo, i tre condannati, furono legati con doppie catene, nel mentre la porta della chiesa veniva sbarrata, infatti il temporale non accennava a smettere ed in più era subentrata la notte, chiaramente l’esecuzione era oramai rimandata al giorno dopo. I tre disperati, in catene, sotto lo sguardo dei gendarmi, si avvicinarono in lacrime al quadro della Madonna implorandola di intercedere per loro, dal quadro si udì provenire una voce, che li rassicurava sulla sopraggiunta libertà, questo mentre le catene si spezzavano, e la porta della chiesetta si spalancava. Da allora il culto per la Madonna della Catena si diffuse da Palermo in tutta la Sicilia, ed anche oltre. Veniamo adesso alle coincidenze di cui accennavo prima, sia San Leonardo che la Madonna della Catena (ed anche il suo Bimbo che regge in braccio) recano in mano una lunga catena, infatti sia San Leonardo che la Beata Vergine hanno dato la liberà a dei prigionieri, inoltre per accedere a Mongiuffi Melia, provenendo da Letojanni, si deve passare necessariamente da una galleria, chiamata “Galleria di Postoleone” scavata nel 1916 nella roccia, a mani nude o con colpi di piccone, in quanto non si poteva usare l’esplosivo, da parte di 300 prigionieri austriaci, durante la prima guerra mondiale (ed anche in questa occasione, a Mongiuffi Melia, si ha la presenza di prigionieri costretti ai lavori forzati). Infine una curiosità, molto spesso dal culto della Madonna della Catena, proviene un singolare nome, molto comune da queste parti, sia al maschile col nome di “Cateno” che al femminile, “Catena” (per citare un personaggio noto, la scrittrice Catena Fiorello). Inoltre, se piove, qualsiasi sia la processione-festa religiosa, con la vara portata in spalla, la vara col santo non esce, se invece la pioggia arriva durante la manifestazione, allora l’evento acquista per i devoti-portatori (non per i devoti-tiratori o devoti-spingitori…) un motivo di forte stress psico-fisico, in quanto il terreno reso scivoloso dalla pioggia (o magari, peggio, dalla presenza di fango misto ad acqua) rende rischioso il percorso per la possibilità che uno, o più portatori, possano scivolare, con il possibile ribaltamento della vara, e conseguenze facilmente immaginabili.
Il racconto fotografico che qui presento, è stato realizzato assemblando fotografie fatte il 6 novembre del 2022, il 6 ed il 10 novembre di quest’anno 2024; il fulcro della festa-processione è quando il sacerdote appende una grande cuddurra (ciambella) sulla mano di San Leonardo, in quella occasione piccole cuddure vengono offerte alla popolazione (preparate ed intrecciate a mano nei giorni precedenti la processione); sono presenti delle ragazze che indossano un tipico vestito “tipo saio di monaco”, adornando il capo con un velo, appartengono alla congregazione delle “figlie di Maria” (terz’ordine carmelitano); alla fine della processione, con la vara che ha fatto rientro in chiesa, si assiste ad un rito che ha lo scopo “affettivo” di tenerlo in vita, viene fatto per non disperderne la memoria, pur non avendo perso il suo significato originario, quel che resta è oramai solamente un fatto simbolico, è il rito della “pesatura” (in alcuni centri della Sicilia, esso ha mantenuto il suo significato originario) un asse di legno viene messo “in equilibrio” su di una delle due travi che servono a portare in spalla la vara col Santo, alle due estremità si pongono da un lato un bimbo/a, e dall’altro lato un sacco con del grano, riempito fino a quando il peso del grano raggiungerà il peso del bimbo/a, e quel grano verrà dato in dono al Santo, in realtà resta l’aspetto simbolico della procedura, la donazione viene ugualmente fatta al Santo, ma in cartamoneta.
P.S. La Madonna della Catena e San Leonardo liberavano dalle catene, queste in quanto tali, non sono solo fisiche, ci sono anche quelle psichiche, e forse sono le peggiori….
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Yes you might translate this sentence in different ways and you might get what I mean in the correct way or might not.
Let me explain my way and the reason I called this shot with the above title.
I was walking on the beach a few months ago to be honest looking around me and watch every single thing in that amazing place which is one of my favorite places that I go to and release what’s inside me and most of the time it makes me happy lets say.
That I got tired and I found myself a place to rest on the sand of purity this how I call it, Suddenly it caught my eyes this piece of rocks which was really near by me, the waves comes in silence and every time it leaves the rock alone there is a shape created.
At that moment I kept thinking, the wave couldn’t move the rock but it kept playing and moving the sand forcing it making different shapes.
At that moment I decided not to be the sand and be the rock and you should be the rock because these days its difficult to find someone who makes you feel that you are the rock while you are the sand.
Simply they will keep using you in different ways and sometimes they make you feel that you are a slave to them.
You being a boss doesn’t means that you should make your staff slaves, you being a policeman doesn’t means you should deal and treat everyone as they did something wrong and you should make them be afraid from you.
Never forget that you are stepping by your feet every on your family !!!
Yes you are stepping on them, you are stepping from what you are created from which is the SAND, imagine !!?!
ALLAH (God) created humans from sand and not from gold or silver, he created us from the dirtiest thing in this universe something that we step on everyday Why ?!?
Simply to make us remember what we are created from and not become selfish.
But unfortunately Some people they never think of this, all what they have in mind is that when money exists Power does, well they are totally wrong.
One day you are the boss and one someone will be yours.
Treat every single human being as a brother or sisters of yours, Am not saying criminals or bad people noo ,, I mean the poor people the lower class of yours, because we are all created from the same thing and you should know that nothing Stops the one who created to take you back at any time, when you never know, it might be in a second, minute, hour or days.
Watch your attitudes with people and remember what you are created from before its too late my dear.
Enjoy it.
How could I tell you what I hope. I already said about us finally being in a place where we could really be happy for each other, and it's not a lie. Trust me. Now, enough about me..but questions-How about you? How have you been? Why did you do that?-are not allowed so I just write sentences here left alone.
Sadly, all indications are that 2016 will be the last full year of trolleybus operation in Wellington.
Photoshopped image courtesy of Alan Wickens.
On 12 December 2015, nearly 200 countries, including New Zealand, signed an accord in Paris on climate change which focuses on nations using less fossil fuel and reducing their carbon emissions.
Yet in Wellington where they already have a perfectly good and relatively new efficient trolleybus system that is non-polluting and uses renewable energy, community leaders want to dump it in 2017 for more diesel buses.
The Greater Wellington Regional Council aspire to electric traction one day but for now see no future in what Wellington already has.
Couple that to the fact that weekends and generally evening services provided by Go Wellington, revert to motor bus operation, a half-hearted approach in Wellington “doing its bit” (little though it is) to show it is “clean and green”.
And so it is with great disappointment to announce that the GWRC met on 16 December 2015 where it was confirmed that trolleybuses will be phased out from the end of June, 2017.
The efforts of Generation Zero and their petition to Councillor Paul Swain, arguments from Councillors Sue Kedgely and Paul Bruce and many pleas from others for trolleybus retention cut no ice with the majority of the Council.
This announcement finally sounds the death sentence on Wellington trolleybuses.
"If New Zealand signed the recent Global Warming Accord to reduce greenhouse gases, why would Wellington do just the opposite in 2017 and increase greenhouse gases by replacing emission free electric trolleybuses with diesel buses?
Perhaps this question should be presented to the GWRC or better yet, the Prime Minister of New Zealand? Some one needs to knock some sense into the GWRC and their trolleybus abandonment plans", says one U.S. trolleybus enthusiast.
Our family friend, John, has what he calls his funeral suit. I suppose we are now reaching the point where I need one too. In fact, I have lost several friends, former colleagues from The Mob, something that will accelerate as the years pass.
Last week, I noticed that a friend of mine on Flickr, Günter, had not commented on any shots for a few weeks. He used to leave funny one sentence comments that almost always brought a smile.
The lastest shot on his photostream was of a fresh grave.
His.
Sadly, Günter passed away on New Year's Day, and his family posted this last shot to let the world know. Or his friends, anyway.
We had visited his and his wife in Bonn, and he had come to stay with us too, we share interests in railways, photography and beer.
It came quite a shock I can tell you.
Online, people come and go, mostly without fanfare or announcement. One day they are there, and then they're not. Did they just get fed up, or something more terminal?
Most of the time, we'll never know.
I am lucky in that I have met many online friends in real life, sometimes here in Kent, but also in the US too, so know they are more than screen names and photos, but real people with lives, who are pretty much as wonderful as thei online presence would have you believe.
Life goes on, of course, but I will miss Günter, and sad for the fact we will not raise beers in a friendly toast to each other.
We woke at half six, I went to the bathroom and looked out the window. Still too early for birds, but there wasn't a breath of wind either, nor any cars to be seen moving. So it looked like someone had paused time.
Cleo is perpetual motion, however, and coming downstairs revealed her to be always on the move until her food is placed just where she wants it.
I went to Tesco by myself, with a list as long as a long thing, while Jools stayed behind and fed the hungry washing machine two loads of dirty laundry. Good news is that Tesco was fully stocked with fresh produce, including rapsberries from Spain. We like them for breakfast at weekends, its a hard habit to break.
Back home to unload and makaid breakfast; fruit and yogurt followed by warmed croissants.
Jools said she had been sitting all week, so would not come with me to go churchcrawling, so I go on me tood, driving up the M20 to Maidstone, to revisit All Saints church, where I had not been for over 12 years. I had checked Google, and it said the church would be open from 10:00.
I timed it to arrive dead on ten. I parked the car opposite, and didged traffic to get over the main road, I went to the first door only to find it locked. But a sign suggested there were two more possible ways in, so walked round, checked the north door, and that was locked too. That only left the west door, under the tower, to try. That was ajar, so my hopes lifted. Only to find the inner door locked.
Maybe I was too early?
A lady came in, I asked about the church. She said she was a bellringer, and disappeared up the steps to the ringing loft, where sounds of poorly rung bells could be heard.
I went round the church one more time, ending back at the west door, and again all way in were locked.
Sigh.
But there was a runners up prize; a church on the edge of town, in what used to be a village, at Bearsted. THe sat nav told me it was just a ten minute drive away.
So, I drove across town, through the crazy one-ways system, out the other side and along to Bearsted, where there were ancient timber framed houses, so old they had settled over the centuries into strange angles, none of which were right ones.
I found church lane, which wound its way through a modern housing estate, parked outside the chuchyard, and I could see a nice "church open" sign before I got out.
Although it looked spendid from the outside, inside it had been reordered at least twice, so that any ancient features were well hidden indeed. Even the glass, usually a rescuing act for over restored churches, were either just average or poor here. But it was my first visit here, so another tick in the box.
I now had to get home, as Jools is joining the speaking ciruit, as a lady has asked Jools to lead classes in beaded jewellery making.
I hightailed it back to the motorway, and once on, settled down to cruise back down to Dover and home, getting back at half twelve, with an hour to spare before Jools had to leave for the class.
So, it was just me an the cats for a few hours. There was football to entertain me, so I sat beside Scully on the sofa and watched the Championship game while she dozed beside me.
At three, it was time to concentrate on Norwich away at Millwall, one of six teams above us, and a win here would put us back in the play-offs. It was an exciting game, Millwall took the lead, only for City to level before half time, and then score two more early in the 2nd half. Millwall plled one back in the last ten minutes, but we hung on to win 3-2.
Not perfect, but a win at the New Den where they had been unbeated since September. And then, along came Nodge.
Dinner was a rushed one of pizza and iced squash, as we were going out to a gig.
Lawrence was the singer in an indie band in the 80s called Felt. He then formed Denim, an ironic pop band for the 90s, which also stiffed. He now fronts Mozart Estate, which does a fine line in ironic pop. Still.
We drive over th Ramsgate, to a small venue called The Music Hall. We were early, but got in, and went to the bar where we chatted to a couple about our age about music. In fact, most folks were about "our age".
First up was a young female singer/songwriter, who strummed her guitar along to her 6th form poetry.
The hall, which was barley bigger than our living room was about 50% full, but comfortable. We went to find somewhere to sit, thinking that the bar would be empty, only to find it rammed with more people than when we left it half an hour before.
We went to get some air, and finding nowhere to sit, went to the car.
Jools was shattered and fell asleep, and I really did not feel like being rammed into that room unable to see the band, and not able to lean against a wall to rest my back.
I said we'd go home.
So we did.
I don't regret it.
We got back at ten, Jools went to bed, while I had a glass of sloe port.
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Holy Cross church stands to the south of the village green at the end of a cul de sac. Its noble tower is crowned with queer sculptures, slightly reminiscent of Alnwick Castle. The exterior has a nicely textured effect, but this leads to an unexpectedly clean interior - the result of much care and attention and recent reordering. Whilst it cannot pretend to be in the top league of Kent churches it offers a fine selection of 19th and 20th century glass and some fine wall tablets. West tower, nave, chancel, north aisle and chapel, south porch.
www.kentchurches.info/church.asp?p=Bearsted
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BERSTED.
BERSTED lies the next parish north-westward from Leeds. It was antiently written Bergestede, and most probably took its name from its situation, Berg, in Saxon, signifying a hill, and stede, a place or village.
THE PARISH lies mostly on what may be called high ground, a pleasant, and the greatest part of it a dry situation; the soil is in general a deep sand, though towards the south-west part it partakes of the quarry rock, and on the south side of the Lenham river a black moorish soil of fertile meadow ground. This river parts it towards the south from Osham, another smaller stream, which rises near Boxley, separates it on the western side from that parish and Maidstone, leaving within the bounds of it a part of the hamlet of Maginford. Besides the above, this parish is watered by two or three other smaller rivulets, which rise northward, and run here into the Lenham river, the easternmost of them separating it from Hollingborne and Leeds. The high road from Ashford and Lenham towards Maidstone, runs along the northern boundaries of it, passing over Bersted-green, the houses round which form the parish village, near it stands the church; besides this there are two other hamlets, called Ware and Roseacre-streets. In the south-east part of the parish is the seat of Milgate, pleasantly situated and wellcloathed with trees, at the back of which the ground descends to the river, and at a small distance that of Lower Milgate, so called from its lower situation still nearer the river.
A fair used to be held here on Holy Cross day, September 14, now by the alteration of the style, changed to Sept. 25, for pedlary, toys, &c.
The noble family of Bertie own this parish to have been their most antient habitation in this kingdom, for they are said to have possessed lands in it near the parsonage, at Strutton-street, and elsewhere in this neighbourhood, as early as the reign of king Henry II. and among the Harleian MSS. there is a grant of arms, anno 2 Henry VI. to Bartie, of Berested, in Kent; they continued here in king Henry the VIIth.'s reign, as appears by an antient rental of that time, and there are still lands, called Barty lands, in this parish and Thurnham; and from those of this name settled here, in a direct line was descended the dukes of Ancaster, now extinct, and from them the lady Willbughbye, of Eresbye; the earls of Abingdon, and other distinguished branches of this family claim their descent.
The manors of Leeds, Moathall, and Thurnham, extend over this parish, in which there is an estate belonging to the former of them, which has constantly passed through the same succession of owners, from the family of Crevequer, who were proprietors of it in the reign of William the Conqueror, to the Rev. Dr. Denny Martin Fairfax, of Leeds-castle, who is at present in the possession of it.
MILGATE is an eminent seat, situated in the southeast part of this parish, which was formerly esteemed a manor, though it has long since lost the reputation of ever having been one.
The family of Coloigne antiently possessed this estate; one of whom, Robert de Coloigne, died possessed of it in the 35th year of king Edward III. In process of time, his descendants came to be called Coluney; one of whom, Thomas Coluney, as appears by an old survey of Bersted, possessed it in the 14th year of Edward IV. Soon after which, that is, in the beginning of king Henry VII.'s reign, it was become the property of the family of Stonehouse, whose antient seat was at Haslewood, in Boughton Malherbe.
Robert Stonehouse, esq. was of Bersted, at the latter end of king Henry VIII.'s reign. His son, George Stonehouse, esq. was clerk of the green cloth to queen Elizabeth, and resided at West Peckham, where he died in 1575, whose eldest son William was created a baronet anno 4 Charles I. and Nicholas, the second, was of Boxley, in this county. He bore for his arms, Argent, on a fess sable, between three hawks volant, azure, a leopard's face, between two mullets, or. (fn. 1) In the beginning of the reign of queen Elizabeth he alienated this seat to Thomas Fludd, esq. afterwards knighted, who was son of John Fludd, esq. of Morton, in Shropshire, and bore for his arms, Vert, a chevron between three wolves heads, erased, argent; which coat, with his quarterings, was confirmed to him by Robert Cook, clarencieux, in 1572. He resided at Milgate, where he died in 1607, and was buried in this church, having considerably improved and augmented this seat. His son Thomas Fludd, esq. afterwards of Otham, succeeded him in this estate, which he alienated in 1624, to William Cage, of Farringdon, in Hampshire, barrister-at law, who resided here. He was bred at Lincoln's-inn, an utter barrister, and was descended from Richard Cage, of Packenham, in Suffolk. He bore for his arms, Per pale, gules and azure, a saltier, or, and a chief, ermine, which was an alteration from the antient arms of this family, viz. Azure and gules, over all a saltier, or; and, together with an addition to the crest, was granted to him by St. George, clarencieux, in 1624, (fn. 2) and in his descendants it continued down to Wm. Cage, esq. who was likewise of Milgate, and was sheriff in 1695, and represented the city of Rochester in several parliaments during queen Anne's reign. Of his sons, William died s. p. Lewis will be mentioned hereafter; and John was of Lower Milgate, esq. Lewis Cage, the second son, became at length possessed of Milgate, where he resided, and left one son Lewis, and a daughter Catherine, who married first, Mr. George Eastchurch, of Maidstone; and secondly Christopher Hull, esq. but died s. p. On his death, Lewis Cage, esq. his son, succeeded him in this seat, where he now resides.
He married Annetta, second daughter and coheir of Edward Coke, esq. of the White Friars, in Canterbury, by whom he had four sons; Lewis Cage, esq. of Lower Milgate, who married Fanny, eldest daughter of Sir Brook Bridges, bart. the Rev. Edward Cage, rector of Easling, who married Jane, second daughter of Charles Van, esq. of Monmouthshire; John, who died in the West-Indies unmarried in 1789, and the Rev. Charles Cage, of Cristmell, vicar of Bersted, who married Elizabeth, daughter of colonel Graham, and one daughter Catherine, as yet unmarried.
AT A SMALL DISTANCE westward from Milgate, there is a good house, called COMBES, alias LOWER MILGATE, which on the death of William Cage, esq. came to his youngest son John Cage, as before-mentioned, who died s. p. It is now the property of Mrs. Brander, the widow of Gustavus Brander, esq. and daughter of Francis Gulston, esq. by a daughter of William Cage, esq. Lewis Cage, esq. junior, at present resides in it.
MOAT-HALL is a manor in this parish, the mansion of which, from the materials with which it was built, was called Stonehouse. It antiently belonged to the neighbouring priory of Leeds, as appears by several old boundaries and papers, and was most probably part of those demesnes given to it at its first foundation, by Robert de Crevequer, in the reign of king Henry I. These demesnes appear by a rental of the time of king Henry VII. to have been held of the manor of Leeds, though they have been long since accounted parcel of this manor of Moat-hall.
On the dissolution of the priory in the reign of king Henry VIII. this manor, among the rest of the possessions of it, was surrendered into the king's hands, who afterwards, by his dotation-charter, in his 33d year, settled this manor, among other premises, on his new founded dean and chapter of Rochester, with whom it remains at this time.
The present lessee of it, under the dean and chapter, is Mr. William Usborne. There is a court baron held for this manor.
AT A SMALL DISTANCE southward from the church lies an estate called OTTERIDGE, formerly Oterashe, which in the reign of king Henry VIII. belonged to Simon Bertyn, one of the brethren of St. Bartholomew's hospital, beside Sandwich, who by will in 1530, devised it to Jeffry Merchant, of Rainham.
It afterwards came into the possession of the family of Munns, who continued possessors of it for several generations, till at length one of them sold it, with Aldington, in the adjoining parish of Thurnham, to William Sheldon, esq. whose descendant Richard Sheldon, esq. at his death, bequeathed it to his widow, and she re-marrying with William Jones, M. D. entitled him to it. He died in 1780, leaving by her two daughters; Mary, married to Lock Rollinson, esq. of Oxfordshire, and Anne, to Thomas Russell, esq. and they in right of their wives, are respectively entitled to it.
Charities.
SIMON BERTYN, one of the brethren of St. Bartholomew's hospital, near Sandwich, owner of Otteridge, in this parish, which he devised, together with his messuage called Buds, with its lands and appurtenances, in Allyngton, beside Thurnham, by his will in 1530, to Jeffry Marchant, ordered that the said Jeffry and his heirs male, should for ever yearly distribute, on the first Sunday of Lent, in the church of Berghsted, to the parish clerk there, and to other poor people, four bushels of green peas; that is to say, to every one of them, one peck.
EDWARD GODFREY, gent. of Thurnham, gave by his will in 1709, thirty shillings yearly out of lands in this parish, called Crouch field, for the schooling of poor children; half of them to be of this parish, and half of that of Thurnham. And he left 30s. yearly for the same use, to be paid out of an house called Rose acre, in this parish; the payment of which has been constantly refused, upon pretence, that he had no right to devise that charge on it.
The poor constantly relieved are about forty-five; casually twenty five.
BERSTED is within the ECCLESIASTICAL JURISDICTION of the diocese of Rochester, and deanry of Sutton.
The church is situated on high ground, at a small distance southward of Bersted-green. It is dedicated to the Holy Cross, and is a handsome building, consisting of two isles and two chancels, with a square beacon tower at the west end of it. On three corners of the summit of the tower, are the figures of three dogs, or bears sejant, for they are so defaced by great length of time, that they can but be guessed at. If they represent the latter, they might have been placed there in allusion to the name of this parish: if not, these figures might perhaps be the crest of the founder of the church. In this church in the Milgate chancel, are monuments for the Cage family, and for Robert Fludd, M. D. A memorial for William Godfrey, jun. in 1690; and for Elizabeth, daughter of Henry Bosvile, esq. of Bradburne, justice and clerk of the court of wards, married first to Edward Mabb, gent. of this parish; and secondly, to William Godfrey, of Bersted, yeoman, obt. 1614. In the porch, against the east wall, is a small monument for Stephen Mason, of Boxley, citizen and vintner of London, obt. 1560, arms, A thevron, between three tuns, or barrels.
There were some lands and tenements in this parish, given by several persons, who stiled themselves the fraternity of the Holy Cross of Bersted, for a priest to sing mass yearly for one quarter of a year, in this church.
The church of Bergnestede, with all its rights and appurtenances, was given in the reign of Henry I. by Robert de Crevequer, son of Hamo de Crevequer, junior, to the priory of Leeds, then founded by him; which gift was confirmed by Baldwin, archbishop of Canterbury, in the reign of Henry II. who then appropriated this church to the canons there, towards the finding of lights and ornaments in their church. Archbishops Theobald and Hubert confirmed it likewise, as did John, prior, and the convent of Christ-church, in 1278, by the description of the church of Berghestede, with the tithes of Strutton. King Edward III. likewise confirmed it by his charter of inspeximus in his 41st year.
This church, together with the advowson of the vicarage, remained part of the possessions of the priory of Leeds till the dissolution of it, in the reign of king Henry VIII. when it was surrendered up into the king's hands, among other estates belonging to it.
After which, the king, by his dotation charter, in his 33d year, settled both the parsonage and advowson of the vicarage of this church on his new-founded dean and chapter of Rochester, with whom they now remain.
¶On the intended dissolution of deans and chapters, after the death of king Charles I. the possessions of the dean and chapter of Rochester, in this parish, were surveyed in 1649, by order of the state; when it was returned, that the parsonage or rectory of Bersted consisted of a messuage, barns, &c. which, with the tithes and glebe land of forty acres, were of the improved rent of 46l. 8s. per annum, which were let anno 13 Charles I. at the yearly rent of 9l. 13s. 4d. and four bushels of malt, for the term of twenty-one years; and the lessee covenanted to discharge the pension of forty shillings to the vicar, and to repair the chancel of the church. Out of which lease was excepted, the advowson of the vicarage, and the portion of tithes called Vintners Portion.
The vicarage is a discharged living in the king's books, of the clear yearly certified value of thirty pounds, the yearly tenths of which are 12s. 9d.
In 1649, the vicarage was valued in the abovementioned survey at twenty pounds per annum.
The parsonage is leased out by the dean and chapter to Mr. John Packman, but the advowson of the vicarage they reserve in their own hands.
The vicarage is endowed with all manner of tithes, except grain, and the vicar now enjoys the abovementioned pension of forty shillings from the lessee of the dean and chapter.