What
motivates and inspires you? How do you avoid burnout?
SchNews
mp->> Here's a question: how do you
all avoid burn-out? What inspires you and keeps you going?
Jack->> Gardening on my allotment.
Ray->> Having other things to do other than SchNews,
actually. I think that's quite important.
mk->> Not letting it take over the entirety of your
life.
Ray->> Yeah, really.
Jack->> My allotment! We were going to have an article
in the SchNews book, "How to Avoid Burnout." We sat
there, and went, "Well, don't!"
mp->> Don't burn out? That's the only way?
Ray->> It's just friends doing stuff together, isn't
it, really?
Jack->> There is a real problem of burnout, though.
I reckon everyone should spend a couple of days outside, gardening
on our allotment.
Ray->> As we keep saying over and over, it's not
just serious stuff, either. Humor.
Amy->> Yeah, certainly, have a laugh, go down the
pub when we get bored.
Jack->> Right.
Amy->> Go down to the beach when it's too sunny
to be in the office.
Jack->> We go down to the pub, get a few beers in.
I do think it's just don't take yourself so seriously, and, I
think, take the piss out of everything. Well, obviously some
things are a bit too near the bone. I just figure, you got to
laugh at yourself and everything. That is one of the main problems
with political activists, they're up their own arse. And I know
'cause I was one of them, you know, vegan police. It's a stupid
way to get, 'cause you just fucking grind yourself into the ground.
But the stuff we're doing with SchNews Live, sometimes you think,
"Was this meant to be political?" They are just ultimate
piss-takes of everything, really, showing little videos of, say,
the geezer getting pied in the face. Humor gets some people involved,
so that's your way to avoid burn-out.
Ray->> Someone came to our training day a few weeks
ago, and since then we've had a letter back saying, "It
was amazing to meet you, and since then I've got a copy of your
book and got in contact with one of the groups on your contact
list, and I'm off to Spain in the summer to find out about sustainable
energy." Things like that, you know.
Will->> We've had people from all walks of life,
like pensioners. We had a letter the other day from a pensioner
who said, "You inspire me. I've been fighting all my life
and sort of given up, and now I feel inspired to go out and do
things again." Prisoners, definitely prisoners.
Jack->> I think, doing something positive in your
spare time.
Ray->> Don't try and do everything on your own.
Jack->> Learn to say "No"!
Ray->> Yeah, really.
mk->> I was wondering if people involved in SchNews
look to earlier points in history in England, or in other lands,
for that sense of inspirational history? Even recent history.
Jack->> For me, the Miners' Strike, I would say.
Will->> And the Poll-Tax.
Jack->> The Miners' Strike because of the whole
weight of the state against them, but the structures that come
out of that, all the support groups around the country. The women's
groups, where women for the first time who were in little villages
were going out and speaking all 'round the world. When I was
getting involved, that just blew my head that that was all going
on. Blew my head what was happening to these people. And then
the structures that come out of it to fight back. Then I went
and stayed in the Rhonda Valley with people, and there was blokes
that said, "I'll eat grass before I go back," you know
what I mean? "My family did in the 1926 strike." There
was this one guy, he crossed the picket line, and he still couldn't
get a drink in that village, he had to go over the hill 'cause
they still wouldn't speak to him. And I just thought, that sense
of solidarity, saying, "This is all we've got, and if they
take it, we're fucked." So, that sense of solidarity you
get from various trade union struggles.
Will->> I mean, that was all part of globalization,
although nobody really knew it at the time. It was all pre-planned
to bring about what there is now, basically.
Jack->> Smash the back bone of the miners. And even
then, I was coming from an anarchist background, some of my mates
were, "I'm not supporting the miners, I don't believe in
work, fuck work." But I was like, "Once they beat these
people . . . ." The majority of people have to work. Again
it's that political snobbery.
Ray->> That's right.
Jack->> And if we don't support them they'll come
for the next people. And they did, they just went dit-dit-dit-dit-dit,
and 1994, hello, it's our turn, here we go.
- Miners' Strike
The Miners' strike
(1984-85) was a struggle against Thatcher's imposition of an
"efficient" free-market economy and withdrawal of state
support from nationalized industries. Led by the world's oldest
organized labor movement, the strike was brutally crushed by
police forces who beat, intimidated, and even killed striking
miners and their supporters.
_______________________________________________________________________________
| Find out more on this topic
by checking out the Index |
back up to the interview |
| ( Click your browser's [BACK]
button to return to this interview page ) |
|
- Poll Tax
A poll tax is
an anti-democratic per-capita tax. Institution of a poll tax
by Thatcher was greeted by massive popular opposition & riots
in Trafalgar Square in early 1990. Many feel that outrage over
state brutality against the miners coupled with the nationwide
uprising against the Poll Tax helped kick-start the new wave
of direct action in the UK during the 1990s.
_______________________________________________________________________________
| Find out more on this topic
by checking out the Index |
back up to the interview |
| ( Click your browser's [BACK]
button to return to this interview page ) |
|
|