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A review by lewis_fishman
Chavs: The Demonization of the Working Class by Owen Jones
5.0
No war but class war.
This will be last year on Goodreads - while having people reading reviews is wonderful, and I always enjoy seeing what all my friends are reading are reading, I've reached a point where I no longer want to support companies, artists, platforms, people or mentalities that are actively seeking to destroy the planet, destroy creativity, entrench class divide, or any combination of those reasons. As a result, Goodreads falls under this. If you'd like to keep up with me, I will be found on Storygraph - https://app.thestorygraph.com/profile/lewis_fishman, Substack - https://substack.com/@lewisfishr, and Letterboxd - https://letterboxd.com/lewisfishr/. This paragraph will be attached to reviews up until December 31st.
"XXIX. Chav-bashing draws on a long, ignoble tradition of class hatred. But it cannot be understood without looking at more recent events. Above all, it is the bastard child of a very British class war
An excerpt from “A Year of Watching Films In Order to Feel Better About My Life” by Lewis Fisher, and specifically after watching “Firebrand”, directed by Karim Ainouz.
Given that I wasn’t originally planning on watching this film (I’ll admit I saw this on the 3rd of December), but decided on a whim to buy another ticket for the British International Film Festival, I was really unsure what I’d write about. Could I write about the male gaze, of using both sexual assault and abuse in cinema as plot development or motivation (as was seen in this film)? Would I write about how I feel about the institution of royal families, therefore ruining any future chance of a knighthood? It wasn’t until I was reading Chavs on the train home, and the quote above specifically, that I decided what to write about. As Australia is the bastard child of Britain, it serves that the class hatred of Australia’s recipients of the welfare state, ie dole bludgers, malingerers, those faking it, myself including at time of writing, is a bastard child of the British bastard child class war. For those not in the loop, current sitting Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who grew up in council housing with a mother receiving welfare, recently bought a multi-million dollar property; aligned his Labor party with Liberal (the Australian conservative faction) to rush through an ill-thought out social media ban for under-sixteens; and despite running on a climate platform, has only greenlit further coal mines and seems to be doing very little to being averting complete climactic collapse, which in Australia has already played out to incredibly severe standards. My point with this is that Albanese, and many of those in elected positions, especially in the left of politics, have forgotten who it is they represent - the people. Even if ‘supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses’ is played for laughs, the point still stands. Culture wars are deployed in order to stop those in power from being targeted, instead focusing on petty squabbles rather than demanding those with power to change things and actually do something. For most of my life Australia has been under the thumb of conservative governments, and despite brief years under Labor, it is clear to see that the Labor party now is a lot more conservative than their roots would suggest.
What is the solution then? The Labor party has the ability to influence change in order to best reflect the interests of the people, and make the lives of Australians easier. Implementing stringent and punishing tax cuts on companies and the ultra-wealthy for starters, rather than indulging the whims of lobbyists and those not concerned with the common person. At time of writing, it is looking increasingly unlikely that limiting the planet to 1.5 degrees of warming will happen within my lifetime, and we may be lucky to limit it to 2 degrees. That’s extremely fucking worrying. It is easy for people to say that individual efforts are in vain, and that it is the fault of large multinationals, and it should be up to them alone. Personally, that’s a cowardly way of thinking. Yes, you as an individual are incredibly unlikely to have the same amount of influence on stopping the climate crisis, or reducing the social and financial divide between poor and rich, compared to some or compared to companies - that does not mean you do not try. I became an ethical and environmental vegan because it was at the time, and still is, the right thing to do, for both myself, my potential children, the people I know, and the future lives of everyone who will come after me, and all those who will come after me who I will never know. Classism is deeply entrenched both in this country and around the world, and the intersection of fixing a classist divide is demanding better from your governments, demanding better from yourself, and demanding change. If our, or your, government is not up to the standard required, then we demand a better one. Buying into traps such as “QLD is in a crime crisis”, or that “A social media ban is designed to prevent bullying of children” or “the economy will trickle down to those who need it from those who have it” or “100 companies are responsible for 71% of emissions” will lead us astray as a person, as a society, and a species. If you look at the history of homo sapiens, which will soon be impossible at the University of Wollongong, my alma mater, due to short-sighted and uninformed budget cuts, we are a species that has fought, fights, and will continue to fight. If we do not fight and demand for better, then we will fail as a species."
This will be last year on Goodreads - while having people reading reviews is wonderful, and I always enjoy seeing what all my friends are reading are reading, I've reached a point where I no longer want to support companies, artists, platforms, people or mentalities that are actively seeking to destroy the planet, destroy creativity, entrench class divide, or any combination of those reasons. As a result, Goodreads falls under this. If you'd like to keep up with me, I will be found on Storygraph - https://app.thestorygraph.com/profile/lewis_fishman, Substack - https://substack.com/@lewisfishr, and Letterboxd - https://letterboxd.com/lewisfishr/. This paragraph will be attached to reviews up until December 31st.
"XXIX. Chav-bashing draws on a long, ignoble tradition of class hatred. But it cannot be understood without looking at more recent events. Above all, it is the bastard child of a very British class war
An excerpt from “A Year of Watching Films In Order to Feel Better About My Life” by Lewis Fisher, and specifically after watching “Firebrand”, directed by Karim Ainouz.
Given that I wasn’t originally planning on watching this film (I’ll admit I saw this on the 3rd of December), but decided on a whim to buy another ticket for the British International Film Festival, I was really unsure what I’d write about. Could I write about the male gaze, of using both sexual assault and abuse in cinema as plot development or motivation (as was seen in this film)? Would I write about how I feel about the institution of royal families, therefore ruining any future chance of a knighthood? It wasn’t until I was reading Chavs on the train home, and the quote above specifically, that I decided what to write about. As Australia is the bastard child of Britain, it serves that the class hatred of Australia’s recipients of the welfare state, ie dole bludgers, malingerers, those faking it, myself including at time of writing, is a bastard child of the British bastard child class war. For those not in the loop, current sitting Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who grew up in council housing with a mother receiving welfare, recently bought a multi-million dollar property; aligned his Labor party with Liberal (the Australian conservative faction) to rush through an ill-thought out social media ban for under-sixteens; and despite running on a climate platform, has only greenlit further coal mines and seems to be doing very little to being averting complete climactic collapse, which in Australia has already played out to incredibly severe standards. My point with this is that Albanese, and many of those in elected positions, especially in the left of politics, have forgotten who it is they represent - the people. Even if ‘supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses’ is played for laughs, the point still stands. Culture wars are deployed in order to stop those in power from being targeted, instead focusing on petty squabbles rather than demanding those with power to change things and actually do something. For most of my life Australia has been under the thumb of conservative governments, and despite brief years under Labor, it is clear to see that the Labor party now is a lot more conservative than their roots would suggest.
What is the solution then? The Labor party has the ability to influence change in order to best reflect the interests of the people, and make the lives of Australians easier. Implementing stringent and punishing tax cuts on companies and the ultra-wealthy for starters, rather than indulging the whims of lobbyists and those not concerned with the common person. At time of writing, it is looking increasingly unlikely that limiting the planet to 1.5 degrees of warming will happen within my lifetime, and we may be lucky to limit it to 2 degrees. That’s extremely fucking worrying. It is easy for people to say that individual efforts are in vain, and that it is the fault of large multinationals, and it should be up to them alone. Personally, that’s a cowardly way of thinking. Yes, you as an individual are incredibly unlikely to have the same amount of influence on stopping the climate crisis, or reducing the social and financial divide between poor and rich, compared to some or compared to companies - that does not mean you do not try. I became an ethical and environmental vegan because it was at the time, and still is, the right thing to do, for both myself, my potential children, the people I know, and the future lives of everyone who will come after me, and all those who will come after me who I will never know. Classism is deeply entrenched both in this country and around the world, and the intersection of fixing a classist divide is demanding better from your governments, demanding better from yourself, and demanding change. If our, or your, government is not up to the standard required, then we demand a better one. Buying into traps such as “QLD is in a crime crisis”, or that “A social media ban is designed to prevent bullying of children” or “the economy will trickle down to those who need it from those who have it” or “100 companies are responsible for 71% of emissions” will lead us astray as a person, as a society, and a species. If you look at the history of homo sapiens, which will soon be impossible at the University of Wollongong, my alma mater, due to short-sighted and uninformed budget cuts, we are a species that has fought, fights, and will continue to fight. If we do not fight and demand for better, then we will fail as a species."