clair056

I've been thinking again about the Trump phenomenon. As many have pointed out, plenty of other US  Presidents have presided over racist penal systems, nationalist sabre rattling and domination by corporations. Why is Trump any worse? Well partly because he represents an attempt to turn the clock back on some of the limited social progress that has been made in the past 50 years, in the process unleashing overt racism and legitimising the extreme right at home and abroad. But he also prompts  fear because of his very unpredictability  - he is not simply a smooth front man for capitalist business as usual, but someone who creates an impression that his personal power comes before everything, and that therefore nothing is sacred and nobody is safe. There is something almost archetypal here - he is like the 'tyrant monster' described by Joseph Campbell in 'The Hero with a Thousand Faces' (1949): 'The figure of the tyrant-monster is known to...

Great article from i-D magazine, no. 91, April 1991 about post-club gatherings at Motorway service stations (click on images to enlarge): '3 AM, Saturday morning. The M6 is windy, wet and desolate. Its rvice stations offer comfort only to lorry drivers and sleepy executives. For many weeks, however, selected services have paid host to the coffee and communal smoke of hundreds of ravers post club comedown. After the semi legendary Blackburn parties, police continually harassed the convoys criss-crossing Lancashire and beyond. Although parties such as Revenge provided a brief replacement, the next best thing was driving long distance to a club and afterwards passing a few hours chilling at a service station. A network of clubs around the Midlands and Northwest, such as Legends in Warrington, Quadrant Park in Liverpool and Oz in Blackpool now provide the excitement and camaraderie of the raves of 1989 and 1990. Each club generates its own Service station mayhem; favourites including B...

The recent demonstrations during the visit by Donald Trump reminded me of demos against another controversial US President more than 30 years ago. In June 1984, President Ronald Reagan visited London to participate in a World Economic Summit at Lancaster House. This was during the period when US cruise nuclear missiles were being deployed in Britain in the face of widespread opposition. To coincide with the summit, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and other peace groups called for demonstrations on Saturday 9th June 1984. We know a fair amount about how these protests were viewed by the state as a result of the release of various official files relating to CND in this period, collected together at  the Special Branch Files Project . Home Office and police correspondence indicates that UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was unhappy about the potential for news coverage of the demo distracting from the Summit. However she was advised that there was no l...