Community Fair

'Working Towards Community 2.0!'

C3 is facilitated by OfCare, in association with the Home Office, the Department of Training and Education, and the Department of Social Cohesion and Security, with generous sponsorship from Symbiomundia (formerly Grindley & Bundage PLC).

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Sunday, December 25, 2005

Communal Joy

Now, now, no rows! I’m sure we’ll have a lovely communal experience—a bonding session, sharing joys and sorrows. And for those of us temporarily separated from loved ones, be reassured that OfCare is working on your behalf to resolve the issues. It’s a question of priorities; sometimes the needs of the community have to be taken care of before those of the individual; you just have to trust those who are looking after your interests.

Scientism

Really, Dr Feramor! I think you’re allowing your scientism to intrude a bit here. It is well known that the cultural diversity that we all celebrate includes a vast range of dietary choices. You’ll find, too, that the vegetarian cultures, though perhaps not as materialistic and active as our own—I mean Western—have compensatory qualities of social and spiritual creativity that we might learn from.

Christmas: The View from Evolutionary Psychology

I see no harm in controlled festive enthusiasm as a regulatory principle, though I distrust the mythical basis, the need for which, however, seems to be hard-wired into the primitive reptilian areas of our brains. Incidentally, Tristram, I’d be rather careful if I were you; evolution has made us carnivores and this is the basis of our uniquely dynamic nature. The effects of a vegetarian diet could be potentially destabilising both physiologically and psychologically. I wonder if there could be some correlation between your psychological state and the rejection of meat? Perhaps you would like to volunteer for some experiments in the New Year?

Be Sensitive

I’m sure we all appreciate the sentiments expressed by ‘Merry Christmas’ but we do have to be very careful not to tread on anybody’s sensibilities here. There are many people who are clinically depressed and ‘Merry’ could be seen as mocking and denigrating their culture. So let’s just respect each other’s differences and hope that everybody’s psychic goals achieve some measure of satisfaction during this holiday.

MC from Rob

Merry Christmas! I just hope everyone has a good time. Shame we can’t all have a proper party really.

Merry Christmas

Don’t worry love—she’ll be fine. It’s safer in here than out. Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas Don!

Happy Christmas

Yeah, Happy Christmas. They’ve got my daughter, I hope she can enjoy it, that’s all I care about.

Chicken Tikka Masala

Someone said it’s just Chicken Tikka Masala so it’s multicultural. And I don’t think we can get pissed Clary. Maybe that Jesus will get us out of here. Happy bleeding Christmas!

Merry Christmas Clary

Merry Christmas to you Clary and all the rest of you. Shame we can’t meet. Have a good one. xx

Jesus and the Turkeys

Yeah Jesus was like the first anarchist, so he’d really want that. I’m veggie so I won’t be having the turkey. I don’t like to think of the turkeys imprisoned and tortured without any rights. Remember how Jesus freed the turkeys at the market. And Gandhi too. But Merry Christmas all the same.

Peace and Goodwill

Merry Christmas everyone!! I love Christmas, everything about it! Songs, films on TV, presents, getting pissed, happiness! Can’t wait for dinner—turkey and stuffing and chipolatas and cranberry sauce, roast potatoes and parsnips and sprouts and gravy and pudding and cake, lovely! It’s the season of good will so let’s think of world peace and how the Christmas spirit can blossom everywhere. xxx

Tuesday, December 20, 2005

The rumours about Latvia

I simply must intervene here. The rumours that we have Centres secretly established in Latvia for the more obdurate clients is simply not true; that would be a breach of the open, collaborative nature of our project. Quite often people simply disappear out of irresponsibility.

Days till Christmas

I don’t care if days go missing! It helps pass the time till Christmas. Roxanne’s right, Dulcie, all this is just till everyone’s sorted, then you’ll meet up again. You can still talk and everything, but don’t get sad.

Days

There’s a lot of days going missing! What are we going to do about it?

Tuesday, December 06, 2005

My Dad

My Dad, too. Just when he was finishing his big project. It was going to be a special Christmas present for me. They think he’s in one of those places in Latvia.

Don't worry Dulcie

Dulcie, you’ll meet up again. I know what it’s like, really. My feller went missing. There’s a lot of people going missing.

Monday, December 05, 2005

Don

It wasn’t aliens Don you dick. It was those girls in R Wing they rescued—prostitutes, rescued from massage parlours, they’re going to be deprogrammed, whatever that means, and sent back to their families and their homelands. I wish I could see you. Why can’t we meet?

Something about me

I left school early. I got pregnant. But we’d always had books in the house and I always knew people who read and talked about what they read and loved it. I’m not saying this out of a need to share either. I’m talking entirely to myself. I’m practicing words. Talking about literacy, now they’re saying I’ve got to learn parental literacy, parental intelligence. I’m fucking furious.

Just noisy families

There’s lots of families been moved in here too—lots of little kids with them. Could be them screaming. I feel sorry for them. But they were making noise and the neighbours could hear them through the thin walls. We were always very quiet in our home. A bit too quiet. Though it was ok, I read a lot too—loved it. How come you read so much then Roxanne?

The Disorder of Evil

But we’re social animals, Tom. We’re here to respect each other, so what’s evil is what harms the community. Though, of course, despite our welcoming of faith groups, the word ‘evil’ has connotations of absolutism inappropriate for our more pluralistic age. We’re moving away from the old mediaeval paradigms of ‘evil’ in order to see this behaviour as a sociophyschological illness that can be treated or at least contained. What people call ‘evil’ really is just disorder—in the body, in the spirit, or in the community. By detecting it early, we save a lot of trouble and anguish in later years—and there are enormous economic benefits too.

Still Guilty?

So like good and evil’s a matter of opinion too? So maybe I wasn’t really guilty?

A Social Critique

Well, actually research shows that people’s tastes are socially constructed and even that the whole idea of art, literature, and so on has been used to hold back people from maximising their potential. Literary value, then, is created by the old-style conservative privileged elite that our new movement is challenging. They’re usually men, of course, and white men at that.

Good Books

Didn’t you go to university then Dr Z? And is there really no such thing as a good book?

How to Read

And Roxanne, you do have to learn that everybody’s tastes are different. That’s why our OfTru sponsored reading groups are so much better than the old university model—there’s no leaders, no one telling you what to think. It’s true democracy. Of course, it was resisted at first by the old elite, jealous of their privileges, wanting to hold onto their cultural capital. Our goal is to redistribute that wealth—in fact, challenge the idea of high culture in the first place. Culture should be self-expression—therapy. It should be immediate and relevant—your ideas, not those of some dead, usually male, so-called expert.

Back

Well, I’m back. I know, I’m not to talk about it. But we can talk about books as well as music can we, so she says. I’m better read than you think, I’ve read a lot, me. What was it you said before about having too many ideas, Dulcie? And Don’s book. With respect, Don you should try and put more ideas in it Don, there’s nothing wrong with making people think a bit. And maybe play around with the words a bit. It reads too straight if you see what I mean. Make it difficult and fun—people like a challenge.

Time Thing

You can fiddle with the dates on the posts. You could make it right that way. Seems a lot of effort though. There’s another mystery too—the times are all wrong!—have you noticed the times? They’re all in the middle of the night when nobody’s around!

Loyalty Cards

You might be interested to know a bit about the Community Loyalty Card, first pioneered in Wilmslow in the 1980s after a disturbing flood of workshy Liverpudlians and other aliens into what was a very successful community. You do know, Tom, that access to healthcare and other services is dependent upon good citizenship. There are Top-up Value Points on the Card for good community behaviour, proactive self-health care, voluntary work, etc. And these points can easily be squandered by lapses into antisociality. It really is your own responsibility if this happens—we treat you like adults; it’s not a dependency culture anymore. This is the responsibility society.
And you have rights only on condition that you share the duties of every other citizen of the community. The new laws allow us to maximise the efficiency of social relationships and meet our targets which aim to protect the decent majority and make war on the degradation of communal life.

But it’s not just changing the law; we’re changing the culture, and that’s where our educational programmes come in, which I might do a little post on later. We do try to deal in carrots rather than sticks. It’s a 21st century methodology.

A Youth

Well, I’m one of those Youths you keep talking about. I’m here because, well, bit by bit I’ve had most of my credit deducted from my Community Loyalty Card. And they’ve seized my home. I’d started off alright, with the credits from youth work, befriending old ladies and all that, and the Pledge, but it all went wrong when me dad disappeared. I’d joined The Band of Joy. Pledging to abstain from sweets, junk food, alcohol and drugs—fucking daft, really. Sex and loving relationships etc etc.

I had a load of bonus points for my community activity. Then I lost them for hanging out. And got caught in one of those random piss tests on the street. It was schools and work at first, then on the street, remember? It got worse. There was antisocial joking likely to cause panic or offence—Well, that’s how they put it. Or name-calling of those in authority. And spitting—you can’t help it sometimes with the baccy chewing. Had a job on the side, running a stall, needed the money cos I had no points, but then I got done for selling burgers to minors. I got shopped to Big SIS—like the TV show only gentler and for the community, as they say.

Lots of little things, it just built up. But we’ve got to find out about this time thing. We’re being robbed.

Hey, Tom!

Who’s the new boy with the big mouth then?