Tavistock Square and the Foregrounding of Nuclear Weapons
I bought The Guardian again this morning, as I have done for the last 30 years. It will probably be the last time. The lead article in G2 is what has made me come to this.
John Lanchester, a name I hope I never see in print again, has a two page spread about the road that runs from Hampstead High Street to The Strand. It's name changes along the route many times. There is a point where it becomes known as Tavistock Square. Of the bombs that exploded across London on 07.07.05, the only one above ground was on the bus in Tavistock Square.
Not once in the article is any mention made of the significance of Tavistock Square as a site dedicated to the ideals of non-violence and peace. There is a statue of Ghandi and tributes to the victims of Hiroshima and prisoners of conscience in the Square (see previous post). Since the outrage of the bombing the Guardian has only carried four lines, on it's letters page, of this crucial information. It's not as if this is top secret information.
It is inconceivable that Lanchester is not aware of Tavistock Square's peace credentials. He spent six years working in the BMA building on Tavistock Square for fucks sake. He knows the area well.
But this omission is as nothing compared to the content of the article.
What is emphasised in the article is a story about an Hungarian physicist and friend of Einstein, Leo Szilard, who had a moment of epiphany 300 yards south along the same road that also comprises Tavistock Square. That day, 12th September 1933, the newspapers had reported a talk by Ernest Rutherford on the splitting of the atom. While walking and thinking deeply Szilard came to a sudden realisation. If smashing a neutron into an atom could be made to release two neutrons from one of the atoms and these two neutrons were to do the same, they would release four neutrons. Each time this was repeated it would double the number of neutrons and, in the words of Szilard, "It might be possible to set up a nuclear chain reaction, liberate energy on an industrial scale, and construct atomic bombs."
In one paragraph in the article Lanchester writes about the occultist and poet WB Yeats losing his virginity in Woburn Place close by Tavistock Square. This paragraph of puff has no import other than to link sex with atomic death.
Reading the article reminded me of the back-cover blurb on the Journeyman published book, 'Let The Rail Splitter Awake and other poems' by Pablo Neruda (now out of print unfortunately). I quote, 'As Neruda has said, before the hawks of Wall Street and Washington can hurl the atom bomb they must annihilate us morally. That is the mission of their poets - the Eliots and Pounds who degrade life and stultify the will to resist.' This can also be attributed to any writer not just poets.
The 'Nuke Em' brigade in the White House has made unprecedented advances since 11th September 2001. The continuous propaganda and Orwellian language that has been directed at the American people since then, has to a certain extent inured them to the immorality of using nuclear weapons. It is not as if a majority of Americans are demanding their use. It is just that after any nuclear attack by America it would be thought as having been inevitable anyway. An acceptance after the event and for which the psychological groundwork has been laid. This process is now being accelerated in Britain following the bombings of 07.07.05
The foregrounding of atomic death and sex and the disappearing of peace and non-violence in the story of Tavistock Square, in The Guardian of all papers, is one of the most profoundly irresponsible acts in journalism I have had the misfortune of witnessing.
John Lanchester, a name I hope I never see in print again, has a two page spread about the road that runs from Hampstead High Street to The Strand. It's name changes along the route many times. There is a point where it becomes known as Tavistock Square. Of the bombs that exploded across London on 07.07.05, the only one above ground was on the bus in Tavistock Square.
Not once in the article is any mention made of the significance of Tavistock Square as a site dedicated to the ideals of non-violence and peace. There is a statue of Ghandi and tributes to the victims of Hiroshima and prisoners of conscience in the Square (see previous post). Since the outrage of the bombing the Guardian has only carried four lines, on it's letters page, of this crucial information. It's not as if this is top secret information.
It is inconceivable that Lanchester is not aware of Tavistock Square's peace credentials. He spent six years working in the BMA building on Tavistock Square for fucks sake. He knows the area well.
But this omission is as nothing compared to the content of the article.
What is emphasised in the article is a story about an Hungarian physicist and friend of Einstein, Leo Szilard, who had a moment of epiphany 300 yards south along the same road that also comprises Tavistock Square. That day, 12th September 1933, the newspapers had reported a talk by Ernest Rutherford on the splitting of the atom. While walking and thinking deeply Szilard came to a sudden realisation. If smashing a neutron into an atom could be made to release two neutrons from one of the atoms and these two neutrons were to do the same, they would release four neutrons. Each time this was repeated it would double the number of neutrons and, in the words of Szilard, "It might be possible to set up a nuclear chain reaction, liberate energy on an industrial scale, and construct atomic bombs."
In one paragraph in the article Lanchester writes about the occultist and poet WB Yeats losing his virginity in Woburn Place close by Tavistock Square. This paragraph of puff has no import other than to link sex with atomic death.
Reading the article reminded me of the back-cover blurb on the Journeyman published book, 'Let The Rail Splitter Awake and other poems' by Pablo Neruda (now out of print unfortunately). I quote, 'As Neruda has said, before the hawks of Wall Street and Washington can hurl the atom bomb they must annihilate us morally. That is the mission of their poets - the Eliots and Pounds who degrade life and stultify the will to resist.' This can also be attributed to any writer not just poets.
The 'Nuke Em' brigade in the White House has made unprecedented advances since 11th September 2001. The continuous propaganda and Orwellian language that has been directed at the American people since then, has to a certain extent inured them to the immorality of using nuclear weapons. It is not as if a majority of Americans are demanding their use. It is just that after any nuclear attack by America it would be thought as having been inevitable anyway. An acceptance after the event and for which the psychological groundwork has been laid. This process is now being accelerated in Britain following the bombings of 07.07.05
The foregrounding of atomic death and sex and the disappearing of peace and non-violence in the story of Tavistock Square, in The Guardian of all papers, is one of the most profoundly irresponsible acts in journalism I have had the misfortune of witnessing.
posted by les at 15:21
1 Comments:
Helloooooo, Les! How 'bout your first comment? I am, now ashamed to say, an American, though one of the few true one's, who comes to you via your comment on Kurt Nimmo's blog on 7-13-05, and comment because I am really impressed with and by you, your blog, your cojones, your no-holds-barred telling it like it is, your realization of the engineered class struggle, your whit, and not least your photography.
I have another one of those "mysterious illnesses" as they call them in the States, and I think they might also be called that or something similar in the U.K., known as Chronic Fatigue and Immune Dysfunction Syndrome (CFIDS) in the U.S. (an appropriately-degrading name from a completely corrupt U.S. government), so I can relate to your plight with M.S., believed to be related to CFIDS, like Fibromyalgia (FM), Gulf War Syndrome (GWS) and Multiple-Chemical Sensitivity (MCS).
In G.B., Europe and elsewhere abroad, CFIDS is known as Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME), or Encephalomyelitis Myalgic, depending on where one lives; and this is what Persons with ME/CFIDS are trying desperately, without any luck, to get the name changed to so that the disease receives some credibility, much like M.S. finally received after getting its name-change.
Anyhow, off the depressing illness stuff, and on to....
"Don't bogart that joint, my Friend... Pass it over to me..."
Well, no doubt, since you've visited Nimmo's (In)Famous "Another Day in the Empire", you know who I am since I comment there almost every day, and appear to be a thorn in the side of some if not most because they can't seem to relate to my commenting style, etc.; but, if you care to, and haven't already, please visit me at my new blog, at: http://www.wolfbritain.com/ And/or my "old" Blogger one, which I'm also keeping going, at: http://form-legal.blogspot.com/
All of nothing but the best to you, my Friend, and ONLY True Peace,
Wolf
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