Blog: Nuclear War In "Bad Idea" Shocker!

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So, myself and The People On My Protest March went over to Butler's Wharf in That London last night to witness a "unique performance" put together by Damon Albarn, Brian Eno, Robert del Naja from The Massive Attacks and some other people to protest against Trident. It was meant to start at 6.30pm, but the Greenpeace website said to get there for about 6 o'clock ready for it all to begin.

THUS we met just before 6 o'clock and walked through a PARTICULARLY ACE bit of That London round Tower Bridge which has been DOLLED UP quite a bit of late - CHI CHI little alleyways and shops cavorted about before we emerged onto a BANKSIDE VISTA of Tower Bridge, The Tower Of London and lots of other LONDON stuff right next to City Hall - it looked GLORIOUS and ONE felt joyous to be alive and living in such a fantastic place.

We got to the wharf and sat ourselves on a bench to wait... and wait ... and wait. Half past six came and went as a crowd gradually gathered, peering over the water at the Arctic Sunrise which was moored nearby. We could see people milling about but nothing much continued to happen... for about three quarters of an hour. It was a bit BLOODY ANNOYING really - we'd been told to get there for a certain time, which we all had, it was COLD, and it's not like they hadn't had ALL BLOODY DAY to get it sorted out ON THEIR OWN BOAT is it? It's just RUDE, is what it is - i hate it when ROCK STARS do it and at least they've got the excuse of BEING IDIOTS, so when a campaigning organisation does it it's just ANNOYING.

However, at about 7.15pm things finally kicked off... and became MUCH MUCH MUCH MORE ANNOYING. You'd think people of MEANS like Messrs Eno and Albarn would have been able to afford at least a FAG PACKET to FINESSE the PIECE on, rather than leaving it as the contents of the back of a soggy BEER MAT, but maybe it was ART that i don't understand. What happened was that a choir of people went "Aaah... Aaah... Aaah" for FORTY MINUTES. THAT WAS IT.

OK, there was MULTIMEDIA on top of it - while people were going "Aaah... Aaah...Aaah" apparently at random (for, as noted, FORTY MINUTES) three ACTORLY VOICES read out SANCTIMONIOUS STATEMENTS over the top. Apparently, and I may need to have a second listen to get this right, Nuclear War would be a BAD THING. THANKS DAMON! They started off reading out facts and statements about The Nuclear Clock which, as I'm sure we're all aware, is SET by a group of Scientists to represent how close the world is to the brink of disaster. Throughout the PIECE the ACTORLY VOICES kept saying "The Clock Is Ticking" which ACTUALLY IT ISN'T. ALSO they would say "It is 1953. The Clock stands at five minutes to midnight" or "It is 1990. The Clock stands at seventeen minutes to midnight" i.e. SOMETIMES IT GOES BACKWARDS. SO IT'S NOT TICKING EVER FORWARD, IS IT?!?

AAARGH! And to make it WORSE it was all read out in disjointed segments, THUS:

POMPOUS VOICE: The Clock!
WHINGING VOICE: STANDS! at!
MAN WITH STAGEFRIGHT TALKING TOO FAST: Quarter to four!


And while all THAT was going on the big screen on the side of the boat was listing FACTS about all the times the world has come CLOSE to the brink of Nuclear War by accident. Obviously this is meant to make us think "The very presence of these terrible weapons means it would be so easy to accidentally destroy ourselves!" but ACTUALLY, what with all the tossing about that was going on, I found myself thinking "Hmm.. so, after sixty years of near-accidents, doesn't this demonstrate how effective and reliable the fail-safe methods are?"

There was also a big piece that came on saying "Denying other nations the right to build nuclear weapons whilst refusing to disarm yourself is like standing with a cigarette dangling from your mouth demanding that everybody else stops smoking." AAARGH! NO! IT REALLY ISN'T!! First of all, smoking PRIMARILY harms THE SMOKER and if it harms anyone else IT IS ALREADY DOING SO. Actually, a smoker telling other people not to smoke is AT WORST a little hypocritical AT BEST trying to stop other people making the same mistakes that they have done. NGGG!!! A BETTER metaphor surely would be to say it is like waving a gun around at people, telling them not to build their own guns? With ALL that that implies?

So yes, I found the whole experience a bit frustrating and annoying, and obviously so did a good few other people as the crowded waterfront grew noticeably less crowded as the droning dragged on. Oh yes, and also - JUST before the whole thing started ANOTHER boat drew up right in front of the Arctic Sunrise, presumably with a crowd of journalists to review it, which moored their giving THEM a nice view of the whole thing. At the beginning i found this OUTRAGEOUS - so, we the Greenpeace supporters and people who'd come to join the protest, WE had to stand waiting for 45 minutes in the cold on the edge of the river a hundred feet away, but the MEDIA were shipped in just before it starts with a really good view? THANKS for showing us WHO YOU VALUE!

HOWEVER, as it all wore on i realised that maybe NOT being on a boat stuck in the river was a good thing, as we were able to MAKE OFF, which after forty minutes we did. Just as we went under the bridge it finished, and it MAY WELL BE that it was followed by an hour's worth of interesting music, well-argued points, and fun and good times applied in a - let's try and remember - WORTHY CAUSE, but personally i had had QUITE ENOUGH for one evening.

When we got home we watched "The Great Global Warming Swindle" which said that, actually, Global Warming is caused by THE SUN (and showed some fairly convincing STATS to demonstrate this, tho i HANKERED for someone who thought it was MAN causing it to explain this - many of the speakers banged on about the lack of debate in this area of science whilst manifestly failing to engage in it themselves), and that the rush to say it is due to the actions of HUMANITY was a RUSE started by - wait for it - an alliance of THE EXTREME LEFT and MARGARET THATCHER!

At this point I fully expected them to say that THE STEREOPHONICS were involved too, and we would have had the full set!

Normally I would have HIED me to WIKI to see what was going on, and would probably have been a lot more QUESTIONING about the people making these claims that went against so much that we'd been told about The Environment, but after the concert this evening i was WEAKENED, and took much of it in. It's such a shame that it had been such a load of old bollocks - it IS a cause that I agree with, and if (as The High Collar In My Brian Eno In Roxy Music Costume said) they'd said more about how WASTEFUL it was to spend SO much ca$h that could be used SO much better elsewhere and spent LESS time ponderously berating us with THE OBVIOUS we'd all have been a lot better off.

And THAT'S what I was doing on The Day That Captain America Died!

posted 9/3/2007 by MJ Hibbett

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