Time flies apparently. It's that dad joke where a man throws his watch out the window to see time fly.
I wanted to wait to post anything until I got my interview results. I got them two weeks ago, and since then I've been saying "I'll do it a little later." And then a little later becomes two weeks. I can't seem to decide on a topic. Some bloggers have stuff happen to them regularly and some create content through baking or something on a regular basis, but even though my disabilities are with me all the time, I genuinely don't have things to deal with. My work accepts me, my partner accepts me, my dad forgets that I have multiple disabilities, I forget I have multiple disabilities (case in point when I went to the practice nurse for an Asthma check up, she refered me to nuero physio, as the practices new goal is to promote nuero care. First she saw my name on the list and wondered why, then when she spoke to nuero disability on the phone in my presence and listed the various interesting abilities, I genuinely wondered who she was referring to. That reminds me, need to book in to see the gp).
There are many things I want to blog about, primarily the precieved war on the disabled by the current government. Because I do not need a second bedroom for a carer, and do not recieve any government assistance in the form of benefits, I have not been directly affected by cuts that could be seen as a war. This means that while I could write a blog about unchecked personal opinions and what flashes up on my news feed (not that I'm a paranoid conspiracy theorist but some times I like more than one opinion and view point to inform my life), I think a fact checked, if a little biased, post would do more justice to the blog and maybe actually raise some valid points. Don't get me wrong, I would love to be the first, which I won't be because I am late to the party, to raise a shield to defend those who need it, but it needs to be evidence based.
In my opinion, something that's apparently dangerous on the internet, there has been a subtle attack on those on benefits, through shows like "Benefits Street" and perhaps even "Jeremy Kyle". Any such reality TV through the key hole type show is bound to pick things that score ratings, either by making us feel superior or by simply trying to raise our choler at where our money might be potentially going. It's the same with shows about benefits frauds and migrants. Yes fair, there will always be cheats and frauds and people coming to steal the things we work hard for but on the whole people are not monsters. But we can be convinced they are. During times of war, governments try to convince us the people in the village over the hill eat their children and sacrifice goats to some abhorrent god. Then as soon as war is over, each side has to convince the other that they are just like each other.
The easiest example is that militant fighters in Iraq where told US marines had to kill a baby to become a Marine. This shows that life is precious to everyone, if an US citizen was told Muslims have to kill a baby to become a militant, they would be outraged. This is simply the reverse. Watch the dash cams from Russia. They help push cars out of ditches and little old ladies to cross the road, just like anyone in the UK would, but thanks to aggressive policy, we need to see them as the "enemy".
On a more local level, as Nigel Farage put it, "would you want Romanians to move next door to you?". That is the most awful scare mongering, and my honest answer is "i don't really care". That's an awful lot of people to sweep up in one statement. I know loads of Romanians in work and I would say they are decent nice people. It's a bit like asking the Germans would they like Brits living next door? Well maybe or maybe not. Are they the well educated types who are frightfully polite or are they the louts we get on holidays who steal sun beds (it's a recent poll that Germans believe English to hog sun beds).
And this brings me back to benefits. Sure theres people on TV who get benefits and smoke six packs a day and don't want to do volunteer work for benefits but are they the majority? If you watch the "cat calling" video from NYC there's no white men in it, and this is explained as bad editing, what the white men said wasn't clear, or off camera, so they didn't make the cut. Equally I bet for any sort of benefits Britain trype reality show, they cut twenty people who are honest down on their luck people who have just been dealt a bad hand and need a bit of support for the one person who has five different baby daddies and smokes like a cigarette factory on fire which will make people upset (rightly or wrongly). It bumps up TV ratings and like it or not promotes the government line of we need to cut benefits because that's where it goes.
Mean while, in my own life, things are certainly looking up. I got the job, something I have yet to annouce on anything resembling a "public" forum due to there not being ink on paper yet. This is certainly another step forward, even if it's all gone a bit Game of Thornes with the "you win or you die" type concept about the three month probation.
Living on my own is still a struggle to some degree, and my partner came to help me clean again over the weekend. I should have a clean as you go policy but then I come in late from work or something and I make food and it all goes from there. At the moment however, I appear to have carpet.......
So, my lovely viewers, I shall leave you here while I go and try to research interesting and evidence based post about benefits cuts. Thank you for reading.
