never thought of Hades under the Mississippi

[satyrica]

so two months in I finally managed to action [fear my social work speak] one of my New Year, er, undertakings by starting to get back involved in the Queeruption stuff: although in my defence it only took so long because they'd burnt themselves out a bit over Xmas and haven't had a meeting until now. It was a bit sparsely attended and a bit tentative but, from my point of view, really productive: I like the political focus of the campaigns they've got planned (ID card defiance, no-borders stuff, protesting the G8) and there's a good balance of more communityish stuff as well, so am upbeat about being less slack in my support- especially as the winter recedes.

I'm also beginning to think Rufus Wainwright is gigging in London so often, it seems, he ought to set up some kinda loyalty reward card scheme: Tuesday night was my third in about a year, a kinda pre-tour launch gig for the new album, at the endearingly ickle Islington Academy. He spent pretty much the first hour just playing his new songs which individually sounded really promising but, whether because of our familiarity or his, never quite took off in the same way as when he started playing Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk, Poses, Vibrate and others. The ordering worked quite well, actually, as it meant he get to showcase the unfamiliar material and then leave everyone on a real buzz. The mix of very personal and very lavish muscial arrangements gives a really good atmosphere in slightly undersized venues and the endearing dappiness of his stagechat belies just how flavour-of-the-month he seems to be right now.

In other upbeat news, it looks like the potential fallout from my weekend may not be as serious as I'd feared- although I'm not going to rest easy yet.

Comments

[emilydongray.livejournal.com]

you think you had fallout!

Glad you are becoming active about your gayness....I think. I never understood pro-active sexuality groups; for example, you come out of the closet, then complain about having it written on an ID card? Hmmmm.

I see how you would want to tie in your political activeness with your gayness.

[satyrica.livejournal.com]

yeah: my fallout was from the saturday night . . .

Queeruption has always been more about having a visibly queer presence within the protest/anti-capitalist movement as a whole as much as anything, which is why it tries to do communityish things as much as poltical actions.

[reindeerflotila.livejournal.com]

I am having problems reconciling my ambivalence re: id cards with my usual reaction to things like this. i guess my opiion is that the info is available elsewhere anyway, they track you via visa use etc already and we have the highest percentage coverage of camera recordings iof any country. so unless the start including things onto the remit of the card i have no problem with it whatsoever. * must research more into what exactly will be on the card *

[reindeerflotila.livejournal.com]

and oh and yay for avoiding fallout.

ID cards

[fascicle.livejournal.com]

I like the term Queer - it covers both my gaiety and my clinical craziness.

Are you allowed to reveal any of Queeruption's cunning plans about ID cards?

I have plans for the ID card scheme. Once the legislation is finalised, I will change my
name-of-record to something at least five lines long and insist that if any of it appears
on an ID card, it must all appear (put that in your fields and smoke it!). If I do it by
Declaration (e.g. ad. in the Times, I can avoid the difficulty encountered by
a certain crying footballer in trying to change his name to G8 (numbers not permitted
in Deed Poll documented nomenclature). That means I will be able to include numbers
and typographically-difficult symbols. In fact, I'll probably just post the Declaration
to a free webpage. There are other methods of changing one's name under UK law,
but I'm not even going to consider trying for my own clause in an Act of Parliament!
If Matthew Parris were still a power in the Commons, or Alan Clark was still alive,
then I might have, but I can't think of an extant MP who'd oblige me for larks. Maybe
I can trigger Evan Harris MP's social conscience, but I doubt he has the clout.

I think I'll make the first name on the middle line rotate to a different gender-neutral name
every six months, and the last two names on that line be the poll-topping boy's and girl's name
from the latest Office of National Statistics report (i.e. changing yearly). A nod to my birth or
use-names will come in the form of an Egyptian cartouche referring to water and some syllables.

I have been insisting on the title Myr for about fifteen years, so they'll also have to
permit odd titles (I've not heard anything about whether they're planning to permit
just the Mr/Mrs/Miss/Ms/Dr range, or if Revd and Msgr &c will be covered, but I bet
Myr will gum up their Crapita computer system... my bank cards say Myr but my bank
letters often say "Mr", which gives me the occasional hysterical giggle).

Finally, if they make the cards free to people on Income Support, I will test the legal
status quo - "One may call oneself anything one likes, as long as it is not for the purpose
of committing fraud" - to claim multiple cards under multiple names. I'm prepared to bring
the test case over this particular silent attempt by New Labour to erode a liberty and lessen
human rights.

Free Live Free!

Re: ID cards

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

One problem you may have is that changing your name by declaration doesn't oblige other people to stop using your old name. In particular, the government will probably just refuse to play ball.

Re: ID cards

[fascicle.livejournal.com]

Even changing your name by deed poll doesn't force recognition of the new name necessarily (There are different rules for first names and surnames, and rules I've never bothered to learn about a married woman's surname).

Declaration does have legal force, and you can subsequently
insist on it being recognised. I don't know that you can ever
make people stop using an old name (cf the singer Prince, inter
alia, though he recanted). The quoted text is the legal position, though there are following clauses giving additional exceptions after "fraud" e.g. obscenity/blasphemy is not permitted. Mr Barclays-Bankers-are-Bastards was OK... it has to be a bit stronger to be illegal.

I'm relying on Dust in the World Machine.

NHS

[fascicle.livejournal.com]

If the ID cards are to be used to access NHS resources, does this mean that there will be no mechanism
for NHS treatment of refuseniks? The government obviously hadn't considered mental hospitals when it
decided to ban smoking on all hospital grounds (cue outcry from advocates of people involuntarily placed
on secure wards under Section)... I bet it hasn't in re ID cards and Sectioning.