More proof that greed is not good

FOOD FOR PROFIT directed by Giulia Innocenzi & Pablo D’Ambrosi (Italy , 2024)

The way I see it there are three compelling reasons to switch to a strict vegan diet : for the animals, for the planet and for your health. This documentary suggests a fourth is to strike at the heart of capitalism.

 If you don’t have a dream …..

I’ve never been convinced that graphic images of gruesome slaughter house practice do much to change hearts and minds. There’s a certain shock value but this only has a temporary impact. I think most people are aware that what occurs before the meat appears on our plates or is wrapped in cellophane is not for the faint-hearted. Out of sight, out of mind is enough for most determined carnivores.  Pigs, chickens, sheep and cows meet sticky ends but they also make for tasty meals.

Learning to love the life force

The Answer is Simple ….. Love Yourself, Live Your Spirit’ by Sonia Choquette (Hay House Inc., 2008)

 Sonia Choquette is a globally celebrated spiritual teacher, intuitive consultant, storyteller and visionary guide. In this admirable and persuasive self-help guide she advises we readers to stop dwelling on past errors and start to “live as Divine Beings.” 

She views problems as opportunities which offer the path to true wisdom and warns against the trickery and self-deception of the ego.  She advocates choosing self-love in order to “embrace the authentic you.” These are laudable aims and there’s plenty of truth in what she says.

Choquette’s daunting CV challenges mere mortals like myself to suggest that anything she writes could possibly be wrong.  However,  I venture to part company with her in the manner in which she merges the concepts of the ‘Divine Spirit’ with that of ‘God the Creator’ as if these concepts were one of the same thing.

She writes confidently that  “Your Spirit after death simply returns to the great Creator, the Holy Mother/Father God, and resumes being the light it is made of.” There is of course no fact-based evidence for such an assertion. As with all religious beliefs, faith and mystery stand in for objective proof.

Choquette goes on to revere the Creator as the source for “the fulfilment of all your needs.”  She argues that since this great Woman/Man looks after all our interests all that remains is to keep the heart open and clear. This is all fine and dandy if you are prepared to take on trust the notion that  “God has a plan and positive things are always in store for you.”

Confusingly, she also maintains that “we, as Spirit, are the creative writers, directors, and actors in every scene.” In saying that we and God have the power to steer our lives towards peace, love and understanding is surely a contradiction in terms. Either we open our hearts up for celestial guidance or we set about doing the guiding ourselves. Who’s in control here?   

As I non-believer, I believe that placing trust in a mystical (and unprovable) creator is to deny the power we have within ourselves. As a result, every time Choquette introduced the word Spirit (always with a capital letter) I mentally substituted the term ‘life force’ (in lower case).  After all, the book title urges us not to love your spirit but to live it. 

In short. I think a better title for this book would have been  ‘Love yourself, Love your life force.’  

What’s God got to do with it?

What’s to like about The Zone of Interest ?

We live in a world increasingly dominated by likes or un-likes and surrounded by people to follow or unfollow. Although this was entertainingly dramatized in the Black Mirror episode ‘Nosedive’ ,  in reality it is no laughing matter. The grey areas in between these binary choices are marginalised to the point that there’s precious little space left for nuanced opinion.

When a film like Jonathan Glazer’s ‘The Zone of Interest’ comes along this limitation is a major problem.  The film is an accomplished, complex and uncompromising piece of work that left me awestruck, disorientated and a little numb. These are not reactions that can be summarised  by clicking a ‘like’ button.

The Windrush Betrayal

The Windrush Betrayal : Exposing the Hostile Environment by Amelia Gentleman (Guardian Faber, 2019)

Betrayal is a strong word. It means calling out disloyalty, deception and, above all, a violation of trust. It is absolutely the right word to describe the trauma and destruction of the lives for those now referred to as the Windrush generation,

Jamaica gained independence on 19th July 1962. Before that it was part of the British Empire. This meant that passengers who disembarked from the SS Empire Windrush ship at Tilbury Docks in England on 22nd June 1948 were officially British citizens.

With hindsight, the problems these passengers subsequently faced could have been forseen. Eleven Labour MPs wrote to Clement Atlee, the Prime Minister of the time, proclaiming “An influx of coloured people domiciled here is likely to impair the harmony, strength and cohesion of our people and social life and cause discord and unhappiness among all concerned.” Faced with such blatant racism, perhaps the only surprise was how long it was before the proverbial shit hit the fan.

The now is now in Perfect Days

Perfect Days directed by Wim Wenders (Japan/Germany, 2023)

Up until now, my favourite toilet cleaner in popular culture has been Raymond Briggs’ ‘Gentleman Jim’, a cartoon character from 1980 who dreamt of breaking out of his humdrum existence and dead end job. In stark contrast, the character of Hirayama in ‘Perfect Days’, played brilliantly by Kōji Yakusho, is more than content to follow a daily routine that borders on a zen-like ritual as an employee of a Tokyo toilet cleaning company.

It helps that the facilities he works in are in a series of incredible buildings commissioned by the Nippon Foundation in 2018. This unique architectural project was coordinated by Yamada Akiko who set out to counter the image of public toilets as “dark, dirty, smelly and scary” places that were best avoided Through unfortunate timing, these buildings were completed around the time that the pandemic struck. Post lockdown, the esteemed German filmmaker Wim Wenders was asked if would be interested in making a documentary to publicise this enlightened initiative. He leapt at the chance but happily decided to turn the film into a work of fiction.