fri 3 nov

I stand longer than necessary brushing teeth and staring out of the bathroom window watching the blue tits on feeders dangling from sprawling buddleia. An albino bird has become a regular visitor. I think it’s a sparrow but could it be a snow bunting? Unlikely. They do not seem to frequent London and are classified ‘amber’ on the UK Red List  or Birds of Conservation Concern. They popped up recently when, sorting through drawers, I came across the quiz cards I loved as a child. Constantly asking to be tested on my wildlife knowledge. This pack of identification cards housed the beautiful snow bunting under ‘British birds’ but many of these birds know continents. Swallow. Pink footed goose. Swift.  

Sshhhhh

I say this to anyone entering as I try to film through the glass but a big ssshhhhh reverberates in this time. Don’t speak out. Speak out and face the consequences. The idea that a child and particularly a girl child should be seen and not heard was still a prevailing motto as I grew up. I became selectively mute through my early teens. Choosing silence, I literally could not find my voice – a vast chasm between what was in my mind and how it might (not) come out as speech. The traces of this persist though now in an odd and inconvenient psychosomatic hearing loss in times of stress.

Never has it been more important to listen and to actually hear. To see clearly what is in front of you (and it is there in front of our eyes and stated with clear intent).  To add your voice for "the fact that people are trying to suppress speech is not an excuse for you not to speak out"(Neihisi Coates).  

Ella Saltmarsh who recently produced the amazing ‘Long Time Academy’ (https://www.thelongtimeacademy.com/about) exploring our understandings of time and how we might be good ancestors, talks about her feeling that somehow her silence kept her safe. But “that her silence was noted” – that she was held accountable for this and, more than this, - that silence hurts yourself and other people. She links this to the form of collective silencing that is happening and that any fear we might have of speaking out is nothing to that being experienced by people under bombardment. She refers to conversation with activist and author Joshua Virasami about the way colonialism often manifests itself today through a’ series of apathies’ – the consequences of good people saying nothing.

So many good people are speaking out. A risk in a time of Mccarthyist suppression to call this by its name.

·       Bosnian genocide and war survivors condemn the genocidal actions of the Israeli regime

·       ( https://twitter.com/Rrrrnessa/status/1720037863209755098)

·       UN Secretary General. Antonio Guterres repeat calls for ceasefire -  “To silence the guns we must raise the voices for peace.’

·       Unite union call for ceasefire (https://www.unitetheunion.org/news-events/news/2023/november/unite-calls-for-an-immediate-ceasefire)

·       Labour leaders and councillors across the country calling for Kier Starmer’s resignation due to his refusal to pressure for a ceasefire. (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lancashire-67306141)

·       Academics across the world sign open letters condemning both the ongoing attacks on Gaza and attacks on free speech  e.g. letter to UKRI (https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vQuP_mvDHNjryNd2gnenQJ0ffUMZ_1SdVL-2RnWdYJZdw5CGIAuyG00-KzCBLWiYwvBD2Xear-hGSsX/pub) Letter ‘Scholars, students and activists in the UK stand in solidarity with Palestinians and call for an end to British complicity in genocide’  - https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PZDYy-N0NRoTnaBJrwbkztXZfGdHvLF_YJ0aVc8Mfjc/edit. Sign here https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSccDLrtqNXmqMkWtbjSc1__yPa_uoHBa_t7ehuIjalCzxtyuA/viewform

And a powerful letter signed by lists of Jewish artists and writers countering the claims that condemning the State of Israel’s action is anti-Semitic.  https://www.nplusonemag.com/online-only/online-only/a-dangerous-conflation

“We refuse the false choice between Jewish safety and Palestinian freedom; between Jewish identity and ending the oppression of Palestinians. In fact, we believe the rights of Jews and Palestinians go hand-in-hand. The safety of each people depends on the others. We are certainly not the first to say so, and we admire those who have modelled this line of thinking in the wake of so much violence. “

“For each of us, Jewish identity is not a weapon to wield in a fight for statist power but a fount of generational wisdom that says justice, justice, you shall pursue. Tzedek, tzedek, tirdof. We object to the exploitation of our pain and the silencing of our allies.  We call for a ceasefire in Gaza, a solution for the safe return of the hostages in Gaza and Palestinian prisoners in Israel, and an end to Israel’s ongoing occupation. We also call on governments and civil society in the United States and across the West to stand up against the repression of support for Palestine.  And we refuse to allow such urgent, necessary demands to be suppressed in our names. When we say never again, we mean it.”

But the bombs keep dropping. And we watch it on our phones and TVs.  How much more needs to be streamed and televised before this seeing and hearing manifests in manifold voices that cannot be suppressed or ignored.  One short video, slotted between climate chaos, covid inquiries and advertising on an always refreshing twitter feed shows a little girl being released from the weight of rubble. Imagining she has died she utters ‘are you taking me to the cemetery?’ One of her exhausted, traumatised rescuers replies. “You are alive and shine like the moon.”

A moon that shines down on us all. Mute witness to these scales of catastrophic terror and profound care -  our shared humanity and the crimes against it.