Luxury Beliefs
the opposite of luxury is necessity
Morning folks
I had an entirely different post planned, but thanks to the Tory Party conference being all over my newsfeed, I’ve had Suella’s “luxury beliefs'“ phrase in my head all week. Which I’m sure is precisely what her speech writer would have wanted. I’m annoyed at myself for being so annoyed by her ridiculous performed nonsense, but hey ho.
I always pay attention to the words people use. Apart from anything else, it can be fun. Like most people, I find it fairly hard to actually engage with the news these days, certainly in any meaningful way. I can’t wade through political ideas very easily and don’t find myself falling easily into a particular pushed ideology very often. Other than the great one that my favourite pub used to have as its’ only rule, which was “Don’t be a Dick”. Obviously, if pushed, I’m probably a woke liberal leftie who loves things like The Environment or, crazy things like The NHS.
Anyway.
I decided to not do my usual thing of scrolling past, and made myself sit through the whole 30 minute palava. What a time that was. Felt pretty sick listening to it, so I decided to just write down the sentences or phrases that jumped out whilst I sat there.
This is often how I start poems, with a big block of associated ideas, written quite quickly and without too much thought. Wouldn’t usually show this part of the process because it’s usually nonsense, but here’s what I ended up with…
Unprecedented change/winds of change/mere gust/hurricane/concreted over the countryside/millions more/uncontrolled/far too squeamish/surge/small boat crossings/soon be closing down asylum hotels/foreign criminals/we struggle even to confiscate their phones/they even tried to call Winston Churchill racist/islamist extremism (pause---scattered claps)/status- have the luxury of promoting luxury ideas/luxury belief brigade/ivory towers/with their soft sentences/ostentatious compassion/they think patriotism is embarrassing/anti-british history/whole institutions captured/want them to mow their lawns/pernicious nonsense/curb woke/kier ‘take the knee’ starmer/the conservative party is also a kind of trade union- we are the trade union of the british people/shelley- rise like lions after slumber, in unvanquishable number, shake your chains to earth like dew, which in sleep had fallen on you/you are many they are few
In case you were wondering, yes she did refer to the Tory party as the ‘Trade Union of British people’ and yes she did use Percy Shelley’s words from “The Mask of Anarchy”, a poem written after the Peterloo massacre for her own means, but that’s perhaps a post for another time.
Such disdain for anyone who speaks in ‘soft sentences’ and shows ‘ostentatious compassion’. Repetition of the word ‘luxury’ over and over again- ‘luxury beliefs’, luxury ideas’. There’s just something so stark and weird about the use of that word.
Luxury=
“A state of great comfort or elegance”
It doesn’t really make sense when applied to ideas, as far as I can see (I suppose she means ‘privileged ideas’, but that language is probably far too ‘woke’). It’s certainly not one you would associate with compassion for over-packed, unsafe, tiny boats trying to find refuge. The word luxury is not one that springs to mind about the state of most things right now.
The opposite of luxury is necessity. Necessity is a word that seems more apt.
At times like these I wish I was a better writer, and could do a good job of summing all this up. But all I have is this very small poem I wrote, using some of the words above as a starting point…
It’s unfinished and un-named, but thought I would share what I have so far, just in case anyone is interested in the process! And it felt like a healthier thing to do than stew on things.
Invitation to write/play…
Listen to something and free-write. Can you use the words you wrote to create your own poem? Cut the words out and jumble them up, or use them to create a blackout poem. There are endless possibilities. If I’m ever feeling slightly stuck, using someone elses words as a jumping off point is always handy.
Some slightly more joyful things…
Oh my word, how good is Deadloch? Naturally I now am in love with Madeleine Sami, who plays the bonkers detective Eddie.
Also loving Welcome to Wrexham, but then I’m always going to be an absolute sucker for a real life Ted Lasso situation.
Still obsessed with Ezra Furman’s All of us Flames album. One of those pieces of art that comes along every so often, and is beautifully effective at putting you in someone else’s shoes.
What have you been enjoying?
As ever, would love to see anything you create.
Yours, forever ostentatiously luxuriating in my beliefs
Em x
I really loved reading your process here. I thought it was very inspiring. And I loved the final poem too. So poignant and clever to turn her words back. Brilliant, really. Definitely do that more especially when you have a passion. We don't have enough political poetry these days I think. Xx