Tag Archives: peace

Stephen Harte

Why Eurovision gives me hope

By Stephen Harte | Sat 11th May 2024 - 12:55 pm

 Happy Eurovision!

Today is the highest and holiest days of the camp calendar – the grand final of the 68th Eurovision Song Contest from Malmo, Sweden.

Growing up in Thatcher’s dismal 1980s in West Lothian (immediately to the west of Edinburgh but with none of the cosmopolitan colour of Scotland’s capital and getting all of the bust and none of the boom of those Tory years), I never travelled abroad until I left school. Eurovision was a glimpse into another exotic world. Eurovision wasn’t cool in the 1980s (and ABBA were yet to be reborn in Gold) and I often thought I was the only person I knew who was drawn into the spectacle. It never occurred to me that I was one of many queer people for whom Eurovision gave life.

Camp theory teaches that we can often find the most profound truth in the silly and irreverent. Eurovision has been that to my liberal, European heart. Our shared European home has been a place of war and division – and remains so today, with war in Gaza and Ukraine and the spectre of the far right stalking virtually every country (not least this ugly Tory Brexiteer government in the UK). The fact that something as camp and outrageous as my beloved Eurovision Song Contest unites us speaks to me and gives me hope in the way that a speech from Macron never could.

For example, in the 1993 contest in Millstreet in rural Ireland, at the height of the Bosnian war, the Bosnian act had to be flown out, under fire, in a UN helicopter. We had a jury in Sarajevo under siege calmly give their votes over a crackly UN line. The Irish compère thanked Sarajevo and simply told them to take care. Not a dry eye in the house!

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Kirsten Johnson

God Speed The Plough

By Kirsten Johnson | Thu 8th November 2018 - 12:30 pm

One of the pleasures of being a PPC is the opportunity to visit many venues in the run up to Remembrance Day on Sunday.

Last week I had a look around the Flower Festival at St Sabinus’ Church, Woolacombe. Many of the exhibits struck a chord – I, after all, grew up on military bases and appreciate from the inside out the sacrifices women, men and children make in service to their country. The embroidered cards with faded handwritten messages, sent back and forth (yes, some French ones sent home to girlfriends from the front line) were especially poignant.

However, one flower display stood out, and that was the tribute to the Women’s Land Army. “God Speed the Plough” honoured the vital work of women undertaken whilst the nation was at war.

The Women’s Land Army was originally set up in 1917 but then dissolved after the First World War. It was reinstated in 1939 as a voluntary service, and then conscripted women from December 1941. “Land girls” did a variety of jobs on grain, stock and dairy farms, including deployment in an anti-vermin squad (‘rat-catchers’).

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The Voice

The campaign starts up again

By The Voice | Fri 26th May 2017 - 7:00 am

It’s the first day of national campaigning since the Manchester attack on Monday night.

For Tim Farron, it’s not an immediate return to hostilities. Instead, he’s going to Warrington to visit a Jonathan Ball/Tim Parry Peace Foundation in Warrington.

The Foundation was set up by the parents of the two boys who were killed by the Warrington Bomb in 1993.

Tim wants to learn about the charity’s work.

Later he will attend a remembrance service at a Mosque with the Ahmadiyya community in Manchester.

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Julie Smith

Baroness Julie Smith writes…The European Peace Project

By Julie Smith | Wed 22nd June 2016 - 11:55 am

Peace: the single most important reason for the creation of what we now call the European Union, and the reason it remains so crucial. The European project arose from a clear vision: to make war in Europe ‘materially impossible’, to create enduring peace in a continent long ravaged by war. It is almost impossible to imagine now the devastation that plagued our continent for so long. And that is thanks to the visionary ideas of its founders. A spirit of reconciliation and mutual cooperation among the six founding members was crucial to ensuring Immanuel Kant’s idea of perpetual peace seemed to be a reality.

Of course, many would argue that is NATO that has kept the peace in Europe. It has certainly been important in securing the borders of its European members. During the Cold War the European Community as it was initially known could rely on an American security blanket to protect them from Soviet threats. Yet, within its own borders it was the mutual trust that developed as a result of pooling sovereignty in the areas of coal and steel and then across a wider set of economic policies that ensured member states began to see each other as partners and allies, not potential invaders.

For generations now we have lived secure in the knowledge that our fathers, brothers and sons will not be summoned to fight for our country. Military engagement by the state and by individuals signing up is voluntary, not forced. We have the EU to thank for that.

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Antony Hook

Opinion: 200 years on from Waterloo: democracy not dictators, unity not barriers, peace not war.

By Antony Hook | Fri 19th June 2015 - 1:32 pm

WaterlooThis week’s 200th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo is a reminder of how far Europe has come.

At Waterloo, 65,000 men were killed or wounded in one day.  In contrast, we have now had 70 years without war in Europe.  Long may peace continue.

We enjoy secure peace partly because every country in Europe now has an elected government. There are no more monarchs or dictators seeking out war for vanity or power. Most importantly, we have the European Parliament where modern opportunities and problems, which cross old national borders, can be discussed by MEPs we elect rather than fought over by armies.

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Jonathan Brown

Opinion: Violence And Peace In The Middle East – There Is Something We Can Do

By Jonathan Brown | Wed 16th July 2014 - 8:55 am

Gaza Burns - photo by Al Jazeera EnglishThe recent murders of the Israeli and Palestinian children were in themselves terrible crimes but they also served to ignite the latest round of brutal violence in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Some media commentators are tempted to suggest that this is inevitable and un-resolvable but I don’t believe that to be the case.

I was surprised recently to discover – and then to find that I greatly admired – the Liberal Democrat Friends of Palestine’s 9 point plan for peace and the three principles that inform …

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Ian Jones

Opinion: Europe and peace – the ties that bind and the dangers of the rise of the right

By Ian Jones | Wed 18th December 2013 - 4:30 pm

There are many sound economic reasons why Britain’s continued membership of the EU is good for our country and for Europe itself. We are already making that case as the Euro elections approach in May 2014 and must continue to do so.

However, there is one over-riding reason that is barely getting mentioned as the whiff of ‘little-Englander patriotism’ in euro-sceptic campaigning risks once again becoming the stench of right-wing xenophobic nationalism in Britain and across Europe.

The historical development of the EU has provided the ties that bind European nations together in peace after a century of vicious blood-letting, including the …

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