A BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO ZEROISM
In years to come, once the Peace Prizes have gathered dust, the fanbase has grown from a following to a cult to a sophisticated political system and finally a late night public access TV show, when I’ve been knighted, sainted, and sued in a series of undignified paternity suits, we’ll look back on this section of the site and wonder why I blew this whole introductory sentence on absolutely nothing.
Sorry. This is The People’s Zero. This is the ethical living guide for cynical bastards. This is how nobodies like us are going to change the world. Listen:
A Beginner's Beginning
The Grand Zero Epiphany. How a nobody figured he should do some things about some stuff but still be kind of a dick about it.
Inspiring.
Goals, Plans & Assorted Machiavellia
What we’re going to do, how we’re going to do it. And why you’re included in the we.
Principal Principles
You can’t change hearts and minds with insufferable smugness alone. Apparently.
THE BLOG
Onward to independence, somehow
The Equality Act (2010) demands people make reasonable adjustments to meet the needs of those with disabilities and long-term illnesses. What I’m saying is, Long Covid’s still giving me a doing so you’re legally obliged to pretend this post-election hot take was published about three weeks ago.
Green Scotland/Little England
The Scottish Parliament elections are coming up on the 6th May, and even those of us still slobbing around with Long Covid can do something actually useful: We can vote to make a ton of progress on a whole bunch of things, and take steps towards ending Tory cruelty forever.
Victory!
Victory! After four years of outrage and misery, five days chewing my nails down past the knuckles, and four nights sleeping so fitfully I thought maybe post-election panic was a cure for Long Covid lethargy, we got the motherfucker: Donald Trump got beat.
Red alert: Vote blue!
In the wide world of general do-goodery there is, at present, an opportunity to right an absolute shit-ton of wrongs and restore a small bit of order and decency to a smaller bit of the universe: Voting Donald Trump the fuck out of office.
Inactivism
When last we met, back in mid-lockdown May, I was banging on about Covid knackering my attempts to do a bit of the old ultra-activism. As I said back then, if ever there was a time for some proper solid do-gooding it’s in the middle of a deadly pandemic. What I didn’t anticipate about this particular deadly pandemic is that I would be personally attacked by the motherfucker.
Impatient Zero
I decided to spend ten days off my tits with fever, and then most of March struggling to breathe, and then half of April self-isolating while I downgraded my cough from persistent to lingering to socially awkward. It’s been frustrating. But I’ve been up and about for a few weeks now, and the old nagging feeling that I should be doing more is kicking back in.
THEIRStory
I was a true believer back when the allegations first hit. I loved Michael Jackson with the bone-deep intensity only teenagers get to feel, when music feels important. When it feels tribal. When the heavy metal mob splits from the goths, when the indie kids look down on manufactured pop fans. I spent the next couple of years in second-hand record stores, car boot sales and memorabilia fairs building a collection so obsessive it could have scored me a diagnosis and a decent whack of DLA.
Vote. Campaign. Donate. Win.
Well… We lost the fuck out of that one, didn’t we? After Christine Blasey Ford’s heroic testimony, after Jeff Flake’s ego-driven dithering, after a week of two Republicans pretending to struggle with the ethics of the thing, we had Trump mocking Dr Ford while his disciples laughed uproariously.
No.
And so to the latest reason for perma-outrage in this hellish, goatee-filled darkest-timeline in which that sorry bastard is occupying the White House and people like him are swagging around with their racism and misogyny proudly on show: the Kavanaugh hearings.