There were two riots in American prisons in a week in 1953.

Apparently, the inmates didn’t see themselves as a part of any global or even national movement. Different countries had different problems. But all these riots received global attention.

I can’t cover all these riots, so I’ll focus on two prisons that were spoken of in the British newspapers, one in Colorado, and one in Nebraska.  When I was growing up, those were what you might consider two of the calmest places in North America.   (More on that in another post, perhaps.)

First, let’s go to Colorado. The headline in the story in the Manchester Guardian read: “Riot in Colorado Prison. Two Guards injured.”

It was the 16th of July, 1951. There were 11 prisoners in solitary confinement.  Another five tried to free them. After attempting a jail break, or at least a solitary break, these five barricaded themselves (perhaps with others) in a cell block.

Now, it’s obvious which side has the sympathies of the Manchester Guardian in this. The five apparently included three serving long terms for kidnapping, and other a life term for murder. It’s hard to sympathize with them based on that information.

Who was the fifth, and how did he get mixed up in all this? The Manchester Guardian doesn’t say. Were others involved? The Manchester Guardian probably didn’t know.

The guards surrounded the rioting prisoners with “sub-machine guns” but apparently didn’t fire a shot. However, the five were somehow shot and wounded.  That’s how we know there were at least five, they were only counted because of their wounds.

The guards also surrounded the blocks with tear gas, which apparently was also not used.  How the prisoners got shot and wounded is completely left out of the story. Did they hurt each other, or did the guards fire with the submachine guns, or rifles?

The prisoners supposedly gave themselves up by putting their hands up due to quick thinking by the guards.  It seems they gave up without a fight, which deepens the mystery.

And, they were later put in other solitary confinement cells, next to those of the prisoners they had tried to free.

Also left out is how the two guards were injured. I’d like to know what happened to them afterwards as well as during the conflict. Were these guards who provoked the prisoners, or were they innocent bystanders?  Did the methods of trying to quell the prisoners result in “friendly fire”, where the guards were accidentally hurt by other guards? Or, were the prisoners exacting revenge for injuries real or imagined?

Perhaps this story, when studied in entirety, provides lessons for making prisons safer for guards in the future, lessons we may have learned but are now forgetting.  However, it is far from complete.

I’m interested in the fifth prisoner, the one not accused of any major crime, who somehow got mixed up in all this.  I wonder who he is.

One prisoner who was in a Colorado prison at that time later moved to Nebraska.   He was not accused of a major crime, but he was mixed in with those who were. Perhaps he saw that riot, and the next one.  Perhaps he was a part of both.

On the 17th of August, 1953, there was a riot in Lincoln, Nebraska which again made the papers as far away as Machester, England (even with riots at home, in South Africa, Algeria, and elsewhere to talk about.)  Here’s the ironic report.

A squad of guards armed with shot-guns marched into Nebraska State Penitentiary here to-day and quelled a riot by prisoners who had burned down six workshops, and beaten up three of their fellow convicts[.] [T]he prisoners had been warned that the guards had orders to shoot to kill if anyone resisted, and returned quietly to their cells. No one was hurt.

No one was hurt?  What about the fellow prisoners that had been beaten up?  If I understand correctly, they might have been thought to have been snitches, or perhaps those prisoners were seen as being too close to the guards.

The article makes the riot sound much less terrifying than it probably was on the ground.  One of the fellow inmates could easily have feared losing his life.  These shot guns weren’t brought out as a matter of routine.  These were tense times, with riots throughout the country.  The news story here was that this particular riot didn’t seem to amount to much, at least as far as the guards were concerned.

In Canada, in the previous year, 1000, yes, one thousand, prisoners had participated in a riot.  On August 15, 1954, troops were called out to the prison in Kingston Ontario, known as Portsmouth Prison.

Police and firemen were already on the scene, when sixty troops joined them to heard the thousand prisoners back to their cells.  The firemen were apparently there because there was a blaze to be controlled in the prison workshop.

When the report was published, no one knew what caused the fire, but the prisoners had had control of their cells and certain other parts of the prison “for several hours.”

Could that be called a riot?  Well, Portsmouth Prison in Canada had had riots before, like one in 1933 which lasted several days and led to prison reform in that country.

But the most interesting one for us is one in Nebraska earlier in 1955.  This is one of the few riots which had a cause mentioned.

In was March 28th.  The headline read “Nebraska Prison Revolt
‘Sadistic’ Wardens.”

This was a hostage situation, where the prisoners had captured and held non-prisoners.  Nine prisoners asked for “all wardens we can prove to be sadists and/or head-beaters” to be fired.  They wrote a letter to the governor with other demands, and in return they’d release two wardens which they held captive.

They had other demands, including medical treatment, no favoritism, and “and a table so we won’t have to use our beds as tables.”

What were these “sadistic” wardens doing?  Was this revolt linked to Colorado?  How were these disputes resolved, and what legacy do they hold with us today?  We’ll get to more of that later.

The riots of the past led to reforms in the United States and elsewhere.

Now, there are movements which say the reforms have gone too far, or are now going in the wrong direction.  We see a new age of lawlessness, of overcrowded prisons, and we wonder what kind of reforms we need in our society.

And, there are movements which are having us look at the rights of victims, to help us consider what prison is about: minimizing offenses before they happen, and making society a safer place for everyone.

While we reconsider how broken our current prison system is, we should remember the past, so we don’t make the same mistakes again.

We’re in pre-production of a film about the story of one of the prisoners involved in one of these riots. He’s not named in the British papers, but the current draft of the screenplay features the last story above as a key scene in his story.

Ray Tapia has told his story from the inside.  His story goes into far greater detail than the news stories did.  And, we are currently working on bringing that story to film.

Selected news sources:

(1) Riot in Colorado Prison. The Manchester Guardian (1901-1959) 1951 Jul 17:10.

(2) U.S. Prison Riot Quelled. The Manchester Guardian (1901-1959) 1955 Aug 18:9.

(3) 1,000 Convicts in Prison Riot. The Manchester Guardian (1901-1959) 1954 Aug 16:1.

(4) Nebraska Prison Revolt. The Manchester Guardian (1901-1959) 1955 Mar 29:1

However, can statistics be used to tell stories? That’s what a team led by Vinny Bruzzese is trying to do. For 20k, he’ll tell you how your screenplay compares to successful films.

Statistically, he says, get rid of the Ouija board. Well, I could have told you that without statistics. I hate Ouija boards, and back when I was looking at other people’s scripts, if I say a Ouija board it would be an automatic rejection. I wouldn’t read any further, because generally Ouija board scenes were a cop out.  But, Jumanji is similar to Ouija, and it worked okay.

But he also says that bowling “tends to feature in films that fizzle”, or that don’t do well. Perhaps, but I remember bowling in Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. And then there was “the dude” in The Big Lebowski? And remember all the bowling in the Simpsons series? (Sure, that’s tv, but anyway.)

My guess is that most bowling scenes are badly written, and most writers who use them are being uncreative. They are limiting their films to their own experiences, or worse still, imitating bowling scenes in other movies.

One of the Karate Kid films had bowling, and that didn’t do too well, but I don’t think it was the bowling scene that killed it. The film wasn’t well promoted, and it’s story was a bit convoluted. It was also before its time. Back when it was released, the idea of a boy being dependent on a girl didn’t go down to well. Now, after Hunger Games, a film like “Another Karate Kid” might have done a bit better.

However, another problem was the bowling was kind of out of place. All these extra monks took the story in other directions. Mr. Miyagi was no longer the lonely mechanic, he now had a huge temple of mentors. The film didn’t fit the series.  Cutting out the bowling scene would not have improved the box office.

And, there’s a right way and a wrong way to do a bowling scene. And, I’ll have to admit, that a good writer can make a good Ouija board scene (although I haven’t personally seen it yet.)

The writing isn’t the only thing that’s possible to do statistics on. We might soon do a statistical analysis on the age of the director, the height of the producer, or the length of the surname of the lead actress, and see how that compares to box office success.  Or, more specifically, shoe size of the male lead, thickness of eyebrows, biceps to neck ratio, length of bridge of nose, and other similar stats in casting.  Or, the ratio of green to red in the background, or the colors used in the shirts worn by the extras.

Some of those facts seem irrelevant, and I would agree. It might be a coincidence, you say. Well, the same could go for bowling scenes.

With all this talk about bowling scenes, you might think I’ve written one that I don’t want to get rid of. As a matter of fact, no, I haven’t. Bowling doesn’t really fit the pace of the scripts I have, or it doesn’t really fit the storyline.  (Now that I say this, I do have a new visual bowling scene forming in mind, but I can’t think of a story to fit around it just yet.)

I loved seeing Napoleon Bonaparte bowl in Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, however. I think a lot of things about some of my favorite films were statistically risky. I’m objecting to getting rid of bowling scenes from the point of view as a spectator, not a screenwriter.

Anything I wanted to say in bowling I could probably say with darts or baseball, if I really had to, in the kinds of film I’m planning to make. But, I can’t imagine watching Big Lebowski without the bowling.  (So, “The Big Lebowski” wasn’t a huge economic success.  Maybe that had something to do with the title, or any other number of factors.)

Raw statistics do not account for coincidences, and may not account for cause and effect. The bowling scene, like the Ouija board scene, are merely indications of symptoms, not the illness itself.

If someone sneezes, there’s a chance that person has an allergy to cats, and that there is a cat in the vicinity. But, the sneezing individual could also have hay fever, or a common cold. Taking away the bowl of cat food, or the rubber mouse won’t make the cat-hair-allergy sufferer stop sneezing. But, knowing that sneezing is generally a sign of a bad thing can help you troubleshoot things up to minimize problems associated with sneezing.

Similarly, these statistics will be useful to those who do enough research to understand them. Those who merely take out a bowling scene, or even – I hate to say it – take out Ouija boards, without knowing why, will find their scripts weaker for it.  They will make flat films that statistically should be good.

Of course, the stats maker will then find a new set of cliches.

So, while I don’t like the idea of eliminating bowling scenes, there may be a use for statistics in film yet.

A new standard?  Well, he was mentored by Willis O’Brien, one of the best effects artists from the silent era, a man behind the original King Kong.  And he later inspired the likes of Peter Jackson and George Lucas.  Each generation has had amazing technicians and artists.  These technicians and artists were able to add their own imagination to stories and create characters and worlds beyond belief.

For the microbudget filmmaker, the creator of the classic B-movie, perhaps it might not always seem like a great thing.  The audience now wants high production values, realistic monsters, and it’s harder for the man in a suit to pass as King Kong.  Harryhausen’s attention to detail raised the bar in the field of special effects.

George Lucas, similarly, raised the bar with recording quality and other aspects of production values.  Though a few microbudget films still get shown and enjoyed, the standards are higher than they once were.

Harryhausen’s films still live on in his collections, his influence is still felt in a range of filmmakers today.  We’d like to remember the greats who are still with us in the field of fantasy and science fiction, including Jame Cameron, George Lucas, Steven Speilburg, Tim Burton, Jim Henson and all the others.  But, these big names are nearly all directors.  Harryhausen was a hands on man, he didn’t direct the films, he was more of an actor or a puppeteer.

Today, there are many animators, special effects artists, technicians, background artists, puppeteers and others who work behind the scenes. A few, like Frank Oz, are well known.  But so many more remain obscure.  They follow in the footsteps of the greats, artists like Harryhausen who seemed to be able to add special effects to a picture single handedly.  Now, with large teams of incredibly talented individuals, their names fly fleetingly in the credits.

So, as well as paying tribute to Ray Harryhausen, we take this opportunity to pay tribute to all of those still around who were influenced by him and continue to raise the bar in media production.  Thank you for making us laugh, for helping us feel for a character, for enhancing our experience at the cinema and helping to bring the dreams of screenwriters and directors to the screen.

Unwritten? Actually, the character arc “rule” been written down over and over by critics for centuries.

Well, these films have arching characters, but the main character doesn’t seem to arc.

7. Wizard of Oz. Now, I know what you’re going to say. At the end, Dorothy realized that “there’s no place like home.” Therefore, she has a character arc.

Well, that phrase wasn’t in the original script. “There’s no place like home” is a touchy saying that the producers asked for, in order to create some kind of sentimentality. It works, but it’s not a character arc. Dorothy’s the same young woman at the start and the end of the picture.

The true arching characters are Tin Man, who gets a heart, Cowardly Lion, who gets a medal, and the Scarecrow, who gets a brain.  Even the Wizard himself seems to arc more than Dorothy.  (Notice that Dorothy reacts in the same kind of way to fraudulent man behind the Wizard as she initially does to the Cowardly Lion and even Miss Gulch.)

You could say that Dorothy grows in her view of them, as it’s really all just a dream, and their changes are just representations of her changed perception of home. But then, you’d miss the fact that for pretty much the entire movie she wants to get home.  The only difference is that at the end, she knows how.

6. The Fugitive. I got this from scriptmag.  I fell asleep during that movie as a kid, so I’ll trust what he says. However, there is a change in the main character, played by Harrison Ford, at the beginning. He tries everything, asking people for help, creating a fake class reunion, jumping off of waterfalls. He even tries telling the policeman that he didn’t kill his wife.  His desperation changes his reality, and his view of the world.

Now scriptmag says that the villain has an arch. Perhaps.

But, the main character is forced to become ever more resourceful, because he is being hunted.  He does things he wouldn’t have done had he not been chased.  He becomes more used to running, more used to deception, more used to the need to be discerning in who he trusts.

In fact, he does undergo a character arc, especially when compared to Bond films, serials or superhero movies.  Even if The Fugitive’s name is cleared, he can’t go back to being the same man again.   So, I guess this one doesn’t count.

5. Almost any Bond film. Ever seen James Bond undergo a touchy-feely transformation? Feel regret? Change his course of action? Bond has no real conscious, he has no doubts. His actions are almost robotic.

Sometimes the villain has a revelation, saying why he did what he did. The villain doesn’t have an arc during the movie, but he flashback’s to his own arc, what made him (or her) a villain.

4. BATMAN. Like Bond, many silent type superheros also lack a visible arc. Again, the arc is often with the villain.

In the 1989 Batman, the Joker started out kind of bad, and ended up really bad.

However, Batman does kind of change. His relationships with others is altered over the course of most of the films.

In superhero movies, it might even be the love interest that arcs. Westerns can be added to that genre.  In westerns, it can be the townspeople that arc, in their acceptance of the hero.  Or, as in classic tragedy, the villain could arc in a kind of regret and realization (as sort of happened in Spiderman 2, and to a degree in Dpiderman 3, where a lot of characters tried to arc, including the hero.)

3. Character studies. Sometimes, a Film is more about character than plot. Classic art house movies like Le Rayon Vert are character studies.  The main character doesn’t really change in Le Rayon Vert, we just observe her in different situations, and see how she reacts.

The ending is satisfactory, but the change is merely in her circumstances, rather than her personality.

This also goes for comedies, which can also be character studies.  Some of the best character study comedies have no real character arc, at most they end with a realization.  However, many contemporary comedies include some kind of character arc, even if it feels contrived.

2. Serials.  Am I being repetitive here with Bond, Batman, superheroes and serials?  Kind of.  In a true story, the character ends with a different world than he started with.  However, in the sitcom, or the serial, the character can’t change.  This is mostly television, but some film serials work the same way.

This leads to formulaic sequels, which some people actually like.  However, even in these, there’s usually some kind of arc with someone.  There’s a life lesson learned, even if its a minor one that doesn’t change a character.  If the same character repeatedly makes the same mistakes, eventually the series will get boring.  At the very least, the villains need to vary the tactics somewhat.  Or you need to change the scenery or something.

Sometimes, we bring out a different element of the character, and the serial will be an extended character study.  Quantum Leap, the Love Boat, and other tv shows often allow us to do character studies on “guest” characters, while we can enjoy the familiar heroes we’ve seen before.  (No one really has to arc, but sometimes the guest characters do.)

However, most serials are relatively short in length.  Longer films tend to benefit from some kind of arc, or at least a death or marriage at the end to finalize the storyline.

1. Bad movies. In a lot of really badly written movies, there is no character arc in any character.

Some are serials.  Some are just poorly thought out.

In any case, character arc is more than just character change.  To be interesting, something has to work upon that change, it needs to be tied into the plot.  It shouldn’t happen at the first drop of a hat, if character change comes too easily it won’t be convincing.

Other things can arc besides character.  Villains and supporting roles can arc, but so can the town in general.

Have you seen a film which you think has no character arc that doesn’t fit the categories above?  Let us know.

Later, I’ll illustrate seven blockbusters with great character arcs.

In 1906, The LA Herald released an article saying that Anarchism “Menaces the Peace of all Nations.” They included a wide variety of groups as anarchists, perhaps too wide.

When I heard about the Boston bombing, I didn’t know what to think.  I was reminded of a high school history class, when we learned why Americans don’t like socialists.

You ever notice that in the USA they don’t celebrate May Day as a labor holiday?  Instead, Labor Day is at the start of the school year.  If I remember my history class correctly, the old American stereotype of a socialist was a bearded man with a bomb.

This stereotype goes back well over 100 years.   Instead of looking at my own imperfect notes, and trying to remember what I learned, I’ll take some old newspaper articles to explore the issue.

1919 (extracts from a New York Newspaper)

“America’s Answer to anarchist bombs”

“Death for the Murderers, Deportation for Alien Agitators, No “Free Speech” for Anarchy and Ostracism for “Parlor” Bolshevists”

This was from the New-York tribune. (New York [N.Y.]), 08 June 1919.

The New York Tribune said more, attacking other newspapers in the area.

“The radicals were at first inclined to dismiss the bomb explosions as frame ups. Later “The New York Call” laid the chief blame for the outrages to the spirit of war and deprecated the use of all violence.

What kind of political bent do you think the Tribune had?  Do you think it is being fair to the Call?  Well, here’s an excerpt that it printed from the New York Call:

For nearly five years [The First World War] mankind has been systematically filled with a philosophy of violence and force.

Newspapers have been filled with hate and intolerance. Godly men have worked themselves into a frenzy of passion and urged most cruel punishments for the ‘enemy.’ Universities have contribute their scholars for the same service, and their presidents have been busy stirring up patriotic fervor.

Lynching and physical assault have had plenty of apologists. [Do people defend lynching today?  Are there other controversial methods similar to lynching?] Poets have given us their hymns of hate. The literary cult has written stories with vengeance as their theme. Patriotic orators have whipped the masses into an orgy of violence. Suspicion has been sowed nationwide, and hate has become a national dogma.

[This was in 1919.  Was this hatred directed toward any specific groups in the United States and Europe?  What were the results of this hatred?]

“Is it to be expected that all this would cultivate intelligent views or that it would make us descend a niche lower in the animal scale? Whatever the answer may be, there is the fact that bomb explosions in no less than eight cities are reported in the press of Tuesday.”

[Do you know where these eight cities were?  What do you think people felt at the time?]

“All the fine frenzy of ‘nationalism,’ ‘patriotism,’ ‘democracy’ and ‘liberty’ cannot wipe out the stain, the horror, of murder, committed in their names. Whether it be dropping bombs on defenseless cities in Great Britain or Germany; whether it be sending out liquid fire from one or the other side of armies locked in mortal combat; whether it be bullets and the torch on the hillsides of Ludlow, murdering women and little children in the name of capitalist ‘law and order’; whether it be a murderous blockade, or whether it be the midnight assassin placing bombs at the doors of individuals, it is all a denial of civilization; it is all a return to brutishness that bodes ill for the race that suffers it.” [note, by "race", it is probably meant human race.  During the later decades, race took on a different connotation.]

Now, Why would the “radical press” think the stories were fabricated, or that there were “frame ups”? Surely, some anarchists did thrown bombs, especially in Europe when they were fighting against dicators and tyrants. Rome, Open City, shows this happened throughout the resistence in Europe as late as the 1940s.  Of course, by then, there were new, more terrifying, enemies.

Occasionally, you do come across a story that looks fabricated. Take this one, from the National Republican way back in 1887.

Female anarchists

They want to incite a man to make bombs and are arrested.
Chicago, Nov.14. -

“I have no use for a man who is too big a coward to make bombs to kill the police. If you won’t make bombs I’ll leave you.”

This was what Mrs Clara Paech [sic], of No. 1010 Vahnorn street said, with all the violence of a virago, to her husband Rudolph, on Sunday night.

At the same time Miss Johanna Oppitz, Rudolph’s sister-in-law, dashed a bucket of water in his face, and old man Oppitz joined in the melee and caught his son-in-law by the neck.

Rudolph swore he would not make mobs to please his anarchis wife and her family; that he was a law abiding citizen; that he was no coward, and no anarchist.

He would not stand more abuse from them, so he appeared before Justice C. J. White’s police court to day and obtained warrants for the three, charging his sister in law with assault and the others with disorderly conduct. They were arrested and held in bail of $200 each.

National Republican. (Washington City (D.C.)), 15 Nov. 1887.

This story looks made up, either by Rudolph or the media.  The National Republican, though an anti-slavery paper, does have its prejudices, especially when it comes to religion.  Do you agree, or do you think this really happened as described?

Conclusion

I don’t know what motivates people to bomb things.  I have my theories, one that I stated in middle school, “if you take something too seriously, it’ll take you,” and another “the means determines the ends.”  In other words, where you set your mind is where you end up.

So, if you’ve already been reading about bombs all day, I’d suggest you turn to the funny pages instead of contemplating this any more, or read some inspirational quote on how to build better relationships with your family or your clients.  And, if you know someone obsessed with violence, I think it might be an idea to try and broaden that person’s interests, to give them new goals.  However, if you want to know a little more about history, and be a more informed voter, I have a few questions to consider.

1. What do you think people in 1887, 1917, or 1776 would have thought about CCTV cameras?  Do you think CCTV cameras have prevented any attacks or riots in London?

2. How are anarchists portrayed in the media?  What about classics like Rome, Open City? (or list other films where you’ve seen anarchists depicted.)  Did the media change its attitude toward anarchists, or were anarchists   depicted as comparatively sympathetic to show the extremes of greater evils?

3. Do you think changes in immigration policy made America safer?  Do you think any policies used to contain anarchists were misguided?  If so, what were some negative consequences of those policies?

4. Why do you think anarchists flourished for so long in Europe and the United States?  What policies do you think created more anarchists?  Which policies do you think prevented vulnerable people from joining the anarchist cause?

5. Do you think anarchists were generally violent?  Was it the ideology, charismatic leaders, the desperate state of individual anarchists, or something else which led to violence?

6.  Where would you go to confirm your opinions?

7. What do you think you can do, as a teacher, parent or friend, to prevent an individual from becoming influenced by violent propaganda?

8.  Do you really think we have it worse now than they had it 100 years ago?  Does the fact that a former generation overcame a similar threat give you more hope for the future?

9.  Have the measures we have taken over the past 20 years really made us safer? Or, do they just merely make the problem worse?  Are they well thought out, or guided by emotion?

Add your own questions.  My list is based on the limitations of my personal experience and research.

Sources:

New-York tribune. (New York [N.Y.]), 08 June 1919. p 7

image: Los Angeles herald [microform]. (Los Angeles [Calif.]), 23 Sept. 1906.

National Republican. (Washington City (D.C.)), 15 Nov. 1887.

1) The Shawshank Redemption.

I know you’re going to say that “oh, everyone pretends to like Shawshank” and that simply isn’t true.  I know lots of people who hate this movie.  I like it.  I doubt it’s a realistic documentary, or it changed the world and people’s opinions on corporal punishment, or any of that.  The head warden is based on Nixon, apparently.

Well, let’s just say this.  It’s about the only Stephen King story I like.  It’s about hope, and finding hope even in the darkest dungeon on earth.  Any more, and I’d be giving it away.

2)  Escape From Alcatraz.

Yes, perhaps you think I’m pretending to like this one.  I mean, listen to a guys head and it sounds like a bird.  This is one of those classics, you can’t pin your head on why you like it, it’s just cool.  So cool, in fact, that it seems like every few years another filmmaker tries to copy it by having yet another lame remake.

3) Cool Hand Luke.

Again, another prison movie that’s not about prison.  This is more like a school playground.  In many ways, it’s like the juvenile prison at the end of “le 400 coups.”  There’s an egg eating contest for crying out loud.  This movie is not for everyone of course, and you’re allowed to hate this movie without being seen as insensitive, which is more evidence that the people who like it really like it.

4) Scum.

Unlike most prison films, this one has subtlety, which allows the eruptions to have more power.  It’s not as “in your face” as the title would suggest, rather, it has a varied tempo which makes it less “cool” and more effective.  Perhaps Scum wasn’t an international box office sensation, but it did get a few careers going, and it did inspire imitators.

5) The Gray Mare

Sure, the film hasn’t been made yet, but we wouldn’t have taken on the project if we didn’t like it.  This has the potential to be a great film.  Of course, it’s notoriously hard to make a great prison film, so this probably won’t be out this year.  It is now only in early stages of development.

To find out more about it, follow The Gray Mare on Facebook.

Now, we’ve decided to give everyone the opportunity to get involved in telling a story about Dara Says.  In the spirit of the 2012 Olympics, we’ll keep everything even.  There will be two contests, one for boys, and one for girls.  That will give men and women an equal chance of winning.

Male contestants: Write a one to five minute script about Jack’s night at work at Ghost Marks CCTV.

Female contestants: Write a one to five minute script about Molly’s day at work at the university.  (An unnamed University in Wales.)

For more of an idea of who the characters are, see the trailer.

Share each at the Dara Says Facebook page or to fan.fiction@darasays.co.uk by email.  Scripts must be in correct screenplay format, in English or Welsh, and be suitable for general audiences (We aim for the DVD to be rated U/G or PG, for any videos to be screenable on daytime television, and we aren’t looking for offensive or obscene language.)

Screenplays can be sent as movie magic screenwriter files (.mmsw), movie draft files, pdf files (.pdf), text files (.txt), rich text format (.rtf), or open office documents (.odt).

The winner in each section will have the opportunity to have their script produced and be part of the Dara Says DVD.

The first round will be seeing if the screenplays are eligible.  Those screenplays that are eligible, and which we feel are true to the character, will be entered into the second round.  The judges in the second round will be Dara Says Facebook page fans, and the final round will be judged by the backers of Dara Says crowdfunding campaign.   (By then, the campaign will be over.)

There will be no charge for entering, and there will be no cash prizes or prizes of monetary value.  This way, we can keep the contest available to as many people as possible.  We are not under an obligation to produce the script, but we will probably want to add it as a fun extra.

The fine print:

By sending us your script or linking to it on the Dara Says Facebook page, you agree to allow us to publish it on the Dara Says website and Facebook page, and the Ptara website, so that others can vote on it.  We still keep the rights to our characters and the original story, and we retain those to make distribution of the film easier.

The contest is for fun, and is not an offer of employment nor is it an offer to purchase services.

Please send all entries to: fan.fiction@darasays.co.uk by the 19th of April with a short note saying that you allow Ptara to publish your work on the Dara Says website and the Dara Says Facebook page and related places for the purposes of this contest.  Or, if you prefer to link to it on the Facebook page, please confirm that you are entering the screenplay in the contest.

Kenneth Rapoza for Forbes puts it short in the title to his article from 9th of November, 2012: “America’s Middle Class Shrinks Further. Now, Blacks And Whites Equally Broke”  he continues that “those who said they were firmly in the great American middle fell to 49 percent from 53 percent in 2008.”  Those statistics are of Forbes readers, and it doesn’t include those who stopped reading Forbes because they lost hope of being in the middle or upper classes, so the number is probably higher.  But even if that low number were representative, that’s still four percent in four years.

In the Huffington post, Noam Chomsky, ever the academic, takes some time to get to the point.  After speaking of the emergence of a new underclass, he states:

After all, it’s an unprecedented era and has been so since the 1970s, which marked a major turning point in American history. For centuries, since the country began, it had been a developing society, and not always in very pretty ways. That’s another story, but the general progress was toward wealth, industrialization, development, and hope. There was a pretty constant expectation that it was going to go on like this. That was true even in very dark times.

I’m just old enough to remember the Great Depression. After the first few years, by the mid-1930s — although the situation was objectively much harsher than it is today — nevertheless, the spirit was quite different. There was a sense that “we’re gonna get out of it,” even among unemployed people, including a lot of my relatives, a sense that “it will get better.”

This current pessimism, according to Chomsky, is what is sparking the Occupy Movement (and the new underclass are the “99 percent”, or almost everyone.)  That may be partially true.  I see both the Occupy Movement and the Tea Party movement as protests by the shrinking middle class, or those who no longer feel middle class.  Sure, there may be rich people involved, trying to control both movements, and long time poor people might join these groups just to belong to something.  But, the core of these movements, as far as I can tell, is among those who once identified as Middle Class.

While the Tea Party pretends to base its beliefs in the constitution, most of the Tea Party platform has nothing to do with the American constitution.  Income Tax on profits would not have been seen as bad by the founders as a gross tax on sales, known as the consumption tax.  In fact, Consumption taxes on beer, information, paper, and yes, tea, were what prompted the Bostonian “tea party” to throw a lot of corporate property in the ocean.  They were also decried by Thomas Paine.  What the Tea Party is to me is an outburst of frustration, a recognition that something was there in the American spirit that is disappearing.  But, wasn’t the original Boston “tea party” a similar outpouring of frustration?  Chomsky would probably say it was optimistic frustration.

Chomsky points out that in the great depression, there were optimistic activists.  He may leave out some of the conservative or religious movements involved, but when he points to moderate movements the media may now think of as left-wing, he chooses peaceful and patriotic protest movements.

Chomsky then affirms that “It’s quite different now. For many people in the United States, there’s a pervasive sense of hopelessness, sometimes despair. I think it’s quite new in American history. And it has an objective basis.”  The biggest danger of the Occupy Movement is the hopelessness that we have seen elsewhere in the world lead to extremism.

Hopelessness is not unique to America.  We see it in Britain, in the so-called PIIGS countries, and elsewhere.  While politicians and the Troika say “let them eat cake”, the former middle class may have some cheap store bought cake to eat, but they can’t be sure their children will.  Scapegoats are coming along, with Ian Duncan Smith speaking of “benefit tourism” among immigrants, and the major British political parties openly engaging in xenophobia.  While the UK independence Party may simply want to leave the European Union, the mainstream parties are trying to steal their thunder by sounding like the real extremists.

And we see birthrates falling to extremely low levels.  Extremely low birth rates are not a result of women’s lib and access to contraception.  No, the countries which were furthest ahead in women’s rights at the end of the 20th century, France Britain and Sweden, had some of the higher birth rates in Christian and Secular Europe.  Extremely low birth rates are a sign of extreme pessimism, and have historically been followed by violent revolution.

The media has recently spun Chomsky’s dual class system by separating Chomsky’s “precariat” into six or seven classes.  In Chomsky’s view, which is surprising similar to that of Forbes, the world is splitting into the plutocracy and the Precariat.  But, others have adopted his word, precariat, and split that “99 percent” into six of seven groups (or perhaps all seven), to pit the “upper” precariat groups against the lowest group, which they call precariat.

The precariat, according to the BBC survey , are middle aged people with no life, no education, and no culture.  Their jobs include working in care and other boring, low-paid jobs.  They take them away from the 99 percent and make them the lower one percent.  Their hobbies include watching sport, rap music, and using Facebook and their average age is 50.   Most of their friends are supposedly people of similar backgrounds to themselves.

The BBC then creates two slightly higher precariat groups who are just as broke, but are younger, generally better educated (they leave out that degrees mean less these days), and have a more diverse social network.  They are likely to have friends who are artists, or still have youthful ambition.  In reality, they are just younger Precariats who aren’t worried about saving for a pension yet, and still have energy to go to parties or start part-time businesses after their dead-end jobs.  Once the debt burden gets too much, and young-people discounts no longer apply, their social life with contract too.

Or, as my French lecturer once said, Le plus que j’age, le plus je deviens sauvage (the older I get, the more I become antisocial.)  He said that to teach us the double meaning of the French word “sauvage”, but he also pointed out that more and more graduates are doing jobs that don’t require a university degree.  Degrees are just longer schooling, with a BA being the new GCSE.  Younger people are more educated in terms of letters after their name, but that doesn’t translate into opportunity (see the laws of supply and demand for more information.)

Sure, they may have a low income and no savings now, but putting young precariats at a higher group gives them hope.  It’s a great Machiavellian technique, and if people believe it, who knows?  Maybe the optimist spin will get the economy moving again.

What’s pushing this seven step class system?  Since Reagan, it’s been fashionable in America to say “we are middle class.”  The term Working Class was replaced with Blue Collar, allowing middle class identification to expand to all those of middle income.  And the range of middle income expanded to include most people who worked for a living.  It was a great tool against socialism.  Yet, the tricks the media and politicians use try to make everyone feel middle class are starting to fail.

Of those who identify as lower class, Forbes writes this. “Roughly four-in-ten (38 percent) have experienced downward mobility since their childhood while 26 percent said they were raised middle class and 12 percent of the lower class respondents said they actually grew up in the upper classes.”  At the same time, the upper class was also shrinking.

That’s right, America also has a shrinking upper class, those in the top ten percent (but perhaps not the very top) had incomes that were precarious enough to fall into the lower class.  Riches to rags stories are not uncommon.

As all this is just about which class we identify with, why should we worry?  America’s love of capitalism has always been based on optimism for the future, for a better future for our children.   When we loose that optimism or hope, well, read history to see what happens.

But, after all this, I’ll just say that this seven step class system is nothing new.  It has existed in Britain for hundreds of years.  If anything, it just shows the ignorance of journalists.  They are pretending to elucidate the rest of us, when they don’t know any more than we do.

Sure, the wording has been different, but look at history.  There has always been an “underclass” which was lower than the working class.  Then, among the middle class, there is the upper middle class, the lower middle class, the upper, upper middle class, and the other sections.  Among the upper class, there are the aristocracy, and then a few steps down before you get to the upper upper middle class.  The groups at the top tend to be larger.

Chomsky’s view is that mobility is cutting us into two classes.  Sure, the precariat may have a range within itself, but there’s growing, impenetrable wall to get to any kind of economic stability or hope of stability.  And Chomsky is seeming to predict a new revolution that will knock that wall down.

As to the so-called “new” seven class system, well, read a book called “watching the English” by Kate Fox.  “Middle Class” Americans might see class as dependent on income, but to the British it’s almost like a caste delineation, or perhaps a cultural and ethnic one.  Even more than that, class is genetic.  There are even tales of discrimination based on class (as class is something your parents give you).  The walls have long been there in British mentality, they’ve only started to crumble recently, while in America, according to observers like Chomsky, the walls are starting to form (and most people are being shut out).

I hope that Mike Savage and Fiona Divine properly cite Kate Fox in their “findings.”

The middle class, in Britain, is a way of seeing the world.  It looks down on people who wear trainers and hoodies when not working out as chavs.  It prefers to drive a modest car than a Mercedes or a four wheel drive.  Well, that’s a comic look from an anthropologist in Watching the English, but it’s pretty accurate.  Class is not about income or savings, it’s really an ethnic or cultural group.

Perhaps its not entirely genetic, more to do with upbringing, and occasionally one can be adopted into another class.  And as time goes by, more middle class people adopt working class hobbies, like fanatically watching soccer.  But the three class system still holds true, with the subclasses it expands to more than seven.  Or at least seven, depending upon who you ask.

Sources

Kenneth Rapoza, Americas middle class shrinks further now blacks and whites equally broke, Forbes, 9 November 2012 http://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2012/09/11/americas-middle-class-shrinks-further-now-blacks-and-whites-equally-broke/

Noam Chomsky, Plutonomy and the Precariat, The Huffington Post, 5 August, 2008, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/noam-chomsky/plutonomy-and-the-precari_b_1499246.html

The Great British Class Survey, BBC Science [sic], http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/0/21970879  (Other BBC pages also talk about this “new” system.)

Kate Fox “Watching the English: The Hidden Rules of English Behavior“  Hodder, 2004

Today, we can report that we have gotten a hold of someone who works in the financial sector, at a major banking institution.  To keep this individual anonymous, we shall call them “Bankster 667.”

Ptara: You say that credit ratings are driven by prejudice, can you please explain?

Bankster:  What’s there to explain?  Just look at history, see what happened and when the economy tanked.

Ptara: So, why did it tank under Bush’s last year?  How was that prejudice?

Bankster:  It wasn’t Bush’s policy.  Every time Obama spoke, the financial institutions lost faith.  You see how the financial institutions followed public opinion polls concerning Obama.  There were a lot of racists out in Wall Street and there still are.

Ptara: So why isn’t the US economy in a pit now?

Bankster:  They kind of got over Obama, they see him as Irish now.  Also,  he didn’t keep his promises, and they just see him as a figurehead.

Ptara: And why are the financial Institutions after Europe, surely if they’re racist…

Bankster:  I’ll have to interrupt you there, because you sound like an idiot.  Didn’t you notice that Moody’s spoke of downgrading Britain moments after it was revealed that White British were a minority there?  At the current rate, by 2050, there will be fewer White British people in London than there are in Thailand.  Then another credit institution threatened a downgrade when it was found that two other British cities also list white Britons as a minority.

Ptara: But what about the PIIGS?  They aren’t undergoing ethnic change at the same rate.

Bankster:  Portugal’s economy collapsed when their government approved the gay marriage bill.  Cyprus supports Palestinians.  It’s all social politics, nothing to do with economics.

Ptara: And at the start of the recession, when Brown was in power, there were no reports of cultural change or political correctness.   Nothing more than in the Blair era.

Bankster:  Sure, there was no new marriage law, like the Tories passed recently, and the news of massive immigration wasn’t taken as seriously, but political correctness was everywhere.  Remember, the unions successfully sued local governments because women were paid less then men.  The lawsuit meant women would be paid the same, in addition to all the maternity and paternity benefits.  The old boys at the credit rating industry didn’t like that.

Ptara: But in the USA there was an equal pay law.

Bankster:  Sure, but there are no maternity benefits.  Every time the loony left complains that the USA is unequal, the credit rating agencies and Wall Street get all giddy about America.  The stock market soars.

Ptara:  Do you have any evidence of this?

Bankster:  Who needs evidence?  I work for a financial institution, we do what we like.  We call you lazy, then take your money and go off on holiday.  It’s a racket really, but somebody’s got to do it.

Ptara:  Is there anything we can do to fix the economy?

Bankster:  Not at this point.  Now that your governments are stupid enough to bail out, all the big boys will keep acting irresponsibly.  The big boys don’t care if small banks or countries hit the rocks, just as long as the billionaires keep their cash.

Ptara:  Do you have anything positive to say?

Bankster:  Sure, Happy Easter Monday.  And, be frugal with your money.  Not like it matters anyway, inflation will destroy the value and you’ll work twice as hard for half as much.

Ptara: Thank you for your time.

Bankster:  And thank you for your time, money, and effort.  See you in the Bahamas.  (But I’ll be celebrating, and you’ll be serving me Martinis.)

“I suppose you have by this time heard of the grand entertainment the Spanish army gave to the British army at this place on Easter Sunday.  I say grand, because it was one of the finest and best conducted things I was ever witness to.  It had a beautiful effect to see the British troops paraded in columns, each corps having the head of its column fronting the ground where the fête was held, and remained in that position till their inviters came forward, and after a handsome invitation spoke in the Spanish language, were conducted to the tables prepared, which were most admirably laid out with everything luxury could suggest; and I am happy to add, nothing but mirth and good humour prevailed during the day.”

Later, the celebrations continued.  On the 19th of May, 1812, Spain had a new Constitution.  But fighting and the slow speed of communication back then delayed the news and celebrations.  On the 2nd of April, celebrations were made by soldier and citizen, along with Portuguese and British troops who had come to help liberate Spain.  Individual celebrations may have been spontaneous, but the whole affair was planned and “calculated to excite the deepest sensibility and patriotism.”

“After the military oath had been administered in the field of Torre Alta, henceforward to be called the field of the Constitution, the Calvary dismounted, the infantry piled arms, and both repaired to the English and Portuguese troops, who were drawn up in the rear without arms.  There the officers and soldiers mutually shook hands, and with the most cheerful shouts marched together to enjoy the entertainment which had been prepared.”

Among the decor and buffet, there was a table, which had flags of the three nations laid out, Spanish, Portuguese, and British.  Either side of the Spanish flag was adorned with slogans.  The slogan on one side said “Long live the triple alliance of Spain, England and Portugal.”  The other side’s was “Eternal Honour to the Constitution, the Congress, and the Spanish Government.”

Meanwhile, the French had their own way of celebrating Easter. On April 1st, the French paper “le Moniteur Universel” reported that the economy in Liverpool was so bad, that 18,000 people were on government benefits.  Some say this was an exaggeration, meant to show the enemy in distress.

The regime of Napoleon didn’t seem to celebrate Easter as much.  There was a mention on Easter Day of Catacombs that were discovered under demolished religious buildings, but no real mention of the Holiday itself.  The theatre and other entertainments seemed to go on as normal.

In either case, the religious significance of Easter seems to have been lost.  Parliament took off the Easter weekend, and used the holiday as an excuse to postpone talking about an Embezzlement bill.

The Prince Regent, for his part, went dressed in state to Chapel Royal at Saint James to receive the sacrament.  And on Easter Monday, the Lord Mayor and others dressed up and had their traditional ceremonies, which appear to at least pretended to have some religious significance.

But not everyone in London saw the holiday as a cause to celebrate. The morning Chronicle, for its part, published an Easter poem that did not seem to celebrate the triple alliance.

It was entitled “Doggerels for Easter, 1812”

Would that our fears were vain.
Would we’d no cause for pain!
And merry rounderlay
Should pass our hours away
During the holiday.
The Times call forth the theme,
Which shut out daylight’s beam,
And midnight horrors spread
O’er millions wanting bread.
Whence then begins our woe
The Minister can show?
In foreign war it lies,
Where Briton useless dies:
In treasure wildly spent,
From us by taxes rent.
No useful guineas shine
But, hunger-smote, we pine. [...]

And then it went on to describe some people of the time, politicians soon forgotten.  The poem, printed in two parts because of its length, also mentioned the Prime Minister, the Prince Regent, the brother of Wellington, and even Saint Patrick’s day (alluding to the murmuring of the crowd in the London celebrations).

Not everyone from the Triple Alliance countries opposed the French.  Some Portuguese, Spanish, and even British troops were following Napoleon’s “Army of Europe” Eastward.  Napoleon had recently made an alliance with Prussia, and with perhaps the largest army yet assembled in Europe (the largest since the Middle Ages), they were planning to invade Russia.