UNFINISHED READING - Beliefism by Paul Dolan

Paul Dolan is a Proffessor in Behavioural Science at the LSE, a podcaster and author, whose central topics have been happiness and are beliefism. This book covers similar territory to Jon Yates's book Fractured, but to my mind it does so far less effectively.  They are both really examining how homophyly ( People Like Us Syndrome ) is operating in our society, and how an excess of it is deleterious to the performance of a democratic society.

I have given up on this book, mainly because I didn't respond well to the manner in which it is written, and I could feel my hackles rising every time there was a new checklist. Dolan is very fond of a mnemonic ( eg. EMBRACE - goodness my life is too short to explain that one) as an aid to practicing breaking out of beliefism. It may be some folk do find these useful, but I do not. The only list I find useful is for shopping.

Coming, as he does from a social science background. Dolan's thesis is littered with niche jargon that is largely not self explanatory. Here are a few examples - The hot and cold empathy gap - The somatic marker hypothesis - FAE Fundamental Attribution Error - Safety Net Libertarianism - Exposed Cognitive Diversity - AP Affective Polarisation - Negative Utilitarianism - Feeling Thermometer. I mean, feeling thermometer, I've definitely got one of those, and it says specialist language for special people.

One of the main virtues of Jon Yates's book was that it strenuously avoided using this sort of pseudo scientific language, and chose to make writing plainly and clearly a self evident necessity, in order to be intelligible to a much wider readership. Even the term Beliefism, I would suggest, is not that helpful either. Just stick an ism on the end doesn't make something more understandable.

So, I've abandoned this book at page 131, with sixty five pages to go. It's no good regretting my impulse purchase now, nor of the waste of paper that this is a hardback. But there are becoming some recurring themes in the books that remain unfinished by me, and impulse purchasing is one of them. Dolan is. I assume, a sincere man. With a laudable aim to fight back against one if the most pernicious maladies affecting our civilisation and its future. So I applaud his efforts in that regard. But, I just found this book unnecessarily heavy going. 

His choice of frames for his spectacles was not an issue for me until I read his book. After that I was subject to a cascade of my own personal prejudices.

CARROT REVIEW - 2/8

FAVE RAVE - Banjo & Ro's Grand Island Hotel

After two series of Banjo Beale, blagging his interior design wares across the Hebrides. Here he is, now together with his long suffering husband Ro, taking on rejuvenating an abandoned hotel on the Isle of Ulva. It's a hugely ambitious project, very carefully structured and edited here in a reality documentary format, with it's necessary peak dramas and crisis points. The weekly decorating of different rooms, ignores the primary necessity of stopping the roof leaking, getting the water, electric and heating to work, and replacing the windows. This only makes sense from the perspective of a makeover renovation programme. This is not how you would start a project of this scale. But that wouldn't make for such watchable television

What makes this programme essential viewing and so deeply lovable, is Banjo and Ro's relationship. Banjo the perpetually inspired designer, with an irrepressible urge to buy that rather too expensive piece of tat he sees some potential in, whilst Ro, yet again, points out the essential impracticality of his whole approach. As a period enamel bath appears over the horizon dramatically flown in under a helicopter. Ro has repeatedly to row back on his sensible doubts, when the room is finally and triumphantly finished. Undoubtedly this project will not have been straightforward, not just financially, but emotionally. But the cheque from the Beeb will help. This project is very far from finished, so there is at least another series in this. I certainly hope so, because this one was hugely enjoyable. The landscape of the islands is so ravishingly beautiful as a backdrop to their renovation shenanigans..

CARROT REVIEW - 7/8

2026 PLAYLIST - No 1 - I Hit My Head All Day by Dry Cleaning

About to release there third album in almost as many years, Dry Cleaning are a distinctive, but very droll odd band. At one end you have Florence Shaw with her 'found dialogues' and consciously contrived pedestrian imagery  carved into gnomic lyrics. And at the other, are three very skilled tight musicians, Tom Dowse (Guitar) Lewis Maynard (Bass) and Nick Buxton (Drums), who turn out really hard edge, catchy riffs and grooves. Somehow these two elements aught not to meld together. And the truth be told, for me, they don't always. The lyrics can frequently seem far to indulgent in their insubstantial whimsy, too other worldly to be about much at all. Delivered as they are in this neutered, drily sardonic manner. Whereas the music emotionally kicks ass with the best of them. As this dadaesque oblique social commentary yabbers on over the top.

Since 2021 when Scratchcard Lanyard was a minor indie hit, the novelty value has worn thin. On this track Hit My Head All Day, these two opposing strains live happily together for about six or so minutes, but feel at any moment they might drift off and go their separate ways, the tune evaporating into the ether. This one, however really does work well, but god knows how. Maybe its the breathy drum sound she keeps hitting.

RANDOM SNIPPETS - No 5 - Weeping In The Ruins

'Discerning whether a desire is a healthy one to encourage, or not, is a life skill to be learnt. It's one that I find always requires my conscious practice, because I've yet to  master it. I notice in myself when a desire has become particularly sticky. When I ardently want something to happen, to buy something, to find something troubling me that won't go away. There is a subtle shift, when it flips from being a passing maybe pleasant thought, into this betrothed willed for thing. What then follows are the incumbent anxieties, stresses and strains derived from my yearning.  The weightiness of carrying this desire around with me, as though its a gall stone I cannot expell. 

And yet, as soon as I can release my grip, relax the need for something to happen, and breathe more with the ebb and flow of life. Then the mind turns that little bit looser and away from the tight control of destiny. I commit myself to further suffering through desperately clinging.  And yet, losing something I've grown fond of or loved, it can be painful. To grieve for what has now gone from your world, it is a saddening experience. These wounds can go deeper and sometimes can last longer than even my one little lifetime. As every time I visit an old monastic ruin, I'm reminded and once again lament for what has been lost. For in the ruins of our desires, of what remains, can be our grieving for centuries old unhealed wounds, but also for our wish to be at peace with them. I cling onto a memories as I stand right in the midst of their ruins. And here as I'm weeping in the ruins of what was, I start the process of washing away the residue of accumulated pain, to set my desire for restoration to rest. To learn how to let this thing be.'

Taken and further adapted from my Morning Study Journal the 13th January 2026.

SCREEN SHOT - The Last Showgirl (2024)

Shelly (Pamela Anderson) has been a performer at the Razzle Dazzle review on the Las Vegas strip for most of her life. Working her way up to being the central dancer, in what twenty odd years later has become a distinctly old fashioned, and seedy semi nude revue. She always talks it up, about how it is in the tradition of the Paris Revue, as if this was high art she was involved in. This show she believes creates beautiful tableaux not crude sensationalism. Then one evening at a dinner party with the other showgirls, Eddie ( Dave Bautista ) turns up to tell them the revue is being cancelled and will close in a fortnight. For Shelly this news is devastating, she's never known any other life. Surrendering her daughter Hannah (  Billie Lourdes ) to fostering, so she could continue her important work on the strip, The film covers the period up to the final show, and how she slowly goes to pieces, and has to face some painful truths about the shallowness of her life and the supposed 'art ' she has created. In this she is aided by Annette (Jamie Lee Curtis) whose life has already transitioned from retired old showgirl to spunky casino waitress, who is approaching old age with nothing in the bank financially or emotionally.

The Last Showgirl is a beautifully written and composed film, that is extraordinarily sad and touching. Pamela Anderson is the vivid heart of it, in a career defining performance. Shelly is shown warts 'n' all, how she has lived an essentially deluded and selfish life. Exhibiting both the good and the bad in her character, and yet still you feel for her. Like many Americans, she's unable to retire, because with little or no pension, she needs to keep working till she dies. There are many gut reaching moments, that ring painfully true. Eddie, is the shows floor manager who has been there since Shelly began, and is, unbeknownst to Hannah, her father. Bautista plays him sympathetically as a good hearted soul, who unfortunately has this habit of unwittingly putting his foot clumsily through his own best intentions, so the showgirls don't ever respect him. Jamie Lee Curtis, appears to no longer mind how she looks in movies, and plays Annette as this profoundly embittered woman who has lost respect for most people, but feels for Shelly's predicament because it has been her own.

The Director Gia Coppola ( Francis Coppola's  grand daughter ) had to pro-actively seek out Anderson for the central role. Which relies crucially on subverting our own expectations of Anderson, and her career and reputation, to end up completely transforming both. The acting trio of Anderson, Bautista and Curtis are what make this film believable and sing.  All of them play deeply flawed characters, with a depth and nuance that is rare to see in contemporary American movies.

CARROT REVIEW - 6/8

RISING UP MY DUCK PILE - January 2026

As is to be expected Christmas brought a few new books to the pile. It also brought me a Duck Light, which now sits atop the pile changing colour. It's quickly become a much loved accompaniment to my regular bedtime reading.  So much so I have now rechristened this my Duck Pile.

DENISE MINA - THE LESS DEAD

I'm just over halfway through reading this at present. It is, as ever with Denise Mina, an extremely compelling read. It's short chapters ideal for bedtime reading. A story that begins with a woman Margo innocently trying to reconnect with the world of her birth mother, who was murdered shortly after she was born. But her digging allows a whole lot of unresolved stuff from that time to start bubbling back up to the surface, and most of it is not pleasant.

Charity Shop

Currently Reading

BERNARD McGINN - THE MYSTICAL THOUGHT OF MASTER ECKHART

In the realm of medieval Christian mysticism Master Eckhart is thought to be somewhat seminal. McGinn's book comes highly rated as an introduction to his controversial, but none the less  influential writing. I am quite looking forward to getting round to reading this. But I suspect I will really have to be in the right headspace for it.

Christmas Present 

PAUL DOLAN -BELIEFISM 

Halfway through reading this book. Which in many ways covers similar ground to Jon Yate's book Fractured, but comes at it from a distinctly social science perspective. This I'm finding is jargon heavy at times. His arguments feel less humanly approachable, and hence I am not finding it compelling to read. Rapidly losing interest, here's hoping I make it to the end. His solution to the problem of 'beliefism' comes in the form of a mnemonic EMBRACE which is enough to put anyone off their morning cereal.

Hive Bookshop, Alysham

Currently Reading 

 

OWEN BARFIELD - POETIC DICTION

This is one of those books that at the time you bought it, seemed like an interesting prospect. Sometimes books do have their moment, and I'm beginning to get the feeling this one may be in danger of passing it. It's been in my book pile quite a while now. Seminal though it reputedly is, this might I suspect prove interminable in the end.

Holt Bookshop

Yuval NOAH HARARI - SAPIANS

Another book which I'm looking forward to getting around to reading. I've been impressed with the clear headed nature of his mind when interviewed. So I'm hoping he writes in a similar vein.

Waterstones

ANNIE GRAY - THE BOOKSHOP, THE DRAPER &THE CANDLESTICK MAKER

As someone who spent most of their working life in retail, and I love history about the ordinary everyday things of life, this book seemed right up my street. Annie Gray is also a regular TV and radio presenter, particularly in the area of culinary history. I expect this will be a good read.

Hive Bookshop , Alysham.

JANINA RAMIREZ - THE PRIVATE LIVES OF THE SAINTS

A favourite TV  history presenter. Her speciality is the early medieval. I found her earlier book Feminia really illuminating. It opened out the era for reappraisal for the role of female presences within it. This one will be a joy.

Christmas Present

RICHARD V REEVES - OF BOYS AND MEN

I've seen him being interviewed and he delivers a quietly eloquent and right on the ball explanation of what the masculinity crisis actually is. Without a hint of the casual mysogyny or outright toxicity that can often accompany the discussion of subject matters such as this one, on the internet.

Christmas Present

BEN CONNELLY - INSIDE THE FLOWER GARLAND SUTRA

Recently listened to a talk by this guy as part of the New York Zen Center -  Commit to Sit season. Speaking about aspects of this elaborate and lengthy Mahayana Sutra that I found engagingly expressed. I'm hoping the book lives up to my expectations.

Christmas Present 

DIARMAID McCULLOCH - LOWER THAN THE ANGELS

McCulloch is always a really peachy historical read. This one is all about sexuality in Christian theology and how it's terribly oppressive response is not always supported by what you actually read in the biblical source material. I expect this will be regularly punctuated with his usual dry witty commentary.

Christmas Present 

WILLIAM DALRYMPLE - THE GOLDEN ROAD

Yet another historian I've seen being interviewed, who I'm hence interested in reading. This one being a history of India, Pre, Post and during the British Raj. He is an expert on the British East India Company, the first historical example of a corporation that turned into an authoritarian oppressive regime. Very prescient in our present era of  techno- oligarchy.

Christmas Present 

KAZUO ISHIGURO - THE REMAINS OF THE DAY

I've not read any Ishiguro before. This is of course his most famous, and reputedly his best novel. I just saw it going for a pound in a Nottingham charity shop, so couldn't resist buying it.

Charity Shop

SHERINGHAM DIARY No 136 - Whirled Peas

Well, all appears to have gone quiet on the Sheringham Bus Shelter front. The NCC, true to their word have pulled the plug on the development and the contractors have left. So we now have an unfinished Travel Hub with a protective ring fence.  I have a feeling this may prove to be yet another NCC scare tactic to make the town feel the cost of being naughty boys and girls. 

I don't believe they've any intention of ultimately leaving it like this.  Who knows what pressures might be being applied behind the scenes. The government has just given a huge amount of money to improve bus transport in Norfolk. They're not going to sit by and watch it stall, because Norfolk County Council is having a hissy fit over a situation its handled ineptly.

The fact is that if you apply for Grade 2 listing for the Bus Shelter, this takes time. Once you have that, you can then draw up a new planning proposal for approval, this takes time. There maybe local elections that could radically change the composition of councils and previous decisions could then be reviewed, this takes time. As the contractors were being delayed by the protests, and you'd probably have further delays during a bad winter anyway, they may have had to consider pausing the development to remain on budget. All of these things absorb time.

If you kick the can far enough down the road, you gain time for people to forget, to reverse your previous inflexible intransigence without losing face, or being seen to capitulate to the protestors. Come up with a new proposal, return the contractors, job done. To do all this would require mothballing the project anyway, so why not make it look like its all Sheringham's fault. Make the town stew for a while, so that next time they'll perhaps remain fully compliant. Someone will return to finish this off, it's just a matter of someone deciding when.

STOP PRESS - LATEST NEWS A local asked to see the results of the original planning consultation on the Transport Hub development, only to find of the 500+ responses, nearly 400 opposed the whole development plan. So the NCC ignored and went ahead with the plans despite significant local opposition. People didn't oppose the demolition of the bus shelter because they didn't want the whole development in the first place. All of which makes the NCC look even more duplicitous, and the whole basis of their 'fit of pique' look even more shameless.

Well, Christmas came and went like a request for a stripper gram. A whole fortnight of merriment and self indulgence. Enjoyable though that was. My body was beginning to scream enough with the heavy duty food by Boxing Day. And yet there was still more to come. Our final fling of celebrating climaxing, if you'll forgive the terminology, in a weekend in Nottingham after New Year. Lovely food, lovely presents, lovely people, and then it was all over, and I was out. 

I decided that a little bit of monk like time, of self denial and confected abstinence was more than called for. So I've chosen to instigate - Cakee Free Januaree. A whole month without confectionery, and sweet stuff generally, crossing my unglazed lips and entering the hidden sanctum of my stomach. The shock to my system might prove fatal. Some. I'll not name them lest there be a public backlash, joined me in this noble undertaking but have lasted four days before whoolfing a chocolate bar. I say this with no sense of malice or pulling rank here, noble and unsullied as I am, as yet, in my present resolve. To get to February 6th pure and holy in spirit, it seems easy now, but ask me in a couple of weeks how that's actually feeling.

This January it's a year since I first started learning Tai Chi and Qi Kung. It feels as though I've been doing this practice all my life. It's become such an established part of my morning routine. The group I attend in town there are around ten of us. Apart from the teacher Rick, I am the only other male present. There was a time in the autumn when I joined the experienced group,and I suddenly had a period of anxiety about whether I felt welcomed by the assembled ladies. You start getting paranoid about  why you are the only one who has an empty chair either side of them. Or if I'd accidentally committed some faux pas simply through being male. I decided in the end not to care whether they did welcome me or not, and came because I enjoyed it.

The group is long established, and everyone has their set place they stand in the practice hall, and seem overly self conscious of not stepping out of line or place.  Anyway, things are generally friendlier towards me now, I make an effort to not be ignorable, which I take as a sign I'm feeling more relaxed. Also, I am now in my third term in the experienced group, and any likelihood of my being a flash in the pan visitor not worth the time getting to know, is fast disappearing. I'm not going anywhere, I love doing this too much.

I've been pondering on what I might want to engage with this year, that is new to me. Ideally something that gets me out and about and engaging with folk more. Not settled upon anything in particular as yet. We are in January, and I still have my part in submitting the tax return to complete. Which is collecting together receipts and invoices and data entering them, before Hubby rounds up all the rest of it. This 2024-25 self assessment is the first after we closed the shop, so the data entry is vastly reduced, as are the amounts of expenditure involved. I anticipate an easier process, but who knows? I can feel my resistance to engaging with it, but once I get started, remember the process, I'll get stuck in. 

I recently completed a grey knitted cowl which came out pleasingly well. I'm currently knitting a cabled sleeveless jumper. Having finished the front and back, there's really just the blocking and knitting the neck and arm holes. It will soon be time to start thinking what the next project will be. I'd like to do either a Aran or Shetland pattern. Having done two sleeveless jumpers in a row, perhaps I should have a go at a sleeved jumper or a cardy. Hubby has been getting very expert at knitting, and has recently taken to knitting gloves on DPN's, so I am now the proud owner of a beautiful hand knit pair of gloves.

Whilst in Nottingham, Hubby and I visited IKEA, to collect ideas for how we might improve our kitchen. We have decided after living here for nine years in April, that it's time to give it a bit of love and attention, to redecorate at least. But also, to go through what we have in our cupboards and throw out the items you acquire that never really land in the realm of being useful. It is also an opportunity to reconsider how we use spaces, organise our cupboards etc. We've settled on a provisional colour palette of sage green and bamboo as the aesthetic. Though we have as yet to pin this down to specifics on an actual paint swatch. Though its not the colour we are currently considering, Hubby has become inordinately fond of one green paint. colour, because it's a pun - Whirled Peas.

The kitchen has areas neglected by us, like the dusty grease trap that collects on the top of cupboards. And even though we started out trying not to use this as a storage space, our resolve succumbed to pressure over time.

There is a lot of sorting out, cleaning and prep to be done before we can even start any decorating. We have ambitions to paint the existing cupboard doors. This might prove trickier than we expect. A bit of preliminary internet search advises quite meticulous cleaning, sanding and priming. They are only cheap kitchen cupboards, stripping off the plastic veneer seems easier, I am now in possesion of my very own pistolet thermique. I'm nervous about doing anything that commits us to any course of action that will prove more expensive financially or the amount of time required. But watch this space. 

Whilst in Nottingham we visited Sherwood, which is filled with the sort of niche shops catering for what used to be called the 'alternative' market, from vegan supermarkets to afro hairdressers. What caught my attention was a poster for an adult educational initiative entitled - Macademie - Nuts About Education.

FÍNISHED READING - The Devil You Know by Gwen Adshead & Eileen Horne

This book was right up my street. A world renowned forensic psychologist recounts various types of supposedly  ' evil monstrous' people she has sat down with in therapeutic sessions - the serial killer, the delinquent, the pedophile, the mentally unhinged person who murdered their Father. And she expertly tells you the often tortuous and difficult process of enabling that person to reach the point of going beyond their own denial and evasions, to fully acknowledging their responsibility and the consequences for themselves and others, of their past actions.

For all the horror in what they did, these individuals remain human beings with a core conscience, however buried it may be beneath layers of denial, aversion and rationalisation. Adshead, has over the decades of practice, learned how it is to listen closely to the tone, the how and what they say, as indicators to where they might be in the process of self acknowledgement of their past actions. Whilst also paying attention to her own instinctual responses and reactions. That frequently point to the unknown elephant in the room, that underlies the facade they are presenting. A couple of patients curated a respectable and seemingly stable exterior behaviour, seeming to appear models of balanced self knowledge. But this somehow did not ring true. It was her task as the therapist to keep subtlety pushing them to towards whatever it was they were trying to evade. Why are they currently feeling uneasy, or so potentially suicidal, if everything is just so hunky dory?

One patient, a GP, self referred themselves, because they were depressed and sleeping badly. Their wife had recently left them, and there was evidently something up on a much deeper level. He'd agreed to a series of six sessions, but missed or was late to a lot of them. When he did come, he was quite abrasively self assertive, trying to take charge and direct the sessions. He wanted help, but entirely on his terms. Knowingly deflecting or mocking her questions. With every patient there comes a point which she calls that 'bike lock' moment, when one final turn unlocks and reveals the whole underlying issue. With the GP it was asking him why his wife had left him. It turned out she'd been aware for many years that he'd been viewing porn, but it was when she discovered it was child porn that she'd taken the kids and left him.

This is one of those books that lifts the veil on the complex mental gymnastics people put themselves through to avoid facing a truth. In this sense, regardless of their crime, it is a very human person that is revealed through therapy. It's about them fully acknowledging what they did, the pain, the regret. Without which it's impossible for anyone to move on. And this turns out to be eminently relatable for any relatively self aware human being. We all have our blind spots and self evasions, things we just cannot bring ourselves to fully confront. This book has such a lot to teach us all about human tenderness, and how we come to greater self awareness. The underlying legacy of these life histories, can be almost as shocking as the details of the heinous crime. How a perceived lack of love can have consequences further on in later life. Only these particulars consequence turn out to be tragic for everyone involved.

CARROT REVIEW - 7/8

WATCHED - The Traitors

I'm aware that what I'm about to say is not a viewpoint that is commonly held. None of us likes to believe we live in a bubble, but in one way or another we all do. Mine involves avoiding some modern TV reality game shows. This began with Big Brother in 2000, and my current must avoid at all costs are Squid Game and The Traitors. I do this largely because I distrust, or find distasteful, the essential unethical and crude exploitative underpinnings of them. So I've placed myself outside of all this charade, looking on from my very own semi distant bubble, and to be honest remain baffled and appalled. 

I'm not unaware of how huge popular The Traitors is. How can you avoid all of that? The answer is you bloody well can't. It's like someone drip feeding wine into the veins of a reformed alcoholic. You will watch this, because it's your duty to.  I have only viewed an episode or two when Hubby and I have been with his family at New Year. Whilst I have found this happenstance instructive as to how it actually operates as a game, it has not substantially changed my opinion. I still find the format makes me grimace, and suck through my teeth. Even as I sense its attempts to get its sticky tentacles around attaining my own active involvement in its machinations. I do have a clearer sense now for how the programme panders to the worst in us.

There are subtle methods by which it gently softens you up to receive it. This is largely achieved by having a popular presenter up front, like a sort of loveable mischievous Auntie.  Claudia Winkleman's magic is spread like homemade jam all over it, her charm and emollient presence renders whatever is to follow perfectly acceptable  This also allows the viewer to be drawn unquestioningly into engaging with the format. Set it in beautiful countryside, in a magnificent castle, it's all set to support the Scottish Tourist Board

Programmes such as The Traitors points you towards reflecting upon where our country might currently be at. To our straightened financial times, to just about surviving, to where making money is more important than how it's earned, to how our moral compass appears to have been misplaced, to living out a fantasy in the age of stupid.  People engage here with the execution of deceit. Who contestants say they are may be a total lie. The choice of contestants, the type of person they are, hasn't happened by accident. This is not just about being encouraged to fib and dissemble, contestants are chosen for how they fit into particular character types, to which they are then goaded to play up to. This 'game' is then played out so one of them to win a huge amount of life changing money. Your asked to be convincingly yourself, no, sorry fake a convincingly hyped up version of yourself. To use dissimulation to climb to the top for this pile of dosh. The game plays it's own small part in legitimising the social collapse of trust, and it's dependence upon the unfettered individual pursuit of greed, widely active in the world outside of it.  Nothing is metaphorically out of bounds on The Traitors. you have to be prepared to murder to get access to that pot of money, via the round table mockery of a jury, which is often nothing more than an apologetic lynch mob

This process is an absolute minefield sociologically on people's ability, or more often clumsy inability,  to judge the motivations of other people. What people will do in order to gain money. This is only a reality game show, I have to keep reminding myself. It is both serious and facile, and that is meant to throw you off the scent of any qualms you might have. Never forget Traitors is now a valuable format with huge international reach. Some contestants try knowingly to game and second guess the format, with not much success. No matter how confidently they expound their sleuthing abilities to be. There's a lot of puffed up braggadocio on show, which is all the more pitiful when this falls flat on its face. 

Unanalysed mistrust fills the airtime. Clichéd views about men, women or people of colour hover like a malevolent shadow beneath the surface all the time. An inability to examine their own motivations, let alone those of others, becomes jaw droppingly apparent. It's a parody, nay a veritable pantomime, of real life opinionatedness. To massively take out of all proportion a small oversight, a stumbled word, a moment of embarrassment, the wrong time to look away or consider their groin. Major tantrums are thrown entirely for televisual effect, to improve ratings.

I understand how this so easily becomes addictive light entertainment. That's why I'm so proactively resisting watching it. Indulging as it does in a comforting voyeurism, you self identify with particular contestants, laugh and sneer at the sheer stupidity on show. And feel moments of faux superiority because, after all, you've known all along who the traitors are. Meanwhile the contestants flounder around in stately comfort, swimming in an over heated pool of contrived deception and lies, trying to correctly ascertain what is really going on. 

It's a two dimensional puzzle game involving real people, cultivating their worst motivations, to create extremely good viewing figures. No one learns anything remotely useful from this entire process. Everything is as lightly glossed over as the staggering expense of Claudia Winkleman's wardrobe bill. Wherever you look, at whatever level you view this format from, you find a grubby commercial venality. The Traitors is perhaps then the perfect mirror for our time, it's like watching a ship sink in slow motion.

There, that's my Mary Whitehouse moment over with.

CARROT REVIEW - 2/8

FINISHED READING - The Shortest History of Japan by Lesley Downer

Lesley Downer has written a number of fiction and non fictional books about Japan. Originally coming from an anglo-chinese family, she has grown up and lived in various parts of Asia. Her abiding enthusiasm remains with Japanese art and culture. The Shortest History of Japan, is part of Old Street Publishing's series of books about countries, seemingly part of a recent trend towards producing brief histories. Probably for use as the sort of primer you might read before or during a holiday visit. Its also for people like myself, with an abiding interest in Japanese culture, both ancient and modern, who wants to get more than a sketchy sense of the historical background to a countries development. To appreciate the broad sweep of it, without getting bogged down in the finer details.

Like most cultures, there is a mythic dimension to Japan's past, it's a world of pagan folk infused nature, animistic spirits, mystical shaman and legendary warrior queens. With expanding trade networks developing, Japan came under the cultural influence of Korea and China. Cross fertilising with the natural soul of Japan, this formed its own unique synthesis. Being strongly influenced by another countries culture, from which they take what they wish and make it their own, becomes one of the guiding tendencies in the Japanese mindset. Whether that has been Korea, China, The Portuguese, Great Britain, or contemporary American.  They avidly absorb fresh influences and takes full ownership of them by giving them a distinctly Japanese character. The Japanese Tea Ceremony, would be one end result of this process of Korean cultural assimilation.

Gradually Japan becomes a nation state, independent of the Chinese mainland. But the ensuing eras of conflicts between warring family factions, creates a sense of a country constantly scrabbling over who has ultimate control over its very being, whether that be the Emperor, the shoguns, or the samurai cult. The arrival of Buddhism, initially resisted by the nobility, is ultimately completely absorbed into the aesthetically refined courtly culture of Heian period Japan. Nara Buddhism, becomes this state sanctioned religion with its own standing army to protect it from marauding forces. This style of Buddhism was kept primarily for the Royal Court, into which ordinary people had no entry or purpose

During one peak of seemingly perpetual civil conflict, sees the emergence of several more populist Buddhist movements. This Kamakura period, begins with Shinran, then follow Rinzai, Dogen and finally Nichirin. Ordinary people are actively encouraged to partake in Buddhist practice. Its also the point where the original indigenous faith of Japan - Shingon, begins a process of infusing Buddhism with its intimate feeling for nature, that eventually produces the glories that is Zen religious practice, art and culture. The Emperor gradually is turned into the puppet of the Shogunate, who become the real rulers of Japan. They come under the influence of Portuguese traders and their Christian missionaries. This is the period where the FX series Shogun is set. When Dutch traders, inform the Shogunate that the Portuguese have been lieing to them about their true mission, they expel them. The entire country then becomes closed off to the outside world. Bar one small Dutch Trading Post in Nagasaki.

Japan reaches its cultural peak in the Edo period, during their enforced isolation. But this comes crashing to a close with the arrival of one American gunboat in 1853-54 The British were quick to follow, similarly forcing the Japanese to sign an unfair trading treaty at the point of a gun, whose terms were only advantageous to the British. In order to wrest their independence back, the Japanese modernised their culture at an extremely fast rate. This hurled them into the late 19th and early 20th century, a bit heady and disorientated from the rapidity of the change required.  Contemporary Japanese novels of the time portray the existential chaos for Japanese identity the country found itself in, that it has only comparatively recently emerged from. As usual, Japan has made the most out of its interaction with Western culture and economic models. Producing its own idiosyncratic interpretation, infused with the Japanese versions of pop culture and individualism. Though its been in the economic doldrums in the 21st century, it is still a stable world player, that is reconnecting with its unique heritage and making greater efforts at preserving it, 


CARROT REVIEW - 5/8

POEM - Shaking Our Superior Head

It appears we have presumed
the importance
of bringing to them a name 
to state there deviation
from acceptable to
castigate to the abhorrent core

the fault lines in their beliefs
being more important still not
to be listened too
to care for how they arrived here
what circuitous routes they took to
turning a deaf ear to our wisdom

nor can we allow one
free finger of thought
to touch upon the reasons
for bleaching their hair roots
lest accidentally to stumble upon a
need for stability and belonging

of a very similar cast
to your own to what
you demand and possess
for sure they are 
clinging to clearly
unconscionable conclusions

but all desires run hungry
for a clear cut gypsy globe
to gaze through for omens
to dispel the persistent misting
of tired rationales
cracked frameworks

and caged mindscapes
however incorrect we
conclude these to be
in the wrong they stain humanity with
a compromised existence squeezes tightly
around the neck of them

emerging from this murkier
less familiar end
of the shallowest income bracket
to be found near our neighbourhood
seeks favourable conditions beyond
the insecurity of plasterwork 

the surface mould on their
turned out to be
trashed horizons
and the ever advancing
pollution haze of grim prospects
and career potholes

they want what you want
to have what you have
even looking at
the same photographs
they perceive them in negative
with all faces blackened

teeth erased and backlit
skies thunderous in
a petri dish culture of grim
all moral prognosis
biologically dipped in fixative
declared superior via slogans

gestures and sounds that bite those
purely English apples of prejudice
tattooed upon their flexed arms
affinities cable tied to lamposts
that brings to them a pride
that puts all bread and

ambivalence to bed we fear
the fouling of fossil fueled ideals
seeping into our eco-cleaned carpets
because all this has seemingly
got far too difficult
for us to encompass to continue

being eminently reasonable about so
we slap a name upon them
and shaking our superior head
walk back to the car
fearing for our lifestyle sanctified through
our better taste and choice in shoes

 


Written by Stephen Lumb January 2026

WATCHED - Titanic Sinks Tonight

We might believe we know all we need to know about the sinking of the Titanic, through all the repeated films that have been made of this disaster at sea. A large luxury liner hits an iceberg, sinks to the bottom of the ocean with a huge loss of life, end of story. This BBC series of four programmes, Titanic Sinks Tonight, takes you through the two hours plus of its sinking in 'real time', showing you minute by minute how the disaster developed and it's aftermath. What gives this programme its power to grip you, even though you know what the outcome is, is the vividness with which it portrays what is happening through its dramatic reconstruction, and the verbatim accounts  from the surviving passengers and crews testimony.

It also makes great use of  historians, disaster, migrant and trauma survival experts, and most significantly here the writer Jeanette Winterson. Who is amazingly good at conveying the often curious logic behind human behaviour, when its put in the pressure cooker of a highly stressful situation. How we think and respond when we are in heightened panic mode. She is just so down to earth and humane, touchingly reminding you not to jump to moral judgements here. For no one knows how they would really respond in the midst of such a crisis. How we believe we would react, is just wishful thinking. When it comes to self preservation, to survival, something much more instinctual kicks in, and that might be far more selfish and ignoble than we'd like to imagine we would be.

As it takes you through the agonising process of sinking, the number of missed opportunities, and individual failings or mistakes start to pile up. You get a vivid picture of why this turned out so badly. How much the 'unsinkable' claim, made everyone complacent and slow in their responses. Early warnings about icebergs that were ignored because it wasn't flagged up via the correct terminology. The complete lack of a ship wide communication system, to convey information from the ships boiler room, eg - to the captain, or to inform passengers. The Captain who decided that in order to avoid panic,  he told hardly anyone, even in his own crew, that the ship was in the process of sinking. No one knew what to do. People had to decide for themselves what was happening and how best to respond. One officer misinterpreted the 'women and children first' ethos, as women and children only. Which made married couples reluctant to get on the boats, the boats that were inadequate in number anyway. The assumption that there would be a ship near by to come to the rescue, which there wasn't. The list goes painfully on.

Its a very tense and distressing watch, because you really feel for the wide range of people whose testimonies are being brilliantly portrayed here by actors,  The chilling fact that those who got in a boat could hear the screams and pleas of the hundreds of passengers floating in the ice cold water, and could also hear the slow descent of an eerie quiet as hypothermia silenced those sounds of distress. There is also a sense of the real injustice that the engineers who'd heroically and doggedly fought on to the last moment trying to keep the ship afloat, were the last to reach the upper boat deck, only to find there were no boats left to take them.

If you were a first class passenger you were far more likely to survive. If you were a woman or a child you were far more likely to survive. If you were a man, or a member of the crew, you'd be forced into a pose of stoicism and stiff upper lip about your prospects of surviving, which were incredibly small. The men who did survive, had to face public disapproval that their survival was a dispicable dishonourable stain upon their moral integrity. Of the nearly 1500 passengers who died, nearly 1100 of them were crew or third class passengers. There was a hierarchy of survival at work here based upon the implied greater value in being wealthier. Which is quite shocking when laid so factually bare like that.

I highly recommend watching, its quite compellingly told, one episode and you're hooked

CARROT REVIEW - 6/8  

Available to stream on BBC IPlayer.

FINISHED READING - Domination by Alice Roberts

 

One of the pivotal moments in the history of Western Civilisation was when the Roman Empire crumbled. They'd ruled Britain for nearly four hundred years. After their departure there is a period where documentation, and archeological information becomes sparse. What was really happening in this period, has been subject to a constant flow of theory and conjecture. What does clearly happen is the remarkable rise to dominance of Christianity. In Domination, Alice Roberts gives her riposte to Tom Holland's much more Christian friendly book Dominion. In the process she gives St Paul a slanderous makeover and the Christian approach to charity fundraising gets a good drubbing. Christianity as portrayed here, is not really a religion, but a scam intent on expanding it's property portfolio, and pressurising the middle classes to cough up more dough. A faith not primarily concerned with capturing hearts and minds, but with greedily grasping for charitable donations and acquisitions.

.
Modern historians have to beware of allowing the contemporary hermeneutics of suspicion becoming their default mode. I am not a Christian, nor an apologist for it, but I did find Alice Roberts snarky asides and very 21st century infused cynicism, somewhat irritating. Reducing everything to the machinations of power, wealth and a duplicitous desire for status, to the exclusion of anything else. No one is without mixed motives, and early medieval Christians were undoubtedly as prone to that too. But you can feel through out Domination that she is unwilling to give one jot of credence to the Christian faith itself, and the strength of its religious message in forming and transforming human actions. Its presented as so inherently and allpervadingly craven, corrupt or darkly manipulative. And yet, at the same time it is worth acknowledging that the economic dimension of ecclesiastical history is often quite conveniently overlooked or overlayed with the glittery distracting gloss of faith. In it's desire to highlight the economic underpinnings funding Christianity's rise, this book inverts that and buries spirituality under several truck loads of avarice and baser self serving motivations.

From the moment the apostles left Jerusalem on their mission to convert the gentiles, how this was to be financed became an issue. Many of Jesus's disciples appeared to be humble men of working class origin, who had not the personal resources to fund the proselytising of their faith. The nascent religious movement needed to have wealthy patrons. Paul, along with Matthew, had a profession, he was educated. He came from a well off family, and was notably the only apostle who had Roman citizenship. He could talk the language of trade and money, and find converts through that. Paul's repeated urgings in his letter's for followers to put their money where their faith was, was not him being disingenuous about his own pecuniary needs. Christian outreach work elsewhere, not necessarily by him, needed support.  All this travelling back and forth visiting the major ports of the Eastern Mediterranean was not cheap.

From this practical necessity Christianity gradually embedded itself, and found great profit in the Roman way of doing things. So much so, that by the time of Constantine's conversion, he was attempting to direct control of it. If you take Jesus's approach as portrayed in the Bible as your moral guide, then there was huge amount of rank hypocrisy involved in this getting into bed with the Empire. Jesus healed and taught the poor and needy. Christianity constantly refered back to the humble poverty of those original converts with pride, as if this remained true. The poor are hard to see or hear at all in Roman accounts, what the number of converts amongst the poor was remains conjecture., But the middle class, nobility and soldiers are well documented because they were literate and hence eminently more noticeable. The concept of the wealthy being favoured by god, was a Roman one that Romanised Christianity adopted and promoted,  because it fed their coffers.

There is a lot in this book to recommend it, pulling together disparate information that proves quite fascinating. It also challenges the traditionally held viewpoints of Christian history. She describes vividly the period after the Romans depart, how the remaining nobles who led tribes, did not immediately fully abandon the Roman traditions and ways of administration that were left behind. Their adoption of the Christian faith had been part and parcel of becoming Roman. The elite families in charge, she alleges, remained largely the same, continuing to be in control of secular and religious hierarchies. 

Roberts tends towards quickly dismissing the genuineness of their faith or asceticism, by implying that being Christian to them was like a fashion accessory, an entirely self serving pretense. One that was solely about preserving status, or conferring sainthood upon you upon your death, regardless of a lack of evident spiritual qualities. I don't believe popular veneration of local saints would work, if the latter were truly the case. Local people would surely remember whether someone was saintly or not, they'd probaly met them in person. Leaders of noble families sent their sons and daughters into the monastic life for a variety of reasons, sometimes to provide them with a diverting vocation. One that took them away from secular power and temptation to partake in internecine power struggles for succession within their own family. It wasn't always a strategic extension of a noble families influence, but a way of dispersing and neutralising elements that might become problematic if kept within it. Sure, this was not primarily about depth of faith or devotion, but these cannot have been totally lacking.

Whenever a religion becomes too comfortable a bed fellow with those who exercised political power, both sides are corrupted by the incestuous nature of it. That Christianity was, in the last decades of the Empire a small percentage of the Roman citizenry, but a much more substantial presence within its ruling elites, tells you a lot about how cults can quickly proliferate within small self-contained groups and contexts. Where an Emperor's charisma and exercise of power alone, can create a culture where his advisors all profess to be of a particular faith. Currently how many Republican senators in the US are pretending to be ardently Christian Nationalists, purely for the purposes of career advancement?  Christianity certainly became more prone to extreme authoritarian behaviour through its easier access to power and influence. Intolerant prejudice, oppression and corruption assumed its default mode. And this tendency was present from quite early on, and only grew more hardline as they became the biggest religion in Europe, ruthlessly suppressing and exterminating any religious competition or heresy.

She expends a huge amount of time exploring conflicting evidence for how devout a Christian Emporor Constantine was or wasn't. Its all highly conjectural, and, yes, you couldn't base either a defense nor prosecution on the history Eusebius wrote. The dominant Christian reinterpretation of the Chi-rho symbol undoubtedly happens at sometime subsequent to Constantine's conversion. Though it is far from unusual in the history of Christianity for it to adopt existing symbols and practices if they provided a useful cultural bridge. In fact they became rather adept at that.  It is unclear what reason made Constantine chose the Chi-rho. It's perfectly plausible that he adopted this because it possessed a useful ambiguity.That this was a symbol that appealed to a broad range of people and beliefs. It neither alienated Roman traditionalists nor the Christians, it worked for both.

It is undoubtedly correct to question whether Eusebius created the modern view we hold of Constantine, and the high significance placed upon his conversion experience. How much did we just assume that was how it was, even though it arose out of a Christian hagiographical puff piece. But the interesting thing about hagiography is not necessarily how far it manufactures the truth, but what beliefs and behaviours they are trying to reflect and inculcate via the narrative they're constructing. This book, for me, was outlining a purely economic interpretation to explain Christianity's rise in this period. It appeared to be attempting to construct it's own myth making hagiography, mining its themes with an almost religious fervour. This left me distinctly wary of fully taking on these ideas, wondering what was being left out of the picture she was presenting us with. What contemporary prejudices would this be serving, and how much this was objective history or subjective interpolation?  Domination is a useful corrective, but frequently the supercilious self righteous tone of it, annoyed the hell out of me.

CARROT REVIEW - 4/8

MY OWN WALKING - Winterval Journal 2025/26

' No one, after your death is going to say why weren't you more like this or that,?  

You should ask yourself, why weren't you more your self?'  
Koshin Paley Ellison 

Once you start to pull at the threads and implications of this statement, all the pretenses and social conformities of modern life begin to unveil themselves before your eyes. Are we ever truly ourselves, what is that anyway, how would we know, how would we recognise what our true self even looks or feels like? Being more your self, doesn't mean nestling into you and your opinions and to hell with everyone else, quite the opposite actually. But this inevitably is our starting place. We retreat into recollecting our past life.

I try to locate a sense of myself somewhere in this self composed narrative I call my life story. If I reflect on that story as I habitually relate it, this has quite often been in pursuit of some ideal I had, for who I might become. And that thought required me to be a particular person, that thinks and behaves in a particular way. You could say that from ones childhood through your teenage years, you are trying on qualities or personas to see if they fit you. You experiment with, and reimagine your future self, what is not yet fully formed in your sense of your self, what you might turn out to be. The 'your' becomes inextricably entwined with 'the self 'into the compound word 'yourself', revolving through our imaginative teenage cos play.

So much of our teenage angst revolves around perceptions and expectations of ourselves as a particular gender. What you imagine as a man or woman you should be like. Now, quite often I'd think I ought to be this supremely confident man, sure of who he was, clear about what I wanted, was ambitious, took risks, and had a go for it attitude, to make things happen by sheer assertive force of personality or will. A man was physically and mentally strong, extraordinarily capable and forthright about what they believe. This form of masculinity was a stance we were supposed to adopt. The problem for me was, I wasn't at all sure I had these qualities, nor whether I wanted some of them.

Once I realised I was gay, this began a process of decoupling myself from making comparisons with who I was against the mirror of this masculine stereotype. One I'd been finding myself perpetually falling short of. There are, however, numerous ways of being a man, the majority of them chronically under explored and under used. Mainly because the cultural constraints placed on what masculinity is and isn't, are very tightly drawn. The current controversy over gender, is founded upon a clash of quite extreme viewpoints on what a man or a woman is. That its either a fixed binary or a broad flexible spectrum, entirely biologically or fully culturally determined, in a traditional versus a progressive view of manhood. And the clash of these polarities, these two, actually quite flawed certainties, has produced not one resolution, but one hell of a mess on the floor. 

Gender has many aspects that condition and fix it, whilst also being a cultural performance, a mode of outward self expression of an inner sense of identity. I recognise that this is currently a contentious issue, because gender and sexual orientation are vital constituent parts of who we are. Yet, this is not the bee all and end all of life, not the complete package, particularly when you ask why weren't you more yourself? And your answer becomes - this is what I was allowed to be.

Whether a traditional man, a gay man or non-binary, these are just ideas, conceptions about who you are that we lay over ourselves, they are ultimately not who you are really. If we fix too much of our identity and value onto these notions, they can become cages too, which we never allow ourselves to step outside of. No longer permitting ourselves to be contradictory, contrary or inconsistent individuals. We actively curate and contain who we believe we are. Making ourselves fit the stereotype,whether inherited or self created.

One of my spiritual teachers once said, 'There's only one thing worse than not getting what you want, and that's getting what you want' . Once you achieve your aim and fully arrive at 'yourself', this no doubt much longed for destination, after the euphoria has died down, there is a moment of anti-climax, a realisation that this is not quite the end of the journey you thought it was. You may have resolved one inner conflict, only to find others rising up to start clamoring for their resolution too. Never ever allow yourself to become the maid servant of your dissatisfaction, you'll be run ragged.

When I first encountered Buddhism, I was being run ragged by my dissatisfaction. Not a happy bunny at all. Buddhist meditation and teachings landed in an extremely needy, but receptive lap. I had for a while, what is commonly called Beginners Mind, a naturally open and eager receptivity to whatever I was presented with, this went in deeper and I had a clearer sense of the potential Buddhism was pointing me towards. And then it suddenly became quite ordinary, as though the beacon of light got dimmed. It was an activity I did devotedly every morning, because consistency in practice is extolled, commitment considered a quality to be cultivated. Binding ourselves tightly without a rope, to things we have found some value in, or are reputedly still beneficial. 

Once we start being a practicing Buddhist, a Christian or Moslem, we define ourselves by these names. And what we truly are becomes lost in the accretion of centuries old metaphysics and doctrinal frameworks. Any faith can be an expedient means, a necessary road upon which we travel in order to get ourselves to a place where we no longer need it. To a place where we can be free of any terms, designations and strategies, where the search for meaning and self importance retire themselves. However, we are more likely to find ourselves getting stuck, trapped in thinking we need to be a particular spiritual person in a particular spiritual way. It's not necessarily the religions fault, this is just what humans tend to do, we conform ourselves to our misconceptions.

In the Buddhist Heart Sutra it recounts all the things that the state of Enlightenment is not. Its not a thing that our senses can name, grasp or define, its not a thing our desires can obtain, its not even a thing really. At the conclusion comes a mantra that urges you to be gone, gone, gone beyond, gone completely beyond That appears to remove Enlightenment so far from our actual lived experience, to be comparable to an unbelievable fantasy. As Dogen put it - in order to be yourself, you need to forget yourself.

Though it does have its predictive oracles every time we meditate. As you let go of associative thought patterns, current mental obsessions, the concerns and fetishes surrounding your self definition, your sense of purpose or analysing the meaning of your meditation experience. Somewhere in the fleetingly brief disappearance of mental chitter chatter, the moments where you let go of stridently insisting on 'yourself' being you, who you really are, a freedom from all concepts, naming, definitions and expectations, tentatively emerges, blinks, pops like a bubble and is gone. For one liberated moment  the 'your' becomes decoupled from the 'self'' leaving it denuded and free to fly.