The declining status of Westminster optics

Musings

The third or fourth ‘political’ memory I have is witnessing a large demonstration against the Iraq War on my birthday. I can remember riding on a bus across Westminster bridge and noticing the encampment of the peace campaigner Brian Haw; being sternly warned against looking at his ‘pictures’ which, like the more ribald animal rights literature, Call of Duty, the Chuckee films, certain scenes in the oeuvre of David Attenborough and South Park fell under the broad category of “gore.” But it was not the equipage of this flamboyant canvasser which attracted my attention. I remember this as the first time I became aware of the palace of Westminster itself as it briefly glided past as a solemn grey blur. When told that is where “people run the country” or “the government lives” I was instantly fascinated by the first of many occult worlds it seemed incumbent upon me to access.