Saw Declan Welsh & The Decadent West live on Wednesday night, and I was blown away with the way they took over the stage. Declan’s stage presence was just amazing, he is so expressive and lively and absolutely put his whole soul into each song which was amazing to witness. Definitely went right up to the top of my list of live performers I wish to see again. Already adored them for their music and values, but wow the energy radiating off the stage was just amazing! What really blew me away was the two speeches they made, one in solidarity with Palestine and their experiences there before playing their song Different Strokes. The second speech leading to their song Do What You Want, my sister managed to catch on record almost in it’s entirety. I’m posting it because it felt so personal to me, it felt so so special to be in a room full of strangers and hear it and feel, for a second, the power in people. The power in us. Because while I love softness and I love kindness, I do miss a bit of punk and anarchist attitude. We should, as a matter of fact be getting pissed off about being fucked over, we do deserve better and we should be fighting for our rights! We should unite over the important stuff!
”…..and when ever that happens, the people who wish things would just stay the same, become increasingly desperate in trying to create, new parayas, new scapegoats, new people or actions to focus on, and in the last few years one of the most pronounced efforts has been seen in the strange fixation on trans people.
The transphobia taking over institutions and media, despite the fact that almost every public attitude survey, in most countries, say again; people just wanna let people live their lives. So why is this manufactured? Well, number one: Straight up bigotry! Some people hate other people because of who they are. And that’s fucking shit, and those people are not worth our conversation or attention.
But secondly: The only way that we change things is through creating a big group of different kinds of people, who all understand what is to get fucked over. We are fucked over in different ways, for different reasons and at different pains. But unless you have a personal net-worth of over one million dollars; welcome to the fucked over club, we are happy to have you!
And they know, the people who have a lot right now; Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos... That the biggest danger to them is that if poor people, transpeople, black people, white people, asian folks, women, straight people and queer people… all realise here: If we can unite over one thing; being fucked over, there’s no way they can stop us. So they try and pun you against other people, who should be with allied.
Do you know how I know that hey are our allies? Is that if you go and march with Palestine, you’ll see a trans flag. If you go at a march about women’s rights, you’ll see a trans flag, if you go at an anti-war march you’ll see a trans flag, if you go to a march about trade union rights, you will see a trans flag. Because when you are a part of a community that has been oppressed, you’ll understand what solidarity is. You understand it’s importance. Let’s learn from our times comrades, and be there for everyone, no matter how much their experience is like ours!”
