A dawning revolution – politicisation and radicalisation in an era of increasing confusion

“For too long, we have been a passively tolerant society, saying to our citizens: as long as you obey the law, we will leave you alone,” Cameron will say. “This government will conclusively turn the page on this failed approach.”

Over the past weeks, I have felt a nascent radicalisation dawning, one in which I no longer trust in institutions, or believe the media; one in which I believe the power structures in place have overt control over our lives and the puppeteering of events around the world in order to achieve their aims.

I’ve always sat on the political fence, awake to the ideas and exasperations of others, understanding that people by and large (or indeed at all) cannot help the way they are, and that events are part of a much larger cycle of cause and effect. Though I would consider myself broadly left wing, I understand that powers in play around the globe make stabilising the economy key to the nation’s survival, and that controlling the forces  rearing their heads in protest about habitual oppression is necessary to maintain peace. However, in my view, it is perhaps the oppression that needs addressing in the first place.

Passive toleration is one thing, but when you are dealing with myriad forces with myriad causes, it can be hard to unpick the roots from the thorns. Today, I clicked on an image re-tweeted by someone I follow on Twitter – @jihadijoe – a satiric character exposing the media confusion and idiocy that has accompanied the Isil rise to power. It was a picture of a baby with a knife held to its throat, and a second image showed another child – a girl, without her head.

Who am I to say whether this image is real or not, (I’ve later learned it was likely a hoax); whether real or not, it is designed to stir up revulsion about a fight about which I know little, and have had a tendency to bury my head in the sand. But images like this are designed to force us to pull them out one way or another. I live in Tower Hamlets where there is a large Muslim Bangladeshi population and it feels like relations are at simmering point. As three young bearded men in skull caps walked past me on my bike, yesterday, challenging me with their eyes, I felt afraid. I feel fear on the tube when I see groups of traditionally dressed Muslim men with bags or rucksacks. I feel fear when I see groups of them hanging out outside the station.

I was seven months pregnant on the 7th of July 2005 when  the bombs exploded on the tube and a local bus, and I still remember my fear that Canary Wharf, where my husband was then working, was going to be hit by a plane. The propaganda, drummed home every day in the Evening Standard has worked. I am not racist. I am, sadly, possibly wrongly, mildly Islamaphobic.

Is it wrong that I’ve celebrated my local, apparently corrupt mayor, Lutfur Rahman and his brother in-law-deputy being removed from power? I’m not sure they haven’t been replaced by anything fairer. If I were on the other side of the fence, I’d be pretty pissed off by now too. Pissed off enough to be radicalised perhaps. I feel like I have become radicalised myself, one way or another.

It is well known tactic of control to confuse the population so no one knows what to think, and so no one does anything. But it is important to remember that we are being persuaded one way or another, by the media and myriad other forces. Perhaps I would be more reassured by Cameron’s decisive action on militant ideologies, if I didn’t know agents are sent into the crowds at anti-austerity demonstrations to stir up protesters and create arrests. I feel we are living in frightening times, and I’m actually not sure which side I’m on, if we have to take sides in this increasingly divided nation and world.

All I know is that  decisive action that feels like the right  solution might actually be the wrong one: acting tough, as previous governments have tried to, has only made matters worse. But when you’re in a world of delicately poised agendas, fractured diplomacy, wealth inequality and massive fucking guns, it’s really, really hard to play nice, or even speak up against injustice all.

Perhaps, as Cameron suggests, all we can do is keep our heads down, toe the line and do what we’re told. Which is hardly a democracy, now is it? It says something that I’m increasingly afraid to raise my own head above the parapet and say anything at all.

All I can say is that Theresa May seems, for once, to be a lone voice of sense amid all this, with her policy of giving a second chance to those who are young, impetuous, and who have changed their minds, which might be the biggest pressure of all on those who are considered radical, in the end.