Harry's Last Stand
Not Patriotism But Socialism and a Dream of Escape Sent Me To War
JM Smith
"It’s the 82nd anniversary of D-Day.
It’s a day 21st-century neoliberal politicians commemorate soldiers from a long-ago war for the sacrifices they made to preserve Western democracy.
Dying for our freedoms is the slogan.
It’s a bit much, isn’t it? Frankly, it’s nauseating."
Harry's Last Stand
The 1% Murdered History with Curated Nostalgia
How social media, orchestrated collective amnesia, and the erasure of COVID helped bury the past to usher in fascism.
JM Smith
"It’s the anniversary of Tiananmen Square today. When the protest was put down by the Chinese government in 1989, I saw the world very differently."
Harry's Last Stand
Twelve Years On, Harry's Last Stand Went from Warning to Reality
JM Smith
"Harry’s Last Stand, Twelve Years On
For almost forty years, the Welfare State improved the lives of the many. It wasn’t perfect, but citizens living under it had good reason to believe their lives were more comfortable and purposeful."
Harry's Last Stand
History Isn't Repeating. It's Frozen in Fascism
JM Smith
"Trying not to think about what lies ahead is what humans do in a capitalist world. Spare time is rationed out to us by the entitled the way my father once tore a stick of gum into strips to share with my brother and me.
People invest their slivers of free time trying to survive a cost-of-living crisis that has no off-ramp."
Harry's Last Stand
Our Coming Storm Will Be Worse Than 1938
JM Smith
"“Can it get any worse?” asked a young person.
“No,” I lied because it was their birthday. “Good things are just around the corner for you.”
Perhaps the truth would have been kinder, but that is for another time when it isn’t their birthday."
Harry's Last Stand
There Will Be Time Before Last Orders
JM Smith
"The weather, like my mood, was unsettled this morning. I walked along the bank of the river that cuts my city in two. I was on my way to an appointment—a meet and greet at a recently opened doctor’s surgery. I was being interviewed by a doctor new to the area to see if I was a good match for her GP surgery."
Harry's Last Stand
“I Got Out, Dad”
JM Smith
"Sometimes memory acts like a stab wound; other times, like a paper cut.
Yesterday, seeing a photo return on my phone like a migrating bird brought happiness and sadness at the twelve years separating me from that moment. It was of my dad holding a freshly printed copy of his book Harry’s Last Stand, taken in May 2014 just before we flew to England to begin his book tour."
https://open.substack.com/pub/jmsmith/p/i-got-out-dad?r=12u3ju&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
Harry's Last Stand
Ours is an Age of Exhaustion
JM Smith
"My apartment building’s laundry room has been out of commission for ten days now.
No one, including the building manager, knows when it will be working again. So the tenants wait, grumble and learn to live with another inconvenience that comes from renting during a housing crisis.
Harry's Last Stand
AI Is Rewriting the Past to Own Our Future
JM Smith
"Many of the photos that appear on social media platforms, especially the historical ones, make me wonder if they are real or AI-generated. Changing our consciousness about the past, present, and future is not creativity; it is malevolence."
Harry's Last Stand
"Hitler's Going To Put Us In The Shit."
JM Smith
"It is unnerving to live through a time when ordinary citizens face economic collapse while the better-paid indulge in gilded-age fantasies. Civil society has been deliberately unmade by the 1%, along with the political parties and news media that serve their interests."
#HarrysLastStand #HarryLeslieSmith #JohnSmith #politics #fascism #poverty #NeoLiberalism
Bob Jamieson
