The Fucking Cosh

This is the fucking cosh.

Over our heads, for the sake of some dosh...

What agitates me the most: the thought of losing my income and having to go to the local foodbank. I would starve. I can't eat that kind of food, no matter how kindly the hand that gives it to me. Even then their packages are only intended to be an emergency stopgap for a few days. Sugar is no answer to a nation starved by a ruling elite that doesn't give a damn.

I don't even think they could, were they so inclined. Stones don't bleed.

The local foodbank. Hah! Even that's a lie: without an income how do I get to the foodbank? is the bus service going to be made free for victims of Tory sanctions? Somehow I don't think so.

If this happens I am fucked. That would be it.

This is the black hole people like me - the thousands facing this ruinous pernicious government - face. If you stare into this hole, something very dark stares back and it is the shape of a non existent future. It's a void that consumes you such that there is only one way out.

And we can't talk about that.

Everyday I now have to wait for that brown envelope - or maybe it's camouflaged: the last one was white instead. I knew what it was. I recognised the shape of the enemy. They can't hide from me.

That will be the envelope telling me it's time.

Time to go to that place: the Mount Doom of our time. Here the receptionist ringwraith lives. I shall not pass without three forms of ID. Opening a bank account would be easier. I don't even have three, as I don't own a passport nor do I drive, so she will have to let me pass or...well there's that void I mentioned above. The DWP, compassionate in its wisdom, doesn't care about that kind of situation. Neither does it care if the forced waiting that follows becomes too much for you. This is how the sick are treated. This is the new normal.

The waiting is over when the not-really-nurse-Nazgul calls you in for the interview. At this point it's almost a relief. You no longer have to hide your shame from the strangers in the waiting area, while hiding from theirs, all of us together, huddling in uncertainty to the point of exploding.

If you weren't stressed before, you will be now.

All of this awaits; coded in a few lines of simple text printed on a sheet of paper. There are more warnings and threats than there are instructions and support on this paper. It is not an invitation to attend something positive; it's a road map to your own destruction. It's a constellation of misery that stays in your sight - until the next time, when it happens again.

One letter that changes the world, the outcome of which is largely preordained, insidiously; designed to leave you with nothing. It would, I think, be less arduous to put us in a plane, take us up to altitude, and simply through us out the door. Good luck!

This is the future for people like us. This is what it looks like. Staring into the sun would be less painful.

There is no future. If you can't find anything to help you with this, oh well!

Unfortunately that support simply doesn't exist. For all the kindly intentions and positive rhetoric of those who work in this sector, they have precisely no power. Can they intercede with the dark lords of the DWP? What light do they wield to shine on the shadows within? Would a 'work coach' listen?

Do I even need to answer? Perhaps some might, but that isn't the norm.

If you can't find your own personal Gandalf, to accompany you on this unwanted quest, you will fail. The system will swallow you up and spit out your bones, recycling them for the paper needed to write the incantation of invitation to destruction for the next poor soul. It is every circle of hell in perpetual endless motion.

It will never end. There is no hope this system will change in the foreseeable future. No pause will call a halt to this. The likelihood of a general election is slim, and even that is no guarantee Corbyn will get the 60+ seats he needs for a victory - and that would only be the start of his troubles.

We have to set fire to this world or it will not change. That is the only answer, take it however you want.