That's what I can remember from my childhood.
Occasionally,'Don't be bad.'
Good.Bad.
'Be good.'
'You are good.'
'Don't be bad.'
If you were very unlucky,'You're bad!'.
That was my mother saying this,but at school it was the same.
I didn't feel I was acting or behaving any different when I was 'bad' or when I was 'good'.
The difference was just in the word attached to these actions.
The word,and the reward-or punishment.
Through association,these words took on a power of their own-like Pavlov with his bells or a clicker in dog training.
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So,'good' and 'bad' were related to obedience,to doing and saying what another person wanted of you.
And each person wants something different.
In Rugby,aggression was 'good' and I was a 'good' pupil.
In the playground aggression was 'bad' and eventually(after the expulsion of a couple of other kids)I was the 'Public enemy no.1(so said our dramatic headmaster).
The Religious Education teacher liked my jokes and gave me 'commendations'(for being 'good'),but in other lessons humour was 'bad' and I was given 'discredits'.
25 commendations and you got a pen with the school's name on it.
3 discredits and you got after-school detention.
I got a pen once,and detention many times.
The discredits seemed much easier to get.
That didn't seem quite fair to me.
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I quickly realied I was much brighter than practically all the adults I knew,and their 'good' and 'bad' soon came to mean little to me.
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Mum and Dad would scream and fight at home.
Dad would get angry,and Mum would do all she could to let us know it was not her fault(that Dad was 'bad' and she was 'good').
I believed this simplistic explanation for quite some time,but eventually came torealise that Mum was not so perfect and it does indeed take two to tango.
Things are rarely black and white(apart from zebras and penguins).
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Dad beat me occasionally,and I spent gradually more time away from home.
I developed a short temper,and would be quick to attack other kids.
I hurt one kid particularly badly,and I was suspended from school.
I was now oficially 'bad'!
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When I returned to school,everyone treated me different.
Especially the other kids.
I was now 'bad',and in the playground that gave status,respect,fear-which was 'good'! : )
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Interestingly(to me anyway),the modern British street/gang/youth culture-which resemble the playround in many ways-has adopted this same use of the word 'bad'.
It now means 'good'.
It's meaning has inverted.
To say that a song is 'bad' means that it's good.
'Your trainers are bad!'means that they're good.
A 'bad man' is what all boys aspire to be...
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I wanted to be a bad man.
I started reading about the Army-the Paras and the SAS,especially the latter,reading everything I could.
I wanted to be just like them.
Prior to this,my obsession had been serial killers.
I had wanted to hunt and kill.
Not women,not children,not old people-just other men.
I had thought alot about hising in bushes and jumping people,stabbing them to death.
Hiding the bodies.
Being clever and not getting caught.
I never actually did anything about it,though.
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'...Thesiger's dark humour never deserted him: he likened one young chief he met - smeared with the blood of three men he had just killed and castrated - to "a rather nice, self-conscious young Etonian who had just got his school colours for cricket".'
Obituary of Wilfred Thesiger in the independant.
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I started running and doing press-ups and pull-ups.
I did my Army tests and was accepted.
I said to my Mum,'If I killed someone as a civilian,I would go to prison and everyone would think I was bad.'
'Yes',she said.
'But if I join the Army and kill people',I continued,'they will say I'm a hero and give me medals.'
'Yes',she replied ,impassive.
'Strange',I thought.
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'One man's terrorist is another man' freedom fighter.'
Anonymous aphorism.
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Army training was great.
Hard,ordered-just what I needed.
I remember in bayonet training,they would 'beast' you ragged,tell you you weren't working hard enough-run some more,crawl some more-to get you tired,pissed off and aggressive.
Then they'd stop you and shout,'What's the bayonet for?'.
We'd shout,'TO KILL!'.
The instructor would say,'Who you gonna kill?'.
And everyone would shout,'THE ENEMY!'.
Except for me.
When they's ask,'What's the bayonet for?',I'd reply,'TO KILL!',like everyone else-but when they'd yell,'Who you gonna kill?'-I'd scream back,'ANYONE!'.
As 'anyone' sounds sufficiently like 'anemy' when screamed the instructors didn't notice.
This amused me greatly,and was also true.
I didn't care who they put in front of me.
'Enemy' or 'Anyone'.
I'd stab,shoot or blow them up.
That's why I'd joined the fucking Army!
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I got awarded Best Recruit in training,out of 52 lads(which was 'good').
Life in the regiment was boring,and even worse I was living with mostly idiots.
Lazy,stupid and worst of all-'soldiers' who had never fought.
I tried to get an opportunity to do P Company and get transferred to the Paras,where I was sure the attiutude would be different.
I was told,'No chance for a least 2 years.'
My youthful energy soon turned to depression.
I was 19 years old and thoroughly unhappy.
I planned my way out.
I planned my escape route,planned my time.
On guard duty at an Airbase in Cyprus,I shot my webbing belt and did a runner.
I hid in a swamp,crawled around a communications 'Antenna Farm'-luckily avoided the search dogs and the helicopter wasn't sent in case I shot at it(they couldn't find my weapon-which I'd thrown in the bushes!).
I finally went to sleep in a dip by the side of the road,with search vehicles passing within metres of my hiding place.
After a few hours of shitty half-sleep,with mosquitos biting my hands and face I got up and walked until the RAF police picked me up.
I basically then acted like I had had a breakdown.
I got sent to work in the Sergeant's and Warrant Officer's Mess.
While the 'Powers that Be' were working out what to do with me(which lasted 7 fucking months),we were robbing and swindling the bar and winning ourselves free alcohol and money!
Finally,the Army 'trick cyclist'(psychiatrist)-a colonel-interviewed me and said,'What would you say if I told you I thought you were making this up and there's nothing wrong with you?'.
I thought for a second.
'I would say that I was very stressed and upset to have done what I've done already.
Now,I'm even more stressed and compared to what I think I might do if I'm forced to stay in the Army,what I've done is only the tip of the iceberg.'
The 'trick cyclist's' eyes widened,he looked very nervous and said rapidly,'I'm going to recommend your discharge from the Army.'
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It's funny,that the only time I'd actually used the skills the Army had taught me-fieldcraft and the like-was to evade capture from my own Army and get myself booted out!
If they'd refused to let me out,I was going to petrol bomb the offices in the Battalion Headquarters(at night,when no-one was inside).
I was sure that would get their attention!
I got an SNLR('Services No Longer Required')for Temperamental Unsuitability('bad').
The Regimental Sergeant Major,who I had got to know through my time as a Mess Waiter and Barman had asked me to reconsider leaving,because I was a 'good lad'.
He told me if I ever needed a reference,he'd personally write me an outstanding one.
Like we've said,nothing is black-and-white.
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I heard a funny(surely apocryphal)story,while I was in the Army.
A soldier would stand out the front of the camp,during the working day and in his own time,too.
He would stand their rain,shine or snow.
This didn't take long to catch people's attention,and when anyone asked him what he was doing he would reply,'Waiting for the bus.'
Now there was no bus stop for miles around,and the 'head-shed'(Officers)soon decided the soldier had mental problems and decided to discharge him.
On the day of his discharge,the now ex-soldier was standing in front of the camp as usual.
'Alright Bob',said a passing sargeant,'Still waiting for the bus?'.
Bob,the ex-soldier,looked at him knowingly and with a glint in his eye and said,'What fucking bus?!'.
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I was unemployed for a number of months after leaving.
I was living with my Mum,but my savings soon ran out.
A big biker type that was a friend of a friend passed on the message that there was a night going working on the door of a local saloon(there's no better word for it!).
I started,did all right and had a new job.
I was a bouncer!
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Being sociable,prepared to graft and get stuck in,I soon got more work.
I ended up on the door of a fairly big music bar,working with a 'little' Kasmiri known as Farri.
I say little-he was short but very powerful and exuded an aura that kept most people wary.
He was very streetwise,had worked the door for a long time,collected debts,hurt people for money,robbed drug dealers and who knows what else.
He was always alert,primed for action and taught me alot about what it takes to survive and win the 'game' of violence.
I had begun reading Geoff thompson's series of Bouncer books,which impacted me greatly-and I lent them to Farri afterwards.
He would entertain me,and teach me alot,with his colourful,vivid stories of violent encounters.
It made an impression on me how matter-of-factly he would say,'so I had to hurt him' or 'I hurt him pretty bad' or 'so I knocked the first two out'.
This wasn't some wanabee or bullshitter,but a genuine hard-case and professional in the world of violence.
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Farri had started out as a young,immigrant Taxi driver,in the racist '70's and had quickly developed a reputation for fearlessness.
The other Taxi drivers began to call Farri if they had a problem.
A couple of guys had refused to pay a Taxi driver and had gone into a packed skinhead bar on a rough council estate.
Farri was called,entered the pub solo-a 10 stone 'Paki'-and got the money without a blow being thrown.
Soon he started working the pubs,the clubs and the raves.
Steroids,weights,Karate and boxing had changed the ten-stone immigrant into a little powerhouse that looked like a cross between a pitbull and Ghandi.
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Farri was very philosophical and a master of applied psychology.
His lessons formed me a great deal,but also with time indirectly got me into some trouble.
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'You can take the boy out the street,but you can't take the street out the boy.'
Proverb.
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I had moved into an area where there was alot of drug-dealing.
I would smoke weed,but nothing else.
I would put my kick bag out by the porch,right by where drugs would be sold,and do everything I could to murder the bloody thing.
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Work was getting more hectic and I had been kicked out the club for throwing someone down a flight of stairs.
Farri got me a spot in another club,and these guys were semi(if I'm generous!)criminals.
There was a guy called Chris Ballard,who was a European Kickboxing Champion-juiced up to the eyeballs.
He used to go to one of the bars,where there was a big screen and play a video of his fight highlights from Eurosport.
He would run this video over and over,standing at the side while people watched,recognised him and pointed.
He would love that.
There were holes in the emergency doors,where Chris had gone 'on one' and kicked and punched them.
He had moved from one town to the next,as he was banned from clubs for his violence.
The police were very keen to lock him up.
I couldn't help but notice that he would let all of the under-age 15-year-old girls in,and his girlfriend looked about 14 and 6 stone.
I read a few years back that Chris had commited suicide with a shotgun,after an argument with his girlfriend.
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In this atmosphere,I was becoming increasingly tense and stressed.
I was spending my time between the door,my home on the drug-dealing 'frontline',my friend Al's place and a squat on the river.
Farri was offering for me to do some 'work' with him-debt collection,kidnapping or whatever.
Some of the drug dealers were offering me money to watch their sellers.
Alan was going mad and taking more drugs.
He was on mediaction from the doctor after putting an axe in someone's head a couple of year's before,and he had sunk into a depression afer his uncle had recently committed suicide with a chainsaw(!).
As a complete counterpoint to all this,I had been spending days away from my shitty life relaxing in an abandoned boatshed that was being squatted by hippies.
Sunny days,sleeping by the river and an open fire.
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I had a group of football hooligan,coke dealing,neo-nazis looking for me after I hurt one of their lads,and was ducking and diving,with a 'tool' in my pocket and constantly looking over my shoulder.
When a young neighbour told me that 7 or 8 police had turned up looking for me,I thought,'Shit!'.
I went to visit the hippies and they told me,'We're leaving-going to another city'.
I said,'When?'.
'Now',they replied.
I thought for about 2 seconds about my horrible life and shit prospects(likely prison or hospital),and decided to go with them.
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Now things changed.
We were staying on a protest site stopping an old railway station being knocked down(at least for a while).
I began to man the door of the building(obviously!).
I told the junkies they couldn't stay and organised the security in the parties.
I got involved with the free-party(illegal rave)crews and sound systems,started living in squats,smoking lots of weed and taking acid.
I began to read about spirituality and the path of the mystic.
I started playing the digeridoo and even going barefoot.
Now,I was a Spiritual Warrior and I had given up violence.
For a while.
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The parties and the squats were great.
Peace,love,community.
I felt a sense of belonging and that I was 'good'.
I was popular(which is a big part of 'being good' for most people).
I felt I was a cog in the machinery,a piece in the puzzle and a servant of the people,and of Love(I told you I was smoking alot of weed!).
I felt I added something to situations and groups.
I was a diplomat and a peace-keeper.
I managed to deal with the police,troublemakers,the wounded,the sick,the troubled and stop numerous fights without myself causing any harm.
I felt I was protected by 'God' and that I was in no danger(and belief often allows things to manifest).
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Unfortunately,police pressure,drugs and violence fucked up the hippie/squat/traveller scene.
'All good things must come to an end.'
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I had started taking more and more drugs,ofa ll types until I finally found crack.
And then heroin.
In no time,I was living on the streets and begging for money.
During all those years,I can honestly say I almost didn't exist.
I was seeking oblivion...death,and I guess I found it.
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Overdoses,prison,suicide,violence put and end to many people I knew.
During a few crazy years,stabbings,beatings with baseball bats and the like became normal news.
If those sorts of thing are ever exactly 'normal'.
Friends found dead.
Life wasted.
I gradually(and with difficulty)came off the drugs,and the rage returned.
