[John Riley]

I like how the satire is revealed. How the poem keeps the reader alert, curious. It's a very well-done sonnet, Matt. Remarkable.

I don't care for the last line. It's a horrible thing to have to say but the Nazi metaphor--sheep being led to the showers--is not up to the rest of the poem IMO. It's too much of a wrap-up, a considered head nod. I think it's a great place to dig in and find something much fresher and worthy of the poem. Something as startling as the first thirteen lines.

Hope this helps.

[Matt Q]

Glenn, James, Alex, Max Joe, Jim, Susan, Alessio and John,

Thanks everyone for you comment on this. You've given me lots to think about.

The poem has proven less clear in its intentions than I'd thought it would.

"Useless eaters" (unnütze Esser) was a term used in Nazi propaganda to describe disabled people, depicted as requiring assistance from the state but incapable of offering anything in return. Among other things, the propaganda stressed the financial burden disabled people placed on the state and on able-bodied workers and families. A programme of forced sterilisation of disabled people beginning in 1933 (inspired by the USA, who'd already been doing this for a couple of decades) was followed in 1939 by a programme of mass extermination (Aktion T4). The question of how to kill disabled people effectively in large numbers was addressed by the development of gas chambers disguised as showers, a strategy that later also came to deployed in the concentration camps.

I'm wondering it the phrase "useless eaters" is not as well known as I thought. Or perhaps the issue is that it always solely applied to disabled people? I'd be interested to know.

Glenn,

I'd intended the "we" to refer to disabled people in receipt of social security -- the "useless eaters"; it's useful to know that didn't come across. I certainly don't want the poem to be read as an endorsement for genocide, again useful to know that my intention here hasn't come across.

James,

I'm glad this is working for you in some respects. You said you were still thinking, so I'd be interested to know where your thoughts ended up.

I'd also be interested to know more about your comment that the holocaust is the "ur-placeholder for this sort of thing". I guess to me, it seemed specifically relevant to the poem. The gas chambers disguised as showers were, after all, developed specifically for disabled people, who'd first been depicted as useless and burdensome. Disabled people were, apparently, the most acceptable/palatable -- or the easiest -- place to start. And the modern right-wing narratives do have dark echoes (and here, sadly, I include the current Labour government). The "unacceptable" burden on the tax-paying "hard-working families", the sanctity of work ("Work actually frees people" as Iain Duncan Smith said on breakfast TV the last time massive cuts were imposed on financial support for the disabled), the depiction of disability benefit claimants as cheats and malingers etc. But maybe I've misunderstood your point? Perhaps the poem doesn't make the context clear enough? Or perhaps you’re very correctly pointing out that I’m far from the first to draw these parallels?

Re L3, is it the alliteration of "choked and choicest" that you find overdone, of the alliteration of "each eats enough"? Or the combination, maybe?

Alex,

I'm glad the context came across. Yes, comparison with the Nazis can be a risk, but it's a comparison I wanted to make. I wasn't that happy with "desperation", a bit too abstract and maybe not quite the right word anyway. I'll look at that section again. I'll also give some thought to a volta prior to the last one. I wasn't really intending the poem to turn strongly before the final line, but it's certainly something worth thinking about.

Max,

"choicest cuts" and "foreign holidays" certainly should work against the social security claimants reading, but it's the part of the narrative over here. A quote to illustrate: "You know there are people getting Chinese [takeaway] deliveries every night [...] It does get your back up [...] you get a free car if you’ve got [disability social security]. [...]. Why should I work and others get it for nothing?".

There's currently a lot of outrage here about people with significant mobility issues being given "free cars", although, of course, this isn't quite what happens: instead there's a lightly subsidised leasing scheme (the company running it gets some tax breaks). Anyway, people on (disability) benefits living it up while others toil and have less is definitely a trope over here. Useful to know it doesn't translate.

Joe,

The poem clearly reads more ambiguously than I’d thought it would with regard to the speaker’s beliefs (once the final line arrives). On reflection, I don’t think I mind that much if the read still sees self-loathing. Internalisation of stigma is very definitely a thing. So, I think I’m OK if there's ambiguity as to whether or not the N actually believes the propaganda, or whether the N is heard as speaking mockingly / satirically / bitterly. Though hopefully the poem doesn't read as if it condones the overt views of the speaker – or the gassing ...

Jim,

Thanks for your detailed reading of this. Useful to know how this came across. I'm wondering if, if the Nazi connotations of "useless eaters" had come across, the final line would have been less unexpected (though hopefully still something of a shock).

Susan

Thanks for letting know how you read this. I'm pleased all that came across, including the dehumanisation and its potential consequences.

Alessio

I'm glad you liked the poem. As I said to Joe, internalisation of stigma/persecution definitely happens, and while that wasn't quite what I was after here, I'm not sure that's a problem for the poem.

John

I'm glad you like the poem, and read it as satire. As to the last line, I think your point may be similar to James's. As I said in greater detail to James, the gas chamber reference seemed quite specific to the subject matter of the poem. That said, maybe the close is too easy a move. I'll definitely be giving some thought to where else I could take it.


Thanks again everyone,

best,

Matt

[James Midgley]

Hi Matt,

Following up -- I said I'd think about it more, and indeed I did. My thoughts ended up being something along the lines of -- the poem more or less does what I think it wants to do (clearly this wasn't exactly what you wanted it to do, though). I still think it all hinges on that turn-about of tone and perspective, but as that's what the poem seems to want to do and be, maybe it should be allowed to be and do that.

I wondered whether others found this confusing because it's more based in UK sociopolitical ideas than might be obvious to we Brits. These sorts of sterotypes are ubiquitous, of course, but maybe our history of welfare state interventions (and pushback to them) has generally made us more aware of them. Hard to say.

The issue with the showers/chambers is trickier. It isn't common knowledge that they were first used to 'euthanise' the disabled -- and even here there's room for confusion, as my understanding was that these were first used in psychiatric populations, which doesn't gel quite so well with the portrait(s) presented in the poem, at least to my mind.

The gas chambers are always going to bring to mind the Jews first and foremost, and same with ideas of arbeit macht frei.

I understood that these were depictions of 'benefit-fraudsters'. It actually wasn't clear to me that these were meant to be disabled people specifically, rather than a broader conglomeration of the kinds of people that might receive these stereotypes -- but yes, it was clear that this did include disabled people. For example, prisoners also came to my mind when thinking of those who are excluded from 'forms of productivity/contribution' and who might likewise be led to the showers -- so, other sorts of institutional dehumanisation, too. I was not familiar with the term "useless eaters" as a reference to disabled people at all.

Holocaust references are always going to crinkle noses. There can be no poetry after Auschwitz, after all. That isn't to say they can't work.

Maybe there's a way in which the figuration is too settled until we get to the final line, which allows it too little wiggle-room for belief. I find myself trying to fit it into the framework that's come before -- I can imagine a bunch of people in a pub, chatting, drinking and eating. It's shocking and incongruous -- and makes that framework disintegrate -- when the final line arrives, which makes the poem's machinery very evident.

But, as I say, that seemed reasonably enough to be part of the poem's purposeful operation. Maybe there's a way to fit the showers more conceptually to something more in line with something that might more reasonably happen to the 'we' in their day-to-day -- pointlessly showering (for no one really as they have no workplace or etc to get to). If the reference were made a little more subtle, the poem might better have its cake and eat it too. The line as it stands steps out of the logic the poem has so far set up -- which can work as a kind of one-time shock, but then that hand is played and revealed.

I'm enormously tired so I'm not sure this has been all that helpful -- hopefully there's something here of use.

Cheers

[Matt Q]

Thanks James,

Tired or not, that was very useful. I can see I've been committing the classic error of reading the poem from the perspective of one who knows how it was all intended Still, finding that out is one of the benefits of workshopping.

I guess even if someone does know the historical usage of "useless eater", there's no reason why it shouldn't be read in its general sense of "someone who is seen as requiring assistance from society but offering nothing in return" without it seen as being specifically relating to disability. And if you're not familiar with its historical usage, it likely implies something similar to that anyway.

And you're right that the poem includes stereotypes that apply to all people on social security. I was including both since disabled people on social security are a subset of people on benefits, they are subject to both sets of stereotype. But no reason the reader shouldn't read, as you did, that this is about all people on benefits (or all don't work), of whom disabled people are a subset. So perhaps the poem needs to be more narrowly focussed.

And yes, it does seem that some of the stereotypes are specific to modern British narratives, and unfamiliar to non-Brits. I guess since it's British narratives around state support for disabled people that I was intending to write about, that's necessarily going to be a challenge.

Anyway, lots to think about, including, as you suggest, the possibility of a subtler ending.

It may be that this isn't working in its present form, and I just need to start again.

best,

Matt