Gary Speed. Sympathy & Suicide.

The news broke this morning that the now late Wales football manager, Gary Speed, has been found dead at his home after apparently taking his own life at the young age of 42.

Shock has of course swept through the footballing world.  Speed played over 500 premier league games, won 85 caps for his country, and after less than a year retired as a player was appointed manager of Wales.

Of course death is a horrific aspect of life, and all deaths deserve to be acknowledged and mourned accordingly.  Speed's death will be mourned across Wales, the UK, and worldwide.  Rightfully so, to an extent.  

Speed has left behind a wife and two children.  Is it right to have sympathy for an individual who has taken their own life?  It is those still here who must deal with the consequences.  Not that I know the exact circumstances of his life, but suicide in my opinion is often an easy way out, in some ways a selfish way out.  Are we right to wear black arm bands and honor a minutes silence for someone who commits suicide, but then brush over the countless individuals who die saving others?  I don't know.

I don't discredit what Speed did as a footballer, and through the countless character references I have heard so far this morning he was obviously a top man.  But if the reports are true, he made a decision, a decision to take his own life.  He was a healthy young man with a family and most likely the job of his dreams.  There are people in the world with a lot less going for them who struggle but still fight for a better life.

I'd be really interested to hear what you think?

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Hovis. The Best Of Both.

This is the first time I have blogged about a topic on request, but it is a topic that is of genuine interest to me and one which raises several questions.

What is life like being mixed race?  It’s great, I love it, and I wouldn’t change it for the world.  But, wouldn’t a white, black, brown, yellow or green person say exactly the same thing?  Surely not many people wish they were a different race?  In my experience people tend to accept who they are and the attributes they have been brought into the world with.  You can be jealous of individuals sure, but not of an entire race right?  People are who they are.

My background.  My dad’s family are Dominican and my mum’s Italian.  Unfortunately I haven’t yet had the pleasure of visiting Dominica, but I have been to Italy countless times and love the place.  I live with my mum and spend a considerably greater amount of time with her than I do with my dad.  Yet if someone was to ask me to describe myself as either black or white I would most likely say black.  To me that seems strange.  Why black?  Why not white?  I guess it’s simply because of the colour of my skin and how much that influences everything society.  To society I am black because my skin is brown.  Simple as.

There is a strange deep-rooted view in society that a white face is the starting point for human creation and that anything else is a deviation.  Race is treated like adding fruit squash to a glass of water, as soon as the first drop hits the water it becomes something else, no longer pure water.  In fact that is not how it works at all.  We don’t start as anything, white, black or anything else.  We are all unique blends of our parents and that should be appreciated and respected in it’s own right.  I embrace both my cultures as much as possible and would never ignore or disregard part of my make-up.  It’s my belief that at some stage in human development there will be a time where there are no longer strict races, and all people will end up being mixed.  This will go a long way to stopping much of the violence across the world and creating an overall better harmony in society.

To me, being born with parents from different cultures was a blessing.  I gained two sets of beliefs, traditions, and experiences.  It is harder to be labeled and put in a box.  But the thing I love most about being mixed race is, in my opinion, the way in which you can interact with diverse groups of people, from all different races.  I don’t think it’s a coincidence that one group of my friends are predominantly white and another predominantly black yet I find it easy to fit into both.  That’s not to say that only mixed race people can socializes across cultures of course because that’s not true at all.  I just mean that having a racial/cultural bond with both groups, subconsciously perhaps, allows me to fit in without much difficulty, the same is true when meeting new people.  I would be interested to hear from different people to hear about there experiences.

I'd be really interested to hear what you think?

Please subscribe/follow my blog if you think I'm worth listening to... 

Signing off.

Hovis ‘The Best Of Both’