History - A Steve Rant

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'Have you seen this?' asked Steve handing over a copy of the Barry and District News. Johnny smiled, he hadn't seen Steve in over a month, yet there was no hello, no how are you, just straight into a rant.

‘Good evening to you too,’ he said sarcastically taking a mouthful of beer. But Steve ignored him and just stabbed his finger at the offending article.
Johnny looked at the article Steve was pointing to, the picture showed an old factory and the headline said Historic Rank Hovis site demolished.
‘An old factory being torn down, hardly news is it, I love how these local papers fill their pages.’ Johnny said, trying to second-guess Steve’s rant and thus nipping it in the bud. He hadn’t.
‘What gets me,’ Steve said, ‘Is that that building is part of our history, the headline even says that, yet no one has tried to save it. They are callously tearing it down.’
‘Well it’s not exactly pretty is it? They are redeveloping the whole area.’
‘It's not about being pretty, and anyway it's beautiful in its own way. It's over 100 years old and as I said it's part of our history, our heritage, our industrial heritage. I bet if this was a church or a country house they wouldn’t unceremoniously demolish it. In fact people would be asking us for money to save it.’ Steve took a swig of beer.

‘Soon there will be no factories left, the places where real people, the workers, lived and worked are being airbrushed from our lives. Coal mines gone, steel mills gone, cotton factories gone. It’s like the history of the working class doesn’t matter. Imagine if those walls could talk, imagine the stories they could tell; stories of hard graft, of exploitation, of love and death, of hard times, industrial unrest and of a sense of community. But those walls are being silenced by the wrecking ball, gagged by the bull dozer.’

Johnny sat quietly listening to his friend’s monologue, when Steve wanted to he could be quite passionate.

‘It just goes to show that history is not what happened, but what people want us to believe happened. History isn’t made, it’s manufactured. These places should be preserved, their histories told. They should be public places like castles and churches, so kids can go to see them, can touch the walls and feel the atmosphere. But no, they are torn down or even worse turned into yuppie apartments so the rich people can continue to exploit the workers.’

‘I agree comrade Steve, power to the workers.’ Johnny said

‘I’m serious,’ Steve said, ‘the working class is being airbrushed out of history.’

‘And I’m thirsty,’ said Johnny pointing to his empty glass. ‘and I didn’t come hear for a lecture on communism. So another beer comrade?’ Steve looked at his still half full glass and realised he’d better drink more and speak less, while Johnny disappeared to the bar.

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