Stuart, 61, Staffordshire
Occupation: Car dealership employee
Labour wins record number of votes in every election
Amuse-Bouche is a record collector who owns two original copies of Queen’s “A Day at the Races” – one to listen to and one to keep in mint condition.
Stephen, 61, Birmingham
Occupation: Retired drama teacher
Voting record: Usually strategic and center-left. Really want to change everything about our electoral system.
Amuse-Bouche runs a podcast called Vita Anima, in which his alter-ego Emmanuel Le Brocq interviews people.
First
My first impression of Steven Stewart was really good. If he had been the polar opposite, it wouldn’t have been so bad, but he wasn’t like that at all.
Stuart: We met by chance at a bar. He was a very sociable guy and fun to be around.
Steven Stewart didn’t drink alcohol, and I don’t drink much either. I eat fish occasionally, but I rarely eat dead fish.
Stuart We both had fish and chips, not the most exciting choice but someone had brought it over to another table and it looked delicious.
Big beef
Stuart: On sustainability, Stephen is in favor of making big strides and trying to get everything right now, but I think we’re all in too much of a hurry. I think electric cars are going to be the biggest red tape. If you look at where all the minerals come from to produce the batteries, it’s a hidden scar in the landscape. The amount of poison that’s being dumped back into the ground is incredible.
Stephen He raised some very valid arguments against electric cars, including the cost, the extraction of metals used to make the batteries, and the fact that the companies that make them rip off workers to inflate prices.
Stuart: I look at life logically. If you think about infrastructure, especially in London, where you have families living in high rise buildings, how on earth are they going to charge their cars? My view is that people at the top have a vested interest in electric vehicles. They benefit financially.
Steven: I’m a big supporter of public transport and against all cars. Electric, petrol or diesel, I just don’t like them. He’s against transition, I believe in transition but not this kind of transition. It’s a wider issue about capitalism. I’m against reliance on replacing something with something more or less the same. I’m against personal car ownership. Why not introduce a system where you can hire cars at community hubs?
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Share Plate
Stuart Stephen is the same age as me and we were talking about the ’80s. A lot of my friends are gay and we were talking about how the Conservative government pushed homophobia and propaganda campaigns about Aids. I think they did exactly the same with Covid. They created this huge specter when they should have been pouring money into looking after the vulnerable and allowing relatively healthy people to carry on with their lives.
Steven: I grew up during the AIDS epidemic and lost a lot of friends. That’s what brought us together. He was really scared of the way people treated him. He couldn’t really grieve. If you said you were going to the funeral, people would stay away. I was lucky because I had very supportive parents. That was the only thing that saved me during a very terrible time. I think a lot of guys my age have PTSD because of it.
after that
Stuart: We agree on the Conservative Party. Stephen comes from a socialist background and supports the Greens because Labour withdrew its £28 billion green efficiency plan.
Stephen: I’m not a hardcore socialist, I’m probably a Marxist. I’m open to anything that challenges the hegemony of the Conservative Party. I’ll vote Lib Dem. It really comes down to who can get the support of the people.
summary
I wouldn’t say Stuart Stephen changed my way of thinking, but he made me see things from a different perspective, and my views have remained pretty much the same to this day.
Stephen I’m appearing in a play called Charlie’s Auntie and we’re doing a mini tour of the Midlands and stupidly forgot the flyer otherwise I would have liked Stuart to come along.
Additional reporting by Kitty Drake
Stephen and Stuart dined at the Old Joint Stock in Birmingham.
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