Being A Good Neighbour: Putting on a Show (or three)

Last Friday we launched Good Neighbours, our new livestream show. What do you mean you missed it?! Designed as Eurotrash meets a zoom call for cultural organisers and artists, with guests from the grassroots, Britain's Got Tarot, and sponsorship from Eco-Warrior Barbie, its anarchic, TFIF-Tiswas TV vibes were on purpose, promise! 

That’s because we’ve got a hunch that making us all feel good about our neighbours, and being a good neighbour, are the stories that are missing from what the media and politicians are spinning up around us, as they battle to dominate this moment.

And the people who have those stories to tell are the ones already doing the work, on the ground, where they live. Our job is simply to raise up those voices and shine a light on their work, which is why we featured Common Ground Org in south Devon, Maff from the incomparable Camerados, and the wonderful women from SAWN in Oldham.

More on our broadcast strategy in a future post. 

For now, if you missed it, here’s a clip:

We go live again on Friday 28th November, 1pm-2pm!

The Fête of Britain loves Scouse and Brizzle

Although Good Neighbours was actually launched a few weekends earlier, when The Fête of Britain landed at Rough Trade in Liverpool for an evening that mixed brilliant music, arts, zine-making, community organiser soap boxes, and a whole bunch more vibes. Have a look:

As with our Good Neighbours show, we’re super proud to have shared the showbiz spotlight with incredible artists and shone some of that onto the super-brilliant organisers across Liverpool, Birkenhead and the surrounding area who are the people who keep this country running. That includes Neo Community, The Shewsy, The Wanderin Library, Arts Emergency, Craftivists, We Are Dorothy and many more. 

The Fête of Britain is a rolling festival over the next four years to bring people together to show that we can – and will – collectively make a better way to live. It’s a massive party with purpose in the places that matter to us most, and brings culture and causes together on everyone’s doorstep. It’s the place where we can speak honestly about the mess around us and the need for a different way to run our nations and neighbourhoods, bringing together the unsung heroes and good neighbours who are making a better way to live across the length and breadth of these isles.

Big congratulations especially to our Sophie and Maddy for organising such a brilliant event, and to core collaborator Sarah P Corbett.

We’re in Bristol next weekend! Sunday 16th 12-5pm at Rough Trade. Get your tickets here!

Hey! Festival in Newhaven

And what Good Neighbours is all about – reminding us that we are and want to be good neighbours to each other – was on show at our second Hey! Festival writers' event in Newhaven sandwiched between the two, like a happy slice of luncheon meat in a friendly focaccia. 

The event featured Palestinian writer and activist Ahmen Alnaouq in conversation about the project We Are Not Numbers to publish the voices of young Palestinians, as well as a brilliant session of ‘fate writing’ where the audience became participants and presenters, for example: 

Pulled together this time by author Nicholas Royle and a crack team of volunteers, Hey! Festival is a writer-led initiative from the Hard Art collective. Pop up, mobile, micro live lit spaces where literature and activism collide. 

Hey!’s next outing is in Manchester in April. If it’s your thing, get in touch and be part of the new literary event waiting in anticipation for the legal letter from our more established H*y on Wye friends.

We Are Free to Change the world

We Are Free To Change The World is the new event series from Dash Arts, created with ArtsAdmin and the Fête of Britain, that asks how artists and activists can work together to imagine change, and act on it.

The series begins with READY on Thursday 20 November 2025 at Toynbee Studios, the building Dash has called home for many years. Toynbee has always been a place of social activism and experimentation — it feels right to begin here.

Book your tickets for READY HERE [Pay What You Can] - Thursday 20 November 2025, 6–9pm – Toynbee Studios  28 Commercial St, London E1 6AB

Elsewhere in Absurdity…

We’ve been a bit stretched over the last few months (see above), but never fear, we’ve got a whole bunch of more strategic, analytic and playfully absurd pieces to share with you over the next few weeks leading up to the festive break. But we’ve still managed to sneak in...

• Clare was a guest of the Irish Ambassador to discuss participatory democracy and the Irish citizens’ assemblies;
• Sophie, Maddy and Charlie were at a Stewart Lee-hosted Samhain Ritual;
• Charlie is still marvelling at how easily revolution can be co-opted into service of a Fucking Car Chase in the film One Battle After Another;
• David has been accepted onto a doctorate at Ashridge. It is practice-based, meaning the work David does here and elsewhere is what he will be studying to deepen and accelerate his learning around the practice of generating societal-level transformation. Well done David.