Pete Shaughnessy RIP
CHARISMATIC campaigner and Worthing resident Pete Shaughnessy sadly took his own life just before Christmas, after a long spell of serious depression, at the age of 40. Pete was best known for his work in mental health campaigning, being one of the founders and driving forces of Mad Pride, an organisation that pushed for an end to the treatment of people suffering from an illness - mental ill health - as second class citizens to be abused and manipulated by those in power. He was also dead keen on football, particularly non-corporate lower-league stuff, and was a fan of Crystal Palace and Dulwich Hamlet, from his old stomping grounds in South East London, as well as Worthing FC, where he had become social secretary. Pete couldn’t stop himself getting involved with a good cause and was a regular helper with Brighton radical newsletter SchNEWS and with your very own Porkbolter and had been a regular at worthing eco-action meetings until he became ill last year. Ex-bus driver Pete was a great bloke who made loads of friends wherever he went - as witnessed by the packed-solid church in Dulwich for his funeral on Christmas Eve. Obituaries were published in The Big Issue and The Guardian (the national, not the Worthing one). There is to be a tree planting in his honour and a special memorial night at Brighton’s new social centre, The Cowley Club in London Road, on February 8. We’ll miss him, as of course will Penny, Daniel and many others, particularly his kids in London. Cheers, Pete. It was good to know you. Oh and by the way - it wasn’t you that was crazy. It was this porkin’ world we live in...