Ain't No Twat In The Union Jack

Hello peepoes. Have you been *loving* the jaw-dropping headlines and stories about Nick Clegg and the Lib Dems that the Daily Murdochs have been collectively spewing out over the few weeks or so? I have. I *loved* them so much that I thought I'd give you a few of my own as an amuse-bouche before the long slog of a ridiculously long and serious blog:

Clegg's favourite comedian is Jim Davidson!
Clegg's ring tone is Crazy Frog!
Clegg took a shit on the Queen Mum's grave then wanked over it!
Clegg abducted Madeleine McCann!
Secret Lib Dem scientists to release Zombie plague just before World Cup*!

*It will also make the undead gay and Muslim. Which does pose the question of how much sympathy the tabloids would have for the victims.

The whole recent nonsense about Gillian Duffy, The Bigoted WomanTM, has just further revealed how insidious an intellectual cancer the tabloid way of thinking really is. Calling a bigoted woman a bigoted woman is perfectly reasonable to me, even restrained! And the fact that even though it was a private comment that was blown out of all proportion just points to the nasty-minded, shallow, trivial, kneejerk thicko thinking that's becoming so much more prevalent in society and which the Daily Murdochs are encouraging, shaping and propagating. The Daily Heil went mad after the last leadership debate because they didn't focus on Bigotgate! All this does is further make it clear - as if it couldn't be any clearer! - that the Daily Murdochs feed into the basest and pettiest of human behaviour that we tell ourselves isn't harmful: bitching, obsessing over trivial slurs and problems and working oneself into a tizzy over the smallest thing, focusing on that stupid little issue and never letting go, like a dog with a bone, as though some petty little nonsense matters more than any other issue and generally blowing the whole thing out all of proportion. This sort of thing is just about acceptable over a cup of tea with our neighbours, moaning about late buses with strangers at the bus stop or in the girls' bathroom at school but not in this sort of universal way. It is not just pathetic and annoying, it is humiliating to witness and entirely tedious. How can anyone respect (or read) a newspaper that approaches every issue like a bitter, moany old Nan with a touch of sundowner's and a colossal dripping-cooked chip on her shoulder? If media is something that we look to for authoritative representation of truth and fact, why is it acceptable for far too many of them to be about as authoritative, clued-up, calm and objective as two chavvy teen girls slagging off 'that bitch' at the back of the bus?!

I actually think these rags have done society a huge favour with all this extraspecial bullshit; because they themselves are stuck in a backward, future-fearful, Ruritanian mindset, they underestimate people's access to info nowadays. They forget that it's all Murdochian agenda, not fact or truth, and that we can all find out easily that they're run and owned and controlled by Murdoch, and that we have so much more info at our fingertips via the net and that being on the net, certainly for younger people, means that we have wider circles of friends that we could ever have had before the rise of social networking, so that we are exposed to a much broader view of the world, introduced to and challenged by, lots of different opinions and new facts. We can effortlessly click on posted links that take us to sites and facts we'd never otherwise see and with the televised leader's debates, we can see for ourselves what the leaders are like and how they cope under pressure and being truthful (as far as possible), etc. Certainly, far too many people are still too gullible and easily-swayed, but on the other hand, more people are now clued-up, perceptive and more widely-read, at least media-wise, and can see the rabid, disgusting scaremongering, shameless agenda-pushing and outright lying of the tabloids for what they truly are. One can only hope that the two balance each other out, if nothing else.

Far from being the first herald of the apocalypse that the rags fall over themselves to portray, social networking sites like Facebook give us access to experiences, opinions and facts that most people would never have otherwise encountered. And the fact that this happens practically by osmosis due to the very nature of social networking is its beauty; open-mindedness and awareness being increased just by being yourself, by being social and revealing just how easy and normal it is to be tolerant and broad-minded. Obviously, a small number of people don't have this experience or even use social networking to connect with other idiots and sickos like themselves and cement in their minds the rightness of their idiocy and/or sickness, but that's sadly unavoidable. Post-Facebook Britain is not going to be duped by the Cult of Murdoch in the same way that it has been in the past. The more you socialise and expose yourself to difference, you cannot keep your mind so closed to facts and figures and you can't help but get wiser, more tolerant and empathetic, more understanding and more, well, socialist. I'm not saying for a minute that signing up to FaceCrack will have you singing The Red Flag and getting a tattoo of Aneurin Bevan within a week, but the more you widen your experience of people, the more you broaden your mind.

I'm actually surprised that one of the few things that Facebook isn't accused of by the tabloids is the spread of what online commentors like to call ZaNuLiarBore (ie New Labour) propaganda - after all, they blame it for everything else. On the other hand, the lies they spread have never had to be based on fact or truth before, so why am I expecting them to get anything even slightly right?!

One question that has been rattling round my head during Election Season is wondering why the right wing parties and papers love to bang on about 'broken Britain'? Frothing on like a mad old Uncle on Boxing Day about how our country is terrible and ruined and going to the dogs and THEN they claim to be the true patriots! So let me get this straight - it's because you love this nation and being part of it so much that you spread lies, deceit and hatred to convince everyone it's a nightmarish shit hole, is it? This attitude reminds me of the Australian ranger character from Monty Python who proudly declared that "I love animals - that's why I kill 'em". The tabloids seem to have all decided to whip a sadly large proportion of the country into an frenzy of entirely fictitious and pointless fears, beliefs and apparent truisms. The number of people inculcated in the Cult of Murdoch seems to be growing exponentially with the growth of people getting smart, getting more knowledgeable, getting deprogrammed from the cult's clutches and rescuing others. Like any good sect, The Cult of Murdoch has a goodly array of mantras for its acolytes to parrot; mantras that are empty and trite but cleverly designed to strike a chord in the minds of people unable or unwilling to think about things in any way that isn't self-obsessed and parochial. People bandy about phrases like 'it's political correctness gone mad' and 'you're not allowed to be proud to be British anymore', as though these were actual facts. As though they have bothered to even think for themselves for a split second; or been allowed to by the Cult. The Cult takes the thing you hold most precious, breaks it apart and when you're empty and despairing, promises to give you a new, better vision of that precious thing... and all you have to do is obey.

Let's look at those two particular examples of popular empty rhetoric in more detail. Obviously, if you're reading this, I think it's safe to presume you don't need to be told that they are meaningless, untrue horseshit. But just dismissing them without investigation is hazardous, for ignoring them as the rambling of fucktards (even though they are) helps them become part of a certain type of pervasive cultural lexicon. 'It's political correctness gone mad' is the adult version of shouting 'S'not FAIR!' and storming off to one's room when Mummy expects you to do something reasonable or tells you off for something you deserve to be confronted about. It is the battle cry of inadequates who begrudge being expected to be a full, normal adult and think about others for a few seconds, instead of being able to do and say whatever they like. And the worst thing is that encouraging this behaviour and thinking actually punishes those doing it, not frees them, because it makes them see everything and everyone as the enemy - except for the bastards forcing this crap on them. Of course, this has always been the attitude and behaviour of Tories but the beauty of it is that it takes a very upper-class concept and makes Uncle Toms of ordinary men and women brainwashed into the mindset of Massah. Once you get the people you want to control to enslave themselves, they'll self-chastise of their own volition and possibly be crueller than you ever would. They will then never be able to see the inherent and unnecessary induced-masochism that has become their norm. Basically, this is a phrase that encourages low-level sociopathy; the outrage at having to have any responsibility, accountability and more importantly, empathy, whilst fully expecting and demanding that society bends backward to anticipate, accommodate, appreciate and facilitate your every need. The idiotic and plain wrong notion that 'you're not allowed to be proud to be British anymore' is part of the same anti-logic. It furthers the lie that being expected to be a considerate, functioning member of society is a an aggressive attempt to strip you of your rights and very identity; that thinking outside yourself for a second is the annihilation of self. These phrases want to encourage all that fascistic libertarianism has to offer: selfishness, fear, confusion, resentment, non-participation, dissent, and pathetic, sulky megalomania. These are the default emotions of people who feel something lacking in their lives and deep within themselves and need to fill it with something; anything. These usually being anything that apportions blame anywhere other than where it belongs - with the very individual feeling it in the first place. The irony is, of course, that the very thing that is lacking is the ability to look properly, intelligently and objectively at what is within and without.

But so many people tragically want and need a stern-but-indulgent, all-authoritative Daddy to override the caring, thoughtful and reasonable expectations and chastisements of Mother Society. Do things Daddy's way and he'll lavish you with treats (but don't tell Mummy; poor old Mummy who has to get on with the thankless, repetitive drudge of making everything run smoothly). Since time immemorial, this inadequacy has been met by religion. But with Christianity on the decline in this country, to the happy point where it is rapidly becoming an anachronism and an irrelevance (so much so that one of the most popular Cult of Murdoch memes is that Christians believe themselves to be persecuted because everyone's laughing about their imaginary friend, boohoo), the gullible and ineffectual need someone or something to explain every for them, to issues rules and commands and to tell them what to do, think and who and what to hate (although not necessarily why, as it's always based on irrational and unfair nonsense). What the Cult of Murdoch is doing, very cleverly, very insidiously, very scarily, is creating a pseudo anonymous Cult of Personality, one narrow-minded catchphrase at a time. The typeface of one's favourite right-wing rag replaces the iconic image of a Great Leader in the heart of the weak and stupid and becomes their precious source of 'truth' and succour (and Murdoch is too much of a Jabba The Hutt-alike to ever grace a student's t-shirt, let's face it) and the journalistic style within, his multifarious mouthpiece. Why, it's almost enough to make one invoke the spectre of the cult member's favourite book to crudely mis-reference in online comments - 'Nineteen Eighty Four'! Or, as they always spell it, '1984'. It is easy to sneer at the people who read these papers and become inculcated into the Cult of Murdoch - mainly because they are idiots and deserve it - but do not be fooled; on a much grander scale, a Cult of Personality is capable of equal, if not superior evil to religion. Just look at C20 Russia and China. Obviously, things are no way near that bad here and I'd be as mental as a Daily Heil Express reader myself to suggest they were, but such cultish thinking becoming normative cannot be dismissed as harmless nonsense and allowed to grow unchecked.

The attitude and memes that the Cult of Murdoch and its church leaders, the Conservatives, BNP and UKIP, are trying to spread can only ever be negative and deleterious for society; the puffed-up self-importance of the weak-ego, the need to always feel better than others of the insecure, the blaming of everyone else for all problems, however spuriously, of the petulant primary-school bully. It's quite easy to understand why right-wingers always hark back to the days of the second world war, calling it a simpler, better time, because for them, the mores of that time represent a form of acceptance for all the nasty, pathetic, pompous little bad characteristics all right-wingers share: the need to blame, to have an enemy, for homogeneity, aggression and jingoism to be lionised, for crude stereotypes to reign, for everyone to be in their place so that the blinkered do not have to make any effort towards anyone else or particularly control their own behaviour, for there to be a definite 'them and us', for everything to be focused on one monolithic, androcentric goal that required no subtlety, finesse of mind or action, no creativity, no diversity, no change, no intelligence, perception or thinking. To be able to reject, eject, hate and even destroy with impunity. To ride roughshod over anyone who isn't exactly the same. To have something instant and unchallenging to fill the dark spaces left by lifelong feelings of inadequacy, instead of looking at oneself. To feel powerful, to be in control, to be on top; to be SUPERIOR. To BLAME, BLAME, BLAME.

Of course, it's very clever to always hark back to the mores of WWII as many of them represent the very best of who we are: the unity, the camaraderie, the inclusiveness, the pulling-together, the fearlessness, the selflessness, the charity, the perseverance. The right want to trick us into thinking that these wonderful characteristics, which are certainly things to be very proud of, can only go hand-in-hand with the vile negative flipside. They are so brainwashed by the negative set of mores that they cannot see or believe that the positive ones are entirely possible - and, indeed, much more possible - with a more laid-back, caring, inclusive, open, multi-cultural, tolerant, egalitarian mindset. My Grandfather was a tank commander in WWII and when me and my brother asked him, as children, what was his proudest moment about the War, he answered without having to think: it was that he had got the job done without ever killing a single person (the second was that he had tricked a German platoon out of its entire cigarette supply). THAT'S why we should be proud to be British - we will get down and dirty when it's called for but we will always remain civilised and caring about humanity. And be unassuming, nonchalant and joky about it too.

There is one sad and ironic twist on the phrase 'you aren't allowed to be proud to be British anymore', of course - that it is the very people who spout this bollocks that make it impossible to truly be proud to be British. To me, it is these people who are ruining this nation. Perhaps we all have a few acres of Ruritania we retreat to in our minds when thinking about national identity. In mine, the occupants of my Britain are quirky, complex, funny, delightful people with steady hearts and quixotic tastes and moods. We channel negativity and disappointment into sarcasm and black humour. Our culture is so vibrant, fresh and exciting, with something for everyone because we embrace the multiplicity and variety of experience and background that arguably make us the, well, grooviest nation on Earth. All the things that right-wingers hate are what make us great; that give us things that make the rest of the world love us - our fluidity, our eccentricity, our understated, underplaying of achievement and skill that only the truly confident in oneself can have. Our ability to adapt and thrive, to welcome the new and strange and make it work with what we've already got. To ask for little but to give so much. We're not attention-seekers or fuss-makers because what's the point and besides - we have to cycle to the library whilst the rain holds off. It might be as unrealistic as the picture the Daily Murdochs are intent on painting, but I know which one I'd rather believe in - and be part of.

By E.