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Long live different personalities - even for politicians.

23/6/2017

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One of the nastier developments in the media over the last few years has been the insidious attempt to force all politicians to have the same personality, expressing their emotions in the obligatory media-conscious way. The latest victim of this Orwellian nonsense has been Theresa May, someone with whom I have not felt a great deal of sympathy until now. Over the last few weeks she has been the subject of a thoroughly vicious and dishonest campaign largely because she has not always publicly worn her heart on her sleeve during the string of recent disasters and tragedies, even though those who have had dealings with her, not all from the same political caste, have testified that she has been deeply moved. I sympathise with her because I know where she is coming from. I have sometimes been accused of being diffident and shy myself. It’s true that my own emotions are often understated, but believe me they are there, and I don’t think they are any the less for not being on show, in fact the opposite might be the case.

One thing I have in common with Theresa May is that I am from a very ‘English’ background, had a fairly typical English education and, while my father was not a vicar like hers, I am from a churchy sort of background. While I now lean more towards agnosticism, I would be the first to admit that those early influences have left their mark on me as early influences do on everyone, regardless of their background. While humour most certainly played a part in that background, and I have fairly good relations with a diverse assortment of people, there are some things I have never learned to do convincingly and so I avoid them, as to get it wrong can simply make it look like a parody. I will laugh and joke with anyone, but I can’t really do ‘high fives’ and I can’t visualise Mrs May doing them either. Shaking hands was the way we greeted people, and it is neither superior nor inferior to any other way.

The problem with forcing a media-expected way of showing emotions onto everyone is that everything becomes a façade, and that means a person’s merit may be judged largely on their acting ability. It also means that politicians will be inclined to put photo opportunities and other shallow gestures above more practical actions. What on earth is the good of a politician (and the attendant media circus) turning up and getting in the way when the fire, police and ambulance services are trying to get on with the urgent job in hand? Better to visit the injured in hospital a little later when they are in a position to appreciate the visit. This is what Theresa May did, on advice from the security and emergency services, yet she became the butt of one of the nastiest and most irrational personal campaigns I can recall in recent years. This campaign may well rebound on those who organised it, as the political opportunism was all too obvious, and people will judge for themselves who exactly has been better at the ‘gentler, kinder politics’ Mr Corbyn somewhat ironically spoke of a little while ago.

It’s not only in politics that this showy and sometimes unconvincing way of displaying emotion has crept up on us. Although not always in front of a camera, some people, especially younger ones, are influenced by the images they have seen on TV and social media. Up until twenty or thirty years ago, for example, school students would go on a set day in July or August to collect their GCSE results (roughly 16-year-olds for those of not familiar with UK exams) and A-level results (mainly 18-19 year olds – these results being the important ones for getting into university). They would go along, look at their results, some would be happy and some sad and congratulations or commiserations would be exchanged. But then the media got hold of it and this has led to an entire personality change among older teenagers. With cameras there, a new tradition of dramatic tears, histrionic hugging and general hysteria was born. In the first few years it was probably when local TV was there to record the event, but later it somehow became the way they thought they were supposed to behave. Now with Facebook and other media this hysteria is on another level again.

Of course, it may be assumed that I’m a bitter old fart (which I am), jealous because I did not have all that touchy-feely stuff in my day. Yet although it wasn’t as often, we did have those moments. It’s just that when they came, they came because there was a reason for us, and you knew instinctively when those moments were. Doing it for a camera or when getting your exam results was not one of them (except for the most extreme fails). We just went to the pub.

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The wonderful freedom of conscience in a safe constituency.

6/6/2017

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PictureElection fever hits Suffolk
If I lived just a few hundred yards down the road my vote would be worth more than it is. There the two main parties tend to be relatively close and the outcome will usually depend on which party is doing better nationally, whereas here it would take an earthquake to dislodge the incumbent party. Am I outraged by this inequality in voting power? On this occasion no, despite my long-standing support for proportional representation. You see, living in a constituency where the outcome is a foregone conclusion means that you can vote with your conscience without risking the outcome. Sometimes there are issues for which you would really like to show your support but cannot risk damaging your normally favoured party or giving a chance to the one you think would be a disaster. When you know it can’t really affect the outcome you can at least use your vote to encourage an also-ran even though you know you won’t be giving him or her a seat in Parliament.

This time, as in 2015, the no-hoper I intend to ensure will receive at least one vote in Suffolk Central will be the Liberal Democrat. I suppose voting for them in two general elections in a row (plus one about twenty-something years ago) means I should begin to see myself as a Liberal Democrat voter, but in truth I don’t – not yet. Last time it was as a reward to them for joining the coalition despite the dangers to themselves, and I knew they would suffer for it while their erstwhile coalition partner prospered. This time it will be all about Brexit. The Liberal Democrats have called for a vote at the end of the process and by so doing have shown again that they are prepared to stick their necks out for sanity. I find it odd that people cannot see the reasoning behind a second referendum when the details are known.  If you enter into a contract for a lot of things these days you are given a period to reconsider. If you are allowed a cooling off period when buying a vacuum cleaner, why not for a pig in a poke? It matters not that I am one of very few people who is prepared to encourage them in this way, as my vote was pretty worthless in the first place.

In my blog of 19 April, just after the election was called, I predicted that someone on the Labour side would make the claim that we owed the Health Service to Labour. Today Jeremy Corbyn went a step further and claimed it was all Labour’s idea. I’m not going to go over old ground about the Beveridge Report of 1942 and all the parties’ commitment to a Health Service free at the point of delivery. I’m not even going to point out that Beveridge was a Liberal and the majority in the Commons that approved it were Conservatives. What Labour did do after 1945 was adopt the most unwieldy and centralised model that for a time alienated the medical profession. Though having said that, and having worked in the NHS, there’s no way of not alienating them sometimes as they can be an unreasonable and arrogant bunch when they want to be.

I’m quietly amused by Labour’s sudden support for the police. When I lived in East London in the late 70s and 80s several of my friends were Labour activists and police were the mortal enemy, or at least the Left felt obliged to claim they were. And some on the Left most definitely did support terrorism, not only by looking admiringly at Jerry Adams and Co (the body language in the photos bely any idea that they were just sounding them out with a view to negotiations) but to the extent that they thought it funny when Airey Neave was blown up outside Parliament and again when Lord Mountbatten and some of his family (including children) were murdered by Irish Republicans. It shook me at the time and still does, though one later claimed that it was simply the bravado of the weedy. Some people like sucking up to gangsters because it makes them feel more macho than they are. The closer in spirit (though never physically!) you were prepared to get to violence the more left wing and militant you must be, and all Brownie points stemmed from that. I thought those nasty, silly days were gone, but over the last couple of years they seem to have returned. It seems we have to go through the same experiences again before the lesson is learned.



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    Paul Williams's (McEvoy Williams) Blog.  General stuff about History, Literature, family and Ipswich.

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