It’s ridiculous. A row over the removal of ‘Easter’ from an
egg hunt. On a poster headed ‘Easter Fun’. Found via a link on a front page
headed ‘Easter Time’. In a sane world, it wouldn’t fly. In a sane world, it would
be shot down by a media that spoke truth to power. But this isn’t a sane world.
There was never a halcyon time where sanity and reason
prevailed but, post Brexit, we have been propelled into some of the darkest and
most confusing times I can remember. The row over a Cadbury’s egg hunt may seem
trivial given the big lies making hay across the world but it is a simple symbol
of how such things now play out and, more crucially, the motivations behind all
parties when they do.
We now live in a world where their reality is the only
reality. Where once this was the preserve of a clutch of outliers on social
media who refused to believe in anything that was accepted fact, refused to
engage in debate or shift their position one iota, this is now becoming the de-facto
position of anyone in any kind of authority or with any kind of stake in a
breaking story. Fact crumbles in the face of obstinacy and politically
expedient positions.
Witness our Prime Minister’s reaction to Eggxit. Push points
of her vicar father and membership of the National Trust solidify a data driven
political strategy that allies her with a set of values that chime with her
current defender of British values schtick. Shoring up (once again) what is
perceived as the Tories current weak spot, the territory to the right ignored
(even cut adrift) by the Cameron / Osbourne alliance but now the only game in
town with the centre ceded by Labour and unattainable for now by the Lib Dems.
Politics as usual? Removing the UKIP threat is the only goal.
Witness the Bishop of York wading into the row, claiming
outrage on behalf of the Quaker Cadbury family with a bombastic claim that the company
were ‘spitting on the grave’ of the Cadbury founder, somehow missing the point
that Quakerism believes all days are holy days and therefore do not celebrate
Easter. Or indeed, that Cadbury were quite happy to lead the charge in making
chocolate eggs for a celebration in which they didn’t participate. Or that the link between Easter and eggs is more cultural than religious and harks back to paganism. Along with
our PM this was the Church staking their claim to primacy, surreptitiously
stating that Christian belief defines the behaviour of national institutions as
the UK is a Christian country.
Such statements and behaviour carry a darker tone, less
surprising from the Conservative Party than the Church and, whether unintended
or deliberate, like Brexit carrying a dangerous message beneath its seemingly
reasonable surface. For who is to blame for this decoupling of ‘Easter’ from ‘Egg’.
Is it Cadbury? Forced into a position the company issued a statement that said
they wished to encourage people of all faiths to take part, a weak PR misstep at
best and a dereliction of duty at worst, looking less an affirmation of values and more a flimsy catch all response to any issue of religious tension. Thus, focus shifted from the company to
those much derided ‘liberal values’ and, by extension, multi-culturalism. Which,
given the history of the company and its pioneering social values, is both
miserably depressing and totally unexcepted in this topsy-turvy create your own
reality world.
Signs of this cultural push back are everywhere and, as
ever, the trivial masks the reality.
Take another non-story of the week, Leggxit, the Daily Mail’s
return to Benny Hillism to belittle both the gains of feminism in the public
sphere and a serious constitutional crisis forewarned by those who opposed the
Brexit so publicly backed by the title and its (non-domiciled) owner. Little
surprise that its female writer was rolled out to defend the piece; after all,
if a woman wrote it, it can’t be sexist, the oldest trick in the book and akin
to UKIP’s endless front rowing of their handful of ethnic minority members.
The PM, in sharp contrast to Eggxit laughed it all off.
Laughing at outright sexism is a known strategy, deployed not just by men but those
women who felt that feminists were, well, you know, not ‘proper’ ladies. It was
the default response to uppity women who objected to wolf whistles and bum
slaps in years gone by, the chauvinistic defence of ‘it’s just a bit of a
laugh, where’s your sense of humour?’, was, I thought, given the take-down a
few decades ago. Now it’s not just back but backed by our PM. Expect a return
to scantily clad ladies being chased by sweating men any time now on ITV Encore.
Then today, as if to confirm that we really are running the
clocks backwards in the UK, The Sun have revisited a past headline with a new
xenophobic update transferring ‘Delors’ to Senors’. Well, they’re all foreigners,
aren’t they? No mention there of the Gibraltarians caught in the crossfire that
they so forcefully voted against.
Now here’s where it gets serious. Recall the stories around
Cambridge Analytica and their role in securing success for both Leave.EU and
Donald Trump by micro managing data captured to tailor messaging to garner
votes and target resources? The push of the story revolved around the data and
how it was being used. Little thought was given to the other side of the story,
the morality of a world in which political messaging was being perverted and
manipulated to give individuals the exact message that they desire. That was
accepted without any serious comment.
We are complicit in accepting that our political leaders are
driven solely by personal and party gain and further that we are powerless to
stop them. We have lost belief in our own power, whether through ennui or fear.
The concept of public service, of proposing the tough, unpopular decisions for
a greater and more lasting public good, is now at its lowest ebb in my memory.
Fellow travellers here are the Labour Party, implacably opposed to Brexit yet triangulated
to accept the ‘will of the people’ in a desperate (and likely futile) attempt
to shore up votes and seats. A bill to repeal hanging, formalise state
abortions or even create a public national health service would seem impossible
in the current climate given the forces that would immediately swing into
action as they did around Brexit to squash all debate. Too often our response
is to disengage, leaving a rump of self-interest that can be exploited and
manipulated to maintain and strengthen the type of power that puts us all in,
eventually, a desperate position.
And this is not just a UK issue. For UKIP’s seizing of the
political agenda despite little real public support (one borrowed MP), see also
the Front National polarisation of the French political system to Oui or Non
for Marie Le Pen, removing real choice to a binary call. Likewise, Germany's ADP,
seizing headlines to corral a similar position in their domestic politics. A
real functioning democracy, with its mess of compromise and shades of opinion is
being reduced to a Push / Pull system bolstered by unregulated political outrage
and systematic vote grubbing policy positions engineered to game the system
rather than create a better reality.
Which is the fear. I grew into adulthood believing that the
big battles were won. That sexism, racism, isolationism was confined to the
history books. I accepted that our politics would always be flawed and tainted
by self and party interest but that certain lines once drawn, could not be
erased. Bereft of real leadership to mount the push back across culture and
politics that is necessary to confront these vested interests and challenge the
non-realities that are being transformed into fact in front of our eyes
requires a new set of channels, new forms of leadership and community, new
commitment to a shared cause, built on compromise around basic beliefs about
truth, facts and morality. As Europe knows from the thirties, pretending things
aren’t how they are doesn’t solve anything. Disengaging is not an answer.
Poking fun from the sidelines changes nothing. Now, more than ever, is the time
to stand up.
