Britain is in crisis: the nation is deeply divided with a virulence not seen in living memory – since January in fact. COVID-19 has riven the country into two opposing camps:
- The terrified;
- The fed up.
However a third camp is making its presence felt:
- The bullies
Which faction is in charge of events? Take a guess – it is as it ever was.
This is a frightening time for all the timid, hypochondriacs and conformists, and possibly for everyone who does not wander about with his or her head in the sand (if that s actually physically possible). For the fed-up, ah – can we just get back to normal? It’s not the Black Death, so imagine how we would be if it were – a sense of proportion, please, and do something about that nasty cough of yours – here, borrow my hanky.
For all natural bullies though, for the bullies – this is a heaven-sent opportunity to tell other people what to do. Now they have an excuse to look down their noses as neighbours. They salivate over nailing planks over people’s front doors like in the good old days of the Great Plague of London – Defoe has been flying off the shelves in Hampstead. There is exquisite pleasure in gaslighting the reluctant into believing their are personally responsible for killing thousands. Never has there been an opportunity like this since Brexit.
How long can this go on? For the terrified and the fed-up, it cannot end soon enough. For the bullies, let the plague roll on.
See also
Books
- Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds by Charles MacKay (1841)
- A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe
- Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How it Changed the World by Laura Spinney
- The Madness of Crowds: Gender, Race and Identity by Douglas Murray
- 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos, by Jordan B Peterson
- Woke: A Guide to Social Justice by Titania McGrath
- The Man in the Red Coat by Julian Barnes
- By Boris Johnson:
- By Aristotle:
- By Anthony Burgess: