Suffer the children

I remember, back in the sixties, our next door neighbours were proud to have marched in the Ban the Bomb demonstrations. It had no effect on either government policy or their own lives and when I got to know them a little I realised it was for them just a jolly day out with a bunch of other young people, making a noise for the sake of it and justifying it by pretending to themselves that they cared. They didn’t. Even back then there were families who could survive on a combination of the dole, cash in hand work and the black market. Far from being good little socialists and humanists they were on the take, allowing others to take the strain.

The world faces many challenges and most responsible governments – including our own, believe it or not – are taking steps to meet them. On climate change, for instance, since 2010, the UK has reduced its CO₂ emissions by a quarter: 50% more than any other G20 country. And in 2017 the UK cut more CO₂ than the rest of the EU27 put together. That was under Theresa May and the Conservatives. Yes, the very same Theresa May the striking children were calling to be fucked. Charmers, aren’t they?

In fact the real thrust of the Socialist Worker assisted kiddy-strike was laid bare in their chants ‘Fuck Theresa May’ and ‘Tories out’ oh and ‘Oh, Jeremy Corbyn’. And many banners read ‘System Change not Climate Change’. The news media delighted in broadcasting lisping infants reading out emotive copied-out essays, but this was no cuddly attempt to bring people together and heal the planet; it was a naked and blatant manipulation of malleable minds.

The left have long argued for children to be given the vote and the far left have absolutely no compunction over weaponising the gullible. They do it with old people, with poor people, with black people, with muslims; they lie to them and tell them how badly they are done by under the hated Tories and then promise to magically tax the country to a standstill to somehow make it all better. The truth of course, is that the UK government record is exemplary in comparison to most of the rest of the world, but the truth has no traction here.

And the truth behind this irresponsible action is that kids were used as a political human shield for the only real aim of the hard left, which is to hold power. Forever. In their warped thinking the great socialist revolutions of the past only failed because of the frailty of corrupt leadership. In their new Utopia without the threat of ever being deposed by the demos, they will finally shape the world in their version of Marx’s image. Religions hold sway over people by telling them comforting tales and damning warnings; extreme socialism does the same.

Socialist worker? Biggest oxymoron in politics.

For my generation it was the threat of nuclear Armageddon. Today it seems climate change is the preferred cover. In either case the inconvenient truth is that children, who have only recently discovered the truth about the Tooth Fairy and Father Christmas, are too easily manipulated by the shiny baubles and gewgaws of Socialist Santa and his demonic elves and Friday's so-called strike was a prime example of how easily emotions can defeat facts. Still think we should let children vote?

Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em

Frank Spencer and I have something in common – compared to the Labour Party we are the very epitome of competence, meticulous planning and iron discipline. Captain Corbyn, like a day-skipper attempting a global circumnavigation on the basis of ‘how hard can it be?’ is managing to steer his rusting hulk of a party ever closer to the jagged rocks of electoral oblivion and just like watching Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em it is in equal parts hilarious and embarrassing. As his own party briefs against him, cabinet hopefuls are forced to do the solidarity waltz on a slippery dance floor.

Diane Abbott got to do her “no, no, no” response in her Maggie Thatcher voice on Radio Four’s PM when she told Eddie Mair how unfairly Jeremy Corbyn had been treated. Caroline Flint tag-teamed her to deliver a marginally more credible defence and both managed to clumsily sidestep the issue of Ken Livingsone’s appointment as co-chair of Labour’s defence review  without asking Angela (Anne?) Eagle if she minded. Ken insulted sensitive Kevan Jones after what he over-sensitively took to be a challenge to his own competence and the social meeja decided at some point that Ken’s ‘see a psychiatrist’ jibe was equally despicable as racism.

When even the feeble Simon 'Titty' Danczuk can openly brief against you, there has to come a point when you know you’re in trouble: "He's not got any authority and it's becoming an issue for him." Danczuk said and then a whole series of other discontented Labour figures popped up to grumble about the economy, Trident, shoot-to-kill and Corbyn’s former associations with disreputable figures. Captioning a photograph of the Labour leader with Hilary Benn, one newspaper even ventured to suggest this was a picture of both the current and the next party boss. What else is going to unravel before Jeremy is brought, head-in-a-sack to the star chamber?

Then the House of Lords, in a show of utter contempt for its elected colleagues demonstrated its own slide into irrelevance by voting – against all logic – to support the giving of votes to 16-year olds. The raising of the school leaving age to eighteen and the ridiculous extent to which young people are fawned over bodes ill for wise judgement. When the majority left school at fifteen the voting age was twenty-one. Six years of working for a living before getting the franchise. I see nothing whatsoever to suggest that giving a vote to part-formed humans who have not yet finished basic schooling is a sound idea.

Government is EASY!

Tony Blair often used the soundbite ‘joined-up government’ even while consultative cock-ups were being hastily spun as triumphs. Compared to the state of play in government at the moment, his administration looks like a high watermark of coordinated policy. But to look at the current confused and disorganised state of politics in general the possibility of connecting the dots looks ever more remote. It’s as if we already have children making all the rules.

The People's Assembly Against Reason

Parliament voted – narrowly – to deny a vote on the referendum to sixteen-year olds. Cue the outrage from the left, the Jockanese, the Euro-fanatics… and all twenty-seven teenagers who can actually spell Parliament. But they can join the army, get married, pay tax, say those who insist this shows their maturity, to which the response is that they need the permission of an adult for the first two and we all pay tax anyway. Besides, at sixteen they are not considered responsible enough to buy cigarettes and alcohol, so ya-boo-sucks. The plain fact is that children and politics don’t mix well. (And some people never grow up at all.)

If you want an illustration of that maxim you need look no closer than the infantile posturing of the People’s Assembly Against Austerity and their ill-mannered protest against what the largest proportion of our democracy voted for. In particular, the Socialist Worker Student Society betrayed their true motives with the following call to arms: “Hate the Tories?” they asked and in the same breath went on to conflate so-called austerity with racism… simply because in left-wing politics (the natural politics of the very naïve) non-sequiturs trump reason every time.

(Don’t tell them ‘fightback’ isn’t a verb)

So, let me see if I’ve got this. In response to the declared wishes of the electorate to get our economy back on track they will engage in economically disruptive social and civil disobedience actually intended to directly harm the micro-economy of local organisations and businesses. They will deny small businesses trade by deterring footfall, yet have zero impact on the global industries they despise. It doesn’t sound very grown up to me. But maybe I'm not being generous enough; maybe they know exactly how ineffectual their movement is and this is more of a social event than a serious protest?

As for the racism, is it just coincidence that the student banner blatantly uses the Palestinian flag colours? Oh, of course, silly me; it isn’t racism if it is: A) People the left despise, or B) Anti-semitic. You have to love the joined up thought processes of the left which mirror exactly those of the immature; I don’t like it, therefore it is to be abhorred by all. Or what? You’ll stamp your feet and withdraw your labour? Will you also forego your benefits for the period of your demonstrations? After all, it is those you despise who pay for your idleness. End austerity? God help you if you ever come to know real austerity.

The Commons also voted to, quite rightly, not allow foreign nationals living here to vote in the referendum, so a double hooray for common sense. Except in the eyes of those too blinkered by the certainty of youth, whatever their age, I suppose that is racist. For an example of the stupidity of those who rely on the race relations industry to maintain their righteous outrage look no further than those, like Yasmin Qureshi, who can’t tell the difference between a lone racist gunman and two billion people who follow a doctrine of extreme prejudice against anybody who doesn’t believe what they believe. Be it politics or religion, skin colour or culture, there are none who hate so blindly as those who do it because they are told to.

Kiddy-Fiddling

It’s all about the money, at least if you buy the Tory electoral line. And what normal person wouldn’t want to? Britain is getting back to work, people are becoming better off, the deficit is steadily shrinking and with a steady hand on the tiller we are on course for more of the same. But, in the absence of any credible policies to counter the Conservative good news campaign, the parties of the left are betting the farm on appealing to the hateful impulses of unthinking socialism. The Tories are portrayed by Labour, the SNP, Plaid Cymru and even to some extent by their coalition partners, the LibDems, as the enemy. To the left, success is to be vilified and loathed and the Tories are a rapacious horde to be exterminated. Talk about killing the golden goose…

There is no part of the constituency to which this ‘nasty Tory’ line plays better than our dumbed down, experience-lite, naïve, coddled, starry-eyed youth for whom sound-bites pass for philosophy and Russell Brand’s unhinged rhetoric for the wisdom of the ages. If one thing is certain, it is that children should never have any influence on those with the power to make decisions which affect everybody. I’d even go so far as to say that children should rarely even be consulted about decisions which directly affect themselve; they are minors and no matter how well they imitate their elders, few are capable of making wise choices about affairs to which they have made no contribution.

So, it’s little wonder that the left-wing think tank, the Institute for Public Policy Research proposes that voting should be compulsory in the first election after any youngster reaches the age of majority. In an election battle that is being fought currently on the manipulation of flimsy and largely meaningless financial statistics, what qualifies mere children to make sense of the Play-Your-Cards-Right game of higher/lower/better-off/worse-off than the adults who actually stand to win or lose by it? Which way do you reckon the spotty ones will vote; for less pocket money, or a Brucie Bonus?

The Greens have the answers to EVERYTHING!

And what does it say for the gravitas of any party that fervently seeks the votes of children to retain power - Hitler Youth, anybody? Gerrymandering is a constant political threat, whether by electoral boundaries, corrupt postal means, or the buying of votes for benefits bribes. The left are so convinced they are right and only they are right and that only they have any moral entitlement to be in power that they will do or say almost anything to groom a vote. In other words they will happily deceive gullible young minds to vote for their own enslavement to the state, which is tantamount to child abuse. But will the brown-shirted, Labour Youth, kinder-voters, in their failed socialist futures ever get a chance to point out on the political doll where the Labour Party touched them?