The imposed burden of birth into an adverse setting one did not create. Queen Elizabeth II, Monarchy, Democracy and Republics.


Being born

Into a Family
that dictates
the parameters
of your entire lifw
in order to
meet the needs of
a thousand year old
Hierarchy of Power,
Wealth and Violence.
Is not an easy place to end up.

The person is not the Institution.

The Institution exploits the person.

Abolish the Institution,
free the family,
free their children,
free the people
and
let us
keep it humane
and
just.


Post script.

I wrote this poem at midday Thursday 8th September.

This poem could just as easily been written for all children born into this culture that is so violence prone.  Violence has many forms.

Poverty, for example, is an institutionalised setting crafted by Wealth Extraction as a dominant political force. Imagine being born into a racist or zenophobic society. We are all born into a culture we did not create, and that culture commonly fails to meet our full human needs, as it demands that we meet it's needs, often at our expense.

As various threads of commentary emerged, on Friday morning, 9th of September, I wish to add this:

Even as I wrote this poem, prior to the announcement of the passing of Queen Elizabeth II, I noticed a thread of quite  nasty comment about the Queen as a person and I think it's valid to say that it’s more than that at face value. 

It is that there are political forces that exploit anger and pain on matters political, economic and cultural to generate thoughtless nastiness on all sides.

Making angry, hurt people angrier than they already are, for political and economic gain.

For me it is important that I honour the ordinary person she could have been, acknowledge the imperfect humanity of the person she was (I too am flawed in my humanity ) and focus on the Institution, it's historical basis, it's place in our democracy and I feel that it is vital that we who embrace honesty and probity push back against the hatred the groomers are trying and will continue to try to stimulate.

I noticed during Brexit the entities grooming pro-Brexit  irrational stances were also grooming anti-Brexit hatred to harden the proBrexit narrative and to use the anti Brexit hatred as a weapon for Brexit. Setting brother against brother, sister against sister, children against parents, neighbour against neighbour.

I think such hatred on either side, whilst understandable (there is much to be angry about, there is much pain in our lives) is also inappropriate and is corrosive to genuine democratic discourse. To deploy manipulative content to exacerbate that pain and anger is beyond the pale, it is utterly cruel and is a wound upon our polity.

The groomers  (Cambridge Analytica et al, Cummings, and many, many others) were deliberately engaged in emotional  trigger manipulation via online microtargeting aimed at both sides, designed to undermine rational discussion and to amplify division, and yet nobody within the Remain spotted it. 

Remain  couldn’t counter it. Labour, Lib Dems, Greens and others did nothing to expose it and confront it. That was a major failing.  A serious vulnerability.

That’s a trait in all of us who are exposed to and often distracted by grooming, when we are targeted by deliberate content designed to exacerbate any and every emotive vulnerability, and thus 'nudge' us from Fore Brain rational thinking to Amygdala based emotional reaction. 

Being aware of it is the first step in disarming it.

Any honest observer of weekly theatre known as Prime Ministers Questions in the UK Parliament can see that dynamic being deployed by leading politicians and back benchers. 

It is not surprising then that such dynamics percolate news media, online activity and our pubs and living rooms and offices.

The trickle down effect, to reset a well worn phrase.

Monarchy and The State as a polity.

There are very good arguments to suggest the abolishment of Monarchy as part of the English political settlement. An Institution crafted by violence, enriched by violence and colonisation, imposing a hierarchy of automated respect as a citizens duty, wrapped in flags of war and conquest, is not suited to the 21st Century.

Therefore it must be a rational argument, rooted in love of the people for each other, grounded in the best that healthy democracy can deliver and aspire to, with the intent to improve the lives of ourselves and our children, and their children to come.

Hatred and stereotype, caricature and insult, polarised 'debate' will not bring us to that happy state. We must check these when they emerge, irrespective of where they emerge from.

Let us do what we can to disarm the hatred stirrers, and root our polity in love, humility, honesty and empathy.



Kindest regards


Corneilius

Thank you for reading this blog.

"Do what you love, it is your gift to universe."

This blog, like all my other content creation work is not monetised via advertising. If you like what I present, consider sharing my content. If you can afford the price of a cup of coffee or a pint of beer/ale/cider for a few months, please donate via my Patreon account.

https://patreon.com/corneilius - donations gratefully received

https://www.reverbnation.com/corneilius - .mp3 songs

https://www.soundcloud.com/coreluminous - .wav Songs

https://www.corneilius.net - Archive

#folkmusic
#singersongwriter
#blogger
#music

No comments: