Apologies for the long delay.  But here goes.  You’d think the following was written just yesterday, or at least within this year, and was about Hong Kong… read on, and I’ll identify the who and when tomorrow…or google it!

‘Alienation is the precise and correctly applied word for describing the major social problem in [removed by me] today. People feel alienated by society. In some intellectual circles it is treated almost as a new phenomenon. It has, however, been with us for years. What I believe is true is that today it is more widespread, more pervasive than ever before. Let me right at the outset define what I mean by alienation. It is the cry of men who feel themselves the victims of blind economic forces beyond their control. It’s the frustration of ordinary people excluded from the processes of decision-making. The feeling of despair and hopelessness that pervades people who feel with justification that they have no real say in shaping or determining their own destinies.

Many may not have rationalised it. May not even understand, may not be able to articulate it. But they feel it. It therefore conditions and colours their social attitudes. Alienation expresses itself in different ways in different people. It is to be found in what our courts often describe as the criminal antisocial behaviour of a section of the community. It is expressed by those young people who want to opt out of society, by drop-outs, the so-called maladjusted, those who seek to escape permanently from the reality of society through intoxicants and narcotics. Of course, it would be wrong to say it was the sole reason for these things. But it is a much greater factor in all of them than is generally recognised.

Society and its prevailing sense of values leads to another form of alienation. It alienates some from humanity. It partially de-humanises some people, makes them insensitive, ruthless in their handling of fellow human beings, self-centred and grasping. The irony is, they are often considered normal and well-adjusted. It is my sincere contention that anyone who can be totally adjusted to our society is in greater need of psychiatric analysis and treatment than anyone else. They remind me of the character in the novel, Catch 22, the father of Major Major. He was a farmer in the American Mid-West. He hated suggestions for things like medi-care, social services, unemployment benefits or civil rights. He was, however, an enthusiast for the agricultural policies that paid farmers for not bringing their fields under cultivation. From the money he got for not growing alfalfa he bought more land in order not to grow alfalfa. He became rich. Pilgrims came from all over the state to sit at his feet and learn how to be a successful non-grower of alfalfa. His philosophy was simple. The poor didn’t work hard enough and so they were poor. He believed that the good Lord gave him two strong hands to grab as much as he could for himself. He is a comic figure. But think – have you not met his like here in [removed by me]? Here in [removed by me]? I have.

“An unleashed lust for wealth and power turned them into aggressors…society had evolved too many elites, all demanding excessive baubles, a culture wobbling under the weight of an excess of desire, nobility is expensive, non productive and parasitic, siphoning away too much of society’s energy in frivolous cravings…”

Close your eyes and you can imagine this quote referring to the excess of the super rich, those with mega yachts, private jets, Caribbean Islands etc etc.  Or it could refer to a decadent corpulent west gorging on Welfarism and trash TV.  A declining, increasingly illiterate society, who prefer the images of illusion over critical thought processes.

Open your eyes now.  It’s actually from a book called: “The World Without Us.”  I bought it on impulse. A misanthropic impulse of course.  I enjoyed it!  The author is referring to the decline of ancient cultures,  the  Mayans or the Easter Islanders.

Do you have to be a misanthropic pessimist, part Malthusian,  part Hobbesian, to see the parallel here, or did I just smoke too much at University?

I don’t know why, but the idea of a new beginning appeals to me, I know it appeals to most of us, fortunately, most of us don’t get a chance to exercise our impulse for clean slates.  Most religions are about a new beginning, as are  Fascism, Stalinism, Communism and dare I say it, James Lovelock, darling of the Green Terror.  I think it puts me in bad company.  Fortunately I only want to be like Greta Garbo… why won’t they all just leave me alone!