On sanitisation and sterility

Nu Britain is becoming an increasingly paternalistic, uniforming society. From health (and safety) to doing your own bit for the environment, society, social interactions, and culture are being standardised according to a middle-class, puritan yardstick. It also smacks of elitism. All these controlling measures seem to be embedded in a deep-rooted loathing of the 'prols'. The thought of more independence for the prols and also the uncouthness of some middle-class traitors is seen as a threat to middle-class lifestyle. There are three important controlling aspects to Nu Britain:

1) Environmentalism.

2) Health (and safety).

3) Morality.

Now, first of environmentalism. Environmentalism has come to be defined as a neo-Green or Green capitalist movement, which is focuses on individual guilt and penance. This then results in a greater stratification of society in which the Green elites are able to live well by doing penance (offsetting, or simply paying more) while the prols are meant to feel guilty about flying once a year to Prague and, more importantly, are simply marketed out of certain behavioural patterns. Neo-environmentalism is paternalistic in so many ways. It augments the minutest actions of individuals into catastrophic proportions. In some cases it uses very contestable facts in order to attack the actions of ordinary people (see the plastic bags fetish).

The problem is that environmentalism is framed in strong elements of truth but the interpretation is flawed. Though I am no scientist and though it remains difficult to deal with or access scientific analyses of the earth's climate etc., environmentalism is not simply a fairytale like religion, as some right-wing commentators assert (see Peter Hitchens). Even without going into the science, it is self-evident that pumping stuff into the air will have and is having some kind of impact on. I have little doubt that mankind is affecting the globe. What we should be asking is: Do we really want to create a more highly stratified society in which we create a new luxury, Green elite? If environmentalism were serious about the issues it raises (and I doubt it can) it would have far sharper criticism directed towards production rather than consumption. It would question the very system we live in. But it doesn't. Instead Neo-Greens love demonstrating their expressed loathing for the prols. Environmentalism has provided a means of attacking the lives of said prols in that it offers framework of catastrophic guilt (namely, you are destroying the planet by getting an extra plastic bag at Somerfield). It not only attacks ordinary people here, but also the developing world. Neo-Greens therefore manage to tick not just the classist box, but also the racist one at the same time.

Moreover, there is a horrible resemblance between big business (BB) and environmentalists as both are human-centric self-important phenomena. Whlie BB asserts its right to abuse the planet (that's the environment and people), Neo-Greens equally regard themselves as wielding dictatorial powers over the planet. They simply want to preserve the earth as they see it fit. I suggest we accept that change will happen and learn to adapt. This does not preclude the possibility of querying the system of production (on the contrary), but we don't need environmentalism to make that point.

Secondly, health (and safety). Attacks on any aspect of life that has not conformed with sanitised view of life and 'health' have increased. The recent smoking ban that has been spreading throughout Europe is perhaps one of the most obvious manifestations of middle-class paternalism in the name of health. Others include the assumption that ordinary people are too stupid to feed themselves or their children and therefore end up obese. Similar to Neo-Green thought, the implication is that the prols cannot deal with any freedom to decide and will thus only gorge themselves and their children. Therefore the austere middle-class will have to teach them how to live their lives properly. A further aspect has been the recent suggestion of banning mobile phones for car drivers. While I rarely stand up for automobile rights (I personally don't drive), this proposed piece of legislation appears to be yet another attack on the prols. Talking on the mobile while driving is being singled out as a terrible offence, as talking on mobiles is associated with chavs, whereas respectable middle-class drivers will of course use their hands-free and SatNav. No, mobile phones are clearly the biggest distraction to drivers and a potential killer (chavs killing the respectable crowd is probably the biggest fear of the middle classes alongside the racist fears of imported viruses from the far east...the yellow peril). Using hands free, SatNav, talking to one's 2.4 kids, watching interactive adverts alongside every road, aggressive Merc and BMW drivers on their ways to 'important' business meetings and differences in reaction times between humans (some are simply slower than others) are ignored, but mobile phones are singled out. It's just such an easy target.

Again, with a lot of these proposals there are some truths surrounding the issues. But I suggest yet again that I would rather live in a more ad hoc society than accept changes based on class and ethnic prejudice. I don't want to live in a society in which a neo-Green health elite dictate what is good and bad (usually bad) for the rest. These proposals are also quite un- or even anti-cultural. Take the smoking ban. There is a complete void when it comes to understanding the cultural and historical significance of smoking. It's completely ignored. Science takes precedence over culture. The obsessive sterilisation and sanitisation of society is an ignorant and philistine position to take. David Hockney has tried to make this point, but ultimately failed.

Morality is an issue, which includes environmentalism and health (and safety) but also steps beyond that. It encompasses environmentalism and health (and safety) as Green and health guilt dictate a new form of morality. But it goes further. The recent controversy of censoring (later retracted) the word 'faggot' from The Pogues song A Fairytale of New York and the trial of Samima Malik the so-called Lyrical Terrorist highlights the distrust the middle-classes and (media) elites towards the riffraff and street culture. Accordingly Britain has to be protected from vulgar language ('faggot' sung by an anarchic Anglo-Irish folk band...) and youthful radicalism.

Now, the worrying aspect to all this is the fact that a lot of the criticisms directed at environmentalism, health and safety, and issues of enforcing thought morality comes from the paranoid right.

Environmentalism is criticised by the likes of Peter Hitchens as climatechangelism without understanding the wider problems of top-down imposition and the society that has/is been/being thereby created. It is possible not be classified as a climate change denialist (which is part of the Green guilt) but still criticise the manifestations of Green Guilt.

Health and safety is often rebuffed by the right, because it simply impinges on their liberty without understanding the wider issue of destroying culture and cultural patterns and aggressive loathing of the prols.

Thought morality is often rebuked in the infamous right-wing motto of 'PC gone mad'. But this is not the issue. Again, some of the debates are correct. Political Correctness is not wrong. Racist and homophobic tirades are rightly frowned upon and attacked, but again Nu Britain has stepped beyond that. It is seeking to uniform thought and, more worryingly, change culture retrospectively. That is how the issue should be addressed.

Many of these issues have been usurped by the right, but the right has of course consistently misunderstood what is at the heart of the problem. Neo-Greeen environmentalism is problematic not because it's mumbo-jumbo as right-wingers assert (it probably isn't), but because it is being used to stratify society and retain western capitalist hegemony by imposing Green Guilt. Health and Safety is not simply an infringement of individual rights but it is cultural analphabetism. And similar thought morality is not 'PC gone mad' (a no-go argument), but it's airbrushing the vulgar, which again is culturally so important. To resist these uniforming, sterilising, sanitising movements does not belong to self-important right who seek similar restrictions on the prols and the developing world & ethnic minorities. It ought to be reclaimed.