Though Cowards Flinch

I have for some time now been actively opposed to the Conservative-driven narrative of a Broken Britain, confident in my own theory that the malaise on our society is caused not by some collapse in national morals, but by structural and power inequalities which sometimes find expression in alienated behaviours.

It is time for a mea culpa.  I was wrong, and Phillip Blond is right.  Unless something is done quickly by those destined to lead us, we are lost.

I have had nagging doubts about my leftwing certainties for some time new, but I threw off the shackles of socialism when I read of this appallingness in a newspaper local to me, the St Helens Reporter:

A man got his hand stuck in a teapot while trying a fish out a teabag.

The details of the ambulance call and the small cut to the hand make for almost unbearable reading for anyone of British stock, but we must confront the truth. 

The sad reality is that a man in St Helens failed to use teabag tongs to take the teabags out of his teapot.  That bears repeating with big letters: HE FAILED TO USE TEABAG TONGS.

But it gets worse.  The collapse of social norms are such that the St Helens Reporter feels the need to carry a picture of a teapot (see above) as part of its story.  

This suggests strongly that younger people in St Helens – focused entirely on the pleasures of “pop” music and meeting at bus stops – DO NOT EVEN KNOW WHAT A TEAPOT IS.

And this is happening in St Helens,the very home of Mr Johnny Vegas, comic impressario and advertiser of tea and teapots.  Lord only know what it’s like in Dunstable. Or Barnsley.

It is the end for Britain.