Sunday 29 December 2013

Debauchery And Gluttony: The True Spirit Of Christmas

I'm late on this since that Christmas thing has been intruding, but after doing a bit of catching up on my reading, I can heartily recommend you listen to a 13 minute recording over at Spiked (I'd have liked to have embedded it here but ...) discussing the miserablists who pop up around about this time every year.

Commenting on the joy-sucking snobbery exhibited by "left wing Scrooges" and "modern puritans" who see Christmas as a problem rather than something wonderful and life-enhancing, Brendan O'Neill draws historic parallels with the Church, Cromwell, and Dickensian dismissal of the poor as irresponsible plebs who should behave and know their place. All while pointing out that hedonistic over-indulgence has a far greater claim on December than anything the charmless and anti-social amongst us might wish we'd comply with.

This quote in particular chimed with me ...
"There is a huge chasm today between ordinary people and - I don't know what you want to call them, the chattering classes, the liberal elite, the political class, whatever we want to call them - there is a huge gap between these two constituencies"
... considering it's similar to what I was saying on Friday.

Do go have a listen in full, and then remember that the true spirit of Christmas ain't quite over until the last booze and Quality Street runs out or the darts finishes on TV, whichever is the latter.


6 comments:

Edgar said...

"I don't know what you want to call them, the chattering classes, the liberal elite, the political class,..."
If he thinks that is what we call them, he is out of touch with the British people, himself.

Dick_Puddlecote said...

I'm sure in private he'd call them something more fruity. ;)

Classless said...

Let us be totally honest about who to blame for the gradual erosion of freedom,of liberty and true festive enjoyment.Forget the elite,the political classes,the festering media cliques.Look around at your neighbours,your friends,your relations,your work mates.Do they care what happens to those around them,do they bother when restrictions effect others,do they worry about what they leave their kids.No, all what matters is self,me,my own,whats mine. To quote many from the upper classes "do the working classes deserve any sympathy"
Let them rot in their gutters of apathy.

truckerlyn said...

Classless, you are, sadly, spot on.


Too many ordinary people these days do not believe they can change anythings, certainly not with a vote, so they vote for the same party they have always voted for, which is often historically what the family have voted for, in the vain hope that one day their party will get it right.


When their party gets in and it is pointed out what a rotten job they are doing and that none of their election manifesto has made it through to parliament with them, the simply say, "ah well, the other lot left them such a mess to clean up, it will take time." Totally pathetic and apathetic.


Sadly, the majority of the country deserves what it is getting, but that also leaves those of us who are prepared to fight in whatever way we can and who do not believe in the main 3 parties, a bit in limbo!


That's life! Hopefully a sack full of pennies will finally drop and a few more 'die hards' will join with those of us who have seen the light!?!?

MarkWadsworth said...

the true spirit of Xmas is never over - you can spend the next eleven months quietly planning the next one and trying to make it a smidge better than the last one.

abu saleh said...

Moving Simplified We found out this morning that we may be headed to

Fort Bragg this summer(surprising as we weren't due to PCS for another year)

fort bragg pcs