You Have Nothing To Fear, But Fear Itself!

The above sentence sounds like a line from a Batman film, where the caped crusader has a head shot to camera and mutters the words with menace.

It was actually Franklin D. Roosevelt who uttered this memorable phrase in the 'thirties. America had just had the Wall Street crash, and the Great War (nothing great about it!) had not long finished. While, over in Europe, a certain Mr A Hitler, formerly of Austria, now residing in Germany, had plans to re-design Europe without the aid of a Feng Shui expert, which can only lead to disaster, as nothing would be in the right place when he finished with it! People were worried about the future and with a certain amount of good reason.

But what about now? Does this still ring true in the world today? We have a world recession, with banks and governments trying to shaft ordinary working people. House prices are out of the reach of large sections of the population. We have more paedophiles per acre than ever before. Not to mention lunatic religious factions taking power in already unstable countries. And then we have global warming, just to bulk up the list of things to lose sleep about.

But are things really that bad? A lot depends on who, where and what you are. If you are eighteen and want to buy your first house in London, unless Mummy and Daddy are rich, or if you are on the extreme benefits band such as the Royal family, forget it, you have no chance. But if you are middle aged and have a large family home and you wish to move on, then the market is quite buoyant.

Banks and governments have always stuffed the people, but yet we keep on voting them in and bailing them out, do we ever learn?

Most of our fears come from the media and the government. Theresa May said that our terrorist alert had gone up to "Oh my God, think of the children!" level, then added that intelligence suggests that there wasn't a terrorist threat that was imminent. Was this announcement nothing more than scaremongering? After all, the Tories did want to bring in new legislation to give the police more powers. I find myself saying this next sentence over and over to people, Every new law is one fewer right for you! Human rights are often removed in the name of security. They are not about keeping you safe, they are about keeping you under control!

You are more likely to die in a golfing accident than by terrorism. I know we have the lunatics in the Middle East who want to kill everyone who doesn't read the only book in the library. But we have always had them, its just that we aren't funding this lot! And at some stage, just like with Mr Hitler, or Adolf to his friend, we no doubt will have to go to war with them, because they will, sooner or later, alter the price of oil. We all know that you can kill and maim innocent people as much as you like, but mess with the oil supply and you are in deep, deep shit!

Then we have the paedophiles. They are around every corner! No child is safe! I blame the bleeding hearts and the liberal minded people for this. First it was letting gay people get married, two people who love each other showing affection is disgusting, Then it was letting the great unwashed drink Pimms. Even ginger-haired people can now have children outside Scotland!! What the fuck is happening to this country? It used to be full of good, hard-working people. Where the police were looked up to, and free to invent as much evidence as they liked against people they didn't! And the clergy were the backbone of our lives, with their unflinching morals about sex and families and sex in the families. They were the people to go to in time of trouble. There are no paedophiles around every corner when the church is strong in society, because most of them are there in the church.

When I was a kid I was forced by my father to become an altar-boy, I have to say that I have never encountered any sexual impropriety by any priest, just lucky I guess. We did have a priest that displayed psychotic tendencies, but people were too scared of him to point this out to him.

We used to go away on trips with the church to, of all places, a convent! I know, it sounds odd to me now, but it was just one of those strange things that you take for granted when you're a kid. We all had to go swimming under the watchful eye of Father Butch! That wasn't his name, it's just how I remember him. He used to swim around with us and he used to wear Speedo budgie-smugglers, but I suppose everyone did in the sixties. I can't help but think, if you remove the 'S' from Speedos, what you are left with.

The fact is that most, though not all, of the high-profile abuse cases are historical, and most were committed by teachers, doctors, and mainly priests: all middle class, all professionals. I'm not saying that there weren't or aren't paedophiles among the working class, but now, just like then, it wasn't some dirty old man in a greasy overcoat but usually a family member or family friend that committed the act. Last year in Britain, there were fewer old people dying over the winter than ever before. This is a fact, records prove it, but it's not news worthy.

We also hear a lot about gang culture in our cities, and how dangerous the situation is, and getting worse. What the hell do you think the Kray twins were? There were more gangs in the Victorian period than ever before, but we have turned these people into folk heroes.

The third world is still impoverished and starving. If the Ebola crisis had started in Washington, we would have a cure for it now. And, strangely, the HIV virus is getting weaker and burning itself out! 

But some things never change. The rich are still rich and getting richer, while the working class are still going to food banks. We now have twenty-four-hour news channels that have to fill their schedules so "news" that years ago wasn't reported is now reported with a bit of a twist to keep you interested.

Yes, there are lots of problems in the world, and yes, there are lots of bad people in the world (most have suits or work in banks, or both!) but nothing ever changes, and that is a problem, and something we should worry about. But there is always hope. I'm a glass half-full man and education is improving, although Gove did his best to put a stop to this. Healthcare now has more money thrown at it than any other time in history. We need to change our view on politics and about society. Stop the blame culture that we have grown so used to. Every new wave of immigration is seen as the cause of all the country's problems, but the problems remain. Maybe, just maybe, the problems were already here.

We elect politicians to improve our lives, our society, and the world. We do not elect them to further their own careers and bank balances. So if you are worried to leave your house because of fear of getting mugged, or if you are scared of your house being repossessed there is only one direction to point, and that's to your government.

"You have nothing to fear but a bland faceless bureaucrat in a suit!"