Attention, comrades. My fellow heroes, titans, thinkers of deep thoughts. It is time to map out the world of tomorrow:

There are no post revolution theatre troops, only post revolution mine troops, comrade. pic.twitter.com/ACIref7r9r

— Hegel Borg™️ (@xxclusionary) June 10, 2024

Because after the revolution, we will need accessible theatre.

Presumably, to take our minds off all the riots and ruin and burning cars. Earlier revolutionary rumblings can be found here and here. Topics covered include the pivotal importance of “artists and visionaries,” and the righteous washing of other people’s bin contents. Thereby enabling us to “eat from a revolutionary and resistance standpoint.”

Consider this an open thread. Share ye links and bicker.

Lifted from the comments, a small point, on suburban versus city living. And those who would prefer that you didn’t have a choice:

I went out on my porch last night and there was a guy milling about in front of my neighbor’s house, sitting on their retaining wall, just, you know, hanging out on somebody else’s property at 11pm.

Freedom from that (and a million related things) is what suburbanites are… https://t.co/O94JKBdBv5

— wanye (@wanyeburkett) May 30, 2024

A thread ensues.

In the comments, Jacob adds:

Well, yes. Quite.

Not having to guess whether some stranger sitting on your wall at 11pm is a threat, or just someone with an impaired sense of boundaries – and not having to do that regularly – is freeing. Likewise, being able to park your car on the street outside without fretting, routinely, about whether someone may try to steal it, or steal some part of it, or just vandalise it out of moron spite, is similarly non-trivial.

And contra Mr Gifford, a thing one might wish to enjoy.

Update, via the comments:

Mr Gifford, since you ask, is a proponent of the “15-minute city.” He doesn’t much like car ownership, or people having the option of living in the suburbs. He’s also rather disdainful of the fact that some of us would rather not “live closer to all kinds of different people,” a proximity to difference – now there’s a euphemism – that is presented as some kind of unexplained moral imperative.

That some people prefer to have neighbours with broadly compatible values and expectations – say, regarding behaviour, noise, the observation of normal boundaries, things of that kind – seems to vex Mr Gifford. The word “privilege” is deployed in a rumbling kind of way.

A rumbling we’ve heard before, while marvelling at its implications.

Update 2, via the comments:

Regarding Mr Gifford’s enthusiasm for our proximity – that’s coerced proximity – to “all kinds of different people,” MattS notes,

Another non-trivial point, one touched on here, and about which readers may have views somewhat at odds with those of Mr Gifford.

Dicentra adds, not unreasonably,

YOU WILL CARRY THOSE FOUR BAGS OF SHOPPING ON PUBLIC TRANSPORT. OR DIE IN THE ATTEMPT. CITIZEN. 

And where, needless to say, you will delight in being surrounded by “all kinds of different people.”

At which point, this came to mind, along with this. And of course this infinitely charming scene. Among many others.

Update 3:

In the comments, Daniel Ream adds,

And if everyone involved has shared values and behavioural expectations – the kind of cultural common ground – and moral common ground – that Mr Gifford would presumably disdain as problematic, as mere “privilege.”

A while ago, I mentioned that for many years a neighbour has had an ‘honesty box’ on a small, home-made stand on the pavement outside their house. Passers-by can help themselves to surplus produce from the owner’s vegetable garden, or small plants, or unwanted toys, or whatever. People leave the suggested, very nominal charge or whatever they deem appropriate.

In a box. That doesn’t get robbed.

Almost every time I pass it, I’m faintly pleased that it exists. It does seem rather symbolic. And it serves as a reminder that I’ve lived in neighbourhoods where such a thing would very promptly be vandalised and thrown into the road, and where delight would be taken in its destruction – and in the misery of its owner.

And the difference between the two scenarios – or between this scene and this one – is not caused by poverty, or indeed “privilege.” It’s about being better people. The kind of people one might, say, prefer as neighbours.

Update 4:

Regarding the reference to better people, EmC replies,

To acknowledge the obvious does have an air of scandalousness. Such is the practised dishonesty of our times. But at risk of being thought “privileged,” or insufficiently egalitarian, I would prefer to walk down the street without someone doing this in order to do this. To me or anyone else.

Outrageous of me, I know.

Quoted below, extracts from a conversation that in many circles would result in much hissing and flailing of limbs, but which, it seems to me, very much ought to be had:

From the following video, in which Andrew Gold talks with the formidable Mia Hughes, author of The WPATH Files, about pseudoscience, malpractice, and experiments on children.

It’s a forty-five-minute watch, but there’s plenty to chew on. Much that could be quoted. I should point out that the later sections of the interview, which explore surgical affirmations, or as one surgeon puts it, “creating body types that do not exist in nature,” does get a little vivid, and indeed surreal.

Lifted from the comments, a little elaboration on an Ephemera item from yesterday. Specifically, an everyday scene from Ruislip, Greater London:

Queuing means the old, small and weak are treated fairly. Not all cultures queue. I saw this living abroad. pic.twitter.com/XAXOY5n5uq

— Larry Lemon (@larrylemonmaths) May 13, 2024

Note that the would-be bus passengers, the ones accustomed to queuing and now looking on in weary dismay, have varied shades of skin.

As Rafi adds in the comments,

Quite. And the fact that mentioning the degradation may result in scolding or social punishment of some kind is itself part of the degradation. Plenty of people are itching to seize upon any such transgression, thereby asserting their own high status. Above the likes of you.

And so, quite a lot of people who don’t much care about the skin tone of those doing the pushing and jostling, but who do think that politeness and queuing are good things, things that a society shouldn’t lose, are, by many progressives, pushed into the category of Incorrigible Bigot, as invalid by default. As if the grievance, the stated issue – “queuing means the old, small, and weak are treated fairly” – could only be about the pigmentation of the players, not their actual behaviour, to which attention has been drawn.

And with those who prefer politeness suitably cowed or demoralised, the degradation continues.

It should, I think, be pointed out that this suppressing and demoralising effect, the adding of insult to injury, has not gone unnoticed by many of those keen to do the suppressing and demoralising.

Some years ago, I mentioned a car journey in which, for reasons that escape me, I was distractedly listening to BBC Radio 4’s Loose Ends – a sort of whimsical revue of chat, music, and substandard stand-up. The generic left-leaning comedian of the week, whose name I didn’t catch, was pleased by the taboos surrounding immigration and multiculturalism. Lots of code words were used – “Sun-reader,” and so forth – so that the disdain for working-class people and their fears wouldn’t be too overt.

The gist of the comedian’s punch line was, “Isn’t it hilarious that people who have concerns about mass immigration and failures to assimilate – the rapid and estranging transformation of their neighbourhoods – now have to be quiet because otherwise they’ll be called racists and possibly lose their jobs. Ha! We won!”

This triumphal non-joke – and it was blatantly triumphal – was deemed incredibly funny, or at least ideologically congenial, and much mannered clapping ensued. Of course, this was aired shortly before the uncovering of events in Rotherham and elsewhere, and before our immensely vibrant age of Congolese machete gangs.

And so, if that nice Mrs Wilson, the old dear two doors down, can no longer get on a bus, and dreads waiting for a bus because of the Third World scuffle that now ensues, and if she no longer feels she can complain about this without being thought racist, then this is totally fine, apparently. Indeed, it’s a basis for triumphal smugness by BBC comedians and BBC studio audiences.

Today’s word, since you ask, is alienation.

Update, via the comments:

sk60 adds,

Well, again, quite.

And the rate at which new arrivals materialise, their sheer numbers, will have an effect on how well, or how poorly, those new arrivals adapt to the customs and values of the host society. Indeed, it will have an effect on whether those new arrivals feel inclined, or obliged, to make any such attempt.

Which brought to mind this:

And yet, it seems we’re supposed to imagine that such massive, unprecedented immigration, seemingly indiscriminate immigration, both legal and otherwise, couldn’t possibly create problems. Things one might lament. Things lost and irretrievable.

If the word irretrievable sounds too emotive, consider the practicalities in the bus stop video. How does the customary courtesy prevail – how does it reassert itself – against a jostling mass of rude people? People whose attitude is screw the rules – and by extension, screw everyone else. The considerate, including the elderly or frail or physically unimposing, will either have to start jostling too, or just stand back in muted dismay and wait for the next bus. Probably in the hope that the same thing doesn’t happen, or happen quite so badly.

So, one more time. Some things, when lost, may be irretrievable.

And note, as in the case linked above, the progressives loudly denouncing as “hostile” any reservations about massive, unselective immigration can in the very next breath bemoan “societal breakdown,” as if the two things couldn’t ever, under any circumstances, be related.

Our betters, you know. They say so themselves.

Update 2:

Oh, to be in Portugal.

Further to this, touched on in the comments,

Here’s Helen Joyce on transgender overreach, exploited politeness, and belated pushback:

Full interview below:

An earlier, longer interview with Ms Joyce has been mentioned previously and can be found here.

Consider this an open thread. Share ye links and bicker.