It's the Government's Fault
When the snow fell this January the Pundits Rapid Response Unit came out vigorously: it was 'the coldest winter for 30 years', claimed The Guardian. Britain was facing 'one of the coldest winters for 100 years', said The Birmingham Mail.
Then, as school children rejoiced, as traffic slid inelegantly into a small snow drift and people stayed home from work in record numbers, a sleek spokesman for the Prime Minister reassured us that the government was doing all it could.
On Christmas Day, as Northwest Flight 253 prepared to land in Detroit, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab tried to blow the plane up by igniting a plastic explosive with a syringe sewn into his underwear. President Obama said the nation had failed its citizens because it had not protected them.
In Copenhagen the top brass from nations around the world gave us a supreme example of the effective way governments can act to make our lives better. Why do they keep trying - and more to the point, why do we keep expecting them to?
Last year was a litany of poor performance - much of it attributed to 'the government'. From banking to air travel, from school dinners to underwear, 2009 showed us that any woe in the world can be blamed on the government. In the Home of the Brave a judge ruled the Katrina flooding was the government's fault. The clear implication from both critics and government spokespeople is that 'the government' can or should protect us from a multitude of ills and inconveniences.
This inter-Atlantic megalomania must stop! We are capable human beings. We can look after ourselves. Scapegoating the government or any other organisation is futile and dangerous to our personal health because it overlooks the clear and obvious solution: we can take responsibility ourselves.
The snow: we spent a happy hour with our neighbours clearing snow so we could both get our cars out onto the road. We enjoyed a cup of tea together, then we went out to do our usual work, feeling warmly virtuous. Lots of our fellow-citizens stayed home, feeling miserable because their cars were stuck and snow on the satellite dish was disrupting their picture. We had about six inches of snow - not that much to dig through.
On flight 253, young Abdulmutallab torched his pants - and besides the major discomfort this caused, he received further unhappiness when his fellow-passengers jumped on top of him with one accord. Their action probably saved their lives.
The official line in both these cases? During the Big Snow the police advised us all to stay home and not make unnecessary journeys. They could, instead, have advised us to be good citizens and helpful neighbours and go out to clear the section of road outside our homes. Airline security is entrusted to a vast array of under-paid people operating ever more sophisticated, expensive and intrusive machinery with an ever-decreasing use of human intelligence and individual judgement. The individual passenger, who has the greatest incentive to arrive unharmed, is encouraged to act like a sheep instead of a thoughtful, capable individual.
I've been itching to use the wonderful phrase of journalist William Safire, who died in September last year, and this is my opportunity! Let's resolve to ignore the 'nattering nabobs of negativity' who push blame. Instead, in 2010 let's make life better. Let's take more control of our own lives. Let's commit to taking responsibility, thinking rationally, and acting for the good of those around us as well as ourselves. If we could do that, 2010 could be the year our society starts to grow up.
Rob Gorle