Red Cliffs Of Dawlish

Red Cliffs Of Dawlish
Red Cliffs Of Dawlish

Sunday 5 March 2017

Politics: The Tedium Of Burning Off Nervous Energy




Gas Flare on Oil Rig

As per wikipedia:

"Gas flaring at many oil and gas production sites protects against the dangers of over-pressuring industrial plant equipment. When petroleum crude oil is extracted and produced from onshore or offshore oil wells, raw natural gas associated with the oil is brought to the surface as well... vast amounts of such associated gas are commonly flared as waste or unusable gas."

Each and every day I tend to find that underneath the surface of my daily routine, I'm a bag of nervous nerves jumbling together and managing to coordinate the day by ensuring these nerves are managed at the same time as working on the aspects that are directly relevant to performing my various tasks and duties according to external criteria and the measurement of success that connects to objectively.

I'd guess with Brexit, it's analogous? There's too many people with so much nervous energy, that is not very usable and hence over time as with the gas flare above the excess needs to be burnt off gradually, at the same time as extracting the useful or usable energy?

Pointing this out, is not really changing anything, but it is contrasting with what is always pointed out with little actual productive response from people interested in politics; which is:-
  1. Deliver the arguments to people
  2. It's just a question of how much exposure needed to get the message through. 
  3. Apparently this is what politicians do for us. Except they don't and can't.

In fact because this is what people believe IS politics, because what politicians do and say is for "everybody, everywhere and all of the time," reported through the news-media and then imitated by people: The result is this burning off/of nervous energy has become the full extent of public actual participation in the decision-making machinery of the nation (UK): Our politics.

It's interesting but listening to the student speeches for their GCSE English Language "persuasive speaking" module, they have in the high marking ones perfectly parroted this process from politicians to news-media to people in the arguments presented.

Here apparently the facts are laid out in pro vs con style and various arguments are compared and "scientifically measured" against each other, and along with news-media, applauded for doing so skillfully. Yet, what I would argue is actually going on here, is the "Gas Flare" component of politics. For what the students are really doing is fitting the arguments to the marking criteria of their speeches and what the politicians are doing equally when exposed to their source of information on the EU is fitting that to the rhetorical devices they use as their own marking criteria - which is the popularity they seek to gain from the morons who vote such a bunch of charlatans into their offices be it geographic constituency or sector of the economy.

Taking the analogy further, what then describes the actual useful energy component extracted as it were in our politics? Equally valid to ask: Can people be usefully involved in politics at this scale of millions of voters, so called "democracy"?

A lot of people would have chosen to vote Remain for selfish reasons: They don't want their house to go down in value or their business to lose money due to currency or export changes or rule changes and so on and so forth. Equally a lot of people would have voted for Leave based on nervous energy as well without really understanding the implications and scope of what Brexit necessitates; such as being sick of the lies of politicians and being excluded from politics or simply being malcontents or indeed gaining an idea that the EU is not all it's cracked up to be and that somewhere in the future there really will need to be a major decision to make: So why not make it now and force the issue?

In all these cases people choose the criteria that befits them: They don't choose the criteria very often that fits the actuals state of knowledge of the subject eg How little attention was focused on FLEXCIT in the YEARS before the EU Referendum decision as one if not an special one of the Brexit papers published and freely available to people to consult.

Because of this absolutely huge mismatch, we're probably going to experience the long tedium of burning off nervous energy around Brexit for years to come let alone the actual productive negotiations extracted finally.

I doubt many who voted in the EU Referendum will see or understand much of the effective energy extracted out of this political process: All they'll be left with is looking at the slightly attractive gas flare given off 24 hours a day and 7 days a week in the news-media and by politicians and by people who perfectly parrot this process believing it to be something useful that it is not. By the time the UK doesbecome noticeably distinct within or without the EU, people will then be considering the even worse tedium of bureaucracy of standardization that awaits once they can get over their state of nerves! But at least with this there is the case to be made that people could be contributing and acting usefully in their participation of politics according to their knowledge in their area of life and how these rules and regulations affect them?