KLINGON TO THE FUTURE

It is somewhat irrational to assume that the end of the year is the threshold of a new and hopefully improved beginning of a new life. What is nothing more than a change of date is not a new beginning, unless one sees each new day as a new start. Perhaps that is a way of greeting a new day. Life starts today!

 

There are various traditions that are associated with the new year, involving the making of resolutions or a determination to accomplish certain projects or change patterns of behaviour; however, the reality is that resolutions to do things and attempts to improve one’s behaviour can be done at any time, providing one had the resolve to accomplish the desired objective. It is all a matter of will and self-discipline. Nonetheless, all that has gone on before still remains in the memory and cannot be changed. One’s interaction with others is not only one’s own memory but is also embedded in the memory of those we have interacted with, and sometimes evidenced in writing, in photographs or on video and film. Indeed, at the end of a calendar year it is often looked back on and various events and activities are mused over, analysed, extolled or regretted. Certain citizens are marked out for praiseworthy accomplishments and certain dramatic events are noted; however, life goes on and passed events will stay as they are. Simply because a calendar date is chosen for reminiscences, does not actually create change. The pretence that it can or does, is not rational.   

 

In fact, resolutions and declarations of new beginnings can occur at any time, and are a continuing aspect of human culture, even though, on the whole, such resolutions and declarations, more often than not, lead to the same repetitive patterns of behaviour.

 

One need only reminisce on the machinations of the current government to see this in operation. The conservative party has formed a government during the last 12 years. There have been 5 changes of leadership and with each change the chosen leader has declared a new beginning and a reformative change; yet, the ministers in power remain the same. Whatever the electorate is told about progress and change is a complete fabrication, an attempt to deny the truth and gaslight the public into believing that a new and improved government has been formed. They are the same people who have been in place for 12 years. There has been no change and no real determination, will or self-discipline, to improve patterns of behaviour or achieve publicly desired objectives.  They have run the gamut of catastrophe. As the new year begins, I can only hope that some semblance of decency and realisation envelops the current leadership and a general election is called in the spring. May would be the perfect time. That is my fantasy.

 

The reality is that they will cling on. They are indeed very akin to the fantasy species created in Star Trek, the Klingons, who are described as prideful, ruthless and brutal, practicing feudalism and authoritarianism, a warrior caste relying on slave labour. If that is not a fair description of the current conservative party in power it is pretty close. Klingon by name, cling on by nature. They even have their own language. One only need compare the “I have a dream” speech between Suella Braverman and Martin Luther King Jr to note the difference in tone between human beings and Klingons.

So, the UK Enterprise goes boldly into 2023 with aliens at the helm. The result of this is a ship floundering through the cosmos with no direction, shedding its valued institutions and principles as it trundles on. There is no mutiny in place, only an acquiescent crew hoping that, in the near future, new officers and captain will replace those currently on the bridge.

As I turned on my computer this morning, it flashed up a number of “memories” in the form of collections of pictures taken over a number of years. The collection for the 18^th May 2013 turned up a visit to Strasbourg and the European Court of Human Rights. It is simply labelled “Droits de L’Homme” = “Rights of Man” or “Human Rights”. Why any country would seek to disassociate from the court is baffling, particularly when that country’s citizens were the first true champions of such rights.  It also threw up photos of Christmas past: