The constant noise of the world we live in
“Nothing but doom and gloom” - moaned my daughter from across the table while scrolling through the news on her phone - “it starting to feel like harassment.”
All day she’s had been pinging with text messages while trying to get through her day’s work and prepare a presentation for a client this afternoon.
My grandson’s school inundated her with updates since early morning: you can now update your details on Parent Pay, has anyone seen a green scooter, don’t miss the your deadline this Wednesday for our upcoming event.
She’s not even the mother of the child. Her phone number is on the school list for emergency and to pick him up from school when mum or myself can’t.
Her number must have ended up in the school’s bulk text message by mistake. I called the school and they sorted it out immediately. After all, in the Age of Fear, that’s enough to make people working in institutions paranoid. I should know, I was a primary school teacher for 25 years.
It was bad back then but now it has gone way off the scales.
Consider this excerpt from the newsletter I received from my granddaughter’s secondary school by email, no doubt also by accident. It reads:
“A reminder to parents that while in some communities Halloween 'trick ot treat' traditions are well established, this is not widespread.
We advise against our students undertaking such activities as this poses safety concerns and for some of Haringey's more vulnerable residents, older children in costume approaching their houses can intimidate and scare them.
If your children wish to go trick or treating, we advise you accompany them and only visit residents you know and who are expecting you.”
Gone are the days when the newsletter was on a double-sided A4 sheet given to the kids on Fridays and school did not poke their nose in what kids got up out of school.
These days children are treated like orphans in care and parents - when not undermined by curriculum experts - lectured like children and issued reminders by strangers they’ll probably speak to once or twice a year for 10 minutes maximum at parents evenings.
The trick or treat tradition was something kids looked forward to every year at Halloween. Once they turned 10 we allowed them to go round the neighbourhood in a small group. Before the invasion of illegal immigrants who have a problem with this country’s traditions but nonetheless feel entitled to come and live here and before the authorities adopted a permissible attitude towards masked activists who go around robbing shops and assaulting people impudently in broad daylight, Halloween was a widespread tradition.
What message are our education institutions drumming into our children’s heads?
That we should respect communities that do not respect them.
What else? The school reminds parents and advises against such activities, basically insinuating that parents are unaware and need somebody else to think on their behalf and tell them what they should and shouldn’t allow their children to do outside school, in their private time and space. So kids no longer look up to their parents as figures of wisdom and authority but turn to authoritarian strangers who know better for direction in life. Of course, if then the experts get it wrong, the parent will be there to take the blame. These days parents seem to serve only one purpose: the role of scapegoat to damage control the mess caused by institutional failures.
The element of tradition, which is what held community bonds from time immemorial, is also erased alongside parental dignity and their right to raise children according to their values - not the dictates of the socialist state.
What I find particularly vile and insidious aside that, is the state of fear they try to instil in young people and the sense of guilt.
Be afraid! Trick or treat poses serious concerns about your safety.
Sorry mate, I tell you what poses serious concerns on a daily bases and not just at Halloween. It’s the crowd of dodgy mugs sitting all day long outside Bar Lucia sipping coffees my granddaughter has to pass by every day on her way to and from school. They sit there on their phones, leer at young girls passing by, make lewd remarks and some even had the audacity to walk up to them and get close. The Council does nothing because they’re the cream of the crop of the Albanian cartel and let’s face it - since 2010, that was Indira Kartallozi’s plan all along - she’s made a mint and now she’s living the life globetrotting and mingling with NGOs.
Let me digress just a minute, to tell you who she is and what’s her connection to Haringey council, education and the Albanian (Kosovar) cartel.
Now if that was British men they would be browbeaten and labelled toxic masculinity but we’re dealing with a designated protected group, their behaviour is justified by culture. Instead of them having to respect the culture of the country they emigrate to, the roles are reversed and it’s the native of the country who are told to adapt to theirs.
Would they reciprocate the British with the same courtesy in Albania, Saudi or any other country? You already know the answer unless you’ve lived under a rock for the whole of your life.
What worries me is what the kids educated today will grow up into - disaffected adults profoundly damaged by the self-hate and doctrines of self-sacrifice for the ‘other’ drummed into their heads by years of false projections and ideological indoctrination.
What happened to the Lionheart of Britain?
Has it disappeared?
Has it been put to sleep?
Whatever happened, it has to be revived and that means staring down those who would us intimidate and cowering in fear and continue to celebrate our traditions with pride.