Welcome to Britain - Land Of No Hope, And Former Glory

As the collective vision of the future becomes ever bleaker and more of our society continues to opt out, we are faced with a decline that can’t be rectified by policy alone.

It feels as though we are currently living within a society that is in decline, whose decrepit body is a shell of its former self, struggling with every breath, waiting to eventually die a thoroughly undignified death. For us, I suppose the cells in this morbid analogy, there is nothing left to do, our host vehicle is beyond repair, and the ‘do not resuscitate’ marker has been crudely tattooed on its chest. Now is the time for reflection, to appreciate those memories of better days long past, and try to wait out the final moments before it’s all over. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, well now it is the end of times, let's accept it and move on.

I must admit, I’m not entirely sure that everything was indeed better in the past, and it may just be a case of a rose-tinted view of a period I never lived through, however, I feel confident in saying that the future doesn’t look particularly bright. To add insult to injury, I am sure that there are plenty of statistical arguments that could be made for living standard improvements in recent years, combined with an abundance of surveys, government-funded research, and social media sentiment analysis that would show we are living in an irrefutably more prosperous and positive time than our ancestors. Yet, I think there are occasions when a collective subjective experience is equally as valid as any study’s data or objective analysis, and I believe there is a shared majority view that we are, in fact, witnessing a very real societal decline. Like a piece of fruit left outside for weeks on end, the growing rot may not be observable every day, and there will certainly be moments when the fruit looks gloriously edible, but the compounding decay will be inarguably evident soon enough. That’s how I feel about our society today, we are rotting on the inside, and the most overt signs of our decomposition will soon become obvious, and to many, the hallmarks are more than clear already.

So what is the cause, how have we got ourselves in this position, and surely there is a way out. Well, to start with, I am keen to avoid outlining any one ailment that may have contributed to this sorry state of affairs, not because I agree or disagree with it as a root cause, but because I think this is as much an issue of intangible suffering, as it is of tangible harmful contributors. When the sun is shining and the air is warm, many everyday problems seem to be partially alleviated. Yes, if you have just been maimed, those bright yellow rays are unlikely to solve your immediate distress, however maybe struggling to find a parking space, or 5 minutes spent looking for lost keys, may feel far less consequential. Whereas, on a cold, miserable day, even a door not being held open could rightfully drive someone to impromptu defenestration. Your external conditions drive your internal feelings, and these determine your attitudes, actions, and behaviour. That is why, when our society feels like rainy day after rainy day, it is no surprise that this external collective state of negativity hinders any attempt at societal wellbeing and progress.

The future is a very powerful concept. You can be tricked into believing that the future possesses any number of infinitely positive outcomes, just waiting to be experienced. The self-help and pro-manifestation community is built upon this premise, and so too have politicians frequently relied on this psychological trick. However, this is not a one-way street, and a belief in a negative future is just as influential, destroying even the most valiant attempts at day-to-day positivity. It is this deeply negative future outlook that has led many of the younger generation to no longer buy into society. Why contribute to a system that feels abandoned even by those who have benefited most from it, and who have played the greatest role in making it what it is today?

This, I feel, is the crux of the issue. A society is not buildings or commerce, it's people, it's a community with a shared ideology, with a shared commitment to a shared goal. Everyone has bought in, they all know what needs to happen, and will do what it takes to make it happen. There is a vision of a future that they want to be actualised, and they will all benefit once it is accomplished. Yet, this can no longer be said for the vast majority of those currently going through the motions in today’s world. There is no shared vision of the future, there is no sense of community, and we have transformed into a zero-sum winner-takes-all society where, in order to scrape some remotely positive future, I have to take from yours. We are in Mad Max Britain, but instead of cool desert car fights with Tom Hardy, we compete over who can get onto a graduate scheme, and who gets the best new build plot with a complimentary EV charger.

Despite policy after policy, and government initiative after government initiative, the feeling of decline will persist, and the ineffectiveness of recent solutions just reinforces the feelings of total despair. If there is a solution, which I am not sure there is, it is never going to be top-down. It needs to emerge naturally and spread organically, until even the most downbeat citizen can’t help but feel a twinge of positivity within. This is what will drive societal buy-in, which in time, will turn into community accountability and a shared optimism about creating a future that all will benefit from.

Of course, at this very moment, imagining such a transformation feels like too far a shift into the sort of utopian propaganda projected onto screens at election year party conferences. Yet, maybe times are actually changing, there is finally something to celebrate, an event that we can all be united by, that will push even non-believers into action. Universal Studios is coming to Bedford, so stop your moaning and pre-order that season pass, a brighter future is on the horizon.