The Cows of Winscombe 13th September: Cows three days running? Really?
Another unexpectedly sunny morning.
Boots on and with various disturbances in my innermost being (otherwise known as ‘things on my mind’), I set off intending to retrace a walk past the surgery and across fields to Shipham Lane. I’d even spent time searching for my glasses so I could see enough detail on an OS map to know where to find a particular footpath.
In the event my feet took me to a longer route, through Sidcot and up to the radio mast before descending to King’s Wood and on to the Strawberry Line to return home, 90 minutes later.
I did not expect to see cows.
I’ve walked this route a few times and only walked past sheep and lambs in the Spring. So it made me smile when I found some cows happily munching grass far enough away not to notice me gazing at them. The thought went through my head ‘that means I won’t be able to resist a third Cows in Winscombe blogpost’ and here we are.
Two of the uppermost ‘things on my mind’ I could name in specific terms. Better, though, to reflect on the bass notes. Most music is recognisable by its melody, the top notes, and the right hand on the piano. The left hand, which plays the bass notes, plays a background role. Without them, something’s missing, but it’s difficult to recognise the piece or the track simply from the bass alone. Two bands that buck that trend are The Police and Red Hot Chilli Peppers.
I digress.
So, it is tempting to comment on Charlie Kirk’s assassination, which was on my mind, probably like yours? And Exeter University. Also bothering me. But I won’t.
On Charlie Kirk, I will leave the floor to Barack Obama, who tweeted (if that’s still a verb?) on X:
We don’t yet know what motivated the person who shot and killed Charlie Kirk, but this kind of despicable violence has no place in our democracy. Michelle and I will be praying for Charlie’s family tonight, especially his wife Erika and their two young children.
On Exeter University, all I need to say in detail is that I’m looking forward, even though daunted, sitting at the feet of expert lecturers. It (an MA in Creative Writing) starts next week…and I still have some hoops to jump through.
What I will attempt to comment on re: Exeter is the difference between modes of communication and actual communication; the harmful drift from simplicity to false sophistication.
And, continuing a heavy theme, to articulate my concerns about suppression via polarisation as the background to Charlie Kirk’s assassination.
Well? How many of you have taken yourself off for a long walk because you’re carrying some bothersome thoughts that need some time to settle, or to emerge from the brain fog?
Hopefully, I won’t forget the cows and the countryside by the time I finish this. It was a beautiful walk. Another title I considered for this piece was ‘Beauty’. I hope I can link the above to beauty.
In recent years, the term ‘polarisation’ has become a popular term expressing deep concerns about the glue that holds societies together. In the UK, our recent flirtations with polarisation have been, I would argue, over whether to Remain or Leave the EU, and in the last two years over Israel/Gaza. In the States, the antagonism between MAGA and Antifa supporters (rarely reported in the UK) and similar left-right extremist groups and the two main political parties continues to be extremely unsettling.
Why deep concerns? Here’s my interim answer: polarisation leads to suppression.
In the UK, depending on whose company you were keeping, it was wise to keep schtum about your Brexit or Remain views, or your support for Brexit champion Boris or Remainer Cameron, or you’d be shouted down, shunned, ostracised, and vilified. (Even in churches, Christians were nervous about showing support for either side, depending on the political profile of their church, for fear of an unseemly row).
Fear of speaking out was palpable. Wisdom triumphed over Courage. The result: Suppression.
In the campaign to join the EU in 1972, arguments were put forcefully by both sides, but without rancour spilling over into societal unrest or an erosion in civil dialogue.
The glue that holds a democratic society together is free speech, freedom of association, freedom of assembly, freedom of the press, freedom of religion, and the right to a fair trial.
In conclusion, as much as I defend Charlie Kirk’s exercise of freedom of speech, I look to America to ensure that the man arrested for his assassination is given a fair trial.
Really, what is on trial is whether we want to live in a democracy or whether we will slip into fascism, either to the right or to the left. Since Mussolini, who coined the word ‘fascism’, and Hitler, we have associated ‘fascism’ with the far right, but it can be equally associated with the far left. The characteristics of fascism include dictatorial leadership, forcible suppression of opposition, and subordination of individual interests for the perceived interest of the nation or race.
Why deep concerns? Here’s my interim answer: polarisation leads to suppression
Tragically, we have witnessed democracies tumble into the fascism of Hitler’s far-right National Socialism, and then the far-left version in Communist East Germany in post-war Europe. Dictatorships that ruthlessly silenced all opposition and free speech.
Beauty? The freedoms we have taken for granted in the UK – and the West in general - are as beautiful as the air we breathe, the blue sky above, and the sweet smell of autumn. The bible says we should think on these things. It’s good advice.
Let’s just say that my experience of joining Exeter University with its sophisticated e-management of umpteen Apps, email log-ons, an avalanche of communication, and, with less than a week to go before I sit in a lecture theatre here, are the things I don’t know:
1. My timetable
2. Who my lecturers are
3. Where to go
4. The number of days per week I need to be on campus
5. Access to a personal tutor
Here’s my point.
The avalanche of communication with well-designed webpages, links to opportunities, and so on, has relegated the essential information, as above, to a lower league. I have the impression of busyness; an overworked admin staff desperately trying to keep this complex show of e-communication on the road so that, heaven forbid, it never falls beneath the presentational standards of competing institutions.
Meanwhile, I need to know the above. Really, that’s all I need to know.
This disease is not Exeter University-specific. It’s widespread. Sophistication has replaced Simplicity, with the result that priorities are obscured and lost.
Sometimes progress is an inversion of the meaning of the word.
In 1975, if I wanted a doctor’s appointment, I would travel to the surgery, take a board with a number from a hook, and wait until my number came up. Simple. No forms to fill in, no website to log on, no admin staff needed, no telephone calls. During the night, a doctor was on call. Every day. Local. Reached by a landline telephone call.
It wasn’t perfect, of course, and had to expand as Whitstable’s population grew, but simplicity has been replaced by false sophistication.
The beauty of simplicity is that it is democratic; everyone, young and old, understands how to access the information they need. False sophistication leads to a divided and unequal society where those who can navigate the sophistication become a mobile e-elite and those who struggle are discriminated against and, all too easily, fall through the cracks.
St Paul wrote the following words:
‘Finally, brothers, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue, and if there is anything praiseworthy – meditate on these things.’
The walk in the beautiful countryside near Winscombe this morning allowed me to meditate on the type of society I hope we can maintain. Personally, I hope the walk has helped me from getting too drawn into commenting on the awful assassination of Charlie Kirk, or the specific frustrations surrounding starting a Master’s at Exeter. I hope I have been able to reflect on how good and wholesome a society can be if it upholds the above-mentioned freedoms; freedoms I have more or less taken for granted, and that I want my grandchildren to enjoy without fear.