I’m no expert on geopolitics. I slept through most of GCSE History, and I could just about find Ukraine on a map (assuming you gave me a couple of cracks at it). But I know something – the West isn’t the West anymore.
For too long now, we’ve been getting away with non-actions; repackaging our cowardice as virtue, and blowing ourselves every time the innocent are bombed to smithereens. We seem to have forgotten that sometimes, genuine actions are required – not the routine emetic of celebrities sticking two fingers up to the Ukrainian people, pretending it’s the sign of peace.
The cancer of virtue signalling is now so virulent, even the outbreak of WWIII is insufficient to cause a deviation in the script. With the ill-deserved confidence of a David Lammy expenses claim, the same old chancers have wheeled out the tried and tested tealight double shuffle in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. I’ve always secretly hoped EU top brass were running an illicit candle factory on the sly; alas, I fear even that is wishful thinking.
The stakes for the best pisstake are enormous: Harry and Meghan (or rather Meghan and Harry) issued an ‘urgent’ message for Ukraine, with all the conviction of a wankwipe. Sadiq Khan sacrificed an entire selfie to tweet, ‘Tonight, London lights up in solidarity with our friends in Ukraine. You are not alone.’ Seeing as all the other scumbags were playing ball, the Taliban joined in, advising ‘restraint’; which might not get many retweets, but should win them best joke at the Edinburgh Fringe.
#Bringbackourgirls, #jesuischarlie, #blacklivesmatter, #clapforthenhs, and now #standwithukraine – we don’t stand for anything anymore.
Like Gary Linekar, I also know sweet FA about Russia and China. I don’t know how serious Preident Putin’s nuclear threats are, nor whether China is genuinely planning to invade Taiwan. But it doesn’t really matter what they are serious about, because it is abundantly clear, we are no longer serious about anything.
We’re not serious about the military; pared to the bone, and currently at its lowest level since 1714. But then, when the new chief prioritises diversity, the shadow foreign secretary demands a ‘gender-balanced human security force’, and you spend all day on your arse reflecting on inclusivity anyway, what does it matter?
We’re not serious about education. Instead of the three R’s, teachers are instructing our children on pronoun use, giving them trigger warnings for children’s books, and encouraging them to swap genders like Panini stickers. The three R’s are racist anyway, bigot.
We’re not serious about our energy supply. Despite the fact that we have enough shale gas beneath our feet to meet the UK’s energy needs for decades to come, we seem content to outsource production – all for the appeasement of Greta Thunberg, Sweden’s worst export since Ikea.
We’re not serious about our history, either. Instead, we seem content to allow its desecration. Our schools are instructed to ‘overhaul’ the curriculum, or at the very least, to teach that it’s all bad. Our universities meanwhile are too white, and are being replaced by ‘walls of diversity’.
The only things we are determined to take seriously are problems of our own invention: the desperate need to make everything from police cars, zebra crossings, and university flagpoles gay; the untold psychological damage inflicted upon our children, to save them from a harmless disease, and the utter lunacy that the contents of your pants sheds no light on your gender.
My daughters have never known a world without Covid hysteria. A world where they may show their faces, refuse to ‘celebrate’ diversity, or be considered ‘racially innocent’. I don’t want them growing up in a world which insists Caitlyn Jenner is a woman, Meghan Markle a victim, or George Floyd a saint.
The mayor of London recently stated he needed 24-hour security ‘due to the colour of his skin.’ The mayor of Kiev recently stated he is ‘proud of the citizens’ spirit’, and enlisted in the army. I feel for the Ukrainians, I bet they’d love a bit of Covid right now.
So while I don’t know everything Russia and China are up to, I’d bet at least a hundred of my genders we all know what they’re not up to. It’s time the West got serious, and started worrying about the important stuff again; we’ve got rather a lot on at the moment.
