If he didn't exist, they'd have had to create him.When I put my son to bed at night, we have to search under the bed and in the cupboards to make sure there are no monsters, ghosties or bogeymen. He's afraid of what might be there - of what he can't see and can't find.
He tells me, "just because you can't see them doesn't mean they're not there. They're hiding".
Dungeekin Minor's fear has one advantage. He stays in his bed . . in other words, his fear of the monsters under the bed keep him exactly where I want him.
So the weekend brings us news that that colossus among statesmen, Gollum Brown, has castigated the Pakistani goverment and demanded that they 'take out' Osama Bin Laden.
A man once supported by us (that is, the US/UK 'special relationship'), who then turned against us and is now vilified as the world's most dangerous terrorist. A man who is never seen in person, but who periodically releases video recordings denouncing the West and all it stands for, and calling for root-and-branch change.A man who hates everything we stand for. A man who masterminds atrocities against our societies and who wishes us dead.
Sound familiar?
Osama Bin Laden is the bogeyman of Western government. He's the Keyser Soze of the terrorist fraternity, the Emmanuel Goldstein of the noughties.
This creature of the caves, the terror of Tora Bora, is the mythical fantastical monster that the Government use to keep us pliant. His spectre hovers over our daily lives. If we don't do what the Government says, Osama's gonna get us in our beds.
Osama Bin Laden drives the legislation that controls us. If we don't have ID cards, Osama will blow us up. If we don't have 42-days detention, Osama will unleash a 'dirty bomb'. If we don't have CCTV, Osama will slaughter us in our sleep.
If we don't send our troops to Afghanistan, Osama will unleash a jihad upon western shores, destroying the world as we know it. So we'd better have another billion or three in defence appropriations.
I ask you to consider Brown's demands, and then consider this...
If Osama is captured or killed, there is no need for an Afghan war of occupation. There's no need for ID cards, 42 days or any of the other legislation we currently suffer under. There would be no need for the massive diminution of Civil Liberties we have had and continue to experience.
Yet this legislation keeps us powerless, and subservient to Government. And this fear of Bogeyman Bin Goldstein keeps us looking outward at an external threat, while ignoring the pernicious creep of totaliarianism on our own shores.
Ask yourself this. Is Bin Laden more valuable to this Government dead....or alive and scary?
Because I think if Bin Laden didn't exist, then they'd have needed to create him.
He tells me, "just because you can't see them doesn't mean they're not there. They're hiding".
Dungeekin Minor's fear has one advantage. He stays in his bed . . in other words, his fear of the monsters under the bed keep him exactly where I want him.
So the weekend brings us news that that colossus among statesmen, Gollum Brown, has castigated the Pakistani goverment and demanded that they 'take out' Osama Bin Laden.
A man once supported by us (that is, the US/UK 'special relationship'), who then turned against us and is now vilified as the world's most dangerous terrorist. A man who is never seen in person, but who periodically releases video recordings denouncing the West and all it stands for, and calling for root-and-branch change.A man who hates everything we stand for. A man who masterminds atrocities against our societies and who wishes us dead.
Sound familiar?
Osama Bin Laden is the bogeyman of Western government. He's the Keyser Soze of the terrorist fraternity, the Emmanuel Goldstein of the noughties.
This creature of the caves, the terror of Tora Bora, is the mythical fantastical monster that the Government use to keep us pliant. His spectre hovers over our daily lives. If we don't do what the Government says, Osama's gonna get us in our beds.
Osama Bin Laden drives the legislation that controls us. If we don't have ID cards, Osama will blow us up. If we don't have 42-days detention, Osama will unleash a 'dirty bomb'. If we don't have CCTV, Osama will slaughter us in our sleep.
If we don't send our troops to Afghanistan, Osama will unleash a jihad upon western shores, destroying the world as we know it. So we'd better have another billion or three in defence appropriations.
I ask you to consider Brown's demands, and then consider this...
If Osama is captured or killed, there is no need for an Afghan war of occupation. There's no need for ID cards, 42 days or any of the other legislation we currently suffer under. There would be no need for the massive diminution of Civil Liberties we have had and continue to experience.
Yet this legislation keeps us powerless, and subservient to Government. And this fear of Bogeyman Bin Goldstein keeps us looking outward at an external threat, while ignoring the pernicious creep of totaliarianism on our own shores.
Ask yourself this. Is Bin Laden more valuable to this Government dead....or alive and scary?
Because I think if Bin Laden didn't exist, then they'd have needed to create him.
3 comments:
But we did create him,,,,
The bogeyman is, of course, a corruption of Napoleon bonapart.
I have news for Mr Brown.
I am not scared of Osama Bin Laden nor international terrorism; neither am I scared of swine flu, nor the 'financial crisis' that he keeps trying to make worse; nor striking postmen or the threats of such by useless overpaid public servants. Let them strike, that would save a few quid and might give the disaffected Police a chance to give the teachers and social workers a good kicking, just like the miners got.
So what other excuses will he come out with to justify his increasing socialist totalitarianism ?
The frightened elite (frightened of losing their power & position) need a bogeyman to keep us in order.
This was excellently put by Adam Curtis in "The Power of Nightmares - The Rise of the Politics of Fear" in 2004.
Admittedly it's NTSC, but a DVDDisk image is available foc from http://www.archive.org/details/ThePowerOfNightmaresDVD.
If you didn't see it 5 yrs ago, watch it now. It's validity increases as time moves on...
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