Gone

 

Relic of a bygone age, a remnant of an integrated mass transit system the like of which we can only dream of enjoying today, and yet one we so desperately need. Even after Beeching cut this line in the 60's I remember in my childhood an integrated public transport network of buses and trains that allowed for effective and affordable travel around the country; sadly the trajectory since then for public transport has been one of death by a thousand cuts. Made me think more broadly about how much our society's lost; or more accurately what we once enjoyed, the things we used to take for granted, the raft of public services, the culture, the communities and a myriad of opportunities; we were rich by so many metrics. Time's not been kind to our society though has it, it's a much thinner space we navigate today.

The fall of reality

'Oh no, there ain't no sanity clause'...The Damned weren't wrong, were they. What's wrong with folk? Wherever you look the threads of reality are being pulled at, unpicked or beginning to unravel. QAnon and kin warp folks minds with weird tales of strange conspiracies, Critical Theories lay siege to provable science with fantasy narratives and a global pandemic can be denied in the face of overwhelming evidence and personal testimony. And that's before we consider the everyday effects of the algorithmic echo chambers, crony politics...crony everything, a polarizing media, and a raft of other destabilizing influences on reality.  An anti vaxxer told me that the vaccine is a conspiracy to inject nano crystals into us in order to disconnect us from the Godhead and connect us to the cloud, from where we'll be controlled...they were serious, to them this was real. Inquiries around evidence were met, as so often, with me being told to go educate myself...no evidence though. No, there's never any credible evidence, quantifiable evidence is so passé in our post real world. People have fallen out of love with truth and reality, they've been seduced by sci-fi B movie plots and competing ideological orthodoxies offering whatever...and if you disagree with them, even a soupçon, you're either a fool or their sworn enemy. With reality under attack like this from all quarters, you have wonder where this road will lead us and how long before we arrive. I'll be honest, I'm still quite hoping for the zombie apocalypse, purely as it would be simpler.