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What the surrounding lackeys thought of this singular episode I will not guess. Indeed, the longer I live, the less I care to meditate upon what lackeys do think. But that the adventures of their employers provide them with ample food for thought there can be no doubt.
Arnold Bennett - The Ghost (1907)
Seems too dismissive, but the coronavirus debacle has hammered home the message that these people are establishment lackeys. There is little indication that they aspire to be anything else. It is not even clear that there is what we might call the political space to be anything else.
3 comments:
It's just about possible that, had covid not happened, the current crop of politicians would have been more outspoken and interesting. It's telling that the one politician who gets universal praise as being a success is Nadhim Zahawi, who merely had to churn out huge numbers of jabs. A large scale administrative job, suitable for a very diligent middle-manager.
Maybe it's the politicians themselves, but maybe the public just want administrative competence. When so much is provided for you, all you ask is that it is done well.
In the time of the Great Pestilence there were 3 social orders. The Workers, the Priests, and the Warriors. The Workers fed the Priests, the Priests interceded with God for the Warriors and the Warriors provided protection (mostly against other Warriors).
Now there are the Lackeys, the Courtiers and the Elite. The Lackeys maintain modern life for the Courtiers, the Courtiers compete to gain patronage from the Elite, and the Elite try to maintain their position at the top of the pile (because an ordered pile is a good pile).
A rough approximation... but I'd argue that the 'social orders' were, and are, just interconnected people trying to stave off chaos.
Sam - we may get administrative competence as computer systems have the glitches and weaknesses sorted. That also seems to be a threat - too much competent administration in too much detail leading to inflexibility and ultimately to failure.
DJ - trying to stave off chaos is similar to Karl Friston's description of how our brains work - navigating through life by avoiding surprises. It seems to leave us with an important difference where people have varied tolerances towards surprises. A politically exploitable difference.
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