Not in the exciting way that sentence is usually attached to, but in a normal way, living on the edge of society. While we see more restrictions and rules close in around us in our daily lives, I can’t help thinking of how it happened, and how there were always those signs it would be this way. And instead of heeding those warnings, however subtle they may have been, we collectively ignored them, instead doing exactly what was expected of us. A couple of points for this particular piece, and I’ll go with Gypsies as the first, travelling folk and the ones who seemed to always do what they want, not being told where to be or what to do, yet managing to sustain whole communities and organise. Now, I am aware that a certain criminality used to follow where they went (not all), but was it always that way? Or was that a consequence of new laws and rules, meaning they would always be moved on, not allowed to stay and earn a living, so they adapted to their environment, to a point. Same with lots of areas of the country, where the government keep them in a deprived state, meaning there are only certain options available to for making money. Because really, that’s what it usually comes down to. People trying to make money, so they have a roof over their head and eat. And they have put so many barriers and obstacles in the way of those very simple things, so they are no longer simple. My reasoning for some of that is laid out in my article Life, and why it would suit a purpose to the powers that be, to make your everyday normal life hard and stressful to navigate.
But back to the travelling community, who may indeed have only become such travellers because they were always being moved on, before they got a chance to settle, or put down more roots. But I became quite intrigued by them as a community when I learnt they were ‘outside the system’ mostly. Same may not be true today, I’m not sure, but I couldn’t believe it. No birth certificate often, didn’t live in houses or on estates, didn’t claim benefits because they weren’t registered, but had to make their way so would do cash jobs or find other avenue of revenue, whatever they could find, I guess. Now, that sounds very much like the type of thing we all used to live like, maybe not constantly moving or travelling, but just getting by. Not having to be registered, regulated and ruled. Because it all starts with that first certificate doesn’t it? Where you sign your children over to the state essentially, and they are then ‘in the system’ as we call it. So they can ‘care’ for you, ‘educate’ you, ‘medicate’ you ‘keep you safe’ and so on. Do you see the pattern emerging? And we have seen how those four particular branches of the establishment, have been used to coordinate what we see now, if you try and get out of one area, another has you. Also by way of regulation though, little things at first, my article It was a piece at a time, goes into that too, but I started noticing when they started fining parents for taking their kids out of school early for holidays. A slight overreach I thought, isn’t anyone concerned by that? The way the authorities started overriding parents became more prevalent, and shocking incidents in the 80’s of children being taken from their parents in the middle of the night by ‘care services’ didn’t make me feel any more safe as a kid, I have to say. I started to see that the authorities had too much power over the individual and family unit, and it would only get worse. Courts gets to decide things, schools tell you what you can and can’t do with your children, they take money from you and interfere when really, if people didn’t have that interference and control over them, maybe they would be able to get on, or sort things out themselves, or be able to grow into a proper adult who is responsible for themselves and their own family. Because they are taking that away slowly, but surely. And perhaps that is why so many seem lost, or unsure, or unable to sort themselves out, because there so may hoops to jump through already just to ‘quality for society’ that some just can’t be bothered. And I totally understand it now. Trapped in the system, and by the system.
My second point is about chips again, covered recently in Chipping away. It starts with pet chips though, and on the face of it, did seem like a good idea. Your dog can always be identified, in case it gets lost, or stolen. Apparently it meant everyone would have to legally register their dog, and you would be ‘good citizen’ dog owner for complying. And oh how we shake our heads when they say, ‘this dog hasn’t got a chip’, or we look down on someone because they ‘didn’t follow the regulations’. Because let’s be honest, it didn’t change much did it? Shitty people can still buy and have dogs, dogs can still be stolen and the chips cut out, or they actually work their own way out i’ll have you know. But it didn’t reduce any dog attacks, or stop any thievery, or make any dogs any safer from that, but yes, some pets have managed to be reunited with their owners because of it. And other people and companies have made an awful lot of money from those products, services and insurance that often goes with a new regulation or law change. And now the talks of chips has inevitably swung round to humans, in fact over a decade ago now, and around 5 years ago they started implanting them. Over 4,000 people in Sweden initially, and maybe more or less by now, because if it was a total bust, would they tell us? Not yet anyway, only after they have sold them to everyone, and exhausted all avenues of revenue for that, would they admit it didn’t work. And not being funny, but we can’t even seem to get the most basic of societal system to remain at a stable or consistent level currently, so the idea they are just going to become this slick fully functioning dystopian society, is almost laughable. But to be fair, I’d rather save the laughing for when I know that for sure, because they are pretty good at making it look like something, without it actually being there or real. If you catch my drift. And this week a leaflet caught my eye, of the Freemasons of Georgia offering child identification chips, so here we are, the slippery slope just keep getting longer. We are being made to be part of a corporate life and society whether we like it or not, and it seems there really are better ways instead of a greedy company pretending to be democratic government telling you what to do all the time to line their pockets, don’t you think?
