A PEOPLE WHO IGNORE THE PAST HAVE NO FUTURE

*

For the past 12 years we have become more aware that the English as a people are not as vigorous to protect what their forebears fought for and in many cases died for. We have had a steady encroachment into many areas of our lives by an intrusive and scaremongering GOVERNMENT which would have been unheard of except in time of extreme danger as was the case in the TWO WORLD WARS of the 20th century. Even then there was still in place measures to protect the citizen and their accustomed liberty for which they and their kith and kin were fighting for at home and in foreign fields.

  NOW in the first decade of the 21st century we have a GOVERNMENT under the cover of a WAR on TERRORISM which was mainly fostered by an illegal invasion of a Muslim country under false pretences and which the British Government is in 2008 now making plans for a future withdrawal while the world is looking the other way. 

After eleven years of New Labour the people of our Island Home now live in a society which is alien to the majority of the people many of whom had experienced the true horror of war and mindful to defend their liberties  now find that their every movement and thought has now become the concern of an  intrusive and meddling Government.  The expected angry response from the general public has been barely noticeable and as a consequence the Government feels confident enough to proceed with its 'Big Brother' plans to have in our once free Island Home the most observed People on the Planet. 

*

In 1932 during the GREAT DEPRESSION there were a series of broadcasts on FREEDOM IN THE MODERN WORLD by John McMurray which went to the root of being a human being and not a machine manipulated by the STATE of which the following has been taken:

'If we make a morality of social service, in practice we hand ourselves over to organisations;and in the long run that means handing ourselves to the STATE.  The vast increase in STATE ORGANISATION in recent years has not made human life better.  It has only made large number of people wealthier; and it has done it at the expense of human freedom and himan goodness'.....

If you are going to judge a mans goodness by what he contributes to the life of the community, then you make him merely an intrument, a tool for doing something.  If men are at their best when they are servants, then slavery is the proper condition of human life. Unless a man thinks for himself and determines for himself what he shall do with his life, he is less than human. If you tell him that he ought to serve society, work for the betterment of conditions in the future, identify himself with the cause of progress; in fact if you tell him that he ought to sacrifice himself or devote himself to anything, and thast his goodness consists in that self-sacruifice and devotion; then you are denying his right to be a person, to be himself, to be REAL.

Lastly, the falseness of social morality is shown by the fact that it inevitably subordinates

 HUMAN BEINGS to ORGANISATION.

Life, in the biologiocal sense,mis organisation; and evolution is simply the gradual production of more and more highly organized types of  living creatures.... Now serving SOCIETY or HUMANITY always means in practice serving INSTITUTIONS -serving the STATE or your BUSINESS or your TRADE UNION.  And the more you serve INSTITUTIONS the more complecated that they become, and the more service they demand; till WE ARE ALL SLVES OF OUR JOBS.     The more intricate and complicated the mechanism of SOCIAL ORGANISATION becomes the more men have to subordinate their HUMAN qualities and activities to the mere business of keeping the machine working smoothly. And as a result, slowly and suely, they LOSE THEIR FREEDOM and become themselves ONLY cogs in the MACHINERY. In this way the ideal of social morality undermines HUMAN FREEDOM.....

The organisations of SOCIETY are meant TO SERVE US.  The STATE is the SERVANT of its MEMBERS -that is a GOOD old DEMOCRATIC DOCTRINE.  But we have almost turned it topsy-turvy nowadays with bour talk about SERVING THE STATE.  Against all such falase ideas we must insisty that A MAN is a MAN, and the GOODNESS of his LIFE is in its own INNER QUALITY, in its own INTEGRITY;  NOT in any SERVICE it may do to other people or to the STATE or the CHURCH or the FUTURE.

I have tried to show you how this false morality of social service arose and came to dominate our thinking. It comes from thinging about the , VALUE of HUMAN LIFE in biological terms.  the discovery and rapid development of the idea of evolution in the last century [19th century] is the immediate HISTORICAL CAUSE.   We have got into the habit of thinking in terms of PROGRESS and ORGANISATION and GROWTH and DEVELOPMENT.  These ideas are all right in their own place, when we are dealing with PLANTS and ANIMALS.  And because we are animals they have a place -a SUBORDINATE PLACE - in HUMAN LIFE.  But we are not merely animals; and our morality, the GOODNESS of our HUMANITY, is not derived from the animal but from our HUMAN NATURE.  That is WHY a MORALITY of PROGRESS and SOCIAL SERVICE is a FALSE MORALITY.  It treats HUMAN NATURE as if it were merely animal nature and so DESTROYS HUMAN FREEDOM.

IF OUR DUTY IS TO BE SERVANTS, HOW CAN WE BE FREE?

[WE AGREE!  but GORDON BROWN intends to increase the SERVANTS of the STATE which will place huge debts on future generations. It will truly be a once FREE NATION STATE divided WITHIN which will stifle INIATIVE ,ENTERPRIZE and SERVICE.  It is an obvious and easy option for NEW LABOUR to do what it does best and that is increase the burden on the taxopayer and gain more votes from the growing numbers who will owe their livelihhod to the STATE.  Over the past TEN YEARS the RICH have become RICHER and the POOR POORER.  ONLY PR PROPRTIONAL REPRESENTATION can cure the EVIL but it seems that we are the only advocates of such an important development which would increase the numbers of voters and safeguard [when we are out of the EU] our once FREE DEMOCRATIC COUNTRY.

*

OCTOBER-2008

HOME

If you  going to judge a man's GOODNESS by what he CONTRIBUTES to the LIFE of the COMMUNITY, then you make him merely an INSTRUMENT, a TOOL for doing something.

'If men are at their best when they are SERVANTS, then SLAVERY is the proper condition of LIFE'.

JOHN MCMURRAY(1932)

TRUTH is always a means to good living.  So that FREEDOM to THINK  means in practice FREEDOM in dealing with the machinery of LIFE, FREEDOM in organizing the MEANS of LIFE, that is to say, FREEDOM on the material side, ECONOMIC and POLITICAL FREEDOM.

JOHN MCMURRAY.(1932)