I wish I shared Andy Beckett’s optimism that people will not tolerate becoming poorer indefinitely (Britain once rioted over the price of bread. What would it take for us to confront greedflation today?, 28 April). Instead, I fear that Aldous Huxley was spot-on in his vision of a brave new world in which the masses are kept passive and constantly distracted by cheap thrills, soft drugs and an endless diet of trivia. More recently, Neil Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death highlighted how the mass media has been used to provide constant puerile entertainment that distracts most of the population from serious matters of economics and politics.
Most of the British public is now kept in a political stupor by endless stories about celebrities, soaps, reality TV, the manufactured melodrama surrounding the royals and the blaming of “the other” for our myriad economic and social problems – whether that “other” be refugees and migrants, supposedly idle workers, single parents, “greedy” unions, welfare claimants or the so-called liberal elite.
And added to this is the successful manner in which the Tories and much of the press promote divide-and-rule to keep ordinary people blaming each other – the working v the unemployed, public sector v private sector, strivers v skivers, young people v baby boomers, etc.
Of course, those of us who point out these tactics are condemned as elitists for apparently being more critically aware than the masses.
Pete Dorey
Bath, Somerset
• Andy Beckett asks: “Where are the riots?” I have observed a number of riots at close quarters and sometimes contributed to picking up the pieces afterwards. Rioting does not seem to produce the radical and lasting change that we need in British society.
It is tempting to focus on the immorality, greed or sheer gall of the profiteers who receive grossly enhanced incomes during a cost of living crisis. But what we need is a relentless exposure of the model of government that recent administrations are finally failing to conceal from the public.
Getting elected at all costs so that you can shovel taxpayers’ money towards your political friends and cronies while public services shrink does not make for good government. The awareness of the public that things are not working for them is rooted in day-to-day experiences, and this has to be the purchase point on which opposition politicians focus.
The NHS failures, including the exploitation of the workforce, are underpinned by a combination of overcentralisation and creeping privatisation. Just as capitalism comes in different forms in different countries, the running of services such as transport, housing provision etc could become more effective with a variety of public/community management and accountability, which can, to use the jargon beloved of recent prime ministers, “deliver for the British people”.
Geoff Reid
Bradford
• I cannot understand the apathy of the British public in relation to the ruthless profiteering crucifying millions of families. Energy bills and food prices are going through the roof, working people are being forced to use food banks, and rents are sky-high. Thousands are inside huddled under a blanket instead of being out on the streets. We’re being taken for absolute mugs by the fat cats. Anywhere else there would have been a revolution by now.
Jan Leyland
Wallasey, Wirral
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