My Iron Lung

The problem with self-esteem is that the more it gets chipped away, the more brittle it becomes.  The more you are told you are wrong, the easier it becomes to believe it.  The more often you are persuaded that your opinions have no value, the less often you voice them.  The less that you voice your opinions, the more they are treated with contempt.  It is not a question of feeling worthless, just that you are not part of the equation: that the world is perfectly happy to get along without your input…

If I’m honest, I’ve never really brought much to the party: a carefully chosen bottle of wine that only the most desperate would drink, a plate of mushroom vol-au-vents* and five minutes warm-up for the main event.  I do have a gift for making everybody else feel a little better about themselves – but only because they are not me.  In company I cover up by turning off my brain and switching my mouth into overdrive.  I take no responsibility for what comes out of the bloody thing.  You should have known better than to have brought me here…

I imagine that everybody needs some form of emotional crutch from time to time: chemical, alcoholic, emotional, chocolate… everyone needs something to lean on and everyone knows someone who is never happier than when they are kicking it away.  I wonder what their crutch is?  There is some kind of liberation in being freed from the responsibility of participation by the knowledge that your opinion is not worth serious consideration, that generally it can be dismissed without the inconvenience of listening to it.

The Bible says that the meek shall inherit the earth – what it doesn’t say is that it is dependent upon the mighty allowing them to – and we all know they will not.  The mighty will inherit the earth, the meek will inherit the task of keeping it going; of accepting the abuse and sticking to the rules.  They will not be party to the making of the rules, nor will their participation be welcomed.  Rules are not framed by those who must live by them, but by those who consider themselves above them.  What is the point in any other opinion, when you are sure you already know best?

It is important (unfortunately) to face facts (something at which I am very bad): if the meek were ever to actually inherit the earth, they would have to hire somebody else to run it.  Probably someone not entirely different to the eejits who run it right now.  It takes a certain type doesn’t it?  Our leaders are one of two varieties: a) career politicians who have always had the conviction that they know best or b) successful businessmen who have discovered that money buys the right to know best.  In either case they are unlikely to allow themselves to be ‘ruled’ by the meek for long.  We may have been bequeathed the planet, but the lawyers are already picking through the smallprint.  We won’t take much persuading that it has all been a big mistake and worthlessness will flood back alongside a vain attempt to retain a little dignity: “The earth?  Oh, we gave it back.  We never really wanted it anyway.”

In truth, my friends, the meek will inherit bugger all until everyone else has sucked everything good from it, and then we’ll tell ourselves that it is no more than we deserve.  It’s what they have told us, and we have to agree…

Suck suck your teenage thumb
Toilet trained and dumb
(When the power runs out
We’ll just hum)… My Iron Lung – Radiohead

*Literally ‘flying in the wind’ – the world’s most disappointing party food, if only because 99% of every one ends up on the carpet.

For my younger readers, an Iron Lung is a now largely defunct machine that breathes for you when you lose the ability to do it yourself…