Whatever happened to showing respect?
THERE was a time when Britain was, rightly, renowned across the world for its civility and sense of respect. Expressions such as “a classic English gentleman” or the “British sense of fair play and what is right” echoed around the globe. So what has gone so woefully, regrettably and downright heartbreakingly wrong?
The memorial to Bomber Command (if you haven’t been, it is well worth the visit as the solemnity and the heroism it portrays are definitely stirring) has been defaced by some mindless moron who saw fit to hurl white paint over the sculpture, depicting a group of fliers preparing to risk their lives for this country during the Second World War. Using the bare statistics from that conflict, when you realise more than 55,000 of the 125,000 who served in Bomber Command were killed, there’s a fair chance only half of the ensemble would see the next day dawn.
This wasn’t the only statue or monument defaced. Paint was thrown over statues of Winston Churchill and US President Franklin D Roosevelt and over the memorial dedicated to WPC Yvonne Fletcher, who was fatally shot while on duty outside the Libyan Embassy in 1984.
It’s a fair bet whoever committed these thuggish outrages knows absolutely nothing about duty, gratitude or sacrifice and, while I loathe them with every fibre of my being, if you step back and ponder some harsh facts you can quickly see how we have descended to this moral cesspit.
Respect, whether for yourself, others, the environment or even your surroundings has become virtually non-existent. We’ve touched before already this year on the truly shocking fact that almost 50 teachers are attacked in some shape or form by primary class pupils every school day.
While it is correct to allow for a number of these children being effectively, and with no callousness implied, “repeat offenders”, this is truly horrific. When one teacher who had been attacked called my radio breakfast show she said she hadn’t reported the child because she feared his parents would then come to the school and attack her again! She also said most of her common room felt the same way.
If we “lose” them at this age, what hope can there be? Naturally it gets worse as they progress through school. Many of them are understandably drawn to supporting football teams but what do they see when they watch the games? Stars they adore spitting, cheating, diving and often openly swearing at the officials. Again, that is then repeated on the playing fields as soon as they’re old enough to form teams.
No sanction is allowed to be deployed against them at school, or in some instances even at home, as the parents are warned off with a shrill “I’m gonna call ChildLine if you touch me”. These youngsters certainly know all about their rights but little about their responsibilities.
For some there isn’t even the discipline that a job instils, as they are either too lazy or inept to get one. Time was, the first taste some of them got of how they should be living their lives came courtesy of their first brush with the law. Now our police “services” (using the word “force” is laughable) have been transformed into boxticking, politically correct social workers, even that restraint has vanished.
While we are continually told we need to Go Green to save the planet, these are the same mindless morons who hurl litter from their car or just drop it as they walk along the street. On public transport they speak into their mobile phones often at a level normally only heard on the deck of an ocean-going yacht in a transatlantic storm, littering their Neanderthal grunting with fourletter words. The volume of the tinny, mindnumbing trash they call music is so high, it disturbs all around them. Asking them to turn it down is not the wisest of options, unless you happen to be an off-duty SAS officer.
That is the generation we have bred. Would those brave men who took to the skies and gave the ultimate sacrifice do it again if they’d seen how this country had turned out?
Strangely, the answer is probably yes. Because theirs was a generation that knew precisely what duty was all about. HIGH-RISK convicted sex offenders have been housed in budget hotels after their release from jail, according to a report from the chief inspector of probation. This is an absolute scandal. That any of your children or loved ones could have been exposed to this risk is unacceptable.
But consider this: how many of our law-makers and judges who allow this Russian roulette-style insanity have ever actually STAYED in a budget hotel? THE SITUATION in Venezuela worsens by the day. Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt has followed the US lead in supporting the country’s opposition leader, Juan Guaidó, as its legitimate leader. Current President Nicolás Maduro has led Venezuela, once the richest nation in the whole of South America, to the brink of economic collapse. Its capital city, Caracas, is gridlocked with protest, and inflation exceeds one million per cent – yes, you did read that correctly.
Over the past four years three million people, or a tenth of the population, have fled from endemic poverty and no health care. Those still trapped have no running water and the lights go out more often than they are on.
So, step forward the British politician who supports the incompetent Maduro: Jeremy Corbyn. You have been warned.