The battle of Canning Town proves barbarism is never as far away as you think...
MY HEART sang when I first watched the film of arrogant, self-righteous Warmists being pulled off the roof of a London Underground train. I am weary of the way that the Climate Liars have browbeaten the whole Establishment into submission with their wild, fanciful panic about impending doom and their unhinged plans to plunge us into a new, literally dark age. Unlike many other commentators, I am not at all convinced that they have a point or deserve any sympathy.
And I must confess a personal interest. As an infrequent flier, I was uselessly angry a few months ago when their criminal threat to close Heathrow by the use of drones forced me to revise long-cherished travel plans, at a cost of several hundred irrecoverable pounds.
It was also pleasing to see somebody doing to these pains in the neck what our enfeebled, politicised police are so reluctant to do. If you watch the videos from Canning Town Station carefully, you can hear the authorities instantly conceding defeat to the Warmists without a fight, feebly ordering all passengers to leave the station.
How typical this is, too. Whenever normal people are the victims of anything, somehow it is impossible for the police or the authorities to do anything about it.
Anti-social behaviour in your street? So sorry. We’ll drive by for two minutes and then never come back, and that’s if you’re lucky.
Your neighbour smokes illegal drugs in his back garden and perfumes the air with marijuana? Not interested. Burgled? Fill in a form. Protesters stopping you from earning a living? Sorry, but we’re too busy. But a convoy of politicians through the streets comes with an arrogant and bullying escort, all motorbikes, whistles and ‘Stay Back!’, as if it were Vladimir Putin going by in his special Kremlin lane. And an offended transgender person on Twitter can summon teams of cybercops to descend ferociously on a critic, while a man who calls on the IRA to murder the Cabinet gets a gentle, kindly letter, promising he is not in trouble.
But once I had stopped gloating for a moment, I watched again. And I saw danger. In October 2019 there is still just enough restraint in a London crowd for the episode not to turn really nasty. The film did not show exactly what happened to the protesters once they were yanked to the ground. I suspect they got quite roughly handled, but they were rescued by cooler heads.
But how long will this restraint last? I’m told the new Joker film portrays a sinister, malevolent world in a modern setting, and I think that’s where we are heading if we are not careful – blood and flying boots among the skyscrapers. When justice sleeps and authority folds its arms, people eventually decide that there is no further point in obedience or restraint.
Because the thing is that this general exasperation is widespread on all sides. And if justice is not revived, it will explode.
It’s a while now since I found myself in the murderous hell of Mogadishu, a nightmare come true. But the worst of it was finding out later that, a few short years before, the blasted, dangerous desolation I saw had been a prosperous, civilised cityscape of well-dressed people, smart cars and white-gloved traffic police. Barbarism is never as far away as you think.