Sunday 11 October 2009

A Coconut Tree Moment




Mid afternoon coffee and cake on the veranda. A man shuffles up a forty foot palm tree directly in front of me in search of coconuts - no harness - no fear. All he has to do is avoid a slip and he will be just fine. The man's flippancy and carefree attitude towards such a death defying act, got me thinking.

In my place of birth, Northern Ireland, people used to be free to take chances. I look back on my childhood with somewhat rose tinted glasses, remembering a time when there was such as thing as an accident - people allowed themselves the luxury of bending rules, to obtain what they wanted.

On a recent trip home, I spent a full year living and working within a system that I barely recognized. The workplace, and society at large, was a place where people where tripping over themselves, not to literally trip up. Accidents, it seems, have become a thing of the past. Now, as a result of a greedy a manipulative legal system, borrowed from the US, there is no such thing as an accident.

"Where there's blame, there's a claim."

I tried to explain this eventuality to a Thai friend and he was very confused indeed.

"But, what do you mean if you fall in work, it's not your fault?" was his perplexed response.

I might as well have been speaking Swahili.

A man in work, climbing up a tree with his own consent in Northern Ireland, would sadly now cause a large degree of nappy wetting. In fact, I could imagine it becoming front page news in a local newspaper, the headline reading:

"Man sacked, and jailed for deliberate and shameful health and safety violation."

One could picture the scene with police, ambulances, fire engines and rapid
response, yellow jacket wearing, private security experts on the street all looking skyward with a look of disgust of their faces.

"Where are his hat, goggles, and safety net"

"Does he have a climbing license from the local council?"

"Just who does he think he is?!"

At what point in the future will a beacon of rationality reveal itself and say:

"Enough of this bullshit. what have we become?"

Depressingly, Probably never.

The precedent has been set. The ball is rolling, and people are making real money out of common sense, at the expense of individual freedom of choice. Personal freedom is not what it was. Stressed workers from builders to engineers, are all tip-toeing round their work places, spouting the latest vomit inducing soundbite from the dinner time news.

"That's a health and safety", I was aggressively told my a superior in my last job in Ireland. "I wasn't aware that health and safety is a noun" was my forward and frustrated reply.

In all honestly, the year I spend back home I felt violated by nonsensical parroting like the aforementioned. Here in Thailand, there may be corruption, chronic dis-organization and borderline anarchy, but at least you feel human - animated. I saw people on the verge of hemorrhaging because a yellow mop bucket, was being used on a red mop bucket's floor space - I kid you not.

For those of you who live in Britain, this will not come as a shock, in fact you are probably thinking

" Yeah, of course you shouldn't be using the incorrect mop, that's simply ridiculous!"

Pithel of this type, has anesthetized an entire generation, squeezing their ability to think straight. Once trivial issues, are now punishable by one the spot fines, or even a lengthy stretch in jail. Personally, I question a governments ultimate intentions when shouting in a car, or arguing with a privately employed traffic warden are criminal offenses.

What's next in this crazy state of affairs; enforced euthanasia to solve the problem of an aging population? Is an aging population a helath and safety issue? Who knows where it will all end?

The point is that anything can become law if twisted in the right way, and repeated often enough. Rapidly, liberty is being eroded, and people are too busy working to pay tax to notice. Like a faulty tap dripping, freedom is being stolen drop by drop; insidiously sucking the joy of life from people, replacing what were everyday actions, into incriminating offenses.

Next time your in the car and your afraid to turn over the radio because there's a policeman nearby, think of the Thai man in the coconut tree, and wonder where it all went wrong.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

The culture of Blame. Somebody must be responsible for (whatever) because it surely isn't my fault!!!

The narcissism of the Boomer generation may have contributed to this. Hippies who got tired of living with less decided to live with more and became the yuppies. But one thing they never lost was that they placed the Blame on the Man. It was the fault of all those lawyers, politicians, doctors, and other great white breadwinners. Refusal of acceptance of responsibility in the Boomer generation has resulted in the predicament of this age.

Read a book called Boomeritis by Ken Wilber to learn a lot more.
http://www.amazon.com/Boomeritis-Novel-That-Will-Free/dp/1570628017

In particular, read anything else by Ken Wilber. He's an Integral Psychologist, which is a somewhat new way of looking at psychological development of individuals, groups, and nations.

Singapore Dividend Collector said...

Thanks for the comment. I will check out some Ken Wilber soon.

Mike

Unknown said...

Oh, and by the way, perhaps not Enforced Euthanasia.

Rather, we'll be purchasing Life Credits in order to earn the right to have children. The world is overpopulated at the moment. There is either a big war coming or a lot of painful, responsible birth control. So some friends and I thought, hey, what if you had to earn your right to have a child? Say, perhaps, you need 10 credits to purchase the right to have a baby. You get one point for finishing elementary school, which is something of a gimme. You get another for high school/secondary. Earning your driver's license gets you one. A Bachelor's degree gets you two while an Associate's or Technical certification gets you another one. Earning over $25,000 gets you another credit. Paying $2000 to the Social Security Oh Shit Relief Fund gains you two credits. Being convicted of a misdemeanor loses a credit while doing charity or volunteer work earns another one.

The biggest problem is what to do about Catholics. Since they don't believe in inhibiting reproduction, we will simply have to reinstate chastity belts.

Singapore Dividend Collector said...

A very good system for controlling the demographic time bomb.

Could we not let the multi-nationals get in on the act?

Spend less than 2,000 dollars in any one year in any corporate eatery and get your manhood removed.

Spend over 5,000 dollars in KFC and get clearance to have your beautiful first child.

The rest is beyond me.

A a word to the Roman Catholics: Bring back the chasity belt. This is one particular antiquity that we need back in force!

Mike