Narcissists against freedom

Take four recent developments:

- Joey Barton provokes “fury” by saying that suicide is selfish, with some of his critics invoking the weasel work “inappropriate“.

- Over 30,000 people complain to the BBC about Jeremy Clarkson’s “shoot the strikers” comment.

- Luis Suarez gives Fulham fans the finger, and they faint like Victorian spinsters.

- Emma West has to spend Christmas in prison, supposedly for her own safety after she gets death threats for her racist rant.

These events all tell us something sad about the British people - that many of us have become illiberal prigs, quick to take offence and to condemn.  I suspect there are three related pathologies underlying this:

1. Narcissism. Events are interpreted through a me, me, me prism. They give us the opportunity to demonstrate our delicate sensibilities and our “moral compass.“  This approach excludes curiosity. It stops us asking: “why did s/he do that?” (The answers are, in order, because: he’s got a point; he’s got a book to sell; he’s been abused for the last hour; she’s probably mentally ill.) We are all newspaper columnists now - in the sense of having a self-absorbed moralistic incuriosity.

2. Infantilism. We have become like children, desperate to seek protection against things that upset us. We’ve lost Samuel Johnson’s manly attitude to freedom: “Every man has a right to utter what he thinks truth, and every other man has a right to knock him down for it.” Instead, we now look to the “authorities” to knock him down.

3. A hatred of disorder. Richard Sennett has described how people respond to chaos and uncertainty by constructing a “purified identity”. Instead of embracing uncertainty and learning from it, “threatening or painful dissonances are warded off to preserve intact a clear and articulated image of oneself.” This warding off consists of demanding that dissonant experiences be suppressed.

I say all this for a reason. When I said yesterday that the public’s hostility to redistribution was due to cognitive biases, some rightists replied that this was typical lefty arrogance. But what they ignore is that public attitudes are also hostile to liberty too. For me, both are a matter for regret.

Comments

[Luis Enrique]

well, what I hope is that you are actually describing a minority here. If there are 60m relaxed individuals with a sense of perspective in this country and 10m hysterical offence-o-philes, that's enough to complain to the BBC in droves and maybe put Emma West at risk.

I also hope that people are soon going to realise that a fuss being made about something on twitter, or complaints being made etc. isn't newsworthy because it only goes to show that out of a few tens of millions of people, uptight prigs are plentiful and these people have a vastly disproportionate presence on social media, complaints forums etc.

[flyingrodent]

Of all those, football fans taking offence at rude hand signs is always the most hilarious. The stuff you hear shouted at players off the terraces is unbelievable, the kind of thing that would get you a richly-deserved hiding if you shouted it in a pub.

[Luis Enrique]

Imagine a community consisting of 9 sensible people and 1 idiot. At the moment the media in this country spend all their time reporting what the idiot thinks. Probably because it's more entertaining.

[Jonny_boy27]

You do realise the daily mash is satire, right?

[Philip Walker]

I haven't clicked through, but The Mail presumably can't work out whether it likes suppressing speech or hates suppressing racists.

[chris]

@ Jonny boy27 - Satire? It's the most accurate news service we have.
@ Luis - I'd like to think you're right. But I fear that the one noisy idiot might be the tip of an iceberg. And it is surely worrying that there are so few voices (esp in the meeja) telling people to just get a grip.

[Ralph Musgrave]

Perhaps the explanation is the collapse of Christianity combined with the fact, which is obvious from history, that human beings need a religion, or at least some strict set of rules. Amongst other things, this enables the pompous and the arrogant to play high priest, and lay down the law – when they aren’t molesting choirboys.

[Tom Addison]

Great post. I reckon a lot of it might be faux outrage as well, people pretending to be offended and shocked so they can show what caring and compassionate people they are, like how facebook turns into the National Grieving Competition whenever somebody dies.

[justine]

Chris Dillow.
I want to buy your book but is nt it coming out in paperback yet?

[Phil]

The reaction to Joey Barton's comments is extraordinary & rather depressing. He didn't say "Suicides - selfish bastards, eh?" (which wouldn't be that far out in any case - a friend of mine who'd counselled would-be suicides said something very similar). He said: "Suicide is a mix of the most tragic, most selfish, most terrible (and I want to believe preventable) acts out there" Can't see a word I'd want to change.

[Sam Langfield]

excellent post

[chris]

Thanks for those king words, everyone.
@ Justine - the book'll not be out in paperback; it sold almost nothing in hardback. You're not missing much.

[alanm]

No Fulham fans were offended by Suarez's finger. I'd be surprised if a single one complained. Amusing though the mash piece is.

By the diving perhaps.

[alanm]

I think Neil Warnock is now agreeing with you!

[Uggs Boots]

These events all tell us something sad about the British people - that many of us have become illiberal prigs, quick to take offence and to condemn. I suspect there are three related pathologies underlying this:

1. Narcissism. Events are interpreted through a me, me, me prism. They give us the opportunity to demonstrate our delicate sensibilities and our “moral compass.“ This approach excludes curiosity. It stops us asking: “why did s/he do that?” (The answers are, in order, because: he’s got a point; he’s got a book to sell; he’s been abused for the last hour; she’s probably mentally ill.) We are all newspaper columnists now - in the sense of having a self-absorbed moralistic incuriosity.