We often look upon the middle ages, during which the structure of society was defined as consisting of three estates, as an era mired in corruption, immorality, institutionalised abuse of power, and pox. The first and second estates were self-styled moral guardians, the holders of power, the legislators and setters of creeds; they lorded it over the third estate: working people.
A tarnished priesthood
Today, the first estate of the clergy, irrevocably stained by perpetual scandals about child molestation and long vilified for its enduring and pervasive abuses of power, has slipped from its vaunted position as being closest to god. Rather, the Catholic priesthood has Mount Sinai to climb when it comes to regaining its place in the hearts of disgusted believers, while Anglicans, Methodists, Lutherans and a heavenly host of frail churchmen open their doors to ever-dwindling congregations of ageing worshippers.
Politicians in the dock
The second estate consisting of lawmakers and wielders of power has acquitted itself equally poorly. A stomach-churning saga of fraud, corruption, deceit, collusion and out and out theft has left the public, already rarely disposed to trust politicians, feeling that their country is being run by a crude, posh organised crime syndicate; Tim Nice-But-Dim and his mates caught with their silky-skinned mitts in the till.
As the sordid story unfolds of backhanders proffered by News Corporation and pocketed by bent coppers, the police - the law enforcers and peacekeepers of the second estate - are exposed as being as crooked as the MPs who help to create the law of the land.
A free press: free to bribe and cheat?
The fourth estate, the free press, the media in all its many and varied forms, has gloried in the toppling of its fellow pillars of society, revelling in salacious stories, digging dirt, finger-pointing and without a doubt, gloating: 'Look how we tell the truth. We are of the people. We are one of you. We support you and uphold your values; or at least the values you purport to have.' Truth will out, however, and the pilfering habits of MPs pale almost into insignificance next to the unfolding phone hacking scandal, implicated in which is Andy Coulson, former communication director to PM David Cameron.
So with three of the state’s stalwarts scrabbling around in the muck, searching for solace in the comparative shame of the others, is the time right for the third estate, the people, the ‘mob’, to rise up and wrest power from the stinking and stained hands of what it thought were its betters?
Anarchy in the UK?
Anarchy has been long painted as chaotic, unsustainable and unworkable by the very institutions whose actions have recently brought them into such disrepute. It would be nice to trust in an anarchist utopia, governed by nothing but freewill, and fettered only by one’s personal morals but the truth is that the majority of anarchists are dull theorists whose blinkered belief in a deeply flawed system makes them very unwelcome guests at dinner parties, and whose socio-economic framework is even less workable than welfare capitalism.
The way out of the current quagmire of petty Hobbesian me-me-me-ism can only be a sea-change in national attitude, via less celebrity adulation, less tawdry voyeurism, more empathy, encouragement to think for oneself, support for embattled parents, transparency and accountability throughout the clergy, press, houses of parliament and police force – and the long-overdue removal of Rupert Murdoch from his position as the lying, cheating mouthpiece of the nation.
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