TEXT JOIN TO 77022

Friendship in the Aftermath of Reality

I’ve worn my thumbs down to spiky bone. To be a good sport, over the last week I have given traumatized progressives exactly what they want. I’ve dutifully succumbed to the commands of the mad, the demands of the jilted.

“If you voted for Boris Johnson, delete me as a friend!” Because of X and Y and perhaps Z.

The social impeachment charge sheet extends from the fantastical to the absurd. Those selfish so-and-sos scotched Jeremy Corbyn’s Winter Wonderland, and ushered in fascism.

So, in true Christmas spirit, I have obliged heartily the shouty demands of authoritarian narcissists, and self-deported from their digital encampments so disfigured a reality to the one they deplore.

A queasy insight into the minds of some. Sharpened by the interrobang, such gentle requests litter my social media feeds.

Of course, it is the usual suspects. “Hang your heads in shame!” cried the green of bangs, and steel of nose. Which is ever so charming, not to mention convincing.

Democracy, of course, counts only when they win.

Given last week’s drubbing (which I have taken the liberty to christen “LOL Thursday”) it’ll be a while before they taste anything so syrupy sweet as the first seven seconds when I awake and it breaks across my head that they don’t matter anymore.

Nope. They do not. And It’s not you. It really is them.

The kind who succumb to mystery “illnesses” the kind of which “the doctor doesn’t know what is wrong.” Perhaps, I suggest, because there is nothing wrong. It’s the Type D personality carousing mendaciously into an indulgent “woe-is-me” stupor.

Yes. The Type D personality. The kind that develops a raging cancerous tumor from a mere sniffle. The kind that convinces its host of a Jewish plot to snap their shoelace. That kind.

Its debatably sentient incarnation almost angst his way to Prime Minister last week. I say “almost.” Well, he was present. On the field. He made up the numbers.

Corbyn, sorry, “Jeremy” as the Jonestown aspirants know him so, is “Type-D.” A metronomic, Holden-Caulfield-without-the-charm. Jeremy is now sawdust soup. And it is everyone else’s fault.

Because, dear reader, my vote for the Conservatives’ “stonking” majority means I’ve signed up to capture the poor in nets, bound and deliver them to a celebratory dinner of which the main course is fillet of gig worker.

People “are literally starving!” said another compassionista, in a country in which two-thirds are obese or overweight, and whose own BMI I suspect is above that of “emaciated.” We are famished here, of rudimentary calculations.

Still, I persisted. For one, I am not too comfortable with the wailings of adult-olescents clogging my newsfeed with impotent puritan rage. Nor am I comfortable with the vote-shaming of a majority of ordinary people.

To click “unfriend” is like digital Ayahuasca. And I’m zooming towards eighty such ceremonies. Which, funnily enough, is the number of Boris Johnson’s majority. The magic figure. Nice and round—dreamy.

On election morning, the Corbynistas implored those they now accuse of “literal genocide,” to “consider the worst-off.” To just “think” about the poorest before we voted. Of course, they didn’t tell us who to vote for. That would be imposing.

So, I did. I pondered those worse-off than me. Those bright kids from public housing whom botchy schools grind one down into a regretful nub.

Those locked out of owning their own bricks and mortar. I thought about those in post-industrial wastelands whose birthrites were ripped, still beating, from their chests.

And then I voted Conservative. The mood of my progressive betters then soured like sun-warmed milk.

Millions agreed with me. Many of them, the progressive squall has drained years denouncing as “gammon.” Who is salty now, eh?

After all, the Red Tory party liberated the Labour heartlands, consigning the gross disfigurement of a once great party to unfailing laughing-stock.

I cannot type this beatific sentence enough: Labour enjoyed its worst result since 1935. And we did, too.

According to Instagram, Jeremy was on course to win 649 out of 650 seats. His name then engraved on England’s 1966 World Cup trophy. Oh, reality, you injurious tart.

You know who else agreed with me? The poor. The middle-class. And the rich. Yes, Boris Johnson won with all three. We, yes “we,” quietly conquered the North. We won in the midlands. We won in the south.

As many American commentators have noted, (and this journal before it was voguish), Boris has tickled the sweet spot. A heady brew of Left and Right—decidedly not wishy-washy “centrism”—rules on both sides of the drink.

It’s what people actually want. Not the mad incantations of Maoist fanboys, nor the genocidaires of the libertarian right. And they want Brexit.

Of course, this Red Tory moment won’t sate the purists. Nothing does. That is why they are purists.

And like my green-banged Corbynista friends, that is why they don’t win.

Get the news corporate media won't tell you.

Get caught up on today's must read stores!

By submitting your information, you agree to receive exclusive AG+ content, including special promotions, and agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms. By providing your phone number and checking the box to opt in, you are consenting to receive recurring SMS/MMS messages, including automated texts, to that number from my short code. Msg & data rates may apply. Reply HELP for help, STOP to end. SMS opt-in will not be sold, rented, or shared.

About Christopher Gage

Christopher Gage is a British political journalist and a founding member of the Gentlemen of the Swig. Subscribe to his Substack, "Oxford Sour."

Photo: Kirsty Wigglesworth - WPA Pool/Getty Images

Content created by the Center for American Greatness, Inc. is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a significant audience. For licensing opportunities for our original content, please contact licensing@centerforamericangreatness.com.