Sleeping With the Enemy
On dealing with a Liberal Democrat
Awoken rudely last Sunday at 11am by a Liberal Democrat. I open the door to her, still in my pyjamas. She welcomes me to my new middle class neighbourhood, asks me where I have moved from, and dispenses with a few other pleasantries before digging the knife in.
“Do you mind if I ask what your voting history is? I mean, assuming that you do vote - and I hope you do.”
I told her that I did not vote, and that there was no existing party which I would vote for.
“That is a shame. You would do well to remember that Democracy is hard won and easily lost”
She was about to move on to the next door before I bid her stay, telling her in the most amiable tone that she had convinced me, and that I would be first in line at the polling booth come the next local election to vote for the Conservatives.
Familiarity breeds contempt. Now that I live among them, I think that on the whole, the Middle Classes are more odious than the Working. The Working Class, at least, are exactly what they are supposed to be: idle and stupid. But the Middle Class, supposedly industrious and cultured, are anything but. Most are tradesmen and NHS administrators that got lucky, and the Liberal Democrats (who these people invariably vote for) are their guardians, whose job it is to ensure that nothing new ever gets built.
This is because growth threatens their very way of life. They fear that any kind of new commercial life might distract them from their two principal hobbies, which are going to the supermarket and sorting out the recycling.
I have no doubt that my neighbours have equal contempt for me and my dirty little car. For my part, I find their French lacking, and on the rare occasion where I have been able to peer into their windows, have found Sally Rooney novels on the bookshelf.
The LibDem campaigner has not returned, but it seems I have not been written off entirely, as her party continues to shove their political propaganda through my letterbox. I grow nostalgic for my days in that remote northern town, where the local junkies would instead feed their own human shit through my letterbox. They were at least honest.
Guppy, do you shop at Sainsbury’s? It is there and there only that the vulgar Middle Class do their weekly shopping. I should know, I have been beleaguered with such an upbringing.