DOPPELGANGER 3

Some time ago I went into Sainsbury’s on my way home to do some shopping. I removed the black woolly hat I was wearing and I put my shopping into a back pack at the till. As I left the shop I went to the toilet as a large number of shop staff came out of the door. Leaving the toilet, I was followed and stopped outside, where I was accused of shoplifting. I was told that I was seen in the drinks section picking up a bottle although I hadn’t been anywhere near that section. At the till, it was noticed that I didn’t pay for the bottle, which I didn’t have.

The “leader” of the group was a bit of an idiot and let me go after I’d said that I didn’t have a bottle and showed him my receipt. I carried on but the mob returned, this time with a suited man who told me again of what I’d apparently done. He then searched me but, of course, he couldn’t find a bottle. He looked a bit confused, as if I’d just performed a magic trick to make the bottle disappear in front of him. There was a bit of a mumbled apology before they returned to the shop.

I’d have liked to have seen the CCTV images of “me” taking the bottle. Nowadays they have security men that would have stopped me as I left.

GOVERNMENT

The anarchist, Emma Goldman said that, "If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal." How true that is about governments and their politics. Another saying I’ve heard is, “Whoever you vote for, the government wins.”

Politics and government were created by the rich for the rich and those who work for the government are servants to do the bidding of the rich. Below them are the police and armed forces to do the dirty work.

In the past, government served the establishment such as the monarchy, the nobility and religion to make laws to keep the peasants in their place. In some ways it still does, except that their powers have been lessened. A few centuries ago the monarchy wielded a divine power over their people, giving them the right to kill anyone who dared to think differently. This included blasphemy against the established religion.

There are still parts of the world that use such methods, under the control of dictators.

The peasants can’t be kept in their place with that type of force as used in the past, although the establishment wishes they could. Public protest is safer without the organisers being arrested, tortured and executed. In the past, those who took part in any activity were regarded as unthinking followers of their leaders.

For example, when the nobility began to enclose land by taking over public land and expelling the common people who had farmed there for centuries, any resistance could be quelled by military force.

Now the government works for any individual or organisation that possesses wealth which still includes the monarchy and nobility. The police find it easier to concentrate on small companies and individuals who evade paying taxes. At the same time, wealthy individuals and large companies can find ways to escape paying many millions, quite often using loopholes in the law. These companies can do as they please, with the governments backing.

DOPPELGANGER 2

There have been a few times when I have been seen by other people when I know it couldn’t have been me.

When the film "The Most Fertile Man in Ireland" was in the cinemas, I'd thought about going to see it. One Friday I looked in the local newspaper cinema guide but it wasn't there. I was going to town and wondered about visiting the Tourist Information for a cinema guide. I was to go to the library on the Saturday morning and so I didn’t go that far into town.

On the Saturday, I went in the Tourist Info and browsed looking for a guide. I could hear the woman behind the counter talking and a woman near me said that she thought that it was I who was being spoken to. I was told that the new guides were in now. Apparently I had called in on the Friday afternoon. I had stood at the door and asked about a guide. I was told that they would be in on Saturday. She recognised me as the person who’d come in.

Television of the future, now?

A couple of days ago, I was watching BBC 4, which was showing the group Slade at the BBC. But I was watching on Freeview and the signal was bad. It kept disappearing or breaking up, with the sound stuttering. It depended on weather conditions and so didn't happen all of the time. When it did, most of the digital channels vanished leaving a No Signal sign on screen.

I commented to the friend I was watching with that when I'd watched Slade back in the 1970s, I didn't think that the televisions then would be better than what I was watching 40 years in the future on digital. I'd thought that the television of the future would be advanced and sophisticated but in reality it was worse.

PILGRIM FATHERS

I have recently learned something about the Pilgrims who left England to sail to America.  They left because of religious persecution but it wasn’t to seek the most obvious sort of religious freedom. Apparently England had too much religious freedom for their liking and they called for less freedom. They were too much for the English people to bear and were persecuted for it. That does explain a lot about the USA, where I have heard that some schools still teach creationism instead of natural selection.

Those Pilgrims could be described as religious fundamentalists. That’s somewhat ironic now, when the USA has so much trouble with other religious fundamentalists from other parts of the world.

HOMELESS

I heard about the number of humans being made homeless has increased as more of them lose their homes, being unable to repay their mortgage.

This again shows how money is more important than humans. The money lenders are quick to remind everyone that they will lose their homes if they can’t keep up the repayments. If they can’t, they are chucked out on the street and the property is sold to get the money back. The money lenders couldn’t care less about those who have ended up sleeping rough on the street. The government cares even less about them.

This is a ridiculous situation, in a ridiculous society. Why do humans put up with this? Could it be because those who are still able to pay would rather ignore the plight of strangers? They don’t want to be reminded that it could be them if their circumstances change.

PROPERTY LADDER

This expression really makes me cringe. Homes are to live in and should be cheap and easily available. At least that's the theory. But no, it couldn't be that simple. It never is with humans. It seems like humans have a masochistic attitude to life in the way they have to complicate the most simplest and most basic necessities. Money is god and must be obeyed.

Homes are yet another way to make money. That's their primary function. They are to be sold for more than they were bought for, with improvements included to increase the value. The additional value is then used to buy a more expensive property. Hence the ladder humans crawl up.

It doesn't matter to the owners whether anyone can afford to buy somewhere to live. It's all down to greed of the owners and the banks or building societies. Humans have been conditioned to see such a progress as a sign of success and would be unhappy at being labelled as greedy. Some may complain about their property not selling, which obviously could be improved by cutting the asking price but that would be unthinkable to those selling. The property ladder is calling them.

If someone wanted to buy a proprty they can always borrow money and spend much of their lives paying back more than they borrowed. If they later can't pay back, the banks will quickly throw them out of their home and sell it themselves.

 It's the 21st century but there are many who are living in squalor, making a choice whether to use energy to heat their homes or to cook food. When someone manages to get a home, there are ridiculously expensive bills and taxes to pay. The elderly suffer the most.

OPIUM FOR THE PEOPLE. . .

Karl Marx described religion as the opium of the people. He was wrong, it’s money. It’s not just opium but every other recreational drug you could think of.

Like a narcotic drug, the effect depends on how much is taken, with a similar confusion between reality and fantasy. The user becomes convinced that they can do anything, that anything is possible. It numbs the senses, creating a cushioned bubble around them against the difficulties produced by reality.

They become less and less interested in those without money, possibly feeling paranoid about anyone planning to take it from them.

They have allies in governments who have always been on the side of the wealthy. They have created laws to allow them to prosper and to keep away the undesirables.

ARMS TRADING

During the Falklands War, the thing that struck me most was that the Argentineans were using French built Exocet missiles against the British armed forces. No one commented about this, that a supposed ally to Britain was supplying weapons to a country which was then using them to destroy and kill the British forces.

I find the arms trade a strange concept. Because of the resulting wealth they can largely do what they like. Governments become mesmerised by that wealth and the taxes collected from it. That’s more important than human life.

Countries have supplied weaponry all over the world and so it’s highly likely that they could be used to kill humans from those same countries. And no one seems to care.

I couldn’t imagine myself working for a company that produces weapons which were to be used for the taking of human life. Money acts to numb the mind away from such thoughts, to keep reality away.

WHY DO PEOPLE DO THAT?

Why do so many humans copy what others are doing rather than thinking for themselves? That applies in many situations. It can become a pack mentality.

If those who are in the world's military forces were to consider what they were doing instead of blindly obeying orders, there wouldn't be any wars. The same with governments but they are forced to conform to what their party decrees. There are many psychopaths running dictatorships, propped up by the military that follow blindly for their own advantage rather than thinking of others. They are given permission to exercise their basest excesses towards those who are considered a danger to the regime.

World governments are occupied by those who are filled with a sense of their own self importance. They are filled with corruption and greed, getting out it what they can to increase their wealth and fame.