The Evil European

While not being technically correct, as in I have had other holidays, but it was the last holiday I booked for myself (back in time when I had money, my PhD was going well and I was still sane).

Anyway, the reason I remember the holiday was five years ago was that I passed through London during the biggest protest in British history. Ironically enough I was passing through London as I was flying to New York from Heathrow (Hell-throw).

What I remember was the energy, the buzz that surrounded people. A feeling that people had a say in the way their lives where governed. Turned out to be bollocks as poddle man went ahead with the invasion. It can be seen as a turning point in the relationship between citizens and the government.

"But the protest also represented something else, focused not so much on the issue of Iraq as on the sense that mainstream politics was drifting away from the public, and at least some of the marchers felt that in protesting, they might somehow drag Westminster back."
The Guardian, 15/02/08

Like many I feel increasingly disenfranchised from the entire democratic process. The power of business and the executives use of the threat of 'terror' to construct an every more elaborate surveillance state. God, I sound like a liberal stereotype.

If people become more and more disenfranchised it will enable an every more closed society to be constructed. Some people will just retreat while others will use non- and anti-democratic means to get their voice heard....this will in turn result in ever more draconian approaches to governance....I am not sure if I am talking about a hypothetical or an actual future.