As Fi Bows to Peer Pressure

Before I begin my rant, I just heard a very interesting saying. The gentleman, who is on National Radio right now, said (paraphrased) ‘there’s Governments trying to run things, corporations trying to run things, and people trying to live their lives’. This is exactly how “civil society” is defined by a number of theorists. Civil society is the third sector, not the state or the market, but a group of people trying to live their lives. I’m sure no one reading this really cares but it’s something I haven’t had time to think about since last year (when I took a paper in Civil Society and Development) and it’s interesting to hear someone other than my lecturer saying it.

Rant Time:

Everyone does silly things. We’re human. It’s the way things works. Eve bit an apple, Adam didn’t help things, they hid behind some bushes, got kicked out of the garden, and now we’re all pretty good at screwing up. It frustrates me that politics is particularly dirty and in many ways I guess that’s one of the [many] reasons that I don’t want to ever be an MP.

My problem is that I like David Parker. I was particularly glad that he’d been given two important ministerial portfolios (transport and energy) and I had real hope that he’d be a real asset to the Government and country. Now I don’t know what to think. I don’t want to condone what he did, even if it was a “mistake” . . . but on the other side he’s a fantastic MP and he’s doing amazingly well given the fact that he’s only been in Parliament for four years. He’s bright, wants to make a difference, and is concerned about the current problems dogging the transport and energy sectors. I don’t know whether he’ll resign from his ministerial portfolios, but from here on in it’s going to be more difficult for him to be taken seriously by the opposition and media, at least for a while. That bugs me. Doing silly things bugs me. I’m going to stop thinking about it caus it’s making my head go round in circles. I don’t ever want to be an MP, please keep reminding me of this.

As the ‘Sunscreen Song’ man said: “Accept certain inalienable truths: Prices will rise. Politicians will philander. You, too, will get old. And when you do, you’ll fantasize that when you were young, prices were reasonable, politicians were noble and children respected their elders.”