Friday, 20 February 2026

 Democracy?

I recently read the Hitler playbook on how he took over Germany, all done by so-called democratic means, leaving him in office as a dictator.    Watching the end of the US Empire, I do not see any difference in the playbook being used there. When you read it all as a bit of history, it sounds just the same.  As Churchill said, “One thing that we learn from History, is that we don’t learn from History.”   

What Churchill said in 1948 was, “Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” It appears that this is what is being done in the USA, and if we let Farage have his say, he will likely follow the same playbook.

Of course, the big cry is, “But these people were voted in.’ It’s interesting to note that Hitler was voted in; he had great support from the “Christian” vote.  And is it not true that Putin was elected? And is it not also correct that the Donbas voted to become Russian?

Some people believe that a dictatorship may be preferable to a democracy. Interesting to note C.S. Lewis’s comment on that position, when he said, “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others. We would be wise to be thankful for the praiseworthy aspects of democracy while working to avoid the others.”

Sure, refugees sometimes do bad things, and so do British-born people; but is that a reason to “tar them all with the same brush”?

Right now, in the UK, we are seeing people with Balaclavas over their heads, late at night, climbing ladders, scaling lamp posts, and erecting English flags, claiming that what they are doing is patriotic. Do we really believe that that is what it is all about? Patriotism? I really do not think the British public are that gullible.  It is about racism, it’s about protecting “the real English”, whatever that is.

A friend of mine, a ‘real Englishman,’ conducted one of those family history searches. To his great surprise, he discovered that his family line had Albanian ancestry.  (Great Britain was the title designated to Britain as opposed to other nearby islands.) Who are the English, Angles, Saxons, Celts, Vikings, and Norman French?  We even spoke French for a long time.

I like the comment by Greg Valerio, who looked at a line of the English St George's flags recently put up: “I am enjoying the irony that St George is not English, he never visited England, and in fact was Syrian. I think it's great that England is so multicultural that we have a Syrian as our Patron Saint. May the flag of St George always be a symbol of our multi-cultural and inclusive diversity.”

Saint George originated in the late 3rd century in Cappadocia, an area now in Turkey, as a soldier in the Roman army who refused to recant his Christian faith, leading to his martyrdom around 303 AD. He is a venerated Christian martyr.  

 

I am writing this because, yes, I am very concerned; I do not want to see the UK follow the same path as other places in our world. We need to be watchful. We need to be savvier.  We need to not listen to those who shout the loudest.  We need to think.

 

And, no! I am not part of the Z Generation, nor a baby boomer. If you want to check those phrases, I am one of those who they call from “the silent generation”. However, on these dangerous issues, I do not want to stay silent. Please do some research. Don’t listen to one source. Don’t just read the ‘popular press’. Check, and then check again.

 

Adrian Hawkes

adrianhawkes.blogspot.co.uk

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