I made the comment that I make my observations on this blog according to my opinion of reality and I was asked to explain this. It appears to many people that reality is a given, that there can only be one reality, and this is a very common misconception because people reason that surely there cannot be more than one reality? However, reality is actually a relative term. What do I mean by that?
Your reality is conditioned by your environment. Each individual is a social being whose character and consciousness is the result of their socialisation. That is the great error of modern day free market neoliberalism, that people can be seen as individuals in their own right. As Marx tells us quite correctly, the atomised individual of free market theory is an impossibility. Each of our personal individualities is determined within our social environment. As a result, what appear as reality to you will be the result of you environment, where you live, the lessons you've learned from your parents, your school, you family and your peers. As a result, reality will appear to you as an ideological construct according to many social factors. Reality for a Catholic will be different from a Protestant or a Muslim. The reality of someone who lives in Glasgow will be quite different to someone who lives in London etc. The reality of a millionaire is a very different reality from someone who lives on benefits.
It is the same with communities. We all need electricity, gas, our refuse needs collecting and we need access to shopping facilities etc. However, the installation of gas and electricity, the problems of refuse collection are, in reality, markedly different in London where you can have upwards of 10,000 people per square mile, to that in Ross and Cromarty where you have 4 per square mile. There are not many supermarkets north of Perth. That is why a proper democratic system requires genuine representation both in personnel and in the community. It is absurd to have a system where 80% of political control lies in London and 80% of that control lies with white middle aged privately educated males.
To the people who govern us, reality only exists within the elitist circles that they spend their lives in. In addition, they genuinely believe that if your reality is not the same as theirs then it should be. It is painfully obvious that London does not even attempt to understand Scotland except from the perspective of what they perceive as reality. However, the same is true with respect to Newcastle, Liverpool, Manchester etc. In reality, London has no real concern for them any more than they have concern for the Scots. How often have you heard someone who has returned from a visit to an area of the country that is quite distant from where they live remark that it was like being in another country? That is because it is like being in another country. The reality of life in Devon and Cornwall is markedly different from that in Glasgow or Dundee.
That is another compelling reason for Scotland to gain control of their own affairs, because the people who represent us neither share our reality nor even try to represent what the Scots perceive as reality. I don't care if Jim Murphy and Douglas Alexander are born and bred in Scotland because they quite genuinely make no attempt to represent us, they only represent what their masters in London tell them to represent. What they persistently do is attempt to persuade us that our reality should be perceived in Westminster's terms. The Tories are even worse.
There is no right or wrong reality and you're reality is as important as anyone elses. What you need is a political and economic system that not only respects your reality, but attempts to represent it in a meaningful way. But most importantly, we need a system that ensures that all realities are respected and protected. However, if your reality is negative and oppressive then it must be challenged and alternatives made available. You must have an environment where you are able to control, shape and alter your reality. That is real democracy, that is real politics. I will continue this theme later as this post is getting rather long and I suspect many people may not read this far.
Your Servant
Doktor Kommirat
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