Pretentious Metaphor

I have a fairly strong dislike of articles that say things like ‘the Eurovision Song Contest is a Metaphor for our Times’. However, I feel like posting just some short thoughts that make exactly that rather pretentious point – and I promise to be embarrassed about it. Ten years ago, in 1997, Katrina and the Waves won the contest for the UK with the anthemic ‘Shine a light’. Let’s not worry about the little detail of Katrina being American; it was a good song for once and deserved to win. Last night, the execerable Scooch came second last with ‘Flying the Flag’ a glitzy song with a strong line in sexual innuendo.

We went from top, to second bottom (taking in bottom place on the way) over the last ten years – the ten years of Tony Blair’s premiership.  And here comes the pretentious metaphor. We’ve gone from a bunch of serious musicians who won the competition to a glitzy, glamorous, but ultimately cheap bit of tat which came second last. At the same time, Britain has undoubtedly become richer and more self confident – one cannot deny that our economy has been stable under the Labour government. But during the same time our public life and international standing has been cheapened by a diet of spin (which is a nice way of saying lies) and shameless self preservation by the government. Others will list Mr Blairs failings in greater detail than I can, but the Ecclestone saga and above all the manipulating of evidence to take us into a war with Iraq will all form part of his legacy – overshadowing the real achievements of his government. I live and work internationally and I know for a fact, whatever our politicians might say, Britain is not as respected as much now as it was ten years ago.  Sadly Scooch’s shiny suits rather sum up how we are perceived around the wall – lots style, lots of money, but empty inside.

Mr Blair’s legacy, as far as I’m concerned is that I don’t feel as good as being British as I did ten years ago. I’m glad to see him go, and hope that the next prime minister will restore some sense of morality to British public life. However, I don’t hold out much hope. The book of Psalms says:

Do not put your trust in princes,  in mortal men, who cannot save. (Psalm 146:2-4)
It is better to take refuge in the LORD  than to trust in man. It is better to take refuge in the LORD than to trust in princes. (Psalm 118:8-9)