Shutting out the conventional world and ignoring
expectations is a luxury enjoyed by the elderly, as well as being a mark of the
reactionary, the misfit, the crank and the eccentric. It can also be true of
the original thinker, the deeply creative artist, or any other brand of focused,
determined and memorable individual. Those lists of “greatest ever Britons”,
which generally include the likes of Brunel, Newton, Turner, Churchill, Lennon
and Hockney (and occasionally Jeremy Clarkson, although I don’t insist), would
probably coincide closely with lists – should they ever be compiled - of
“greatest ever exercisers of two fingers”.
These are people not acclaimed for their docility, people not
famous for accepting the status quo, for being told “you aren’t allowed to
think like that” and keeping stumm. Not necessarily easy people to get on with,
not necessarily nice or very moral people, but effective at what they did, baiting
the establishment, beating it at its own game without becoming fully part of
it. The trick, of course, is not to sell out once you’ve done your bit, but to
retire or die with said digits still fully outstretched - until rigor mortis completes
the job for you. Incidentally, I’m pleased to see that David Hockney is still going
strong, doing exactly what he wants to do in amused and growly contempt of those
who think he should do differently. I’m greatly looking forward to visiting his
retrospective at Tate Britain
In the future, historians may look back at 2016 as a year,
along with 1789, 1848 and 1968, when many people started getting stroppy, started
giving the finger to those who for many years had told them what to think, what
was good for them, what they were and were not allowed to say. They voted for
Brexit and for Trump, voted to jump out of a less than perfect frying pan and
into a fire, whose temperature and extent neither they nor anyone else could judge
or predict. At present, we’re witnessing the irrationality that sets in when
rationality doesn’t give you what you want; the irrationality that becomes the
new norm, the new rationality.
“Two fingers to the lot of you” could be hugely entertaining if the potential implications weren’t so serious. Fine if you’re a genius level artist, engineer or scientist. If you’re the leader of the free world or just an average member of society who wants a more congenial life it may be less reliably productive. A facile and ugly gesture it certainly is, more diagnostic of a despairing state of mind than anything else. A bit like an angry suicide note written intentionally to hurt. Naturally, from time to time everyone needs a safety valve, and giving vent to a vigorous V-sign or its verbal equivalent is probably healthier than taking antidepressants, kicking the cat or invading somewhere that doesn’t deserve it. By itself the gesture does little more than cause offence and make the finger-owner or the obscenity-utterer feel better. Very occasionally, however, it may herald the start of something, a tipping point, a decision reached, a new start. Thesis, antithesis, synthesis - the eternal Hegelian triad. I’m not holding my breath.
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