IV

"Last night was great. Thanks."

"Mmm it was nice"

For one estate to be par excellence the estate of liberation, another estate must conversely be the obvious estate of oppression.    ~Karl Marx, Contribution to a critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right

"I'm glad I met you at the demo."
Says a young man.
"Yeah it's been a few years."
Says a young woman as he fumbles around the bedroom floor looking for his clothes.
"Good times, everything was simpler then."
"We were only young, it was still fucked we just had less idea how badly."
"7million were in London then, protesting, standing up together, for what was right...
...it was the fucking end of the Liber Party when they declared war on Iraq with Greg Brush and Team America"
"Well it wasn't, they carried on for 7 more years."
"Yeah and i'd wager they'd have launched war on Iran, Syria and Russia by now if they'd retained power. They'd still be bombing Iraq and Afghanistan." he says as he leaves the room.
"I saw a bunch of Girls were protesting in Afghanistan against the Taliban's medieval Islamic modesty laws...They're so brave, same in Iran. The Morality Police there killed a young Kurdish Woman last week, there has been rolling civil unrest, according to the few reports I've seen on Splatter."
"Probably America getting involved trying to destabilize Russia's allies." he shouts back from the bathroom. He pisses into the water making a loud bubbling noise. "Pretty orange" he thinks to himself.

"Idiot. why the fuck did I sleep with him" she says under her breath. she's warm lying in bed.
"he put his clothes on maybe he'll just fuck off.. Handsome fucking leftists with rich parents and a degree. They never had to question anything, life was mapped out for them from day one. They benefit more from the Capitalist system than anyone. No one questions them and they never question themselves. They barely ever come into contact with anyone real. If he played guitar he might aswell be Jesus."

"Do you play guitar!?" she shouts to him.

"I learned a few songs" he says, then flushes.

He opens the hot tap and runs it for a few seconds rinsing his hands, until the boiler kicks in and heats it up.
Once it's warm he puts the plug in. He looks at himself in the mirror. "Met a lot of good people yesterday. Thom.... Ava.... James and his girlfriend, Ellie, Ari, lot's of passion." He  turns off the hot tap, closes his eyes and puts his face in the water.

"stereotypical liberal idiot." She thinks and rolls over closing her eyes.
"fuck today I'm sleeping most of it, it's Sunday anyway.
the revolution was yesterday, and I'm hungover.
I'll look on splatter later and see what happened at the other protests.
Everything these people say and do is to mitigate their bad conscience.
When was the British working class ever radical?
Maybe the miners in the 80's, but most mines stayed open. No solidarity. Maybe some general strike in the 20's. He'd have been an officer in the army, respectable parents, money, a good education, just because they aren't officers today, doesn't mean they don't hold up the entire establishment in other ways. If he was born in Iran he'd be in the Revolutionary Guard...
Churchill was in charge of the police at the time and ordered they shoot to kill.
Maybe when England was a republic, hah, A couple years in the 17th century.aaaaaaaaaaaaaah" She stretched and lay face down on her pillow.

The governing Consortium Party is holding it's annual conference in Birmingham this year. It will be the first chance the new Prime Minister has had to address her party and the public in this way. As she heads towards the protected entrance, and security cordoned walkways, she hears music playing over a loud tannoy system. It is the soundtrack of a farcical, slapstick comedian called Benny Hill. A protestor has been granted clemency to express his freedom of speech and movement in this manner. As the cameras follow the Prime Minister her head remains fixed humbly towards the floor.

This morning her Chancellor of the Exchequer, has declared a U-turn on abolishing the 45% tax rate for the highest earners. The bank of England has had to inject £65Billion into the economy, buying long term government bonds to stop the £ devaluing against every other developed nations currency, and causing a mass sell off by British investors.

The Consortium Party, despite running their past few campaigns based on austerity economics, is subsidising extortionate energy prices and corporate tax cuts. Everybody can see that the £18 billion in cuts to state benefits, is to be used to make up the shortfall for £18billion worth of tax cuts. Everyone can see that the £500 handout from the government, is there to alleviate the £500 average increase in Gas and Electric bills. Everyone considers their domestic budget as though it was their soul, they try to keep it in good condition, untarnished by debt.

A few dozen protestors shout slogans and hold signs expressing their dissatisfaction and various facts they've learned from the internet.

The Consortium Party have been in power now for twelve years. They have had 4 leaders in that time. Opposition is not only extremely divided, it is terminally demoralised by failure after failure to mount a successful challenge to the Government. This is not completely down to Consortium Party strategy, though it has been highly effective, it also owes a great deal to multiple competing factions of populist dissatisfaction and rage sweeping the entire World, and their various political and cultural manifestations.

Lot's of different groups, organizations and individuals attribute this discontentment to a number of different causes, ranging from hostile States, Economic conditions, counter-Intelligence, Government policies, Membership to the EU, to the apocalypse happening and a hostile alien/satanic/marxist invasion being underway.

Complete anarchy has broken out among the reformers. Political conviction and policies are less important than the ability to maintain or ascend to a position of power. To some degree politics has devolved into a popularity contest, a popularity contest which the Consortium seem far more effective at competing in. By portraying themselves as intellectually, morally, and socially inferior to the majority of society, they are able to implement policy to benefit the wealthiest and most powerful in society. This is not so much a paradox, as it is the basis of codified managerial science, since the time of Niccolò Machiavelli. One must be both a fox, wily and cunning, and a lion, bold and audacious, to subdue one's enemies, internal or external, and pacify the populace.

A thirteen year old girl sits on the sofa scrolling through instaglam on her phone while the tv is on.
The news plays on tv, girls her age protesting in Iran, they are waving their headscarves around their heads and chanting.
In Brazil polls are tied between the incumbent Neo-Fascist leader Bombalero, and Social Democrat leader Lola.
South America currently has a number of governments that could be described as radically left wing, and particularly South American.
There are archaeological excavations on a number of sites in the Amazon jungle underway.
They could push the date back for human civilization in the Americas by thousands of years, and completely revolutionise conventional understandings of human history.
"Mum where's Iran" she asks.
"It's in the East my love"
"Further than China?"
"No, not quite as far as China, China is East of India, India is East of Pakistan and Afghanistan, Afghanistan is East of Iran, and Iran is East of Turkey and Iraq."
"Have you been to any of those places?"
"I've been to India, and Turkey"
"What's Iran like?"
"Well it's a religious society. They have very strong ideas about what people should be, what they should do and what they should think.
But it wasn't always like that."
"why is everyone calling girls brave there, just for waving headscarves and protesting?"
"Because the police there can lock them up and punish them for it.
That's why the protests started.
The police arrested a woman called Mahsa Amini, and beat her.
She died later that day."
The girl blinks and looks at her mum, she has been busy folding laundry the whole time, now she is putting it away in wardrobes.

The final attendees file in to the Consortium party conference. Jacob Flee Smog is one of the last, he is ushered in by 10 police officers and a load of video cameras, he appears to have taken a longer route to the entrance which passes right in front of the dozen assembled protestors. A number of protestors shout obscenities at him, while they pace after him and his entourage.

Another Consortium politician, Michael Linencant follows not far behind to similar abuse and harassment. One young man invades his personal space and is kept back by the officers. He continues to gesticulate and shout aggressively towards him for thirty yards, until he gets to the security gates and enters the conference area.

Tonight they will launch the conference, the following week will be filled with activities, seminars, training, workshops and opportunities for networking.
Those outside the conference will see little to none of this political work, but will instead be shown a few a brief summaries of the key talking points and clips of the main speeches. This will give them a sense of the identity and purpose of their leaders.

A middle aged couple watch the tv news and cringe at the young man jumping up and down in front of Michael Linencant. "They constantly outwit the left" says one.
"turn it over" says the other.
The first continues:"the thing about the Consortium is they are just the face of business.
.....Their support is the most active force in society. It constantly shapes our world.
Nothing has more say in society than big business, money talks."
"yeah yeah" the other interjects, "whatever".....while getting up off the sofa....
...."you wanna cuppa?"
...."yes please....
....you see, for Liber it's the opposite way round, for them the Party is the active element, it's activity is regulating business to protect the workers, or taxing business to fund society and it's members. The activity of Liber is hampering the activity of the Consortiums active side...
The activity of the Consortium, is convincing the people to vote for big business, rather than their own interests, they don't actively advance their agenda, in public at least, but they mitigate it's effects with compensation of various..."
"Mhmmm, you want a biscuit?"
"yeah bring the pack"
"Custard creams or digestives"
"Surprise me.....
.....anyway they offer things like tax cuts for lower earners, or this winter fuel allowance subsidy..
they know the lower earners benefit from the things taxes buy more than others, and they know taxpayers will be paying out twice to the energy companies...
Finally they know the average poor voter won't know those things...."
"mmhmmm"
"thanks babe...
what do you fancy watching?"
"Naked Dates in the Sun?"
"haha please no!"
"Awhhhh,,,,, haha,,,,, how about a nice film?"
"What about finishing that series..."
...."oh yeah The Throne Games I enjoyed it last time, we can watch a couple episodes....
thats real politics..."
One thinks to themselves..."we are the passive element, the propertyless, those who rely on the active element, the business owners to pay their wages....
...The Liber party can only offer a world to come, something ideal, a vision. nothing different that's real. The World that is, that we all live, work and die in, defines the limits of people's imaginations."

For the revolution of a nation, and the emancipation of a particular class of civil society to coincide, for one estate to be acknowledged as the estate of the whole society, all the defects of society must conversely be concentrated in another class, a particular estate must be the estate of the general stumbling-block, the incorporation of the general limitation, a particular social sphere must be recognized as the notorious crime of the whole of society, so that liberation from that sphere appears as general self-liberation.   Ibid

 Tomorrow the Prime Minister will give her first big speech.