Just who are They, and what are They up to?

They asked me how I knew/My true love was true…. Or so the song goes. But who were they, and why did they ask anyway? They don’t appear very sympathetic – they with their sneering inquiries about how I knew my love was true. Are they the same They as the They who don’t know It’s the end of the world (It ended when you said goodbye)?

They pop up not only in song but all over the place in English discourse. They sound like a bossy and snooty crowd of know-it-alls. They are well placed. They are in touch. They are in the loop. They can make waves. They are depressingly indifferent to our fate. They push us around. They talk behind our backs. They don’t understand how we feel. Who do they think they are? When will they ever learn?/When will they ever learn?

They are also closer than we to where it’s at. Everything’s up-to-date in Kansas City/They’ve gone about as far as they can go/They went and built a skyscraper seven stories high/About as high as a building oughta grow. But then they would, wouldn’t they? It’s the kind of thing they do.

I have been sitting in a village pub in Derbyshire, pondering Them and their significance in popular thought. Conversation overheard can be more revealing than conversation joined, and I listened unnoticed to a discussion of how They can now impound your car without so much as a by-your-leave, in a range of circumstances known only to them. Not only was it unclear from the context whether They were the police, the local authorities or some official bully unspecified; it was highly doubtful whether anyone involved in the conversation really cared to know.