In Competition No. 2498 you were invited to submit a speech by one of our newly ‘emotional literate’ politicians unveiling a piece of legislation and incorporating the following words: ‘dysfunctional’, ‘narrative’, ‘empower’, ‘co-dependent’, ‘holistic’, ‘self-actualisation’, ‘closure’.
The traditional ministerial waffle of government policy documents now has a new ingredient as politicians vie with each other to feel our pain, threatening to drown us in an ocean of empathy. David Cameron’s much-mocked ‘Hug a hoodie’ slogan is but one example. To my list you added some horrors from the ever-expanding self-help lexicon: ‘proactive’, ‘inclusivity’, ‘self-esteem’, ‘intuitive’; and this one, a corker from Alan Millard, ‘endemic idealistic adherences to institutionalised norms’. Curiously, the topic of pet empowerment cropped up more than once. The winners, printed below, get £25 each and the bonus fiver goes to W.J. Webster.
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The narrative of civilisation has always been driven forward through an increasing awareness of co-dependent relationships and a widening of the parameters of self-actualisation. Wherever there are dysfunctional social interfaces it is government’s responsibility first to support, then to empower the disadvantaged. The Domestic Pets (Welfare and Respect) Bill is designed to effect a step-change in attitudes towards our siblings on the mammalian continuum. It pursues a holistic approach to the challenging issues raised by the household nexus of pet and ‘owner’ (‘guardian’ will be the legislative term). Its provisions will actively promote the wellbeing — physical, psychological and spiritual — of pets by means of a series of contractual requirements in areas such as diet, medical attention, reproductive rights and freedom of movement. The insupportable master-slave paradigm will be consigned to the incinerator of history, bringing closure to a shameful age of anthropocratic imperialism.
W.J. Webster
This Bill supports inclusivity. It has an anti-élitist dynamic. It respects the differently abled. It includes a strong equal-opportunities dimension, interfacing with self-esteem issues. It aims to create space and widen horizons. Instead of dismissing the needy co-dependent, the mental-health statistic and the anomic victim of a dysfunctional family it addresses the problematic of positive ways to empower them. And if the quest for a cure-all, a grand narrative, has had to be abandoned, there are still viable holistic and synergetic solutions to be adopted. In the individual’s search for self-actualisation, the wellbeing, requiring a menu of life skills, there are many pitfalls, and not all trees grow tall. Yet why shouldn’t they? With proper legislative action, now the disadvantaged can be in a win-win situation, able to become accepting, achieve closure, move on and support meaningful relationships.
G.M. Davis
This Bill seeks to empower the dysfunctional pre-teen in wresting control of his or her personal narrative from the creativity-retardant social strictures and controlcentric institutional gatekeepers that have too long occluded the vision of those of us committed to the roll-out of a behavioural diversity agenda. The Bill seeks to redefine challenging behaviour, seeing it less as an inappropriate output than as an evolving and therefore necessarily malleable shard in the development of the expanding holistic personhood present in each and every societal unit. It provides for a suite of provisions — modular social-orientation workshops, self-actualisation counselling delivered through social partner networks, peer-centred praise-end-reward syndicates — designed to drill down into and unlock the negativity bubble. We will deliver incessant mentoring to the ostracised and assisted exit strategies to the co-dependent, proactively facilitating all to move independently from stakewielder to stakeholder status and thereby generate closure.
Adrian Fry
It is time for proactive action language plans to be unveiled in academies and technology colleges, in training centres across and within the national infrastructure. The narrative of the interface between physiological obesity and dysfunctional academic achievement is a given. Not so our downturn in communicable speech, as witness our understandability audit trails. Our language strategy, more prepotent than ever, and totally holistic, will roll out the self-actualisation of all, and will empower learners and learning managers alike, ending endemic, co-dependent, abusive relationships between individuals and non-sustainable grammar styles. By drilling down into this trauma, we will achieve national closure, inducting citizens into sustainable, disaggregated conversation, oral and non-oral. It is time the writing came off the wall on to the blank page of societal rights and responsibilities. To speak clearly. To maximise clarity in word usage scenarios. To make English fit for purpose. Hence our Linguistic Competencies Initiative Bill.
Bill Greenwell
Let me start by reminding you that the majority of crimes occur in the home. This visionary and far-reaching legislation will hit right at the heart of domestic violence, enabling victims to seek new meaning through self-actualisation and self-realisation. The introduction of CCTV to private households will empower the community in known cases of abuse and permit closure. I will give personal support to the measure making it a holistic solution that develops a new narrative, encompassing progressive ideas of liberty, fairness and responsibility. The legislation incorporates two co-dependent visions: initially only dysfunctional households with a history of domestic violence will be targeted at the request of the social services or any family member; ultimately the attractively designed and unobtrusive devices, with the potential to be updated with smoke or cigarette detectors, will be extended to all private homes, symbolising the essential common purpose without which no society can flourish.
Shirley Curran
When we foreground the marginal, we empower the disempowered. We recognise the authenticity of their narrative, not only our own monocultural, ethnocentric or solipsistic one, in real time. But cosmetic changes alone will leave dysfunctional structures intact, muddying the waters. Our intervention must be radical and holistic, articulating the image of self-actualisation for the co-dependent, providing creative roles for the deviant, freeing the inner child, balancing the chakras and offering a crisp management style while delivering a raft of healing solutions. Where people need boundaries, we shall prioritise boundaries. Where they demand space, we shall rework the parameters of openness, and where they seek closure we shall help them move on. We value leadership, but not top-down, more affective water-cooler-dialogue style, plus the maximising of human resources. We are passionate about partnership strategies. Hence from now on dwarf-throwing will be a crime. It’s a no-brainer.
Basil Ransome-Davies
No. 2501: Nobody’s alive
Charles Pooter and Samuel Pepys wake up one morning to find themselves in 21st-century London. You are invited to submit a diary extract from either man for July 2007 (150 words max.). Entries to ‘Competition 2501’ by 28 June or email to lucy@spectator.co.uk.
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