Look forward in anger

It’s seldom difficult to make young men angry about something. John Osborne’s 1956 play Look Back in Anger reflected a whole generation of 1950s “angry young men” who were angry about the class system, inequality and repressive social norms.

Today, however, young men’s anger has been weaponised against many of the social and environmental norms that characterise healthy societies. I was strongly reminded of this by an article in Byline Times by Hardeep Matharu, inspired by Donald Trump’s victory and how it was won by “visceral instincts amplified by populist politicians capitalising on the deep anger born of gross inequality, and tech disinformation feeding the polarisation and the need for a sense of ‘psychic justice’.”

That, in a very complex nutshell, is something those of us who treasure western democracy, for all its shortcomings, should fear. Unpicking this, it says the onslaught on the west’s political stability is being fuelled by a toxic combination of billionaire oligarchs, Wild West social media, poisonous influencers and, of course, fascist regimes like Russia actively trying to destabilize the whole of Europe and North America.

It’s no accident that, among the conspiracy theories hatched by this tidal wave of darkness, is that man-made climate change has been made up by scientists (for some unknown reason) to deny young motorists cheap petrol. Many oligarchs, remember, derive their wealth from Big Oil.

Social media too play a massive part, from those which fail to curb the endless Russian bot-farm lies about Ukraine, to those happy to push conspiracy theories and extremist politics. Already Bluesky is starting to feel like a camp for refugees from a nasty, repressive regime.

Toxic influencers are being listened to. Just this morning one popped up in my feed in support of Elon Musk’s attempt to revive bizarre conspiracy theories about 9/11. He’d had 8.5 million views already.

And then there are the Russians, whose baleful influence on US and UK politics we’re not allowed to know about thanks to our libel laws.

But I’m reminded that the current government attack on England’s planning system has followed a very similar trajectory:-

–  Create a myth about young men being unfairly excluded from something;

–  Set up a social media campaign with angry young men promulgating the propaganda;

–  Secure a big following of angry young men buying into these simplistic beliefs;

–  Target politicians who are out of power and want to win it back;

–  Promise them that supporting the propaganda will win them votes;

–  Remind the politicians, once in power, how they got there;

–  Sit back and enjoy while your mega-wealthy backers reap the rewards.

If this all sounds painfully familiar from the Yimby Lobby of the past five years, hold on to that thought. Only yesterday, one prominent yimby supporter on X was citing a Spectator article arguing that “Nicholas” gets nothing from the social contract because he isn’t likely to need the NHS soon (!) “and by the time he does, there probably won’t be a state pension anyway”. The influencer responded that being 30 in Britain “is to be a cash cow, milked to subsidize everyone else, while barely being able to afford your own rent.”

It’s probably not worth pointing out that males in their 30s are at the peak of their earning potential and maybe shouldn’t ignore the rest of society. But inevitably, the post prompted a reply saying the UK’s biggest problems are “high-volume, low productivity immigration” plus “planning and the lack of ability to build housing and infrastructure”. How Pavlov’s dogs do salivate once they’ve been “influenced”.

Meanwhile, another influencer was demanding that we “burn down the planning system” after a local authority refused permission for five market houses, to protect local employment and a valuable local service.

As certain tabloid papers used to say: “You couldn’t make it up.” Some do, of course.

All this is a tangible threat to our democracy, but the issue is, what are we going to do about it?

Fighting fire with fire probably goes against most decent people’s instincts. But we need to do something about this tide of propaganda aimed at vulnerable young men on social media before it overwhelms our political system. It really is later than we thought.

Jon Reeds