Sunday story # 5 : Gary Lineker and the Soul of Mankind
The Gary Lineker thing now going on in Britain shows up what's so very wrong with present day society and culture. No, I'm not saying that he was right this week nor that I dislike him, but what the heck is going on today?
The Soul of Man Under Socialism was an 1891 political essay by the famous playwright Oscar Wilde in which he wanted expound a "libertarian socialist" worldview and an absolute critique of charity as such under which I would put the current view of some in power of how the BBC should be working towards too. Contrary to Lineker I've been working almost thirty years as a mere librarian trying to do my bit for the local community against meagre pay and coping with a lot of fustration all the way. Wilde's own deepest concern was also with man's soul; when he analysed poverty and its causes and effects in The Soul of Man under Socialism it was not simply the material well-being of the poor that distressed him, but how society does not allow them to reach a form of self-understanding and enlightenment.
Not only material poverty but also that of the mind. He even adopted Jesus of Nazareth as a symbol of the supreme individualist in his argument put forward. He advocated socialism, which, he argued further, "will be of value simply because it will lead to individualism" and "substituting competition for cooperation will restore society to its proper condition and will ensure no doubt both material and metal well being for each member of the community.
Decades later I like to think that we've wised up on the beauty of 'political socialism' but still see her as the only beau in town. When one writes about Christ, one knows more of Him and thus also gain the knowledge of true beauty. For sure Wilde himself made a point of differentiating "individual" socialism from "authoritarian" (government-centered) socialism, advocating a much more libertarian-type approach, "What is needed is Individualism. If the Socialism is Authoritarian; if there are Governments armed with economic power as they are now with political power; if, in a word, we are to have Industrial Tyrannies, then the last state of man will be worse than the first." What is indeed needed is much more individualism of the right kind. Well, I'm trying my best on here and everywhere else
Agree…more constructive criticism and healthy debates are needed. Creativity in every form should be encouraged, supported and appreciated. We need good teachers now, more than ever. So the education system shouldn’t be choked at the hands of political parties who only tend to suppress genders/history/facts and freedom of thought.
