Of Post Election Disappointment Again

I'm quite used to being on the losing side. It doesn't ever stop the disappointment. After the horrible election in December 2019 I posted an article about being vigilant. It seemed apposite. The Tories have achieved little over the last forty or so years to earn my trust or my support. Many have acted with dishonour and the policies they have espoused have undermined any sense of fair play; or so it seems from where I'm standing. I look forward to being proven wrong, but evidence has yet to accumulate to ease my concerns.

After I shared the report a staunch Tory friend told me it was important to recognise that the majority had won and that I should be gracious in defeat. We were definitely going to leave the European Union and there would be no further delay. It feels as though this defines what is wrong with this particular kind of conservatism. It blames the losers for being hurt. It is surely the winner who can afford to be gracious in the winning. After all, what have they left to prove? The winner holds all the cards with an eighty-seat majority in the Commons. All I have is my ability to withhold cooperation and compliance, so don't tell me how to behave or what to feel. I'm not ready to hear that.

Surely the job of the "winner" is not to tell me how to behave. It is rather to draw me in, soothe my anxiety. Theirs is the responsibility for healing the damage. They need to prove they were right, much more than that I was wrong. I can't do their job from where I'm standing.

It seems always to have been thus. Poet/songwriter, Roy Harper, wrote the following lines in his song Kangaroo Blues:
Hey, Mr Nixon, Hey Mr. Heath
Can't you pull your pants up boys
I'm standing underneath

When my children were young they would sometimes get angry. All I knew about how to help was to hug them till they calmed down. I'm angry and I fear for worse to come. Maybe I just need a hug.