- by Owen Morton
I am currently writing an essay for my history degree (well, not actually current per se, since I'm currently writing this article, but as I say so often, you know what I mean) about democracy in the early twentieth century. This essay is making it abundantly clear to me that democracy now is failing. Voter apathy will soon result in no one actually bothering to vote. So what are the alternatives?
Well, we have the monarchical alternative. I think everybody will agree that government by the monarchy would prove to be a stupid idea. Everyone complains enough about Prince Charles succeeding the Queen now, when he won't actually get any power. Just think about the outrage it would cause if he were going to be a ruler. So the monarchy is out, unless they create a new monarchy, with a totally new royal family. Such as mine, for example. I could be king. That would be good. But I think such a system, while I would undoubtedly make a wondrous monarch, would be open to corruption in the event any of my heirs was not quite so wondrous as me. So the monarchy is not the way to go, even if I were to be king.
Other alternatives are just as extreme. Fascism is an obvious no-no. Nobody likes fascists. I daresay that even if I were to join a fascist movement, my clear coolness would be unable to redeem it. Thus we don't want to be fascist. Communism would be a good way to go, if only people weren't such complete bastards that they would inevitably destroy it, as Stalin and, to a lesser extent, Lenin demonstrated in Russia all those years ago. Anarchy hasn't had a serious test yet, but I'm willing to bet it would go wrong. I think that's the main systems of government that are available - and none of them seem to work.
So what we need is a brand new political system to govern this country with. And I think I have the answer. What we have to do for a perfect political system is to be ruled by someone that no one would ever expect. We've seen the options of one person ruling everybody (monarchy and fascism), a group of people ruling everybody else (democracy), everybody ruling and thus by extension nobody really ruling (communism), and nobody ruling, full stop (anarchy). This doesn't seem to leave very many options. Thus as I have said, politics needs to head off in a totally unexpected direction.
And what could do this better than making the country governed by something rather than someone? By something, I don't mean an animal. I mean an inanimate object. This may be a radical proposal, but there is absolutely nothing else we can do. Once democracy fails, we will be well and truly up the spout, and will be forced to resort to one of the other four methods of government that I have already discussed. But I am proposing a new way forward. Government by inanimate object is the only way we can go.
But, I hear you cry, this is too vague to satisfy us critics! Who is to say that the inanimate object selected will not merely prove to be less, not more, adept at government than, say, Tony Blair? To which I agree. There are, as you may know, many different inanimate objects in this world (notable examples include rocks, golden syrup and packets of JoJo's Bouncing Beans). Some are, presumably, not as good at government as others. This is why it is so important to select the correct inanimate object to be our ruler.
I have thought long and hard about this rather important question. I have rejected candidates which at first glance appeared to be the right choice, such as the packet of 3 Double Action Pad Scourers on my shelf, and the empty jam jar which for some reasons adorns my desk, and eventually come up with a real winner.
The only inanimate object which is fit to govern us for the next couple of centuries until a better system can be found (for I am at pains to stress that this is by no means a permanent solution, just one that will last us until someone comes up with something else) is the wooden pen and pencil holder on my desk. To describe this item more fully, I will point out that it is in the shape of a cat, has a glittery diamond stuck to its forehead and has 'Lizzie Morton I love ?' scrawled on the bottom, presumably because my sister once owned the item in question.
And now you are doubtless going to ask me why I think this singularly interesting object should be the thing that rules us for some considerable time. The problem is, I don't know, and you know I don't know, and I know you know I don't know, so there's not a lot of point in me trying to justify myself. So I'll just abandon this political thesis right here before I embarrass myself further.