Sam Delaney: I’m not just angry at the king, I’m angry at everything we’ve become

Every sensible person knows the ‘culture wars’ are a contrivance being played out by a tiny number of angry idiots who have been duped by a failing government and their media sponsors into believing that men and women being allowed to piss in the same public convenience presents an existential threat to humankind. 

It’s all a scam, like a man at a trestle table asking you to guess which paper cup the ball is under. Only carried out with even less guile. It’s rage fuel for idiots. There is no woke conspiracy or new liberal elite. There are just human beings trying to get along and survive in increasingly difficult conditions. 

The Tory government has made this country poorer, unhappier, less productive and more divided over their 13 years in power. UK inequality is among the worst in the developed world. Our average life expectancy is in decline. By every measure, the final 13 years of Queen Elizabeth’s life were overseen by the worst series of governments to ever serve her.

Bleak stuff, right? What a boring, middle-aged, unpatriotic, cliched dad I am. Yep, I am all of those things. Sue me. It was difficult for me to catch glimpses of the coronation (I tried my best to avoid it, but it was as insidious as it was ludicrous) without becoming angry, outspoken and – yes – boring. 

“Dad, it’s not that deep, it’s just a party,” said my 15-year-old daughter as I ranted at her about the gold carriages, preposterous ceremony and fetishised news reporting that surrounded it.

“It’s a party that cost us £250 million quid when there are kids surviving off food banks!” I said.

“Why are you so angry?” she asked.

“YOU should be angry too,” I replied. She told me she’s too young to get angry over stuff she can’t control. I thought that was pretty insightful. 

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The King’s knees-up was almost 30 years to the day I started my A levels. Back in 1993, as I stood on the edge of adulthood, there was optimism in the air. John Major’s Tories were on their way out, the monarchy was less popular than ever and it seemed that the weird, embarrassing and restrictive class systems that pervaded the country were about to evaporate. 

In the years that followed it briefly seemed like they had. Not only did Tony Blair’s government invest in public services and social welfare while growing the economy, there was something culturally progressive going on too. From Oasis growing from a council estate in Burnage to become the biggest band in the world, to the books of Irvine Welsh and an art revolution driven by the likes of Tracey Emin and Damien Hirst, it felt like Britain was finally a meritocracy. 

Working-class people with flair, energy and wit were thriving in every sector of society. Being posh was profoundly unfashionable. This was the world I graduated into in 1997, joining a magazine publishing industry that was booming – and dominated at the time by state school kids like me.

So how did we get to where we are today: a polluted island of poverty, corruption and gormless deference, where senior politicians are always on the make and disenfranchised families are duped into waving little flags at an unelected head of state while he grumpily has a bejewelled hat stuck on his head by a man dressed as a wizard?

My generation came of age at a point when we had every opportunity to make this country the progressive, egalitarian, beautiful Jerusalem we knew it should be. But we failed and I’m not sure how or when. The establishment classes took back control, like they always do, while we weren’t looking. 

I tried to explain this to my daughter. That I wasn’t just angry with the King, or the government, or the flag-waving drips on the Mall. I was angry at myself for expecting things to keep getting better without putting much effort into making sure they did. I don’t think she was listening. Frankly, who can blame her? 

Read more from Sam Delaney here

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Sort Your Head Out: Mental Health Without All the Bollocks by Sam Delaney is out now (Constable £18.99). You can buy it from The Big Issue shop on Bookshop.org, which helps to support The Big Issue and independent bookshops.

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