Boltbrechtsen ‘fisks’ the Cat

By Piers Boltbrechtsen

Applied Hermeneutics’ token right-wing commentator, Piers Boltbrechtsen, takes Cat Stevens to task on the seam of crypto-fascism underlying a hitherto much-loved song.

Cat Stevens: Well I think it’s fine, building jumbo planes.

Or so he says... But I detect a definite trace of irony in his tone, betraying an attitude to building jumbo planes which is ambivalent at best.

Stevens will undoubtedly seek cover behind the sanctity of artistic creativity or his flaky search for ‘deeper truth’, but I’ve become convinced his words are evidence of something darker, indeed uglier.

Yes, get what you want to if you want, ’cause you can get anything.

More irony, obviously. So, just exactly what is wrong with “getting what you want”, huh? The unprecedented abundance of affordable consumer goods is one of the triumphs of the world market economy.

It’s so typical of the nouveau-mega-riche such as Stevens to want to deny the rest of us those very basics he’s able to buy for himself with the loose change in his pockets. While pretending to champion the poor, it seems he couldn’t care less — if he doesn’t actually hate them.

Well you roll on roads over fresh green grass.

A hatred of development and economic progress also seems a recurring theme in much of Stevens’ work. This kind of thing is so typical of leftist romantic hankering for ‘nature’ in some kind of pristine, Arcadian state, which has never existed and will never exist.

And anyway, for heavens sake, development is not a zero sum game.

But they just go on and on, and it seems that you can’t get off.

Roads go on for precisely as long as they need to, no more, no less. If his chauffeur can’t read a map, then Stevens probably ought to review his HR training requirements. But all this empty carping against healthy progress is just beyond silly, moving into paranoid territory.

But will you keep on building higher ’til there’s no more room up there?

Of course, I knew it — another Club of Rome ‘Limits to Growth’ henny-penny doomsayer.

Stevens hates growth, hates development, and hates the poor plebs who enrich him and feather his nest buying his intellectually and morally bankrupt recordings. I’m willing to bet he also hates the very idea of the poorer people of emerging economies achieving the development and growth they need and deserve.

But tell me, where do the children play?

Helloooo — earth calling Stevens!

There are, and will continue to be, ample designated children’s play areas wherever and for as long as they are viable. These will be determined by the market, which is the best mechanism yet known for the guidance and management of human affairs. The market, indeed, is a far superior alternative to the fatally flawed, utterly discredited, dead hand of human moral agency, for which Stevens seems so nostalgic.

The typical modern designated children’s play area is better, safer, brighter and more cognitively stimulating than any children’s play area previously known in human history. These will improve continuously for the long-term foreseeable future, if not in perpetuity.

The better-balanced and better-informed children who’ll reap the benefit of all this progress and prosperity will not be gulled by whining haters such as Stevens, who’ll ultimately stand condemned for opposing the unerring march of the market towards prosperity for all.

I hope he’s ashamed of himself, but sadly I doubt it. Oh, and by the way, the tune stinks too.