Category Archives: Politics and sociology

Understanding Putin

Posted on 07/05/2022 by Jon Garvey

An old university friend who also follows The Hump wrote to ask me about the sources I use most on the Ukraine conflict, and shared some of his own with me. Among them is Postil Magazine which carries some weighty and worthwhile articles. One which I highly recommend is this one by Etienne de Floirac, giving a deep insight into the political (and irreducibly religious) basis of Vladimir Putin’s vision for Russia. It confirms what I had suspected since the start of this war, that to see Russia’s role apart from its spiritual aspect is an almost universal error in the West. To what extent that neglect is deliberate, and … Continue reading →

Posted in Philosophy, Politics and sociology, Theology | 1 Comment

Nothing to see in Canada…

Posted on 03/05/2022 by Jon Garvey

Since the news is hot, I may as well comment on it, knowing in particular that I have some Canadian readers who are unlikely to get it on CBC.

Posted in History, Politics and sociology, Theology | 2 Comments

Powerful ju-ju 2022

Posted on 02/05/2022 by Jon Garvey

The confusion of paganism – especially if not regulated by a highly formulated priestly cult – lay partly in that one was never really sure why anything happened, and so predicting what would happen seemed a fruitless pursuit. Some god might start something going in nature or human experience, only to have it overturned by the caprice of a jilted goddess, or modified by a maledictive curse from some neighbour. The best explanations for the inexplicable became arbitrary stories from magical thinking.

Posted in Politics and sociology, Science, Theology | 2 Comments

Exit strategies are double-plus ungood

Posted on 30/04/2022 by Jon Garvey

Early on in COVID, when my church’s leadership was enthusiastically following the government impositions on meeting, distancing, masks, etc, and the Baptist Union guidelines even sought to out-do those restrictions, I became notorious in meetings for asking, “What is our exit strategy?”

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That’s the way the money goes

Posted on 29/04/2022 by Jon Garvey

Britain has been in financial trouble since fighting two World Wars, of course, but it did manage finally to pay off its US war debt in 2016. [Correction – 2006: only 60 years rather than 70!]

Posted in History, Politics and sociology | Leave a comment

Essential misinformation

Posted on 28/04/2022 by Jon Garvey

It’s got to the stage when the GMC’s current move to get doctors struck of the medical register for “peddling misinformation” on social media is just another run of the mill event, rather than registering on our minds as the atrocity it actually is. I guess it’s like the Soviet Union in the 1930s, when the show trial of yet another revered government leader discovered to be a capitalist spy must have become routine. You took it for granted that most of your heroes were really traitors, and could only rely on Comrade Stalin.

Posted in Philosophy, Politics and sociology | Leave a comment

Grass roots and Astroturfs

Posted on 21/04/2022 by Jon Garvey

Amid the COVID insanity of 2020, you’ll remember, was the additional collective insanity of Black Lives Matter, exporting mass-action over here from a single unfortunate incident in the US, resulting in demolished statues, near-riots, and all the great and good of church, state and media coming out in solidarity. When the Marxist/anarchist roots of the organisation came to light, those insitutions bewailed how the movement had been “taken over” by activists, failing to notice that activists had started the movement to enlist the uncritical masses, and how closely its campaigns coincided with US elections.

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The world of stupid

Posted on 20/04/2022 by Jon Garvey

So the Russians offered a safe passage for Azov fighters holed up in the Azovstol Steelworks in Mariupol, including even the foreign fighters who, on Russian estimation at least, are technically mercenaries not covered by the Geneva Convention.

Posted in Politics and sociology, Theology | 1 Comment

Daily Skeptic gets the Hump

Posted on 20/04/2022 by Jon Garvey

Just a heads up that the above on-line publication commissioned an article from me on the state of British General Practice. It’s here.

Posted in History, Politics and sociology | 2 Comments

British unexceptionalism

Posted on 18/04/2022 by Jon Garvey

Just as COVID threw into sharp relief the capture of of our institutions by dark forces, acting as confirmation to those of us who had suspected we were being led into serfdom through propaganda, so the Ukraine war has clarified to what extent the mythos of the American military-industrial complex trying to impose its hegemony over the whole world is, in fact, sober truth.

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