Oh to be stupid in contemporary Ireland –but to be thick would be very heaven!

 Were I stupid I wouldn’t realise how much I am being fucked up on a daily basis.

 I would swallow unquestioningly all the crap I heard. I would believe that those with better jobs – or in my case any job – were inherently better than me, cleverer, more intelligent, more able all round.

 I would believe that those governing me did so always with my best interests at heart, and that even when they were forced to take tough decisions they did so motivated by my well-being. They were far cleverer than little me, and most of them had degrees, which is something to do with universities.

 I would also hold it as an article of faith (well because I’m stupid I wouldn’t know what an article of faith was) that those given the tasks of enforcing government policy carried out their tasks selflessly yet courteously in even the most trying conditions. In turn they were also much more intelligent (maybe a little cleverer than the politicians but they never let on), so that when they said that black was white I could not contradict them – which I wouldn’t do anyway because I probably wouldn’t know what contradict meant.  

 But because the good Lord above saw fit to give me average intelligence and understanding of the world around me I must wear a veritable crown of thorny unhappiness. For I can see too well that many of those with jobs are often much stupider, or they do stupid things, and are bound by equally stupid rules. What’s more they often owe their jobs to their relationships to local politicians or to their family’s membership of certain political parties.

 I see so well that those who govern me (as well as many of those who would like to govern me) are a pack of dissembling, dishonest liars, motivated by a desire to enrich themselves, their families and cronies; who every so often indulge in a perverse pantomime of seeking my vote so that they can continue their larceny. They count amongst their raks a fair share of drunkards and drug addicts, and they participate in a a system which,m both at national and especially local level is veal and corrupt.

 And I observe impotently that those who work for the government are a group of retards, with intellects the size of petits pois (and personalities to match), who are motivated by nothing except craven self-preservation and awesome disregard of their fellow men and women.

 The first president of Equatorial Guinea, Francisco Macias Nguema (about whom I have written elsewhere), once outlawed unhappiness in his country and made it a mandatory duty to be happy.

 If I were stupid I’d be happy and content. Come on swine ‘flu.