Throughout the lingering and tenure of Queen Elizabeth II, the sinuous journey thoroughly documented by generations of news media, and overanalyzed by delicately calibrated scientific instruments, the world witnessed a universal phase shift. This narrative does not involve the cauterization of fascism, visiting the lunar surface, or mapping the human genome, but rather a gravitation towards social diplomacy which began as a subtle and steady cultural movement, that in recent years has transformed into a virally reckless torrent.
While the Queen was born within the infantile stages of the nuclear age, she left this world tarnished by an introverted and insatiable lust for inconsequential snippets of data accessed anywhere and anytime to the convenience of the individual. With the gaping floodgates of information opened, the era of the smartphone was preceded by the adoption of political correctness and the adherence to the idea that all inequalities in life should be eliminated through policy, effectively abolishing free will. At the time of her death, the first world faces a crises sparked by ideology that threatens to terminate liberty, as the foreboding words of Ayn Rand are obscured by decades of dust accumulated through a disconcerting and oblivious storm. While her legacy will be celebrated by billions, the question remains despite the technological marvels of the last nine decades, is the world a better place today than it was the middle of the twentieth century? Orwell, aka Eric Blair, would be interested to know the answer as original thought and critical thinking skills have all but been eradicated in the dystopian environment of smart machines and sleek gadgetry which manufactures a template for conformity. How ironic, the endgame of efficient and cost-effective assembly lines is control, not of productivity, but of individual spirit.
With the younger generations transfixed by a digital dreamworld, and afraid of reality in the absence of zero consequences through actions taken through a softscreen, the future appears bleak, although weighing a possible fate against the unknowns in the universe is tantamount to delusion, one has to examine the concrete events that led to the disassembling of neo-colonialism. A more pertinent and blatant example was the Hong Kong debacle as the “99 year lease” of the colony was allowed to terminate under the watch of Elizabeth. While not viewed as a top-ten notable event of the century by historians, the irregular and arduous semi-transfer of power from the UK to China, was indicative of an unsettling trajectory veering towards sanctimony, and leaving practicality bound for intellectual purgatory.
As many of the colonists felt betrayed by both the Queen and Margaret Thatcher the impending doom of Beijing ransacking the remaining tenets of Capitalism over a 25 year period was a forgone conclusion. The facilitation of Deng’s “one country, two systems policy” was the first nail in the coffin for what was supposedly a specially designated economic zone, but has ended up as abomination of a social experiment with citizens now at the mercy of the Communist party, after common law was nullified by aggressive and repressive legislation drafted and approved by China’s central government. What was one a stunning pearl, has become a glorified prison of exploitation on a multitude of levels.
The unsettling fate of Hong Kong is a concrete example of totalitarianism was refined and perfected over the lifespan of Elizabeth, as elitist liberalism stemming from university campuses in both Great Britain and the US has indirectly embraced the will and goal of tyrants since the inception of the human rights movement. As the British empire was dissolved and radical apologists overcompensated the alleged suffering of native peoples by installing dictators to an already precarious hierarchy, those who had earned wealth and stability were left to chaos of the resulting mobs and incessant corruption.
In the wake of the Queen’s passage, society has devolved into one big toxic gossiping family where free speech can be hampered in real time on multiple continents by a digital consensus, and virtually every destination on the planet can be reached within a 24 hour time frame as vacationing is looked at as a hobby. As disinformation and urban myths afflict the collective conscience, the unfortunate residents of Hong Kong are marooned in an environment dominated by HD facial recognition cameras and caught in the shadows of a glorified police state are the true victims stemming from the indifference ingrained by victim culture. While billions of individuals waste the precious moments of life transfixed and elevated to an undeserved pedestal thanks to the curse of social media, the diminishing realists of the world population calmly reminisce about the simpler days where common sense was as prevalent as climbing trees and riding bicycles during lingering Summer days.
The pageantry and contrived grace of the royal court is not an indictment of the Queen in the geopolitical transmutation of the world, but rather her sobering presence as a cohesive force while fundamental freedoms were extinguished with a nod and a polite smile. The murder rate and violence is skyrocketing in London as a result of stringent anti-gun laws. While WWII was a victory for humankind, humanity has lost the culture war, as the Hong Kong model for submission is being subtly introduced into Northern Europe and percolating into North America through Canada. The chilling narrative of Hong Kong residents relying on a DIY smartphone app to avoid throngs of police and the possibility of forced labor camp in 2019 has been long forgotten, not to mention a large tech consortium removing the software from a downloadable platform.
Within the confines of the information age, where men cannot be men, women cannot be women, and pedophilia is referred to by progressives as “minor-attracted person”, the world has regressed over the last 96 years amid a stunning paradoxical technocracy, at least from a social and ideological sense, and it is only getting worse.