The era of hysteria! Historian DOMINIC SANDBROOK says Britain has become a nation of overgrown toddlers with a bigoted mob mentality, intolerance and a raging sense of grievance at every slight

What was the defining image of 2017? Theresa May, standing grim-faced outside No. 10 the day after the General Election? Young revellers cheering Jeremy Corbyn at the Glastonbury music festival? The blackened ruins of Grenfell Tower, or the horror at the Manchester Arena?

My choice would be rather less specific. When I look back on a year of remarkably grim and gloomy headlines, the image that swims into my mind is that of an overgrown toddler hunched over a keyboard, its face contorted with outrage.

And no, I’m not just talking about Donald Trump, with his lamentable penchant for sending inflammatory tweets in the early hours of the morning. I’m talking about the ugly new face of Britain, a nation that in the past 12 months has seemed in danger of losing touch with sanity, perspective and rational judgment.

Historians will surely remember this as the year that delivered one of the biggest political surprises in modern history, with Mrs May losing her Commons majority as her great election gamble backfired.

They will be struck, too, by the stunning transformation in Jeremy Corbyn’s image, which saw him converted from deluded loser to potential Prime Minister in a matter of weeks.

For me, though, what defined Britain in 2017 more than anything else was a growing sense of hysteria.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines hysteria as ‘exaggerated or uncontrollable emotion or excitement’. And I think those words perfectly capture the increasingly self-righteous, strident and intolerant tone of our public life.

You see it in the hard-Left demagogues who sought to exploit the tragedy of Grenfell Tower for political gain — among them, unforgivably, the leaders of the Labour Party.

You see it in the self-styled intellectuals who cannot forgive their working-class compatriots for daring to vote Leave in the Brexit referendum.



Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-5222215/Dominic-Sandbrook-Britain-nation-toddlers.html#ixzz52iwM6tBr
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I'm in full agreement with that post by Didge, we are breeding a Nation of ?...........put your own words in !

Its a good article ...and it points out a lot of truth about how this country is being turned into a Stepford country, where no one dare have an opposite opinion to the ones who shout the loudest and longest.

The internet is once more to blame in part...any imagined public slight can be voiced or recorded for millions to comment on, what would have been laughed at or ignored in the past now makes front page news ....it is a form of mass hysteria, and it does control many peoples lives.

Until we recognise that we are all, particularly in the western world, brainwashed into being little rats within a wheel, nothing will change ever.

Didge wrote:What was the defining image of 2017? Theresa May, standing grim-faced outside No. 10 the day after the General Election? Young revellers cheering Jeremy Corbyn at the Glastonbury music festival? The blackened ruins of Grenfell Tower, or the horror at the Manchester Arena?

My choice would be rather less specific. When I look back on a year of remarkably grim and gloomy headlines, the image that swims into my mind is that of an overgrown toddler hunched over a keyboard, its face contorted with outrage.

And no, I’m not just talking about Donald Trump, with his lamentable penchant for sending inflammatory tweets in the early hours of the morning. I’m talking about the ugly new face of Britain, a nation that in the past 12 months has seemed in danger of losing touch with sanity, perspective and rational judgment.

Historians will surely remember this as the year that delivered one of the biggest political surprises in modern history, with Mrs May losing her Commons majority as her great election gamble backfired.

They will be struck, too, by the stunning transformation in Jeremy Corbyn’s image, which saw him converted from deluded loser to potential Prime Minister in a matter of weeks.

For me, though, what defined Britain in 2017 more than anything else was a growing sense of hysteria.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines hysteria as ‘exaggerated or uncontrollable emotion or excitement’. And I think those words perfectly capture the increasingly self-righteous, strident and intolerant tone of our public life.

You see it in the hard-Left demagogues who sought to exploit the tragedy of Grenfell Tower for political gain — among them, unforgivably, the leaders of the Labour Party.

You see it in the self-styled intellectuals who cannot forgive their working-class compatriots for daring to vote Leave in the Brexit referendum.



Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-5222215/Dominic-Sandbrook-Britain-nation-toddlers.html#ixzz52iwM6tBr
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

Spot on. Especially the last two paragraphs

At least the peasants revolted when it came to Brexit......maybe all is not lost.