95 And Not Dead Yet: Yessir, This Time It IS The End

by Reg Green (February 2024)

Are things really that perilous? Every news commentator seems to think so. But didn’t they always think that way? As Noel Coward lamented back in the 1950s:

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They’re morbid in Mongolia
And querulous in Quebec,
There’s not a man
In Balochistan
Who isn’t a nervous wreck.

–

Continuing to probe the world’s woes, he found

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They’re sullen in Siberia
And timid in Turkestan,
They’re sick with fright
In the Isle of Wight
And jittery in Japan.

–

Even that wasn’t the half of it.

–

They’re nervous in Nigeria
And terribly cross in Crete,
In Bucharest
They are so depressed
They’re frightened to cross the street.

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And so on.

There’s a lesson here. Every year since humans started thinking about the future they could convince themselves that their world was tottering to its end. But we’re still here, aren’t we?

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