Something to be proud about...

Great! So we won second place in the medal tables in the Olympics beating China. It’s certainly pleasant to have something to feel good about in GB. We ‘beat’ all countries except the US of A, four times our size in terms of population. Sport entertains and engages so many people, I suppose that I should join in the congratulations.

Somehow though, it feels like a hollow victory. Will it buy us any real long term benefits? I doubt it. We will probably now enter into an arms-race with China to outdo each-other in the Tokyo Olympics. Is it too cynical to remember Juvenal’s quip about ‘Bread and circuses’ to keep the masses under control? We still have to face the awfulness that is our decision to leave the EU.

At the weekend I met an old work colleague; he proudly told me that he had voted to ‘leave’ in the referendum. Before I could stop myself, I called him a ‘bastard’. His revelation caught me short; the realization that sensible, ‘ordinary’ people that I had been friends with voted to leave... Yes, I’m bitter; no, it’s not sour grapes over the Olympics. I just wish that we, as a country, had done something about which we could all be really proud.