Speaking at a Glastonbury Town Council meeting on 15-minute cities

A few days ago, a well intentioned, strongly law abiding, pillar of the community, Christian friend sent me a link to a 17-minute video titled: “Glastonbury Town Council meeting on 20-minute Neighbourhoods” and recommended that I watch it from 5 minutes in, as he thought (rightly) I would be interested.

It happens recently (45 days ago to be precise) I posted “Could Southend become a 15-minute city?” (Southend being my city and I know some of the people involved in the debate) and, besides what I have posted on a number of related matters raised in the video, I watched with interest. It also happens that regularly some righteously indignant friend raises a concern they feel could and should be addressed and asks that I sign a petition setting this out that will hopefully be brought to the attention of those who can do something about the concern or at the very least are made aware of the depth of feeling. Having been a community activist since soon after the turn of the millennium, being my main career before retiring, and feeling by getting involved in addressing some of the very social justice issues that get the woke brigade riled and well aware of the brainwashing that has occurred over the climate emergency that isn’t one (rather it is a ploy to dumb down some / many and then enslave all of humankind) I feel I have to an extent earned the right to speak out. Yet in more recent years, I have become disillusioned to such an extent that “I can’t be bothered wasting my time” and revert instead to type: “a grumpy old man”.

But back to my friend, I thanked him for the share, congratulated him for starting to wake up, and added the comment: “I was aware of this video but didn’t watch because a. I thought I understood the issues and b. information overload. This lady is a firecracker, is she not? and one who knows what she is talking about. Although some we may have to take with a pinch of salt else certain goody goody Christian leaders will call us out as a conspiracy theorist and send us to Coventry with a don’t touch warning if we get over-enthusiastic trying to wake others up with our bombshell knowledge. My point is we need to check out the facts, some of which is admittedly hard to do e.g. who are this cabal intent on screwing greater humanity where 15 minute cities are part of the great plan. One thing it does show is the power of grass roots engagement something those of us in the theologically sound brigade don’t do nearly enough of”. Having said that, I did watch the video. I’m glad I did and it got me excited and enthused.

The following is true if we are a Christian: our priority must be living lives pleasing to God and doing what we can to share with others the good news of the gospel. But on the other hand the Christian message is based on truth being paramount and loving our neighbor, so we can’t ignore these concerns or excuse ourselves from doing anything about them. Whether or not we are a Christian, there is a case to be made for speaking out based on doing our research and noting there may be a price to pay when we challenge the official narrative. I can’t speak for the lady in the video regarding her faith (or lack of) or whether everything she said is true (not so long ago many would have called her a conspiracy theorist and she would have been vilified if she couldn’t be shut up) but I am glad she did speak out because if not her then who and if none of us then we will be pitiful slaves, all because we failed to challenge the evil intents of the hidden hand “cabal” and their evil agenda to control humanity.