Thinking is not just a private act – it shapes the world we live in. Right now, powerful voices are framing our politics with paranoia:
-
War paranoia – pundits talk calmly about conflict with China.
-
Migration paranoia – a tiny minority problem inflamed into a crisis.
-
Fiscal paranoia – false fears about debt used to justify austerity.
These distortions threaten to distract us from the real crises: poverty, underfunded services, the housing shortage, and climate change.
But as Viktor Frankl once reminded us, we always retain the power to choose how we frame the world. The question is: will we give in to paranoia, or think differently?
This is the audio version:
This is the transcript:
I think.
That's not why I am, as Descartes might have said, but it is certainly what I do, pretty much to the exclusion of all else.
And thinking is a pretty time-consuming activity, which is why I don't and can't do other things, even though people often ask me to do so.
I am dedicated to thinking, and there's a good reason for that. I believe that thinking changes the world.
I was reminded of this when I was reading a Substack by a person called Aurelien, who is a political commentator who, for good reason, writes under a pseudonym, and I would strongly recommend his analysis. It's deep and thoughtful.
His suggestion in a very recent post was that we are facing an increasing climate of fear around the world. Not just fear, in fact, but fear, bellicosity and apocalyptic anticipation that has overtaken Western pundits and politicians. Mix this, he says, with pundits talking quite calmly about a war with China, and we are dangerously close to suffering a war psychosis.
In other words, thinking about war can itself change the world by changing the prospect of war. The idea, in that case, that our thoughts and actions are independent of each other, is quite absurd. They're not. They can't be, and they never will be. And that's why thinking matters.
Now, throw in another form of distorted thinking, and that is the paranoia about migrants into the UK. Maybe half the UK population at present thinks that migrants are the biggest problem that we face, when in reality, just over 10,000 people a year attempt to enter the UK without any entitlement to do so, and most of them are returned.
The fact is, majority opinion is being inflamed by a tiny minority problem, at huge cost to everyone now because this paranoia - and that is what it is properly described as - is distorting everything about our politics.
And then there's something else to mention, and that is our fiscal paranoia because we are supposedly facing a fiscal crisis. If you look at the heavyweight newspapers, like the Financial Times, they're saying that we are in trouble as a country, interest rates are rising, the government may have unsustainable debt, and we are going to, therefore, go to hell in a handcart. Not quite the phrase they use, but that's what they imply.
And the fact is that all of that is complete and utter nonsense. The only reason why the UK is in trouble is because Rachel Reeves has, wholly inappropriately, adopted a fiscal rule that she now cannot meet, and which was always glaringly obviously going to be unachievable. City thinking is, however, being totally distorted by this.
But the fact is that the resulting cost of their paranoia is going to be enormous if they feed that back into the thinking of Rachel Reeves, who does, as a consequence, deliver austerity by cutting the spending on public services that the City is now demanding.
Thinking can be dangerous if it's wrong. And that's my point.
What we are seeing here is the power of thinking. And the power of thinking can be a force for good, and it can create harm.
When it creates collective paranoia, the danger of real harm to society is very high. And that's what we're seeing right now.
War paranoia.
Migration paranoia.
Fiscal paranoia.
All of these are significant distractions from the real issues that we face.
People going without because of poverty.
Services being underfunded.
Children being denied the education that they need.
Climate change being ignored.
Houses not being built.
And all of that is happening because powerful people are framing the political issues of the day inappropriately, with their ability to frame the world in their way of thinking.
We need to be reminded of somebody called Viktor Frankl. He was an Austrian Holocaust survivor. As he put it, the last thing we ever have is our inalienable right to determine how we view the world. He used this to literally survive Nazi camps, out of which he came as a survivor.
We have the choice to decide how we frame things, he said.
We can succumb, or we can choose to survive.
We can choose evil, and we can choose good.
We have the right and the power to think.
We do, as a consequence, have the power to frame the way we look at the world.
This is not the moment to give up on that power.
We do not need to think that war is inevitable.
We do not need to victimise migrants.
We do not need to believe austerity is required.
We can frame the world differently.
That, as Viktor Frankl said, is our right, our choice, and as I would suggest, our duty.
We have to fight back against negative thinking. And if we do, we can win against the forces that are lining up against us and which threaten us all.
Taking further action
If you want to write a letter to your MP on the issues raised in this blog post, there is a ChatGPT prompt to assist you in doing so, with full instructions, here.
One word of warning, though: please ensure you have the correct MP. ChatGPT can get it wrong.
Comments
When commenting, please take note of this blog's comment policy, which is available here. Contravening this policy will result in comments being deleted before or after initial publication at the editor's sole discretion and without explanation being required or offered.
Thanks for reading this post.
You can share this post on social media of your choice by clicking these icons:
There are links to this blog's glossary in the above post that explain technical terms used in it. Follow them for more explanations.
You can subscribe to this blog's daily email here.
And if you would like to support this blog you can, here:
Buy me a coffee!
I agree 100%.
In terms of “powerful people are framing the political issues of the day inappropriately, with their ability to frame the world in their way of thinking”
I strongly recommend “Byline Times” Sept’ issue – much of it is about framing by those that oppose democracy.
To oppose them, we need framing that means something to citizens. Not “too many immgrunts”… but “better NHS”, “better transport”, etc etc.
Noted
Much of this stems from the fear of those holding wealth and privilege now that their positions are under threat. They have good reason to fear, because climate-ecological breakdown does imply radical change to our lifestyles and economies – one way or the other. Their response to this is to distract – to focus on immigration, trans people, or any one of many ‘culture war’ non-issues that stop us thinking and talking about real economic problems like their own over-consumption, media ownership and nefarious political lobbying.
The problem for the political left – indeed for any rational person – is that we can’t take away their fear; indeed, the more we draw attention to the facts, and their logical implications, the more we push them to extremes.
So, we have to address the cause of their fears.
That is a politics of care.
Currently hate is selling very well. It’s origins are of course hate/resentment or rather failure to recognise we always as a species need to balance our individual needs against others. Sadly religion which is a belief system in such balancing is being used once again to pursue the opposite!
“Perceived wisdom” includes widely held beliefs or ideas that are commonly accepted as true, even if they may not be factually accurate or proven by evidence.
We can all think of examples, beliefs that are actually untrue:
❌Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.
❌There is no such thing as government money, only taxpayers’ money
❌Fruit juice is healthy
We can partly blame John D. Rockefeller and his General Education Board as a vehicle for promoting pharmaceuticals (derived from oil), and ensuring that wealth moved towards the wealthy.
Source: The Dark Truth of the Educational System Shaped by John D. Rockefeller
https://medium.com/@sofialherani/the-dark-truth-of-the-educational-system-shaped-by-john-d-rockefeller-77bf1b0167dd
I agree on all three of those claims – they are all false
Almost half the population think there are more ‘illegal’ immigrants here than ‘legal’. Large numbers are in favour of mass deportations.
What does that say about our media? What does it say about our politicians?
We need a much better media and politicians.
See the poll
https://yougov.co.uk/politics/articles/52704-is-there-public-support-for-large-scale-removals-of-migrants
I will look at and think about this data.
As you say, we need a better media.
Again I recommend the book “Minority Rule “ by Ash Sarkar, especially the brilliant chapter 5.
She charts the right wing commentariat as loathing the working class in general , the benefit thieves, the feckless Chavs of Little Britain etc …. Until 2011 when it all changed and suddenly they saw the working class of all ethnicities coming together against austerity ; at that point , to deflect from the deprivations of that austerity a new “enemy” was needed to blame . And so suddenly the immigrants, the “others” rose to the fore to take the blame, and swiftly the White Working Class become the downtrodden heroes of the day.
The old trick of Divide and Rule. We do indeed need a better media.
Very apt post Richard.
But who controls/influences our thoughts?
We are indeed being groomed for war, groomed for poverty, groomed for Farage.. BBC is part of the propaganda machine grooming us.
Its just as much about what they say/report and what they don’t. The speech in Whitehall by a foreign oligarch called for the overthrow of our elected government before the next election.
The BBC just said Musk ‘addressed’ the ‘Tommy Robinson’ gathering. No journalistic interest in what he said whatsoever. Wasn’t this incitement to insurrection?
They also said ‘between 100,000 and 160,000 ‘ were on the demo – which is probably somewhat less than all the many Gaza demonstrations over the last few years – which the BBC often doesn’t mention at all. And even when they do, they never suggest how many attend the Gaza demos. They never mention number or numbers , neither ‘thousands’ ,’tens of thousands’ or ‘hundreds of thousands’. But surprise surprise, the BBC did it for Tommy Robinson
Much to agree with – and most especially, how come they noticed this and not all the enormous Gaza demonstrations of late about whuich there was never a murmur from the MSM?
And it’s about time the BBC and the Guardian call him by his name, Stephen Yaxley-Lennon. Yet today the Guardian still indulges the Tommy Robinson moniker in their headlines, only mentioning his real name in the text. Do they not understand why that matters?
Thinking…………
Too often people don’t want thinking, they just want action. Impatience rules. And then when things go wrong they can make themselves look indispensable.
My father used to remind me that as an individual i must take a major part of the blame for the situation I find myself in at any moment. I am officially elderly but so what does that stop me doing things or thinking? No. Most of the population believing that migrants are the UK problem need to stop and think how is it there problem. The NHS and other welfare services were under stress before Brexit due to austerity measures that have contributed to our present situation.
Keep thinking Richard.
An example of scaring mongering in the Sunday Times “Nobody wants a bond crisis but it may be the safest way to wake us up”. Why? According to the article to wake up the threat from Russia/China/North Korea.
Utter garbage.
Total bulls**t.
Are these people stupid?
Niot least because a Keynes proved, the threat will be beaten with bonds.
The control process in the BBC slips occasionally.
Friday (or Thursday) night, at the Proms, Israeli conductor Ilan Volkov slipped the BBC leash, live on TV.
Link available at The Canary with some video
I can’t find it on iPlayer and I haven’t got a recording. It may quietly disappear
Transcript:
https://blog.thoroughlygood.me/2025/09/12/bbc-scottish-symphony-orchestra-principal-conductor-ilan-volkov-speaks-out-at-the-bbc-proms/
Here’s how the Jewish News reported it – https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/israeli-conductor-condemns-his-country-in-extraordinary-proms-outburst/
Very good, although I was blocked from Jewish news
This is a good thinker that I think readers of this blog will appreciate: Richard David Hames: https://open.substack.com/pub/richarddavidhames and https://www.facebook.com/share/1CGiqtK24v/
I have subscribed to take a view.
Yes, dangerous thinking arises from incomplete/false information.
It is very easy to lose sight of the fact that all thinking springs from memory, knowledge and conditioning, which are always limited. Thinking can be especially dangerous when we turn our conclusions reached through thought into fixed beliefs.
Epistemological humility is the recognition that our understanding of the world is limited and shaped by our beliefs and experiences. It involves accepting that there are many things we do not know and being open to different perspectives and ideas.
As Fernando Pessoa wrote, we can never know all the factors involved in an issue and so we can never completely resolve it. To reach the truth we lack both the necessary facts and the intellectual processes needed to exhaust all possible interpretations of those facts.
Agreed