Marxist tendencies
10 January 2015
I don’t want to belong to any club that will accept people like me as a member. (Groucho Marx 1890 – 1977)
Put a group of yotties, especially British yotties, together anywhere and they will find some excuse to form a club, association or interest / activity group. They then spend an inordinate amount of time drawing up a ludicrously complex set of rules, the primary purpose of which appears to be to prevent as many people as possible from joining.
Actually it is unfair to single out yotties here, for what we are describing is a universal human characteristic, although far more pronounced in those who possess a Y chromosome. Golf clubs are prime examples, given as they are to fighting a valiant rearguard action to continue excluding the 52% of the population who are unencumbered by said chromosome. Though why anyone, irrespective of sex or sexual orientation, should want to join a golf club remains outside my comprehension.
I suspect that the root of this behaviour is the perceived need for a sense of exclusivity, the feeling that by being a member of this particular group one is in some way special. What's the point of joining a club if the world and his dog are members?
So the next stage is to undergo a series of schisms, splitting into smaller and smaller subsects, a bit like the Church of Scotland (see caption shot for diagram of schisms) or almost any Revolutionary Popular Liberation Movement "If there's one thing I hate more than The Judean People's Front it's the People's Front of Judea". This process continues until the original club eventually consists of 47 distinct units, each comprising a maximum of three individuals, with all units constantly at each others' throats.
I was going to extend this analysis to Islam but:
a) I'm too much of a coward,
b) I always thought Sunni & Shia recorded 'I got you, Babe', and
c) It's too complicated. The Church of Scotland ended up with a mere nine sects. With Islam I lost count (and the will to live) at twenty.
We had our first contact with this phenomenon within minutes of arriving at Lagos, our first wintering stop. We were still tidying the mooring lines when up to the boat marched an unusually neatly attired yottie. He was wearing immaculately pressed chinos, a blindingly white polo shirt and he was carrying a clipboard.
"I say," he said in slightly plummy, clipped tones "Would you like to sign this petition?"
I waited, expecting a further explanation of the purpose of the petition. None was forthcoming.
"I don't know" I said, eventually, "What's it about?"
This rather flummoxed him, as if it were a totally novel concept that someone should actually want to have the origins, purpose and target of a petition explained to him before putting his name to it. After an awkward silence, his powers of speech returned.
"Oh, er, yes, well. It's to the marina management. We want them to make the singer in that bar up there turn his volume down. Or preferably stop altogether. Will you sign it?"
"That's a bit difficult." I said. "We've only just arrived and I've never heard him. He might be quite good and play at a restrained volume."
"Oh no - that's not the case at all. He's very loud and coarse. Goes on until the early hours of the morning. Gets drunk and sings Irish songs, you know the sort of thing".
I assured him that I didn't know the sort of thing, that we had not had an opportunity to judge for ourselves and it would be somewhat unfair to put someone's livelihood at risk on the basis of hearsay. This took him aback somewhat. He looked at us quizzically and suspiciously as if we'd got into the marina, and indeed yachting in general, under false pretences.
"Can't you just sign it anyway?"
"Sorry, no."
"What about your wife then?"
"What do you think?"
He gave me the sort of look that suggested he was memorising my face and boat name so he could be sure he blackballed me if I ever had the effrontery to attempt to join any club that he had any say in. Then he turned on his heel and walked off without a further word.
It wasn't long before we were approached by a representative of the opposing camp, who suggested we frequent the bar in question, if only for no other reason than to cock a snook at the 'poncy tossers organising the petition'. We had some sympathy with his overtures.
Thus were we introduced to the dubious delights of what is known throughout the yachting community as 'Pontoon Politics'. It has reared its head at every place we have overwintered, although its severity has ranged from mere petty sniping and backbiting through organised campaigns of social ostracism and character assassination to covert sabotage and, in extremis, open warfare. Our current marina, Lefkas, is probably the least affected. Mind you, I have to say that or they'll all start picking on me and I'll be kicked out of the embroidery group.
Any difference of opinion or belief; any lapse in manners or behaviour, however minor; any perceived slight, real or imagined, will serve as the trigger to initiate a schism and the establishment of yet another sect. At the same time any new arrival is assiduously courted by representatives of all the established groups, eager to assert their numerical superiority over their rivals. The problem is, of course, that success in this area directly compromises the purity of the original group and so provokes yet another secession.
So it goes on. Groundhog day follows groundhog day follows groundhog day until there are so many overlapping groups that to fully describe the situation would require a three-dimensional Venn diagram of such fiendish complexity that even Stephen Hawking's mighty prefrontal cortex would start dribbling out of his nostrils should he be rash enough to attempt its construction.
Nevertheless, a valiant, but probably futile, attempt to describe this phenomenon in detail will be made in the next, stupor-inducing, episode of 'Marxist Tendencies'.
Oh - and by the way, the Poncey Tossers were right about the singer.