Doug Jewell

Doug Jewell was born in 1972, lives somewhere by the water in Bristol and studied English at Bath Spa University. He has written occasional articles for serious publications but prefers to write light-hearted stories about animals. He has a thing about brunette women, Dalmatians and his favourite word is 'Oops!'

Premature Emancipation

With at least a month to spare before I was due to reconvene life in the real world, the first day of my bummer holiday began sat at my computer founding a new force in British politics. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you: The Apathy Party. Slogan: Dare to be indifferent. What do we want? Nothing in particular. When do we want it? Whenever, and there's no rush. To garner support for my new party I printed up a thousand flyers spelling out my doctrines and took to handing them out to passers-by in the street. This isn't as easy as you'd think. People still reject you by not taking the single sheet of A4. Not everyone though. Occasionally you get someone who thinks you're being serious and stops for a chat. "This bit here about the convergence thesis?"

"Yes?"

"You seem to be saying that if you get into power you will fund research into remote control lawn mowers."

"That's right."

"The convergence thesis is the name given to the argument formally developed in the fifties that Socialist and Capitalist societies would inexorably grow more and more alike. The basic premise is that planning is paramount in modern societies, and that all forms of planning and administrative control are, whatever their supposed ideological complexion, essentially the same. It's got nothing to do with remote control lawn mowers."

"Is that so?"

"It is actually. And another thing, Khrushchev was not famous for inventing the Rubik's Cube."

"Don't be such a Silly-Billy. You'll be telling me next Karl Marx didn't have a huge hit record with 'Hazard'"