The ‘stick to your knitting’ down fall of another hectoring
politician has an important message. Far more than what Marx described as history repeating itself as tragedy
and then comedy, what we face is the ‘blind spot’ of a humanity unable to
recognise itself in the drama.
My thesis is this: the issues that ‘civil society’ are
engaged with are all ‘canaries in the mine’ that point back to a source of
poison gas within ourselves. If we could
deal with the gas in the mine, the canary wouldn’t keep suffering. And young
people are our biggest canary, most reflective of the chaos by which humans
fail to love, communicate with and bring out the best in each other – whether in
families, organisations, or communities.
If I look back on my working life, at least a third of it
has been spent trying to solve inter-relationships that have got in the way of
offering effective services to people.
And if I look across the charity sector, I see organisations that are
hosts to so many human dramas, within a tragi-comedy where charities are competing
against or trying to work with other organisations with the same character
flaws. All in the name of a charitable mission that is lost under the Game of
Thrones battle for sustainable funding and ‘recognition’.
The HR, change management, partnership, governance, funding,
and workforce development approaches we use to shape our civil society are all unfit
for the position we are in. None of them come from a position of how to love
and work with each other in a shared community of purpose. They are rational systems, but the human
emotions we are dealing with defy their logic. What we face are the paisley pyjama
bottoms of fallibility.
When Newmark said stick to the knitting; when Major famously
talked about back to basics; both unintentionally touched on a deeper truth:
that the knitting and basics are the messy human flaws and vulnerabilities we
like to blame others for – problem families, feral youth, etc – but are best
personified in the everyday actions of ourselves. I wouldn’t like to imagine what
pyjamas the cabinet and its shadow wear each night, let alone who paid for them. The point is that it’s irrational for us to believe
that we are led by saints whose only intent is to serve. Just as it is
irrational for those in power to criminalise others for being in positions of
poverty.
In my experience, charities deal with the faulty ‘knitting’ of
family systems, politicians, social class and gender structures, and personal
conflicts between ourselves, that have ‘stuck’ various people with intolerable challenges. We must to get back to that fact. The laws, values and habits that define the
knitting patterns of our society and ego all need urgent renewal. If pyjama politicians, sting-obsessed
journalists and funding-obsessed charity leaders are not up to that task, then it’s
time for someone else to take a lead. Who wants to shape a different tribe? I so dearly do...
