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The Forum > Article Comments > Town and country > Comments

Town and country : Comments

By Georgina Hibberd, published 5/1/2007

After fleeing to the city as soon as she was old enough, the author returns on an extended visit to the rural beachside small town where she grew up ... Best Blogs 2006.

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It is no surprise, Georgina, that it took you 15 years to discover the Pax Rustica. It took me about the same time to understand that country kids are subjected to such a comprehensive barrage of metrocentric propaganda that they regard the acquisition of urbanity as a surrogate for enlightenment.

Urban culture goes to extraordinary lengths to keep hold of those minds that it has captured. The bush and bush life is routinely demonised and ridiculed in ways that, if applied to some other cultural minority, would have the discrimination commissioner baying for blood. And most pervasive of all is the regularly reinforced fear that, having left the city, some sort of intellectual fall from grace would take place that would prevent you from ever returning.

What you are discovering is the magic of place, free of the continuous connection that metrocentric living demands of it's subjects as the price of privacy. The city will not trust you to experience a time and place without first filtering the experience through ideology and collective interpretation. An experience can only be worthwhile if a crowd is experiencing it too.

Indeed, the very concept of privacy is alien to a small town in the same way that the capacity to reinvent one-self, at whim, is limited to those who enjoy urban anonymity.

So what you lose from being unable to be a street slut on Friday night, an artist on Sunday afternoon, and a working professional on Monday, you gain in honesty. You can still do much the same things under the Pax Rustica but these attributes will be recognised as parts of the whole person by both close friends and mere acqaintances.

But more likely, you will discard the need for conspicuous displays altogether. The true test, of course, will come on your return to the big babylon and finally recognise the facades that controlled your perceptions. Good luck with your journey.
Posted by Perseus, Friday, 5 January 2007 12:49:22 PM
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Hence the elevation of the status of animals by metrocentrics.

People are just too much work too irritating and time consuming whew, one even has to communicate with them. It is much easier to attribute the most desirable human traits to animals -- and they don't even ague about it, just pat them on the head and let them lick your face. Nirvana.
Posted by Cowboy Joe, Friday, 5 January 2007 2:33:59 PM
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