Politics For Dummies

I was pleasantly surprised this morning to hear a couple of young men debating politics on the back of the bus. They usually just smoke weed and compete to squeeze as many swearwords into their speech as possible.

The men were dressed in scruffy work clothes, and were obviously labourers of some sort. They were discussing the Madrid bombings as I got on the bus, and seemed quite well versed in the history of the ETA and Spanish politics in general. One of them mentioned that he had lived in Bilbao for a year. It's always good to hear unlikely looking people talikng about politics. I tend to be of the up-my-own-arse opinion that working class people don't care about politics, so it's nice to see my stereotypes shattered occasionally.

But no. No, no, no. I got it all wrong. They weren't debating politics, but planning an all-white Britain and a carpet-bombed Middle East. 'When the BNP get elected we'll all start speaking our minds more.' 'We should shut the gates and keep all the (insert name of race here) out.' 'I don't understand why we can't just load up with nukes and flatten Iraq. Men, women and kids, they're not even human anyway.' Yeah, that style of thing.

I don't think I've ever heard a guy with such a tenuous grasp on reality. It was hilarious, but also worrying to see his friend nodding in agreement. It was all I could do not to turn around and laugh in his face.

Anyway, the moral of the story is that stupid people shouldn't voice their opinions. They should sit quietly in the corner until I give them their instructions.