I was watching that Lennon/Yoko film at the weekend, and there were some scenes in which he participated in a protest march and they played “Power to the People” on the soundtrack. More on that subject below. More immediately, this weekend, there were also many news reports about the so-called Gilets Jaunes protests in France against increases in fuel tax.

Now.

I ought to be cheered that it is still possible, in these times, to mobilise people to a cause. Reports from our relatives in France confirm that even in the backwaters of the rural East, people have been out on the streets, blocking roads and causing disruption. Even my mother-in-law, who has to use a petrol station that will allow her to pay by cheque, had to adjust her ingrained habits.

But, of course, it’s the wrong fucking cause. Regardless of the rights and wrongs of Macron’s fiscal policies, fuel taxes should be higher, and people should be confronted with the reality of the need to change our patterns of consumption and get out of their cars. Just today at work, we were discussing attitudes to environmental causes, and I pointed out that the young people we teach are all too willing to make short and pointless car journeys in preference to walking. Faced with that kind of recalcitrance, the fact that people are politically moved by increased fuel prices and almost nothing else is just depressing.

I want to take those people by the scruffs of their gilets and give them a good shake. Maybe stick to the fucking 80kph speed limit occasionally and you’ll save fuel. Maybe stop driving home for lunch and back to work again.  Maybe get a bank/credit card so you don’t have to drive 20km so you can pay by cheque, mentioning no names.

And as for Lennon: one gets the strong impression that, like everything else he ever did, his protest march served (at least) a dual purpose: he had a single to promote.