{Censure and Self-Sacrifice in Society}[5th January 1989]

[Redbook6:88-89)][19890105:1931]{Censure and Self-Sacrifice in Society}[5th January 1989]

.1931

Some time early last year, I think it was just before I stopped taking The Times, the TV listings carried a preview, and photo, of a man whose name I forget,* a property developer of dubious repute, who was building himself a mansion in the Home Counties on the proceeds of his ability by strong-arm methods to evict the **tenants of residential blocks he had bought for redevelopment.

It is hardly relevant whether the law was on his side or not, because quite clearly from his quoted statements he welcomed the chance to increase his reputation for unpleasantness to tenants, for obvious reasons; the television investigation was actually serving his purpose very well.

I don’t suppose anyone now alive can remember living in a society, in Britain anyway, where villains boasted nationally of their villainy in order to terrify the opposition, or where the villains were so strong – economically, institutionally – and their victims so weak.

*I should have kept the cutting, but it made me so angry that I threw it away.

**[probably legally secure, protected]

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