cambalache (Photo credit: Ignacio Conejo)
There is an old tango called “Cambalache”, in which Enrique Santos Discépolo alludes and vehemently condemns the deep moral relaxation of the XX Century.
Today it happens it is the same
to be decent or a traitor!
To be an ignorant, a genius, a pickpocket,
a generous person or a swindler!
All is the same! Nothing is better!
They are the same, an idiot ass
and a great professor!
There are no failing grades or merit valuations,
the immoral have caught up with us.
If one lives in a pose
and another, in his ambition, steals,
it’s the same if it’s a priest,
a mattress maker, a king of clubs,
a cad or a tramp.
Seventy eight years later, Mr. John Ward from The Slog writes this generation’s answer to “Cambalache”, a tango in English prose which I prefer to call “The Swap”:
Politicians no longer dictate policy, they take orders;
they no longer take soundings –
and if they do, such soundings are suppressed when ‘off-message’.
Public servants see us as working for them in general,
and their pensions in particular.
Lawyers no longer provide equality before the law to the poor,
they protect the rich from the consequences of equality before the law.
Bankers no longer finance capitalism,
they starve entrepreneurs and underwrite monopolism.
GPs don’t have a calling any more,
they have a business model and some targets.
Policemen only rarely solve crimes:
their new job (as they see it) is being a cross
between an amateur social worker and a tax collector.
Teachers see themselves as promoters of socio-political conformity
rather than individual responsibility and unconventionality.
The Foreign Office sees itself
not as the vanguard of British interests and values,
but the seeker after a quiet life.
Judges no longer protect human rights,
they defend the cynical exploitation of human rights legislation.
Climate change debaters no longer see themselves as seeking the truth,
they see their job as trashing the other side.
Parents more often see their children as a conduit for their own egos,
rather than small bundles of indiscipline and appetite who need to be socialised.
Mr. Ward alludes and vehemently condemns the deep intellectual relaxation (i.e., STUPIDITY) of the XXI Century.
Related articles
- Tangos are deeply philosophical – no matter the idiom (paulmarsic.wordpress.com)
- Foreign Office Alters Tokyo Advice (confused.com)
Yes, tangos are philosophical. An entire history of the twentieth century could be written using the lyrics of tangos.