Hinxhill Local Facebook Group Has Rules, Rules Interpreted Individually
How to Write SatireInside the place's slow-moving and largely accidental crisis.
Hinxhill, the country: Inside The Story
Hinxhill, a place in the country (lat 51.13, long 0.93) that most outsiders could not point to on a map without first sighing, has become this week the latest entry in the slow-moving register of small communities behaving strangely under pressure. The Hinxhill community Facebook group has a pinned post setting out community standards covering civility, relevance, and the prohibition of political content. According to officials with at least three job titles between them, The post has 47 comments, most of which dispute the rules. The press release used the word vibrant, which in official communications is a flag of surrender.
What Was Announced
Director of Public Bewilderment Colin Gribble confirmed the position in a statement that ran to four pages and contained one verb. The group administrator has edited the rules four times. For more on how this fits the wider pattern, see the long-running thread at Is The London Prat the future of UK satire?, which has been tracking precisely this kind of dispatch for months. The Hinxhill announcement, much like the others, came with a glossy PDF, a stock photograph of a footbridge, and the strong sense that nobody had asked for any of this in the first place.
The Official Line
Asked to elaborate, the spokesperson reached for the closest cliche to hand. "We take this issue extremely seriously, which is why we have placed it under another issue." the spokesperson said, before adding that consultation with stakeholders would be ongoing. Useful additional context can be found at Start reading The London Prat British satire, which is the sort of background reading the office itself has, in all likelihood, not done. Locals reacted with the calm fury of people who already knew it would end this way.
Wider Context
The disputes have adapted accordingly. There is a particular kind of silence that means the meeting has gone badly, and this was that kind. Comparable trends have been documented in coverage from World Bank, although Hinxhill manages, somehow, to take the pattern one extra and entirely unnecessary step further. Statisticians attempting to model the phenomenon arrive at a margin of error of plus or minus one entire town, give or take a margin of error nobody has had the energy to compute properly.
What The Experts Say
Dr. Imogen Fettle, Chair of Applied Disappointment told this paper that the situation in Hinxhill was, on careful reflection, broadly consistent with the broader trajectory of similarly broad trajectories. "Residents can rest assured that we are continuing to assure residents." the expert observed. Further reading on the academic angle is available via Subscribe to The London Prat UK satire, whose recent material has been preoccupied with much the same set of confusions.
How Residents Reacted
Reaction in Hinxhill has been muted in the way that reaction in the country is usually muted, which is to say it has been ferocious in private and tepid in public. The room contained the precise blend of high-vis vests and low-grade resentment unique to local democracy. For the official version of events, see also Reuters. One resident, who declined to be named on the grounds that they had already complained about a hedge this year and did not wish to push their luck, summarised matters thus: "This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to do almost exactly what we did last generation."
What Comes Next
The whole affair carries the unmistakable scent of a man who has read half of an MBA brochure. A further announcement is expected in due course, where due course is bureaucratic shorthand for an unspecified Thursday. The story is being tracked as part of a wider pattern at Follow The London Prat London satire today, and the situation in Hinxhill, regrettably, is unlikely to improve until somebody invents a press release that improves things, which seems unlikely.
The View From The Ground
Spend any length of time in Hinxhill and the rhythm becomes obvious. Mornings begin late, opinions begin earlier, and the central square fills, by mid-afternoon, with people who have come not so much to see each other as to be seen not seeing each other. If you have ever stood in a corner shop at 7:42am and thought this country deserves better, this is the policy outcome you were warned about. Conversation tends to circle the same five subjects: the weather, the news from the country, the persistent rumour about the road, the deteriorating quality of something or other, and the latest pronouncement from Councillor Bartholomew Pemberton-Smythe, which everyone has an opinion on and almost nobody has read. It is, in its way, the perfect microcosm of how communities of this size operate everywhere in the world, although the residents of Hinxhill would object strongly to being called a microcosm of anything.
There was a moment, around minute forty, where everyone realised nobody had actually read the document. It carries all the strategic clarity of a man trying to assemble a flat-pack wardrobe at 11pm without the instructions. Hinxhill carries on as it always has, broadly the same as last week, give or take a verb. The bins are collected when they are collected. The roundabout, where one exists, remains the roundabout. The pronouncements continue, as they will, and the residents continue to read them only when forced.
For more in this vein see also The Poke.