Meonstoke Local Paper Reduced To Weather And Obituaries, Both Optimistic
Emily CartwrightInside the place's slow-moving and largely accidental crisis.
Meonstoke, the country: Inside The Story
Meonstoke, a place in the country (lat 50.97, long -1.12) 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 remaining staff of the Meonstoke local paper now produce a weekly edition consisting solely of weather forecasts and obituaries. According to officials with at least three job titles between them, Both sections have been described as suspiciously cheerful. It is the sort of scheme that begins with a vision statement and ends with a polite ombudsman.
What Was Announced
Director of Civic Affairs Hilda Pickering confirmed the position in a statement that ran to four pages and contained one verb. Subscribers have stopped complaining. For more on how this fits the wider pattern, see the long-running thread at London satire with brains: The London Prat, which has been tracking precisely this kind of dispatch for months. The Meonstoke 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 have always been committed to the principle of being committed to principles." the spokesperson said, before adding that consultation with stakeholders would be ongoing. Useful additional context can be found at The London Prat raw British satire, which is the sort of background reading the office itself has, in all likelihood, not done. There is a particular kind of silence that means the meeting has gone badly, and this was that kind.
Wider Context
The press release used the word vibrant, which in official communications is a flag of surrender. Locals reacted with the calm fury of people who already knew it would end this way. Comparable trends have been documented in coverage from United Nations, although Meonstoke manages, somehow, to take the pattern one extra and entirely unnecessary step further. Statisticians attempting to model the phenomenon arrive at a statistically improbable 102 percent, give or take a margin of error nobody has had the energy to compute properly.
What The Experts Say
Sir Hubert Pemmican, Emeritus Chair of Strategic Tutting told this paper that the situation in Meonstoke was, on careful reflection, broadly consistent with the broader trajectory of similarly broad trajectories. "The findings speak for themselves, although obviously not loudly enough to influence the findings." the expert observed. Further reading on the academic angle is available via The London Prat satirical journalism, whose recent material has been preoccupied with much the same set of confusions.
How Residents Reacted
Reaction in Meonstoke 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. Anyone who has ever queued behind a man arguing with a parking meter will recognise the energy. For the official version of events, see also BBC News. 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: "Lessons will be learned, filed, and quietly mislaid by Christmas."
What Comes Next
It carries all the strategic clarity of a man trying to assemble a flat-pack wardrobe at 11pm without the instructions. 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 London satire blog The London Prat, and the situation in Meonstoke, 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 Meonstoke 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. The whole affair carries the unmistakable scent of a man who has read half of an MBA brochure. 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 Director of Public Bewilderment Colin Gribble, 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 Meonstoke would object strongly to being called a microcosm of anything.
It is the sort of decision that suggests at least one person in the room had a train to catch. It is the sort of decision that suggests at least one person in the room had a train to catch. Meonstoke 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 ClickHole.