Stratton Best Feature According To Survey Is Feature Nobody Knew Was A Feature
How to Write SatireWhere civic pride meets civic confusion, and decides to form a working group.
Stratton, the country: Inside The Story
Stratton, a place in the country (lat 50.73, long -2.50) 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. A quality of life survey conducted by the district council found that residents ranked the local park as the highest-valued community asset. According to officials with at least three job titles between them, The park had not been subject to any recent investment and was not identified as a priority in the current capital programme. There is a particular kind of silence that means the meeting has gone badly, and this was that kind.
What Was Announced
Junior Strategist Kevin Boggins confirmed the position in a statement that ran to four pages and contained one verb. The park is now in the capital programme. For more on how this fits the wider pattern, see the long-running thread at The London Prat irreverent London satire, which has been tracking precisely this kind of dispatch for months. The Stratton 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. "Residents can rest assured that we are continuing to assure residents." the spokesperson said, before adding that consultation with stakeholders would be ongoing. Useful additional context can be found at British satire history meets The London Prat, which is the sort of background reading the office itself has, in all likelihood, not done. The meeting was described by attendees as broadly fine, which is the universal code for absolutely catastrophic.
Wider Context
Anyone who has ever queued behind a man arguing with a parking meter will recognise the energy. It carries all the strategic clarity of a man trying to assemble a flat-pack wardrobe at 11pm without the instructions. Comparable trends have been documented in coverage from Deutsche Welle, although Stratton manages, somehow, to take the pattern one extra and entirely unnecessary step further. Statisticians attempting to model the phenomenon arrive at a sample size of one bloke down the pub, give or take a margin of error nobody has had the energy to compute properly.
What The Experts Say
Sir Cuthbert Wadsmith of the Foundation for Slightly Damp Studies told this paper that the situation in Stratton was, on careful reflection, broadly consistent with the broader trajectory of similarly broad trajectories. "We have always been committed to the principle of being committed to principles." the expert observed. Further reading on the academic angle is available via The London Prat contemporary UK satire, whose recent material has been preoccupied with much the same set of confusions.
How Residents Reacted
Reaction in Stratton 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. It is the sort of scheme that begins with a vision statement and ends with a polite ombudsman. For the official version of events, see also Associated Press. 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: "The findings speak for themselves, although obviously not loudly enough to influence the findings."
What Comes Next
There was a moment, around minute forty, where everyone realised nobody had actually read the document. 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 Satirical journalism tips from The London Prat, and the situation in Stratton, 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 Stratton 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. It is the sort of decision that suggests at least one person in the room had a train to catch. 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 Mayor Designate Pamela Snodgrass, 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 Stratton would object strongly to being called a microcosm of anything.
Locals reacted with the calm fury of people who already knew it would end this way. Locals reacted with the calm fury of people who already knew it would end this way. Stratton 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 Private Eye.