Brutalism

In Sheffield the new brutalism is out here on the moors. Once the city was known for its brutalist architecture, housing blocks like Kelvin and Park Hill Flats, the sort of monstrosities that are so ugly that someone who imbibed warped public relations with mothers milk decided to make a virtue of their mean spiritedness and give them a trendy label. Brutalism is like heroin chic and having your jeans half way down your bum.

Now it's out here where some of us come to escape trends and managers and manipulators of public opinion. You may complain of the wanton vandalism of tree destruction claiming that natural beauty should be inviolable. But you get nowhere with these who have seen the light of the new brutalism. Ugliness is the new beauty. Destruction is the way to conserve. Desolation is what we go out into the countryside to enjoy. If they say it often enough we will eventually repeat it back at them. Wildlife can only be wild if it is controlled.

The key to controlling people's way of looking at things is to label them differently. If you tell your helpers and volunteers that you'r about to destroy some beautiful birch trees they may well balk at the prospect. Calling it scrub bashing and it's easier to come to terms with.