Scarfolk Tales of the 70s

[EndtheMadnessNow]

Scarfolk is a town in North West England that did not progress beyond 1979. Instead, the entire decade of the 1970s loops ad infinitum. Here in Scarfolk, pagan rituals blend seamlessly with science; hauntology is a compulsory subject at school, and everyone must be in bed by 8pm because they are perpetually running a slight fever. "Visit Scarfolk today. Our number one priority is keeping rabies at bay." For more information please reread.

Blog I stumbled across the pond that had me (I'm sure BIAD knows of this palace of laughter)

Identified Flying Objects (& Esoteric Truth)

In the 1970s, the distinction between fact and fiction completely broke down as a result of years of government fabrications, corporate deceit, media falsehoods and systematic educational disinformation.



Objective truth gained an esoteric, almost occult status along with subjects such as ghosts, bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, pagan paediatrics and other unexplained phenomena. Many didn't believe that objective truth even existed.

The dwindling numbers of people who insisted that real facts were 'out there' were pushed to the fringes of society and labelled conspiracy theorists. They saw it as their duty to promote even the most rudimentary facts and reintroduce them into the public arena.



One area of so-called "arcane knowledge" concerned IFOs (Identified Flying Objects), which eventually caught the public imagination, or rather the lack of it. Sensationalised books and magazines about the topic flooded newsagents and bookshops (see pages above and below from The IFO Phenomenon (Corgi, 1977) and a pull-poster from IFO Monthly magazine). By the end of the decade, many people claimed to have had a "close encounter" with an IFO. Some even reported that they had been taken aboard such craft.



For more information about the suppression of facts in public discourse, see the Truth Reform Act of 1976 and mandatory de-education classes.

The Fact Ban (1976)



In 1975 the government discreetly tortured citizens to find out what they thought of its leadership. The results revealed that many participants thought the state "cheerfully totalitarian","despotic, but in a nice way", and "I'll say anything you want as long as you stop waterboarding me and give me back my eye."

The government sensed a need for change and announced that it would be introducing more liberal attitudes to its policies, particularly those relating to facts and information.

Facts had always been problematic for the government because of their inflexibility. Though the use of facts in state administration was strongly disparaged and had largely been expunged from political life, some civil servants stubbornly refused to yield to inexplicable reversals in party policy.

An internal council memo to employees read: "Facts do not serve the best interests of a successful government and we must not permit them to hinder our healthy economy with their tyrannical, oppressive insistence on what is and isn't true. If you must employ a truth, ensure that you are liberal with it -  untamed, unedited facts can be dangerous in the wrong hands. Ideally, you will create your own facts so that you can retain control of them."

In early 1976, as part of its Truth Reform, the government went a step further and initiated an all-out ban on unsanctioned facts, as can be seen from the above council leaflet distributed to employees. Until the end of the decade all facts were created and authorised by a new governmental department called the Fact Office or F-OFF for short.

Mandatory De-education Classes



Post-Truthism is nothing new. Following the Truth Reform Act of 1976, it became every citizen's civic duty to attend de-education classes. The state instinctively felt that knowledge and the educated people who wield it destablize governmental plans, especially those that routinely and deliberately disregard verifiable facts.

According to one de-education textbook: "A good or 'Schrödinger' fact is simultaneously true and untrue until such a time that someone in authority tells you which, though they may change their mind or substitute the fact entirely for another piece of information, fabricated or otherwise, that suits their personal or political needs."

It could take many years for a citizen to unlearn everything, particularly because they first had to learn the complex method of how to unlearn. (Also see the How to Burn Books book).

Additionally, because de-education classes were compulsory (and expensive), some people opted instead for lobotomies by backstreet barber-surgeons, who, it was later revealed, received government funding. These unregistered practitioners would lay their patients' heads on the bottom step of a staircase, then release a Slinky attached to a sledgehammer from the top step. If this procedure was unsuccessful, they would force the patients to binge-watch ITV talent shows such as Opportunity Knocks or the BBC's Come Dancing programme.

Confirmation Bias Goggles (1970)



Confirmation Bias Goggles were the first wearable technology to be wired directly into the brain. In addition to the pinhead-sized speaker which perpetually broadcast the statement 'Of course you're right!' into the auditory cortex, the goggles sensors could also switch off those parts of the brain that deal with troublesome emotions and feelings such as empathy, decency and healthy scepticism.

By tapping into the wearer's biases, the goggles literally deleted undesirable objects from the wearer's field of vision. Sights that were too dominant to be erased completely were visually falsified to validate the wearer's preconceptions.

By 1971, the state had adapted the goggles for use in schools. Children were told precisely what to think and what their personal opinions as adults would be. Unsurprisingly, everybody who tried the goggles, without exception, thought that they were a great idea. Each set comes with a free lifetime subscription to Cognitive Dissonance.

"Children: The Cause of All Crime"

In 1970 the Scarfolk Crime Commission embarked on the largest study into crime to date. After two years of intense investigation it found a startling correlation between the types of people who commit crime and their early life experiences.



The findings were unequivocal: 100% of criminals had also once been children.

The council immediately put into effect acts intended to reduce, if not entirely eradicate this insidious cause of crime. Thousands of children were rounded up in camps. Toys were burnt in massive pyres. Adults were sterilised. Anyone who had been in regular contact with children, or had ever been a child, was quarantined in vast bunkers specially built several storeys below the council building.

Though Scarfolk was reduced to a ghost town, the scheme proved a success. During the first month that these stringent measures had been implemented not one crime had been committed. Consequently, at the 1972 Conference of Sham Utopias, a local conservative MP predicted that the most successful towns, and even countries, of the future will be those that eradicate all citizens who have any connection to, or dealings with, children or the adults they grow into.

Memory Chemicals (1979)

The campaign and treatments were so effective that some people became inexplicably afraid not only to go outside but also to not go into rooms in their own homes in case they saw or overheard something forbidden.



Those who could still manage to venture into rooms immediately forgot why they were there and, following a deluge of confused calls to the authorities, they had to be reminded that they had forgotten, and should now forget that they had remembered that they had forgotten.

'Allclear' Open-Air Nuclear Bunkers

In 1971 the government's civil defence budget was slashed. Local councils limited their building of conventional nuclear bunkers and focused instead on cheaper alternatives, for the general populace anyway.



From government public information literature:

"Though secure, Britain's existing nuclear bunkers are cramped and do not offer the comforts of home living. Built from drab, uninspiring concrete, they are brazenly unaesthetic and because they lack natural light, occupiers risk becoming fed up during their stay.

"Government officials, royals and the independently wealthy have courteously opted to endure these cheerless conditions so that you don't have to*.

"We think that you and your family deserve more agreeable accommodation when that 4-Minute Warning jingle sounds.

"Enter ALLCLEAR, the government's new post-nuclear solution for YOU. ALLCLEAR Open-Air Bunkers are easily erected in approx. 60 minutes. They are light, airy and available in a choice of fun colours: orange or yellowy-red. They even come with their own FREE power-string, velcro all-seasons flap and a multipurpose stick [...]

"*Please note that any attempt to secure a place in a traditional concrete bunker (and in doing so compromise the well-intended benevolence of the above mentioned persons) will be rejected with extreme prejudice."

[BIAD]

Scarfolk is a town in North West England that did not progress beyond 1979. Instead, the entire decade of the 1970s loops ad infinitum. Here in Scarfolk, pagan rituals blend seamlessly with science; hauntology is a compulsory subject at school, and everyone must be in bed by 8pm because they are perpetually running a slight fever. "Visit Scarfolk today. Our number one priority is keeping rabies at bay." For more information please reread.

Blog I stumbled across the pond that had me (I'm sure BIAD knows of this palace of laughter)...

Oh thank you-thank you... I absolutely love these types of websites!
I recall another one, now lost in time and its location lost to my old-age, where a small group of young men
travelled the highways of England and snapped photographs of the different type of concrete steps found along
the bland and boring routes of the country.


An example of the paths less taken.

These upbeat chaps also visited English small-town shopping centres that were failing during the early-eighties.
With waddling old pensioners being the main footfall of these places during the working-week, Councils had
created seating-areas for the sud-faced food-gummers to rest and this was where the website-lads would appear
to take photographs and add in their own hilarious commentary below the images.

Today, it's difficult to understand the runtish thought-process of the young public hesitantly stepping out onto
the brand-new world of the internet back then. Websites had to be created and the means to do so were limited,
places of instruction for such a feat were scarce and the notion of possibly breaking something that belonged to
an unknown 'owner' of this conduit was a genuine cause to be timid of building one's own place to frolic in.

Slowly, the serious-side of displaying information changed and with it, came the opportunity to act one's true
age. Chess manuals and mature discourse with like-minded people from around the world gave way to places
where -usually with a straight face, a particular type of humour developed and a type of sub-culture was born.

Whilst some young men and women adhered to performing the rituals of meeting, courting and functioning in
the real world and ignoring the 'poncy' idea of 'playing on a computer', there were some who forego the chance
to grab-a-feel of a damsel and focused on their complicated assignment of being an internet-geek.

But back then, it had drawbacks. The act of using the internet meant your telephone line was tied-up and since
parents didn't bother with this assumed new toy -certainly in England, a youngster's access had to have a strong
urge and what better is there than larping it up with your nerdy friends!!

I don't mean to drag down the humour in regards of this thread, but there's an element of helpful reality within
the images the wonderful website (and yourself) kindly provided.

The words and the construction of the sentences are no different from the sensationalising that the media have
used for generations, any simple subject-matter can be dressed-up to be portrayed as something important and
bring a reason for a reader to remain with the source of this supposed-revealing narrative.

Statistics are deemed important to gauge a topic (an idea always pushed by the media these days!) and so the
public takes for granted that the figures are genuine. I know from personal experience that in the media-game,
most statistics are invented and only serve to give an article bona fides.

Here with the blogspot of the fabulous municipality of Scarfolk, we have a fine example of someone taking the
piss out of a multi-billion-dollar industry and yet, it's a mocking the MSM will never understand!!
Blogs like Scarfolk are rare, but please don't let them die.

.................................................

By the way... many a true word is said in jest.


A Scarfolk idea                                                                               A Ohio idea

[EndtheMadnessNow]

"helpful reality" indeed!! The more I look back on modern history rather factual, humorous, or something in between, the more the present feels like synchronicity Déjà vu that is only getting stronger and more weird.

Your bottom image hits really hard! Really makes ya pause & ponder.

“The only new thing in this world is the history you don’t know.”
— President Harry S. Truman