In the Spectator offices, my colleague Mary Wakefield and I often end up talking about young people while we’re making tea. She thinks I’m a bit too cocky about civilisation. Apparently when she starts telling me something weird that she’s seen my generation doing, my eyes start darting madly, looking for a way out. She probably looks at me and thinks I’d open the gates to the barbarians to avoid the horror of an earnest opinion.
The re-election of Donald Trump has us feeling different ways too. Mary has written this week about the phenomenon of ‘Trump trauma’. There’s some pretty wild examples in there, all of which are deserving of our laughs. But I found these people strange, even though they’re of my generation, and I didn’t recognise them. I wondered, are these people just attention seekers?
I went to Cambridge to find out more. If there was one place in the entire country that might have been expected to look traumatised about Donald Trump’s re-election, it would be Cambridge.
Cambridge isn’t the only great liberal institution whose reaction looks comic, rather than sincere
So on a Friday night, it should have been the centre of the resistance.
Comments
Join the debate for just $5 for 3 months
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for $5.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just $5 for 3 monthsAlready a subscriber? Log in