In recent years Britain has become the Willy Wonka of social control, churning out increasingly creepy, bizarre, and fantastic methods for policing the populace. But our weaponization of classical music--where Mozart, Beethoven, and other greats have been turned into tools of state repression--marks a new low.
We're already the kings of CCTV. An estimated 20 per cent of the world's CCTV cameras are in the UK, a remarkable achievement for an island that occupies only 0.2 per cent of the world's inhabitable landmass.
A few years ago some local authorities introduced the Mosquito, a gadget that emits a noise that sounds like a faint buzz to people over the age of 20 but which is so high-pitched, so piercing, and so unbearable to the delicate ear drums of anyone under 20 that they cannot remain in earshot. It's designed to drive away unruly youth from public spaces, yet is so brutally indiscriminate that it also drives away good kids, terrifies toddlers, and wakes sleeping babes.
Police in the West of England recently started using super-bright halogen lights to temporarily blind misbehaving youngsters. From helicopters, the cops beam the spotlights at youths drinking or loitering in parks, in the hope that they will become so bamboozled that (when they recover their eyesight) they will stagger home.
And recently police in Liverpool boasted about making Britain's first-ever arrest by unmanned flying drone. Inspired, it seems, by Britain and America's robot planes in Afghanistan, the Liverpool cops used a remote-control helicopter fitted with CCTV (of course) to catch a car thief.
Britain might not make steel anymore, or cars, or pop music worth listening to, but, boy, are we world-beaters when it comes to tyranny. And now classical music, which was once taught to young people as a way of elevating their minds and tingling their souls, is being mined for its potential as a deterrent against bad behavior.
In January it was revealed that West Park School, in Derby in the midlands of England, was "subjecting" (its words) badly behaved children to Mozart and others. In "special detentions," the children are forced to endure two hours of classical music both as a relaxant (the headmaster claims it calms them down) and as a deterrent against future bad behavior (apparently the number of disruptive pupils has fallen by 60 per cent since the detentions were introduced.)
One news report says some of the children who have endured this Mozart authoritarianism now find classical music unbearable. As one critical commentator said, they will probably "go into adulthood associating great music--the most bewitchingly lovely sounds on Earth--with a punitive slap on the chops." This is what passes for education in Britain today: teaching kids to think "Danger!" whenever they hear Mozart's Requiem or some other piece of musical genius.
The classical music detentions at West Park School are only the latest experiment in using and abusing some of humanity's greatest cultural achievements to reprimand youth.
Across the UK, local councils and other public institutions now play recorded classical music through speakers at bus-stops, in parking lots, outside department stores, and elsewhere. No, not because they think the public will appreciate these sweet sounds (they think we are uncultured grunts), but because they hope it will make naughty youngsters flee.
Tyne and Wear in the north of England was one of the first parts of the UK to weaponize classical music. In the early 2000s, the local railway company decided to do something about the "problem" of "youths hanging around" its train stations. The young people were "not getting up to criminal activities," admitted Tyne and Wear Metro, but they were "swearing, smoking at stations and harassing passengers." So the railway company unleashed "blasts of Mozart and Vivaldi."
Apparently it was a roaring success. The youth fled. "They seem to loathe [the music]," said the proud railway guy. "It's pretty uncool to be seen hanging around somewhere when Mozart is playing." He said the most successful deterrent music included the Pastoral Symphony by Beethoven, Symphony No. 2 by Rachmaninov, and Piano Concerto No. 2 by Shostakovich. (That last one I can kind of understand.)
In Yorkshire in the north of England, the local council has started playing classical music through vandal-proof speakers at "troublesome bus-stops" between 7:30 PM and 11:30 PM. Shops in Worcester, Bristol, and North Wales have also taken to "firing out" bursts of classical music to ward of feckless youngsters.
