You know you’ve made it in life when you’ve become a totemic hate figure, existing only to absorb blame for all the world’s ills, personal failure and anything else hurts that someone doesn’t like. Bet you’ll never read that on LinkedIn. Although, I don’t know to be honest, maybe there’s some kind of ‘personal growth’ angle to that unholy utterance. “Delighted to announce that I’ve just been promoted to the role of Official Bogeyman, with a remit to re-energise the blame culture sector, in a multi-platform, inclusive way.”

That’s not about me, you understand. It wasn’t some confession slipped into the first para, seeking jocular absolution from any transgressions committed knowingly or otherwise. While I have been a human pinata on a few occasions (both personally and professionally) – and believe me, it wasn’t pleasant – I try to steer clear of the Bogeyman role these days. Other than writing for The Leither. Which, given some of my recent output, may have seen my screeds pinned to a few dartboards. BOO HISS COCO!

Hey, it’s all the rage. No, literally. Rage is currency. And it’s going through a period of hyperinflation. To the point where it’s all gone a bit ‘Weimar’; you need wheelbarrows of the stuff to cut through the default anger levels. Which are on the high side. Well, so it seems anyway. And keeping it all ticking over are… the bogeymen. The appointed and anointed villains of the piece, whose status, function and origins run deep in societies and cultures right across the globe; the lodestone for one’s fears, anger and hatred. 

The first XI picks itself these days. Israel, Donald Trump, landlords, the Tories, Westminster, JK Rowling, Rangers fans, neo-liberalism - deployed with the regularity of a verbal tic in The Guardian comments threads.

(And no offence to Tourette’s sufferers by the way; I don’t want to end up like The Chief from Scot Squad).

The list goes on and on. To the extent that in the mainstream Scottish polity, playing Bogeyman Bingo has never been easier. But it’s funny, because us Scots were once bogeymen too… 

“Warte bis der Schotte kommt!!” or, roughly translated, “Wait until the Scot comes to get you!”. Such was the German mammy’s invocation of a well-kent bogeyman back during the 17th century, around the time of the Thirty Years War (one of the classic numerically monikered wars in my opinion). Us Scots being a bit of a menace at the time – itinerant peddlers and mercenaries for hire as we were. Demonised I tells ya! It’s all a conspiracy! Generalisation. Cherry-picking. Lazy thinking. And aw the rest. 

But that’s the case now as well, no? Which is to say, on the one hand, no sane person could argue that Donald Trump isn’t a monstrous figure whose continued functioning heartbeat troubles the world. But on the other, it’s too easy to lean into the mentality it encourages in us all; one that’s already hard-wired too.

We all need a boogeyman, boggart, bugbear, bogle, bwgan, busemann, bebok, buba, baubas – a similar etymology pervades across many European countries and cultures – to invoke, curse… and blame.

Shadowy, devilish figures, hooded sometimes, or carrying a sack or bag in which to bundle miscreant children (a common depiction in Hispanic and Latin American cultures); global folklore serves up so many variations of the monster.

Indeed, in Spain, parents warn insomniac children to get to sleep lest ‘El Coco’ should get them – the fear figure so named for the demon’s hairy brown face, reminiscent of a coconut. El Coco? Cripes, that puts me right in the dock, given colloquial Embra-ese for my first name!

I assure you, while deeply flawed, I am no monster. In much the same way, both cyclists and motorists aren’t. Or landlords and tenants. Or continued union with the UK and independence. Or even, whisper it quietly, even Brexit and the EU (even if it’s hard to find anything worthwhile about the former, tbh). Yes, you can have good and bad versions, actors and protagonists on both sides of these issues. But we seem gripped by fear, anger, and an almost pathological need to identify and invoke demons.

Sure, it’s a real time-saver. But projecting all our angst, attitude and antipathy about the world onto hate figures or bogeymen is a fool’s errand. For what will happen when the bogeyman is vanquished? When you win that vote, get your way or slay that dragon, and the world still isn’t as you wish it to be, but as it really is, with all its disappointments, disenchantments and disaffection? Who or what then shall be the magnet for all ills?

 

The writer Philip K Dick once defined reality as “that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn’t go away”. And I guess that’s the hard truth that we must all confront, no matter our politics, personal gripes or how we perceive this all-too-often ugly world; to be able to look whatever is left when we stop believing in bogeymen, square in the eye. And then tame the very monster within us who would forever need monsters to tame.