Traitor to the Combine

A provocative title, isn’t it? We’ll get to the ‘Traitor’ bit later. But what does ‘Combine’ mean?

According to Irish writer, John Waters:

‘Combine’ was the word used by Chief Bromden in Ken Kesey’s novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest; he used it to describe the force, a kind of evil syndicate, that bears down on humanity, seeking to oppress and re-set its behaviour.1

In Kesey’s book, Bromden refers to the Combine as “a huge organization” that runs both the “Outside” and the “Inside”, i.e. everything.2

This might seem like a simplistic ‘Matrix’-style view of the world, or perhaps the Combine conjures up visions of the ‘Illuminati’ or Ian Fleming’s ‘SPECTRE’. But if you think about it for a few moments, Chief Bromden’s perspective is far from being what is mockingly referred to as a ‘conspiracy theory’.

Have you ever come across expressions like ‘establishment’, or ‘city hall’, or just ‘the man’? Maybe you have heard one of these terms, as in ‘you can’t fight city hall’, or you were brought up to believe that the individual is no match for the ‘establishment’, whether it is the tax authorities or the House of Lords.

Whichever label you prefer there is one cardinal truth to bear in mind. Not only can you fight ‘city hall’ (or the Combine) - you can win too!

This became clear to me early in 2020. On March 11th the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared covid-19 to be a pandemic. Straightaway our government imposed a series of unprecedented and OTT restrictions on the public.

Because I could see that there was no pandemic, I refused to go along with any of it. I could not, in conscience, lend credence to the deception by participating in the bizarreness all around me.

So as best I could I ignored every regulation, every piece of government advice, every propagandistic newspaper article and TV bulletin, and every ad screaming ‘the end is nigh’ unless you do what we tell you. Despite my ‘heresy’ I survived - and I am now over 70.

It was not just covid however. I realised that the Combine, incorporating the pillars of our society: government, media, big business, judicial system, church, etc., was deceiving us about a lot of other things as well. Of course individual politicians and doctors are often lovely people - but they are part of a system, the Combine, that is definitely not lovely!

How do I know this? Dear reader, it’s confession time.

Years ago I was a (not insignificant) cog in the Combine machine - by no means a senior executive, but not a little pinkeen either. I was certainly not a passive onlooker. I contributed to the growth and enrichment of the Combine and its members. So from that point of view I guess I am a Traitor now. (I’m still lovely though!)

But it is not only me. We are all part of the Combine. We work for the Combine. We buy our food from the Combine. We watch TV shows and movies made by the Combine. And we send our children to schools run by the Combine.

Without our active support (or our implied consent) the Combine would cease to exist - overnight. This is good news because, if we were to withdraw from the Combine, it would collapse!

That is why I am withdrawing. Lately I have been cutting my ties to the Combine, one slender thread at a time. I am not a radical - I don’t do bold gestures. But if I can keep heading in the same direction, one day I hope to be completely free. In these articles I write about my day-to-day efforts to put principle into practice, to become a ‘Traitor to the Combine’.

One last thing. I need your help. You may well have found a better way to do something I am flummoxed by. So please share your advice and experiences here.