PECKERWOOD'S WEEKLY LUNOCRACY POST! For the Week of 1/12/2026!

For decades, the United Kingdom has presented itself as a model of democratic maturity. Procedural. Measured. Governance by pragmatic norms rather than overblown theatrics. Even its scandals arrive packaged and presented with a polite veneer.  However, now that reputation functions less as an admirable virtue than as subterfuge and camouflage. The UK has become a case study in how a liberal democracy can fracture silently, outsource devastating cruelty to the mostly tabloid press, and erode minority protections while smugly congratulating itself on restraint.

It is a mistake to view Brexit as merely a referendum outcome. It was a cataclysmic structural event that rewired British politics, possibly forever. It normalized grievance as a governing force, degraded public trust in expertise, and created an unyielding state of cultural agitation. The economic damage is no mystery. It has unfolded exactly as the critics predicted: reduced growth, trade friction, labor shortages, and a continually shrinking tax base. Apparent, but less discussed, is the political consequence: scarcity politics.

Post-Brexit Britain governs under conditions of chronic ineptitude and constraint. Public services have been hollowed out. Local councils teeter on insolvency. Charities are asked to patch the gaps created by foolish austerity while being systematically defunded themselves. This environment is a perfect storm for artificial culture wars where symbolic enemies are much easier to manufacture than to enact meaningful structural reform. 

A Useful Bigot: Nigel Farage

This is where the once maligned Nigel Farage becomes indispensable. Farage does not need an office to exert power. His role is discursive. It drags the Overton window rightward, framing appalling cruelty as common sense, and guaranteeing that political energy is always directed at specific cultural targets rather than examining economic accountability. 

British tabloids, particularly the shameless right-wing rag Daily Mail, function not as modes of balanced information but as political actors. They do not merely reflect public sentiment; they manufacture it. Over the last decade, they have perfected a poisonous feedback loop: identify a powerless marginalized group, frame its existence as a threat or excess, amplify outrage by manipulating facts, present sensationalized stories to support their right-wing slant, then demand political response.

Unfortunately, Trans people have become the ideal subject. Too small a demographic to exert influence. Poorly understood. Easily sensationalized. The press framed healthcare access as “ideology,” legal recognition as “radicalism,” and basic safety as “controversy.” This was not accidental hysteria. It was a targeted, sustained editorial strategy. Once such a concerted effort poisons discourse, policy can retreat without resistance.

Under Prime Minister Keir Starmer, trans rights have not been defended; they have been purposely managed downward. Starmer’s leadership is defined by risk minimization and intentional cowardice, not rights protection. His government has repeatedly chosen ambiguity where clarity was a requirement. 

The Coward Keir Starmer

Trans Rights: Policy by Delay and Restriction (2020–2024)

• 2004: Gender Recognition Act established medicalized, court-based recognition.

• 2018–2020: UK government consultation on GRA reform receives overwhelming public support for simplification.

• September 2020: Government announces it will not meaningfully reform the Act, citing “complexity” and “concerns,” effectively shelving reform indefinitely.

• No replacement framework followed

Healthcare Access and the Cass Review

• December 2020: Bell v Tavistock High Court ruling restricts access to puberty blockers for under-16s.

• September 2021: Court of Appeal overturns Bell, restoring clinical discretion — but the damage is done.

• 2022: The Cass Review (commissioned by NHS England) issues an interim report questioning existing models of youth gender care.

• 2023: NHS England announces the closure of the Tavistock Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS), replacing it with regional hubs that, as of 2024, remain limited in capacity.

• 2024: Final Cass Review recommendations further tighten access, with immediate downstream effects on care availability.

Each step is framed as evidence-based caution. The net effect is restriction.

This is policy by evasion. No single act appears catastrophic, but the cumulative effect is undeniable. It is an unmistakable structural exclusion. Westminster’s harm does not arrive like an obvious threat or with a screaming announcement. There is little fanfare.  It arrives painfully in digestible increments, wrapped in polite caution.

Parallel to this injustice is the staggering and alarmingly swift defunding of LGBTQIA support infrastructure. This is not anecdotal; it is systemic. Essential services shrink or totally disappear. Local councils withdraw funding under cruel austerity pressures. National support programs are opaquely restructured into nonexistence.

NGOs close quietly. Crisis lines drastically shorten hours. Community spaces begin to vanish. The disingenuous assumption is that unpaid labor will absorb the damage, but that never happens. They know this, but don’t care. Without resources, human rights struggle to survive, and the results are devastating. 

Between 2019 and 2024, LGBTQIA charities reported:

• loss of local authority grants tied to austerity budgets

• shrinking NHS-linked support funding

• increased reliance on short-term, competitive grants

• closures of community spaces and crisis services

This strategy mirrors broader austerity logic: privatize care, externalize responsibility, and treat community collapse as unfortunate, but unavoidable. It couldn’t be helped, they claim, but make no mistake, this is a choice. 

Do these methods sound familiar? They should.  Anyone paying attention to the American political landscape recognizes the bad-faith debate, media saturation, contempt for competence, and the reframing of viciousness as necessary and honest. Nigel Farage supplies the constant agitation. The tabloids amplify the message. Mainstream politicians supply the cover. The single ingredient required for this recipe is craven disregard. 

Scotland exposes the lie at the heart of Westminster politics and is a counterpoint. The Scottish government has taken comparatively stronger positions on LGBTQIA protections, including trans rights, despite intense pressure and legal constraints imposed by the UK government.

Scotland’s Gender Recognition Reform Bill

• December 2022: Scottish Parliament passes the Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill, simplifying legal recognition.

• January 2023: Westminster invokes Section 35 of the Scotland Act for the first time in history to block the bill.

• December 2023: UK Supreme Court hears Scotland’s challenge.

• February 2024: Supreme Court rules the UK government acted lawfully in blocking the legislation.

This was not merely a legal dispute. It was a declaration of centralized authority over minority rights and a firm warning to devolved governments.

Scotland remains bound to UK-wide media ecosystems and legal frameworks that systematically undermine its autonomy. Scotland’s divergence highlights how out of step Westminster has become and how centralized power overrides regional consensus. The union persists formally. Culturally and politically, it is splintering.

Britain’s power structure embraces the falsehood that a collapse resembles a dramatic revolution. This is misguided and untrue. Collapse can happen in civil tones with impeccable manners. Therefore, it can be quietly administered. It arrives as a funding review, a delayed reform, and a circuitous debate is framed as a balance. Democracy fails when it becomes evasive and knows harm is occurring but chooses caution over courage every time. The British state has not lost control. It has made a clear choice on who to sacrifice. And it has done so calmly, legally, and with the veneer of courtesy. 

The union holds procedurally. Ethically, it is fractured.

photos: BBC News, Guardian.