The influence of small towns on the
character and behaviour of its residents
is a matter of historical nostalgia, places
where, as villages gathering farmers and
craftspeople together in a common area
where all were known to one another
resulted in a community of personalities
where the perennial divisive crank was
identified along with the meek mild
tempered man living with the harridan
and the local professionals in law and
medicine and church represented the
refined gentry, mercantile interests held
by those of exotic backgrounds and any
whiffs of impropriety sniffed out by
those with arcane talents from whom
nothing could be hidden. Proliferating
by word of mouth and a movable press
naming, blaming and shaming might
convince all and sundry to improve mode
of conduct lest local law enforcement be
moved to custodianship. That world of
tight community surrendered to a world
where the population pool is immense
no longer confined to towns and villages
of yore, where scandals and anti-social
events of psychotic dimension continually
flavour the news. The intimacy of belonging
evaporated, the flamboyant flaunting of
celebrity absent moral boundaries reigns.
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