![\"Richard](\"http:\/\/www.bmj.com\/home\/icons\/bmjh7648e.jpg\")
I\u2019m fed up of being told not to panic over swine flu. If I want to panic then I\u2019ll panic. I\u2019ll run naked and screaming down the street imploring my neighbours to do the same.<\/p>\nI\u2019m fed up of being told not to panic over swine flu. If I want to panic then I\u2019ll panic. I\u2019ll run naked and screaming down the street imploring my neighbours to do the same.<\/p>\n
But then I realise that I don\u2019t know what exactly you do when you panic. Do you turn to jelly, burst into tears, take to your bed, shoot yourself? I\u2019d better look in the dictionary, especially as there presumably won\u2019t be time for that when I do decide to panic.<\/p>\n
This is how Dictionary.com defines panic: \u201ca sudden overwhelming fear, with or without cause, that produces hysterical or irrational behaviour, and that often spreads quickly through a group of persons or animals.\u201d (I didn\u2019t know this, but panic also means: \u201cSlang. someone or something that is considered hilariously funny: The comedian was an absolute panic.\u201d American usage, presumably.)<\/p>\n
\u201cIrrational behaviour\u201d covers anything, but what about \u201chysterical\u201d? Isn\u2019t that a sexist word? Dictionary.com defines it as: \u201cuncontrollably emotional.\u201d Maybe I\u2019ll try that when I decide to panic.<\/p>\n
But what irritates me most about Fergus Walsh of the BBC earnestly telling me that it\u2019s not time to panic is that he implies that there may be a time to panic. I imagine him one day looking serious and saying: \u201cSwine flu deaths have now reached 500 a day. It\u2019s time to panic.\u201d Or, if I translate: \u201cIt\u2019s now time to behave irrationally or become uncontrollably emotional.\u201d<\/p>\n
Clearly there is never a time to panic if you have any choice in the matter. Panic is entirely useless as are regretting, worrying, and feeling guilty. These are all activities that eat you up and have no positive side to them.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve been practising and preaching this philosophy for a long time, and I\u2019ve mostly been successful in avoiding regret, worry, or guilt. There are things that I might have regretted, worried about, or felt guilty over, but where would it have got me if I\u2019d \u201cindulged\u201d those feelings? Nowhere useful.<\/p>\n
My comedian brother Arthur Smith, a bit of a philosopher and moralist, is worried by me not regretting, worrying, or feeling guilty. He believes these to be the tools of conscience. If I decide not to feel guilty won\u2019t it mean that I will happily do dreadful things that I should have felt guilty about? I will become an amoral monster, rampaging through South London indulging every beastly appetite.<\/p>\n
An empiricist, I simply answer that I don\u2019t do anything more amoral than him\u2014perhaps, he might answer, because I don\u2019t have the same opportunities. So I urge you, gentle or ungentle reader, to follow me and discard regret, worry, guilt and panic. When Fergus tells you it\u2019s time to panic, ignore him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I\u2019m fed up of being told not to panic over swine flu. If I want to panic then I\u2019ll panic. I\u2019ll run naked and screaming down the street imploring my neighbours to do the same. But then I realise that I don\u2019t know what exactly you do when you panic. Do you turn to jelly, […]<\/p>\n