To nine out of ten of you the choice which could lead to scoundrelism will come, when it does come, in no very dramatic colours. Obviously bad men, obviously threatening or bribing, will almost certainly not appear. Over a drink, or a cup of coffee, disguised as triviality and sandwiched between two jokes, from the lips of a man, or woman, whom you have recently been getting to know rather better and whom you hope to know better still- just at the moment when you are most anxious not to appear crude, or naïf or a prig- the hint will come. It will be the hint of something which the public, the ignorant, romantic public, would never understand: something which even the outsiders in your own profession are apt to make a fuss about: but something, says your new friend, which “we”- and at the word “we” you try not to blush for mere pleasure- something “we always do”.
– C.S. Lewis, from an essay called The Inner Ring. I was reminded of this by David Foster of Chicagoboyz.
Very very true.
Every 14-year-old boy who’s ever been hit-on in a bus station knows this drill.
The amazing thing about the global warming freaks was how little seduction they included in their campaign. It seemed to me like it was all hectoring.
A marvellous address by C S Lewis. It has prompted me to offer some thoughts on the Chilcot Inquiry:
http://www.charlescrawford.biz/blog/the-chilcot-inquiry-lords-of-the-inner-ring