The current Rustler’s microwavable meat advert depicts a bloke who is sat at his bland table in his bland living room, about to have dinner. He’s in the November of his years, closer to St Andrew than Guy Fawkes, and as he reaches for his snack, his life flashes before his eyes. It is a life unfulfilled and failed, where every dream is a lie, and every hope rescinds upon him, jading him ever further. Every cultural and political movement is but a moment in time, a spark of promise quickly extinguished. Beaten at school, waiting in line in soup kitchens, beaten by police batons in ‘60s peace marches, bored and jaded from then on. No other fad or movement would awaken him again. Until now. You see, it was ok that this struggle was pointless, because along the way somebody figured out that you could irradiate a soggy roll encompassing a lump of indeterminable meat to an acceptable temperature, cutting down dinner preparation time by up to half an hour. What a time to be alive.

The advert is called “80 years of torment.” I guess it’s meant to be tongue-in-cheek but, after these last few months, for an activist soul it is trolling your effort, your ideals and your hope. It is telling you to GIVE UP, forget any such pretence of a better tomorrow, because the only progress is in rapid-ready snack food. Maybe pop a tub of pringles open for dessert – they are right there. What even is fruit anyway. A waste of time, that’s what. You don’t have time to prepare a proper meal, what with all the working you have to do. It’s alright though, because the politicians have your back. They are working late too, and what salt of the earth they are, they are also having a burger for dinner. No Rustler’s for them though, they have sent for a gourmet, onion-ringed affair straight from the heart of Dalston, moulded from a hand-fed beast that, before it too was sacrificed for the cause, had a bigger home than you, and a better diet to boot. It was sped to the Royal Mile through the streets of London by a brave cyclist, darting through the taxis and the tourists on her less-than-zero hours contract, risking her life and others to make sure the burger gets to the Chancellor of the Exchequer before it loses too much temperature.

(Actually, he’s not Chancellor any more is he. He’s a tabloid hack, or a professor, or something.)

He can eat what he wants at whatever job he wants, because he is free to do so. That’s what they say they are about, freedom. They have so much freedom already, and all they want is more. They have always been mercantile, freedom is the silver in the mines of Potosi, the secret Porcelain recipe from Jingdezhen, grab it while it’s hot and hold on for dear life. You? You have to earn your freedom. As long as you live the right way, you too can have freedom. Put aside a penny a day for retirement, and you too can enjoy a microwavable burger when you are old. It’s triple-locked.

All this talk about liberty and they don’t even know what it is – they think it cannot be created, only taken away. So that’s what will happen next, now that they have purchased popular consent. Trickle down. The poor don’t want opportunity, they want stability, an unchanging, uncompromising dourness on the face of the Commons. A two-track broken record is comforting, when your work status is precarious, your rent fluctuates with the seasons – waiting for the eviction notice – “I’m sorry, we want families and young professionals to move into your dilapidated, ladybird-infested bedsit” – or the fire alarm. You never quite know who is waiting for you around the corner, these days. Do you feel safe? Not me. The promise of further change? Well that’s just terrifying. A microwave is reassuring, you know exactly when the beep will chime, you know exactly when your meal will reach lukewarm bliss.

It was a question of taking Britain back to the ‘70s, or maybe to the Age of Empire. Bring back the workhouse. Restart the Crusades, at a push. It would be good if everybody stopped time-travelling for a moment and looked outside the window. Capital looks after its initiates, the rest of us make their coffee and bring banquets to the door of another Junior Vice President. It’s in the nature of service. I love microwaves after long days, rip off the plastic and away we go. Technology isn’t simply there to improve our lives, but to make it possible to get more out of our bones. Afternoon tea allowed fourteen hour shifts, smartphone order apps allows two hour delivery. A paper-over-cracks health service allows a higher retirement age for those who haven’t spent their time living the right way, with chronic conditions as colleagues because ATOS said so. What a time to be alive.

You don’t get it, do you? Your grandparents never had a microwave. They had steady work, though. And here you have a smartphone. They aren’t for the poor, so you must be rich. Clive of India didn’t have a smartphone, and he never complained. Benefits aren’t for everybody, so they should be for nobody at all. People dressed in grey with grey countenance under miserable skies only see the world in blacks and whites, with us or against. A toasted Panini costs more than a week of mobile service, wealth has always been relative, dumbass. Thank you Rustler’s for feeding the people, one coronary at a time, relieving the pressure on our darling NHS. The population is exploding, and you want to keep people alive? You monster.

This is a time to celebrate. Haul your arse to the hypermarket (it might even be on offer), or your friendly neighbourhood food bank, take your meal from the shelf, remove all packaging, and wait for the beep. Take a seat, pick up the damp luxury that greets you, and eat every last bite. Don’t you dare complain you precious little soul about your life of diminishing returns, and remember the immortal words of Harold MacMillan – “you’ve never had it so good.”