THE FUSE

I wonder if UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has ever watched the 1980’s movie Footloose. Bear with me. The film tells the story of a teenage boy who moves from a big city to a small, conservative town that banned dancing following a tragic car accident involving local adolescents. The boy and his friends refused to accept the ban and set out to overturn it so they could enjoy senior prom. It sounds quaint and quintessentially 1980s, but the script is said to be loosely inspired by the true story of a group of Oklahoma teenagers who successfully challenged an 80-year-old ban on public dancing. The moral, of both the true story and the film, seems to be: Where there’s a will, teenagers will find a way.