Before I start, I'd like to take a few moments to comment on the recent death of Michael Jackson; Stop clogging up all the newspapers. These last two weeks, I haven't been able to open my eyes without seeing headlines and tributes and all manner of mentions towards MJ's demise. Now I'm not a cold-hearted man, I'm not going to say I'm glad he's dead, regardless of all the things he may have done in his life that weren't exactly above board. I am, however, a man who knows about how far people can push things until they exceed the limit; the MJ cashcow should've dried up days ago, yet still we're being subjected to conspiracy theories, Facebook fan pages, 10-page pullouts and, of course, the obligatory but rapidly tiresome jokes. Too many bandwagons spoil the journey, and there must be a whole lot of bandwagons in this case, what with the millions of people that seem to be jumping onto them.
Farrah Fawcett didn't have this much attention drawn to her death. Billy Mays and Molly Sugden practically went unheeded when they bit the dust, save for the odd quarter-page newspaper tribute and occasional pub quiz question, so why should Michael Jackson get so much attention? He was clearly a gifted singer and dancer, and it's no secret that his music is loved and praised all over the world, but people could argue that Farrah Fawcett and Molly Sugden did the same thing with television, or Billy Mays contributed the same amount to the world of shouting at people to buy gimmicky products. But as these others are brushed off as yesterday's news, MJ is still pilfering the headlines of every newspaper and magazine from here to the horizon. Why? Because he was a freak, that's why.
If Michael Jackson was simply a talented musician, people would have mourned him for a day and then carried on with the rest of their own lives, but because he was so widely renowned for being insane, his legacy continues in the form of constant news stories. I admit that his father is to blame by thrusting him into the limelight at such a young age, and I agree with other people that suggest the whole business of inviting children to Neverland for sleepovers was his attempt to live out the childhood he never had, but the point remains that, because of all this, people knew he was mentally challenged. What kind of healthy person would call their child Blanket and proceed to dangle them over a balcony? None, normal people don't do that, which is why normal people don't get news coverage, even upon their death.
We're a nation of people that love a good freak show. Why else would Big Brother still be going after all these years? It certainly isn't for the intelligent conversation that goes on inside the house; it's because British people think "Hey, this year's lot are a bunch of weirdos, I hope they do something hilariously stupid like kill each other!" Reality TV is a horrible concoction, but nobody can deny that it brings in the freaks and viewers alike. Millions of people watched the X-Factor final last year, but that's because they actually cared who won. Millions more people watched the first auditions because that's when they show all the lunatics that were allowed through the two previous, untelevised auditions because of the entertainment value. I've an idea for a new slogan the British Tourist Board can use to describe our culture - Britons Love Cretins.
It isn't just freaky people we love either, it's freak weather. Sudden rainstorms, heatwaves, cold snaps, floods, miniscule earthquakes, once they arrive on the scene, the press is sure to follow. One of the Entertainment headlines on the BBC main page is "Potter stars drenched at premier", which was also a story in some of the celebrity spreads in the national papers today. The gist of the story, as you can imagine, was that something utterly drole happened, but it's "news" because it happened to famous people AND involved freak weather. Double the entertainment value, clearly.
The story, in full might I add, is that it rained at the premier of the new Harry Potter film. Some of the stars got wet, while Emma Watson stayed in her limo until someone brought her an umbrella. She was even judged as a spoil-sport for such an action! Imagine, wanting to stay dry rather than walk out in the rain! What a bitch!
I am, of course, being sarcastic, and I hope the editors of said papers were too when they said this story was a good idea, because it isn't. So what if the Harry Potter stars got wet in the rain yesterday? I got wet in the rain yesterday as well, but you don't see a full-page spread in my local paper about that. But that's because I'm not a celebrity. We all seem to have this fascination with celebrities as being in the upper echelons of humanity, and we admire and fawn over their lives even though they're quite similar to our own, save for their job (if they have one) and how much money they have. Just because they have £50 in their wallet instead of £5 doesn't mean the fish and chips they're eating is any more interesting than the fish and chips everyone else is eating, so it's time to put a stop to this nonsense and start talking about actual news, rather than made up news.
And speaking of actual news, I heard something about Michael Jackson the other day.....
Until next time, my z-list celebrities, ta raa!
Wednesday, 8 July 2009
Tuesday, 16 June 2009
In reverie: the lull between eras
I'm not in the best mood right now, it has to be said. I'm not entirely sure why, maybe it's the mixture of music, boredom, inactivity and reminiscence. These past few days I've been feeling very trapped, as though I've unlocked a new door into life but haven't the strength to open it, and even when I do manage to lock my fist around the knob and turn it, my feet are set in place and I can't move forwards. A part of me blames my dire financial situation, the rest just stares about, forlorn and confused.
Finishing University seems to have taken its toll, finally; those that have long finished University always describe it as "the greatest experience you'll ever have", which doesn't bode well considering it's just come to an end for me. Does this mean my life's going to go downhill from here? Was University my one last flourish of true freedom before my education ends and my real (and apparently lesser) life begins? No, not in the slightest; I have many wonderful things to experience that far outweigh the simplistic frivolities University offers, that seem to reach no further than drinking, throwing up, forgetting everything and making as many mistakes in a single night as possible.
I've got marriage to look forward to; having children; doing at least one of my two dream jobs. I think my problem extends to the fact that, though I may have finished, the vast majority of my friends haven't and, as such, they can continue to enjoy their lack of responsibility and keep appreciating the simple things whilst I have to, contradictory of my personality though it is, grow up. I mean, my girfriend, the girl I intend to eventually marry and spend the rest of my life with, has only just started University. Tonight she was out all night with her friends, getting ridiculously drunk and having an all-round good time, whereas I was sat in my Dad's quiet living room, in the quiet village, having a nice quiet beer and a marginally quiet chat about all sorts of things. Was I jealous? Very. Was I angry? A little, yes, though not at her; more, I was angry at how I don't get to do that anymore.
For me, the next few months of my life will be spent working somewhere like Tesco, patiently labouring, waiting for the long months to pass until I get to begin teacher training, or touring the country with my acoustic, or possibly even travelling to all the places in the world I said I'd visit as a student and never did. I'm not ready to grow up yet, not by a long shot, I've still got so many things I want to do. But, even though I'm still very young, it feels like I have no time to do any of these things now. The ending of an era has a strange way of making one feel like all the opportunities that said era had to offer, even though they're still available now, have been lost; I now feel like I have no choice but to move on, put aside all the dreams I had in the "to not be touched" box in my memory, along with all things I should've said to some people, activities I meant to partake in but never got round to and ideas I wanted to test while I still had the chance.
No doubt I'll feel better in the morning, I always do. But I think for the next few weeks I'll continue to be lodged in this odd frame of mind, as I spend my time trying to find (and then perform) a job and unpacking the last three years of my life into my tiny bedroom back home, because for the next few weeks, or even months, I don't think I'll have anything to really look forward to, because this is the quiet lull in chapter transitions when nothing really happens; this is the part of the novel where the character has experienced one major event in their life and is getting back to normal before the next one suddenly hits him/her.
It's depressing to say goodbye to such an amazing experience as University, but only because there's such a long wait until the next amazing experience comes along. And until it does, no doubt I'll be living my life very quietly, patiently labouring until it arrives.
Finishing University seems to have taken its toll, finally; those that have long finished University always describe it as "the greatest experience you'll ever have", which doesn't bode well considering it's just come to an end for me. Does this mean my life's going to go downhill from here? Was University my one last flourish of true freedom before my education ends and my real (and apparently lesser) life begins? No, not in the slightest; I have many wonderful things to experience that far outweigh the simplistic frivolities University offers, that seem to reach no further than drinking, throwing up, forgetting everything and making as many mistakes in a single night as possible.
I've got marriage to look forward to; having children; doing at least one of my two dream jobs. I think my problem extends to the fact that, though I may have finished, the vast majority of my friends haven't and, as such, they can continue to enjoy their lack of responsibility and keep appreciating the simple things whilst I have to, contradictory of my personality though it is, grow up. I mean, my girfriend, the girl I intend to eventually marry and spend the rest of my life with, has only just started University. Tonight she was out all night with her friends, getting ridiculously drunk and having an all-round good time, whereas I was sat in my Dad's quiet living room, in the quiet village, having a nice quiet beer and a marginally quiet chat about all sorts of things. Was I jealous? Very. Was I angry? A little, yes, though not at her; more, I was angry at how I don't get to do that anymore.
For me, the next few months of my life will be spent working somewhere like Tesco, patiently labouring, waiting for the long months to pass until I get to begin teacher training, or touring the country with my acoustic, or possibly even travelling to all the places in the world I said I'd visit as a student and never did. I'm not ready to grow up yet, not by a long shot, I've still got so many things I want to do. But, even though I'm still very young, it feels like I have no time to do any of these things now. The ending of an era has a strange way of making one feel like all the opportunities that said era had to offer, even though they're still available now, have been lost; I now feel like I have no choice but to move on, put aside all the dreams I had in the "to not be touched" box in my memory, along with all things I should've said to some people, activities I meant to partake in but never got round to and ideas I wanted to test while I still had the chance.
No doubt I'll feel better in the morning, I always do. But I think for the next few weeks I'll continue to be lodged in this odd frame of mind, as I spend my time trying to find (and then perform) a job and unpacking the last three years of my life into my tiny bedroom back home, because for the next few weeks, or even months, I don't think I'll have anything to really look forward to, because this is the quiet lull in chapter transitions when nothing really happens; this is the part of the novel where the character has experienced one major event in their life and is getting back to normal before the next one suddenly hits him/her.
It's depressing to say goodbye to such an amazing experience as University, but only because there's such a long wait until the next amazing experience comes along. And until it does, no doubt I'll be living my life very quietly, patiently labouring until it arrives.
Sunday, 5 October 2008
A prediction: things will stay exactly the same, as usual
I know it's still quite a way off, but I was reading up on the metaphysical theories surrounding the year 2012. Apparently, in his book 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl, Daniel Pinchbeck believes that there will be a 'global awakening' to 'psychic connection', creating a noosphere. A noosphere was explained by Teilhard de Chardin as a collective consciousness of human beings. As we're becoming more organised in social networks, the noosphere will grow until we're all connected in our minds.
Some of you might find this idea terrifying. Imagine if everyone on earth (and by then it'll be 7 billion people according to the US Census Bureau) knew exactly what you were thinking. That'd scare the pants off me! Others may find this really cool, because perhaps this will lead us to a higher plane of existence, a superior emotional depth, an age of peace, maybe even a physical and emotional utopia. Or, of course, we might all get superpowers.
But do you want to know what I think? You're reading this article, so I imagine you do. I think this event will be insignificant to everybody except Mark Zuckerberg. Because when I read the words "social network" and "collective consciousness" I thought of only one explanation; 2012 will be the year that every person on earth is a member of Facebook.
Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against Facebook. In fact, I love it, and when I'm at home and not doing other things, chances are I'll be on it. I even have it open in the background while I do other things, because that's how great it is. But even I would find it an anti-climax if my noosphere theory is right, and I have a feeling it is. Ancient predictions have a habit of being prematurely hyped up. I imagine most of you still remember back in early 1997, when Nostradamus predicted the world would end. I was frightened all day about that, given I was only 9 and very imaginative, and all that happened was that some of my fish fingers were a little crispier than I would've liked.
So let me provide my own, modern ideas of some popular theories surrounding 2012. For starters, the big one; the completion of the thirteenth B'ak'tun cycle of the Mayan calendar. People have been wetting themselves for years over what's going to happen, so allow me to put my own idea forward: the fourteenth B'ak'tun cycle will begin. Not very frightening, is it? Not very interesting, either. Michael Drosnin, author of The Bible Code, thinks an asteroid will hit the earth, having "deciphered" the Bible. Forgive me for being slightly closed-minded, but you could predict anything by picking random letters from the Bible. I could read through Genesis and discover that, according to some re-arranged letters, I'm having a sandwich for lunch tomorrow. Again, not the most intense theory in the world, is it?
And there resides the problem. We live in an age where Hollywood has embedded itself into our perceptions, and as such, we crave excitement and danger. Life would be tremendously boring if we spent our days in safety, rather than constant mortal peril. We eat these theories up, and when they don't come true it doesn't matter, because there are loads of others that could come true! That's why there are forty+ theories on when the second coming of Jesus is supposed to occur. Once one date has passed without the bearded magician popping up out of thin air with a party jug of water, another date is predicted just a few weeks or months later. There are a few speculators, me included, but they are drowned out by the innumerable amount of people that assure us he is going to come back "at some point". We don't even know if he really existed yet, so one step at a time folks!
Sadly, until we all decide life's too exciting and begin ignoring the word 'terrorist', watching films about a short man falling over and getting a full grasp on reality, our world will be abound with these ludicrous theories until one actually becomes true. In the mean time, I'll see you on Facebook. All of you.
Until next time, my collectively unconscious readers... salut!
Some of you might find this idea terrifying. Imagine if everyone on earth (and by then it'll be 7 billion people according to the US Census Bureau) knew exactly what you were thinking. That'd scare the pants off me! Others may find this really cool, because perhaps this will lead us to a higher plane of existence, a superior emotional depth, an age of peace, maybe even a physical and emotional utopia. Or, of course, we might all get superpowers.
But do you want to know what I think? You're reading this article, so I imagine you do. I think this event will be insignificant to everybody except Mark Zuckerberg. Because when I read the words "social network" and "collective consciousness" I thought of only one explanation; 2012 will be the year that every person on earth is a member of Facebook.
Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against Facebook. In fact, I love it, and when I'm at home and not doing other things, chances are I'll be on it. I even have it open in the background while I do other things, because that's how great it is. But even I would find it an anti-climax if my noosphere theory is right, and I have a feeling it is. Ancient predictions have a habit of being prematurely hyped up. I imagine most of you still remember back in early 1997, when Nostradamus predicted the world would end. I was frightened all day about that, given I was only 9 and very imaginative, and all that happened was that some of my fish fingers were a little crispier than I would've liked.
So let me provide my own, modern ideas of some popular theories surrounding 2012. For starters, the big one; the completion of the thirteenth B'ak'tun cycle of the Mayan calendar. People have been wetting themselves for years over what's going to happen, so allow me to put my own idea forward: the fourteenth B'ak'tun cycle will begin. Not very frightening, is it? Not very interesting, either. Michael Drosnin, author of The Bible Code, thinks an asteroid will hit the earth, having "deciphered" the Bible. Forgive me for being slightly closed-minded, but you could predict anything by picking random letters from the Bible. I could read through Genesis and discover that, according to some re-arranged letters, I'm having a sandwich for lunch tomorrow. Again, not the most intense theory in the world, is it?
And there resides the problem. We live in an age where Hollywood has embedded itself into our perceptions, and as such, we crave excitement and danger. Life would be tremendously boring if we spent our days in safety, rather than constant mortal peril. We eat these theories up, and when they don't come true it doesn't matter, because there are loads of others that could come true! That's why there are forty+ theories on when the second coming of Jesus is supposed to occur. Once one date has passed without the bearded magician popping up out of thin air with a party jug of water, another date is predicted just a few weeks or months later. There are a few speculators, me included, but they are drowned out by the innumerable amount of people that assure us he is going to come back "at some point". We don't even know if he really existed yet, so one step at a time folks!
Sadly, until we all decide life's too exciting and begin ignoring the word 'terrorist', watching films about a short man falling over and getting a full grasp on reality, our world will be abound with these ludicrous theories until one actually becomes true. In the mean time, I'll see you on Facebook. All of you.
Until next time, my collectively unconscious readers... salut!
Wednesday, 24 September 2008
Time to lower the humour level to orange...
Last night I went to a roller disco at a local Student's Union club. I was terrible. I fell over almost instantly, fell over again when I tried to participate, stood by the railings for about half an hour and then decided to leave, falling over in the process. I have to admit, it wasn't one of my finer moments. But, of course, I was able to spare a tiny bit of the concentration I was using to keep upright to take a cynical look at the event.
I could talk to you about the fact that people had paid around £7 just to go round and round in circles. I could share a giggle about the old woman in the middle of the floor showing people dance moves they could use. I could rage at all the know-it-alls that glided around the floor thinking they were the coolest person in the world. I could even comment on how serving alcohol, a substance that eventually makes people fall over, was a bad idea at an event where people were falling over. But no, I want to mention the fact that, before I was given the right to fall over, I had to sign a declaration that stated that if I somehow died in there, it would all be my own fault.
This generation is riddled with paranoia. To abscond themselves from being sued, the event organisers basically told everyone that if they were injured, everyone else could only stand and laugh at them. I'm sure if I had broken my arm last night, I'd be more interested in getting some kind of medical attention than demanding the company to give me a bit of loose change. But, alas, that's just the world we live in nowadays.
I blame lawyers, myself. Ever since lawyers realised their speedboat comes as part of a pair, they've been doing everything they can to swindle money off people. Using exciting buzzwords and confusing legal jargon, they can brainwash anyone they lay their hands on to part with their hard-earned cash. Is it any wonder there are so many divorces nowadays? Happy families belong in the 1950's, not today's modern times, or so must the lawyer's think, which is why they make it their business to tell any wife they see that their husband is the worst human being in the history of earth.
Injury lawyers are worse. I once saw a court case where a man sued his boss because, having slipped over at work, his knee gets colder than it used to do. He could just as easily have sued God for making cold weather, or himself for being a clumsy bastard, but he sued the one person closely related to the incident that actually had money. If you want to go up a ladder at work, try sawing it in half, covering the bottom with orange juice, laying spikes around the floor and doing the hokey cokey. You'll definitely fall off, and your lawyer will definitely manage to shift the blame to your boss.
Of course it's not just the lawyers that make the world that little bit worse. Politicians are at it too. I'm not going to turn this into a long, boring political debate, unlike my last entry, but I do want to mention one thing, and that is 'terror alerts'. As if the world wasn't paranoid enough, we now have politicians telling us just how paranoid we should be. I'll wager fifty years ago there were terrorists, and the only kind of alert system was "we're being attacked" and "we're not being attacked". Perhaps it was even just a man in a high building with a pair of binoculars who, upon seeing a bomb heading towards the city he was in, radioed in and said "we're boned".
The introduction of a terror alert system shows us that everyone is just paranoid about something that is, let's face it, bound to happen at some point. People have attacked other people since they realised there were other people. Which means we're always under threat from being attacked in some way or form, so the terror alert should always be red. The terror alert system itself signifies that we're already boned. The colours are just there to determine how boned.
Until next time, my uncivil servants...ta ra!
I could talk to you about the fact that people had paid around £7 just to go round and round in circles. I could share a giggle about the old woman in the middle of the floor showing people dance moves they could use. I could rage at all the know-it-alls that glided around the floor thinking they were the coolest person in the world. I could even comment on how serving alcohol, a substance that eventually makes people fall over, was a bad idea at an event where people were falling over. But no, I want to mention the fact that, before I was given the right to fall over, I had to sign a declaration that stated that if I somehow died in there, it would all be my own fault.
This generation is riddled with paranoia. To abscond themselves from being sued, the event organisers basically told everyone that if they were injured, everyone else could only stand and laugh at them. I'm sure if I had broken my arm last night, I'd be more interested in getting some kind of medical attention than demanding the company to give me a bit of loose change. But, alas, that's just the world we live in nowadays.
I blame lawyers, myself. Ever since lawyers realised their speedboat comes as part of a pair, they've been doing everything they can to swindle money off people. Using exciting buzzwords and confusing legal jargon, they can brainwash anyone they lay their hands on to part with their hard-earned cash. Is it any wonder there are so many divorces nowadays? Happy families belong in the 1950's, not today's modern times, or so must the lawyer's think, which is why they make it their business to tell any wife they see that their husband is the worst human being in the history of earth.
Injury lawyers are worse. I once saw a court case where a man sued his boss because, having slipped over at work, his knee gets colder than it used to do. He could just as easily have sued God for making cold weather, or himself for being a clumsy bastard, but he sued the one person closely related to the incident that actually had money. If you want to go up a ladder at work, try sawing it in half, covering the bottom with orange juice, laying spikes around the floor and doing the hokey cokey. You'll definitely fall off, and your lawyer will definitely manage to shift the blame to your boss.
Of course it's not just the lawyers that make the world that little bit worse. Politicians are at it too. I'm not going to turn this into a long, boring political debate, unlike my last entry, but I do want to mention one thing, and that is 'terror alerts'. As if the world wasn't paranoid enough, we now have politicians telling us just how paranoid we should be. I'll wager fifty years ago there were terrorists, and the only kind of alert system was "we're being attacked" and "we're not being attacked". Perhaps it was even just a man in a high building with a pair of binoculars who, upon seeing a bomb heading towards the city he was in, radioed in and said "we're boned".
The introduction of a terror alert system shows us that everyone is just paranoid about something that is, let's face it, bound to happen at some point. People have attacked other people since they realised there were other people. Which means we're always under threat from being attacked in some way or form, so the terror alert should always be red. The terror alert system itself signifies that we're already boned. The colours are just there to determine how boned.
Until next time, my uncivil servants...ta ra!
Tuesday, 9 September 2008
Entering the polling station looking for Superman
So, the news is saying that Gordon Brown has announced he's going to "re-think" his policy on tackling government pressures. It's also saying algae turns Polar Bears green, but that's funny in a non-ironic way. But Brown re-thinking his policies? I wonder why that could be? Perhaps it's because since he became Prime Minister, everything seems to have gotten a lot worse, so obviously his current policy isn't working very well.
I doubt it's his fault, though. Our economy, at least, was doing fantastically well while he was Chancellor of the Exchequer, so I doubt moving to the top spot somehow fogged his economic vision. Sadly for him, the inevitable crunch came about once Brown eagerly jumped into Blair's still-warm seat, so it looks like he'll be remembered as a terrible PM. Unless the crunch is beaten and the economy sustained while he's still in charge. I'm going to stick with him being a terrible PM then.
It won't be just Brown that gets the brunt of this criticism, however. Even though New Labour has done some fantastic things for us these past eleven years, as a nation we tend only to remember the things that we don't like rather than all the good stuff. It's always been like that, and probably always will.
When people remember Thatcher, we don't think about her great strides with improving the NHS, nor the abundant benefits of her privatisation policy. We think about how she was a horrible person who had some vendetta against the North. Or at least that's what history has warped her into.
When we think of Eden (and this is going back a bit, now) all we can think of is how he screwed up the Suez Crisis. We vaguely recall he had some mildly impressive policies, but they never surfaced because he had a nervous breakdown and had to quit, thanks to everyone shouting at him about handling the Suez Crisis as well as possible under immense pressure.
And once New Labour is knocked off the top-spot, which may be in a fair fews years considering the current calibre of opposing leaders, we won't remember the improved foreign relationships, we won't remember our economy being stronger than ever before, we won't remember showing the world Britain is still important thanks to the Olympic and Capital of Culture bid-winners.
No, we'll remember New Labour as a nanny government that passed all sorts of laws to stop their Sunday afternoon being ruined, such as banning fox-hunting to keep the noise down, banning smoking to keep the air clean, the devolution of power to Scotland to put an end to angry Scots phoning them up for favours, increasing the National Minimum Wage so their teenage son can afford a taxi instead of asking for a lift, and warring with Iraq so they don't get bombed while taking a stroll round the Lakes.
Unfortunately for Brown, this is the way we are, and given that he was in charge when we all ran out of money, we won't be erecting a statue of him any time soon. As with all PM's, when anybody opens the newspaper to see a string of bad news, they say "this is terrible, why isn't Brown sorting all this out?" For some reason we think our government is full of supermen who could deal with all our problems if they only decided to bother.
So I want to hop on the bandwagon and open up BBC News' homepage, and urge Brown to put on his cape and deal with the following; asian police officers fired for "racist reasons", 22-year-old paedophile "schoolboys", historic piers constantly catching fire, floods across England and Wales and a string of deaths and murders all over the place. Once he deals with all those problems, he may be well on his way to being a revered PM. But if he doesn't do his job properly, we may soon be attacked by green Polar Bears.
Until next time, my red-faced readers......sayonara!
I doubt it's his fault, though. Our economy, at least, was doing fantastically well while he was Chancellor of the Exchequer, so I doubt moving to the top spot somehow fogged his economic vision. Sadly for him, the inevitable crunch came about once Brown eagerly jumped into Blair's still-warm seat, so it looks like he'll be remembered as a terrible PM. Unless the crunch is beaten and the economy sustained while he's still in charge. I'm going to stick with him being a terrible PM then.
It won't be just Brown that gets the brunt of this criticism, however. Even though New Labour has done some fantastic things for us these past eleven years, as a nation we tend only to remember the things that we don't like rather than all the good stuff. It's always been like that, and probably always will.
When people remember Thatcher, we don't think about her great strides with improving the NHS, nor the abundant benefits of her privatisation policy. We think about how she was a horrible person who had some vendetta against the North. Or at least that's what history has warped her into.
When we think of Eden (and this is going back a bit, now) all we can think of is how he screwed up the Suez Crisis. We vaguely recall he had some mildly impressive policies, but they never surfaced because he had a nervous breakdown and had to quit, thanks to everyone shouting at him about handling the Suez Crisis as well as possible under immense pressure.
And once New Labour is knocked off the top-spot, which may be in a fair fews years considering the current calibre of opposing leaders, we won't remember the improved foreign relationships, we won't remember our economy being stronger than ever before, we won't remember showing the world Britain is still important thanks to the Olympic and Capital of Culture bid-winners.
No, we'll remember New Labour as a nanny government that passed all sorts of laws to stop their Sunday afternoon being ruined, such as banning fox-hunting to keep the noise down, banning smoking to keep the air clean, the devolution of power to Scotland to put an end to angry Scots phoning them up for favours, increasing the National Minimum Wage so their teenage son can afford a taxi instead of asking for a lift, and warring with Iraq so they don't get bombed while taking a stroll round the Lakes.
Unfortunately for Brown, this is the way we are, and given that he was in charge when we all ran out of money, we won't be erecting a statue of him any time soon. As with all PM's, when anybody opens the newspaper to see a string of bad news, they say "this is terrible, why isn't Brown sorting all this out?" For some reason we think our government is full of supermen who could deal with all our problems if they only decided to bother.
So I want to hop on the bandwagon and open up BBC News' homepage, and urge Brown to put on his cape and deal with the following; asian police officers fired for "racist reasons", 22-year-old paedophile "schoolboys", historic piers constantly catching fire, floods across England and Wales and a string of deaths and murders all over the place. Once he deals with all those problems, he may be well on his way to being a revered PM. But if he doesn't do his job properly, we may soon be attacked by green Polar Bears.
Until next time, my red-faced readers......sayonara!
Thursday, 28 August 2008
I only do it for the money!
A particularly lazy friend of mine last week boasted in front of a few of us that he'd managed to do a single day's work and was now quite tired. At that point, another friend, one very over-worked and lifeless friend, replied "what do you want, a f***ing medal or something?" Judging by the state of our current society, he probably did. Nowadays it seems as though everyone believes they're owed much more praise than they're given for something they do that hardly deserves any praise at all.
For my first example, I refer, as is often the case in arguments like this, to the world of sport. Fifty years ago, in not a single sport, aside from the Olympics (where the medal system is flawless but the events themselves need to be reconsidered, I believe), was there a constant barrage of praise rained down upon the athletes competing in them. Nobody was ever idolised and worshipped. A star player never suffered from colonic-tongue syndrome thanks to the media. I don't even think star players existed, because back in those days it was results that were celebrated, not individuals.
In these modern times, however, it seems that if someone does something right in their particular sport they are known up and down the nation as a "hero". That's a word that's loosely thrown about a bit, these days. An arthritic old man jumping into a lion cage to save a class of children is a hero. A woman who cuts a pouch into her body to protect her baby from a fire is a hero. Jade Goody's cervical cancer is a hero. But a footballer? No, I don't think so.
Before you decide to refer to whoever scored a goal this weekend for your team as a hero, remember this; while you spend ten hours a day sat behind a desk doing paperwork that will never be read, not receiving the slightest bit of praise for it and being paid a mediocre salary, the person you're about to call a hero is receiving national acclaim for doing something he is paid £100,000-a-week to do, yet barely manages to do it once a month. Therefore he's not a hero: he's a second-rate employee.
In 500 years, when England next wins the Ashes, I hope that instead of calling them heroes, the people of England just say "well, you took bloody long enough, didn't you?" I certainly hope English people in the future have a better long-term memory than English folk today. When England won the Ashes, our citizens were dancing in the streets and organising victory parades and showering general priase upon the 'heroic cricketers' (there's a term that doesn't make sense) and completely forgetting that for the previous 25 years the team had failed in every attempt to win that trophy. Epically failed. It's not even a decent trophy, it's some tiny bit of ornate balsa wood. And it's cricket, which officially "doesn't matter".
Of course, it isn't just sport where praise is unjustifiably requested, it's everywhere. Kids expect an awards ceremony every time they draw an appalling picture of some haggard, string-haired, hunchbacked stickman, so long as it reads "To the best _____ in the world" underneath it. Instead of just patting a dog's head or saying "good boy/girl" when teaching it a trick, now you have to entice it with dog treats, so when the dog finally learns how to do a backflip, it's too fat to perform. Even computers are at it; whenever you turn a modern PC or laptop on, it makes a "ta daa!" noise, as though it's performed some kind of magic trick. No, you've just turned on, we've barely scratched the surface of what you're supposed to do, let alone what you can magically do.
The problem is we're now a nation of over-achievers. With the right funding and facilities, both of which are readily and widely available nowadays, we could be just about anything. Therefore instead of a select few 'elite' citizens standing above the rest and saying "I'm special. I can do something you can't. Idolise me", we're all at a level height, all demanding the praise that's so prematurely thrown around.
In this day and age, it's rather quite difficult to stand out as an individual, but I'm trying my very best. And do you know what? I think I deserve a f***ing medal!
Until next time, my first-rate readers... ciao!
For my first example, I refer, as is often the case in arguments like this, to the world of sport. Fifty years ago, in not a single sport, aside from the Olympics (where the medal system is flawless but the events themselves need to be reconsidered, I believe), was there a constant barrage of praise rained down upon the athletes competing in them. Nobody was ever idolised and worshipped. A star player never suffered from colonic-tongue syndrome thanks to the media. I don't even think star players existed, because back in those days it was results that were celebrated, not individuals.
In these modern times, however, it seems that if someone does something right in their particular sport they are known up and down the nation as a "hero". That's a word that's loosely thrown about a bit, these days. An arthritic old man jumping into a lion cage to save a class of children is a hero. A woman who cuts a pouch into her body to protect her baby from a fire is a hero. Jade Goody's cervical cancer is a hero. But a footballer? No, I don't think so.
Before you decide to refer to whoever scored a goal this weekend for your team as a hero, remember this; while you spend ten hours a day sat behind a desk doing paperwork that will never be read, not receiving the slightest bit of praise for it and being paid a mediocre salary, the person you're about to call a hero is receiving national acclaim for doing something he is paid £100,000-a-week to do, yet barely manages to do it once a month. Therefore he's not a hero: he's a second-rate employee.
In 500 years, when England next wins the Ashes, I hope that instead of calling them heroes, the people of England just say "well, you took bloody long enough, didn't you?" I certainly hope English people in the future have a better long-term memory than English folk today. When England won the Ashes, our citizens were dancing in the streets and organising victory parades and showering general priase upon the 'heroic cricketers' (there's a term that doesn't make sense) and completely forgetting that for the previous 25 years the team had failed in every attempt to win that trophy. Epically failed. It's not even a decent trophy, it's some tiny bit of ornate balsa wood. And it's cricket, which officially "doesn't matter".
Of course, it isn't just sport where praise is unjustifiably requested, it's everywhere. Kids expect an awards ceremony every time they draw an appalling picture of some haggard, string-haired, hunchbacked stickman, so long as it reads "To the best _____ in the world" underneath it. Instead of just patting a dog's head or saying "good boy/girl" when teaching it a trick, now you have to entice it with dog treats, so when the dog finally learns how to do a backflip, it's too fat to perform. Even computers are at it; whenever you turn a modern PC or laptop on, it makes a "ta daa!" noise, as though it's performed some kind of magic trick. No, you've just turned on, we've barely scratched the surface of what you're supposed to do, let alone what you can magically do.
The problem is we're now a nation of over-achievers. With the right funding and facilities, both of which are readily and widely available nowadays, we could be just about anything. Therefore instead of a select few 'elite' citizens standing above the rest and saying "I'm special. I can do something you can't. Idolise me", we're all at a level height, all demanding the praise that's so prematurely thrown around.
In this day and age, it's rather quite difficult to stand out as an individual, but I'm trying my very best. And do you know what? I think I deserve a f***ing medal!
Until next time, my first-rate readers... ciao!
Over-tired and underwhelmed
So, now that it’s all over, I feel safe going out into the streets without hearing all about the bloody Olympics. For just two weeks every four years, people who don’t care about sports suddenly seem to turn on each other. Americans and Britons, who were best of friends one day, are instantly at each others’ throat, quarrelling about which country is best, while antagonising maths bods decide to whittle up “medals by population” graphs to incense these arguments further. Meanwhile, all the decent television (little as there is nowadays) is being shunned to one side so we can flick between different events on different channels. Never before has it been so easy to cycle between such thrilling competitions as ‘The Men’s Underwear-Only Pogo-Stick 100m Hurdles’ and ‘Bizarrely-Named Deviation of, what is essentially still, Rowing’.
All the while, I’m sat in the middle of these debates, pacing the room waiting for these events to be over so I can watch ‘Mock The Week’, wondering who in the world cares about who’s best at jumping over a horizontal stick using a bendy one? Who would find a country impressive if they said “We’re the best at spinning around and throwing things”? Surely whatever country it was said to would reply “So what? We have a rapidly expanding economy, spurred on by our increased trading activity, meaning we have a lot more money to spend on reforming critical areas such as healthcare and education. But good job on being able to throw stuff, that’s, er… really important in… erm...”
The only highlight of the Olympics was the closing ceremony, and I don’t mean that ironically; seeing Boris Johnson look more uncomfortable than I have ever seen any person before was a treat, and I was overjoyed when Jimmy Page came out and, using the power of music, shouted to Leona Lewis, “STFU bitch, guitar solo!” Of course, it was nice to see Britain’s contribution to the hand-over celebrations. For those of you who didn’t see it, here’s a brief summary -
Shit dancers with umbrellas cavorting around a bus.
Bus turns into a hedge (seriously) shaped like London.
Leona Lewis comes out wearing, what looks like, a giant green windsock.
Jimmy Page appears, bearing a striking resemblence to Father Jack Hackett.
Page and Lewis play a (rather disappointing) version of ‘Whole Lotta Love’.
David Beckham lives up to his title of ‘Most Pointless Man in the World’ by appearing from the bus, picking up a football and kicking it into the crowd, hitting a Chinese flag-bearer in the face.
End of ceremony.
I actually quite enjoyed our country making a right tit of itself. It conveyed a simple message to the whole world, comforting them and raising their morale, because the message was clear - we’re all idiots now, there’s no chance of re-building the empire, you’re safe! The only bit that ticked me off was Beckham’s needless appearance. I wonder exactly how many millions of pounds he was paid to appear in the ceremony for, realistically, around 17 seconds. Makes you proud, doesn’t it?
Until next time, my bronze medals… adios!
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