Matthew Wright

If you need the context of what this is about you can find it here. To summarise a 16 year old was killed here recently, 20 minutes walk from where I live. Matthew Wright and guests decided it's a subject for jokes. I tend not to object too much when someone makes a poor taste joke, generally I'll defend them if pushed into it. Free speech and all that stuff, but this wasn't something you can even try to defend. This wasn't even in poor taste, it was incredibly insensitive, it was wrong to deal with it in that way. The issue I think is that some people, including Matthew Wright, don't entirely see it that way.

I didn't know Liam Aitchison, or even know of him until he was reported missing. He was less than half my age. I remember being 16, not entirely fondly but I lived through it. He wasn't allowed to. He was murdered by someone. This is not a subject for humour by any sane and normal individual.

Matthew Wright did apologise for the comments. Or at least that is what the news sites are saying. I remember reading something when Liam Fox resigned about the apology he gave, he apologised if it appeared he did wrong, but it was your fault for thinking he was in the wrong. I can't remember who wrote that piece but it's worth a read if you can find it. And that's how I read the Matthew Wright apology, you took offence, I'm obliged to say sorry to keep my job, but it is your fault for finding offence in what I said.

I've seen some comments comparing the comments to what Jeremy Clarkson said about strikers. That in my view was obviously a joke. And I've seen other comments asking would he have said that about the murder of Stephen Lawrence, and then mocked his accent the same way. Do you think he might have been condemned as racist if he'd done that? Probably. I'm not accusing him of being racist, or even anti-scottish, but it is something to consider.

The other thing that has got people annoyed was his apology, and the last comment about the group on facebook about reporting Matthew Wright to Ofcom. This does show, in my view, how he was less than serious about the apology, as it was a crass thing to say at best, and shows him up. He wanted the publicity, now he has it. He may have been right about campaigns on facebook though. That kind of thing is what the Daily Mail at it's worst would do, shout about sacking people, or campaign against someone who has said something stupid, or offensive. And I don't like those. It's organised complaints, and that could be against something important, there are many people who will condemn people they disagree with that you will agree with. We all have different views after all.

I'd like to see Matthew Wright apologise properly, and recognise that it was a stupid comment. I doubt he will, but starting a campaign gives him publicity, and he should be denied that. After all, I can't remember the last thing I watched on channel 5 that wasn't football. I won't be watching him, I never did. I wouldn't have been aware of the comments but for the publicity attached to them. And so therefore we descend further.

Twitter Bullying

Everyone and their Mother has had a comment on Ricky Gervais and the "Mong" debate this week. I'm not going to comment much on it here, read Richard Herring blogging on it as he puts it well. Just a couple of things from me, the first being Gervais' comment about how the meaning has changed, look it's in urban dictionary. I'm not sure if he just looked that up to support himself but what the whole thing looks like to me is a 50 year old trying to talk like he's still a teenager and still cool, which is a little pathetic. You could say any word, let's say the N word, being careful how I phrase things here, and say it means something else, then put up a definition to say it doesn't mean what you think it does, it means this. If it doesn't mean what you say to the people you were talking to then you're being offensive. Offensive can be ok in comedy if you're funny enough but in this case I don't think he was. Purely my view.

And we come to the second point here. What happened when he was challenged on the use of the word was that he RT'd the comments and then a whole load of followers decided to attack. From comments on twitter from Richard Herring today he had several thousand people attacking him for daring to query Gervais and his response about the meaning. Quite a few abusive. Which was in a way encouraged by Ricky Gervais. And that to my mind is bullying. There were other people who took it up with him, and some of them also received abuse, I heard someone on the radio yesterday who had been a victim of this as well. Just for disagreeing with someone, and saying they thought he was wrong.

This isn't something that's come out of nowhere, I've seen it happen or heard from other people I follow on twitter that it happened to them. And I don't get why people do this. They follow a celeb, fair enough I follow a few myself, but when someone disagrees with them, or says something they don't like they RT it and then an attack seems to start. I don't understand why people do this? Why go into attack another person because they disagree with something someone else said? They're generally not being abusive, in most cases although some are, and they're only making a point that isn't nasty to anyone else, but thousands can descend on them because of one comment or RT by someone else. There is general nastiness from individuals as well, but when you get a large number of people doing it, that is bullying, led by a sneering idiot usually. It mystifies me why people do this, why you start sending messages because a celeb you follow says something. Do you think you're helpful, do you think you're defending them when you attack someone else, are you being verbally abusive for a reason other than an ego thing, saying I'm defending this person, because I know them, do you think you're friend with the people you follow on twitter? Don't understand it, I really don't.

Trial by Twitter

So Amanda Knox is innocent and now free, despite what the Daily Mail said very briefly on Monday night although this explanation does tell you how they screwed that up. And as much as I despise the Daily Mail, it's fair enough. But the thing that interests me is the comments that were getting made on Twitter when she was released and are still going on, by a huge number of people who know about as much as I do about the Italian Justice system, (I assume this is true for most of them anyway), which is pretty much nothing. But it struck me again that people believe what the propaganda is, and that there may yet be an issue with that.

Now there are still questions to answer in that case, Meredeth Kercher was murdered by someone and the Kercher Family do deserve answers, which they are not getting. In my view there are many unanswered questions about the case, and they may be able to get some from Knox and Sollecito if they are prepared to tell them, or what they tell the press. But this isn't what I'm talking about here, I'll accept the Courts verdict on guilt or innocence. But plenty others do't seem to.

We had the same kind of comments when Rebecca Leighton was released. People assumed guilt, mostly based on what was said in the press. There is an assumption of guilt when someone is arrested. People talk about not trusting the police, but they seem to automatically assume that when someone is arrested for a high profile crime that they must be guilty and it's ok to pronounce on that. I saw comments when Rebecca Leighton was freed that said how can they let her out when she's guilty, the comments were accusing her of Murder, with no evidence despite the fact the police have confirmed there wasn't evidence of it, people were still screaming that a murderer had been released. There were other cases you'll probably be aware of, mostly based on biased press reports and assumptions made by people hearing the news and not thinking properly.

I don't understand why we slag the press off so much and then accept much of what we're told as fact without thinking about it. When people are arrested and charged they are not guilty at that point, but people seem to accept that the police don't arrest anyone without cause for serious crimes, except when it is someone like them, or related to a cause the believe in, or something they follow. And even then they believe the papers, despite the general criticism of the police that they may make every day. We buy into hype too easily, and I'm not sure why that is for some people. It's just annoyed me. I'm not making a point here really,  I'm just thinking out loud, and there's no-one here listening.

It's a Conspiracy

Started watching a programme on crop circles the other night while flicking through the channels before going to bed. Most of it was just various people talking about how they're from another world, or how they're faked, and showing how they actually do the fake, but there was a section in there about a video someone had made. He claimed it showed a crop circle being made by 2 balls of light. He'd faked it, obviously, but there was someone on there who appeared otherwise rational, who said it was real, and that the guy had recorded it and then lied after he'd been got at by the people covering these things up to say it was fake. Never mind the guy and his mate actually recorded themselves faking it and then confessed later they'd done it. Nope they'd been got at by someone (I assume government but I kind of missed who the someone was, if he said). The argument was no-one else had ever seen a video like it, and no-one had ever made another one as it was too difficult, so it had to be real, and that seems a little odd, why would you repeat a fake seems a better one to me. Took the production team less than 2 hours to replicate on the same kind of software so the no-one could fake it argument went. Although I doubt that bothered his argument too much. Evidence can generally be ignored where it doesn't suit your worldview.

What it set me thinking about was general conspiracy theories, there are a hell of a lot of them out there. And they're mostly bullshit. I say mostly, I suspect they may all be but there's probably one somewhere where some is right about some minor thing, which then allows all conspiracy theorists to say see, told you there was a cover up. The thing is there is rarely a cover up for anything. We had the 9/11 conspiracy theories getting an airing earlier this month, and the ignorance of evidence there. People believing there was no reason for the towers to go down because they were hit by a plane. I don't think they stress tested for a 747 coming into the building, there was no reason for them to stay standing. It's lunacy to suggest that the government organised these attacks as some do, considering the American government can barely organise their budget now, there is no way something that would have required that many people to pull off could have been covered up successfully. It just isn't possible with people talking, someone would know and tell, they can't kill everyone, no matter what you think. They really can't.

Conspiracy theories are a bit of a mystery to me, I understand why you might go there, but I prefer to look at the evidence personally. Generally you can find something that explains what you don't understand, and if you can't it's worth looking again. I don't know if people who believe strongly in them are missing something in their own lives, but it's odd that people can't accept reality. The word But is a good one to use sometimes, but mostly when the truth is told you can tell, and when you can't, you find out quite quickly, especially nowadays. Don't accept bullshit but you should know when it's being spouted.

One final thing, if you believe 9/11 or UFO conspiracy theories are the work of wingnuts, do a search for either Celtic or Rangers and referee, or maybe just SFA. "The Refs are a' Masons agin the bhoys/He had a Cross on his whistle." These are the work of the mad. Much more than anything else you read.

Trolling

There are too many people calling trolling at the moment. Dom Joly is particularly bad for this on my twitter feed, exposing trolls when they are not trolls in my view. They're people shouting abuse, possibly flamers if that term still exists. nothing more or less than that.

To Explain, my definition of trolling would be put in another way, shit-stirring. You're throwing a comment out for the reaction you get, you're saying that Star Wars is crap where Star Trek is the dogs bollocks, and waiting for people to rise to it, and getting off on the reaction. I've never got why you would but apparently some do, which is ok but you don't feed them.

To make what I think clear, this is not a troll, whatever the telegraph believes. He's a wanker, yes, he's a flamer, he's an obnoxious prick, but he is not a troll. There is some thought behind trolling, and it shouldn't just get a reaction saying you're a stain on humanity, it should make people think about what they believe. Trolls should stir it up, they shouldn't abuse people. Please remember that.

Bring back the Cane?

Was listening to Jeremy Vines show on Radio 2 this lunchtime and caught the piece on bringing back Corporal Punishment in schools. They had someone on arguing with the same phrase everyone uses when they argue for it, "Never Did Me Any Harm". You need to define harm as what it actually seems to have done is that it's made you into someone who can't see anything wrong with hitting a child because you can't make them listen to you.

Basically the argument seems to be, when I was young things were better and kids were better behaved in class, we had the cane in schools when I was young, therefore things were better because we had the cane. A kind of odd circular logic, that takes no account of any changes in society in the last 20 to 30 years, and places all worsening behaviour in the context of teachers not being able to thrash the children, rather than looking at any other reasons for it. Drives you mental.

We never had the cane when I was at school, or the belt or anything like it. Was banned in my primary school before I went, and I went to Secondary school (in Scotland) in 1988. I don't remember anything like the problems people speak about today then, although I do believe they're exaggerated in a lot of cases anyway, but it didn't cause any problems to my teachers not being able to hit us. Or didn't seem to anyway, as I remember. Some of them were better teachers than others, some of them couldn't manage a class too well, but it was never an issue that led to violence in the classroom, or any major problems. So why do you need corporal punishment, how will that help anything do you think? Without looking at whats causing the problems you're telling us about, it's just more unjustified violence in my view.

The Price of Fuel

Yesterday they announces that the EU had approved a plan to try to reduce the high cost of petrol which especially affects those of us in the islands of Scotland. Today our petrol prices went up. Again. You can have an argument about fuel prices for the entire country being too high, due to taxes etc, but as Brian Wilson put it in his comment piece in the West Highland Free Press this week it's the price differential that causes us issues up here. About 20p a litre on city prices I think, now up to £1.50 a litre at my local petrol station, or near £7 a gallon.

I also found another comment from Brian Wilson in 2003, when he was an energy Minister in the Labour Government - "There is a danger of price increases at the pump becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy in circumstances which do not justify them.". Also says about prices surging to 90p a litre. Remember that and weep. I will. I just looked up the prices when I passed my driving test in 1994, around 50p a litre. Even allowing for inflation it still makes nasty reading.

But the differential is the particular problem that we see here. I've heard a number of excuses for it over time, it's the cost to get the fuel to the island, or the lower volumes put through the pumps that causes the prices to rise. I've yet to hear a definitive theory that actually makes any sense. There isn't a huge difference in the cost to get fuel to other remote areas of Scotland, or to the volumes but there is still a differential even there. In the Wilson piece he uses Fort William as an example, similar volumes sold, and fairly remote to get it to, but much cheaper than here. The fuel comes to the island by Tanker, direct from Grangemouth I believe, which isn't particularly different to how they get it to other places, but it costs us more to fill up.

The major problem as I see it is that someone is ripping us off on fuel prices, and no-one wants to properly investigate who. Why not? There may be all sorts of reason, investigations have looked at if the retailers here were operating a cartel, but no investigations have ever looked at the suppliers. I certainly don't know why it costs so much, I'd like someone to tell me but I won't hold my breath for it. I do have a feeling I'll be getting fitter with walking so much more from now on though.

The Performance of Grief

There's been a lot of comments, blogs, TV programmes today about 9/11 on the tenth anniversary of the attacks. My personal memory is that I was working, in Glasgow in an office in the science park out the far end of Maryhill Road. Would have been just after 2pm when one of the managers came down and said that a light plane had crashed into the World Trade Centre, which was what the first reports said as I remember it. Then everything in the office went quiet. There wasn't a phone call coming into the place, the only call we had all afternoon was from one customer who was in Brazil, and he was just told to put on the TV. He called back 3 weeks after if I remember right. And we all sat there watching the TV for the afternoon and seeing events unfold just as a group. One of the girls I worked with was trying to contact her parents that afternoon, as they were supposed to be flying from Boston that day. She found out they were ok hours later as I remember. And I can't tell you anything else about that week, or even that evening. What happened after everybody knows, eventually we wound up fighting in Iraq as an ultimate consequence of events that day, or that was one of the excuses used at least.

The thing is that it seems to be the amount of commemoration and talk about it comes across as almost a celebration of the events, and that should not be. It's not so much the overkill, and the amount of TV programmes, especially on the History Channel this week, but it's the way it's being done. I don't have any personal connection the the events, no-one I knew was there, I know no-one who died or was injured, so I don't feel any grief for those who died. Sympathy for the families yes, sorry for the loss of people but not actual grief for their deaths. I see grief as a personal thing, you need to know someone to feel it when they die, anything else is just sympathy, not real grief. You can appreciate the sacrifice of Soldiers and that kind of thing, but it's not really grief for their deaths.

But we seem to have come to a point where everyone has to grieve, this I think started with Tony Blair when Diana, Princess of Wales was killed in that car crash and he was saying the stuff about her being the peoples Princess. It's a national mourning thing that occurred, when everyone was supposed to be grief stricken for the loss of someone they saw in the papers but didn't know. I've never quite understood it, it seems to have taken on it's own life and become a performance of something you were meant to do and were not allowed to question.  In a sense it's the same with the meeting of the dead coming back from the war that Blair and Bush started at 9/11. In Wootton Bassett they were lining the streets when the bodies were repatriated. That started as a few people stopping to honour the dead as they returned, that being fair enough and a personal thing. But it then took on it's own life and it became a ritual, and in doing so it lost a bit of meaning. When it came to an end it was handed over to another town. That had become a performance, not a thing that was done for peoples own reasons, but just a performance that was put on without thought. It began another way, but that's how it ended up. Just a show. People may believe that it's right, and I'm not going to argue, we respect those who fight for us, or we should anyway, but I'm not sure that something being automatically done helps, I hope I'm never in a position to find out.

Why 50 Things to do before you die?

The guy who drove up Snowdon said it was one of the 50 things he wanted to do before he died. I'm not sure if it was just drive up a mountain or specifically drive up Snowdon, although why is eluding me altogether. I can't see the excitement in it, I can't see the challenge or the point. It's a pretty dull thing to want to do as far as I'm concerned, let's drive uphill for a bit off-road. Another tick off the list.

I'm not a fan of these lists anyway. Mostly they're done by adrenaline junkies, or some real idiots who want to show off about the things they've done, like bungee jumping in New Zealand - the question would be why make a suicidal leap without the commitment to the afterlife? Or the places you simply MUST visit, like Machu Picchu, I'm sure it's a fantastic site but it's in Peru, not likely to happen, and likely to be disappointing after the build up it's had over the last few years.

I don't really like people telling me what to do, or where to go, which may be something to do with this, but these kind of lists do really annoy me. It's putting your life down to a tick in a box, yes, done that, next hugely important thing I must do before I die as I've been told my life is incomplete unless I've been attacked by a bull in Pamplona or gone heli-skiing in the Alps. And suddenly everyone has to have a list, and you can't move on, or actually live your life and see what happens, as everything must be geared towards the next tickbox on your list, the next life-changing experience that you simply must do as otherwise you're not a whole human being.

Personally I just take things as they come, I will never go bungee jumping (I don't trust my life to a bit of rubber and some nutcase tying a knot). I'll visit where I want to go, not where you've decided is cool, or massively important and must be seen. I'll do the things I enjoy, and I'll make my own choices thanks. And I'll never drive a car up a Mountain. Because I don't see the point. Driving it round the Nurburgring would be a different matter.

You Give me Road Rage

Every day you take a step closer to a serious road rage incident. I do anyway, so many idiots on the roads at the moment. It's not like I live in a city with a lot of traffic, there are plenty cars but it's not too bad except at certain times, generally when I'm not on the road. But there's still a lot of people I'd quite like to talk to. At length.

Earlier today I nearly crashed, was at a crossroads stopped at the lights, they went green car in front went right,  car at opposite side of lights decided to cut right across me as I was about to go through straight on and also turned right. I think I missed hitting it by a couple of feet. There wasn't anyone coming through behind me, they'd have been able to turn 2 seconds later, but no, they had to go through IMMEDIATELY, sod waiting for you with the right of way, I'll risk killing you to gain a second which I'll lose again waiting at the roundabout down the road. Would love to know what you're thinking.

The other thing with this is the might is right argument. The car I nearly hit was a 4x4, would probably have smashed my Nissan and mildly dented their beast. This is common though, people with big cars decide they have the right of way. Attitude seems to be if you have to go on a pavement or in a ditch that's fine, I'm coming through, you step aside. Around where I live it's not narrow streets as much as a lot of residential parking on them, so only one car can get past. And if they have a 4x4 or something very large, it's going to be them. Pavements are for you to go up on to to avoid being smashed, or possibly killed the speed some of them go at. They're generally arrogant, and you can see them looking as if to say move peasant, I've paid big money for this car, get out of my way, I will drive through or over you if I have to. Just annoying beyond belief.

That and the people coming out of turnings, or especially car parks, who edge out just far enough if you're on that side you have to swerve round them into another lane, if there's no oncoming traffic. Or wait if there is, at which point they edge out further, as they're usually turning right and make sure you're stuck until someone coming the other way lets them out. If I want to let you out I'll make sure you know, with a flash of lights or waving to you. If you edge out you can stay there until hell freezes over, I'll never let you out unless I have to, and the gesture won't be a friendly wave.

Last thing is when did they make indicating illegal? I'm still sure you have to let people know which way you're turning, makes things easier. Especially at roundabouts here for some reason, people not showing the way they're going. I no longer trust anyone indicating because of this, I'm never sure what they're actually doing, mostly apparently going straight according to the car, until they nearly turn into you as they go to the last junction. If someone is indicating they're usually not going that way, or if they are it's too rare, and I don't trust it. So I get stuck, until there's a big enough gap in the traffic, because I don't trust anyone else who drives on the roads round here.

Obviously I am the perfect driver, talking about this. Honest. I think I am better than most, although probably everybody does (except my mother, who accepts she's fairly dangerous, although she's never actually crashed badly). That may be ego, but I'm not as bad as a lot I see allowed loose on the roads.

Scottish Labour Leader

They're looking for a new Scottish Labour leader at the moment, once they work out why they did so badly in the last Scottish election they'll pick one. Just to say here and now I'm not a Labour Member, or even voter at the last election so I'm not an interested party to all this, just an observer of it.

Reason for this is that I saw Tom Harris MP on Twitter earlier saying that under current rules an MP can stand, it doesn't have to be an MSP. I don't know if he'd do a bad job, considering he was my MP for a couple of years when I lived in Glasgow I don't actually know all that much about him other than the Doctor Who obsession, which is probably a plus point for him in my eyes, whatever the Independent diaries say.

Getting to a point, one reason I think Labour lost the Scottish election to the SNP was that they don't seem to take the Scottish Parliament seriously. It's not just most of the known names staying in Westminster, they don't really have that many known names in Scottish Labour outside political circles. Or former cabinet members. Sometimes they seem to talk about it as an exaggerated local council, and treat it accordingly. The fact that an MP is prepared to stand could be taken as that, but the alternatives aren't great for them. And Tom Harris attitude that he's only standing unless someone better comes along? Not really inspiring is it? The centre of their world is London, not Edinburgh. Unless they rectify that, they won't win a scottish parliament election again, or even lead it. They will still make up most of the Scottish MPs, probably, but without an attitude change towards Edinburgh they won't gain Scottish power without a major cock up from the SNP.

I know about the referendum that Alex Salmond has promised for independence in 2014 or whenever, I'm prepared to bet that it will be worded in ways not to damage the SNP if they lose, or they will be an option for further Devolution of power to Scotland. We (probably) won't vote for independence in a straight referendum vote, but I'll bet that we'd vote for more power if it's worded well. And it will be, like Alex Salmond or not, he's not a stupid politician.

If Labour want to get power in Scotland they need this review to be better than I expect it to be, and they need to take the Scottish Parliament more seriously than they seem to. This is my view as someone with an interest in politics, not a political party member, any side, and as an ex Labour voter. It may just be a bad impression I get from them, but those can stick.

E-Petitions and Over-Reactions

Last week someone put a petition on the new government website saying that they should send all rioters to the Outer Hebrides. This was later removed after protests from various people including Angus Macneill, MP for the area. So far, no problem. I live in the Outer Hebrides, we know that what he said was rubbish, and it's been dealt with. But there are still comments being made about it, including letters to the local news websites from annoyed locals saying all sorts of things about the author of the petition, about how he thinks we all live in caves, it's a disgrace and so on. Thing is it didn't bother me that much, it went up, it came down, it's been dealt with. And I think that continuing publicity of it is a mistake, which the author of the petition is enjoying, as that was it's purpose.

I don't believe that the author of the petition has no idea about the Outer Hebrides, I think he's using the petitions site to Troll, rather than making a serious point. Basically I don't believe he's serious. I have no idea who he is, he may have a problem with the Outer Hebrides for some reason, it may not even be his real name he's put on there, interestingly there is another rejected petition from a Richard Miller Brown on the site about sending rioters to boot camps rather than here, but if it's the same man I don't know, Richard Miller is not an uncommon name.

I don't think I have a thicker skin than most, I just feel that continuing to go on about this Petition is counter productive, and something in it makes me think that it's written by someone who wasn't trying to suggest this seriously. Maybe I'm wrong and he was, but I'm unconvinced by it. And as it's now been removed it should be left to lie and forgotten about. I don't see what further needs to be or can be done about it now anyway.

Tony Blair, Morality and Riots

Have been reading Tony Blair commenting in the Guardian/Observer on the causes of the riots and the moral breakdown of society everyone is saying was behind them. The comments on an interesting article are worth a read, as it shows people up badly in some cases, and how divisive Blair was as PM. Some still saying blood on his hands etc. I was going to tweet a couple of points but I'll go on too long for that so I'll throw them in here. I'm not going to try to argue for how you resolve the situation, I don't know and I don't claim to know. But it is not a simple answer. He does talk some sense in here, and I think he's right that we're not in the grip of a general "Moral Decline" but some things did irritate me about the piece.

First point that annoyed me was this one:

The police are under huge pressure. If they go in hard, they fear inquiry, disciplinary action and abuse. It's all very well to say that they should just follow the rules. The police need to know they have strong support from politicians and public. When the riots first occurred, they would have been naturally anxious as to how heavy to be....But my experience with the police is they need 100% backing. 

All very well, generally we will support an honest police force, but at least part of the problems have been caused by the fact some police have appeared corrupt and prejudiced, or at least not entirely honest with what they do, this loses them respect and how can you give carte blanche backing to an organisation that appears untrustworthy? If you don't trust the lawkeepers, or the lawmakers (politicians) who are part of the same issue, how can you give them 100% backing. Saying if the police go in hard. What is he suggesting they do? Go in and beat the shit out of various rioters? Is that what you really want, the police as a better armed gang on the streets during a riot? Don't think that will solve any problems, just create more. If the police don't follow the rules, do you think everyone else is going to?


I'm not going to say anything about the society part and the people he calls outside the social mainstream. I simply don't know enough about it, although I don't entirely agree with what he says there, and there's no reason given as to why people are outside the social mainstream, you can't blame it on immigration and people not integrating, if you don't welcome people and allow them to integrate how can they become part of our society?

The last part of this article also annoyed a little, basically he's saying that he'd worked out the solution to all these problems, but no-one followed it through. To me this reads as massively egotistical. Politicians generally do have fairly sizeable egos, the successful ones anyway, but to say if you'd listened to me it would all be fine?  If I was still PM there would be no problems? Nonsense. Blair did some good things, or his government did at least, including the minimum wage, and also some bad things, including bending over backwards for George W Bush. But to say you have all the answers, if only they'd have listened to me? Sorry, don't buy it.

Abdelbaset Ali Al-Megrahi

Al-Megrahi has been in the news again today, now 2 years since he was released by the Scottish Government due to Cancer, and his expected lifetime of 3 months from then. There has also been quite a few comments from various politicians point scoring about the fact he's lived so long. You can read all about this in plenty places, but there is just a couple of points I wanted to make.

First off, I never had a problem with the original release, and I still don't have a problem with the decision that was taken to let him out on compassionate grounds. The reality is that he would be dead, possibly within that original 3 month estimate, if he was still in a Scottish jail. There is no way he would have received the top level treatment he will be getting in Libya if he was still here, apparently including new drugs not available yet in the UK. So do people want him dead? Not a healthy attitude to anyone, whatever they've done in my opinion.

Another point, if you believe he was the only person responsible for the Lockerbie atrocity you're in cloud cuckoo land, it simply is not possible that was done by one person acting alone. I refuse to believe it was. If Libya was responsible for the bomb then the ultimate responsibility lies with Colonel Qaddafi, and we were happy enough to be his friend in return for oil. We've only recently called for anything to happen to him, and it's been for nothing to do with Lockerbie. Oil apparently is justification for all sorts of things. Never forget the prisoner transfer agreement signed by the previous UK government, which could have released Megrahi to Libyan custody. Signed in exchange for oil from what it appears. Money eases a lot of consciences.

We don't know the exact truth about Lockerbie, we probably never will now. There seem to be people hiding information, this may include the Americans and UK government but who knows. Unless if and when Qaddafi is overthrown some document comes to light that tells as I doubt we'll ever know the full truth. There is another story there, Megrahi may have been involved, but he became a scapegoat for others who were also involved. Why? Who knows.

The Glorious Twelfth, The Grouse and the Guga.

Yesterday was the Glorious twelfth, start of the Red Grouse shooting season, described variously as important for the economy, mainly to tourism I think although what kind of tourist comes to shoot animals you decide. Later in August there is a traditional hunt, taking some men from Ness on the Isle of Lewis out to another island in the North Atlantic to kill Gannets (Guga) for food, a tradition that dates back several hundred years, at least to 1549 according to historic records. This letter sent to one of our local news websites discusses the issue of the calls for the ban on the guga contrasting with the silence related to the grouse shoot. I'm not sure I'd refer to the SSPCA as bunny huggers as it is them calling for a ban, along with some other individuals I've seen, but is there a point as to why they're calling for a ban. Publicity reasons? Because they tend not to discuss any other forms of hunting.

I spent a little time earlier today going through the SSPCA Website news section. The call to ban the guga hunt is shown in there, along with stories about individuals mistreating animals, abandoned dogs and also Train Driver Saves Swan. But there is nothing else on there about hunting in the last year that I could find, if you search about this, you find the RSPB referring to raptors being poisoned to protect the grouse numbers and trying to have people prosecuted for that - fair enough in my view. But nothing from the SSPCA. And correct me if I'm wrong but Guga are birds, so why are the SSPCA becoming involved? I appreciate there may be concern about hunting, but they don't condemn any other forms, they go on about cruelty to the Guga being killed, but nothing is said about shooting or fishing. Guga are killed by a blow to the head, done personally by an individual Nessman, and will be dead in seconds at most. As opposed to a bad shot on a grouse moor winging a bird, injuring it and watching it fall from the sky still alive. Which is cruel do you think?

I'm not calling for a ban on hunting, or shooting grouse, I don't have any problem with killing animals for meat. Killing for sport is an issue, but the Guga hunt is certainly not that. Battery farming is an issue, we're told we should eat free range meat, especially Chicken and I do try to, but no-one is making a fuss about that at the moment. Just about a traditional hunt of a sustainable species that has survived it for several hundred years, and will survive it on the numbers allowed for considerably more, without the intervention of those who try to preach about how these things should be done, without personal knowledge of it, and without considering more pressing issues of animal welfare. It just seems to me the Guga hunters are becoming an easy target for people, and if you want a debate on hunting for food, make it a broader one than targeting a small group hunting for a few thousand birds at most. And look at the meat you eat yourself and how it was killed.

We might need the Politicians

I started sending myself insane last night reading a few of the petitions being put up to the new Government Epetitions website. There are some very strange people putting these up there, for example this one includes the phrase "Jeremy Kyle does it, why can't we." Does anyone want anything to do with this? If you do start running now. I'm sure someone could start a petition saying George Osbourne should sit an Economics A-Level and get 100,000 signatures, doesn't mean that should be passed as a law, or debated in parliament. At least one of the others demands a referendum be called for everything. Not practical, not realistic, and just bloody stupid.

There's been a fair bit of comment about the governments holidays last few days, ignoring the people calling for them to return, or some of them anyway due to riots and the financial issues, there have been other comments asking why do we need politicians, Civil servants run the country anyway, polticians are a waste of money, lets ignore them. The problem with this would be when you want something changed, the civil service will keep things ticking over and run on the same lines, but nothing would change. And this would be a problem, at least some of the time. Looking at the petitions people put up apparently in all seriousness you couldn't run referendums for every decision, aside from the cost issues, as who would decide what would be asked? And god knows what would result anyway.

We might want better politicians than the ones we have, on all sides, we might not like what they decide, but they're better than the alternatives. And we can always vote them out eventually, we can't sack the public.

The Death Penalty - Brief Thoughts

There's a debate been started on the death penalty, David Allen Green blogs here on it as well as he usually does, and for the serious points from a legal perspective I recommend reading this. This blog is my thoughts on the death penalty.

Basically I'm against it. In his autobiography Albert Pierrepoint, who probably executed more people than anyone in the UK, said the following:

All the men and woman whom I have faced at that final moment, convince me that in what I have done, I have not prevented a single murder.

If it's not preventing the crime then why execute anyone? As Pierrepoint also said, it's revenge. Pure and simple and state sanctioned. I don't get the need for revenge, possibly because no-one I'm close to has ever been murdered, but I like to think I'd still be against it then. Our penal policy is a mess, the re-offending rate is ridiculously high for prisoners who come out, unlike say Norway who actually believe in rehabilitation. And people think now that we should start executing them?

The revenge thing makes no sense anyway, revenge would imply suffering and a good hangman could kill them in seconds, no suffering, other than the expectation of what is going to happen before it does. Or do those who want to bring back the death penalty also want torture on the statute books?

If you're going to have a debate on the death penalty, can I suggest this as the question - Do you the British public want to have state sanctioned revenge as an option for those who have committed a crime regardless of the consequences for those innocent who are executed. For there will be innocent executed, mistakes are made in court on occasion.

Morrissey, Meat and Norway

I see we've had Morrissey mouthing off again, comparing the mass murder in Norway to the way Macdonalds and KFC treat animals. I suppose being fair if anyone could say it a militant veggie is at least consistent, all killing is wrong, but he's wrong, in a lot of ways. I've said before that I don't think Meat is Murder, and I'm almost certain he said what he said to create a shitstorm and gain publicity, but anyway I'll still put this out there.

Meat for food tends to be bred as such, we tend not to kill random animals for our Dinner, and we don't just take a gun and go round shooting in public at anything that moves. If you don't want to eat meat or meat products do you just let the animals free, what do they eat? Or do you kill them and let the corpses rot? I understand the vegetarian arguments, I just disagree with them.

 Another thing in that article is where he says killing a Stag is like killing a child, quoted from an interview he did mentioning David Cameron. Wrong again, really. comparing hunters with paedophiles going a bit too far. It's attention seeking. We as a species eat meat. We've evolved eating meat. Some animals will eat us given the chance, so why not? I've taken more words than neccessary to call you it, but Morrissey, you're a dick.

Although one last thing, if you ever find it, read a Neil Gaiman short story called Babycakes. I think it was written for PETA, and basically it's about testing and food after the animals all disappear. And it may make you consider for a second. But I'll keep eating Meat.

Divided into Them and Us

I'm not one of them. I'm not sure who "they" are. It's the playground coming out in people, you have a gang of friends as a child and the other groups are them. We're always us, even if we're them to someone else. Thing is this is basically how our politicians are currently talking. You have to be with us, or you're against us, and one of them. Them being either evil, stupid, or just someone we don't agree with who needs to be demonised or removed from visibility. 

The Labour party have been doing this pretty much since they went into opposition. They're saying if you don't agree with these cuts the government are making you have to support us. If you don't support us you're with them and you're wrong. This seems to be the only argument, as I haven't heard exactly what they'd do differently, although I may have missed something, but it's basically what our politics have descended into, you're With us or Against us, don't ask us to elaborate. Playground arguments between elements of what is becoming a political class, worryingly similar to the Hydra in that you could cut off a head and another would appear almost the same. They are all similar enough to each other that the them and us thing makes no sense when used by political parties. 

When you make everyone who disagrees with you "them", you're trying to ostracise them from the mainstream. From here extremism comes, for if you refuse to listen to what people are saying, and condemn them as stupid or ignore their views and say they have to agree with you and you alone then you push them to the margins. If you don't address peoples fears and explain, or leave them nowhere to go and say that they are "them", who no-one wants to be then people kick back. Sometimes this is targeted in violence, sometimes in protest, but if you push people into a group you just think of as "Them", to be ignored then you damage the democracy you claim to hold dear. You disenfranchise groups of people, who have no-one to support with a good conscience. What do you think starts to happen then?

I'm not Middle Aged

I turned 35 earlier this month. Someone has told me recently that this means I'm now middle aged, as this apparently last from age 35 to 55. First point, I am not middle aged, I refuse to accept this, I'm no different from when I was in my 20s, I don't want to buy a pipe and slippers. (Is that what you're meant to do when your middle aged? Actually I bought a pipe in my early 20s, but that's another story). Secondly does that make everyone over 55 old? Sure they're delighted about that if it is.

Who really makes these things up? The Middle Ages were a period of European history, they have sod all to do with how old I am. So why am I suddenly middle aged? What does it actually mean? If you ever find out let me know. A mid-life crisis might be good fun though I just can't afford to have one. So I'll get on with my life as it went before. And keep getting older, hopefully anyway, but never middle aged.

I'm not making a serious point here, although there is one somewhere, about people being pigeonholed because of their age and only their age. I've met pensioners who can act like teenagers, and are fitter than a good few, and 20 year olds acting so old to try to fit in and seem mature that they could be retired. You're as old as you feel, as old as you act, whatever people say. The only thing I feel has changed from when I was 18, really changed, is the hangovers. They stick a lot worse these days. But that's it. And it still doesn't make me middle aged.

Spoilers (Doesn't Contain Spoilers)

Was listening to Jeremy Vine earlier today, or Friday lunchtime radio 2 depending on when you read this, and they were having a discussion about leaving a will when you die. Wasn't that interested but he then made a comment about a plot point in an Agatha Christie book called Why Didn't They Ask Evans, but stopped himself saying I can't say that, someone might be reading it. Basically he was concerned about giving plot spoilers about a book originally published in 1934. How far do you stretch the idea of spoilers?

The main gripes I see at the moment concern Torchwoods new series (this may be because of the people I follow on twitter), but it does show another issue. With broadcast times being different in different countries, and the crossover on Facebook, Twitter, and now probably google plus, what are you allowed to say to stop someone who hasn't seen something, or read something, getting pissed off with you and giving abuse. Are just major plot points not to be discussed, should everything have a spoiler warning, for how long do you need them?

There was the recent thing with Steven Moffat and the latest series of Dr Who as well, where someone at the premiere of the first couple of shows went online and sent out spoilers before it was even broadcast for the first time. He was pissed off with that, in this case rightly as it could have made some of the moments less vivid on a first viewing. But getting back to the original question how far should you take this?

I remember on Usenet, and I always feel like an old fart when I mention it for some reason, but I followed a few groups for fans of authors and when a new book came out it was discussed, but you generally had spoiler space which meant that

you

wound

up

with

people

doing

this

to

stop

the

comments

showing

up

in

the

newsreader.

A little annoying, but it worked, apart from the people who top posted replies, and there's still a circle reserved for them in hell, and everyone was happy. We'll ignore those who gloried in posting spoilers to annoy people, they're still out there, but easier to ignore.

But again trying to get back to the original question, how long after something is broadcast or published before you should not worry about posting spoilers. I think Jeremy Vine took it a little too far with nearly 77 years, but where is the line, and what is important. Do you think nothing should be openly discussed without warnings for any show ever, which is daft, do you think there should be a reasonable time limit on these things, within a week of broadcast for a TV show say, or is it all fair game once it's out, if you haven't seen it, tough? Should it just be for major plot points, or anything that may interest an individual in the show or book for a certain period of time?

I don't know the answer, I know what I personally prefer to read, and I tend to avoid most spoilers, but they don't bother me too much, as if the show or book is good enough it shouldn't matter, it should still get you even if you know some of what happens, but I know some people believe everything should be kept back. For how long, apparently some say at least 77 years. I think that's a bit too much.

Freedom of the Press

We're happy to have a free press, our politicians are always saying so as well are they not? But they don't exactly want a free press in one sense, they want a compliant press, one that will back them and not criticise them too much. That might ignore a few inconvenient things. Which is why they were all sucking up to Rupert Murdoch so much. Owner of one of the few papers that sometimes changes sides, to it's own benefit first and foremost, which is fair enough for them, but when it becomes to it's benefit through political promises then that becomes an issue.

One of Murdochs comments the other day did make me laugh a bit, he was asked about politicians and PMs coming to him and inviting him to Downing St and everything and said that he wished they'd leave him alone. Would be easy to get them to leave you alone Rupert, although they may be doing so anyway for a bit now, but tell them you're going to leave your editors to make the decisions, they will back what policies they believe is best, and criticise what they disagree with, holding the politicians to account as they do so. But that won't happen will it, and never would.

You invite politicians in to your circle, and use the influence to benefit you, you back the winners and convince them they won because of your support. We now have the situation where our politicians believe it's more important to appease the editors and owners of newspapers rather than the people of this country and it's depressing.

You used to have the situation where the newspapers would give unqualified support to politicians, we've wound up with the politicians giving unqualified support to a newspaper group. And it's now stopped and the world moves on. Will they learn? We hope so. If not we must make our voices heard louder then before to say they must.

Meats Not Murder

Had a conversation on twitter recently about eating meat, and how people don't always think about meat coming from animals, and I've now remembered this story about Mark Zuckerberg stopping eating meat, except that which he killed himself.

The relevant part of that as far as I'm concerned is the bit where he says:

 "I had a pig roast at my house. A bunch of people told me that even though they loved eating pork, they really didn't want to think about the fact that the pig used to be alive."

This does annoy me, if you're not prepared to accept your meat used to be walking about, don't eat it. Give up your bacon and become a vegetarian. As you're not a meat eater. You're might like the taste, but if you're not prepared to accept that your bacon roll used to be part of a pig or that your sirloin steak comes from a cow then you shouldn't be eating it. Animals as part of the food chain has been part of human existence for about as long as we've been on the planet. You have to accept that if you want to eat meat. I accept it and if it came to it would be prepared to kill my food, I'm not likely to have to anytime soon, but if you're not why eat meat?  


Vegetarianism is an acceptable lifestyle choice these days, we shouldn't do battery farming of chickens, or any other animal to get our food, but eating meat isn't wrong in my view. Treat them properly while alive, but always remember that they were when you eat them. 


And the perfect bacon roll should be a Scottish morning roll, smoked bacon, enough to mean you have to eat 2 layers each bite, butter. No Sauce needed, but a runny egg is acceptable on occasion. 

The Chairman

Once upon a time there was a Chairman. The Chairman had power but no responsibilities, influence was his coin, and he gave it to those who would be successful in the land. He could tell which way things would go, and promised others that he would help them gain the power they so badly wanted, and convinced them they could not do it without him, as he would turn on them if they didn't. His lieutenants gathered information and used this as their currency.

After many years of success with this plan, the Chairman became arrogant, and thought he could increase the influence that he had. He put his influence behind the shiny one, who promised much if he could gain power, and courted the lieutenants of the Chairman as his friends and advisors, to help him gain the power he thought the Chairman's backing would enable him to get.

But the shiny one did not know that the chairman was an evil influence on his lieutenants. He did not tell them to break any law explicitly, but they did so to increase their standing with him, to keep his influence with them not against them. The leaders and the sheriffs of the land ignored the misdeeds of the Chairmans lieutenants as they were afraid of what they knew about them, or what they would say to the public to turn their views of the leaders, who held power but were scared to use it except for the good of the few, rather than the many.

Then one day someone was caught out, by telling something they should not have known. The Chairmans lieutenants managed to keep out of trouble for a while, by telling the sheriffs there was nothing to see, and that it was a rogue amongst them. But gradually the web unravelled, as some who did not care what the Chairman knew began to speak out against him. They harnessed the power of the majority, and the leaders came to realise they had to turn against the chairman in public, to try to show they had never been in his power, or never sought his influence. The Chairman had to back away for a short time, and some of the leaders and sheriffs worried what he might say when he was called to account. The Chairman had decided to bide his time, and protect those closest to him, while cutting loose those who had been caught, but keeping them quiet in mysterious ways.

The Chairman has yet to speak, and the story is not ended, but there will be more to tell.

The News Of The End

The News of the World was first published in 1843, and it's about to be killed off. It seems to be a cynical move by News International, to attempt to hide behind the end of one title but keeping what it did under another name, with a streamlined staff running alongside those of the Sun. Which they'd announced they were looking at doing if I remember right. I'd assume that some of the staff of the News of the World will be offered jobs on a new title, but not all. And I doubt anyone getting made redundant as a result of this will get much more than the minimum pay off required by law, News International could afford more easily, but I get the impression the Murdochs are look after the pennies types and if they can save a few quid all the better. I've been through some redundancies, including surviving one where a whole load of friends wound up being paid off. That's unpleasant, and your senior management don't lose a penny or a second of sleep over it. It's a shit thing to go through however it works out.

Whatever you think of the paper itself, and it is/was a rag which printed a fair amount of shit and unpleasant stories, it wasn't any worse than a few other papers that are still out there. If the illegality had been stopped, and we assume they stopped hacking after Coulson resigned and the "Rogue Reporter" was jailed, then why close it now? Just to make yourself look better, and attempt to protect the people at the head of the paper it would appear. Sacrifice the people who were doing the jobs you were paying them to do, and more importantly ASKED or TOLD them to do to save the necks of those who were in the positions of responsibility who you need to protect to save your own necks. It's disgraceful behaviour, although I suppose you don't get to the positions of power without being a complete bastard in one way or another.

There is still a lot to come out on this whole story, the hacking parts can't get much worse, there was no reason for them to hack Milly Dowlers phone, the police would have been checking it you'd think, so by deleting messages to check for stories they were in a sense perverting justice. Doesn't get much worse than that really, although perjury is also a possibility with regard to the Tommy Sheridan case apparently. But this isn't the fault of the journalists, you could even blame the press generally. We're proud of our freedom of the press, to write what they want without fear. And they give us who premiership footballers are shagging, what the stars of big brother are doing now, and other crap I'm not interested in. Although it seems plenty are, how many people buy Heat Magazine after all? That's an argument I may make sometime, but not today.

The people working at the News of the World have been cut adrift, to try to save the News International empire, to put a cover on it where they can say we've dealt with it, that title no longer exists so nothing else needs to happen. This should not be the end of things, there are issues with the bribery of police, paying for information to corrupt cops, hacking phones as what appears to be a matter of course. And the management of the time who were at best operating the US army model of Don't Ask, Don't Tell with regard to the illegal acts. They need to answer the questions, they should not be protected at the expense of the staff of the News of the World. I hope they've maxed any corporate credit cards they had access to and are getting rat arsed somewhere. I hope they find some other workplace that treats them better. It may have been a rag, but that was under the command of the proprieter. And he's apparently going nowhere. And neither is his lieutenant so far.

Andy Murray

Andy Murray lost his semi final yesterday. There's been a lot of comment on this and him in the last couple of weeks while everyone pretends to enjoy tennis during Wimbledon. He gets a lot of negative comments due to his perceived arrogance, there are others about how he's another nearly man of british sport. But there are quite a lot of people who don't like him and I'm not certain why.

We can lose the Scottish/British thing out of the way first, tennis players compete under Britain, so while he is a Scot, he's also British. It is possible to be both, although some seem to think, and not just in relation to this, that you can only be English and British, not Scottish or Welsh and British. Although there does seem at times to be more of an issue with Scotland, which is slightly detached and always has been with a separate legal system and possibly a stronger sense of Scottish nationality, but it's still a United Kingdom.

I don't think it has anything to do with the Anyone but England comment a few years ago either, that was another joke, and most people aren't that sensitive. There are hundreds of comments made about the Scots and sport by the English, which everyone apart from a few idiots ignore. It's got nothing to do with hm being Scottish apart from in a few sad minds. So why is one of our most successful individual sportsmen slagged so much. No Grand Slams but 17 career titles to back that idea up.

People moan about his arrogance, but sportsmen are arrogant, and a few of those commenting back some footballers, some of whom are the most arrogant people walking around. Arrogance is ok to a point, and I don't think he oversteps it, and he does tend to praise opponents in defeat although it can get ignored by people whose agenda it does not fit. There is an issue with what seems to be a dryer than some people get sense of humour in his possession, and he can be a sarky and moody bugger but that's apparently forgivable in others. I don't get it, he isn't Tim Henman which seems to offend some of the more pompous tennis set, but that can't be it either. We tend to celebrate others who don't quite hit the heights, although Murray may yet, and that may change peoples minds.

What it could simply be is we can't see yet if he's a plucky loser or a winner, and some can't make up their minds about him on that basis. But I still find it a bit strange. 

The Creeping Criminalisation of Smokers

Of the UK population around 21% are classed as regular smokers. Just so you know I am still one of them. Yesterday I came across a link to this story, basically a Buckinghamshire councillor has proposed a law banning smoking anywhere in the town. It spoils the environment and he doesn't see why people should be able to smoke in his face. First point on that, I doubt anyone is coming up to you and blowing smoke in your face, even if you're especially obnoxious. If you are outdoors passive smoking will not have that huge an effect, compared to the cars going past you on the street and the exhaust fumes they spew out. Concerned about the cigarette butts on the ground? Put some bins out for them and fine people who don't use them. Although of course that would cost money and wouldn't be a cheap headline to gather publicity for you. Which is what a lot of these stories seem to be, but they get support from otherwise reasonable people.

The main point is, if you want to ban smoking on the street, is it that much of a stretch just to ban smoking altogether? And why not argue that? What some seem to want is piecemeal banning, gradually reducing places you can smoke until it's physically impossible to actually light up without breaking the law, but still technically legal to smoke. Remember they want to stop it in cars as well. I did see a Doctor apparently seriously quoted as saying that you would be safer driving with the exhaust coming into the car interior than smoking in there. Really? You sure on that one? Also if you ban smoking on the street, and ban smoking inside any public buildings, and if you have children you're not allowed to smoke near them, where are you allowed to smoke? Or you're not allowed to smoke but others are? When does that start going too far with regard to civil liberties?

To be honest I can see some of the points with regard to banning smoking, I don't have kids but can see the argument why you shouldn't smoke in front of them and agree with that. You don't need to encourage anyone to smoke, and no-one wants to do that. I don't have kids, my sister has 2 and my brother in law does smoke, but out the back of the house always, which can be interesting when you visit and go out for a smoke with our weather but you live with that. Same in the pubs now, you go outside and deal with the weather whatever it is. Some shelter, or even a windbreak, is nice, but not essential when you're addicted. The issue with pushing smokers outside isn't just how it looks, it's also that you do hang around the doors if there is no area to go, and anyone coming in has to walk through the cloud of smoke, which even I agree isn't pleasant to have to do, and doesn't exactly give kerb appeal for your premises. But what is the alternative?

As far as I can see there are other choices. First one would be to just ban smoking. Give up on doing it bit by bit and ban it. you will reduce the number of smokers. Freedom of choice? Who worries about it. by doing it gradually you hope people won't notice you reduce it, but why not be honest, lose the taxes you gain from smokers and be done with it. Obvious problem being prohibition doesn't work and you end up with something like the war on drugs but if you think it's right, do it. Stop messing about.

Or you could actually compromise, which might be an idea on drugs as well but I'm not getting into that one here. I saw a comment in a newpaper letters page today saying that there was no way any relaxation of the smoking ban should be allowed, as otherwise you couldn't take your children into the pubs with you. To a point fair enough, but if you spend your quality time with your kids in the pub then there are other issues you have. If you have a pub that allows adults only, or even set up a club specifically with smoking allowed what is the issue there? If you set the law that no-one is forced to work there what exactly would be wrong with it? You can allow smokers to gather in a reasonable place, maybe keep some off the streets and keep them tidier for your councillors and everyone is happy.

You don't want smokers to be happy I know, but you need to consider what you're doing, with regard to everyone. Once they've got the smokers where they want them, which seems to be locked in a room sealed to the rest of the building and only accessible through a skylight via the fire escape, they will then start on your Chardonnay, and your burgers. Don't drink, don't get fat, they'll come after you.

The Trouble with Twitter

I like twitter, it's a way to keep in touch with people you know in a way that doesn't involve a phone call or email, and it's easy to do. I spend more time talking to people I've never met than the ones I actually know on there but the idea is still the same. If you follow the right people you can get different views on the things that are happening to what is reported, you have to filter it, but you have to do that with TV news anyway, and you can get a more balanced view from people who are actually there, or concerned with or about what is happening. You can get an idea of who to trust and who talks shite easily enough if you look at it, which isn't possible when you have only one point of view on your TV or in your newspapers. The BBC are to scared of appearing unbalanced or leaning to one particular view that they've lost it, Sky will do what their shareholders tell them, they will be neutral but things may get subtly downgraded or ignored. Newspapers have their own agendas and are free to do that as well. Other sources of news are better, but they don't tell you everything.

You can follow people who are interested in the same subjects you are, you can see what some famous person is doing, or had for lunch in the really boring tweets, you can just randomly follow a bunch of people and get some very weird things happening on your timeline, my favourite being when the journalist Johann Hari was interviewing Stephen Fry via twitter for reasons I can't remember and someone tweeted right in the middle of a serious point asking about how to cook sausages. Well I found it funny anyway. But you can see what other people think on issues you care about, you can lock yourself into people similar to you or get a broader view by following people you don't agree with and work out the truth, or the reality at least. These are some reasons I like twitter.

But there are a few things that have been getting on my nerves when going through tweets recently, and they're getting worse. Or seem to be. Some are just basically annoying, some are pathetic behaviour, some may just be annoying me but I don't know. One that really gets me is the Follow for Follow shite, or people who expect a follow back automatically. If you look interesting, funny, or someone I might like i'll follow you, if you don't I won't. Sounds fairly simple, but some people think of it as keeping score, like that old T-shirt slogan - He who dies with the most toys Wins. Well, he or she who reaches the most followers will be Lady Gaga, or someone like that, it's nice to read new people but it isn't compulsory, and you can lose out if you only follow other people who follow you. If you get to 50,000 or whatever then ok, but if you're following 50,000 as well you're not reading much that's going through, you'll maybe see the odd tweet from most of them, and where is the point of that? I follow just over 300 people on twitter, and can keep up generally if I check in a few times during a day. But many more than that and it's pointless, you're not seeing what people are genuinely saying, even if you live on your twitter app, so why bother. It's just stupid as far as I'm concerned. I'd rather read as much as possible of what the people I follow tweet, rather than 1% of it.

The RT me because you're my favourite actor/doctor/singer people. Why? You're not asking for anything, there's no cause or charity your promoting, you're not saying anything remotely interesting, why ask for an RT with nothing to say? And why do some celebs actually RT them? It's just a waste of everyones time, another brain cell gives up in everybody who has wasted their time reading the tweet, which may not be much but cumulatively it's very annoying. Is it just a game some people are playing? To what end and to what rules. Another thing I don't get, if you're going to talk to someone, actually say something don't just make some noise. Which is what doing that is, it's like kids attention seeking. Probably is in some cases, mental age of about 4 in some people who do it probably, and I do wish they'd stop.

And then we come to the trolls, been around since the days of usenet, (on usenet, is it just me who reads about the AFP news agency and thinks of Alt.Fan.Pratchett, a news group I used to lurk in a bit? Probably). They haven't really evolved much, but do seem to just take a target, say something offensive and then wait for people to abuse them, which is their oxygen. And why do some people draw attention to them? There are a couple of famous people who just RT them and then try to get people to abuse them, or encourage it at least - pointless as far as I can see. I think ignore them until the go away. Or block if needed, starve them of attention, they're toddlers on speed, saying I need attention and will scream until I get it. It's pathetic and annoying. Also you get the aggressive unfollowers who will @ those who they're unfollowing to tell them how boring/stupid/pointless they are. Why? Just unfollow, it makes you look petty and stupid to announce it, and really up yourself to announce it directly to the person you're unfollowing. They aren't there to entertain you and you alone, so you just wind up looking pathetic.

Those are the troubles on twitter, but the good points outweigh the bad I think, most of the time anyway. I'm sure there will be other things that annoy other people, and I'll find more that annoy me, but I've also got somewhere to talk at people, or sometimes to them, and not just mutter insanely to myself. Although I could be doing that of course, and no-one reading anything I put there, but I feel I'm not talking to myself, and that's important.

What a Circus

So, parliament has voted to ban animals in the circus, except it isn't a law yet because it wasn't an official act of parliament or something - democracy rules ok. The main question there is why did the government and David Cameron want to stop it, against what was obviously the will of our elected representatives. I don't think he owns shares in a circus, I don't think Rupert Murdoch would give a toss on this one, so why were they pushing so hard back? I assume someone will find out, although it's probably irrelevant. It does show what our MPs could do, if they had a bit more backbone on other issues, which is an interesting thought.

I see our PM has now said he didn't threaten Mark Pritchard, and that the default setting for his staff is Mother Theresa. Bollocks on the second, we can't know about the first

I approve of the idea to ban wild animals from the circus though, why do we need to have wild animals doing tricks to amuse us, why do we want to watch that? Whatever anyone says they're caged and moved around the country in less than spacious conditions, and then put in front of however many people have bought tickets for no other reason than to make them go "oooohhh" or something. There isn't a very good point to that. To say that the animals enjoy it, how do you know? Would you enjoy being stuck in a cage, no room to move, travelling from place to place, so someone can have a short show before the clowns come on? Think about travelling in a small car with the worlds biggest dickhead. And they won't even let the tigers in to eat the clowns either.

That's my take on it, if you're going to cage animals have a good reason to do it. And there isn't really one I can think of. We shouldn't even do that for food. And I do eat meat before anyone asks, but I'd kill it if I had to. If you do I assume you would as well.

Stopped Clock - Poem

The only thing they noticed was the clock no longer chimed,
They'd complained about it's noise but he'd not listened to a word,
The clock had fallen silent sometime but they never thought,
Why the chimes no longer rang.

Nobody really missed the man who wound the clock,
They didn't think where he had gone, never gave a thought,
Why the clock was silent now after years of chiming on,
No-one cared where he was gone.

The neighbours hadn't noticed that he wasn't there
They didn't think that he had gone, they didn't stop or care,
They just had peace and didn't stop to briefly care that,
The Clock had stopped Dead.

Why Minimum Wage?

There's been another Tory in the headlines, saying the minimum wage is a bad idea for a group of people. I'm not going on what else got ignored in headlines, but he's stuck his head up so people should think about what the minimum wage actually is for.

It's not designed to keep people out of work, it's not there to penalise companies and cut their profits. It's there to pay people a decent wage. Whether it is a living wage or not isn't something I'm going to go into. What Philip Davies seemed to be arguing was that people should be allowed to undercut the minimum wage if they wanted to. He was talking about those who are on incapacity benefits mainly, but the meaning remains the same, if you undercut for some, why not for more, and then all.

First point, who would decide the ones who would be allowed to undercut the minimum wage? I've seen at least one person on twitter arguing that everyone should be allowed to undercut the minimum wage and be paid what they're worth. Everyone has the right to argue how much they're paid, in most jobs they are paying well above the minimum wage, and you can undercut in those circumstances, but not below the minimum in my opinion.

As I see it, the main benefit of having a minimum wage is to keep people paid a decent amount, it's not overly high as far as I'm concerned, and it keeps employers from employing effective slave labour. Private companies want to maximise their profits, which is fair enough. People want to be paid for their labour, the argument arises how much is appropriate to be paid. It's not about dignity, I'm not certain the minimum wage level currently allows for that, but it's about not using people.

If you allow one group to sell themselves to some company at a lower level you are saying to them they are worth less, not worthless, but worth less to you, to us, and to society than others in this country. We may not all be equal, but it's not a bad idea. To say to someone if you can't get a job then lower yourself to working for levels below anyone else, really a good idea? I don't think so. I'm sure (some) companies would jump at it, and it might get more disabled people into work, but is it worth that? Surely better to provide some encouragement to get them into work, financial or otherwise, although likely only financial objectives will appeal to some companies.

Because if you start saying the minimum wage doesn't apply to all, you've killed it. If you say that it can be undercut legally, then it will be. There was a campaign in the Independent about tips to waiting staff in restaurants, those were/are? still allowed to make up to minimum wage. This shows that if some places can undercut they will undercut, as far as they possibly can. They want to keep and increase their profits, that's fair enough, but it should not be at the expense of their workforce.

What's wrong with going bald?

Have been seeing a lot of commentary about Wayne Rooney's hair transplant this week. First of this one on the BBC website - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-13665321. I'm not going to say anything about use of the "word" manity here, other than ask if we're introducing fanity for a female equivalent? As that could go horribly wrong in some context. Personally I write this as someone whose hair started disappearing in my mid twenties, and I've never felt that worried about it.

There may be some reason for that, but the comment attributed to James Nesbit in that article suprised me a bit, this says - "he maintained that it has changed his life and that anyone who says going bald isn't horrible "is lying"."

I've never found my lack of hair an issue, it isn't horrible, and I promise I'm not lying to you there. It's not like I've a small gap on the crown, they wouldn't shave that big a gap in the back of my head if I was playing a monk in a medieval TV series, there's now a circle of hair round the bald spot, rather than the bald spot in the middle of the hair. Should I be worried about it? In case you're wondering I'm not.

Also Matthew Norman in the indy today, link -
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/matthew-norman/matthew-norman-never-mind-the-economy-ill-be-watching-rooneys-growth-2294256.html. I don't think he's being entirely serious, considering the comments about castrating Giggs, although that receding hairline hasn't been used as an excuse yet. But I don't get why you feel comments are an issue, if someone says you're thinning on top, say yes, and? It's just happening, it isn't important. And baldness looks better if you cut your hair right than that awful aubergine colour it goes with the dyed black look, usually with a fake tan to really make you look nuts.

Basically my hairs gone, I have many other issues that caused me problems and smart comments over the years. I don't care about my lack of hair. Bald and, not proud maybe, but unconcerned.