Reflections on Jade

OK, I give into peer pressure. I resist it generally but on this occasion I think that I’m right to bend to the greater will of the population at large.

I watched the last night of “Celebrity” Big Brother on Sunday evening. No surprise at all that Shilpa won, because if there’s one thing we English love it’s an underdog. Also, she’s OK (but I don’t believe she’d have won if she hadn’t been seen as the victim of abuse).

I did get to see more of the horrid Jade and I’ve decided that she really is bloody awful. I still think she’s a bully and that she really does believe that she’s not “racial” (sic). I also still think that the two other girls are monumentally horrid and they’ve not been getting enough stick. In the case of one of them, I suspect my loathing is partly driven by my tendency to dislike scousers.

So I am sorry for having attempted to speak slightly in Jade’s defence. I was roundly rebuked at the weekend for having done so and I’ll try not to do it again!

Art without the bull

This blog finds me sitting in the basement at Suburb coffee shop in Manchester. This is one of my favourite places and I have become such a regular here (in my occasionally unchallenging life) that I’ve become rather friendly with the staff and other regulars. It’s the sort of life I thought New York was about, but have yet to find any evidence that supports this myth.

I just had a nice chat with Neil Roland, the photographer who has an exhibition at Suburb. Apparently, a group of art school students are studying him and people have written theses about his work. He is openly at a loss to understand why. For example, his preference for producing series of photographs in one dominant colour is all to do with the fact that it sells and he thinks it looks pretty. He likes to take pictures of nudes because he thinks they look pretty and he quite likes the control of a nude model doing what he says. Well, who wouldn't? He insists that it’s nothing to do with statements about the vulnerability of the frail human body against harsh industrial backgrounds: he just likes to take pictures of women with big tits and young boys with big biceps and knobs getting naked in public places. Again, who wouldn't?

I find it wonderfully refreshing to hear somebody say “the only reason anybody would buy that over there (points to a series of seven pictures in one frame entitled “Manchester in green”) is because they think it looks nice but mostly because they have a green carpet.” If only all people with talent were so unpretentious I might actually go to art galleries and the opera.

Shipwreck tat galore!

Does anybody else think that it’s been totally bizarre to see what’s been going on in Devon? A cargo ship ran aground off the South West coast, spilling some of its contents. There then followed an unseemly scramble to pick up whatever had been washed up on the seashore. This, let us remember, is all stuff that belongs to somebody else.

There was a TV interview with somebody explaining his joy with the new BMW motorbike that he had "found". One presumes it had been found in a container that had been moving somebody's belongings from Country A to Country B. Surely that’s not possible? If it’s useable surely it still belongs to its previous owner? (The answer is yes it does: English law has no concept at all of "finders keepers".)

The media had a big story. What’s even more brilliant is that they had a big story with great pictures. Woo hoo! The story was all over the place and this encouraged even more people to go along, taking crowbars to prize open any container that refused to open easily, lest somebody else's BMW motorbike was still safely inside. Weirdly, people seemed delighted to find things like a pair of trainers that are “about their size” and will probably be ok once the seawater’s dried out. I wouldn’t be surprised to see such things if a container ship should run aground off a third world country, but is a sodden pair of somebody else’s trainers really such exciting booty in 21st century England?

Today the police (spoilsports) have cordoned off the beach and have finally got the media to mention in passing that this is all theft and that anybody breaching the cordon will be arrested for theft. Some measure of sanity seems to be restored. I do feel that the world is going madder and madder.

The nation's new hate figure

Jade Goody, the nation’s pet chav, has been kicked out of the Big Brother house with 82% of the public vote. Right now, the nation seems to have found itself a new Myra Hindley; our new hate figure in chief.

I’m not a fan of Jade Goody. She is common, she hardly pauses from breath in her loud wittering, she’s argumentative and she bullies. Her mother was in the house this year too and her mother is worse, which explains much. The redeeming feature that I believe she has though is that she is willing to look at how her behaviour affects others and is wiling to confront her weaknesses. I’d prefer somebody who acts badly but is strong enough to look at the truth in preference to somebody who just happens to mostly do the right thing because they were lucky enough to be brought up by a decent family.

To me, the racism argument is really missing the point. Jade was the alpha female of the group. She was really upfront about how she didn’t like Shilpa (I’m not sure I can condemn her for that; Shilpa would be difficult to get on with). Sadly, two other rather dim women followed her and suddenly there was a group bullying Shilpa. So the weak-minded follow the alpha female. No news so far.

It shows an immaturity in our society that faced with bullying where the bullies pick on a foreign accent, the nation goes into paroxysm of self-doubt about whether we’re all latent racists rather than whether we’re all latent bullies. As I said in a previous post, a group of bullies will pick on anything about their victim that they can. Racism is not to be tolerated in society, but neither is bullying. I noticed just now that the two remaining girls who were bullying Shilpa with Jade have now moved into the double bed together. I really don’t understand the psychology of groups of young and dumb women. It all seems so extreme; they always seem to be either constantly bonding in an exaggerated and rather insincere way or ripping other people to shreds.

I think it’s unfair to demonise Jade. In my opinion, the nastier bully was the pointless scouser former Miss UK (Danielle). Jade is taking the fall for the greater sins of others as well as her own. She dealt with the post-eviction interview with considerable self-reflection, remorse and fortitude. I feel sorry for her but I wouldn’t want to meet her.

In need of Viagra

I receive a prodigious amount of spam emails. This is despite me being rather careful not to give out my email address generally and despite me being a distinctly low level consumer of internet porn.

However, I decided to read one of my recent spam messages, as I’ve been taking a certain amount of comfort from the fact that I get rather fewer emails these days suggesting a penis enlargement. My self-esteem is consequently flourishing.

Having come to terms with the fact that I’m not in unusually great need of a penis enlargement, the sellers of goods on the internet now seem to be determining that I have a clear need for Viagra. They have also taken to sending me spam emails with embedded images, presumably to get past my spam filter. I attach one such image at the top of this posting.

What caught my eye with this one is that it is now possible, it seems, to buy “Viagra Professional”. It seems to me that the only professional users of Viagra would be porn stars (in lieu of fluffers who have been largely made redundant I am told) or prostitutes. As I am neither, I have no need of Viagra professional, although I’m somewhat curious to try Viagra amateur for the hell of it.

What is it with use of words like “professional”, “direct” and “express” that is presumed to jazz up any mediocre product? I have seen a shop called “Pizza Direct”, which would only make sense if there were such a thing as a pizza broker. To the best of my knowledge, such a thing does not exist. Long suffering users of the Transpennine Express will also be able to testify how there is nothing whatever express about trundling to Yorkshire at bicycle speed. They presume it sounds good though.

Big Brother the alleged racist

There is much furore in England at the moment about whether a contestant on Celebrity Big Brother is the victim of racism. This story is eclipsing the humdrum non-news of how many people are dying in Iraq. It's doing wonders for the viewing figures of the rather poor TV show. I just submitted a response to the BBC news "have your say" page. There is virtually no chance it will be published as they seem to eschew any sort of comment from people who can spell so I thought I'd rather egotistically publish it here:

I gave up watching BB because I found the contestants irksome, including Shilpa. She lay it on thick about her wealth and that's uncharming. The catty and dim young women in there would have seized on anything that makes another person different to them. We shouldn't go into a paroxysm of self-doubt about if we're a nation of racists. They would mock her Manchester accent, if she had one. If she were to be immune from this sort of unpleasantness because she's Indian, that would be racist.

That was as many characters as can be submitted. Shilpa's OK but she's mightily good at turning on the water works and generally I think she's a bit of a fake. Everybody seems to have forgotten that BB's a game. In her position, easily the best tactic to get votes would be to feign being hurt by the racist digs from the others. These seem to me to be minor school yard stuff which is inexcusably bitchy and gratuitous but anybody of normal resilience takes this kind of stuff from other people every day.

I'm not excusing the bitchiness of the vacuous other girls in there, but it's normal. There are a vast number of bigger issues going on. This is just reality, so we shouldn't be surprised to see it on a reality TV show.

Rejoice all ye fatties! Rejoice!

Fatties of the World, rejoice! Apparently there will soon be a type of chewing gum that stops you feeling hungry and thus the obesity crisis will be over! There will be much happiness and dancing (well initially, more like waddling) in the streets!

The story’s here on the BBC news website if you’ve not yet heard of the impending medical miracle.

Spot how it’s not going to work? If not, you’re probably not overweight.

Speaking as somebody who has spent about half of his life on the somewhat plump side (having spent the other half resoundingly on the “fat bastard” side), I can confirm that overeating for me has little to do with being hungry. I rarely pause eating for long enough to actually get hungry. Appetite suppressants are well meaning attempts by thin people, or possibly self-deluding fat people, to deal with the problem.

My own experiences of when I put on weight are this:

1. I put on weight when I’m not happy. If I’m happy, I lose weight with no effort at all.
2. I put on weight when I’m cold and when it’s dark. This is just another way of saying the same as point 1 really.
3. I put on weight when I don’t get enough sleep, which is most of the time. When I’m relaxed and rested, I don’t feel the need for constant sugar fixes. This isn’t the same as being hungry; it’s an almost physical need for sugars to keep going.
4. I put on weight when I’m on the road, but this is largely linked to not getting enough sleep and not being particularly happy. It’s also a bad thing to stay in a hotel with a prepaid buffet breakfast.

The obesity problem is surely nothing to do with us being hungrier. It’s got everything to do with us being more stressed and less happy than we used to be. The temptation to comfort eat is there and the ease with which this can be done is a danger.

I remember diving in Australia and being somewhat surprised to see the whole food chain swimming around in the same place, seemingly co-existing very happily in peace. I didn’t see one fish eat another fish and I couldn’t work out why. Then I noticed one trying and realised that it’s remarkably hard work to catch live prey and eat it. In other words, you’d only go to the trouble of eating if you were bloody hungry. This probably explains why I find it hard to pass McDonalds, but I’ve never walked past a cow and been tempted to run after it and take a bite out of its arse.

So my theory on the obesity epidemic is that it’s a symptom of a problem with mental health rather than a problem in itself. It’s compounded by high calorie food being too easy to come by. Pills aren’t going to help. We fatties just need to “get real” and that’s the end of the story.

Matt Damon for president!

As I may have mentioned before, I have a bit of a hero worship thing going on with Matt Damon. He talks loads of sense, he can sure act, is very bright and has a good sense of humour. He’s the person in the world who I’d most like to have a beer with. Actually, I’d like to share considerably more than a beer with Mr Damon, but even one’s dreams should have some grounding in real hope! Mr Damon is married (to a former barmaid he met whist filming a few years ago).

Anyway, I just happened upon the story that MD did an interview recently where he said that he believed that there should be conscription to get troops for Iraq. I was perplexed; this didn’t sound like the views of a Harvard liberal one bit. On closer inspection and watching a video clip (see it here on youtube) I got the argument. The USA has a military force almost totally drawn from a poor underclass. They serve becuase of economic need, not because of patriotism. It’s disproportionately black. At some sick level, the civilian leadership of the US military sees the value of US servicemen’s lives as worth less than their own. I understand Matt’s argument and have to say it has some merit. If a society believes that going to war is necessary, it should be willing to share the dangers randomly and fairly. Would Bush really have invaded Iraq if there had been a chance that his twin daughters might be randomly selected to go into danger? I doubt it. If you’re a political leader who’s not willing to take chances with the safety of people you love, you shouldn’t be willing to take chances with the lives of people others love.

Matt Damon for president of the United States! God knows, he’d do a better job than the current idiot.

Power of the internet: the real end of Saddam

I love the internet. It provides many people with porn without the awkwardness of actually buying it. It allows many people to meet in virtual space, some of whom actually find that they like each other in reality. It does many good things, even if you think that porn is wrong just because it’s porn. If so, you have issues that you should talk through with somebody more grounded and wiser than yourself.

The most useful thing that the Internet does in my opinion though is prop up democracy and truth. I do not support the decision to hang Saddam Hussein, since it was obviously going to make him into a martyr. I also oppose the death penalty in all cases since I believe it is a manifestation of all that is bad in human nature. Civilised societies shouldn’t kill in cold blood, although they really ought to dish out life sentences that mean life.

The first pictures we saw of the execution gave the impression of a solemn and almost dignified affair. One could momentarily forget the barbarism of what was about to happen (not that the official version did show all that happened). The world was transfixed. Predictably, the news networks went into a 48 hour frenzy of repeating the same 48 second video and commentary. Gone are the days of news analysis, I’m afraid.

Then a few days later a video appeared that somebody had taken with their mobile phone. All power to them, I say. If you’re going to televise something so barbaric as an execution, do it warts and all. The unofficial video would not have been possible without the internet. Even the BBC wouldn’t have covered it nearly so much if millions of people hadn’t already seen it. It showed the official version to be deeply sanitised to the point of being an untruth. Saddam himself looked even more like a dignified victim of victors’ justice (instead of the sociopathic monster that he really was).

Despite the endless and repetitive coverage of the event no journalist seemed to note the fact that it appears to have been conducted using the British style “long drop” method. This, dear friends, is where a drop of about seven feet is used so that the victim is instantly rendered deeply unconscious by snapping of the neck vertebrae, when their brief journey to the floor is abruptly terminated by a rope around their neck. A bit of research (thanks again to the internet) reveals that this method has never been the official method in USA or Iraq. The US states that have used hanging have always preferred the “short drop” method where the victim strangles whilst still being conscious and involuntarily fighting to breathe and escape; sometimes for some minutes. In other words, courtesy of the internet and somebody’s Nokia, we now know that Saddam was spared the normal and barbaric method and that his death was near instant. We thus know that at least the executioners themselves went about their terrible business with some compassion and professionalism.

Without the internet, we’d know none of this. I’m not altogether sure that I want to know all of it, but if the truth is out there, let’s see it. All too often you won’t actually be told the full truth, as the full truth is inconvenient or just too much like hard work for the average (ie insufferably mediocre) news programme to bother covering. But should you care to find the truth, it’s there for you to find.

If you’re of slightly sick mind and you want to watch the full video by the way, see it here.