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Simon has asked me to jump in while he is basking in Cumbrian sun with his lovely boyfriend, and supply this week's dose of the Simon-esque. Those are some big shoes to step into, and I have been wracking my brain trying to come up with a subject as well-informed and thought-provoking as what he writes (as opposed to the self-indulgent crap I produce). To be honest, it's probably not gonna happen. I'll probably look like this.
I considered the new anti-rape condom , because at first glance it seemed like a shit idea (who wants a rapist stuck in them and then get battered to death when he breaks into a panic?!), but I realised my error upon enduring listening to that South African doctor (sorry, that accent just makes me bristle), I thought it's actually rather clever... unless you forget to take it out for a date - surefire way to never see that bloke again! Made that film "Teeth" almost prophetic.
So no debate there.

The thing is, once one leaves university and joins the work force (and gets a bit older), all original thought goes out the window. I guess the Frankfurt School was onto something. You bust your ass for a pittance and spend most of your life at work, fretting over repetitive tasks and targets, just so you can keep your job, only to come home, shattered and barely able to cook dinner, much less plan protests/improvement of society. All you really want is to give your mind a little break and you end up watching Big Brother or Hollyoaks (did anyone else notice how the stuff they feed us on telly is gradually, increasingly becoming more idiotic, but we're still eating it? Then you go out and buy yourself all the mass-produced stuff to give yourself a sense of reward, or simply because owning stuff disguises one's actual poverty, and the fact that one's living conditions are perhaps not ideal, but buying things to camouflage that fact is a lot easier than going out and fighting for something better.

Reading this again makes me feel like I'm oversimplifying, but the more I apply it to my life and the lives around me, the more I see truth in it.

Best example? Football. I'm writing this as Germany is wiping the floor with England (not that I particularly care for either team or the sport itself). My little town was deserted, and one could hear the howls of pain from the various pubs surrounding the shop I worked in today. I have never ever seen so much united force and passion for anything else, other than the Blitz - and what's football in the grand scheme? War or sports, that's the two things that truly ignite people with an energy that is both frightening and awe-inspiring.

Call me a miserable cow, but that (and retail!) is quite depressing.

But then there are those little things happening that sort of give me hope. Like this woman that came into the shop and bought a stack of books for her 11-year-old son (which he had picked, mind you). And I am not talking Bloody Astrosaurs and Percy Jackson. They were books most 20-year-olds would not have read, classics. Faulkner, Steinbeck, Harper Lee, James Joyce's Ulysses, for crying out loud! I was agape and told her how amazed I am at his reading level, and how pleased to see that at least one parent seems to care that her kids are not conditioned to be morons. And she said something that was beautiful in its simplicity: "We haven't got a television, that's why he spends all his time reading."
God, he must get so much stuff done!


So what is my point? I don't know. I write self-indulgent crap, remember?
I guess it would be: Throw out your television. And stay in school! Your parents wanted you, so they can pay for it. That will teach them.

Yours truly,

Patty

Postcards From Yesteryear

The highlight of my second trip to Whitney, a little Village adjunct to Oxford, David Cameron's consituancy, was the beautiful, inspiring and infinitely kind company of my friend Ms Patty Dohle, it was also the curious litte narrative we happed upon in an Oxfam shop.

Above is the back of a postcard whach had ST-SAVIN-sur-GARTEMPE on the front. It was found amongst a lot of other dull holiday postcards, some written on and sent, some others not. But what made me buy it was what was written on it:

29/7/96

I wonder if you know this church? I'm sitting on the warm and breezy terrace here (7.0pm) looking on to a lovely hillside over the valley (where the motorway and railway lie hidden by a row of limes and hazels). The countryside round here you know - is deeply satisfying in its expansiveness + fertility - many sunflowers now. I do hope very much that Susi's face and teeth are back to normal. Love, F.

Now after getting a good laugh with its bizzarest of final lines, is not the only thing going on here. Another, less self-aware missive:

15.1.94

Dear Grum,
Mum and I are having a day out in Oxford because Dad and Fiona have gone shooting. Hope you liked my photo. I would love to have gone to the ice-show with you. Hope it was good. We went to Maxwells for lunch. Hope the company wasn't too painful ! (at the ice-show) hope to see you soon Love Rachel - Mum.

That one has a picture of an angel intwined round a large letter 'E'. Back below:

Now what intrigues me as in these small little postcards, whole swathes of people's existances are given away. I can imagine F and Rachel (probably a little girl when written, now 16 years older!) - yes the passage of time is another thing. What's gone on since.

So yes two things; must write to these people with photocopies of such postcards with either an explanation or clues as to follow on this project....

...and secondly, to start going to more second hand bookshops/Oxfam's where there are old postcards or letters with written stuff on them.

I got this one to send to an unliked acquantance:

Have Nightmares Kinder.

NEXT WEEK: A dolphin that looks like Simon Weston.

Trolls or 'Internet Opinions'

APOLOGIES IN ADVANCE FOR THE RATHER CONVULUTED WAY I GET ROUND TO THE SUBJECT MATTER

I was hoping to Interview Peter Tatchell recently, owing to the fact that in a pique of optimistic correspondence, a quick e-mail to him got a quick and enthusiastic reply. I wrote to him about my confused yet liberal/green outlook. His reply:

Good to hear of your fledgling first steps into politics. I agree that
it's difficult to find a position that you are most comfortable with.
You have to work out what is important to you, what you care about,
and then that will allow you to view the world through that prism.

I left Labour and joined the Green Party some years ago as the Greens
are the party that most reflects my personal commitments to social
justice, environmental protection and human rights.

Then a suggested date for a promise of an interview...although when I rang to confirm this, he had some problems with his health, and a family bereavement and to postpone to the begining of august. Although I was, and always have been, dimly aware of Peter Tatchell, or his infamy, through incredulous laughter from more cynical members of my family, and knew of his Human Rights Campaigns. It was when I typed in his name into youtube and watched the first video that comes up: http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=peter+tatchell&aq=f which is him talking in Moscow at a protest. He is punched hard in the face and runs yelping in pain, asking for help and protection. Now my honest reaction to this is one of being profoundly upset, sickened and a little embarrassed.

To most people things like this are just a 'news story' at best, and I'm not preaching, I don't want to sound bias, even though I'm gay, that's irrelevent, in this... it's just an EXAMPLE. Now yes, upset that upon further reading that Mister Tatchell has already suffered countless beatings over the years that has left him with brain damage. Culturally it seems that due to someone peacefully protesting and shouting about things causes great annoyance by right-wing people or cynics or people who can't deal with emotional and human costs to things. But what I felt deep down first time I watched this was that his vulnerability was so clear, he was in pain he shouted for help, this strong Human Rights Protestor was reduced to yelping and running away.

Further reading shows that this heavy punch has left him with permanently blurred vision in one of his eyes.

Now, people have responded to this video here are just a few of the 11 pages of similiar comments:

Now, all I hope to show through this is the nature of people who voice 'Internet Opinions' on ANY subject, and there is a game for you to play at home afterwards :)

All I did rather than respond to what they've put, I thought about WHY?, and read up about Trolls; a subject too much blather has already been written about http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll_%28Internet%29 pay particular attention to and perhaps research further:

On March 31, 2010, the Today Show ran a segment detailing the deaths of three separate adolescent girls and trolls’ subsequent reactions to their deaths. Shortly after the suicide of high school student Alexis Pilkington, anonymous posters began trolling for reactions across various message boards, referring to Pilkington as a “suicidal slut,” and posting graphic images on her Facebook memorial page. The segment also included an expose of a 2006 accident, in which an eighteen-year old student out for a drive fatally crashed her father’s car into a highway pylon; trolls emailed her grieving family the leaked pictures of her mutilated corpse.

But back to these lot on this one video. For instance take Spursloyal71's comment 'Ha Ha fuckin faggot that cunt Tatchell got what he deserved he believes in buggerey for 14 year old boys the dirty scummy cunt! ' Firstly, after the swearing, what he says is very misinformed, but what interests me isn't what he says, it's what you can glean from this faceless comment; if you look on his rather sparse account you'll read that he is a 39yr old 'ex-soldier' who states 'Fuck all left wing soap dodgers..I thank you!', he hasn't uploaded any video's just favourites; the top being 'SAS DEFEAT IRA', (this is all justto build your own picture of what this man must be like), as well having 3 subscribers, one being the strangest profile I've ever seen: http://www.youtube.com/user/dmsjr2 he also has 33 friends: bnprenaissurance, sameoldfitup, stbritish (lots of british flags on the profiles that haven't been ominously 'suspended' with red exclamation marks).... so he gets his 'comment' free of any reproach....

I'll do another one just to really hammer the point of the excersice home, then a little postscript on 'trolling' in general....bare with me....

Xervosch23 said: "Someone protect me! Someone protect me!" What a worthless, cowardly, mincing little faggot. He should have protected himself (from the beating administered to him by a young woman) by staying put in England. If anyone needed protection, it was those Russian patriots who might have been infected by his HIV-ridden bodily secretions." Now onto the profile: is really Kevin (And Karin) from Selma, Alabama in The United States, state hobbies as Politics, History, cryptozoology and eugenics. Although states favourite books as George Orwell's 1984.... they have uploaded a video: Stella and Juju, which comprises of a shaky home movie of two dogs, one of them on a lead held by an obese person whose face you don't see and a woman's voice calling on her 'babies' to do something... I don't know what.

Now, to sum up; I was interested that TROLLING, is a purposeful sport - designed to provoke infamy and comment and disprupt, anger and annoy people on the internet, that's what they say, people going 'OH I am glad Diana's dead' on a memorial page to upset people or with a dead child etc. They have little emotional connection with the comment other than to provoke and bait people for I assume views, own personal fun, I have considered something more cerebral myself to court public attention but nothing as cheap and obvious.

But I think if you scatch the surface a lot of these 'comments' because they are little more than swearing and nasty, ill-founded; they are not bringing anything to the table to illicit a debate or arguement, secondly, as has been shown, some actually have connections, deep-held anger they genuinely want to express, and to think of it like that is worrying to me.

I am going to think about how deal with such things, more than just getting into a conversation with them. Because I know what the responses will be.

NEXT WEEK: A choice between; Friendships, Street-art or Pornography.

BOYFRIEND

Well, I shall keep it slightly shorter and syrupy sweet, as at this moment I am on the bed of my boyfriend. Although 'boyfriend' is a rather (he's looking over my shoulder now reading this...so now I feel self-consious and I am all smiley, 'self consious has a 'c' in it' he says - :P) an understatement, to describe him ;)

'snufflehead love you' he says ;) - hehehehe anyhoodle, that's a millimetric slice of my absolute happiness, it's more than you all deserve ;) x