What a wonderful world
Absolutely nothing to do with cricket! hey what a surprise! but a sobering look at the world we inhabit as are fed through our media, a world we are told is the one true world we inhabit, the REAL world - but is it? read on fearless reader.
This is the state of the world on Sunday, October 16, 2005 as presented to its readers by the ‘Independent on Sunday’ (“Britain’s only quality compact on Sunday”, as it proudly boasts). We headline with the revelation that British squaddies are being blown to pieces in Iraq by ‘smart bomb’ technology given (yes, given!) to the IRA by British Intelligence in the early 90’s as part of a ‘Sting’ operation. We do not, however, seem to have received anything in return. A ‘spokesman’ states “It may seem absurd that the security services were supplying technology to the IRA, but the strategy was sound. Unfortunately, no one could foresee back then that this technology would be used to kill British soldiers thousands of miles away in a different war”. Perhaps so, but surely it might have been foreseen that it could (and would) be used to kill British soldiers at the time. Fucking idiots
Such startling idiocy is then followed by the revelation that another startling idiot, President George W., informed Tony Blair just before the invasion of Iraq that Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iran and North Korea would be next. Who needs ‘natural’ disasters when we have more than enough lunatics running things to destroy the planet without any help from “Mother Nature”? Fucking idiots.
This is amply illustrated by turning over a few pages to an in depth scare story about bird flu - entitled ‘how scared should you be?’. This helps to confirm a personal theory of mine that the news media exists in order to keep the population in a constant state of anxiety so that we are that little bit easier to manipulate. The old fashioned epidemic has been supplanted with pandemic, causer of pandemonium, the place of all demons in Paradise Lost. We learn that the British Government is expecting upwards of 750,000 deaths. As one of their emergency measures they plan to suspend international flights from infected countries. Presumably to head off any birds wealthy enough and lazy enough to travel by plane. To top it all we find an ‘opinion’ column by one Geoffrey Lean, with the headline “It is a bigger risk than terrorism or anything Mother Nature could throw at us”. So, it’s official then, birds are not part of Mother Nature. I think Bill Oddie would have something to say about this. Fucking idiot.
On page three we find that the prestigious Cranfield School of Management is worried at the lack of top female executives in business. In a survey they conducted among ‘highly qualified women in their twenties and thirties’ they asked who inspired them to achieve success. Top of the pops were Madonna, Kylie Minogue, Marilyn Monroe and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Perhaps that answers the question why there are not more women working at the cutting edge of industry. Fucking idiots.
Next to an advert for the South Asia Earthquake Appeal we have an article informing us that Gays are apparently not welcome in many of Britain’s guest houses. Such ‘hotel homophobia’ is discussed under the highly inventive headline “Wish you weren’t here”. Reminiscent of the Pink Floyd album “Wish you were here” with its famous cover showing David Davis and David Cameron shaking hands. Fucking idiots.
We then have ‘eminent’ judges likening Britain to Nazi Germany in the attempts by the executive to stifle the judiciary. Why then, does the judiciary always end up with a whitewash when asked to investigate the executive in enquiry after enquiry? Surely they are cutting their own throats. Fucking idiots.
What’s next? A piece on Government ministers taking up lucrative appointments from companies that have profited from Government work. A full page advert from a private health company entitled ‘Private patients don’t jump the queue, they shorten it’. So that’s why people go private, not for their own personal ends but to help others receive treatment quicker. Rich , selfish, greedy solipsistic motherfuckers are really nothing of the kind - they are simply being ALTRUISTIC. Aren’t adverts great? Fucking idiots.
More about David Cameron and drugs. Apparently, the Evening Standard thinks that drug addiction is about as catching as bird flu. A relative of Cameron’s is apparently in drugs rehab so that somehow proves that Cameron himself takes drugs - guilt by association.
The new high tech ID scanning system is going to be hopeless, so no surprises here. That is why Star Trek is a fantasy, and not real, because everything works, except Scotty’s fucking engines. He must drink Carling as he is probably the worst fucking engineer in the world. The engines can never take it whenever really needed and he is continually running out nof dilithium chrystals. Fucking idiot. The new computerised ID system won’t work and has more holes in it than the arms of David Cameron’s relative.
E mails apparently make people fat, and doctors in a Nottingham hospital wanted to terminate a granny with flu because her feeding tube kept falling out. Her daughter naturally refused their offer so they had another go at inserting it and she made a full recovery. The tube of Damocles dangles menacingly above all our heads. We are asll at the mercy of fucking idiots.
Janet Street Porter spends a whole page slagging off Madonna. New cars are full of toxic chemicals and the average 18-24 year old is in debt to the tune of £15,000. Much of it no doubt spent on products advertised in the Independent itself. Art itself is just another commodity as revealed in an article on some mega rich American called Larry Gagosian who buys it by the skip load for his rich clients, although the downside is that he has to pose for a photograph with fat, pasty looking, follicly enhanced Reg Dwight. The Changing of the Guard is on full terrorist alert as they now wear electronic anti bomb devices under their busbies. Takes up the space once occupied by brains. Although if they stopped performing such a pointless exercise, there would be no need would there! Fucking idiots.
As the deadly, flu sodden chickens of death wing our way we find Britons flying in the opposite direction for stem cell makeovers. £15,000 (average debt of 18-24 year old, remember?) at a clinic in Barbados buys you an injection in the arm with a syringe full of stem cells gleaned from aborted foetuses that makes your skin look younger. Christine Roberts, a 57 year old housewife sates, without irony “My skin looked a bit tired, I felt I needed a shot in the arm”. We learn that both John Peel and John Hurt were both abused by teachers at their private schools, although the abusers were Christians, so were probably relying on God’s forgiveness for their actions. Fuck personal responsibility, fucking idiots.
A boring, page filling Vox Pop is followed by the revelation that we are wiping out rare creatures of the deep, as well as corals, as we relentlessly trawl the oceans of the world for what we want and chucking overboard all the dead things that we don’t want. Although there is some small glimmer of hope for the world’s fish population as we learn that the fish and chip shop on the Irish ireland of Rathlin (pop. 70) has had to close down.
The bloke who did all the funny, provocative seaside postcards in the 1950’s is buried in an unmarked grave while Brits who buy places in Brittany seem to be living in a ‘Straw Dogs’ universe in which the locals do things like disembowel their horses and poison their dogs and turn off the electric. Apparently it is because ‘they fail to integrate’. I wonder why? Fucking idiots.
Next, to further prove my theory that the media is just a giant plot to keep us disempowered, confused, anxious and worried all the time so we are easier to manipulate, we have a two page spread entitled “Is this the end of the world?”. Apparently it is, as we are taken through the changing behaviour of ‘Mother Nature’. All of Death is here; drought, famine, earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, tsunamis, extreme temperatures. Who cares about idiot politicians feathering their own nests and thinking only as far ahead as the next election? It’s the end of the world as we know it, but we don’t feel fine.
More about the hapless Cameron, why we all hate Thatcher, and an editorial about the new look Independent which manages to rope in Che Guevera because he used to play Rugby!! The Pakistan Earthquake and why we never learn how to cope with such disasters. I share the view but think where would I start if I was in charge of sorting out the aftermath of such events. Every bloody helicopter has a film crew on it as we watch them taking pictures of dying kids for whom there is no room aboard. Every British TV and radio station has different crews covering such events. Multiply that by all the TV and radio stations in the world and no wonder there’s no bloody room on board the helicopters or not enough food and water for the victims. The fucking mediavultures are busy scavenging tasty titbits for our TV screens. Fucking idiots, telling us that things are really bad and asking people what it feels like to lose all your family, house and everything. How do you think they feel! Fucking idiots.
That’s it. I have had enough. The day today has proved too much to cope with and I am only halfway through the paper. There is much more, including the obligatory story about someone with cancer and turning it into entertainment, and the usual ‘fun’ questionnaire, this time about ‘have you got what it takes for fatherhood?’. Frankly, after reading about the world today, I don’t think I could be responsible for bringing someone into it. How many more fucking idiots do we need?