An interesting week

I know I am under pain of death never to mention “Twitter” in a post again; but there you go, I’ve just gone and done it.

Yes, I know it is a very stupid name, and the “tweets” that go with it sound even more infantile; but it really is a surprisingly vibrant community where interesting issues bubble to the surface daily and are pursued. Forget about pre-teens from Idaho churning out junk; follow some respectable media people and you will be exposed to much of interest.

Last week Twitter was awash with comment regarding a gag order that was preventing newspapers reporting on certain events in the UK parliament. Within hours, the details of what was being suppressed and who was doing the suppressing was all over the internet. Soon, those involved caved in and the order was lifted. An small victory for free speech.

More on this from the BBC if you are interested.

Then there was the pillock working for London Underground to decided to berate an old passenger and finished his tirade with “sling him under a train”. Unfortunately for the pocket Hitler, he was being videoed by another passenger. The video went on the web, vibrated through Twitter, and the lovely Boris Johnson (major of London) picked it up and announced (on Twitter) that there would be an investigation. Hitler has been suspended. The BBC story.

Finally, one of worst newspaper’s in the UK (in the world, apart from “Pattaya People”), the Daily Mail, ran a column by someone called Jan Moir about the death of Stephen Gately. Gately was a member of the boy band Boyzone, which means I have never heard of him. According to the coroner, he died of a heart attack; but Ms. Moir would have none of that; because Gately was gay. It’s an odious piece of homophobia, unpleasant in many different ways.

You can read the article here. But it is not the original piece. The original had the heading “Why there was nothing ’natural’ about Stephen Gately’s death.” And the webpage was surrounded by adverts, and now there are none.

Links to the page started appearing on Twitter, followed by information on how to contact the Daily Mail, the advertisers on the page, and the press complaints commission. The result: a record number of complaints to the Mail, hundreds of, mainly hostile, comments attached to the article, the pulling of all advertising at the request of the advertisers, more than 1,000 complaints to the Press Commission and reports lodged with the police (although it is not clear what they would do with them other than file them). It also prompted an eloquent piece in The Guardian by Charlie Brooker. An extract:

It has been 20 minutes since I’ve read her now-notorious column, and I’m still struggling to absorb the sheer scope of its hateful idiocy. It’s like gazing through a horrid little window into an awesome universe of pure blockheaded spite. Spiralling galaxies of ignorance roll majestically against a backdrop of what looks like dark prejudice, dotted hither and thither with winking stars of snide innuendo.

Fine writing.

It’s not clear what will happen to Jan Moir, we can only hope something nasty.

But it’s not all good. Deepak Chopra is, to put it bluntly, getting on my tits.

The movie “Mystery Men” is about a group of superheroes who are useless. They bring in a mysterious character called The Sphinx to train them, and he is useless too. His training technique consists of uttering sentences such as:

To learn my teachings, I must first teach you how to learn.

He who questions training only trains himself at asking questions.

When you can balance a tack hammer on your head, you will head off your foes with a balanced attack.

There is probably a name for speaking like this (other than “bullshit”) and I expect genuinej knows what it is.

Anyway, Deepak’s output follows a similar approach. This week he has offered me:

The experience of time occurs in a timeless consciousness.

Religion is belief in someone else’s experience. Spirituality is having your own experience.

Instead of metabolizing time, why not metabolize the timeless.

I respect Deepak Chopra and find his world view interesting, but it cannot be understood via sound-bite sized chunks. Sorry Deepak; goodbye.

Comments 🔗

2009-10-19 | genuinej says

An enjoyable read. Sorry I can’t help with a totally apt word, but I’m sure you’re not too wide of the mark with bullshit. Crap, baloney, drivel and poppycock would also work. Agree about Pattaya People and Daily Mail, but I think you are being a bit hard on Ms Moir. After all, he was a queer.

2009-10-19 | Spike says

It has been 20 minutes since I’ve read your final sentence, and I’m still struggling to absorb the sheer scope of its hateful idiocy. It’s like gazing through a horrid little window into an awesome universe of pure blockheaded spite. Spiralling galaxies of ignorance roll majestically against a backdrop of what looks like dark prejudice, dotted hither and thither with winking stars of snide innuendo.

2009-10-19 | genuinej says

Blatant 95% plagiarism.

2009-10-19 | Spike says

I calculated 96.3%, but close enough.

2009-10-20 | Billy says

Your twitter menu on the left used to have a far more better appearence … while the contents were crap, it did at least look pleasant .. bring it back …

2009-10-20 | Spike says

Too much scrolling; lessened the impact of the almost Shakespearean content contained therein.