Woah, Deep

The real problem, and I mean the actually root problem that has been the cause of the furore surrounding Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand is not that someone may have been hurt emotionally by their attempt at humour – it is that it just wasn’t funny.

I am proud to say, that since the very beginning of my existence on blog land, I have been saying that Jonathan Ross is not funny.  http://needfully.blog.co.uk/2008/02/11/open_letter_to_jonathan_ross~3711098

He hasn’t been funny for a long time, at least nothing that was broadcast.

Prank calls are funny.  I don’t want to deny that, practical jokes on the public are hilarious, and I have many happy memories of telephoning people and getting them irate on the other end.  But they need to be funny.  Shouting “he fucked your grand-daughter” down the phone isn’t funny, and I honestly don’t think I would have found it funny when I was 16 or 17.  Of course, as some have said, that what you expect from Russell Brand, I mean, the man was fired from MTV for turning up to work on Sept 12 ’01 dressed as Osama bin Laden.

But when Ross does it, it pisses me off, because here we have a grown man acting like a fucking tit in a classroom, all the while thinking he’s hilarious.  Sit the fuck down and shut the fuck up old man.  If you weren’t aware of the fact that you piss-poor rapport was well outdated and only works on friends you repeatedly invite back to you weekend-ruining chat show, at least be aware of the viewing figures and that fact that every man and his dog think you’re an overpaid knob head.  And as if the horrific combination of your teenage hair, ‘wacky’ suit, speech impediment, charmless ego and pay-packet wasn’t enough.  Now we have to put up with you giggling and squealing like a girl, all because you’ve found another celebrity friend who’s youth and proximity to you is enough to keep your completely bland and pointless career going.  Fuck off.  It’s over.  After this carry-on, you’ll have lost every fan over the age of 40, and anyone below that age doesn’t give a crap whether your friends with Bono or Ricky Gervais, although the fact that your friends with the former sort of reinforces my point here.

I feel bad because I do actually like his film program.  Don’t mind it, it keep me up to date and he has exclusive screenings.  But for fucks sake, don’t push it.  It shows just how much a huge pay packet can keep you out of touch, the fact that for most viewers he was a borderline c**t, yet he still acts the twat, as if he’s untouchable.

Proof of this?  The amount of complaints that were generated by the prank.  Any money, any money says that if it wasn’t Wossy doing this, nobody would’ve cared, which brings me back to my main point – the reason it angered people was because it wasn’t funny and that’s because Jonathan Ross is not funny.

And as for Russell Brand…  There’s not much point in saying anything about him that the gobshite hasn’t already heard, repeated in a loud voice, and turned into innuendo that all the students at Plymouth University can giggle to.

What is the difference in attitude towards sex between a 16 and an 18 year old?  Not much?  What if the 16 year old was sexually active and the 18 year old still a virgin?  Still a difference?  Okay, what about this - an 11 year old girl who has a boyfriend and who is taking birth control pills - does she have the same wisdom towards sex and relationships as a man who is a virgin or who has had only a small number of sexual partners at the age of 30 (they do exist)? Before you start to struggle with the answer, allow me to stop you.  The question is pretty much moot as, when you think about it, attitudes towards sex have nothing to do with your age, but how you are taught to think about it.  Everyone has an experience that can back this up, whether it was noticing that there were girls in school who were a bit more 'mature', or if it was you who wasn't really that arsed about sex until university, while it seemed to be the centre of the universe for your friends.

If I wanted to explain why I was less interested or unbothered by the prospect of sex in school, and why a close friend of mine was, it would be ridiculous of me to mention age, whether he was older or younger.  So why then does age seem to be the deciding factor when it comes to educating the young about sex?

Another set of so-called experts claiming to be a children's charity have managed the lobby certain idiotic members of the government into believing that the cause of our teenage pregnancy/abortion/STD epidemic is not how relationship education is recieved, but when.  http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/7684810.stm

To an ordinary human-being, whose judgement has not been clouded by the desire to please their peers, stay in power and seek approval from the liberal press, the idea of teaching sex eduation to five year olds seems head-scratchingly dumb.  With only a few seconds thought, a normal human being will skip the moral question and simply ask "will it work?"  Now, I can't be bothered to look at the statistics, but let's assume that when the problems of teenage pregnancy and STD's first became an issue of national concern, there was a concensus that the reason for this, was that teenagers were not being taught about that kind of stuff early enough (they obviously needed a few years thought before making any rash decisions).

OK, fine.  Sex education is introduced and taught to all those in school from ages sixteen.  Since then, the 'problems' that were identified somewhere in the 60's have so far increased both numerically and in terms of their impact on families and communities.  And every time new horrifying statistics are produced, there is another cry to bring the initial age for sex education down.

Now, I am not saying that sex education has caused this.  Neither am I saying that we should back-pedal.  There is a mere correlation between the two.  At the very least this would suggest that the strategy of targeting younger ages in order to combat this problem is not working.  In fact, it suggests to me, that the idea that age has anything to do with it at all is ridiculous.  I know 10 year olds who were more sexually aware than I was aged 18 (but that's just me).

So why keep lowering the age?  It's not like we want it to happen.  Sure, if it's proven that teenage STI's and pregnancy can be combatted by simply telling us all about it at a younger age would work, then we'd acceptit - but nobody wants to have their children taught about it under, say, the age of 11. 

Of course I'm not saying that kids shouldn't know about relationships - from a young age we see our parents, Disney characters, local characters and celebrities in and out of relationships.  It is up to our parents and the schools to work in partnership to teach us what they mean and to develop in us a healthy attitude, so that when the time comes, we approach it with an open-mind and with maturity. 

To me, it is blindingly obvious that age has nothing to do with it, so please, let's not encumber our already confused young with the added weight of sexuality, disease, procreation and rejection.  Besides, these things have to be learnt, not taught... and anyway, what 5 year old is going to understand what the hell you're on about anyway?  They've only just managed to touch the top of their head, let alone understand the intricacies of stuff they can't see inside their bodies.

On the brighter side of the impending recession - here's some MAN U fans who are fighting the good fight. Join in!

http://www.redcafe.net/f8/sign-here-if-you-beating-credit-crunch-209757/

hilarious.

What with all the doom and gloom that the BBC insists on delivering (as it has been proven before that recessions have always been saved from a depression by despair, panic and pessimism), words like 'spiralling', 'free-fall' and 'collapse' being used gleefully on all fronts - here's something that really is low on the list of priorities (except for big girl's blouses).

"The Cats Protection League said it had £11.2 million deposited in a UK bank owned by the collapsed Kaupthing.

The NCVO has held talks with the government which has promised to do all it can protect the charities' money.

But City Minister Paul Myners gave no guarantee their assets would be secure."

[BBC News UK Edition]

The Earth wobbled in it's orbit due to the collective shoulder-shrug of millions of home-owners and investors following the release of this news.

I'm not yet friends with La_Spice but I saw this little challenge floating around that place and thought I'd have a go:

Work

My father always said
Of all of us at home
That we must’ve been the laziest
Family bar none.

We always got up late
When there was no school
While he would sweat and work and trudge
For him it was the rule.

“Get up you lazy bastards,
Why has God done this to me?
I hate my life, I hate my work
And still have no money.”

His favourite phrase for calling us
I didn’t understand
But I’m ‘pathologically lazy’
And it makes me feel quite grand.

So now here is the irony
Of my dad’s reaction:
He worked so hard
And frowned so hard
And avoided all inaction.

That now I am not that lazy
But remembering my dad
I am now afraid of work
‘Cos he made it look so bad!

[bizarrely I found this on the Iceland website, which generated a new found (though not massive amount) respect for the company]

The Chief Executive's Handbook

The classic 21-point career plan for a new Chief Executive goes like this:

1. Agree an amazingly generous salary, bonus, perks and LTIP package.

2. Settle your bottom comfortably in a swivelling chair behind a very large desk.

3. Order an even bigger desk and a better-padded chair in a more luxurious office suite.

4. Recruit a surprisingly attractive PA.

5. Announce that you have inherited a company in crisis. Issue a shock profit warning accompanied by massive provisions, setting a conveniently low base for recovery.

6. Appoint highly paid management consultants to conduct a top-to-bottom strategic review.

7. Sidestep questions on what exactly a Chief Executive is for, if management consultants need to be appointed to determine the company's strategy.

8. Replace your finance director and auditors, to help cover your tracks.

9. Negotiate an even more generous salary to reflect the massive challenge of turning round the company that you now unexpectedly face.

10. Agree new LTIPs to reflect the enormous drop in the share price since your appointment.

11. Announce results of the strategic review, which has cost over £1 million and taken six months to state the bleeding obvious.

12. Botch its implementation, so that the expected recovery does not take place. Issue a series of further profit warnings (traditionally, a minimum of three).

13. Start sleeping with your surprisingly attractive PA to alleviate stress.

14. Bring in a new set of management consultants, who recommend 'focusing' the business through the sale of any remaining assets that actually make some money.

15. Achieve lower than expected returns from this fire sale.

16. Recommend acceptance of a derisory takeover bid for the rump of what was once a half decent business.

17. Exit the smoking ruins with a £1 million pay-off to cushion the pain of redundancy, and the thanks of grateful shareholders for getting the appalling company you inherited into a saleable condition.

18. Join a Government taskforce to advise on why British business is not fulfilling its potential.

19. Gain a suitable honour (CBE or above) for your important contribution to public life.

20. Apply for a new job as Chief Executive.

21. See 1.

This is, of course, a completely theoretical scenario, and any passing resemblance to any actual Chief Executive, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Keith Hann is a financial PR consultant with few clients and even fewer friends. www.keithhann.com

I had a flat mate who was convinced that the Moon lnadings never happened. He'd clearly watched some DVD or Youtube documentary on this. I could tell because his reasoning behind this was based upon assumptions he'd never bothered to research, it relied heavily on the fact that people rarely know all the facts, it showed a very basic understanding of the circumstances surrounding the Space Race and a willingness to believe that the US is at the centre of every nefarious activity that has gone on since, well the end of the First World War.

He presented me with various ideas that he could only half remember from the convincingly deep tones of a voice over. Something about the stars being absent in the photgraphs, the foot prints, the flag and their movement on the surface. All these things can be easily explained away if one was so inclined (which he clearly wasn't), despite my best efforts.

Something he could never explain properly however: the basis for this whole thing is that the US was in a race against the Soviet Union to land a man on the moon. It all comes down to the Soviet Union.
So why was it so important to land on the moon, I ask. Well, it's to do with prestige, beating the Russians, showing the power of capitalism etc.
Right. Firstly, why did the Russians not think of this? Is it because the Americans are naturally more dishonest - that's original. Secondly, was it really that important? Did the world need to see this display of power to convince them that capitalism was better than the form of government used in the USSR? I don't think so - and frankly, the people to whom this MAY have mattered, I doubt if landing on the Moon would have mattered much to them anyway.

Another thing about the Soviet Union: if it were to be believed that the US never landed on the moon - that it was all a hoax, it was filmed in a basement somewhere and that it was a massive cover up. If none of it was real, but it made it look as if the US had beaten the USSR and now dominated Space and won over the hearts and minds of the world... if that did happen - what the HELL were the Russians up to? Did they not notice that nobody went to the moon? Did their satellites not detect the lack of an Apollo 11 rocket that escaped the Earth's atmosphere, broke into pieces, landed on the Moon while another piece orbited, rejoined again and flew back to Earth? If this was such a rat race as the theory suggests, do you not think that the Ruskies would have jumped at the slightest chance to make the US look silly? But they didn't, and the Russians actually had stuff orbitting the Earth while the Moon landing's were suppossed to have happened. They kept schtum about it.

In which case, maybe THEY were involved too...

If there's anyone who happens to find the fake moon landing story plausable, please can you explain this to me.