No small talk. Let's rattle on through some more bonkers letters.
===========================================================
What a wonderful wedding.
As mentioned last time, I've taken these letters from papers over the last month or so. This one is from May 11th so we're on the William/Kate wedding here. I'm sure you realised that already but hey ho.
A handsome prince, an accomplished and beautiful bride. Our Queen and Prince Philip looking happy and immaculate.
I did not watch it, but from the pictures I've seen it looks that way. I'm pleased for William and Kate, I really am. Thankyou, Peter Hollingworth, for writing in this lovely letter about a lovely wedding. I like this letter a lot, so far, and as long as you don't do something mental like use the Royal Wedding to shoehorn in a criticism of the EU, I'll be with you every step of the way.
Lots of ordinary people in the congregation with foreign royalty and leaders of the Commonwealth countries - and not an EU representative in sight.
I give up, I really do. This is like the "Nick Clegg's fault" thing which went around Twitter a few months back, except this isn't tongue in cheek. This is horribly, nightmarishly real.
It's just started raining here. THAT'S YOUR FAULT, ANDRE AGASSI!
A truly British event and a day to be remembered.
So you shouldn't be moaning. By the way, wasn't Clegg there? And wasn't he an MEP?
Why can't our MPs realise it is time to change tacks and to get back with the Commonwealth we created, before Heath turned his back on it.
Bring back the Empire, what I always say. Sort out these funny chaps with a right British slap, what!
What made him want to be a good little European? Was it his own way of getting his own back on General de Gaulle who, as President of France, not only said "No" to our first application but added: "The British people will never be European". Now most under 60-year-olds think they are European - their passport tells them so.
Anyone still trying to work out the connection here between this guff and the wedding? Anyone? Bueller?
But if they look at a map they will see that the nearest point of the European continent is 22 miles from us across the sea.
I know I say this every time, but this must be the shittiest thing ever written. TWENTY TWO MILES! OH MY GOD! Can you even IMAGINE that distance? Wow, mainland Europe is SO FAR AWAY.
We can't afford the £45m plus which we give Brussels every day, nor the 70% of laws being imposed on Parliament by Brussels. Get us out. I enjoyed being British again.
Peter Hollingworth
Harborne, Birmingham
And you are writing into The Shropshire Star because......?
===========================================================
So that's why we're in Afghanistan...to kill Bin Laden.
Well, there's a number of reasons we, and others, are in Afghanistan. These reasons are valid and I completely support the troops that are out there. Bin Laden? Well, as a key member of Al Qaeda, he was always going to be in the firing line (literally). I have slight reservations about how he was removed, but I understand, with some regret, that Army boys don't mess about. In the long run his death doesn't change anything, really, but it was a powerful, highly symbolic moment.
I see, how clever. I thought it was to give democracy to the Afghan people, to control the cocaine market and put two fingers up to the Russians.
You thought right! Well done. The influx of nasty drugs from Afghanistan and it's neighbours (nudge nudge, wink wink Pakistan!) presents the biggest danger to our young people, in my opinion.
So that's why British troops have died, revenge for 9/11. I see, so Obama can be re-elected.
Dude, you've now given us six possible reasons for why we're in Afghanistan. You were correct with...I'mma say three, with the Obama thing a tad cynical but probably true.
It only took them four years to plan and execute the killing of the most wanted man in the world.
Quick summary of this letter: "It is a disgrace that troops were in Afghanistan to kill Bin Laden. What took you so long you muppets, why didn't you kill him STRAIGHT AWAY?!"
I know we should have invaded Zimbabwe and got rid of dictators. Not played up to them like Libya, Pakistan and most of the Middle East.
I've addressed this before, so I shan't again. But, John, please please please tell me how we could have/can invade Zimbabwe. Please do!
Clue: You can't.
Yet we must obey our masters, the Americans. They know best.
John R Brown
Shrewsbury
I dealt with you last time - I remember the name. Will have to keep an eye on you.
===========================================================
Now is the time for the Conservatives to demand Mr Cameron call an election.
?????????????????
It is quite obvious that this country can no longer be governed by a coalition.
?????????????????
We must remove Mr Clegg and his Lib Dems. No more immigration. No more EU. No more windmills.
GT Inwood
Shrewsbury
Fuck windmills. I'm serious.
I was stopped by a man in the street the other day, doing a survey on the threats of society. On his list of options he had: Drugs, climate change, terrorism, global pandemic, nuclear weaponry, the EU (naturally). I realised then that he was a complete amateur.
"Windmills" I softly said to him, as I handed his clipboard back to him without ticking any of the boxes. "Windmills" I repeated, before turning and slowly walking away.
===========================================================
One more letter for you now, and I've deliberately left this one till last. If anyone has ANY idea what the living fuck this is all about, please, leave a comment below. If you can, you're a better person than I am. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you....this.
One has often wondered how Dr Samuel Johnson, the eminent lexicographer, managed to compile the wonderful dictionary.
This is a very fair point - seriously. When you sit and think about it, what a staggering achievement. How DID he do it? It's a real shame that when I see his name, I automatically think of Robbie Coltrane and that Blackadder (III?) episode, instead of the man himself and his fine, fine achievement.
The term happiness is a state of mind and the word utopia enters our picture.
The term 'happiness' is a state of mind....okay, right....and the word 'utopia' enters our picture...
Not entirely sure about the second bit, but go on.
Numerous citizens "ate" political correctness as a base for a form of reasoning, drawing comparisons to the days before New Labour's Human Rights Act - a misconception surely?
Emyr Davies
Wrexham
Is it me? Am I being thick, and just not getting that?
I've read that letter about 15 times, and I'm still none the wiser. Congratulations Emyr, you've silenced me. Answers in the comment box please.
Thursday, 16 June 2011
Thursday, 9 June 2011
Killing Two Birds
Just a quickie for you this time folks. If you roam around on the internet a lot then you may have seen this already, but if not then it's worth a watch. It appeals to me as a hopeless romantic greatly:
Of course, if you follow my relatively new Tumblr page, you might have seen it already! Yes, I have a Tumblr account. I'm still trying to figure it out, and it will never, ever be the priority compared to this blog, but for stuff too little for here and too big for Twitter, it's perfect. I don't update it that frequently, but feel free to check it out over at:
http://thefallandfalloftimlovejoy.tumblr.com/
See what I did there?
Of course, if you follow my relatively new Tumblr page, you might have seen it already! Yes, I have a Tumblr account. I'm still trying to figure it out, and it will never, ever be the priority compared to this blog, but for stuff too little for here and too big for Twitter, it's perfect. I don't update it that frequently, but feel free to check it out over at:
http://thefallandfalloftimlovejoy.tumblr.com/
See what I did there?
Friday, 3 June 2011
Writers Gonna Write!
Dear readers,
Something truly staggering has happened. Over the past few weeks, my local paper The Sloppy Star has been inundated with bafflingly barmy letters - and I mean inundated. I don't use the "I" word lightly, don't you worry about that. Now, if you're a long term reader you'll know all about the letters page and the bonkers correspondents, but in the past few weeks the volume of said scribblings has increased dramatically. It's actually quite awe-inspiring, but also rather fucking scary. In one particular edition, there were eight stupid letters to marvel at. 8! EIGHT! IN ONE PAPER! That's....I mean....wow.
I like to be a good and responsible blogger, so every letter of the magical variety I saw, I saved the paper. Thus my room now looks like the awkward bit in your local library where they stockpile old newspapers, but it's these sacrifices I make which enables this blog, TRAROTL, to once again retain it's crown as Britain's Most Beloved Blog, as voted for by Blogger Insider magazine readers*.
I've lost count of how many letters I have to analyse for your reading pleasure, but I suspect it's getting close to 20 now. Naturally I shan't be covering them all in this blog entry - I'll spread them out over the next...say...3 years or so, but before I drown in print, let us make a start.
*May or may not be real.
==========================================================
Calm down dear it's only a Coalition which is falling apart.
Not really. Not yet.
"How can I stay in power?" said Cameron. "I know, we'll have a vote."
Hmmm?
AV, first past the post or name out of a hat. "Name out of the hat", that's the one said Cameron, "My name on every vote," said Cameron. A wonderful idea, dear.
John R Brown
Shrewsbury
A promising start, I think we can agree?
==========================================================
At the time of writing this letter, there is much confusion as to whether Osama Bin Laden is dead or not.
This letter is taken from The Shropshire Star of May 9th, 2011, exactly one week after Bin Laden was shot and killed by US military. There wasn't any confusion about Bin Laden's status then, nor is there now. Dead, isn't he? As dead as a Dido.
Dodo.
There is much finger pointing at other countries involved, including Pakistan and it can soon escalate into another war. I am not aware of the procedure in other countries, but it may be a useful exercise to ascertain if there have been any children registered with a bin Laden as the father in recent years since 2002.
This is unintentional genius.
Nurse: "Do we have a name for the father, to put on the birth certificate?"
Mother: "Bin Laden. Osama."
Nurse: "How lovely. And what does Mr Bin Laden do?"
Mother: "International terrorist, warlord and overseer of a violent and fundamentalist group consisting of a multinational, stateless Sunni army which strives for global Jihad."
Nurse: "I'll just put 'Political Campaigner' on the document itself, so I will!"
That conversation took place in Ireland, judging by the last sentence.
I am saying this because there have been reports of his death since then.
Which were false.
Speaking of which, there should be a death certificate issued. However, like Barack Obama's birth certificate, it could take up to three years to find.
Trevor Mytton
Shrewsbury
Sigh. http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/birthcertificate.asp
==========================================================
In the first-past-the-post contest of female hats at the royal wedding, Mrs Cameron was the clear winner.
Letter taken from Tuesday May 10th, so you can see that, much like the first letter, these unfunny idiots are taking every opportunity they can take to crowbar in references to the AV vote of a few days previous.
Her choice was original and outstanding. The PM has real class for a wife.
I should hope so, considering her background which is, shall we say, "privileged".
Fred Phipps
Minsterley
That's it? Seriously?
Look, I'm no expert on writing letters, but I can't help thinking that a letter into The Shropshire Star, lest we forget, should at least try and cover a minimum of one of these areas:
1) Something about Shropshire
2) Something of national interest
3) Something which contributes to an ongoing debate/issue, either locally or nationally
4) Something amusing
5) Something interesting
With that in mind, I'd mark Fred's letter as 0/50. Quite some achievement.
Let's have one more for now. I think I can cope with one more as long as it isn't from my long-term arch nemesis, Val Duncan.
==========================================================
The Greek bailout...get a life.
Oh Val. This relationship is only going to end one way, I fear - a duel to the death at Reichenbach Falls. A nice literary reference there for my highly sophisticated readership.
Do you really believe "we are reluctant, but we will do it anyway" will cut any ice?
Sorry....me? Me personally? Well, Val, errm...well I suppose that's just the way it is, isn't it? They use the Euro, so I suppose it's financially sensible for the other Euro using nations to buck them up a bit. But thanks for asking, appreciate it.
You are on a slippery slope to nowhere.
Fucking hell, that was just an opinion off the top of my head. Lay off a bit eh?
Think about it.
Right.
Major is an irrelevant force.
Major? Wait....JOHN Major? John Major, Prime Minister between 1990-1997? Are you....what?
Blair is toxic.
Tony Bliar - he lies about EVERYTHING - is "toxic". WHAT DOES THAT EVEN MEAN?
Brown is toxic.
You've done that one.
Clegg is toxic.
Everybody is "toxic". We get it. This is like a karaoke rendition of Britney's song "Toxic", only sung by a xenophobic lunatic.
Miliband is a national joke.
I think this is a tad harsh. Nevertheless, WHAT in the name of bejesus are you talking about? What is your point Val?
Now the country has its sights set on Cameron.
?????????????????
All of them are leaders who sold their country out - they trashed our laws and imported foreign laws illegally.
After a slow and bizarre start, Val has settled down and has resorted to her safe ground - the EU is shit, we should tell Europe to fuck off, foreign laws blah blah blah. She'll carry on this theme for a little while longer.
They wrecked the economy and sold everything off to Europe. They got us involved in unwanted (and expensive) wars. They sold off our gold reserves. They gave money we didn't have to countries with more reserves than we have and fed the insatiable EU. They bailed out a currency we didn't use. They gave money to educate foreign children while putting our students in debt. All of them are traitors to the British people.
Vintage Val! But here comes an odd change of tack.
The country has sussed out what is going on, just look how the last party leaders were got in.
This is a very odd statement, but luckily Val doesn't just ditch it and move on, she proceeds to dig herself a big hole in trying to explain it. We're going in, folks!
Clegg was pushed onto the dumb Lib Dems. It took the Communist unions to push Miliband into place. And it took AV to put Cameron in over David Davis.
Right.
a) Nick Clegg wasn't exactly "pushed onto" the Liberal Democrats. He stood against Chris Huhne in an election determined by party members.
b) I dislike trade unions - a debate for another day - but to describe them as 'Communist' is facile. Mind you, it is a shame they interfered in that election. If they hadn't voted in Miliband, just think! The leader would have been....Miliband.
c) The Conservatives do not use AV in their leader elections. You are an idiot and I hate you.
Let's move on!
All of them were placed to weaken and destroy their parties and the country for an EU takeover.
Long term readers will understand that this isn't satire - that Val isn't a comic creation dreamt up by a mate of mine, or myself. It COULD be a wind-up - if it is, it's sensational. I fear it isn't though.
Only the party faithful are too dumb to see it. The rest of the country are far more intelligent.
At this point I, and I suspect you, are thinking "Let's wrap it up now eh Val love?". Not yet my friends, she's got more!
But the country will redress the balance and when it is ready it will pull down the coalition and vote an anti-EU party into power. Look around, it's already starting to happen across Europe and it will happen here. The EU is a busted flush and the country will make sure all of you fall along with it unless we get a vote to come out of the EU. You can't win this one...
Back to me again, are we?
600 against 60 million is very poor odds.
600? I'm going to assume Val is meaning MPs here, of which there are 649 currently sitting in the House of Commons. But thinking about it, trying to assume anything Val Duncan means is an exercise in futility - her mind is a strange ol' place after all.
The country has a long memory and a sharp sense of justice. It will take its revenge, be sure of it.
Val fucking Duncan
Telford
Until next time, you deranged nut.
Something truly staggering has happened. Over the past few weeks, my local paper The Sloppy Star has been inundated with bafflingly barmy letters - and I mean inundated. I don't use the "I" word lightly, don't you worry about that. Now, if you're a long term reader you'll know all about the letters page and the bonkers correspondents, but in the past few weeks the volume of said scribblings has increased dramatically. It's actually quite awe-inspiring, but also rather fucking scary. In one particular edition, there were eight stupid letters to marvel at. 8! EIGHT! IN ONE PAPER! That's....I mean....wow.
I like to be a good and responsible blogger, so every letter of the magical variety I saw, I saved the paper. Thus my room now looks like the awkward bit in your local library where they stockpile old newspapers, but it's these sacrifices I make which enables this blog, TRAROTL, to once again retain it's crown as Britain's Most Beloved Blog, as voted for by Blogger Insider magazine readers*.
I've lost count of how many letters I have to analyse for your reading pleasure, but I suspect it's getting close to 20 now. Naturally I shan't be covering them all in this blog entry - I'll spread them out over the next...say...3 years or so, but before I drown in print, let us make a start.
*May or may not be real.
==========================================================
Calm down dear it's only a Coalition which is falling apart.
Not really. Not yet.
"How can I stay in power?" said Cameron. "I know, we'll have a vote."
Hmmm?
AV, first past the post or name out of a hat. "Name out of the hat", that's the one said Cameron, "My name on every vote," said Cameron. A wonderful idea, dear.
John R Brown
Shrewsbury
A promising start, I think we can agree?
==========================================================
At the time of writing this letter, there is much confusion as to whether Osama Bin Laden is dead or not.
This letter is taken from The Shropshire Star of May 9th, 2011, exactly one week after Bin Laden was shot and killed by US military. There wasn't any confusion about Bin Laden's status then, nor is there now. Dead, isn't he? As dead as a Dido.
Dodo.
There is much finger pointing at other countries involved, including Pakistan and it can soon escalate into another war. I am not aware of the procedure in other countries, but it may be a useful exercise to ascertain if there have been any children registered with a bin Laden as the father in recent years since 2002.
This is unintentional genius.
Nurse: "Do we have a name for the father, to put on the birth certificate?"
Mother: "Bin Laden. Osama."
Nurse: "How lovely. And what does Mr Bin Laden do?"
Mother: "International terrorist, warlord and overseer of a violent and fundamentalist group consisting of a multinational, stateless Sunni army which strives for global Jihad."
Nurse: "I'll just put 'Political Campaigner' on the document itself, so I will!"
That conversation took place in Ireland, judging by the last sentence.
I am saying this because there have been reports of his death since then.
Which were false.
Speaking of which, there should be a death certificate issued. However, like Barack Obama's birth certificate, it could take up to three years to find.
Trevor Mytton
Shrewsbury
Sigh. http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/birthcertificate.asp
==========================================================
In the first-past-the-post contest of female hats at the royal wedding, Mrs Cameron was the clear winner.
Letter taken from Tuesday May 10th, so you can see that, much like the first letter, these unfunny idiots are taking every opportunity they can take to crowbar in references to the AV vote of a few days previous.
Her choice was original and outstanding. The PM has real class for a wife.
I should hope so, considering her background which is, shall we say, "privileged".
Fred Phipps
Minsterley
That's it? Seriously?
Look, I'm no expert on writing letters, but I can't help thinking that a letter into The Shropshire Star, lest we forget, should at least try and cover a minimum of one of these areas:
1) Something about Shropshire
2) Something of national interest
3) Something which contributes to an ongoing debate/issue, either locally or nationally
4) Something amusing
5) Something interesting
With that in mind, I'd mark Fred's letter as 0/50. Quite some achievement.
Let's have one more for now. I think I can cope with one more as long as it isn't from my long-term arch nemesis, Val Duncan.
==========================================================
The Greek bailout...get a life.
Oh Val. This relationship is only going to end one way, I fear - a duel to the death at Reichenbach Falls. A nice literary reference there for my highly sophisticated readership.
Do you really believe "we are reluctant, but we will do it anyway" will cut any ice?
Sorry....me? Me personally? Well, Val, errm...well I suppose that's just the way it is, isn't it? They use the Euro, so I suppose it's financially sensible for the other Euro using nations to buck them up a bit. But thanks for asking, appreciate it.
You are on a slippery slope to nowhere.
Fucking hell, that was just an opinion off the top of my head. Lay off a bit eh?
Think about it.
Right.
Major is an irrelevant force.
Major? Wait....JOHN Major? John Major, Prime Minister between 1990-1997? Are you....what?
Blair is toxic.
Tony Bliar - he lies about EVERYTHING - is "toxic". WHAT DOES THAT EVEN MEAN?
Brown is toxic.
You've done that one.
Clegg is toxic.
Everybody is "toxic". We get it. This is like a karaoke rendition of Britney's song "Toxic", only sung by a xenophobic lunatic.
Miliband is a national joke.
I think this is a tad harsh. Nevertheless, WHAT in the name of bejesus are you talking about? What is your point Val?
Now the country has its sights set on Cameron.
?????????????????
All of them are leaders who sold their country out - they trashed our laws and imported foreign laws illegally.
After a slow and bizarre start, Val has settled down and has resorted to her safe ground - the EU is shit, we should tell Europe to fuck off, foreign laws blah blah blah. She'll carry on this theme for a little while longer.
They wrecked the economy and sold everything off to Europe. They got us involved in unwanted (and expensive) wars. They sold off our gold reserves. They gave money we didn't have to countries with more reserves than we have and fed the insatiable EU. They bailed out a currency we didn't use. They gave money to educate foreign children while putting our students in debt. All of them are traitors to the British people.
Vintage Val! But here comes an odd change of tack.
The country has sussed out what is going on, just look how the last party leaders were got in.
This is a very odd statement, but luckily Val doesn't just ditch it and move on, she proceeds to dig herself a big hole in trying to explain it. We're going in, folks!
Clegg was pushed onto the dumb Lib Dems. It took the Communist unions to push Miliband into place. And it took AV to put Cameron in over David Davis.
Right.
a) Nick Clegg wasn't exactly "pushed onto" the Liberal Democrats. He stood against Chris Huhne in an election determined by party members.
b) I dislike trade unions - a debate for another day - but to describe them as 'Communist' is facile. Mind you, it is a shame they interfered in that election. If they hadn't voted in Miliband, just think! The leader would have been....Miliband.
c) The Conservatives do not use AV in their leader elections. You are an idiot and I hate you.
Let's move on!
All of them were placed to weaken and destroy their parties and the country for an EU takeover.
Long term readers will understand that this isn't satire - that Val isn't a comic creation dreamt up by a mate of mine, or myself. It COULD be a wind-up - if it is, it's sensational. I fear it isn't though.
Only the party faithful are too dumb to see it. The rest of the country are far more intelligent.
At this point I, and I suspect you, are thinking "Let's wrap it up now eh Val love?". Not yet my friends, she's got more!
But the country will redress the balance and when it is ready it will pull down the coalition and vote an anti-EU party into power. Look around, it's already starting to happen across Europe and it will happen here. The EU is a busted flush and the country will make sure all of you fall along with it unless we get a vote to come out of the EU. You can't win this one...
Back to me again, are we?
600 against 60 million is very poor odds.
600? I'm going to assume Val is meaning MPs here, of which there are 649 currently sitting in the House of Commons. But thinking about it, trying to assume anything Val Duncan means is an exercise in futility - her mind is a strange ol' place after all.
The country has a long memory and a sharp sense of justice. It will take its revenge, be sure of it.
Val fucking Duncan
Telford
Until next time, you deranged nut.
Friday, 27 May 2011
This Is The One (Part 2)
"And so, to tonight. My opinion hasn't really changed since I blogged about the game a few weeks ago. I fancy us to score, at least once. Vidic and Ferdinand will be a strong threat from corners, and if they play Puyol and Sylvinho, that's a definite weakness. I think we'll surrender the majority of possession, and just make sure that Barcelona always play in front of us. Xavi and Iniesta, two wonderful players, can pass the ball around as much as they like, providing they don't play in Eto'o or Henry in behind. And as for the little maestro, Messi - we have to stop the cross field ball that Barca play. If you look at some of their goals from previous CL games, it's a ball across to Messi on the right, who cuts inside onto his left foot and causes mayhem. If Evra has an outstanding game, he can combat Barca's main attacking threat. Team I would pick:
van der Sar
O'Shea Rio Vidic Evra
Carrick Anderson Park
Ronaldo Rooney Tevez
I have nothing left to say."
You know that phrase "The more things change, the more they stay the same"? Two years after writing those words on the eve of a Champions League Final versus Barcelona, here we all are again. The experience of last time has burnt me I'm afraid - as much as I want to, I just can't see us winning it. I'm not sure we're as explosive going forward as before, and we certainly don't have the wildcard of Cristiano Ronaldo anymore either. The scariest thing though? Barcelona are better now then two seasons ago - Villa better than an ageing Henry, Alves better than Puyol (at right back), Abidal better than Sylvinho. I think Messi is better now than he was then, ditto for Iniesta. Their side is not only packed with skill and craft, but with experience and know-how. Their manager is young, but he's won this competition before, and he's won back-to-back La Liga titles. Put simply, they are the best club side in the world, and the best side I've ever seen.
BUT! In a one-off game, every team is beatable. Even this one. Blimey, Arsenal beat them a few months back, so we KNOW it can be done. A poor performance from them, and anything is possible. It'll need one hell of an effort from every player, but I have faith in them. And you'd better believe that if any manager can instigate their downfall, it's the great man himself, the heartbeat of Manchester United, Sir Alex.
A game of this nature means that every football fan - particularly those with a Mancunian leaning - has rambled on about tactics and gameplans etc on their blogs or websites or on their podcasts for a wee while now. To be honest, I'm not into that - I just enjoy watching a good game of football. The excerpt above pretty much stretches my interest of football strategy to the limit. As such, I'm not even going to try analysing the game - if you're interested in that stuff, don't bother with me, go straight to Jonathan Wilson or a Man United blog for your nerd fix. But in terms of line-up, I can only see Fergie going with:
van der Sar
Fabio Rio Vidic Evra
Valencia Carrick Giggs Park
Rooney Chicharito
I'm not sure how I feel about that - I'd perhaps ponder dropping Chicha (which would be harsh on the lad) and putting another midfielder in, either Anderson or Nani. It's a shame Fletcher has been out for so long and won't make it, to be honest, as we're a better side with him in it when he's at the top of his game. The problem is, sticking Rooney up top on his own and putting another central midfield player in suddenly makes us seem very defensive. Teams have tried that in the past against Barcelona but they've always found a way through, and you wonder if it's best just to fight fire with fire. Chicha the highest player forward and Rooney putting in a shift when we don't have the ball? Might be a better bet.
But that's enough of all of that. I'm nervous, but the fact I believe we're underdogs makes it a bit more bearable. With football, it's always the hope that kills me. Prediction? I'm going for:
Barcelona 2 -1 Manchester United
Villa, Messi - Vidic
But I just hope it's a great game. The occasion deserves that, and both teams are more than capable. Enjoy the game, and COME ON UNITED!
Wednesday, 25 May 2011
Oh We Could Be Heroes
I'm guilty of doing this a lot, I know, but let me take you back to a previous time. For this blog entry, let's try July, 1999.
It was before dinner one night when I walked into the lounge to find my older brother watching the TV intently. To my amazement, it wasn't Baywatch, Eurotrash or anything with female breasts in, but cycling. CYCLING?! BOR-ING, I thought to myself, and settled down on the couch with a magazine. But with the TV turned up loud and the commentator getting rather excited, I found I couldn't concentrate on reading, and soon I was watching along with my frere. And bloody hell, it WAS exciting! The sands of time have meant that names and teams have slipped out of my mind now, but what I can remember of that day was that it was a classic "flat stage" of the Tour de France - a rider was out in front of the main field, desperately trying to cling on and reach the finish line before the main pack caught up to him and swallowed him up. It was absolutely engrossing, and I loved it. The next night, I sat and watched the highlights through choice. I loved the drama of it all, I loved the fact the race was split into different components (best sprinter, best mountain rider etc) and I loved the countryside of France.
And because it was July, 1999, not only was I introduced to the greatest bike race on the planet, but I was introduced to a brash Texan who's name I'm sure you'll all know, whether you know the sport or not. Who's story I'm sure you'll all know, whether you know the sport or not. What you probably don't know however is how much impact Lance Armstrong had on my life. The 'Tour de Lance'? It was for me, and even though I fell in love with the race, I cannot pretend that I watched it as a neutral. From 1999 through to 2005, I felt like I cycled every step with him. The mere mention of Jan Ullrich's name made me flinch and hiss. I LOL'd at people who criticised him. I couldn't understand how people weren't rooting for him.
There's always been smoke around Lance Armstrong, but for him, his legal team and for staunch supporters like me, it was always easy to blow it away with a wave of the hand. Floyd Landis said something? He's a joke. Tyler Hamilton? Ditto. This French man has said this? He hates Armstrong. David Walsh has co-written a book packed full of rumour and suggestion? Well, he's just a prick anyway. A relatively unknown rider has said something? Oooh, who's Mr Jealous Cakes?! And so on and so forth. You casually dismiss each one, you discredit each one, you move on and hope that the noise subsides. But before you know it, the noise comes back, and it's gotten louder.
A few days ago the US television programme "60 Minutes" reported that George Hincapie, for so long a trusted ally of the Texan, is among three former team mates to testify - to a US federal grand jury, no less - that they saw Armstrong use performance enhancing drugs. It doesn't end there, either - is also believed that Hincapie confessed to supplying his team leader with EPO. With Landis or Hamilton or Andreu you can scoff, but not Big George. As the cycling presenter Ned Boulting tweeted:
"It does seem as if the tipping point was reached last night. The momentum all one way now, surely."
And Hincapie himself? He tweeted:
"I can confirm to you I never spoke with '60 Minutes'. I have no idea where they got their information. As I've said in the past, I continue to be disappointed that people are talking about the past in cycling instead of the future. As for the substance of anything in the '60 Minutes' story, I cannot comment on anything related to the ongoing investigation."
Sometimes, it's not what you say. It's what you don't say.
How do I feel? As someone biased, it would be really easy for me to change tack - start telling you how it doesn't matter, it's in the past, everyone else was at it, the end justified the means, look at his charity work etc. But I can't do that. I'm totally sickened by the whole thing - sickened that I was taken in, that I believed, that I held this man up as something he wasn't, that I proudly wore the wristband telling people to "Livestrong". How the fuck does injecting yourself with shit constitute as living strong, Lance? At this moment in time, there's been no confession - only more denials - and no solid evidence, but Ned Boulting is right, I fear. There's always been smoke, but now we're walking round the corner and seeing the fire.
You know the real tragedy of it all? Much like the baseball player Barry Bonds, it's the continuous denials. If you did it, just be a man and say you did it - don't hide, don't pretend. Don't discredit and ridicule everyone who's telling the truth, the people who are trying to make the world see the light. The American people don't hate Barry Bonds because he took drugs - they hate him because he's a jackass. Like Bonds, Armstrong reached the crossroads and picked the wrong turning. I fancy he'll keep on denying until he can deny no longer, but by that time nothing he says will matter. The damage will be done.
The case of Lance Armstrong does underline one thing however - that I must now accept that sport has to be watched through cynical eyes. There are no heroes, no fairy tales, no magic, no perfect stories. Athletes must never be seen as being "role models" to our young people. I was as shocked as most people were about the identity of the footballer who had an affair with Imogen Thomas - I'm not going to name him here but obviously everyone knows who he is - but looking at him through dispassionate eyes, I realised that as long as he played well for my team, I didn't care. That might be a sad state of affairs, but as The Stranglers said, no more heroes.
On my bookshelf I have these items:
DVD and accompanying magazine about Lance Armstrong
"Lance Armstrong: Images of a Champion"
"23 Days in July: Inside Lance Armstrong's Record breaking victory in the Tour de France"
"Lance Armstrong: Tour de Force"
Lance Armstrong's two autobiographies
When the whole truth is revealed - and it will - if you want any of those items, just let me know. Otherwise they're all going in the bin.
A legacy trashed, forever.
It was before dinner one night when I walked into the lounge to find my older brother watching the TV intently. To my amazement, it wasn't Baywatch, Eurotrash or anything with female breasts in, but cycling. CYCLING?! BOR-ING, I thought to myself, and settled down on the couch with a magazine. But with the TV turned up loud and the commentator getting rather excited, I found I couldn't concentrate on reading, and soon I was watching along with my frere. And bloody hell, it WAS exciting! The sands of time have meant that names and teams have slipped out of my mind now, but what I can remember of that day was that it was a classic "flat stage" of the Tour de France - a rider was out in front of the main field, desperately trying to cling on and reach the finish line before the main pack caught up to him and swallowed him up. It was absolutely engrossing, and I loved it. The next night, I sat and watched the highlights through choice. I loved the drama of it all, I loved the fact the race was split into different components (best sprinter, best mountain rider etc) and I loved the countryside of France.
And because it was July, 1999, not only was I introduced to the greatest bike race on the planet, but I was introduced to a brash Texan who's name I'm sure you'll all know, whether you know the sport or not. Who's story I'm sure you'll all know, whether you know the sport or not. What you probably don't know however is how much impact Lance Armstrong had on my life. The 'Tour de Lance'? It was for me, and even though I fell in love with the race, I cannot pretend that I watched it as a neutral. From 1999 through to 2005, I felt like I cycled every step with him. The mere mention of Jan Ullrich's name made me flinch and hiss. I LOL'd at people who criticised him. I couldn't understand how people weren't rooting for him.
There's always been smoke around Lance Armstrong, but for him, his legal team and for staunch supporters like me, it was always easy to blow it away with a wave of the hand. Floyd Landis said something? He's a joke. Tyler Hamilton? Ditto. This French man has said this? He hates Armstrong. David Walsh has co-written a book packed full of rumour and suggestion? Well, he's just a prick anyway. A relatively unknown rider has said something? Oooh, who's Mr Jealous Cakes?! And so on and so forth. You casually dismiss each one, you discredit each one, you move on and hope that the noise subsides. But before you know it, the noise comes back, and it's gotten louder.
A few days ago the US television programme "60 Minutes" reported that George Hincapie, for so long a trusted ally of the Texan, is among three former team mates to testify - to a US federal grand jury, no less - that they saw Armstrong use performance enhancing drugs. It doesn't end there, either - is also believed that Hincapie confessed to supplying his team leader with EPO. With Landis or Hamilton or Andreu you can scoff, but not Big George. As the cycling presenter Ned Boulting tweeted:
"It does seem as if the tipping point was reached last night. The momentum all one way now, surely."
And Hincapie himself? He tweeted:
"I can confirm to you I never spoke with '60 Minutes'. I have no idea where they got their information. As I've said in the past, I continue to be disappointed that people are talking about the past in cycling instead of the future. As for the substance of anything in the '60 Minutes' story, I cannot comment on anything related to the ongoing investigation."
Sometimes, it's not what you say. It's what you don't say.
How do I feel? As someone biased, it would be really easy for me to change tack - start telling you how it doesn't matter, it's in the past, everyone else was at it, the end justified the means, look at his charity work etc. But I can't do that. I'm totally sickened by the whole thing - sickened that I was taken in, that I believed, that I held this man up as something he wasn't, that I proudly wore the wristband telling people to "Livestrong". How the fuck does injecting yourself with shit constitute as living strong, Lance? At this moment in time, there's been no confession - only more denials - and no solid evidence, but Ned Boulting is right, I fear. There's always been smoke, but now we're walking round the corner and seeing the fire.
You know the real tragedy of it all? Much like the baseball player Barry Bonds, it's the continuous denials. If you did it, just be a man and say you did it - don't hide, don't pretend. Don't discredit and ridicule everyone who's telling the truth, the people who are trying to make the world see the light. The American people don't hate Barry Bonds because he took drugs - they hate him because he's a jackass. Like Bonds, Armstrong reached the crossroads and picked the wrong turning. I fancy he'll keep on denying until he can deny no longer, but by that time nothing he says will matter. The damage will be done.
The case of Lance Armstrong does underline one thing however - that I must now accept that sport has to be watched through cynical eyes. There are no heroes, no fairy tales, no magic, no perfect stories. Athletes must never be seen as being "role models" to our young people. I was as shocked as most people were about the identity of the footballer who had an affair with Imogen Thomas - I'm not going to name him here but obviously everyone knows who he is - but looking at him through dispassionate eyes, I realised that as long as he played well for my team, I didn't care. That might be a sad state of affairs, but as The Stranglers said, no more heroes.
On my bookshelf I have these items:
DVD and accompanying magazine about Lance Armstrong
"Lance Armstrong: Images of a Champion"
"23 Days in July: Inside Lance Armstrong's Record breaking victory in the Tour de France"
"Lance Armstrong: Tour de Force"
Lance Armstrong's two autobiographies
When the whole truth is revealed - and it will - if you want any of those items, just let me know. Otherwise they're all going in the bin.
A legacy trashed, forever.
Monday, 16 May 2011
Ban the Banner!
Evening all.
It's certainly been a very interesting weekend of football here in the United Isles. Before I get to the main theme of my blog entry though, let me just wander off and touch on a few things that the greatest game has given us over the past few days.
1) West Ham United have been relegated, and Avram Grant has been sacked. The only mystifying thing about that sentence is the fact that the Hammers board members - all of whom are stupendous arseholes - left it until the final nail was inserted into their coffin before deciding to replace the most clueless football manager the world has ever seen this side of Les Reed. For any non-football fans reading this, it's difficult to explain to you what an awful, awful manager Avram Grant is. Perhaps it'd be better to just tell you that he's relegated the last two teams he's managed, he had a hand in ousting the greatest manager Chelsea ever had, and he inspired no confidence whatsoever in his players. It is still unclear what UEFA coaching qualifications he actually has, but reports coming out from West Ham's dressing room about his tactical "knowledge" suggest he hasn't got many. No wonder the last rousing half-time speech in there was from captain Scott Parker, not himself.
2) Many congratulations to AFC Telford United on their promotion via the play-offs to the Blue Square Premier - otherwise known by us old farts as the Conference. When I first moved up to Shropshire, Telford United and their ground The Bucks Head became my regular source of football, and though it was a billion miles away from Old Trafford standards I didn't care a jot. The stadium was old and run-down however, so they bulldozed it and replaced it with a gleaming new one (New Bucks Head, funnily enough) which eight years on remains VERY impressive by non-league standards. What happened to Telford United is a story for another day, but after it crashed and burned in 2004 a new team was set up by the fans and they started all over again. The fact that they've got back to the level Telford United were at within seven years is a testament to the magnificent work done down there. I was sceptical, and there's still work to be done, but watching the play-off final made me proud that there's a football club which represents the local community so voraciously as AFC Telford do, and really proud that that club is within walking distance of myself. I wish them all the good luck in the world.
But now I want to get to the matter in hand, and it's concerning this:
3) Manchester United won the Premier League title on Saturday afternoon, their 19th league crown.
4) Manchester city won the FA Cup on Saturday afternoon, ending a 35 year trophy drought.
This story can get complicated but for the sake of everyone I'm going to simplify it down. For the past decade or so there has been a banner at Old Trafford which has displayed the number of years since city, one of our rivals, last won a trophy (a picture of it is below if you've not seen it). Now that city have triumphed in a (largely irrelevant) competition, a discussion has broken out - what to do with "the banner"? As I follow an awful lot of United supporters on Twatter, it's a debate I've been seeing a lot in the last few days. Opinions have generally been divided between:
a) Take it down.
b) Keep it up.
c) Modify it.
but I've not seen anyone yet who's shared my opinion of the banner - that it should never have been there in the first place.
What I love about my football club is that history just seeps out of its every corner - most of it good, some of it bad. If you asked me to name a United Dream XI, I'd struggle, and that'd be just based on players I've seen with my own eyes, never mind including Robson, Law, Charlton, Best, Edwards and more. What I love about my football club is that we're one of the most successful football teams in the world. What I love about my football club is the splendour of the stadium, the fact we have the greatest manager of all time, the Munich tunnel, the proud and loud away support, the fact everyone else hates us, and so much more.
In my opinion, the pride I, and hopefully others, feel in my football club should be reflected by the banners and flags that adorn the ground. We should boast about OUR achievements, OUR players, OUR history and OUR on field prowess rather than spend so much time thinking about others. It's the same for the chants - Patrice Evra? Javier Hernandez? Michael Carrick? No songs for them, but plenty about hating Scousers or city being a small club. Fair enough, I agree with those sentiments, but it's not productive. The only chant we have for Ji Sung Park is about the dubious culinary habits in his native country.
Okay, "the banner" was mildly amusing but it's always been an albatross around our necks. Would it have inspired the city players to try extra hard? I don't know - I doubt they care, actually - but the fact that Roberto Mancini took great delight in saying how they were going to "rip that banner down", and the fact that after their win, the city players paraded a banner saying "0 years" on the Wembley pitch means that you can bet they were aware of it. And now it becomes an embarrassment. Take it down? Cue city fans piping up with "where's your banner gone?" at the next derby. Keep it up, or modify it? Just makes us look obsessed. For what it's worth, in my opinion it has to come down. But in my opinion, it should never have existed.
Take it down, and replace it with something that celebrates Manchester United. Jesus Christ, there's plenty of stuff to choose from.
It's certainly been a very interesting weekend of football here in the United Isles. Before I get to the main theme of my blog entry though, let me just wander off and touch on a few things that the greatest game has given us over the past few days.
1) West Ham United have been relegated, and Avram Grant has been sacked. The only mystifying thing about that sentence is the fact that the Hammers board members - all of whom are stupendous arseholes - left it until the final nail was inserted into their coffin before deciding to replace the most clueless football manager the world has ever seen this side of Les Reed. For any non-football fans reading this, it's difficult to explain to you what an awful, awful manager Avram Grant is. Perhaps it'd be better to just tell you that he's relegated the last two teams he's managed, he had a hand in ousting the greatest manager Chelsea ever had, and he inspired no confidence whatsoever in his players. It is still unclear what UEFA coaching qualifications he actually has, but reports coming out from West Ham's dressing room about his tactical "knowledge" suggest he hasn't got many. No wonder the last rousing half-time speech in there was from captain Scott Parker, not himself.
2) Many congratulations to AFC Telford United on their promotion via the play-offs to the Blue Square Premier - otherwise known by us old farts as the Conference. When I first moved up to Shropshire, Telford United and their ground The Bucks Head became my regular source of football, and though it was a billion miles away from Old Trafford standards I didn't care a jot. The stadium was old and run-down however, so they bulldozed it and replaced it with a gleaming new one (New Bucks Head, funnily enough) which eight years on remains VERY impressive by non-league standards. What happened to Telford United is a story for another day, but after it crashed and burned in 2004 a new team was set up by the fans and they started all over again. The fact that they've got back to the level Telford United were at within seven years is a testament to the magnificent work done down there. I was sceptical, and there's still work to be done, but watching the play-off final made me proud that there's a football club which represents the local community so voraciously as AFC Telford do, and really proud that that club is within walking distance of myself. I wish them all the good luck in the world.
But now I want to get to the matter in hand, and it's concerning this:
3) Manchester United won the Premier League title on Saturday afternoon, their 19th league crown.
4) Manchester city won the FA Cup on Saturday afternoon, ending a 35 year trophy drought.
This story can get complicated but for the sake of everyone I'm going to simplify it down. For the past decade or so there has been a banner at Old Trafford which has displayed the number of years since city, one of our rivals, last won a trophy (a picture of it is below if you've not seen it). Now that city have triumphed in a (largely irrelevant) competition, a discussion has broken out - what to do with "the banner"? As I follow an awful lot of United supporters on Twatter, it's a debate I've been seeing a lot in the last few days. Opinions have generally been divided between:
a) Take it down.
b) Keep it up.
c) Modify it.
but I've not seen anyone yet who's shared my opinion of the banner - that it should never have been there in the first place.
What I love about my football club is that history just seeps out of its every corner - most of it good, some of it bad. If you asked me to name a United Dream XI, I'd struggle, and that'd be just based on players I've seen with my own eyes, never mind including Robson, Law, Charlton, Best, Edwards and more. What I love about my football club is that we're one of the most successful football teams in the world. What I love about my football club is the splendour of the stadium, the fact we have the greatest manager of all time, the Munich tunnel, the proud and loud away support, the fact everyone else hates us, and so much more.
In my opinion, the pride I, and hopefully others, feel in my football club should be reflected by the banners and flags that adorn the ground. We should boast about OUR achievements, OUR players, OUR history and OUR on field prowess rather than spend so much time thinking about others. It's the same for the chants - Patrice Evra? Javier Hernandez? Michael Carrick? No songs for them, but plenty about hating Scousers or city being a small club. Fair enough, I agree with those sentiments, but it's not productive. The only chant we have for Ji Sung Park is about the dubious culinary habits in his native country.
Okay, "the banner" was mildly amusing but it's always been an albatross around our necks. Would it have inspired the city players to try extra hard? I don't know - I doubt they care, actually - but the fact that Roberto Mancini took great delight in saying how they were going to "rip that banner down", and the fact that after their win, the city players paraded a banner saying "0 years" on the Wembley pitch means that you can bet they were aware of it. And now it becomes an embarrassment. Take it down? Cue city fans piping up with "where's your banner gone?" at the next derby. Keep it up, or modify it? Just makes us look obsessed. For what it's worth, in my opinion it has to come down. But in my opinion, it should never have existed.
Take it down, and replace it with something that celebrates Manchester United. Jesus Christ, there's plenty of stuff to choose from.
Wednesday, 4 May 2011
Let's Talk About Sex, Baby
Wotcha?
Twitter, that horrid little online world of reactionary views and unoriginal jokes, is all abuzz right about now because of a woman called Nadine Dorries.
Dorries, for those of you who don't know, is a Tory Scum MP who recently confessed that her online blog, set up to engage with us "normal" folk, was "mostly fiction" and "relied heavily on poetic licence." She's also been up to funny stuff with a married man, allegedly. Dorries has been making the news today because of comments she made in the Commons earlier, but Twitter is funny in that it's a bit like Chinese Whispers - sometimes things can get twisted and contorted, other times things get spread around even when they're fake (much like a "quote" supposedly said by Martin Luther King the other day) so let's look at what Dorries exactly said:
Teenage girls must be given lessons in how to say no to sex, a Conservative MP has told Parliament. Speaking in the Commons, Nadine Dorries proposed that would result in classes in abstinence, but only for girls aged 13 to 16. She said society was "Saturated in sex" and teenagers should be taught that it was as "cool" to say no to sex as to know how to put a condom on their boyfriend.
"The answer to ending our constant struggle with the incredibly high rate of teenage sexual activity and underage pregnancies lies in teaching our girls and boys about the option of abstinence, the ability to "just say no" as part of their compulsory sex education." she said. "Peer pressure is a key contributor to early sexual activity in our country. Society is focused on sex. Teaching a child at the age of seven to apply a condom on a banana is almost saying 'Now go and try this for yourself.' Girls are taught to have safe sex, but not how to say no to a boyfriend who insists on sexual relations."
So how do we feel about all of that? Personally, I think Dorries is wrong in wanting a branch of sexual education to be taught to a specific gender - in this case, girls. What does that achieve? I have visions in my head of 13 year old girls leaving a classroom and feeling terrified that any boy passing them is going to demand intercourse with them. I don't have a problem with abstinence being mentioned in sex education classes, but to teach children to say "yes" or "no" is extremely unsafe and frankly stupid ground. I also find it horribly moralistic - "You MUST NOT say yes to this boy!" etc. Educate children thoroughly and let them make their own decisions in life. Besides, when I was 15 I remember girls saying "no" to me. Quite often, in fact. Come to think of it they were, and still are, particularly adept at doing that. Gutted.
Some more quotes and opinions can be found here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/may/04/nadine-dorries-teenage-girls but I want to move on, because I want this blog post to be about this subject, rather than Dorries herself.
I went to a primary school, a middle school (for half a year) and a secondary school. In all of those days/months/years, the sex education given to me amounted to this:
a) In primary school, one day my class was divided into the boys and girls. The girls went off somewhere, to another room, to talk about God-knows-what. They didn't tell us afterwards, and to this day I don't know. This is a serious point however, which I'll get to in a minute.
Us lads got ushered into a room where we were greeted by a male teacher (there was only two in the school) who was also our football coach (I was the dependable left-back, thankyou very much). My memory is very hazy, I can't really remember what he told us, but it was something about sex - mainly what happened to boys in terms of ejaculation and erections and all the rest of it. We were about 11, and I understood NONE of it. I had no fucking idea what he was talking about, so I stopped listening. I messed about with my friend, and eventually we left the room and went back to class. The talk was never mentioned again.
b) Secondary school. We were about 15, and some cunts (I'm sorry, but they were) came into the school to give us a talk about sex that promised to be "fun". I hated every single fucking second of it - partly because I'm a quiet, shy person, but mainly because I didn't think how these people approached it was in the right manner. Example - at one point, we had to sit around in a big circle, and take turns to say our names but with a sexual term attached to it. For example - Charles Chlamydia, Patrick Penis (Yes, I know, tell me about it) and my poor friend Ivan who, as no-one could think of anything else, got branded Impotent Ivan. The reason behind doing this? I can't tell you - not then, not now. It was fucking awful, and embarrassing, and it achieved precisely nothing, except make me wish the ground could swallow me up. There was a few various other shitty things like that - I think at one point one of the guys waved a condom around to get a laugh - and then that was it. And like primary school, that was sex education done with.
In terms of sex education, my schools failed me. I didn't know it at the time, but whisking the girls away that day in primary school set a precedent in my mind - boys stuff is boys stuff, girls stuff is girls stuff, and clearly I didn't need to know the latter. Periods? Tampons? Female contraceptives? No good asking me, to be perfectly honest. Serious discussions about sexual infections, teen pregnancies, genitalia and non-penetrative sex? At school I was never in the position to discuss or be taught about any of those things.
A lot of people will say it shouldn't be the schools job to teach about sex. I disagree, mainly because a discussion about these things with strangers is better than with parents. Thinking about it, my parents never talked about sex with me. My Dad never talked about "birds and bees", my Mum never taught me about womens health. I suppose that if my schools failed me on this issue, so did my parents.
So how did I learn about sex? Well, we got the internet in 2000, when I was 13, and sitting here now, pretty much everything I know about sex has come from it. Most of that is, admittedly, because I'm a massive pervert and I watch shitloads of pornography, but some of it is because I was curious about stuff - stuff that I felt embarrassed to ask my parents about, stuff which I never got close to learning about at school. As I type this, I look out of my window and I see my little brother. I don't want him to grow up like that - to feel like sex is a taboo subject to be tiptoed around, or to find out what the inside of a vagina looks like by seeing a Dutch girl on a webcam opening her legs up. Who knows where I'll be when he's 12/13 (hopefully in Boston but probably still here) but I like to think that I'll put my arm round him and say "Look, this is no big deal, I'm cool talking about anything at all".
Going back to schools, and wrapping things up, what's the answer? I don't know what secondary school sex education is like right now, as I'm mid-20s, but I hope to God it's better than what I suffered. So much of sex education is based on frivolity. I understand that it's really tough to counter that when you're dealing with teenagers, but I'd like to see a more professional and grown up approach. Instead of having a big laugh, talk to students like they're adults - which they'll be one day, y 'know - and stress that sex shouldn't be a taboo subject but it is one that should be taken seriously. Knowledge is power, and I can't help thinking that perhaps it's a lack of knowledge which results in 17 year old girls walking round with pushchairs and prams. Outside of schools, make condoms more accessible, for fucks sake. Last time I bought some - and my God, it's been a while - I bought two for £3. Two for £3! Since then they've probably gone up in price as well. When I think about that, it doesn't surprise me a great deal that you see youths on The Jeremy Kyle Show who have gone around bonking young women and getting them up the duff. "Put something on the end of it!!!" Kyle will scream at them, but why would they pay that much for something that's seen as "uncool" and "unnecessary"? Knowledge is power, and if their sex education was anything like mine, they simply don't have it.
Thoughts?
Twitter, that horrid little online world of reactionary views and unoriginal jokes, is all abuzz right about now because of a woman called Nadine Dorries.
Dorries, for those of you who don't know, is a Tory Scum MP who recently confessed that her online blog, set up to engage with us "normal" folk, was "mostly fiction" and "relied heavily on poetic licence." She's also been up to funny stuff with a married man, allegedly. Dorries has been making the news today because of comments she made in the Commons earlier, but Twitter is funny in that it's a bit like Chinese Whispers - sometimes things can get twisted and contorted, other times things get spread around even when they're fake (much like a "quote" supposedly said by Martin Luther King the other day) so let's look at what Dorries exactly said:
Teenage girls must be given lessons in how to say no to sex, a Conservative MP has told Parliament. Speaking in the Commons, Nadine Dorries proposed that would result in classes in abstinence, but only for girls aged 13 to 16. She said society was "Saturated in sex" and teenagers should be taught that it was as "cool" to say no to sex as to know how to put a condom on their boyfriend.
"The answer to ending our constant struggle with the incredibly high rate of teenage sexual activity and underage pregnancies lies in teaching our girls and boys about the option of abstinence, the ability to "just say no" as part of their compulsory sex education." she said. "Peer pressure is a key contributor to early sexual activity in our country. Society is focused on sex. Teaching a child at the age of seven to apply a condom on a banana is almost saying 'Now go and try this for yourself.' Girls are taught to have safe sex, but not how to say no to a boyfriend who insists on sexual relations."
So how do we feel about all of that? Personally, I think Dorries is wrong in wanting a branch of sexual education to be taught to a specific gender - in this case, girls. What does that achieve? I have visions in my head of 13 year old girls leaving a classroom and feeling terrified that any boy passing them is going to demand intercourse with them. I don't have a problem with abstinence being mentioned in sex education classes, but to teach children to say "yes" or "no" is extremely unsafe and frankly stupid ground. I also find it horribly moralistic - "You MUST NOT say yes to this boy!" etc. Educate children thoroughly and let them make their own decisions in life. Besides, when I was 15 I remember girls saying "no" to me. Quite often, in fact. Come to think of it they were, and still are, particularly adept at doing that. Gutted.
Some more quotes and opinions can be found here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/may/04/nadine-dorries-teenage-girls but I want to move on, because I want this blog post to be about this subject, rather than Dorries herself.
I went to a primary school, a middle school (for half a year) and a secondary school. In all of those days/months/years, the sex education given to me amounted to this:
a) In primary school, one day my class was divided into the boys and girls. The girls went off somewhere, to another room, to talk about God-knows-what. They didn't tell us afterwards, and to this day I don't know. This is a serious point however, which I'll get to in a minute.
Us lads got ushered into a room where we were greeted by a male teacher (there was only two in the school) who was also our football coach (I was the dependable left-back, thankyou very much). My memory is very hazy, I can't really remember what he told us, but it was something about sex - mainly what happened to boys in terms of ejaculation and erections and all the rest of it. We were about 11, and I understood NONE of it. I had no fucking idea what he was talking about, so I stopped listening. I messed about with my friend, and eventually we left the room and went back to class. The talk was never mentioned again.
b) Secondary school. We were about 15, and some cunts (I'm sorry, but they were) came into the school to give us a talk about sex that promised to be "fun". I hated every single fucking second of it - partly because I'm a quiet, shy person, but mainly because I didn't think how these people approached it was in the right manner. Example - at one point, we had to sit around in a big circle, and take turns to say our names but with a sexual term attached to it. For example - Charles Chlamydia, Patrick Penis (Yes, I know, tell me about it) and my poor friend Ivan who, as no-one could think of anything else, got branded Impotent Ivan. The reason behind doing this? I can't tell you - not then, not now. It was fucking awful, and embarrassing, and it achieved precisely nothing, except make me wish the ground could swallow me up. There was a few various other shitty things like that - I think at one point one of the guys waved a condom around to get a laugh - and then that was it. And like primary school, that was sex education done with.
In terms of sex education, my schools failed me. I didn't know it at the time, but whisking the girls away that day in primary school set a precedent in my mind - boys stuff is boys stuff, girls stuff is girls stuff, and clearly I didn't need to know the latter. Periods? Tampons? Female contraceptives? No good asking me, to be perfectly honest. Serious discussions about sexual infections, teen pregnancies, genitalia and non-penetrative sex? At school I was never in the position to discuss or be taught about any of those things.
A lot of people will say it shouldn't be the schools job to teach about sex. I disagree, mainly because a discussion about these things with strangers is better than with parents. Thinking about it, my parents never talked about sex with me. My Dad never talked about "birds and bees", my Mum never taught me about womens health. I suppose that if my schools failed me on this issue, so did my parents.
So how did I learn about sex? Well, we got the internet in 2000, when I was 13, and sitting here now, pretty much everything I know about sex has come from it. Most of that is, admittedly, because I'm a massive pervert and I watch shitloads of pornography, but some of it is because I was curious about stuff - stuff that I felt embarrassed to ask my parents about, stuff which I never got close to learning about at school. As I type this, I look out of my window and I see my little brother. I don't want him to grow up like that - to feel like sex is a taboo subject to be tiptoed around, or to find out what the inside of a vagina looks like by seeing a Dutch girl on a webcam opening her legs up. Who knows where I'll be when he's 12/13 (hopefully in Boston but probably still here) but I like to think that I'll put my arm round him and say "Look, this is no big deal, I'm cool talking about anything at all".
Going back to schools, and wrapping things up, what's the answer? I don't know what secondary school sex education is like right now, as I'm mid-20s, but I hope to God it's better than what I suffered. So much of sex education is based on frivolity. I understand that it's really tough to counter that when you're dealing with teenagers, but I'd like to see a more professional and grown up approach. Instead of having a big laugh, talk to students like they're adults - which they'll be one day, y 'know - and stress that sex shouldn't be a taboo subject but it is one that should be taken seriously. Knowledge is power, and I can't help thinking that perhaps it's a lack of knowledge which results in 17 year old girls walking round with pushchairs and prams. Outside of schools, make condoms more accessible, for fucks sake. Last time I bought some - and my God, it's been a while - I bought two for £3. Two for £3! Since then they've probably gone up in price as well. When I think about that, it doesn't surprise me a great deal that you see youths on The Jeremy Kyle Show who have gone around bonking young women and getting them up the duff. "Put something on the end of it!!!" Kyle will scream at them, but why would they pay that much for something that's seen as "uncool" and "unnecessary"? Knowledge is power, and if their sex education was anything like mine, they simply don't have it.
Thoughts?
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