Police without a leg to stand on thanks to BBC News Writer

Maybe it’s the way my mind works (or fails to work?) but when I read this article [BBC News - Woman and child hurt on Bridlington's Jungle River ride.] I almost called the Police to commend them on their outstanding powers of detection in identifying that the ‘pair’ of legs in question were indeed from the same place (and, presumably, attached to the same person):

“…the girl was taken to Scarborough Hospital with cuts to her legs.

Police say the pair are from South Yorkshire.“

I’m pretty sure the cops are know where the pair of legs come from. So, this week’s F-grade (awarded for ambiguous nouns and general semantic failure) goes to A. Nonomous of the BBC. Well done.

GZS

Rugby is better than football because I say so…

If I had a penny for every time I’ve heard some rugby-shirt wearing middle-class ex-public-schoolboy cretin come out with this smug pile of old drivel, well, I’d have £0.37p…

“Football is a gentleman’s game played by thugs, but Rugby is a thugs game played by gentlemen.”

Okay, let’s put aside the blindingly obvious drum-beating and simple-minded one-upmanship that this turn of phrase embodies and look at the actual logic of this half-witted statement.

Firstly, if football is a gentleman’s game played by thugs then that means that it’s not a gentleman’s game – it’s a fucking thugs game.

Gentleman my arse! Um, hang on. Ah, no, don’t hang on. What I actually meant to say was ‘Stop that, you cad! My nadgers are on fire.’

Secondly, if rugby is a thugs game played by gentlemen then that means that it’s a thugs game played by gentlemen who lower themselves to the status of a thug to play it. Ergo, it’s a fucking thugs game.

A thug is as a thug does...

I might as well use the same basic thinking-error to produce any manner of bollocks in an attempt to ‘big-up’ whatever claptrap I might feel like defending:

“Weed is a graduates drug taken by idiots, but Cocaine is an idiots drug taken by graduates“

Or, to put things on the same level of mundanity as ‘rugby versus football’:
“McDonalds is a thin mans restaurant that fat bastards eat in, but Burgerking is a fat bastards restaurant that thin people eat in”

Or, to  take things to their logical semantic conclusion:

“White is a winner’s shade used by losers, but Black is a loser’s shade used by winners “

 

It doesn't matter if you're black or white.

The sheer starkness of the tautology used here is actually making my head hurt.

These self-satisfied tribal fuckwits can all climb on a giant rocket on a one-way trip to the little known star system of Circularus Argumentius. Once there, and entirely powered by the miracle of the Logical Fallacy Drive, the rocket would circle the largest star for exactly infinity-1 second before finally imploding in a cloud of moronic self-righteousness. Or something.

GZS

P3R5ON4L1S3D NUM83R PL4T35

(Or, ‘Personalised Number Plates’ if you want to interpret it that way…)

So, what’s the problem? Well, there are so many problems at so many levels with so-called ‘cherished plates’ I don’t know where to begin.

Firstly, anyone who actually ‘cherishes’ a serial number on a piece of plastic is a bit of a saddo. Not only that, it gets screwed to the front and back of what is invariably some twat-wagon (like a convertible Audi with a silver windscreen frame, or a top-of-the-range Ford Focus with white leather interior and a straw boater and a box of Kleenex on the rear parcel shelf. Say no more…).

Secondly, and I’m afraid it just doesn’t matter how hard you squint or how much you want it to, this:

will never actually mean:

GEORGES

What it actually says is:

GC<Screw>O9GES

Okay, so visually it looks a bit like ‘Georges’ but it also looks a lot like ‘GEOgGES’ or ‘GCO9GES’. It doesn’t actually say ‘Georges’ so what’s the point? If the UK’s number plate system actually supported the full alphabet and allowed natural-language registrations then actually having a plate which read ‘GEORGE’S’ (note the apostrophe) would be worth something, cherished perhaps. But not GC<Screw>O9GES.

Secondly, for some reason there are people out there who want to use this inadequate licencing system to attempt to communicate something about themselves to other drivers. Never mind the back window filled with ‘Twat FM’ stickers and little silver fish symbols stuck to the boot, that’s just not enough for these people. So, in addition, we get number plates like:

5UES BWM

Yes, that’s actually meant to read: SUE’S BMW, but more often than not you can’t get the acronym for many car manufacturers, so they settle for BWM. The net result? They’re driving a car with a plate that, to casual eye, looks like it’s named after Sue’s BUM. Not forgetting the fact that we can all see she’s driving a fucking BMW… and it already has BMW written on the boot and the bonnet. I bet that if you visited the owners house their toothbrush would have a ‘Sue’s Toothbrush’ sticker on it and the bog roll have ‘SUE’S BWM’ watermarked onto each sheet.

Look, we just don’t want or need this information, least of all plates which try to be all clever and mysterious with plates like:

4L4N 50K

Oooh! I wonder if ‘Alan’ won £50,000 on the lottery? Oooh, imagine that. Or, or maybe Alan gets paid £50,000 to drive that car all day? Or, or perhaps Alan really likes Socks (5ok5) and runs his own sock (50k) company? Who fucking cares what it means? Why go to the expense of a personalised number plate when the personalisation is literally so personal that no one else gets it. The twats.

Look, I’m not against people having lots of money or nice cars – but please, for pity’s sake, why can’t these people stop and think before they go down the personalised plate route? It’s the automotive equivalent of having the words ‘I am a dick’ tattooed onto the forehead and back of the neck. (actually, that would read: ’1 4m 4 D1C’…)

Lastly, but by no means least, if you have a personalised plate it’s clear that you’re trying to send one or several messages about yourself to the rest of the driving world:

a) ‘I’m proud of my car’,
b) ‘I’m great, here’s some info about me to prove it’, and
c) ‘I’ve gone to some expense to personalise my car, bet you haven’t’

If all or any of the above are true and you drive:

a) A Subaru megatwat-wagon with under-body LED lighting and massive bass bins mounted into the boot, or
b) A Jaguar with doilies draped over the headrests and a box of Kleenex on the parcel shelf, or
c) A de-badged Renault Clio with a “fockin’ massive” spoiler and a ’No Fear’ or ‘Kenwood’ sticker in the back window

then you might as well sell the plates and buy a decent car with normal, meaningless, DVLA-issue number plates that won’t make you look like a sad, self-absorbed tit.
Either that or upgrade your plate to one which reads:

W4NK3R

I guarantee that everyone will know what that one means…

GZS

“I’m right, you’re wrong. Screw you. PEACE. x”

I’ve had it with these people. The ones who clutter up message boards and forums of all kinds, just waiting to splurge their (often deluded/self-righteous/downright crazy) opinions onto ordinary folk. I can hear a few “What’s wrong with that?”s and “it’s a public forum, get over it”s. Well, I’ll tell you what’s wrong with it, by (fictional) example:

___________________________________

Re: UFO’s Over My House
Posted at: 12.09pm PST

Hey all, LOOK AT THIS! I captured this OBJECT today. Id just finished my daily round of taking random photos of the sky from my backyard, wondered inside to make some tea, when I started to look at the photos on my PC screen. AND GUESS WHAT???!!?? At 30000% zoom I found THIS:

MORE EVIDENCE OF ALIEN CRAFT, MY FRIENDS! WATCH THE SKIES! PEACE. FESTOR

_________________________

Re: UFO’s Over My House
Posted at: 12.09pm PST

Festor, I think the photo you just uploaded to the site of a ‘UFO Over My House’ is clearly indistinguishable from a ‘bird’. I think that, in all probability, it is a bird – unless you have other photos or eyewitness testimony to suggest otherwise.

Pete

_________________________

Re: UFO’s Over My House
Posted at: 12.16pm PST

PETE YOU ARE WRONG, IF ITS A BIRD THEN HOW IS IT HOVERING?????? I KNOW WHAT A BIRD LOOKS LIKE AND THEY DONT HOVER, AND THIS ISNT ONE!!!! I HAVE LOADS MORE PHOTOS OF THESE ‘CRAFT’ AND EXPLAIN WHY I NEVER SEE THEM WITH THE NAKED EYE, ONLY ON PHOTOS??? I TAKE OVER 300 RANDOM SKY PHOTOS A DAY AND *ALLWAYS* CAPTURE SEVERAL OF THESE INTELLIGENTLY CONTROLLED METALIC CRAFT. I ESTIMATE THEYRE OVER 100-FEET IN LENGTH – HAVE YOU EVER SEEN A BIRD THAT SIZE????? EVER SEEN A BIRD MADE OF METAL????!? NO, IT’S MORE EVIDENCE OF ALIENS IN SUPER FAST SHIPS MY FRIEND. IM GLAD WE CAN RESPECT EACH OTHERS OPINION, EVEN IF YOU ARE A SKEPTIC AND MORE CLOSE-MINDED THAN ME. PEACE. FESTOR.

_________________________

Now, here’s tip for all you PEACE lovers out there: Just because the opposite to PEACE is WAR doesn’t mean that you’re safe from any form of criticism just because you sign off every opinionated, deluded and unscientific wad of shit you spew out with the word ‘PEACE’. Respect is a two-way street, which means you DON’T get to force your opinion down other peoples throats on a public forum, then (predictably) use the ‘close-minded skeptic’ card (and the ‘we all respect each other, DONT WE‘ passive-aggressive card) as if it was reasoned argument, and finally sign the whole sorry, block-caps-riddled thing off with ‘PEACE’. I mean, what in all of crapdom do you think this is achieving?? Ooh! Better not disagree with this dude! After all, all he wants is peace (awwww, what a guy…) and if I pursue this argument, even in a logical and rational fashion, it’s tantamount to saying that I want WAR! I can’t possibly retort, that would be to insult his strong beliefs and rock this lovely guys peace-boat! Mustn’t do that..!

Yes, we can rock that boat. And we must. Everytime someone signs off a crock of crap like that with ‘peace’ it’s our duty, as free thinkers and rationalists, to represent freedom of expression and reject underhanded simple-minded tactics like these at every turn. If these people don’t want their bubbles bursting by the rest of us they should stay off public forums and stick to grubbly little secret societies where everyone is as singlehandedly dumb and narrow-minded as they are.

There, I’ve said it. Peace.

GZS

To Tweet or not to Tweet – that is the twatting question.

Tell everyone about your meaningless shit - all day, every day.

I’ve already covered what’s ‘wrong’ with social twatworking site Twitter here. But…

If you thought it was astonishing that there are human beings who regard “I’ve just watched TV for an hour and taken a shit” as worth putting into cyberspace, now we have our elected and tax-funded government doing it too.

And look at the torrential flood of uncertainty that it’s generating. Nobody’s sure whether Twitter is of any serious or long-term value whatsoever, yet we have stories in the news like this:

Government Advice Urges Tweeting
New government guidance has been published urging civil servants to use the micro-blogging site Twitter.

It beggars belief! Armies of civil servants being told by their bosses that that can spend an hour a day on Twitter!  What useful information is going to make it into those 140-character ‘tweets’? Okay, if it’s a news service then you might be able to argue that they’re just using Twitter as a bulletin service, HOWEVER the intention is:

“[to] produce between two and 10 tweets per day, not including replies to other Twitterers … Tweets should also be limited to issues of relevance or upcoming events rather than just campaign messages, and insights from ministers are encouraged.”

So, expect a flood of meaningless crap, paid for by your taxes, as civil servants struggle to find anything useful to put into 140 characters ten times a day. Listen up you Government types: Less is not more when it comes to of politics and the electorate. More quips for political sniping, more headline-grabbing but shallow soundbytes and more off-the-cuff policy rhetoric is NOT what we need. We need detail, we want full explanations, more information. Really, us kids can handle it.

Meanwhile…

Clegg Takes Over His Own Twitter Name
Lib Dem Leader Nick Clegg has reclaimed a Twitter account in his name from a supporter
“This is obviously something I do with some really great people in my office who are much more gifted at this than I am. You wouldn’t want me to tweet all the time.”

That’s right, Nick – we don’t want you to Tweet all the time. You and all politicians should recognise that jumping on the high-tech social-networking bandwagon, while it might ‘sound’ good, just creates another faceless electronic barrier between you and the electorate. I like the web, I really do, but people want to be heard, they want to meet their errant local counsellors face to face at least once a millennium. (Also, who the fuck would ever describe anyone, or themselves, as a ‘gifted’ at Twitter?? I mean, that’s like saying you’re ‘gifted’ at pissing.)

And then, back at H.Q….

The confusion really sets in:

Council Bans Staff From Twitter
The council said the use of Twitter was being reviewed to ensure no messages, or “tweets” may damage its reputation.

So, on one hand central Government are telling their staff to be twats and twit ten times a day at their own discretion; and on the other we have local councils banning Twitter altogether – essentially because they don’t want the opinions of their employees outside  their direct control. So, my next question is: if Twitter is going to be part of every civil servant’s job function, who’s going to pay for the enormous task of vetting, monitoring and moderating what is ‘tweeted’. What do you mean “you don’t need to” ? This is the Government we’re talking about. In a month or so, (after some scandalous and damaging tweets have been allowed to happen, of course..) they’ll have a choice to make: ban Twitter altogether and save a ton of public money, OR…
Spend a few million quid on a central ‘Twitter monitoring Department’  to ‘ensure quality tweets’ in each town council and government office. Bang goes the new hospital ward you hoped your taxes might pay for, then.

Meanwhile, over at the Department of Smoke and Mirrors….

They’re reading this happy item with sheer glee:

Twitter Followers Can Be ‘Bought
‘Twitter users who lack an audience for their messages can now buy followers.

Gordon Brown, yesterday.

So, as Twitter becomes the popularity-barometer of choice for political parties everywhere, we already have organisations who, for a fee, will do the Twitter equivalent of buying votes. How democratic. What do you mean “they’d never do that”…?

I predict that this phenomenon will mutate into full-blown Twatter-flu within only a few months, burning a giant pyre of public cash on the way. It will become a national epidemic and resist all attempts by sane people to shut it down in favour of longer, more meaningful face-to-face contact with the electorate.

And, finally…

Royal Household Turns To Twitter
The Royal Family has now joined the Twitter micro-blogging revolution.

Twitter was probably invented for this exact purpose – the Queen naturally speaks in 140 characters or less. What she says might be qualified as ‘royal news’, so we’re not going to get Twitter-twatter like:

“One just had a stonking curry followed by six lagers and an absolutely monster spliff. Now I’m orf to watch ‘Ross Kemp on Gangs’.”

GZS

‘Do UFO’s Exist?’

Before a bunch of new-ager’s, ‘believers’ and self-proclaimed ‘ufologists’ jump up and scream “Yes!” it’s important to know what the acronym ‘UFO’ actually stands for:

Unidentified
Flying
Object

So, journalists, hacks and local news reporters take note:
You all sound like dicks when you open a news item with ‘Do UFO’s Exist?’. Look, we all know that 99% of the time you’re going to end up showing clips of loonys with silver-foil hats on, voiced by an oh-so-tongue-in-cheek presenter who gently debunks the whole subject in a patronising piss-taking manner, culminating in a smugly-delivered hanging question: “So, do UFO’s Exist? You decide.” by which point the viewer already has “Do they Bollocks.” firmly implanted in his or her mind. Job done then, Mister Smug Bastard of Foregone Conclusion News.

UNIDENTIFIED means UNIDENTIFIED. Therefore, OF COURSE UFO’s exist. If it’s in the sky and it remains unidentified then it is, by definition, a UFO. People routinely use the word ‘UFO’ where they really mean ‘Extraterrestrial Space Craft’. If they want to pose the question “Do Extraterrestrial Space Craft exist?” then that’s one thing, but if they insist on posing the dumb-ass unthinking question “Do UFO’s Exist?” everytime some village idiot takes a photo of a bird, a ‘Chinese Lantern’ or a helecopter at night then it just adds insult to injury.

And that brings me on to the morons who post stuff onto the web like this:

"I didn't see anything in the sky at the time, but when I looked at the photo later I immediately jumped to a ridiculous conclusion"

and this:

"Oh my God! Hovering Orange 'Orbs'! That can only mean one thing! Yes - I've flushed my common sense and intellect down the toilet!"

Listen up – if you’re about to post a photo or video of a so-called ‘UFO’ which looks like a blurry dot (especially if you catch yourself writing ‘I didn’t see anything at the time, but when I looked at the photo later…’) then DON’T. You just look like a flying-saucer nut at worst and a gullible unobservant twat at best. Guess what – if you didn’t see a 50-foot alien spaceship behind your wife’s head in that holiday snap you took on the beach then there PROBABLY wasn’t one. So, what on earth could explain a cigar-shaped blur moving through the sky? It it a bird, is it an insect – no, it’s a 50-foot alien ship. WTF…

And, if you look up into the night sky and see a ‘slow moving orange sphere’ or an ‘orange orb’ or a ‘flickering orange cylinder’ then, unless these things are darting all over the sky and performing rapid changes in speed and direction, please please for Pete’s sake hold your horses. Don’t jump on the web and upload some shaky mobile phone footage of your ‘Fleet of Orange UFO’s over Twatsville’. The sad truth is that there is now a global business in selling Chinese Lanterns to wedding receptions, party-organisers, special events and UFO-hoaxers. Yes, there really are companies out there with names like ‘UFO Balloons Ltd’ selling these Chinese lanterns (amongst other things, like giant solar UFO balloons) under the thinly-veiled recommendation that it would be ‘cool’ to perpetrate a UFO hoax. These companies, and the people that buy their products, are consummate morons who fall under a neanderthal trance whenever they see a bright light or naked flame. Just look what can happen when these things go wrong:

Apart from being a fire hazard, these things can get very high indeed – it’s only a matter of time before a light aircraft or microlite collides with some wanker’s idea of fun. Often people call the police thinking that either a plane has gone down or aliens are about to land – hoax balloons and anything ON FIRE that can get to such a high altitude should be banned. No more wasted police time, no more drunk people posting footage of Chinese lanterns on YouTube, no more hysteria over false UFO sightings. And yes, I do mean false Unidentified Flying Objects – as they’re patently identifiable. They do not defy rational explanation. And that leads me to my final point:

The acronym ‘UFO’ should be redefined to mean UNIDENTIFIABLE Flying Object. By definition, everything is ‘unidentified’ until a rational explanation is found. If people want to use the acronym as a synonym for ‘Alien Spacecraft’ or ‘Extraterrestrial Ship’ or ‘Phenomena Unknown to Science’ then we need to start talking in terms of quality of evidence. In my book, if a UFO sighting successfully resists a viable, rational positive identification or potential explanation of the object in question then the object’s status is ‘unidentifiable’. In other words – it becomes a true enigma, something of value to science that warrants further investigation, untainted by spurious knee-jerk explanations and biased terminology such as ‘Flying Saucer’ or ‘Intelligently Controlled’ or ‘Craft (all those terms are loaded and over-used by ‘believers’  – you know who I mean, the ones who upload videos of blindingly-obvious hoaxes to YouTube and dub the X-Files theme tune over the top – the sad tossers.)

Here’s another acronym for all those true believers out there: RBT -

Reject
Biased
Thinking.

GZS