Jumpers for goalposts

You’ll have to be patient. I assure you that the title will make sense by the end of this entry. It may, however, seem as if this is going to be about football. It isn’t; it’s about politics.

You may all stop groaning.

Specifically, it’s about fashionable politics. (A little clearer now.) Several ingredients of the following discourse are, I think, self-evident. I think we can all agree that news coverage peters out after a while, particularly when no changes occur. A war may be ongoing, but unless something significant happens you’ll hear none of it in the papers, TV etc. Unfortunately, one has a tendency to believe that “no news is good news,” when actually most of the time no news means things are simply as bad as ever they were.

But I think it’s worse than that. And again, I don’t believe the following to be contentious: the media prioritise what sells, what’s popular. There is, across the board, a “flavour of the month” syndrome.

But I’m not writing this to rail against the media. After all, they produce what sells, and what sells does so because we buy it. It’s ourselves on which I wish to focus.

In the past I’ve blogged about how quick people are to be outraged, using Facebook as an example. Whilst that’s true in and of itself, I think Facebook is a bigger target not simply because of their size and reach as a company, but because it is fashionable to criticise them, particularly on issues of privacy. (Perhaps because their size and reach as a company makes them not just a large target, but a fashionable one, or perhaps because privacy itself is a fashionable issue.) Needless to say, their position is one which needs to be heavily scrutinised, but some of the things written about them are beyond scrutiny; they are factually inaccurate and, I think, exist partly due to the cache brought by hammering The Social Network.

But, let’s leave that one alone. There are many other issues I could choose as an example of political fashion and misreporting leading to a frighteningly unfounded opposition to one thing or another. One issue - which should be obvious to most people reading this - is too divisive and too close to my heart to raise here whilst simultaneously illustrating my point clearly. Indeed, there’s almost always a contrary opinion to be found on a hot-button political topic. Except, perhaps, with regard to the following: Tibet.

Now, surely we can all get behind Tibet, right? Indifference is one thing, but I don’t think I’ve met a single individual who actively and entirely opposes Tibet’s cause. Some of you may know that I do a little work (though not so much these days) for a charity called the Tibetan Jewish Youth Exchange. In so doing, I’ve met people who are dedicated to the issue permanently.

But even though Tibet is a worthy cause, I still believe that much of the supportive - supportive - attention it receives is merely a matter of fashion. To be clear, during the Beijing Olympics, there was certainly a lot more attention on Tibet and China than there is now. But that I understand. When a major event is held in a country, a light is shone on that country, and so forth.

But for many, Tibet (and similar issues) is a matter of appearing to be one thing or another in front of one’s peers. ‘Cool’ perhaps, or ‘enlightened’. And just as with the media, the issue fades after a time, but not because it has been resolved. For whatever reason, we’re just done talking about it. Perhaps there’s something else to talk about. Perhaps we’ve said all we can on the matter, thereby removing an opportunity for us to say anything not already said and thus appear to be relevant and interesting. It’s fashion.



See that? I mean it is literally on a t-shirt. It’s fashion. Now you may argue that the t-shirt conveys an important message, but I would argue that whilst that’s true, it’s very easy to wear a t-shirt which suggests support of a cause whilst in reality the wearer does nothing actually to help aside from wearing it. It’s posing. And when was the last time you saw somebody wearing one? Possibly during the Olympics, but it’s not so fashionable right now.

Moreover, whilst a Google image search yields unsurprising results for a “Free Burma” shirt, who’s talking about Burma? Of course occasionally it’s in the news, but overall a country with one of the worst human rights records on the planet receives a staggeringly small amount of attention by comparison. Tibet is more fashionable than Burma, for sure.

Jumpers for goalposts. A laboured title, really. But the jumpers don’t denote empty space between them, through which a ball must be kicked and a goal scored. Instead, I want you to picture a clothes rack with two jumpers bookending assorted garments including khatas, longyis, and hijabs. Take a shot, why don’t you? Just be sure to check the political mood before you decide on which side to aim for.

Mmm, chocolate

Yes indeed, it’s not all Facebook, social healthcare and gender expectations here at The Unbloggables. We also cover the serious issues. The issues that matter. And quite frankly, what could matter more than those diminutive chocolate pebbles, variously coloured and adorned with a delightful – and tasty – ‘m’?

That’s right; I’m talking about the wonder that is M&M’s. Or should that be “the wonders that are…”? It’s hard to tell, and we’ll come back to that later. But we can all agree they’re delicious, and a welcome confectionary in a harsh 21^st century world of miniature everything and New Twix. (Don’t believe me? Look it up.)

But, dear reader, I ask you this: marvellous though they may be, do they deserve to have their very own superstore? You know what, don’t answer. It’s too late.

They have one.

Actually, they have four. I discovered the first I knew of these whilst meandering through the various building works in Leicester Square, London, with a dear friend. The bemusement we both felt is accurately captured in this photo of said friend examining a stuffed M&M. (Or should that be a stuffed one of M&M’s? We’ll come back to that later.)

The first M&M’s World store, which has eluded my attention since 1997, can be found in Las Vegas. The remaining two are in New York City and Orlando. I really am at a loss for words. I mean, who wants an M&M outfit, painting, or even a soft toy?! And if we’re honest, the one which my friend is modelling in that photo looks very much like Towelie from South Park. That dude is high. The M&M, I mean. Not my friend.

And that may in fact shed light on the genesis of this absurd idea. Some stoned guy at Mars, Incorporated, probably just having lost the company’s fortune in Vegas, walks into the office on the verge of unemployment and says, “Hey, how about a whole store – over several floors! – in which we only sell M&M’s. Yes, I realise there are basically only a few varieties, but heck, let’s just shove them all in containers of various shapes and sizes and sell those for eight times the price one would pay for the same quantity of M&M’s in one of those unpretentious paper packets you find at the newsagent.”

It’s evil genius, when you think about it. Can’t vary the product? Vary the packaging! And before I get angry letters about the many kinds of M&M’s, in wide circulation, and certainly in the UK, there are basically two types: regular and peanut. Supposedly other flavours have been flirted with, and outside the UK I know at least of the peanut butter variety. But essentially it’s just those two. And I didn’t even see many of the peanut ones at Leicester Square. Just the following (with thanks to the Jon Ziman-Bright collection).

A rainbow of M&M’s. Explain that to me. You can go and create a mix to your taste. I use that word in the aesthetic, rather than the lingual sense, because THEY’RE ALL THE SAME FLAVOUR! It’s madness! Who do they think they are, Jelly Bellys? I mean selecting Jelly Belly beans is a tough job, a decision not to be taken lightly. I couldn’t give a damn what colour my M&M’s are.

And now the issue to which twice now I’ve promised we’d return: that damn apostrophe. Look, I’m just gonna say I’ve made a foolish assumption here because, to the credit of Mars, they’re certainly consistent about it. But I just figured that what with that single, white m stamped on each one, that these ones were ms, and those ones were ms, and that collectively they were M&Ms. But apparently, I misjudged; they are M&M’s. Which begs the question, who exactly is M? And furthermore, who, precisely and without delay, is M? I would like to meet them. And hey, if they do exist, which M is which?

These are the questions which keep me up at night. The caffeine levels in the lifetime supply of M&M’s I happen recently to have received from Mars, Inc. has, I’m sure, nothing to do with it.

Girls & Boys

One of the reasons I had for starting this blog is that I was finding too many things on my friends’ Facebook walls on which I wanted to comment, but didn’t for fear of hijacking their status and turning it into one of the unholy rows one finds on the internet (see previous entry).

Here is one such thing. To the person who posted it: I’m sure you don’t mind me commenting on it here, but this is a case where, if I had commented on it via Facebook, you would have come to know a riotous mess of flame war goo on your wall, and I’m sure that’s unwelcome. To the rest of you: read this. It’s short.

One gets the sense that political debate, as with most debates, disagreements and disputes encountered in daily life, is predominantly about stubbornness in opposition. In this case, the parents are in danger (to take this to the extreme) of considering all criticism of their parental method to be the intolerant, unenlightened outcries of conservative types afraid of change. On the other hand, those same ‘conservative types’ are likely to label the parents as the sort of holier-than-thou, socially wayward ultra-liberals whose loose morals will surely corrupt all people touched by them.

When not stubborn in opposition, often the parties involved come to realise that they sympathise with each other’s views more than first they realised. Most of us, in my experience, are moderate types, and frequently it is only toward the end of a discussion that our paths diverge. But until that point, fundamentally we share a lot of the same concerns. That being the case, we shouldn’t dismiss all views as reactionary by those who wouldn’t understand. They might just have a point, and their comments are usually not entirely void of validity.

So where do I lean on this issue? I think most people who know me would say I generally lean toward the left, but of course direction is relative. (And the whole left/right spectrum thing is nonsense anyway, but that’s another blog entry.) I could be standing on the edge of a pier, leaning toward the sea. But I’m still on the pier. Were I at the beginning of the pier, still leaning toward the sea, I’d be very much on the pier and almost on solid earth. So to answer the initial question, now that I’ve successfully bamboozled you, I’m leaning toward the concerns of those who – one would say, I guess – are leaning rightward of the parents. The parents are, in my opinion, [switch metaphor!] in danger of falling into the sea.

(Side note: confused metaphors are just the worst kind of writing. And awesome.)

Fortunately, the article mentions most of the concerns I have. Predominantly, it’s about the wisdom of experimenting with one’s child and the consequences for that child’s well-being. Even if the cause is just, and even if the problem can be solved, the child has not chosen to bear the tremendous weight of tackling the problem; this child is going to experience enormous social suffering, regardless of whether you think that suffering is morally unacceptable, or changeable. I appreciate, of course, that parents need at times to make life-defining decisions for their children. This is not one of those times. The best case scenario is that by raising children this way some social norms and values are changed, but that’s a long-term goal over several generations. Presently, this child will suffer. Not wishing to get too personal, but having experienced what not being normal is like as a child I can say with confidence that even the slightest, seemingly superficial differences can have a significant effect, one which both presents itself at the time and cascades throughout the individual’s life with great, compounding subtlety.

But is this a solvable problem? Is it even a problem? Heck, what actually is the problem? I’m not so sure.

Two possible problems present themselves, and from what I can make out of the article the parents’ decision appears to be a response to both of them. Firstly, there’s a desire for the child, Storm, to be able to choose their own gender without the predetermined expectations of a male or female sex influencing them, which if involved would remove Storm’s free choice. Those gender expectations are the first problem. Furthermore, society is intolerant of people with ill-defined gender (problem two), and raising Storm in this way is making a stand against such intolerance.

On the first point, I do agree that gender expectations play a significant role. But so does genetics, and to try to ignore such a fundamental scientific truth – that males and females are different on many subtle and not-so-subtle levels – is foolishly impossible. I am certain that some part – quite possibly the majority – of gender identity is absorbed through environmental responses to an individual whose sex is known. Boys and girls are treated differently from birth because we know they are either a boy or a girl. But I also know that some of those expectations have arisen through experience of biological facts, and therefore have some element of truth to them.

By concealing the sex of their child, the parents are attempting to shield Storm’s gender from these influences. But this is not an opt-in relationship. The child is whatever they are, and this will make a difference regardless of who knows about it. (And at the very least, the child knows about it.) Now, it’s entirely possible that the parents realise this, and are merely trying to mitigate the influence of people reacting to the sex of the child. They are perhaps not actually claiming (although it is unclear) that they can separate what they consider to be properties solely of gender from sex completely, so we’ll give them the benefit of the doubt on that one.

(Though they have in fact relayed Storm’s sex to “close members of the family, including their two young sons, one friend and the midwives who delivered the child,” and of course the parents themselves know, so obviously the experiment – or situation, if you prefer – has already been contaminated, thus no longer able to achieve the parents’ aims, and certainly not proving anything. I’m going to let this go as well however for the sake of argument. Let’s say this small group of people knowing makes no difference.)

So, I’ll presume that total denial is not their position. Nonetheless, I feel they are tackling the issue in the wrong way. As far as I can tell, the problem isn’t that there is this biological fact known by the family and friends of this child, the problem is that those people who know may have rigid expectations of what this fact should mean; how the child’s sex should manifest itself as gender. One can use sex to inform gender and personality loosely, but should be not only ready, but also willing, to revise that perspective as one’s knowledge of an individual increases. I’d venture that this applies on all levels when getting to know a person, for example keeping in mind, but not depending upon, something you may have heard about an individual via a trusted third party. In the case of the child, one also needs to keep those expectations malleable enough so as not to become self-fulfilling. Apparently the parents have little faith in the abilities of people other than themselves to do this, which is understandable. But nonetheless, it’s those abilities and expectations that need to be worked on, rather than attempt a total blackout which will serve only to confuse a lot of people, Storm included. It is not possible actively to tackle a biological reality. They have picked the wrong battle.

Raising the child this way is not an effective stratagem for promoting gender tolerance. Tolerance should be insisted upon, and woven into a child’s moral fabric, but one doesn’t teach tolerance either to an individual or to their immediate society by creating an artificial example. That’s an inaccurate simulation, is unnecessary, and compromises the child’s happiness. The parents perhaps underestimate their own influence; family and friends may treat the child with the weight of gender expectations, but as long as the parents are free of those expectations, and instil in their child values of individualism and confidence, they would have given the child all the things they need to choose their own path without the confusion and isolation that comes from this method.

Case in point: one of the parents’ sons, Jazz, who is said to have been confused for a girl and whose friends “would react with Jazz over his gender,” is now being home-schooled. So Jazz is now missing out on a professional education and the socialisation of his peers, both of which are hugely important aspects of a child’s development, if not critical. Now of course I’m not saying that he should try to fit in no matter what so that he can go to school, and I also realise that he was not raised ‘genderlessly’, but I’m certain that Storm will suffer the same isolation when it needn’t have necessarily been the case.

I wonder what kind of upbringing Jazz did have. Well sadly, and with a degree of trepidation, I’m going to be a little harsher now.

Having made the previous points whilst granting the parents the benefit of the doubt, I’m sorry to raise the following possibility: this is about the parents’ self-gratifying desire to feel good about themselves, rather than doing something good for the child and/or society at large. Were it about the child, perhaps the parents would have been more sensitive to the issues above. Does one really want to make life difficult for their child for the sake of an ideological issue about which the child cannot possibly yet care, when there are less risky routes to take? Do they really think they’re doing Storm a favour by forcing them to navigate these difficult waters now, rather than promoting a free mind and the liberty to gradually become whomever it is that they feel they are?

Perhaps that’s unfair, but there are some indicators. Jazz’s favourite colour is pink. His younger brother, Kio, likes purple. That’s curious to me, because as a dear friend reminded me, if QI has taught us anything it’s that there is no biological basis for the concept of traditional colours for boys and girls (see this: first paragraph, under the ‘Topics’ heading). Indeed at the beginning of the 20th century the colours were reversed! (This article expands on this subject a little more.) So the fact that today girls tend to like pinks and purples and boys tend to like blues and greens is a purely environmental factor, the exact type the parents are trying to avoid. That being the case, is it a coincidence that their two boys chose stereotypically feminine colours? Personally, I think not. What I do think is that this is a sign of the parents subconsciously pushing stereotypically feminine traits onto their boys in order to prove a point. Those two could have chosen any colour to be their favourite, but they both happened to choose what today are considered ‘girly’ colours. Jazz also has long hair. How much ‘choice’ did he really have in that?

(Another side note: for years from about 19 years old I had long hair, and my favourite colour remains purple. I lost count very quickly during the ponytail phase of how many times people thought I was a girl – I think my lack of height surely added to the problem. This never bothered me in the slightest, and when I was growing up everyone was quite sure I was boy.)

This all really upsets me, because, I say again, the more one examines the situation the more one gets the sense that this a means of the parents pursuing some ideological ideal which they have, which the children don’t have, and for which the children will suffer. But because it’s such a hot-button political issue, any disagreement with their methods may come in the form of, or be greeted by, the sort of knee-jerk response to people on a different part of the political spectrum of the sort I previously described. But within that disagreement may lie several valid concerns, which should unite all involved in the supposedly common goal of maximising the child’s happiness.

The bottom line is this: with all the benefit of the doubt regarding their motives, the nature of the problem and the manner in which it can be solved, the parents’ chosen method for raising their child is still taking a massive risk with the child’s development, the repercussions of which could cause a lifetime of internal disharmony, if not severe psychological issues. How can they possibly justify such a method?

(Final note: I’ve explained why I try not to get into these topics on Facebook, but one of the reasons for getting into it at all is to have an intelligent discussion, and that I might learn something. So please do put in your two [currency of choice] in the comments section below, which you can log into with an existing account of certain types, including Facebook, Twitter, and Google. Please go easy on me; I am not out to offend anyone.)

Some Thoughts on the NHS

I have been contemplating this post for a couple of weeks now. My first inclination was to make this ranty, as that is not only my chosen style for this blog but also the way in which I prefer to deal with things that bother me. There’s nothing like a bit of comedy-infused rage to make a situation seem better. But no. If there is anything that I have learned in my years living in the UK, it is that nothing can polarise a group of people quite so much as the NHS. I have been informed that standing by the NHS is something of an issue of national pride. I can dig that. But I can’t go without explaining exactly why I find the NHS so distressing. So I will go gently.

About six weeks ago, I was walking my dog in the woods and I stumbled over a root. I didn’t fall over; I just tripped. I heard a loud pop and felt something tear and immediately knew that I had torn a meniscus (a disc of cartilage in the knee). F**K!

It’s an annoying injury. It’s textbook torn meniscus. Pain going downhill, pain bending the knee, pain when rolling over in bed. My knee locks. I can feel something moving around in my knee when I walk. There is no comfortable position. The pain isn’t constant, but when it is bad it is difficult to put weight on my knee at all. Which is, you will understand, inconvenient when it comes to taking the dog (who needs at least an hour of exercise every day if I want to prevent him from digging a hole through the wall) out for a walk. 

After a long conversation with my uncle, who is a retired orthopaedic surgeon in the States, it became clear that I needed to be seen. In the States, I would have called an orthopaedist and gotten an appointment, but since that’s not the way it works on the NHS, I called my GP. My GP said that I should go to the minor injuries unit at the local hospital, so I did that. There, I had x-rays taken (not helpful for diagnosing a cartilage tear but good for ruling out a fracture) and was told that since I hadn’t fractured my knee, I would need to have an MRI done. And in order to get an MRI, I would have to see an orthopaedist. And in order to see an orthopaedist…I would need to see my GP. 

I hobbled over to my GP’s office and was (fortunately) able to get an appointment. I explained the injury to the GP. I told him I thought I had torn a medial meniscus. He told me that he didn’t think I had torn a ligament. I told him I never thought it was a ligament and that I thought it was cartilage. He told me that it was more likely to be a cartilage injury. I think we were on different parts of the same page. No matter. He proceeded to inform me of the bleeding obvious: I would need to see an orthopaedist, who would want to get an MRI of my knee.  

It took three weeks to receive the magic letter from the NHS saying that I had been given an appointment to see an orthopaedic surgeon. The appointment was for August 5, which is unfortunately the day that I am scheduled to fly to the US to teach (ironically) a course in emergency medicine. I called the appointment centre to have my appointment moved and was informed that there is no way to get an earlier appointment (“Because no one here is paid to maintain a waiting list”) and that the next available appointment that they could give me is—get this—October 5. Four months after the injury. Which is, in case you are paying attention, within the 18 week target set by the NHS. 

Here is where I start to have serious issues with the NHS. I want to start by saying that I think it is all very honourable to have a health service that aims to provide healthcare to all residents, and at little or no cost at the point of service. But I also want to say that a healthcare system is only as good as the access to care that it provides and in my case I have to say that the NHS has failed me miserably. 

OK, I am aware that my knee injury literally isn’t going to kill me. I understand that if I had a life-threatening injury, things would be moving a whole lot faster. But I will argue that this particular injury has the potential to be life-changing, at great cost to me and potentially at great cost to the NHS. The longer I wander around with a torn meniscus, the more damage I will do to the bony structure of my knee. I will increase my chance of developing osteoarthritis and I will increase the chance of ending up needing a full knee replacement later in life. 

The major failing here is that the NHS is having me wait for four months before I see anyone about my knee. That means that the first point of meaningful contact (and no, my GP doesn’t count) will be four months after my injury. The NHS has absolutely no idea what it is that I am hobbling around on, and are gambling that in the four months between injury and consultation, no further injury will be incurred. This is, in the case of a meniscal tear, very unlikely to be the case. Keep in mind that after waiting to see an orthopaedist, I will then go on a waiting list (six weeks or more) to have an MRI done, and then another waiting list for arthroscopic surgery. This could leave me injured and waiting for surgery until next year. 

A similar thing happened to me last year. I needed to see a gynaecologist for a very worrying problem and wasn’t able to get an appointment for three months after I saw my GP. My GP recoiled in horror when I suggested that someone (like her) might want to do a quick exam, and no one seemed to acknowledge that in order to get an accurate diagnosis, I might need to have an ultrasound immediately. I ended up ditching the NHS and going for private care. 

Which is, by the way, what I am going to do with my knee. I am not privately insured, so this is going to come out of pocket and is going to put my husband and me into an awkward financial position for a little while. I am going to have to pay for my consultation (which is happening this afternoon, June 30, and is with the same doctor who was too booked on the NHS to see me until August 5 or October 5), an MRI, and potentially an arthroscopic surgery. But it is worth it because I will be able to get it all done well before Christmas, which almost certainly wouldn’t happen on the NHS. 

Since my injury, I have had a lot of people say things like “Don’t knock it, the NHS is free”. I’d like to address that directly. First of all, the NHS is most certainly not free. It is paid for by the taxpayer (and yes, that includes me). Any program that is funded by the taxpayer is also open to the scrutiny of the taxpayer. And we don’t have to accept that just because it is free at the point of service, we don’t have any right to demand a better system. 

Please don’t get me wrong. The NHS does some things really well. I love being able to see my GP for free when I have the flu. I have had a herniated disc in my back for a few years now, and I am perfectly satisfied waiting to see a spine specialist, since I already know what is wrong. I would love to lean on the NHS for my knee care, but I absolutely refuse to do so at the cost of my well-being. I refuse to live in pain and am very fortunate to be able to cobble together the resources to go with private care. 

No one is forcing me to use the NHS. So I’m not. But if the service is inaccessible to people when they need it, I will ask this: can’t we do better?

In defence of Mark Zuckerberg

The internet is full of people who seem to be traversing the cyber dimensions solely to pick at the scab that is one of my biggest pet peeves, if not actually the biggest: avoidable conflict. Actually, that may be unfair on the internet; these people are everywhere, offline included. However, with the veil of anonymity that the internet affords, the web is rife with the sort of vitriol usually reserved for 14 year-olds.

In the past I had assumed most of them were 14 year-olds. This, sadly, is actually not the case, although frankly it would be bad enough if it were. It is all too clear that people just love to feel wronged, to have issues, to claim some grand moral injustice.

Now if you’re thinking that’s rich coming from this blog, and me personally, well then I need to explain myself a little better. I’m all for a light-hearted rant, and complaints where they are due. The head-to-wall meetings induced by so much ineptitude are infuriating, but hardly outrageous, and whatever rage occurs, particularly in my various statuses via services various, is put out there mostly to amuse. That stuff is annoying, but one laughs it off.

What I’m talking about are the ostensibly much more serious issues, to which people overreact, claiming as they do an unprecedented breakdown of moral fabric or abuse of human rights, and not taking even a single moment to consider the issue at hand, to reflect on some other perspectives.

Please note that I do, of course, recognise that kicking up a storm is sometimes entirely justified. Just not always. More often than not though I think it comes down to this: we’re not making enough effort to keep calm, and be happy. It’s as if we’d rather be upset, and unhappy.

And that, dear friends, brings us to Zuckerberg. And in fact Facebook in general. A couple of things have come to my attention recently which really make me sad. Actually, I’d go so far as to say that they irk me. That’s the paradox: one of the few things to make me mad is people being unjustifiably mad; a battle being created where previously there wasn’t, where instead one might have hoped for measured, rational discourse.

To begin, here’s a short thing you would help us all by reading.

Now, there are many things wrong with that article, but I’m going to jump straight to the point: the author takes a quote entirely without context and then invokes meaning from it that is nowhere to be found, and subsequently gets extremely angry about that which they themselves have created. To save you the bother, here’s the quote of Mark Zuckerberg.

“People thought that, you know, it was just too much, right, they wanted to share stuff on the site but they didn’t want it to be so much in people’s face. You know now it’s just part of the site that I think most people in a way would be like ‘What’s going on? How can there be Facebook without this?’ …One of the good things about the Internet is you can just kind of build something, and people will choose to use it or not, and that’s how we win debates.”

Without the benefit of context – we don’t, as it goes, know to what or to whom he was responding – it seems that here Zuckerberg is referring to Facebook’s features, which allow you to share photos, locations and other data various. And, he says, a lot of people might have considered some of those data to be too much personal information to be exposed, and subsequently fed to one’s Facebook friends. But, he adds, and quite rightly so, people can choose to use it or not, and apparently we’re using it. That’s capitalism for you. It’s not all bad, you know?

By using the service we validate those features which we have chosen to use, and indicate that they are not pushing the boundaries of privacy too far for our own, individual tastes. (Different people can share different data on Facebook, after all.) Zuckerberg is clearly referring not to how that data is stored, secured or shared with third parties. He’s talking about how much information users feel comfortable volunteering, and how we have, as a whole, grown accustomed to sharing increasing levels of detail about ourselves on the internet. I think that’s fair comment and also quite right, on the whole.

Back in the head of the author however, this quote somehow translates as “arrogance” on the subject of safe stewardship of that data. We’ll get there, but first let’s tackle this sentence from the article: “He [Zuckerberg] is basically saying Facebook will do what we want, when we want and if you don’t like it you can leave.”

That’s not an interpretation I can get anywhere close to, let alone behind. A better, though still slightly harsh way of putting it might be that Facebook will offer you the features they want, when they want, and if you don’t like those features you can leave. Point is: Facebook will not do anything it wants. Nowhere in that quote does Zuckerberg even being to hint at such an attitude.

But it gets worse. The author’s unchecked anger is clear and present from the introductory paragraph. Their idea of balance, having brought up the subject of increasing amounts of data being open to the public realm, is that you either think that this is “OK,” or “a horrific violation of your privacy and how your data, statuses, photos are used by people you don’t know in ways you don’t approve of.” I think it’s pretty clear which one of those the author thinks, but I guess nobody said this wasn’t an opinion piece.

But the quote of Zuckerberg has absolutely nothing to do with how your data are used by people you don’t know. It’s about the volunteering of data to people whom you do know. There is, of course, the related issue of whether or not that information is safe from third parties, but again nowhere in that quote is Zuckerberg addressing that issue. He’s merely pointing out that people are using Facebook, irrespective of whatever concerns they may have had, or indeed continue to have. So of course the author jumps to the conclusion, that Zuckerberg has jumped to the conclusion, that this grants Facebook license to do whatever they want.

The strange thing is that by the end, the article starts to undermine itself by way of common sense and fair literary analysis, admitting that ultimately the users themselves make the choice to take part and can opt not to do so if they wish, just as the Z-man himself said. So, evidently Facebook can’t do whatever it wants. Or at least it can, but it will subsequently pay the price when the users vote with their virtual feet.

Oh, but it gets worse still. And here I digress for a moment. Someone once said to me, after watching The Social Network (a film about the creation of Facebook, for those that didn’t know), that they enjoyed the film but subsequently felt not so good about using Facebook. I asked why. The response was along the lines of, “Well, he’s not a very nice person, is he?” I am at this point reminded of a glorious scene from Father Ted, captured below.

The word ‘dreams’ in that diagram needs to be replaced with ‘media’, and then the revised image shown to an awful lot of people, including the person cited above. It’s a film! It’s a dramatised version of events. Some of it is true, some it is based on truth but twisted, and some is not true in the slightest, instead being wholly the result of someone’s, or some people’s, imagination. I am a programmer myself, and I can assure you that Mark Zuckerberg did not, in any way, race back to his dorm to program the relationship status feature the moment he thought of it whilst at a party. And even if he did, there definitely wasn’t a theatrical score in the background. It’s drama.

To go back to our article with the unchecked anger, the author clearly gives away their own misunderstanding of reality, quite humorously, by proclaiming Facebook to be, “at the center of the Social Networks right now.” Marvel at the thought-provoking capitalisation of social networks! Ponder the significance of the pluralisation! Was the film about more than one social network? Perhaps there is a sequel of which I was unaware, possibly entitled The Social Network 2: Revenge of The Winklevosses. (What is the plural of Winklevoss? I was quite tempted by Winklevosserati. Answers in the comments, please.)

The bad journalism aside, it’s the author’s emphatic, bile-spewing outrage that disappoints me. I can understand a misunderstanding, but this person is clearly more interested in being angry than in feeling content. Why?

More recently, there have been cries of foul play over a new Facebook feature, in which facial recognition is used to make suggestions as to which persons are present in a given photo. If it spots your face, and has a high degree of certainty on the matter, it will suggest to the person uploading the photo – who is, of course, a friend of yours on Facebook – that they tag you in the photo, indicating to all who view it that you’re there to be found.

It only takes the phrase ‘facial recognition’ to make people lose all sense of perspective, and for the technologically challenged to conveniently forget their lack of expertise prior to wading in on a matter without first attempting to understand it, or – and here’s a thought – calling for additional opinions before they send for their high horse. Does Facebook now automatically tag any photos in which it detects you? No. Does it create any tags by itself, ever? No. Does it give away any personal information that wasn’t previously available to the person uploading the photo in which you appear? No.

The BBC ran an article on this, which has since been updated following Facebook’s apology for not being upfront about the feature going live. And yes, they should apologise. Users should be informed of new features, especially if there’s an option to turn the feature off; it’s not as if we regularly check our privacy settings to see if there are any new ones with which to toy. Facebook should have announced it, if only to prevent the sort of ridiculous overreaction and misunderstanding by the likes of the BBC, who didn’t, apparently, have the insight and / or motivation to point out those things which I pointed out in my previous paragraph. It took Facebook to issue an apology, in which they also included those observations, before the BBC seemed to have an accurate handle on the matter.

The article has now been updated. Whilst it doesn’t make it clear when this was said (before or after the apology), it does now also quote Graham Cluley, a senior consultant with Sophos – a highly-regarded computer security company – who somehow fell into the same trap, saying as he did, “Once again Facebook seems to be sharing personal information by default.” Balderdash! This man works for Sophos and so I hope that actually he knows better, and that this is just desperate press-grabbing on his part. But either way, I despair. No information is shared. None! All that’s happening here is that Facebook is pointing out to your friends that you’re in the photo (which they already knew, unless they’re blind, in which case how did they take the photo?), saving them the hassle of having to select you from a list. The friend whose photo it is still has actively to take Facebook’s suggestion, so absolutely nothing is happening here which wasn’t happening before. Tagging is still a human-controlled, manual process. And unless your ‘friends’ on Facebook have never seen your face (or checked your photos), they have learned absolutely nothing about you.

I’m not in any way saying Facebook’s record in this department is flawless. Far from it, in fact. They do need to be more transparent when introducing new features, and their security settings, whilst powerful, were for a time overly complex and defaulted to the loosest possible settings. What’s more, they have been shown to suffer, along with several other sites, from accidental data leakage.

But all of that is beside the points raised here. There are legitimate issues, but they’re not the ones being discussed in these cases.

And here, an admission: this piece isn’t actually in defence of Mark Zuckerberg. I just thought that the title would ensnare a few readers. (If you’re reading this, and it worked, then ha! Totally got you.) This, as I said, is about people choosing conflict in a manner which suggests they’d rather feel offended than peaceful. Not to mention happier, as well.

That seems a shame to me, as well as counter-intuitive. Would being more positive not benefit us all?

My Adventure with Half-wits

Look, it’s me again! Who knew that after my very appropriate (and important) rant about paella, I would have another pressing matter of utmost importance? Well, I do. 

Because I just had the worst day ever. 

We should start with my immigration status. I am an American citizen, yes, but I live in the UK and am married to a Brit. This is an important fact, because it means that every two years, I am at the behest of a little organization called the UK Border Agency. Now, I don’t know if they are the most sadistic or the most incompetent government office out there, but they certainly have my attention today. And that attention, ladies and gentlemen, is far from adoring. 

Because I am in the process of applying for my next UK visa, I am required to have my biometric details enrolled. That means that I have to attend either a UKBA office or a particular post office in order for my facial features to be photographed and scanned, and for my fingerprints to be taken. I don’t have an issue with this, but I will have it be known that it isn’t exactly a free service. Obviously. 

So today I decided to go to London to go to the post office at High Holborn. The thing is, the UKBA makes it clear that they want applicants to go to the post office. It costs them less money. So I decided to do just that. 

I took my dog for a short walk, knowing that I was going to hop onto a train, take the hour-long journey into London, enroll my biometrics, have a coffee with a friend, and head home. Back within four hours. I walked to the station at Haslemere, my barcoded biometric enrollment letter in my hot little hand, and waited for my train.

Which was cancelled. 

I should have taken the hint, but I got onto the next one instead. That one ended up being more than a half hour delayed into Waterloo. Having finally arrived in London, I walked to High Holborn, where I was told to wait in line behind another biometrics victim until I could be served. Then I was asked into the biometrics booth, where the postman took my barcoded letter and scanned it.

Nothing.

Scanned it again.

Nothing. 

“Mrs. O’Sullivan,” he said. “This happens often. Your barcode is wrong. It isn’t damaged or anything. It’s just that the barcode isn’t correct. The machine won’t read it, so we can’t take your biometrics today.”

It’s wrong? The barcode on the official UKBA letter, the barcode that I have to have in order to enroll my required biometrics is WRONG? No fucking way. 

A call to the UKBA will sort it out, right?

WRONG! Wrong is the word of the day! Because my options are as follows: either they can send me a new letter with a new barcode (will it be correct? who knows?) or I can make an appointment at the UKBA enrollment office in Croydon. Croydon! Everyone’s destination of choice! And I can’t get an appointment for three weeks! Hurray!

No matter that this will affect the time that it takes to process my visa application. No matter that I need my passport back before August so I can visit my family in the States. No! Because I get to go to Croydon. To have my mugshot and fingerprints taken like a criminal. Thanks. A. Lot. You. Useless. C***s. 

So, it’s back to Waterloo to take my train back to Haslemere. 15 quid poorer and none the happier. And what’s this? There are only five trains listed on the entire Waterloo board? It’s 1930 and the 1900 train to Haslemere is still at its platform? Er…Awesome. 

Right. Two whole hours later (thanks to signal failures at every signal between Waterloo and Woking), I finally arrived home. I expected to cook some dinner, crack open some beers, and cuddle with the hubby and the dog on the sofa. 

But a day like this, mind you, can never end that simply. No, it really can’t. The obvious ending is thus: I walk in the door, I kick my shoes off, I feed my dog, I go upstairs and find…pee. A lot of pee. A whole dog’s worth of stinky, yellow pee on the bed. On the duvet, on the mattress, on the floor. Thanks a lot, dear doggy.

My husband says (as he kisses me sweetly on the cheek) that life can’t be so bad when you have a husband that loves you (and plenty of beer in the fridge). And he’s right, of course. 

But the opportunity to blog about the inept wankers who sent me the barcode equivalent of the shit that makes up their collective brains makes life even sweeter. 

Forget Paella. It’s UKBA that really gets under my skin. 

Pie Ay Uh

Welcome to The Unbloggables. Yes, this is the place where you can expect a regular, unbiased meditation about the issues that matter. Well, maybe not regular. I’m not so good at that. And not unbiased, necessarily. And as for meditation? Well…actually, rant may be more like it. But it WILL be about the issues that matter.

Like the appropriate pronunciation of food. 

This evening I was watching TV and was forced to witness perhaps the greatest assault on food pronunciation in human history. The offending item? An Iceland advert. No, not the country. Iceland the country can’t afford adverts, and even if it could, any food mentioned would be unpronounceable anyway. No, I am talking about Iceland the classy store. And this evening’s advert was selling their ever so special version of the popular Spanish dish, paella.

That’s right. Paella. Pie. Ell. Uh. According to Iceland. 

Oh, now, come on. Seriously, I don’t even speak Spanish. I avoided Spanish like…like…the Spanish Flu when I was in school. I took French. I took Latin (Latin!?!). I got a master’s degree in Russian! All to avoid Spanish! But even I know that to pronounce paella with that offending hard L is to murder the very word and toss its bloodied corpse into a sewer, to be devoured by rabid rats (and the plague-laden fleas upon them). 

Pie. Ay. Uh. Paella. 

We can add pollo to that list, too. Yes, it’s dressed provocatively, flaunting that double L like a high end hooker in stilettos. That doesn’t give anyone the right to mistreat our poor pollo chicken. Treat it nicely. Buy it a drink. Give it some respect. 

I am sorry to say that I have to include fillet in this particular rant. I have been informed that to pronounce fillet the French way sounds affected here in the UK. Well, if it’s wrong (it isn’t), then I don’t wanna be right! What can I say? I’m a Yank. We Americans know how to pronounce our words! Fillet = Fill. Ay. Tortilla = Tor. Tee. Ah. Worcestershire = War. Chest. Er. Sher. Um, I mean: Woo. Stuh. Shuh. Shuh. No, that’s not it. This: Woosht? Esht? Er? Shter? 

Oh, forget it.