It's the internet stupid

T'interweb, and by extension social media is a wonderful thing. Facebook in particluar has tremendous utility value when it comes to meeting folks and getting utterly mullered. Like text messages before it, the ability to co-ordinate disparate groups and individuals in order to successfully meet in The Whalebone for some of their splendid Neck Oil, and perhaps a pickled egg, has consigned to the shredder the old memories of sitting in a boozer in the 80s and wondering what everyone else was up to whilst sobbing into a pint of sloppy 70 pence mild at the sheer, numbing isolation of life as a man in the high suicide risk factor age group of 18-35 in Thatcher's Bloody Britain.

Unfortunately, like all good things, Facebook and the like have inevitable drawbacks. Amongst the worst are the ubiquitous posts that make an irritatingly illogical statement about some stranger's political/moral/ethical/mind-numbingly-fucking-irrelevant beliefs before adding 'Re-post this if you agree.'

In the early infancy of Facebook there were also the posts regarding a syphillitic, blind, quadriplegic baby girl from Grantham who would get vital self-esteem saving surgery if a million people reposted. Fortunately enough annoyed users idiot-slapped the re-posters enough times that the message sank in to their thick, porridgy, retrogressive brains and they appear to have vanished, at least from my pages.

Not so the urban myths.

A while ago I had the fairly chirpy story of an air hostess whom, when faced with a bigoted passenger complaining about sitting next to a ginger or gay biker or something, turned the tables in hilarious fashion by being very nice to the target of said bigot's complaints. Oh how delicious, and brave a stand on her part, such action was to the 73 tits who read it without thinking that it sounded too bloody twee to be true. Of course 30 seconds and the power of google reveals that it was not true at all but was an internet myth that originated in South Africa and has been doing the rounds for years in one form or another. In a way this particular post is harmelss enough, after all it reflected an agreeable sentiment. Unfortunately the same goes for a much more problematic breed of 'viral' internet myth.

Today came a post by someone on my friends list, under the title 'this is disgraceful', that purported to be a scanned image of a letter (comprising lots of angry capital letters) sent to an MP demanding investigation into why the Great British Pensioner is undervalued by the Deparment for Work and Pensions to the tune of around minus 300% in comparison to, and I quote, 'IMMIGRANTS/REFUGEES LIVING IN BRITAIN'.

Cue the subsequent outpourings of disgust at the state of Britain...

'it's what this pathetic country has come too'

and

'weak,weak we used to be called great...not anymore'

and not forgetting

'tell me about it. they gettin more in benefits than i get paid'


Naturally, to anyone with an even slightly inquisitve brain, this letter seemed rather suspiciously to be a stinking pile of bullshit. And it is, as evidenced by just 30 seconds  of effort and a bit of google power. This is deeply annoying and the kind of thing that is seriously irksome, to the point in fact that it suggests, nay DEMANDS that the original poster should be condemned to a life of emotional pain and ignominy via a carefully considered sentence only fitting to the crime... the Facebook 'unfriend'. For a split second I did consider this may be an over-reaction, but no. This kind of spurious, ignorant ersatz patriotism and rabble-rousing is nauseating, and such a cynical and utterly fictitious diatribe can only 'go viral' if some witless chimpanzee not only buys it, but spreads it around like so much disease-ridden guana.

So Ian Hollis, you're an idiot. Get the fuck off my list.