Buzzwords of 2024

As always, long words, misty concepts, bloviating and navel-gazing were popular.

reset

agency (Everyone has agency. So what about “You are responsible for everything that happens to you”?)

Mari Lwyds are everywhere. A few years ago it was Krampus.

Attractive women being called “ugly” by TRAs and incels. (And TERFs are "smelly".)

When talking about unions, you must say “over a barrel”, “in hock” and “magic money tree”.

Snow is forecast: There are thick drifts, roads are closed and drivers spend ten hours in their cars in the Pennines. 
Everybody: Single snowflakes seen! Britain shuts down ha ha ha! Oh dear the power’s gone off. I say it’s jolly cold. Where did we put the candles/head torch/extra duvet? How soon do we start eating each other?

"New paradigm" is back from the 1970s.

Twitter is asked: What phrase makes you roll your eyes? The responses are a salami slice through 2023 and the 2000s generally.

accountability, problematic, triggered
mask, cis, whatever
empowered, equity, learnings
toxic, inclusive, kiddos
equity, Win-Win, zero sum

identify as, context, patriarchy
pronouns, wait his turn, I got this.
hypervigilance, climate change, laser focused
genocide, -phobic anything, safe space…
speaking power to truth, healing journey, Just sayin’.

common sense, safe and effective, lived experience
gender assigned at birth, That's just the way I am.
conspiracy theory, Let's unpack that, community
It is what it is, at the end of the day
Let me be clear...

living your best life, follow your heart, my truth
Rest in Power, greater good, The science is settled.
marginalized communities, gender-affirming care
fur baby, white privilege, reimagine
stunning and brave, my journey, existential

trauma response, triggering, heal
queering the..., feminine energy

Adjectiving verbs with a Y – evadey, spy-ey, popular January.
Not to be in any sense spoilerific, but...

People telling others to “cope”.

There are a lot of moving parts... (of a complex situation)

[Absolutely anything] starts with the self.

It’s not the cold, it’s the humidity.


Have the hipsters shaved their beards off? Are there hipsters any more?

agentic: There’s a lot of “agency” around.

An incentive structure has been set up where tons of ppl pretty much can't survive without competing in some kind of victimization Olympics. And of course those ppl get out-competed by a bunch of a**holes who could do just fine, but see that victim Olympics is the game. (@HephaistosF)

What to Say About the Duchess of Sussex: She is such a tasteless, crashing, bourgeoise arriviste snob, it's repulsive.

warm desking: hot desking, but in an area of four desks. You sit with the people you work with, you just move round every day.

crunchy women: what we used to call an “earth mother”. Or perhaps Gwyneth Paltrow. But why crunchy? They eat crunchy granola? “Crunchy millennial tropical trad-wives” says @nealjclark over a pic of a long-haired woman breastfeeding.

Health-worker vaccinated here. No health issues so far. Meanwhile there are so many “Christian” crunchy women that lie to prove a political point and wish death/infertility on you while miscarrying every year despite of not being vaccinated. (@perromediano96) (In the 70s they hated popular culture and scientific medicine etc, and believed in astrology, spoon-bending, Jung and dualism.)

Don’t make me tap the sign.

Effects of lockdown: shoe shops sell 60% trainers and 40% shoes. After lockdown people couldn’t get their office shoes back on, or found they got blisters.

Effects of lockdown 2: Some cafés and food outlets cleared out tables and chairs, and have never replaced them all. Instead we’re offered stools and a counter – or nothing. Americans eat from brown bags while walking and slurping coffee from a sippy cup and we’re expected to do the same. Do we eat like tramps on a park bench? There are fewer and fewer places to sit down. Solution: seek a café where people work on laptops. However: tables and chairs rarely match and tables are far too high. This makes eating with a knife and fork difficult, too. You feel like a child who needs to sit on an Encyclopedia.

Oh, “brisket” was pastrami all along!

Anything other than 100% support of trans people is “transphobia”. Support of women, or claiming they exist, is also transphobia! Any criticism of men is “you just hate men”. It’s the sloppy thinking I mind.

Are the Israelis scattering Gaza with bombs disguised as tins of tuna? Sounds like the rumours that in WWII the Germans dropped exploding chocolate and pens.

Feb: “disgusting” is code for anti-Semitism

Where did all this mimosa come from? Something to do with Valentine’s Day?

Cuddles are now snuggles.

coded: “Do I code as female?”

February rumours: Primark is closing, David Irving is dead, Pope says you can eat what you like during Lent.

Prophecies of doom: Google is closing its search facility. Twitter was doomed as soon as Elon Musk took over and everybody is leaving or will leave. A year on it looks much the same. Those who joined with the sole aim of getting “engagement” and publicising their thing have moved to duller pastures. We don’t miss them. Those who like arguing about epistemology have stayed.

People really enjoying calling each other narcissists and attention-seekers. As someone points out, people may need attention. There’s even something called “care-seeking”.


Fresh (and there's an irritating silly voice women adopt to say "fresh!" in adverts):

Ultimately, they all want us to see Richard III in a fresh new way. (Guardian on a play about RIII with Michelle Terry as Richard)

UK Eurovision entry is “fresh, modern, contemporary”.

Rescued chairs painted greige will “have a fresh look that will appeal to younger buyers”, claims Bridget (paraphrase).

Grey bathrooms are also “fresh and modern”. They have “metro tiles” (lavatory) and square basins, sinks, loos and bidets.

When you’re my age, you’ve seen “fresh looks” come and go.

March 2024

"Genocide" is being used to mean ethnic cleansing. “Send them somewhere else” is not the same as “kill them all”.

People confuse non-binary with non-biological, and autonomic with automatic. They’ve heard about the autonomic nervous system, but think it means most of our behaviour is automatic.

People still producing “But your loo at home is unisex!” as the ultimate gotcha. It doesn’t contain ten stalls with doors and walls open at top and bottom and it is not constantly visited by strangers, or – still worse – colleagues. Equally annoying are those who say “Language must evolve!” as if it had a mind of its own, every time an organisation removes the words “woman” and “mother” from its website/brochure/leaflet.

It looks as if academies can make up their own ways of disciplining children. The slightest thing becomes an “infringement” and if you collect too many you are isolated all day with only a sandwich for lunch. (Wasn’t it called “detention” in our day? I fear some parents love the idea.)

Narcissist now means “nasty person” and all nasty people are “narcissists”.
Who are the “neoliberals”? What is “neoliberalism” and why is it responsible for all society’s ills?

March 17
This week’s meme:
Well they all have mental health, don't they? No one uses the term mental illness, why don't they? People are getting away with literally murder because the words mental illness are not used. Crisis teams telling people to have a bath, a cup of tea or a walk. (@LizPeecock)

March 2024
doordash: Came out of nowhere. Bad because exploits delivery drivers. Disabled say “necessary”. Big row over why can’t they microwave?

Who is this Eckhart Tolle everyone is so crazy about? Sounds medieval but prob still alive and churning out “benign, self-congratulatory, soothing” mottoes. (Paul Fussell)

Late March kerfuffle about women protesting that the Garrick Club is still men-only. Today's trope: What does it matter if a club for influential people who run the country doesn’t include half the human race? (First women accepted a few months later.)

You have to pre-emptively condemn evil, or people will complain. They’re still complaining that headlines don’t read “SHOCK! HORROR!”

“Who hurt you?” tagged onto practically anything – a love of X, a hatred of Y, an interest in Z.

April 2024
This week nobody wants to work any more.

2024-04-13 Everything is “hard” this week. Things "go hard".

2024-04-17 Hey guys, it’s 2024 and Russia wants its empire back. (Not looking so sunny for Russia, December.)

The Cass Report is published. Everyone is suddenly an expert on research methodology. (@RedMags60. Because they don’t like its conclusions.)

Is “healing” something an injured party has to do? It’s just “get over it” in a new hat, isn’t it?

Qualia popular late May, no idea.

divisive: all-purpose boo word

Some Americans are terrified that Harris and Walz are “communists”. Harris wants equality! Walz is the descendant of German immigrants who have been communists for generations! Harris wants “equality of outcome” instead of “opportunity”.

emotional regulation

high trust, low trust

Percival Everett – where’d he come from?

Temu: an online marketplace operated by the Chinese e-commerce company PDD Holdings. It offers heavily discounted consumer goods mostly shipped to consumers directly from China. Went live in the States in 2022, says Wikipedia. Become a byword for terrible quality.

pickle ball: Tennis with ping pong bats?

received a cancer diagnosis: has cancer

2024-07-23
thug

Resilience – it was everywhere and now it’s gone.

agency (used to be autonomy)

hoovering: sucking you back into an abusive relationship.

“Beautiful” to many means “highly over-decorated”, or “I can’t imagine how they did it”. Horror vacui. If you want "engagement", post a picture of a fan vault.

September
Labour is already “Liebore”.

slop for AI output and more

Subaltern (progressive buzzword like carceral). Just used to mean subordinate or subsidiary but sounds good and keeping up with the cool crowd.

Late Oct
soft power

2024-12-07 This goes hard!
2024-12-09 Manifesto popular this week.

seed oils (all year)

More here, and links to the rest.

Technophobia 13

Phasing in technology

Do you remember when everyone’s video player/recorder had a set of flashing noughts? It’s 2024 and some tweeps still don’t know how to create a thread by replying to their own posts.

PSA: When using Find/Replace in Word, remember it’ll change any word with that letter combination even if it’s in the middle of a completely different word where such a change would make no sense. You know, before you send sample pages to an agent. (@cocoskeeper. Select Advanced Find and Replace and make it the default.)

Anyone know how to put a keyword setting into twitter to filter out any content containing them? And does it also work for names? (@OwdAlbert. Click More, find Privacy and Security, and follow the steps to Mute Words.)

Yesterday a user opened by telling me "The software doesn't work." Upon remotely accessing, it turned out what they actually meant was "I don't know where the icon is." (@whispous)

For my entire 30 year career so far, my favorite part are the people who are TOO BUSY to learn something simple that will save them HOURS. If I had a nickel... (@one_dunkirk)

My old employer sent me away from one of the eight computers the sales staff used. He needed to check his emails if a customer had faxed yet. I said: "Why don't you use one of the others?". He said his emails were on the computer I was using. (@Formula1Wimbo)

Whoever posted yesterday about the fact that Word can read your work out loud, may your head always rest on the cool side of the pillow. (@ParanormalJunk2)

The feeling when you find out that your company basically depends on a single elderly Java programmer maintaining antediluvian legacy code. And the gentleman is about to retire, to boot. (@Agippo_Vermith)

Just read on Linkedin. For German lawyers to create a pdf, they need to print it on paper and then scan it to a pdf.  But a judgement was given so that this "extra step" is not necessary any longer. Digitalisation for Germany is progressing at a snail's pace. (Tehn Yit Chin @tehnyit. And I've just read that some German firms are phasing out fax machines.)

Pah, simple! A friend who works at a German archive has to print out every email received (I assume not including spam) and any response has to be printed and passed around on a round robin before they’re allowed to reply. Both original email and reply are then archived on paper. (@priddy)

At my current job as a tax collector, the woman training me had had this job for 20+ years. She was showing me how to do the Excel spreadsheet for the monthly totals, and wasn't using any formulas. She would use the calculator to add everything up and just document it. (@raspbrrytea)

We stopped having computer labs in school because "everyone knows how to use the computer now" and suddenly they didn’t any more. (@GOOPREALM5000)

Shoutout to everyone who remembers the days before satnavs, when you’d go to visit someone on the outskirts of London and four hours later you’d pass Big Ben for the second time while screaming. (@SoVeryBritish)

What I’ve learned from this post is there’s a remarkable number of people who think satnavs are somehow the work of the devil and not to be trusted. (@RobTemple101)

My beloved wife has just informed me that she accumulates Chrome tabs until Chrome eventually crashes, at which point she gets rid of them by clicking “don’t restore”. (@A_Luckmann. Bookmark your frequently visited sites, and save your files in a folder on the hard disk. It'll display them in alphabetical order!)


I once asked someone on a Teams call to share their screen and point at the problem. They shared their screen and then pointed with their finger at their own screen. (@RhysTEvans)

Zoom call member: I can’t see my desktop if I’m sharing my screen. (Solution: At top right, click "Exit fullscreen". You can also fix the Chat so that it pops up in the centre of the screen. I should make Youtube videos, shouldn't I?)

We’ve been using Zoom since lockdown and people still won’t mute themselves in a meeting of 20 people when one person is speaking. Even if you’re sitting there in silence, if your mike is on it will disturb the sound.

The academic who gives a Zoom lecture but doesn’t plan to record it and make it available: another case of “Oh yes, I use this dirty, demonic technology but I’m too holy to do that”?

About 25 years ago the magazine I was working for discovered the intranet concept and asked us to put up a photo and bio. Half of us did, but nobody designed the presentation so they were all different. That was the end of that for a bit. Then a colleague started running the internet from head office. Suddenly he had a whole department, and older, grander colleagues wondered what they were all doing. Then the mag put their whole archive online for free for a time. Now they have a whole separate online mag.

Big joke when social media arrived (20 years ago) – "The company’s account is run by an intern". Surely now a whole department?

When the firm I’d just joined got Macs instead of dumb terminals and a central server, they didn’t know they could save stuff locally. But at the same time they didn’t know there was still a central server and the whole magazine was not “in their machine”.

A few years ago:

Me: You can watch TV on your computer.
Them: I can’t because the computer is in the coldest room in the house.
Me: Get a space heater.

Others explain that “watching TV” can only happen if the whole family is sitting together on the sofa. Most people have caught up, and are watching TV on their phone.


Amazon is phasing out its checkout-less grocery stores with “Just Walk Out” technology, first reported by The Information Tuesday. The company’s senior vice president of grocery stores says they’re moving away from Just Walk Out, which relied on cameras and sensors to track what people were leaving the store with. Just over half of Amazon Fresh stores are equipped with Just Walk Out. The technology allows customers to skip checkout altogether by scanning a QR code when they enter the store. Though it seemed completely automated, Just Walk Out relied on more than 1,000 people in India watching and labeling videos to ensure accurate checkouts. The cashiers were simply moved off-site, and they watched you as you shopped. Instead, Amazon is moving towards Dash Carts, a scanner and screen that’s embedded in your shopping cart, allowing you to checkout as you shop. (Gizmodo.com. You had to put your glasses on and fiddle about with your phone before you could enter the shop. A writer to the Times letters page complains he has to pull over and put on his reading glasses before he can operate all his car's whizbang technology.)

A friend points out that many are strangely passive about Facebook. They moan that they don’t see posts from certain friends any more, when they just need to visit the friend’s page. And if they like or interact with the posts, that friend will appear in their newsfeed again.

People in the mid-90s who came to computers late simply couldn’t see that some of us had been using the things for at least a decade, and that this meant we were far more expert than the newbie. They bluffed and threw their weight about and wouldn’t listen when we tried to tell them how to do things.


Is there a word/phrase for that process where people first complain about technological change, then accept, then embrace it? (Lee Jackson, 2012. I call it "tomatisation": Tomatoes are poisonous, deadly, an aphrodisiac, condemned from the pulpit, decorative, delicious with cheese.)

Every new technological advance especially if social (blogging, twitter, the Internet, mobile phones) does a “Five Boys”: appalled, cautious approval, I’ve adopted it!, five prominent women say it has changed their lives, its days are numbered, it’s as dead as disco.

Geeks invent way of chatting, discussing, debating, getting help, making friends. Civilians don't want to know. Twenty years later when everybody has a computer and mobile phone a clunky version of the same thing is invented and it becomes this year’s must-have. But there are still those who just refuse to use a computer or any kind of technology.

A friend writes: I NEVER do Facebook, but when I sneakily take a peak for some reason, I LOVE your photos.


The spiral cords of old-fashioned phones used to get very tangled, and hence shorter and shorter. Every now and then you had to dangle the handset while the cord unwound itself. Men never did this. OK, some men. One Branestawm-like colleague let the cord wind itself until he could barely lift the handset to talk to anybody. Men never cleaned the cords, either.

Mice used to have a central trackball that got very dirty over time. The mouse ceased to work efficiently, and it was necessary to dismantle the mouse and clean the trackball. Men never did this.

Another thing men never cleaned – typewriter keys. (It was fun. Cleaning fluid, a toothbrush and toothpick.)

They never changed typewriter ribbons, either. The ribbons were supposed to switch direction when the reel came to an end. Sometimes you had to do this manually. Some humans continued typing on the same patch as the letters became fainter and fainter. Others typed everything in red because they didn't know how to switch to black.

It’s 2023 and I have a smart meter and a little gizmo that shows how much electricity I use – except it shows nothing. And I still need meter reading visits? And I need to supply a meter reading to query my bill? Well, EDF Energy? (The smart machinery is installed in the original metal cupboard, inside a cupboard, which may be the problem. It’s 2023 and to make the up-to-date technology work I have to remember to open both cupboard doors occasionally. The little gizmo shows nothing, as before.)


More here, and links to the rest.

Contradictions 12

 

Even when unattributed, all encountered in the wild. Some names have been redacted because people have lost jobs for having the wrong opinions. Direct quotes are in italics.

I still think it's funny that people get surprised that young folks don't want kids when you've spent their entire childhood telling them that motherhood is the lowest possible aspiration in life and that pregnancy will ruin their lives. (@wrowclif)

I have a question for older people. Why do you have children, if you’re going to spend the rest of your life denying young people what they want, insulting them for being lazy, stupid and ignorant, deriding their taste in music and fashion, and taking away their rights? (@PaulbernalUK)

I was overwhelmed with information about how tough it was to be a parent at the same time as I was being told it was the most extraordinary, blissful, transformative rite of passage and that there was no other love like it. That I was, in essence, living half a life by not having children of my own while simultaneously being so incredibly lucky to pursue a responsibility-free... girl about town, career woman existence. (Article in the Times on infertility)

Kids today are hyperactive couch potatoes with a short attention span who play Minecraft for hours.

Men: Women ought to get married and have babies.
Also men: I'm not ready to settle down.


You can't claim the Jews killed Jesus while also insisting Jews are from Europe.

Pro-Pals resurrecting millennia-old antisemitism to own Israel at the same time as saying Jews aren’t indigenous to the land. Make it make sense.

I do not understand Progressives uncritically supporting the Palestinians who deny equal rights for women and criminalise homosexuality.

Jew haters reject Israel for being an "ethnostate" (despite having over 20% minorities). They also reject Zionism because Jews aren't a "real" ethnicity (despite Zionism starting as a secular nationalist movement). Could you please at least make your hate consistent?


You don’t know what a woman is but Kamala Harris lost because she’s a woman.

It’s academics’ job to be critical about everything – but not gender.

If the Garrick Club can bar women, why can’t lesbian clubs bar men? (Dec 2024 the Garrick Club now admits women.)

If genitals don’t define gender, how does removing them affirm it? (Internet meme)

I don’t understand why I have to accept everyone as they are, but I have to change, because everything I do upsets them.

When woke politicians talk about wanting more women in government when they pretend not to even know what women are, I weep.

Somehow like 95% of people are "queer" now yet "queer' is still a marginalized minority. It's amazing.

If gender is perfomative and is identity, why are surgery and hormones necessary to affirm it?

If all human beings have a gender identity, why do only trans people get theirs protected in law?

Aren’t “trans” and “non-binary” mutually exclusive?

I love how they claim there are only about 10 gender-critical people in the world and/ or everyone is a 'Bot' while simultaneously making massive lists of 'transphobes'.

I don’t get it. If trans rights are supported by the majority and rejected by a minority, where is the source of the genocide impacting trans people across the west? How can you be widely accepted by society whilst also being the victim of social cleansing?

To make the claim transwomen are women you have to simultaneously know what a woman is, and deny you know what a woman is in the same sentence. Once you've achieved that, pretty much everything else is plain sailing.

So how come misgendering is literal violence and actual literal violence is celebratory, peaceful protest?

"It was only tomato juice," said the man who claimed he’d die if you called him Colin.

Why, when people who claim a synthetic sex identity want to pee, there is only a handful of them going about their lives who are no threat, yet when anyone speaks about the harms of the ideology, there are vast swaths of them being murdered and oppressed?

Curious that the same people who don’t believe in a higher power have decided gender is some invisible ‘essence’.

Still can’t stop laughing that in Spanish a non-binary person is either “no binario” or “no binaria”.

When women had evidence to support their arguments against the GRR Bill Scotgov rejected it on the basis of being "anecdotal." When trans activists and Scotgov funded groups had evidence to support their arguments it was valid because it was "lived experience."

It always amazes me how the same people who are absolutely convinced of the power of women's words to hurt trans people are also the ones so skeptical of the danger of men in women's spaces.

Them: We must respect the language people use to describe themselves and people who don’t do this are appalling. Also them: I wouldn’t personally describe you as a feminist.

We condemn female genital mutilation, we are shocked by past abuses like foot-binding and the castrati, but... if it's happening now in our culture it must be OK?


People I know, in the past: "You should be more aware of how you come across to others!"
People I know, currently: "You should stop caring so much about what others think!"

America: Be yourself!
Also America: Be like everybody else.
Also America: Have therapy to find yourself. That’ll be $60.

Hey you. Be yourself. But also tone it down a little. Read the room. But also speak your mind. Be responsible with your future. But also take risks, life is short. Kindness is everything. But also you'll get nowhere if you're not fighting. Don't sell out. But also grind/hustle. (@PrinceVogel)


Bibliolaters: "The Bible is perfect, but we fail to understand it correctly because of our sinfulness."
And also: "The Bible refutes evolutionism, and everyone should be able to see that perfectly clearly." (@SteveTiger999)


Doctors being so bad at identifying Autism is hilarious when you consider how good children are at figuring out who's Autistic when they're deciding whom to bully. (@AmberlynWhite)

@IntrovertProbss The people that always complain I don’t talk enough never seem to actually listen when I do speak

"I am religious and live by faith. Evolution is a religion that requires faith so it's stupid and wrong". (@grenangle)

Everyone should be free to express themselves however they like. <turns off replies> (@oliverburkeman)

I get so confused when y’all go on and on about how society doesn’t allow men be emotional. It is women who are punished for emotions, it is women who get told that we can’t do or be certain things because we’re “too emotional”. (@onosowobo. She adds “While we worry about men’s feelings.”)

100% of the pro-life protesters “should have been aborted”.

Feminists used to say that looks don’t matter but we should also wear ugly clothes and no makeup.

People say we have a lot of different selves, there’s no such thing as free will and all actions result from subconscious prompting or habit – and at the same time assume criminal responsibility exists and the guilty should be punished.

We need to sell things, but we don’t want people to buy things because it’s bad for them.

How can we have austerity (boo!) AND consumerism (boo!)?

Live in the moment, but learn from experience.

Schrodinger’s migrant: refuses to work while taking our jobs.

Men who mansplain how to fight the patriarchy are the patriarchy.

Every time a (prominent) man is accused of sexual crimes, someone will say "he's innocent until he's proved guilty", as if that meant he really was innocent. At the same time many complain that headlines are too bland, and not sufficiently condemnatory – we don't say "Bestial Monomaniac Charged with Unspeakable Crimes". That's because the accused is innocent until proved guilty.

Moan about Twitter and Facebook but resist advice to curate your feed: “Too much trouble,” “I don’t have the time”. Both mean “I don’t know how”.

I am a middle-class libertarian and I’m against banning things, especially smoking in pub gardens, but people who play loud music on public transport and say "Can I get a latte" should be shot.

In the 19th century, the groom said to the bride: "With all my worldly goods I thee endow". The law stated that on marriage, ALL a woman's possessions became the man's. And everybody knew this.

More here, and links to the rest.

Outrageous Excuses 23

 

The president of South Korea says he tried to stage a coup in order to "send a message". (@PopulismUpdates)

Pro-Yoon legislators argued in the party meeting that the president declared martial law because he was "lonely" and "needed a friend to talk to." (@BluRoofPolitics)

Many otherwise smart people lose their minds when they hear arguments against eating meat. They say things like: eating meat is natural to our species; it's tradition; other animals eat meat too; it’s the purpose of animals to be eaten; animals don't feel pain. (@victorckumar. I'd add: Plants scream when you pick them. We are omnivores - we have canine teeth. If we didn't eat meat many cattle and sheep would never exist and that's as bad as killing them. Vegetarians look so pale and sickly. How do they get enough protein? Or Vitamin B?)

The US worried that maternal mortality had risen. It turned out to be an artefact of a change in the way data was gathered. Christopher M. Zahn, interim CEO of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, responded: “reducing the U.S. maternal mortality crisis to ‘overestimation’” is “irresponsible”. Why? Because it “undermined... all the hard work of health care professionals, policy makers, patient advocates, and other stakeholders”. Noahpinion.blog continues: This is absolutely breathtaking, and not in a good way. One of the most prominent doctors in the field of obstetrics is openly arguing that positive data about U.S. health should be suppressed, and that popular misconceptions based entirely on data artifacts should be encouraged to persist, in order to motivate the public to devote more resources to the goals he thinks are important. (Americans are big on motivation.)

Telegraph: 'Heathrow officials responding to a complaint about security staff wearing Palestine flag badges claimed that employees wore them to let travellers know they spoke Arabic.' I'm not buying this. (@GillianLazarus)

Merriam-Webster asked what grammar hill tweeps would die on and then deleted all answers reading “Woman: adult human female” before closing the account. Excuse: “We let an intern run our socmed account.”

The almost-nude man painted blue in the Olympics opening ceremony was An "interpretation of the Greek God Dionysus" to make us "aware of the absurdity of violence between human beings".

Bullfighting preserves Spain’s biodiversity.

Billionaire socialite Jocelyn Wildenstein who has been dubbed ‘Catwoman’ shows off her new face, despite denying extensive plastic surgery and claiming her looks are down to her ‘Swiss Heritage.’ (@OliLondonTV)

Rioters’ defence lines so far:
My client has had a difficult home life
My client suffers from long term addictions
My client has a long running problem with alcohol
My client has mental health problems
My client understands he has been 'foolish'


TRUTH IS NOT IMPORTANT BECAUSE...*

In life it’s important to know when to stop arguing with people and simply let them be wrong.

Nobody ever changes their mind as a result of argument or disconfirming evidence.

On attrappe pas les mouches avec le vinaigre.

You can’t put out a fire with gasoline.

Fools give you reasons; wise men never try.

Reason is important, but it's not the be all and end all.

No reply is best.

No point telling people they’re wrong, they’ll never listen or change their minds.

Just ignore them.

Adversarial argument never uncovered the truth. (Popular in the 80s.)

Legislation can’t change minds. (But it does. Conversely some people haven’t noticed changes in law that took place 200 years ago.)

Argument never changes minds. (Your interlocutor may go away and think about it – and change their mind.)

Don’t oppose them, it only encourages them.

People never change their minds – except sometimes they flip. An anti-gay marriage campaigner is now for it, an anti-Muslim campaigner spent so much time debating with missionary Muslims in Bradford markets that he converted. Also if people never change their minds why bother propagandising them?

Our reverence for the truth might be a distraction that’s getting in the way of finding common ground and getting things done. (Katherine Maher)

We spend a lot of time taking down alleged arguments that are no more coherent than "my favourite colour is pancakes." This must stop. People say stupid, wrong things to us to soak up our time, not because they even believe what they are saying. (@stuartlosaltos)

Don’t waste your time with explanations; people only hear what they want to hear. (Paulo Coelho)

We need to stop trying to be tolerant of intolerance. So many people talk about "you have to have a calm discussion to change their minds". No. There’s no reasoning with racism. We need to make it socially taboo and embarrassing, strong peer pressure is more effective. (@AmusedApricot)

Never argue with an idiot. They will drag you down to their level and beat you with experience. (Mark Twain)

The idea that there is no objective truth or that we shouldn't bother trying to find it is just an excuse used by people who don't want have their opinion changed by facts... I believe there is still an underlying truth even if we can't find it. (Christina Rees)

* It might disprove my argument. And if we let people try to change other humans' minds you might attempt to change MINE!

WE CAN’T POSSIBLY DO THAT BECAUSE...
Interesting tidbit on Rory Stewart's experience as minister in DEFRA. Plan to plant 500 million trees, at minimal cost to the public, opposed by environmental groups on the basis that they wanted to micromanage "the right trees in the right places". (@AnyaM8_)

Americans: We can’t have healthcare and public transit because the government would have to do it and they’d be useless. (@AndyGJBurge. Other reasons for not having public transport: we'd have to mix with poor people and poor people are likely to be... you've got it.)

More here, and links to the rest.

Junk Statistics 11

Junk or not junk? This one seems trustworthy:

Between 2012 and 2017, sales of cacti and succulents rose 64% in America. (Times)

And these:

There are 500,000 giant redwoods in the UK, planted by the Victorians, and they are starting to outgrow neighbouring trees.

Just 6% of the total number of immigrants in the UK are asylum seekers. Just 37% of those arrive on small boats. Most commonly they are from Iran and Afghanistan. When assessed, the majority are judged ‘genuine’ and granted refugee status or other leave. Yet, parts of the electorate are somehow convinced that they are a major problem confronting all of our everyday lives. (@aljhlester)

Some good news in London, where the number of cycling trips has increased from 1.19 million a day last year to 1.26 million this year. (@TransportActio2)

The SNP has lost 32,000 members in less than 15 months. (March 2023)

Half of people in London don't have a vehicle. (And something like 10% don’t know a river runs through it.)

In the UK:

86% don’t want TW in Womens’ changing rooms.
83% don’t want TW in Women’s toilets.
79% don’t want TW in Rape crisis centres.
89% don’t want TW in Women’s sports
84%+ don’t want TW in Women’s’ prisons.

Women:

are +51% of the population
but +70% of the poor
and +83% of single parents
doing +66% of the work
producing +50% of the food
but earn just +11% of the pay
and only +1% of the land

But a car ad claims they make 60% of the buying decisions.

44% of the world’s gasoline is consumed by the US.

90% of homes in Israel use a solar water heater.

However:

33% Of Women Will Go On Dates Just For The Free Food. (eviemagazine.com)

Over 40% of adults in the UK are single. Sixty-three percent of men and 34 percent of women under 30 report being single, according to a Pew study.

"At age 45, on average, married men are making $37,138 a year more than single women, $35,479 more than single men and $33,849 more than married women." Report from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. (@g_lamarche)

The brain needs 40 to 80 repetitions of something to form a neural connection.


50% of marriages do not fail. There was a period after no-fault divorce became legal that the divorce rate got that high because suddenly a lot of people who had wanted to divorce were able to. But that was temporary. The divorce rate is way lower now. (@PetticoatShrink)

The unprecedented high rate of modern divorce is sometimes blamed on the following factoid:

Historically, the average person had 2-3 beloved spouses die during war or childbirth. (@wil_da_beast630)

And, a historian points out, most researchers fail to take into account divorce rates at other times and in other cultures: medieval Muslim societies, and 19th Japan, experienced high divorce rates.

This reminds me of the paper I read where it looked at the archaeological record and estimated that historically only 20% of men reproduced (violence, disease, etc.) whereas nearly 100% of women reproduced. This implies that the 20% of men were fathering 100% of the children. (@sivori)

See also sexual partners in our day: men exaggerate the number, women reduce it.

60% of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck.

3/10 go to university today. Most of them graduate with a 2:2 from a rubbish poly in 50k debt and then go and work in non grad jobs. (@LeoMars75. He earlier said their 2:2 is in “media studies”.)


More here and links to the rest.

Hey guys, it's nearly 2025!

It's nearly 2025 and I'm STILL telling people how to create a thread by replying to their own tweets.

@Beardandcamera It’s 2024 and we’re back to hermaphroditic fish.

It's 2024 and people are still moaning that the COVID vaccine wasn't properly tested.

And others thinking that looking at Twitter isn't "using" it, heaven forbid.

@DavidNBrown619 It's 2024 and the UK is debating what a woman is. The insanity needs to end. ASAP. (Update: It's December 2024 and the US Supreme Court is doing much the same.)

It's 2024 – unmute! 

It's 2024 and Zoom doesn't make "controls visible" the default, let alone "original sound for musicians".

It's 2024 and you still keep all your tabs open and save everything to the desktop – don't you?

It's 2024 and the government still isn't ensuring all schoolchildren learn to touchtype properly.

It's 2024: Why doesn't Twitter make it obvious that a post/tweet is part of a long thread, with many previous messages? You just have to guess. Hey guys, its 2024!

It's 2024 and Facebook shows you “most important” comments as default, not having twigged that commenters create threads, and have long conversations.

It’s 2024 and sports kit is unisex – meaning that it fits boys, and doesn’t fit women and girls.

@JacksonWheat1 We still doing "evolution isn't true because it's a theory" in 2024?

More here, and links to the rest.

Reasons to Be Cheerful 2024: 33

WOMEN 

1823 Elizabeth Fry's Gaols Act is passed, mandating women-only prisons with women warders (pictured).

1872 Composer and chemistry professor Alexander Borodin establishes medical courses for women.

1880 November: The Isle of Man grants female suffrage in an amendment to the Manx Election Act of 1875.

1887 Susanna Salter becomes first woman elected mayor in the US. A group of men opposing the involvement of women in politics submitted her name hoping to humiliate all women. She won with a thumping majority and was an effective mayor.

1915 The Council of the Royal Astronomical Society unanimously agrees this motion: "That this meeting approves of the admission of women as Fellows and Associates of the Society and of all necessary steps being taken to render their election as soon as possible."

50 years ago, Dublin pubs refused to serve women pints of beer unless accompanied by a man. Nell
McCafferty led 30 women to a pub where each ordered a brandy and a pint of Guinness. The bartender refused the beer request, so they drank their brandies and walked out.
(@Katiadower)

1960s/1970s Laws requiring "active resistance" to rape were repealed.

1970 Leaders of the National Organization of Women spearhead a women’s strike in the US. At the time, American women were paid 59 cents for every dollar a man was paid for doing similar work, despite the Equal Pay Act of 1963. Women were barred from some universities such as Harvard (it only changed its mind in 1977).

1978 Hannah Dadds becomes the London Underground’s first woman Tube driver.

1990 Married women in the UK become independent entities for income tax purposes.

2018 Women receive equal prize money in surfing after years of lobbying by women.

2023 Shetland’s Up Helly Aa Viking fire festival admits women and girls into the procession for the first time. (It’s a Victorian “revival”.)

2023 Leicester Cathedral celebrates first all-female clergy team (first for England).

2024 Southern Baptists reject a proposal to ban churches with women pastors.



LIFE IN GENERAL

1612 Last person burned at the stake for heresy in England.

1677 Parliament repeals the writ De Heretico Comburendo, which made burning at the stake the punishment for heresy.

1824 Repeal of the Test Act abolished the requirement to assent to the 39 Articles for many professions.

1830 Last person pilloried in St Albans.

1855 Arthur de Gobineau’s Essai sur l’inégalité des races humaines is published.

1871 The  Bank Holidays Act designates four holidays in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and five in Scotland.

1872 In St Alban's, the last person was condemned to punishment in the stocks.

1873 Jeannie Senior is the first woman in the UK to be appointed as a civil servant (outside the Post Office), as the first female inspector of the education of girls in pauper schools and workhouses.

1888 Brazil abolishes slavery.

1914-18 Queueing begins.

2013 The ban on royals marrying Catholics is abolished.

2008, 2021 The common law offences of blasphemy and blasphemous libel were formally abolished in England and Wales in 2008 and Scotland in 2021.

2021 Legal age of consent (15) is made official in France.

2022 New legislation increasing the legal age of marriage to 18 has come into force in England and Wales. Under the Marriage and Civil Partnership (Minimum Age) Act, it is now a crime to exploit vulnerable children by arranging for them to marry, or enter a civil partnership, under any circumstances. Campaigners argued that a loophole allowing 16- and 17-year-olds to marry with parental consent was being exploited to coerce young people into child marriage. Those found guilty of arranging child marriages face up to seven years in prison. (The Week)

2022 Equalities Minister Kemi Badenoch says  the government wants all new public buildings in England to have separate male and female toilets.

2022 Dominic Raab intends to ban transgender prisoners from women’s jails.

Singapore will repeal its ban on sex between men, said Lee Hsien Loong, the country’s prime minister. In 2018, India’s highest court also scrapped a colonial-era ban on gay sex, while Thailand has recently moved closer to legalising same-sex unions. (The Week 2022-08-21)

2022 We are thrilled to announce that the word "woman" will not be removed from our Maternity Protection Act 1994. The Work Life Balance and Miscellaneous Provisions Bill 2022 has been amended, and the word "woman" has been reinstated (in the US). (@TheCountessIE. She points out that “inclusivity” means “excluding half the human race”.)

2022 Florida bans puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and sex reassignment surgery for minors.

2022 Mermaids sued the LGB Alliance for being an inadequate charity. Now Mermaids is under investigation by the Charity Commission.

2023 UK to ban single-use cutlery and plates. (Sales of collapsible cutlery soar as café goers are faced with the problem of eating large lettuce leaves with one, fragile wooden fork.)

2023 Illinois bans assault weapons.

2023 Scots police disassociate themselves from Stonewall.

2023-02-20 Sadiq Khan promises free school meals for all London primary school children.

2023 Eli Lily agrees to cap insulin at $35, dropping the price by up to 70%.

2023 World Athletics votes to exclude transgender athletes (presumably from women’s sports).

2023 Italy makes going abroad to acquire a baby born to a “surrogate mother” a crime.

2023-05-03 Essex pub that hanged racist dolls from the rafters closes after boycott . (The golliwogs were taken down, but the pub owners replaced them.)

2023-05-12 Wind is main source of UK electricity for first time. (bbc.com)

2023 The NHS has banned puberty blockers for children outside of clinical research.

2023 Oxfam chief leaving after anti-trans 'villain' cartoon resembling JK Rowling (Express)

2023 Japan has raised the age of consent (established in 1907) from 13 to 16.

1993 Leeds Supertram Act passed. Since 1993 France has constructed and put into service a total of 22 tram systems.

2023-07-06 Alcohol sales are going down, sales of healthy alternatives are going up. (Expert on BBC Breakfast.)

2024 Lia Thompson loses a legal battle to compete in the Olympics as a woman.


LESS THAN CHEERFUL

Universities in Japan have lowered women's exam scores for years to deny them entrance.

1753 Jewish naturalisation bill, repealed in December the same year.

1929-1973 7,600 people were forcibly sterilised in North Carolina.

2022 Primark is reinstating single-sex changing rooms – but allowing anyone in the women’s who “identifies as a woman”. Booths don’t have doors, but curtains that don’t reach the floor. Staff say they’ve been told they “must” allow in men who claim to be women. (Self-ID is not law.)

2023 Merrythought sell 10,000 Golliwogs a year.

2024: Young women are being diagnosed with alcoholic liver damage.

Thanks to @TheAttagirls.

More here, and links to the rest.

Grammar: Howlers 27

Write to me, and I will send you some brieflets to browse through and a brass badge to wear in your loophole. (Gerald Wiley)

You'd better battle down the hatchets. Once a poly time. Have a pupcake. Gone off on a tandem. On a petty stool. Windshield factor. Rod iron gate. Wheel barrel. Valentime’s Day. French benefits. Condominimum. (via Twitter. Batten down the hatches, once upon a time, cupcake, tangent, pedestal, wind-chill factor, wrought-iron, wheelbarrow, Valentine's, fringe benefits, condominium. And "heart-rending" has irretrievably become "heart-wrenching".)


We’ll burn that bridge when we come to it!

Joanna Cherry sadly loses her seat. Tonight’s SNP defeat was sewn by Nicola Sturgeon and Ian Blackford. (@PhantomPower14. They mean “the seeds of defeat were sown”.)
sew division: sow division

sails from: hails from
metaphorical: metaphysical
sloncho: cilantro
crowned jewel: crown jewels (The royal regalia that belong to the monarch.)
crassonts: croissants
paramount for "more important": It means "most important".
ultraviolent lamp: ultraviolet
Caucuses: Caucasus

aniquilate: annihilate/liquidate
marywania: marijuana
chicken coup: coop
Solomon Gomorrah: Sodom and Gomorrah were notoriously sinful cities, according to the Bible.
slathering: slavering (You slather whipped cream onto a cake, and your guests slaver over it.)
Don't confuse deem (consider) for deign (lower yourself to answer the door etc)

Jejune does not mean naïve or callow – it means "dried-up".
blue a casket: blow a gasket
a manevelant presence: malevolent
hiding go seek: hide and go seek
make due: make do
crushing bore: crashing bore
dye-sected: dissected
Chock it up: Chalk it up.

cheese lounge: chaise longue
insightment: for incitement
It was a different seriniro: scenario
I'm just about to tug into some American pancakes and bacon. (@eyre_ann. Tuck into.)
media barrens: barons
All-timers’ disease: Alzheimer''s
Crimes including assault, fraud and purgery: perjury

mired by scandal: stained by, marked by (You can be "mired in" a situation, like a car stuck in the mud.)

pass mustard: pass muster
wonderlust: wanderlust
I'm biting my time: biding
You’ll be in for a ruffled time: rough old time
He got off scotch free: scot free
Low and behold!: Lo and behold.

Pity The Times is a burnt flush. (@SimonD555. That’s “busted flush”. Poker, probably.)
white as a sheep: sheet (Common in the US - where sheets are coloured or patterned?)
down to brass tracks: tacks
dorma window: dormer
ludacris: ludicrous
Bastille burner: pastille burner (producing incense)
straddled with debt: saddled

jumped up charges: trumped up. (A parvenu or johnny-come-laterly is a jumped-up temporary gentleman.)

Amphibious pitcher makes debut: Venditte becomes first pitcher in 20 years to pitch with both arms in MLB game. (ambidextrous)

nerve-wrecking: nerve-racking (wrack [wreck] and rack [torture on a rack] are terminally confused.)

foul-weather friend for false friend (A foul-weather friend would stick to you through thick and thin)

I was a laughing stalk: laughing stock
Old history was drudged up: dredged up
Rebuff his arguments if you can! rebut
This guy is the epitome of evil in carnet! evil incarnate (evil personified)
He was a wolf in cheap clothing: It was sheep's clothing in the fable by Aesop
Have we taken on more than we can chew? bitten off more than we can chew
wholly pledged: fully fledged

You can’t just pander or be fodder. You have to pander to something or be fodder for something, like soldiers are "cannon fodder". "Fodder" means "animal feed".

A slight woman, her hair perfectly quaffed... (British Journal of Photography. That's "coiffed".)

However, Farage poured damp water on the idea last night: Even Nigel can't get his hands on any dry water.

prophetic fallacy: pathetic fallacy (Ascribing emotions to inanimate objects eg "Angry storm clouds hung over the city." "The glacier's approach was remorseless". Try "unstoppable".)

Where can I buy combustible compost bags?: compostable

Avoid writing "yield" when you mean "wield". You yield to a stronger foe – you give in. You wield power or a sword.

There is a title wave of truth that is about to start coming out. (Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene)

M&S clothes division has been a “thorn in the shoe” for the company, says a spokesperson. (stone in the shoe, thorn in the side

A stiff and upper-lipped Victorian (Daily Telegraph, stiff-upper-lipped)

Typo of the day America has become a vessel state of Israel. (tonythorne007, vassal)

You’re going to have to cut your cloth accordingly. (Wes Streeting)
Lord Moylan may have made an excellent point about the North of England needing to understand that its low population density and small cities mean it can't expect transport as good as London's. We need to cut our cloth and settle for something like the Low Countries. (@thomasforth. The proverb goes: You must cut your coat according to your cloth.)

The Mexicans recognise the upper crust on their tortilla when they see it. (The Times on Lady Susan Hussey receiving a Mexican order – the Sash of Special Category of the Order of the Aztec Eagle.  Tortillas don’t have crusts. They’re so thin there is hardly an “upper”. The upper crust is the top crust of a loaf of bread. It would be clean, unlike the bottom crust which might have picked up some ashes and dirt from the brick bread oven. Well, it’s no sillier than some explanations!)

Old-tie network: old-school-tie network, sometimes called the Old Boy network. (Your fellow Etonians, identifiable by their school ties, give you a helping hand or leg-up.)

Someone was ticked off for talking about Sunak’s “cortege” (funeral procession). Perhaps cavalcade, convoy or motorcade would be better.

Quasimodo predicted all this! (The Sopranos, Nostradamus)

As one of our longest-reining staff members, Andy joined us in 1982 and never looked back. (Reigning. The monarch reigns, you rein in a horse. The Farplants Group)

All around the backwaters of Europe, the common lot of people were still engaging in folk practices of which the church could make no sense, and for which it had no room. (the-hinternet.com “The common lot of humanity” means “the common fate of humanity”, ie death or suffering. “The common ruck of humanity” is meant. How about “People were still engaging...”?)

Williams attempting to seduce Hattie Jacques while Charles Hawtrey is hiding in a cupboard is pure drawer room farce. (Imdb comment. Drawing-room comedies were very genteel and the opposite of farce.)

They don't deserve to be raked over the coals. (It’s “hauled over the coals”. You rake over the embers of a fire.)

Tarnishing the whole service (the NHS) with one sorry brush invalidates those of us doing a great job. (Dr Ellie Cannon. You apply tar to a fence with a brush. Silver gets tarnished if you just leave it in a box or on the sideboard, due to oxidisation.)

dead to the wide: It's a garbled cliché. A Victorian girl who has a child out of wedlock is “dead to the world”. She’s still alive, but she’s dead to “the world”, ie “society” ie people like her parents and their friends.

Thank you to Marjorie Hutchins for her steadfast approach to child safeguarding without the likes of which we will all be treading water in service of the men who groomed these kids. (What does she think “treading water” means?)

It is a problem – when parts of the humanities sacrifice the scholarly ‘moral ground’ and descend into ideology, what value do they have that can be defended to anyone other than like-minded ideologues? (@ianpacemain. Moral high ground.)

In 2018, when I won a journalism prize, Pink News published a scree of of outrage. (Janice Turner, Times. She means "screed".)


Mixed metaphors

The fact that I guessed the murderer in Mrs. Christie’s book only shows how easy it is to miss a cog, through dropping one of the threads. Having forgotten the right explanation of a small incident, I smelt a rat that wasn’t there, and found a mare’s nest which ought to have held a cuckoo’s egg. (Charles William, 1931)

These new developments reinstate the historic street scheme and knit back together the urban grain. (Mixed metaphor. You can't knit a grain.)

Thankfulness is the daylight that crushes the mouldy power of sin. (@Eric_Conn)

Sex and the City smashed that tedious Bridget Jones learning curve of trying to work men out like a complicated jigsaw puzzle to the wall and said, “Let’s start again.” Evening Standard, June 2023

It’s intelligent. It’s left-wing. It’s pathbreaking. (Theconversation.com. Trail-blazing? Ground-breaking?)

The heat poured down upon the narrow deserted streets like a scourge. (An early work by Margery Allingham)

Don’t gloss over the cracks. (You paper over cracks in plaster to hide them. You gloss over a flaw – with paint?)

The victim’s name rang a weird bell in the flea market in the back of my brain. (Martin Ross)

This book treads “well-tilled terrain”. (Anthony Cummins, Observer. Treads a well-worn path? Digs over well-tilled fields?)

Rishi Sunak’s presence in No. 10 is a “groundbreaking milestone”, and John Prescott was a "towering pillar" of the Labour Party.

More here, and links to the rest.

Goldwynisms

Film mogul Samuel Goldwyn was known for garbling the English language.

Only 12 apostles? Go out and get me thousands!

Give me a couple of years and I'll make that actress an overnight success.

I don't care if it (his new picture) doesn't make a nickel. I just want every man woman and child in America to see it.

I'm willing to admit that I may not always be right, but I am never wrong.

I read part of it all the way through.

When I want your opinion I will give it to you.

I don't want yes men around me. I want everyone to tell the truth, even if it costs them their jobs.

An oral contract isn't worth the paper it's written on.

Go see that turkey, and see for yourself why you shouldn't see it.

I'm giving you a definite maybe.

Gentlemen, include me out.

That's the trouble with directors. Always biting the hand that lays the golden egg.

Never make forecasts, especially about the future.

You fail to overlook the crucial point.

Put it out of your mind. In no time, it will be a forgotten memory.

I never liked you and I always will.

In two words: im-possible.

My wife's hands are so beautiful I'm going to have a bust made of them.

If you can't give me your word of honour, will you give me your promise?

When told he couldn't film Radclyffe Hall's "The Well of Loneliness" because it dealt with lesbians, he replied: All right, where they got lesbians, we'll use Austrians.

More jokes here, and links to the rest.

Even More Corny Old Jokes

Stop me if you've heard this one – or save it to put in a cracker.

Blackadder: You see, Baldrick, we need everyone to believe in God, because then they'll be good and not steal my last farthing. But how to persuade them?

Baldrick: Sir, I have a cunning plan.

Blackadder: What's that, Baldrick?

Baldrick: [cunningly] We attack a 19th century biologist. (Pictured.)


You know what's odd? Numbers that can't be divided by two.

Archaeology: a career in ruins.

Autocorrect is my worst enema. (Jim Devlin)

The future is certain; it is only the past that is unpredictable. (Old Soviet joke)
 
All mushrooms are edible, some only once.

I pleaded an urgent subsequent engagement. (Oscar Wilde)

Dates are important, ask any camel.



School inspector knocks on door of progressive school. Door is opened by a naked child.

Inspector: My God!
Child: We don't believe in him here. (Shuts door.)

Can you keep a secret?
Yes, what is it?
Well, so can I!

If you pour water on a duck's back, it runs off.
I'm not surprised - I would too!


Census Taker: Does Willie Handler live here?

Me: No.

CT: Well, then, what is your name?

Me: Willie Handler.

CT: Wait a minute–didn’t you just tell me that Willie Handler doesn’t live here?

Me: You call this living?

(Via Willie Handler)

 

Scene: Berwick Street market.

Stallholder: Pahnd a pahnd, pahnd a pahnd, bananas!

Man in pinstripe suit: My good man, it's a "pound a pound!"

Stallholder: Pahnd a pahnd! Pahnd a pahnd!

Pinstripe: Dad!

Stallholder: Son!

(They hug.)


Interviewer: Mr Gandhi, what do you think of Western civilisation?
Gandhi: I think it would be a very good idea.


In the Bayeux Tapestry, the Normans are literally in bits on the floor.
Helpful Anglo-Saxon: Hast thou tried a myndfulnesse seminar?

Social workers happen upon a beaten and bloody man lying groaning on the pavement. One turns to the other and says, "My God, whoever did this urgently needs our help." (@DavidBennun)


I'm reminded of the story that, when John Prescott, Margaret Beckett and Tony Blair were contesting the Labour leadership in 1994, they were referred to at the BBC as the lion, the witch and the wardrobe. (Jonathan Calder @lordbonkers)

Explorer: Ah, the lost tribe of the Amazon!
Tribe: We're not lost, but are you?

Many years ago I visited North Wales in November, and asked for the time of the next bus from Bangor to Capel Curig. "May", was the response. (Richard Gray)

There’s a lot of denominational friction: Catholics vs. Orthodox, Protestants vs. Catholics, Reformed vs. Evangelical, Mainline vs. Non-Denominational. My brothers in Christ, we should not be attacking each other. We should be ganging up on the Unitarians. (@aelfred_D)


Two Ancient Egyptians are carving an inscription.
How many times do I have to tell you! It’s eagle before snake, except after feather!

I had a terrifying experience last night. I was alone in the house having a bath, when all of a sudden, I felt a tap on my shoulder…


Lisa: My halo sometimes slips around my neck. Actually, on a bad day, my waist!!!
Tiffer: Lisa, don't worry until it's an anklet.


Scientists build a supercomputer to solve the world’s problems.

Scientists: Is there a God?
Computer: There is now.


When I took my ‘structures’ exam as part of my architectural training my viva examiner said “Well I’ll pass you but if you were going to be a doctor half your patients would die.” (Barry Richard Joyce)

During the storms of 1953 when the sea was about to breach the sea walls, the conversation in one house went.

Should we warn the neighbours?
No, they didn't warn us when the Vikings came.
 

I’ll let you know if nothing happens! (Maigret)

If you’re a dreg, be a proud dreg! (Stagecoach)

Rizzo: Why are you whispering?
Gonzo: It’s for dramatic emphasis!


Doctor, doctor, I’ve got a red rash that forms circles and spreads outwards!

Ah, you’ve got erythemata annulare centrifugum!

What does that mean, doctor? Is it bad?

It means you’ve got a red rash that forms circles and spreads outwards.

(Rob Buckman)

 

Interviewer: So where are you from then?

Lenny Henry: Dudley.

I: No, where are you really from?

LH: (puzzled) Dudley

I: OK then, where is your father from?

LH: Dudley.

I: So where is your grandfather from?

LH: Ah that's different, he's from Wolverhampton.


It’s World War Two and the Yanks have arrived. They’re sitting on the steps of their hotel ready to wolf whistle at two girls who are approaching.

Girl One: Remember, do a casual wave and say “How ya doin’, guys?”

(Punch)


1st debutante: How was your honeymoon? What was it like? You know...
2nd debutante: It's much too good for the working classes.

More here, and links to the rest.

Old Nun's Prayer

Old Nun’s Prayer

I am growing older and one day will be old. 

I intend to speak my mind at every opportunity.

And give people the benefit of my wisdom – I’m older than they are and know better.

Dictatorial and perfectionist is better than bland, neutral and dull.

It’s probably a good idea not to alienate people, but I’m not going to accept any rubbish they spout.

Let me hang on to the details – nobody else does.

I’m allowed to moan from time to time like everybody else. Tit for tat – I’ll listen to others.

If I can remember what happened when others can’t, I’m going to point it out. I’ll do my research as usual.

If I disagree I’ll say so, and I’m not going to do everything you want just because I’m old and I need to stay in everybody’s good books.

When it comes to humans, expect the unexpected.

(Found on an old computer, 2024)

James Hilton's Lost Horizon

Published in 1933 - note date. 

We had the film at school, and everybody remembers what happens to Lo-Tsen. Terrifying moment. But it was a long time since I'd read the book. 

Spoilers alert! Four random Westerners are escaping from an oriental trouble spot on the last plane out. A bluff American (Barnard), a young diplomat (Mallinson), an older diplomat and former army man and explorer (Conway), and a middle-aged woman missionary (Miss Brinkwell). Their plane goes off-course over the Himalayas and eventually crashes, and the pilot dies. Soon a party of Tibetans rescues them and leads them down a perilous route into a beautiful valley, Shangri-La, that's not on any maps.

The story is relayed by Conway, who is first heard of ill with fever in a Chinese hospital.

They stay in the monastery, but meet only one of the personnel, Chang, who gives wonderfully obscure answers to all their questions. Moderation in all things, he says, and the truth is always somewhere in the middle. Yes, of course they can leave with the next party of porters bringing necessities from the far-off outside world. In a month, or six, or a year.

Conway is affected by the beauty and calm of the place, and his shell shock (PTSD) from World War One begins to be soothed. In a distant manner, he falls in love with the only other female inhabitant, the teenage Lo-Tsen. Barnham makes the best of it, Miss Brinkwell sees new souls to save - but Mallinson chafes against the boredom. 

Conway is summoned to meet the head Lama. The old man tells him a long story – how the place was discovered by a French missionary, Father Perrault, in the 18th century. How he built the lamasery and became its head. How a local herb plus the atmosphere of the place gave him an incredibly long life. How the whole place is funded by a bottomless gold mine.

"But you understand, don't you," he explains, "That anybody who finds his way here cannot be allowed to leave."

Conway learns more about the lamasery, and meets more of its ageless inhabitants who, with centuries before them, are conducting in-depth scholarship in the library. The monastery is founded on Christian lines, though we see no ceremonies and hear no sermons. The library, collected over hundreds of years, preserves Western civilisation. Lo-Tsen arrived in the late 19th cent, on the way to get married. But she has forgotten such desires, and "is happy". "All that fades in five years," says Chang.

"A great conflagration threatens to destroy Europe," says the head Lama. "But we shall then emerge and re-educate its people about its intellectual heritage."

"You never died, did you, Father Perrault!" says Conway.

"I want you to be my successor," replies Father P.

But then the porters arrive, and Mallinson grabs Conway, saying that if they don't leave now they'll be trapped for ever with "these boring Tibetans"! Mallinson, too, is in love with Lo-Tsen, and they want to escape and lead a normal life. Barnham - on the run from the police - says he'll stay and run the mining operation more efficiently. Miss Brinkwell wants to remain with her potential converts.

So the three set out to meet the porters. It is assumed they make it back to China. We switch back to the gentlemen reconstructing the events. Conway has disappeared again. No mention is made of Mallinson. We're told that Conway was delivered to the hospital by an old, old Chinese woman who soon died herself. 

And all we remember of the book and the films is the happy valley where humans can live for ever. Successive films (one is a musical) distorted the story and dropped the patronising Sunday School tone. The book convinced me that Utopias are hell.

Margery Allingham's Black Plumes

Black Plumes is a standalone novel, without Mr Campion. It has been extensively reviewed by Clothes in Books, who luxuriates in the mourning garments and points out that the policeman's accent is an "excrescence". I hadn't read it for years, but I remembered who had dunnit and why and how. 

In one way it is a mish-mash of some favourite Allingham tropes. The old-established family firm running a gentlemanly business: here an art gallery, in Flowers for the Judge a publisher. The very old lady who was a force to be reckoned with in the 1880s and is still living in the Victorian era (Police at the Funeral). The Old Dark House that contains surprises (Police at the Funeral). There's a fake engagement (The Fashion in Shrouds). There are old retainers who have no education but a lot of common sense. There's a butler who is there merely to show a man going to pieces. There's a loyal secretary who has grown old with the firm. There's a central character who acts "woman in agony because she thinks her boyfriend dunnit". Here there is too much fear stabbing people's diaphragms and the like. Tell, don't show.

The central character is Frances, the youngest Ivory in the dynasty. She stands around on dark landings, while the drama happens offstage, or is told in retrospect (with lots of "had been"). Her brother in law is found dead in a cupboard, and his elaborate funeral follows, plumes and all. The old lady, Gabrielle, insists on deep mourning and proper obsequies, and "Frances began to recognise for the first time the awe-inspiring common sense behind the absurdities of that great social code of the day before yesterday." The Victorians were the Boomers of their day.

Frances notes that her pseudo-fiançé is very good looking and works out, depressingly, that many other people must have thought the same.

Her half-sister-in-law Phillida is an odd character. She hardly ever speaks, but we are told that she is "greyhound like" (thin) and has "smooth, red" hair. She is a hypochondriac who spends much of her time in a lace negligée, sobbing on a "day-bed". She is very worried by her husband's odd behaviour. We don't have much time to study him as he is soon the body in question. Various other gruesome things happen, there's another death, and Phillida retires to bed to mumble deliriously, and that is the last we see of her.

Various characters warn each other not to "get hysterical" – this seems to mean showing, or feeling, emotion in any way. Meanwhile Phillida is acting as a role model in case they want to "break down".  ("My good girl, you can't hang about this ghastly house day in and day out. It's unhealthy. It'll get on your nerves. You'll get hysterical." Later: "Don't go all ethereal over it." Phillida herself "was nervy anyway and underoccupied and it turned into a neurosis. She's a mass of hysteria now.")

David Field, the pseudo-fiançé, is almost the only one to produce Allingham's usual humour. "A deep feeling of no enthusiasm for both of them descended upon me." In another lighter moment, a police station is said to be "neatly decorated in government green".

Everybody seems to think they understand the human mind perfectly, but Allingham points out that "More fantastic beliefs are held by the layman about insanity than about anything else in the civilised world. Frances was no alienist. She had been brought up to believe in the shibboleths." This is the author speaking, not any of her characters.

This paragraph has stayed with me all my life: Frances's mother "used to sit and listen to the intolerable pain of her last illness. 'You can get above it if you do... Listen to it and it's not yours. It's a thing by itself.'" I'm not sure this method works. This also touches a nerve: "The entire gathering was aware of that tingling sensation in the soles of the feet which comes just before the worst is told."

This mystery has slid rather out of sight, perhaps because of the use of the N word by a couple of the servants. It couldn't really be edited out, as it is one of the hinges of the plot. One thing that has long puzzled me: how do those aged retainers carry on scrubbing floors and carrying heavy trays?

More Allingham here, and links to the rest.

Misunderstandings in Shakespeare

We all know that "Wherefore art thou, Romeo?" means "Where are you Romeo?" Juliet is on her signature balcony calling down to her lover in the garden. Isn't she? Actually she is soliloquizing and has no idea her lover is listening. "Wherefore art thou 'Romeo'?" she asks, adding "Deny thy father, and refuse thy name". She is a member of the Capulet clan, and he is a Montague, and the families have been at daggers drawn for decades. Or the other way round. She means "Why are you 'Romeo'?" She adds:

What’s in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet.

The essence of the thing is not contained in the name, said philosopher Ernst Cassirer. Juliet is being quite deep.

****

If it were done when 'tis done t'were well
It were done quickly.

The witches have told Macbeth that he will be "king hereafter". So why not fulfil the prophecy by killing King Duncan?

He ponders: If it's all over when the deed is done, then it's a good idea if it's done quickly.

He is punning on two meanings of the word "done" – "over" and "achieved". But as Agatha Christie proved so often, you commit one murder and then...

****

There's husbandry in heaven – their candles are all out.

Banquo is walking around Macbeth's castle. He is uneasy and can't sleep, and tries to work out what time it is, observing that the stars can't be seen. "Husbandry" means thrift: the inhabitants of heaven have put their candles out to save money. But it's also a pun – he means that husbands are doing what husbands do after lights out. In the dark he bumps into Macbeth, who is on his way to murder King Duncan. 

****

Hoist with his own petard clearly refers to suspending someone by a giant skyhook – doesn't it? It means "blown up by his own mine". Here's what Hamlet said:

For 'tis the sport to have the enginer
Hoist with his own petard; and 't shall go hard
But I will delve one yard below their mines
And blow them at the moon.

Did Shakespeare intend those internal rhymes: petard, hard, yard?

What People Say They Want 3

@DrJenIzaakson The chasm between what people say they want vs what people actually want.

She wanted to make it clear to me that no woman wants to see her husband cry, even though women say men should be more emotional. That’s just what they saaay. Women want strong men. (Via Twitter)

@NatalieKelda (writer): People say they want original ideas but most prefer the same thing just slightly repackaged... It's so sad bc agents and editors keep saying they want unique/different stories but then go "No, not like that" so people from a different cultural background are forced to water down and Anglicise their story to a point they lose their distinct voice.

And while people around the globe think they like spicy food, Mexico is the only country that really does, so chilli Doritos have to be made spicier there. Meanwhile, she says, “even the tiniest level of heat” is too much for Russia. (Crisp flavour creator, Guardian Dec 2023. Conversely, you’ll be safe eating “hot as Hell” food in the US.)

In a 2020 McKinsey U.S. consumer sentiment survey, more than 60% of respondents said they’d pay more for a product with sustainable packaging. A recent study by NielsenIQ found that 78% of U.S. consumers say a sustainable lifestyle is important to them. Yet, ask any CPG executive if this matches actual sales figures for these products and services. (Fastcompany.com. Presumably “...and you’ll get the answer ‘no’.”)

@FABRICIONAKATA: 70% of straight women say they want a partner over 6ft but only 15% are partnered with a man over 6ft tall (in econ we call this revealed preferences). (In common sense, we call it “availability”.)

@SLCPaladin: 72% of households SAY they want a walkable community, but only 22% actually live in one.

And then there is the more meta problem of personal qualities people say they want to find in others versus what they really want - and what they really mean. Be original, just like everybody else.

And you can’t get much more meta than this: 

@theotheroliver: Do you guys think there is such a thing as an intentional disconnect between what people want and what people say they want? Like "communicate!" etc but more like a lot of people want to get something while specifically not asking for it or denying that they want it? (Now I want you to be totally honest...)

@JennaHollan Many people are rationalising, not rational. They say they want honest communication but feel attacked and take everything personally if you actually offer it.

@sgbrownlow Most of what people say they want is what they believe others think they should want. Most people don't want what they need, or even what their soul cries out for. They desperately want to fit in. So they play it safe, asking for only what they imagine others will approve of them having, determining that through context clues and mind reading.

@sam_d_1995 The problem with "just listen to what people say they want" when it comes to housing and transportation policy is that most people don't know what they want, and even more people want things that are inherently contradictory (you can't have more housing and less development!).

Nice girls. Men say other men should marry nice girls, and that girls should be nice and marry nice men and have nice children. But they go for the painted ladies. And they don’t want to get married.

A year ago, we were in the middle of a General Election campaign. And there was one message I heard loud and clear on the doorstep: We want things to be different. (David Cameron, 2011)

@spectator British couples are having just 1.6 children. However, when you ask them how many they want, the answer is 2.3. 

@Botanygeek Pretty much every ‘heritage’ / ‘heirloom’ tomato you buy in fancy stores… They are usually a mix of weird shapes and colours bred in the last few decades to match what we like to *think* oldy worldy tomatoes were like.

@DelLuna25 People say they want diverse adult animation but then throw a fit any time we get it and it attracts an audience that isn't cishet white college dudes. (He’s talking about anime porn.)

@KebidooO This is a black Muslim man taking public office at a major metropolitan before he’s even 50 and seems to have a clear realistic objective. Why is he getting so much hate when this is what people said they wanted – a young diverse government?

By Heck sausage maker ditches meat-free products due to lack of demand. (Daily Mail 2023-05-05)

The crowning ambition in my life is to be able to be with another person. That’s what we all want. We say we want world peace… (Sue Perkins, Times, 2013)

Spontaneity is a virtue that we wish to have ascribed to us but don’t actually want to act out. (Steven Poole, paraphrase)

Americans like laundry products that are advertised as smelling of lavender, but actually smell of vanilla. (Harper’s Magazine)

What is it about late capitalism that allows a profitable literary industry to be built on telling us we should appreciate simple pleasures, get back in touch with nature, express ourselves creatively, attend to human relationships rather than material things, come to terms with our mortality, and so on? (Sam Leith, Guardian, 2012)

People say they don’t like laugh tracks, but they prefer programmes with laugh tracks.

They say they want to see new, original movies, not remakes. They don't go and see them, but go and see sequals and remakes.

They say they like subtle colours in the garden, like pale pink old roses. But in garden centres, it’s the brightly coloured blooms that fly off the shelves.

They say they want to buy handmade things from small businesses, but buy stuff that's mainstream and mass-produced.

Publishers say they want new, original ideas and quirky approaches, but buy the same old, same old.

Studies consistently find that when new grocery stores open in food deserts, people still buy the processed foods. @StatisticUrban

Everybody says they want to be different. They even claim they ARE different. But they’re very surprised when they meet someone who really is different. They’re convinced you’re normal underneath.

More here, and links to the rest.