Misandry - the acceptable face of discrimination

Most people reading this blog will, I imagine, be familiar with the term 'misogyny'. It's strict definition is a hatred of women, though its meaning has been broadened in the mainstream media to include any act of discrimination by males against females. It's something which ageing male television presenters seem to be accused of on a fairly regular basis, and of course a misogynistic attitude is wrong, plain and simple.

Who among you, though, is familiar with the term 'misandry'? Scholars of ancient Greek will recognise the fragment of 'andros' in there, the word for 'man', and so it should take no great leap of the imagination to discern that we're discussing a 'male equivalent of misogyny'. That is, after all, the term I put into Google to find 'misandry', though in my defence it's such an underused word that none of the spell-checkers on my computer include it in their standard definitions.

This is wonderful news, isn't it? A term so underused that it doesn't even appear in the dictionary. Surely, then, incidents of misandry are so rare as to be impossible to find. I wish it was so.

Misandry is woven into the fabric of modern popular culture. Don't believe me? Well, I can give you four common examples, and I'd be really surprised if you haven't come across at least one of these in the last six months.

• Diet Coke ads
  This is one which just keeps running and running, and has even been updated recently. If you're not familiar with the concept, allow me to explain; it's not very sophisticated... The idea is that a bunch of modern career ladies are working hard, and deserve a break. What better than a Diet Coke, because of course women are always worried about their weight, right? This advert is guilty of misogyny too!
  
  But of course, it's not that simple, because by some convoluted and not quite believable reason, there's a hunky guy strutting around their office performing some manual task or other, over whom they drool, thereby objectifying him in a manner which would cause outrage if the gender roles were reversed. But it's OK, because it's just a man, and they don't mind being made into sex objects, right?
  
• Silly Daddy Pig
  Peppa Pig is a very important part of many young girls' lives. I really can't object to the program as a whole - it's harmless, quite funny and moderately educational, and not even too annyoing for the parents (well, me at least. Can't speak for everyone here). However, one character takes a misandric bullet in almost every episode. Daddy pig is clumsy, lacking in common sense, prone to outbursts of anger and/or grumpiness, and generally seen as another dependent for Mummy Pig to look after.
  
  Wow. Stereotyped much? This falls squarely into a view of the world where the mother in any given modern nuclear family is the capable one, the one who manages the family, and the father is just another kid, albeit bigger. See also, the next point, regarding pharmaceutical adverts.
  
• Pharmaceutical and Pharmacy adverts
  What happens when winter comes? Daddy and the kids all mope around the house dying from a minor case of the sniffles, whilst mummy, who is suffering from real flu, period pains (their cliché, not mine) and possibly malaria, runs around doing everything. This usually includes the Christmas shopping, and Christmas dinner. All while holding down a big job in the city, making nativity costumes and curing cancer in her spare time. And how does she manage this? Well, apparently it's by taking Nurofen products and shopping at Boots.
  
  Really? Doesn't work that way in my house, and I suspect not in yours either. Mums are often amazing, don't get me wrong. But dads can be OK, too; they don't have to be (and often aren't) infantile dependents.
  
• Twilight moms
  Possibly the most disturbing case of double standards in recent times is the habit of middle-aged women screaming like pubescent girls over the teenage characters in the Twilight film franchise. I've used the American spelling of 'mom' since it's typically a US trend, though not exclusively so.
  
  Imagine this was a group of middle aged men getting hot and bothered about a teenage girl in a film. In public. With signs. And screaming. OK, that last part wouldn't happen anyway, one suspects, but just the very idea would have the Daily Mail up in arms about perverts. It's OK the other way around, though.
  
  Double standards are discrimination by exclusion - why should one group of people be allowed to behave in a certain way when another cannot? Or, rather, why should these women be allowed to get away with behaving in this (quite frankly disturbing) manner?

Why is this such an important issue? After all, haven't men been treating women in this way for centuries? Isn't it time for a bit of payback?

Well, no, not really. You see, even if misandry is deemed acceptable (and it certainly seems to be, according to mainstream media), that doesn't mean we should allow it to be part of our society. You see, following the logic of the 'payback' argument goes something like this:

1) Misandry is no different from misogyny.
2) Misandry is acceptable, because it's only fair.
3) Misogyny, being equivalent to misandry (see point 1), is therefore acceptable.

Um, no. No, it isn't. So, you see, if you make misandry acceptable, you're not only doing damage to the image of men, but serving to counter women's rights. Oops.

There's a second string to the 'damaging women's rights' bow, too - the idea that misandry is quite reasonable only serves to lower the tone of the argument. it says, "Look, we're just as bad as you are, now!" It serves only to reduce everything to the lowest common denominator. It's a race to the bottom, a fight to see who can be more discriminatory.

You might also be thinking to yourself that this isn't quite as important a fight as women's rights, or gay rights, or race rights, or the rights of any other oppressed minority. You're kind of right, I'll concede that. But, you see, if you blithely accept one form of discrimination, that leaves the door open for all of the other sorts. I'm not concerned that this misandry will have a significant effect on the role of men in society. What bothers me is that it is (and I really hate to use this term, because it's always used by those with a not-real-world view of the likely outcomes of anything) the thin end of the wedge. If this is OK, what else will be?

Why Americans need to be careful about who they vote for

There are plenty of reasons, I'm sure, for choosing one political party over another in the race for the American presidency. I imagine there's a fair amount of history involved, too - if your parents voted for one party or another, you're fairly likely to follow them, once you've got over your youthful rebellious phase. And of course, for the rest of us in the wider world, the outcome is extremely important - if the Democrats get in we'll get to hear rabid nonsense from Republicans for another few years about how America is going to waste, and if the Republicans get in we're likely to die in a massive nuclear war. Joys.

But Americans really need to have a good, long think about how they vote, because the direction of politics in America has a very profound affect on how the country is seen around the globe. Americans might suggest that they don't give a damn about what we think, and if that's their attitude that's fine. But it's short-sighted and naive, and I'll tell you why: without the export trade and the influx of tourists, the American economy is trousered.

These revenue streams are governed both by the strength of the American economy, and also - crucially - the perception of the American public across the wider world. People won't go to American if they think it's full of tub-thumping rednecks, and let me tell you one little thing you may have missed, America: if you elect Mittens Romney, people will think that you're a dangerous bunch of idiots.

Tourists will be shit-scared of your border agencies. Anyone who fails to believe in puritanical, Americanised Christianity will fear for their rights of religious freedom, and anyone living east of the Mediterranean will imagine themselves being arrested upon arrival for being a "damn Commie".

If you elect a Republican president, the world will, I'm afraid, have no option but to think of you as having potatoes instead of brains. You can complain all you want that I don't know the first thing about American politics, and you'd be mostly right, but this isn't about knowing American politics, it's about knowing how non-Americans think. And America, I've had years of practice at doing that...

Should we ban tobacco outright?

Recent legislation in the UK has seen another blow to the tobacco industry, with retailers no longer allowed to display tobacco and tobacco products on their shelves. Instead, these products must be kept in shuttered cabinets, with the shutters only opened at the precise moments of need. This is a further attempt to discourage youngsters from viewing the purchase of tobacco as a 'normal' activity, and further legislation might well get passed which enforces the sale of these products in plain, non-brand-designed packaging, to increasingly de-glamorise the industry. This move is already being implemented in Australia from December this year.

Clearly we are heading towards the point where sales of tobacco are eventually eliminated entirely. Certainly the current direction of policy is to marginalise the practise of smoking as much as possible - it is becoming harder to buy cigarettes, and the ban on public smoking sends addicts (an inflammatory term I very deliberately use) out into the freezing rain to get their fix. It would seem, then, that we are moving toward a society where smoking is banned outright.

Let me go on the record now to say that I agree with this outcome. Smoking should be banned, because it is an addictive, harmful activity with no benefit other than to satisfy a craving which only exists due to smoking in the first place. It costs the NHS something like £5bn per year, as well as having a knock-on effect onthe family and friends of smokers, not least through second-hand smoke inhalation.

Pro-smoking lobbying groups (often sponsored by, if not officially part of tobacco companies themselves) will argue that to smoke is the right of the individual, and that it should be a personal choice. To some extent it should be considered thus - after all, who are we to prevent others from making their own choices in these matters? On the other hand, though, imagine if tobacco was introduced to the world for the first time in 2012 - it would instantly be legislated against as a harmful drug, probably in Class C of the UK system, much like cannabis. It is only our history of using this drug, coupled to a perceived lack of impact on personality (unlike, for example, heroin use), which prevents it being considered quite as harmful as perhaps it should be.

Of course, a total ban is probably an impossible dream. Tobacco companies know they can't win the war, but they're fighting all the way. They support both the Conservatives and Labour in the UK, and as such can guide policy towards measures which, while they appear to be aimed at curbing the uptake of tobacco, will have very little effect on existing users - if you need your fix, you'll get it. We must also consider the revenue from tobacco sales, which is predicted to be £12.1bn for the 2011-2012 UK tax year, a not inconsiderable sum. Pro-smoking groups would argue that losing this revenue would dramatically harm the UK economy, and to a point they have a decent argument - the revenue certainly outweighs the quoted cost to the NHS, though in my sums I'm ignoring costs to the economy due to time off for smoking-related illnesses.

I don't know the answer, but I suspect it lies in the re-invention of the tobacconist, a shop type which has morphed into what we would now call a newsagent. Further marginalisation of the sales process is probably the only feasible means by which we will continue to decrease the demand for tobacco and tobacco products. Eventually there will come a time when the revenue from smoking begins to fall (according to the figures quoted in the link above, they have steadily climbed since 1990, and probably before that), and we will see a decline in the power of the pro-smoking lobbyists. Only at that point will a complete ban be on the cards.

When debating goes south

Before I begin to get into things, let me just go on record to state that this article has nothing to do with any opinions I might or might not have regarding the role of religion in the world. This article is nothing to do with that, it's all about how some people who should know better allow themselves to fall into a mode of argument which weakens the foundations of their arguments. Anyway, on with the rant...

There's very much been a recent trend towards a cheap, unintelligent approach to the debate over the relevance (or lack thereof) of religion in the modern world. I'm not intending to debate the rights and wrongs of religion, but rather to discuss a prevalent habit for lazy argument which makes its proponents look rather absurd.

Leading the way in this field is the humanist Richard Dawkins; you may have come across his work. He is according to all available accounts a fairly intelligent man, but he does have at least one serious failing - his inability to discuss his anti-religious feelings without highlighting them as exactly that: feelings. Dawkins approaches his arguments with a zeal which, were it not painfully ironic to do so, we would happily liken to a religious fervour.

That he is enthusiastic about his subject is not in itself reprehensible - quite the opposite in fact - but when he claims to represent the cold, hard face of reason, he cannot afford to allow his feelings to interfere. He must be the Jedi, the Vulcan, the dispassionate warrior of logic and reason. By not being so, he cripples his own argument.

And there is another angle to the modern anti-religious argument which is self-corrosive: the "sneering" attitude, which aims to suggest that the owner of the attitude isn't even willing to get into a debate about religion, because it's somehow beneath them, or the argument is pointless because it's already been won.

I'm a huge fan of Stephen Fry, a witty, urbane, intelligent man with a sense of humour which can dissolve me into fits of laughter. But he is prone to a rather sneering attitude to the issue of religion, an attitude which can be summed up as "oh, I'm sure it's a lovely thing for some people, but come now, it's not really something serious, is it? Haha".

I'm not interested in having a discussion about whether his views are right or wrong, but his approach to the argument, which simply put assumes that it is impossible for an intelligent person to examine religion and subsequently wish to join in, is rather crass and unworthy of the man. I'm convinced there are a number of really rather intelligent people involved in religion all over the world, and to assume that their faith comes as a result of some sort of failure of reason really does insult that intelligence.

I suppose my angle here is that I dislike sloppy argument with weak foundations. The same accusations could, I have no doubt, be levelled at the religious communities of the world, but, and here's the fundamental difference, religions never claimed to be based on cold, hard logic. Opposing views often do claim to be logical, and therefore arguments submitted by the anti-religion lobby need to transcend any possible emotional colouring, or the laziness of the condescending "come, now". Without being beyond reproach, these arguments begin to look a little childish, and therefore lacking in fundamental validity.

Film Piracy - gaarrgghhh!

And no, I'm not talking about Captain Jack Sparrow... or, for the record, piracy of television programmes. 

I'm bored, bored of the same old arguments surrounding online piracy. Apparently, a study has just concluded that online piracy of films has risen by 29% over the past five years. This, my friends, is hardly headline news - the availability of high speed internet has increased rapidly in that period, removing the last serious barrier to the downloading of massive content, so what did they expect? The example set by music pirates was bound to be followed.

On the one hand, I disagree wholeheartedly with pirating. As an aspiring author, copyright is important to me, and I don't like to see an artist's income damaged by the activity of a group of people whose only defence is that it's too expensive to actually buy music or film. That's a little like trying to defend stealing a television from Dixons on the basis that you can't afford to buy it. It's ridiculous, and you'd never get away with it in real, physical terms, so why do you think it's OK to do it online?

On the other hand, the film industry kind of had it coming, and I have little sympathy. For years they have charged ridiculous prices to watch films in the cinema, and then they're upset that people are trying to find a way around having to take out a mortgage just to see the latest in a long line of rather average films. Seriously, guys? Come on. Cinema is, quite simply, fantastically overpriced. You can't even blame the cinemas themselves, as it's well known that the only way they make a profit is through food and drink sales. It's the distributors who set the prices in reality.

And it's not as though the production companies and the stars of these films are underpaid so that the distributors make a profit. Quite the opposite, in fact. Last year alone (2010), the top three earners in Hollywood (James Cameron, Johnny Depp and Steven Spielberg) earned a total of $437,000,000. That's a ludicrous sum.

Before you spit out your coffee, I'm well aware that most actors and producers/directors earn nowhere near those sums. In fact that disparity simply adds another string to the bow of my argument that Hollywood has nothing to complain about - only in a den of such thorough corruption could some individuals be paid so well and yet others practically starve.

Hollywood, it would seem, is beginning to reap what it has sown. For too long the industry has lived in a bubble, believing itself to be far more valuable and important than it really is. Will the world cry if the film industry collapses? Probably not. I certainly won't.

Election Fever Entirely Fails to Grip UK...

There will be a general election in the UK on 6th May.

The BBC News website devoted a full-width banner headline/picture combo to the story.

The last time I checked, the story was only 6th Most Read, and 5th Most Shared.

Epic Giving-a-damn-about-politics Fail. 

Interesting things you should know...
(the following numbered points are copyright BBC Top Gear magazine - buy the June 2007 issue for more. Italicised sections are my comments)

1) According to Euro NCAP, an Audi Q7 (SUV, villified) is less harmful in a pedestrian impact than a Ford Fiesta (small, 'safe' family runaround).
2) A season of F1 racing burns less fossil fuel than a single transatlantic 747 flight.
3) The Stern Report found that cars make up less than half of all transport emissions in the UK.
4) The average British home emits 1500kg more carbon dioxide per year than a Ford Focus.
5) A car carrier (the ocean-bound variety) burns 1756 tonnes of heavy fuel oil one way from Japan to the UK (that's a lot, and the worst kind, and makes the Prius - made in Japan, shipped worldwide - not suddenly so environmentally friendly. According to an earlier article, that journey adds 1 tonne of carbon dioxide emission to an average 16.5 tonnes for 100,000 miles of Prius driving, a significant amount).
6) Oxford Street is the UK's most polluted street. Most of Oxford Street's length is closed to cars.
7) Like trains, cars are only efficient when they're full. A fully loaded Discovery emits less carbon dioxide per occupant than a fully loaded Smart (of the two-seat variety).
8) Acid rain from mining nickel for Prius batteries has destroyed the landscape of Sudbury, Ontario to such an extent that NASA now uses the area to test drive its latest lunar vehicles.
9) The average saloon car is responsible for its own kerbweight in carbon dioxide per year. The average Brit accounts for 30 times their own body weight.
10) The UK's superminis emit three times as much carbon dioxide as its SUVs.
11) While 85% of cars are recycled by law, trains go unregulated with much of each heading to landfill.
12) A domestic flight emits 400g/km of carbon dioxide, four times that of a small diesel car with only the driver onboard.
13) Despite being smaller and emitting LESS CARBON DIOXIDE THAN A PRIUS, the Volkswagen Polo Bluemotion is not exempt from London's Congestion Charge.
14) Farting cows are responsible for 18% of all greenhouse gases, more than cars, planes and all other forms of transport put together.
15) A Landrover Discovery has a smaller carbon footprint than a London cab.
16) A Boeing 747 emits 400 tonnes of carbon dioxide in 24 hours. It would take 250 cars a year to achieve this.
17) Some electric cars aren't governed by today's safety legislation - I urge you to buy the magazine and see what happens when they crash test a G-Wiz. A technician is apparently heard to utter: "I see these tests every day but I've never felt sick before". Alternatively, the footage is available at www.topgear.com/gwiz.

This isn't going to persuade anyone who's already made their mind up that cars are evil, but banning them from the roads based on emissions is not going to solve the problem. It won't even make us meet the more stringent Kyoto targets. How about targetting homes and businesses instead, environmental lobbyists? Get a clue...

Debt-hit NHS removes light bulbs
Ok, the idea is meant to be that we're shocked by the fact that this hospital is saving a few quid by taking some lightbulbs out. Problem is, the MP they quoted really has rather missed the point. He said "If our hospitals are scrimping money on light bulbs, how can they afford the latest drugs and high quality patient care?". Er, by scrimping money on lightbulbs perhaps?

There are so many things bugging me today I'm going to have to listify:

1) Sport - why is sport so rubbish these days? Seriously. I can't remember the last time I actually got really excited by a sporting event. Take the Premiership, for instance. It's dull and boring. The same people win all the time, the same people lose all the time. There's very little unexpected, and 99.9% of the headlines are about politics, mostly managers getting annoyed at how craps the referees are. Pretty much every other sport we see is crap, mostly because Sky have bought the rights to and raped everything else that's interesting, charging people unpleasantly large sums for an inferior product. I realised last night as I scanned the pages of BBC Sport that for the first time in a long time, I really was looking forward to the excitement of Formula 1, and that's saying something considering the driving is as dull as it's possible to get.



3) John Howard - I am, for about the four billionth time in my life, embarrassed by my home nation. It's always the politics, because you just can't deny that the place is really behind the times. John Howard (stupid, stupid man on a par with George W) has come out and slammed Barack Obama, an American Democrat presidential candidate, for suggesting that he would pull American troops out of Iraq within a year if he was in power. Now, there are plenty of people in world politics who would share Mr Obama's views on the subject (I know I do). So why has John Howard slammed the guy? After all, he's not even in the same political arena! Perhaps, and I don't want to suggest that mr Howard is racist here (he is, by the way), this has something to do with the fact that Obama is an African-American. By that I mean his dad is African, his mum American, rather than he's just black and can trace one of his ancestors three hundred years ago to Africa. And that he would certainly not be a political ally of Mr Howard. If Howard gets another term, Autralia is only going to become more embarrasingly outdated. I pray that this doesn't happen.

4) Paul Jewel, and the referee situation - have a look at this. I can understand the Wigan manager's response to what is quite clearly favourable treatment for a big club at their home ground. It happens all the time at Old Trafford, Stamford Bridge and the Emirates. We're past the point where we can excuse the odd mistake with the old 'only human' chestnut. These aren't odd mistakes any more. They're common, and categorical, and should be picked up by referees who deign to call themselves 'professional'. Clubs are being cost points and financial bonuses by men who are making more errors than they should be allowed to get away with. And my team (Boro) haven't even been that badly affected by refs!

That's it for the list. Other than that, my Monday morning is full of annoyance on the work side of things, and full of sleepiness elsewhere. Really need to get this whole body clock thing sorted. Hey ho.

Big Brother Racism
Normally I wouldn't comment on any issues that I view as inflammatory, and as regular readers will know I've only broken this self-imposed rule a couple of times in the past. I'm worried, though, about the recent turn of events in the Celebrity Big Brother house, where one of the contestants (in case you missed it, or aren't living in the UK or India) was accused of racially abusing another, the Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty.
My reaction to the number of complaints, and the way that some of the comments have been singled out, swings between two extremes, and can settle on neither because I don't think that I have a full understanding of the accused's character. On the one hand, I think the complaints are fully justified. The massive street protests in India (including the od favourite of effigy burning) are another thing, but then that's simply because we wouldn't be doing it that way here, so it's unusual to me - we're just too damn polite to actually stand up for ourselves most of the time. But on the whole, when I hear the comments and see the way Shilpa has been treated, I'm pretty disgusted (though not wholly surprised, a view which has developed over my years in the wider world - more on this below).
The other extreme is concern. That sounds a little mild-mannered to be an 'extreme', but it is. I'm worried that this is going to become another bandwagon, that the issue will be hijacked by those wishing to make a point not central to the issue. The discussion of racism and the underlying current of this social problem is all good and well, and if this situation brings the issue to the forefront and forces us to confront the ignorance and bigotry in this country, then all the better. The problem comes when this issue is used as a stick with which to beat the UK, for other perceived crimes (and real ones). The crime, of course, is the nature of our foreign policy, which is imperialistic and out of line with the general wishes of the public. We have had a chance to fix this, but because it was more comfortable to do so, the majority left Labour in power. Ever since we invaded Afghanistan, and then went after Iraq in the name of freedom (a pen-name for the otherwise anonymous 'Mr Oil Greed'), the UK has been a target of hatred. Believe me the hatred existed before Tony Blair gave extremists an excuse to vent it (and a direction, by aligning ourselves with the beligerently stupid American George W), but since it has become normal to hate the UK and America, and the reasons have become more and more mudied by politics, any excuse to have a go at the British is seized upon.
I don't mean to sound like we should be feeling sorry for ourselves. We have no-one to blame but our own voting public. But I am concerned that this stance seems to have risen to the level of international politics, with India seeking to question the UK about the Shilpa issue. Racism happens every day, in practically every country (with the possible exception of Iceland), and governments don't get involved. India's excuse this time is that the racism is being given an airing, and that the goverment has a responsibility to step in and halt it. This is, in the case of, say, holocaust denial, perfectly reasonable - not every viewpoint deserves a view, because not every viewpoint is based on an intellectual decision. The idea that a citizen of the UK automatically deserves the right to spread hatred under the banner of freedom of speech demeans the very basis of the concept, which is nothing like 'freedom of hatred'. However, in this case, I rather think the comments need to be aired so that the likes of middle England, peaceful in its ignorance of these issues, can be made aware that they exist, and can be disgusted enough to try to make things better. My point here is elucidated by the case of a Shipwrecked (another Channel 4 program) contestant, who was heard to utter racist remarks in the first few days of the show. Channel 4 claims it wants to continue airing the series on the basis that later on this contestant's views change. I agree, therefore, with their decision, because it's worthwhile showing that the ignorant can be educated, that those who hold these views are not entirely beyond hope, and not entirely acting out of malice.
Before I went to university, I never really encountered racism. To me, a comfortably-off, white, middle-class male, it was a historic thing. The N-word was banned quite publicly from the playground when I was a kid, and although the war wasn't quite done, we all knew at some level that the fight had gone out of the fascists. It was a false view of the world, but it was comfortable. I attended a private all-boys school for my secondary level education, and it was a fairly well-mixed place culturally (even including kids from across the financial spectrum due to a thorough scholarship scheme). I wouldn't say it was a perfect mix, because we didn't have stupid people there, but the racial mix was pretty healthy. I left this environment firmly believing that racism was dead as a concept, because there really wasn't any at school. Yes, there were cultural divides, but that's just tribality - skin colour didn't matter. But when I left that little bubble and experienced the outside world for the first time, I was shocked to discover that it's full of bigotry and racism. It still disturbs me now.
I'm not entirely sure what my point is here. I think I wanted to say that I'm still unsure whether the way in which this issue has been dealt with really is right. Jade is ignorant, as is this girl on Shipwrecked, and they're not alone. Social education is the only cure, and ignoring the issue by shutting down Big Brother isn't going to help.
Having said that, I still can't stand that bloody program...

Having recently ranted about the way in which shirts I bought from Marks and Spencer were packaged (private rant, not blogged), it pleases me to note that they are at least making the effort to go carbon neutral. Reminds me that I need to sort out neutralising the car and our flights this year.

Ok, I'm not the most politically correct person in the entire world, but as I sat watching The Simpsons this evening, I was rather shocked to see that they'd shown the episode including the attempted assassination of Saddam Hussein. Now, normally this wouldn't be anything to worry about, but if you have a look at the dateline on this post and check out the news for the week (assuming you're not reading this this week), you'll find out that the man himself was executed for crimes against humanity only a few days ago. For some reason, it just doesn't seem right.

Haven't done this in a while, so thought it was about time I did something.

Went to see Muse on Saturday night. It doesn't take a genius to work out that they were going to rock. As much as they did? A little unexpected. Personal highlights include the mad mechanical housing thing the drummer lived in, covered by a thousand lights, and the renditions of New Born and Plug In Baby from Origin of Symmetry, and Invincible and Knights of Cydonia from the latest album, the latter of which was the finale. The older stuff was especially good - they've always been favourites of mine, and to finally hear them (and feel them) played with such passion and skill was worth every penny of the ticket price alone.

I might have a job soon, and I'm getting excited about the prospect. After three and a bit years of a PhD which I've come to loathe with all my heart, the idea of something new, with structure and realisable targets, and decent pay, has got me all hot under the collar. Obviously it's too early to tell if either of the interview processes I'm involved in will actually be successful, but hopefully one or both of the two will actually be offered to me.

Final bit of news - a new blog. Well, not yet, but in a little bit when I get it sorted out. I need a place to write random stuff about the model aircraft, and this isn't it. Went to a show type thing on Saturday (before Muse - I'm so schizophrenic), and was disappointed to find that many of the stereotypes of modellers do hold true. I won't say too much more than that, as I'm sure you can fill in the blanks for yourself. I know there are modellers out there who don't fit in to the traditional stereotypes, but they seem to be few and far between judging by Saturday's evidence.

One last thing (sorry!) - got an e-mail this morning about a seminar given by one of the departments here at the university. Part of it reads (and this is copied and pasted from the e-mail, a direct quote): " SKA is expected to be operational with a severe cost constraint of one billion Euros". SKA stands for Square Kilometre Array, and it's basically a large radio telescope. What bothers me about this, and one of the things that I've never managed to square away about the whole research thing, is the concept that a billion Euros is a 'severe cost constraint'. That's more than the GDP of the entire African state of Lesotho. Or, alternatively, more than the combined GDP of the six poorest nations in the IMF. On a bloody great telescope. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for progress, but surely this money would be better spent elsewhere, such as in the hunt for decent, sustainable energy sources, or the search for a cure for AIDS or cancer. Complaining that you 'only' have a billion Euros for your big telescope is childish and shortsighted, which pretty much sums up a lot of scientific endeavour these days...

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Consensus grows on climate change
Yay! Another report! What would we do without all these valuable reports to tell us that chucking loads of pollution into the air has a negative effect?! Still no mention of when international governments are going to do anything real about it though...