Smoking dumb

Well, as this idiot-fest demonstrates (see http://www.iomtoday.co.im/news/health/should-smoking-be-banned-in-cars-when-children-are-present-1-6460990 ), the island's politicians and public health wonks (or perhaps they now prefer 'wellness facilitators') are intent on following the UK in some bizarre dance of the headless chickens.
I'm not sure what amuses me more, that public 'consultants' get paid good salaries not to do elementary fact-checking, or that the great Manx public (or at least that underemployed cross-section of it which hangs out on ' local news' sites) can waste all day griping cluelessly but not once think to look up the 'study' in question. For example here (see http://anthonymasters.wordpress.com/2014/02/01/smoking-in-cars/ ).
But then, democracy and informed choice are alien concepts to the island, and an off-island owned press which is only here to serve their government and private sector advertisers - and which is also fast losing the hard copy circulation which props that up (see http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/2014/news/abcs-all-the-figures-for-regional-weeklies/ ) - needs as many chuckleheads as possible clicking aimlessly as often as possible in order to justify their advertising rates, I suppose. It matters not that they read pure garbage, spout pure garbage and in every other way behave like the kind of no-hopers who have few future employment prospectives unless they can round up enough other losers to get elected.
Other than giving updates to off-island libertarians who - until a week or two ago - saw the island as a small oasis of sanity within the British Isles I doubt I will get animated enough to worry either.
In fact, it would probably be hypocritical for me to intervene anyway. I long ago accepted that the Manx democratic process is a lie, that Manx civil servants in reality only ever 'work' for those who make it worth their while and therefore that Manx laws or regulation which cannot be enforced never are.
Ho hum. Business as usual then.

Silent Write, who'lly shite

The local sock puppet media (though all Manx media has had either a government or corporate hand in the glove for over a decade now) brought us a sermon from Sentamu’s Apprentice at http://www.iomtoday.co.im/news/isle-of-man-news/god_is_good_at_nothing_1_4093685 .
Oh dear, it didn’t get a good reception, did it?
When even the under-employed dimwits who haunt Johnston Press online forums have gone off a major source of urban myth and general misinformation it may be time to call it a day. Because, as Gary Otton of Scottish Media Monitor (a contrarian colleague of mine who knows that company’s publications better than most) says, only those who stay wilfully under-informed in order to confirm their knee-jerk prejudices haunt such dives in the first place.
Garry, by the way, has the dubious honour of having been banned, even under many pseudonyms, from pretty much every Johnston Press website there is. He has this annoying habit of pointing out the myths and factual inaccuracies in PR pieces from faith-based Scottish hate groups which lazy hacks run, uncut, as their own work. That never goes down well, and as for writing both Sexual Fascism and Badge of Shame (the two best, most damning books ever on the collaboration of the Scottish media in religious hate campaigns against gays, which led to both abominations like Section 28 and a massive increase in homophobic violence) – well, that was right out!
Incidentally, follow the link on the right to Scottish Media Monitor and you will really have your eyes opened about ‘responsible’ local media, church organisations and their friends in government. After a little of that you might just see similarities to the kind of things that vex me, and the reasons I bang on about them. Same media group, linked church groups, similar political scenario.
The odd thing is, I counted four recent stories which gave an excuse for Paterson to offer his dubious thoughts. It might just be because the Manx media is cutting and pasting more twaddle provided by the usual pressure group numpties than usual. Manx hacks so hate to leave the office and actually attend events or go and speak to the public at the best of times: having to leave home and actually go to the office over the Xmas break would probably be a grind too.
But even that is not the oddest thing to me. The oddest thing is that not only have we seen nothing in the Manx media about El Bish chairing the committee charged with producing the Anglican Church ‘pastoral statement’ on civil partnerships (see Big Story, curious silence for more on that), but that the local faithful do not know about it either, and not even the few full time professional clergy have been informed.
The possible exception to this would be the tiny clique of right wingers whose job it is to hand down to Manx Anglican plebs policy and wisdom which, in turn, has been relayed to Paterson from Sentamu’s private crew– a crew which, of course, ‘our’ Bish used to lead.
Their notorious lack of other contact with ordinary churchgoers - and the even bigger gap between them and anything which might be termed the real world - explains a lot. No wonder so many of them are retired civil servants.

A new generation of parliamentary privilege

An article (see http://www.isleofman.com/News/article.aspx?article=40226) by someone I recall as a local paper editor some years back caused me to raise an ironic eyebrow, and gave me a giggle or two. Nothing similar has appeared on radio or in the local print press yet, which doesn’t surprise me for the same reasons that it caused me so much amusement.
The thing is, I pottered about in Manx journalism 20 or so years ago when Hazel Hannan, then MHK for Peel, one day used parliamentary privilege to ask impertinent questions of the Minister for Tourism about Charles Kerruish. More specifically, she was trying to clarify what funding Kerruish might have received from the Tourist Board (as it then was) towards the costs of some holiday cottages he was having built, and with what guarantees.
Doubt later emerged as to whether they really were holiday cottages, and if any part of the possible grant conditions required him to pay back some or all of the grant if he, say, sold them on as private housing after a year or two because tourists didn’t rush to rent them – because tourists weren’t tending to rent a lot of holiday accommodation (or even to visit the island) at the time.
If this sounds familiar that might be because, some years later, similar questions about holiday accommodation were the undoing of a Chief Minister who Kerruish regarded as a protégé. They also went unreported until a court case some time after the questions were being asked, by which time most of the Manx public had obtained answers elsewhere.
Sadly, it seems only two journalists were in the Keys when Mrs Hannan made her enquiries. One was the hardworking Charles Guard from Manx Radio, the other was the equally conscientious and quite elderly Jennifer Leece, then working for the tiny Peel City Guardian, as was I.
Actually, this wasn’t unusual at a time before Johnston Press bought out the island’s two ‘rival’ larger newspaper groups. In fact it was something of a joke between Jennifer and Charles that the other papers only attended Tynwald if one of the MHKs who spoon-fed them was about to make a speech. Much of the time, so printworkers from that era who had to handle last minute page changes say, they just listened in to Charles’s reports and made notes, or used tip-offs from any MHK who was using them as unpaid PR, or just asked Fred Kissack (then Chief Secretary).
Charles, as I remember, did not include Hazel Hannan’s queries in his report that day. Perhaps, like Jennifer, he saw nothing startling in them. It was the usual practice, then as now, that any backbencher querying the actions of the political senility had been primed to do so by the subject in order that such wasters could make a carefully scripted reply to reassure the unwashed masses.
Jennifer, however, did report them, and they appeared in that week’s paper, as from my memory the editor also saw nothing remarkable and expected the Greatest Living Manxman (as he was then regarded) to make a routine explanation in due time.
Only he didn’t. Indeed, there were then claims the paper had misreported the questioning and the GLM even brought considerable influence to bear on both Mrs Hannan and the island’s smallest newspaper to retract all mention of such matters.
At which point the editor dug in his heels, backed the ever accurate Jennifer and said he would wait for the Hansard report to prove she had recorded it word perfect. Which she had. And then, as the editor also ran Manx Life, he continued to ask questions. Meanwhile, the island’s ‘national press’ remained silent, having simply not been there to hear the questions, even if they would be prepared to break the habit of a lifetime and for once demonstrate the gumption or tenacity to follow up.
Which they did not, as they also had not when senior civil servants (or even local police on at least one memorable occasion) ‘advised’ local newspapers not to follow up other stories in those years. The point being, unlike our shoestring operation, those papers received considerable income from government advertising and were expected, in return, to run numerous flattering stories helpfully and exclusively supplied to them.
There was, so I was told, an ‘understanding’ between senior civil servants and the two larger papers that government would prefer it if it was able to place public notices in two publications (as then and now required by various laws) but only pay once. Therefore it would sit back and wait while the papers got into a war for other advertising (which would handily also wipe out smaller, more troublesome publications) and reward the winner when the rival folded.
As it happened, Johnston Press was playing the same game on a larger scale around Britain, intent on monopolising the regional market which was then the only press growth area. When the two Manx rivals had near bankrupted themselves it stepped in, bought them both and captured the entire government contract. JP also found a huge potential one in return for bigging up drunken lunchtime pronouncements from finance sector figureheads who, in the name of all decency, should really be left to ramble incoherently into a hotel urinal until they pass out.
So, in these new and desperate times are we about to see elected politicians and the local press being told by senior government figures who lack even a public mandate what to ask, what to report, and about whom?
Or is just business as usual? In which case I predict the press won’t even need to be ‘advised’, as Manx journalists once were in quite a heavy-handed manner. They already know, and will.
As for the politicians in a parliament where procedure and access to power is controlled by characters who are not used to being questioned (or even having to suffer the indignity of seeking election)……
What do you think?

I can't go on....I'll go on

Oh, it's no good!
Stewart Home once said his Art Strike was "the dumbest idea -ever", but that was (kind of) the point anyway.
I had a few folk asking me to think again, but I tried to stick to my word and not touch this blog again until January 1st 2012.
Then I wondered, is this blind adherence to an abstract principle - even if tongue in cheek and camp as a row of tents - any better than religion? But still I held out. I was hardly twiddling my thumbs either, but while I got on happily enough with other things since January 1st I also watched, with growing horror, what seemed like the total surrender of the local press to a tide of PR bilge - often temperance nazi trash and other pure faith led cretinism.
And to make it worse, it seemed like every last critical voice on the island had taken a more serious New Year resolution than me to just give up asking questions, poking fun....or anything else.
On any given day since January 1st I could have poured scorn at the new folk myths posing as 'news' and 'community action' repeated uncritically and without even a vague attempt at sub-editing or balance through what passes for the Manx media. But I kept cool and instead carried on reading my collections of satirical writings from days before churnalism was invented.
So why change my mind now?
Oh, I don't know. Maybe it was the guilt at knowing that if, say, campaigns against stoning or forced marriages had emergency appeals I couldn't pass that on. Or maybe it was just having to pick up on an event of huge Manx historical importance like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMiskrFz-vY from an off-island source, because it hardly got a mention in the local press. They would prefer to run tripe like http://www.isleofman.com/News/article.aspx?article=34360 instead.
I will write off the Sodor Trust briefly and bluntly. The parent is http://archbishopofyorkyouthtrust.co.uk/ , whose website is somewhat economical with the truth, as you'd expect from a parasitical outfit whose only raison d'etre is to milk the public purse. Look up England and Wales registered charity number 1129075 to find a little more, but you still won't get far past the public image.
Also spend a little time wondering what faith healing has to do with youth work, and if you cannot work that out see if you can explain why one of the trustees, the Reverend Beatrice Brandon, is not only a faith healer but even manages to run her own charitable trust with the help of senior Anglicans up to and including at least one bishop.
And ask yourself why Anglicans are going in for the newest evangelical scam on the rates -'street pastoring' - and if they plan to do it here. I know of at least one bunch of Manx happy clappies who have been sniffing around the Department of Home Affairs, but I didn't think even the Police Liason Committee were falling for that one, and I know officers policing Douglas's weekend club scene didn't, never mind anyone in the Manx Anglican hierarchy. Maybe innocent clubbers really do have to worry about a new threat to public order - late night scriptural muggers.
And that's just today's news.
OK, I'm going to go halfway on this. I really have too much serious stuff to do elsewhere to get back into this on more than an occasional basis. But maybe the odd item is going to come up I cannot ignore, and the odd Sunday afternoon when I can't resist giggling at it.
The miserable, doomstruck characters of Beckett are not my idea of a role model, but as one of them says somewhere (oh, I can't even be bothered to look up where): "I can't go on....I'll go on"..... or rather, as a real Irish comic creation always says: "......go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, go on......GO ON!!!!!"

Twin-set and Pearls Pervs - Are Your Kids Safe?

A while back (see Attack of the blue-rinse conspiracy theorists from September) I mentioned a paranoid campaign by the Mothers Union against the ‘commercialisation of childhood’.
I suspected then that the local twin-set and pearls mafiosi must be just going along with their UK godmothers. What I hadn’t realised until last week was just how serious this particular organised crime spree is. Seemingly, it goes right to Downing Street itself.
This BBC report for example (see http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11923107) shows beyond doubt that not only are the deranged fantasies of superstitious, upper middle class whackjobs taken seriously by others who miss the institutional rent boy racket that passes for ‘private education’, but that the Old Girl Network is as prolific as the better known boys club in Westminster.
The more serious worry is that this also has shades of Tipper Gore and the infamous PMRC (Parents Music Resource Centre), the bandwagon-jumping, horse-frightening US campaign which caused ‘Parental Advisory’ stickers on CDs, and whose side-effect was to guarantee sales for any potty-mouthed rapper on major labels only sold through chain stores, while hastening the demise of independent record and video labels and stores in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s. Thus, while principled musicians (from Frank Zappa to Jello Biafra) fought the censorship and exposed nonsense like the ‘Satanist lyrics on LPs played backwards’ myths (through lengthy senate hearings and court battles) the sexism, homophobia, violence and other genuine social evils the PMRC might have tackled actually increased in popular music.
Perhaps God-fearing middle American parents just don’t worry about that sort of stuff. Certainly they have a long record of sponsoring it.
But what really makes me laugh is that the Mothers Union is run by a bloke (unless Reg Bailey is some Joyce Grenfell clone of a gym mistress whose sexual realignment isn’t complete). Whoever he is, I don’t want him or any of his sex-obsessed friends anywhere near my child, and neither should any sane parent.
Note again that the ‘research’ they did is confined to Mothers Union members. Therefore it does not represent the reasoned views of well balanced, well informed parents who engage with the real world, but of paranoid ranters afraid of the dark and unhealthy interest in child sex some of their best friends haven’t managed to sublimate or deal with properly. Just because media-illiterate Christians are filthy-minded pervs who can’t bring their kids up that doesn’t mean everyone else is.