Personally I am not a big fan of Valentine's Day. When asked, as a "grown-up", I usually respond with some rant about how it's capitalist, just another way of spending our money, how insecure your relationship is if you need a £2.99 card and an expensive meal to reaffirm your affections, blah blah blah.
"But what about Christmas or Easter?" they usually cry. Well, the reason is that I was happy at Christmas or Easter. Valentine's Day was just another humiliation event to face during the school calendar.
Hence why I agree with this school's decision to ban Valentine's Day cards. Most comments are from outraged parents, including this mother who says: "It's a tradition, I can remember when I used to receive cards from boys in school. It's a lovely thing to do." Yeah but you got cards, didn't you love? Speaking as someone who never received a Valentine's Day card that wasn't from her gran, it hurts. Like most schools, there was a postbox system for delivering your cards. Actually it was the same box used for delivering Christmas cards to classmates except a massive heart was stuck on the top; with the fake snow almost hidden from view. In high school, it was incorporated into "Business Enterprise" and plucky students would go from class to class offering a range of services. You could buy a fake plastic rose for £1 going right up to a small box of chocolates, a card AND a rose for £3. The one year I was brave enough to send a card, I was laughed at. And it hurt.
Seeing these cheap gifts and expensive cards being handed out only reinforced how unpopular I was. Being constantly told I was ugly and disgusted chipped away at my confidence. Early high school was not fun. Therefore banning these cards will help those who know they will not receive such gifts. Yes, it's a bit of fun for those involved. But those left out? It sucks.
Out of interest, this Sunday Him Indoors and I will be celebrating Valentine's Day by eating lots of takeaway food and watching that romantic classic of Hackers.
Showing posts with label news. Show all posts
Showing posts with label news. Show all posts
Friday, 12 February 2010
Tuesday, 2 October 2007
Ian Curtis, compression and Vanity Fair
The cosmic forces in the world are keeping me away from something I want. Very badly.
Control, the new film depicting the life and times of Ian Curtis, opens on general release in the UK this week. I adore Joy Division and the Manchester scene of the 1970s/80s since catching 24 Hour Party People on television one night. It's now one of my most played DVDs and my 'cheer up' film.
Alas, due to other social events and work, the earliest I can see this film is Monday. Monday?! Monday?! So I am not a happy bunny especially as my social life is going to have to be compressed and packed away for the next 8 months or so. Control marks the countdown to when my life is reduced to university, food, paid work and D.H. Lawrence (for no other reason than he's my author of the moment).
My annoyance was kicked off by reading the following article in ysterday's email edition of the Guardian (more on that later) on disability. The writer's stance in the article is that Control contains many themes but one theme that has been overlooked is one of disability. Ian Curtis is probably one of the most famous epileptics, at least in musical history. I read in a magazine article (possibly NME) that even the drum loop could set Ian off into a fit. You can see how music became both a love and an endurance test for him.
As with such articles, it goes off on a tangent and queries whether it is right for actors to depict disabilities they do not suffer from in reality. The comparison of Laurence Olivier blacking up to play Othello has caused some anger. See what you think - link to the article here. As a side topic, Francesca Martinez, who is mentioned in the article, is not a very funny comedienne. Well, she wasn't when I saw her almost a year ago. Her act was primarily based upon her disability which would have been interesting if it had been actually funny. Perhaps her act is improved - she apparently got excellent reviews at the Fringe.
And to my last point. I recently invested in a copy of Vanity Fair, the magazine. It's listed in the women's lifestyle section of most magazine sections. When you see straplines such as 'Iraq's Millions' and 'Bush's Bunker' (and actually referring to a person rather than anatomy) paraded alongside magazines proclaiming "Britney's Booze Bloat!" and "Chantelle is sick after every meal!" you wonder what the world is coming to.
Anyhoo, I read an interesting article on the media and presentation of information. Many newspapers have embraced the web and many post articles on-line, often free of charge. But this creates a problem for the editors. Individuals may not choose to invest in the money for a physical copy of the newspaper when they can access the articles for free. Indeed, as I discovered on my volunteer work placement, the Guardian on-line database has articles and news stories going as far back as the early 1970s.
For me, the news is part of my day. It doesn't feel right if I haven't glanced at the email edition of the Guardian (I pretend it's environmentally friendly to get the email edition - in reality it's so I don't waste money on a paper I don't have time to read) or catch the BBC institution of the Six O'Clock News. Information retrieval and presentation is something that interests me. Probably explains why I want to be an archivist. When I on holiday, I either invest in a copy of a broadsheet or log onto the BBC website, just to check Britain hasn't sunk into the sea when I've been away.
So, what is the way forward? The article (which doesn't appear on Vanity Fair's website - smart move) claims by 2012, the Internet will take over 'traditional' forms of news reporting. In some ways, I welcome that as it means information will, hopefully, more more accessible to the masses. But it's the choice of what news people choose to take in. Will they frequent downbeat stories about what fucked up things humans are doing to each other (most recent, events in Burma) or will they favour the latest in Britney's fall from grace?
I hope to God it's the former rather than the later.
Control, the new film depicting the life and times of Ian Curtis, opens on general release in the UK this week. I adore Joy Division and the Manchester scene of the 1970s/80s since catching 24 Hour Party People on television one night. It's now one of my most played DVDs and my 'cheer up' film.
Alas, due to other social events and work, the earliest I can see this film is Monday. Monday?! Monday?! So I am not a happy bunny especially as my social life is going to have to be compressed and packed away for the next 8 months or so. Control marks the countdown to when my life is reduced to university, food, paid work and D.H. Lawrence (for no other reason than he's my author of the moment).
My annoyance was kicked off by reading the following article in ysterday's email edition of the Guardian (more on that later) on disability. The writer's stance in the article is that Control contains many themes but one theme that has been overlooked is one of disability. Ian Curtis is probably one of the most famous epileptics, at least in musical history. I read in a magazine article (possibly NME) that even the drum loop could set Ian off into a fit. You can see how music became both a love and an endurance test for him.
As with such articles, it goes off on a tangent and queries whether it is right for actors to depict disabilities they do not suffer from in reality. The comparison of Laurence Olivier blacking up to play Othello has caused some anger. See what you think - link to the article here. As a side topic, Francesca Martinez, who is mentioned in the article, is not a very funny comedienne. Well, she wasn't when I saw her almost a year ago. Her act was primarily based upon her disability which would have been interesting if it had been actually funny. Perhaps her act is improved - she apparently got excellent reviews at the Fringe.
And to my last point. I recently invested in a copy of Vanity Fair, the magazine. It's listed in the women's lifestyle section of most magazine sections. When you see straplines such as 'Iraq's Millions' and 'Bush's Bunker' (and actually referring to a person rather than anatomy) paraded alongside magazines proclaiming "Britney's Booze Bloat!" and "Chantelle is sick after every meal!" you wonder what the world is coming to.
Anyhoo, I read an interesting article on the media and presentation of information. Many newspapers have embraced the web and many post articles on-line, often free of charge. But this creates a problem for the editors. Individuals may not choose to invest in the money for a physical copy of the newspaper when they can access the articles for free. Indeed, as I discovered on my volunteer work placement, the Guardian on-line database has articles and news stories going as far back as the early 1970s.
For me, the news is part of my day. It doesn't feel right if I haven't glanced at the email edition of the Guardian (I pretend it's environmentally friendly to get the email edition - in reality it's so I don't waste money on a paper I don't have time to read) or catch the BBC institution of the Six O'Clock News. Information retrieval and presentation is something that interests me. Probably explains why I want to be an archivist. When I on holiday, I either invest in a copy of a broadsheet or log onto the BBC website, just to check Britain hasn't sunk into the sea when I've been away.
So, what is the way forward? The article (which doesn't appear on Vanity Fair's website - smart move) claims by 2012, the Internet will take over 'traditional' forms of news reporting. In some ways, I welcome that as it means information will, hopefully, more more accessible to the masses. But it's the choice of what news people choose to take in. Will they frequent downbeat stories about what fucked up things humans are doing to each other (most recent, events in Burma) or will they favour the latest in Britney's fall from grace?
I hope to God it's the former rather than the later.
Wednesday, 18 April 2007
It's True: Creative Writing can make You go Crazy
I'm sure by now the people who read this blog will be aware of the college shootings in Virginia, USA. If not, then you need to watch the news more often and look beyond the weekly edition of Heat magazine for news information.
One thing that has emerged from this horrible event is that the gunman was part of a creative writing class. AOL has published some of his writings that have come via a fellow student. I am somewhat sceptical of the authenticity of his work, mainly because I wrote better work when I was 12. But we shall come onto that later. The comments upon the news story are revealing in themselves. One commenter says this "porn" should not be published by such a worthy source as AOL. Will this person think twice about renting a film such as Teaching Mrs Tingle or reading Stephen King's novella The Body because it contains such examples of imaginary "porn"?
So, what do these pieces of writing have to say? One features a 13 year old boy with stepfather issues and the second one is the adventures of under-age gamblers in a casino who get caught by their hated schoolteacher. First of all, the quality of these pieces is....well....shit. Take away the striking images conveyed by his word choice and you have some badly written tripe whose author is probably an extreme loner. As the America media is never tired of pointing out, we have to watch out for those ticking time bombs.
If I was at school I probably would have been labelled a 'ticking time bomb'. Why? Because my creative fiction pieces were not very far off what Cho Seung-Hui wrote. I once received the top grade in the class for a piece of work which, after numerous violent acts, ended with the protagonist being shot in the head. Several pieces of work included themes of rape, self harm, murder, torture and suicide. As far as I was aware I was never considered at risk to myself or other pupils. Not once was I referred onto any counselling or asked to attend such a thing. Out of interest, a boy in the year above me wrote an excellent short story about an ETA bombing. I wonder if his work would still be as highly praised as it was when I was at school six years ago?
Bringing this back to my original point, what benefit is examining this guy's attempt at creative writing? His description of being introverted and not wishing to be very sociable sounds like many creative writers I've met. Writing is a strictly self-centred business and you get used to being on your own. In this case all it means that in the event of this college shooting a legacy has been left behind. Some people leave internet blogs behind. Others leave suicide notes. Cho Seung-Hui left behind some badly written pieces of creative writing. On the grand scale of things; does it really matter? 32 students and professors are dead for the simple reason they turned up to class on time. Trying to create a stereotype for these kind of murders is not going to help.
One thing that has emerged from this horrible event is that the gunman was part of a creative writing class. AOL has published some of his writings that have come via a fellow student. I am somewhat sceptical of the authenticity of his work, mainly because I wrote better work when I was 12. But we shall come onto that later. The comments upon the news story are revealing in themselves. One commenter says this "porn" should not be published by such a worthy source as AOL. Will this person think twice about renting a film such as Teaching Mrs Tingle or reading Stephen King's novella The Body because it contains such examples of imaginary "porn"?
So, what do these pieces of writing have to say? One features a 13 year old boy with stepfather issues and the second one is the adventures of under-age gamblers in a casino who get caught by their hated schoolteacher. First of all, the quality of these pieces is....well....shit. Take away the striking images conveyed by his word choice and you have some badly written tripe whose author is probably an extreme loner. As the America media is never tired of pointing out, we have to watch out for those ticking time bombs.
If I was at school I probably would have been labelled a 'ticking time bomb'. Why? Because my creative fiction pieces were not very far off what Cho Seung-Hui wrote. I once received the top grade in the class for a piece of work which, after numerous violent acts, ended with the protagonist being shot in the head. Several pieces of work included themes of rape, self harm, murder, torture and suicide. As far as I was aware I was never considered at risk to myself or other pupils. Not once was I referred onto any counselling or asked to attend such a thing. Out of interest, a boy in the year above me wrote an excellent short story about an ETA bombing. I wonder if his work would still be as highly praised as it was when I was at school six years ago?
Bringing this back to my original point, what benefit is examining this guy's attempt at creative writing? His description of being introverted and not wishing to be very sociable sounds like many creative writers I've met. Writing is a strictly self-centred business and you get used to being on your own. In this case all it means that in the event of this college shooting a legacy has been left behind. Some people leave internet blogs behind. Others leave suicide notes. Cho Seung-Hui left behind some badly written pieces of creative writing. On the grand scale of things; does it really matter? 32 students and professors are dead for the simple reason they turned up to class on time. Trying to create a stereotype for these kind of murders is not going to help.
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