John Walker's Electronic House

Everyone in the entire world, with the single exception of me, is STUPID. And I’ve had enough. If you all don’t stop it right away, I’m going to start killing you.

First of all, this has really pissed me off. Originally announced in May, and included in the year’s round-up of things the BBC website staff didn’t know (I’m still looking forward to the appearance of the correct use of “its” and “it’s”), it’s SOMETHING I FIGURED OUT WHEN I WAS A CHILD. All these pathetic questions that people ask rhetorically when trying to announce the unanswerable nature of life’s mysteries make me so damn cross. There’s not a single one in common use for which the answer isn’t perfectly obvious and easily discovered. “Why is grass green?!” Because chlorophyll doesn’t absorb the green region of sunlight, you vacuous cretin. And included amongst these moronic platitudes is, “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?” As a child, I stopped when asked this, and replied, “Well, it will be the egg, cos whatever evolved into a chicken would have laid an egg that was the first chicken.” And now I read that this May, twenty years later, this is some sort of bloody scientific revelation, announced to the world by leading experts? And worse, the BBC responded to these gits trying to garner limelight for themselves by stating the achingly obvious with coverage, surprise, and even an inclusion in the end-of-year compilation? DO BETTER. Everyone, for crying out loud, take a look at yourselves and DO BETTER.

More frequently driving me to crazed distraction (and blimey is it hard to maintain a head of fury while listening to The Album Leaf) are people who WILL NOT THINK WHEN TALKING. Nothing makes me shout more loudly than Radio 4’s Any Answers. Following the generally dreadful Any Questions (Question Time on the radio, television plebs), it’s an opportunity for listeners to phone in and offer their own unique perspectives on the issues discussed. Oh wait, sorry, typo. Offer the same idiotic drivel they read in the editorial of the Daily Fuckwit last week, before having it confirmed by a squawking chav interviewed on Sky Bloody News. Never, EVER do they listen to bumbling twit Jonathan “I’m Not As Useless As My Brother” Dimbleby, as he attempts to ask them to provide some thinking behind their trumpeted bile, but instead they press a giant red reset button on their forehead and repeat what they’ve already said, only adding in some fresh new racism. These ghastly insults to oxygen are the lowest form of human life. I’d rather sit down to eat with a member of the Taleban than any single caller to that programme. Why do I listen, you ask? Because somehow, no matter what time I go into the kitchen to make food on a Saturday, it’s always 2.05pm by the time I’m in there. This same mystical blackhole chooses 2pm and 7pm on weekdays to make sure I catch the sodding Archers at least once a day. If I go too early in the morning for it to get away with warping ahead to after two, then it will make sure it’s 10.20am so I get the most awful part of Women’s Hour.

I’m sure my neighbours have considered calling the police, thinking that I’m horribly abusing a spouse or something, as I scream in rage, “YOU DISGUSTING COW, DIE OF RABIES RIGHT NOW,” or similar, at some broken glass-voiced old Daily Mail-reading bitch proclaiming the “coloured people” are stealing our jobs.

Anyway, the point of all this was to despair at the comments that have appeared beneath my obit to Mike Dicken. I thought, seeing that he was dead and all, it would be a good and decent thing to write something honest about him, as his relatively low profile would mean little media coverage. But obituraries make me furious, as they’re simply cowardly lying. Dicken was an arsehole in many respects, and I think such things should be remembered. But despite this, and despite there being an appropriate place for whiny sentimental tributes on the station’s website, somehow my comments section is filled with barely readable nonsense about how he – nrrgghhhhh – “spoke for us all”.

NO HE BLOODY WELL DIDN’T.

He spoke for stupid people who think that their majority stupid opinions are being oppressed, because their six million selling newspaper tells them that no one’s being allowed to say the thing they’re saying to six million people (along with five other six million selling newspapers) because of the oppressive liberals and their politically correct agendas. These gutwanks read this and are aghast. “No one’s allowed to say this thing that I’ve just read in this national newspaper, and indeed any number of other newspapers?! What can be done about this?!” And then later that night when their hoary old radio presenter lazily reads out the story from the Shithead On Sunday, they think, “God be praised! This single man was brave enough to stand up to the legions of LEFTY PINKO NAZIS who are preventing everyone else in the whole world from daring to utter such secret and radical truths.” And from this the champion is born, the Chosen One risking his life to state the opinions of The Oppressed Man On The Street. I’ve said what I have to say about Dicken, and I did secretly like him, but I cannot cope with the sanctimonious drivel being posted beneath it. Why are you people reading this? Did someone link to it or something? Please, go, run away.

So I went shopping today. And yes, I realise this was a bit bloody stupid of me. But it really confirmed the excellent reasons why I should never be allowed to carry a weapon. Ipswich would be forgotten after the trail of dead I would have left in my wake this afternoon. Look, I know I’ve gone on about this before, but for THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS GOOD AND PURE, am I really the only person in the world who makes an effort to be conscious of who is in front, to the sides, and behind me at all times? Answer: Yes. Yes I am. The only one. I now have no hesitation before growling loudly at people who stop dead in the middle of the street for NO GODDAMN REASON. And I mean growling. There’s no better release for the circumstance, and no better reaction from the selfish bastards who do it. But blimey, did I snarl a lot today.

Every now and then you catch someone who at least understands. Stood behind a group of four who were blocking the entire pavement and standing dead still, I raised my bags of shopping and brandished them as a weapon at their hateful heads. Across the street a dad with kids saw and laughed understandingly. He might live.

Sales appear to bring out the very worst of human kind. It was as if all the inmates of Britain’s prison hospitals were having a day out in your Beautiful Bath, released from their shackles for one afternoon only. Everyone shuffled painfully slowly, like bad extras from One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, no one trying to do anything or get anywhere. I wouldn’t have been even vaguely surprised if they were just slowly stepping backwards on escalators, ensuring their mindless trudging was as purposeless as could be. I despaired for humanity while shopping for jumpers today. Please, everyone, go back to work. I want my town back.