[MoMo]

I think that it is now time to leave the little woodland folk alone and turn to a really serious topic which confuses me.

WHERE HAS OUR PRIVATE AND SILENT SPACE GONE TO?

Boom-box 4X4s which pollute the streets with their mindless bass booms of non-musical intervention are ruining everyones lives to the point that you can't hold a conversation at an intersection without having to crick your neck towards your companion to make some intelligent assessment of what they're trying to say!

I hate the the wa___ers!

They have nothing to add to society, and everything to take take away! Apart from damaging their own hearing, they don't give a monkey's about anyone else's. What sort of culture do they represent? Is it the culture where everyone has rights and no-one has responsibility?

TURN IT OFF!

Same could be said for the guy who has to boom into his mobile phone for the 45 minute duration of the trip from Glasgow to Edinburgh!

Why do we have to know everyone's opinion on everything, as they mouth their trivia into the ether? Hasn't any one of them heard about manners? Do we live in such a cut-down, wasted, semblance of freedom that this is all we have " RIGHTS " to?

My God, don't we hear enough opinionated trash from the media that we have to put up with the cliched banter of mere aquaintances who happen to be bored, and don't know when to rest their tongues and read the paper to pass the time? Better still, why can't they use their brains and THINK for a few minutes. This is called using the imagination!

Soon the world will be a cacophany of noise which fills the universe. The product of this will be a society that never thinks....only listens to inconsequencial trash.

The late Kurt Vonnegut predicted all this. He imagined a society in which intelligent people had to have a noise-emitting device fitted to their ears, and through which would come a nerve-shattering noise every 30 seconds, or so.
He imagined this in his story about " The Handicapper General " ( WRONG : " Harrison Bergeron" ! ) in which society had truly become equal. Everyone had a handicap to make them the equal of everone else!

Of course, Kurt Vonnegut was captured by the Germans during the war and witnessed the aftermath of the bombing of Dresden. This made him a little whacky.....but made him see the big picture clearly. Read " Slaughterhouse Five " and you'll see what I mean.

I think that we are nearing the point of too many rights and not enough responsibility.

[TopHat]

MoMo, you are thinking of the story entitled "Harrison Bergeron".

We don't need a Handicapper General here on this side o' the pond; we already have the Democratic Party and Ebonics is now an accepted variant of the English language.

[MoMo]

Ebonics is now an accepted variant of the English language.
Top Hat

What's 'Ebonics' ?

[TopHat]

African American Vernacular English. IOW, the legitimization of gutter slang.




Now, one can say "Yo, Ho" instead of "Excuse me, Miss" and still be grammatically correct.

[MoMo]

Wow! The ship is sinking! I thought that the hip language was reserved for movies and bad TV shows.

No-one speaks standard english now. The more variation the better, I guess.

[TopHat]

I won't debate the merits of such an idea, but it certainly allows everyone to get an "A" in English.....

[jim]

Ee bye gum, Mo tha carnt arf rant when tha gets goin.

Am barn ta say thas reet though,

[TopHat]

What er ya speakin' there, boyo? Welsh?

[jim]

Welsh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!! splutter gasp. Wad ya mean Welsh ???????????? Nay Nay lad,

That there was good old Yorkshire dialect. Stems from the Vikings influence.

Tha knows, if tha does owt for nowt alus do it fo thysen.

[TopHat]

Silly me! I should have noticed the odd vowel that appears now and again....