3.28.2006
Copenhagen: to the point
I just got back from a weekend in Copenhagen. Like the Time Out guide states, it really is like a giant middle class. Everyone is impeccably dressed in dark conservative colours. With wealth comes fur-clad ladies, many design and fashion shops and stupidly expensive restaurants, oh and a great number of proud statues. The streets are clean. Bikes are highly popular. You see bikes everywhere; not just in special bike parks but against lamp posts and buildings. Never secured with a chain. An unnecessary investment for a civilised, advanced people where crime is damn near non-existent.The train from the massively impressive and super-modern airport to Copenhagen central station was fantastic. Wonderfully clean, spacious and smooth-running. The seats were practically sofas. The railways tracks and grass banks leading up from the tracks were litter and beer can free (though a significant amount of graffiti). In the UK obviously many primitive Brits litter and the councils are far too stubborn and unwilling to clean up. The private railway companies... no way will/can they invest in regular clean-ups.
Over 25% of Danes have a degree making them one of the most educated people in the world, and it seemed all spoke English. They are also one of the most good-looking people of the world. The men and women can be strikingly handsome and refined. There is in fact a distinct lack of ugly people, fat people, chavs and 'ganstas'. Some of the tall blond women, riding past on their bikes, are simply stunning. They are not an outwardly friendly people; in fact, service providers can be quite direct. However, they are also very controlled and relaxed going about their business, something I realised at the airport. Some Brits tend to be frantic at the airport with big manly mothers bawling at their dumb husbands and sprawling ill-mannered shits... er I mean children (I know, harsh perhaps) as they piss off to the rest of the world they intend to explore in their life-time: being Spain.
Denmark has a small population, so mayhaps this is why crime is low and wealth and order is high. However, there are countries with low populations who are not successful, and then there is Japan, a country with a very high population density, but low crime and a dominating middle class. So, it would seem it is down to the people themselves; something intrinsic. It is also worth noting both these examples are quite closed countries.
3.18.2006
In the news recently – Britain: it's like eating a pie full of shit with sharp blades interspersed
Various information I obtained from the papers recently.
Mick Philpott is a twat. He is a father of 13 with a wife and a girlfriend who wants his Derby Council to pay for a bigger house for all his sprawling sproglets. At least 8 of the children are always there, with others staying over occasionally at the four bedroom council house. When it gets too much poor Mick, who does not work, has to sleep in the tent in the garden. They claim £2000 a month in benefits. The council said they will have a long wait, if they want a bigger house on the free. What did poor Mick Phillpott have to say to that – 'I think this country is going down the pan'. The fucker. How dare he. I say that, not him. He is one of many reasons why this country is going down the freakin' pan. This is the problem with too much liberty... twats like this can have lots of sprogs, who will seriously lack attention and grow up in crowded and unhealthy conditions, and claim loads of green and not have to lift a finger in the world of decent hard working people. We need laws on this. Two/three sprogs max if you cannot demonstrate competence, unwillingness to suckle from the state's tit and especially if your, deep down, just using your kids as a way out of the real world where people fucking try. If they have the right to pop out as many kids as they want and then to claim stupid amounts of benefits, I want the right to know my taxes are not going to be paying for this irresponsible shit. I also want the right not to walk around town and encounter shitty insulting youths, whose indifferent parents have pissed off their duty to bring up good citizens. Rights...haha ya can manipulate them how you want in theory. You can pull a right out your arse.
Teenage mums – we have the highest rate of teenage pregnancy in Europe because it's shite here in the UK. The Mirror on Monday 13th published a story about these kids having babies. Laura – mother at 15 – said she met her son's dad in a nightclub. 'I liked him because he offered to buy me vodka'. She also said 'Until I'm 16 I can't get the benefits other people do. I've had to stop the drinking and cut the fags.' Well...shit.
The Government is spending millions on projects to hopelessly reduce this shameful problem. Some are paid money (£30 a week) to complete their GCSEs. Giving them money, for something they should be brought up to believe is crucially important in the first place, is not productive at all. It just brings more shame. We had to give kids money to get an incentive for education. Fuck that up the arse.
On Tuesday night I watched a documentary, with ever growing dismay, called Drunk and Dangerous on BBC1. It followed police forces at various different locations in Britain and showed the state of our 24 hour drinking fest. It is so horrendously pathetic and degrading to see some of these people. These men and women just love to wind-up the police, as they fall out the pubs and get plain nasty and violent. We also have the hooded 'gangsta' youths doing pistol shooting gestures to the officer's heads. Why fear authority... the worse they will get is a night in the cell and/or a small fine. They will be too pissed to worry about being in a cell anyway.
From the Times on Tuesday I learnt that the Government long ago lost control of the asylum system. The Home Office has lost track of 400 foreign national criminals released from Prison and thousands of other failed asylum seekers. If they commit a crime and get caught then they can be removed from the country (but it costs a bomb), oh and some poor sod has to be a victim to reveal them.
I don't know where all this will go...maybe anarchy one day. This underclass and this drinking culture just seems so embedded now. They have all fortified their positions and say a big fuck you to all authority and decent folk everywhere.
3.04.2006
The UK – it's like eating a pie full of shit
A simple idea. I was wondering recently that many other countries on a similar economic level with the UK don't have an expensive NHS; don't have a large navy and an army with soldiers all over the world. This means these other countries must have more money to spend on internal affairs like greater government subsidy for TRAINS, for example. Our trains services are not getting the help, management and direction they need, they just rot. And how about more money for the pensioners who get so little compared to some other similar countries. For such a high tax country, SO MANY things are just not good enough! Where is this money going?
I get the impression these other quiet countries, like Sweden, Denmark and Japan, are putting everything that have into developing and moving forward, sorting out their own problems more so (eg higher and older population, crime, education and making life good and easier for their citizens). Whereas we prefer to act like we are still some glorious and powerful Empire that must look after countries that cannot look after themselves. It's a honourable thing to be an altruistic country but we must focus on ourselves more. The internal rot is everywhere and growing. Neglected estates boil with indignation.
And the NHS: an amazing achievement I know; it's just a shame it seems to be such a disorganised mess and that so many are forced to go private anyway, even if they cannot afford to. I guess what really grates is the fact we pay high taxes but still catch dirty, primitive, late trains; walk through shit-encrusted litter strewn streets; buy a chocolate bar from some miserable sod; avoid lowly ignorant youth and then get home to find our washing machine has broke down and getting someone to fix it quickly, without complication and not piss you off in any way is damn near impossible.
