The which celebrity do you really, really hate meme

Bryony Gordon has a standard sleb based opinion piece in The Telegraph today where she sounds off about how much she irrationally hates Hugh Grant despite never having met him. So far so barely worth linking to.

However she makes this statement in the article:

I have a theory that almost everybody loathes one person in the public eye with such passion that the mere mention of their name is enough to make you combust with rage. This person has to be someone famous, someone you have never met before, someone who can pop up on the television for 30 seconds yet make you feel apoplectic for hours afterwards.

She then goes on to explain that she put this proposition to a number of her colleagues and they each quickly came back with someone.

As I thought about it, I realised that this actually does apply to me. In my case I rather irrationally hate Patrick Kielty. I mean come on, look at his smug face! Also, he just strikes me as a nasty piece of work. I recall years ago seeing him having a spat with someone on Fame Academy (I think it was one of the judges, I wasn't really watching it) and he just really reminded me of people I have known in my life like that who are snide and take real pleasure in doing down others. Since then I can barely stand to see him on the TV at all and will actively switch him off even if he is on something else that I really like. (I just pray to Jeebus that Uncle Stephen does not make him a regular guest on QI).

Anyway, I wondered how common this phenomenon is so I thought I would memeify it.

The rules are as above that they must be famous and also that you have never met them. I am going to exclude politicians or people you hate for political reasons too. It has to be just based around their face or demeanour or something else equally shallow and irrational! And you can only pick one so if you have loads it has to be the one you hate the most. However irrational though you must justify your choice and try and persuade the rest of us of the rightness of your cause!

I tag:

Jennie Rigg

Dazmando off of Bracknell Blog

Tory Rascal

Byrne Tofferings

and Tom Harris

LDV Meme - Favourite blog posts

I realise I am a bit late to the party but I have been on holiday so have only just had the chance to do a post in response to last weekend's Lib Dem Voice meme regarding the blog posts from our own site that we wish to self nominate for the imminent Lib Dem BOTY awards.

So here are a few plucked from my blog:

Democracy Diner: I did this satirical sketch last month imagining what it would be like if restaurants treated its customers in the same way as the electoral system treats its voters. It was fairly well received.

If Jeni Barnett's MMR show is within Ofcom rules then the rules are broken: I feel very strongly about evidence based medicine and in this post from June I questioned whether Jeni Barnett's disgraceful LBC show on the subject of MMR from January should have been deemed to be within Ofcom rules.

"Commentariat vs Bloggertariat" event review - #eiblogger: This was a review of the #eiblogger event that Editorial Intelligence kindly invited me to in June and which I posted the next day. It was well received and was reposted on the Wardman Wire. I also posted a follow-up where I listed what myself and other bloggers considered to be "Classic blog posts" in response to Martin Bright's assertion during the event that he had never come across one: Classic blog posts for Martin Bright of The Spectator

How STV would re-enfranchise voters: One of a number of posts I have done about the benefits of STV. In this one which was a direct response to a Tory in Manchester who I had been debating with on Twitter the night before, I highlight how STV could actually be beneficial to someone of his political persuasion in his geographical area.

Cameron will say anything to avoid electoral reform: A response to a piece David Cameron wrote for the Evening Standard where he mustered all the canards he could find against electoral reform. I attempted to rebut them all and this post was well received and linked to.

Fascinating research into public perception of the drugs issue: A post from last month where I highlighted some interesting findings from research done in New England a few years ago about people's attitude to legalising cannabis for medical use. It turns out that although a majority are in favour of it, they erroneously think they are in a minority!

I attended Andrew MacKay's meeting and I think his position is now untenable: On 22nd May this year I attended a meeting called by my local MP Andrew MacKay where he attempted to explain his behaviour regarding him and his wife (fellow Tory MP Julie Kirkbride) claiming two second home allowances between them. The meeting went very badly for Mr MacKay and the next day despite what he had said to the media straight after the meeting he announced he was stepping down. My post includes a synopsis of the meeting from contemporaneous notes I made during it. This is my second most successful blog post ever with over 5,000 page views.

MPs Expenses and safe seats correlation - update: This is my most read blog post ever with over 6,000 page views and was linked to by Polly Toynbee in the Guardian as well as lots of bloggers both inside and outside the Lib Dems. It was a follow up to my post Has our electoral system contributed to the MPs expenses scandal? It explores the apparent correlation I discovered between the likelihood of an MP having been involved in the expenses scandal and the safety of their seat. Thse two posts led to me being invited onto Radio 4's "More or Less" programme to discuss the working behind my findings and the idea that our First Past the Post electoral system that allows these safe seats is at least partly to blame for the scandal has now seeped into the national political consciousness in a way that I still find amazing. I have heard senior politicians including cabinet members referring to the apparent link in arguments for electoral reform which as a keen reformer myself I find most gratifying.

Quel est l'état de la blogosphère Lib Dem?

Following up on the latest LDV weekend meme, here are my thoughts on the state of the Lib Dem blogosphere:

What are the greatest successes of the Lib Dem blogosphere?

I think that the Lib Dem Blogs aggregator is one of the best things about the Lib Dem blogosphere. It enabled me to get an instant audience for my posts when I first started (and it still does) and I know it has helped many others similarly.

Lib Dem Voice is also an excellent hub for all of us and its existence has been a great anchor for me as I have become more and more involved with blogging.

What are we, collectively as bloggers, failing to achieve?

There are no individual Lib Dem bloggers who are anywhere near as widely read as Iain Dale or Guido Fawkes and a number of other right-leaning bloggers. Maybe some (perhaps many) in the LD sphere aren't so bothered about that but with readership comes influence.

We also collectively don't seem to have a very high media profile. For example, a couple of weeks ago Jonathan Sheppard (Tory Radio) popped up on The World at One to publicise his "Scrap Early Day Motions" campaign even though I suspect the website itself gets a very small amount of traffic (I am basing this on the fact that I wrote an article for it arguing for reform, not scrapping and got almost no referral traffic from it). I know a number of Lib Dem bloggers were opposed to the campaign but as far as I know, none of us got any mainstream media coverage for our views on this. Maybe it's because we are not as well connected as the Dales, Fawkes, Greers, Sheppards etc. but if we want to influence the mainstream debate then we need to be better at doing this.

How does the Lib Dem blogosphere compare with those of the Labour, Tories and other parties’?

I would say this wouldn't I but I genuinely think that the debate within the Lib Dem blogosphere is of a higher quality than that in the other two main parties. We seem to genuinely debate issues and largely respond to criticism constructively and without resorting to ad hominen attacks. I concede we are not always perfect in this way, but we are far, far better than many Tory and Labour examples, some of which are just plain nasty.

How helpful is blogging as a campaigning tool (are there examples of it making a real impact)?

I think it needs to mature. I helped set up a local campainging blog for Lib Dem activists in my area (Bracknell Blog) and there are many other examples of locally based blogs that may be able to make a difference if they can build up a decent local readership. National blogs are naturally going to find it harder to make an impact as the effect is so much more diffuse.

I do think though that eventually, blogs and other online media will make a big contribution to campaigning.

What do you think the next year holds in store for the Lib Dem blogosphere?

I think the run up to the election will be a very interesting time for us. The febrile atmosphere that will inevitably ensue will test our ability to be responsive but also measured in our approach and to properly debate issues. I hope we don't succumb to the lowest common denominator stuff that I see from too many blogs in the other spheres.

It would also be nice to see more Lib Dem bloggers and them being more active. My understanding is that there are already well over 200 on the aggregator but it often seems to be the same 20 or 30 I see posting frequently. Perhaps the galvanising effect of the general election will improve this and I hope the momentum can be maintained after the election.

PS: I started blogging as a Lib Dem blogger last November and I haven't looked back so if any Lib Dems reading this have been considering doing it themselves and you can devote a little bit of time I would suggest you go for it.

EDIT: I was in a bit of a grump earlier on and re-reading this I realise that I have been a bit harsh on the Tory and Labour blogospheres. There are great examples within these and I have had numerous enjoyable debates on here and on their blogs as well as across Twitter. I just feel that at the extremes there are some examples that leave something to be desired but they are to be fair very much a minority.

I learned the truth at seventeen

That love was meant for beauty queens, and high school girls with clear skin smiles, who married young and then retired.

Actually that was Janis Ian's experience of being seventeen. But having been tagged by Stephen Glenn (well he said "feel free to have a go yourself" and I read those words and assumed he was speaking directly to me) I thought I would have a crack at this "Politics and me at Seventeen" meme.

I did also sort of learn the truth (about politics in my case) because I studied "British Government and Politics" at A-Level and it opened my eyes to the full wonder of our political system. It was also at the age of seventeen in 1991 that I visited the Houses of Parliament for the first time on a politics class trip guided by our then MP Gordon Oakes. I think he was a bit sozzled and perhaps not the best guide but it was amazing to see inside the place which had only just been opened up to the TV cameras.

Thatcher had just been deposed, a general election was imminent, EMF were in the charts, comedy was about to become the new rock and roll. Times were good for the young political enthusiast.

And yet I never got directly involved. As I have discussed previously on this blog I actually only finally joined a political party last year (2008) at the age of 33. Looking back now I am not really sure why. I think when I was that age I was more interested in socialising (by which I mean going out and getting trolleyed) and the ladies than sitting in rooms debating policy positions with the type of people who were generally considered geeks. It sounds a bit sad to say that now because I probably would have loved doing it given how much I was in awe of politics. I can still vividly remember a hustings that took place in our Widnes Sixth Form College in the run up to the 1992 general election where the candidates from the 3 main parties took questions from the assembled stroppy teenagers. I asked a question about the River Mersey in case you are interested (I am too embarrassed to say exactly what that question was now although I do recall).

I can still remember the names of the candidates. Gordon Oakes for Labour (the incumbent - see above), David Reaper for the Lib Dems and Grant Mercer for the Tories. Mercer was clearly a parachuted in candidate earning his spurs in an unwinnable seat. I can still remember him reeling off central office statistics in a vain bid to convince a fairly partisan crowd that the Tory government was doing some good! Incidentally, if anyone knows what happened to either of the Lib Dem or Tory candidates subsequently I would interested to hear.

Anyway, I suppose that's about all I have to say for this meme. In some ways I regret not having got involved in politics earlier, but on the other hand I have been able to form a clear and strong political identity independent of parties and then choose the one that most closely matches me today.

Eight things I hate

Constantly Furious who always seems to be angry about something or other has tagged me with the "Eight things I hate meme" which is apt given his perpetual state of rage. He seems to think that Lib Dems never get annoyed about things. Well here is my attempt to prove him wrong:

1) The fact that to try and work out what the quickest and cheapest train journey to somewhere is has become all but impossible. I am sure it never used to be perfect under BR but there are now about 50 different companies you can book journeys through and not only do they all give you different information and contradict each other, but if you wait 5 minutes and go back to the same company, they even contradict THEMSELVES! Who the hell thought it was a good idea to split it all up so you can now never find out who is repsonsible? Actually I know. It was the last Conservative government in a final act of spite before they fell into political oblivion.

2) Homeopaths. Take your anti-scientific, placebo emulating, useless sugar pills and shove them where the sun don't shine.

3) Anti MMR campaigners. Congratulations by the way to all those dogged campaigners who still believe that one flawed and completely discredited study 11 years ago trumps all subsequent properly scientific studies that show absolutely no link at all between MMR and autism. You have now succeeded in causing the worst outbreak of measles in many years. The worst example of this I have seen recently is Jeni Barnett the LBC radio hostwho I can only describe as an idiot who spent 45 minutes spotuing pseudo-scientific nonsense and screeching down and insulting anyone who disagreed with her. I blogged about this disgraceful episode here.

4) The First Past the Post electoral system. How can a system that shuts out most small parties thus depriving a substantial proportion of the electorate of any parliamentary representation and that allows a government to get 55% of the seats on 35% of the vote be considered fair or democratic?

5) The War on Drugs. This has been going on for 40 years. It clearly does not work. There are about 500x more heroin addicts in the UK now than there were in 1971 when the misuse of drugs act was brought in. the current system maximises harm and criminalises people for what is essentially a public health issue. And yet when anybody tries to question the current system they are bayed at from politicians and the media that they are "soft on drugs" and emotive arguments that don't actually engage with the questions are mustered against them. Hence most politicians are terrified to go anywhere near the subject.

6) Big Brother. I know CF also listed this but he is bang on. What had the potential in series 1 to be an interesting sociological experiment (indeed that's how Endemol first tried to sell it) quickly degenerated into what it is now. A bunch of ecomaniacal, attention seeking idiots scratching each other's eyes out for the chance to get their boat on the box for an extra few seconds and thus score the front cover of Sleb magazine. No talent, no redeeming features and no shame.

7) Marmite - nuff said

8) Windows Vista: This is a long one so you might want to stop reading now!
- It is so slow. I am certain my current Vista machines (work and home) are both slower than my previous XP machines even though the hardware in both cases is significantly better. It still amazes me how speed considerations just seem to go out of the window for OS and application developers. I don’t want to have sit there for 5 minutes waiting for a load of unnecessary services to load up. I also don’t want to see a spinning blue circle for 20 seconds after I invoke Windows Explorer. I just want Windows Explorer! The worst example of this is clicking CTRL-ALT-DEL. Even this can take 15 – 30 seconds to bring up the low level menu. This is supposed to be a shortcut to the low level of the OS!
- Windows Explorer seems to choose the style and fields available for my view all by itself. Sometimes it will go for thumbnails, sometimes lists. I have tried forcing it to always be “details” with the fields most useful to me (filename, size, attributes, date modified) for all folders but this does not work. I have lost count of the number of times I have to turn off “Artists”, “Album”, “Genre”, “Rating” and “#”. It seems to assume every folder is to be used by a 13 year old child cataloguing their mp3 collection. Even folders that do not contain any mp3s. Beyond frustrating.
- UAC is just intrusive and as far as I can tell in my case pointless. However I have been warned it is a bad idea to turn it off so I put up with it.
- I have reminders of things like “Div X update” every time I want to run Windows Media Player but when I say “OK” there is no update available and I am unable to turn this off.
- The “All Programs” section of the windows menu is worse than in XP.
- Silly things like changing the name of “Add/Remove Programs” to “Programs and Features”. Why!!? It just confuses long time users of Windows. I still have to think every time I need to do this now, “what is it called again?”. Unnecessary cognitive overhead.
- Loss of up arrow in Windows Explorer. This is such a stupid omission.


I now tag Oranjepan and Norfolk Blogger.