Monthly Archives: October 2024

  • Font for fascism

    Steve WoodsLanguage, Politics, Tech

    Convicted serial offender and fascist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, who for some inexplicable reason prefers to be called Tommy Robinson, has brought out a book with the help of a ghost writer Peter McLoughlin.

    For a day the book entitled Manifesto was top of Amazon UK’s best-seller chart, according to The Guardian, is is currently unavailable on Amazon’s website.

    Cover of Manifesto written by Peter McLoughlin with interference from Stephen Yaxley-Lennon

    Whilst the cover looks like the flag of St George folded in half, the text below the title dubiously claims the book deals with Free Speech, Real Democracy and Peaceful Disobedience, whilst what Yaxley-Lennon and his supporters indulge in is freedom to be racially prejudiced, fascism and violent disorder, as the media have duly reported down the years.

    However, the most salient feature of the cover that caught your correspondent’s eye was that the title and the names of the book’s authors were all written in the Comic Sans font.

    This friendly sans serif font is popular in place like primary schools due inter alia to its assumed legibility. This font, termed notorious by none other than the BBC, has also been in existence for 30 years this year.

    However, the font has not proved universally popular, as is imparted by its Wikipedia page.

    Film producer and The New York Times essayist Errol Morris wrote in an August 2012 posting, “The conscious awareness of Comic Sans promotes—at least among some people—contempt and summary dismissal.” With the help of a professor, he conducted an online experiment and found that Comic Sans, in comparison with five other typefaces (Baskerville, Helvetica, Georgia, Trebuchet MS, and Computer Modern), makes readers slightly less likely to believe that a statement they are reading is true.

    Contempt and summary dismissal are both apposite to anything that comes out of Yaxley-Lennon’s mouth, from his pen (or in his case crayon. Ed.) keyboard or camera.

  • Know worries

    Steve WoodsLanguage, Media, Politics

    The verb to know and the associated noun knowledge are both concerned with the possession of information, awareness, familiarity, recognition and the like.

    Over the centuries this has resulted in some very specialised uses. One of these is the phrase carnal knowledge, described by Wikipedia as “an archaic or legal euphemism for sexual intercourse“. Thus the verb to know can take on sexual connotations. The most notable example of this usage is in the King James Bible in Luke 1. This is where Mary receives news from the angel Gabriel that she is to be mother of the son of God. When so enlightened, she replies as follows in verse 34, implying she is either unmarried, a virgin, or both:

    Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?

    Three members of the Metropolitan Police
    Hello, hello, hello!
    What are you writing about here then?
    Besides the field of human physical relationships, another field in which know has a particular meaning is law enforcement. The phrase in question in this context is “known to police“. Anyone who is known to police is not usually a person who drops into the station regularly for tea, biscuits and a chat. The phrase implies one has been arrested, charged and possibly convicted too, i.e. one has a criminal record.

    Or at least it did until this week.

    Yesterday’s Bristol Live/Post carried a report of an Avon & Somerset Police Question Time on 14th October featuring Chief Constable Sarah Crew and Clare Moody, the elected Police & Crime Commissioner.

    At one stage the discussion turned to human trafficking and modern slavery. The Chief Constable remarked that places of employment where trafficking was suspected included car washes, nail bars, care homes and agriculture.

    To this Ms Moody added:

    Victims of modern slavery and human trafficking are some of the most vulnerable people in our society.


    In order to be able to intervene in this criminality you have to be able to identify it’s happening. Your own threat assessment estimates that only ten per cent of the victims of this crime are known to Avon & Somerset Police.

    Is Ms Moody implying that 10 per cent of slavery and trafficking victims have a criminal record or have been previously arrested by Avon & Somerset’s finest? Or is she unaware of the special meaning of known to police?

    Your ‘umble scribe suspects the latter.

    Is known to police on the route to becoming another archaic or legal euphemism? Add your thoughts in the comments below.

  • Bristol Live exclusive: M4 diverted via Somerset

    Steve WoodsBristol, Media, Oddities

    The London to South Wales motorway, otherwise known as the M4, runs from Chiswick in the west of London to Pont Abraham Services near Pontarddulais in Sir Gaerfyrddin (that’s Carmarthenshire for monoglots. Ed.). It passes through or close to the major towns and cities of Slough, Reading, Swindon, Bristol, Casnewydd (Newport), Caerdydd (Cardiff) Pen-y-bont ar Ogwr (Bridgend), Port Talbot and Abertawe (Swansea).

    The route of the M4
    Route of the M4. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

    Or rather it did: until a traffic report on Sunday in Bristol Live which saw road repairs move it several tens of kilometres south from South Gloucestershire, the unitary authority in which Tormarton is situated to Somerset.

    Headline reads Motorway lane shut in Somerset after road repairs 'fail to set'

    Fact checking is important when reporting the news, except it seems when one works as a Reach plc ‘journalist‘: or the newsroom atlas has inexplicably gone missing; or is non-existent.

  • Whom the gods wish to destroy…

    Steve WoodsLanguage, Politics, Social Media

    The seventeenth and eighteenth centuries saw the revival of a phrase dating back to ancient Greece and such luminaries as the philosophers Sophocles, Plato and the playwright Aeschylus. That phrase, still with us today, is generally rendered as Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad.

    All of which bring us neatly from ancient Greece and the Enlightenment to the 21st century and the United States presidential campaign.

    Kindly step forward disgraced former president, insurrectionist, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual predator, business fraudster, congenital liar and golf cheat, one Donald John Trump, an immodest man with much to be modest about.

    Despite being the worst president in modern times, the felonious Trump is once again running for office. One reason for this might be to keep him out of jail for his 34 current felony convictions, with probably more to follow for stealing classified documents and other high crimes and misdemeanors (as per the US constitution).

    However, as the campaign has progressed – not necessarily to The Donald’s advantage – it has become increasingly apparent that Trump is becoming increasingly incoherent and possibly senile.

    Take, for example, the post below on his Truth Social account on the havoc caused by Hurricane Helene recently.

    Note in particular the use of block capitals, a sure sign of something awry.

    Post reads DEVASTATION IN THE SOUTH LIES SQUARELY ON THE SHOULDERS OF THE INEPT BIDEN AND HARRIS ADMINISTRATION. THIS HURRICANE NEVER WOULD HAVE COME ANYWHERE CLOSE TO OUR BORDERS AND WREAKED HAVOC ON THIS BEAUTIFUL COUNTRY IF I WERE STILL IN OFFICE. THE FRAUDULENT 2020 ELECTION HAS ONCE AGAIN WROUGHT A TERRIBLE FATE ON AMERICA!

    Yes, you did read that correctly: it was all the fault of the incumbent Biden-Harris administration, which is a fairly typical Trump assertion. However, the claim in the next sentence that the hurricane would never have come near the US of A reveals delusions of divine powers, i.e. the ability to control the weather.

    This is not the first time Trump has had difficulty with a hurricane. Those with long political memories may recall Sharpiegate during The Donald’s disastrous occupancy of the Oval Office. The hurricane’s name was Dorian and, as CNN reported at the time, little Donny used a black Sharpie (a brand of felt-tipped pen popular in the USA. Ed.) to alter an official National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration map to include Alabama in the hurricane’s predicted course.

    Make America Grate Again, eh Donald? 😉