Anti-social Network

Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, Bebo, Faceparty, Badoo, Tagged, Deniers of the Holocaust, Haters of Everything and Racist Scrapbook are just some social networks you can become a part of.

A social network is a website where you create a profile and then share useless information about yourself with people you used to go to school with or once met at Dan's Birthday. You know that girl you thought was quite good looking for a ginger? Yeah, well people like that.

Facebook has to be the king of Social networks at this present time. It has over 600 million active users and according to Social Media Today, in April 2010 an estimated 41.6% of the U.S. population have a Facebook account.

It's scary to think how many people are using up their lives and devoting so much time to this website. Imagine if the time spent updating your status or commenting on John's photo of Claire slipping in a puddle of her own vomit at last years Christmas party, was used productively to help destroy the opt in donors list, save certain animals from extinction or to help stop Andrew Lloyd-Webber from appearing on television ever again.

It's not just the waste of time that makes Facebook anti-social it's the fact that it is used as a shameless self promoting tool. This is something I bet you haven't even thought about before but how many time do you see people with a status like this: "Just got back from skiing, now off to do a gig in Holland". Should we actually give a shit about what people we once met are doing with their pathetic, little and boring lives?

Uploading pictures seems to be the most cringe worthy part of the Facebook self promotion as it is controlled in most by the people who are in the photographs. By this I mean they only ever post pictures of themselves that they like or think they look good in. This adds to the false sense of reality that comes from the Facebook community by showing utterly unrealistic representations of people.

Several problems come from this unrealistic representation, for instance people being insanely jealous of Sheryl because she looks like she's lost some weight and you haven't, or James looking like he knows loads of really sexy women and you don't. The chances are that you don't know any sexy women but James doesn't either, he just took a photo with some of his sisters friends while out that night when you were at your parents house with the flu.

So to conclude this essay (and it is an essay). Facebook is something that wastes time that could be put to better use. It makes people jealous of other people for no reason as their lives are equally as pathetic as everyone else's. It helps faceless evil companies advertise directly to you by monitoring what groups you are a member of. Therefore exploiting you in the most sick way possible, perhaps even more sick than sneaking up on you in the middle of the night and farting directly on your face while you sleep.

So next time you log in to Facebook just think about all the little furry animals that will die from you doing so - oh and sleep well...

Films Have Lied To You

When I was growing up watching films I assumed my life would be full of exciting things, cowboys or pirates perhaps? All that has occurred is a slow, expensive and uneventful life.

Now enough about me lets talk about you. Films have really helped shape the way you expect your life to pan out, how you expect your perfect man or woman to be, how you expect to be rich and happy and ultimately you will have lived a worthwhile life. This I'm sure has not happened.

Take romance for example, in films women are swept of their feet and wined and dined. Often men will come to blows in order to win the affection of a certain female. Has this ever happened to you?

Films like Love actually make women think that they will fall in mad all encompassing big pink and squidgey love. More often than not they will have a series of failed relationships perhaps involving a few cases of light domestic abuse before settling for Darren from accounts because he has his own house and isn't addicted to crystal meth.

Another way in which films bullshit you is by making you think life is actually exciting. They show you guys with guns chasing each other down the street and blowing each others heads off. The closest we get to something that exciting is by driving slowly past a motor way traffic accident. Have you ever even seen a gun? I haven't.

Has good ever actually won over evil? Certain films would have you believe that at the end of the day the evil bad guys will be brought to justice, yet in real life they kill John Lennon and somehow Andrew Lloyd-Webber is allowed to live.

Perhaps the government should take steps to liven the country up. Maybe remove every time keeping device or release wild baboons in to central London. I'm just brainstorming here really.

Don't get me wrong I really do love film with it's power to help us escape and learn about the world around us, but I also fear its capability to delude and mislead people about how life will be.

They can inspire us to go out and do great things, make us laugh, make us cry, make us think, make us jump, but also make us believe that America can save the world, which it can't really. Can it?

God Made Me An Atheist

Religion could be the most restrictive and negative thing that anyone can have in their lives, more so than not having the ability open your mouth or not being able to stop repeatedly hitting yourself in the head with a cricket bat.   It dictates what you can't do and seldom gives you a break. It is responsible for murder, war, the spreading of fatal diseases and Sarah Palin.  

 There is no evidence for the existence of god which makes me wonder why people kill and have been killed in the name of it.   I'm sorry there is evidence I hear you say, the bible. Of course any book written thousands of years ago is a good text book to lay down the way you should live your life in this ever changing diverse and modern world. Silly me. 

 Anyway back to the point. This week in the news appeared a rather bizarre article about a 19 year old, American, college basketball star who was kicked off the team and out of the college all together.   Now you must be thinking why? You are probably thinking he shot someone, raped someone, made racial remarks to a fellow baller? He did none of these.   Do you know what he did? He slept with his girlfriend. That's it That's all he did. They were both consenting and of legal age. They were in a relationship and they were in love.

 The reason he was kicked out was due to the deep religious beliefs of the school were sex before marriage is deemed as bad as running round the town shouting Jesus is a prat.

So put down those bibles and start living your life the way you want to, free from guilt and constraint. Or don't, its up to you.

 Other people in the news creating religious based controversy this week include that fashion guy John Galliano telling some Jewish people their grand parents should have been gassed and when Tony Blair said he hates the Jedi. Only one of these is true.