Tell you what I hate – it’s phoney stuff, the word phoney came to me initially as it was Holden Caulfield’s pet hate and like many people over a certain age I was struck my his valour as a child.
Well it is the way in which people try to glean glory these days that has been getting to me in a massive way of late – for a start we live in a generation desperately seeking some sort of praise or affirmation from their peers or persons unknown – this status is measured in likes and retweets amd faves and views and backlinks and a host of social data and flows which engender a warm cosy glow in the participant’s soul. We seek fame and approval like 3 year olds.
So this diatribe, I must admit has been inspired by a few particular items so I will just whack them on and continue my day. They are characterised by being predominantly executed by smug wankers – phoney ones at that.
I think the first thing to do my head in in this way was the Ukulele player. Now my personal experience is that playing the guitar is very difficult, indeed most musical instruments require structured lessons, late nights, heartbreak and joy in order to reach the ‘stage’ whereby you are ready to perform to an audience. Not so the Ukulele, oh not so that tiny, squashed, guitar like twat strummer. It appears that you can buy one of these and they are so easy to learn that you can just put on a Hawaiian shirt and get up on stage and start your smug pandering on stage. Of course there will be people who envy your prowess and smug ill placed confidence and surely as tax and nurses they will go and buy one of those shitty things and a week or two later will have mastered no only the talentless strumming but the i need a shit look on their face as they play.
That brings me to another such similar issue which is SUP – Stand UP Paddleboarding. It is much the same as the previous issue – right we are all spoon fed with the supposition that there is a cool pervading surfing – there is the association with California in the 60’s; there is the beautiful fitness of the protagonists and there is, again, the notion that some sort of Aloha spirit is bestowed upon the participant. Well actually surfing is really difficult and in order to achieve any sort of mastery – in order to be able to exclaim to ones peers – “I am a surfer” – you have to get really cold and wet, and hurt even, you have to struggle and fall off and look like a complete idiot for ages. It is a slow and hard learning curve which never ends and always frustrates as you improve. Now, like the Uke, there is a way to saunter around with a board and stake your claim to ‘surfcool’ ( predominantly an idea broadcast by surf clothing manufacturers ) and ponce about with a SUP board. OK – in order to be able to paddle a SUP board on flat water you need about 10 seconds experience and suddenly you will be sharing surf videos from YouTube on your Facebook timeline. This is just crap. I mean it is bad enough that anyone falls for the retailers marketing and imagines that there is anything special about themselves because they do something but for dubious wankers to try to shortcut their way into am arena which is reached by struggle and effort is unforgivable.
That was going to be it when, yesterday I saw a photograph taken on a drone. Now photography in itself is a bit of bullshite anyway. If you have a big fuck off camera and a finger you will do pretty well anyway. But now the shortcut is the drone. The main talent of a photographer has always been taking something out of the ordinary, be it a captured moment or an interesting angle – Like wow fuck how did you take such an amazing picture….. like because I went on to Amazon and bought a fucking flying camera – that’s how – just fuck off with your drones I say – you are not clever nor creative just a nerdy wanker.
Last but not least I hate bloggers. In the old days you had to be good at writing, inventive, clever, erudite and interesting to get into print. Nowadays cunts like me write a load of shit and post it on their website and think that they are a writer. Noone reads past the third line of anything these days – we just look for pictures after that much reading. You bloggers out there remember – if you could write you would be paid to do it – fuck off and get a job.