Social Media | Steve Woods

MP finally visits constituency

22/12/2024 Steve WoodsOddities, Politics, Social Media

The seaside resort of Clacton in Essex has the singular accolade of being voted Britain’s worst seaside town by Which? However, its reputation sank even lower in July 2024 when it elected congenital liar, charlatan, grifter and BBC Question Time resident Nigel Paul Farage as its member of parliament.

Even before his elevation to Halitosis Hall, the frog-faced fascist’s presence in town vexed some people: one even threw a milkshake at him; and not for the first time either!

Thus far this fake man of the people has avoided holding a single constituency surgery citing dubious security reasons. Indeed, he has probably spent more time at Mar-a-Lago in Florida, home of the disgraced president-elect of the United States, disgraced former 45th president, insurrectionist, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual predator, business fraudster, congenital liar and golf cheat, one Donald John Trump, than he has done in the parliamentary constituency he’s supposed to represent and in the House of Commons where he’s supposed to speak on behalf of the good burghers of Clacton.

Anyone would think he would be better titled the Dishonourable Member of Parliament for Mar-a-Lago. Indeed he was last there last week meeting Musk the man-baby along with Nick Candy, a man so trusting of giving so much of his money to the Farage Fan Club (which some call Reform UK) that they made him party treasurer.

Some disturbing news came though on social media this morning: Farage has once again remembered where Clacton is, posting the following on the man-baby’s toxic right-wing social media echo chamber.

A well-known annual visitor to Clacton with one who prefers Palm Beach, FL

As Santa knows his way to Clacton better than its alleged parliamentary representative, what’s the betting that Farage grabbed a lift with him? All speculation is welcome in the comments below.
Musk’s Rothermere moment

21/12/2024 Steve WoodsMedia, Politics, Social Media, Tech

Controversial is perhaps too polite a term to describe the political pronouncements of rich man-baby Elon Musk, particularly as he seems to favour marching on his right foot.

Not content with being best buddies with his latest pal, the disgraced president-elect of the United States, disgraced former 45th president, insurrectionist, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual predator, business fraudster, congenital liar and golf cheat, one Donald John Trump and having a major influence on US politics before the Felon of the Year has even been asked to swear his oath of office, Musk is also now turning his attention to foreign policy.

This was recently illustrated by his recent cosying up to the far right of British politics in the shape of talks about a significant donation to Reform UK, the private fiefdom (and fan club. Ed.) of the mountebank known the world as Nigel Paul Farage that masquerades as a regular British political party.

Musk has now shifted his attention to the eastern shores of the North Sea and more specifically to Germany, where Chancellor Olaf Scholz recently lost a vote of confidence, with a general election due to be held in February.

Yesterday, Musk posted the following on his increasingly right-wing pretend social media platform.

The AfD (Alternative für Deutschland is described in Wikipedia‘s understated manner as a far-right and right-wing populist political party in Germany, although terming it Neo-Nazi would be more accurate given its rampant nationalism and racism.

If one accepts that social media today has as much influence now as newspapers had in the decades after the first war, then a clear parallel can be seen between Musk and one Harold Sydney Harmsworth, also known as ‘Lord’ Rothermere, the proprietor of the Daily Mail in the 1930s, a decade when a disgruntled WW1 veteran was making political waves in Germany.

Following the 1930 German federal election, in which Hitler’s Nazis won 107 out of 577 seats, Rothermere wrote in the Mail that Hitler’s party “represents the birth of Germany as a nation”. This was after the erstwhile Corporal Hitler had made clear his hatred of Jews and belief in racial supremacy in his book Mein Kampf.

In 1934 fascism had spread to establish roots in Britain in the shape of Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists, which was founded in 1932 and otherwise known as the Blackshirts on account of their uniform.

In 1934 Rothermere attached his name to what is doubtless the most notorious headline ever to appear in the Mail, which then as now was telling its gullible readers what to think in the form of a outpouring of praise for Britain’s then nascent fascist party.

Rothermere’s support for the Nazis and their policies were evident right up to the outbreak of war in 1939. When persecuted Jews started fleeing Germany after Kristallnacht in 1938, Rothermere’s Mail responded in typical racist fashion.

Fortunately, Musk will not be able to distort German politics as he is attempting to do in the Untied Kingdom by waving large amounts of cash beneath politicians’ noses. Foreign political donations are expressly forbidden under German law. What is more, Section 25 (2) no. 6 of the Political Parties Act requires political parties to identify donors paying sums exceeding €500. Party statements of accounts must list donations and contributions paid by elected representatives/officials to an amount exceeding €10,000 euros per calendar year, stating the donor’s name and address and the total amount of the donation received. Furthermore, Single donations in excess of €50,000 euros must be reported immediately to the President of the German Bundestag, who will then give notice of the donation and the donor’s name, online and in a Bundestag printed paper as soon as possible.

The time has long since past when the UK should have tightened up on political finance to be as rigorous as Germany.

In the meantime, what effect will Musk’s endorsement of fascists have on the German election in February? One German commentator on social media has already remarked that, apart from financial power being equated with political power, one thing that is not happening in Germany is any discussion that these circumstances are inherently undemocratic and that this influence does not just start with party donations, does not end with the ownership and direct influencing of journalism and the media and thus represents a problem.

Any thoughts? Leave a comment below.
Black Friday – a comment

29/11/2024 Steve WoodsOddities, Politics, Social Media, Uncategorized

From your ‘umble scribe’s social media feed on so-called Black Friday.

In other news, as an antidote to irresponsible mass consumerism, today is also designated as Buy Nothing Day, whilst Amazon workers in 20 states are planning to strike today until the equally ridiculously named Cyber Monday.
Tech meets tasty

25/11/2024 Steve WoodsLanguage, Oddities, Social Media, Tech

First came the emoticon – pictorial representation of a facial expression using characters — usually punctuation marks, numbers and letters — as an adjunct to written language to express a person’s feelings, mood or reaction, without needing to describe it in detail. From the start of the 2000s, this was followed by the emoji, a pictogram, logogram, ideogram, or smiley embedded in text and used in electronic messages and web pages, likewise to express feelings, moods or reactions.

Nowadays emojis are ubiquitous and not necessarily confined to electronic messages and web pages. They can be found on clothing, trinkets and, as your ‘umble scribe’s social media feed revealed at the weekend, baked goods. 😀
EU Commission fines Meta €797 mn.

15/11/2024 Steve WoodsPolitics, Privacy, Social Media, Tech
US technology giants are finding out the hard way that their usual anti-competitive stateside business practices are frowned upon on this side of the Atlantic, particularly in the Berlaymont building in Brussels, headquarters of the EU Commision.

A few months ago, X, the failing social media site formerly known as Twitter, was notified by the Commission that the latter was in breach of the Digital Services Act (DSA) in areas linked to dark patterns, advertising transparency and data access for researchers (posts passim).

This week it was the turn of Meta, the parent company of Facebook

This week the Commission announced it had fined €797.72 million for breaching EU ant-itrust rules by tying its online classified advertising service Facebook Marketplace to its personal social network Facebook and by imposing unfair trading conditions on other online classified advertising service providers.

The Commission’s investigation found that Meta is dominant in the market for personal social networks, which covers at least European Economic Area (‘EEA’), as well as having national domestic markets for online display advertising on social media.

In particular, the Commission found that Meta abused its dominant positions in breach of Article 102 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (‘TFEU’) by:
- Tying its online classified advertising service Facebook Marketplace to its personal social network Facebook. This means that all Facebook users automatically have access and get regularly exposed to Facebook Marketplace whether they want it or not. The Commission found that competitors of Facebook Marketplace may be foreclosed as the tie gives Facebook Marketplace a substantial distribution advantage which competitors cannot match; and
- Unilaterally imposing unfair trading conditions on other online classified advertising service providers who advertise on Meta’s platforms, in particular on its very popular social networks, Facebook and Instagram. This allows Meta to use ad-related data generated by other advertisers for the sole benefit of Facebook Marketplace.
The Commission has ordered Meta to bring the conduct effectively to an end and to refrain from repeating the infringement or from adopting practices with an equivalent object or effect in the future.

The fine of €797.72 million was set on the basis of the Commission’s 2006 guidelines on fines.

In setting the level of the fine, the Commission took into account the duration and severity of the infringement, as well as the turnover of Facebook Marketplace to which the infringements relate and which therefore defines the basic amount of the fine. In addition, the Commission considered Meta’s total turnover, to ensure sufficient deterrence for a company with resources as significant as Meta’s.

Margrethe Vestager, Executive Vice-President in charge of competition policy, said: ” Today we fine Meta €797.72 million for abusing its dominant positions in the markets for personal social network services and for online display advertising on social media platforms. Meta tied its online classified ads service Facebook Marketplace to its personal social network Facebook and imposed unfair trading conditions on other online classified ads service providers. It did so to benefit its own service Facebook Marketplace, thereby giving it advantages that other online classified ads service providers could not match. This is illegal under EU anti-trust rules. Meta must now stop this behaviour.”
Ovine emissions reduction – update

09/11/2024 Steve WoodsLanguage, Oddities, Social Media

Along with dogs, sheep are believed to be one of the earliest animals to be domesticated by humans.

According to Wikipedia, sheep are most likely descended from the wild mouflon of Europe and Asia and their domestication date is estimated to fall between 11,000 and 9000 BCE in Mesopotamia and possibly around 7000 BCE in Mehrgarh in the Indus Valley.

For some reason, sheep are very popular on the Mastodon social media network and Thursday, 7th November, was peak sheep day, with photos and videos being posted all day, together with the customary hashtags, although these were all Welsh, e.g.#defaidodon (sheep of Mastodon). One very humorous sample is shown below.

Picking up on the theme of the post, domestication has involved a long process of selective breeding to arrive at today’s breeds, which bear little resemblance to their wild ancestors. For much of their history, most sheep were powered by charcoal before the Industrial Revolution, but this soon changed to coal due to its higher calorific value. With the climate crisis underway at present, sheep powered by electricity and renewables are now being developed; and there is even talk of fuelling them with biomass. 😉
Susie’s quiet comment

06/11/2024 Steve WoodsLanguage, Media, Politics, Social Media

Susie Dent is a lexicographer and etymologist who has appeared in “Dictionary Corner” on the Channel 4 game show Countdown since 1992.

Susie also has a presence on man-baby Elon Musk’s Twitter/X social media platform and usually posts her own chosen word of the day, which is frequently influenced by that particular day’s news agenda.

Here is her contribution for today, 6th November 2024, following on from the news that disgraced former president, insurrectionist, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual predator, business fraudster, congenital liar and golf cheat Donald John Trump has been elected the 47th president of the USA.

All your ‘umble scribe will say is that the US was faced with an IQ test yesterday: and failed it; abysmally.
When saying sorry is too hard

26/10/2024 Steve WoodsLanguage, Politics, Social Media

The last week has seen the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (Chogm) held in Apia in Samoa. However, the meeting did not necessarily turn out in favour of the British state and its representatives, one Charles Philip Arthur George Mountbatten-Windsor, who some believe is its legitimate head of state, and ‘Sir’ Keir Rodney Starmer, head of government and leader of an allegedly Labour administration.

The main point of contention was one of the many crimes against humanity committed by the English/British during their centuries-long invasion, colonisation and exploitation of vast areas of the world’s land surface – chattel slavery.

The Caribbean members of the Commonwealth, under the umbrella of Caricom, have been demanding reparations for slavery for some time. Their reasoning is based on the fact that when slavery was abolished within the British Empire in 1833 (the slave trade as abolished in 1807. Ed.), the owners were compensated for their loss of ‘property‘ in the form of 700,000 enslaved persons This amounted to £20m and accounted for nearly one-quarter of the government’s budget in the year that it was paid. The emancipated slaves and their descendants were never compensated. Indeed to add further a insult to their suffering, the freed slaves were expected to work for free for the people who had already exploited them and were being handsomely rewarded for their inhumanity.

Mr Windsor, whose ancestor Charles Stuart II granted the Royal African Company (RAC) a monopoly on all English trade with Africa, had particular difficulty in apologising for the harm his family and his state have done to Africa and the Caribbean. The RAC’s initial purpose was to trade in gold, but quickly moved on to trading in captured human beings, which became its main activity. The so-called royal family also invested in the slave trade: William of Orange (the King Billy so beloved of certain people in Ireland’s occupied six counties) bought shares in the RAC off one Edward Colston, whose statue in Bristol was toppled a few years ago and taken for a bath in the city docks. Despite his own family having blood on its hands from the slave trade, the best Charlie boy could manage was to call slavery the “most painful aspects of our past continue to resonate. according to the BBC.

As for Starmer, he has ruled out any talk of reparation, but has indicated he is open to non-financial reparations, as The Guardian reports I don’t somehow think the Caribbean governments of Caricom will be persuaded by offers of mirrors, glass beads and other trinkets for supplying two centuries of free labour for Britain and its elite.

Beside slavery being discussed slavery, the transatlantic slave trade and reparatory justice have all made their way into the meeting’s final communiqué (PDF) in its paragraphs 21 and 22.

Finally, here’s a little song about saying sorry especially for Charles and Keir., which your ‘umble scribe hopes they will enjoy.
Whom the gods wish to destroy…

01/10/2024 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.

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? 😉
Two cities, two cuisines, one politics

14/09/2024 Steve WoodsBristol, Oddities, Politics, Social Media

All cultures, countries and regions around the world have their own local cuisines, some indigenous, some introduced by incomers and yet others a mixture of the two.

Also termed food cultures, your correspondent notes that food is often inextricably linked to politics as well as identity, as has been apparent in two separate examples from the cities of Bristol and Chicago.

In your ‘umble scribe’s sixty-something years of existence, food in the Untied Kingdom (mis-spelling deliberate. Ed.) has changed beyond all recognition with dishes and tastes from right around the world become increasingly available. I well remember the curiosity and excitement when the first Chinese takeaway opened in my home town of Market Drayton in North Shropshire all those decades ago.

Since those long gone days, takeaway food has become a staple in the British diet; and with the advent of delivery services such as JustEat and Deliveroo, customers can now order takeaways without having to rise from their sofas.

In this post, your correspondent notes that in two separate cites – Bristol and Chicago.

Bristol

First Bristol and a comment on the ephemeral nature of catering establishments despite everyone’s need for food and delivery services. The subvertising in the following photograph was spotted on the city’s Fishponds Road yesterday afternoon.

Note how the subvertising has got the background colour of the original JustEat sign almost right, as well as matching the original font faithfully.

As regards the phrase ‘Eat The Rich, your ‘umble scribe thought it was a modern phrase arising out of anarchist political thought in response to ever-increasing increasing wealth inequality and food insecurity. However, it actually goes back rather further.

That rather further back takes us to the days of the Terror which followed the French revolution. On 17th October 1793, Pierre Gaspard Chaumette, President of the Paris Commune, gave a speech to the city in which he apocryphally remarked that the philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau said the following:

Quand le peuple n’aura plus rien à manger, il mangera le riche.

In English this translates to the following:

When the people shall have nothing more to eat, they will eat the rich.

Chicago

Next to Chicago and more specifically The Wieners Circle, which describes itself as an ‘iconic hotdog stand on the north side of Chicago serving up high quality street food with a side of insults‘ [sic].

The Chicago eatery has responded in feisty fashion to the unfounded assertion made by the disgraced former president, insurrectionist, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual predator, business fraudster, congenital liar and golf cheat, one Donald John Trump, that immigrants in Springfield, Ohio were eating residents’ pets during his recent televised debate with the Democrats presidential election candidate, Kamala Harris, as shown below.

Politics and food also have a long relationship. Back in 1798, Cartoonist James Gillray published ‘John Bull taking a Luncheon: – or – British Cooks, cramming Old Grumble-Gizzard, with Bonne-Chere‘ shortly after Nelson’s victory over the French at the Battle of the Nile. The strong link continues today as shown not only by these examples from Bristol and Chicago, but also by American Republicans renaming French fries ‘freedom fries‘ after French opposition to the 2003 Iraq war (cheese-eating surrender monkeys anyone? Ed.).

Update 15/09/24: Trump has continued to make unsubstantiated claims about immigrants in Springfield to such an extent that his cult-like followers have targeted the Springfield’s city Hall and other buildings with bomb threats and a side serving of racial hatred.

Bristol

Chicago

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