| Tuesday, August 1, 2006 |
10:34 - I'm sick, doc... prescribe me an iPod
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/tm_objectid=17435594&method=full&siteid=66633&head
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Via Lance:
GADGET addicts are suffering from a real sickness, according to scientists.
They said people who always want to trade in their iPods, computers and cars for the latest models are victims of a genetic affliction called neophilia.
Their genes mean they have a form of cellular enzyme called monoamine oxidase A, which leaves them more in need of stimulation from new things.
Researchers at Yamagata University School of Medicine in Japan say the enzyme is "significantly associated with higher scores of novelty-seeking".
Everything's a disease! And we're all entitled to be free of disease. At government expense!
On a related note: The Adult Swim bumpmasters annoy me sometimes with their cheerleading for awful shows that I'd probably find a lot more entertaining if I were a Hyphenated-American Studies major at UC Berkeley. But some nights they come up with rare moments of genius.
Like last night. Towards the beginning of the block, they noted that:
The British government has introduced measures to combat "cyber-bullying".
Which is defined as bullying using computers or cell phones.
Then, very slowly, one letter at a time:
W
WT
WTF.
Look:
This was then followed by three screenfuls of densely printed words adding up to about twenty lines of text per screen—a rant that would take some scrolling if you read it in a browser. The gist was something like this:
What ever happened to the Code of the Schoolyard? What became of giving wedgies to the awkward kid, so he would be forced to grow up and learn to deal with life? We're obsessed with coating the world with Nerf now, so kids are guaranteed to grow up never having known adversity or overcome a challenge. Parents: BEAT YOUR KIDS! Now, we aren't actually advocating beating your children—and these words don't represent the views of Time-Warner or the Turner Corporation—but we are advocating that parents take some responsibility for their kids' lives and worry less about protecting them from life's harms and more about making sure they grow up right.
[adult swim]
This is a horrible paraphrase, because each of the three screens was shown for a total of about three seconds. Someone in the office snapped, it seems.
And about time, too. Now that guns are so banned in England that they're going after people's knives now, and now that the murder rate in London is something like five times what it is in New York (I don't know the number, but New York is now like the 175th most dangerous city in America, compared to #1 twenty years ago—and London's crime rate seems to be climbing exponentially), it seems that whatever slippery slope is embarked upon with the misguided fetish for "safety" will play itself out in our lifetimes.
The good news, if it is good news, is that the most spectacular consequences of all this will occur somewhere other than here. We'll see where we're headed. And with any luck, we'll have the wherewithal to change course.
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Brian Tiemann
