www.vodafoneareapileofshit.com

So, yes. The ongoing saga of the starship Vodafone, and its continuing mission to be as crap as possible. To boldly go where no man – where no one – has gone before, except maybe Southern Rail. They’ve been there. They’ve been there a few times. In fact they’ve been there so often they really should have a season ticket, which would cost them a small fortune and leave them feeling dissatisfied and disappointed, like coming home to find that someone’s eaten all the chocolate hobnobs and there’s only a stale digestive left.

But this isn’t about Southern Rail. This is about Vodafone, and their continuing mission to surpass every previously accepted norm of incompetence, like they’ve dug up Norris McWhirter and are trying desperately to revive him so he can create a whole new Guinness Book of Records entry for Most Pathetically Useless Company in the Western World.

Vodafone, you are truly, absolutely, mind-boggingly shit.

You already know about the ridiculous bill they’ve landed me with, as a result of La Child doing whatever the hell it is adolescent children do with their phones, but ever since complaining bitterly to Vodafone about it the company has managed to dig ever bigger holes. ‘Don’t send texts to La Child,’ I told them, ‘because she’s a child. If you can’t send texts to me, then at least send them to the number registered as the account holder.’

‘Yes, yes,’ they say, grinning like a local asked by a tourist for directions in a language they don’t understand, and of course an hour later La Child tells me she’s had the most bizarre conversation with someone from Vodafone who wanted to talk about ‘the complaint’.

Yes, after having been told that that particular number went directly through to an 11 year old child with neither the competence nor the authority to deal with the account, Vodafone called that very child to discuss why it is they’d allowed an 11 year old child to incur such horrific charges. You couldn’t make it up. So I call Vodafone again. ‘Seriously, lads, don’t call la Child. She’s a child. She’s 11. If she walked into your shop and asked you for a phone you’d tell her to run off and play with her dolls. Come on, cease with the silliness now.’

‘Yes, yes,’ they say, grinning like a… you get the picture. So I try a different tack. ‘OK, we’re getting nowhere now. So I tell you what we’re going to do. I’m cancelling my direct debit. I’ll pay you what I’d normally pay you, plus what I’d have to have paid up front you to use all that nice extra data. But I’m not paying you the balance. You want to talk about that, call me.’

And lo, the direct debit was cancelled, and today la Wife – la Wife, note, the number registered to the account holder at least but still not the number I’ve told them to call – got a text. ‘Oh,’ it said, ‘you appear not to have paid your bill this month. Would you mind awfully going to www.vodafoneareapileofshit.com to pay it please?’

As it happens, Vodafone, yes, yes I would mind. You can take your bill and you can shove it so far up your router cable that you might, just, possibly, start to take note of how very pissed off I am. I try to contact them again, specifically to tell them that their bill does roll up nice and tight and can therefore be used for anal filling purposes, but the website is down. So instead I wander over to twitter to vent. Vodafone respond with this: ‘have you tried our online chat service?’ Er, yes, I believe I have. And calling. Over the past two weeks I’ve spent about 4 hours on the phone to you cretins, and here we still are, no further forwards. ‘Oh,’ say Vodafone, ‘how about, er, our chat service?’

Fuck me with a big stick marked “Really?”

So Vodafone. Let me spell this out for you in words you might actually understand: DO NOT CALL LA CHILD. DO NOT CALL LA WIFE. CALL ME. UNTIL THIS IS RESOLVED I NO PAY YOU NO MONEY. You have my number, and so does the ombudsman.

I am vexed

It's nearly Christmas. In 10 days' time, if I haven't murdered my immediate family over a disagreement about how best to cook roast potatoes or beaten my inlaws to death with the remote control, I will enter 2014 full of optimism, ready for a brand new and exciting year.

Maybe. 

In anticipation of leaving 2013 behind, here are some things that continue to vex me:

1. Enough with the class shit already. Middle this, toff that, as if it actually means anything. People are people. Move on.

2. Politics. It is a truth universally acknowledged that those who seek power will, once they have it, seek to retain it, and politics seems to me to have become nothing but the attempt to remain in government for the sake of remaining in government. Say nothing that can be misconstrued, offend no one, avoid promising anything. 

3. Decisions are no longer taken. See (2). Views are canvassed, polls questioned, focus groups formed. Government no longer governs, it follows, but those who it follows have neither the information nor abilities necessary to know how to make an effective decision. Result? Bad decisions by timid politicians taking note of an ignorant public. 

4. The X Factor. Fuck off, Cowell, and take 1 Direction with you.

5. Corporate life. Apparently I work in a "service industry" where my clients expect me to be "available". This, I now understand, requires me to respond instantly to emails received while on holiday. "This request was received at 9.30 this morning," I was told the other day by The Annoying One. "It's now 11.30 and the client has called me to complain about your slow response time." I'm on holiday, I replied, and it's only two hours. "Unacceptable!" Oh, fuck off, do.

6. One trick twitter ponies. Hate animal cruelty? So do I. Dislike the Tories? Hey, join the club, there's lots of us about. Talk incessantly about nothing else? Yes you do. #getafuckinglife

7. Tinsel. I don't care how much it costs, I don't care how carefully you drape it over your expensive mantelpiece, and no, the fact that it's Christmas makes absolutely no difference - it looks shit. 

8. It's "Christmas". Not "xmas". "Christmas". I am not remotely religious, I am not in a fervour of any description. This is a grammar ting. Get it right, you lazy feckers.

9. In a similar vein, 140 characters is plenty. Stop mangling the English language.

10. Lists. 

Wall to Wall

Dear Wall to Wall Productions

Thank you for your letter. La Child is delighted to read of your interest, and is flattered that you would like to talk to her about appearing in the next series of Child Genius on Channel 4. 

 

After some careful consideration, she has asked me to respond thus: 

Fuck. Right. Off.

I appreciate that this may be a slightly disappointing response, almost Lyssan in its directness, so allow me, on her behalf, to explain. Being gifted - a genius, as you would have it; intellectual; clever; of high ability; whatever label you feel might be appropriate to burden her with - is not a character trait to be laughed at, or an ailment to be pitied. Children who are gifted are not freaks to be gathered together in a tent for the amusement of the paying public. Pointing and laughing, as a sport, died out a couple of monarchs ago, along with workhouses and cholera.

I say this in the full knowledge that of course Channel 4's general output might lead you to an altogether different conclusion. Made in Chelsea, Extreme Celebrity Detox, Big Brother, not exactly shows renowned for their in depth view of anything, other than the general nastiness of one's fellow man. As @giftedphoenix put it at the time:

 

Channel 4 has so gone to the dogs. Last night it was ten ton testicles; tonight it's Child Genius #strikinglysimilar #gtvoice

— GiftedPhoenix (@GiftedPhoenix) June 25, 2013

 

Now, I know, I know that you've said that the intention is to produce a series that will delve deep into the difficulties of parenting a gifted child. That it's a documentary, not a gameshow. A sensitive look at the issues faced by children who just happen to have been born with an ability to do things that others their age cannot. You've been at pains to point out that children in the past series really enjoyed the experience, that they loved being able to show off what they could do.

 

Such a shame, then, that the last series was so woefully misunderstood by everyone else:

 

This child genius thing on ITV is mind boggling awkward. Precocious socially inept kids and their pushy patents. A psychologist's wet dream

— Graeme Swann (@Swannyg66) July 2, 2013

 

#childgenius NO Parents sad desire to not allow childhood ! Beauty pageants the same SAD BASTARDS LET THEM LIVE AND PLAY

— KATIE MAGNET ❤️ (@KatieMagnet) June 24, 2013

 

 

Anyone watching child genius? What are these parents thinking? #childgenius

— Tim Lóvejøy (@timlovejoy) June 11, 2013

 

Watching #childgenius AKA UK Future Virgins

— Don Ferguson (@DFergPR) July 3, 2013

 

What next? Surely Katie Hopkins wouldn't....?

 

Local 'Gifted & Talented' workshops are stroke of marketing genius. 'My child attends a gifted & talented workshop'. Bragging mum currency

— Katie Hopkins (@KTHopkins) June 17, 2013

 

You see, as much as we’d like to believe that there might be someone out there with entirely noble intentions, someone with an actual understanding of what it’s like both for the children themselves and for their parents, someone who appreciates the difficulties these children face, someone who wants to produce something that gets those difficulties across to the world at large in a way that will start to turn people away from the tired old stereotypes that the media loves to encourage, I’m afraid it just doesn’t look like that someone is you, Wall to Wall. Sorry.

 

The follow up to "Child Genius" 10 years later "I hate my Teenager, he's an obnoxious tw*t" #childgenius

— Max Brown (@MrMaxBrown) June 25, 2013

 

Yes, that’s precisely what I want for my daughter...

 

Yours not bleedin' likely

Marcos Branza

I think I'm offended by that

Humour is a funny thing. What's one man's roll on the floor, hilarity ensued, stop stop I can't breathe is another's puzzlement and disgust, offence and head shaking. Some people get it, some people don't. Some people like it, others don't. Some humour relies on you having to think about what's being said, the context, the intention, the target, some just needs you to laugh at someone slipping on a banana skin. Point is, it's all subjective, innit?

 

The reason I raise this is because subjectivity isn’t something that social media does very well. Figuring out the subtext in a tweet isn’t always easy. Sometimes, when the person who's talking isn't standing in front of you but is instead just writing stuff down, you have to think a little harder about things. The usual clues aren’t there: the body language, the tone, the reaction of others. So you need to fill in the blanks yourself. Sometimes you read things which in isolation appear to be terrible, but when read in context aren’t. Sometimes, you have to think about it. 

 

Context is all, but it counts for about 3/8ths of fuck all on Twitter, where it recently appears to have gone for an extended holiday. If you've managed to navigate your way through the Ninja Cat videos and the Daily Fail Sidebar of Shame to get to this blog then I suspect you're savvy enough to know all about the sexism/rape brouhaha on Twitter over the last few days. Caroline Criado-Perez campaigned successfully for Jane Austen’s picture to be on the face of the new £10 note. A good thing, and Caroline understandably used twitter to express her delight at her success. Then, as often happens, someone said something, someone else said something else, then others said other stuff and by the end of it you had what could comfortably be called a polarisation of opinion; rape threats on one side, feminist indignation on the other, shouts, brickbats, waggling of fingers, apoplexy. There was the odd slightly ineffectual call for freedom of speech, some leftist ‘hang on eine minute, bitte’ attempts to reintroduce some sense, but mostly just lots of shouting and gnashing of teeth.

 

Much of what was said was distinctly offensive, there’s no getting away from that. It was nasty, and it was unpleasant. And some of it seemed to be more than that; some people seemed to be making proper, bona fide threats, and if so it was illegal and deserving of prosecution, and one chap today has been arrested. That is good. But. There seems to have been a bit of a rush to conflate 'offensive' with 'illegal'. 

 

Anyone who’s either (a) ever studied Philosophy or (b) watched QI will know about syllogism. For the rest of you, a syllogism isn’t, as you might expect, a stupid sperm, but instead is a logical premise in three parts with a major premise, a minor premise and a conclusion. For example –

 

Major premise: all lawyers are humans.

Minor premise: all humans die.

Conclusion: yippee, all lawyers will end up at the bottom of the ocean, har har.

 

Syllogism is good. We like syllogism. Syllogism is logical, and we like logic. But some people, particularly those who in a fit of red-mist offence are in a rush to condemn, can occasionally be guilty of a syllogistic fallacy, or just 'not getting it quite right'. For example:

 

1. All men are humans.

2. Mary is a human.

3. Therefore, Mary is a man.

 

And this has what to do with twitter and the great sexism brouhaha? You may well ask. Well, sit back, relax, kick off your high heels, dear, unpin your hair, have a sip of tea and let me explain. A frighteningly large number of tweeters, all otherwise seemingly sensible people, appeared to be saying that:

 

1. All these tweets are offensive and unpleasant.

2. Some of these tweets contained threats.

3. Therefore all these tweets are bad and should be reported.

 

If you happen to agree with the premise that ‘being offended’ is the same as ‘fearing for my safety’, then yes, it’s a valid syllogism. Aristotle would be proud. Otherwise, you might in fact feel that we’re straying a little too far towards giving people a right not to be offended, and there is, of course, no such right. You can’t cry foul just because you don’t like something. If someone is actually threatening you then it’s an assault, it’s a crime, and would you believe it, there’s a law against that. But if there’s no threat, if you just happen to be ‘offended’, well… whoopee do. In the words of national treasure Mr Stephen Fry:

 

“It’s now very common to hear people say ‘I’m rather offended by that’, as if that gives them certain rights. It’s actually no more than a whine. ‘I find that offensive’. It has no meaning, it has no purpose, it has no reason to be respected as a phrase. ‘I’m offended by that’, well so fucking what?”

 

At this point I should say that free debate is a cornerstone of a pluralistic and democratic society, but I’d be stealing the fine words of whoever it is that writes the unfebuckinglievable blog over at http://unfebuckinglievable.wordpress.com, so instead I’ll say simply that there is nothing – nothing – that stifles discussion and debate more effectively than people taking offence. So please, don’t.

 

Lest I should be accused of somehow condoning something I don’t wish to (and it pains me no end to actually have to spell this out, as if it weren’t obvious already), I’d like to make two things completely clear:

 

1. actually threatening to rape someone is horrible, nasty, and criminal. If you do it then you can and should be arrested and prosecuted. A large number of the tweets sent to Caroline Criado-Perez must have been unpleasant in the extreme to receive and I confess it’s hard to see how they can have been intended to achieve anything other than intimidation. Frankly, if you actually threaten any sort of violence then you should be arrested and prosecuted. Any violence against anyone should be stamped on, and I say that without a hint of irony; and

 

2. sexism should be educated out of society. Any prejudice is wrong and, frankly, pointless, but it’s a huge issue and it needs more than the waggling of society’s finger at the odd mindless thug. The way toys are marketed to children, the way childhood is stereotyped, the way the media use sex to sell seemingly everything, the way journalists harp on incessantly about the female figure, all these are things that need to change, and it’s a slow and difficult process. We’re all guilty to some extent.

If you happen to have any views on what I’ve just said, positive, negative or just ‘meh’ then please comment. Tell me. Let’s talk about it. I’m always willing to be proved wrong, to be convinced of the opposite view, to have my horizons broadened.

 

If you’re just offended, well... whoopee do.

Technology. Marvellous, isn't it?

Ah, technology eh? Eh?!

I'm a recent convert to the Twitter experience. I spent the first few years wondering what on earth it was, and then another couple of years wanting nothing to do with it, convinced that it was just a way for deluded schleb hunters to delude themselves into thinking that they had a direct line to their favourite Z-lister (who of course would be delighted to immediately befriend them and validate their existence).

I'm not a million miles from that view now, but I am mellowing slightly. It does seem to work quite remarkably well as a means for eliciting the immediate attention of organisations I can’t seem to get any attention from in any other media. To wit: I had the (dis)pleasure of having to speak to my electricity and gas provider a few days ago, and as I waited on hold listening to the dulcet tones of Huey Lewis and the News I passed the time by tweeting about how long it was taking, and asked somewhat flippantly whether anyone fancied taking bets on how long it would be before they bothered to answer the phone. Within minutes up popped a little notice to tell me that I was now being followed by that very same electricity and gas provider, who then VIA BLOODY TWITTER offered to call me immediately to sort out whatever the issue was. At this point I’d been on hold for….26 minutes. Well done if you guessed; give yourself a pat on the back and go slap a traffic warden.

Damage limitation, see. I moan, and the organisation comes on to remedy the problem before I can moan some more. And it works, that's the frustrating thing. As soon as 'Gerry' from [generic energy company] offered assistance my sails sank in calmer waters. How could I continue the rant? 'Gerry' would feel sad. Couldn't have that.

I could carry on the rant now and say that offering to placate one customer doesn't make up for the fact that average 20+ minute hold times cannot be acceptable in anyone's book, but that's not the point. The point is that actually the phone is becoming redundant. Another example to further illustrate this: I couldn't quite figure out how to do something with my mobile (phone someone, probably), so I thought I'd call the phone company concerned, and spent 15 minutes or so listening to some dirge or other and getting increasingly frustrated. Then I spotted a little button on their website that said 'chat with an adviser'. OK, thought I, I'll give that a go, all the time holding on the telephone just in case. Two minutes later I was engaged in a virtual discussion with someone who was (a) helpful and, more importantly, (b) available, and two minutes after that the problem was solved. As I closed the chat session I realised I was still on hold on the telephone.

There has to be, of course, a certain element of social (media) engineering going on here. It's cheaper for organisations to deal with their customers via twitter, or some chat system, where the bod at the other end can be involved in any number of discussions at once rather than be held up on one call with one difficult customer. But I find myself not really giving two hoots about why they're doing it, so long as it works, and by all the Gods it does seem to work.

It's all still new and marvellous to me, you know. I'm typing this on an iPad, which is doing the non-manly thing and multi-tasking by also pumping some music to me via some wi-fi headphones (‘look, no wires!’), and once I've finished typing I'll upload this to my blog, whilst all the time sat on a train accessing the interwebs via 3G. For someone born in the 70s when the next big thing in mobile communications was a telephone with an extra long lead so you could sit in the hallway and talk to your friends without your parents overhearing you, this current state of affairs is nothing short of witchcraft. I am in awe of it, something which La Child, of course, cannot understand. She was born into a world where this (iPhones, the Wii, wi-fi, constant access to everything, the ability to find anything out at any time on practically any medium) is all normal. Even my blackberry is old technology to her; whenever she picks it up she ignores the keyboard and tries to use the screen, which of course doesn't work and which leads to her shaking her head in disgust and go searching for her mother's iPhone instead. If I'm having any sort of technofear it's the 8 year old who sorts it out. "Look," I'll say to her, "marvel at this, I'm listening to Italian radio live on the iPad!" and she will smile sweetly, say "yes, daddy," and walk away chuckling at how much of a Luddite I am.

Technology. Marvellous.