Film

This one tickled me because of its full on frothing at the mouth. The Western Mail (aka “The Daily Mail for Welsh people”. Collectively they will be referred to as * Mail) is wondering whether we’re turning into the society depicted in A Clockwork Orange.

Quick answer: no, we’re not.

There you go. Sorted.

That’s never enough for a * Mail article though. We must continue to scare.

Thirty-five years on, are we heading for the kind of nightmarish vision presented in that film – a place where young people kill for kicks?

There are points in history – slavery, Hitler, children being sent up chimneys – at which we look back in dismay asking, “Why didn’t someone do something?”

The slightly mythical happy-slapping compared to slavery, Hitler and children being sent up chimneys. Marvellous.

Just for laughs, incidentally, count how many of the sentences following “Thirty-five years on…” end in question marks, with one concluding sentence that supposedly answers those questions.

“Is the moon a balloon? Can I have fries with that? Happy slappers should be shot.” See how the final proposition doesn’t necessarily follow the questions posed, but because it’s placed in proximity to the questions, it supposedly is the answer.

Ah the wonderful world of * Mail rhetoric.

Curious about how all of Uwe Boll’s critics fared in that boxing challenge? Wired has a full write-up under the wonderful headline Raging Boll.

He picked a right bunch of nancies to fight against though, don’t you think, given the number of potential opponents out there? But then again, the upper weight limit was 180 pounds (less than 13 stone, 82kg) so maybe there wasn’t a fine array to pick from after that.