Giving ASH what they deserve
Next Friday is [apparently] Black Friday.
This is yet another of those ghastly concepts which has spread across the Atlantic in an effort to squeeze even more money out of our wallets.
This is followed by Cyber Monday. I haven't a fucking clue what that is but as it is yet another Mercan invention I shall treat it with the contempt it deserves and ignore it completely.
Then we have Giving Tuesday. I confess I have never heard of this one before so it must be a new one. Not content with trying to sell us every useless piece of tat they can think of, they are now trying to squeeze money out of us for no reason whatsoever other than apparent guilt.
I have to thank ASH for pointing me in the direction of Giving Tuesday, as they are using it to appeal for funds. It seems the millions of taxpayers' money they already get isn't enough.
I think for once, just in the spirit of Giving Tuesday I shall send them a donation. Now my Deposit Account is a little threadbare at the moment but the dog has stepped up to the plate and offered me all her deposits so I shall happily forward them on to ASH.
I actually feel quite sorry for ASH. In particular, ASH Scotland has just had a very hard time of it.
Their Sheila Duffy appeared before some committee or other and things didn't go quite as planned. She rode in on her white horse in her guise as saviour of mankind presumably with the intention of ordering the committee [and the gubmint] to have nothing to do with the Evil Big Tobacco. However she was [just a little] confused by the way things went. It's well worth the watch.
Dick Puddlecote has already had a go at poor Shiela [as if she hadn’t enough troubles] but I would like to add one small observation, purely in the interests of honesty and accuracy which poor Sheila seems to crave so much.
In her opening propaganda speech she gives the usual guff about Big Tobacco designing their products to kill [blah blah]. she mentions that smoking kills one in every two consumers [with a dark hint that they may be planning to up that to two out of three]. She then goes on to state that tobacco is responsible for a quarter of all Scottish deaths, which confuses me a little. Assuming a quarter of the population smokes, that means that all of them account for a quarter of all deaths? This is in fact true – if a fifth of the population are readheads then a fifth of all deaths are redheads. Right? But being a redhead didn't necessarily kill them. That's called logic.
So if a quarter of the population smokes, and a quarter of all deaths are smokers then that would seem to imply that smoking was just as incidental as being a redhead or having blue eyes. So using her own argument, smoking seems to have no effect on whether you die or not? What point is she trying to make?
Poor Shiela. And on top of all that she is accused of being a part of the tobacco industry?
You have to feel sorry for her?
I think I will add my own contribution to Penny's after all.
She seems to like wallowing in shit.
I think an empty packet of twenty filled with butts would be appropriate.
As far as they are concerned – the ultimate Weapon of Mass Distruction.
You bastards, mocking such a beautiful young lady, just look at those sexy eyes, I presume they are eyes only when the questions got a bit difficult they looked more like surgical incisions.
Welcome AJ! Beautiful young lady? Where? Is my eyesight failing? Unless you mean Duffy? She has a gentle enough accent but has the face of a headmistress in a foul mood. Would I kick her out of bed for eating biscuits? Definitely. She'd never get in in the first place.
I think AJ's right. Such a beautiful lass she…
…oh, wait…
Damn! Wrong glasses again. Ah, that's better. Lord! Kick her out of bed for eating biscuits? Taking a good look I wouldn't let her in bed in the first place.
The problem is that the likes of Duffer see themselves as the righteous ones, They are so comprehensively brainwashed that no matter what facts you put before them, if those facts don't coincide with what they believe, then the facts must be wrong.
"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me."
The rod and staff in this instance being the tenets of Tobacco Control. And when people are wedded to a doctrine to such a degree, argument and presentation of irrefutable facts are irrelevant,. They will be ignored, because they don't fit the narrative.
The priceless moment was where it was pointed out to her that she's part of the tobacco industry herself. The logic is sound and she did NOT like that at all. She didn't know whether to explode or cry.
The worst aspect of all was that she was being hammered by avowed non-smokers, so she couldn't even come back with the old waffle that they are all in the pay of Big Tobacco.
Just what more do these interfering prod nosed busibodies want
All interests that these whining left wing illiberalself righteous arseholes happen to hate are always "vested"
another leftie buzz word !
Basically what they want is for everyone [except smokers] to be as fanatical on the subject as they are. They really do see themselves as saviours of the world. "Vested interests"? "Funded by"? "Sponsored by"? All the same pathetic meaningless argument.
Thanks Grandad for the links to all those 'deserving' causes.Unfortunately, for me, never a great 'charity' donator to begin with, that well healed woman of recent Rehab controversy finally put paid to any inkling I ever had towards donations.
In the meantime, I will continue to 'like' your postings of this blog/diary on Farcebook and will continue to 'share' them as well.
Likewise – I won't support any charity whose staff are earning far more than my pension. The only charities I subscribe to are those who I know for a fact badly need the money.
Thanks for the "shares" or whatever they're called. Do you actually use those buttons under the post? Just wondering as I was seriously thinking of removing them.
"An industry whose … main interests lie with its profits"
As opposed to someone who has no real job of work, sucking from the public teat.
"Lives lost early"
I hope that when she leaves this world, it's wishing that it had come 30 years earlier.
Can you point me in the direction of any company whose interests don't lie in profits? Is she so wrapped up in her narrow minded little world that she doesn't realise that the purpose of any and every private enterprise is to make profits?
She'll have to stop buying food and clothes if she is so worried about the profit motive. Or maybe she thinks that Tescos, Waitrose and the rest are all gubmint funded too?
Here in Vermont, the "activists" are much more (rightly) concerned with the location of wind towers and solar farms in our forests and on top of our mountain ridges so big tobacco is pretty much ignored overall.
On the other hand, the powers-that-be are seriously considering legalizing marijuana which will, of course, turn every single one of us into zoned out pot heads.
Don't worry – we have some serious eco-nutcases here too, and a plentiful supply of those visual monstrosities they call wind farms.
They are also considering legalising/decriminalising [not sure which] marijuana here too. Maybe the general idea is to get us all so stoned we stop complaining?
Now that's a thought…
I'm planning a trip Stateside next year and watching very carefully.
The flights to the East Coast are much shorter for me. I'm told Autumn – sorry, Fall – is spectacular in VT and having it enhanced would be rather good.
Twenty Rothmans – meet KirkM. KirkM – meet Twenty Rothmans.
Now the two of you are introduced, you can meet [in VT] in a grand blue haze. You can raise a glass in my name!