11 November (Part 1) - Who’s bitter?
Someone I have known for more than half my life said to me yesterday that she
finds it immensely amusing (or something like that) that someone who has always been a staunch
Conservative supporter - she was once the union representative in a large
factory, but a right leaning one - is prepared to spend so much time exposing
disreputable Tories at Bexley council.
I explained that it is not Conservatives who I set out to target but just the disreputable, the
dishonest and the self-serving. It just happens that in Bexley they all seem to be Conservatives
and how can you overlook attempts to have you put in jail just for being
critical of them?
Former Labour Leader Chris Ball once said to me when I bumped into him in the Furze
Wren pub that he was under no illusions I wouldn’t be chasing him if I saw the
opportunity, and he was right. His 40% tax rise still rankles.
Both opposition parties have come under notice since the last election. Councillor Daniel
Francis (Labour, Belvedere) said it was just part of modern political life but I’m not so
sure UKIP councillor Lynn Smith is so broad shouldered.
When asked by the aforesaid friend why I continued I said it had nothing to do
with keeping readers amused and informed and I didn’t really care about the
number of readers or the number of Twitter followers. It might not even matter
too much if the only readers were Bexley Conservatives because I know it annoys
the hell out of them and they think the blog is read by thousands. (†)
You can see that from the sort of messages I get from them. This one arrived
overnight…
I wonder whether you listened to the piece on the Radio 4
Today programme last week about online commentators.
It was said they fell within 5 categories
1. The Pointless - morons, illiterates, ranters and blind stators of the obvious
2. Pompous Pontificators, blogging types who think the world is hanging on their every word
3. Paranoids
4. Hobbyist Obsessives whose whole purpose in life is to explain their world to
people, and to correct perceived wrongs or misconceptions;
5. The Green Ink brigade, conspiracy theorists, nutcases.
I wonder where you would place yourself!
To answer the question I suppose it could be 4. except that I don’t think I do a lot
of telling Bexley council what they should do and I’m not sure that 5. fits
either though I suppose the inner coterie of Bexley council must conspire
together or we wouldn’t always see absolutely consistent 100% votes for their
leader. Actually I still enjoy writing the code that keeps the site going
without resorting to some package like Wordpress; which probably does make me a
bit weird.
† It is. All of them believing I am bitter and twisted presumably.