The problem with society

I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before, but just what the hell is going on with the law in our society? I have always believed in the concept that the law is supposed to represent the values that a society expects. And the law is supposed to support those people trying to meet those expectations.

But over time, we’ve all seen that concept wither away so that innocent people are put at the disadvantage. I’m sure if I tried hard enough, I could find a way to blame this on Gen Y, but I’m not 100% sure that would be fair. I do believe that their “The world owes me a living” and “Whatever I have done wrong, it’s someone else’s fault” attitude and way of life is a major contributing factor, though.

The latest in stupid laws that SHOULD protect the innocent, but instead helps the guilty, is the humble “Beware of dog” sign. No, I am NOT shitting you. This sign apparently began in the Roman times. It read CAVE CANUM (pronounced Kah-way, not Cave). The Romans loved their little lap dogs, so the sign was actually designed to warn visitors that there were small dogs in the area, so that they would be stepped on. Over time, the sign has developed into a warning to visitors that if you come into the yard, you may very well get bitten.

As it happens, police in various Australian states have verified that if you put up a “Beware of dog” sign, or in fact any sign warning people that by venturing into your yard they may experience unwelcome attention by your dog, you are admitting the fact that your dog is dangerous. So what does this mean to you?

What it means is any from your admission of guilt that your dog is dangerous, which means that if someone jumps your fence with the intent of breaking into your home, and your dogs bites them……you have admitted liability. The burglar can sue you. In extreme cases (I believe this is the case in Victoria), the RSPCA can actually seize your dog and “euthenase” it. Without your permission. Because you have accepted that it’s dangerous.

WHY does this sign NOT work in favour of the tenant? WHYcan’t it simply mean “If you come into my yard, you will be bitten”? And then, if some genius decides to ignore your sign an jump your fence, they deserve everything – and every stitch – they get as a result.

You’ve heard me say this before – stupid doesn’t hurt anymore. If you’re dumb enough to walk up to a fence, behind which is one pissed off German Shepherd barking at you, and there’s a sign saying “Beware of dog”, and you are stupid, and you go in the yard. That should be YOUR fault. End of story.

Tradies

What is with these knuckleheads? I mean, seriously. I had to restrain myself from adding the “C” word to the title.

In my job, I start early, so that means I get to travel to work with every tradie in Brisbane – I’m sure of it. And if it’s not EVERY tradie, then it’s just the ones who can’t f**king drive.

This morning, before 7am, I was subjected to one bloke who was driving a work ute, and towing a trailer made out of the back half of another work ute. You know the kind I mean. But here’s the catch. On the left side of the trailer, there were no lights. I don’t mean he had lights, but they had somehow malfunctioned. There were no lights. At all.

And on the right side, all the wires were hanging out and there were no globes or cover. So…… the genius in this story was driving through semi-peak hour traffic with no lights on his trailer. And then he decided that if he wasn’t going around 15 kph over the speed limit, his dick would shrink to a size even smaller than it already is.

You can imagine the havoc he was wreaking by driving like this without lights. So as he weaved his way Matrix-like through the traffic, we were all left guessing what his next move would be.

As I got closer to work, I was subjected to even more of these morons. I’ll admit that parking must be at a premium, but I’m sure that there’s a clause in parking legislation that allows minimum-wage, minimum-intelligence tradesman to park wherever the f**k they want, blocking traffic and putting lives at risk.

I had almost made it to work when I was subjected to the moron of all f**kwits. A guy in a lorry (the only way I can explain the medium-size of his truck) comes out of someone’s driveway. The road I was on would easily fit five cars abreast (hehe, I said breast), however our hero managed to block the entire road.

And then, he drove at around 20 kph in a 50 kph zone. And then he slowed down. And then he slowed down some more. And then he stopped. Right in the middle of the road. No brake lights. No indicators. No hazard lights. Just decided to stop. As I put my life in danger to get around this idiot – considering all I wanted to do was get away from him, as he obviously had no intention of letting the rest of us know his plan – I did that most masculine of things, and abused him through my window – so that he couldn’t hear me.

So why is it, these champions of society get away with it? When I do 5 kph over the speed limit, it’s like someone put out an APB on my car, and I’m surrounded by a SWAT team. And yet these bottom-feeders manage to get away with treating the law like it doesn’t exist – or at least, doesn’t apply to them.

Inconsiderate colleagues

As much as I try to get along with the people at work, there’s a couple of stereotypes that I know we’re all dealing with. Let’s face it, there’d be very few people who go to work because they prefer it to being at home, so why do we put up with these people?

Exhibit A: The person who microwaves their lunch, but then decides that 2 minutes isn’t EXACTLY how long they want their food in there. They really only want to microwave it for 1 minute 57 seconds. So they open the door with 3 seconds to go. Let me start by saying I have no problem with this. Occasionally, I too have punched a time-frame that was a bit long, and on my return have found a melted lid and steam/smoke filling the oven. BUT, I press that little CANCEL button. It’s not hard, and I don’t have to push my next meeting back to fit it in. BEEP, we’re done. So why is it so F**KING hard for others to do the same?

Exhibit B: The loud phone talker. This is the genius who hasn’t yet grasped the technology of the telephone. Sure, in the days of tin cans and string, you had to raise your voice a little so the sound would travel. But not, they have these things called microphones, right? So why, does this Einstein YELL in to the phone? There is one guy at my work who is so f**king loud, you can hear him as you enter the building. Luckily, I’m not known for my tact, so I pass his workstation, I put my finger to my lips, and give him a SSSShhhhhhh. If only I didn’t have to do it 5 times a day.

Exhibit C: The guy with no life. You know who I mean. Everyone has someone at their work who never seems to leave. He’s there when you show up in the morning, and he’s still there when you go home 30 minutes late. Even when this guy is on leave, he shows up anyway. I have one such offender in my workplace. We have threatened several times to chalk his tyre, just to make sure he goes home at night. With Christmas fast approaching, most of my colleagues have started their holidays. And even though this guy has been on leave for a week, he has been in every day, doing work. He’s been working harder on holidays than I do when I’m working!

Exhibit D: The person who fails/refuses to pass on information. Sadly, my work seems to be BUILT on these people. There’s less than 40 people in my workplace, and our role is quick dynamic, so our tasks change regularly. In that kind of world, everyone needs to know what’s going on at all times. The office space we occupy is so small, any individual could literally step outside their office and shout “Hey, there’s a meeting after lunch in my office!”, or “Tomorrow, I need everyone to make sure they’re wearing a bikini”. Not literally, but you know what I mean. What we have, is people who either walk around to everyone individually and tell them, or who wait until the morning and then say “By the way, we’re all wearing bikinis today”. Idiot.

Exhibit E: The person who can’t use the internet. How, on God’s green f**king Earth, in this day and age, can someone who has a job, NOT be able to navigate the internet? Seriously! And I don’t mean design a web page, or anything technical. One colleague yesterday not only didn’t know how to get to, or use, google maps, but when I tried talking him through it, and started with “Right, open Internet Explorer”, he couldn’t even really manage that. He did that thing where you don’t double-click fast enough, and then the icon title highlights. But he sat there, staring blankly, unable to even resolve THAT little problem. Moron.

Have I missed someone? I’m sure there’s more of these people out there, but I now need to take a few deep breaths and finish my bourbon. Let me know if there’s someone at your work who drives you nuts.

Stupid doesn’t hurt anymore

I’ve mentioned this before, but a colleague of mine always says “Stupid doesn’t hurt anymore”. What he means by that is that those of us with more than a modicum of common sense have to have our lives filled with rules and restrictions so that the idiots don’t kill themselves. Whatever happened to natural selection??

One of my BIGGEST hates on the road is RED RIGHT ARROWS (RRA). As much as I try, I can’t come to any conclusion as to what purpose they could possibly serve, other than to stop f**kwits from killing themselves. And let’s face it, if you’re stupid enough to drive your car into the side of a truck, maybe you SHOULD drive your car into the side of a truck.

Let me just quickly remind our American friends again that our lanes work backwards over here. So our red RIGHT arrows would be the same as a red LEFT arrow for you guys. Now you see what I mean? Exactly!

In Brisbane, we all get sit at traffice lights with RRA. And wait. While there’s no on-coming traffic. What…..The…..F**k. The compounding issue here is that the line of traffic waiting to turn right grows longer and longer for no logical reason. So when that RRA goes away, only about 4 cars get through, and then the rest get stuck – at the arrow, with no oncoming traffic.

If our governments stopped thinking along the line of protecting the dullards, and let those of us with more than a handful of brain cells think for ourselves, I wouldn’t spend 20 minutes of every hour waiting to turn right. Maybe then some of these morons might start to be removed from the mortal coil, and the rest of us could live in relative happiness.

Just think. If these people slowly disappeared, maybe you wouldn’t need all those shitty little warnings you see everywhere. Like having to reduce the speed limit by 20 – 30kph at “roadworks” when there’s actually nothing restricting the flow of traffic. Or maybe the fact that if you fall down a flight of stairs, you won’t be able to sue anyone any more. After all, if you fall down, that’s because you f**ked up, right?

Here’s another example – and yes, this is true. At my work, we needed someone to install a lite-pro on our ceiling. All the cabling was down when the building was built, but for some reason we needed a custome bracket for the hardware. So the guy shows up, climbs his ladder and drills a couple of holes in the ceiling for the screws to go into.

When he’s almost finished, he realises he left a couple of screws in his truck, so climbs down his ladder and grabs what he needs. When he gets back inside, some Inspector has arrived, to make sure the “workplace is safe”. The guys has – literally – two screws left to put in and the 3 hour job is done.

But Miss Safety-first inspects the guy’s ladder. “It’s out of date” she tells us. It seems that someone hasn’t inspected this guy’s ladder recently, so she deems it unsafe (despite the fact the guy has been up and down it for the last 3 hours). The guy comes back with “No problem, I have another on in the truck”.

He retrieves the ladder, but it turns out THIS one has NEVER been inspected! OMG! So Miss Safety-first deems this one an abomination, and the whole job comes screaming to halt. Even though, after 3 hours, we just need two screws installed.

I have nothing against the bloke – he’s doing his job. But I work on the theory that some genius once fell off a ladder – because he (or she) was being stupid. So now, EVERYONE has to have their ladders inspected at regular intervals to make sure that WE can’t be sued when they kill themselves.

Why can’t we just let these idiots kill themselves? And then the rest of us can go back to the way life was in the ’80′s, where everyone used commonsense. And if you stuffed something up, it was YOUR fault and you couldn’t sue someone. How I long for those days!