Source of humour

 I saw an article in a magazine earlier this week about the amount of money being made by comedians these days, apparently the top ones can earn mega bucks. I was wondering where they find all their material. It didn’t take much looking to discover one source. Being in Penzance with a few minutes to wait I called in at the Blue Snapdragon for a ginger beer, it’s the wrong name by the way but Tom who I had to meet indicated that he knew where I actually was. As there was a Daily Mail on the table I absent mindedly started to peruse its headlines. I needed my glasses to read any more but fortunately had left them at home. Just one flick through and I realized this was the source of much of the comedians’ humour. The moral outrage that roared from every page must keep all the readers in a permanent state of anxiety and the pharmaceutical industry in business.  There was even an article about the shocking rates of ‘happy pill’, (their term for anti depressants), usage in the UK. I wondered if it was a double bluff.

The front page was a rant about the money businesses are spending on re-educating the dross coming out the comprehensive education system, supported by two editorials about the lax discipline in our schools, with a photo of woman who is opposed to her daughter’s school taking disciplinary measures against her daughter. Why are these women invariably overweight and dumb looking? I’m not surprised by either article, I gave up giving detentions years ago as at least 50% of them were rendered null and void by parents demanding a better say in their children’s education and using it to tell me that, although they hadn’t been in my classroom or school corridor to witness anything, their child hadn’t done it. Then there’s the daft chase for ‘levels’ which ended up with the teachers virtually doing the exams, especially the course work, for the pupils and of course that wonderful idea that every lesson has to be ‘fun’.

Then there were articles about the signs of addictive stress levels observed in 78% of young people when they are separated from their mobile phone or lap top.  Why is anyone surprised? Just observe their compulsive phone behaviour in any high street or cafe. These were followed by an article about mountain rescue teams berating people who use phone sat navs for navigating as they invariably end up lost, they advised people to use maps. I really had to laugh at that one.

Next a photo of some  female celeb who looks stunning at 57, forgetting to mention anything about Photoshop, air brushing or the amount she has spent on being remodelled. Then an appalling photo of Ricci Gervais who has lost weight, presumably on some crash diet, but now looks decidedly ill compared to the before photo.

Was I outraged? Not in the least, it’s a huge joke, all one needs to do is read a paper like this and they’ve a script written for them. Tell it how it really is and we’ll split our sides.