A CAUTIOUS RE-ENTRY....

OK.  I`ve been away from these pages for some weeks now and so it is with some trepidation that I make this cautious re-entry into the wonderful world of blogging.   The reason for my absence?  Well, in a nutshell I reached the stage when there was so much to rant about, grumble about, even rebel against that I frankly didn`t know where to begin.

In that regard, not much has changed - if anything the mad world we live in has become even more bonkers.  Despite which, I have been inundated with the odd enquiry as to my absence and a little encouragement to have another go, chiefly from my neighbour the well known error of judgement, Mr. Slightly.  But more on that story later.  

I have discovered that finding something to rail against is an almost daily occurrence and it`s difficult therefore to chose something  but I saw a report yesterday that seemed ripe for the attention it deserved, so here goes.

First, the illustration at the top is self-explanatory - not just Orwell`s classic but also the fact that there is something of a local connection - there`s a smart rather exclusive `development` up the road with just a few `desirable residences` which goes by the name of Orwell Spike as it sits on the site of an old workhouse - a spike - which Orwell frequented in his tramping around the countryside.

I was reminded of this when I saw a report yesterday that a school student had been suspended from his school in Aberdeenshire for insisting in his opinion that there were really only two genders and that anything else was the result of `social construct.`

The incident took place when the teacher logged on to a website and found only male or female gender types listed as options, which he claimed was ‘old fashioned’. When the schoolboy disagreed, he was ejected from the class. After being allowed back, he secretly filmed the teacher. In the video, which has been watched on YouTube more than 90,000 times, the teacher can be heard telling the pupil: ‘You’re entitled to your opinion but it is the policy of the authority to acknowledge inclusiveness."   

Seems that Big Brother really is watching you, at least in Aberdeen, although I suspect that the Orwellian Thought Police are pretty widespread in the daft age in which we live.   Time to update 1984 to 2019 and see if we can spot the difference?   I can imagine that the student in question probably goes by the name KZ6090 Smith, W.  But maybe it`s another case of `if you become a teacher, by your students you`ll be taught.`