Rant

I started ranting in the pub last night. Not raving, cos that would involve too much foaming at the mouth, but a pretty good rant, nevertheless. I managed to surprise myself cos I’m not normally a person with very strong opinions, but the subject of store ‘club cards’ came up. Oh dear. I used to work in advertising and I’m fully aware of the insidious and evil effect that marketing has on us. The information that they (the Men in Black – proper conspiracy theory scary-type Them) have on us, as individuals is not only unnecessary but invasive and wrong. Why should they need to know that Mr x at 12 Nowhere Street prefers to floss his teeth and buy round lettuce instead of iceberg. They sell lists of this type of information to whomsoever they please because they managed to get our permission by deliberately confusing us (tick this box if you want us to sell your details when you would expect it to say tick this box if you DON’T want us to). Which means you will be bombarded with junk mail, spam, unwanted sales calls and ‘prize’ offers. And the most scary thing about this Big Brother control they have over us? It works. We do take them up on their offers of cheap this or free that. We buy the products they recommend, we eat where they tell us to, we wear what they tell us is IN. Bah, humbug. I’m never setting foot outside my house again. Thank god the tinfoil helmet works, at least.