Forks n' Freedom

This amused me. It’s amazing what makes news these days.

An article printed in the paper indicated that a study conducted at the recent “User Experience 20045 [sic] seminar” indicated that 95% of Internet users reacted negatively to pop-up adverts, ones that flash excessively, and/or make annoying noises.

Next week, on Aphertiser: Results on the study into whether Internet users like having their eyes dug out with rusty forks. It is anticipated that subjects will exhibit similar negative behaviour to those experienced in the study outlined above.

Moving along from my usual paperbashing, I was on my way into work this morning, when I noticed some graffiti. Note, I don’t often notice graffiti, as I find staring at walls on my way to work rather pointless. I do enough wall-staring when I actually GET to work. But that’s another story.

This graffiti simply read: “Freedom is dead!” Despite my initial shock of the words actually being spelt correctly and being somewhat legible, I did actually stop to ponder over said declaration.

I cannot say for sure what exactly was the inspiration for this piece, whether it was some recent events, or those obvious ones from 2001. Yet, I can’t help but feel that this graffiti wouldn’t have been inspired had the author of said piece appreciated freedom’s existence beforehand. Maybe the perceived absence of freedom today wouldn’t have been so hard to fathom, and that defacement of public property wouldn’t have been warranted.

As succinct and to the point the piece was…

After further consider, the accuracy of the statement seems to be subjective depending on who you are. For instance:

Most people: “Freedom died after September 11”

Cynics: “Freedom was an illusion, and has never existed.”

Veterans: “You wouldn’t have known Freedom if it wasn’t for us.”

Academics: “Just what IS freedom? Define it.”

John Howard: “Freedom won’t die whilst I’m in power, but surely will under Labor. Is this an election year?”

George W Bush: “Freedom is alive and well, and under our guard at an undisclosed location. We’ll let them out when we think we’ve finished our job.”

Comedians: “Probably died whilst waiting for Sally Robinson to show up for their date. Wait, who’s the flavour of the month now?”

Asylum seekers: “Ffffffreeee… dom…?”

As for where I fit, well... I don’t believe that freedom is dead, but perhaps it’s a little ill. But, this illness won’t go away if there is some perception that insidious characters in dark corners have somehow multiplied. The simple attitude that freedom is dead is more fatal to this liberty than any other scapegoat that the media throws at us.

On that note, I need some volunteers... preferably owning their own rusty forks.