Jade Goody, we hardly knew ye

So on Mother's Day of this year, Jade Goody finally left us for good. Since the revelation of her cancer - and indeed, since her TV debut in 2002 - she has been a controversial figure for many, especially so during her final days. With the Jade Goody gags already doing the rounds, I thought an appropriate blog post this time round be to voice my thoughts on the woman, her 'legacy' and her career.

I apologise in advance if this offends anybody, I hope it doesn't amount at any point to speaking ill of the dead or libel; by the same token I have no interest in pandering to the public opinion of an individual in light of her struggle.

I am no fan of Jade Goody. I was no fan of Big Brother or its celebrity equivalent either, but that didn't stop me watching the show for however many years before finally giving up as it got more and more convoluted. The point is, while I may have disliked her while she was on my screen, the fact of the matter is that nobody forced me to watch Jade Goody on my TV, and it was my fault for watching and finding her annoying. As amusing as a lot of what she said was, it's a bit harsh for people to totally dismiss the girl on the basis of being essentially an ordinary English girl in this day and age, with perhaps a less than average intelligence. I'm also inclined to detest anyone associated with a certain PR expert, because he is fairly well documented as a man without scruples.

The whole Big Brother 'racism' incident is, to me, not an example of racism so much as an example of total ignorance. And there's a great deal more ignorance and stupidity in the world than thinking that all people in the East eat with their fingers, don'tcha thing?

Let's give the girl some credit here. She may have seemed stupid, but either she was actually a lot smarter than she seemed or she surrounded herself with very smart people (which in itself is a clever thing to do). She sold her name brilliantly, doing TV shows, books, perfumes, all sorts of merchandising based on no discernible talent whatsoever, although I'd suggest she at the very least was a good business woman. To be honest, I can't really fault her for that. One of the reasons why, as a music journalist and fan, I've always found it so hard to call a band or artist a sellout is because... well, money matters. And I think most of us would be hard pressed to make the 'right' decision when so much money is involved.

Which brings us to her last days. Any gossip magazine had a story about Jade every week from her diagnosis to her death. Jade has herself admitted that since she was dying, she cashed in on that to cement a future for her children. Now anyone willing to take the criticism she took for that decision, sacrificing her own credibility for the needs of her children, deserves applause. Anyone willing to undertake all of the horror of cancer in the public eye, just to solidify her children's future, deserves praise. And anyone who helps raise awareness of cancer, even if only one case that otherwise would've slipped through the net is find, deserves a medal.

Jade Goody may have been a lot of things both positive and negative. But at the end of the day, she never did anything bad that you couldn't avoid by turning off your TV or putting down the newspaper; and the good that she did was probably well worth all of that.

Clubbing

So after much cajoling, my girlfriend finally convinced me to go out clubbing with her for her birthday on Saturday. Having been slightly hung over all day Sunday (I'd have been happier to be very hung over in the morning and fine later on) I think I have just about enough thoughts in order to blog about it. So in the immortal words of Kel, awwww here goes.

The night consisted of:
- Getting takeaway and chatting for a while.
- Going to The Ship
- Going to Warehouse

Takeaway was all good but I was missing for a lot of it trying to find some ID, having a shower and getting ready.

Firstly, being what Eric Idle once termed 'merely an amateur drinker,' I didn't down quite as much as everybody else. This is my key problem - to me, drinking is not an activity. It is something to be done in addition to other activities. So as much fun as it was to hang around in The Ship, the pub I consider to be 'my local,' the weight of drinking was not really enjoyable to me, even if I do like a few.

Warehouse was where things kind of fell apart, for a number of reasongs.

- Clubbing is great, if you like to dance. I don't. Meaning I had nothing to do but sit and drink, which I did for a while (although Warehouse don't do my favourite drink). Thing is, all my friends (well, the ones I came with, I found some others upstairs) were dancing.
- If you go with friends, you may as well not have bothered, because the music is too loud to talk to them and on a dancefloor you get separated within seconds. Plus the music is also too loud for them to get a phone message.
- If you don't like the music, too bad, because it's loud as hell and will just keep pounding at you.
- Time may fly when you're having fun, but when you're bored it's verrrryyyy sllllooowwwww.


On the plus side, I expected to be utterly miserable all night, but I did have a bit of fun, and the rest of the time was just plain bored - an improvement on the expected misery. I can see myself doing it again as a favour to my girlfriend (it was her birthday after all) but not sure how often it'll happen that aside. Plus we need to find a club that does Kopparberg!

Dopes that don't smoke dope are dopey

Seeing as this blog was started for journalistic reasons technically speaking, I don't know if this goes against any of the rules about what we 'should' be posting on the internet. I'm also not sure I care, so here goes.

Marijuannnnaaaaa.

Kids, say hello to our new anti-drugs spokesman.

Ish.

Drug use isn't as black and white as people say it is.

Firstly, if we're to theorise that whatever drug you're taking is actually what it claims it is (that being one of the problems), then there are still smart and dumb ways of doing it, just as there are smart and dumb ways of driving a car, and that can kill or injure you just as badly. But that is a whole other rant.

My second point, which is what today's main rant will be about, is that just because something is strictly speaking illegal doesn't mean it's worse for you than something that's legal.

At least one person I know will doubtless point out the pros and cons of all of them, and probably correct any of my factual inaccuracies regarding drugs too.

Heroin and crack are probably the stupidest drugs to try. I think it's the highest addiction risk (I heard somewhere that either or both can get you after one use) for least value for money. Anyway, point is, those are pretty dumb. Other ones aren't as idiotic as people would have you believe in the media, but it varies.

Interesting side note, I read a hilarious interview with Kings Of Leon in Q talking about their cocaine use, in which they talked about how with one use of cocaine they knew it was stupid and not worth it. The VERY next quote was 'after two years on that stuff...'. That's hilarious.

Anyway, the point is, one of the most hotly debated drugs as far as legalisation, declassification, masturbation and exacerbation is marijuana.

Let's not bullshit about this.
- Marijuana is not as bad for you as smoking or drinking.
- If nicotine or alcohol were discovered tomorrow, they would be class A in an instant.
- If the government could tax cocaine, we'd all be on the nose candy.

Marijuana has no proven physical addiction. It's all mental, but the mind is a powerful thing and so it creates symptoms of withdrawal. Even these aren't as bad as those from kicking the booze or the fags - if you're addicted in the first place, and some lucky bastards don't have addictive personalities anyway.

It hasn't actually got, as far as I know, that many proven negative effects - there's only correlational studies, but you can find correlations to a lot of weird shit if you try hard enough. The most prominent one is that it increases likelihood of schizophrenia. Ironically, I believe certain newly pioneered treatmrents for schizophrenia include amphetamines. Go figure.

Something a good man I know called Aaron King pointed out to me was that it's somewhat of a typical student outlook to be in favour of marijuana being legal. He's right, and as such I know my voice will probably never be heard. The main problem there is that I'm not a marijuana user myself, and wouldn't be even if it was legal.

But I've got pretty bombed on stuff that's entirely legal. I have major back problems as most people who know me are aware, and I am jacked up on painkillers 24/7. When I originally hurt my back, I got fairly high on my painkillers and was pretty close to addiction before I got them changed. Both them and the pills I'm now on I got just by asking the doctor for them. I don't think he even examined me. The doctor I'm currently seeing certainly didn't, he just took my word. God, he even asked me what my dosage was!

Of course, that's completely legal, and I really do have back problems. But who's he to say I did?

I'm running out of key points here, so I'll just sum up. As long as alcohol and nicotine are legal, marijuana should be too. By sheer logic.

But then we're not talking about logic, we're talking about politics.

My big 'Big Issue' issue

Okay, I'm going to rant a little bit about charities before I pin down what this blog is really about.

In Preston town centre, there's quite a few beggars around, just like there were in Nottingham. A lot of them just kind of sit there, some have dogs, some have instruments.

But far too maligned are the Big Issue sellers. It's a publication with somewhat of a negative association - given that it's sold by those who are perceived as tramps - and it doesn't really deserve it.

Firstly, having read several of the last few issues, I quite like it and buy it when I can afford to.

Secondly, a Big Issue seller isn't your average beggar. Someone my girlfriend knows once bought some food and tried to give it to a tramp - they promptly threw it back in his face and shouted "I don't want your food, give me some money." This is what you can never guarantee isn't going to happen if you give food to a tramp - or more specifically, if you give them money, you never know where it's going to go. It's cynical, yes, but unfortunately it's just the way things are.

A Big Issue seller, on the other hand, has to buy his or her copies of the mag off the company that makes them before he can sell them. This shows he's put aside some money so that he can spend it on something that ISN'T drugs, and that they are actually trying to help themselves. This is commendable, and should be encouraged. So even if you don't read the damn thing, buy a Big Issue.

Going... down?

Greetings, traveller.

As part of my journalism course, I've been encouraged to start a blog on a topic of my choosing.

So I am. I have yet to decide on a solid topic. I will probably just rant about the media, both as in the press and as in music, film, television, etc.

I'm going to write my first blog in a couple of minutes, I just figured it should be a separate post to my introduction.