Inbox Nasties

Aaah, don’t you remember the good old days? Back when spam filters actually seemed to work, and the only weird emails you’d get were from your long lost Nigerian businessman friend who conveniently chose this time to waltz back into your life so you could transfer him some money, even though he’d obviously pay you back? Or from those pesky people who seemed hell-bent on telling you how to give your girlfriend that bit of extra pleasure, and explaining how you could gain an extra three inches in a week? Well, unfortunately, those rose-tinted and legendary days have now come to an end. Mr Okuma and The Cialis Corporation have since ceased to email me, and I suddenly feel like the ex-boyfriend figure, yelling “Baby, please, come back! I didn’t mean to ignore you!”

“Why,” you ask? Well, there’s a whole new set of meanies that may just be nestling in your inbox right now.

Around seven times a day, I get an email from Scott Brian. If the name wasn’t suspicious enough [my mum always told me that anyone who had two first-names was a greedy little git!], the subject headings are fishier than the tuna salad you ate last week. Apparently, I, an 18 year old university student, hailing from the North West of London, can earn at least 6,000 pounds a DAY just from working in the comfort of my own home! And apparently I’m not the only one, John Carter, a stay at home dad from somewhere in Missouri has done it too, and is now absolutely raking it in! Isn’t that fantastic!?

Not really. Although I’m absolutely ecstatic for Mr Carter [if, indeed, he exists at all], I don’t really want to make a million pounds just by sitting in my room and ‘following a magic strategy’.

But that’s not the only one. There seems to be a whole new generation of spammers out there. As far as I can see, they love absurdist language and abstract comedy. Not only do they send you emails packed so tightly with viruses that it seems that it’s inhumane, but they send you meaningless drivel like “of Them it is YOU I think of Mum said Teapot Happiness.” And if you’re thinking of doing a double-take to try and actually make sense of that sentence… just… don’t bother.

One spammer, though, did catch my eye and almost made me fall in love in an instant. There was creativity, geek appeal, and a certain amount of panache in the email, and it was only made better by the phrase “JESUS TO STAR IN NEW BATMAN MOVIE. CLICK HERE FOR MORE DETAILS.”

Obviously, the link was full of viruses. But the thought of Jesus playing Batman!? That, my friends, was completely worth it.

But the moral of this story is to always keep your antivirus fully updated and running, keep your computer patched and updated, and the number one rule of life: if it looks suspicious, it probably is.

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AV Explained

THE POLITICAL BIT

As most people know, the people United Kingdom went to the polls yesterday, both to vote on the parties that controlled their councils, and to choose a voting system to be used in future elections where MPs are selected to represent their constituencies in the House of Commons.

Being someone who has yearned for a true democratic voting system for a while now, AV is a change that I would welcome with open arms. Even though it's just a small step in the direction of true Proportional Representation voting system, it's still the right way to go.

However, it seems that the "No to AV"/ "I Can't Believe It's Not Tory" campaign's constant streams of fear-mongering, and blatant lying [something that was admitted by David Blunkett], seem to have resounded into the hearts and mind of the electorate, and it looks as though AV won't be implemented for a while. Many people, too, have chosen just to vote no in order to deal a scathing blow to Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, who, I feel, has become a scapegoat, and is being blamed for items of legislation that are simply out of his control. In fact, many Labour supporters have come out to say that Nick Clegg's association with the YES campaign meant that they'd be a loser from the start. What an incredibly funny comment from the same people who promised that they'd install some form of proportional representation all those years ago. That, as we can see, never happened, and Britain didn't even have a referendum on voting systems- another Blair lie that was fed to the masses in this country, just to be a votewinner.

However, the status of the parties and how I feel about the public treatment of Nick Clegg is another matter for another blog post- so here's the bit I planned to come onto in the first place.

THE 'EVERYONE' BIT

As I said above, the "No to AV" campaign has spread dozens of lies and smears, using the same Tory tactics that allowed David Cameron to become Prime Minister in the first place. These lies seem to have got to several people, and I fear that these lies, as well as some other misconceptions, have damaged the YES campaign altogether. Although there are tonnes of videos on youtube, by the electoral commission, by several pressure groups, and one even involving "Reform Cat" [for those who are really into their memes], I thought I'd do my bit, both as a Lib Dem member and a supporter of fairer votes [even though it's a tad late] to clarify some of these thoughts about AV.

AV is the most complicated system that's ever been heard of in the world. Ever.

False. Quoting from my twitter, "AV is just the right amount of complicated- where normal people can understand it, but Tories can't." There isn't really any mind-bending statistics or procedures that anyone needs to get their head around, even though the "No to AV" campaign wants you to think so.

You, on polling day, would go to your polling station and pick up your ballot paper as normal. Instead of writing an "X" in the box of the one candidate that you want to represent you, you use numbers to mark the candidates in order of preference. So you mark a "1" for the candidate you want as first preference, a "2" for your second

preference, and so on until you get to your fifth preference.

Obviously, you can stop when YOU want to, and you don't need to mark all five choices. If you want, you can even just mark your first choice, and leave the polling station.

After this, your job is done.

When the votes are counted, counters will see if any candidate has at least 50% of the first preference vote in order to win. If no candidate has 50%, then counting continues, and the second preference votes are counted. If a candidate still hasn't got 50% of the vote, counting continues on the third preference votes, and so on and so forth until someone gets over 50%.

This means that the majority get fairly represented, and we don't get typical FPTP drawbacks, including tyranny of the minority.

AV will be extremely expensive to implement

False. Ballots will still be counted by hand, and will use the same method as First Past The Post. There is no expensive equipment needed, or specialist people who can somehow read numbers instead of Xs.

AV wouldn't be helpful to me because I haven't got more than one choice

False. If you haven't got more than one choice, or you don't want to mark more than one choice, you don't have to. You can feel free to mark a number "1" next to your chosen candidate, fold your paper, and place it in the ballot box, if you wish.

AV would result in a coalition government every time.

False. Despite that dim-witted quote from Tory MP and chick-lit author Louise Bagshawe on "Have I Got News For You" the other week, this simply isn't true. Although there may be a slightly higher chance of coalition governments, it certainly won't happen every time, and the chance isn't raised by much.

No-one cares about the voting system, anyway, duh.

False. While I'm a bit of a politics geek, and have adored looking into this sort of thing from the age of 10, it's not just me. Louise Bagshawe, who, again, must be some sort of spiritual guide for village idiots everywhere, seemed to show a notion of no-one caring on her TV appearance. 50% of Scottish people turned out for the referendum- I hardly think that shows apathy...

The AV system will allow the BNP, and several other right-wing, weirdo-parties to come into power.

False. AV does not automatically allow the BNP party to get into power and use their malicious ways to change the country. Don't forget that a candidate needs a MAJORITY to get elected. The BNP currently have no MPs, and has been losing council seats, judging by the figures from yesterday's vote. So it seems as though the BNP would lack the necessary support that it would need under the AV system.

AV is a fairer system that reflects the majority's interests

True. As I said above, a candidate needs over 50% of the vote to win.

So there we have it. I hope I've dispelled a few myths and taught a lesson. At the time of writing, it seems as though the YES campaign hasn't done the trick, and once again the Tories have managed to lie their way to victory, rendering this 1000+ word blog post useless. So once again Britain can kiss goodbye to rose-tinted dreams of steps towards Proportional Representation. If anyone knows how I'd be able to autopost this again when Britain has another referendum on AV in the year 3067, drop me a line.

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