Crooks

DZ has long felt that corporations in the UK seem to have precious little concern for the rights of their customers, seeing them only as walking cash machines. Over the past few years he has had a number of occasions when various companies have tried to weedle out of their responsibilities.

Such as "petplan" trying to avoid paying out for a dog's vet bills by claiming, falsely, that the medical condition occurred less than 2 weeks after the commencement of the policy. A period when, despite you having paid the premium cover is not provided. It gave DZ immense satisfaction to prove them wrong and eventually present them with a bill for £8000.

Or Apple, trying to claim that a cracked screen protector (with an intact screen underneath) invalidated the warranty and therefore the defective battery could not be replaced. Could anyone explain how, even a cracked screen could damage the battery. They seem not to care about the fact that warranties "do not affect your statutory rights".

Whirlpool informing me that there is a product recall on a tumble dryer, because they burst into flames, and then offering to SELL me a new one at a discount.

These people rely on people not having the tenacity to pursue them, paying up because it's less trouble.

Probably the worst offenders here are the car parking companies, which operate many hospital car parks. Typical are UKPC who have in the past been caught out altering photographs, changing date stamps, making stuff up and blatantly lying to screw people out of exorbitant "penalty" charges. In the world of industry this is not considered bad behaviour. UKPC have on their website the statement "UKPC is very proud to be identified in the London Stock Exchange Group's "1000 Companies that Inspire Britain" 2017 report"  I think that says it all about modern Britain

Despite having been suspended in the past they have been caught out, and suspended by the DVLA yet again.

So remember. For the time being you can park in a UKPC car park at your hospital, not pay, and they are forbidden to pursue you for any parking infringement incurred during the suspension.

Alternatively you could move to Wales, where it is illegal for hospitals to charge for parking

Family

In my post "DNA" I used one of my favourite bits of film. The film of Buzz Aldrin giving Bart Sibrel a very well deserved punch in the face. But what I like most is not the actions of Buzz or Sibrel, but of the lady accompanying Buzz, who is his daughter.

In this more extended version of the incident you can see that she makes a number of attempts to separate the two men and keep them apart. It might seem that she is trying to protect her aged father from the unwanted attentions of that prick Sibrel. But I think nothing could be further from the truth. I think it was the other way round. When the words "coward and liar" come from Sibrel's mouth just see her reaction. She's getting out of the way. I think she knew exactly what his reaction was going to be. She is as much of a star as her dad.

DNA2

No sooner was the ink dry on my last post than I came across this article in the Guardian. The article itself is bunk and illustrates exactly what I was saying about the dumbing down of the British public, who are increasingly falling for this sort of thing.

But...............................................

My faith is restored because the article also illustrates that there is hope for us in the form of two different groups of people.

1. The practitioners of this therapy.

 These people are almost certainly aware that their IV high dose vitamin therapy is total drivel. But they at least are making money out of the gullible and the uneducated. Cynical possibly, certainly unethical, but not without a degree of calculating intelligence. A fool and his money are soon parted. You may not admire these people, but I don't think you could call them stupid.

2. My real respect though goes to the vast majority of those who have made very appropriate responses to the article in the comments section.

 It appears that a lot of people out there have had a decent education after all.

DNA

DZ has a friend who used to live in the USA. The family moved from there to the UK some years ago for the sole reason that they felt the standard of education in the states was very poor and they wanted their children to get something better. I remember at the time being very surprised and doubtful that things could be so bad over there that they would undergo such disruption.

After all, the USA is the most technologically advanced country in the world isn't it? Surely that speaks of a very high level of scientific education. After all, they sent men to the moon.

But of course many Americans will now assert that that was all untrue, which starts to make you wonder about their intellectual prowess. And telling this guy that he's a liar and a coward is particularly stupid.

But perhaps a good illustration of the startlingly poor level of scientific education of Americans is this study, which indicates that 80% of Americans have no idea what DNA is, and want foods containing it to carry a warning label! And it seems this level of ignorance goes all the way to the top

To be fair there is no similar study for the UK population so I don't know if we would be any better. And a lot of bizarre pseudo scientific beliefs do seem to be creeping in here too. Our own government has precious little in the way of scientifically literate people. Out of 650 MPs, only 25 have a science degree. The last PM with a science degree was Margaret Thatcher. In addition the Health and Science committee of the House of Commons for many years has had this guy on it.

Perhaps we are getting close to this a lot sooner than we thought.

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Days, weeks and months.

Most people will be aware that a lot of dates in the calendar are dedicated to some historical event, or worthy cause. Many of the dedications are well worth honouring, such as "Human Rights Day", December 10, "International Beer Day" (YAY!) 1 August, or "International Holocaust Remembrance Day" January 27.

Others, though this is purely DZ subjective opinion are  a little more............dubious? "International day of Francophonie", March 20 ("Nous nous rendon" seems to cover most eventualities.) Also "World Puppetry Day" March 21, and "Star Wars Day" May 4! (Yes really!)

And finally others are positively shite. In particular is April 10, the birthday (in 1755) of Christian Friedrich Samuel Hahnemann, the founder of the utter bilge known as homeopathy. The date has now been appropriated by quacks as "International Homeopathy Awareness Day" Indeed, so keen are they to perpetuate and encourage this tripe that the day seems to have metamorphosed into a whole week, which, thankfully ends today. It was preceded by "Chiropracty week", celebrating another load of pseudoscientific drivel, pushed by a load of quacks.

Why they should be entitled to a whole week when the cause of abolishing slavery only gets one day is beyond me.

But my faith is restored by the fact that some causes actually get a whole month. And one such is just around the corner. May is "International Masturbation Month"

In the words of the song "It does me good, like it bloody well should". Which is more than you can say for homeopathy or chiropracty.