[Previous entry: "The wisdom of Gen. Wesley Clark"] [Main Index] [Next entry: "ClaireFiles Forum Back Onlin"]

09/17/2003 Archived Entry: "The Nannies Are On a Roll!"

THE NANNIES ARE ON A ROLL THIS WEEK. Debra here, again. Surfing the Free State Project Forums recently, I found links to several interesting tidbits.

Tidbit the First: Should License Be Required to Go Online? A license for internet surfing? You gotta wonder what these folks are smoking. Do they have any concept of the economic impact of their little plan? Yanking people off the 'net until they complete a friggin' class of ... a day? A month? A semester? Please.

Tidbit the Second: I always thought that the Brit mindset was significantly different from our own. Now I'm sure of it. This article details the results of a study on Instant Messaging practices in both the US and the UK. What caught my eye was that Brits tend to "misuse" IM at work at a rate nearly twice that of their US counterparts. Says the article:

"One explanation for the disparity is the Big Brother notion. Nearly 60 percent of British respondents did not believe or were unsure whether their IM conversations could be monitored by their employer while 71 percent of US respondents believed -- correctly -- that IM messages could be traced."

It's a different world across the pond. They're surrounded by cameras, monitored constantly, but don't believe IM's can be traced?

And finally,

Tidbit the Third: Courts in several states are forcing divorced parents to pay for their child's college tuition. Um, okay, I'm a little behind the times, but when a child goes to college, isn't s/he normally over 18? So exactly why the f--- are courts forcing people to pay the way for grown adults? Wanna go to college and your parents won't pay? Get a f'ing job, you bum!

No wonder you have 35 year old men living in their parents' basements playing video games, or 35 year old women (usually with a kid or two in tow) living with their mothers. No one is asking them to grow up; in fact, childish irresponsibility is apparently encouraged.

Now please excuse me while I go vomit.

Posted by Debra @ 12:36 PM CST
Link