Currently my Facebook status reads:
Stilgherrian is going to tell everyone who Talks Like A Pirate today that they’re a gullible unimaginative fuckwit of a sheep.
Mass-organised opportunities to “do something different”, like International Talk Like a Pirate Day, are just another way in which peer-pressure is deployed to make people conform to certain group behaviours. Yes, you can have fun in your life — but only this kind of fun. And only today.
And the rest of the time you can continue being a dutiful little cog in the machine.
Sorry, I’m capable of making my own fun. And I will decide what sort of fun I have in my life, and the circumstances in which I’ll have it.
And I certainly won’t put up with people exerting peer pressure, saying “X is wondering if Stilgherrian is a ‘Land Lubber’?” How dare you imply I’m behaving unacceptably just because I happen not to join your pathetic mob action.
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19 September 2007 at 10:40 am
Snarky Platypus
Appropriate responses to people talking at you like a pirate:
I think you’re reacting a bit too strongly to this though. Let the plebs have their fun
Actually I’m getting rather fond of the first response…
19 September 2007 at 1:49 pm
jason
While we’re at it, let’s scrap Jeans for Genes and Red Nose day, and all that tedious stuff.
19 September 2007 at 4:13 pm
Stilgherrian
@Snarky Platypus: I was trying to be good and not use the word “plebs”. Maybe “proles” or even “gammas”…
@jason: Agreed. If people want to donate money to genetic research, they can. If they want to wear jeans, they can. But “wearing jeans to show that I’m donating to charity” is just boasting about how good you are.
19 September 2007 at 6:05 pm
Alexey Stakhov
Today is also edit-wikipedia-to-change-the-date-of-”talk-like-a-pirate-day”-day
19 September 2007 at 9:08 pm
patrick
Yeah, you’re overreacting BIG time. People have fun in different ways. Let them be.
Just because it doesn’t CONFORM to YOUR way, you dismiss them as plebs or proles. Now … you don’t think that’s being stupid? I think it is.
20 September 2007 at 6:23 am
Stilgherrian
@patrick: You’ve missed the point. I really don’t care what someone else does, as long as it doesn’t frighten the horses — though I reserve the right to believe that it’s stupid, and to tell them so. What I object to is the peer pressure involved when someone implies that someone’s a lesser person because they didn’t join in, sheep-like.
As for “plebs” and “proles”, please read more carefully, note who said what and in what order, and turn on your irony detector. You’ll get a lot more out of my writing — and life! — that way.
20 September 2007 at 7:29 am
Snarky Platypus
Patrick: I offer my first response to you…