Everyone is an expert about everything

I don't know what it is but suddenly everyone is an expert about everything all the time, no ifs, no buts, no maybes. I assume it's to do with the fact that, even with the smallest of portions of technical expertise, you can set up your own blog, with a virtually unlimited audience. Even if you don't want to go through the hassle of doing that, all you need to do is hit the comment button below a news item and, hey presto, there are your own views, broadcast to all and sundry. There's Facebook, Twitter, Hi5 and MySpace, all ready and waiting to receive your key-taps of wisdom and deposit them onto the 'net.

Combine this with the successor of "it must be true, I saw it on the telly", viz. and to wit, "it must be true, it was on the internet" and you have a recipe for self-perpetuating mythology that is unparalleled in the known space-time continuum.

Having an excellent meal mid-week at Bouzouki, I crossed verbal swords fondly with my well-beloved sis-in-law, who had noticed that a certain soft-drink had been banned by Zimbabwe or Venezuela or somewhere equally at the cutting edge of epidemiology. From there it was but a short hop skip and a jump to the cleaning qualities of the beverage, for all the world as if our stomachs don't contain way more acid anyway, arriving at the conclusion, based on nothing but anecdotal evidence, that soft-drinks were the work of Satan.

I exaggerate for comedic effect, but you get my point, I'm sure.

No sooner had the day dawned (without this column having been sent, me labouring under the impression that it was still Tuesday until a text from Ye Ed jolted me back into the real world) than the news broke that cases of swine flu had turned up. A serious matter, of course, though not sufficiently so, one would have thought, to call Ghostbusters.

Buzz, wrong answer: No sooner had the day seen light than we started having Facebook statuses (if that is, indeed the plural of status) warning people not to eat pork, to stay away from crowds, to avoid being sneezed on and sundry other advisories, nestled in with diatribes against the authorities. Most of the advice, while being pretty obvious, was sound, but the one about not eating pork, especially if it comes from Spain, had me roaring with laughter, and when I queried, with tongue slightly in my cheek, the basis for the advice, I was told in no uncertain terms that I obviously was a horrid man who didn't care about my family.

Precisely why certain people thought they should have a rant against the authorities wasn't immediately clear to me, though when you combine this with the crass ignorance that led them to warn against the consumption of pork products, you easily get yourself to the conclusion that they're the sort of people who have to blame someone for everything.

And when the already tenuous grasp such people have on reality is compounded by political considerations (as in, blame GonziPN for everything, from the price of oil to the spread of viruses) well, there's not much you can do except roll your eyes in awe.

Of course, the subject that is attracting words of wisdom from everyone and his brother and sister is the Piano project, if I can give it that shorthand appellation. I recounted last week how one unbiased observer had already said the plans were rubbish before Renzo Piano had even got through the presentation of his vision, which I thought was pretty good, even for a country renowned for jumping to conclusions with an alacrity that is astounding.

Well, things haven't changed: whoever wanted an opera house stuck to his guns, as if the Barry site is the only one in the whole country which can accommodate a theatre.

To be fair, which I really shouldn't, because it doesn't make for provocative writing, most people seem to like most bits of the concept, though that doesn't stop certain types from misconceiving the fact that they have an opinion as a validation of that opinion simply because they have a right to it.

When will people get it into their heads, I wonder, that I'm the only one who is right all the time, as far as I am concerned? Yes, Joe Blogs will be right some of the time, from my point of view, and Jane Jones will be right some of the time, sometimes at the same time as Blogs, too, but, looked at from where I'm sitting, I'm the only one who gets it spot on the money every time, without fail.

Understood? Now stop moaning and follow my advice, why don't you?

imbocca@gmail.com

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