I recently stumbled across a newer version of the Midnight Oil song, “Beds Are Burning.”  80’s music burned itself on my teenage brain and this was one of my favourite songs. Actually, I tend to be partial to a good protest/social awareness song.

Media evokes and provokes. However, producers seem to want us to believe that media can only produce good. Think of all the money raised by “We Are the World.”

Now if you have the audacity to suggest that some of the media that is produced has a negative effect – even just the effect on a child’s worldview that may not be our collective best interest – you will be accused of being hysterical, uninformed, simplistic.

Is it really possible that media works only one way, for good and never for evil?

By the time you read this Oprah will have had her interview with Lance Armstrong and he will have admitted to drug use as part of his training and competing in cycling. Is this really a surprise?

It’s highly unlikely that any elite athlete today hasn’t tried or regularly used some form of enhancement. Even a cursory review of the history of performance drugs reveals that many drugs were made specifically for sport. This doesn’t diminish their natural talent, gazillion hours of training, and other sacrifices to be the best of the the very best. Drugs don’t make an elite athlete; they help make elite athletes more elite.

While I don’t support drug use, the reality is that the consumers (you) want bigger, faster, stronger and they want that year after year. We buy the shoes, shows, and whatever else their bigger, faster, stronger is used to sell us.  Along with this, we don’t want to know how they do it; we want them to lie to us so we can believe in a reality that doesn’t exist.

It’s hypocritical to be shocked and angered when an athlete is found to have used drugs. We are just getting what we are paying for.

As part of my mid-life crisis I have been going to the gym on a regular basis. I used to be a “gym rat” so it’s kind of same old, same old. However, what’s really interesting is that these days, everybody (say 98%) are wearing headphones of some kind. Now, I’m not knocking listening to music or whatever while working out. It’s just that, it seems we are losing all our third spaces.

A third space is a place other than home or work where we have community. Think Cheers, where everybody knows your name. In the olden days, a work out buddy would encourage you, maybe even shout at you, even give you a hard time if you slacked off. It was more than that – we talked about life, work, family. The gym was a third space.

Today at the gym there were two guys who are obviously workout buddies. And yet, both had earphones and they barely spoke with each other. I wonder how many other third spaces are being degraded by our constant need to be plugged in?

May I rant?

The expression goes “The Customer is always right.” Of course, that’s not true because sometimes the customer is an abusive jerk trying to rip you off. However, if you have a good customer and you want to keep them as a customer you want to give them excellent service.

Unless you’re Canada Post.*  Canada Post provides two kinds of services. One is the traditional put a stamp on it and send it service. The other is similar to a courier with faster delivery, tracking numbers and the like. With the stamp service, expectations are really low; if you want to go cheap and you don’t care if it gets there then that’s the service you use. With the courier-like service, expectations are high.

A couple weeks ago, my son sold his camera online. The buyer was out of town so for shipping he was going to use Canada Post. I was helping him, using my PayPal account to receive the funds. I’m new to PayPal but it seemed like the funds were sent to us – we received a notice that we were to confirm that we had shipped the camera. Yes, it has been a huge learning experience for both of us.

After he paid Canada Post for the shipping – $100 – we went back to PayPal only I noticed that something wasn’t right. I called them and my suspicions were confirmed, the buyer was scamming us, even sending counterfeit PayPal confirmations. Our priority became stopping the shipment of the camera. We might be out $100 but if my son could get the camera back he could at least salvage something from this experience. We went to the local post office the very next day but we were out of luck.

So I called Canada Post’s tracking service with our tracking number.

What I discovered is, at Canada Post, their mandate is not “The Customer is Always Right” rather it’s the policy that’s always right; even when that means they are taking the side of the criminal – aiding and abetting fraud. You see, even though we sent the package at a cost of $100, and even though we had the tracking number, and even though we could show that we were victims of fraud, they wouldn’t cancel the delivery and return the package to us. Instead, they told us to call the police and file a complaint; only the police can intervene and have the package stopped.

Now at this point, their system was reporting that the package was still in our city.  We begged them to hold it while we initiating the call with the police. No can do – it’s policy.  We called the police, they were very prompt and contacted Canada Post immediately. Two thumbs up for them. However, at that point their position was the matter is closed.

Later that day, Canada Post contacted my son with a reference number and said the package would be returned to him. That was two weeks ago. We checked the tracking site again and it indicated the package was leaving the country. When I called them yesterday, I was told we might as well consider the camera a lost cause.

The part that burns me the most, is the answers I received when I was talking with one of the Canada Post reps. I asked two things: technically speaking, could he push a button and make the shipment stop and, who else I could speak with who had the ability to make critical decisions. The answers: yes but he wouldn’t do it because of policy, and, regarding the ability to escalate our call, no, they are unwilling to do anything to help their customer and they have no policy to escalate a customer’s concern.

Boooo, Canada Post, booooo.

*For those outside Canada, Canada Post is a government owned monopoly. We have other couriers in Canada – UPS, FedEx, etc. – but in a small community like ours Canada Post is the easy option for sending stuff.

May I rant? I usually don’t get into pop culture bashing as it just seems to make the disgusting thing more popular and make the complainers sound like wing nuts. I have to risk it.

I was skimming through YouTube when I saw what looked like might be a musical parody of 80’s movies. I like such parodies because as far as I am concerned the 80’s were just asking for it. Anyway, it turns out to be a Katy Perry music video. I’m not a KP fan because she’s a sell out but I gave it a couple minutes; again I like an 80’s parody.

This song/video is so wrong on so many levels. KP plays a nerdy girl who goes to a party next door and is transformed by a friend into a “party girl.” That’s so typical in pop culture – a woman’s strength and beauty doesn’t come from character, intelligence, or talent but her ability to squeeze into tight clothes (and lose them just as quickly). It’s also shouting out very loudly that a woman with “normal” hair, braces, glasses, and clothes is unattractive, boring, lonely, etc.

The lyrics are disturbing to say the least. Here’s the chorus:
Last Friday night
Yeah we maxed our credits card
And got kicked out of the bars
So we hit the boulevards

Last Friday night
We went streaking in the park
Skinny dipping in the dark
Then had a menage a trois
Yeah I think we broke the law
Always say we’re gonna stop-op
Oh whoa oh

This Friday night
Do it all again
Do it all again
This Friday night
Do it all again
Do it all again
This Friday night

The video has all the necessary elements of a KP song – drinking to excess, sex, vomiting (usually it’s the listener but in this case it’s KP herself), blackouts, and of course the important life lesson – this is all fun so do it again and again!

Now here comes the worst of it all. The song/video is loaded with “adult lyrics and situations” (in quotes because it may seem adult but it definitely not grown up). However, if you catch the short out take videos you discover that the KP character is in EIGHTH GRADE and 13 years old. Gross.

I would say that KP’s moral compass is broken but that would mean she actually has one.