We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.

Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]

If you’re unhappy and you know it…

If you’re unhappy and you know it, ring the cops.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, ring the cops.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, and you really want to show it…
If you’re unhappy and you know it, ring the cops.

If you’re unhappy and you know it, shout out loud.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, shout out loud.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, and you really want to show it…
If you’re unhappy and you know it, shout out loud.

If you’re unhappy and you know it, blow your horn.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, blow your horn.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, and you really want to show it…
If you’re unhappy and you know it, blow your horn.

If you’re unhappy and you know it, ring up again.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, ring up again.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, and you really want to show it…
If you’re unhappy and you know it, ring up again.

If you’re unhappy and you know it, jump up and down.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, jump up and down.
If you’re unhappy and you know it, and you really want to show it…
If you’re unhappy and you know it, jump up and down.

(The original version of this post was rather obscure, so I have expanded it. I also felt that a musical setting would render the advice of the Minister on how to assist an old woman being beaten up more memorable to citizens anxious to do the right thing in these difficult times.)

11 comments to If you’re unhappy and you know it…

  • RAB

    I just looked at the link.
    Yeah I thought that’s what you were referring to .
    I would have just headbutted the dumb bastard that said that, and got my ASBO sorted straight away.
    Then, at my leasure, I can , at no cost to myself,
    breach it in the defence of my fellow citizens.
    Knowing that, in the reality of things, nothing whatsoever will happen to me. And maybe a little old lady will sleep safe in her bed tonight. No thanks to the Constabulary!

  • Sunfish

    Tony McNulty is a damn disgrace. Here you have the country that invented individual freedom as we know it today, created the common law, colonized the whole freaking world and civilized much of it (cranky yank drunks in the mountains who name themselves after baitfish aside), and the government tells its people to cower, call the police, honk their horns, and stick their hands in their pockets.

    When I first got hired, one of my oral board talking points was a statement by this guy, who had a saying that “The police are the public and the public are the police, with the police only being a few people paid to give full-time attention to matters that are the duties of every citizen” or words to that effect. Yah, what did he know, he only INVENTED THE WHOLE CONCEPT OF MODERN POLICING IN A FREE AND CIVILIZED SOCIETY AS PRACTICED IN THE ENTIRE ENGLISH-SPEAKING WORLD.

    This is why the whole concept of a “commons” is at least a little flawed. “Commons” to me includes the notion of public streets where people can go outside and go about their business without fear. And yet, your government insists that you, as citizens, have neither the duty nor the right to preserve it as a public space safe for people to do whatever it is they do. Preventing crime and disorder in the public sphere is the duty of the police, who should hypothetically be able to depend on the help and goodwill of the public who benefit from a peaceful street and city. The arrangement falls apart, though, when high government officials announce that it’s the duty of the citizen to do nothing at all, and certainly not to act in the absence of the police who are all off dealing with stupid crap in the furtherance of Home Office statistical targets.

    Mama McNulty should have insisted on a condom.

  • To blow my own horn: I have posted on this here.

  • Eamon Brennan

    A couple of years ago I walked through my car park to find the not too infrequent site of a couple of 15 year olds using the dark corner of the yard to sell a stolen moped to some other little skank.

    After the customary exchange of harsh words, I left to walk my dogs. 2 minutes later I spotted a police range rover stopped at the lights.

    I knocked on the window and told them about the underage fences operating beneath their noses. I foolishly asked if they would go and have a word with the little bastards.

    I was told, in a very patronising fashion, that they were the armed response squad and couldn’t help me. Then they drove off leaving a crime being committed in peace about 50 yeards away.

    Maybe I should have told them the bike had been nicked by Brazilian electricians.

  • RAB

    Um Eamon,
    Am I completley off my face
    or have you told us this one before?

  • He hadn’t told it to me before, RAB. I thought it worth hearing.

  • Quite. So what if he said it before? It’s still shocking and furthermore it is relevant to the thread.

  • Eamon Brennan

    If I have told it here before (and, as you can imagine, the event left quite an impression on me so I have regurgitated a few times online), it must have been quite a while back, seeing as my posting frequency here is about one every six months.

    That’s a hell of a memory you have there RAB.

  • RAB

    Dont apologise Eamon, a good story is always worth repeating
    I thought I’d had a glass or two too many!

  • RAB

    Oh and just to clarify, Natalie and Lurch
    I wasn’t having a go at Eamon or anything, I was just perplexed.
    It happens to me a lot on Samizdata.
    Mainly to do with Smite control. I can cope with being smited now , after all my experience, frustrating though it is, but it’s other people getting smited that makes you think you’ve had one to many.
    You read a thread, do a post, go away, come back a while later, and there is a post before yours that you could have sworn wasn’t there before. It says all you said but better! Does my head in!!
    So if anyone thinks I have something against repetition, I’ve done this moan, almost word for word, three times now 🙂

  • Brian

    I’ve a idea. What we’ll do is: I find that scum McNulty and start beating seven shades out of him. You all stand making urgent phone calls to the local rozzers (omitting his name, of course) and otherwise following his advice.

    I’ll get probation, you’ll get a laugh, and he’ll regret he was ever born.

    Sounds like an excellent deal to me. Now where does he live…?