Petitions

I'd like to dedicate the following to BGT, for it was he who inspired me to put my thoughts on the subject down in writing.

The Big Green Thing was asked to sign a petition calling for the closure-threatened Walsall to Wolverhampton rail link to be kept open. He replied, somewhat ardently, that he was not a fan of petitions and forwarded his views to me.

I replied thus:

Dearest BGT,

I have to admit to being much on your side in this debate. Historically, petitions have proved ineffectual, to say the least (witness the ill-fated Stop Being a Naughty Adolph protest handed to the German embassy in London in 1939).

One flaw in petitions lies in their invariably insipid preambles. Words or phrases such as “we the under-signed”, “consider”, “sincerely” and “possibility” ensure that the documents never make it past even the most inattentive and unskilled correspondence secretaries to evil despots. Should they, by chance, overcome these hurdles they are unlikely to strike fear into the hearts of the recipients – no-one ever went into hiding and sought the skills of a plastic surgeon having been “urged” to do something.

The overriding drawback to petitions, however, is that they are gathered by people for whom the targets of their ire have no respect. The wrong-doers reason that if someone is so fair minded and reasonable as to favour this form of protest and also has the time and patience to go around getting others to sign their names on a piece of paper then they will be fair minded and reasonable enough to understand that no-one gives a fuck what they think and they will also have the time and patience to sit around being crapped on by them until Hell freezes over.

If one has no alternative but to write to express angst then I have found that, in dealings with Eon, Lloyds TSB Bank and Nottingham Forest Football Club, “testicles”, “clamp” and “urethral scrape” carry more gravitas and invariably at least result in a response from someone in authority, even if it’s only a police officer, which it has been for me on four occasions thus far.

No, the only path to direct action lies in…..well……direct action. Mr A. Hun did not expand his holiday timeshare business across Asia and Europe by penning a strongly worded letter to The Times. Mr N. Bonaparte did not increase the sales of garlic and sautéed amphibian propulsion systems in Prussia, Spain, Italy and the Austro-Hungarian empire by writing to the chairmen of various policy and resources committees.

To this end, might I suggest that a determined and sustained bombing campaign to cultivate terror and widespread panic be instigated across the wider Midlands region until those evil, baby-eating, devil-worshipping monsters in charge of regional integrated transport strategic planning are brought to their bloodied and broken knees and forced to maintain the Wolverhampton to Walsall light rail commuter link.

While I’m on the subject, if anyone has any old Semtex or unused pipe bombs lying in their attic or garage or knows of around a dozen people willing to blow themselves up for charity then I have a few ideas as to how we might get the litter bin reinstated outside the Somerfield supermarket in my village and also fund an Al Qaeda training cell on the village green into the bargain.

Yours in a tight jacket with straps at the back,

Reg.