Massive Outrageous Headline...

Right this one's a bit of a two hander. Firstly, I will complain about the media. In the pub yesterday I noticed a copy of the Express with the headline 'Romanians Steal Man's House' another notch on the sordid bedpost of intolerance. There was a time when that headline would have been 'Man Steals Diana's House' but now it would seem that the Express has pushed aside its previous catch-all headlines for shiny new immigrant-based ones. A bold move, seeing as the Mail have had this territory pretty well covered for what seems like forever and yet the Express has seemingly snuck in under the radar and got away with it, but why?

Well, one logical explanation is that when the Mail does it, it's a bit like Nick Griffin doing it. Alright he might be a massive c*** but he's apparently forged a legitimate political career out of racial hatred and intolerance. When the Express do it, it's like a baglady wearing a Diana tea-cosy on her head and yelling toothlessly to all and sundry. Another explanation is that regardless of what the Express put as their headlines, all the jokes ever made about the paper will feature Diana headlines (you can check Mock the Week for proof if you like).

But everyone's been having a go at preposterous headlines recently, not just the redtops and tabloids. One of today's more ridiculous stories is in the Telegraph and reads 'Facebook linked to rise in Syphilis'. Again, this is one of those classic bits of sensationalism from the paper that last week published an article about the 'Large Hardon Collider'. Obviously logging on to FB doesn't give you an STI and, let's be honest, there's a good chance that a lot of the members (yes, I'm looking at you, ALL-CAPITALS MAN and n vwl grl...) already have something. The link between Facebook and Syphilis is apparently due to the social networking website making it easier to have casual sex, though I think they'll find that the easiest way to have casual sex is to go out and talk to a real person in real life.

As little as I do actually want to defend the website, it's not really its fault if its users go out and have unprotected sex with a relative stranger. Unless the Telegraph are lobbying for some kind of Facebook Mum App that reminds you to take a condom with you every time you log off, there really isn't much of a story here. I'm fairly certain that most users are aware that if they have unprotected sex with a stranger, it could result in Syphilis, babies and other sexually transmitted diseases...

Right, that's the first part done. Here's the second bit- I've spent much of the last 3 hours trying to remember a word. It's a word for a written law or statement... no, not an edict, written, remember?... It's a funny word, it doesn't sound like it should be what it is... it might be latin?... Anyon- hold the phone, affadavit, that's it! Affadavit.

That is all.