Browsing the Net on the Midnight Shift
Jun 12th, 2010 by Conor McCabe
I was doing a bit of shopping on The Book Depository last night when I clicked on its real time viewer, which allows you to see what other people are buying (I was getting a copy of Tyndale’s New Testament).
Whereas this popped up from Japan:
this popped up from Ireland:
That’s somewhat addictive. In my three minutes following the real time viewer, many comic books were sold. Not much else however.
You could watch that all day!
I know! Weird, isn’t it?
I presume the point you were making with the comparison of the books randomly bought in Japan and Ireland is the contrast between the fantasy of one and the realism of the other, reflecting priorities for people in the two societies?
There was a good discussion on Vincent Browne’s TV3 show the other night in relation to the Leaving Certificate. I didn’t catch her name or posotion but there was a woman on the panel who was making the point about how competitive and uptight Irish society is (my words) relative to other societies, and as one aspect of that how important the LC is in defining someone’s future prospects, or apparently so important anyway. The point being that Irish society has moved close to the edge in many ways, including aspects of collective mental well-being.
Which fits well with the book on panic which you’ve noted.
And as for Japanese society, well I’ll leave it to someone more opinionated on the subject than myself to make any comments on that.
Man, all I know is I live in a world where it’s the Japanese who are chilled-out and it’s the Irish who are panicking.
It made me chuckle at one in the morning, that’s about the depth of it.
As regards the Irish as more competitive than most other societies, sounds like typical Irish naval-gazing nonsense from the Vincent Browne show. I mean, where to start? Irish teenagers are under more competitive pressure to succeed than teenagers in South Korea, Japan, Germany, France? Doesn’t take away from the pressures of the Leaving Cert, but it is frankly wrong for the guest to claim that the pressures of the leaving cert puts the pressures and anxieties faced by most teenagers in the rest of the developed world in the shade.
I would agree with the mental health issues, though. The biggest killer of young Irish males is suicide. That’s a frightening and frankly depressing statistic.
The point she was making, and I think it was made in an IT article recently, was that in more socially equal societies people don’t feel the immense pressure to “succeed” at all costs because they know and believe that the society in which they live will look after them if they don’t “make it”, and that the material and psychological premium attached with success is not such a big deal, compared to less equal societies.
Anyhow I thought she was making some decent points at the time, most of which I’ve forgotten since as the show is on quite late for my metabolism, I was tired watching it. So not really an example of the Irish navel-gazing nonsense you refer to.
I’m not clicking on that Conor, I’m not going anywhere near it. We have history, Book Depositories and my family…
Haha! Brilliant.
Never was on that book depository before strictly used Amazon UK and ebay but as soon as I clicked on that after another fairy tale to Aussie more Irish consumption namely ‘What does your poo tell you?’ and ‘Can We Trust the Gospels?: Investigating the Reliability of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John!’
After double checking (there was another buyer) What’s Your Poo Telling You? (Hardback) might be worth getting.. I have a wee bit of a mental blockage at the minute.. http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/book/9780811857826/Whats-Your-Poo-Telling-You
I clicked on the link for What’s Your Poo Telling You? and one of the recommended reads was this one:
http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/book/9781905102945/Make-Your-Own-Sex-Toys
I see Wexford on a saturday night is still THE place to be then ??
Jim try googling ‘grassyknoll.com’ then….
Ah yes, I love this facility on Book Depository too. But I do worry when I think of those people around the worldf seeing my purchases and saying to themselves, “What the fuck is Critical Realism?”
This might be apocryphal, but I THINK I remember reading somewhere that Japanese mythology is the only one that does not feature little people. Perhaps that’s why they import their fairies or need advice on how to draw them.