Friday 30 January 2009

Tipping - Where in our evolution did this germ appear?


By Albion

For a change from discussing politics I want to show that we really are just Sheeple. We follow the herd. We do not want to be seen as being different, we are afraid to think for ourselves, to break away from the flock and be our own person. The ‘yoof’ today wear the latest fads in clothing and hair styles to be different but they are not being different, they all look the same. Take the girl with her thong showing just above her jeans, which are resting below her hips? I have just passed a dozen of her sisters looking the same but sporting different coloured thongs.

Take taxi drivers for example. Why the hell do we tip them? They earn a percentage of the money they take as fares, so why do we also give them more money. I liken it to benign begging. There are first world countries where tipping is unheard of. Australia comes to mind. The London cabbie hates Aussie tourists they think they are tight. They are not; they refuse to play this silly game. I find tipping quite disgusting and demeaning for the beggar.

Even the Asian taxi driver would never have received a tip pulling rickshaws around Delhi, or the Pakistani selling a curry delight from a roadside stall on the outskirts of Islamabad. So why expect it here? taking advantage of first world begging maybe?

To make your point when you finally refuse to play this game anymore, to wean yourself off this awful practise, try this. Where the fare might be say 4 pound 80 pee, tell the cab driver you are from Australia and you do not normally tip on principle, but in an isolated case such as this you will make an exception. You then give him a fiver and tell him to keep the change, its one small step at a time to wean oneself off this stupidity. You have to be your own man…or woman depending on your personal topography.

I wish it ended there but it doesn’t. Again WHY do we tip hairdressers? What is special about their service that warrants a tip? I don’t tip my doctor; I don’t tip the bearded Asian gentleman in ‘Mohammed’s Kitchen of Asian Delights’ when he serves me my bacon sandwich and a cup of coffee.

My barber gets a salary, why am I supplementing his salary by giving him more than the price list charges? Is it because his wages are not enough to live on? Well Doody bloody Doo! whose fault is that? He should ask his employer for a raise, he should not have to beg off his customers. But the hairdresser knows too well his client will be shamed for his non-generosity by the waiting customers staring at him as he heads for the door.

The Busker in the street I can understand, he may have been a commodities trader, financial adviser or very big in hedge Funds that has hit hard times, he may have no means of support. Maybe the bank has confiscated his mansion and he has had to sell the Bee Em and the yacht to pay his debts and to pay for his wife’s share of a shattered marriage of what is left of his worldly assets.

The fact he can also play the Banjo admittedly is in his favour, so I give the poor man a tip, don’t I?

Politics is no exception. Who are you voting for at the next election? Labour. Why? Well my husband voted labour didn’t he? See what I mean?

What about the British National Party you ask? Oh no, the BBC says they are the far right and they started WW2 and are going to open up the concentration camps. You say, what if I told you the BBC lie on order of the government? Impossible they say!

Well times have changed. Who your husband or dad voted is not going make one iota of difference to your future or to your quality of life. Your dad and your husband’s dad are from a different generation, England was not being sold to the highest bidder. It just might surprise you to learn that you are an individual not a mirror image of anyone else. Don’t believe the lies of the establishment. For them there are still rich pickings at the trough.


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