I'm not being racist but...

A huge thank you too Sarah for giving me the heads up on a programme recently played on Channel 4 here in the UK - Race and Intelligence: Science's last taboo. I just spent an hour of my life watching Rageh Omaar investigate the truth behind this debate, and have to admit that while I didn't expect to enjoy it as such I really did!

James Watson, one of the discoverers of DNA and it's DNA double-Helix structure was recently at the centre of a storm over supposedly racist comments he made - that Africans are naturally less intelligent than White Europeans. It's hardly a new idea, and in our racist society that has spent most of the last 500 years undermining minorities and denying it the idea gets brought up about every ten years.

The first part of the show is hard going. Omaar, and Black British journalist, comes face to face with a lot of the scientists and high profile figures that are claiming race has a lot to do with intelligence, and it makes for uncomfortable viewing. I'm often uncomfortable to discuss our race with my white friends, for concern that they might take offence, so how these men can look Mr Omaar in the face and tell him that blackpeople are less intelligent is mind boggling to me. The idea at first is that there is genetic variation in intelligence, and that this variation correlates with racial make up. East Asians are smarter than Whites who are smarter than Blacks and so forth.

I was brought up believing that intelligence is multi-faceted, as suggested by Howard Gardner's model from 1983. Different areas of intelligence exist, ranging from spacial awareness to musical intelligence or mathematical intelligence. It is possible to have higher scores in one type of intelligence than another - evidence of which is seen in people like David Beckham. Few would say that he gives a clever or insightful interview, but on a football field he sees something that I could never hope to understand and is exceptionally intelligent.

Towards the end of the programme, after visiting Dr James Flynn, we start to broach this idea of intelligence. IQ is denounced as simply a single measure of a type of intelligence, and the Flynn effect shows that IQ is increasing over time in our populations. It is possible to learn to do well in an IQ test. By learning the types of questions asked you can force your results to improve and score higher. The final segment of the programme discussed how this happens in society - how parental influence and a desire to learn, how changes in our culture and society all lead to higher IQs.

Personally I think intelligence is down to opportunity, luck, and using what talents you were given much more than it could ever be down to race. To argue that my skin colour, or even my brain size, affects my intelligence seems wrong and flawed. But to avoid the subject seems even worse. Look up some research on race and intelligence and see what you think? I know working with the Urban Scholars would have been a waste of my time if I put stock in that sort of theory - there's more correlation to race and soft drink than there is to race and intelligence in the kids we work with. More important than judging someone's intelligence is supporting their learning, their aspiration, and their will to succeed, because the smartest person is lost without those.

Windows 7. Like vista, but not shit.

Windows 7 was released amidst unexpected publicity from the evil bastards at Microsoft. When XP was released (the earliest OS release I can remember) I know it was a big deal, but so many people were happy with their windows 98 ME or 2000 machines, and the hardware requirements seemed so prohibitive, that it wasn't a leap.

The same happened for Vista. It came with new PCs, but so what, for the majority of tasks people wanted XP, the release version was a bit buggy so it picked up awful press, and 3 years on people still joke about how shitty Vista is, despite service packs, patches, and hail-mary code passes.

Obviously having a second fuck up of an OS release wasn't an option for microsoft, so 7 had to be everything. The release candidate that I ran on my 3 year old laptop was nice. It worked better than Vista, it worked better than XP most of the time, and it looked pretty. So when my release copy of Windows 7 pro became available on thursday I downloaded it, installed it, and have been using it since. And do you know what? As yet my only complaint is that Office 2007 can't match the delightful green colour scheme I chose for Windows itself.

My 3 year old box of crap has been resurected as a fast and fun machine for less than £50, to buy new RAM and a new OS, and this is bound to give me at least another year or so out of it. Windows 7 might not be the best thing in the world, Linux and OS X fan boys will still argue its faults, but it really is good enough for me!

Pint of Best and, what crisps have you got mate?

I love the pub. One of the things I miss most about my post-graduation job and lifestyle is the days of being able to go to the bar and get a round in. Part of what I love about the pub is the beer, obviously. I don't drink all that much these days, though I probably am guilty of giving a different estimate to every health professional that asks me my weekly consumption. And by drinking less it makes my trips to the pub much more important and enjoyable. I like the atmosphere of a good pub, the food and drink, and the fact that as a 22 year old man I have pretty much gained a complete understanding of pub etiquette.

I read two unrelated articles today on Pub-rules LINK 1 & LINK 2 which made me think. I remember when I was younger and the pub was a bit of a mystery. There was only a short period of my life, between my 17th and mid 18th year, when I fit the traditional lager drinker model, and very quickly moved on to real ale, continental beers (no, not Stella, real Beer), and good old style scrumpy, and I feel that this has led to my drinking habits and the rules I follow.

The blokes I went to uni and worked with when I first came to Uxbridge knew how to drink properly. Not just in terms of volume mind, they knew how to drink socially, and I quickly learnt how to work with rounds, with different peoples drinks, and learned pretty much all of the skills that good bar staff need to know, just through the bottom of a pint glass!

Since I've been poorer than at any time of my adult life in recent months I have had a problem with going to the pub as much as I like, but this causes problems. My usual drinking buddies have either left, moved on, or just got other people to drink with, and all of my new friends are women of the "glass of rose" variety I think, so who the hell can I go to the pub with to compare the character of a porter from a city brewer to a golden ale from the country with?

Pint, anyone?

Now, That's what I call music.

There's a feeling, a really wonderful feeling, when you're in the middle of the crowd at a gig. You know the words, the melody, the rhythm. So does everyone else in the a udience. And as you jump and sing and enjoy the music you realise that it is perfect.

Another way: In your room, sat in bed or on the sofa, the speakers are up full volume. You relax, and feel the music. The bass makes your chest move, and your feet move on the floor. And every note, every melody is perfect.

And again. You step out of the train, or the bus, and it's raining. It's cold, but you have your hat and coat on. Your scarf is up over your mouth so just your nose and eyes are exposed to the elements. On your mp3 player is the album you bought last week, which you've heard probably 15 times over since you bought it. And as you take your first step towards wherever youre going and the best track off the album starts and everything is good.

Last night I saw Kurran and the Wolfnotes play live. You might remember them from my glasto twitter reviews. The difference this time is that they had good sound, a decent audience that were loving everythign they played, and it was phenomenal. I cannot recommend them highly enough, so get out and find their stuff.

Enjoy.

Whatabitch || Garage Sessions from Kurran and the Wolfnotes on Vimeo.

blah blah blah, BNP, blah blah

I promise a legitimate post soon on this subject. All of the furore around BNP leader nick griffin is fascinating. As is well known, I am so anti-BNP that sometimes I burst with anger at their ludicrous, racist policies. I'm currently watching the BBCs own coverage of the protest outside the BBC studios for the filming of Question Time.

The BNP are facists, but this is a multi-faceted argument: so please read as much as you can and think, rather than just shouting the N word at the Nazi-esque bastards.

What a nasty lying fuck.