Hello.
Dave from Watford sits in an East London café, sipping on
coffee-infused herbal tea that came out of a Mongolian ox’s arse. He flicks
through his dissertation one last time, gets up, bangs his head off three bare
light-bulbs, of various sizes, hanging from the stripped back ceiling and makes his way to the
analog till and its attendant. He hands over a Winston to the girl with a tattoo of Audrey
Hepburn on her neck and a bandana knotted in her quiff. There will be no
change.
He then makes his way to the Department of 21st Century
Literature at the New Hoxton Metropolitan University of Humanistics and Communications. It will be his final time. The reception desk informs him that his
tutor is away and that they will make sure that his dissertation is delivered that
very day. Some forms are stamped, a copy handed over and Dave leaves. He will
go home, on his matt black fixie, and sleep for the rest of the day. The
receptionist places Dave’s dissertation – “The Dynamics of Relations between
African women and the ISIS LBGTQRS community via mobile phone” – in the ‘out’
pile. Done.
A couple of months pass and Dave, by now, is a civil servant in Hull as work was hard to
come by in the mediascape of London. He has received a letter from the university. He opens the envelope. It declares that he has achieved a 2:1 with special
mention for his thoroughly researched dissertation. It will be printed in
weekly segments in the University magazine over the course of the next five years. Back to work, now, Dave!
The months pass and Dave is still in Hull. A job is
a job after all. One day, whilst on his tea-break, standing outside vaping nettle
and avocado through his nose-pipe under the North-Eastern English drizzle, he checks
his Twitter feed. He is not a big contributor but he likes to keep a tab on
things. And, low and behold, there amongst the top UK trends is #RelationsAfricanWomenAndISISLBGTQRS. He clicks on it and
scrolls through the sea of factually based opinions, or tweets.
@MrsBeckyBeiber : Here’s a petition in support of all the
African women and ISIS members living in Lewisham goo.gl//tWE23uHh #RelationsAfricanWomenAndISISLBGTQRS
(14 Comments, 2 Retweets, 17 Likes)
@ILoveHarryStyles : My prayers go out to #RelationsAfricanWomenAndISISLBGTQRS
(3 Comments, 5 Retweets, 29 Likes)
@NandosUK : Our peri-peri chicken can better relations.
Blacks love chicken and Muslims can’t eat pork. #Cheeky #RelationsAfricanWomenAndISISLBGTQRS
(19 Comments, 167 Retweets, 593 Likes)
@TheGeezerLad : I’d watch that, anybody have a link? #RelationsAfricanWomenAndISISLBGTQRS
(0 Comments, 0 Retweets, 1 Like)
@Z_ListCeleb : Only together can we make things better, like
when I bettered relations between the black woman celeb and the Muslim celeb on ‘Who
wants to be a baker on ice get me out of here’ in 2010 #RelationsAfricanWomenAndISISLBGTQRS
(8 Comments, 19 Retweets, 71 Likes)
And the feed goes on and on and on. Dave, with a quick
search, discovers that the problem in their relations lies in the fact that the
mobile networks between the two communities are inadequate. This is something
that he had foreseen happening months before. If there were one subject that
Dave knows inside out, it is #RelationsAfricanWomenAndISISLBGTQRS. This is his
moment. The moment Twitterlandia will take notice of Dave from Watford. He
tweets.
@DaveSmith86 : My
dissertation this year was all about #RelationsAfricanWomenAndISISLBGTQRS. No
stone unturned. Here’s the abstract goo.gl//Tgb34iLO
Let the comments, retweets and likes roll in! But, alas,
Dave is not a Twitter comedian (the ones that claim they wrote and own all jokes,
ever), nor is he a vlogger using the network to direct 12-year-old girls to a
Youtube channel on how to contour your armpits. He is simply @DaveSmith86,
civil servant, likes a flutter on the nags, a lifetime Watford FC supporter and
all his views are clearly his own. He has 98 followers. His phone bings four
times the whole day. His tweet has received a total of 1 comment, 0 retweets
and 3 likes. The comment is from Anna, a girl who was on his course at the New Hoxton Metropolitan University of Humanistics and Communications.
@AnnaBanana : Hey @DaveSmith86! Hope all is well. When R U
next back in London? B good 2 catch up. Xxxx
He had always liked Anna, but she never reciprocated. She
had friend-zoned him, the poor bastard. It has only been six months, or three new versions
of the iPhone, since that terrible date but now it seems like a life-time ago.
Her comment lifts his spirits. What good is going viral if tomorrow he still
has to go back to his shitty job, in a shitty building, in shitty weather, in a
shitty town? It is all but a fleeting sensation. It is not as if you can put it
on your CV.
The following Saturday Dave’s beloved Watford FC are playing
away against Hull. Dave obviously is at the game. His team, the surprise of the
season, need only 11 points from their last five games to lift the trophy. Dave films the team’s celebration of their second goal on his phone. A funny,
choregraphed dance that was obviously practiced at the training ground.
Incredible scenes. When all has settled down, Dave tweets the clip of the tiny
players – he has a shit seat – dancing around the corner flag like Native
Americans. By the final whistle, it has 7 comments, 13 retweets and 24 likes.
@LittleTone87 : Oi oi big dave! What a result! Couldn’t
script shit like that! We go again, fam! #HULWAT
@Jimbob563 : Dave, cuz, Hull of a game! 3 points closer and
they gave 110%! #HULWAT
@MeatBalls14 : You must b buzzin matey! That was a 6 pointer….get
in! #HULWAT
@PhilMeGlass : Me mate put a quid on WFC to win league at
200000/1, looking good with 4 games left. Boom!
@TheLadBible : Can u contact us. We would like to use your
clip.
@GazzaBeans : Ludicrous display by the mighty Hornets. Goals
win games and winning more games than everyone else gets you the title. I told
you. #HULWAT
@BarryTBone : Never easy against a team like Hull. Decent
team on paper. What a win! Best league in the world #HULWAT
On his way home, Dave takes out his phone and responds to
only one of the comments.
@DaveSmith86 : @TheLadBible go fuck yourselves in human
centipede style.
That evening, whilst watching Match of the Day with its
panel of footballing prophets (one of whom, Larry Ginekar, had tweeted his
support for relations between African women and ISIS non-heterosexuals which
got 34810 retweets), his phone bings once more. It is an eighth comment on his
video-clip.
@PhilMeGlass : That dickhead mate cashed out his bet at
Christmas…what a knob!
Of course he did. Dave watches the Watford highlights,
knocks the TV off and goes to bed. For the first time in years he switches off his
phone and goes to sleep.
He awakes, never has he slept so good in years. He makes a brew and sits down at the kitchen table staring at the wall. He takes his phone out of his pocket. It is still off. He pauses. He is going to leave it off. For the day. Fuck it.
In this fast moving world, it is time Dave from Watford took a break.
In this fast moving world where Big Brother has been on our screens since 2000, X-Factor and Strictly Come Dancing since 2004, it is it is time Dave from Watford took a break. But it is pointless to go abroad as he will find the same programmes on the televisions there just in different languages.
In this fast moving world with its monarchy, handful of mainstream media owners, Christmas starting in November – fucking John Lewis advert – and Spice Girls, Take That, Steps and Blue's fifth come-back tours, it is time Dave from Watford took a break.
In this fast moving world where social media has become as predictable and obnoxious as the hangover after a stag-do (#MotivationalMonday, #TuesdayTip, #WednesdayWisdom, #ThrowbackThursday, #FridayFeeling, #RIPObscureCeleb, week in week out), it is time Dave from Watford took a break.
In this fast moving world where pay-TV builds up a football game - Super Sundays, Warrior Wednesdays, Fighting Fridays - with an army of pundits and experts for three days, rehashing the best moments from games bygone, only for it to be a shit 0-0 draw, it is time Dave from Watford took a break.
In this fast moving world where a footballer from ten years ago, who scraped a quater-final once in an international tournament, and his ‘designer’ wife still are ‘news’, as is Cheryl WhateverHerSurnameIsThisWeek (ironically she tweeted her support for the African women), it is time Dave from Watford took a break.
In this fast moving world where the hate, ignorance, brand-plugging, repetition and white-noise of Twitter is a source for lazy journalists who believe fact-checking is but an optional, it is time Dave from Watford took a break.
In this fast moving world where the Internet has branded 2016 the apocalypse - they have made their 2016 an apocalypse - it may be we just live in a world with a majority of Daves from Watford wanting a break. A break from the high-pitched buzz of a world obsessed with bad news that most likely wasn’t ready for the third millennium hence its nauseating spews of nostalgia that cut across our politics, media and social networks. Not ready to let go.
In the end...
...it's all a load of Bovine Skittles!
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