tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2481298417819219839.post9014940111412938454..comments2024-03-28T16:08:45.744+00:00Comments on A K Haart: The unstoppable rise of fatuous activityA K Haarthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05897490979828603179noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2481298417819219839.post-6630489065900192342017-06-05T19:31:14.983+01:002017-06-05T19:31:14.983+01:00Demetrius - I like porridge so I'll be fine. T...Demetrius - I like porridge so I'll be fine. The trouble is I also like to have the central heating on in winter. Maybe it will be one or the other.<br /><br />Roger - you are right, I saw a fair bit of it before I retired. Eventually there was no point having relevant professional qualifications, the thing to have was an MBA, the gift of the gab and a the ability to skip off elsewhere after a year or two networking. <br /><br />Oddly enough I remember a senior scientist predicting something like this way back in the mid seventies. He suggested that ultimately scientific qualifications would take nobody very far.<br /><br />James - in that case I was gainfully employed writing it :)A K Haarthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05897490979828603179noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2481298417819219839.post-8119257860604103542017-06-04T19:54:50.546+01:002017-06-04T19:54:50.546+01:00I was gainfully employed reading and attempting to...I was gainfully employed reading and attempting to follow it all.James Highamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14525082702330365464noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2481298417819219839.post-62572564409795512422017-06-04T16:46:22.502+01:002017-06-04T16:46:22.502+01:00I think we get a clue from looking at all the brig...I think we get a clue from looking at all the bright young things who make serious money hanging around advertising, media, politics and finance. Get a degree in something like Geography or Art Appreciation or History and you are marked out as suitable material. Avoid at all costs anything so quotidian as any technical topic or anything too clever. Medicine or surgery is just about OK so long as you never actually do it.<br /><br />Then a spell in something a bit twee, National Trust or one of the better sort of charities before moving swiftly on to public relations or marketing (but never sales) or strategic planning or consultancy. Then a jump into the fringes of politics or one of the newspapers or TV companies. Then a jump into a quango or indeed into politics itself.<br /><br />The key is never to be pinned down precisely, no one quite knows what you do but you are connected to all the best people and your approval is needed. Quite what would happen if you did not exist is a question polite people in the same boat never ask and impolite people in a less important boat never get to ask.<br /><br />As for what happened to people who did real things, well they were pushed on the scrap heap and their industry replaced by heritage centres (run by folk as per above). Crafts persons are replaced by redundant account executives who work an ersatz forge and hammer iron whilst making ooo arrr noises in an inauthentic manner. The key is never to be authentic, always be totally false and fake, all the best people are.<br /><br />Just take a look at the career paths of recent top political figures and you will get the idea. Being rich and going to proper schools helps a bit too, and that is where most of the common oiks are going to find the door just a little bit closed. But so far the key is plenty of BS, it will get you to the top.<br /><br /> Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2481298417819219839.post-58934418948277906212017-06-04T11:54:40.563+01:002017-06-04T11:54:40.563+01:00An essential problem with modern fatuous activity ...An essential problem with modern fatuous activity is that so much of it is based on debt and increasing liabilities. If it were just what we did with spare cash as a minority interest within our means it would be something of a waste but containable. If it does go wrong as it is very likely to, then instead of us making slight adjustments we will have to totally change our lifestyles. Anyone for porridge?Demetriushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17198549581667363991noreply@blogger.com