Be positive and then things can only get better
I AM an optimist! Is it possible to be one with all that’s wrong in the world? Absolutely!
Despite all the greed, fake news, personal opinions masquerading as facts, ludicrous political correctness, gender idiocy and minority causes, I believe things will change for the better.
As Shakespeare put it, we are all actors on a stage, with our exits and entrances provoking change.
It feels as if we are taking part in a melodrama/farce/circus/black comedy. We have plenty of villains, laughable situations, stupid plots and clowns in charge.
We have to accept that nothing stays the same — though football teams, bankers, politicians, business leaders and glamorous celebs would wish that wasn’t the case.
I believe one of the root causes of emotional hysteria in the West is that we fear our exits. We can’t see a value in our personal existence and seek to fend it off for as long as possible.
We all need to feel we have a part in this play, even just as a spear carrier or walk-on role.
Everything has a limit, whether high or low, like a graph with its peaks and troughs. Once it reaches a certain height it has to fall again and once it reaches rock bottom it has no alternative but to climb.
That is why I am optimistic about the future. So what about it, fellow optimists, shall we be a positive minority and get ourselves and our views acted on?
Not only are we acting in this play, we are writing the script and directing the production. We are also its audience and fiercest critic. It is entirely up to us. SHEILA ATTWATER,
Swindon, Wilts.
Scrutinise the inquiry
THE venue for the Grenfell public inquiry — a ballroom in the Grand Connaught Rooms dripping with chandeliers — is inappropriate.
Do we believe inquiries are conducted in the public interest and to root out those responsible?
Are they not set up to mitigate culpability and reduce financial redress? The terms of reference do not include a broader remit to look into the impact of government policies on social housing.
Three hundred people applied to be ‘ core participants’ in the inquiry team, but retired judge Sir Martin Moore-Bick, who heads the inquiry, rejected a call to appoint a survivor of the fire.
The claim that it would risk undermining impartiality just does not wash. Witnesses are essential to achieve justice.
So, let us scrutinise the Grenfell inquiry and determine whether it progresses in the days, months and perhaps years to come.
WILLIAM BURNS, Edinburgh.
Reading the riot act
I LIVE in Labour shadow chancellor John McDonnell’s constituency of Hayes and Harlington and I’m furious he is travelling the country inciting riots with the unions instead of doing his job.
Hayes is in chaos with stabbings and people sleeping in the streets. The High Street is plagued with roadworks and the buses have been diverted, meaning elderly people have to walk up a steep hill. I thought the job of a shadow chancellor was to juggle figures, not join unions in trying to bring down the government.
Miss C. VINCENT, Hayes, Middx. THE Collins Dictionary definition of the word ‘treason’ is the crime of betraying your country by trying to remove its government using violence. So can it not be construed that John McDonnell’s call to overthrow the Government is an act of treason?
JOHN DICKSON, Santiago del Teide, Tenerife.
Punish fly-tippers
WHY haven’t the travellers who fly- tipped near the Olympic stadium (Mail) been arrested?
Once again it is the unfortunate landowners who are responsible for clearing up the mess. And what is the travellers’ punishment? To be evicted from a site they have rendered uninhabitable.
They must be laughing all the way to the next place they turn into a rubbish tip, safe in the knowledge the authorities will turn a blind eye.
T. BAILEY, Nottingham. YOU can be fined £75 for dropping a cigarette end on the pavement, but it seems you can get away with dumping tons of rubbish.
E. J. DUNN, Bingley, W. Yorks. CREDIT must be given to the Olympic Park fly-tipping travellers for their productivity. Shifting that amount of rubbish in just 20 days is remarkable. TREVOR NEWMAN,
Dunstable, Beds.
Monkey business
THE outcome of the court case involving the macaque monkey and the photographer brought by animal charity PETA is farcical. No thought has been given to whether the monkey will be able to handle the sudden increase in wealth. The lives of many lottery winners have been shown to fall apart in similar circumstances.
The macaque previously kept himself busy with everyday monkey business, posing for tourists, taking the odd selfie and having swing-on parts in wildlife documentaries. Now, with no reason to get out of his tree in the morning, he could succumb to the temptation of the good life and squander his wealth and his health on a never-ending supply of bananas.
BILL NAYLOR, Wilsford, Lincs.
Wind farm danger
THE threat of yet more wind farms off the coast of Britain is a disastrous idea (Mail).
We have seen the appalling effect on birds and there are fears their vibrations may be behind the increase in stranded whales.
If that was not bad enough, the wind farms make superb radar masking shields.
This is a worry when Russian warships and aircraft regularly pass along our coasts. The 2012 Olympic Games and the International Conference in Cardiff had to be protected by Royal Naval warships with the new generation of highly sensitive radars.
Yes, the offshore wind farms have been declared transponder mandatory zones, which means aircraft passing over have to switch on these detecting devices.
The problem is that terrorists and criminals would switch off transponders, which is what the 9/11 hijackers did immediately they had control of the aircraft.
E. C. COLEMAN, Bishop Norton, Lincs.
Dozy sleep warning
I WON’T lose any sleep over the dire warnings about not getting a solid eight hours a night (Good Health). My normal sleep pattern is that I go to bed at 11.30pm, get up at 1am to watch TV, read or do puzzles, and go back to bed at 4am to sleep until 7.30am.
I thoroughly enjoy my life and am in full health at the age of 83.
I am able to garden, go clothes shopping with my wife if it can’t be avoided, play bowls and shin up the ladder to repair the roof.
If I had followed the sleep expert’s recommendations, maybe I’d be Superman. WARREN PAGE, Purley on Thames, Berks.