‘I assure you the thought never crossed my mind, lord.’
‘Indeed? Then if I were you I’d sue my face for slander’.
(The Colour of Magic)
#quote
See tagged statuses in the local bookrastinating.com community
“I don’t want to die now! I’ve still got a headache! I don’t want to go to heaven with a headache, I’d be all cross and wouldn’t enjoy it!”
You did no fact checking, and I must scream
https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/10/i-have-no-facts-and-i-must-scream/
I'm neither a journalist nor a professional fact checker but, the thing is, it's has never been easier to check basic facts. Yeah, sure, there's a world of misinformation out there, but it doesn't take much effort to determine if something is likely to be true.
There are brilliant tools like reverse Image Search which give you a good indicator of when an image first appeared on the web, and whether it was published by a reputable source.
You can use Google Books to check whether a quote is true.
You can use social-media searches to easily check the origin of memes.
There are vast archives of printed material to help you.
The World Wide Web has a million sites which allow you to cross-reference any citations to …
You did no fact checking, and I must scream
https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2025/10/i-have-no-facts-and-i-must-scream/
I'm neither a journalist nor a professional fact checker but, the thing is, it's has never been easier to check basic facts. Yeah, sure, there's a world of misinformation out there, but it doesn't take much effort to determine if something is likely to be true.
There are brilliant tools like reverse Image Search which give you a good indicator of when an image first appeared on the web, and whether it was published by a reputable source.
You can use Google Books to check whether a quote is true.
You can use social-media searches to easily check the origin of memes.
There are vast archives of printed material to help you.
The World Wide Web has a million sites which allow you to cross-reference any citations to see if they're spurious.
Now, perhaps all that is a bit too much effort for someone casually doomscrolling and hitting "repost" for an instant dopamine hit. But it shouldn't be. And it certainly shouldn't be for people who write for trusted sources like newspapers.
Recently, the beloved actor Patricia Routledge died. Several newspapers reposted a piece of viral slop which I had debunked a month previously. Let's go through the piece and see just how easy it is to prove false.
Here's that "viral" story. I've kept to the parts which contain easily verifiable / falsifiable claims.
Wikpedia says that her birthday was 17 February 1929. She would have turned 95 in 2024.
Open up your calendar app. Scroll back to February 2024. What date was 17 February 2024? Saturday. Not Monday.
Now, OK, maybe at 95 she's forgotten her birthday. What else does the rest of the piece say?
In 1968, Patricia Routledge won Best Actress (Musical) at the Tony Awards - she was 39. I don't know if I'd consider appearing on Broadway as provincial stages.
Keeping Up Appearances was first broadcast in 1990. Patricia was around 60, not 50, when she was cast.
While she may have thought it would only be a small series - even though it was by the creator of Open All Hours and Last of the Summer Wine - there's no way that being the lead character could be described as a "small part". She wasn't a breakout character - she was the star.
Wikipedia isn't always accurate, but it does list lots of her stage work. She was working steadily on stage from 1999 - when she hit 70 - but none of it Shakespeare.
I was able to do that fact checking in 10 minutes while laying in bed waiting for the bathroom to become free. It wasn't onerous. It didn't require subscriptions to professional journals. I didn't need a team of fact-checkers. It took a bit of web-sleuthing and, dare I say it, a smidgen of common sense.
And yet, a couple of newspapers ran with this utter drivel as though it were the truth. The Independent published it as part of their tribute - although they took the piece down after I emailed them. Similarly The Express ran it without any basic fact-checking (and didn't take it down after being contacted).
Both of them say their primary source is the "Jay Speak" blog. There's nothing on that blog post to say that the author interviewed Patricia Routledge. A quick check of the other posts on the site don't make it obvious that it is a reputable source of exclusive interviews with notable actors.
The date on that blog post is August 2nd, 2025. Is there anything earlier? Typing a few of the phrases into a search engine found a bunch of posts which pre-date it. The earliest I can find was this Instagram post and this Facebook post both from the 24th of July - a week early than the Jay Speaks post.
To be clear, I don't think Jay Speaks was deliberately trying to fool journalists or hoax anyone. They simply saw an interesting looking post and re-shared it. I also suspect the Facebook and Instagram posts were copied from other sources - but I've been unable to find anything definitive.
I would expect that professional journalists at well-established newspapers to be able to call an actor's agent to fact-check a piece before running it. If they can't, I would have thought they'd do a cursory fact check.
But, no. I presume the rush to publish is so great that it over-rides any sense of whether a piece should be accurate.
This is irresponsible. Last week saw the BBC air an outright lie on Have I Got News For You. A professional TV company, with a budget for lawyers, fact checkers, and researchers - and they just broadcast easily disproven lies. Why? Maybe hubris, maybe laziness, maybe deliberate rabble-rousing.
The media have comprehensively failed us. They will repeat any tawdry nonsense as long as it keeps people clicking. It's up to us to defend ourselves and our friends against this unending tsunami of low-grade slurry.
I hope I've demonstrated that it takes almost no effort to perform a basic fact check. It isn't a professional skill. It doesn't require anything more than an Internet connection and a curious mind. If you see something online, take a moment to check it before sharing it.
Stopping misinformation starts with you.
This is no madness; 'tis England.
— Lady Peinforte, in “Silver Nemesis”
This is no madness; 'tis England.
— Lady Peinforte, in “Silver Nemesis”
Susan hated Literature. She’d much prefer to read a good book. (Soul Music)
The President is always a controversial choice, always an infuriating but fascinating character. His job is not to wield power but to draw attention away from it.
"Marvin," he said, "just get this elevator to go up, will you? We've got to get to Zarniwoop."
"Why?" asked Marvin dolefully.
"I don't know," said Zaphod, "but when I find him, he'd better have a very good reason for me wanting to see him."
"Marvin," he said, "just get this elevator to go up, will you? We've got to get to Zarniwoop."
"Why?" asked Marvin dolefully.
"I don't know," said Zaphod, "but when I find him, he'd better have a very good reason for me wanting to see him."
Niklas quoted Mother Mary Comes to Me by Arundhati Roy
When it came to me, Mrs. Roy taught me how to think, then raged against my thoughts. She taught me to be free and raged against my freedom. She taught me to write and resented the author I became.
The Guide says that the best drink in existence is the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster. It says that the effect of a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster is like having your brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped round a large gold brick.
In the beginning the Universe was created.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.
Niklas quoted Everything We Do Is Music by Elizabeth Alker
Back on the call to Young, I sense he is getting tired we've been speaking for well over an hour, and I've been informed that he has been working round the clock preparing for his forthcoming performance. I start to wrap up our interview, and as I get ready to say goodbye, he says, very sincerely: 'I really hope I have answered your questions and that my answers have been useful to you,' and thanks me for taking an interest in his work.
I thank him back and, although I've been advised not to ask about his influence on pop and rock musicians - apparently he takes no interest in it-I decide that, since we've stayed on such good terms, I'll venture one last question about his legacy and how it feels to have shaped the careers of so many other artists within and far beyond his own practice.
'Is it true?' he asks, before chuckling to himself for a while. And then finally he replies, 'The thing is, it's not about ego gratification. It's about trying to do the right thing, and if you try to do the right thing with your life and other people agree you're doing the right thing, then that's very satisfying.'
"But the plans were on display . . ."
"On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them."
"That's the display department."
"With a torch."
"Ah, well the lights had probably gone."
"So had the stairs."
"But look, you found the notice, didn't you?"
"Yes," said Arthur, "yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying Beware of the Leopard."
"But the plans were on display . . ."
"On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them."
"That's the display department."
"With a torch."
"Ah, well the lights had probably gone."
"So had the stairs."
"But look, you found the notice, didn't you?"
"Yes," said Arthur, "yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying Beware of the Leopard."
"The insurance business is completely screwy now. You know they've reintroduced the death penalty for insurance company directors?"
"Really?" said Arthur. "No, I didn't. For what offense?"
Trillian frowned.
"What do you mean, offense?"
"I see."
"The insurance business is completely screwy now. You know they've reintroduced the death penalty for insurance company directors?"
"Really?" said Arthur. "No, I didn't. For what offense?"
Trillian frowned.
"What do you mean, offense?"
"I see."
From the New York Times bestselling author of When the Sea Came Alive and The …
J. Robert Oppenheimer: We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried. Most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad-Gita; Vishnu [a principal Hindu deity] is trying to persuade the prince that he should do his duty, and to impress him, takes on his multi-armed form and says, “Now I have become death, the destroyer of the worlds.” I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.
Charles L. Critchfield: That famous saying that Oppenheimer made when the bomb finally went off—“I have become death, the shatterer of worlds.”—it’s always said that it’s a quotation from the Gita, but of course it isn’t, because it’s in English. I looked through these three volumes of Gitas for that line and it’s there. But it’s very different from the way Robert says it. Chapter 11 is called “The Book of the Manifesting of the One and Manifold.” In Verse 12 of that chapter, it says, “If a thousand suns should at once blaze up in the sky, the light of that mighty soul would be all their brightness”—the “mighty soul” being God, of course. In Verse 31 of that chapter, the soldier Arjuna says, “Tell me, you awful form, who are you?” Krishna says, “I am time, destroyer of worlds.” The word “time” is the Sanskrit word “karma,” which is used in a sense that means “Father Time” and, therefore, can be associated with death and with the Supreme Deity. I suspect Robert made up his own [translation] because he read Sanskrit. I wouldn’t put it past him to have rehearsed this saying so that he’d be prepared to be dramatic, because he liked to be dramatic.
"You know," said Arthur, "it's at times like this, when I'm trapped in a Vogon airlock with a man from Betelgeuse, and about to die of asphyxiation in deep space that I really wish I'd listened to what my mother told me when I was young."
"Why, what did she tell you?"
"I don't know, I didn't listen."
"You know," said Arthur, "it's at times like this, when I'm trapped in a Vogon airlock with a man from Betelgeuse, and about to die of asphyxiation in deep space that I really wish I'd listened to what my mother told me when I was young."
"Why, what did she tell you?"
"I don't know, I didn't listen."