Phariseeism
June 15th 2009 01:26
I've more than a little irritated. Just over a month ago, my wife got knocked off her motor scooter by some bloke who somehow wasn't looking. The form to renew the bike's registration arrived a few days ago, so I made a trip down to the place where the bike now resides and got the plate and registration sticker off the now-defunct machine.
Filled out the form and my wife signed it (as usually happens at our house, my wife not being enamoured of forms) and took it into the AA (Automobile Association) today to have the bike de-registered. The young girl behind the counter first tells me it wasn't valid because my wife's motor vehicle license wasn't on it. When I pointed out that the form said either the identification details OR the license, she told me that my wife had to come in and present the form, to stop fraud!
Fraud? How is there any hope of fraud? We want to deregister the bike. I'm her husband. We live together and actually talk to each other. The bike is written off, gone, kaput. There is no money owing to us on the registration (or at best a couple of dollars). Who or what exactly are we going to defraud?
When I persisted, she checked with her colleague, who was just as unhelpful: it's the new law. Would I like to speak to the manager? What, so I can have a third person tell me it's the new law, and back up his staff? (At least I hope he would.)
Once again, I said, the innocent suffer because the wrongdoers cause problems. What I didn't say is that this is yet another example of 'phariseeism', that never-far-out-of-the-picture approach to life that has to legalise every last detail.
Last week I rang up to see if I could hire a school hall because I want to put on a concert later in the year. Yes, I could hire it as long as I was prepared to provide insurance for $1.4 million for the time I used it! That, apparently, is what the new hall cost. Seemingly, if the school uses it, it's covered. If the school isn't using it, but no one else is, it's presumably still covered. If I'm using, I have to fork out on insurance for it.
The day before I'd checked with another hall hire. They want me to pay for the piano tuner to come not only after we've been there, but before. This strikes me as very odd. Surely the last person to use the piano will also have had to suffer this piece of nonsense, and the person coming after me. In which case the hall owners are getting paid twice each time for the tuner to come.
Somedays I despair of people ever thinking normally about things again. We overload ourselves with laws, big and small, mostly nit-picking, and wonder why people break them so readily - they're sick to death of being hemmed into corners.
Filled out the form and my wife signed it (as usually happens at our house, my wife not being enamoured of forms) and took it into the AA (Automobile Association) today to have the bike de-registered. The young girl behind the counter first tells me it wasn't valid because my wife's motor vehicle license wasn't on it. When I pointed out that the form said either the identification details OR the license, she told me that my wife had to come in and present the form, to stop fraud!
Fraud? How is there any hope of fraud? We want to deregister the bike. I'm her husband. We live together and actually talk to each other. The bike is written off, gone, kaput. There is no money owing to us on the registration (or at best a couple of dollars). Who or what exactly are we going to defraud?
When I persisted, she checked with her colleague, who was just as unhelpful: it's the new law. Would I like to speak to the manager? What, so I can have a third person tell me it's the new law, and back up his staff? (At least I hope he would.)
Once again, I said, the innocent suffer because the wrongdoers cause problems. What I didn't say is that this is yet another example of 'phariseeism', that never-far-out-of-the-picture approach to life that has to legalise every last detail.
Last week I rang up to see if I could hire a school hall because I want to put on a concert later in the year. Yes, I could hire it as long as I was prepared to provide insurance for $1.4 million for the time I used it! That, apparently, is what the new hall cost. Seemingly, if the school uses it, it's covered. If the school isn't using it, but no one else is, it's presumably still covered. If I'm using, I have to fork out on insurance for it.
The day before I'd checked with another hall hire. They want me to pay for the piano tuner to come not only after we've been there, but before. This strikes me as very odd. Surely the last person to use the piano will also have had to suffer this piece of nonsense, and the person coming after me. In which case the hall owners are getting paid twice each time for the tuner to come.
Somedays I despair of people ever thinking normally about things again. We overload ourselves with laws, big and small, mostly nit-picking, and wonder why people break them so readily - they're sick to death of being hemmed into corners.
| 27 |
| Vote |
Comment by bevetal
With regard to the hall, does it need to be a hall, or would our Church do ? We have two very nice pianos. And we wouldn't require 1.4 million !
Comment by Mike Crowl
Webitz
Work Report
We'll see how it pans out!