Surely They Aren't Serious

No, I'm not calling you Shirley. I try not to spend all my time simply linking and commenting (and I also try not to make bad jokes with movie references) but in this case, I thought I would let you in on my process.

It started with this article on the BBC which, based on its headline (Woman held for noisy sex 'breach'), I just had to see. I do occasionally succumb to the desire for pulp news and silliness. The relevant portions:

Earlier this month [the woman in question] was given a four-year Asbo banning her from making excessive noise anywhere in England.

But she appeared in court on Monday, charged with three breaches of her Asbo in just 10 days.

And I thought, "Huh, banning someone from making excessive noise, that's pretty silly. Anywhere in England, eh? Can she still travel to Scotland and have loud sex? The BBC said England, not Great Britain or the UK. I wonder what an Asbo is." You're no doubt wondering that last bit yourself, if you don't happen to come from the UK.

Enter Wikipedia, source of all things knowable and editable. For those who don't care to read the full article, Asbo stands for "Anti-Social Behaviour Order," and is basically the British way of keeping people from committing various petty crimes or disturbances of the peace. I'm not really interested in saying that they're a good or bad idea; I think they should speak for themselves. For instance, to quote Wikipedia, here are some things which can earn you an Asbo:

• Vandalism
• Theft
• Abusive behavior
• Harassment
• Flyposting (putting up flyers in illegal places)
• Organizing illegal raves
• Begging
• Whistling
• Suicide attempts

Just some. Certainly not all, because making excessive noise isn't on that list. It reminds one rather of the Old West: "Son, we'd better not see you whistlin' 'round these parts again."

I should like to strongly emphasize that I am in no way saying that the UK is alone in this type of civil law; the US has acres of strange civil codes, as, I'm sure, do many other countries. I just think some of them are... a little silly. I could go through the list, but I'd rather let Wikipedia give some further amusing examples.

• Two teenage boys from east Manchester forbidden to wear one golf glove.
• A 17-year-old forbidden to use the word "grass" as a term of abuse in order to threaten people.
• A 15-year-old forbidden to play football in his street.
• An 18-year-old male was banned from congregating with more than three youths, and subsequently arrested when he entered a very popular youth club (The subject scheduled for that day was how to deal with anti-social behaviour).
• The first farmer to be given an ASBO was instructed to keep his geese and pigs from damaging his neighbour's property.
• The oldest recipient of an ASBO, an 87-year-old man who was abusive to his neighbours.
• The youngest person to be threatened with an ASBO, a two-year-old boy accused of kicking a football at windows over a fence 7 feet (2 m) high and verbally abusing residents when asked to stop. This, however, turned out to be a police error.

Actually, what's really amusing is that, in the previous quote, "geese" and "pigs" were considered important enough to be linked to other Wikipedia articles about, you guessed it, geese and pigs. Ah, the wonders of technology.

Yep, this is just silly. Much of life is. Learn to revel in it.