The point is that selling drugs is illegal. And whether or not you think they should be illegal is a completely different issue. Even if your opinion is "Man, these laws are sooooo unfair!", that doesn't give you any more leeway to break them. And this guy is choosing is break them, which he knows will get him sent to…

Just got to Italy, and they are all about breakfast cake. It does make sense, considering you don't see any fat people under the age of 40 here...

I'm moving to Rome tomorrow for five months! It's for my uni course, and I have a room in a flatshare but no job. Which is okay because I have some crazy-huge government grants, but I will defs need to find lots of projects to keep me busy. As well as re-learning all the Italian I forgot whilst I was on my placement…

Pretty sure he made a pact with the devil. In return for his eternal life, Lipton must discover the favourite curse word of every living actor.

Extraterrestrial is right. I realised this one day when a random Wikipedia browse led me to an entry for a 1940s radio show and there was a James Lipton on the cast list. I thought "It can't be THAT James Lipton - dude must only be in his 60s." Nope. About to turn 86. I'm 90% sure he is Imhotep.

It's weirdly endearing to picture the head of the C of E unselfconsciously chucking a crumpled fiver into the collection plate. Really goes to show that the war years generation live thriftily...

Cultural defensiveness, I think. Some of the reaction to her story was awful and very unkind, as well as misogynistic. However, it's that fear of having a nice part of your everyday culture stamped out by what are popularly known as the 'PC brigade'. This, IMO, is probably a little hysterical, but it certainly is true…

I like to think of it as a little bit of the Blitz spirit. Camaraderie and good-humour between strangers.

Yes, but that seems a little stretched given that the article also points out that a small number of African-American students belong to the sorority. And by extension, a miniscule fraction of students at Berkeley.

If you come from a very formal 'sir' and 'miss' society, I do understand how it might seem weird or over-friendly. That said, I don't think it's anyone's business to start complaining about a local practice as though it must be universally wrong and weird. Just take it in the spirit it's intended, which is usually…

Oh, THAT'S why I hearted you...

Any fool can tell the difference between a leering 'darling' (must say, I loved the On The Buses pic the Guardian chose to accompany their coverage) and a friendly regional term. 'Love', 'duck', 'pet' and even (down my way) 'my lover' are all unisex words completely devoid of sex, lust, perving or anything except the…

It's not about help, and I think that's a bad and deliberately emotive comparison. If she had expressed the slightest desire to leave this vicious little gang of sadists, she could have walked out. No-one was keeping her there. And, yes, I am aware that people can be restrained by psychological as well as physical…

I seriously wonder about the mental health of the people in these groups. Yes, I know that group mentality can make people behave a little crazily, but jeez...beating people and slamming their faces against the wall? That's downright sadistic.

I do think the universties should ban such activities on campus, but at the end of the day these are grown men and women who volunteer to be treated like scum and are now apparently pissed off about being treated like scum. Yes, I'm sure she was aware it would be tough to quit the pledging process - but that, my…

I worry about the precedent which that would set, though. So many leisure activities/charity events have been priced into non-existence by the insurance required to offset the risk of being sued for some minor injury or hurt feeling. When you open to door of legal resposibility, it can snowball beyond belief.

I have a horrible, HORRIBLE hunch that it may come from the idea of '+1'-ing a comment or statement you agree with on message boards. In French, they actually have a verb for that now: 'plussoir'. I am non-plussed by you. I do not plus you. Please don't let it be that, but I fear that might be the origin of the…

If you don't clutch them, you have nothing to fear, awesome pearl-wearers of the world.

Simple answer: you are too smart for this ad copy.

They did cast colourblind. I see your point, but that is exactly what they did. They asked the audience to imagine the characters were black.