I have ID therefore I am?

4th September 2009 • 0 Comments

Now I don't plan on learning to drive, nor do I have the spare money to purchase one merely as ID.I didn't get one of those Explore cards, Nor did I get a Portman group pass, which incidentally the gov removed backing of and is no longer accepted in shops, pubs and clubs.

This often leads to problems, as my only form of photographic ID is an out of date British Passport ( by 3 years! ) I have not left the country in that time and have no plans to do so in the next little while, so I won't renew it as it now costs a rather princely sum of £77.50. Paying that much just to use it as ID is absurd, its risky enough using my out of date one as ID, if all that hum drum about identity theft is to be believed.

And please don't get me started on the myriad other 'identity cards' which in a blink of an eye turn from being widely accepted, to useless plastic, taking up yet more space in your wallet.

As I said earlier problems arise with my passport, I rarely get told 'I can't tell that's you in the photo', Hell I'd accept that!

It's all down to the little expiry date, why does this matter when I'm using it to get in to a club?, It's not in a different country and I'm not going to fly through the door in a Boeing 747!

This little expiry date seems to trip the door staff up, surely I'd not have a passport if the government didn't believe I was who I said I was, and indeed I am as old as I say I am. What has changed in that time? Does the government disown me after that expiry date? If I was one of those people that steal identities surely I'd have the wit to forge an in date passport? No?

Another issue is with the policy on the door, ID checks are very much random, and if your a buxom young lady with the inhibitions of a big brother contestant, then all the better for you! although I'll concede this may not happen often.

This is in essence discrimination; unfair or different treatment of a person or group on the basis of a belief or an attitude formed beforehand.

Again I'd have no problem if everyone was ID'd but it is very much random or left to the judgement of the individual. (which again has no standard, so could as well be random)

Considering the amount of things in today's society which need photographic ID why can't the government produce an ID card and send it to everyone that wants it for free. Of course replacements should incur a cost to the individual and in all honesty a limit of 1 or 2 replacements in a year or similar seems rather generous.

If our existence and our word is not enough to prove we are. Give us a free government ID card of some sort. Stop with the stealth tax on self and indeed the discrimination of self.

I can only think René Descartes if he was alive now would not have remarked, I Think Therefore I am but indeed as the title of this blog states, I have ID therefore I am.

[note] Blogged in the wee hours leads to stupid mistakes, and proof reading is a terribly laborious task, will look at this again later and have at it with a corrector pen! [/note]