I mentioned a while ago that I was currently in the process of taking legal action against the landlord of my previous apartment. This has gone on for some months now. But I received an email yesterday informing me that a decision had been made, the decision was final, and that neither party could take the matter further. This was perfectly fine by me, as the decision was that I should receive my deposit back in full, as opposed to having £915 deducted from it, as my landlord proposed for "damages". This was a much better result than I was expecting. I thought the deposit protection company would probably meet the demands of each halfway, and deduct about £400 from the deposit. But evidently, my cynicism has been proven wrong. At least on that front. This rarely happens, so I still stand by my cynical outlook fully.
As a friend pointed out, the reason that such compulsory deposit protection companies exist in the first place is due to the number of landlords who attempt to extort huge amounts from the deposits of their tenants. I like to call this financial rape (though this doesn't sound too catchy so maybe I'll think of something better). The way I see it, this is so they don't have to use their own money to pay for the upkeep of their shitty properties. Double glazing and a new boiler would have been a start, since not many people are half-reptile.
To revert back to my cynicism for a while, I pose the question: why do people have to be such wankers? Why do people insist on justifying my misanthropy. This isn't how it happens in films. In films people like me have a wondrous experience with a purely altruistic bunch of people which changes their whole personality. But this is reality I guess...
So why is every person on the planet in some way out to swindle, extort, or otherwise abuse everyone else? I know people are crap and annoying and everything most of the time. But I still understand that treating other people like idiots, or otherwise generally abusing them, is frowned upon by general society. So you don't do it.
But apparently, you do. When I think about it, everywhere I look everyone is out to screw everyone else as much as they possibly can without being reprimanded for it. The food you need to buy to survive is priced ridiculously high to profit the supermarket chains. The energy companies, the water companies, the music and entertainment companies, are all in business purely to draw as much profit from you, the consumer, who is forced to pay their ludicrous prices. This is a piece of plastic, inside another piece of plastic, with a 5 page booklet inside, and it costs £12 fucking 99? And you people who make those stupid piracy adverts actually wonder why we download things illegally? Then there are the banks where you have to keep that tiny amount of money, who charge you £50 for using a reserve that you never even asked for. And more than that, who caused the financial crisis which we are all paying for in the first place! But do the banks take responsibility and admit they were wrong? What a ridiculous fantasy that would be. If sexual rape is is punished severely, why isn't financial rape (I can't come up with anything catchier)? Just because you aren't physically slapping someone in the face, doesn't mean you should do it metaphorically.
It's not even a case of human beings being inherent arseholes. It all comes down to money. As Tony Soprano so perfectly states, "That's what is comes down to isn't it? Motherfucking, cocksucking money" (forgive me if this quote is slightly incorrect). The thing that everyone wants, but few people have. The thing that a few have masses of, but which the majority have very little of. It's not a modern philosophy. The French Revolution happened for this very reason. But whenever those little hiccups known as recessions occur, attention is drawn to the fact that most of us have no fucking money. The fact of the matter is, most of us are adhering to these austerity meausures so a few greedy wankers can go on holiday with their bonuses.
So it must be said that it genuinely comes as a surprise to me when something happens to contradict this opinion. The decision of the deposit protection agency surprised me. I was expecting a bad result, as I always do. But instead I received the best result I could have hoped for. This hasn't happened for a very long time. It's almost like karma, if you believe in that crap. But it didn't exactly contradict my opinion... My theory is that my landlord's mortgage was riding on the rent from that apartment, but they couldn't find a tenant to move in after us, so the deposit deductions (coincidentally just short of a month's rent) were an attempt to cover their mortgage (or otherwise pay for the overdue refurbishments in order to get a new tenant). I guess that would mean that they are in a bit of a jam right now. Maybe I could buy into this karma stuff after all...
However, as my friend rightly pointed out, the only reason for these compulsory protection agencies to exist, is the fact that everyone, if left to their own means and decisions, is an untrustworthy arsehole.
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