I’d like to make a complaint... Why some of us are so good at making a fuss
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Were you the child whose indignant letter yielded a free bar of chocolate? Séamas O’Reilly puts pen to paper to reveal why we are a nation of complainers.
By Séamas O’Reilly
The biscuit was only barely covered. If I’d had to guess, I’d have said 30% of its surface had chocolate applied, and that’s being charitable. Certainly more charitable than the manufacturer of the Jaffa Cake in question, who I pictured as God’s perfect miser; a Scrooge-like figure toiling in a candle-lit factory, peering over their bifocals to smear homeopathic levels of chocolate on one sorry corner of my favourite tea snack. I was 10 years old, and had never had a particularly strong sense of myself as a consumer champion, but this biscuit, this disgrace, roused something inside me.
‘Dear McVitie’s,’ I wrote, addressing the entire company in my missive. ‘I was shocked and appalled to discover this Jaffa Cake (enclosed) in such a state.’ In hindsight, I was savvy enough to moderate my speech to sound adult, bu...
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