A refined form of trolling if there ever was one, and one of the latest trends to sweep our islands, is to proclaim loudly to the whole of Facebook groups like ‘The Salott’ or ‘Are You Being Served?’ about how expensive some random place is, and how we, the uninformed public, must never visit again.

Gone are the days when one complained about actual issues such as finding glass or insects in their food; now, we are hell-bent on denouncing any shack, hole or fancy restaurant for not selling us chips at cost price and pizzas for tuppence.

This is like me publishing a letter to The Ritz denouncing them because I can’t spend €4,000 a night on a room

While many a catering establishment are indeed charging extortionate prices for shoddy service and unimpressive food, many keyboard warriors routinely stand on their profile’s pulpit and work themselves into a frenzy over any outlet that has the audacity to charge a fiver for a pint of beer like ardent Texan evangelical preachers.

Like many other peoples around the world, the Maltese have a reputation for complaining, but I’m not sure anyone does it quite as passionately and seriously as we do. We do not only seem to be born with a burning need to complain about things that are usually of little or no consequence while ignoring the big, fluorescent pink elephant in the room, but we will also bulldoze over anyone or anything that stands in our way.

Last week some woman thought she was doing the Facebook community a favour by warning them about a place she felt served overpriced food, roundly ignoring the fact that she could have done what everyone else does when they can’t afford to do something, and well, not gone there in the first place.

Many people seem to feel entitled to set their own prices for things, and to be honest, I start to wonder whether they’ve arrived here in a time machine from 1850 where people were still bartering with livestock and beads. I get that open-air markets are still a normal fixture in Malta but I didn’t think I had seen it all until I witnessed a woman arguing with a sales assistant because she wouldn’t give her a discount on a skirt in an international franchised store.

I know that we love to complicate things as a nation, but if you can’t afford something, there is a really simple way to deal with it: you either save up or you go for something cheaper. You definitely don’t take to your keyboard in high rage and dramatically complain to all and sundry that you were left to die of thirst because you weren’t willing or able to pay extra for something.

This is literally like me publishing a letter to The Ritz denouncing them because I can’t spend €4,000 a night on a room. Maybe it’s time we started using all the righteous outrage we have mastered so well for things that actually matter.

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