Termitewatch (18) - Let us Dupre

The Egregious Forum never fails to provide a laugh, to any who glance through it over their cornflakes. The past 24 hours has seen a wonderful thread, entitled "FIDE rated in January, NOT in March". Over its course, a certain Paul Dupre fulminates with quite unimaginable intensity, over some kind of minor rating discrepancy, which now appears to be merely the result of a player being assigned the wrong rating code for a certain event.  Even one of his fellow termites felt constrained to express his concern that "if the ECF don't appoint an I[nternational} R[ating] O[fficer] soon, Paul may spontaneously combust". But our Mr Dupre certainly belongs to the "conspiracy, not cock-up" school, and sees dark forces at play, solemnly warning:

I'm not allowed to talk about what I know - but understand this.
One day I will and all hell will break loose.


One can only hope that the Western world's intelligence agencies have been alerted to this dire threat to world order.

Photo: www.imdb.com

One cannot help wondering what it is that makes termites get so worked up about such trivia. It would appear to be a demonstration of Sayre's Law, which states that "in any dispute, the intensity of feeling is inversely proportional to the value of the issues at stake". The rule is generally used to explain why academic politics are so bitter, but the chess world seems an even better example. After all, threats of uncontrolled nuclear proliferation or terrorist attacks on iconic New York landmarks pale into insignificance, alongside Martin Page having three rated games at the 2010 Surrey Major (all of which he lost!) attributed to the wrong player...