Wow.

I just realised something else

A 'Hobson's Choice' is (according to Wikipedia) 'a free choice in which only one option is offered, and one may refuse to take that option. The choice is therefore between taking the option or not taking it. The phrase is said to originate from Thomas Hobson (1544–1630), a livery stable owner in Cambridge, England, who, in order to rotate the use of his horses, offered customers the choice of either taking the horse in the stall nearest the door—or taking none at all'.

Wikipedia also says that a 'Hobson's Choice' is different from
'a true choice between two (or more) options
blackmail (do something, or have some unpleasant fact about your past revealed)
extortion (do something or suffer unpleasant consequences of some other sort)
a Catch-22 situation (all choices yield equivalent results)'.

The reason this surprised me so much is that 'Hobsons' is also the name of a company which 'specialises in student intelligence, recruitment, and enrolment management'. I know this because we had to fill out questionnaires for them at School a few years ago, and they have been sending me spam ever since. I should have fake e-mailed them, but it all seemed very official and serious, and I didn't have the guts to do it at the time. (Though I remember having to list 3 possible career options and I could only think of 2, so I ticked the 'armed forces' box as the third. Do you think it skewed their graphs? I wonder if I was an anomaly, suspended, all alone, above the line of best fit).

Is it just me, or is 'Hobsons' a slightly odd name to give such a company? I don't really know about everything they do, but all the spam they've sent me and all their magazines that have been thrust at me have been about going to university. Are they implying that a university degree is the only real option post 18? Is it brainwashing?

Their website says that they have 8 offices around the world. So if I really have uncovered some sort of conspiracy, we should act fast, before a big man behind a big desk dials a number on his big telephone and we are all caught in a big trap and...um....live lives of big oppression under a big dictator.


Argh. You see.... this is why it takes me ages to write an essay. I get side tracked so easily.

Though it's amazing what learning another language can teach you about your own. =)

In French, 'Hobson's Choice' is 'choix qui n'en est pas un'.
...so...erm....yeah....basically they don't have a word for it....