Well Darlings,
Regular readers will know how often I try to ridicule political correctness in this column. That and the Nanny State are possibly the two things I hate most about today. But my first topic this week has nothing at all to do with political correctness - it's all to do with good old-fashioned bad taste, and some faggots!
Dictionaries will tell you a faggot is, apart from the culinary delight, a bundle of sticks and branches bound together, or it is an offensive term for an openly homosexual man. For the purpose of this article, forget the sticks and concentrate on the homosexual man. Faggot is one of those words like "tart" which, although in general usage it is intended to be offensive, it can be used by some people when addressing another in an endearing and humorous manner. In other words, it is perfectly okay for me to call (say) a close gay friend eyeing up some talent at the local disco: "You faggot!" or even: "You tart!" No offense would be meant, or taken.
"Where is all this going?" I hear you ask. It is going as far as Mad O'Rourkes in Tipton, West Midlands. We're told this pub restaurant sports a menu which includes meals labelled: "Wham, Bam, Thank You Lamb", and: "Henpecked Chicken Pie". Amusing, perhaps? It certainly suggests something to you about the establishment, doesn't it? But when we hear that another dish there is called: "Barrymore Pie - Faggots swimming in gravy", maybe we have learned all we need to know about the place.
Naturally there have been complaints, but the landlord, Peter Towler, maintains he will not bow to pressure by anyone offended with the naming of the dish. He is reported as saying: "These people say this is not funny but their behaviour is turning it into a joke." So if it is they who are turning it into a joke, it wasn't originally intended as a joke, albeit in bad taste, then?
This man may not like gay people. He may not like Michael Barrymore. And that's okay by me. I doubt Michael is too bothered, either. My shoulders are, like most gay people's shoulders have grown to be, broad enough to suffer him with the contempt he deserves - but what the hell has this man got against the family and loved ones of Stuart Lubbock, the young guy who died so tragically in an incident obviously referred to by the name of the dish?
Some things can never be funny. If the patrons of this eating place have any decency, I'm hoping they will boycott it until the landlord has a change of heart. How would any of them feel were it to be the death of one of their loved ones referred to so callously? And who is to say it will not be, one day? We would not tolerate a barbecued grill being referred to as the Twin Towers, a double-decker sandwich as anything to do with the terrorist bus bomb, or a meat and vegetable soup called Tsunami Surprise. So we must not tolerate this!
Mr Towler works in the hospitality trade. Maybe he needs to buy a dictionary in order to learn what the word "hospitality" actually means!
That was bad taste in the extreme, this is political correctness gone mad: Johnstown Primary School in Carmarthen, Dyfed, has banned pupils from making Mother's Day cards in case it should upset any classmates without a mother. The school head, Helen Starkey, tries to defend her actions by telling us 5% of her pupils had little or no contact with their natural mother.
Really? Well, I never knew my real mother either. She died when I was eight-months-old. But making Mother's Day cards at school was never an issue for me - I simply made them for my "Auntie". Very happily, too. Why does this woman look for problems, and seemingly wish to make them, when they don't really exist? Should someone with such an outlook on life actually be allowed to teach children? It must be debateable. Perhaps she would be better employed demonstrating outside of Marks & Spencer. I swear they were selling men's trousers with two legs the last time I was in there. Can you imagine how upset that must make all the one-legged guys?
Get a life, Helen! And when you do you will discover it is unique; there is nobody else quite like you - so don't expect everyone else, each of them with a unique life of their own too - some better off; some worse off - to adapt in order to fit in nicely with your life. We have what we are given, and we should be helpful to all those who are less fortunate than we are - but we should not be expected to dramatically change our lives or the rest of the world for them. Although we must always cater generously for the paraplegic, deaf in one ear, blind in one eye, mentally retarded, illegitimately born and orphaned son of an immigrant one parent family, a heroin addict who had AIDS, we cannot - and we must not - all try to adapt our lives to be like such a person "in case they should be offended". To be told we should, offends me!
With so much of the traditional British way of life having been flushed down the pan this past decade, perhaps those of us who are rich enough might like to import a "Pimped Out John". The creation of a US plumbing firm, Roto-Rooter, this is a luxury bathroom that comes equipped with a laptop computer, a flat-screen TV, an iPod with speakers, an Xbox, a refrigerator for drinks and snacks, and even an exercise cycle. Seemingly only lacking a musical loo-roll holder that plays "Colonel Bogey", it is the ideal place to hide for all of us who wish to escape this crazy politically correct world. A world where, to be politically correct, none of us should possess a bathroom - in case such affluence might be seen as offensive by anyone less fortunate who has to do it behind a bush!
Political Correctness, the Nanny State, and let's not forget that other little gem: Health & Safety, must surely be responsible to some degree for the nation of brain-dead zombies we are fast becoming. That, and Big Brother! I can think of no other reason to account for the 47,000 people who have visited a webcam website so they could stare at a block of cheese maturing. Watching paint dry used to be a joke, but today there are people for whom something very similar has become an attraction!