Ken Livingstone, poisoner of youth
I don’t know if you could properly call it a "seal of Dacre". Maybe a "chamber of Phillips" is better. Either way, when you start making grandiloquent predictions that such and such a measure can’t go forward because the middle classes simply won’t stand for it you’re certainly entering a dank and cavernous realm of some sort:
Threatening but meaningless. What specifically are the middle classes going to do if junk food companies sponsor the Olympics? “I’m not voting for political party X because company y is involved in a pharmaceutical product trial?” Don’t see it somehow.
But perhaps I’m looking through the wrong end of the telescope here. It’s becoming increasingly apparent that Nick’s subjects are pretexts from which to hang his current obsessions, to wit:
The liberal left is: anti-semitic, writes bad plays, disagrees with me, wallows in a general state of intellectual treachery.
Segregation is bad. All public services should be for everyone.
Ken Livingstone is friendly with a Muslim cleric of whom I disapprove. All his works are therefore of the devil and he must be condemned at every opportunity.
For a standard Nick column, perm any two from the above three. Aside from a brief hack at the segregation business, it’s item number three that gets an extended outing here. Let’s imagine the genesis of the column as follows. This week, I wish to write about how Ken Livingston is a terrible man. He hasn’t actually associated with any bearded religious reactionaries this week, so I can’t go at it directly. But he is behind the Olympic bid. And the Olympics is probably going to get sponsored by junk food companies. Therefore Ken Livingstone is poisoning your children. Isn’t that just typical of a chum of the fiendish al-Qaradawi? See how it all fits together.
Columnist purses lips and nods significantly, convinced that he’s managed to manipulate woolly minded liberals to get behind his jihad. Readers who don’t share his obsessions wonder vaguely what the point of column was.
Rioja Kid
As new Labour ought to know, there is no force on earth as determined as the British middle class when its blood is up. It has the power to pummel this government and, indeed, the London Olympics.
Threatening but meaningless. What specifically are the middle classes going to do if junk food companies sponsor the Olympics? “I’m not voting for political party X because company y is involved in a pharmaceutical product trial?” Don’t see it somehow.
But perhaps I’m looking through the wrong end of the telescope here. It’s becoming increasingly apparent that Nick’s subjects are pretexts from which to hang his current obsessions, to wit:
The liberal left is: anti-semitic, writes bad plays, disagrees with me, wallows in a general state of intellectual treachery.
Segregation is bad. All public services should be for everyone.
Ken Livingstone is friendly with a Muslim cleric of whom I disapprove. All his works are therefore of the devil and he must be condemned at every opportunity.
For a standard Nick column, perm any two from the above three. Aside from a brief hack at the segregation business, it’s item number three that gets an extended outing here. Let’s imagine the genesis of the column as follows. This week, I wish to write about how Ken Livingston is a terrible man. He hasn’t actually associated with any bearded religious reactionaries this week, so I can’t go at it directly. But he is behind the Olympic bid. And the Olympics is probably going to get sponsored by junk food companies. Therefore Ken Livingstone is poisoning your children. Isn’t that just typical of a chum of the fiendish al-Qaradawi? See how it all fits together.
Columnist purses lips and nods significantly, convinced that he’s managed to manipulate woolly minded liberals to get behind his jihad. Readers who don’t share his obsessions wonder vaguely what the point of column was.
Rioja Kid
posted by The Rioja Kid at 11/13/2005 02:05:00 PM
4 Comments:
I thought it was absolutely extraordinary. It really was:
Kiddies!!! Dontcha love 'em!!?!?! If anyone touches a hair on the heads of our luvly little kiddiewinkies, I'd chop their hands off, right??!! How dare Ken let those burger-advertisers turn 'em all into fat hoodie asbo yobs!!!!
Kiddies!!! DOntcha hate 'em??!!!?! All those middle class parents a whinin' and a whingin' about how Ronald McDonald is going to turn their bright-eyed bunnykins into a fat hoodie asbo yob!!! It makes me sick!!
I really think someone should tell Nick that Alison Pearson has been selected to be the next incumbent of the Lynda Lee-Potter column in the Daily Mail and that there is thus no potential financial advantage to be gained by anyone else demonstrating their facility with Glenda Slagg impressions.
Besides, McDonald's already plasters its logo over every football match in the world to no protest at all from the bourgeoisie. They've stopped turning up to games, but not for that reason.
"As new Labour ought to know, there is no force on earth as determined as the British middle class when its blood is up"
As indeed they proved over their pet subject to accompany a piece of Bruschetta, the Iraq war.
As Simon said they sponsor the England team, and the 1996 European Championships, the last major international sporting event in Britain,
The F.A. disclosed on 11 April 2002 that McDonald's, the fast-food giant, would become the third of the five partners sponsoring the England team. The four-year deal with McDonald's reportedly would bring in £7.5 million per year. McDonald's was then one of the 15 main sponsors and the official restaurant of World Cup 2002. It was also the official restaurant at World Cups 1994 and 1998 and at European Championships 1992, 1996 and 2000.
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