Breaking News - Sir Ian Bowler resigns

My Other Life

I recently started another blog (yes, I know...) to cover all of my work stuff. It has me pimping various things I've done, and thoughts about comedy and writing. The political / funny / imaginary things will remain here.

If you'd like to read the other why not go over to the site and click on Blog. I'd love to see you there.

Metaphorically. If I go to the site and it is actually just a picture of you I wouldn't love that. Iwouldn't love that at all.

In Defense of Giving Offense

Sticks and stones...

Last week, Andrew Neill (who looks ever more like two testicles wrestling over a tumour in an unhappy scrotum) interviewed Chris Mounsey of the often-wrong but always entertaining Devil's Kitchen blog, in his capacity as leader of the Libertarian Party UK (LPUK).

This has had a couple of results. First, it has enabled me to stop wondering what DK looked like (my earlier speculations are in this post here). Second, it has revealed an oddly puritan tendency in certain other bloggers.

Whilst it's clear from the clip above that Chris was not prepared for the kind of interview that was conducted (perhaps he was labouring under the misapprehension that the BBC would use their four minutes with the smaller parties to try to find out a little of what their policies were, or to attack the philisophical underpinnings of them), I have to admit to being quite baffled by the glee some people seem to be taking in the episode.

I suppose some of this is the sort of smug grin we're all allowed when we see one right-wing cunt monstering another. Except I can't help feeling that using the license fee to sponsor one hideous, authoritarian, Thatcherite grotesque putting a less-hideous, non-authoritarian puppy in its place is not necessarily the sort of thing we should be applauding.

The most worrying strand, to my mind, is that this exposed the author of Devil's Kitchen as a 'nasty person' and showed up his revelling in perverse scatological pornography as being outside acceptable thought. Which would be fine if those people expressed any of the same concerns about Hunter S Thompson, H.L. Mencken, Martin Rowson, Steve Bell, Mark Twain*, Jonathan Swift, Tom Paine, Charlie Brooker, or James Gillray.

There is a long history of utterly unjustified invective, full of imagery that is patently repougnant to normal minds. But it is some of our best political writing, it shows is some essential truths.

Yes, being on the receiving end of invective, and invective, can be painful (I was in Tonightly, I know how vicious some Internet forums can be), especially if it is undeserved (ah...). However, bile, vitriol, anger, well-worded invective, inveighing against what we see to be evil, these are vital parts of our political culture. If we dilute our imagery until it is all acceptable to a consensus of reasonable-minded people then we are condemning it to sterility.

Ah yes, but he is leading a political party, he should be prepared to answer for what he has said, the argument runs, and that is not one I should disagree with. When Hunter Thompson ran for Sheriff of Aspen County (admittedly his most famous invective was yet to come in Fear And Loathing On The Campaign Trail '72 and the political journalism after that) he refused to apologise for anything he had said in print. Instead, he revelled in it, and only didn't win because the Republicans all (apart from 150 of them) switched their votes to the Democratic candidate to keep him out. And his manifesto included changing the name of Aspen to Fat City and ripping up the city streets and replacing them with turf.

Chris Mounsey was almost criminally stupid in not being better prepared to stand up for what he had said, either by defining it as valid comment, or satire, or concentrating on the substance of what he had said. More worryingly, this appeared to be the first time that it had occurred to him that things he types might be hurtful to the people they were typed about. Indeed, he seemed embarrassed into apologising. Chris Mounsey didn't look bad because he was too nasty, but because he was too nice, too unprepared to continue saying outrageous things in the face of someone upset by them.

Maybe that's one of the problems. DK occasionally feels like it's vitriol-by-numbers, that it's not motivated by true rage because if it was, he wouldn't hesitate to say it to their faces. At its best it is a howl of excoriation; at its worst: a clumsy collection of right-wing venom stapled together for attention.

The Devil is not a writer or creator of offensive imagery on a par with any of those listed above. Of course, he's also part-time. He has a tendency to reach for the easiest and most tired of offensive cliches, and rarely takes the time to construct an image that is apt and shocking and delightful precisely because we haven't seen it before, preferring tired torysphere usages like 'monocular cunt Gordon Brown'. When he does, however, it's worth waiting for. That's why (along with Justin McKeating, Unity, and Anton Vowl) he's one of the few UK political bloggers whose posts I always try to read.

I've done live television a few times, and the moment that the floor manager counts you in both moves bowels and emblankens minds. I'm prepared to believe that Chris was prepared to give a fluent and convincing account of the policies and beliefs of the LPUK. The fact remains that he wasn't given a chance.

We absolutely have a right to know what those who would try to lead us have written in the past. We should be prepared to allow them to complete a sentence in response. It's also important to establish what they are planning to do, what they think, and why. I agree entirely with the commenter on one site who said that it made no sense for Andrew Neil to introduce part of the show looking at smaller parties, and then to spend a third of the interview mocking their being a small party, no matter what one thinks of them.

Do I think the question shouldn't have been asked? No. Do I think it should have been the subject of most of the interview? No. Do I think Chris should have been able to answer questions about it succinctly? Definitely.

As a result of this interview and the publicity it received, Chris has decided to change the way in which he blogs. In his post about this he makes it very clear that the fact that his boss phoned him to express concern about his blogging did not amount to any pressure being put on him to stop blogging in the way he did. Although he did.

Which is an interesting argument for a vulgar libertarian to make because, presumably, there would be nothing wrong with an employer dismissing an employee for blogging something they didn't like. Or marrying someone they didn't like. Or wearing something they didn't like. That is entirely the province of the employer. And, presumably, talented people who want to write, marry, or wear whatever they like will find other, less-restrictive places to work. Unless, of course, they also happen to like their jobs.

So, Chris is at pains to point out that it is his choice to curtail his blogging. It is his choice, and our loss; because, agree with him or not, he wrote some very funny, very horrible things. The Devil is dead. Long live some other cunt.

* On Jane Austen: "Every time I read Pride And Prejudice I want to dig her up and hit her over the skull with her own shin-bone."

Deus Vult!

Crikey! Thank goodness we're over in the Middle East to Stop Terrorism, and not to fight some misguided holy war.

Ah.

Where it's happening

Apologies for the relative silence over here, but there's been such a lot going on over at In The Gloaming, I haven't had a chance to think about much else.

Sorry.

Sue Reid & Me...

So, Sue Reid has written a poorly-researched, vindictive piece based more on her personal perjudices than on, you know, truth in today's Daily Mail? It doesn't surprise me. I helped her do the same thing once.

I don't have time to blog about it properly (although I may try to over the weekend), but here's the article I wrote for The Guardian about it in either 1999 or 2000. It originally appeared in G2 in May of 1999 (or, perhaps, 2000. I can't remember, it was a while ago...).

Please excuse the terrible prose. I was young. I liked words...

Sue Reid & Me...

Sometimes...

Sometimes, Hitchens still gets it absolutely right: "Once again, one is compelled to ask which would be worse: a Sarah Palin who really meant what she merely seemed to say, or a Sarah Palin who would say anything at all for a cheap burst of applause."

Um, publishing that last bum-screed appears to have wiped my blog of all of its other content. Which is a little sad.

Except for fans of bum-screeds...

Anyone know how to fix it?

***UPDATE - All fixed. My greedy Amazon affiliate link was ruining everything... ***

There may be some of you who feel that you haven't seen enough of my flabby, white arse in your lives. There may be some of you who yearn for the opportunity to glimpse that pellucid pork-peach bouncing up and down on your television screens. I can only suggest that those of you seek immediate professional help, before you completely lose it in the middle of Sainsbury's and begin wedging whole Stiltons down your trousers, braying like a donkey, and attempting to climb into the frozen peas because "They're so lovely; so green and friendly..."

However, although I've not seen it, this DVD may well answer your prayers. Your my-bum prayers, containing, as it claims to, the Best of Tonightly. I like to think that my wobbling anus was one of the highlights.

Of course, it may not be on there at all, but you could look at my face on the front cover, and just imagine my bum. That's what I'll be doing this Christmas...

Tonightly DVD

Why They Call Us The Blues

In honour of the Conservative Party conference (and because Comedybox have apparently lost last year's version down the back of the Internet), here's my little tribute from 2007:

Announcing In The Gloaming

In The Gloaming is the new project from me and the rest of the Dirty Blondes. It's a series of monthly comedy-horror podcasts, and they start at Hallowe'en.

Do pop over to the blog, and sign up to be kept up to date with all that's going on. We've got special guest stars, jokes about bums, all sorts...

It's going to be magical.

My response to Decca Aitkenhead

For those of you who haven't read this lovely piece of work, you should before reading what's below...

Twatt Lucas, More Like...

by Aitka Dickenhead

The jowls opposite me wobble like two toads full of custard taped to a thin man's cheeks. I fear for a moment that the jowls are going to slide liquidly off the head of bald, Jewish comedian Matt Lucas, taking the rest of the skin with them, and leaving just two eyeballs staring out of an insecure skull.

When I replay the tape of my interview with the overweight, Jewish comedian, one thing really stands out: I am excellent at interviews. He is rubbish at them.

To be fair, it doesn't start well.

“Good morning,” he said, a thin line of sweat glistening on his bald brow. Yes, he's polite, but does sheer, biting misery force him to be polite? Fortunately, I have no such qualms.

I'm not meant to. I'm a hardbitten, no-nonsense, take-no-shit reporter for a tough paymistress. Yeah, fuck you. I'm an arts correspondent for The Guardian. To show the bald, overweight comedian quite how unimpressed by him I am I fart loudly. Unexpectedly. Brilliantly.

Does he say something funny in return? No, he coughs and changes the subject like he's embarrassed about having a middle-aged woman farting at him in a restaurant. He has no self-confidence. I think he might be gay,

If you're one of his millions of fans, I can only assume you haven't been exposed to good comedy, like the scintillating prose I craft for this very paper. Many people have said that my articles, on occasion, were 'quite funny'. And yet I don't have a series on BBC1. I don't have a career in films. Because I'm not bald or overweight.

Now he's staring at me like an accountant peering through a flesh-coloured life-preserver. Maybe it's not the 'done thing' to be typing this at the table, but you'd hope a so-called comedian would have a healthy disrespect for authority. I stand on the table and urinate into his soup. He says nothing, but I notice he doesn't eat any more of it. I think bald, Jewish comedian Matt Lucas is quite rude.

The moment he mentions thin, fully-haired non-Jewish comedian David Walliams, he suddenly is full of praise. Words tumble out of his head as if he meant them, and he seems genuinely and warmly affectionate. He is so insecure he even feels the need to pretend to like his friends. Or, what is even sadder, he might actually think he likes them.

It can't have been easy, growing up bald, overweight, and Jewish. In the maternity ward, the bald Matt Lucas must have waved looked at all the other babies – lithe, with full sets of teeth, and hair down to their shoulders – and begun to wave his tubby arms and wail. An act he would perfect for Shooting Stars, a programme he continues to want to work on.. I find myself pitying a grown man with the massive insecurities that could lead him to still admire someone and wish to work with them whilst in his mid-30s.

His adenoidal drone reminds me of everything that is wrong with comedy nowadays: it is written and performed by people who don't feel the need to constantly amuse me. Thoughtful, shy, and embittered people all now think they have the right to write comedy. Long gone are the fun-loving clowns, always ready with a quip or light-hearted anecdote. I'm thinking of the Spike Milligans, the Tony Hancockses, the Lenny Bruces. Song and dance men, who made your rotten heart soar.

“I think you are very boring, and this interview is making me want to puke my gall bladder into your lap in the hopes that you will do something entertaining.” I say, flicking his ears, spitting on a photograph of his mum. He seems shocked.

“I suppose you think I'm rude!” I bellow through a megaphone I have brought along for just such an eventuality, “You idiot!”

He smiles, with what would appear to be good grace, but is probably a murderous hatred born of many years being a sub-standard hack. It is the oleaginous smile of the rich, bald and overweight. And Jewish.

“No, it's probably just me,” He's right. It is him. “I'm a little tired at the moment from rehearsals-”

I cut him off by ramming my right elbow into his mouth, stifling anything more he has to say.

But I hope he's right. I hope he's tired from rehearsals. I do, truly, from the bottom of the calcified olive pit with which they replaced my heart, hope that he's not that insecure. I hope he's not a grasping, dusty nun's-quim of a human, whose only joy is belittling others. I do hope he's not that.

But I can't be sure.

The style and grace of a young Marilyn Monroe. Birthday fail.

Eleanor shows the poise and sheer star quality we all know she has...

HINT: Watch right until the end. The last two seconds are the best two seconds...

It's a shame when people you like turn out to be profoundly retarded. There you are, introducing them to your parents and friends, when they run to the buffet and start shoving prawns up their noses, rubbing their bare chests on the pate, and trying to make sweet, sweet love to the skirting board.

Devil's Kitchen, as delightful and entertaining as he usually is, has become that pate-rubber.

In a fit of what I can only describe at shit-minded, smug, awfulness (note: I could describe it as other things. But I'm not going to), he has subscribed to the meme du jour of simpletons everywhere. To wit: everything bad in the world? That's left wing. Everything good? Is right.

What started as a piece of contrarianism from the idiot son of American conservatism has become a bog-standard piece of ill-thought-through conservative nonsense. It's quite possible, and I'm quite desperate to hope that DK meant this as nothing more than a piece of cunt-baiting mischief.

If so, consider me baited...

Let's consider this late-term abortion of a phrase: "collectivist policies—and thus of the Left."

To which I can only respond: since fucking when? Since actually fucking when? Since when have the monarchy and the armed forces and police, the most aggressively collectivist organisations we've yet to come up with, looked to the Left for their support?

The fact that some bloated, corporate imbeciles call themselves socialists whilst being authoriatarian, collectivist morons, doesn't mean that a state of being an authoritarian collectivist moron makes you a socialist. Quite the reverse. Just like being a rancid twat doesn't necessarily make you a conservative. Although it's a pretty good indicator.

The Left has been the home of Tom Paine, Benjamin Tucker, the Anti-Corn Law Leagues, the Chartists, the Suffragettes, Proudhon, Saint Simon, the Levellers, and those who have been fighting the State for hundreds of years. The Left has been anti-authoritarian for centuries, and we're meant to admire the Right for working out that the State wasn't particularly wonderful in the 1970s?

Unless it was Pinochet's state.

And, yes, I'll hold my hands up: my identification of myself as 'left' is deeply ingrained. No matter how interested in libertarianism or anarchism I am, I know whence I've come, and that's from the left. I am a creature of the left. A creature of anti-authoritarian, non-conformist politics; interested in raising the lot of each and every one of us. That's my emotional core. It's instinctive, and no matter where I end up, it will be for the left reasons.

It doesn't mean that I sit around wanking over pictures of Pol Pot, and thinking that Stalin was right - but he didn't go far enough, any more than I imagine DK licks chocolate spread off large monochrome posters of Mussolini, humming the Horst Wessel Song as he does. (Actually I would have just imagined that, but I don't know what DK looks like. I'm imagining Dustin Hoffman, but shorter, with Joe Pesci's crazed rat-eyes. Yeah. He'll fuck you up.)

I would imagine DK's instinctive association with the right, despite their history of being murdering, fascist, collectivist bastards is something to do with his upbringing as well. Something terribly wrong in his upbringing. The idea that any contemporary of mine can have lived through the early 1990s, and thought: "You know, these Conservatives are pretty good. When I can vote, it will certainly be for people like them." is frankly appalling.

I appear to have ranted, drifted.

The post DK cites is a lazy in its thinking as it is turgid in its prose. When attempting, loudly yet feebly, like a toddler insisting they haven't had dessert whilst wiping chocolate mousse from their bottom lip, to show that the BNP's policies are left-wing, Dizzy says:

The raising of the inheritance tax threshold to £1 million; - utterly
meanigless given that the economic will be in the shit and no one will
have that much to give away because of the socialist protectionism. A
dog whistle policy that is total inconsistent with the socialism
already laid out.

It also happens to be one of the Tories' key pledges. Heaven forfend that anyone notice that the language, and actually some of the policies of the BNP, much as he might like to describe them as left-wing, are those of the Conservative Party.

But that's nit-picking. It's playing their game.

It is a shame that there isn't a better showing for left-libertarianism in the British blogosphere. America has Kevin Carson, Rad Geek, In The Libertarian Labyrinth, and the Center for a Stateless Society; while we just have the bores at Samizdata and Devil's Kitchen, who at least possesses both a brain and some wit.

It's a shame that British libertarianism is so kneejerk and in many ways backwards in its online presence. It's a shame that some libertarians, so wedded to their 'right-wing' identity still feel the need to try to whitewash Pinochet whilst keeping their ideological skirts dry ('Pinochet was slightly not nice, but much, much better than any other conceivable thing, including the elected president, and he remained sexy to the end') or, and this is an absolute classic - fuck it, he can say it in his own words. This is a comment by The Wobbly Guy on a Samizdata post bemoaning the election of Obama:

"That's it. I'm pinning my hopes on China. I don't care if the Chinese
are authoritarians. They believe in capitalism, and I'm throwing in
with them."

And it's unfortunate that there aren't really any libertarians in the UK, just weapons fetishists, and plump men approaching 40, whose heads all look as if they have been boiled. And their refusal to engage with either the history or philiosophy of anti-statist thought (unless reading Ayn Rand counts) ensures that the LPUK will forever be a fringe party, a party to which thinking people are not invited.

If 'libertarians' could start being libertarians, and stop being 'right-wingers', however, that might not be the case...

(Full disclosure: This post was written when I was 63% drunk. The views expressed may not even be mine.)

Last Sunday we did the first 'episode' of our new improvised show, Off Your Chest, at Lowdown at The Albany. I've never had to improvise a whole show before, so it was 'a learning experience'.

One of the things I learnt was that a pun isn't always just a groan moment for an audience. In the right context it can take their breath away. And leave me spluttering like a deflating twat for a good four minutes.

As a Kilroy-esque chat show host, I'd been challenging Darren Strange to explain how he spent his benefits. We'd established that his benefits were insufficient for him to eat at Pizza Express every day. He said:

"If I stop going spending my benefits on pizzas in the current climate they'll go under. Pizza Express will go under, ASK will go under, eventually Pizza Hut will go under..."

And from behind us, John Voce, veteran of the Comedy Store Players, the voice that launched a thousand Kwik Fit adverts, said:

"It's the Domino's effect."

Just wow.

In scripted comedy that's a sigh, something we've all been aware was coming, a punchline. Here it was a small but tiny victory over chaos, manna from the comedy gods, a moment when the universe falls into alignment.

I had to hide my face because I was laughing so hard.

So there is a time and a place for a pun to be majestic and exciting. It's at our next show, April 12th at Lowdown at The Albany, 240 Great Portland St, at 7:30.

Why not come and see if John can do it again?

Just wow.

'Class'

TV News...Comic Relief Special On CBBC - We Love Telly - TV & Entertainment - Mirror.co.uk

The sitcom I wrote has a preview in The Mirror. I'm getting quite nervous as to how it turned out now.

Still, we shall see...

Apparently, Homer Simpson was at Obama's latest speech (listen carefully at 6:34)...



Woohoo!

I never assumed I'd find myself sticking up for people who named their children Adolf Hitler Campbell and Aryan Nation Campbell. But I think, much as it turns my stomach, I'm going to have to.

These people have had their children taken away because they're racists. Courts have decided that these children would be better off in care than living with racist morons. I disagree.

I believe that unless a parent is physically abusive to their children, it's probably best that their children grow up with them, no matter how weird, alcoholic, or even racist the parents are.

And they're really stretching things to find grounds for removing these children. Their landlord said: “They’re not destroying anything, the house is clean and they pay their rent on time,” he said. But, he added, “There comes a point when you say, ‘Enough is enough.’” Yes! Damn those clean, non-destructive residents who are punctual with the rent. Damn them to hell!

Essentially, I believe you should be taken away from your parents only if they are going to do you physical harm. I believe that because the alternative is so extreme. A childhood in care homes or foster homes is an outcome to be avoided when possible.

Lots of us have idiots for parents. Lots of us have people who are more or less racist for parents. Lots of our parents give us names that make our schooldays hellish. None of that stops them loving us, or us loving them, or our being raised in a supportive, loving environment..

And we get over it. We get over the things our parents do. We get over the terrible people (in some ways) our parents are. We try not to make their mistakes. We try not to name our children Heinrich Himmler Tapley. We get better. We try not to make the same mistakes. We have our own hideous mistakes to crush our children with...

And, yes, I've just found myself defending the people who gave their children horrible racist names. Bleeeeh.

Gah.

This is just a test to see if the new comments system is working.

But I hope you're having a wonderful day, anyway...

The Battley-Tapley Christmas Letter 2008

Well, what a year 2008's been in the Battley-Tapley household! There have been tears, joy, and laughter for us, unlike for those of you from whom we haven't received a Christmas letter: whose lives we can only assume have been utterly eventless.

The big news, of course, this year, is that it looks like Natt's alcoholism is finally under control. In the past few months we have been able to visit bars, restaurants, and zoos with relative confidence. Not since August has he jumped onto a dessert trolley and started smearing himself with Black Forest Gateau, or improperly fondled a koala. We pray that his progress continues through 2009, and the courts agree to remove his tag at his hearing in April!

Zoe's ongoing course of botox and regenerative gene therapy has really kicked her career up a few notches, and she is now appearing as 'a human statue' in Covent Garden, no less! She isn't enjoying the commute, and her ongoing feud with one of the fire jugglers has caused some problems, but she struggles on, and hopes to be promoted to the South Bank soon!

2008 also saw the birth of our fourth child, Enrique, who was taken away by bailiffs because of the credit crunch.

Still, let's not get ahead of ourselves. There's nothing worse than a Christmas letter that is anything but completely thorough, so here we go...

JANUARY saw the slaughter of Amanda, our pig. We hated to have to do it, but she was looking very old and tasty. Seeing Eleanor playing in the warm entrails of the sow that had once suckled her (during Zoe's post-natal depression) was really special, and emphasised how lucky we are to have a daughter and some delicious sausages.

FEBRUARY was a difficult month, that saw Zoe convicted of a 'road rage'. To clarify, because there have been a lot of falsehoods disseminated about this incident in the press, Zoe was not naked at the time. She was wearing a hat, and a bandolier full of ammunition.

MARCH was a very proud month, as Eleanor won the Nobel Prize for Physics for her work on the Planck scale, and quantum fluctuations in space-time. She also got her Grade 3 Oboe (no distinction this time), and a 25 metre swimming badge.

APRIL saw our annual hibernation. It was perhaps our most successful hibernation since 1996.

MAY was the month in which Natt's one-man show, an adaptation of Hamlet,with Natt doing all of the voices took to the stage - or should we say, the pavement! Eschewing fusty traditional venues, One Man Hamlet was an exciting experiment in open air theatre: a performance without the gaudy appurtenances of lighting, costumes, or an audience. In a rave review, Westminster Council called it 'a public nuisance'.

JUNE saw Eleanor complete the first leg of her around-the-world tricycle ride. Unfortunately, her record-breaking attempt had to be cut short when she was accosted by a group of road-pirates in the Urals, and was sold into white slavery. She smuggled her way back into Britain in a Somalian's stomach.

JULY failed to produce any notable events for our family. We think that this is probably July's fault, and have decided not to participate in July in 2009.

AUGUST was the month in which the Olympic fever gripped the country. Zoe's stalwart efforts in the pole vault won her a nomination as BBC Sports Personality of the Year, and a ruptured vagina. The heroic way in which she limped from the field, and gamely applied ice and bandages to her crotch won the nation's hearts.

SEPTEMBER, as ever, was an exciting time, as Zoe's birthday party loomed. Once again, the party guests were treated to a torrent of personal abuse, watered-down alcohol, and the sight of Zoe staring drink-sodden into a mirror, clawing at her face and weeping: 'Where did it all go so very wrong.' Great fun!

OCTOBER was the month in which Eleanor finally made us very proud grandparents. After 15 long months, she provided us with a grandson, Patrice. Her boyfriend, Malcolm, works at an abattoir, sweeping up blood, but this will only be true whilst he is on remand, after which he plans to train as a teacher. We would have preferred it if they were married, but Malcolm already has a wife and four children, so we understand why they thought that it would be both inappropriate and illegal.

NOVEMBER saw Natt back in prison, the victim, yet again, of mistaken identity. Once again, we would appeal for anyone who has seen the violent, drunken groper of women and animals who just happens to share Natt's name and face and DNA to come forward. Your evidence could be vital.

DECEMBER isn't even finished yet, and already we know it's going to be the best Christmas ever. The family portraits in the attic grow ever more demented and hideous, which can only augur well for the new year!

Natt and Zoe and Eleanor and Patrice wish you a merry Christmas, and a happy 2009. Have a wonderfully festive period.

Love,

N, Z & E
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