RED BARON'S WORDS

OK I recognise that my current direction has alienated the Christian Right (like they ain’t long gone from around here!), the Populist Right so now it’s time to offend the Politically Correct! Hell let’s see if I can’t one day get an excommunication into the bargain!

Language has always been a fascination, I love it’s nuances, it’s power, it’s foibles. The myriad assortment of differences in dialect, vocabulary, accent and mistakes make us as unique as our physical features. Our language imprint and style is tantamount to a current fingerprint of who and where we are at a particular time. Our vocabularly reflects local influences some may be long-standing others more recent, it can reflect class as well as cultural heritage.

I saw a program called ‘The C-Word’ the other day, a fairly easy-going etymological study of this word, perhaps the most taboo word in the English language. The program did not seek to say that everyone who says it is either good or bad, neither did it seek to denigrate those who abhor its usage. However it did look at some interesting points which in fact transcend simply this word and strike at what the underlying problem often is. The word cunt was used frequently in the 12th to the 18th centuries without any eyebrow-raising. Grove Lane in Oxford was formerly called Gropecunt Lane (the name signifying that it was an area used by prostitutes) and part of people’s names in 13th Century frequently contained it. Since the word always carried the same meaning it is not as if suddenly lexical inference has meant it has taken on hitherto uncharacteristic slang tendencies. So it is a relatively modern phenomenon and it is unsurprisingly the Victorians who are principally responsible for it’s transition to the heavy profane word that it is today.

It was interesting that in the program they spoke to a comedian from East London who explained that it was a common word used in slang conversations without necessarily implying offence and this certainly mirrors my time in SE London particularly. I could call my best friend a silly cunt, a daft cunt, a drunk cunt, a sick cunt or a poor old cunt without him taking umbrage. However this is because of the way I would use the word. If, however I used it in anger at someone the consonents are practically spat out – “you (fucking) cunt” would indeed be intending to cause offence. In London people would know the difference between the two without any ambiguity. It would be pretty unrealistic to expect any standard slang not to include an extensive use of the vernacular, I can only speak for London and if I were offended at the use of profanity I wouldn’t have been able to go out!

By the same token my best mate and I frequently refer to one another as a homo or a gaylord, not to signify homosexuality, nor in a way which is designed to offend, it is just a light-hearted way to say berk or pillock. Just as I have heard gay men refer to other gay men as a ‘right old queen’ or such like. Most people would not raise their eyebrows were we to call one another a berk, despite it’s origin being Cockney-rhyming slang Berkley Hunt – meaning cunt. Likewise the term getting on my wick has become mainstream despite its derivation being Cockney rhyming slang – Hampton Wick – dick. In real cockney usage though rather than getting on my wick you would normally say it was getting on your Hampton, the actual rhyming word being the one that is frequently dropped. (Someone tell me please why Hampton in SW London is used in this Cockney sense and not Hackney Wick which is in Cockney heartland of E. London?).

The reason I would defend our usage of what the politically correct might term homophobic insults in this context is because for either of us to be called gay is not an insult, we are not homophobic, the word gaylord is more used in its retro sense because we both recall it being used in the playground in the 1970s as an almost show-stopping insult before anyone was aware what it actually signified. This in fact illustrates perfectly how words can be used because of the significance others attach to it – so much language of the playground is used because children have overheard the way it has been used by people older than them and the weight that it has appeared to carry. However familiarity with words can lead to a lessening of their power as it ceases to retain its shock value.

I have discussed the word nigger many times before. I will not refer to it as ‘the n word’ because this affords it more linguistic power than the word itself is due. Nigger has been in circulation for a while coming originally from the Latin niger meaning black, the word negars was used in 1619 by John Rolfe, describing slaves shipped to Virginia colony. Neger or neggar was widely used in Dutch communities to refer to African slaves. It is generally thought to have become a word used in pejorative terms around the late 18th early/19th centuries. Nowadays it would be uncommon to hear white people use the word nigger, outside the urban working class youth, unless they are using it in a racist sense, such has been the political correct campaign against it, however amongst black youths it has long since been re-appropriated and this has been a great deal more effect in diffusing its impact.

Pakis has been similarly repatriated by the Pakistani community and rightly so, it renders it useless as an insult and therefore the discomfort of the white middle classes is merely symptomatic of their outdated morality. It is quite normal now to see banners for ‘Paki Power’ at cricket matches in this country. I remember certainly in the 70s it was relatively common in London to see graffitti saying ‘Pakis out’ or ‘Pakis go home’ the irony was that most of the supposed Pakis these people were referring to were in fact Indian, a great many via Uganda, and yet the term wog which had been used from the days of the British Empire, but more commonly since the 1950s was largely declining in circulation then, I haven’t heard wog used now for many years.

Spastics is an interesting one, it is not generally used any more to refer to those with spastic diplegia and cerebral palsy. and it would be interesting to therefore chart its decline as a word used in offensive situations particularly in the young who have not grown up with the word being around. The word spastics being used derogatively had a direct result on the Spastics Society changing their name to Scope because their research had shown that parents were less likely to contact the society for fear of their children being tarnished with the label and businesses were uneasy about linking themselves with a perceived stigmatic term. Did this change in name halt the use of the word spastic, I suspect it has had a large impact on it, I would contend that one hears it a great deal less these days, however in answer to the bigger question of whether this name change did anything to increase awareness and tolerance of those with cerebral palsy and other such conditions I would say probably not. Furthermore the emergence of terms like Scoper or Scopers or Scopey, which I am told have come into existence, appears to counter the assumption that the word spastic disappeared following a concerted campaign by the anti-discrimination movement of the 1980’s as I have seen claimed. Words such as spaz, spacker, cripple are still in pretty common usage and spaz illustrates another example of the problem with removing words because it is widely used as an accepted and inoffensive word in the US whilst it is slang and generally considered offensive in the UK. An example of how quickly language can adapt to circumstance can be seen in the case of Joey Deacon, a cerebral palsy sufferer who had overcome great physical handicap and showed that his mental capacity was unimpaired. His story was shown on Blue Peter which at the time was almost universally watched by schoolchildren. The insults, Joey and Deacon which were widesread and instantaneous remain to this day, seldom used, as most who were alive at the time are older and wiser, but they would still be understood by any of the generation brought up in the 1970s to early 80s which coincided with the broadcasting of Joey Deacon’s story in 1981 as part of the International Year Of The Disabled.

In conclusion we will always use words for different purposes and to convey our feeling to other people. The word itself is a mere conduit to those emotions, it is the vehicle by which we carry them and we will always use the word we feel most befits not only how we feel but how we will make the other person best understand, this is what I like to call linguistic chameleonism as I feel that describes the whole process by which many of us change our accent and our vocabulary to fit our surroundings. If people are driving whilst drunk you don’t remove the car and allow the driver to find another one to drive you take the driver out of the system. The same rule applies to language. If you remove the words cunt, nigger, paki, spastic etc from the system you do not stop those who seek to use these words to cause offence and to do harm from still wishing to do so, you merely deprive them of their primary means of doing so for a short period of time they will adapt and find different words that have or will come to have the same meaning. This to me is one of the biggest impediments to the success of political correctness and why the movement is doomed to abject failure because it seeks to tackle the effect of a problem and not the cause. Forcing children to sing Baa Baa Green Sheep or changing the colour of bin bags really does nothing to increase interracial harmony, removing the word cunt from the English language would not make mysogany disappear overnight and changing names to appease people’s sensitivities is fighting a rearguard action because when a new name comes to represent the same stigma are you going to be forced to change again, surely this is allowing the bigotted to dicate terms?

This sort of approach offered by the political correct lobby has also the problem of no clearly definable limits after all should we abolish the word sinister because it comes from Latin sinistra meaning left and like the term cack-handed can be used to imply derogative connotations to those who are left-handed. Western European society and language is founded on the principle of right being right – the English proves that, but the French droit also means right in both senses as does the German recht. In Irish, deas means both right side and nice. Ciotóg is the left hand and is related to ciotach meaning awkward. Even people who can do things with both hands are said to be ambidextrous drawing on the stem of dexter Latin for right.

By changing or removing words we will not change the issue that people mock, insult, mistrust or fear those who are different. A decent system of education with a breadth of understanding and exposure to a myriad assortment of people and backgrounds and cultures is far more likely to instill a comprehension that people’s differences are merely part of what makes up who they are, to be celebrated for their own sake but only within the context that we all remain at heart human beings and in the scheme of things such differences are trivial. Maybe at that point we can then move on and respect the other apes and not see them merely as big monkeys.

Anyone deeply offended by this entry has missed the point entirely.

Song Of The Day ~ Yeah Yeah Yeahs – Down Boy

I don’t know if it is just me but on the issue of Maddie McCann I am disturbed by the mass hysteria and complete blanket coverage. Obviously as a parent I can quite see that the parents of the little girl will do everything and exploit any conceivable situation in order to find and expedite the safe return of their child. It is not their position of which I am critical or at least questioning, it is that of our society at large.

There seems something wrong, something very false about all the posters and memorial services, as if it’s a collective confessional and everyone must make themselves a part of the charade or risk being branded part of the problem. I can’t help but think that this is something akin to an attempt to wash off the guilt of a system that demonises older children and exploits and sexualises younger ones. After all in the midst of the memorial services, internet chain mails, local paper connection stories there is no debate taking place, no questioning, a singular lack of introspection. It is as if this is all lip service, the Catholic confession that gives absolution in return for hollow promises without any genuine need to change.

Under normal circumstances I believe there would have been a moderate amount of news discussion about a child going missing, some recriminations at the parents of the child being allegedly in a restaurant down the road when it happened and after a few days there would have been the presumption that she was dead. Naturally one would not expect parents to have to believe this until it was confirmed unequivocally, I cannot imagine any parent is likely to give up hope until the absolute last and that is why so many hang on to the last shreds of hope when there appears really to be nothing left, kids who haven’t been seen in 20 years that sort of thing. There are many in this situation who whilst they would not wish to find out their child may be dead would welcome some news one way or another in order to achieve some kind of closure, how can you mourn one of the most important people in your life when you don’t know if they may one day be coming home?

This case differs in many ways. Firstly the depth and breadth of coverage has been something to behold it has at times been utterly pervasive, bordering on the hysterical. At a time when soldiers are being killed in both Afghanistan and Iraq where flood waters are causing billions of £s worth of damage to some major cities across the UK the lead story has often remained that the girl is still missing and Mr X is being questioned or that there has been a sighting in Country Y. A £1.5 million reward has been offered, small wonder then that there have been alleged sightings across Europe. On the internet there are official websites, unofficial websites, blog commentaries and daily columns of nothing in particular on the sites of every tabloid and TV channel.

The parents have had audiences with major politicians and religious leaders including the Pope. What anyone expected the Pope to be able to do about this Lord alone knows (I use that phrase advisedly!) but it did keep the headlines and column inches ticking. I can’t help but think that the only ones who really gain from this is the media itself. Such news is soft work, it thrives on speculation and the hope of the desperate and stories and facts require little if any substantiation.

Wristbands have been made and sold (I confess I genuinely don’t know what the money has gone towards). They have even had the entire English Premier League football players coming out with T-shirts on at the start of the first game of the season.

I can never remember this sort of concerted publicity campaign for anything and certainly it eclipses every other comparable scenario. I can’t help but wonder what other parents of lost or deceased children must be feeling, combined with the obvious hope of a happy end to the story I’m sure must be an element of frustration and anger that such attention was not afforded their family in its hour of need.

Recently I have seen posters of bunny girls and high street honeys put up at the same time as sex attacks were taking place, where people are being shot more regularly because violence is becoming an accepted part of life and its glorification by some and acquiesence by others allows this all to continue.

I would not be so bold as to suggest that the current state of this country’s oppressed majority is entirely a product of a concerted effort of the status quo but they have the option to do nothing about it knowing that the internal turmoil, fear and violence is enough to keep the downtrodden where they are. Our detached, individualist, exploitative world devoid of cohesion, unity, responsibility comes at a price, and as more and more people are forced to pay it there has to come a time when it is just too expensive. As long as there is no realisation of this fact that situation will only perpetuate and we will keep having to look for and ultimately bury our children and the only real hope in life is that they continue to be someone else’s.

Song Of The Day ~ Smashing Pumpkins – Tonight, Tonight

***Stop Press*** ***4000 Immigrants Per Week*** ***Someone Call The Right-Wing nut-jobs***

According to an article in The Express there are 4,000 people a week applying to leave the UK.

Can you imagine the furore if this were people coming in to this country? My God they’d be standing on the White Cliffs of Dover, pitchforks in hand, foaming at the mouths and talking about Agincourt and Trafalgar.

Ironically The Express claims that one of the main reasons people are leaving is the immigration to the UK!!! Surely only the English right could attempt to justify such a position?! I can see the cartoon-like character now “I don’t like immigration, all these bloody foreigners coming over ‘ere, so I’m going to sod off to a foreign country.” These are of course the same people who insist on speaking louder to foreigners who don’t understand English and attempt to turn what little enclave in which they have landed into a British theme park. For further information on the British abroad see Big John.

Of course The Express does not cite actual references as to where it has obtained its information on what is actually going through the minds of those who are departing these shores nor has it named any names or conducted proper interviews. After all it would not be especially conducive to a right-wing rant if these people were former foreign nationals, or were leaving to avoid staggeringly high property prices, or leaving because they favoured a more cosmopolitan and less bigotted lifestyle. Just as it is not capricious to look too carefully at the state of the infrastructure and the reasons for it of the countries whence immigrants often come before criticising them for leaving. Of course the British emigrées will expect a warm welcome in whatever country they chose to go to and they will not give a moments consideration as to whether or not they have a right to be there.

The trouble is that this media brownwash is so pervasive, the hegemony is now so strongly anchored in the hard-line right that voices of the slightly right of centre are used to provide “balance” because they are different from the norm. The right these days see the genuine left as a spent force and that there only minor threat comes from the liberals. It is a grand Washington Consensus, so pervasive that it is so often unquestioned and therefore unfettered. The media is so positively under the control of the select few as to draw Orwellian compatisons or even those with Alfred Hugenberg and the Goebbels annexation in Nazi Germany. In the US for example establishment figure Michael Moore is held up to be the great swashbuckling radical and yet Moore is merely an state-annexed version of the wet centre ground. A figure brought out by the establishment as a bogey man to be booed and hissed like a Punch & Judy performance. The real left is therefore denied a franchise completely.

We can battle on the fringes and know we are right and convinced of the virtue of our own arguments, but in order to effect any change the hegemony must be constantly and consistently challenged from all different points of view. The seeds of doubt must be sown in the minds of those who have not bought into the bullshit but do not know where else to look for information. This is not about a conversion, it is about an awakening. You cannot force a person to think things are wrong, you can only draw their attention to it and allow them to have the information at their disposal to make up their own mind. I do not leave comments on right-wing blogs in an attempt to be big and clever, or in a mis-guided attempt to win back those who have turned to the fervent right, I do so to capture the interest of the casual observer in order that they know that there is another opinion out there. They can do with this information what they will it is not for me to indoctrinate. Things are not all shades of the same grey. I’m red and proud to be so, I do not ask you to be so, just hear the arguments and make up your own mind when you have the facts.

Ask yourself this – do the Right actively seek reasoned debate? When asked to account for their opinions do they argue rationally and strongly or do they turn to personal insults? Pick at the seams of any ideal and see whether it unravels. Question everything, it’s the only way you’ll ever learn, those who don’t wish to be questioned are generally the ones who have the most to hide.

Song Of The Day ~ Maximo Park – Girls Who Play Guitars

I shall leave aside the irony depicted in this photo of Prince Harry wearing a t-shirt bearing the image of Che Guevara, it is an improvement on his previous fashion choices but whilst I am sure Rommel would have little problem with the Prince sporting his Nazi-emblazoned Afrika Corps uniform I think Che might have slightly more objection in this picture which suggests abject ignorance at best. Harry is currently the 3rd in line to the throne. He is also a member of the Armed Forces. There has for some time been a debate surrounding his unit’s deployment to Iraq and whether or not Harry should accompany them. It has recently been decided by the army that they will not take the risk of sending him.

So the Windsors get to keep their blue-eyed boy safe. One wonders what the Williams from Cardiff or the Walshes from Manchester would really think of this as their boys and girls join the countless thousands who have been packed off to war before them. Some of them will not come back. Is that fair, or is it a case of one law for the poor and a totally different set of standards for the bluebloods?

The military’s view is that Harry would be a target for the insurgents. Personally I think all the British troops are targets for the insurgents and I question whether the disparate rebels in Iraq really have access to the sort of highly specialised intelligence to pinpoint an individual soldier within his battallion. Or is the army coming clean about its inability to protect its own servicemen. It would of course be a PR disaster were Harry to be wounded or killed, as we are no longer in the times when the royals lead their troops into active service. It would be even more of a catastrophe were he to be killed by friendly fire. Again one has to ask whether it is possible for intelligence to pinpoint an individual soldier when it comprehensibly fails to prevent people being killed by their own side.

Furthermore it would be highly likely that were Harry to be killed there would have to be an enquiry and at present one cannot see the army being altogether keen to get into that sort of territory whereby potentially a Pandora’s box may be opened. What with friendly fire casualties, collateral damage and prisoner brutalities it would take one hell of a cover-up not to let any of that out.

So we are expected to wear the fact that a minor royal of precious little if any actual significance to anyone’s life, save his own family and thus no more or less important than all the other sons and daughters out there, will be granted a Get Out Of Death Free card through no merit of his own but by the arbitrary coincidence of his place and lineage of birth. This angers me because my politics make me believe that we are all genuinely born equal, so such exceptions for some and not for others are an anathema to me.

So why do we have the monarchy? They are good for tourism apparently, which would appear to suggest that were they not to be there we would lose revenue. This is interesting as I have never seen a comparitive study as to whether the royals bring more in than we are required to spend on them but I do know that in spite of France having got rid of its blue-blooded parasites sometime ago there are still a great many visitors to Paris and the palace at Versailles and I am quite sure that paying for the upkeep of the regal history of France costs the French Republic a great deal less than the British population pay in taxes in order to prop up the money-vacuuming bastards in Buck House.

We are told that the Queen volunteered to pay income tax, which was magnanimous of her to do so, in the context of an era where the Tory government of the time had brought the top rate of tax down to an almost all-time low. The Queen does not pay the London congestion charge for her state cars. She pays Council tax on a voluntary basis but then she can afford to since receiving a large proportion of the Queen Mother’s estate valued at between £50 million -£70 million for which she is not required to pay inheritance tax. (There is an exemption for sovereign to sovereign bequests, interesting since the Queen Mother was not the monarch) The Civil List which pays for the royal estate is currently fixed until 2010 at £7.59 million a year. The individual figures who were fixed to gain from it in 1993 were The Queen, the Duke Of Edinburgh and the Queen Mother, so the Queen Mother’s estate has been largely funded by the tax payer. The Duke of Edinburgh receives £359,000 annual salary which has to be one of the contenders for the title of biggest example of money for old rope.

It’s the 21st century people, have we really not outgrown this bloated parasitic institution which installs a glass ceiling of privilege and oppulence beyond which we and our children may not reach? Can we not find a better use for £7.9 million such as education, housing, healthcare rather than propping up an arcane outdated set of in-bred reactionaries?

Song Of The Day ~ Skinnyman – Council Estate Of Mind