Woy tight-lipped at yesterday's England unveiling
by Chris Tobin
So here we are once again with the Faux Outrage brigade stamping feet and shouting from the rooftops, with hands waving in the air with indignant annoyance, as again THAT national newspaper has chosen a headline from its gutter drenched library of a filing cabinet, where they choose to visit on what seems a weekly basis.
Now firstly I must admit – I have not seen the headline and nor do I feel I need to view it to comment. Of course I know exactly what it said and the manner in which it was delivered – that of social commentator for our nation, passing an alluring if deviously constructed piece of journalistic garbage to attract maximum exposure for itself – job done.
The offending article, or headline, about the new England manager Roy Hodgson being unable to pronounce the letter R, similar to Jonathan Ross.
Let me state my stance regarding any sort of misguided defence [which this is not] of THAT newspaper, that intolerable piece of trash, which I choose to not only ignore, but detest is rather more an attack of those nit-picking self-proclaimed custodians of social and political correctness, who given any opportunity will jump up and down with their high heels, or size 9s with their very own style of malignant outrage.
Fellow journalists – who only weeks earlier were quite happy in the use of racist rhetoric linking Fabio Capello to Italians jumping sinking ships, whilst others would link Luis Suarez to a dictator [General Pinochet] – now cry foul at a witless despairing headline from one of their foes. Pot and kettle springs to mind.
Social activists as I like to refer to them, have again taken football as its new cause – well they have very little to occupy their days with, having been evicted from St Paul’s with sleeping bag in one hand, whilst the other contains a metre of string with a scruffy mutt attached to the opposite end.
I have had my social conscience bombarded with varying degrees of political correctness from all angles these last few days and it has had enough; the overload has it running for cover.
Let’s get one thing straight in this otherwise skew-whiff squabble – Roy Hodgson is not disabled and any suggestion he is, or in some way should be described as being, is bloody insulting to the man himself, and to the lady who lives across the road from my mother, who has one of those shopping buggy things to get round, as she struggles to walk a few yards.
The guy struggles with his Rs and just because That newspaper has encouraged the whole country to debate it, does not make it any different to taking the rip out of the follicly challenged [hopefully this is the correct description for baldies] or those that take an umbrella to a football match [wally with a brolly], or a man who has a turnip for a brain.
Which now leads me on to those with absolute memory loss – football fans have forgetfulness like no other, amnesia akin to having constantly had the latest Nike football smashed against its hollow cranium.
The faux outrage from football supporters toward particularly the “Hodgson Headline” is without doubt example, if indeed it were needed, of the inept attempt of an apathetic group of people to flower contempt as they endeavour to prove they are indeed perturbed in a hot and bothered way, in the regard of social acceptance, as momentarily they forget about what happens within their individual tribe each and every Saturday afternoon on terraces around this glorious island.
Guilt is not just about one’s own actions, but also association, a kinship, a type of thinking where actually it includes no thought – the closing of eyes, and ears, and a transitory silence – as any apparent disloyalty renders you and your social conscience paralysed, in an arena where only sheep need follow.
I have heard sexist, racist, homophobic, and all manner of other discriminatory language from individuals and groups, some in tune, and some out of tune and all have been acceptable in the confines of the coliseum. You pay your money and take your choice.
Referees accused of blindness along with their little helpers with flags; parentage questioned; the sexuality questioned of many a professional footballer – Arsenal and Sol Campbell springs to mind – then add Adebayor his mother and his father, and we have a song; offensive and racist, yet regularly rolled out in jest , and not only by Arsenal supporters, but many others. I have even witnessed it being sung when Adebayor was not even within 100 miles of that particular stadium.
The constant chants from Old Trafford toward Liverpool in respect of Hillsborough, and in return Munich, which Manchester City supporters also like to sing. Add to this list Chelsea, West Ham, and Millwall and any side that has ever visited Brighton – you get my drift.
I am pretty sure that the few who have never thrown a stone, and never broken a window, will scream “How dare you” at my provocative piece – I am without interest in you, take your outrage elsewhere….bothered….face.
The next time football fans wave that sword of moral indignation around, they perhaps want to be extremely careful they don’t chop off a fellow supporter’s head – or worse still their very own. That could cause memory loss.
You can find me on Twitter https://twitter.com/christobinsings
