A Gentleman's Domain

No title necessary; just read.

Image provided courtesy of Mike Thomas of Encyclopedia of British Dance Bands

“The mood and temper of the public in regard to the treatment of crime and criminals is one of the most unfailing tests of civilization in any country. A calm and dispassionate recognition of the rights of the accused against the state, and even of convicted criminals against the state, a constant heart-searching by all charged with the duty of punishment, a desire and eagerness to rehabilitate in the world of industry all those who have paid their dues in the hard coinage of punishment, tireless efforts towards the discovery of regenerating processes, and an unfaltering faith that there is a treasure, if you can only find it, in the heart of every man – these are the things which in the treatment of crime and criminals mark and measure the stored-up strength of a nation, and are the sign and proof of the living virtue in it.”

Winston Churchill to the House of Commons, 20th July, 1910

Prudes on the Prowl.

Image provided courtesy of Mike Thomas of Encyclopedia of British Dance Bands

It is a truth universally acknowledged, and deeply regretted, that the sub-species prudus miserabilis is everywhere among us, like some incurable crotch rot. I’m not talking about people who simply don’t like seeing this or doing that. I’m talking about those people who, due to their own personal shortcomings, not only don’t want to see this or do that but they want to make sure no one else sees or does either. In other words: I don’t like it so you can’t do it. These are the practitioners of the sharply indrawn breath, who cast a pall of gloom over any gathering they attend because they make it known that they disapprove of what is going on, and ruin things for everyone. Was there ever a phrase more guaranteed to make the adult heart sink than “good, wholesome family entertainment”? Well, to the prude, that is almost pushing the envelope.

John Cleese put it best. Whenever someone says “I’m not a prude but…” what they really mean is: “I am a prude and…” And then they go on to say how they want to spoil everyone’s fun. If ever there was group that deserved to be loaded into a rocket and fired straight into the sun to receive a humane but justified end, it is the prudes of this world. However, there is probably some law or regulation to prevent this extermination devoutly to be wished. All one can do is try to ignore them, deplore them and discard them.

Prudes On The Prowl was the title of a series of articles in the Daily Telegraph in the 1890s, which lampooned and derided the followers of a vinegar-faced Victorian prude, a certain Mrs. Ormiston Chant. She had got it into her head to change the status quo at the Empire Theatre, a music hall much beloved of officer cadets from nearby Sandhurst, where ladies of the evening would parade themselves in the wide area behind the dress circle, which was lined with bars at which cadets, students and others drank before, during and after the stage performances. This delightful mingling of Bacchus and Venus went undisturbed for years, until the prudes decided that they wanted to put a stop to it. They forced a craven theatre management to erect canvas screens between the bars and the area where the girls walked. This was obviously an age where good people did not sit still and allow prudery to overpower them, and the following day a crowd of enraged students and cadets attacked the screens and tore them down. They were never erected again. The cadet who led the mob, I am delighted to report, was a hero of mine, Winston Churchill, then in his early twenties, who later went on to distinguish himself in resisting other tyrannies

But cut one head off the hydra and two more grow in its place. Prudery is everywhere. Witness the moronic reaction to Janet Jackson’s five-second exposure of a nipple on national television. The latest depressing example, though, comes from Paris.

Yes, Paris. The one In France. The same Paris that was Mecca to so many progressive artists, authors and musicians between the wars. The Paris where Josephine Baker danced topless at a time when Hollywood was being smothered by a prude conspiracy called the Hays Office. About the last place on earth you’d expect the cancer of prudery to raise its filthy head. In 2001 they had the brilliant idea of actually building an artificial beach on the banks of the Seine (do you build beaches?) – a real, live, sandy beach where Parisians and tourists who couldn’t get to the Mediterranean or Atlantic coasts could relax and sunbathe.

Now, the French have the right idea about beaches. Mattresses are often provided, as are food and drink. No deck chairs. And there is nothing remotely remarkable about topless sunbathers, or people wearing thongs. There is no drivel about children who see bare breasts being traumatised or damaged. No one bats an eyelid. In fact, anyone who dared complain would probably be laughed off the beach.

But not, it seems, on Paris Plage. Not only have they seen fit to ban thongs and topless sunbathing, but they are also imposing fines for transgressors, 36 euros being the tariff. What are they thinking? This is like building a bar and then announcing that wine is banned.

Luckily the popular press has rightfully been heaping ridicule on the prudes in the city government. The mayor, Bertrand Delanoë (openly gay and therefore should know better than to cave to the prude faction) and his deputies have found themselves on the defensive. With luck the press will keep up the pressure and put an end to this utterly ridiculous situation. Maybe someone should suggest to these stinking killjoys that they should all move to Kansas, join an old ladies’ church quilting group, watch good wholesome family entertainment, and go round telling everyone that they are not prudes but…

And After the Break....

Image provided courtesy of Mike Thomas of Encyclopedia of British Dance Bands

Speaking of reality TV, which we weren’t, but somebody somewhere must have been, one of the things they so often do, which to my mind really insults the intelligence of the viewer (yes, I know, to watch some reality shows the viewer needs no intelligence anyway) is that not only at the start of the show do they give you a preview of what is to come, which is perhaps not unreasonable, but they also do it just before each commercial break. They do it on all those televised court shows; they do it on that one about insufferable, snotty airline staff lording it over frustrated and sometimes ill-behaved passengers; they even do it on intelligent reality shows like Top Chef and Project Runway and Bad Lads’ Army.

The producers must be so utterly terrified that as soon as the commercials start, viewers are going to start surfing, never to return. Well, if your show’s hold on the viewer is so tenuous, maybe it would be a good idea to improve it. Just an idea. I’m glad to say they don’t indulge in this ridiculous practice in the excellent The Amazing Race or the riveting Hell’s Kitchen.

Now, if like me you tape programs to time-shift your viewing, you can always fast-forward through these pre-break previews, which always give away the best bits, but you shouldn’t have to. If I watch an episode of E.R. or West Wing (may it rest in peace) they do not tell me what is coming next. That would ruin the drama - and reality shows should earn from that because they too need drama about them, or else no one would watch.

But before drama shows get too smug, let me add that come the revolution, one of the first groups of people to be put up against the wall (right after all the middle-aged men with ponytails) will be the folks who make trailers for TV dramas. They seem to feel the need not just to whet your appetite but to ruin it. They, too, give away all the best bits in advance. What are they thinking?

Remember that episode of E.R. the other day (late 2004 I think it was) where a patient with a mystery illness was discovered – shock horror – to have smallpox? Well, right at the start of the show when they were wheeling him onto a curtained cubicle to see what was wrong with him, I was saying; “Check him for smallpox, guys!” Why? Because the trailer people had already given away the most dramatic twist of the whole show. They didn’t have to – I would have watched anyway.

Likewise, on one of my current fave progs, Life On Mars, there was a rather witty joke which, when we finally saw it, fell completely flat. Those trailer trash had featured it in the preview that had been shown over and over during the week before the show. It’s not easy to force even a half smile at a joke you’ve already heard a dozen times in the last few days. This was all so unnecessary but they do seem to regard the viewer as a disloyal clod with the attention span of a goldfish, and I don’t think they are right.

Vile & Pathetic.

Image provided courtesy of Mike Thomas of Encyclopedia of British Dance Bands

A few days ago I read Mel Gibson’s statement (of apology? explanation?) after his arrest for driving drunk, and the reportedly anti-Semitic comments (though comments is probably far too civilised a word for such sayings) he made to the arresting officer. About what he said when he was arrested, I shall say nothing. You probably have read it too. It is beneath contempt and doesn’t deserve any form of debate.

That statement which was released a few days later, though, bears looking at in detail because it is a sad, sad document. It was released through his publicist and the first question one asks is whether he wrote it or whether his publicists cobbled it together. It certainly seems the work of someone who is not comfortable with language as a means of communication and who feels that you can strengthen any argument by throwing in as many syllables as possible and that you should never use one word when seventeen will do. Well, there’s a lot of it about in west-coast movie circles. But let’s look at one or two things especially.

I would like to take it one step further, and meet with leaders in the Jewish community, with whom I can have a one-on-one discussion to discern the appropriate path for healing. It’s almost as though he doesn’t want to let the sentence end, so he says it in that verbose, inflated way. Incidentally, matey, you can’t have a one-on-one meeting with a group of people. One-on-one equals two. But exactly how will you be doing all that path-discerning? Did you have anything in mind or did it just sound good when you wrote the statement? And how will you know when the path is appropriate? Would you recognise an inappropriate path when you see one? I’m not really up in discerning paths, so I’d be very curious to know how it is done.

Let’s look at what comes next. I have begun an ongoing programme of recovery and what I am now realising is that I cannot do it alone. He’s carrying on as though he were a victim. He isn’t. The people who had to listen to him that night were the victims. So, you’re in an “ongoing programme” of recovery. Tell us: how long did you think that you could do it alone? What made you realise you cannot? And when? Yesterday? Last week? Three months ago from last Tuesday?

I am in the process of understanding where those vicious words came from… They came from you, sunshine, nowhere else! You were not a ventriloquist’s dummy with someone else (presumably an anti-Semite) working you. Alcohol can make a person belligerent, tired, euphoric, even violent. But can it turn a person into an anti-Semite? Or does alcohol simply make a person less guarded about his inner feelings?

The whole of this statement, when you hack you way through the awkward psychobabble, is designed to make him out to be an unwilling victim of something that suddenly enveloped him when he was arrested, that is not part of his personality make-up. Anti-Semitism isn’t something that just descends upon you out of the blue when you least expect it, and vanishes with the dawn. It is a set of twisted values and judgements that a person arrives at himself, and in order for you to let it out - in a drunken rage for example - it has to be in you in the first place. Apologise by all means – it is the only right thing to do. Atone, make restitution. But to try to join hands with your victims and make out that you and they have suffered equally by your actions – that’s just pathetic.