Summary apology from a celebrity
James Hogg
Telegraph that Carol Thatcher, who is perhaps most famous for
winning "I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here!" in 2005, has
repeatedly said that she has nothing to apologise for. This must
surely answer the question, "What is a summary apology?" It's an
apology that is quickly retracted.
Here's the story. Before you click the link I should warn
sensitive readers that there's a picture of Thatcher:
James
(BrE with a distinctly septentrional flavour)
bill...@hotmail.com
> Combining topics from two recent threads, I see from today's
> Telegraph that Carol Thatcher, who is perhaps most famous for
> winning "I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here!" in 2005, has
> repeatedly said that she has nothing to apologise for. This must
> surely answer the question, "What is a summary apology?" It's an
> apology that is quickly retracted.
>
> Here's the story. Before you click the link I should warn
> sensitive readers that there's a picture of Thatcher:
>
I had the misfortune to listen to the Comptroller of BBC1 Jay Hunt
getting herself into a right pickle trying to insist that the
conversation was NOT private, because it occurred on BBC premises.
Rather a dodgy premise, I think. Not that I hold any brief for Carol
T, nor for the use of the word "golliwog", though I'm struggling to
think of any world-class black male tennis players who look like what
she might think a golliwog looks like.
Will.
the Omrud
He's a French geezer named Jo-Wilfried Tsonga. I admit to never having
heard of him before.
But I'm interested in the basic issue. If I say "Jo-Wilfried Tsonga
looks like a gollywog", is that racist? I don't see how. What about
"Prince Charles looks like Big Ears"? Or "Rowan Atkinson looks like Fagin"?
My sorely-missed friend looked like Linford Christie. Would it have
been racist to have said this?
--
David
James Hogg
<usenet...@gEXPUNGEmail.com> wrote:
>bill...@hotmail.com wrote:
>> On Feb 5, 9:08 am, James Hogg <Jas.Hogg...@SPAM.gmail.com> wrote:
>>> Combining topics from two recent threads, I see from today's
>>> Telegraph that Carol Thatcher, who is perhaps most famous for
>>> winning "I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here!" in 2005, has
>>> repeatedly said that she has nothing to apologise for. This must
>>> surely answer the question, "What is a summary apology?" It's an
>>> apology that is quickly retracted.
>>>
>>> Here's the story. Before you click the link I should warn
>>> sensitive readers that there's a picture of Thatcher:
>>>
>>> http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/4513939/Carol-Thatcher-...
>>
>> I had the misfortune to listen to the Comptroller of BBC1 Jay Hunt
>> getting herself into a right pickle trying to insist that the
>> conversation was NOT private, because it occurred on BBC premises.
>> Rather a dodgy premise, I think. Not that I hold any brief for Carol
>> T, nor for the use of the word "golliwog", though I'm struggling to
>> think of any world-class black male tennis players who look like what
>> she might think a golliwog looks like.
>
>He's a French geezer named Jo-Wilfried Tsonga. I admit to never having
>heard of him before.
And he doesn't look at all like a golliwog. Not the ones I used
to collect from Robertson's jam anyway.
>But I'm interested in the basic issue. If I say "Jo-Wilfried Tsonga
>looks like a gollywog", is that racist? I don't see how. What about
>"Prince Charles looks like Big Ears"? Or "Rowan Atkinson looks like Fagin"?
>
>My sorely-missed friend looked like Linford Christie. Would it have
>been racist to have said this?
Tolerance of all such comparisons nowadays is rather niggardly.
LFS
>
> But I'm interested in the basic issue. If I say "Jo-Wilfried Tsonga
> looks like a gollywog", is that racist? I don't see how. What about
> "Prince Charles looks like Big Ears"? Or "Rowan Atkinson looks like
> Fagin"?
Comparing a person to another person (assuming that Big Ears is a
person) is not quite the same as comparing a person to a thing, which
has the potential to be rather more insulting IMO. Add the baggage
carried by the word "golliwog" and you have the potential for even
greater insult.
>
> My sorely-missed friend looked like Linford Christie. Would it have
> been racist to have said this?
>
Not on the basis of my previous argument.
--
Laura
(emulate St. George for email)
the Omrud
> the Omrud wrote:
>
>> But I'm interested in the basic issue. If I say "Jo-Wilfried Tsonga
>> looks like a gollywog", is that racist? I don't see how. What about
>> "Prince Charles looks like Big Ears"? Or "Rowan Atkinson looks like
>> Fagin"?
>
> Comparing a person to another person (assuming that Big Ears is a
> person) is not quite the same as comparing a person to a thing, which
> has the potential to be rather more insulting IMO. Add the baggage
> carried by the word "golliwog" and you have the potential for even
> greater insult.
It's clearly very rude (and hence something I would be unlikely to say),
but is it specifically racist?
>> My sorely-missed friend looked like Linford Christie. Would it have
>> been racist to have said this?
>
> Not on the basis of my previous argument.
I once handed him a large gollywog which had been knitted for one of our
children by a relative; I asked him if it was "racially acceptable" or
some such phrase. He failed to give me a straight answer - whether this
was because he didn't have a strong view or because he was just as
English as me and unwilling to cause offence I don't know.
--
David
Peter Duncanson (BrE)
wrote:
>the Omrud wrote:
>
>>
>> But I'm interested in the basic issue. If I say "Jo-Wilfried Tsonga
>> looks like a gollywog", is that racist? I don't see how. What about
>> "Prince Charles looks like Big Ears"? Or "Rowan Atkinson looks like
>> Fagin"?
>
>Comparing a person to another person (assuming that Big Ears is a
>person)
Big Ears is a character by Enid Blyton (along with Noddy). From a US site:
http://pbskids.org/noddy/characters-bigears.html
Big-Ears is a friendly and cheerful gnome who lives in Toadstool House and
is one of Noddy's best friends.
He is a hundred years old and very wise. He often spends his days in Toy
Town riding around on his bike and helping Noddy work out a way to solve
his problems.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noddy_(character)#Characters>
Aha! One of the other characters:
Mr Golly, in the books is the owner of the Toyland garage. He was replaced
by the politically correct Mr Sparks in the TV series in the early 1980s.
> is not quite the same as comparing a person to a thing, which
>has the potential to be rather more insulting IMO. Add the baggage
>carried by the word "golliwog" and you have the potential for even
>greater insult.
>
In this case the "thing", the golliwog, was a toy doll and therefore a
make-believe human:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golliwog
Carol Thatcher reportedly saw the tennis player on a TV screen and said that
he looked like a golliwog. I don't see the likeness myself. Even if it had
been an apt comparison it was unwise given the tendency for the
hyper-politically-correct to have nervous breakdowns.
There is a strange dichotomy between on one side, the affection in which
golliwog dolls were held by their owners, the sales of Robertson's jams gained
by the use of the Golliwog image, both positive uses of the image, and on the
other side, the negative use of "golliwog" as a rascist term.
Personally, I found the use of the name Sherpa for a range of Leyland vans
much more unremittingly offensive.
The Sherpa people had come to public attention as guides and porters for
mountaineering expeditions in parts of the Himalayas:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherpa
To name a goods vehicle after them was to treat them as little more than human
pack-animals. There might be some slight justification that it was a tribute
to their physical abilities, but...
The vehicles (half way down the page):
http://www.aronline.co.uk/index.htm?lcvpurposef.htm
--
Peter Duncanson, UK
(in alt.usage.english)
the Omrud
> On Thu, 05 Feb 2009 11:25:45 +0000, LFS <la...@DRAGONspira.fsbusiness.co.uk>
> wrote:
>
>> the Omrud wrote:
>>
>>> But I'm interested in the basic issue. If I say "Jo-Wilfried Tsonga
>>> looks like a gollywog", is that racist? I don't see how. What about
>>> "Prince Charles looks like Big Ears"? Or "Rowan Atkinson looks like
>>> Fagin"?
>> Comparing a person to another person (assuming that Big Ears is a
>> person)
>
> Big Ears is a character by Enid Blyton (along with Noddy). From a US site:
> http://pbskids.org/noddy/characters-bigears.html
>
> Big-Ears is a friendly and cheerful gnome who lives in Toadstool House and
> is one of Noddy's best friends.
>
> He is a hundred years old and very wise. He often spends his days in Toy
> Town riding around on his bike and helping Noddy work out a way to solve
> his problems.
>
> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noddy_(character)#Characters>
I'm sure Laura knew that - I took her question to be about whether a
non-human character in a story is a "person".
- Because Noddy won't pay the ransom.
> Aha! One of the other characters:
>
> Mr Golly, in the books is the owner of the Toyland garage. He was replaced
> by the politically correct Mr Sparks in the TV series in the early 1980s.
There were several members of the golliwog family in the original
stories. I don't remember Mr Golly though - is there a picture of him
anywhere? Ah, yes:
http://www.collectorsworld.net/gollyscrap.htm
And I see references to Mrs Golliwog - I have a feeling that the younger
members of the family were scamps who got Noddy into trouble.
--
David
LFS
> On Thu, 05 Feb 2009 11:25:45 +0000, LFS <la...@DRAGONspira.fsbusiness.co.uk>
> wrote:
>
>> the Omrud wrote:
>>
>>> But I'm interested in the basic issue. If I say "Jo-Wilfried Tsonga
>>> looks like a gollywog", is that racist? I don't see how. What about
>>> "Prince Charles looks like Big Ears"? Or "Rowan Atkinson looks like
>>> Fagin"?
>> Comparing a person to another person (assuming that Big Ears is a
>> person)
>
> Big Ears is a character by Enid Blyton (along with Noddy). From a US site:
> http://pbskids.org/noddy/characters-bigears.html
>
> Big-Ears is a friendly and cheerful gnome who lives in Toadstool House and
> is one of Noddy's best friends.
>
> He is a hundred years old and very wise. He often spends his days in Toy
> Town riding around on his bike and helping Noddy work out a way to solve
> his problems.
>
> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noddy_(character)#Characters>
Well, yes, I know that, Peter, although other readers may not, so the
explanation may be helpful. I thought it worth noting that there is a
subtle distinction between making comparisons to real people, fictional
people and fictional gnomes.
>
> Aha! One of the other characters:
>
> Mr Golly, in the books is the owner of the Toyland garage. He was replaced
> by the politically correct Mr Sparks in the TV series in the early 1980s.
>
>> is not quite the same as comparing a person to a thing, which
>> has the potential to be rather more insulting IMO. Add the baggage
>> carried by the word "golliwog" and you have the potential for even
>> greater insult.
>>
> In this case the "thing", the golliwog, was a toy doll and therefore a
> make-believe human:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golliwog
I'm not sure that a toy doll is necessarily a make-believe human but my
point was that this particular "doll" is already imbued with concerns,
whether misplaced or not, about racism.
If Carol Thatcher had compared a female tennis player to a Barbie doll
her remark would probably have been considered bitchy but the feminist
concerns around Barbie dolls are less acute than the racist concerns
about golliwogs.
>
> Carol Thatcher reportedly saw the tennis player on a TV screen and said that
> he looked like a golliwog. I don't see the likeness myself. Even if it had
> been an apt comparison it was unwise given the tendency for the
> hyper-politically-correct to have nervous breakdowns.
>
> There is a strange dichotomy between on one side, the affection in which
> golliwog dolls were held by their owners, the sales of Robertson's jams gained
> by the use of the Golliwog image, both positive uses of the image, and on the
> other side, the negative use of "golliwog" as a rascist term.
I don't think it's a dichotomy so much as a reflection of changing
concerns in society over time.
>
> Personally, I found the use of the name Sherpa for a range of Leyland vans
> much more unremittingly offensive.
>
> The Sherpa people had come to public attention as guides and porters for
> mountaineering expeditions in parts of the Himalayas:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherpa
>
> To name a goods vehicle after them was to treat them as little more than human
> pack-animals. There might be some slight justification that it was a tribute
> to their physical abilities, but...
>
> The vehicles (half way down the page):
> http://www.aronline.co.uk/index.htm?lcvpurposef.htm
>
I agree but I wonder how sherpas themselves feel about it.
bill...@hotmail.com
Is this not just another example of racist stereotyping - the little
gollies are basically criminals, probably going around doing lots of
knifecriming. Noddy was lucky to survive.
Will.
Athel Cornish-Bowden
I
>
can't raise much energy to defend Carol Thatcher, and yes, I think what
she said was offensive (if we believe the Torygraph). On the other
hand, with the same qualification, Jo Brand seems to be a nasty bit of
work as well:
"Brand is the subject of a separate complaint to police from the
British National Party after she joked on another BBC programme about
sending excrement to people on a leaked list of members of the
far-right group."
Incidentally, I see that she is a "comedienne", whatever that is -- a
completely unneeded feminine form of "comedian", I suppose. I wonder if
the people who use that word realize that the French word "comédien"
means (in its primary sense) something different from "comedian".
--
athel
John Dean
Apparently the racism isn't the issue. The little-endian argument is that at
least one person who was on the One Show was offended when CT used the word
'golliwog' in the Green Room. CT was told she must apologise to that person
and anyone else who was offended. She wouldn't. So she's barred from the
show. She's NOT barred from working at the BBC (she's currently doing two
other shows) which is what you would expect if racism was the issue.
Who else likes golliwogs? HM the Q -
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1135931/Race-doll-row-hits-royals-Queen-say-sorry-golliwogs-sale-Sandringham.html
http://tinyurl.com/byaz2a
--
John Dean
Oxford
the Omrud
<quote>
Officials stressed that the Queen, who is currently in residence on the
estate, is not personally involved in choosing the stock sold in her
shop. That, they said, was down to a 'management team'.
</quote>
Golly.
And HMQ's daughter-out-law:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1033269/Golly-whats-car-Camilla-Duchess-Cornwall-spotted-controversial-toy-boot.html
http://tinyurl.com/64zlqn
I apologise for the source. I didn't inhale, honest.
--
David
Peter Duncanson (BrE)
wrote:
> Jo Brand seems to be a nasty bit of
>work as well:
>
>"Brand is the subject of a separate complaint to police from the
>British National Party after she joked on another BBC programme about
>sending excrement to people on a leaked list of members of the
>far-right group."
I don't find Jo Brand to be a nasty piece of work. I didn't hear that joke of
hers, but it sounds to me like a reference to the stereotype of the members of
the BNP as being the sort of people who would themselves send excrement to
people they despised. So sending excrement to them would be "turning the
tables", "the biter bit", etc.
CDB
The picture is frightening, but it's the words that make you want to
cry. "Broke-up" as a verb, "on the television set" (not the
Sylvania), "nothing to say sorry for", and especially "a more fulsome
climbdown".
LFS
>
> Apparently the racism isn't the issue. The little-endian argument is that at
> least one person who was on the One Show was offended when CT used the word
> 'golliwog' in the Green Room. CT was told she must apologise to that person
> and anyone else who was offended. She wouldn't. So she's barred from the
> show. She's NOT barred from working at the BBC (she's currently doing two
> other shows) which is what you would expect if racism was the issue.
> Who else likes golliwogs? HM the Q -
> http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1135931/Race-doll-row-hits-royals-Queen-say-sorry-golliwogs-sale-Sandringham.html
> http://tinyurl.com/byaz2a
>
I find the idea of Jo Brand taking offence strangely paradoxical.
Athel Cornish-Bowden
<ma...@peterduncanson.net> said:
Yes, but I'm one of those strange people who don't approve of murdering
murderers, or of sending excrement to people who send excrement., etc.
--
athel
Peter Duncanson (BrE)
wrote:
>On 2009-02-05 16:24:44 +0100, "Peter Duncanson (BrE)"
><ma...@peterduncanson.net> said:
>
>> On Thu, 5 Feb 2009 15:53:25 +0100, Athel Cornish-Bowden <athe...@yahoo.co.uk>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Jo Brand seems to be a nasty bit of
>>> work as well:
>>>
>>> "Brand is the subject of a separate complaint to police from the
>>> British National Party after she joked on another BBC programme about
>>> sending excrement to people on a leaked list of members of the
>>> far-right group."
>>
>> I don't find Jo Brand to be a nasty piece of work. I didn't hear that joke of
>> hers, but it sounds to me like a reference to the stereotype of the members of
>> the BNP as being the sort of people who would themselves send excrement to
>> people they despised. So sending excrement to them would be "turning the
>> tables", "the biter bit", etc.
>
>Yes, but I'm one of those strange people who don't approve of murdering
>murderers, or of sending excrement to people who send excrement., etc.
I don't think she intended it as more than a witticism.
Chuck Riggs
Much to-do over nothing, is my reaction.
--
Regards,
Chuck Riggs
Near Dublin, Ireland