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Bored office discussion topic of the afternoon has been the TV quiz Bullseye. Mostly it was just an excuse for Paul to bring out some more of his piss-poor impressions, but then somebody enquired as to what Jim Bowen was doing now.
Chris responded and said he's been sacked from Radio Lancashire for making some sort of racist remark to a guy on-air. He didn't know exactly what had been said so investigations began…
It seems that Jim Bowen was sacked because he used the term "nig-nog" whilst talking to some black chap on the radio. He was quite rightly fired and most people will say that what he said is indefensible.
But no, not Mrs C Parkinson of Livesey, who leapt to the presenter's defence with the following…

I FIND it extremely sad that a gentleman of Jim Bowen's standards and talent deems it necessary to resign on such a trivial issue (LET, October 7).
Perhaps we should have our dictionaries trawled to make sure there are no more faux pas in there of an incorrect nature, political or otherwise - that should keep the finger-pointing "nig-nogs" of the world busy for a while.
"Nig-nog," is a play on the word "noggin," meaning a small measure, used largely in ale houses for shorts.
This also was used as a criticism as in "use your noggin," (brain - if you've got one!)
Calling someone a nig-nog is a long standing practice, with no colour connotations. It's been going for longer than political correctness.
Malice is the key word in this issue. Act and punish where there is need. We should all remember this when getting ready to point the political correcting finger.
Malice? Jim Bowen? I don't think so - not at the age of 65!
MRS C PARKINSON, Heys Close, Livesey.


If you're ever caught denying the holocaust whilst in Austria then maybe you can employ Mrs. Parkinson as your defence.

"M'lud, Mr.Irving wasn't denying the holocaust, he was actually denying the existence of the "Holland-coast". The use of the word Holland is political correctness gone mad and Mr. Irving was merely stating that it should actually be called "Netherlands-coast". How could you think a 67 year old man would show malice? He's 67! 67!"

People are strange.

My aunt read a lot of books about the treatment of captives in Japanese prisoner of war camps. She even met a couple of people who had survived the horrific conditions in the camps.
After this she wrote into the local paper and said that if she ever met a Japanese person she'd spit in their eye.

Her marriage to my uncle Yoshihama ended shortly afterwards.*



*most of that last story was true.

Two Hour Silence For Quiet Contemplation Of Silence

I've just been reading about George Best…it's hard to read about anything else in the newspapers at the moment, especially in the sport sections.
The fall-out from the weekend seems to be dragging on, when a minute silence involving Leeds and one at Man City V Liverpool degenerated into shouting and some booing.
Now, I'd never boo a minute silence and recognise that George Best was a great footballer, but some of the outpourings of disgust at the bleating of some nobheads seems ludicrously OTT.
To football fans of a certain age George Best was an icon and somebody who they idolised. But, it's over 30 years since his heyday and many football fans won't have seen him play football bar from a few old football clip shows. The George Best they knew was an alcoholic, a drink-driver, habitual wife-beater and someone who their dad told them had "pissed their talent away".
So, yeah, to boo a minute silence is not on, and shows no consideration for those there that wanted to show respect to someone that they admired. But I wanted to read the report of the Liverpool game in The Guardian on Monday, but instead had to read about how Liverpool fans were a disgrace for not respecting the memory of someone they didn't care for. I'm sorry they did it and interrupted your time for reminiscing in your memories of childhood and the sixties, but it isn't a tragedy and it isn't worth the responses I've read about this week.
I've read pious drivel from Man U fans in claiming that this is the sort of behaviour they expect from Liverpool and Leeds fans as they always sing songs about Munich, and Man U fans are all angels guv. Well, bollocks, because I've been at Anfield and heard hundreds of Man U fans singing Hillsborough songs and I've read about taunts levelled at Leeds fans about the trouble in Turkey a few years ago. No set of fans are angels, just as none are demons, the followers of every football team come from every part of society, the rich and the poor, the decent and the utter shits. It isn't a team problem, it isn't a football problem, it is a problem in that some people have utter ignorance for anything that doesn't directly concern them.
A media that followed George Best from wine-bar to pub to wine-bar as he slowly threw away his second chance of a normal life after a liver transplant, now wallows in unquestionable hero worship of a man who -albeit talented- was a deeply flawed human being.

When I was a child we had a minutes silence for the people who were pointlessly killed in wars, fair enough. A worthy cause.
Now, not a week goes by without us being requested to bow our heads for the victims of a terror attack, a man who got his head cut off, the victims of another terror attack etc. etc. Is this a way of assuaging guilt at our cushy lives and the fact that western society has degenerated into a collection of feckless and self-centred pricks? Are we supposed to give ourselves a pat on the back for shutting our gaping banality-spouting gobs for a minute? Because how many actually feel sorrow for what has happened and how many just want to not cause offence like I would have done if I was at that game on Saturday?
A minute silence no longer makes a statement and any power of remembrance has been diluted by the fact we've started an irreversible slide into commemorating the loss of any human life by staying silent.
What then, will we start having 30 seconds of quiet contemplation for the losing X-factor contestant that week? Will we lay wreaths at a statue of Chris Tarrant every time someone doesn't get just the amount they needed on 'Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?' to buy themselves a mock-tudor mansion in which they could indulge their tawdry tastes in interior décor.
And a worthwhile silence will keep growing. We paused for three minutes this Remembrance Day to set it apart from silences which were less "worthy". Will this continue to grow in length as the list of celebrity deaths and disasters worth a minute silence continues to grow? Or will we eventually realise that the fact that some people didn't want to commemorate the death of a flawed football player isn't as terrible as the fact that thousands of people are lost in an earthquake in an instant and most people didn't bat an eyelid?