Those Brits sure love their Thatcher

I blame Thatcher... Carol, that is

I blame the no-life parasites who whined about them to the meejah in the hope of getting paid enough money for a Good Story to settle last month's Visa bill.

My heart goes out to the Thatcher family and the Royal household at this difficult time

"Unfortunately we regret that for administrative reasons hearts cannot be returned."

They should have wheeled Carol out to plead for her brother's release when he was under arrest for attempting to engineer a coup in Equatorial Guinea.

I believe they're currently not on speaking terms.

He pulled the head of her favourite golliwog.

Now he just decapitates African regimes.

Did somebody mention decapitation?

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/38844000/jpg/_38844949_statue_pa_port.jpg

Well he would do if he could remember where they were.

Lord Tebbit, who served in Baroness Thatcher’s Cabinet, compared the sacking of Ms Thatcher to the BBC's recent reinstatement of Jonathan Ross. “It does seem very odd that Jonathan Ross can be back broadcasting having made obscene, insulting remarks on the air, and Carol Thatcher, who said something which is allegedly highly offensive but which I rather doubt was meant to be so, in private, should be banned in this way,” said Lord Tebbit.

These remarks were not in private, they were a typical racists attempt to get others to agree with their racism and it's about time we stopped trying to make excuses for it. There is nothing "allegedly" offensive about calling someone a "golliwog".

she shouldn't have said it, and it's wrong, and she's a terrible man, but she didn't call someone a golliwog, she foolishly said the guy looked like one.

Bored with this

How odd, Ned - every article about this non-event states that the remark was made in a "private conversation."

But of course it's more fuel for the Sun and the Mail and everyone else with a vested interest in getting rid of the BBC. The problem is not so much that they move the goalposts but that the BBC are so cravenly obliging to aid the move.

It was said in her workplace. If I said someone looked like a golliwog in my workplace I'd be in deep shit, and rightly so.

I don't get this bollocks about how somehow private racism is ok - the more fuckers are caught, grassed up, outed, whatever, the better.

"Ms Hunt told Radio 4's Today programme: "What Carol decides to say in the privacy of her own home or in a private conversation with friends is one thing.

"What she says in a green room space, when there are 12 people, in her capacity as a roving reporter for The One Show is a rather different thing." "

From the BBC, so take it as you will.

Really looking forward to having this identical argument every three weeks for the next year.

f I said someone looked like a golliwog in my workplace I'd be in deep shit

Actually that's probably not true, going by the office reaction to this story. Fairer to say my employer's diversity policies *should* mean I'd be in deep shit.

You can't just say whatever you want in the workplace. End of.

I'm considering running a sweepstakes as to how long this takes before it moves on from casual racism to Alan Shearer doing a "no homo" rant on MOTD.

End of. Get rid.

Perhaps all workplaces should issue a list of acceptable words and expressions for employees to say and summarily sack, blacklist from other employment and prevent from claiming welfare benefit anyone who says anything that offends anybody else. Then we'd all be in the gutter.

Only if it applies to member of the Thatcher family

Might as well bring back the Stasi and be done with it.

You really think people need to be explicitly told that words like "golliwog" are unacceptable in the workplace?

xxxpost to marcello trollin

Is it OK to say someone looks like Talvin Singh in the privacy of an internet message board?

Let's just have a society where people say nothing and communicate with nobody else because they're scared to say anything. That'll be a brave but offence-free future.

Or we could have one where people think before speaking and manage to have conversations not involving golliwog references. Surely not beyond most of us?

And of course the golliwog non-incident/non-scandal is merely yet another mask for the media to hide behind in preference to talking about real issues.

Stupid racist twat loses job. I don't lose any sleep.

erm onimo, no diss but

OMG I WANT THIS AMAZING RONALDINHO BOTTLE OPENER

I must admit I have never seen any meaningful exploration of the complex issues behind racism on the BBC.

In that thread (that I hoped never to read again) I accepted that for some people they instantly saw that as a racist caricature but that I didn't. I also accepted that not intending to offend someone doesn't mean you're not offending them. I saw it instantly as "lol big teeth" which is pretty much a standard Ronaldinho zing in the UK then attempted to be more considered in my opinion when the thread blew up.

I learned some lessons there about how one might not be aware something is offensive.
Thatcher's been utterly remorseless and trying to make the big story into some kind of betrayal of confidence, and Marcello agrees.
I think there's a difference, but still - mea culpa, to an extent.
xp

And of course the golliwog non-incident/non-scandal is merely yet another mask for the media to hide behind in preference to talking about real issues.

you're getting it backward. The woman made a racist comment in her workplace, was fired for it, and released an apology that basically went "i'm sorry if you're butthurt but think about how much the bbc have hurt me by revealing that, in my workplace, when asked to retract a racist comment and apologise for it, i did not". Racism is a real issue; not being willing to accept that what you have said is offensive is a real issue; trying to smokescreen your own offensive behaviour with 'oh, disgusting, the bbc, more leaks than thames water' dailymailisms is a real issue as it's part of an entire culture of faux-naïve buck-passing where the most egregious behaviour can be handwaved away with a "oh well i'm not politically correct, me". Carol Thatcher was working for the One Show as a journalist, as a person who goes around the country talking to people: if she's too dippy to recognise that to say someone looks like a golliwog is insulting, if she's the kind of person who believes it's 'safe' to use racially dubious terms if she's in a green room surrounded by other white people, if she's not got the basic sense to not use offensive terms in conversation (a person who talks for a living!), then she shouldn't have been doing that job anyway. And that's a real issue: a basic lack of concern for other people and their feelings, displayed by a person in public life.

what is not a real issue: paranoid wannabe-libertarian fantasies about a world in which people are silenced for speaking their minds.

i'm so glad i never saw the bottle opener thread at the time...feel so deeply embarrassed at so many of the brits being so clueless on it.

why because you care about/WANT to feel national pride?

i'm so glad i never saw the bottle opener thread at the time

You posted on it.

C Sharp Major 100% on the money here.

i'm so glad i never saw the bottle opener thread at the time

You posted on it.

Lex doesn't even know who Lex is!

i meant, i was glad i wasn't on it at the time it was kicking off and getting clusterfucky.

Ah, nice to see that the spirit of Rik Out Of The Young Ones is alive and well...

The correct course of action would have been for her colleagues to smile, shake their heads, say to themselves, "ah well, that's Carol" and get on with their lives. As a freelancer, she was not "sacked."

Racism certainly is a very real issue, and is cheapened and trivialised by the thoughtless flinging about of pseudo-moralistic outrage on the part of people who should know better but of course are paid large sums of money by the meejah to be pseudo-outraged.

There is a pronounced difference between political extremists who actively seek to stir up discord, hatred and conflict and the perhaps thoughtless but ultimately harmless remarks of people whose upbringing and set of values are different from ours. If we sacked everybody from every workplace who made thoughtless comments or remarks there would be 40 million unemployed.

Unfortunately, since humans are human and not perfectly programmed robots, and therefore biased, prejudiced and unthinking in many senses, the best course of action is to come to terms with the fact that human beings are what they are, distinguish actual evil from silly, jokey remarks and get over ourselves.

As for "a world in which people are silenced for speaking their minds," isn't that exactly what the real extremists want?

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.tmz.com/media/2009/02/0202_miley_cyrus.jpg

ah well, that's Marcello

*shakes head*

don't think reposting stuff from Jagger's facebook is cool

lol "actual evil"

ie retail staff showing insufficient deference

ie2 people running crappy lapland theme parks

Marcello, if you don't deem referring to someone as a "golliwog" in the workplace a sackable offence, can you give us an example of language that you would find unacceptable? Or is, in your view, all legislation against so-called hate speech in the workplace wrongheaded?

There is a pronounced difference between political extremists who actively seek to stir up discord, hatred and conflict

Weren't you calling out the media for having leaked the BNP membership list not so long ago? Perhaps they're only stirring up discord, hatred and conflict in the privacy of their own homes.

Referring to someone as a golliwog "in the workplace" is different from making a jokey, off-the-cuff reference in a private conversation.

A private conversation, with colleagues, in the workplace.