It's been a pretty fucking horrible evening tonight with the sickening news coming out of America on the Connecticut school shooting. Astonishingly, this is the THIRTY-FIRST school shooting since the Columbine tragedy in 1999. 31 shootings at schools in one country in 13 years... and yet the far-right gun-nuts will STILL continue to claim that "their right to bear arms" is more important than the protection of their children. Utter fuckers.
My thoughts are with the bereaved families in Newtown, further details on the tragedy are still coming to light as I type this. I wanted to write a quick blog on something that, by comparison, seems almost light-hearted and comedic. Although, if you take anything the Daily Mail says seriously, the following piece will not be funny, but an outrageous shock that will make you want to stop paying your TV licence fee. Have a ganders at this:
BBC told to hire more gay presenters for kids shows
You read it? I just want to briefly touch upon the none-too-subtlely seething, homophobic tone dripping through this article. The BBC has had a fuckload of stick the last few months, some of it admittedly deserved, and really stuff like the Savile scandal is journalistic gold to papers like the Daily Mail, who have had a vehement anti-Beeb stance for as long as I can remember.
But this article gives you two Mailisms for the price of one: snidey digs at the Corporation AND barely-polite homophobia. The piece is written in a way as to rabble-rouse Middle England once again into believing because those lefty Marxists at the BBC are again trying to indoctrinate your children into the evil ways of homosexuality.
The article claims that the results of this survey will mean that Auntie will "follow ITV's lead" by hiring presenters such as SMTV Live's Brian McDowling. So the Mail are basically reporting on this as news, despite the fact it's just the results of a study and any implications have obviously not happened yet. Then the Daily Fail writer suddenly remembers that, like the Light Channel, the BBC have indeed already employed homosexuals in high-profile childrens TV jobs, such as Andrew Hayden-Smith, so they slap a big picture of him on the webpage and remind us he is a "gay actor". Erm, how about just an actor?
The article is at pains to give it's readers important info about the study: apparantly one in five heterosexual men are uncomfortable with the amount of LGBT people on TV. No mention of the four out of five who are either totally comfortable with it, or just don't realy spend any time thinking about the sexual preference of TV stars, just as long as they are entertained.
The writer concludes by, for some reason, dredging up a comment from fucking FIVE YEARS AGO by CBBC host/comedian Kirsten O'Brien about "everyone at CBBC is either gay or hates kids". The article acknowledges begrudingly that the Corporation said this remark was made by O'Brien as part of a routine at an Edinburgh comedy show. FIVE YEARS AGO. A JOKE BY A COMEDIAN. Yet the fucking fascists at the Mail shoehorn this into the news like it's in any way relevant. Oh, and the final sentence briefly brought up other kids TV scandals, such as Richard Bacon taking cocaine while he still worked on Blue Peter.
Christ, how long ago was that, about a decade ago? It could have happened fifty years ago and the Mail would still bring it up to take their latest swipe at the public service broadcaster of the United Kingdom. Whilst simultaneously having a sly dig at the LGBT community aswell. Don't even get me started on some of the reader comments. I'll just end myself by saying, Britain is fucked if this kind of tripe continues to get a captive and believing audience. Until next time, cocksockets!
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