Sunday, February 07, 2010
The 'other' c-word
Further tidying up at home has unearthed a few more relics from my past. Today for show and tell I present a cutting I extracted from the 14 July 2007 edition of Britain’s leading serialised Diana obituary, The Daily Express*.
The most appropriate long-term home for this particular exhibit is in a shiny, white time capsule alongside some Jim Davidson DVDs, Prince Harry’s swastika armband and the attempt by the Daily Mail cartoonist ‘Gary’ to emulate Der Stuermer from July last year**. But for now the Internet will have to sustain the memory of this little beauty from the games and puzzles page, the only part of the Express worth paying attention to. If the circle I drew around it isn’t a big enough hint, you need to level your eyes at the previous week’s answers. The ‘c’ word in question is the ultra-offensive BNP shibboleth, rather than the name that Nick Griffin goes by when he appears in public.
*Or as it’s known in my godforsaken little town – the newspaper you buy when the Daily Mail runs out.
**If they ever find that home recording of Richard Littlejohn and Gary Bushell oiled up and stripped down to what look like thongs to the untrained eye but are actually loincloths, in which they wrestle in a slimy vat of baked beans for David Yelland’s pleasure, then they can sling that in there too. It seems no less real or distressing for having just been made up in my head.
The most appropriate long-term home for this particular exhibit is in a shiny, white time capsule alongside some Jim Davidson DVDs, Prince Harry’s swastika armband and the attempt by the Daily Mail cartoonist ‘Gary’ to emulate Der Stuermer from July last year**. But for now the Internet will have to sustain the memory of this little beauty from the games and puzzles page, the only part of the Express worth paying attention to. If the circle I drew around it isn’t a big enough hint, you need to level your eyes at the previous week’s answers. The ‘c’ word in question is the ultra-offensive BNP shibboleth, rather than the name that Nick Griffin goes by when he appears in public.
I know, I know, they didn't mean it like that. After all, 'coon' can have other meanings. It just happens that none of them are used around here. It was a sort of Freudian slip. I'm sure that back in 2007, as they jotted down those four letters to raise their score by one word, Express readers thought to themselves "Coon? Ah yes, racoon!"
*Or as it’s known in my godforsaken little town – the newspaper you buy when the Daily Mail runs out.
**If they ever find that home recording of Richard Littlejohn and Gary Bushell oiled up and stripped down to what look like thongs to the untrained eye but are actually loincloths, in which they wrestle in a slimy vat of baked beans for David Yelland’s pleasure, then they can sling that in there too. It seems no less real or distressing for having just been made up in my head.
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