I'm not blind, I'm just a geek.

[alexsarll]

Max Decharne pubs
In witch-haunted Crouch End? Sure.
(Flaming Stars singer)
I note with some surprise that Crouch Hill's really beginning to gentrify. Not the Crouch End slope, that was always fairly posh - the other, between Finsbury Park and Crouch End. What used to be a practically fortified gay pub is now called something like Big Sofa and looks like the bar from Coupling, and now there's a new place called The Crouch a little further up, whose furniture looks even more unappealing than their name.

Yesterday I'd been planning to open this entry with a salute to France Soir, Germany's Die Welt, La Stampa in Italy and El Periodico in Spain, and express my sorrow that no British paper is on that list, because never has it been more important to assert our right to print bad cartoons (and frankly, they're no worse than Steve Bell's recent work). The good news is that a few more papers have joined that list. The bad is that France Soir's owner has decided to maintain France's proud tradition of collaboration and sacked the editor responsible. "French theologian Sohaib Bencheikh spoke out against the pictures: "One must find the borders between freedom of expression and freedom to protect the sacred," he wrote in a column accompanying the cartoons in France Soir. "Unfortunately, the West has lost its sense of the sacred."" Well, my gods were always pretty good at taking care of themselves when they got bothered about the sacred had been disrespected - hideous transfigurations, thunderbolts, that sort of thing. Hell, even the god of the monotheists used to manage the odd rain of fire or plague. If he can, leave it in his hands. If he can't anymore, then why bother worshipping the old fool? Either way - YOU LOSE. Now evolve, die or get the Hell out of the way.

That's Paul McGann's voice on the Eurostar ads, isn't it, comparing them favourably to flying? Bit of a comedown when I last heard him travelling to France by a combination of TARDIS and airship, then heading back by vortisaur.

One detail which will almost certainly be absent from my review of the new Nick Drake biography is that it inexplicably omits to mention his curious resemblance to Mark Wahlberg.

Yesterday I was obliged to explain 'sc@t' to a Frenchman, and narrowly avoided explaining 'tw1nk' to a colleague. I don't want everyone thinking, as one former boss did, "Alex, you know things people shouldn't know."

Comments

[p-dan-tic.livejournal.com]

so what a tw1nk then our barry?

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

Gay slang for a particularly boyish-looking young man. I left the colleague with 'gay slang', he strikes me as the conservative sort.

[p-dan-tic.livejournal.com]

bloody tories

[perfectlyvague.livejournal.com]

That's not the official definition, dear. It's a bit naughtier than that.

[darkmarcpi.livejournal.com]

Lest people assume you used props, you might want to consider a disclaimer:

Please note, the explanation of sc@t was given in the cyber universe and not in the real world. No Frenchmen were harmed, soiled or in anyway defiled in the process.

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

You just have to spoil it for everyone, don't you?

[missfrost.livejournal.com]

I'm a little baffled by your swearchecking there. Surely they're both valid words?

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but then so's c0ck, and remember how some filters object to that? I verge on oversensitivity because know that at least one of my regular readers has an incredibly sensitive firewall, and I don't want to leave her unable to access her whole flist.

[darkmarcpi.livejournal.com]

One of my suppliers was saying that their firewall doesn't even allow emails from companies they deal with based in Scunthorpe and Cockfosters.

Also, there was a girl at school called Lydia Crouch.

[beingjdc.livejournal.com]

Well, the owner is Egyptian, which made it an especially stupid move on the Editor's part. So, to be clear, you now believe in free speech, but not in property rights? I mean, it's the owner's paper, surely it's his business what it says and who he employs?

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

Oh, I forgot that Murdoch's still backing your boys so for now you're all in favour of press tycoons!
It's his right to do that, sure (though the ruling a couple of years back in the US that it was Fox News' right to lie, well that was another matter). It is also my right to then hate his guts for it and wish the fvcker dead.

[thermaland.livejournal.com]

"You see Paul, getting shat on is a bit like making love to a beautiful woman..."

I don't particularly like being referred to as a Frenchman, fwiw and btw.

I was surprised that France Soir took the plunge actually, because the paper has been surviving painfully for some years and changes owner every few months. The editor probably thought he had nothing to lose. However I am pretty sure that a satirical magazine like Charlie Hebdo publishes blasphemous cartoons pretty much on a weekly basis. The Saudis just haven't found out yet.

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

You should have thought of that before you uploaded this, then! (http://www.livejournal.com/userpic/26577186/875994)

I imagine media monitoring services in the Islamic world constrain themselves to the major papers and mags in Europe, or else we'd all get flamed whenever we posted stuff like this, wouldn't we?

[thermaland.livejournal.com]

That icon is ironic(1). It's Cay's beret; I've never owned a beret. Like my Goth icons. Isn't it obvious?

I am actually considering dropping all my stripey tops as they are suddenly all the rage and even bands are selling them now.

(1) I also own an iconic iron, curiously enough.

[my-name-is-anna.livejournal.com]

I don't know what those things mean!

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

You're so sweet and innocent!

[my-name-is-anna.livejournal.com]

Haha no one's said that to me for years.
If ever, actually.

I am not up on all this new rude slang, anyway.

[tintintin.livejournal.com]

'Gentrify' is perhaps a bit strong. It's less of a sh1thole estate pit than it was, but it's still a complete toilet. That gay pub always has at least one smashed window, in my experience.

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

Gentrification's always relative, surely? And since the blinds came down, the name changed and it became middle class rather than gay, I've not noticed the Big Sofa having any vandal worries.

Muhammed: The camera shy prophet!

[johnnybrolly.livejournal.com]

So, right, why is wrong to draw cartoons of Muhammed? Anyone?

Re: Muhammed: The camera shy prophet!

[dickon-edwards.livejournal.com]

'Anyone'? !!!!I think you'll find this subject debated by thousands around the blogosphere right this minute! Go forth and join the fun.

Re: Muhammed: The camera shy prophet!

[dickon-edwards.livejournal.com]

The gist of it all is, it's wrong to draw cartoons of Mohammed because... people might kill you.

Re: Muhammed: The camera shy prophet!

[barrysarll.livejournal.com]

Well, they're against *all* representational art, but I think representing Allah or Mohammed is exponentially worse - it's basically the Judaeo-Christian commandment against graven images, but taken a lot more seriously, because by drawing things you're trying to emulate Allah's creation.

Re: Muhammed: The camera shy prophet!

[dickon-edwards.livejournal.com]

I suppose one way of getting proper answers to your query is to post the cartoons on your own LJ, make the post viewable to the public, and include your home address. Then sit back and see what happens.

I really wouldn't recommend it, though.

Re: Muhammed: The camera shy prophet!

[darkmarcpi.livejournal.com]

Apparently Disney, Pixar etc are currently working on an animated feature film about Mohammed for their next big release. Maybe.