Why then does the organisation choose to bend so quickly to the unrepresentative activists on the censorious left? The Pogues themselves shared a revealing comment from LGBT journalist Harrison Brocklehurst on social media yesterday which, whilst designed to back up the BBC’s decision, in reality exposes the ridiculous nature of the whole affair: “the word itself being in Fairytale Of New York doesn’t bother or offend me, but straight people being so angry and outraged at its removal and literally fighting and arguing for the right to sing it bothers me deeply”.īrocklehurst’s view, endorsed by The Pogues, is clearly that the row is more damaging than the song. I am sure there are many more who squirm at lyrics in BBC-broadcast drill music, yet the BBC rightly chooses to not attempt to sanitise the genre.Ĭulturally conservative Mary Whitehouse-esque complaints are rarely taken seriously by the BBC. It is, of course, fine to not like words in songs. To put that number into perspective, in the same month the Monster Raving Loony Party received 10,000 votes, despite voters only having the option in 24 constituencies.ĭespite the positively lilliputian scale of public outrage, the BBC has decided to elevate this tiny but loud group of basement-dwelling online people to act as its own censor board, adjudicating ever growing portions of its broadcasting content. Fewer than 900 complaints were submitted when The Pogues’ Fairytale of New York was performed by Rob Brydon and Ruth Jones in the Gavin and Stacey Christmas Special last year. The BBC’s decision this week to censor a well-loved Christmas song off the back of some minor Twitter whinging is a classic example of a repeated phenomenon.
As a rule I welcome international exchange yet, like the grey squirrel, this American-derived culture war is an import we on this island could well have done without. Never has this phrase been truer than in the midst of the deafening noise produced by this country’s tiny band of ever more tiresome offence crusaders. Those were the words by which David Cameron delighted the crowd at the 2015 Conservative Party Conference – a time that now feels like a different century. “Britain and Twitter are not the same thing”.