We’ve always laughed through the hard times, and now with World War III on the horizon, my advice is to see yourself through it with mockery, says Brian Reade
My mum used to tell us that during the Second World War it was humour that saw them through the long nights in bomb shelters.
They had nicknames for the jobsworth air wardens (one was called “Isaiah” because one eye was higher than the other), would joke about how the Queen Mother never came near their Blitzed Liverpool street as there were no cameras, and there were sing-songs about Hitler’s testicular issues.
During the Black Death, ordinary Brits would do the Dance Macabre, pretending to be skeletons of aristocrats and kings jiving to the grave – a satire on the universality of death.
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So we’ve always laughed through the hard times, and now with World War III on the horizon, global warming killing the planet, the banking system heading for another crash, the nation hopelessly split by culture wars, our economy so knackered we all need to cough up a lot more tax, and a demi-fascist on course to rule us, the hard times are back with a vengeance.
My advice is to see yourself through it with mockery.
Bathe in laughter at the demeaning of the hypocritical and the powerful. Because it’s the one thing the British do well. And there’s already some good examples. Take the fake council letters posted through doors of people in streets festooned with St George flags in Lydney, Gloucestershire, telling them they’ve been assigned an asylum seeker to live with them: “As staunch patriots, we know you would be proud to assist your country during times of difficulty,” the letter reads.
Even funnier, they say the refugees are from a Muslim tribe named Pha Rage, and are being deported by far-right extremists from the former UK territory of Legin (Nigel backwards).
Their reward? A commemorative mug from the King bearing the flag. Priceless political satire up there with Count Binface’s pledge, when he stood for London Mayor last year, to make Thames Water bosses go for a swim in turd-filled South East rivers. Which unsurprisingly won him 24,260 votes.
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Back to this week and parody Twitter account Sir Michael Take CBE posting this above a story about disgraced Tory peer Michelle Mone buying a £10million flat in Florida: “Why is it people in this country HATE beautiful and successful people? The vicious flak & hate mail Michelle Mone & her husband are receiving is totally uncalled for and motivated by envy and jealousy. Let’s celebrate their success instead of attacking them all the time!”
And the vain and dim Mone, believing it was genuine praise, retweeted it to a tsunami of ridicule.
Amid the right-wing bed-wetting about Labour’s upcoming budget, Private Eye responded with a fake article in the “Doolally Mail” saying “Rachel Reeves is planning to leave you impoverished with no choice but to eat your own children.”
In a list of imminent money grabs they claim a wealth tax means “you’ll be taxed on your wealth until you have none” and “all leaves in your garden will be subject to a windfall duty (also applies to apples)”.
Then there’s Reform UK’s welfare spokesman Lee Anderson wanting to stop Motability grants and instead give all disabled drivers 1960s, three-wheeled invalid cars. Which is no joke, I’m afraid.
The policy that is, not Anderson.
He is very much a joke, yet remarkably odds-on to be a minister in the next British government. Believe me folks, all that is left is laughter.
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BIG QUESTIONS
1. Andy Windsor is no longer using personalised Duke of York number plates such as AY02 DOY on his luxury cars. Any chance we can make him use TO 55ER instead?
2. Can someone remind ITV’s political editor Robert Peston that he’s 65 so maybe it’s time to stop wearing white trainers with a suit?
3. Speaker Lindsay Hoyle trying to stop reporters questioning MPs in public places. Is that so he can jump on his next far-flung freebie without being hassled en route to an airport VIP lounge?
4. Is one of the reasons so many prisoners find it easy to escape from our jails that half the prison officers are having sex with the inmates?
5. Celebrity Traitors having a counsellor on hand in case stars struggle with mental health worries. Is the biggest worry that another celeb may be getting more dosh than them?
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Jeremy Corbyn is in a panto this Christmas, playing the Wizard of Oz-lington in a theatre in his Islington constituency. This could set a trend for politicians to put something back into their community by humiliating themselves in front of kids.
So bring on Jacob Rees-Mogg as Sleeping Beauty (kipping in the Commons was his biggest contribution as an MP), Nigel Farage as Baron Hardup (he’s so skint he needs 10 jobs), David Cameron as King Rat (for using Brexit to try to save his skin), Boris Johnson as Buttons (what he called a £250k salary), Liz Truss as Mother Goose (she goosed the economy), and Keir Starmer as Wishy Washy (no explanation needed).
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I’m driven mad by the amount of radio adverts that feature the voice of Rob Brydon as it’s completely unrepresentative of the amount of Welsh comedians in the wider population.
I’m also mad at the hugely unrepresentative number of appearances of Reform MPs on political TV shows despite having less than 1% of the Westminster population.
And I seethe looking at the massive over-representation of Black faces doing low-paid jobs in the NHS.
So why didn’t Reform MP Sarah Pochin, who says she’s driven mad by the over-representation of black faces in TV adverts, mention any of them? Is it because the Runcorn MP, who used one of her first Commons questions to ask if Labour would “ban the burqa,” is obsessed with hiding Black faces from view?
And, if Reform wins the next election and she is made Culture Minister, will she demand the BBC brings back The Black And White Minstrels and a series of Al Jolson films on threat of removing their licence?
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A heckler tore into the King this week about his disgraced brother, Andrew (how lovely to take away the Prince). He’ll have to get used to it so needs a decent retort. How about: “Come back when you’ve stripped your brother of all his titles and kicked him out of his 30-room mansion”?
Maybe not. How about: “Why aren’t you at work this afternoon instead of sponging off the state?” Definitely not. Better just suck it up.
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There’s an outside spa at my local gym and this week I was lying in the Jacuzzi when the skies opened, the cold rain hit my face and I felt slightly ridiculous.
A man of similar age read my mind and said: “Imagine your dad telling your mum 30 years ago that he was stripping down to his pants and lying in a tub outside Speke industrial estate in the lashing rain, and when she answered ‘why?’ he’d said ‘to get some hot bubbles blown up my jacksie’.”
I laughed so much I almost produced my own bubbles.
