Thought For The Day: Jim Davidson

"[Black comic Matt Blaize] said, ‘If you were to cure Aids and feed starving Africa, save the world from malaria, you would still be a homophobic racist to most people.’ ”

Straight after telling me this, he turns to his notorious appearance on the reality show Hell’s Kitchen in 2007, in which he asked fellow contestant Brian Dowling, who is gay: “Why do you shirt lifters all have a certain look?”

“Yes. He seemed to take no offence whatsoever and then later on after we’d had a drink an argument broke out but not about that. It was about money and it was edited to look as if it was about that. ‘Shirt lifter’ is not a nice word I have since found out. Gay friends of mine explained that it conjures up people fiddling about and I didn’t realise that, I really didn’t.

"Words come in and out of fashion. You know, you can’t call women birds. But you can call French people frogs. They are all just words. It gets a bit mad. But I am not an old-style comedian. When I was old-style it was because it was the fashion to be so, but you can’t go through life trying to please Janet Street-Cleaner or whatever her name is.” He waits for me to laugh and I do...

Jim Davidson interviewed by the Daily Telegraph.

Best question: 'What about giving his third wife, Alison Holloway, a black eye?'

PS Jim tells the Daily Record gay marriage is "very good". God, he must get bored with being asked about The Gays every interview. 

CBB: And The Winner Is...

Well done Jim - it couldn't have happened to a nastier bigot!
Presumably you'll be the special guest at G-A-Y on Saturday?

PS And congrats to the the Daily Star for getting their celebratory front page out so quickly last night.
They also say Jim may be getting his own programme on Channel 5.
Hopefully a chatshow, but one that isn't presented by a 'shirtlifter'.

John Barrowman: Saucy Asides

TELLY hunk John Barrowman has launched a furious attack on “miserable” critics of his naughty panto patter.

The Scots-born Torchwood and Doctor Who star hit back after his cheeky on-stage double entendres were branded “smutty”.

Defiant Barrowman, 46, said: “People like that are just miserable bastards. They need to get over it.

“Or just don’t come back — we don’t need you.”

The US-based star lashed out after coming under fire from fellow festive show favourites and a disgruntled fan.

Orville the Duck ventriloquist Keith Harris, 65, insisted: “Panto is for kids but they don’t get smutty jokes made by people like John Barrowman.”

Veteran telly comic Jim Davidson, 59, added: “Panto’s a chance to be funny without being filthy.” 

But the actor was unrepentant — and promised more saucy asides at this year’s production of Dick McWhittington with The Krankies at Glasgow’s Clyde Auditorium.

He said: “These jokes go right over the crossbar of the kids, while all the adults sit there chuckling.

“The only reason kids laugh is they see their parents laughing away.

“That’s just old school panto and The Krankies are brilliant at delivering that sort of stuff.”

But John — who married long-term partner Scott Gill in California in the summer — admits he did receive one complaint during last year’s Jack And The Beanstalk run.

He said: “We had a letter saying I was making gay references and was being crude.

“I find it strange they didn’t complain about jokes about one of the girl’s boobs.”

The Sun - Scotch edition only. 

Fagburn recalls seeing that grand pantomime dame, John Inman, on TV once saying pantomime innuendo was "self-cleaning jokes".
Rather well put, I thought.

David Miranda: Can't Happen Here!

At 6:30 am this morning my time - 5:30 am on the East Coast of the US - I received a telephone call from someone who identified himself as a "security official at Heathrow airport." He told me that my partner, David Miranda, had been "detained" at the London airport "under Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act of 2000."

David had spent the last week in Berlin, where he stayed with Laura Poitras, the US filmmaker who has worked with me extensively on the NSA stories. A Brazilian citizen, he was returning to our home in Rio de Janeiro this morning on British Airways, flying first to London and then on to Rio. When he arrived in London this morning, he was detained.

At the time the "security official" called me, David had been detained for 3 hours. The security official told me that they had the right to detain him for up to 9 hours in order to question him, at which point they could either arrest and charge him or ask a court to extend the question time. The official - who refused to give his name but would only identify himself by his number: 203654 - said David was not allowed to have a lawyer present, nor would they allow me to talk to him.

I immediately contacted the Guardian, which sent lawyers to the airport, as well various Brazilian officials I know. Within the hour, several senior Brazilian officials were engaged and expressing indignation over what was being done. The Guardian has the full story here.

Glenn Greenwald writing in Monday's Guardian.

Yesterday's Guardian ran an interview with David.
The Guardian's slightly gone to town on this - the talented Mr GG is one of their own, of course - but it's been the biggest news story of the week so far.
Chilling stuff - and a story involving a clear breach of the human rights of a gay man, whose only "crime" is being the boyfriend of an investigative journalist; Amnesty are on to it.

One wonders if the gay media's coverage would have been different if David Miranda had been detained illegally by the Russian authorities?

Pink News haven't covered it at all, for shame.

Anyway, I've organised a protest outside the British Embassy in Moscow for this Saturday - please join me.

 

Update: Textbook stuff from Richard Littlejohn in Friday's Daily Mail:

 

One might have hoped that the Guardian would extend the same support to Jim Davidson as they have to their own man.
But while Miranda has the right credentials — gay, fashionably Brazilian, Left-wing, anti-American, anti-British — Jimbo [Jim Davidson] ticks all the wrong boxes.
He’s a serial heterosexual, fiercely patriotric, works tirelessly for military charities, tells the ‘wrong’ kind of jokes and, horror or horrors, was a cheerleader for Mrs Thatcher and the Tories.
So, even if he isn’t guilty, as far as the Guardian is concerned it serves him right. His kind aren’t entitled to ‘human rights’.
Meanwhile, Jimmy Savile remains dead.

 

If anyone has the faintest idea what that last line means, can they please get in touch?

Jim Davidson: The Ladyboy Defence

CELEBRITY Big Brother star Jim Davidson plans to win over viewers who think he is homophobic by admitting he once had sex with a fella.

The comic was kicked out of TV’s Hell’s Kitchen in 2007 when he called Big Brother host Brian Dowling “a shirtlifter” during a heated argument.Davidson has always denied being anti-gay and claims he had never meant to cause offence.
However, now he has signed to Channel 5’s new series of Celebrity Big Brother, sparks have been flying behind the scenes.
The joker will not only come face to face once again with Brian, 34.
He will also be locked up in the house with gay The X Factor singer Rylan Clark, 24...
However, Davidson has a big secret up his sleeve which he plans to reveal to silence any claims from them that he is homophobic...

The comedian, 59, recalled: “I was in Berlin with my bodyguard and we pulled a couple of girls in a bar.“I sneaked out the back of this bar and she gave me oral sex.
“Afterwards my minder asked me if I’d noticed anything funny about her.
“I said: ‘Big feet.’ And he said: ‘Adam’s apple, too.’ It was a fella!”

Top racist, right-wing wife-beating comedy legend Jim Davidson in the Daily Star there.

Fagburn calls this "the ladyboy defence" (formerly known as "the Lola defence".

This has never actually happened to any straight man ever, it's just an "hilarious" shaggy dog story they tell down the pub to try and show their man of the world credentials to their mates. 

"Beautiful bird, she was... anyway, turns out she was a bloke!"

Great stuff guys!

Piss off, Jim. 

Savilegate: On Erudite Homophobia

I'm so bored with having been endlessly retweeted this essay by Andrew O'Hagan from London Review Of Books over the weekend, and being how told how wonderful it is, I'm going to repeat myself.
Yes, it's fascinating, and seems informed - though can anyone check any of his allegations from 50/60 years ago?
Is its popularity with some, perhaps, because its subtext could be; "It was basically The Gays, you know"?
It's a very, very long article written off the back of Jimmy Savile being accused of sexually assaulting 300 girls.
So why does he only really write about some well-known and long-dead gay men?  

Could O'Hagan's argument not be summarised by these lines from Jim Davidson writing on his blog, ironically published at about the same time that the LRB piece was published. 

"To me [Savile] was just another pervert.
There are lots of them in Showbiz. There seems to be more gay ones than straight, but that's because there are probably more gays in showbiz than most professions."

Same argument, less fancy words, more simply put...

Savilegate: A Philosopher Writes

The BBC has finally gone mental. This hot bed of leftyness has asked itself the question: "Should we have known?" The answer is yes. We all knew didn't we? 
A bloke who's a loner dresses and acts like a nonce and thinks he is the most important person in the world. Hmmm. I knew... and didn't do anything. Mind you I had no proof. To me he was just another pervert. 
There are lots of them in Showbiz. There seems to be more gay ones than straight, but that's because there are probably more gays in showbiz than most professions. 

Troubled comedian, racist and wifebeater, Jim Davidson, writing on his hilarious (unintentionally) blog.

Update: 'The head of the Catholic Church in England and Wales has written to the Vatican to ask if Jimmy Savile's papal knighthood can be posthumously removed, the Church has confirmed.
'The Archbishop of Westminster, the Most Reverend Vincent Nichols, asked Church officials in Rome to investigate the matter, recognising the "deep distress" of the late presenter's abuse victims...'

BBC News. 
Satire dies once more! Hypocrisy throws a party!! Irony spontaneously combusts!!!

Update: Fascinating, lengthy essay by Andrew O'Hagan in London Review Of Books; "If the Savile story – and the stories that constitute a hinterland at the BBC – turn out to involve a great conspiracy, it will be a conspiracy that the whole country had a part in..."

PS The O'Hagan piece has gone viral on Twitter - hopefully not because his subtext could be "it was mainly The Gays". 

Thoughts For The Day: Jim Davidson

...I scold, you’re a menace. You really shouldn’t go around calling people “shirt-lifters” on telly (as he did on Hell’s Kitchen in 2007).
“Why?” he protests. “All my friends who are gay call each other ‘poof’.”
Some of my black mates call each other the n-word, I say, but they’d be shocked if I did it too. Comedy pause. “Well, get some different friends, then,” he scoffs. “How precious is that? ‘I can call myself a n***** and you can’t’...”
“Just ask any gay man who knows me if I’m homophobic,” he says. “That’s how you stand up and be counted.”
Whatever, I say. Bandying the word “shirt-lifter” around as an insult on primetime telly isn’t on. Thanks to systematic bullying with words like that and “poof”, a gay teenager is four times more likely to commit suicide than his straight peers. “Why?” asks Davidson, genuinely confused. “Is it because of the state of all the bloody ugly men in Britain?”

Jim Davidson, interviewed in The Sunday Times. He's adorable, isn't he?
Davidson is currently promoting his first play, Stand Up And Be Counted, about a washed-up old school bigoted comedian (played by himself), appearing at an Aids benefit where he is challenged backstage by a black alternative comic and a gay TV producer. The audience also hear the comic confess how his bullying drove his gay son to suicide... The Guardian's two star review here.
The play maybe Davidson's mea culpa and attempt to show he's a changed man, but in interviews like the one above he does seem keen to fling both feet firmly in his mouth.

Come Fly With Me: Plane Crash TV

Reviews of Matt Lucas and David Walliams' Come Fly With Me have been predictably stinking.
Though pointing out that the targets for their comedy are often society's victims now seems as tired and predictable as... well, as an episode of Little Britain Abroad.
In fact Come Fly With Me has a broad speculum of comic characters, from Fearghal (pictured), a campy gay air steward on a budget airline, to Moses, a campy gay "executive passenger liason officer".
Verily, as Matt Lucas has said; "All human life is there."
Currently halfway through its first series arguably Come Fly With Me's main problem is that it's just not very funny.
However The Sun today have managed to find someone to defend the show;
"David and Matt's new series is absolutely brilliant and very funny.
"I don't believe for one minute they have a racist bone in their bodies.
"They are falling victim to political correctness - just as I did. And political correctness is killing comedy."
Who be this?
None other than right-wing comedy legend and wifebeater, Jim Davidson.
Nick nick!

The Sun: When Celebs Attack!!!

It's all been kicking off in Sunland again!
'DALE 'gay hater' in rant at student'
"EMMERDALE'S Adam Thomas apologised yesterday for making a "queer" jibe at a gay student."
I have no idea who he is either, but judging from his photo "gay hater" Dale looks a bit "gay".
Anyway... "Thomas, 23, snapped after Ricky Platts, 22, approached him in a McDonald's.
Ricky - who is openly gay - went up to say hello after he spotted the actor having a meal there."
"But he says he was stunned when Thomas replied: "Yeah, what about it gay boy?"
Ricky claimed Thomas then started "hopping up and down like a madman" and calling him and a pal - who was in drag - "queers".
Ricky was so shit scared he took out his mobile phone and filmed all this, his misery having been compounded by the fact that Adam Thomas plays a friend of that gay in Emmerdale!
Anyway, Adam Thomas has said he's sorry, so I hope we'll hear no more of this.
'Fan sobs at Boy George's foul rant'
"FOUL-MOUTHED Boy George left a woman in tears after tipping a drink over her because she was chatting during his act at a charity gig."
Luckily someone filmed that on their mobile, too - don't you just love the modern world?
There's a link to a shaky video of it on The Sun's site - and I have to say I can't say I blame George.
And finally... Jim Davidson is interviewed about his next panto.
Although thankfully this reactionary shitbag's celebrity ranking is so low they only put it in The Scottish Sun.
'COMIC Jim Davidson has been branded a right-wing, homophobic racist - surely he can't be that bigoted?''
All together now: Oh yes he is!
Poor Jim hasn't been on the tellybox since 2007 when he called Brian Dowling a "shirtlifter" on Hell's Kitchen.
The case for the defence, Jim? "And anyway, I've been out for dinner with Brian Dowling since that incident.
"Would I have done that if I REALLY was homophobic?"
He's also put famousgaycouple "Colin and Justin" in his new panto.
So there'll obviously be no jokes about them being poofs, there then.
I - literally - cannot fucking wait.