What is Jamie’s Dream School For?
Charlie Brooker poses an important question:
When the series was announced, the initial promotional material was couched in the trad Bash Street Kids visual language of British school-based capers: chalk, blackboards, board rubbers, pencil cases and so on. It looked like Jamie versus Grange Hill. But, presumably because the authorities wouldn’t allow the production team to meddle with the education of actual children, they’re reduced to teaching teenage volunteers who’ve already left school. So: no real kids, no real teachers, and no real exams. Nothing is real. No wonder they called it Dream School. It’s effectively a youth club with Starkey instead of a pool table.
I have to say he has a point. The kids aren’t in the system anymore, the teachers are celebrities who wouldn’t have the time to become real, full-time teachers (and who certainly would undermine all normal, full-time teachers by their mere existence if they did), and the conclusions so far are vapid and pointless. I could have told you that proper mentoring and valuing the voices of young people invariably ends up with better results than shouting at or talking down to them. Instead though we get David Starkey making the programme all about him (for a change), and Alistair Campbell teaching politics, without Jamie Oliver even remarking ironically about getting one of the biggest culprits in British history at turning young people off politics to volunteer for him.
The issues undermining the kids are serious - social deprivation, poor parenting and abuse, and suggesting somehow that bringing in ‘super teachers’ to fix them in a remedial school for kids who’ve already failed in the education system is borderline ridiculous. For every young person whose appears to ‘turn themselves around’ in the ‘Dream’ School, it simply doesn’t matter – their problems in the real world are deep and, as Brooker goes on to say, growing because of the ConDems’ assault on public services:
The first episode opened with Jamie recounting how he left school with no qualifications. The British educational system failed him, just as it fails millions of others like him every year. Now he wants to make a difference. Not by campaigning against education cuts – which might be boring – but by setting up his own school. Not one staffed by actual teachers – which might be boring – but by celebrities. And it won’t be open all-year round – which might be expensive – but for a few weeks. Thus our education system will be saved.
In short the Tories and anyone who supports their outrageously dumb policy of ‘free schools’ can just fuck off. Those who think they can boost their own celebrity off the back of both can fuck off even more.
Free Speech on Twitter Please!
By Charlie Brooker in The Guardian, the ‘Free Speech Manifesto’ by David Wales
The moment I’ve finished typing this, I’m going to walk out the door and set about strangling every single person on the planet. Starting with you, dear reader. I’m sorry, but it has to be done, for reasons that will become clear in a moment.
And for the sake of transparency, in case the powers-that-be are reading: this is categorically not a joke. I am 100% serious. Even though I don’t know who you are or where you live, I am going to strangle you, your family, your pets, your friends, your imaginary friends, and any lifelike human dummies with haunted stares and wipe-clean vinyl orifices you’ve got knocking around, perhaps in a secret compartment under the stairs. The only people who might escape my wrath are the staff and passengers at Nottingham’s Robin Hood airport, because they’ve been granted immunity by the state.
Last week 27-year-old accountant Paul Chambers lost an appeal against his conviction for comments he made back in January via the social networking hoojamflip Twitter, venting his frustration when heavy snow closed the airport, leaving him unable to visit his girlfriend.
“Crap!” he wrote. “Robin Hood airport is closed. You’ve got a week and a bit to get your shit together otherwise I’m blowing the airport sky high!!”
Anti-terror experts intercepted this message and spent hours deciphering it, eventually uncovering a stark coded warning within, cunningly disguised as a series of flippant words.
Chambers’ use of multiple exclamation marks is particularly chilling. He almost seems to find the whole thing rather funny. The violent destruction of an entire airport – hundreds of passengers and staff being blasted to shrieking ribbons by tonnes of explosive, all because one man’s dirty weekend has been postponed – yet all this senseless carnage is little more than an absurdist joke in the warped mind of Paul Chambers.
Funny is it, Mr Chambers? A big old laugh? Tell that to the theoretical victims of your hypothetical atrocity. Go on. Dig them out of the imaginary rubble. Listen to their anguished, notional screams. Ask how loudly they laughed as you hit the make-believe detonator. Go on. Ask them.
If you dare.
At least when Osama bin Laden broadcasts a warning to the west, his intentions form part of an extremist ideology informed by decades of resentment. Chambers issues bloodcurdling threats at the drop of a snowflake. This makes him the very worst kind of terrorist there is – the kind prepared to slaughter thousands in the name of inclement weather conditions.
Mercifully, in this case, before any innocent blood could be shed, Chambers was arrested, held in a police cell, and convicted of sending a “menacing electronic communication”. His appeal was rejected last week by Judge Jacqueline Davies who described his original tweet as “menacing in its content and obviously so. It could not be more clear. Any ordinary person reading this would see it in that way and be alarmed.”
Quite right too. In fact, throughout this case, the authorities have behaved impeccably – which is why it’s such a crying shame I’m going to have to strangle all of them too. But strangle them I must.
Why? Because many of his fellow tweeters, outraged by Judge Davies’ ruling, have retweeted Chambers’ original message in a misguided show of solidarity. Thousands of people, all threatening to blow Robin Hood airport “sky high”. Clearly they have to be stopped – but infuriatingly, many of them hide behind anonymous usernames. The only way to ensure they all taste justice is to punish everyone equally, just to be sure. Hence the strangling, which doesn’t feel like too much of an overreaction under the circumstances. I’m just following the authorities’ lead. They ought to give me a medal. From beyond the grave. After I’ve strangled them.
Still, loath as I am to strangle every man, woman, and child on the planet, it won’t be an entirely thankless task. Clearly I will feel no remorse while strangling Chambers. He is a dangerous madman, and I look forward to sliding my hands around his neck and slowly choking the life out of him.
I also relish the prospect of strangling another tweeter-in-crime: Gareth Compton, the Tory councillor who ran afoul of the authorities last week for tweeting the words “can someone please stone Yasmin Alibhai-Brown to death? I shan’t tell Amnesty if you don’t. It would be a blessing, really.”
He later apologised for what he claimed – outlandishly – was “an ill-conceived attempt at humour”, even though I’m sure Judge Jacqueline Davies would agree that it was menacing in its content and obviously so, and in fact could not be more clear, and that any ordinary person reading it would see it in that way and be alarmed.
Reassuringly, the bloodthirsty maniac Compton was arrested hours later, presumably after being cornered in his lair by a Swat team. I’d like to shake every member of that team by the hand, which sadly won’t be possible while I’m strangling them.
Anyway, I’m writing this on Friday, so by the time you read this on Monday my strangling rampage will have begun – unless the authorities have intercepted these words and arrested me in the interim, in which case I’d like to make it absolutely clear that I intend to strangle everyone in the prison before turning my hands on myself. Attention home secretary: you’ve got three days and a bit to get your shit together. Otherwise I’m strangling this planet sky-high.
Universal Condemnation of Jan Moir
Homophobic Daily HateMail columnist Jan Moir would like you to believe that it’s mischievous of those of us who seem to be part of an ‘orchestrated internet campaign’ to believe her hatchet job on Stephen Gately had ‘homophobic and bigoted undertones’. Does that make Stephen Fry ‘mischievous’? What about Phillip Schofield? A selection of Tweets:
Schofe Sat down to read up on the day. Dear God Jan Moir I hope when you lie in your bed tonight reflecting on your day you feel utterly ashamed
charltonbrooker RT @disappointment: Jan Moir manages to walk the difficult tightrope between being a bitch and a cunt http://bit.ly
stephenfry …mischievous in the extreme to suggest that my article has homophobic and bigoted undertones.” UNDERTONES??!
Let me refer you to Charlie Brooker, who has a way with words, particularly for filth like Moir:
The funeral of Stephen Gately has not yet taken place. The man hasn’t been buried yet. Nevertheless, Jan Moir of the Daily Mail has already managed to dance on his grave. For money.
It has been 20 minutes since I’ve read her now-notorious column, and I’m still struggling to absorb the sheer scope of its hateful idiocy. It’s like gazing through a horrid little window into an awesome universe of pure blockheaded spite. Spiralling galaxies of ignorance roll majestically against a backdrop of what looks like dark prejudice, dotted hither and thither with winking stars of snide innuendo.
Read the whole thing. It’s a great piece, and as usual he’s right about absolutely everything. Fortunately the outrage has caused HateMail sponsors Marks & Spencer and others to withdraw from the online page at least, suggesting she’s caused considerable damage to her employer, who might think twice in the future before printing an article quite so horribly hateful again. There’s simply no money in it after all. A national newspaper, even a rag like the HateMail can’t really afford over 1,000 complaints to the Press Complaints Commission either.
What an odious cow. I sincerely hope she loses her job.
