Here’s an old satire of mine, from a time long before the Brexit Referendum…
And Corbyn!
Originally published on TheSpoof.com
***
Talks have been held between a (still somewhat) cocky UKIP and a (more and more by the hour) desperate Labour Party, with a view to constructing a possible future coalition.
Hopes were originally high, with optimistic and even downright ecstatically joyous talk about an UKIP-LAB alliance filling the Twittersphere.
But shockingly and beyond all reasonable hope, the discussions have ended acrimoniously…
With the “Joint Labour/UKIP Working Group Policy Statement on Disability” containing the offensive word “spacker chariot.”
Many in the UK had hoped that the time was long gone since politicians felt free to bandy around offensive epithets in public; yet, the rise of UKIP has proven otherwise.
Still, for some as yet unexplained reason, both sides are refusing to admit responsibility for the offensive document.
An official UKIP statement claims that the term used in the joint statement was not the originally intended one, but rather a:
“Woolly-Liberal-Corporate/Social-Democratic/LibLabCon/Establishment-Political-Class-PC-Compromise.”
Their-Most-Exalted-Pork-Pie-and-Special-Brewness also blame Labour for rejecting their original “Common-Sense-Everyday-Man-In-The-Street-Joe-And-Jaspreet-Bloggs” phrasing.
Yet, curiously enough, the UKIP statement appears to lack a reference to what the Man in the Clapham Omnibus originally intended to say as an alternative to the inflammatory term which actually made it into the joint statement.
I wonder why?
On the other hand, Labour blames UKIP for not agreeing with their original suggestion, which was “Currently Or Permanently Physically Impaired Person’s Mobility And Transportation Enablement Device,” or COPPIPMATED for short.
The last word doesn’t go to Nigel Farage (hopefully), but we’ll quote him anyway:
“Well, is anyone surprised? The term that Not-So-Non-New Labour (sic) suggested sounded like something out of Doctor Who.
“Yes, I mean, the disabled community may sometimes appear somewhat out of the ordinary or peculiar, at least so some of our more narrow-minded supporters believe…
“But I must assure our voters and the more achingly flamboyant of our candidates, that they are hardly some kind of alien species. It would be grossly unfair to these kind and pleasant people to suggest otherwise.”
“Anyway, we actually meant it as a compliment…
“You know, like Elijah’s Chariot in the Old Testament of the Judeo-Christian tradition, or that wonderful piece of music from the classic Anglo-Saxon… sorry, the simply wonderful British film, “Chariots of Fire.”
“Why, I don’t know why anybody would possibly find that term offensive!”
Former marginal fringe politician Nick Griffin, whose once dark-as-Hades star has waned ever further in the past few months, was even less impressed at this development.
Yes, even less impressed than when, (as he puts it), he was maliciously exiled from the BNP by the Transsiberian Pan-Asexual Illuminati of New Mercury, and the Shape-Shifting Kiwi Bird Trangender Hip Hop Collective of Quebec Tax Evasion Labour Unions…
Sorry, I didn’t quite catch what the other ones were. Still:
“Typical Far-left-Cultural-Marxist-Zionist-Liberal-Compromise from the Kippers. White Nationalists are always talking about the mortal peril that disabled people suffer from us…
“Sorry, that the disabled community poses to our society, and the stern measures that the Pure Anglo-Saxon White Race must make to preserve our future…
“But all these stupid UKIP softies can do is make a pathetic and predictable quip about the disabled?
“And then end, to top it all, they lower themselves to rationalising it to Times-Reading-Philo-Semite-Gay-Loving-New-Labour-Capitalist-Illuminati-Scumbags?
“I mean, if that’s the best they can do, they might as well not even bother!”
But Godfrey Bloom, just this once, insists on having the last word.
“Oh dear! It is such a pity that Nicholas feels so strongly about this issue. I’m so very much in favour of the disabled community.
“Yes, you know, I once knew this fine young chap in the office who had some kind of diagnosis of one sort or another.
“You all know the sort I mean. Yes, a little wet behind the ears, perhaps… but perfectly genial, you know.
“Yes, you could trust him with your life not to rob you of the odd guinea or two. No, don’t listen to that bigoted person you just quoted; the disabled community is a very pleasant and amicable one indeed!
“Indeed; what a nasty young man that Nicholas is, after all. Why, it’s really quite upsetting to see such malicious rhetoric about all those various kinds of disabled people out there somewhere or other.
“You know, not so very upsetting perhaps… well, I really don’t wish to exaggerate or to stray into inflammatory rhetoric.
“But still: such a terribly, terribly, terribly unconstructive manner of speaking.
“Why, it’s as though he were somehow going out of his way to cause offence, purely to wind up people who had an honest disagreement with him.
“Oh, now! Sheer opportunism, I’m afraid.
“Well, it only goes to show what I said in my book, ‘A Guinea A Minute.'”
“Yes, it really is the truth that: ‘Politicians are smooth-talking sociopaths.’ I can’t deny it.”
Still, the attempt to unify two of the most ludicrously dogmatic parties is a thought-provoking one. Maybe next time, it will be Sinn Fein/National Front…
Or DUP/Tories.
***
Note (November 2017):
Wow! Now that was pretty prophetic on my part, wasn’t it?
Nobody thought this would ever happen…
Image attribution:
By Stephen West [CC BY 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons
