Scotland’s Jesus: The Only Officially Non-racist Comedian (6 page)

Of course, to people outside a doctrinal system these things can look very strange. You’d have to explain to them that Stewart Lee – an Oxbridge graduate with a militant anti-piracy stance who appears on BBC Two punching up at the big targets of the day, such as the autobiography of Chris Moyles, mild-mannered comic Russell Howard and the ugliness of Adrian Chiles – is in fact a political comic. Someone like me, who was described by the
Daily Mirror
as a ‘racist comedian’ after a career of telling anti-racist, anti-war jokes, who took the newspaper to court and used the damages to help a Guantanamo Bay prisoner sue MI6 for defamation – I’m apolitical.

That’s the real reason doctrinal thinking is encouraged: it fosters an ability to be deeply irrational. Possessing the moral agility required to say that blowing up civilians with flying bombs is not ‘terrorism’, or even simply to call Paddy McGuinness a ‘comedian’, is tremendously useful to a society like ours. Because we don’t really need commentators to explain or reason; we need them to justify.

Of course, you’re welcome to take Stewart Lee’s view that the best place to criticise the behaviour of a crocodile is from inside its belly, perhaps in the hope that some day you will be so counter-cultural and innately radical that you’ll be given your own show on BBC Two and the opportunity to edit Radio 4’s
Today
programme. I’d argue that would never happen with a genuinely left-wing comedian who thought outside of the doctrinal system. Someone like Bill Hicks or George Carlin would have raised too many awkward questions. For a start, they’d have written an article titled ‘Where are all the left-wing stand-ups?’

As soon as you enter into something doctrinally important, language becomes charged and contested. In Iraq, troops fighting the US were called ‘insurgents’ in the BBC coverage. That’s quite an important choice of word, as an insurgency is something that happens against a legitimate government rather than, say, an occupying foreign army. In Libya, the troops trying to overthrow Gaddafi were referred to on the BBC as ‘activists’. Like they were the sort of people who’d get a petition up about him, rather than publicly sodomise him to death. The doctrinal importance of attacks on American soil is semi-religious. Blood spilled in the Temple. The Boston bombers got the same publicity they’d have achieved by attacking the Kabul Marathon with a dinosaur.

The modern doctrinal era begins with the destruction of the World Trade Center. The Americans, in an understand-able rage at the half-million dollar cost of the attack being funded by Saudi Arabia and carried out largely by Saudi Arabians, invaded Iraq and Afghanistan. It’s good to remember that in years to come this whole period we’re living through will be written off in a couple of sentences under the heading ‘The Oil Wars’. ‘Britain over-reached itself in the Oil Wars, was destroyed, and became Sexcamp 3 for Workers of Shanghai MegaProvince’, the history books will read, as they sit in a petrol-soaked pyramid waiting to be lit as a warning signal to the Lastmen of the Garbagecities that their enemies the Crabmen have begun their final sideways march out of the sea.

Defence Secretary Philip Hammond said we should be proud of what we’ve done to promote peace in Afghanistan. He plans to visit soon; he’s just waiting till they’ve found a full Kevlar bodysuit in his size. We went into Afghanistan to get bin Laden and our mission there is more important than ever, now that we killed him, quite a while ago, in Pakistan.

The US is to open direct peace talks with the Taliban after more than a decade of war. Good to see the US has only waited twelve years and the loss thousands of lives before resorting to ‘speaking’ to them. The meeting will take place at the Taliban’s new office in Doha – I like the fact they’re opening new branches, so long as it doesn’t get like Starbucks where you’ve got a Taliban on every high street. I wonder why they need an office – perhaps they’re branching out and are going to start dealing with both insurgencies and van hire. I bet it’ll be another call centre – we’ll be plagued by the Taliban ringing up to ask if we need replacement windows or do we want to wait until after the car bombing?

There was outrage when burnt Korans were found at a NATO base in Afghanistan. They’d only been partially burnt. That’s because the book on how to maintain a bonfire had been burnt the week before, on a bonfire of books about codes of conduct in sensitive areas. US soldiers don’t understand why the word of the Koran should be precious, as most of the Christian beliefs they hold bear no relation to the literal word of the Bible.

It’s thought Afghan soldiers were passing pencilled notes to each other inside the books they take with them to battle. US soldiers could never do that; it’s hard to get pencil to show up on a cum-stained computer game. It’s been said that because some people have burnt Bibles it’s OK for troops to burn Korans. I’ll take that as giving me permission to restart my culling of Britain’s bouncers. The books were burnt because stuff was written in the margins that the soldiers didn’t understand. A translator is only $4 an hour, but they thought they’d take advantage of the spoils of war and splash out on a whole can of kerosene.

Can you believe it’s over ten years since we brought freedom to the Iraqi people? The freedom to choose exactly who shoots and tortures them. Tony Blair says he’s given up trying to tell people his decision to go to war was right. Instead he tells them it was ‘complex and difficult’. In the way that lying is often more complex and difficult than telling the truth. An angry protester breached security at the Leveson Inquiry to call Tony Blair a ‘war criminal’. Blair could easily stop people thinking of him as a war criminal. He just needs to have sex with a goat.

• • •

So, Abu Qatada has finally gone. Mrs Qatada should move in with Mrs Hamza. As both their husbands are now inside that would basically give us an Islamic fundamentalist version of
Birds of a Feather
. . . Dorien comes round boasting that she’s shagging the gardener and gets stoned to death. We’d all watch that.

Abu Qatada seemed to vary between being free and occasionally going back to jail, where either he would stay, be released or, ultimately, be deported. To truly get to grips with the twists and turns in that story what I did was every time Theresa May began to speak I’d just gently hum the tune of the hokey cokey. I’d time it so she finished as I got to the ‘in/out’ bit, and then when I’d shake it all about I’d pretend I was being electrocuted by the Jordanian secret service. Jordan, of course, gave assurances that Abu Qatada would be treated like any other citizen and be entitled to a full trial by firing squad.

When your arch-enemy is a court of human rights it might be time to take a deep breath and think for a moment what that makes you. Abu Qatada was considered a threat because he spouts ridiculous, hate-filled tirades; if he were white he’d be presenting a phone-in on talkSPORT. To give you an idea how dangerous this man is it’s believed he’s radicalised almost as many Muslims as Tony Blair. As an extra security measure he was apparently given a dodgy compass so that none of his prayers would get answered.

Of course, we couldn’t throw Abu Qatada out of the country just because he was ‘very dangerous’, otherwise there’d have been nobody left in the Cabinet. The Tories demanded that ministers ignore the courts and throw him out. I’m guessing the Tories might not be quite so keen on ignoring the courts when tens of thousands of disabled people refuse to pay their bedroom-tax fines. He was called bin Laden’s right-hand man – and that was enough evidence to lock him up? If we called him the new Shirley Bassey could he get a plum variety slot on ITV?

A Welsh double-glazing salesman called Ahmed Abdulla has been stopped from flying to the US because his name is similar to the name of an al-Qaeda leader. The strange thing is that for the last ten years al-Qaeda leader Abdullah Ahmed Abdullah has been travelling about under the name Dai Llewellyn. His attempts to organise atrocities keep being interrupted every five minutes by a housewife in Swansea who wants new windows fitted.

Islamic extremist Emdadur Choudhury was fined £50 for burning poppies at the last Armistice Day parade. I say, if he wants to live here he should protest about the occupation of Afghanistan the British way. Just shrug his shoulders and reach for the remote when it comes on the news. Burning poppies is a pretty piss-poor way of showing disrespect to our soldiers. It’s not a patch on failing to give them proper body armour. Lots of people desecrate the two minutes silence. At least Choudhury had an opinion about war; surely it’s more offensive when people just continue browsing through the Disney Store? How dare he publicly protest against the occupation of Afghanistan? Especially after all our efforts to bring it free speech. I’m told he’d planned a more lavish protest to bring the infidel British puppet government to its knees. But he couldn’t buy the fireworks as his benefit cheque didn’t arrive in time.

Abu Hamza was extradited to the US despite claiming he was too ill to face trial – well, to be fair, he does have one hand in the grave. My son was shocked. You see, I called his pet hamster Abu! Believe me, that’s where the resemblance ends – his prosthetic, paper-clip paw’s actually shaped into a trident . . . don’t ask, but it’s not cruel as all the animals involved get given badges to use as shields. I wondered why Hamza was so terrified of what the Americans will do to him; then I realised, he lived in Afghanistan for a bit. Actually, you’d think he’d have found a more realistic prosthetic in Afghanistan. We’ve been bombing them so long human hands must be left on garden walls like lost children’s gloves.

Abu Hamza is a disabled man who commands great respect from his followers; if he conformed to our culture he’d be in a Channel 4 documentary about how no one wants to shag him.

He’s been transferred to a US jail known as the ‘Colorado Supermax’. Which is also the name of a feminine hygiene product for cowgirls. The European Court of Human Rights said it was satisfied Hamza would be well treated in America. Which in essence means that before flicking the switch on his electric chair the executioner will tell him to have a nice day.

Three guys in Birmingham were jailed for a suicide bomb plot. If I lived in Birmingham I’d be working on a suicide bomb plot. I’m not sure we should have been too worried about the destruction they could have reaped, given that they couldn’t even manage to successfully burn the piece of paper with their plans on. With the plan of blowing up Birmingham they must be the only suicide bombers who’ve received financial backing from English Heritage. What could make someone who’s raised in this country hate this country so much? Apart from being raised in this country.

This year we also had the Woolwich attack on Drummer Lee Rigby, and terror levels suddenly rose from ‘not bothered’ to ‘holy fuck’. David Cameron returned from Paris immediately he heard that the black guy the police shot had actually done something to deserve it. Cameron activated COBRA, where the government show terrorists they’re not scared by gathering behind steel doors in a bomb proof room. An emergency meeting was held with Cameron, Boris, Pickles, Warsi and May – I wouldn’t even trust this lot to make jelly and ice cream without starting a chemical fire.

The killer welcomed a Brownie guide leader, Ingrid Loyau-Kennett, when she approached him – he must’ve thought he’d completed his Death to the West badge. She wanted to keep him talking to prevent any further violence. That’s unusual, as our scout leader always wanted to stop us talking. Usually with threats that nobody would believe us. Can you imagine being in her Brownie group now? Every time she asks what you want to do, you nervously gaze round to see if she’s distracting you from a police marksman. Lee Rigby was wearing a sweater that showed a picture of a soldier being stretchered away with his thumbs up. There’s a poster for the myth and reality of the job. You can tell his murderers were psychos; they left the body on a double red line. The killers’ travel history is being analysed to find out how they got radicalised – I’m not sure whether that includes ‘going to the newsagent’. People got off the bus near the attack to see what murderers looked like, as that bus hadn’t run a night service for a while.

Nigel Farage said it was terrible this happened on the ‘peaceful streets of South London’. Is he taking the piss? The police had to push their way past two stabbings and a shooting just to make the arrest.

It’s interesting when people discuss whether a crime was motivated by religion or mental illness, as if those were two different things. Police found the training manual they used for the attack. George Michael’s autobiography. The video of the jihadist ranting is going to be one of the toughest ever for Alex Zane to link to on the next series of
Rude Tube
. If it’s an eye for an eye, who replaces the finger you blew off your own hand, you idiot? The killer said ‘in our land’ women see beheadings daily. In Lincolnshire? Are they still executing the left-handed? Still, thank God we held on to that Olympic feelgood factor.

The EDL, who named themselves after the way they text spell the word England, staged a drunken protest. I noticed the EDL rioters seemed to be covering their faces up. That’s a bit Muslim of them. I think the EDL wanted to make a point about Muslims not respecting British law, and what better way to do that than to fight the police? Attacking a mosque in revenge for this murder makes as much sense as attacking JD Sports in revenge for Jimmy Savile. Muslim communities have to denounce these killings because they’re so rare. If rich white guys had to denounce every death in their name they’d never get anything done.

We’ve got to the stage where ‘asylum seeker’ is an insult, whilst the government debates the vagaries of the term ‘rape porn’. ‘Asylum seeker’ means you will be killed if you go home. And not in the ‘I’ve had an extra pint after work’ sense, though in some countries it will be because they had the pint, or went to work. ‘Asylum seeker’ is an insult and ‘WAG’ is a compliment. We have more sympathy for a woman whose husband might miss a header than for a woman whose husband might be missing his head.