Prepare the vocabulary in the first ten paragraphs
I recognise it. I’ve done it myself. But the PM is just a Scot losing his temper
— with good reason
So Gordon Brown has gone from Joseph Stalin to Mr Bean and now to Gripper
Stebson. Andrew Rawnsley’s flinch-and-tell revelations have been a great source
of fun this week. I particularly enjoyed the intervention of the National
Bullying Helpline. I find it hard to respect this organisation, largely because
no one who works there has realised that they desperately need an “anti” or a
“prevention” somewhere in their title. One wonders how many misled bullies have
called them up asking for tips on demanding dinner money with menaces, or
requesting a factsheet on the Chinese burn.
I’m sure the organisation’s founder, Christine Pratt, who is large, ginger,
wears glasses and is called Pratt, knows a fair bit about being bullied, but she
didn’t help anyone this week. When she seemingly grassed up the civil servants
who’d asked her organisation for assistance, she couldn’t even get the facts
straight.
Consequently, poor Ms Pratt became a figure of fun. Phil Woolas, the Immigration
Minister, led the assault by calling her “this prat of a woman”. Yes, he
cleverly spotted that her surname could be used as a term of abuse. Amazingly,
Pratt had no quickfire comeback for this. It surely can’t have been the first
time she’d faced that particular line of attack. I really wish she’d given a
gutsy example to the bullied of this nation by putting the opportunistic Woolas
in his place. Maybe she could have fought fire with fire and pointed out that
“Phil Woolas” is what you do when sodomising a sheep. Instead, she let the bully
go unchallenged.
As for the charges against Mr Brown, they don’t seem to indicate bullying at
all. Every bully has a target, someone they’ve identified as weak and
vulnerable. Mr Brown had no target. The only consistent victim of his rage seems
to have been a car passenger seat.
Mr Brown railed against the universe. In the Rawnsley extracts, the Prime
Minister comes across like a Shakespearean tragic hero. At one point, after he
discovers the police are to investigate potentially unlawful party donations, Mr
Brown says: “For this to happen to me, it eats my soul.” That’s fantastic. It’s
like King Lear in the storm. I wanted Peter Mandelson to appear at his side,
call him Nuncle and lead him to shelter.
And what about these poor aides and civil servants who, Rawnsley says, fell
victim to the PM’s rage? When Bob Shrum was discovered to have recycled bits
from the speeches of Al Gore and Bill Clinton to use in Mr Brown’s speeches, was
the PM not entitled to go properly ballistic? I used writers on the latter
series of the TV chat show I used to do. If one of them had recycled a joke and
sold it to me as an original, they’d have been out on their ear. Mr Brown also
went crazy when told that a civil servant had mislaid two computer disks
containing the personal and banking details of 20 million people. Quite right
too. Was he supposed to just tut and say, “Never mind”?
When I was doing that chat show I got a reputation for being difficult to work
with. I introduced a ritual whereby people who’d messed up, including myself,
had to raise their hand and say: “I’m sorry, I made a mistake.” Then everyone
else would applaud. I think some people saw this as a humiliation. I never
shouted or threw things but I did use withering sarcasm as a weapon. I’m not
proud of that, but trying to make a funny TV show, week after week, can be a
high-pressure activity.
My moods weren’t really about anger; they were about fear — fear of failure and
the resulting ridicule. I’ve always said that when I get to the pearly gates, I
hope St Peter will offer a special dispensation for show-days. Well, if I got
stroppy because someone didn’t get the right video clip to enhance my Westlife
interview, how mad is Gordon Brown entitled to get when someone’s cock-up makes
it even harder for him to run the country?
It seems to me he’s a rough-hewn, passionate Scotsman who really cares about the
job. People respect Sir Alex Ferguson and Gordon Ramsay for that, so why not the
PM? Personally, I’ve been more impressed by these tales of the volcanic Brown
than I was by his teeth-and-tears performance on the Piers Morgan show. I prefer
him as the god of thunder.
I
did a bit of bullying at school. I wasn’t big enough for the physical stuff.
Instead, I provided a sort of mocking Greek chorus for the bullies as they fell
upon their prey. I wasn’t quite part of the bully gang — more of an
artist-in-residence. Now I realise that my verbal attack was at least as bad as
the physical bullying. Derisive words can really rip the self-respect and
confidence out of someone.
So any journalists, politicians or, indeed, comedians who condemn Mr Brown for
his supposed bullying should consider how they’ve verbally bullied him. Has he
not, despite his undeniable work ethic, been the butt of every joke? Has he not
provided the weak and vulnerable target that every bully needs? Shouting,
throwing newspapers and punching passenger seats is small fry compared with
mounting a relentlessly scornful character assassination. Surely the latter
constitutes bullying. If only there was some sort of helpline for Mr Brown to
call
From
February 26, 2010