My, my, my Britannia: The Value of Nothing

I did not want to post this today because I felt it inappropriate to give publicity to the barking mad patriots on Holocaust Memorial Day; a time when intolerance is one of the matters to be remembered.


The Daily Mail (in its online version at least) gave little or no mention to this commemoration. Perhaps the fact that the Muslim Association of Britain had reversed its boycott this year, there was no mileage in the story. Such an omission merely gives strength to the argument that the Mail continues to march along an anti-semitic, anti-immigrant, anti-gypsy and anti-liberal track.
In my main post, I have inserted a Youtube performance of Christy Moore singing Yellow Triangle based on the poem by Martin Niemoller. The words seem apposite given the Mail's slant on life. I looked out for mention of Holocaust Memorial Day in the Mail but came there none. Then I looked for comments to warm the soul, but again, came there none.

One of the interesting aspects of subjecting oneself to daily perusal of ill-informed comments on the DM site, is that whilst there are people with too much time on their hands (pots, kettles I know) who regularly post the same old garbage (step forward John, Tendring; Jacqui Weems, Olderbird, Karen ex-pat, USA) some stories attract larger amounts of comments. Sometimes, it is not what is commented on, but what isn't commented on. For instance, if an immigrant is assaulted (and unusually it makes the paper) there is likely to be no comments.

Yet, on HMD, the Mail is leading a campaign to fight the fascism of............changing the 50p design! How many people could possibly be interested in this? Five, Seven, the inhabitants of Barking? At this time there are 342 comments. So what's this Brown chappie up to now to cause so much distress to the intellectual readers? Still have the will to live? Then, read on....

Brown banishes 300-year-old tradition by removing Britannia from our 50p coin

By Jove, as Ken Dodd would say, he's really gone and done it now! Let's explore more.

(Whilst researching this I noticed that the article had also been pasted onto Stormfront's site (I won't link to the neanderthals of white supremacy but to give a flavour - one Mensa member said, "Just had a bet with my missus that we,ll have a black streak in the union flag within five years if Labour stay in . Any takers ?"
Nice. Cannot even find the apostrophe key on his keyboard!
The title is based on the fact that Stoke City sing Delilah by Tom Jones! and play at the Britannia Stadium. I envisage site hits from BNP and Stoke City supporters)

• The move is a personal embarrassment to Mr Brown, because at the time he made the decision, he was emphasising his sense of "Britishness" as part of efforts to appear a fitting occupant of Downing Street.

Notice that 'Britishness' means (to a Mail reader) anything non-foreign, yet here they are rallying to the cause of a Roman symbol from 2000 years ago which took about 1700 years to appear on coins. This is the standard hypocrisy of Mail Land residents: despise everything foreign yet holiday, reside, buy goods from abroad.

A Treasury spokesman said: "As people will see when the new Mint run is issued, the chosen designs represent the best traditions of British coinage and are totally in line with the Government's desire to celebrate our British heritage, including our historic national and heraldic emblems.

"The traditional Britannia design and other traditional designs will return in future mint runs.

So there we have the usual spolier to the headline; not that our usual suspects read more than the headline. Witness the amount of comments about the Queen not being informed. Not to mention the barmy logic of criticising Brown for being unelected whilst worshiping a hereditary head of state and talking of democracy without the slightest understanding of the British Constitution. Ho hum.

Also, by stating that the design will return, this seems to call into question the suitability of the use of the word banish unless it is meant in the Napoleonic sense. Further on the story uses the phrase, abolition of Britannia. Can't have it both ways. Pastor Niemoller's words are ingrained on me; perhaps they may (with a little re-working) help us here.

First they came for the ex-pats:

Refuse to accept the 'revised' (devalued) 50p coin in your change...insist on using only the 50p with Britannia.

Is there nothing this government won't destroy.

Is there no way of protesting about this - or is it a case of 'we know what's best'....Pity they didn't lose the discs containing this 'improved' design.

- Anne Smith, Lot-et-Garonne, France

Then they came for the racists:

The Nu Labor Socialist Dictatorship has nearly destroyed this country completely, so I guess they might as well take all traces of Britishness out of our coins too! Soon the indigenous white people will be put in concentration camps so our homes can be vacated for the immigrants!

- David Browning, Bolton, Lancashire, England

How deranged and twisted do you have to be to equate a non-permanent change of design on a low denomination coin to a Socialist dictatorship and Nazism. Given the day on which this was posted, this makes the comment even more emetic. What's the betting our Notlob friend is a BNP knuckle-scraper?

Why am I not surprised? What will they replace it with, A Gypsy Caravan?

- Ian, Whitby, England

Then they came for the stupid:

Get rid of Brown now. What right does a Scot or any one person have to alter our English currency?

- B.C., Steyning, West Sussex

So the 50p is not legal tender in Scotland then? B.C. perhaps indicative of the last time this person had a rational thought worth sharing with someone other than their budgie.

I have sat here 10 minutes but still cannot find the words that describe (or you could print) what I think of this unelected idiot of a PM he makes me feel ashamed that I have Scottish ancestors in fact for the first time in my life (67years) I feel ashamed to be English when abroad.

- David., Rushden. U.K.

The Nu-Lab communists destroyed our culture, and replaced it with a multicultural nightmare, where half the people don't even speak English! So I guess they might as well destroy our coins also!

- Ingrid Ribe, Essex, England

Then they came for the downright irritating, usual suspects:

Brown is an unelected PM and therefore anything he approves HAS TO BE illegal. Get rid of the man Britain, please get rid of him - he and his fools are destroying my once Great Country.

- Karen, ex pat USA

McBean-The-Unelected's project to destroy this country will be complete when President Bliar's face replaces our Monarch's on coins and paper money.

- Lickyalips, Richmond, Surrey

"People fight for symbols, for flags, because they represent in a small way the big things that matter to us".

But not Gordon Mc Bean apparently. Each action and decision he takes confirms that he is a traitor. Get him out.

- Peter Pan, Great Britain


As we can see the most important matter on this significant day is a trivial non-story cloaked in the usual Mail smoke-and-mirrors quotes. I'd like to be in the queue when the idiot from France tries to demand a real 50p coin in change. Of course, as we all know, the 50p is regularly altered and Britannia is replaced by a commemorative feature (see here)

I noticed that a giant of the academic world on the racist Stormfront site found it funny that his friend asked for a replacement for the £2 coin commemorating the abolition of slavery. Kinda gives a true sense of where the DM's heart lies. Cunningly, it allows its members to fire the bullets, but it supplies the arms. Not all Mail readers are extreme; some just buy it for the TV and crossword.

However, in closing for the prosecution, I submit that the Mail allows its commenters to provide the finishing touches to the make-up of its public face. As we know that they filter comments made to suit their agenda, they have to take full responsibility for the general views seen on Planet Mail.

In a corner of some foreign field.....

The xenophobes at The Daily Mail are usually best ignored. Its chief stirrer of anti-foreigner bile is the ex-pats' pin-up, Richard Littlejohn. He may make Jeremy Clarkeson look erudite and incisive, but this is the 'belle' of the DM columnists' ball, and he attracts a massive salary to toss off (make your own jokes here) a few hundred words of regurgitated twaddle. What is amazing is that he always brings out comments from his acolytes, most of whom seem to think he should be Prime Minister. Either he writes the comments himself, or there are some serious flaws in our policy of allowing the mentally ill access to the web.

The actual columns themselves are irrelevant; they are all much of a muchness. He appears to google for a story of 'political correctness gone mad' and then uses it to pad out his templated stock phrases and themes. 'Foreigners bad, EU badder, PC thought police, 'elf and safety', stealth taxes on poor motorists, Guardianistas, Tony Bliar (sic), Call Me Dave Cameron.' A monkey could do it. Maybe that's George Bush's next assignment when he leaves office.

Today's masterpiece manages to combine this mistrust of foreigners with an attack on British policing. Sort of PCs being too PC. 'If you think Portuguese police are bad.......' etc

Take this tasteful gem on the McCann investigation:

"Imagine if Maddie had gone missing from a seaside boarding house in Llandudno.
By now the McCanns would have been subjected to random breath tests and their hire car would have been clamped.
After being forced to fill in a 20-page questionnaire about their ethnicity and sexuality, Brunstrom would be offering them counselling, free heroin and suntan lotion.
The only way a kidnapper would have been caught was if he'd been nicked for speeding or pulled over for eating an apple at the wheel. "

This in a newspaper that has lambasted other reports in the media as disgusting. Littlejohn (a favourite of far-right groups) is said to have distanced himself from the BNP by describing them as 'knuckle craping Neanderthals'. If the cap fits.......

Then there is the twisted story of a hospital banning knitting needles. Except that they haven't. They have put them behind a reception area where people can ask for them. Sensible?

What about his loyal band of cult followers:

Those mischievous elves from 'Elfin Safety' are at it again! I can appreciate their concern, because a knitting needle could impale a little elf! Ban wool as well, a wee elf could choke on it! While we are at it, ban pens, pencils, forks, knives, spoons and sniffer dogs, which could swallow a tiny elf whole! I sure am glad I no longer live in the United Kingdom of Elves!- A.M., Australia

Our friend in Oz tries to curry favour by chanting the RL mantra......Elfin safety...ommmmm. I'm sure glad you're not in the UK too, A.M.

A good yarn, Richard, unlike that from the nits at Elf 'n' Leprechauns 'n' Safety! It is almost as funny as Firefighters in Lancashire being given free Polish classes and issued with Polish phrase cards! - Charlotte Browning, Bolton, Lancashire, England

What a wit! Are you related to Robert and Elizabeth perchance? Maybe next time she will give her full address....England, Great Britain, The World, etc...Just reminded me of that Hugh Grant film.

You are 100% correct, Richard! The police cannot find Madeleine, yet they can spot somebody doing one mile over the speed limit! The HELF 'House-Elf Liberation Front'(Harry Potter) brigade really needled me by banning purling, yet MRSA is a politically correct condition! It's a pity the NHS staff don't wash their hands like the politicians, who washed their hands of the people long ago!- Sam, Manchester, UK

I'm not sure this makes any sense at all......which police Sam?

Richard,I am a serving soldier and everytime I return home to Britain, I see the changes that are ruining so called Gt Britain. Many of the soldiers I know have had enough and are doing what your police friend is doing and that is emigrating. The Guardinistas will only be happy when the only group of people left in the land are the ones who believe in their ideology! Going to hell in a handcart? Only if you live in Britain! Keep up the good work, even though they couldn't give a monkeys.- Steve Brown, Ashford, England.

This is one of those posts that makes me think they are not genuine. Too many phrases there...Guardianistas....Hell in a handcart (RL's book of excrement)...Great? Britain. Migration is only OK if British people do it.

I find it so depressing that what you write is true! As one who has left the country largely because of government policies, the waste of tax pounds, the sheer lack of common sense applied by various institutions, I am glad to be out of it.Don't get me wrong, Spain has its faults but it would be hard to imagine it getting away with the kinds of things all three parties seem to want to impose on the British. As for the EU it appears to take the bits it wants and forgets the rest, unlike the UK which adheres slavishly to every new dictat!- Sandra, Spain

Sandra left the country because of Government policy affecting the weather and Sangria prices. At least in Spain you can read the Daily Mail, see Premiership football, have an all day breakfast, drink in the John Bull pub and not have to speak to foreigners.

Spot on as usual Richard. As for global warming, bring it on, we may get a decent summer.- John Phillips, Derby

John thinks he is the first person to make this joke. He is probably the one in the Brunswick Inn pub in Derby who makes the same comment when they have brews from the Titanic Brewery. 'Bet this one goes down well!' Maybe you should move to Sandra's place.

Every day more and more British people are arriving in the region where I now live. All of them cite the same reasons for leaving - the education system, the NHS, crime and multiculturalism. We no longer feel at home in our own country. It has been taken over by unrepresentative and undemocratic politicians and their "placemen".The writing is on the wall. Within 20 years there will be such a change in the UK that it will no longer be our country. Just take a trip into London or central Birmingham and you will see what I mean.I fear for the younger genrations of British kids. They are being dispossessed of their birthright.- Geoff M, Brittany, France.

What a nasty piece of filth. This is a thinly veiled racist attack. We all know what is meant by the comments about Brmingham and London. Then there is the delicious irony of him writing from Brittany! You couldn't make it up.

Bloody immigrants coming to France, drinking our wine....etc. If anyone knows Geoff M in Brittany, please try not to point at him in the rue. He does not realise how pathetic he is.

At last, it's taken someone like RL to put the record straight on this one. Whatever the Portuguese police may or may not have done in this case, you can be certain that unlike the UK plod, they are on the streets dealing with day to day crime in an efficient manner. In fact in most EU countries the Local Police are employed and run by the elected party residing at the town hall and are accountable to the local people. In this manner, police are a common sight on the streets rather than the endangered species that we don't see in England.

Mike, Alicante, Spain

What will they ban next? Will they ban us eating with knives and forks? Perhaps chop-sticks will have to go too! We could all eat Indian style,with our hands; then they'd worry about the china plates, so it would be over to paper plates etc. Where is all this politically correct nonsense going to end? Richard Littlejohn is a breath of fresh air - he is my favourite columnist by far!- Wendy, Alicante, Spain

On behalf of decent Brits I apologise to anyone from Alicante. You seem to attract our bigoted peasants. Wasn't the comment about eating with hands reminiscent of the dim-wit Danielle's snide remarks about Shilpa Shetty in Big Brother? Beware of any bars named Mike and Wendy's when on holiday in Alicante!

The DM was not the only paper to twist this non-story. I was upset with the Mirror over this too.

The problem is that these stories become fact. Nobody seems to read beyond the headline. It is part of the old adage of not letting the facts get in the way of a good story.

Finally, the article does have a serious error (apart from the content) in that the final story about the knitting needles has had the wrong paragraph added to it. It doesn't make sense as it refers to the earlier attack on car taxes. None of his fans have commented. Either they are too thick to see it, or they just post regardless of what the little man writes.