I don’t suppose the actor Emma Thompson did herself any favours to the ‘Remain in the EU’ campaign by announcing that Britain was like living in “a tiny little cloud-bolted, rainy corner of sort-of Europe … a cake-filled misery-laden grey old island.” The Sun has really gone to town on her today, dragging out all manner of loony right wing MPs and a Ukip supporter who wishes to “spank her silly little bottom.” ‘Champagne socialist left wing luvvie” yells Rupert Murdoch’s ugly little organ. Okay, she is a Champagne socialist, just like many of the chattering classes who support Jeremy Corbyn, but how wrong was she?
The Sun spent many years “doing Britain down”, as they might accuse Thompson of doing, and I seem to remember it also spent years repeating David Cameron’s vacuous rhetoric about ‘Broken Britain’. And like the Mail, the Sun is always out there with the so called big story, pointing out how everyone is on the scrounge, that nothing works and that this country is going to the dogs, trying, it always seemed to me, to make us feel bad about ourselves and our country.
I have never heard the term ‘cloud-bolted’ but I am guessing it means cloudy and Britain is cloudy, always has been. It rains a lot too, always has done. And people moan about the weather, always have done. Thompson moves onto more dubious ground when called it a ‘misery-laden grey old island’ but perhaps that’s the people she mixes with. Grey, yes (see above), old island, yes, but misery-laden? Only if you believe what you read in the newspapers, Emma.
On a daily basis, almost everyone I come across is not laden with misery. On the contrary, I see people doing good things, from being with their families to doing good work for others. We’re not always shiny happy people holding hands, but I am puzzled by the assertion that we’re always the exact opposite. I’d say that we are somewhere in the middle. And I don’t think we, as Brits, are unique in this fashion.
But what if she was joking and it’s just that the Sun – or me – who didn’t get it? Words often sound very different than they appeared when written. Put an inflection or emphasis somewhere else in a sentence and words can have more meanings. If you drop a pint of beer on the floor and say, “Oh great!” it might not necessarily mean that you really mean it was great, what with all that broken glass and, worse still, spilled beer. Or if the car brakes down and you sigh, “That’s just what I needed. Brilliant.” This is what is technically known as irony and being pissed off. And that’s literally true.
Of course, the Sun has picked up on Thompson’s words because Rupert Murdoch wants the British public to leave the EU. He will not be wanting us to leave for our own benefit but for his business. He has strong political views about how this country should be, despite now being an American citizen. Thompson’s words will be there to ‘prove’ that it’s multimillionaire luvvies who want to stay in Europe and that Murdoch knows best.
Personally, I will not be allowing Rupert Murdoch to influence the way I vote. Nor will I allow Lord Rothermere, porn baron Richard Desmond, Nigel Farage and his Ukip fruitcakes, Iain Duncan Smith, John Redwood and the 57 varieties of Trotskyist hardliners to persuade me from my view that leaving the EU would be an economic catastrophe for Britain, or rather England because a no vote would certainly herald the break up of the UK.
None of this is even being debated so far with nothing but arguments about immigration, immigration and…oh yes…immigration, funnily enough one of the Sun’s favourite hobby horses.
Thompson’s biggest mistake was to have an opinion at all, in the eyes of the vermin who own and edit our tabloid newspapers. To my mind, her comments were inconsequential in that they are no more relevant to the coming referendum than the views of anyone else. That a fuss has been made of her words tells you all about a country where a free press is something you dream about but something we no longer have, if we ever had one at all.
The Sun wants Thompson to shut her cake hole because she spoke out of line and certainly against Murdoch’s political agenda. And the only way to deal with the likes of her and anyone else who holds an alternative view is abuse. Rupert doesn’t know any other way.
