Richard Littlejohn. Because he's still a little cunt

Still a cunt, exploiting an national disaster to have a go at some football stuff.Image by radiothings.com via FlickrI tried, Mr Littlejohn. I really tried to leave you alone, in the corner, spouting your ill-reasoned hate. But then, you had to go and be even more bigoted than usual, didn't you? Well, here we go again.

 So, who does our dear friend Dick go after in his beloved column this time? A funny-looking immigrant? A health and safety inspector who doesn't like British cheese? A black man who raped a cat? No. This time, he turns his bigoted, stupid gaze over the whole of Japan! (Original article here)

 As you surely know, Japan recently had a spell of bad luck. Mr Littlejohn, in an attempt to give hope that he may be a decent person, starts of with an adequate 2 paragraphs:

"No one with a shred of humanity can fail to be moved by some of the pictures coming out of Japan, whether an elderly woman being rescued from the rubble or frightened, bewildered schoolchildren waiting in vain for parents who will never return. 

The devastation is on a biblical scale. Comparisons have been drawn with the dropping of the atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki."

Yes. It is a terrible thing, isn't it? Now, a decent person would stop talking. A decent person would offer sympathy. A decent person wouldn't,  66 years after the end of WW2, mention the war. But no, that's what Mr. Littlejohn does. Because - remember - the Japanese army were dicks. That's true, of course. But it doesn't really have a bearing on the modern Japanese man or woman. Our sympathy, I believe, should extend to those bewildered schoolchildren, regardless of what their great-grandfathers - most likely dead, unmet by said children - did in the past.

Of course, under the guise of a dead relative, our heroic author manages to justify us having a go at some foreign types as their country undergoes a nation tragedy. Let's rip the piss out of the little cunt, shall we?

It is wrong to visit the sins of previous generations on their modern descendants (very true. Why not say something stupid next?), although that doesn’t prevent the British Left constantly trying to make us feel guilty for centuries-old grievances, from the slave trade to the Irish potato famine (Erm... Ok, yea. I'm not sure what you think the average left-wing person thinks about, but I for one don't spend all my time planning revenge on the blight itself...).  Yet many surviving members of the Burma Star Association still harbour deep animosity to everyone and all things Japanese, 65 years after VJ Day. (Yes. It is understandable why they feel this way, but that doesn't make it right.) 

They won’t want to be associated with the expressions of sympathy over the earthquake and tsunami. And who can blame them? (I, for one. Again - understand where their prejudice streams from. But if you're saying that it is fine for these people to not sympathise for dead children, then you're a moron. And did you do any research? Did you check what the official stance of the Burma Star Association is? Because all I can see on their website is a comment on their forum, where one guy calls it karma. And frankly, whatever happened to him during the war, he's still wrong. Dead children are dead children, regardless of what colour they are)

Like thousands of other British servicemen who were tortured in Japanese prisoner-of-war camps, my wife’s late grandfather, Harold Tuck, would never have joined a minute’s silence for Japan. (He might have. Did you contact him via a medium to ask?) 

Until the day he died, Harold would refuse to remove his shirt, not even on the beach on the hottest day of the year. The scars inflicted by his sadistic Japanese captors were too horrible to be exposed to the harsh light of day. (Yes. That is shit. It shouldn't have happened to anyone. But why should that make it all right that Japan had an earthquake and got hit by a Tsunami?)

Were he alive today, he would have remained doggedly in his seat if requested to stand in silent tribute to the dead of Japan. (Ok. Nice to know. For someone you evidently admire, you're not exactly painting a hugely flattering portrait)

I often wonder what our fathers and grandfathers would have made of modern Britain’s ghastly cult of sentimentality and vicarious grief. (Well, I've got both, and they're more upset by the ghastly tsunami and the cost it reaped in human lives, to be honest.) 

Ever since the hysteria surrounding the death of Lady Di, when half of the nation seemed to take leave of its senses, a section of the population seizes any excuse for a sobfest. (Really? This is just a series of unconnected thoughts, isn't it? Where are you going with this? 10,000 people are dead, and you exploit that to complain about people being upset? They have a right to be upset. You do not dictate people's emotions, and you have no right to criticise decent human beings for showing empathy to the grief of others.)Showing ‘respect’ has become institutionalised. Before every one of the weekend’s Premier League football matches, for instance, fans were forced to stand and observe a minute’s silence for Japan. Why? (I doubt they were forced, they could have stayed sitting if they wanted. And why not? Are you so busy that you can't afford a minute to show respect for your fellow man? Perhaps you're writing another of your novels. They're more important that 100,000 children uprooted from their homes.)

I have no objection to honouring the dead in public (Yes you do, you just had a go at it), if the occasion or sense of loss warrants it (Ah, then you'll surely follow this statement up by giving an example of an event far more tragic than the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami). At White Hart Lane we’ve recently said goodbye to some of the stars of Spurs’ double-winning side from the Sixties. There was genuine sadness over the loss of men many in the crowd had known personally. (You fucking arrogant little piece of shit. You have no idea how anyone feels. Just because you don't care much that 10,000 people are dead, and 12,000 more missing, it doesn't mean everyone else shares your heartless point of view.)

But how many of the hundreds of thousands of supporters corralled into grieving for Japan could even point to that country on a map? (Wow, probably a lot. I'm surprised you've now changed tack to mock the intelligence of football fans, it seems to have come from nowhere. Then again, I'm unsure if you have much of a central narrative here, apart from the fact we shouldn't care what happens to slanty-eyed foreign types)

Like most monsters, the Premier League has a sickening streak of sentimentality. (Again. You're using the loss tragedy of millions to have a go at the Premier League? How do you even justify this to yourself? And you used the words "monsters" and "sickening". There. In a sentence where, having exploited the deaths of thousands, you dismiss their suffering as insignificant compared to the painful torture good white people must suffer under the hands of the evil Premier League.) Barely a week passes without yet another minute’s silence before kick-off (It's a minute. A fucking minute, spent in quiet reflection on the worth of human life. Is that too much for you to sacrifice?). Soon every club will have to employ professional mourners in black tailcoats and top hats to lead the teams out onto the pitch. Replica shirts will come complete with black arm bands. (Well, if you say so.)

There is nothing more meaningless than seeing highly-paid, precocious superstars linking arms and standing in silent tribute to victims of an earthquake on the other side of the world. (This column is more meaningless, actually. For one thing, I'd like to think those footballers aren't as big a cunt as you, and if it encourages people to reflect on the lives and thoughts of others, then maybe the world will become a little better.)The spectacle of a giant furry mascot dressed as a chicken bowing his head in mourning is beyond preposterous (Well, ok. You have a point, maybe he should stay inside for that bit). It is football’s equivalent of those teddy bears you see tied to railings at the scene of every road accident. (Yes! Let's have a go at some more people showing sympathy! Ha, stupid children dying in car accidents!) 

Of course, there is a commercial incentive here for the Premier League. No doubt the Japanese TV rights are up for renegotiation soon (No doubt? But you haven't actually researched this 'fact', have you? I googled it, I don't think the rights go up for sale again until 2013. I could be wrong though, I only spent 10 seconds looking on the internet. Which is 10 seconds more research than you). 

But why Japan and not, say, those massacred in Rwanda or starved to death by Mugabe in Zimbabwe (You're free to set up a minute's silence to commemmorate those people. I think it would be a worthy cause, and it would be nice for you to do something good with your pathetic little life)? I don’t remember a minute’s silence for Haiti, although I may be mistaken (You are.). I’m sure we didn’t have a minute’s silence for our earthquake-hit Commonwealth cousins in Christchurch, New Zealand, before the Milan game. Maybe we did. (There was certainly a minute's silence. I don't know if it was before the Milan game though, becuase I don't assossiate nation disasters with their effects on football)

These days we’d have a minute’s silence if Harry Redknapp’s dog got run over. (No. I doubt it.)I abhor the modern tendency to co-opt every tragedy in the world as an excuse for a self-indulgent display of cost-free compassion. (But you're fine with exploiting tragedies, using them as an excuse to spout bile at things that annoy you. What is this column, except self-indulgence?)

Sam Kirkpatrick (Hi Sam!), a reader from Stanwick, Northamptonshire, saw a woman taking part in a road race this weekend wearing a T-shirt imploring spectators to: ‘Pray for the Japanese people.’ 

The implication being: not just that she was advertising the fact that she is a caring soul, but if you don’t pray for Japan you must be a heartless bastard. (Well, I don't believe in God. But the sentiment is nice. So, from a humanist persective, I think that yes - not at least hoping for the best for the innocent Japanese people suffering in this tragedy does make you a heartless bastard. If you believed in prayer, how long would it take you to ask the big man for a favour on their behalf? A few seconds? But again, you can't spare that time. You're a busy man, aren't you?)

By all means pray for Japan, if you are so inclined, but do it privately. (Or publically. I don't care, I like the thought people care for other people myself) 

Do you think the Japanese held a silent tribute for the victims of the London Transport bombings in 2005 (Maybe. Probably wasn't such a big thing for them. Does that make it ok to not care they're dead.)? Me neither. Meanwhile, they are getting on with the business of mourning their own dead and beginning the process of reconstruction. In Tokyo, life goes on pretty much normally. (Then why not get on with your life as normal, instead of having a go at people?)

Caroline Graham reported from the Japanese capital in the Mail on Sunday. A businessman told her that reports of panic and chaos were greatly exaggerated.‘Here in Japan we are more like the British with their stiff upper lip.’It only goes to show that the Japanese know as little about modern Britain as we know about them. (Well, that report was from the Mail on Sunday. So I distrust it out of hand)

So there we have it. I don't really know what the point of that piece was. I imagine Littlejohn's supporters will see it as a brave, brilliant blow against an imposed grief culture. But I imagine it would be rather easy to oppose a grief culture without being so narrow-minded and bigoted as Mr. Littlejohn's column. What exactly had the Japanese war record got to do with anything, except as a pathetic attempt to justify not showing compassion for the suffering of our fellow man? What about the Premier League - is Mr. Littlejohn so outraged at the idea of a minute's silence that he feels justified in ranking such a display alongside the Tōhoku earthquake?