There’s no Such Thing as Punk Rockers with Flowers in their Hair
Dorothy Parker: Don’t ever spill her pintBeing nice. Such an overrated virtue, isn’t it? Nice guys finish last, they say. Except if you’re a Big Brother contestant, where nice guys win, but the odds against a nice guy getting picked to go in the house are so small that the audience end up having to choose the least objectionable person to win.
Nice is boring, and being nice is even more tedious. Especially when you don’t mean it. I find that I am at a point in life where I am having to be terribly nice just to get by unscathed. I can’t wait til I receive my orders from the Queen on my sixtieth birthday to let loose and tell the world what I really think of them. Bring old age on- then you’re all going to know about it. My gran was an absolute beezer at being cutting and scathing in her final years- I am gearing up in anticipation of the genes kicking in.
Being not nice is so much more fun, and it gets you noticed. This is the advice that all those “Make your blog super popular” sites fail to mention. It is the simple secret to writing success; just slag someone off. The Guardian today has an article about all the bitchy columnists that are getting paid through the turned up nostril to be horrible about people. Manda Platell, Carol Malone et al follow in a long line of female columnists who became successful because they pulled no punches when it came to giving someone a good old verbal drubbing. Dorothy Parker, anyone? They may all die friendless but wow, what a reputation!
Closer to home my old radio chum Andrew Learmonth, possibly one of nicest people you could meet, is getting a whole lot of attention because in his local newspaper column he tried to be nice about the music of Sandi Thom but in the end he very apologetically found that he just couldn’t. He didn’t and doesn’t like her music. Fair dos. I too, am not a fan so much. The fact that she hails from a town not far from mine won’t change that. Somethings you like, some you don’t.
Ms Thom, presumably on googling herself, found the offending article by Andrew about her music and his dislike thereof. She didn’t much like his declaration of his individual taste and decided to make sure he’d never so much as pop his head round the door of whichever village hall she’ll be playing in the future. In her blog post about him she (gasp) even made fun of the fact that he had lost his Original 106 radio show (the one which I also contributed to and which many people miss terribly). It pains me to say that the woman who wrote the genius zeitgeisty lyrics of “I wish I was a punk rocker with flowers in my hair” which delighted old hippies, musical historians and ex-punks alike, failed to use the full range of her vocabulary when she penned a song she wrote for Andrew in response. In her musical tribute which may or may not be called “Fuck you Andrew Learmonth” the word “fuck” is used prolifically to what can only be described as “The Gordon Ramsay Effect”. Click here to listen, but for gawd’s sake don’t tell her I sent you! (And get the kids out of the room first.)
Still for Andrew the news is good. He wasn’t so nice but oh, the publicity! And then some! As a stand up comedian he must be loving the attention.
Clearly slagging people off is the way to go. I am, as we speak, writing a host of columns:
“No that Isn’t Bloody Ironic, Alanis Morrisette! Please Learn How to use the English Language Properly”,
“Paris Hilton. What Is It You Actually DO, Again?”
“Say No to that Second Sandwich, Ms Beth Ditto” and
“Get Over Yourself Dannii Minogue, You’ll Never Be Kylie. Live With It” .
I await the resultant backlash.
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