Joe Kinnear

This Week I’ve…(20th October 2008)

This week I’ve…

…watched England play Belarus on a contraband Setanta Sports card

…listened to Oasis’ “Bag It Up”

…read loads of reports about Humanism and the ‘religion or belief’ equalities strand

…laughed at Emily watching ‘Coming of Age’ on BBC3 – and it was definitely an age thing !!!

…despaired at yet another ‘FAIR-like’ disagreement over payment for work undertaken

…had hope about getting away with swearing based on Joe Kinnear’s suggestion that it was because of our ‘culture and identity’

…been completely random about thinking that it might be a good idea to get back into football coaching – but then coming to my senses again !!!

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Swearing: It’s part of my identity, my culture – or so says Joe !!!

Anyone who knows me reasonably well will know that I like to swear.

In fact, I have been known to describe the word ‘fuck’ as the best word in the English language given that it is immediately recognisable and can be used across a multitude of scenarios to emphasis and intensify meaning or merely provide a more edgier gasp. It can also be used in a more loving (sexual?) context also, but that I would suggest is more open to personal taste and interpretation than anything else. Am I right in believing that it is also one of the most searched words on Google – fact fans, let me know.

Because of this, I was interested to read about Joe Kinnear’s ‘swear-a-thon’ at Newcastle United Football Club a few weeks ago and how it was subsequently dealt with in the media. Whilst I was far from offended or outraged, many others were, to the point that he has since been reprimanded by the Football Association (FA).

But whether Kinnear was right or wrong, and overlooking the myriad debates about issues of professionalism and responsibility, I am – to use a football cliche – ‘over the moon’ with Joe’s comments today. In trying to justify his 52 swear word outburst in just under 5 minutes, Kinnear said:

It’s the language I have grown up with…I’m not trying to be something I’m not. I grew up on a council estate in Watford.

He went on:

I come from a one-parent family. My dad died when I was young and my mum brought up five on a council estate…
…There were things that had to be said and I don’t know how to say them any other way than to tell them straight how it is

In many ways, I agree with Kinnear. Swearing was very much a part of my family and because of this, a significant part of my upbringing also. Almost all family members would ‘eff and blind’ (slang for swearing) and because of this, swearing became the norm with little attention being attributed to it. Consequently, hearing someone swear now, neither offends me nor makes me feel that such language should be curbed. However, there will be many others that would look down their nose at swearing (even though they do it themselves) as being indicative of someone who is ‘common’, ‘chavvy’ or ‘working class’. Might I generalise here, but these people would tend to be typically middle-class and imbued with an arrogant sense of knowing not only what was right and wrong, but also what is correct and proper. The right and proper bastions of the English language possibly.

Likewise, neither do I agree with the view put forward by some – including Kinnear himself – that the use of swear words is a symptom of a lack of intelligence. When I swear, it is because I have chosen to do so, sometimes for greater effect, sometimes just to annoy or get my message across in a more forceful or even meaningful way. It is not because I do not have the vocabulary to use alternative, potentially less useful words or phrases: I just choose not to.

So despite my critical piece a few weeks ago, ‘“It’s part of our religion…our identity…our culture”: tolerating the intolerable…???‘ questioning the motivations of those who try and justify un-tolerable actions and activities by suggesting that they are necessary and integral aspects of their ‘religion’, ‘culture’ and/or ‘identity’, I am now going to be entirely hypocritical and stand up in support of Joe Kinnear in recognising that swearing is an integral part of ‘our [my] identity…our [my] culture’ !!!

What a great excuse…!!!

This work by Chris Allen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0 UK: England & Wales License. Based on a work at www.chris-allen.co.uk.

No Offence…??? Why not…??? (Birmingham Post, Thursday 16th October 2008)

This month’s chunk for the Birmingham Post:

Should we have the right to offend?

I ask this not because I was personally offended by Joe Kinnear’s swear-a-thon. Nor even because I offended my partner by licking my knife in a restaurant. I ask because there just seems to be a lot of people getting easily offended.

Being almost twenty years since Rushdie’s ‘The Satanic Verses’ was published could it just be ‘déjà vu’? No, but there are some similarities.

I was at an event for fifty ‘leaders’ – I was included in this so use the term loosely – last week in Whitehall that sought to consider ‘security and community cohesion’ (a euphemism for extremism and terrorism, natch). Whilst many clearly focused on this, a few were voicing their plans to protest against the publication of ‘The Jewel of Medina’, a Mills and Boon-lite account of one of the Prophet Muhammad’s wives, Aisha. Possibly because of their ‘offence’ at this, they seemed to have forgotten the clear lessons learned from some of the protests that followed the Satanic Verses and Danish cartoons debacles.

A few days ago, I also read how others were ‘offended’ by a London exhibition by the artist Sarah Maples. Described as the next Tracey Emin, Maples – who was raised as a Muslim – has caused ‘offence’ by using one of her paintings – depicting a Muslim woman cradling a pig – as the advertisement for the exhibition. Maples has categorically stated that she does not want to offend arguing that her work actually explores the confusion that many young Muslims face in contemporary western society, not least about what it means to be a ‘good’ Muslim.

Given that the offices of the publishers in London of ‘The Jewel of Medina’ have already been firebombed, it seems that some of those protesting – whether against ‘The Jewel’ or Maples – have missed the irony in that their actions are also quite ‘offensive’…!!!

Which highlights the point: whilst some are ‘offended’ by knife licking, others are ‘offended’ by paintings they dislike. In this column last Christmas, I even offered help to those ‘offended’ by Christmas lights, Eid celebrations and so on. And that was because offence is entirely subjective thus rendering it entirely un-manageable.

Is being ‘offended’ therefore legitimate enough to curb freedom of speech and expression?

In the past, free speech was seen as something that was inherently good. Because of this, restrictions and limitations on free speech were viewed as the exception rather than the rule, to be wielded carefully and only in those cases where speech might cause direct harm. In fact, legislation that affords protection against those trying to harm are rightly in place.

Yet nowadays, we seem to believe that speech and activities that ‘offend’ are in some way socially damaging and so require necessary curtailment. In an increasingly diverse society, this becomes increasingly difficult to manage, balancing one view against another. If we are therefore edging perilously closer to a situation where ‘if I don’t like what you say, you can’t say it’ becomes the rule rather than the exception, whose ‘offence’ will be given most importance?

Expanding upon the Maple ‘offence’ and the fact that pork is seen to be unclean, if vegetarians say that they are ‘offended’ by the sight of ALL meat in supermarkets because it is ‘unclean’, should we immediately oblige and remove it from the shelves? Is this the same or does it merely highlight how we treat people depending upon who they are? If so, we’re not as a society moving forward in a fair and equitable way.

Freedom of expression – including the right to offend – is therefore not just an important liberty; it is the very foundation of liberty. It is everybody’s business to ensure that no one is deprived of their right to say what they wish, even if what they say is seen as offensive by one or indeed many more.

This work by Chris Allen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0 UK: England & Wales License. Based on a work at www.chris-allen.co.uk.