It’s boiling but it feels like we’re all snowflakes now
NOT for nothing do journalists call this the silly season. But I’ve renamed it the stark raving mad season because a series of news items has convinced me Britain has taken leave of its senses. We’re turning into a nation of snowflakes: soft, pretty and melting under heat. Until now it’s only been young adults forming the Snowflake Generation.
Many under-25s seem more prone to taking offence and less resilient than previous generations and are too emotionally vulnerable to cope with life. Now I’m convinced this affliction of the backbone has spread among older people who should know better.
It may not have helped that on my colleague Richard Madeley’s recommendation I’ve just read Enemy Coast Ahead, the wartime memories of Guy Gibson, leader of the legendary Dambusters raid.
The courage of the young men of Bomber Command who stared death in the face nightly and laughed it off is aweinspiring. So how did the country which bred the Dambusters – and millions of other heroes – suddenly turn soft? How did we become so afraid of giving offence that we have thrown common sense out of the window?
Take the decision by Thames Valley police to paint the walls of one of their custody cells a gentle shade of pink, for example. The idea is to make the cell “a less threatening environment” for the 50 young offenders they arrest most weeks.
THE chief mollycoddler, Superintendent Katy Barrow-Grint, says limply: “Being held in custody can be a difficult experience.” Nowhere near as difficult as being mugged or burgled but no one comes round and paints the victim’s house in soothing pink.
What happened to the idea of deterrence? Being locked up in the nick is supposed to put kids off crime not make their lives cushy. Contrast the pink lockup with the tough stance reported that same day from a court in Cleveland, Ohio, where a robber refused to be silent and the judge ordered officers to tape the man’s mouth shut.
“I felt so humiliated,” the criminal said later as civil rights organisations sprang to his defence. Humiliated? Good! Wonder how he felt when the judge later jailed him for 23 years. Judge, you’re a hero.
Next I read to my astonishment that Britain’s biggest sandwich chain, Pret A Manger, has decided to make its gingerbread men gender neutral (I promise you it isn’t April Fools’ Day). A female gingerbread is being introduced and both will be re-labelled as gender-neutral “gingerbread biscuits” rather than men or women.
Pret’s snowflake reason is that “attitudes to gender are changing”. But who could possibly be offended by a gingerbread man?
Probably the same kind who were “distressed” by four nude paintings hanging in Portsmouth Cathedral as part of a summer show by the local art society. The generous ladies captured in oils were “too in your face”, regular worshippers declared. A spokesman for the Diocese of Portsmouth explained: “This decision is not a reflection on the artists’ work but on our duty to balance the needs of all those who come to the cathedral.”
Heavens above! We’re talking about amateur works of art! Has no one at the cathedral been to the Sistine Chapel where nudity is at the forefront of Michelangelo’s masterpiece?
It’s all about being alert to other people’s sensibilities, you see. That’s why a policeman in an unnamed force rang a Muslim charity to ask if it was “culturally acceptable” for an Iraqi paedophile to have a 12-yearold girlfriend. The detective had arrested the man, 26, but said he wanted to be “culturally sensitive” after the suspect told him the relationship was acceptable in his community.
That’s disgraceful – the law that applies in this country is our law, not sharia law. To its credit the charity told the detective to deal with the man as he would any other suspected child abuser. But doesn’t it speak volumes about the PC agenda when an officer should even consider asking such a bizarre question? If the answer from the charity had been different, would the police have turned a blind eye?
The rush towards diversity usually trips us up. The BBC head of comedy says Monty Python wouldn’t have been commissioned today as “it’s too white and too Oxbridge”.
Shane Allen said: “If we’re going to assemble a team now it’s going to be a diverse range of people who reflect the modern world and have got something to say that’s different and we haven’t seen before.”
HOLD ON, Monty Python featured some of the most original sketches ever. The characters and catchphrases are engraved on the national psyche. Is the BBC so blinkered that having the “correct” racial mix is more important than being funny? Actually, judging by a lot of the stuff on the Beeb these days I think I know the answer.
Finally, I read that transgender prisoners are to get their own “delicates only” wash so their lingerie won’t be spoiled. Sorry, I’m lost for words.
What would Guy Gibson have made of all of this? PC no longer stands for political correctness but for pathetic cowardice with no one prepared to stand up and say “enough of this nonsense”. Is this what so many young men died for?
‘How did our nation’s people turn so soft?’
LEO McKINSTRY IS AWAY