Raise British spirits by the power of two
STRANGE to note how so many words, phrases and gestures that only 20 years ago were thought too crude, rude or even obscene to be allowed on radio or TV are now in common usage on both.
Take the F-word. Only newspapers print the letter “f” followed by asterisks and pretend that we will have to work it out. On radio and TV it is in daily use and most standup comedians on the Apollo stage cannot complete a gag without shouting it… often several times. And the gestures are the same. The V-sign is daily visible and never out of shot.
In the marvellous film Darkest Hour, a secretary rebuked Winston Churchill for waving his Victory sign at the people with his hand the wrong way round. The way he was doing it, she told him, meant “Up yer bum” causing the lookalike Gary Oldman to roar with laughter and thenceforward to turn his hand the other way round.
But she, and the scriptwriters, were wrong. Here is the bizarre but true historical origin of that gesture. Right across the world with one single exception – the British – the universal sign of obscene derision is the single, raised, rigid middle finger.
It is obscene because it has a clearly sexual origin. It is presumed that so does the V-sign.
But why are we different? Why do we alone raise two? Well, it’s weird but true.
In 1415, English archers were marching towards the appointed battle scene of Agincourt. As they went through the villages, the French peasants were jeering at them, calling: “When our king has defeated your king we are going to cut off the first two fingers of your right hand and you will never draw your bowstrings against us. Ever.” It did not turn out quite like that.
Those archers cut France’s cavalry and aristocracy to pieces and the few survivors fled the field.
On their way back to Calais and home, the longbow men marched through the same villages. The peasants were now hiding, peering through closed shutters.The archers raised two defiant fingers.
We have been doing it ever since, and only we. Those two fingers are not obscene, of sexual origin. They are the ones with which we draw our bowstrings. So let’s keep raising them to our opponents. In memory of Agincourt.