Rod Liddle is associate editor of The Spectator.
OxfordDictionaries.com has today announced that is adding words like “awesomesauce” and “manspreading” to the dictionary. But what about banning fatuous words and phrases? Here are some of Rod Liddle’s suggestions… 1. Battling my demons It was demons who held down that actress/pop singer/reality TV star and rammed four kilos of charlie up her left nostril leaving
What can we as a society do about the relentless harassment of women by terrifying men? Menacing men, threatening men, priapic men. Something must be done — and quickly. I reached this conclusion after reading a deeply distressing article by the Guardian columnist Daisy Buchanan, who announced that she has imposed a curfew on herself
What can we as a society do about the relentless harassment of women by terrifying men? Menacing men, threatening men, priapic men. Something must be done — and quickly. I reached this conclusion after reading a deeply distressing article by the Guardian columnist Daisy Buchanan, who announced that she has imposed a curfew on herself
The BBC’s Creative Director, Alan Yentob, seems to have spent the last week or so dashing from studio to studio in an attempt to influence the corporation’s broadcasters from saying nasty stuff about a charity of which he was, until it imploded, chairman. The incompetently-managed Kids Company is now mercifully defunct. Yentob has subsequently admitted
The BBC was created out of the ether in 1922. Its first director general, Lord Reith, inhabited a cupboard some six feet in length and presided over a staff of four people, operating out of one long room. Reith confessed that he did not actually know what broadcasting was — an affliction which you might
Have you been microaggressive recently? My guess is that in some way or another, you have, you bastards. If you are not sure that you have been microaggressive, here’s a very good piece indeed by Brendan O’Neill which delineates the sort of thing that might be considered microaggressive by some third-rate academic or the sort
In another blow for freedom and the protection of the vulnerable, Conservative MP Mark Spencer has suggested that anti-terror legislation should be used to punish teachers who hold ‘old-fashioned’ views about homosexuality and perhaps divest themselves of these views to their pupils. I assume this could mean simply reading out bits of the Bible — that
The BBC was created out of the ether in 1922. Its first director general, Lord Reith, inhabited a cupboard some six feet in length and presided over a staff of four people, operating out of one long room. Reith confessed that he did not actually know what broadcasting was — an affliction which you might
In another blow for freedom and the protection of the vulnerable, Conservative MP Mark Spencer has suggested that anti-terror legislation should be used to punish teachers who hold ‘old-fashioned’ views about homosexuality and perhaps divest themselves of these views to their pupils. I assume this could mean simply reading out bits of the Bible —
‘Rude, bone idle… and cosseted by the welfare state! Chinese teachers’ damning verdict on British children after spending a month in UK classrooms. Yes – just about right, I reckon. Except, of course, the English head teacher at the school thinks the Chinese are completely wrong and that their teaching methods are boring. And that we
This job is getting harder and harder, because it is no longer possible to parody or satirise the blithe stupidity of the liberal London middle class. It now exists in a place beyond the reach of such mocking. Take a peep at David Aaronovitch’s piece today on the problems in Calais. Just have a look, and
Imagine, for a moment, the following scenario. In 2016 Britain votes narrowly to remain within the European Union, despite the Prime Minister having achieved little in attempting to renegotiate the terms of our membership. The ‘out’ campaign — which was no longer led by a marginal party, Ukip, but by the majority of the parliamentary Labour party,
Imagine, for a moment, the following scenario. In 2017 Britain votes narrowly to remain within the European Union, despite the Prime Minister having achieved little in attempting to renegotiate the terms of our membership. The ‘out’ campaign — which after 2016 was no longer led by a marginal party, Ukip, but by the majority of
Tomorrow sees the start of the Special Olympic World Games in Los Angeles. I’m sure you’ll be watching with great interest. Just one question: what does the word ‘special’, as used by the event organisers, mean, exactly? Is it to alert us to the possibility that the athletes taking part are even better than those
I wonder who will win the battle for Tim Farron’s soul — the Guardianistas or God? This is assuming that God gives a monkey’s either way. I know that He is supposed to care very deeply about all of our souls, but this is the leader of the Liberal Democrats we’re talking about. ‘Eight seats?
I suppose I should cease carping. We got a Blue Labour budget (except for the ludicrous stuff on inheritance tax), and far better than anything we would have got under my party, Labour. And at least the Prime Minister is addressing the issue of Islamic ‘extremism’. Yes, I suppose, I would concur that taking away
Another conflict of interest and indeed of my mental state. I can think of no journalist I enjoy reading more than Jon Ronson. He is, I think, unequivocally brilliant and my only complaint is that I do not get to read him in the papers more often. His books are very good, too. But this
I should declare an interest – because I work for the Sun. But even so, I cannot quite see what the Royal family’s objections are. It does no harm to remind the nation that Edward VIII had a sort of juvenile admiration for Hitler and that the Windsors are, in general, to the right of
I am getting heartily sick of being subjected to low-level racist and Islamophobic abuse whenever I go out wearing my black Islamic State flag. It is a very beautiful flag, symbolic of freedom and love and bears the legend: ‘There is no God but Allah and Muhammed is His Messenger’, which I hand-painted in Arabic
I think it is time to put into effect my plan for the re-shaping of the European Union. A somewhat scaled-down European Union: Greece wouldn’t be in it, for a start. Nor Portugal or Spain or France or indeed Italy south of a line which I have just drawn on my Times Atlas of the
