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Britain’s Home Secretary Jacqui 'school-mum'
Smith has announced plans* to fine parents up
to £1,000 for the heinous crime of plying their
darling teenagers (sorry, ‘young adults’) with
alcohol.
The Lizard can only assume that the Home
Secretary has no intention of focusing her
withering stare on working-class parents
(coincidentally, Labour voters all) but instead
will be directing her ire exclusively at the
middle-classes.
We middle-class reprobates at The Lizard were,
of course, brought up squarely in the European
tradition, meaning our cold-hearted parents
forced us to regularly imbibe fine samples of
the Bordeaux grape during family evening
meals.
Our insistence that this practice differs
markedly from underclass pikey guttersnipes
vandalising bus stops after glugging the three
litres of White Lighting given to them as a
birthday present by their absent parents, will
no doubt fall on deaf ears.
However, if the Home Secretary is serious
about protecting the nation’s youth from the
deviant arriviste cultural influences of their
parents, here is a list of other social nuisances
she might want to clear up.
Smith has announced plans* to fine parents up
to £1,000 for the heinous crime of plying their
darling teenagers (sorry, ‘young adults’) with
alcohol.
The Lizard can only assume that the Home
Secretary has no intention of focusing her
withering stare on working-class parents
(coincidentally, Labour voters all) but instead
will be directing her ire exclusively at the
middle-classes.
We middle-class reprobates at The Lizard were,
of course, brought up squarely in the European
tradition, meaning our cold-hearted parents
forced us to regularly imbibe fine samples of
the Bordeaux grape during family evening
meals.
Our insistence that this practice differs
markedly from underclass pikey guttersnipes
vandalising bus stops after glugging the three
litres of White Lighting given to them as a
birthday present by their absent parents, will
no doubt fall on deaf ears.
However, if the Home Secretary is serious
about protecting the nation’s youth from the
deviant arriviste cultural influences of their
parents, here is a list of other social nuisances
she might want to clear up.
- Introducing children to the Classics
(notoriously chock-full of bestial
representations of Gods having their
way with mortals). Suggested fine: £750 - Or, scenes of domestic violence in
Shakespeare plays. Suggested fine:
£500
- Or, ballet: the totally inappropriate
proximity between men in silk pants (with
not so much as a hint of mud on their
knees) and women with shorter skirts
than you’d find in Maidstone on a
Saturday night. Suggested fine: £300 - Or, any Benjamin Britten opera.
Suggested fine: £250 - Cricket nets on a Thursday evening. On-
the-spot fine: £10,000
The Independent reports: “Ms. Smith also
promised that young adult binge-drinkers who
displayed an “appetite for destruction” would
be targeted by police.” Though presumably she
did not mean in the same way as Jean Charles
de Menezes.
The Lizard would point out that such
government action would have restrained the
likes of Arthur Rimbaud, Jim Morrison, Alexander
the Great, and any other figure of cultural
interest in the past three thousand years.
Though the Home Secretary suggested that the
State was unlikely to rescind its 24-hour
licensing legislation, she opined, “It can’t be
right that you can still find promotions for 50p
shots until midnight or All-You-Can-Drink-For-A-
Tenner nights.”
The Lizard disagrees.
---
* Yup, she’s at it again.
| © lizardmagazine.com, 2008 |
| Jawohl, Jacqui! First booze, then ballet Thursday, February 7, 2008 |
Dominic Hilton & A S H Smyth