Friday, August 11, 2006

Take my Dan Brown novel and the terrorists have won


NOW OBVIOUSLY no-one wants to get blown out of the skies en route to Torremolinos, but am I alone in thinking that the government might have over-reacted a little in banning hand baggage and severely restricting what items can be carried onto a plane?

Who in their right mind would stop a parent taking a colouring book onto a 10-hour transatlantic flight? And if there’s a way to bring down a Boeing 747 using a Dan Brown paperback and a copy of the Daily Mail, I think the terrorists might have worked it out by now.

There is one simple answer to this crisis - ban certain people from flying at all. Let them use the ferries and the Eurostar. And to what kind of people do I allude, I hear you ask? Well, we’ve got to be a bit sensitive here, so let’s reinvent Norman Tebbit’s cricket test: Sajid Mahmood wouldn’t get a seat, but Monty Panesar would. Get me?

Now I realize that this is completely unfair on the 99.99 per cent of Muslims (many of them British) who bear no ill will towards this country or towards the Wicked West in general. But when you’ve got the entire holidaymaking population inconvenienced, not to mention hundreds of thousands of business travellers, then something radical has to be done.

If that’s not an option, what about this idea that I found on an internet message board (posted there, no doubt, by a single man who lives with his mum and has a poster of the Starship Enterprise on his bedroom wall): why not tranquilise passengers before take-off and revive them upon landing like they do on Red Dwarf or in the Alien films?

No crap film to suffer, no dreadful food to eat, no seat-back kicking, no whining kids, no being pestered to buy scratch cards and cheap perfume … you just wake up refreshed at your destination. Sounds wonderful.

Of course, there may be safety issues regarding the very young and the very old, but let’s face it, the very young and the very old shouldn’t be on a busy passenger flight in the first place. Well not on mine, anyway.

IN SIMILAR vein, we must take to task Scotland Yard assistant commissioner Tarique Ghaffur, Britain’s most senior Muslim policeman and one of the few top cops who doesn’t seem to be suing for unfair dismissal … at the moment.

Mr Ghaffur, who’s supposed to be implementing the law, complains about stop-and-search procedures that see, in his mind, a disproportionate number of young Asians being pulled over as suspected terrorists.

He moans that his subordinates have “often been led more by people’s physical appearances than by specific intelligence.”

Well it’s hardly rocket science, is it? Again, this discussion requires an element of sensitivity, but how many retired, pipe-smoking, Telegraph-reading, tweed-wearing, 65-year-old white males have committed terrorist outrages in recent years? Is it then any wonder that they breeze blithely past the checkpoints while 20-year-old Asian lads with dodgy beards, baggy trousers and bad attitudes find themselves bending over for the rubber glove?

I’m sorry, but we’re at war here. And the enemy is very clearly amongst us. The problem is in identifying the 0.01 per cent before they do something daft.

OF COURSE, you may dismiss this week’s kerfuffle as nothing more than a government conspiracy. It’s a convenient way of taking the focus off Iraq, Afghanistan and the Lebanon; it justifies increasingly Draconian legislation (which will almost certainly be used against you and me one fine day); and it makes John Reid look a bit dynamic while Tone’s out of the country and Six-Gun Prescott has been sidelined.

You may also think that the Duke of Edinburgh personally murdered Princess Diana, that the moon landings never really happened and that the only way to stop Peter Mandelson crawling into your head at night and eating your brains is to go to bed wearing a tin foil hat.

WHILE TRYING to avoid certain dodgy internet sites – and sights – I stumbled across the official website of the Territorial Army. Detailed on it, for the benefit of those who might fancy a bit of light soldiering, are a number of specialist roles for people to undertake. Most were as expected: artillery, aircrew, engineer, driver: others were more esoteric.

What about lawyer, postman, accountant or laundry worker? No, really. So how many people actually wake up one morning and think: “I want to serve Britain. I’m off to Iraq to scrub gussets for Queen and country.”

No, just as I thought.

I HAVE to bring you the sad news that another of this nation’s fine traditions has been outlawed by the Nanny State – the gentle art of rubbing suncream into a Boy Scout.

Paedo paranoia now means that Cubs and Boy Scouts will in future have to apply their own factor 15 should they get caught camping during a heatwave. Only the in the event of a child being part-incinerated will leaders step forward to hose them down on compassionate grounds.

Now I would normally rail against this as a matter of principle. However, recalling my childhood experiences at the hands of a predatory Akela with a squint and a woggle, I think it’s probably for the best.

Dib dib!

O The views of Mr Beelzebub are purely personal and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the Editor or staff of this website, or of anyone who writes a satirical column on Friday morning only to find out that the bloody BNP have adopted one of their tongue-in-cheek comments as official policy by lunchtime. As they say, if the cops can keep white, working-class football hooligans from getting flights to Germany ...

In other news, I don't need any smartarse pointing out that "Dib dib" should really be "Dyb dyb", as it's a contraction of "Do your best". OK?

14 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

The fact is, if the terrorist minority want to kill people, there's plenty of ways of doing it that don't include jet aircraft, railway stations etc. Clamping down on what may have happened really doesn't make us any safer, does it?

It may well be only a tiny majority of the Muslim population that has this in mind, but that's still a sizeable number. However, I don't remember this much fuss over the IRA, and that went on for hell of a lot longer. Think about it, apart from the wellies and green rugby shirt, it's pretty hard to tell an Irish IRA sympathiser from yer average white Brit, and whatever anyone says about the IRA, they were (are?) a very well organised bunch.

As you say, the government's response is somewhat over the top.

It worries me that more and more draconian laws are being pushed out: once the bastards get a taste for legislation, they get addicted.

I think it's a Hitler mentality at work: treat everything as a revolution/war and represent it to the public as such.

4:12 PM  
Blogger kris said...

I suppose the difference is that IRA guys never tried to blow themselves up- on purpose at any rate.

The IRA specialised in bombs in Northern Irish town centres or shopping centres. The exploding jihadis on the other hand just can't get enough of passenger planes. And Airbus wants to cram 500+ in their latest super-jumbo?! Thanks, but no thanks. Maybe someone should explain the concept of "leading with the chin" to them.

4:40 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Also, if you render all your passengers unconscious, you get a much greater space efficiency on the plane. You could pack 'em in as tight as you want and who'd know the difference?

7:40 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

That's true, Kris, but it's not necessary to blow yourself up to kill lots of people. Although I believe that it IS necessary if you want to become a martyr and get your hands on a load of virgins up in heaven.

Figures vary, but apparently between 25% and 31% of British Muslims reckon that the London bombings etc are justified in the light of Britain's backing of US policy and attacks on Afghanistan, Iraq etc. Pretty scary, but how the hell did we arrive at this?

Could it be that not only have many Muslims refused to integrate, but also that we, the "native" white British, have never really allowed them to integrate? That they've been pretty much forced into Ghettoes, by means of economic deprivation and pure racism? I live in the country, but only a couple of miles away, the nearest town has a fairly sizable Asian population. Most of these men work either on the market, in Asian food outlets, on the taxis, or for a local supermarket on the checkouts.

Very rarely will you see them working in the banks, or the increasingly homogenous high street chain stores. Why? I suspect that because the average Brit is somehow intimidated by Asians, he's somehow repelled by them. Equal Opportunities is pure nonsense, as we all know: stating one's ethnic background on an application form merely allows employers to pre-filter out candidates of the "wrong" background before even the interview. Employers KNOW that many Brits don't like Asians: hence, they won't employ more than they have to.

Surely this, and also for reasons of personal safety, effectively isolates the Muslims/Asians. They're neither "Pakistani/Indian/whatever" anymore, nor are they allowed to be 100% British.

And like British "Colonials" in the past, they probably feel a "cultural cringe" when they go to their familiy's country of origin. Being neither one nor the other is surely pretty nasty. Like many with an identity crisis, or like most converts, they try to "Out-Muslim" the Muslims.

Then their adopted country starts a "war or terror" by inflicting worse terror on their fellow muslims. The Muslims I've spoken to are angry about this, but I've gained a real sense of isolation and resentment about the way they get treated here which has little to do with world events.

Political correctness has done more harm than good, as usual. We've gained the horrible American habit of banging on about our "roots". This actually polarises people.

The answer? Damned if I know, but the PC brigade are remarkably quiet these days.

6:22 AM  
Blogger kris said...

Their silence is deafing.

9:02 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hi Jim, howr ye? You've proved me wrong. In all our years I've never known you string more than five words together without swearing.
After all these years. Well done Jimmy a first!

Love as always XXX

Your old shipmate,

Sam.

9:11 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Jim, thanks for your apology, you're a real star. It takes courage to show such humility.

A living demonstration of how, over the centuries, we English have educated and developed the heathen peoples of the world. :)

Thanks again.

Sammy XXX

4:39 AM  
Blogger kris said...

Dear Black Dog, In my gang are some fairly successful muslims. Their families came here, did integrate, and they are solicitors other professionals etc.

On thing they noticed is that the new immigrants don't want to know. You should have seen on tv the other night a high flying muslim surgeon chatting with some self-appointed "cleric". There is a world apart between those guys- and that is why it is the muslim community that needs to try to engage with these new immigrants.

5:51 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Well said Jim. Truce?

9:39 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The Italian Battle Flag no less.

I am truly honoured and humbled Jim.

Scotland forever!!

3:13 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The IRA as a general rule gave warnings as well. Somehow the good old days of Baltic Street, Birmingham and Guildford don't seem so bad.

On more than one occasion I remember being stopped after immigration by guys in suits wnating a closer look at me passport. In those days I guess being young, with scruffy dark hair and blue eyes I fitted a "profile". It never occurred to me a moan about being victimised.

6:30 AM  
Blogger Chris said...

I think John Reid read too many John le Carre novels - bombs in a hardback book? Yeah, right.

I can see that new-fangled ID card scheme being pushed through the House faster than John Prescott in a Ye Olde Burger Bar.

2:34 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Forgiveness is divine Jim, he/she has plenty of enthusiam but not our mature and balanced outlook.

Scotland forever!

7:29 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Chris said...
I think John Reid read too many John le Carre novels - bombs in a hardback book? Yeah, right.

An aside.

The good doctor is misguided. With a RR Trent engine at idle, you should stand the bride and groom about 400 yds to the rear of the exhaust. You now throw the complete contents of your local library into the engine intake. The confetti display is one to be remembered. That engine will not even stutter.
Of course then you get an ASBO!

8:15 AM  

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