What has been overlooked is that Hannan’s observational quip is entirely unoriginal. In Love Actually, the Bill Nighy character refers to “Ant or Dec” when being interviewed by the duo.

Terence and Philip from South Park might have been funnier.

Also note that if I were to write “fuck off chavscum, and don’t come back until you have something worthwhile to say”, the usual wingnut suspects would pile on and chastise me for lowering the tone and/or not debating properly.

Funny how that works.

———

On another note, I’m amused in a actually-not way about how quick people have been to jump on Sunny for pointing out the problems inherent in implying he and Sunder are interchangeable.

You don’t see this about of collective bile when people actually post racist/sexist/homophobic &c sentiments in comments. But if someone dares to imply a statement someone else made might have been clumsily insensitive – and look what happens.

It just goes to show that in our society, still the worst thing you can possibly say is to accuse a white man of having privilege.

On the substance of that, I had very much thought that benign (and futile?) megalomania was indeed the point of Liberal Conspiracy.

These sorts of people are Janus-faced, and occasionally the real character is allowed to show through.

Can I just come back on those who think there was nothing to challenge or question at all here. I think that’s wrong, though nor do I think it is the biggest thing in the world.

If you want to deconstruct what he writes, I think it becomes quite clear why it is legitimate to be mildly offended by it, though it was doubtless intended as a bit of rib-poking. (And I have certainly been winding Hannan up – though over what he has written and said, rather than, eg his posh background).

1. It starts as a gag about names

“They are called, confusingly, Sunder and Sunny”.

Maybe Hannan or somebody else would write “they are called, confusingly, Daniel and David”. (It might also be that the confusion and the humour he intends the audience to find depend on the sense that these are confusing names to remember. There is quite a tradition of this too, though a diminishing one).

2. But that wasn’t the objection. A number of people suggest that the reference to Ant and Dec shows that Sunny’s interpretation can’t be right.

But I would disagree with that.

“as with Ant and Dec, I’ve never been entirely clear on which is which. I once appeared on the BBC with Sunny (or possibly Sunder), and he seemed a very nice fellow”.

The Ant and Dec reference turns it from something about similar NAMES to a SIGHT/VISUAL gag – so that when Hannan appears on TV with me (and spends an hour chatting while watching Question Time) he can pretend it was probably Sunny, or maybe not.

So it is definitely now a joke which echoes and resonates with the [well established] genre of “they all look the same to me”. If that is accidental, it is very clumsy. (And he is talking about two people who look very unalike).

(Indeed, it might well be that the Ant and Dec reference may well even be deliberately in there to innoculate against this interpretation, which some have taken it to do, though in fact it does the opposite if you think about it. I think that is possible because I suspect the author may be aware he is being mildly transgressive in a giggly schoolboy way – he is doubtless proud to be anti-PC – but he may want to signal too that he isn’t crossing the line. If that were right, he’s dug himself in, perhaps unintentionally)

3. Hannan wishes to be dismissive of myself and Sunny. In order to make the joke about our interchangeability work, he can not identify us properly by using our surnames [names], nor can he remember who he has met or been on TV with [visual].

Both of those are a very clumsy way to be dismissive of us as lefties, or to say we write similar things about his deregulatory passions. (This rudeness is of course a pose and in person he has heightenedly good manners).

I am confident that he is not a racist; I was accusing him of being juvenile and puerile. I think it is a deliberate bit of schoolboy giggling, and I think that the ambiguity is part of the giggling, while trying not to cross a line he shouldn’t.

So yes, the joke was “just a joke”, but it was an ill-judged one. It was mildly offensive to those it was about, and not I think unreasonably so.

On the whole I think it is the sort of thing Old Boris might have written to be casually funny, and that New Boris would steer miles clear of for good reasons. (I have never written about those Boris columns and would not attack them for him: they weren’t racist. they were playing with caricatures and stereotypes. But I think part of the point was to titilate a readership to show that he could be mildly transgressive and use terms that are anti and non-PC in a way that he could defend. His problem was that comedic commentary and being a politician are different, though I don;t think attacking him by taking them out of context was fair). But would he repeat the trick now as a politician? Of course not.

In a similar vein, if there were two Conservative MEPs both praising Iceland and democracy, one called Daniel and the other Danny I’m sure you’d struggle to tell them apart too.

Advantage? Hmm…

How long ago did Hannan praise Iceland by the way?

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_z5hT1P0X79c/SNaCH6QWt2I/AAAAAAAACVA/dtmMqJ9ntlA/s200/sunny_hundal_140x140.jpg

http://centurean2.files.wordpress.com/2009/04/sunder_katwala.jpg

Hmmmm…

Sunder Katwala – hair, no beard, etc
http://images.google.co.uk/images?hl=en&q=Sunder+Katwala&btnG=Search+Images&gbv=2&aq=f&oq=

My prediction: Hannan to be offered a safe Tory seat at general election after next.

I second the request for pictures, which would settle this in the time it takes to load a .jpeg.

I have never met a Tory with a good sense of humour.

I have met loads who think they are funny, but thats not the same thing. No doubt Dale is one of those types.