The Chop, Sky History (Sky 123)Thuesday 15th 9:00

[Andy Kev.]

I had a bit of a think about this last night and it occured to me that the bloke's choice in tattoos is his business. What can reasonably be of interest to others is how he conducts himself and as far as I can see he was perfectly pleasant to the black bloke, so for me that means that he is capable of keeping his suspected politics to himself and behaving in a civilised manner and that means case closed.

The second thing that occurred to me is that there must be some right saddos out there who have nothing better to do than analyse other people's tattoos. Each to his own of course and I suppose it is of massive significance to those obsessed with body art. It seems to me, however, to be on a par with dogs sniffing each other's behinds: clearly of central importance to your average canine but not something that any sensible human being would take an interest in.

Or am I being too easy going?

 

[bjm]

...

Or am I being too easy going?

There are no rights or wrongs, only cancel!

 

[DBT85]

If you paint a swastika on your house is that OK too?

 

[Andy Kev.]

If you paint a swastika on your house is that OK too?

I suppose that theoretically it must be OK. Yep, a lot of people are going to be offended, especially anybody Jewish.

The question is: to what extent are you prepared to alienate everybody else? Were parliament to outlaw the displaying of the swastika (as is the case in Germany) then the matter would be quite clear. If it's not illegal in the UK, then it must be OK. If your swastika were absolutely massive, then it would be aesthetically out of order, like e.g. having a Banksy mural on the wall or like that shark that somebody built into his roof but if it's discreet ...

I'm skating around this for the simple reason that if you ban one form of political expression, then you have to ban them all. At the moment we are seeing a lot of so-called "cancel culture" and people who like to ban things which IMO is itself pretty fascist. The best thing is to keep politics for election time. If you don't like nazis (and I certainly don't) then you don't have to have anything to do with them and if they break the law - which they surely sooner or later will - then you've got them bang to rights anyway.

For the Mods: I'm aware that that last paragraph is perilously close to the ban on matters political being discussed and should you feel it necessary to delete it, then fair enough.

 

[DBT85]

You are absolutely free to paint "Hitler was a Saint" on your forehead if it's what takes your fancy. Freedom of speech is not freedom from consequence. No sensible TV channel or presenter will want to be linked in any way to someone displaying nazi symbols for very clear and obvious reasons and it's no shock at all that this was pulled when they eventually had it pointed out.

If someone wants to paint their face, calling people saddos for looking at it (where else are we supposed to look?) and noticing that there are these symbols of hate etched on there seems rather pathetic.

 

[Andy Kev.]

You're slightly misrepresenting what I posted: most folk wouldn't have recognised anything on his face just by normal "looking" - witness the general reaction on here to the allegations and I know I certainly didn't - therefore the people who recognised what they did must be obsessive saddos to conduct what must have been an almost forensic examination of the bloke's face, hence my canine comparison. It would have been better to have kept quiet about it, given that he seemed to be acting in a perfectly normal way. All that's happened is that publicity has been generated and a possible martyr has been created for RW extremists. What we seem to have ended up with is LW extremists having collected a RW extremist scalp. And that's about on the level of mutually sniffing dogs. And a woodworking prog has been given the chop.

Now if he'd actually done or said anything unpleasant, that would have been a different kettle of fish entirely.

 

[Droogs]

Perhaps the people who pointed it out may be those who have suffered at the hands of racists. Who knows there may have been a black viewer whose sibling, parent, grand parent was lynched by this sort of group at some time in the past or who has had their family terrorized by them that reported it. I would definitely think if I were a member of a community that has had a history of persecution from people such as these, I would be very aware of their symbols and codes, don't you?

 

[TJC]

I know I certainly didn't - therefore the people who recognised what they did must be obsessive saddos to conduct what must have been an almost forensic examination of the bloke's face

I'll assume this is aimed at me.

You shouldn't use your own ignorance to criticise others, however rich a vein it may be.

He has a large 88 on his face, it's commonly known that 88 is shorthand for Heil Hitler. If you'd be happy to watch a TV show with someone wearing Heil Hitler t-shirt as a guest that's your prerogative, but thankfully no UK production company would touch that with a bargepole.

White supremacy isn't a political opinion, and isn't a stance I consider worthy of respect.

 

[Nelsun]

Calling folk who recognise details in things "obsessive saddos" does not hold up in this case. Nazi symbolism is not exactly a niche topic - so I'm not surprised some folk had a "hang-on-a-minute" moment at all.

 

[Nelly111s]

I feel sorry for the other contestants. One of them has already won this (it must have been filmed pre-lockdown) and can claim to be “Britain’s Best Woodworker”. If you were trying to use the opportunity of being on the programme to springboard your career, it’s now been dashed.
Whatever the rights or wrongs of the programme, if you were just starting a woodwork career, a massive amount of publicity wouldn’t hurt a bit.

 

[AJB Temple]

I think to be fair, not many everyday people would make white supremacist associations from these number groupings. I had no idea that people used 88 to signify HH, had never heard of the 14 words and so on. To me, when I first saw him, I just saw a man covered in tattoos and was surprised that he had been able to endure having his eyelids done. I regard facial tattoos as really quite a daft thing to do, but them focussed on his woodwork. I would have been none the wiser had it not been for the press articles.

Although I regard practically all of the woke stuff currently as nonsense promulgated by people who like to spout off and be professionally offended but largely ignore real poverty and oppression elsewhere in the world, I don't think this is in the woke or even politically correct category. There is no way that Sky or any TV network in the Western world can show this now that the racist connotations have been made, as he is a walking billboard. I would imagine he is now a pariah where he lives too, and I pity his children.

It would seem that the story about his father being deceased was a very foolish step as it was bound to be checked. The Sky production team have been gullible, but to be frank I would not have made these associations either. The lie destroys his credibility about everything else.

 

[bjm]

.. One of them has already won this.....

What if he was the winner?

 

[Blackswanwood]

What if he was the winner?

If he's not I bet the person who was is pretty hacked off!

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I keep reading everywhere that everyone knows 88 = Heil Hitler. Neither I nor my my wife neither of us illiterate or stupid had ever heard it before.

 

[doctor Bob]

I think these days, most younger generations would know the symbols from certain well know box sets.
Would I have spotted it, don't know, but I knew what the symbols represented.
Am I an obsessive saddo, yes maybe.

 

[bjm]

I wonder if there is a section later in the series where Lee Mack is going 'So, tell us more about some of your tats then...'

 

[Andy Kev.]

Droogs,

what you suggest may indeed have been the case but if we are to discuss this dispassionately - probably the best way to discuss any potentially worrying set of circumstances - I suggest that as a rule it is best to stick to what is known fact as opposed to what might be, although I do of course understand your point.

TJC,

that's a bit paranoid! I was making a general point and I assure you that if I had wanted to direct it at you, I would have done so. You appear to have not hoiked on board the fact that I hadn't identified a single detail of his tattoos (I just thought his face was a dismal mess and wondered why any human being would want to do that to themselves) and so was happy to watch the prog in my innocence.

Nelsun,

with the exception of the universally known swastika, I doubt very much that most people would know a Nazi symbol if they fell over it and it said "Sieg Heil!" to them. That sort of esoterica is not widely known although I'll cough to having read an explanation of where Combat 18 got its name from. So my obsessive saddos remark stands.

Come to think of it, the TV company missed a chance here. All they had to do was excise all of his contributions from the programme (assuming that he is guilty as charged, although we seem to have abandoned "innocent until proven guilty" and he does not appear to have committed a civil or criminal offence, irrespective of how offensive we may find his alleged views*) and say something along the lines of, "One contestant was asked to leave the programme due to the displaying of political symbols which is against our house policy" and then - and this is surely the most important thing - the prog could have been shown to the end. Mind you, if he did win it, as BJM suggests, they could have just blacked out his face, or superimposed a portrait of Malcom X on it, which would have constituted an amusing dig at him.

*Edit: from what AJB says, he does appear to be guilty as charged.

 

[doctor Bob]

pretend it doesn't exist?

 

[Daniel2]

Detriment & punishment for all, from the actions of one.
That rings a faint bell somewhere....

...Just saying

 

[bjm]

Detriment & punishment for all, from the actions of one.
That rings a faint bell somewhere....

...Just saying

The sins of the father....