RIGHTWING snowflakes are forever whining, when anyone pulls them up for a spot of bigotry, that they’re being ‘cancelled’ - that some big bad bully is trying to stop the poor wee baby’s ‘banter’. First of all: baloney. Rightwing culture warriors consistently try to silence anyone even suspected of having a leftwing bone in their body - just check what Nadine Dorries is up to with Channel 4.
So, with regards to the discussion I want to have here, let me state clearly this isn’t about cancelling anyone. That’s not my style. I’m a writer - I’d go to the chopping block to defend freedom of speech. But stupid, insulting, antediluvian nonsense needs called out - so this is an appeal merely for certain folk to grow up and join the 21st century, not a demand to silence anyone.
Onto the matter in hand: yesterday during Jubilee celebrations, viewers were treated to a segment in which the derogatory term ‘Micks’ was used during an Irish Guards parade. The expression came from former Irish Guards officer Jamie Lowther-Pinkerton. He’s a scion of landed gentry, from Suffolk, who went to Eton, and has held various positions as a senior factotum for the Royal Family, including equerry to the Queen Mother and Private Secretary to Prince Harry. He’s also godfather to Prince George. His son was a pageboy at Prince William’s wedding.
Pinkerton referred to the sight of the Irish Guards as “a great Mick cocktail” - some members of the regiment are still recruited from Ireland. Pinkerton went on to call the Irish Guards “the best regiment on the planet”.
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