The "Good" List

Good God this makes me want to puke (as does my hangover but that is another story). A "Good" List. It is the sort of psuedo liberal arse that makes me despair of democracy and freedom of speech. It is partly that I object to what they are saying, but also that they actually bother to do it in the first place.

They say: "from time to time that pedestrian world-view is overturned by individuals whose impulse is visionary, idealist or prophetic."

As a result they have pulled together a List of people dubbed by The Independent as good.

Two things irritate me about this. The first is the fact that this is all a counterbalance to the Rich List - the underlying, pseudo socialist assumption that rich people cannot be good. Sure, some wealthy people are total tossers but you can be rich and good, just as you can be poor and bad.

But the choices, oh man, the choices! Ken Loach, for example. Ken bastard Loach. A man who makes incredibly worthy (and for worthy read dull) films. Yes, Cathy Come Home was ground breaking and helped the formation of Shelter. But I would be much more impressed if Loach had set up Shelter himself, rather than being a pissing film maker. There is nothing that Loach has done that is essential. Stick the people who actually work for Shelter on the Good List, not some cunt who makes lefty, borderline unwatchable films. Not saying he is a bad person. Just not saying he is that good either.

Lionel Blue? Never heard of the fucker. But The Independent tells me he is the the first openly gay Rabbi, and has epilepsy, depression and cancer as well as a "prickly relationship with his mother."Fuck-a-doodle-do. He is gay, ill, and doesn't get on with his mother but apparently because he has "courageously paraded his human frailty with routine references" to his various issues. In other words he bangs on about his problems. You know what? I would have far more respect for someone who has all those issues and shuts up about it. Used to be called "quiet dignity."

Philip Pullman? Now I own a copy of Northern Lights but have never got round to reading it. There is something about it that makes me think "nah, trying to hard to be an intellectual Harry Potter." So I have no idea whether his books are any good but I don't think writing a book makes him a good person. The justification for putting him on the Good List is he "creates worlds in which children see good as a matter of choices that are within their control. Pullman wants children to realise they are the inheritors of philosophical, artistic, scientific and literary riches." Right, so he doesn't interact with the kids he seeks to educate, but instead pontificates for them from afar. I would be more inclined to put some teachers on the Good List - you know, the people who want children to understand what is good but do so by educating the children.

Jon Snow? Oh just fuck off. He wears bad ties and presents a biased news show. The only reason why he is on the list is that the bias of Channel Four News happens to be in ther favour of the watered down socialism The Independent spouts.

There are hundreds of good people in this country. They ain't on the list. Fine, not everyone can be. But The Independent shouldn't call it the "Good List". They should call it what it is: "A List of people that, as tweed wearing Liberal Democrat voting veggie try hards, we think should be honoured with being named in a lefty newspaper."