Ah the arrogance and massive sense of entitlement and moral and intellectual pompous presumption of those in the Media Bubble.
John LLoyd…..
‘Spitting Image could have stopped Brexit’
“It’s a feast, isn’t it?” [the current political situation] sighs Lloyd, who’s a boyish-looking 65. Were the show to return, he thinks it would do “a very good public service”. Spitting Image launched on ITV in 1984 and regularly attracted 15 million viewers. “It informed people in an entertaining way about what was actually going on and it gave people a way of laughing at the situation, rather than going out in the street and burning a car, so I think it reduced the amount of civil disorder.”
Today, Lloyd continues, his piercing blue eyes troubled, “we’re living in an extremely dangerous world where everything seems to be dividing, as if there’s an emotional and moral earthquake going on.
“People are pitching to people’s emotional needs, people are voting with their hearts not with their heads, on the basis of extremely little information. With Brexit, it was extremely difficult to find facts about Europe, so most people were existing on prejudice one way or the other.
“If Spitting Image had been around, we wouldn’t have got into this pickle, things would have been debated a bit more. It’s not good for democracy that people are not informed enough and they just vote from the gut.”
And of course similar arrogant sentiments from dear old David Attenborough who thinks he himself is qualified to talk about Brexit but not the stupid people outside the charmed cricle he exists within….
The TV naturalist said the vote from 17.4million British citizens to leave the EU had created a ‘mess’ and argued that the decision should have been left to MPs ‘to vote on our behalf’.
‘There’s confusion, isn’t there, between populism and parliamentary democracy.
‘I mean, that’s why we’re in the mess we are with Brexit, is it not? Do we really want to live by this kind of referendum?’
He added: ‘What we mean by parliamentary democracy is surely that we find someone we respect who we think is probably wiser than we are, who is prepared to take the responsibility of pondering difficult things and then trust him – or her – to vote on our behalf.’
Yes…..just as the BBC is telling us how wise, intelligent and morally superior Donald Trump is…after all that is why Americans will vote for him no? Ah…suddenly the elected representative [possible] isn’t so wise and wonderful. The hypocrisy of the elite on show once again as they spin and spin on Brexit…astonishing how they think they will get our support by saying how stupid, racist and vile we all are.
Populism is one of the many arbitrary, esoteric, meaningless terms that liberals use to justify treating everyone as beneath them. It is a politician’s mandate to be a populist by definition.
I agree, the word Populism has been hijacked by the leftist media to mean something vaguely bad. But the word isn’t meaningless, it has a very clear definition;
“Populism is a political ideology that holds that virtuous citizens are mistreated by a small circle of elites”
So, why is that a bad thing?
“Populism” as defined by Wikipedia:
“…a political ideology that holds that virtuous citizens are mistreated by a small circle of elites, who can be overthrown if the people recognize the danger and work together.”
Easy to see how the BBC detests populism.
“If Spitting Image had been around, we wouldn’t have got into this pickle”
Unfortunately PC madness has all but killed shows like that. Shame really because humour really is the best medicine.
“Spitting Image could have stopped Brexit” Oh Purlease…..
The programme ran from 1984-1996 and was virulently anti-Tory, and pro lefty. I well remember their “game changing” election night special (was it 1987?) portraying various Tories as Nazis singing “Tomorrow belongs to me”.
1984-1996 12 solid years of Tory rule. Well done Spitting Image, fingers well on the pulse of the British public, and Sooooo influential!!! yet more selective memories from our self regarding, bubble dwelling, media twits.
Please come back and make a difference again.
Spitting Image, remarkable for Roy Hattersly spitting everywhere and one joke:
And the vegetables?
They’ll have the same as me!
[Margaret Thatcher ordering a steak, while surrounded by her cabinet in a restraunt.]
The bloke wants the fate of the nation decided by a television puppet show ??!!
FFS but why not ?
The USA election decided by a cartoon – the Simpsons .
Fracking decided by the Beano . Heathrow by the little girls comic Bunty (Gatwick can be represented by Jacky ) .
Marvel comics can do the expenditure on space programmes and Roy Of The Rovers with Commando can do the defence budget . Viz can lead us to the correct decision about capital punishment .
Why stop at Spitting Image puppets ? The Magic Roundabout had a hippy Dylan who could do the drugs problem and Tinga and Tucker the Two Little Bears have insight to our energy problems . Sooty And Sweep are working on our balance of payments crisis .
We need a puppet government . ( Goodies ) .
Nibor, that’s brilliant! You got it nailed.
Well we’ve already got the Woodentops filling the opposition front bench.
Quite a few of us have felt for years that we were governed by Muppets!
Spitting Image is now available on DVD, by the way. You can buy the set – all series – on Amazon for about 27 quid. However, since Embolden has confirmed vague memories that it was quite lefty, I’m not sure I’ll bother.
I suspect the BBC know perfectly well that one top-grade satirical show would instantly reduce their politically correct nonsense to dust. That’s why we’ll never get one! What better way of destroying the British than by crushing the humour we were once world renowned for?
I suppose the only hope is to bypass TV and put comedy up on YouTube or something. Rod Liddle (in the Spectator) posted a wonderful spoof of anti-Brexiteers – ‘we must have another referendum’. It’s still available for view. (Look out for Annabel Snowflake, played by Rod.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBq1dZGrR3c
Ron Liddle’s spoof on YouTube of remoaners is brilliant. I recommend that you visit Helena’s link.
John Lloyd, a boyish 65 year old.
“With Brexit, it was extremely difficult to find facts about Europe, so most people were existing on prejudice one way or the other.”
Yeah, typical oldie! Quite incapable of using a computer and going to find facts about the EU there, including the Commission’s own web-site. No reading glasses or glasses strong enough for the Government’s own leaflet then, John?
Pah! No problem for the twenty and thirty-somethings who voted for Brexit or voted to Remain.
Was Spitting Image ever as clever, cutting and funny as TW3 at mocking the establishment and elite? Spitting Image was the beginning of the Left wing comedians rant and angst outlets. In John O’Farrell’s book ‘Things can only get better’ (quite funny actually) he recalls the morning after the 1992 Conservative election victory. He writes….’When I arrived at the Spitting Image studios I had no stomach for writing jokes or sketches and the five of us – three other writers and the producer – sat around in depressed disbelief, picking over the entrails of the defeat’. If Spitting Image is brought back on either ITV, bBBC or bCh4, we all know the writers would be from the Jeremy Hardy, Mark Steel, Steve Punt, Marcus Brigstocke and Hugh Dennis kindergarten of thought….ie Left wing jokes hilarious, right wing jokes racist.
Even ‘Private Eye’ is now part of the establishment.
It died along with Peter Cook, or perhaps when Richard Ingrams left.
Er, but we had Newzoids which was Spitting Image with different puppets and it changed precisely nothing.
“Spitting Image could have stopped Thatcher”
But it wasn’t real, so it didn’t stop Thatcher.
“With Brexit, it was extremely difficult to find facts about Europe”
I think Brexiters had no problem, I am still receiving adverts for books on the European Union and its corrupt History.
But then for anyone who only reads the Guardian and watches and listens to the BBC. They would not read, source or receive emails for books about the European Union, unless they where forced to cover a UKIP Conference, and inadvertently came across the UKIP Book Stall.
But then this is typical of the low IQ comedians at the BBC, they presume that the Brexit voter was as ignorant as people at the BBC.
Wisdom comes with age, as you learn from your mistakes, such as voting Remain in 1975, and then voting for Brexit forty years later. This Wisdom with age was also a statistical correlation that favoured Brexit, and proved that the correct decision was made.
David Attenborough’s lack of wisdom was already known from his statements about his position on Climate Change, which came from trusting people not censored by the BBC. So he has found someone he respects who he thinks is probably wiser than he is, who is prepared to take the responsibility of pondering difficult things and then trusts him – or her – to think on his behalf.
So the Man is a fool incapable of wisdom.
Oh yes the far superior minds. The very same clever individuals who couldn’t see that their actions were leading to where we are now.
Where was Attenborough when it needed his clever folks warning our clever political folk that for us at least, the EU would fail?
Who’s in this elite group? The likes of Lineker perhaps? He has 5 million twitter followers, he must be one of our great thinkers, surely?
Is anyone seeing a pattern? Thry link back to the BBC in all but a few cases, hell, even Lilly Allen was making a programme for the BBC.
You missed out my favourite thinker / documentary maker from Lu’on, Stacey Dooley.
Who needs comedy now, just watch her informing us about the drug wars around the world, the migrant crisis in Europe, UK as well as in Lu’on.
Her most used analitical words are: aaaaaaaaaaaaaah – lovelyyyyy- let me give you a hug. My worry is that she might lose her top spot to Lilly who is able to shed tears more efficiently.
Parody is a great tool for showing the political elites to be the fools that they are. If spitting image was still with us the vote would have been 70/30 for Brexit.
Everyone needs to remember just how much contempt Spitting Image had for both its targets and especially for its audience.
In 1985 it repeatedly broadcast a subliminal image of Norris McWhirter – McWhirter’s face was superimposed on a photograph of a naked woman. The was supposed to be a joke on McWhirter, but no one in the audience would have been aware of it because the image was so brief – less than a quarter of a second. What would have picked up by the audience was that there was something odd about McWhirter, but they wouldn’t have known what or why they thought it. This wasn’t comedy or even propaganda (McWhirter’s twin brother had been murdered by the IRA) it was a hidden attempt to manipulate the audience. As I didn’t want to be manipulated through my TV I never watched Spitting Image again.
Of course the High Court backed the broadcaster.
“LONDON (AP) _ The High Court ruled Thursday that it was not a criminal offense to flash a subliminal image on TV screens so fast that it couldn’t be seen but would still register in the mind.
“Norris McWhirter, co-founder of the Guinness Book of Records, claimed the weekly satirical show ”Spitting Image” had repeatedly shown ”a grotesque and ridiculing image” of his face superimposed on the top of a naked woman’s body.
“McWhirter, 60, said he asked for the summons after his 14-year-old nephew discovered the fleeting image of his uncle’s head on the nude torso by using the ”freeze frame” button on his video recorder.
“McWhirter argued that broadcasting such a subliminal image was a criminal offense under the 1981 Broadcasting Act, which regulates commercial television in Britain.
“The act requires the Independent Broadcasting Authority to make sure subliminal images are not telecast, the court said. But, it ruled, it is not a crime if the authority fails its duty.
“McWhirter claimed the image, flashed for less than a quarter of a second, exploited the possibility of conveying a message to influence the minds of the public without their being aware of what had been done. He said that was a breech of the Broadcasting Act.
“But the judges, Sir Anthony Lloyd and Sir Henry Skinner, quashed McWhirter’s summons against the broadcasting authority and canceled further proceedings in the case.”
Very informative, RJ. And a well timed reminder that dodgy judges have been with us for a very long while.
As I recall spitting Image finished being shown on TV just before Labour gained power under Blair in 1997. Blair seemed to have many friends at the BBC. I understand he requested that there would be no repeats of “Till Death Do Us Part” BBC 1965-75 staring his father-in-law Tony Booth during his term of office. There must have been other such requests that we know nothing about, in fact between 1997 and 2010 there was very little comedy on TV that portrayed Labour in a bad light. Was this pure accident or design, I suspect the latter. I can remember the programme the Comedians with Bernard Manning, George Roper, Charlie Williams, Stan Boardman and many more very amusing characters. The BBC and PC brigade would have kittens if that show was repeated.
I’ve always found it interesting that socialist comedian Ben Elton stopped his act around 1997. Can’t think what could have happened in that year to put him off making jokes about the government.
Ben Elton is the embodiment of the hypocritical champagne socialist. I have seen him on TV claiming he wasn’t left-wing in the 80s because he took a pop at everyone. Ben, f*ck off, there’s a good chap; it might surprise you to know that many of us remember your 80s comedy routines so don’t insult our intelligence by trying to re-invent yourself. Still, Blackadder was funny I’ll give you that.
Yes Cranmer. It’s a bit like the BBC who took a break from being part of the Official Opposition to the Government to being one of its main supporters, with the exception of the Iraq War where the Opposition joined the Government in the traditional show of national unity in a war. Of course, they couldn’t always be seen as the propaganda arm of the government so they changed again to being its opposition in 2010. I can’t think what’s so special about those dates which would make them swap roles.
So the “boyish” John Lloyd thinks “Spitting Image” could have stopped Brexit.
I think this is an intereting insight into the left wing mind.
First, he accepts that “Spitting Image” was a show biased to one political side, which was clearly, throughout its run, Labour. It is no surprise the show was dropped when Labour took power, there was nothing left for them to mock at that point.
Second, like all left wing elitists, he thinks that the brainless plebs can be lead to the “correct” decision by their intellectual superiors, ie him and his left wing friends. He clearly thinks, and sees nothing wrong in saying, that 17.4 million British people are dolts who voted the “wrong” way, but could have been persuaded to vote the “correct” way by a stupid television show consisting of foam puppets and silly voices.
Thus speaks the true voice of the smug left wing elite. They really do hate us.
Typical lefty thinking by John Lloyd. Whenever the hoi-polloi don’t do as they are told it is always because they weren’t subject to enough propaganda.
With Brexit, it was extremely difficult to find facts about Europe, so most people were existing on prejudice one way or the other.
Fact 1: Freedom of movement has resulted in a massive influx of Eastern Europeans and our public services being stretched to breaking point.
Fact 2: The EU is governed by an unelected bureaucracy (the Commission) combined with an undue amount of influence from Germany and France.
Fact 3: The ultimate goal is political union.
Fact 4: The Eurozone is a key step towards politcial union and will be preserved at all costs. The brunt of those costs have been borne by countries like Greece, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Ireland and are plain for all to see.
Fact 5: There have been a number of EU treaties which have resulted in it divesting the UK of democratic powers. Until now, we have never been given a vote on whether we want to surrender our democracy to the EU.
Fact 6: The EU has lost control of its borders.
There you go, Mr Lloyd, just 6 crucial, simple, obvious, inarguable facts which were reason for me to vote Brexit.
Oh Johnny , you are too clever for a fish !!
But don’t forget you are “waycist”, homophobic, illiterate, misogonistic person and a bigot.
The remainers have got a lot more intelligent points to make: