Current mood:

irritated

Or: My Party is turning me into Granny Weatherwax When All I Want to Be is Nanny Ogg

(with apologies to those of you who do not read Pterry; some of this might be a bit opaque to you. This and this might help before you start)

You guys know me. I'm a good time girl. All I want to do* is have a few beers and sing lewd songs, and enable others to do the same if they want to. My personal investment in the character of Gytha Ogg is so great that she's front and centre in the banner at the top of my blog, with her cheeky grin and her mug of ale. But it seems that every time I settle down to have a good go at the hedgehog song of late, somebody in the party decides that's the exact moment to say something bloody stupid or pointless or ridiculous or illiberal, and I have to stand up and shout "I can't be having with THIS!"...

I mean, look at the list we've had of late. The tuition fees "personal pledge". The NHS debacle. The internet snooping. And it's not just the top brass making stupid policy decisions, either. Whether it's FCC thinking that they can subvert a perfectly clear conference vote or a party activist thinking that The West Wing is How Things Should Happen over here (rather than a fictionalised account of how things might happen in the US with no shoulds involved at all)**, there are large swathes of the party who seem determined to turn me into a curmudgeonly old bag.

Of course, when this happens there are invariably those who feel it's my reaction to the bloody stupid or pointless or ridiculous or illiberal thing that makes the party look bad, rather than the actual bloody stupid or pointless or ridiculous or illiberal thing itself. Because, you know, someone getting upset when the party does something bloody stupid or pointless or ridiculous or illiberal? That's EMBARRASSING. Much less embarrassing to let the bloody stupid or pointless or ridiculous or illiberal thing carry on and not kick up a fuss. After all, we're liberals, we're famous for standing by and taking it and not rocking the boat... Oh, hang on, that's not right at all, is it?

The thing about Granny Weatherwax, with her righteous anger and her admirable power, is... She's not actually a particularly nice or happy person. Sure, she's a useful person to have around, and she makes the world a better place with her shouty boat-rocking, but at enormous, and I mean ENORMOUS personal sacrifice. Whereas Nanny Ogg? She makes the world a better place too. Maybe not in as spectacular and showy ways as Granny, but she is no less revolutionary in her own way, her boat-rocking is of a much more - um - pleasurable nature, and she is both happy in herself and causes happiness in others. Most of the source of the happiness that she both contains and radiates is that sometimes others think she's an embarrassment, but she doesn't care. It's an art I've never quite fully mastered, but I'm pretty close.

So, I'm going to keep doing what I do, and you lot? You can like me or lump me.



Haters Gonna Hate.

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* Well, not ALL I want to do, but, you know... ;)
** I'm going to extend the same courtesy to him as he does to me in his thinly veiled character assassination of me (now at two posts and all he has thought worthy to blog about for the past week) and not link to him at all and leave you guys to work out for yourselves who I am talking about.