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12 May

Madonna's crimes against humanity are already legion: albums full of crappy songs, dusty video shops full of unrented films, stupid bras, tedious self-promotion, a pointless children's book, Guy Ritchie … it's a long list that just got longer. For the wrinkly queen of pop is currently trying to ban ramblers from her 1,200-acre Wiltshire estate, on the grounds that she needs her 'privacy.' To ensure that she gets it, the woman who's happy to get her tits out on film if it will add to her fortune is invoking - wait for it - the Human Rights Act, to keep the plebs away from her manor.

Let's be clear what's happening here. One unequivocal good that this government has done is to introduce a 'right to roam' to Britain, under which landless plebs like me are allowed to walk unhindered across open country, no matter who owns it. The right to roam is more limited than many people (myself included) would like, but it's a start and it's better than what we had before. Madonna, however, seems to think it doesn't apply to her, and is willing to use up a lot of taxpayers' time and money to prove it.

Now I don't want to come across all xenophobic, but the right to roam is something that many people in this country have been battling for for almost a century, and whole point of it is that it applies to EVERYONE - even rich, spoilt, petulant, talentless ageing pop stars from across the pond. Especially to them, in fact.

What is it about this country? Our vile newspapers can whip themselves up into a frenzy about asylum seekers, most of whom are desperate and in need of our help. We're quite happy to call for poor foreigners to be thrown out of the country, when what we should really be doing is preventing rich ones from buying up estates and then shutting us out of them. I think this is outrageous, so I'm hereby launching a 'send Madonna back where she came from' campaign. Hopefully she'll take Guy Ritchie with her, and then we'll all feel better about living in Britain.

On that note, I'm off on holiday until the end of May. I'm going to get bitten by midges on the west coast of Scotland, where I will be roaming across as much private land as possible. This is how I get my kicks. Each to their own, and all that…

See you in June.

Posted by paul at 05:14 PM | Comments (0)

7 May

I've been very lazy in blogging for the last week. The weather is too good, for one, plus I've been giving talks in bookshops around the country. Last night I was in Leeds, waffling to a small crowd in a branch of Borders, when someone asked me the question I've been expecting at every other Borders talk I've given, but have somehow never received before: how come you're talking in this chain bookshop then, if you're so smugly anti-corporate?

Which is an entirely fair question. The answer, simply, is that I'm doing it for the same reason I published my book with a major publisher owned by a nasty multinational (Viacom) - I want to get the message of the book out as widely as possible, and I want it to reach people who haven't already heard it. In my judgement, it's a better way of changing things than being super-ethical, publishing with a tiny non-corporate house, refusing invitations to talk in chain stores and selling just a few hundred books to people who agree with me anyway.

Naturally the money, fame and glory is better this way too. How else would I afford the upkeep of both my 500-acre estate in Oxfordshire and my Mayfair penthouse, not to mention my fleet of Bentleys? Not through an advance from AK Press, that's for sure.

But enough of this special pleading. On another matter entirely, here is an unbelievable story I came across today in an American newspaper. I suggest you strap yourself into your chair before you read it. Warning: this is not a spoof. Really.

Posted by paul at 05:11 PM | Comments (0)