I was having a sneaky post work
afternoon pint a few weeks back adjacent to a table of full of
refreshed old boys. Their topic of conversation was the celebrities
of the seventies who ended up embroiled in charges of sexual
misconduct. Bizarrely, this turned into a debate about who was the
'worst' offender. “Well” said one of the old timers “It has to
be Stuart Hall”. “Stuart Hall??” chorused his pals in unison
“Why Stuart Hall?” “Well” he said, supping his pint “I
liked Stuart Hall”.
The British have a tendency to assume
that the people they admire, particularly artistically, will have the
same views and beliefs as themselves. When it turns out that they in
fact do not, it hurts. It was especially galling to discover that
Morrissey is in fact a massive twat. I wont bother revising why The
Smiths meant (and mean) so much to me, I've wrote about it
extensively on this very website. Suffice to say, in my teens and
twenties they got me through some pretty dark and difficult times.
What hurts is the fact that once upon a time Morrissey spoke for and
about the unspoken and unmentioned. He spoke up for the marginalised
people of society, the ugly, the shy, the lonely and the afraid. For
the non binary. The non CIS. For the poor and the down trodden. For
me and for you. How can someone who wrote 'It takes guts by gentle
and shy' stumble so far into self flagellating and self fellation
that he ends up a mouth piece for UKIP?
In his book, Saint Morrissey, Mark
Simpson makes the case that Morrissey's bitterness, self worship and
refusal to be wrong stems from years of staying to long in the
closet. I think it's simpler than that. Morrissey has no-one to tell
him 'look, you're talking bollocks there mate'. In his head, whatever
he says is a statement of fact. When you have arenas full of fans
baying at your every utterance it probably feels that way. When
anyone disagrees with him they are 'out to get him'. He really is a
daft old sod.
My respect for Morrissey grew thin
around 2007 when, as a millionaire ex pat living in a mansion in LA,
he deemed it necessary to pontificate to the British how shit their lives are and how as he never voted, we shouldn't either. Really
mate? This was followed by some very dubious comments about
immigration, which really sent the alarm bells ringing. These
missives were totally misguided and, as he is a child of two Irish
immigrants himself, incredibly hard to swallow. He was chatting shit,
and deep down we knew it. Then in 2014, around the time of the
release of the patchy if not totally shit World Peace Is None of Your
Business, it was revealed that the Mozfather was suffering with cancer. Seemingly, all was
forgiven due to the fear that he might go and die on us. This
acceptance was short lived as he really went bat shit crazy. The
pinnacle of his offensive prattishness was his comments after the
bombing of Manchester Arena. Now, Manchester is my favourite city in
the world, we have a lot of history, and everyone in my immediate
family (bar my daughter) have attended concerts at the arena. This
all felt very personal and eerily close to home. On the 23rd
of May last year, the evening Johnny Marr took to the stage with
Canadian band Broken Social Scene in an act of defiance and
solidarity, Morrissey released a statement as offensive as it was
bananas. Blaming immigration and Andy Burnham for the bombing was the
final straw for me. I loved Morrissey but I couldn’t buy his
records or go to his shows after this. Not any more.
I have been lucky, and I mean lucky, to
have released myself from his grip. Hero worship is the enemy of
common sense, and others remain shipwrecked on Mozzers bullshit
island. The self styled 'Moz Army' are the worst offenders. These lot
are little too far along the spectrum for my liking. A bit too
obsessed. I'm a dad in my forties. I don't need Morrissey
anymore, he hasn't been a talisman or a moral compass to me since my
early twenties. But these lot are cursed, believing that saying
anything negative about the quiffed Christ means they are somehow not
true disciples. Ringleader of the titmice, Julie Hamill (who I
actual feel a genuine sympathy for, she has some how ended up
defending her hero, who is to cowardly to do it himself) has gone on
record stating he is 'untitled to his opinion'. By attacking 'non
whites' he is attacking my friends. This is not OK. Is it so scary to say 'actually,
he's talking bollocks here'. Would you really be kicked out the gang?
Morrissey
has become the darling of the right wing tweeting brigade (happily,
easily identifiable by having a union jack by their username. Not
quite going the full hog and having a swastika or 'TWAT' tattooed on
their forehead but near enough) championing him for saying 'what
everyone's really thinking but afraid to say'. Well lads, you are
welcome to him. I'm not going to stop listening to The Smiths. Ever.
Maybe that's the wrong choice, maybe we should stop listening to the
Stooges because Iggy once said 'paki' in an interview or stop
listening to Ian Curtis or Kate Bush because they voted Tory. I
dunno. But I believe, maybe naively, that this is a vast difference
between the Morrissey in his early twenties and the monster pushing
sixty. So here is the compromise. We keep the kitten hugging cardigan
wearing Wilde wannabe Morrissey and the right wing and the Moz Army
and all the other lunatics take the husk of hate that he has become.
Deal?
One
final thought. The right wing-nuts have rallied around Morrissey
because he's 'not afraid to tell it like it really is'. But I'm not
sure that is totally correct. This barrage of hate is maybe just him testing the
water, and maybe his private thoughts are actually full on
horrifically racist. And the more people agree with his campaign of
hate, the dirtier and more hateful views will rise to the top like
shiny scum. Food for thought.
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