Being narsty to carnts

[imomus]

I think I was probably the narstiest person in my family, but it wasn't major stuff. I nicknamed my sister "Little White Pig" just in case my mother's affectionate name for her, "Little White Pet", went to her head. It was for her own good, you understand. Apart from that, everyone in my family was gentle and supportive and civilized to each other. We grew up in an atmosphere of mutual support and kindness which only broke down into mildly sarcastic recrimination when my parents divorced.



Where I really learned about narstiness, though, was at boarding school. Between the ages of 9 and 13 I received a full crash-course in it. I was physically and mentally tortured, and I learned the extreme difference between running with an in-group and being an out-group of one. (Clue: It was mainly that you didn't get beaten up daily.) Now, although my ultraviolent public school was particularly British (think Lindsay Anderson's "if..."), I won't argue here that narstiness is an entirely British pursuit. There are massacres, torture, cursings and stonings all over the world. But I do find that a certain kind of low-level narstiness is considered acceptable and even amusing in the UK. Narstiness (rather than outright brutality, let's say) seems inherently British.

I don't just see this in Britain's notoriously narsty tabloids, although I think an unholy alliance between Rupert Murdoch and British class hatred has a lot to answer for. It's all over the blogs and bulletin boards I read, the ones frequented by British people, anyway. You can't read far without being forced to agree or disagree with the proposition that someone is a "carnt". One friend's recent blog entries ("friends only", so I won't link them here) have identified several.

There's the woman who exaggerated the damage to her Collier's Wood home caused by a recent freak tornado. She's a carnt, apparently, because she said, in an article for the Standard, things like "My home has always been my sanctuary, a place of exquisite beauty and calm." I'm not quite sure, but I think Caroline Phillips is supposed to be an acceptable target because she's precious, hysterical and bourgeois. Perhaps also because her house really is nicer than ours, or was before the freak tornado struck. Anyway, she had to close the comments thread on her LiveJournal because so many people were dropping in to call her a carnt.

Next there's Liberal Democrat MP Lembit Opik, who split from his TV weather presenter girlfriend in order to date one half of East European novelty pop outfit The Cheeky Girls, known in the UK for their saucy seaside postcard pop hit "Touch My Bum". My friend links to the BBC article about this earth-shaking event (and I'm rather surprised the BBC -- still, I think, a public service broadcaster and not a tabloid newspaper -- covered it, unless their agenda is being set by the tabloids) with the terse comment "What a twat". Again, I'm not quite sure what this man's error is. Dating a pretty Romanian novelty singer? Splitting up with a weather presenter to do so? Exchanging a partner close to his own age for a younger one, or a British partner for a foreign one? Whatever it is, the comments thread more or less agreed that Tornado Lady and Cheeky Man have rendered all satire irrelevant.

Things get truly narsty, though, when the news story involves an alleged serial killer. When the police arrested their first suspect in the Suffolk Strangler case this week, the British press made a big deal of the fact that the man was called Tom and had a MySpace page. Despite stern warnings from Suffolk police that the man's name not be released, the Mirror published an article about him on Sunday, and the whole British media then set about discovering everything they could about the Tesco manager, including publishing links to his MySpace page. One of his seven friends was a woman, and this woman's MySpace page quickly filled up with abusive comments. She too was apparently a "carnt" for having friended the suspect. I suppose it's the internet-age equivalent of being stoned in the market square. Anyway, the following day the police found a new suspect.

Personally, I blame Rupert Murdoch for the virulent state of British narstiness, and the large number of carnts per square metre -- sorry, foot -- in the UK. Of course, by pointing the finger at a narsty carnt myself, I'm playing the national sport. But, don't you see, if we all agree that there's just one gigantic narsty carnt in the world, we can all love each other unconditionally. If not forever, at least until Rupert pops his clogs. As those Dutch carnts would put it.

Comments

[insomnia.livejournal.com]

Although my mother was British, and I lived in Britain for awhile in my childhood, the thing I least understand about the British isn't their nasty streak, but their Conservative Party streak.

You'd think one dose of Thatcherism would be enough for any country's memory, and that a repudiation of failed "New Labour" would lead to a desire to supporting either a less centrist Labour government, or the LibDems, but no, everyone apparently luurves David Cameron (http://politics.guardian.co.uk/polls/story/0,,1975783,00.html), and the LibDems, who were essentially right about all the big national issues for most of this decade, are slipping again.

I think what it comes down to is that my England was pretty idyllic anyway, tucked away in the Cotswolds, and I didn't have to deal with the development of "carnt culture"... which is, no doubt, directly tied to the success of the Conservatives.

The media behind "carnt culture" thrives on tapping into the perceptions of victimization by its audience -- primarily by well-off white males -- in a way that's always angry and generally a bit racist, albeit in a socially acceptable manner. The goal isn't to provoke a mob to anger, as in soccer hooliganism, but, rather, to provoke a mob to quiet, socially acceptable intolerance and repression, and a gradual erosion of civil liberties. "Carnt culture" proudly promotes patriotic intolerance for other British who are suspect / carnts.

Carnt culture dictates that all British be angry and intolerant about something and someone, all the time. The audience for carnt culture cannot be sated by societal changes that you would think might placate them, because there's always another outrage to complain about that pushes the cultural war that much further towards previously inconceivable levels of socially acceptable repression.

Media pushing carnt culture in Britain works reliably and achieves its objectives in Britain, just like it works wonderfully in the U.S., under the auspices of Fox News. And, surprisingly, it seem to work reliably over a long period of time, because it fills a basic need for a lot of people.

Ultimately, politicians are forced to show obedience to carnt culture, or else they won't get elected, so whether you back Labour or the Conservatives, you can be sure you're supporting someone who will tolerate an ever expanding culture of carntishness.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I didn't have to deal with the development of "carnt culture"... which is, no doubt, directly tied to the success of the Conservatives.

Yes, and the Thatcherite culture of vilification of immigrants, "naming and shaming" and the "short sharp shock" continues under Blair, even if stuff like Section 28 doesn't. It continues because it taps into a public mood very like the one picked up in the US by American Environics (http://imomus.livejournal.com/169070.html) marketers:

"Environics found social values moving away from the authority end of the scale, with its emphasis on responsibility, duty, and tradition, to a more atomized, rage-filled outlook that values consumption, sexual permissiveness, and xenophobia. The trend was toward values in the individuality quadrant."

[imomus.livejournal.com]

(But of course Cameron is succeeding by being a "nice guy" -- you can't out-Thatcher blair, so you need to do something else. Which is basically to re-invent... John Major.)

[insomnia.livejournal.com]

That American Environics research would be a far more fascinating read, assuming I didn't have to live in it.

While parts of California are fairly fulfillment based, on a statewide level, we seem to all agree on the need for survival / Schwarzenegger.

[(Anonymous)]

I don't think the Blair government is guilty of the villification of immigrants. The only thing I can think of are recent, rather feeble attempts at encouraging integration among British Muslims. To be fair to them, I don't recall a whiff of this kind of thing before July 7th. But this is happening all over Europe - even Holland is starting to sound more aggressively integrationist than Britain.

On the contrary, immigration has rocketed under New Labour and they've generally been welcoming to the vast majority of immigrants. Even if that is basically because they're a good supply of cheap labour.