Sunday 13 February 2011

Rastafuck.

When your article is just missing that smattering of quotes to make your ridiculous stance credible, Mumsnet is an invaluable tool.

The CBeebies show Rastamouse, features the titular character playing in a reggae band, and speaking in Jamaican Patois. This seems to have caught the attention of Jonathan Wynne-Jones and Jasper Copping from the Telegraph, who have quickly jumped on the show as 'provoking compaints of racism'. Unfortunately, it seems all of the hundred or so complaints come from a bunch of absolute fucktards. How this article was a two-man job is absolutely beyond my realm of understanding.

One mother on the Mumsnet forum, using the name TinyD4ncer, says she is concerned her child be attacked for repeating some of the Jamaican Patois phrases used by the mouse.

"The thing I'm most worried about is her saying the words like 'Rasta' and going up to a child and saying (these) things ... my child is white and I feel if she was to say this to another child who was not white that it would be seen as her insulting the other child."


Maybe this has escaped my purview entirely but as far as I was aware, 'Rasta' never has or will be used as an insult in a playground situation. I would also probably challenge the claim that her child is going to be attacked, as implied (actually, fuck it, said) by the author, for using this word.

I don't claim to be any kind of expert in the accuracy of representation of this Rastafarian mouse, but when ALL your quotes are from forums, written in appalling English and gathered in the time it takes to make a cup of tea, my Spidey-sense starts to tingle that bad journalism is afoot.

Secondly, I would also argue that websites such as Mumsnet and BumpandBaby are going to be goldmines for paranoiic and dramatic opinions to bolster any non-article.

An important rule for any budding journalists out there, if the people you're lifting quotes from online have admitted that they have little to no knowledge on the subject they're imparting an opinion on, probably best to cut that bit out:

Another parent, on Bumpandbaby.com, says: "just watched a couple videos .. i'm going to say it is racist".

Well thanks, 'Another parent'. Care for some context, reasoning, grammar? No? Oh ok... my mistake.

The first result on Google Image search is the one they went with, funny that.

The Rastafarian mouse, who leads a band called the Easy Crew and speaks in Jamaican Patois, uses phrases such as "me wan go" ("I want to go"), "irie" ("happy"), "wagwan" ("what's going on?"). His mission is to "make a bad ting good".

I wish Rastamouse had worked on your fucking article, boys.

2 comments:

  1. Shirley, the Mums on Mumsnet would be more worried that with it being a rastafarian mouse that their children might end up smoking preaching the word of Jah whilst toking on a spliff.

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  2. Have you ever actually been on mumsnet? It's a far cry from the usual parenting sites. Take a read of this as a fine example of what the site is like...
    http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mumsnet_classics/1174221-Thickos-on-TripAdvisor

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