Michael Jackson Steven Green Edward Bond

I know I have said it many times before and I am in dire danger of repeating myself ad nauseum but there is little doubt I will say it again and again – it’s a crazy world we live in and here is the latest piece to boggle the mind; a black surgical mask alleged to have been worn by Michael Jackson the night before he died is up for auction. It has been in the possession of one of his bodyguards (why?) who swears it is authentic. The offered item is said to be made of a silk fabric and wow, guys and gals, it bears visible traces of his stage make-up and a lock of his hair! Scream scream scream! Howzzat to make any fan swoon? The bidding is expected to reach £90000. I shake my head in wonder. What is it? Is it a fetish? Is the lucky idiotic purchaser going to spend the rest of his/her life masturbating over it? A thousand orgasms and it is still costing ninety quid a throw. Ten thousand and it works out at nine. If the purchaser is very very young he or she may make it well along the way but I would think at the price it’s reputedly going for the eager buyer must be at least middle aged and won’t get his or her money’s worth before joining Michael in everlasting bliss.

I also swore blind I was never going to return to this subject but it is too much in your face as it were to be continually brushed under the carpet and ignored as it would seem many people would like it to be. Reactions are either viciously ignorant and phobic (Uganda, Liberia, Muslim states, now Russia) or just plain silly: The Emperor Justinian banned it because it causes earthquakes and now some idiot has decided it is the cause of a plague of mice in a Tesco store! No, don’t laugh, this is truly sad. As Frankie Howerd would have said, it’s wrong to mock the afflicted. The idiot concerned goes by the name of Steven Green and is the leader of – you guess correctly, it simply had to be – something called “Christian Voice!” According to Mister Green there is a quite obvious explanation for the infestation of mice – it is retribution from a divine god – in which case all I can say is god has a wonderful sense of humour or maybe he has run out of plagues, locusts, and famine in the close vicinity of Tesco’s and mice will have to do to wreak his divine wrath.  According to Mister Green this retribution has descended on the Tesco store in question because it donated £30000 to London’s Gay Pride and this is their come uppence.

But here is something to really give Mister Green the screaming habdabs, cause him to cream his knickers, explode with righteous indignation, or faint away like a Victorian maiden. A British commercial has been made – in the best of all possible taste I may add – in favour of equal marriage called ‘All Men Can Be Husbands’ and is on the internet. Heavens to Betsy! Maude, the smelling salts, quick! And as Edward Bond once said, “There are no supernatural answers to natural problems.” But obviously that doesn’t stop some people’s imaginations from running amok.