Ah! Joan Bakewell! Dubbed the 'thinking man's crumpet' by Frank Muir many moons ago and a feature of every self-regarding, slightly left wing, artsy-farty programme ever since, the woman has become (for reasons that escape me) some sort of champion for the elderly.
Now, in line with the latest piece of prohibitionist propaganda, Ms Bakewell has transformed from crumpet to fussbucket overnight. Apparently, she has been told that every second old widow woman is now a complete lush, out of her brains on wine or G & T.
Barbara is in her seventies and since being widowed has lived alone. She and her husband were enjoying a happy retirement in France’s expat community. But his illness and death plunged her into gloom. Come 4pm, she starts on the wine and downs a bottle a day.
So Barbara needs a social life, perhaps someone like Joan to take her to the theatre or perhaps just shopping. Maybe just a road trip to the seaside or into the hills. Or an occasional visit to a nice cafe. But that's not what Joan is offering. She's offering a stern lecture about drinking and support for making Barbara's bottle of wine (or actually not unless M. Hollande plans to completely destroy his electoral chances by making wine more expensive) more pricey.
The saddest thing is that Joan Bakewell - who is approaching the grand old age of 80 in fine health - has got the drinking thing about nailed:
Which brings us back to those units. I won’t recite them now because they’re confusing and contradictory: what exactly is “half a standard glass of wine”? All I can say is that my drinking diary registered me as well over the limit. Yet I share the same way of life as many, never drink at lunchtime, rarely touch spirits. And I enjoy the conviviality of old age.
Joan's 'drinking diary' may exceed the limits recommended by the prohibitionists but she's doing fine and has no need - or reason - to change her drinking habits. Certainly not on the back of a pack of lies from the Church of Public Health about old people drinking.
Sadly Joan, once so liberal in outlook, has become just another nannying fussbucket. Indeed, the thinking man's nannying fussbucket!
...
1 comment:
I hate to say this since it can be construed as contentious, but honestly and based on personal experience over many years of life, something similar to that situation could be said about some 80 and 90 year old pensioners who occasionally like to have a pipe full of tobacco, smoke an after-dinner cigar or even go so far as to smoke cigarettes (all of which are today's big taboo). Many such souls lived long happy lives and that little bit of comfort some burning leaf has brought them, in today's nannying fuss-bucket state of constant social condemnation and outright prohibition, there are many an elderly person's life had their social life destroyed and turned into a criminal for all practical purposes, brought about by such hateful, spiteful, mean-spirited anti-smoking fuss-bucketing, as much as those now moving forward to condemn anyone touching an alcoholic drink. By the time they get through, they will have ruined many many lives and have gotten away with it scott-free, given it's difficult to establish the cause behind some early deaths due to prohibitionism, but it kills people by killing their spirits off and creates intolerable conditions, no different than a flower denied water or sunshine eventually gives up and dies prematurely as well, so does the belittled class, especially of the elderly, who aren't as "modern" and "progressive" as today's prohibitionist class has turned themselves into.
Post a Comment