/headdesk
Dear readers,
You would have thought that with the country grinding to a halt under severe weather conditions, there might be more important things at stake than worrying about Doctor Who. Apparently I could not have been more wrong. From the BBC website:
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Doctor Who, BBC One, comment about ginger hair, 1 January 2010
Publication date: 6 January 2010
Complaint
We’ve received complaints from viewers who believed a line in the second part of Doctor Who: The End of Time was insulting to people with ginger hair.
The BBC’s response
We would like to reassure viewers that Doctor Who doesn’t have an anti ginger agenda whatsoever. This was a reprise of the line in the Christmas Invasion episode in 2005, when David Tennant discovers that he’s not ginger, and here he is, missing out again – disappointed he’s still not ginger.
In addition, the Doctor’s previous companion Donna Noble (Catherine Tate) and his new one Amy Pond (Karen Gillan) are both redheads.
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No, this is not a joke. More than 100 complaints were made to the BBC over an off-the-cuff remark in the Doctor Who Christmas special. The remark, uttered by the new Doctor Matt Smith at the moment of his transmogrification into the Gallifrean Timelord ran as follows:
“I’ve still got legs. Arms, hands, lots of fingers, eyes, hair”. Checking his new look, he continued: “I’m not a doll. I’m still not ginger.”
While this statement was in fact a compliment and displayed the Doctor’s deep sadness at not joining the ginger ranks, the more radical elements of the ‘ginger fringe’ have interpreted this as a slur. One mother who complained to the BBC said: “I think it is totally inappropriate for the Doctor to make fun of people with ginger hair — it is a programme children watch and I think it will encourage bullying.” This earth-shattering incident follows an equally heinous crime committed last year, when the BBC responded to complaints from EastEnders viewers after the ginger hair of the character Tiffany was mocked. The BBC said then that characters in a drama should be allowed to “express views/opinions that we personally do not agree with”. It added that the soap also featured “a number of very successful red-headed characters”.
/headdesk
Makes worrying all day about political plots and coups look positively rational.
I watched this with my kids, (fortunate to have the excuse of 3 boys under 13, don’t tell anyone though), and I had a feeling that this would happen. I think they deliberately invited it, all publicity is good publicity after all.
As you point out, the new assistant is also a very leggy redhead, following the long standing Dr Who tradition (Katy Manning, Elizabeth Sladen & Louse Jameson) of giving the dads a little something for Saturday evenings to set the pulse racing while the kids are hiding beind the sofa! (not very PC). No complaints about sexism though.
Nor ageism, the Doctor gets younger every time, and Moira Stewart should really have got the job don’t you think, over 50, female & not white! All the boxes ticked.
The point is simple, Dr Who is like 70’s rock band KISS, if you take it too seriously you have missed the point! Some people will complain about anything.
In the unlikely event that New Labour are returned to power, it will only be a matter of time before Harriet Harman and Jack Straw criminalise anti-ginger words and/or behaviour, or attempts, incitement or conspiracy to commit such.
Incidentally, during my school years (50s & 60s) bullying was fairly commonplace (most commonly inflicted by teachers and/or prefects!). But my recollection is that references to ginger hair never appeared on the bullying or insults landscape. It is surely a relatively new phenomenon, and, perhaps, generated and encouraged by complaints such as this along with its attendant publicity.
LFaT, I believe you are missing a vital piece of information, one which is summed up quite ably by Tim Minchin in his song ‘Prejudice’. I recommend you have a listen, if you can – here it is on YouTube.
Perhaps this will help make the issue clearer.
As I understood it, this is a prejudice who’s day’s are numbered anyway. Not because suddenly gingers are accepted by society but because the recessive gene that gives red hair is in decline.
But for those desperate souls who can’t wait, there’s always this.
@Stu – Lol!
“The BBC said then that characters in a drama should be allowed to “express views/opinions that we personally do not agree with”.”
But only characters in a drama. God forbid real people should ever be allowed to express those views and opinions, eh, Beeb?
I watched it, heard that comment, and thought “ohhhhh dear….. wait for the postbag…”
We ought really have some system for identifying these people and sectioning them. Otherwise, they will have the vote, you realise…
I wonder if this was the same mother who complained to Tescos about a ginger joke on a Christmas card.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/north_yorkshire/8411894.stm
@patently – @Tony E – Interesting that both of you foresaw a reaction to the ginger episode. Richard Dawkins deals with this sort of thing in his book ‘The God Delusion’ (no, I’m not trying to steer this thread controversially elsewhere). He calls it a ‘raising of consciousness’ so that after hearing an ‘issue’ or reference repeated – such as the feminist references to things like HIMself or HERself, and all that, back in the 70s (was it?), we find ourselves spotting and acknowledging the ‘issues’.
But the question still remains, where do these bloody things start?
So the next set of complains coming out of the the BBC will be what? The Caramel coloured kids that Denise from the Royale family said she wanted to match her sofa’s….
A Joke requires a victim of some sort, but the clue is in the word “Joke”
The question to whether the joke is funny or not lies with the recipient…
Never really understood the whole ginger thing – some of the most stunning looking woman in the world are redheads.
@patently – “We ought really have some system for identifying these people and sectioning them. Otherwise, they will have the vote, you realise”
I don’t think ginger people deserve to be treated that harshly, do they? I mean, a bit of light mockery is all well and good (character-building, you know) but I think you’re taking it pretty far there.
@FLS – Baroness Royall is pretty scary though http://olivershah.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/royall.jpg
Didn’t DJ, Chris Evans, set up companies called Ginger Media and Ginger Productions? The appellation didn’t seem to bother him, nor harm his success and prosperity.
Wight Tory: You correctly point out that there are exceptions to every ‘rule’!
All those blonde jokes and they never complained to the government.
I suppose they didn’t get them.