Shooting a Baboon, Shooting a Sunni

Not quite George Orwell, but this piece by John Torode is one of the funniest things that I have seen in a newspaper in a while.  First the disclaimer from the Times: Any connection between the wildlife in this column and this week’s restaurateur is purely coincidental. John Torode is that bloke off the telly. The other one in MasterChef. The one who might have been a 1960s photographer or runner-up in a Lovejoy lookalike competition. He and the bald one are the Flanagan and Allen of cold dinners, the Mike and Bernie Winters of yumming. Torode boldly does the toughest job in broadcasting: professional extempore eating. Watching other people chew is bilious. Showing off your expressive and judgmental eating skills is far harder than blowing away a monkey.

I was in Africa wearing a Robert Redford Out of Africa hat. The sort of hat that just makes you ache to kill stuff. I have a theory about hats: they really do maketh the man.  . . .

We could do a lot of liberal social engineering by rearranging titfers. If riot police had to wear mortarboards, there would be much less gratuitous truncheoning. Prison warders should wear chefs’ hats, bishops should have big Ascot hats, lads in hoodies should be made to wear those food-safety hygiene hairnets after dark. If the Jews and the Arabs wore each other’s yarmulkes and tea towels, it probably wouldn’t lead to peace in the Middle East, but it would be bloody funny.  . . .

And here’s the thing. If you tool around the beautiful and unruly bits of Africa long enough in the company of gangs of men in purposeful hats, sooner or later you’re going to do baboon. You think you’re not, you think you’re the exception, you’re going to just say no to baboon, but pretty soon it’s the monkey on your back. I should have worn my Stella McCartney hat.

Read the rest at the link above, especially the comments of outrage about monkey shooting (h/t Bergholt Stuttley Johnson).  Then check the Reason comments thread that ties this whole post together.

Speaking of wicked tea towels . . .

Luqman Ameen Abdullah (Muslim Alliance of North America)

From the Detroit Free Press:

Posted: Oct. 29, 2009

Radical mosque leader killed in FBI shootout
Feds say goal was Islamic nation in U.S.
BY BEN SCHMITT, NIRAJ WARIKOO AND ROBIN ERB
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITERS

Abdullah, known to some as Christopher Thomas, died after firing on officers during the raid, the U.S. Attorney's Office said. An FBI dog also was fatally wounded.

Better info there than in my earlier post on this incident.


http://sukisite.com/
http://SlashSlashDotDot.blogspot.com/
Browse the series on Google:
Suki I, Suki II, Suki III, Suki IV