MOBOphobe

I was surprised to hear that Glasgow will be playing host to this year’s MOBO Awards ceremony (the most ambiguous awards ceremony in existence?) in September. I used to love the MOBOs when I was young; I went to a primary school where I literally was the only ethnic minority (half-Iranian), something that I was very conscious of and which made my child’s mind decide that I was basically black. Incidentally, this is probably also the only explanation I have for buying Will Smith’s album, and for knowing the words to Richard Blackwood’s first single “Mama Who Da Man?”. I don’t know, son, but it certainly isn’t you.

Anyway, I remember watching it one year and seeing a rapper called Beanie Man on it who I found quite scary. I can’t remember why I found him scary, but that’s by the by. I told all of my friends the next day about Beanie Man and how I was scared of him, and when I think back, I don’t think he was actually that bad. I think I was just saying it for the sake of having something to say, and this brings me to what I actually want to bitch about here- fake phobias.

I understand why some people are scared of spiders. Poisonous spiders exist so there’s the fear factor of being harmed, as well as the fact they have 8 legs and 8 eyes. So arachnophobia makes sense, as do other phobias like agoraphobia or acrophobia. There is logic behind the fear.

What pisses me off is people who claim to, for instance, have a “baked beans phobia”, because 95% of these people merely dislike the taste of beans and have popped the word phobia in there to make them look a wee bit zany. The other 5% probably had a saucepan of baked beans poured over their heads when they were babies, in which case they’re allowed their seemingly irrational fear. Once somebody has decided to have a fake phobia they have to stick with it, which is why a girl I know screams and covers her ears and generally goes mental every time she hears the word “poo”. That’s right, she claims to have a phobia OF THE WORD POO.

I have to say, it’s mainly girls who do the fake phobia thing, probably because we are more likely to have succumbed to “random culture” than guys. Do you think women of the 1950s chatted to each other about their fears of onions, carpets, and dusky skies? I doubt it. And yet it’s easy to imagine Edith Bowman dedicating a whole radio show to weird and wacky phobias, encouraging each caller to outdo the previous one so that it spirals from “I’m scared of the wee bits of crisps left over at the bottom of my crisp packet” to “I’m scared of chins!” to “I’m scared that if I don’t pee six times a day, my fanny will turn into a truncheon!”

Question these fake phobias.



Just question them.

Winch, Poke, Aye Right Then No Chance

Sorry for lack of blogging. I have lots of excuses lined up for you: I've been applying to university; I've been applying for funding; I've been covering tonnes of shifts at work for a girl who I don't particularly like (she thinks that all muslims come from "pakiland", she doesn't know what a stew is, and she only shits once a week).

If I hadn't been so distracted , I would have blogged much sooner about Snog Marry Avoid. I actually saw (what I now realise was) the pilot for this programme at the beginning of last summer, and was disappointed when I didn't see it again. I live on a street which is littered with 3 things: doner kebabs, seagulls, and ideal candidates for Snog Marry Avoid, so it's been fun to watch the people on the programme then look out my window to find one of their doppelgängers in close proximity, who I can then mentally make-under. And I mean mentally in both senses of the word; sometimes I'm in such a bad mood that my mental make-under involves dousing them in bleach and dressing them in underwear from Barnardos and clothes from Bonmarche.

The thing that makes this programme so entertaining is Jenny Frost's embarrassing presenting style. If you haven't seen it, imagine your 9 year old self as a TV presenter, all hand-actions and nervous grins and head-bops. That aside, it's hard to take her advocation of natural beauty seriously since she's visibly fried her hair, slathered on the fake tan, and quite obviously had a boob job. If the producers want to go for irony, they may as well go all out and get Ru Paul as the next presenter.