No Ordinary Fool

What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.

- Salman Rushdie

No one likes to be the butt of a joke. We all have our egoes and none more so than preening politicians. However, those who would put themselves forward to be the leaders of a free society have to accept that they can be openly and, sometimes nastily, criticised. Moreover, art, and caricature in particular, is an important form of such unfettered protest.

Hence, when some unknown painter casually strolled into both the National Gallery and the RHA Gallery last Saturday and hung up two nude paintings of Brian Cowen, without either being immediately noticed, this was a wonderfully audacious form of public protest and artistic expression. Portrayed either holding up a cheap pair of underpants or squatting on the toilet with loo roll in hand, clearly neither image was ever going to be flattering to a grossly overweight man. Yet, any vulgarity that they contain will prove to be really quite tame in nature compared to what will surely now follow by way of a popular backlash!

For, you see, when RTE (Ireland’s State-owned television station) reported the story in a suitably tasteful manner on Monday’s main evening news, it led to private demands being made of it to withdraw the recording of that segment from the Internet (which it did) and for a public apology for any personal offence caused to Brian Cowen or his family or for any disrespect shown to the office of An Taoiseach to be made (which it also complied with last night). Not only was this a snivelling act of subservience on the part of RTE, it highlighted once more just how much influence is exercised by Fianna Fail over the nation’s largest media outlet. Worse, no matter how trivial it may seem, this suppression of a legitimate news story about a public figure damages the freedom of the media and, by extension, the freedom of each citizen of this country.

My initial reaction was to feel anger once more at the arrogance of Fianna Fail. From Charlie Haughey to Ray Burke to Liam Lawlor, they have abused their office shamelessly. The previous Taoiseach could only lamely justify large amounts of unexplained cash in his bank account with the explanation that he had won it in the bookies, m’lud. On top of this, their ridiculous fuelling of this country’s economy by way of  recklessly promoting an enormous private propety boom has brought this country’s economy to its knees now that a global recession is upon us. Yet, let the story of how one ordinary citizen cocked a snoop at them be reported upon nationally and they are leaning heavily on RTE to try and kill it off.

Last year, The New Yorker caused a huge stir when they published a contraversial image on their front cover (above) of what Barack Obama getting into the Oval Office might mean for the country. They claimed that the then-Democratic nominee was not the target of their satire, rather the Republican demonising of him. Yet, the Obama campaign was rightly upset about it, as they knew well that many voters would not draw this distinction and that this was therefore a dangerous light for their candidate to be portrayed in. Accordingly, the campaign and its supporters were very vocal in their complaints, as they were fully entitled to be. Yet the magazine edition stayed on the shelves and Obama’s people simply had to carry on with the business of getting their man elected as best they could.

That is what happens in free societies. Just do not mention “swift boats” to John Kerry…

However, upon further reflection, the ghost of another politician came whispering to my mind. The popular image of Prime Minister John Major became that of the Spitting Image puppet that showed him wearing his underpants outside of his trousers. Soon, other cartoonists (such as Steve Bell above) would adopt the same image in their caricatures of him. Of course, the image, by itself, did not cause the near wipeout of Major’s government in the 1997 general election. Rather, it captured the zeitgeist and therefore became a powerful symbol of a tired government that was out of time, out of touch, and soon to be out of power.

Accordingly, it is more disappointing than surprising that Brian Cowen or his cohorts in the Fianna Fail party are foolishly trying to clamp down on the reporting of this satire. The reality is that they have failed this country badly with their irresponsible policies and lack of true leadership, they are running the gauntlet of the mother of all electoral hidings, they know this only too well, and are shrewd enough to see how images such as these can now so easily push them into political oblivion. In short, their cowardly pressurising of  RTE is the act of people petrified with fear for their ability to cling on to power and who are desperately resorting to bully-boy tactics as a result.

Hence, in a perverse way, I am delighted that they have lashed out in this short-sighted manner. The combination of the St. Patrick’s Day festivities and last weekend’s amazing sporting successes had soothed the national anger to an extent. Thanks to this act of folly, though, they have stirred the hornets’ nest right up again. This party has done untold damage to this country, so it is a pleasure to see them now doing untold damage to themselves.

Brian Cowen, as you ponder upon the pot, do not ask for whom the toilet flushes. It flushes for thee.