My nomination for the “Best UK Weblog” category of the Queerday.com Queeries award (see this post) has caused something of a storm in a teacup in far-off Scotland, where my erroneous nomination has gravely distressed one of my co-nominees:
Queer Day removed a nominee from our first annual Queery Awards for Best UK Weblog. Ironically, we recently learned an Australian weblog, Buggery.org, somehow found itself in the UK competition. Perhaps nominating participants assumed buggery was a strictly British practice – we’re admittedly baffled. And while Buggery will remain listed under Best UK Weblog, another UK nominee asked to be withdrawn. “Would you please remove my site, Naked Blog, from your Best UK weblog poll. I don’t wish to occupy the same platform as an unpleasantly-named site featuring a gratuitously offensive picture. (The site in question isn’t even British, so far as I can tell.)” Voting in all categories continues through Sunday at midnight.
Let’s address the old queen’s concerns in turn. But first, there’s still a little time to vote for me. Go! Quick! Closes soon!
Firstly, is the name ‘buggery.org’ unpleasant?
The word buggery has been in the English language since at least the time of King Henry VIII. It appears in the statute books. It comes from the French bougre (a heretic) and eventually traces its lineage back to a pejorative term used against the Albigensian heretics, orthodox Christians who were said to do evil things such as fail to acknowledge the primacy of the Roman Pope. The word is ultimately derived from mediaeval Latin Bulgarus (a Bulgarian).
My Oxford dictionary lists buggery, without a suggestion that it is vulgar or taboo, at least in it’s primary meaning.
Australians know and love the word buggery and its many derived forms well. Here’s the relevant entry from the Macquarie Dictionary:
buggery noun 1. anal intercourse with a human or with an animal; the practice of sodomy or bestiality.
–phrase 2. as (all) buggery, Colloquial (an intensifier): hot as buggery. 3. go to buggery, Colloquial a. (an exclamation of dismissal, contempt, etc.) b. to deteriorate: the school has gone to buggery since the principal left. 4. like buggery, Colloquial considerably: it hurts like buggery. 5. off to buggery, Colloquial a. greatly off course; in error; astray. b. a long way away.
Secondly, is the picture above “gratuitously offensive”? Obviously that’s a matter of personal taste, but you should know I searched long and hard for a title image for this site which would be suitably edgy without being in any way pornographic. The picture at the top of this page was chosen specifically because you can’t see any actual sex, just one disembodied torso grasping another. My mother-in-law reads this website (hi Mom) as do many members of my family (both here and in Canada) who range in age from toddlers to octagenarians. No-one has ever complained that the site was inappropriate, scandalous, or NSFW.
If you go to Naked Blog you’ll be confronted by a photograph of Jackie Stallone which is, in my humble opinion, infinitely less tasteful.
Mr Naked Blog takes the time to explain his decision to quit the Queery awards thus:
I’ve written to the organisers of this, asking to be removed from their competition. See yesterday. (Now removed.)
Reasons?
First off, ghettoisation. Naked Blog is not a “gay blog”. There’s little or no (Kylie, Madonna-based) gay material here. We don’t do discos, clubs, drugs, sex, or even the Scissor Sisters. As a gay man I’m a sheer disgrace, existing purely on memories of younger, slimmer, less-lined days. Although I don’t try to disguise the reality, that doesn’t mean a need to celebrate it. I hate being gay. Hate it with a vengeance.
Also I’m not doolally enough yet to ignore the tokenism going on here. Two blogs in England, one in Wales and one in Scotland.
But one in Australia? G’day mate, but no thank you. I’ve removed all linking to that site, now that I’ve had a look. Naked Blog is a respectable written entertainment. It does not, and will not ever, link to sites containing explicit sexual imagery.
Oh, luvvie, you are in a tizz. There is not, and has never been, any “explicit sexual imagery” on buggery.org. For a long time, there was a link from here to Naked Blog, but I took it off a while ago when I got bored with his daily accounts of bingo calling, crisp eating and fag smoking.
Next, let’s address his contention that he withdrew because his is “not a ‘gay blog’” due to the absence of mentions of Kylie or Madonna. Buggery.org has never talked about Madonna, and has discussed Kylie only in the context of a post about AIDS fundraising and the red ribbon. Scroll down the page and you’ll find my views on the war on terror, religious intolerance, the movies of Woody Allen, and the respective (and very different!) legacies of Ronald Reagan and Susan Sontag. It’s hardly the kind of thing you’d find on the front cover of your local homo mag, but I’m more than happy to be classified as a “gay blogger” because, on both counts, it’s true.
Is that “ghettoisation” or merely a recognition of the facts? At least it’s not closeted or, worse yet, self-loathing.
In his most recent post, Mr Naked Blog proudly announces that he has been the lead story on Queer Day for 24 hours, and has garnered 200 visitors from the publicity. He then sarcastically attacks his own readers for failing to leave a comment, and announces that he’s going out for the evening to “get rat-arsed.”
Have one for me, mate.
A most dignified response to what could only be classed an attention-seeking hissy fit.
Although I might contest one point: Let me be the first to declare buggery.org NSFW … a boss looking over ones should isn’t going to debate the finer points of whether that image is technically pornographic in the context of a ‘buggery’ title-graphic. I’ve already destroyed one pair of pants after a liberal-minded colleague caught me unawares taking a quick peek with a mouth full of traditional Australian burger with beetroot. But I have trouble watching any porn without covering my eyes [some have very nice soundtracks], so maybe majority opinion isn’t so prudish.
Maybe you should write a UK-centric post, to justify all those people voting for you
… like the top story from the beeb: Tories set to unveil tax cut plan … ugh! Maybe not. No wonder they nominated an aussie :-p
Just in response to that point, I never said buggery.org was safe for work, only that no-one had ever complained that it wasn’t.
Depending on where you work, just about anything might be ruled NSFW. So of course this site is NSFW if you happen to work at the Vatican. But my work colleagues in the AIDS sector and at La Trobe don’t seem too worried.
Horses for courses, obviously. More of that is needed.
Apologies for any hurt or offence. For the record, I would vigorously defend your right to use that title and that picture on your site. I also have the right to be consulted before being linked in a list with those words and pictures. That is something the proprietors of Queer Day failed to do. Just as they failed to keep private a private email I sent them. If anyone is aggrieved here it should be me. Good luck and keep blogging. And thanks for the views on Naked Blog. I hate it as well. (Crisp eating? Don’t remember that one, but you’re right with all the other things.)
Actually, I think there’s something positive to be said for the result of having Naked Blog removed from the nominations, regardless of the ridiculous circumstances surrounding it. And while your temporary butterfly theme is extremely, um, sweet, I look forward to the return of buggery and its tasteful photographic representation. Seriously, yours is one of the most thoughtful and thought-provoking blogs that I read, far more so than the majority out there. And, if you were ever tempted actually to post some of that purported “explicit sexual imagery,” well, I for one wouldn’t complain.
Once again, the image of two men even kissing would raise eyebrows, yet thirty two different breeds of animals and insects can have eveything from explicit sex to an orgy in 20 minutes on public television and that’s safe for even the youngest child. I’m ashamed, Paul. Ashamed that I bootlegged your twink header and made it my desktop, I’m probably offending someone right now. Maybe I should find a nice innofensive picture of some butterfly penis too. Or maybe I’ll just use that wasted time cruising over to queerday to vote for you. Lots of love Paul, and I mean the unpleasant to they eyes, not safe for viewing at work, kind. I’m gonna bugger off now.
I guess I was too late. It’s been a while since I was on your site and I missed the whole process. Oh well, at least we still have the butterflies.