Serves as an unplanned but fitting sequel to the last post. I’ve grown to quite like Charles as King. I can certainly see why he’s always thought very little of the media. Poor bugger, I hope he sticks around for a while longer. 24 hours on and this is still the big story……..and counting.
You see what I mean? Cancer everywhere. It doesn’t help that we also have cancer of the media, where toxic cells of misinformation and non-information multiply at a terrifying rate, fuelled by incalculable levels of ignorance, false-hearted sympathy, plastic sincerity and the sort of creepy, unctuous, patronising and ill-deserved pomposity that we have come to know and hate with having news on the edge of every minute of our lives. The King has cancer; here’s what we know, or more accurately what we don’t.
Newsreader: “Good evening, and if you’re just joining us we have this breaking news to share with you: the King has announced through Buckingham Palace that he has cancer. They have issued a statement in the last few minutes to say that the King will continue with some duties until he begins treatment. They have not specified which type of cancer his majesty has and have asked for people not to speculate at this stage, though they stress that it is not related to the prostate surgery he had last week. At the moment that’s all we know, but we’re going to going to our regular royal press sycophant anyway to see if we can squeeze out more about a story that has already completely run out of steam.”
Royal press sycophant: “Yes, hello and good evening. I’m here, outside the gates of Buckingham Palace, and I’m just going to read out the full statement that you’ve had fixed on your screen for the last 3 minutes” (proceeds to read out the entire statement, in its entirety, which is identical to the one shown on screen, for those people who can’t decide if they are deaf or blind or just remarkably stupid) “so you can see that this is pretty much an unprecedented move by Buckingham Palace, to divulge such highly personal information about the health of a monarch, a head of state no less, in much the same way that the unexpected news about his prostate operation last week was completely unprecedented in a completely unexpected way. And what we know at this stage is really all completely wrapped up in that statement and we know, in very real terms, absolutely nothing beyond it so it’s very hard to speculate about any other aspects of this news story, in particular the parts we’ve been asked not to speculate about, chiefly because we don’t know anything about them and so we have literally nothing to speculate on, as I’ve just said, within exactly the same sentence.”
Newsreader: “Thank you so much for clearing that up then. I mean, this really is unprecedented, for a monarch and head of state, no less, to issue a statement about their personal, intimate health so soon after issuing another, completely different and yet slightly similar statement about their personal, intimate health. And of course, this is just breaking news and we couldn’t possibly hope to speculate about the nature of this new cancer diagnosis, but can you clarify what we know and what we don’t know and what we might think we know about it, without actually specifically speculating or be seen to speculate in a more round-about sort of way?”
Royal press sycophant: “Well, as we know, this statement is so very fresh, issued by Buckingham Palace on behalf of the king just minutes ago, here at the gates of Buckingham Palace, where I’m standing right now. And of course the palace are keen to emphasise that King Charles’ diagnosis of cancer is completely unrelated to his recent hospital stay for an operation on his prostate, so it would be fairly safe to rule out, almost but not quite completely, prostate cancer at this stage, and the palace has also asked for the press and media to rule out any speculation as to the nature of what the problem could really be, so without speculating we’re only left with guess work, which is the same but uses two words and is spelt differently and is not something the palace has specifically asked us not to do, if we’re going to get all technical about it.”
Newsreader: “So we wouldn’t want to speculate as to the nature of the King’s cancer because we simply DO NOT KNOW anything about anything at the moment, except for the information that came out so unexpectedly, just a few minutes ago, in a statement – and if you’re just joining us this is breaking news – that was released very unexpectedly by Buckingham Palace on behalf of King Charles, but is there anything from what you can read into that statement which might give us some kind of clue as to the nature of his cancer, I suppose you could say a guess, rather than simply speculate, because we really are groping around in the dark here, being given a small amount of information on an official level and then trying desperately to fill in the blanks to make it look like it’s a far bigger news story than it really is and utterly disregarding the polite requests of Buckingham Palace and, through them, the king himself?
Royal press sycophant: That’s a good question, and it’s very well timed because, to the best of my knowledge, this unexpected and unprecedented news, it’s fairly safe to say, will be the headline news for roughly the next 24 hours, and that leaves us, and every other news station in every country that has nothing better to do than slavishly follow every breaking news story about the British monarchy, with an awful lot of dead time to fill. Clearly, we could, and will, read out the statement that was issued by Buckingham Palace so many times that many viewers will find themselves reciting it perfectly in their sleep, but we all know that this won’t add anything actually new to the story so all we have left in our pathetic dust-filled journalistic arsenal is to do the one thing we’ve been specifically asked not to do, and that is to speculate. Of course, we don’t want to rattle the royal cage, so to speak, but by pretending we are just attempting some harmless, lazy guesswork we may just get someone at the palace, hopefully the king himself, to crack and give us an extra, almost irrelevant morsel of new news just to stop us going round and round and round in a futile and repetitive regurgitation of repetitive futility. Is that of any help?”
Newsreader: “Not really, but thanks anyway, and please don’t go anywhere because this story could, but won’t, develop massively and unexpectedly, dare I even say unprecedentedly, at any second and we hope our viewers can join us on a giddy journey of blatant, relentless speculation deep into the early hours of the morning, wherever and whenever the early hours of the morning they may find themselves. And before we go to our headline news, which is this news, the same news, at the top of the hour, we’re going to go back to our reporter at Buckingham Palace for the breaking news, which is also the same news, which is also the only news we can think about right now, as we wonder, and shudder at the thought of, just how much time we’ll have to fill until the first waves of goodwill and best wishes messages flood in from political leaders and royalty around the world so that we can read them out in a huge loop for a few solid hours. So, without a hint of speculation, what do you suppose it might be? My money’s on cancer of the fingernails.”
Royal press sycophant: “I’d put a fiver on cancer of the nut-sack, but’s it’s just too early to say. Mind you, it could be prostate and they’re just trying to throw us off the scent. The truth is we just don’t know anything and yet we’re pretending that we do, because we’re shameless arseholes.
Newsreader: “Yes, I think can I see the problem now. A fiver, you say?”
G B Burton. 06.02.2024
On stupidity......and other causes for concern. 