IT IS high time a line was drawn under the Big Brother racial bullying fuss.
Hardly anyone has come out of it with any credit, apart from Shilpa Shetty, who showed great grace and dignity when she won this tacky contest.
Shilpa also showed – originally at least – a forgiveness to those who taunted her, which was as appropriate as it was generous. Well done, Shilpa.
But the whole brouhaha is too much of a media circus for justice ever to be served now.
I'm very uncomfortable indeed with the way Jade Goody, Jo O’Meara and Scouser Danielle Lloyd are now being demonised and put under such intense pressure day after day.

None of these three came across as a sympathetic character in the show, it's true, and I don’t care for any arguments that film footage was unfairly edited to exaggerate their nastiness.
Danielle Lloyd, it needs to be said, was a very poor ambassador for her home city. For all her great beauty, she came across as inarticulate, charmless and filthy-mouthed on the show.
But we do need to remember her tender age of 23. She needs guidance and quite probably she needs a little more education before she is let loose again in the public eye.
We are talking about young women here. The personalities of Dani, Jade and Jo are still in formation.
Dani and Jade are not helped by the fact that they appear to be quite thick. But even so, they must be given a chance to rebuild their lives, and they must be given help, too, if they need it.
The most sickening aspect of this whole racial taunts fuss has, for me, been the sight of the liberal establishment yet again cynically exploiting a few admitedly nasty incidents on this show (which hardly be said to mark the end of civilisation) to taunt working class Britons with allegations of endemic racism.
What about the millions of unbidden acts of kindness that ordinary, working class Britons show to newcomers to this country every year?
As for the people at Endemol and C4, who bring this disgusting freak show to air each year, I hope there is a special place reserved for them in Hell.
None of us should lose sight of this glorious truth: Human life, human personality is special and precious. We should take great care not to demean or coarsen it.
And so racial taunts really should not be made, particularly in the current tense political climate.
But we need to remember that racial insults are in essence no more than the outcome of a childish instinct to call names at anyone who is different. We've all done it, with the casual cruelty that comes so easily to children in the schoolyard.
Overall, I think our society has become become much too senstive on the issue of race. It has made us all frightened of our own thoughts - which is exactly what the liberal-fascists of the race relations industry want us to be.
But British people of all races will never be frightened of their own thoughts.
Freedom sings too strongly in our hearts for that.
It is time to forgive and forget. The childish name-calling on Celebrity Big Brother is already the subject of a police investigation.
We can't blame the police for that. Unwise laws on incitement to racial hatred places a duty on them to investigate.
But no-on will benefit if this mixture of childishness and nastiness ever gets to court.

PS. For early birds among you, I shall be again reading my poetic review of the week’s news for BBC Radio Merseyside’s Breakfast programme tomorrow (Fri 2 Feb) morning.
It should go out at approximately 6.45, but with live radio, running orders are always subject to change.

PPS. For those who have been asking, The Bards of New Brighton (a poetry club I am setting up for Wallasey), launches next month.
It will meet on the first Monday of every month in the front lounge of the Little Brighton pub (locally known as The Ginny) in Rowson Street (Rake Lane end), New Brighton, with the meetings starting at 9pm. The inaugural meeting will be on Monday 5 March.
More details tomorrow on this blog tomorrow – plus a new poem from Barman Burly of Hell’s Waiting Room.

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