Wednesday, January 04, 2006

Offensive Productions Present

Offensive Productions Present

Accidentally witnessing the climax to The X Factor recently got me thinking, once again, that our popular culture is doomed, held to ransom by Simon Cowell, Louis Walsh and their formulaic blandities, with a key change near the end.

Then, returning to a book on the WWII Battle of the Atlantic, it set me thinking: Where would our culture be if Hitler had won? The simple answer, of course, would be "right down the toilet", with Edward and Mrs Simpson installed as our new puppet leaders and George Formby up against the thin wall.

Working on a premise gleaned from Star Trek: The Next Generation, that history has a habit of snapping back into place, it would be little things we take for granted now that would be subtly changed by our new, jack-booted Aryan masters.

Comedy classic Allo Allo, for example, would have been a documentary; and I am certain Dad's Army would have been left completely untouched, except, of course, for the ending. We would almost certainly be studying Sven Hassel in our schools instead of the works of Shakespeare. So, not all bad, then.

A look back, then, through our recently altered history, reveals the following from the studios of 20th Century Wolf:

* Third Reich from the Sun
* Strictly Come Marching (into Poland)
* Hi-de-Heil

* The SS Factor
* My Parents are Aryans
* Fuhrer Ted

* What Not to Wehrmacht
* Ubermensch Behaving Badly
* I'm Alamein Partridge

* Goering for Gold
* Gestapos in their Eyes
* Only Fools and U-Boats

* Queer as Volkswagen
* Extreme Makeover: Poland Edition
* Triumph of the Will and Grace

Speaking as someone of at least 1/8 to 1/4 Jewish extraction (there's a Rabbi somewhere in my family tree, and grief, he's cross), and the grandson of a airman who spent large parts of the war dropping red hot exploding metal onto Rommel's Afrika Korps, I have done my best to avoid anything really, really offensive because - face it - extermination camps are never going to be funny. But, my God, the temptation to add "How Clean is Your Race?" and much, much worse* was almost overwhelming.

Oh.

God, I hate Nazis. Good thing we won, then.

*And believe me, you should see the ones we rejected.


Vote-yes!

Hey! It's the 2006 Bloggies!

Once again, far be it for me to influence your nominations, but I'm particularly chuffed with my tagline "A riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma, stuffed up a dog's bottom", even if it was written by somebody else.

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