Paul Poulton comments

Paul Poulton

People usually know what's right and wrong. It was put so succinctly by Jesus when he said "Do to others like you would have them do to you". It's common sense, or what the philosophers call, 'the Natural Law', natural because we all have it by nature. Some people may not care about doing what's right and some may not believe in right or wrong. But most people at some point in their lives will call out for justice, maybe their mobile phone has been stolen or someone has injured them whilst driving with too much alcohol in their blood or perhaps someone has defamed them or said things about them that are not for other peoples ears. Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross brought personal and private matters into the public arena. Such is the power of the natural law that over 30,000 complaints have now been received by the BBC over the incident on Radio Two where the pair made obscene comments about Andrew Sachs' (the Fawlty Towers hero) 23-year-old granddaughter Georgina Baillie during phone calls to Andrew Sachs. Even the Prime Minister has thrown his weight behind the complaints. They say for every complaint received it equals 1000 that didn't bother to complain, so thats quite a lot of us who complained in our thoughts if not in our actions. I guess the thoughts that most of the complainants had was, "How would we feel if comments were made on air about our relatives in such a crude way." There has of course been a divide between those who think that what Jonathan and Russell did may not be the best comedy they've ever done but certainly not punishable by being taken off the air. The newspapers seem to be keen on letting us know that it's mainly young people who are defending the two comedians, I doubt they have that exactly right, I heard a 62 year old standing up for the two presenters and quite eloquently at that. If we're not radical when we're young we have no heart, if we're not moderate when we're older we have no mind. We need both to make society work.

Russell Brand has now resigned from his radio 2 show saying "I got a bit caught up in the moment and forgot that, at the core of the rude comments and silly songs, were the real feelings of a beloved and brilliant comic actor and a very sweet and big-hearted young woman." Jonathan Ross has been suspended from all BBC programming without pay for three months. He said in his statement: "I am deeply sorry and greatly regret the upset and distress that my juvenile and thoughtless remarks on the Russell Brand show have caused." So the Christian virtue of penitence and humility has been practiced by both Ross and Brand over this incident, and whatever we think of the two comedians style it behoves us to respond accordingly and offer our acceptance of their apologies as we have done the complaining, (in our thoughts if not in our actions). The hero of this whole episode is without doubt Andrew Sachs himself who bore no malice and said "he was not interested in vengeance" and encouraged the two performers to "do better". Andrew showed us how to forgive, show grace and how to turn the cheek, and that's an act of kindness we could all learn from.