.... on effing children
IF I WAS in the dating business and in the habit of describing myself in acronyms, GSOH would be high up on the list. Some of my best friends are comedians and when I am on form they think I am an absolute panic. Yes, I sometimes suspect they are laughing at me not with me, but that is very much besides the point.
I have impeccable comedy credentials. Some of the programmes I enjoy are widely praised, critically acclaimed offerings such as Curb Your Enthusiasm, Flight of the Conchordsand Fair City. IMHO I totally have a GSOH.
So when I first came across the Go The F**K to Sleepbook, this book that's making people laugh across the world, it annoyed me that I didn't ROFLMAO immediately. Not only did I not find it funny, it actually made me kind of sad. It took me a while to admit this out loud because everything I've read about the book talks about how hilariousand full of LOLZ it is. So I read it and I waited for the belly laughs to bubble up inside me. They didn't come.
For those who haven't heard about it, Go The F**K to Sleepis a book written by Adam Mansbach about the many and often intense frustrations of getting small children to bed. It was inspired by his now three-year-old daughter and started as a joke on Facebook where some people (well, me) would argue it should have stayed. Then it went viral on the internet and now it's selling like hot cakes decorated with sugar icing expletives. Here's an excerpt:
“The cats nestle close to their kittens now.
The lambs have laid down with the sheep.
You’re cozy and warm in your bed, my dear.
Please go the f**k to sleep.”
It goes on:
“The tiger reclines in the simmering jungle.
The sparrows has silenced her cheep.
F**k your stuffed bear, I’m not getting you shit.
Close your eyes. Cut the crap. Sleep.”
“Hopefully, the book is very reflective of what we all feel putting our kids to bed,” Mansbach has said. He has described the book as both “profane and affectionate. It’s actually about being a good parent. No child is being mistreated. It’s about being affectionate to a child even when you can’t wait to get out of the f**king room.”
I don’t disagree with him. I’ve been there, tearing my hair out. A woman who emailed the author said that putting her children to bed was easier now knowing that millions of people around the world are having the same thoughts. She can laugh now instead of pulling her hair out. It’s cathartic, apparently.
When I was talking to a friend about how I didn’t find it funny, he said: “It’s not that you don’t find it funny. You find it offensive and that’s a very different thing.” When I thought about it some more I realised he was right. The f**k riddled poem in the 32-page book sounded wrong and brutal to my ears, and because I found it offensive I had decided that it must be unfunny as well.
It’s a common mistake. When people say comedians such as Frankie Boyle are not funny, most of the time what they really mean is that they find him highly offensive. It is possible, however, to find Frankie Boyle highly offensive and utterly hilarious. We know there are some things we are not supposed to find comedic, but we can’t help laughing at, even while hating ourselves for laughing. If we were only allowed to laugh at the things we were told it is politically correct to laugh at, the world would be an exceedingly dull place.
Anyway, my negative response to this book is an old fashioned one, a Mary Whitehouse-style one. While I use the word regularly myself, it seems I have an aversion to this word, however affectionately meant, when used in books aimed at adults in connection to small people going to bed. Using this language in reference to children, even as a joke, leaves me cold. And because of this, I initially decided I was having a GSOH bypass, or worse, that other people’s GSOH was somehow in question.
Meanwhile, to millions of people who don't have a problem with the F**K part, it's hilarious. The word has, after all, become a widely accepted part of the English language. If the book was called Go The F**K To Sleep You Little C**t,and that mothership of swear words was sprinkled throughout, there might not be so many people laughing. But give it a few years and that one will probably reach number one on the Amazon chart too.
It turns out it's not about having a GSOH or indeed nothaving one. I won't be buying the book because the Mary Whitehouse in me doesn't like the fact that it employs the F-word in relation to children. Or maybe I'm just annoyed that I didn't think of writing this bleeping bestseller myself.
In other news . . .
I'm looking forward to getting stuck into Caitlin Moran's half-memoir, half-rant How to Be a Woman, which answers crucial questions such as "Why are we supposed to get Brazilians?"