Friday, November 28, 2008

G-G-G-G-G-Granville! (#4) The World's Top Stammerers

Disclaimer: Gadjo Dilo in no way supports bullying, which is shite, and anyway he now has several years of martial arts training under his belt so come over here - yeah you, <name deleted> - and try your luck if you disagree :-)

As promised, and with great pride, I hereby present the cream of the world’s stammerers. Rather than categorise them by profession I’ve used a simple tripartite taxonomy based on psychological profiling which I call “Playground Kicking Classification”. This simple metric also has everyday application: when you come across a stammerer, enact this scenario in your imagination and you’ll quickly understand what sort of stammerer it is and how it should be treated. (I myself largely managed to avoid this nonsense in the school playground by floating around like some ethereal golden-haired sprite too beautiful to be touched by human hand – I still don’t understand how I got away with it.) Some of the following may actually be ex-stammerers, but this only goes to show how effective a good kicking can be.

FREAKS
Kickable, regardless of what they might have “achieved”:

Rowan Atkinson: If kicked will do the funny face. Now probably a multi-millionaire though.
Yukio Mishima: Gay Japanese poet and fascistic ritual suicidalist - asking for it.
Marc Almond: We suspect he made his stammer up to justify his vaunted victimhood status.
Lewis Carroll: Simply a freak. Avoid.
Elamkulam Manakkal Sankaran Namboodiripad (Indian communist leader): Looks more like a Swot (see below) but you’d always make him say his name in full and then throw his duffel bag over the fence.

COOL PEOPLE
Can stammerers be cool?? Surprisingly, yes, though it may not be obvious at first. By constantly compensating for their deficiency they can become extraordinary gifted at something else. If you’re smart you’ll think before you kick:

Winston Churchill: The ultimate over-compensating stammerer. Respect.
Tiger Woods: All black sportsmen are cool, even if they play golf (though this pushes it a bit, admittedly).
Marilyn Monroe: Sex kitten. Enough said.
James Earl Jones: Super-cool - turned his stammer into the world’s most mellifluous voice.
Joe Biden: An asthmatic, a dunce and a stammerer when young, but you'll soon be mighty glad that you didn’t nick his dinner money.

SWOTS
The “halfway-house” where kicking’s concerned. Many stammerers spend a lot of time in libraries and other places where they try to avoid embarrassing themselves. Surprisingly, it can be worth giving these types the time of day: by pretending to be their friends you can get to copy their homework. Kick, but only as an incentive:

Bruce Willis: “Cool Person”, surely? No. Swot. Becoming a famous actor with a stammer and no talent, he must be a grafter.
Ed Balls: Maths homework... possibly. But which came first, the stammer or the cruel nicknames?
Isaac Newton: He also wore a girl’s wig so even looks like a freak, but his homework’s still worth borrowing.
Charles Darwin: A useful science bod on your homework team, though you'd have to do the monkey dance every time you met him.
Aristotle: Unusual double Cockney rhyming slang for “arse” (via “bottle and glass”), but he’s one of the swots that other swots most often copy from, so knowing him can save you a trip or two to the library.

This list of high-achieving stammerers seems endless, though actually it ends here. T-t-ta-ta for now!

17 comments:

  1. You could turn this post into a series of collectible cards for junior stammerers. This would enhance the cool of even a Namboodiripad.

    I bet he became a Communist because of bullying. ?"I'll sh-sh-show them. I'll be like S-stalin, and b-bomb the school and the t-t-t-temple. And all the g-g-g-girls will want to t-touch my t-t-tunic. Mr Gh-ghosh and M-mr Singh will be sent to re-re-re-re-educ-c-c- - aw fu-f-fuck it!"

    You'll need a better monicker for stammerers, if they are to be an in-crowd. How about "D-lay Boyz"?

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  2. How do we tell the real stammerers from the actors who stammer? Do Derek Jacobi and Derek Nimmo both do it in real life? Is there something about the name 'Derek' that makes a man stammer? These are the questions.

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  3. Marilyn Monroe! Well there you go then...
    Sx

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  4. Gareth Gates being the exception that proves the rule ...

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  5. I reckon you're right, Boyo, that the aggro of being a stammerer made him a rebel, giving him only two options: Communism or Rock 'n' Roll. "Workers of the World, Unite. You have nothing to lose but your Ch-ch-ch-changes, Turn and face the strain, Ch-ch-changes, Just gonna have to be a different man, Time may change me, But I can't trace time!". He certainly had the looks for it.

    Good point, GB, how does one tell the stammer from the flammer. Derek Nimmo just looked like a stammerer though, didn't he, as did cricketer Derek Randall and scenographer Derek Jarman, so, given that Derek Jacobi is simply a very good actor, your theory is probably correct.

    Marilyn Monroe was great though wasn't she, Scarls. But I'd have loved her even more if she'd really gargoyled it up when saying "Ooo b-b-boo b-b-be do", etc.

    I've heard tell of this stammering boy wonder, Daffers, but I've heard neither his stammer nor his singing. Which is pleasenter on the ear, I wonder?

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  6. This set of cigarette cards will have to have the audio track encoded along the edges. Drawing the card across a cheese wire will provide the audible proof of the stammer.

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  7. Boss-eyed, snaggle-toothed, bald and a stammerer - I can see why Nambo denied God.

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  8. Another b-b-b-b-bad to the bone post (with apologies to George Thoroughgood).
    Pearl

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  9. I thought Gareth Gates was cute... until he slept with Jordan.
    Sx

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  10. You're really taking this seriously, Kev, and I'm impressed! Cigarette cards would be a great idea - everybody needs heroes. But more 21st century would be stammering ringtones for mobile phones - now, how annoying would that be, eh?

    I suppose in Nambo's case, Boyo, he'd be denying gods. I don't know what Marx has to say about this - the opiates have now multiplied somewhat. "Religion is the ketamine-candy-flip speedball of the masses"?

    Thanks Pearl, I'm guessing that's a compliment from Stateside! (George Thorogood was a stammerer? No need to apologise to him, he's doing all right).

    Scarly, as ever you're a mine of vital information for we out-of-touch ex-pats. Now you all see how far a stammer can get you romantically!

    Mr Can Bass, he did he did he did, and don't you go around claiming otherwise. She'd have sqeezed his spazzing face between her giant silicone breasts and told him to "stop talkin' and start porkin'"!

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  11. Blimey Gadj, are you a Jordan fan? Poor Gareth... smothered.
    She's ruined her back you know.
    Sx

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  12. Scarley, I barely know who Jordan is - and I'm no great fan of silcone breasts - but I instinctively started defended Young Gareth's reputation when a doubt was cast upon his shaggability. Even I was surprised at how alarmingly tribal I felt at that moment!

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  13. The stutterers are legion!

    Our politicians are stutterers, even with their hands!! Autistic also :(

    Then when you take the "zapette" (zapper) that becomes a lot more evident one :)

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  14. Exactly, Kev, maybe if we ignore it it'll go away.

    Mais oui monsieur. But we've just had an election here (something the people of this country are stoill not used to) and I heard one interveiwer ask Gigi "Romania's Most Corrupt Human Being and Failed Fascist Politician" Becali this: "You have too much money, so why would anybody want you in their political party?" I think the interviewers are more naive than the politicians!

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  15. I wish we had interviewers like that! Devastatingly naive questions like that are like gold dust.

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