by Neil Vodavzny

Let’s talk lesbian, one of my favourite sexes. Why that should be I don’t know, but suspect is to do with strength, the Wonder Woman syndrome. Their strength endears them to me and, since I tend to like women more than men as a sex, that might be it. Whatever, it’s far from Freud, just being honest: sexuality is a type of honesty, like race, which is what I like about this website.

My approach to the two is virtually the same: being allowed to speak our minds does not imply a racially-charged atmosphere. Let me quote something from Damian Thompson quoting Peter Whittle of NCF (with approval) in The Telegraph:

“We must replace multiculturalism with integration.. Britain must be totally colour-blind but reject any subtle ambivalence about national pride” (huh?)

So, to be Right and acceptable you have to lie, according to Thompson. Unacceptable. Race is not something to be sneezed at, but an integral part of what makes being human interesting.

This is mainly about Lesbos, so let’s start with Tanita Tikaram, of Twist In My Sobriety. All the guys cited here have a type of flamboyance which is pretty obviously a facet of their sexuality. The lyrics to Good Tradition (from debut album “Ancient Heart”) have a folk-ish flavour – love/hate, fire/rain:

There’s a good tradition of love and hate staying by the fireside
There’s a good tradition of love and hate staying by the fireside

And though the rain may fall - your father’s calling you
You still feel safe inside
And though your ma’s too proud - your brother’s ignoring you
You still feel safe inside

Oh, was this solo?
Was this yesterday?
Was this true for you?
‘Cos while all the rest have taken time
This didn’t do a lot for you

And the corners laced with memories
Tell you how it used to be
Your mother smiles, the children play, and all the bad things happen miles away

And strong feelings never bother you
You hold your head up while the rest of us try to

Oh, call the stations
Call the people
We all want to know
‘Cos while all the rest have taken time
You don’t wanna know

Well, there’s a good tradition of love and hate staying by the fireside
There’s a good tradition of love and hate staying by the fireside

And though the rain may fall - your father’s calling you
You still feel safe inside
And though your ma’s too proud - your brother’s ignoring you
You still feel safe inside

Oh, was this solo?
Was this yesterday?
Was this true for you?
‘Cos of all the choices you have made
This didn’t do a lot for you

..and, if you check the video, I reckon there’s also a type of vulnerability. This is pretty interesting but, giving Kate Bush a brief cameo, she is often called the shy, retiring sort.

The lyrics here refer to childhood, dreams and fantasies, and there’s a clear parallel with Bush of the Wuthering Heights era growing up in an old farmhouse and dreaming. Being odd or heightened in some way is to be an outsider, as well as a creative artist. Now, we are “allowed” to talk sex, but ethnicity is just as interesting. Bush is the spawn of an Irish folk-dancing mother. Tikaram is Fijian. In the video her eyebrows are wriggling around in a thoroughly interesting fashion. This could be a mixture of being macho, along with the ethnic allure of her physiognomy.

Ethnicity is intrinsically interesting (witness Gaugin), and anyone who says we can’t make such observations is risking a race war; we can’t all be metro-racial egalitarians, or is that the agenda? If so, Thompson is an English fool.

Next up is Linda Perry of What’s Up? She’s another outspoken outsider, more or less giving up fame (if not fortune) on her debut album “In Flight”, featuring one of the great, lethargic anthems of modern ennui, Fill Me Up.

Her ethnicity is Portuguese, and an enlightening comparison might be with Katy Perry who is Anglo-American. Her pop output is “crap” according to the other Perry, which may not be entirely fair, but the bland, middle-of-the-road type for sure. Both Perry’s make a lot of money, but only one is an outsider and a straight talker. This song could be written yesterday (or tomorrow).

Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davidson is another interesting character, again much more flamboyant than her dull-looking Labour counterpart Johann Lamont. The former kick-boxer is finally edging into the Scottish mainstream with her light-on-the-feet dabbling round the knee-jerk insults of SNP Mafiosi.

Finally, poet Edith Sitwell was from an ancient, aristocratic Yorkshire family, claiming Plantagenet descent. Her poem Polka:

See me dance the polka”,
Said Mr Wagg like a bear,
“with my top hat
And my whiskers that -
(Tra la la) trap the Fair.”
Where the waves
seem chiming haycocks
I dance the polka; there
Stand Venus’ children in their gay frocks, -
Maroon and marine, - and stare
To see me fire my pistol
Through the distance blue as my coat;
Like Wellington, Byron, the
Marquis of Bristol,
Busbied great trees float.

While the wheezing hurdy-gurdy
Of the marine wind blows me
To the tune of Annie Rooney, sturdy,
Over the sheafs of the sea;

And bright as a seedsman’s packet
With zinnias, candytufts chill,
Is Mrs. Marigold’s Jacket
As she gapes at the inn door still,

Where at dawn in the box of the sailor,
Blue as the decks of the sea,
Nelson awoke crowed like the cocks,
Then back to the dust sank he.

And Robinson Crusoe
Rues so
The bright and foxy beer, -
But he finds fresh isles
in a negress’ smiles, -
The poxy doxy dear,

... was adapted by fellow Yorkie Patrick Woodroffe.

It has to be said that both these artists are of Yorkshire descent, and can’t possibly be metro-racial. No more than can the Brontes, who were of Irish descent. This is a cultural matter: that is to say, race is a cultural matter. No one can prevent us speaking about ethnicity unless they intend to destroy us culturally. If so, that is race-war.

Another interesting observation is that Woodroffe’s illustration of Sitwell’s poem very obviously depicts a white woman as Crusoe’s “dream fantasy. Very likely this was his subconscious being honest, expressing a preference, or prejudice if you prefer. This type of fantasy art works off instinct and emotion, not conscious thought, so whatever the psyche likes gets depicted, simple as that.

Similarly, it would be impossible to deny the racial/sexual allure of Rossetti’s pre-Raphaelite woman.

These types of ethno/sexual observations have a much wider significance. Race and sex are so intimately tied-up together, being able to discuss one without the other twists society, and any discussion is twisted from the outset toward a metro-racial future of multiculturalism, or culture with a small c. The Western tradition has to allow artistic prejudice because anything else is closing the creative process to observation. How is it that “elite” scientists are able to observe nature, while we can’t observe human nature?