Wednesday 9 December 2009

Think Pink



On the BBC website (with a doff of the old pointy Druidical hat to David Keen, who provided it via the magic of the Twurch) we find that Polly Toynbee, among others, is signing up for the abolition of the colour pink.  Meanwhile, in a completely unrelated area of the pooliverse, we find that the redoubtable Fr Z (pronounced "Zee"?) is also against the colour pink.  For the third Sunday in Advent (and presumably also the fourth in Lent) Fr Z likes a nice rose.  I refer, of course, to liturgical colours.  I've no idea what his taste in wine is.
We are concerned.  We know that St Polly, and also Fr Z, are powerful and influential people in their own spheres.  But surely removing parts of the electromagnetic spectrum is out of the power of even these illuminati?
For be sure, pink is not a "pure" colour.  It is a mixture of others.  If you want to get pink, you have to mix red and some other kind of light that we can't quite work out this early on the Day after the Immaculate Conception.  Imagine a world devoid of both red, and whatever else it is that makes pink.  Liverpool would look a fine sight running out onto the pitch in whatever their shirts would look like if there were no red - it might be yellow for example, and then their current resemblance to Norwich City would be complete.
No, be sure, we need pink, even if it is just the hapless by-product of other, more robust colours.  Who wants to eat a green peach?  Would roses look so lovely if they were brown?  What would the popular artist Pink call herself?  Beige?
So today we have a Celebration of Pink day in the Community.  I attach the programme below.  I am sure we will all find it... garish.


12 noon - Lunch (Medium-rare steak with Pink Fir Apple potatoes)

4pm - At Filling Up of Beakers (in the Library, while the Moot House is - yet again - rebuilt), the Focus Altar will be swathed in pink cloth, which will trail - like a pink river - down the centre of the Space.  Meanwhile to either side of the Liturgical Runway, there will be lit rose-scented tea lights in a profusion of colours (pink and white).  I'm sure nobody has ever thought of doing this before, and equally sure that all heterosexual males will feel absolutely no embarrassment and discomfort about this.  Or the pink curtains with puppy dogs and kittens we've hung there.  Or the pink carpet.  Or the soft toys (one per person) we're leaving on the seats before the Ceremony.

7pm - Tea - Angel Delight with pink custard.  And one half (top left and bottom right quadrants) of the Battenburg Cake.

8 pm - A recreation of "Dark Side of the Moon" by Pink Floyd.  Young Keith on trombone and Edith playing Tabla.  It's going to be a scream.  No, really,  It is.

9pm - Large quantities of rose wine to recover from the concert.

10pm - All-night showing of the Perils of Penelope Pitstop.


Hi-viz colour - yes, you guessed.  But this sight concerns us.  If this is "knitted polyester", who knitted it?  The builder's Nan?  And if you open the larger image we're not totally convinced he's a builder at all.  In fact, we think he may be one of the team on the shoot.  One of the "Marketing" people.


11 comments :

  1. Surely the colour pink itself shows that there is a Creator? No colour as beautiful as this could ever have appeared by some kind of chance evolution - after all, what would it have evolved from? Mauve? No, this is surely proof of what we in the Pastel Christian Fellowship call "Tasteful Design".

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  2. "Anonymous", I'm not surprised you have chosen not to reveal your name. It is members of your sect, believers in the "Pink Goblin in the Sky" who have been responsible for the oppression of millions over the years. I particularly think of the people who died in the great Primary Colours persecution of 7th-century Bulgaria. For believing in the honest beauty of reds, blues and yellows, many rational and scientific people gave their lives.

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  3. "Uncle Reaspn" - the fact you clearly couldn't even spell your own name proves the fallacy of your argument.

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  4. Far from it, Oscar - "Reaspn" is a name that has been passed down in our family for hundreds of years, along with the curse of fat thumbs. We replaced the "o" (which looks like a halo, sign of Christian oppression) with a "p" to remind us that Pink is Evil.

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  5. Anonymous - you have fallen for the old "rosealogical argument", I see. Pink is a mixture of colours which the eye has evolved to detect. People who were unable to see the colour pink would, in the long-past, have failed to detect the danger of such dinosaurs as the BarbaraCartlandosaurus. As a result, they would have spent their time swooning over dashing and swarthy doctors and honest, feisty yet chaste nurses. Those individuals then died out through living in cloud-cuckoo land rather than breeding, and the Pink gene would have been passed on.

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  6. Eva, I can only say with your attitudes you are clearly a believer in Hitler. I suppose that's where you want to end up - shooting all the people who like bright colours, eventually abolishing both pastel shades and primaries, and goose-stepping in your Monochrome Reich in black and white.

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  7. Fondue - that's just the "thin end of the prism" line restated. Nobody's seriously going to want to abolish primary colours. Look at it scientifically - it would be murder at traffic lights.

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  8. Will it take Polly's politics with it, please...

    It's a dastardly plot to make all girls think they are gay, perhaps?

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  9. Archdruid - the first sign of madness is arguing with yourself, even worse when you use a pseudonym to do so. Actually, it's the second, the first is agreeing with Polly Toynbee. So you're done on both counts. By the way, have you been asked to play the wicked stepsister in any pantos this year?

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  10. I knew it was a mistake to pretend to be Matt Wardman...

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  11. I think that Pink is quite a fetching colour!.

    I even have a Pink Shirt, tastefully hidden away in case the wife wants me to wear it.

    It is disguised under the overcoat of the Scarecrow on our roof - we don't have any crows about in urban Kent, but elf and safety said it was a good idea.

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