To be honest, the Europa League is probably about Celtic's level. We really need to accept that being known throughout the world and having a huge fan base does not translate into hard cash. These days money talks and it's only the big boys in the money-spinning leagues, like the EPL that can realistically compete at the highest level. Thinking that Celtic is anywhere near this level is as delusionary as believing that Britannia is still a big-hitter on the world stage; a bit like many of The Peeppul still do.
McMurdo is a prime example of this type of thinking. Yesterday he had a picture of Britannia, accompanied by a rather poor-looking lion, like some representation of Aslan in a low-budget adaptation of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. He sees the usual conspiracies behind the independence debate and believes that there are hidden hands pulling the strings to achieve some nefarious end. He asks the question and his disciples provide the answer: it's all a big EU comspiracy to split up and dominate Britain. Our only hope, apparently is to vote NO and elect UKIP. God help us all if that happens!
Any time Celtic falls down in Europe the same solution comes up time after time; Celtic needs to move to the English League. It stands to reason that Celtic would make far more money that way and would benefit enoromously. It also stands to reason that a YES vote in September would put the mockers on any such move. I would never mortgage my daughter's and my potential grandchildren's future, however, just to benefit the football team I support. No football team, no matter how much you love it, is worth that. The Peeppul, I have no doubt, would see things entirely differently!
Further to McMurdo's Sunday Sermon, there have been a few more contributions from his acolytes. One provides a quote from Mein Kampf, which, for some reason, he seems to think applies to the YES campaign. He's obviously so thick that he can't see the irony in what he is saying. He and his cronies see it all as a EU conspiracy and want to vote UKIP to pull Britain out, with all the attendant nationalist rhetoric. If you really look at it closely it's easy to see which side is the more akin to Hitler's nationalistic views.
Another McMurdo disciple directs his chums to a site written by some group calling itself JAH. I've had a good look at this website and I enjoyed it thoroughly; it's the funniest thing I've encountered in ages! The guy writing it believes that George Lucas did not invent Star Wars but was given the idea psychically by God! He goes on to outline the deep, religious message of the Star Wars movies; well, the three that were initially released anyway. Apparently Satan dictated the other three Star Wars films to Lucas to counterract God's message in the other three! You can read the whole, insane treatise here.
The page that McMurdo's disciple recommends, however, is all about the Catholic Church (Surprise! Surprise!). Apparently the Pope is not actually the real Pope, but an illusory one. The real 'power behind the throne' is the head of the Jesuits! It seems this particular gentleman always dresses in black and it was him that Darth Vader represented in the Star Wars films! I mean...come on!
Delving further into this website provides a clue as to why it excites the Merlinites; it advocates British Israelism and the crazy stories about Jesus traipsing about Britain. These ridiculous tales became popular in the Nineteenth Century as some kind of vindication of Britain trying to take over the world; it was her destiny. After all, didn't Jesus come to Britain to learn from the Druids? The original Druids, however, were nothing to do with the clowns that turn up at Stonehenge these days with long beards and a bedshet wrapped round them. The Druidical religion was pantheistic, worshipping the gods of natural places like rivers, lakes and forests. The Druids also practised human sacrifice. Now why would a Jew come all the way from Palestine to learn from a bunch of pagan savages?
The site also quotes, as an expert, the delusional Dr. Gordon Strachan. (Yes, it's a different one!) This numbskull reaches conclusions based on no historical, archaeological or scientific evidence whatsoever; it's all based on words looking something the same. It's like me pointing to the Japanese word arigato and the Portuguese obrigado, which both mean thanks, and then citing their similarity as evidence that the Portuguese must be descended from the Japanese! Strachan relies on this kind of thing, as do all adherents of British Israelism and the Jesus-in-Britain stories. For example, Strachan excitedly points to the use of the word hypocrite (ὑποκρίτης), the Greek word for actor, by Jesus as evidence that He had attended the Greek theatre. This ignores that fact that just because the New Testament was written in Greek it does not mean that Jesus necessarily spoke it, any more than He spoke English. In other words, it's a load of shite!
Anyway, as usual, The Peeppul pick and choose bits and pieces to attempt to further their own agenda and ignore everything else. The guy that writes the JAH website is obviously a believer in inclusiveness and his hate-filled diatribes turn out to be of an equal-opportunity nature. As well as denouncing the Pope and the Vatican for its wealth, he turns his attention to the Queen and the Royal Family. Although he claims that they're descended from King David, he feels that they've betrayed God's word. Instead of looking after their subjects they're merely looking after themselves while the country is full of starving and homeless people. Oh, and Lizzie's not the real Queen anyway, since she was crowned above a replica of the Stone of Destiny instead of the real thing! That wouldn't go down too well with The Peeppul and it just shows that you should always read the whole thing before commenting or associating yourself with it! It also goes to show that many of The Peeppul live on a different planet from the rest of us. No wonder they think their dead team's still alive!
I was watching an old black-and-white film the other night, called The Halfway House. It's a ghost story, starring Mervyn Johns, of which I had high hopes since Johns was the star of my favourite horror film, Dead of Night. Unfortunately, it turned out to be nothing more than war-time propaganda. The most interesting element of it was the Irishman (with a strangely upper-class English accent) that insisted on staying neutral in the war until his girlfriend was nearly killed in an air raid. This was enough to make him view all Germans as 'swine' and want to join in the fight against them. The whole film was about peddling the myth of fighting to maintain democracy in the face of a totalitarian state.
There were two bits that I thought were laughable. The first was when a French woman was telling the Irishman that he had no idea what it was like to have his country overrun and controlled by a foreign power, which dictated their every move. In real life any Irishman could have turned to the woman and said, "Sit down, Missus, and I'll tell you all about it!" The other was when Mervyn Johns was telling the Irishman that the Welsh saw the English as 'friends' and that he couldn't understand the Irishman's attitude.
As well as propaganda the film was an exercise in stereotypes, with the Welsh folk singing all the way from London on the train. There was also a sinister aspect. The Irishman argued that German U-Boats had just as much right to refuel in Ireland as British ships. Sound familiar? It was a rather tawdry piece of anti-Irish racism, trying to make out that they were cowards and traitors. A bit like The Peeppul and their Orange Order do today.
Finally, a big thanks to fess19 and Jaggy Bunnet for offering their help in finding out Celtic's fixtures lists for the end of the Nineteenth/start of the Twentieth Centuries. The website Jaggy Bunnet pointed me to has loads of information that I'll be able to use in my book and fess19 even offered to lend me his book on the subject. Thanks again for responding so quickly to my plea and for being so helpful. If anyone else is interested, the site Jaggy Bunnet gave me is this one.
A quick history lesson for those Welsh Naionalists speaking out against Scottish independence. (And for the Welshman in that film as well!)
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