The Angry Exile: When did The Mash stop doing piss-takes and start doing policies?

The Hangman

Into our town the Hangman came,
Smelling of gold and blood and flame.
And he paced our bricks with a diffident air,
And built his frame in the courthouse square.
The scaffold stood by the courthouse side,
Only as wide as the door was wide;
A frame as tall, or little more,
Than the capping sill of the courthouse door.
And we wondered, whenever we had the time,
Who the criminal, what the crime
That the Hangman judged with the yellow twist
of knotted hemp in his busy fist.
And innocent though we were, with dread,
We passed those eyes of buckshot lead --
Till one cried: "Hangman, who is he
For whom you raised the gallows-tree?"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
And he gave us a riddle instead of reply:
"He who serves me best," said he,
"Shall earn the rope of the gallows-tree."
And he stepped down, and laid his hand
On a man who came from another land.
And we breathed again, for another's grief
At the Hangman's hand was our relief
And the gallows-frame on the courthouse lawn
By tomorrow's sun would be struck and gone.
So we gave him way, and no one spoke,
Out of respect for his Hangman's cloak.
The next day's sun looked mildly down
On roof and street in our quiet town,
And stark and black in the morning air
Was the gallows-tree in the courthouse square.
And the Hangman stood at his usual stand
With the yellow hemp in his busy hand;
With his buckshot eye and his jaw like a pike
And his air so knowing and business-like.
And we cried, "Hangman, have you not done
Yesterday, with the foreign one?"
Then we fell silent, and stood amazed,
"Oh, not for him was the gallows raised."
He laughed a laugh as he looked at us:
"Did you think I'd gone to all this fuss
To hang one man? That's a thing I do
To stretch a rope when the rope is new."
Then one cried "Murder!" and one cried "Shame!"
And into our midst the Hangman came
To that man's place. "Do you hold," said he,
"with him that was meant for the gallows-tree?"
And he laid his hand on that one's arm.
And we shrank back in quick alarm!
And we gave him way, and no one spoke
Out of fear of his Hangman's cloak.
That night we saw with dread surprise
The Hangman's scaffold had grown in size.
Fed by the blood beneath the chute,
The gallows-tree had taken root;
Now as wide, or a little more,
Than the steps that led to the courthouse door,
As tall as the writing, or nearly as tall,
Halfway up on the courthouse wall.
The third he took -- we had all heard tell --
Was a usurer, and an infidel.
"What," said the Hangman "have you to do
With the gallows-bound, and he a Jew?"
And we cried out, "Is this one he
Who has served you well and faithfully?"
The Hangman smiled: "It's a clever scheme
to try the strength of the gallows-beam."
The fourth man's dark, accusing song
Had scratched our comfort hard and long;
"And what concern," he gave us back.
"Have you for the doomed -- the doomed and Black?"
The fifth. The sixth. And we cried again,
"Hangman, Hangman, is this the man?"
"It's a trick," he said. "that we hangmen know
For easing the trap when the trap springs slow."
And so we ceased, and asked no more,
As the Hangman tallied his bloody score.
And sun by sun, and night by night,
The gallows grew to monstrous height.
The wings of the scaffold opened wide
Till they covered the square from side to side;
And the monster cross-beam, looking down,
Cast its shadow across the town.
Then through the town the Hangman came,
Through the empty streets, and called my name --
And I looked at the gallows soaring tall,
And thought, "There is no one left at all
For hanging, and so he calls to me
To help pull down the gallows-tree."
So I went out with right good hope
To the Hangman's tree and the Hangman's rope.
He smiled at me as I came down
To the courthouse square through the silent town.
And supple and stretched in his busy hand
Was the yellow twist of the hempen strand.
And he whistled his tune as he tried the trap,
And it sprang down with a ready snap --
And then with a smile of awful command
He laid his hand upon my hand.
"You tricked me. Hangman!," I shouted then,
"That your scaffold was built for other men...
And I no henchman of yours," I cried,
"You lied to me, Hangman. Foully lied!"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
"Lied to you? Tricked you?" he said. "Not I.
For I answered straight and I told you true --
The scaffold was raised for none but you.
For who has served me more faithfully
Then you with your coward's hope?" said he,
"And where are the others who might have stood
Side by your side in the common good?"
"Dead," I whispered. And amiably
"Murdered," the Hangman corrected me:
"First the foreigner, then the Jew...
I did no more than you let me do."
Beneath the beam that blocked the sky
None had stood so alone as I.
The Hangman noosed me, and no voice there
Cried "Stop!" for me in the empty square.

Maurice Ogden

Monday, 13 December 2010

When did The Mash stop doing piss-takes and start doing policies?

I ask only because this makes more sense than some things that are being suggested.

As angry students demanded the right to help themselves to other people's money, MPs backed an amendment to the government's higher education funding proposals to just scrap the fucking thing.

...

Professor Henry Brubaker, director of the Institute for Studies and a long time campaigner for the abolition of universities, said: "Hospitals can train doctors, law firms can train lawyers, journalists can be trained by children and sociologists can train themselves by watching television for six hours a day.

"The vast majority of 'careers' are complete bullshit anyway. Sending people to university just means you get pointless, bullshit jobs being done by someone who has spent three years and thirty grand turning themselves into an arse."

Or increasingly someone who has spent even more time and money getting a Master's or something, because these days nearly everyone their age has a vanilla degree in something and they're starting to feel a need to separate themselves from the crowd. You know, a bit like a degree used to do.

Comments (6)

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Bucko · 743 weeks ago

That does make sense. Has the Mash gone normal?
I particularly like the "children can train journalists".
My recent post They give you this shit and you read it out

1 reply · active 742 weeks ago

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Angry_Exile 90p · 742 weeks ago

Don't know that they've gone normal so much as the world is becoming more Mash-like. Or at least so stupid it's getting harder for them to satirise things. "Children can train journalists" isn't far off your last post either.

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AllSeeingEye 55p · 743 weeks ago

Most of the ideas suggested by the Mash these days are damn good. And don't be surprised if some of them surface in a manifesto one day - remember that votes at 18, pet passports and all day pub opening were originally demands of the Monster Raving Loony Party before becoming law.

1 reply · active 743 weeks ago

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Angry_Exile 90p · 742 weeks ago

Yeah, the Monster Raving Loony example had occurred to me too.

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Darcy_Woods · 743 weeks ago

Good becomes bad.
Up becomes down.
War becomes peace.
Freedom becomes slavery.
Mainstream news becomes propaganda.
And, satire becomes realistic good advice and truthful social comment.
Makes sense to me.

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Angry_Exile 90p · 742 weeks ago

I was going to comment just on the last bit about satire becoming good advice but then examples of nearly all the other bits started popping into my head. The one that really gets me was that freedom becomes slavery, which has never been more true. Just look at all the politicians telling us how free we are and in the next breath saying we aren't allowed to do something.

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