Thursday 25 November 2010

Good Work, Agent McKeith

I expect I'm late on this as I haven't watched a single second of the celebrity jungle thingy, but I was alerted to this Gillian McKeith character by the witch in Birmingham who put me up during the Tory conference (don't worry, it's a term of endearment really).

All I was given was an account of the woman's torture in being put in a jail with Shaun Ryder as he smoked a cigarette. I imagined somewhere cramped, concrete-encased, with her knees forced under her chin, and little space to act as a retreat. How else could one think when told of her terrified reaction, and her claim that Ryder would kill them all if he smoked.

So, imagine my surprise on researching and seeing that this is the boxed-in, oppressive, airtight space she was talking about.


No roof, little by way of walls, much much more than fully compliant with even the quite ludicrous conditions placed on smoking areas by a committee of trained monkeys at the Department of Health ... and placed in the middle of a fucking jungle!

The woman is quite insane! Brilliant, isn't it?

She is the very embodiment of the rabid anti-smoker. Incapable of interacting with other humans in a civilised manner; perpetually thinking of herself; screeching like a crack-addled banshee; so stupid as to place herself in a position which she won't enjoy; before blaming just about everyone else for it and demanding that her rights be observed to the nth degree at the expense of the comfort of others.

She is also cowardly, loud-mouthed, terrified of absolutely everything, and in atrocious health considering she has spent her entire life looking after, err, her health.

According to her website, she is supposed to be a bit of a clever scientist** (and a little bit prone to regular bouts of debilitating illness), yet is blissfully unaware that there isn't - and never will be - any science, even junk ASH-tortured stuff, which can point to people dying from the smoke emanating from one cigarette in the open air ... in a fucking jungle.

She's perfect!

If I were an ASH tax-sponger, constantly trying to put a serious face on the fantasy bullshit of passive smoking, I would be reading articles like this through my fingers. Seeing pictures of a haggard old 'health-conscious' crone, held up as a hate figure on national TV, alongside accounts of her spewing out utterances so unbelievable as to make even ardent smoke-haters think twice about what they have been fed, while exhibiting psychosis and proving that they aren't fit to integrate in society, isn't exactly an image the publicity-conscious Shoreditch Mafia will be happy with.

For years, Roy Castle has been touted as the anti-smoker talisman (due to sparse and faulty logic, as we know), but now, those opposed to the rantings of anti-social half-wits have our own poster girl.

Cheers, Gillian, you weapons grade fruitcake, you've just made the job of painting the hysterically smoke-averse as wild-eyed, joyless, death-obsessed, reality-challenged, clinically-certifiable nutjobs even easier than it was increasingly becoming.

The longer she stays in the competition, the better.

** To be fair, the selective Bad Science crowd think she's loopy too I understand, so perhaps this may even make them embarrassed at being in the same ideological camp on the secondhand smoke myth.


18 comments:

Lawson said...

I'm reliably informed that she has had her services retained. Long live the jungle.

Anonymous said...

As my 14 year old son* pointed out on the night, the discussion was had over a nice smoky campfire as well.
The cognitive dissonance is incredible, don't you think?

*Proving that all my time teaching him to recognise bullshit when he hears it has been worthwhile.

Bald headed John.

Anonymous said...

Should you wish to read more about this fraud from a slightly different perspective, I think that it is the same harpy that Ben Goldacre devotes a whole chapter of Bad Science to. Not exactly liberal on smoking our Ben but it is quite a good read.

George Speller said...

Roy Castle smoked cigars. I can produce witnesses.

Curmudgeon said...

One of the best comments I saw was that Gillian McKeith is less than a year older than the far healthier-looking Nigella Lawson, who is famously fond of a bit of self-indulgence :-)

Anonymous said...

Checked out the Goldacre book and it turns out that she really is a fraud. Her Masters and PhD are apparently correspondence courses that you essentially buy but the best bit relates to the (American) National Association of Nutrition Professionals (NANP) which features in your link to her CV. McKeith is apparently a “professional” member of this esteemed organisation, an honour that she shares with Goldacre's dead cat Hettie. Goldacre bought Hettie a “professional” membership for $60 and has a certificate to prove it.

Sue said...

So you don't like her then?

:)

Angry Exile said...

When I began reading this I was wishing waves of redbacks on the silly bitch, but by the end I saw that she does far more damage to the anti-baccy zealots.

Anonymous said...

I trust that her antics are being videoed for the record, the better to be reproduced abundantly at every opportunity along with her statements - not just once, but again and again. Somehow, we must make it our business to ensure, as best we can, that she becomes the FACE and VOICE of tobacco control.

Anonymous said...

Health fraeks like her are actually hypocondriacs.
That's why they are always ill.
In the end hey die from their own meaness.

Anonymous said...

You are right Sue. I am not a big fan.

She is however relatively harmless compared to this bunch of nutritionists:

http://www.wcrf-uk.org/

These people really believe that 42% of breast cancers are caused by lifestyle so if you are one of the unfortunates who contract it, it’s your fault for having that extra glass of wine on a Friday night.

WCRF base all of this tosh on their report and review by their expert panel. The report contains no original work but is the usual biased meta analysis of previous epidemiological dross and the expert panel seems to be mostly made up of nutritionists.

“Professional nutritionists say that diet causes over a third of cancers”. Call me cynical but what a surprise!

Anonymous said...

Shawn will probably be in the final two with Stacy. 10 million people will be watching him puffing away. Anti smoking will be tearing its hair out. Would the BBC put on a show where the contestants are given unlimited supplies of cigarettes to smoke on camera?

Anonymous said...

Look at the state of Shaun Ryder,former smackhead, crackhead, methadone addict and compare with the health freak McKeith.

If you didn't know, who would you think had led the life of a drugged up waster?

Anonymous said...

I watched it live too but also went onto the site and tried to d/load that segment but it was not allowed. In true cinema 'video piracy' style I videoed the monitor screen and d/loaded the sound and matched them both up as best as I could. Still editing but will show the offending piece when done.


TheBigYin

Unknown said...

Here's the video I cobbled together. The smoking bit comes near the end of the video segment and is carried on in sound only where Shaun capitulates and apologises to that stupid bint.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6g-d6HJMYQ

Unknown said...

TBY - he only apologised for the bad language. Am pleased he didn't apologise for the smoking.

They had a very poisonous snake in the camp one evening too. I expect that is nothing to her in comparison to a tiny wisp of smoke which already pales into insignificance due to the campfire.

I have to say that I watched this live and I had to rewind through tears of laughter in total amazement at the stupidity (and the screeching). She told the others in the camp she had asked him politely not to smoke. If I asked anyone something with that 'politeness' I would fully expect a tirade of bad language back.

timbone said...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqGGrO5hjy8

Ciaran said...

I knew that name rang a bell but it took me a while for it to click- I wrote about her, and/or one of her products before: http://ciarang.com/posts/energy-powder

Allegedly, apparently, she used to call herself "Dr", on account of a cheaply purchased fake PhD, but apparently this "title" was dropped after a run-in with the ASA. So I heard anyway - check the facts for yourself. I also heard she is touchy about these things (as quacks usually are) and litigious with it.