• stephan262@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    37
    arrow-down
    5
    ·
    1 year ago

    If the government has even the smallest modicum of dignity, he’ll resign or be sacked. It’s one thing to enjoy crass and offensive jokes, I certainly do, but there’s a time and a place for such humour. I mean he’s the Home Secretary for fucks sake! How in the world did he think that that kind of joke would go down well?

    I’ve seen first hand the aftermath of someone’s drink being spiked… It’s not something I ever want to deal with again. Though I’ll bet it was far worse for the unfortunate victim of it.

    • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      16
      arrow-down
      7
      ·
      1 year ago

      I mean he’s the Home Secretary for fucks sake! How in the world did he think that that kind of joke would go down well?

      And this assumes it was a joke…if I were his wife, I’d be looking for a way to tell if I’ve been drugged or not.

      • EatATaco@lemm.ee
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        If you were his wife and you took that joke as a threat rather than a compliment, you’d be incredibly dumb.

        • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          “I drug my wife…”

          Is a compliment? and speaking of dumb, i didn’t say it was a threat- in the “I’m going to harm you…” sense. I said, if i were here, I’d go have them run a tox panel to see if he was really doing it. There are certain truths to humor, one of which is every joke has some element of truth to it… and the joke is fundamentally about abusing his spouse.

          • EatATaco@lemm.ee
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            Is a compliment?

            No. But you also took it out of context in a blatant attempt to misrepresent it. If it were actually so bad, you wouldn’t feel the need to so grossly misrepresent it.

            There are certain truths to humor,

            Agreed. And in this case that truth could be that he thinks his wife is too good for him and he must go to great lengths to get her not to understand it.

            the joke is fundamentally about abusing his spouse.

            Actually, no, the joke was fundamentally about his spouse being too good for him.

            • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              1
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              1 year ago

              So you don’t think drugging one’s wife…. Is spousal abuse.

              Which was litteraly the joke. Drugging her. So she can’t escape.

              Whose misrepresenting what, exactly?

              • EatATaco@lemm.ee
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                1
                ·
                1 year ago

                Again, the joke is fundamentally about his wife being too good for him. If you won’t even admit that, then what’s the point of following your leading questions? You don’t care about actually being reasonable, you care about justifying your outrage.

                • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  1
                  arrow-down
                  1
                  ·
                  1 year ago

                  Go read the fucking article. here. I’ll save you a click:

                  In case you’re wondering. Rohypnol is commonly used as a date rape drug. And he’s “joking” about dosing his wife “just a little bit” so she can’t leave.

                  Do please explain how jokes that are literally about dosing one’s partner with date rape drug so she can’t leave you isn’t spouse abuse. Also explain how I am being unreasonable here. Please, explain to me how I’m over-reacting and it’s “just a joke”.

      • Lmaydev@programming.dev
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        10
        arrow-down
        3
        ·
        1 year ago

        He reportedly added that the secret to a long marriage was to ensure your spouse was “someone who is always mildly sedated so she can never realise there are better men out there.”

        It 100% was a joke. Just a very inappropriate one.

        • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          20
          arrow-down
          6
          ·
          1 year ago

          Yeah,

          There’s definitely a non-zero chance that he’s doing exactly that. Abusers frequently joke about abusing their partners; they see abuse largely as normal, and that’s why it’s okay to joke about it. If it plays poorly, everyone just thinks they have bad taste in jokes until the partner turns up dead.

          Then it’s “we had no idea…”

          It’s a glaring red flag, and it should be treated as such.

          • EatATaco@lemm.ee
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            Holy shit, imagine thinking a self deprecating joke that basically implies his wife is too good for him is a huge red flag that he’s an abuser and actually drugging his wife. Lol your arrogance and presumptuousness is extremely impressive.

            • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              1
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              1 year ago

              HOLY SHIT… it’s like you think jokes about abusing his spouse is actually funny.

              It’s not. People who make those jokes in public settings (or public-ish, I guess,) are more likely to be abusers. stop excusing it. Stop normalizing it.
              you can be better than that.

              • EatATaco@lemm.ee
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                1
                arrow-down
                1
                ·
                1 year ago

                No, I found a joke about a guy saying his wife is too good for him to be funny.

                In fact, I think people who attempt to turn any off-colored joke into them being some terrible person who abuses their spouse to more likely be abusers themselves. As it goes, we often see the worst of ourselves in others. Stop projecting. Stop assuming everyone is as bad as you.

                you can be better than that.

  • adam_y@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    20
    arrow-down
    2
    ·
    1 year ago

    He should have been sacked when he described Stockton – a place ravaged by 13 years of Tory austerity – as a ‘shithole’ during a televised parliamentary session.

    Not for calling Stockton a shithole (I love the place but it really is a bit rough), but for being the sort of politician that is so poor at their job that they say stuff like this in front of the public.

  • Lophostemon@aussie.zone
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    17
    arrow-down
    9
    ·
    1 year ago

    OH HO HO HAH HAH!!! RAPE JOKES EH WOT?!?

    SO TERRIBLY WITTY EH OLD CHAP?!?

    MARVELLOUS I SAY, MARVELLOUS!!!

    • EatATaco@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      He didn’t make a joke about raping his wife, it was a self deprecating joke about making it so his wife wouldn’t realize there are better men out there.

      But good on you for being so offended by something that didn’t even happen. Marvelous, I say, marvelous.

  • HipPriest@kbin.social
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    10
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    God’s sake. I mean… At least he’s apologising? I could imagine some of our recent lot doubling down on this and refusing to give in to wokeness blah blah blah…

    But yeah. I’m really trying hard to be charitable cos it’s Christmas and everything. That’s not really pleasant stuff to hear from the guy who is in charge of the Police (over 1,100 under investigation for sexual assault or domestic violence atm)

  • shalafi@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    17
    arrow-down
    54
    ·
    1 year ago

    He made a joke in poor taste about his own wife. Not like he advocated raping strangers. Not like he advocated raping his own wife, it was a poor joke. It was meant in a self-deprecating manor.

    Jesus people, let a bad joke go. I’m quite sure he hates himself for it and is quite regretful. Or shall we beat his ass more?

    When conservatives talk “cancel culture”, this is the kinda thing they point to. Don’t feed them ammo.

    • charlytune@mander.xyz
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      Plenty of people have been spiked by a partner in exactly this way. It’s not a funny joke. Someone making this kind of joke and thinking it’s acceptable is shitty. Someone who’s a leading politician, in a job responsible for crime and justice, at a political function in a government venue, telling this joke to a group of women… The unacceptable is off the charts there. I seriously worry about someone with that lack of judgement and humanity being in a job like that. Criticising and holding people in power to account for their actions is not 'cancel culture '.

    • ThenThreeMore@startrek.website
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      22
      ·
      1 year ago

      He’s a Tory. I very much doubt he feels bad about the joke, more likely just feels bad that he got caught. Last month in parliament if you believe his accuser he called a constituency a shit hole and if you believe his defence he called a fellow MP a shit hole.

    • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      18
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      quite sure he hates himself for it and is quite regretful.

      He’s a Tory politician. He wouldn’t hate himself for selling his mom for an extra year of shitting on poor people and immigrants. He definitely doesn’t hate himself for this.

      He hates that he was called out for it, but that’s it.

    • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      28
      arrow-down
      5
      ·
      1 year ago

      [I like to defend Spousal Abuse, and think we should just let it go]

      There. fixed that for you. It’s a non-zero chance that it really was “just a joke”, and even if it was, jokes about abusing your spouse… is never appropriate. Would you find “The secret to a long marriage, I beat my wife so she’s too scared to leave” funny? I doubt it. Because it’s downright awful.

      The fact that he thinks it’s okay to joke about this- to women- in a nominally public, government function… makes me wonder he does in private.

  • Numenor@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    25
    ·
    1 year ago

    According to the paper, Cleverly – a senior minister in Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s Conservative government – said that adding “a little bit of Rohypnol in her drink every night” was “not really illegal if it’s only a little bit.” He reportedly added that the secret to a long marriage was to ensure your spouse was “someone who is always mildly sedated so she can never realise there are better men out there.” His comments came on the same day that Cleverly vowed to strengthen British laws on the growing epidemic of drink spiking in the UK, according to the Mirror.

  • VCTRN@programming.dev
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    7
    arrow-down
    7
    ·
    1 year ago

    So, Lemmings only go with titles, instead of reading the article, like redditors? Smh my head

  • DocMcStuffin@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    71
    arrow-down
    5
    ·
    1 year ago

    Cleverly made the joke to female guests while attending a Downing Street reception earlier this month.

    Yikes! The added context makes it even worse.