R.I.P. Motherfucker

Richard Pryor was the motherfucker born to say the word "motherfucker". And he's no longer with us.

He has passed away at the age of 65 after a heart attack. He had been suffering with MS for many years.

Growing up the first exposure I had to Richard Pryor were the films he did such as his appearance in the Superman franchise and his regular pairing with Gene Wilder in late night televsion classics like "Stir Crazy".

It was only as I got into my early teens when I realised that not only did Richard Pryor used to be a standup but he was one of the funniest that there ever has been. So masterful with an audience, unafraid to lapse into regular converstaion, never scared to improvise material on the fly... He was a comic genius. The only person who surpassed his skill with an audience was Bill Hicks, also sadly deceased.

As I started to watch his material it didn't really matter to me that a lot of it was aimed for black America. There was nothing lost in translation. Pryor was championing freedom of expression and attacking the dominant ideology of America at the same time as being incredibly funny.

I knew, like all great minds, he had his demons, that he had grown up in poverty and lived in a brothel where his mother would turn tricks. It was remarked that one of the reasons that he had some of the views that he did was because every white man he met when he was young was going to fuck his mother...

I went to his home town of Peoria, Illinois when I had a stint in the states. Not much had changed. It was still a poor area with a high black population. I wasn't sure what I was doing with this kind of sub-pilgramige, but I'm glad I did. I felt that his whole outlook made a bit more sense. As a bum from a colliery town in the North East of England I knew what it was like to want to get out of your surroundings and achieve something. Anything.

Pryor started by effectively impersonating Bill Cosby who at the time was the acceptable face of Black America, being beamed into the homes of viewers all over the country. But he realised that this charade was not him, would not bring him what he wanted. He knew he needed to be tru to himself. The rest is history.

If imitation is the most sincere form of flattery then Pryor can consider one of the most flattered comedians. Every black stand up comedian owes him a huge debt, especially those like Eddie Murphy, Chris Rock and Martin Lawrence. Every stand up comedian who wants to talk explicitly about sex, drugs and personal issues owes him a debt too. So candid were his stand up shows that his new material regularly came from all the stories that were reported to the papers about his addictions and health problems. He would always tell the truth behind these stories on stage, even if the truth painted him in a worse light than the papers had already attempted.

2005 had already been a bad year. We lost a lot of good men. This is a bad way to cap off the year. I'm just glad he's no longer suffering.

Richard Pryor leaves a proud legacy. R.I.P.

If you thought Ratzinger was bad...

A lot of my colleagues bemoaned the appointment of a Nazi Pope. Hell, I did as well... Why elect someone - who is as powerful, if not more so than the president of the united states - who believes homosexuals are evil, is against female priests, will not budge on the contraception issue and quite possibly used to sharpen Hitler's knives for him?

I guess the idea of an African Pope just freaked the Catholics out too much. Just in case he told all those people living in countries where AIDS is rife that they can actually use protection to stop the spread of the disease. Religions evolving and adapting to ensure they remain relevant to people who wish to belong to them? Not fucking likely.

We all know the Catholic church is little more than a collection of greedy, thieving, deceitful, chauvinistic, paedophile protectors. Unfortunately, for reasons beyond my comprehension, their particular brand of quaint superstitions seem very popular across the globe. But, if like me, you think a Nazi Pope is the sign of bad things to come there have been far worse:


Ratzinger is not the first Nazi Pope. Pope Pius XII was a supporter of the holocaust and was such a big Hitler fan he refused to excommunicate him for his "sins". Under Pius XII the Vatican's considerable coffers were used to protect former SS members and nazis on the run.

John Paul II, the last one to die, is often heralded as a great man. Not for me. He probably did more to ensure the spread of AIDS than any one person could hope to achieve and was known to regularly play tennis with murderous dictators such as General Galtieri of Argentina. He also instructed priests in places like El Salvador and Chile to show support for the regimes that were active there and not provide counsel for any guerrilas or insurgents.

Pope Leo X used Vatican money to fund orgies. Such were his extravagances the Vatican was starting to find itself in danger of crippling debts so his underlings plotted to have him assassinated. It was unsuccessful.

Pope Benedict IX was the youngest of Popes being elected to the position at just eleven years old. The idea was to appoint a Pope who could be controlled. Instead his reign is often remembered for the "debauchery" that took place, including orgies comprising of both heterosexual and homosexual couplings, incestuous sex and bestiality. Not convinced? St. Peter Damian says so in his "Book of Gomorrah".

Pope Sergius III murdered his successor to ensure that he was elected Pope.

Pope John XII was feared by all under him. So terrifying was his bloodthirsty nature his deacons did not dare speak out against the orgies he held on THE TOMBS OF ST. PETER and ST. PAUL! he would regularly murder hsi priests. The lucky ones were just castrated. Towards the end of his reign he reuqested that Germany declare war on Italy then when realising the Vatican is surrounded by Italians decided to retract his request. Died during an act of adultery...

Most hilarious of all, especially given that the Vatican is against female priests, has to be Pope "John" VII sometimes referred to as "Pope Joan". It wss only discovered that a woman had been ordained when she started to give birth.

So, what do we learn from this little history lesson? That the Catholic church is full of shit, has a history they should be ashamed of - it sounds more like the Borgias - and is utterly corrupt. But we knew that already.

Ratzinger has some way to claim the big Pope hat of evilness...