An open letter to Pastor Terry Jones

"Gosh" both my readers must be thinking at this point "Just what the world needs - more comment on International Koran-burning Day!"

My initial response was to call for 12 September to be designated "INTERNATIONAL BURN ALL THE POINTLESS AND COUNTER-PRODUCTIVE MEDIA COVERAGE OF SOME OBSCURE FUNDAMENTALIST PILLOCK'S BURN A KORAN DAY DAY", but having thought again realised I could squeeze out a blog posting on the matter while it is fresh in everyone's minds.

So here goes:
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To Pastor The Rev Terry Jones, Dove World Outreach Center, Gainsville.

OI! TERRY!

You daft git.

What the hell were you thinking? Are you just trying to stir up trouble for perverse sadistic pleasure?

On balance, I think not. Were you attempting that, I'm sure you could have done better. Were I seeking to offend the Muslim Ummah, I would announce that I would shortly be hosting "International Bar-B-Q Some Pork Chops Over A Pile Of Burning Koran Briquettes And Then Force-Feed Them To Ms Yasmin Alibhai-Brown Day". But I'm not going to, because I'm not a nasty person by nature. Not that sort of nasty anyway. And even then not against Muslims, who despite having a tiny lunatic fringe are in my wide experience of having lived in a Muslim country for six years charming and lovely people.

No - this isn't about offence. Really. I find myself drawn to two key facts about your "church" - it has 50 worshippers and it doubles as a furniture factory. Those hardly propel it into the ranks of influential global spiritual centres no, do they?

There you are, doubtless with ideas well above your station, grinding your teeth about the insufferable injustice of feeling yourself a world-class religious figure and being confined to the rigours of preaching to (and more to the point receiving tithes from) some 50 people, a significant proportion of whom doubtless arrive for divine service in pickup trucks containing arsenals of illegally-held banjoes.

The tithes from such a flock are not even enough to afford crystal meth and gay masseurs like a real preacher, are they?

O for a truly major publicity stunt, eh? Preferably one that would bring in money from and influence over the South's extreme right. Even better, you don't actually have to risk setting fire to your cuffs by igniting anything. Make the threat, get the damn-fool media to splash it all over the world and then back out.

And you know what? You've succeeded. Gimp.