Tuesday 2 June 2009

Freddie disses Fiddy, India, hotel receptionists: storm brewing

In an interesting adjunct to the post below, GQ magazine have just released some details of an interview they'll be carrying with Andrew Flintoff. The highlights:

'I have no problems with a multi-cultural society, I think it's to the benefit of the country. But you have to be careful what levels it takes you to. It annoys me when I phone a hotel receptionist in my own country and they don't understand what I am saying because they don't speak English'.

'There are places I wouldn't go to now. You see these reports of stabbings, bottlings, shootings and you think, 'what's happening to this country?' I think rap music's got a lot to do with it. It makes it sound cool not to conform and to be violent. That's why I think sport has such an important role to play. Cricket kept me away from trouble.'

'There's knife crime, gun crime, homelessness, the financial crisis, so many things need fixing. But when you go somewhere like India you realise we're not in that bad a shape. We have a tendency in Britain to talk ourselves down.'

Lucky we've got Andrew Flintoff to, er talk things back up, then...

NB: Excuse odds just in: 
Misquoted 2/1
Taken out of context 7/4
Jocular comments made in private 6/1
'I love going to India/talking to hotel receptionists/listening to rap music' 11-2

7 comments:

Amy said...

Are you sure he hasn't been possessed by the spirit of a middle aged man with a wife and three kids who only wanted to pay off his mortgage but was then attacked at night by a bunch of "black hooligans" resulting in the most tragic death of the law-abiding father? And that his name was Billy Morton?

Yenjie said...

He's blonde, and he's definitely not the exception. Need we say more?

Brit said...

'I have no problems with a multi-cultural society... But you have to be careful what levels it takes you to. It annoys me when I phone a hotel receptionist in my own country and they don't understand what I am saying.'

Shocking 'levels' indeed. Annoyance at hotels today, rivers of blood tomorrow...

Mind you, Freddie is as entitled to his inane and wholly uninteresting opinions as the next man.

12th Man said...

Isn't Freddie born to German parents?

Dave said...

I think Fred misunderstands the hotel receptionists. When he speaks to them on the phone and they can't understand him, it's not because they don't speak English.

It's because HE'S A FUCKING NORTHERNER.

Rob said...

Clearly misquoted, any sentence Freddie utters has to contain "to be honest".

Tony said...

A professional apology can only be hours away. Expect a liberal sprinkling of "if".