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The Passion Of The Chris

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Fraser McAlpine | 11:40 UK time, Friday, 1 December 2006

Is Lil' Chris too rude for people his own age?

Lil' ChrisThat seems to be what the Daily Mail is getting in a flap about at the moment, or encouraging your parents to get in a flap about, or if not your parents, their parents, and if THEY won't do it, some retired Colonel from Berkshire. Basically, there's the Daily Mail, there's little Chris, and there is a flap waiting to happen. Any takers?

Oh, what, you want actual information? Gah! OK.

Right, you'll have all seen the video for Chris's new song 'Gettin' Enough' right? It's been on Channel 4, and it's on Chris's website () and YouTube and everything. If you haven't, it's a parody of all those videos teachers make you watch about puberty, complete with goonish grown-up saying inane cack like "RAD!" to try and appear 'down' with your 'youthspeak'.

And, seeing as it's a parody of something that some people think shouldn't be shown to children in the first place, there's a lot of sensitivity about whether the video should be available for children to watch too. MTV, for example, have apparently decided not to show it until after 7pm, when the under-10s will hopefully be heading for bed.

GAH! It's got HAIR on it!But, to make matters more complicated, the fact that the video does contain some actual information about that 'difficult age', like "puberty means hair in new places", and some nudge-wink one-liners like "playing music with yourself is fun and healthy", has provoked some interesting responses.

For starters, the state-funded R U Thinking? website, which was set up to provide actual real information about safe sex, saw the video and asked if they could put some advice line numbers in it, in case any of the jokey references were to touch a raw nerve with anyone going through a tough time.

Chris's peeps told the Mail: "The website organisers contacted us and were overjoyed at the opportunity to have the numbers for their campaign at the end. The more information that is out there to help young people, the better."

Which is not a view shared by everyone. The paper also spoke to Nick Seaton, a member of a group called the Campaign For Real Education. He said: "Adults should be setting a good, authoritative example to youngsters, not endorsing this sort of thing. It is an absolutely crazy idea and one that flies in the face of the advice they should be giving young people, which is to refrain from having sex for as long as possible."

So the question is, who is being silly here? The makers of the video for trying to be funny about puberty? The RU Thinking? site for taking a parody seriously, the Campaign For Real Education for using Lil' Chris as a way of attacking RU Thinking?, or the Daily Mail for stirring this whole thing up in the first place?

C'mon, talk to me, people!

(And if any of this HAS struck a nerve, the site you want is bbc.co.uk/slink. They rule.)

Comments

  1. At 08:29 PM on 06 Dec 2006, kirstie wrote:

    im only 13 but theres nutin wrong with tha video it doesnt exactly say any bad words or anything its just a song and a really good one 2
    (i luv lilchris)

  2. At 10:30 PM on 07 Dec 2006, chris adamson wrote:

    well lil chris is proppa sound like i fink teres nofin wrong wid his video, if ppl wanna say stuff like what they bin sayin i wud like them 2 try what he is doin an i bet they find it dam hard, so my avice is leav him alone

    chris 17 fmr st helens

  3. At 03:39 AM on 08 Dec 2006, Anonymous wrote:

    My Adamson,

    Please refrain from writing in such a style. It does not make you cool, it is actually not any quicker, and it burns the eyes of the reader.

    Seriously, no one is going to respect anything you write if you present in it that sort of a fashion. Take out a dictionary, and see what percentage of the words you wrote are actually in it. I doubt it's higher than 10%.

    And to keep this on topic, people should chill out a bit. It's just a music video. I highly doubt any young child is going to get ideas from this, it's quite clearly not serious.

  4. At 06:30 PM on 08 Dec 2006, Scotty Racing wrote:

    Like you never talked like that when you were younger.....

  5. At 06:52 PM on 11 Dec 2006, Niki wrote:

    So..why exactly has this video been banned?
    I mean for one thing not many under-10s watch MTV anyways and for another its not like they'll understand any of it in the first place...and if they do then they've obviously been exposed to it somewhere else.
    Get a grip people

  6. At 03:55 AM on 12 Dec 2006, Nick wrote:

    Scotty Racing,

    I can proudly say I have never spoken in "text speak" and I think it is contributing to the destruction of the English language. It is lazy, it is frustrating, and it is pointless. No matter what age, one should write properly, whether it be on messenger or in an essay. There is clearly a reason for words being the way they are, and this "text speak" is destroying the English language. I find it hard to believe I am the only one who finds this painful to read. I'm just trying to influence people bit by bit so that people give up on this frustrating "text speak" thing. It's worse than people just using bad grammar, it's people intentionally destroying our language.

  7. At 08:19 PM on 12 Dec 2006, Scotty Racing wrote:

    Get with the times then, man!

  8. At 11:49 PM on 16 Dec 2006, wrote:

    heya wat u up 2 wb luv emma :D xxxx

  9. At 06:13 PM on 18 Dec 2006, Anonymous wrote:

    shut up he is so fit an i love his song

  10. At 02:12 PM on 19 Dec 2006, u really wanna no? wrote:

    to be honest, i really don't care what is in lil chris' song. if he is trying to be clever with his lyrics he should stop straight away because it will not be taken seriously. for that to happen he actually has to put some feeling into his music rather than just putting out catchy tunes (that said, i haven't actually heard his new song yet).

    yeah just for the record i haven't got a thing against writing in text language, but i've been doing coursework so i'm used to writing properly at the moment!

    i'll just take the opportunity to say . . . the pigeon detectives are legends

  11. At 12:45 PM on 28 Dec 2006, poppy wrote:

    i think theresnuffin rong wiv chris video n any one who thinks it is r stupid n jus dont like chris so no 1 compalin tis wicked ! lyl chris.h cant wait til febuary innit lool....

  12. At 08:21 PM on 11 Jan 2007, Amy wrote:

    i don't see anything wrong with lil chris' language or da vid, he's just a teenager sayin wot he finks n i think more people shud b lyk him, he's sooo hot.

    Amy 15 from leicester

  13. At 03:26 PM on 21 Apr 2007, Em loves chris =] wrote:

    The song is saafe =]

    I personally dont think there is nethin rong with tht song its awsome. For god sake the world is gettin more and more picky! Its a music video, get over it!

    Loves

    xx

  14. At 02:23 AM on 22 Apr 2007, wrote:

    OMG!!
    ther's so nuthin rong about his video!
    its just givin out info to people bcuz most teens wud watch n e thin to do with Lil' Chris so they'd get that info....nuthin rong wid it..!
    ^o/

  15. At 09:34 AM on 01 May 2007, wrote:

    heya ...
    chris's song is not bad or rude or anything like that its just a gd song hes is 16 lol ya no so he probley will do a song like that lol . im only 14 n i heard the song n i think its a gd song lol im lvn lil chris 4eva ;D

  16. At 05:33 PM on 03 May 2007, Dodger wrote:

    how on earth did all this get on to txt spk anyway?

  17. At 09:19 AM on 01 Oct 2007, wrote:

    lil chris i fink ur well cute i wnt to no how old u are write bk to my email address

  18. At 09:23 AM on 01 Oct 2007, wrote:

    lil chris i fink ur well cute i wnt to no how old u are write bk to my email address n im 15

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