The Pogues’ Shane McGowan “fine” with censoring ‘f*ggot’ in ‘Fairytale of New York’
The Christmas classic controversially remains uncensored on most radio stations throughout the UK.
By Steve Brown
Words: Steven Brown
The Pogues frontman Shane McGowan has admitted he is “fine” with radio sations censoring the word ‘f*ggot’ from ‘Fairytale of New York’.
Each year, the iconic Christmas song featuring English singer Kirsty McColl comes under fire after some radio stations decide not to bleep out the homophobic slur, and many have called for the word to be omitted on every station.
In our recent poll on Twitter, 67 per cent of respodnents voted to keep the slur in the song compared to just 20 per cent agreeing to bleep it, and now McGowan has weighed in on the discussion.
We know what we think, but we’re interested to hear from you guys on this annual debate…
Should ‘Fairytale of New York’ by The Pogues have the word ‘f*ggot’ bleeped out on the radio?
— Attitude (@AttitudeMag) December 4, 2018
In a statement to The Tonight Show, McGowan admitted he is “absolutely fine” with the word being bleeped when played on the radio.
He said: “The word was used by the character because it fitted with the way she would speak and with her character.
“She is not supposed to be a nice person, or even a wholesome person. She is a woman of a certain generation at a certain time in history and she is down on her luck and desperate.
“Her dialogue is as accurate as I could make it but she is not intended to offend!
“She is just supposed to be an authentic character and not all characters in songs and stories are angels or even decent and respectable, sometimes characters in songs and stories have to be evil or nasty in order to tell the story effectively.
“If people don’t understand that I was trying to accurately portray the character as authentically as possible then I am absolutely fine with them bleeping the word but I don’t want to get into an argument.”
Listen to ‘Fairytale of New York’ below: