Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1487971
maltatoday | SUNDAY • 11 DECEMBER 2022 OPINION 10 Raphael Vassallo OPINION "Dude, he said 'abortion'. Har-har, heh-heh, hur-hur…" EVER get the feeling that you're stuck in a never-ending episode of 'Beavis and Butthead' (only, alas, without the epic heavy met- al soundtrack, that made those cartoons so enjoyable in the first place)? No? Ah well. Happens to me all the time. But that's proba- bly because (whether I like to be reminded about it, or not) I very much belong to that 1980s 'MTV generation', myself. So not only do I remember, with per- fect clarity, the original launch of MTV in 1981: but I even re- call a distant age, when a station calling itself 'Music Television' actually DID, from time to time, feature this obscure, long-for- gotten phenomenon called, um, 'music'… But back to 'Beavis and But- thead'. For the benefit of those (rather lucky, with hindsight) in- dividuals who may have missed out on that particular animated series from the 1990s: let's just say that the names refer to two American teenage delinquents, who were renowned the world over for… well, quite a few things, actually: • their unique brand of schoolboy 'toilet humour'; • their insanely-conta- gious trademark 'chuckle' (which is impossible to ac- tually transliterate, by the way: so, for the purposes of this article, I'm going with 'Har-har, heh-heh, hur- hur!'); • their tendency to reduce everything to a basic, bi- nary 'good versus bad' dia- lectic: whereby everything was either 'cool'… or 'sucked'… with absolutely no grey areas, in between; • And lastly, the conspicu- ous absence of anything at all, between their own ears, that could ever realistically be described as an 'IQ'. There, that should be enough to go on for now. (And it should also be enough to explain why I constantly feel like I'm trapped inside one of their episodes, too: but one step at a time.) Now: just to give a rough idea of what that 'schoolboy toilet humour' sounded like… con- sider the following scene (which I freely admit I am recreating from memory, well over 20 years later): TEACHER: OK, class: for this assignment you're going to need a dictionary… BUTTHEAD: Dude… he said 'dick'! Har-har, heh-heh, hur- hur! BEAVIS: Har-har, heh-heh, hur-hur! Har-har, heh-heh, hur- hur! Har-har, heh-heh, hur… AAARGH! I AM THE GREAT CORNHOLIO! I NEED TP FOR MY BUNGHOLE….!" Oops! Sorry, forgot to mention one other thing this cartoon was universally associated with, back in its day. It was decidedly, and very unapologetically… SURRE- AL (almost right up there with that other classic of 1990s car- toon surrealism: 'Ren & Stim- py'…) In any case: I imagine you can already see why that scene re- minds me so distinctly of the supposed 'abortion debate' we're supposed to be having, right now. For let's face it, folks: replace the word 'dick!' – or any other obscenity that Beavis and But- thead always find so amusing – with the word 'abortion'… and replace all the 'Har-har, heh- heh, hur-hurs!' with hysterical screams of 'Witch! Murderer! Baby Killer!', etc… [Note: 'I AM THE GREAT CORNHOLIO!', on the other hand, can stay right where it is. It fits in perfectly with the surrealism of the con- text…] … and, well, it becomes an in- stant, exact replica of the entire ' abortiondebate' we've had (or tried to have) so far. Consider, for instance, how NET TV reported the first day of the Parliamentary debate, over a proposed amendment that will (whatever Chris Fearne may say to the contrary, in our interview today) 'decriminalise' at least one aspect of Malta's total abor- tion ban: by including a (very necessary) exception for cases where the mother's life/health is in danger. One by one, as they passed through the House of Parlia- ment's revolving doors, each and every government MP was accosted by the same question, from the same NET TV journal- ist: "Is this a bill about abortion?" And one by one, they all re- sponded in one of two ways. They either instantly dived for cover, for all the world as though 'scared shitless of the question'… Or else, they gave variations of (roughly) the same answer: "No, because… take your pick: a) it's a 'pro-life' amendment; b) it will 'save mother's lives'; c) 'abortion will remain illegal anyway'; d) 'something completely and ut- terly unintelligible'; e) any or all of the above." In the first case, the journalist would simply shout the ques- tion again (as they retreated at maximum escape-velocity); in the second, she would invariably retort with the same, rapid-fire follow-up: 'Do you know that, with your answer, you have just called the President Emeritus a liar?' Erm… see what I mean? Sorry, but… that makes even Beavis and Butthead sound like 'par- agons of logic and rationality', you know. Leaving aside that the jour- nalist never actually specified which 'President Emeritus' she was actually referring to (and for all I myself know about Maltese Presidential history: it could just as easily have been 'the ghost of Sir Anthony Mamo', as 'Ma- rie-Louise Colerio Preca'…) But I'll admit that was just an aside. No, the real problem is… what was that line of questioning even trying to achieve, in the first place? Because as far as I can see: its only possible purpose, was to somehow force those govern- ment MPs to utter the dreaded 'A-word'… just to be able to cru- cify them afterwards, for doing so. (In other words, exactly as Beavis and Butthead used to do to their long-suffering teacher: trick him into unwittingly ut- tering something that 'sounds like an obscenity', so they can… 'chuckle'.) Which of course, brings us to what the follow-up question would no doubt have been: had any of those government MPs (even a single one) had the guts to come back with a direct, hon- est answer: 'Yes, actually. This bill is 'about abortion'. And it HAS to be 'about abortion', too… because its entire purpose is to amend Article 243 of Chapter 9 of the Criminal Code (you know: the one which regulates, erm,