Someone has taken offence

‘Someone has taken offence’. The message flashed up on my screen when I tried to log into my writing site.

There was no detail. No indication of the offensive item. Nothing to explain who had taken offence, or why.

I tried emailing the site, but the emails were returned to me. I was blocked.

I logged on to Facebook, thinking I could message the site, but a message flashed up on my screen. I was suspended from Facebook, one of my posts had caused offence. No detail was given. I looked up how to appeal. It transpires that the appeal process involved emailing the person who had suspended me. I try the other social media, but they are all the same. I have been banned from everywhere.

At least they couldn’t stop me writing. I took out my notepad, planning how to begin my new story about a troop of clowns who decide to stand for parliament, only to find that the blank pages have been ripped out of the book.

I check my stash of spare notepads, they are all in the same condition. Somebody has broken into my house and removed all of my blank pages. I have no outlet at all for my writing.

With nothing better to do I turn on the TV. Every channel I turn to I find Piers Morgan, Nigel Farrage, Andrew Neil or some other fat, reddened, elderly right-winger bemoaning that they have been cancelled. Piers Morgan is on at least three channels simultaneously.

Why do right wing ghouls have unlimited platforms to bemoan their (entirely fictional) fate, whereas I can’t even write a humorous story about clowns in politics.

In a state of total frustration I open the window and shout out. A squirrel perched in a nearby tree looks at me in confusion. At last, I have an audience.