A couple of scrapings from the bottom of this week’s chunder bucket. First the news that Dr Alan Gribben, an American academic, is about to publish a de-niggered version of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. The word ‘slave’ has been substituted.

His argument, and it is quite a fair one, is that children no longer read the book because schools have banished it. So it’s possible, I suppose, that the Gribbenised version will now find its way into schools, kids will get the taste for Mark Twain’s writing and, when they’re old enough to decide for themselves, will read the original. I dunno. Seems a bit of a stretch to me. Of course schools aren’t the sole arbiters of what children read and for sure there are parents who keep the unexpurgated version in the house, in a plain brown wrapper. Still, it grieves me to think the air-brush brigade have got their hands on such a cracking story. Oh, and ‘injun’ has been deleted too. Along with all sense of history. And humour.

Meanwhile, in the graceless and ever grubbier United Kingdom, the YWCA has rebranded itself. It’s now called Platform 51 (the percentage of the population that’s female). Its chief executive  –  a woman who may be trying to signal something by dyeing half her hair purple  –  says the old name, with the fusty old word ‘Christian’, no longer reflected what the organisation stands for. Gosh. All those old ladies who’ve bequeathed money to the YWCA over the last 150 years must be rotating.

Apparently what this is really about is government grants.  Times are hard and the C word can be a deal breaker. I can see that. Especially if you’re competing with Transgendered Muslims. Just kidding. There are no Transgendered Muslims. At least, I hope not, for their sakes.

That’s all, folks. More stupidity next week. Guaranteed.