>> Channel 4 has also confirmed that Jack Tweed called fellow housemate Shilpa Shetty a "cunt", not a "Paki".

That makes me smile *every* time I read it...

It's like the Fawlty Towers episode when the Major relates how he reprimanded a young woman for calling the Indian cricketers "niggers". No, no, no, he said. They're wogs!

Its probably a legal issue. Racist abuse is illegal but plain vanilla abuse is not.

I'm reminded of the time some bird from Gils Aloud had abused a black cleaner is a Guildford nightclub's toilets. There was a furore about racist abuse and what not but the defense was she's just a little thug and not a little racist thug. So that's alright then.

The one clip of all this I've seen was just prior to Desperate Housewives and I thought the shouting and and screaming was vile.

People, on balance, are bastards, and will behave like bastards given half a chance.

I don't think so. Wouldn't it be hard to be libertarian otherwise? What about the Selfish Gene and the Prisoner's Dillema?

"There was a furore about racist abuse and what not but the defense was she's just a little thug and not a little racist thug. So that's alright then."

Look for Janet Street Porter to use that same defence if/when her trial comes up...

> Wouldn't it be hard to be libertarian otherwise?

No, because libertarians believe in the right of self-defense.

Can I just say, while I'm here, that Shilpa Shetty may well be the best-looking woman on the planet?

Apart from, possibly, Rani Mukherjee.

Oh, and Cate Blanchett. Obviously.

My wife thinks its really about jealousy; Shilpa is a very good looking woman and Jade is just grabbing the nearest weapon to strike her with. I think she's right.

Good point about Cate Blanchett. She looks lovely in The Life Aquatic, which is also a fantastic fillum.

And, having been made to watch Jade's eviction interview, I really, really thought it looked like she'd been advised or kind of prepped for it in some way. She doesn't seem the type to be so apologetic so fast, or to grovel quite as much as she did.

But that's because she's a bint.

They told her beforehand as there was a clip or her talking about being accused of being racist to the other people in the house (except Shilpa) and that thick model girl apologised to her too (blaming Jade, which was a bit weak)

I think it's true that it isn't racially motivated - Shilpa is better looking, smarter and posher than Jade. I think that because she is Indian it saved Jade from having to think of better insults.

She is stunningly beautiful. Not Jade, obviously. ;-)

I think the producers had a word to Jade about what she'd been doing, but I don't think they told her about just how internationally controversial the whole thing had become.

Jade said something in the interview: "I don't judge people because of their skin colour or their nationality." I think that's probably true, but what she also doesn't do, once she's judged them on some other criteria, is restrain herself from using their skin colour or nationality as a handy stick to beat them with.

One thing though - at least Jade was upfront about it. Shilpa knew that Jade didn't like her cos Jade told her. The other two just bitched about her behind her back.