My father and mother were in Oxford in the 1960s at a time when Sergeant Morse arrived in the City and when Oxfam was set up and they were – like Morse – almost, lifelong supporters. They paid over a monthly direct debit even when they could not afford it and would order Christmas presents from the third world via the Oxfam catalogue. But in his final years I finally persuaded Dad that sending his cash to an organisation which covered up for paedophiles in the field was not a good idea. We discussed the bloated salaries of the administrative staff in Oxford and how Oxfam was now opining on areas well outside its original remit of fighting famine. He could not argue and one glorious day I answered a begging call for a Tom Winnifrith from the aggressive sales team at Oxfam, and, with the consent of my father, ( also called Tom) told them to bugger off and to stop the direct debit.
Gradually, over the years, the various scandals, the aggressive phone calls asking for more money and the woke extramural camapigning and bloated salaries have caused more and more folks like my Dad to call time on Oxfam. Follks like Dad may hae been progressives in their youth but they are now in their seventies and eighties and they have just not kept up to speed with the woke revolution. Just at a time when Oxfam really needs to keep folks like my late father on side and remembering them in their wills, Oxfam is doing everything it can to piss them off.
Today comes a 92 page suicide note from Oxfam which has folks my age starting to scream with rage. The older generation are more polite and will just sink into their seats in quiet despair as they work out why you need to call an individual they and why there are now 108 genders, rather than 2.
According to Oxfam, English is a language not always to be used as it is associated with oppressive colonialism. I quote:
“We recognise that this guide has its origin in English, the language of a colonising nation. We acknowledge the Anglo-supremacy of the sector as part of its coloniality.
This guide aims to support people who have to work and communicate in the English language as part of this colonial legacy. However, we recognise that the dominance of English is one of the key issues that must be addressed in order to decolonise our ways of working and shift power.”
That is such obvious bollocks but it gets worse. Oxfam says we should not refer to mothers or fathers but to parents. And you cannot refer to “pregnant mothers” but to “people who become pregnant”. That is so as not to offend trans folk.
It is all total rubbish and starving folks out in the thirld world will be wondering why Oxfam is wasting cash on this rather than on, say, providing food. Just wait until they hear about how much of the cash Oxfam raises goes on staff who rarely leave desks in the UK rather than on, say, food for Africa.
But the real damage will be that over the next few days will not be on confusing starving Africans but that there will be thousands of lifelong supporters cancelling their standing orders. Go woke go broke is meant to be a warning not a business plan but the staffers back in Oxford are so out of touch with how most folks think that they have not realised that.
