Dingbat Ken Livingstone thinks says that Blaine stunt is offensive

the stunt could prove particularly offensive to families of people who starved themselves to death for political reasons, such as the IRA hunger strikers - including Bobby Sands - in the Eighties.

What a twonk!

But...where does he pee?

It's just a publicity stunt. I wouldn't call it magic unless he does a trick like disappear from the box.
I think the protesters may also want publicity.

I read the article about why people are offended and protesting him. These days you can't even do something idiotic without some group taking offense. (If they really are offended and don't just want publicity and attention. )

S. Weasel: I've wondered the same thing.

I came across this guy last week as I strolled towards a meeting in nearby Curlew St, and apart from wondering in a mild sort of way what the point was, and thinking his conditions must be pretty squalid, I was taken aback at having to thread my way through hordes of people. I could not understand why they were gathered in such numbers, just to gawp and take snapshots. I just reflected, not for the first time, that if public executions or gladiatorial combat were to reappear, they would be enormously popular with a great many people. Maybe the vicious dimwit saboteurs were responding to this sort of impulse.

S. Weasel and C. Josephson: He has a catheter. He also has some nappies (or diapers, as some would call them), one of which he threw to the crowd last week.

This has been a very successful publicity stunt. I have had many conversations about the stunt over the last couple of weeks, often with people who would talk about it disparagingly but rather obsessively. I understand he is being generously compensated for the broadcasting rights. (Channel 4 is broadcasting occasional programmes, while Sky has a continuous live feed!)

Seriously, what's the differences between the anti-American protestors and the hooligans trying to kill this 'magician'? Perhaps the article writer is more accurate than he realized.

Yet another reason for the English to be proud of their country - a world class exhibition of the true English national pastime - stupid, mindless, cowardly, gratuitous violence, against anyone and anything, and on any pretext.

Shame they don't have that category in the Olympics! The Brits really would be medal winners...

The drunks, skunks and retards really are in the majority.

They are protesting because he is an American.

And EVERYBODY knows that Yanks have the Evil Eye, and are responsible for all the bad things in this world starting with earthquakes and ending with foot-and-mouth disease.

Next thing you know he will turn all the innocent Brits in London into newts. I say burn this guy before it is too late.

Got plenty of knitting to do Katherine, he has another 33 days to go....and didn't the guillotine replace burning at the stake?.

Besides, he has made total idiots out of most of you already.
:-)

I dunno, expat. It's hard to claim you've made an idiot out of anyone else when you're living on a water diet in a plexiglass box crapping your pants.

I am quite convinced that if Adolf Hitler and his cronies were on the march today the press in this country would insist on referring to them as 'German militants'.

'German Freedom Fighters' surely? Ed.

Thanks for info., Jon B. I find this disgusting:

"He also has some nappies (or diapers, as some would call them), one of which he threw to the crowd last week."

Soiled diapers/nappies? - Threw to crowd?! What a jerk, if they were soiled. Slightly less a jerk if they weren't soiled.

I fail to see any entertainment value in watching him in his box. But, to each his/her own.

It is quite likely he would receive similar treatment if he were to do this in a major US city. I can see some idiots trying to get into the news by harassing him.

He's achieved his objective of being noticed. I had never heard of him before and now I know his name. Unfortunately, for him, I'd never pay money to see him. I don't even think I'd watch him for free.

S.Weasel,

But he's the one getting paid for doing it - it says a lot that others are paying to see such a fool.

And he is a very skilled 'sleight-of-hand' artist, - just why is he doing it?. I'm at a loss as to just what he is trying to prove......

That's entertainment - British style!!!!...

Why is he doing this?

Didn't any of you lot see "28 Days Later?"

Neither did I, but I HEARD it takes place in a London where everyone's become rabid and thuggish (sound familiar?). So it stands to reason, either Blaine knows something Londoners don't know (in which case he wanted a prime, but safe view) OR he's hoping to start the pandemic without nasty animal experimentation and drugs.

Glad to have cleared that all up.

Chris J:

Actually, David Blaine did do something similar in New York City- he enclosed himself in a block of ice in yet another endurance test. Thousands of people showed up initially and blocked traffic - but the reaction in general was not as extreme or as negative.

His mistake was in his choice of location. I suspect that ancestral memories of the bear-baiting in Southwark are responsible for the crowds.

Just out of interest, Expat, whence have you expatriated yourself to get away from the "stupid, mindless, cowardly, gratuitous violence" that we apparently go in for to such a displeasing degree? It's true that a lot of people here have somewhat debased tastes (see the viewing figures for Big Brother, etc) but in what part of the world is that not the case...

Likewise, Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge would be described as 'peace activists'.

No, they were 'agrarian reformers', remember? It's not like they were bad guys, I mean, Noam Chomsky told us that some deaths were going to be inevitable as Pol Pot worked to build a better society. I'm sure a couple million Cambodians would have agreed.

Tony H,

Ah! ah! - now that would be telling, Spain used to be nice, until the beer swillers arrived. Greece lasted a bit longer, then the 'yobs' arrived there. Most of continental Europe has been treated to the 'football fan' , or '18-30', treatment, so most of that is 'out'.

Problem, - where to go to find a bit of peace and quiet without being embarrassed to hear an English voice?.

Has to be somewhere the cut price travel business hasn't found, now where could that be?. The trouble is, no sooner do I think I've found such a nirvana, than it becomes the 'in' place, and it's move-on time again.

Perhaps you might know of such a place?, if so. I recommend you keep it to yourself... and it doesn't have to be too far away..

Your remark: "that we apparently go in for to such a displeasing degree?"

Not apparently, you do, and have done so for a long time. Trouble is, you have become so used to that sort of behaviour, that you think it's normal!.

The drunken pub brawl on the w/e's, the muggings. the geriatric rapes, etc. etc. - and you do have the worst street crime record of anywhere in the western world, - definetely world class stuff, and something to be really proud of...

Is it just me or does David Blaine strike one as a bit of a twerp? I don't find anything particularly impressive about a man coming from the rich west deliberately choosing to put himself on the verge of starving to death.

But I have to agree with David Carr, the folk who have been taunting him demonstrate something that foreigners have discovered of late with some shock - we Brits are not nice people. We take nothing seriously, and a significantly large proportion of the population are stupid, boorish, drunken, ugly cretins. I sometimes wonder if Charles Darwin's theories were actually correct.

Blaine's behaviour tells us something about the narcissistic nature of our wealthy society, but there again, the behaviour of his tormentors tells us something even more depressing.

The Times this morning quotes one Gary Brady, a music producer. 'The man's getting paid £5 million, apparently, for doing nothing. This is the fight against David Blaine plc.' So these 'protestors' are in essence protesting about other people earning money, and are quite prepared to use violence to stop them.

mr Brady is a music producer. QED, he's a self-publicist too. Why else. As for Ken Livingstone's remark, it's self-parody. Who quoted him, Private Eye?

As for the rest , I ascribe it to the all-night-on-the-piss-waving-a-kebab-and completely-out-of-it community.

I assume it was the Sun, paper of choice for this market niche, that sent up the helicopter to dangle a hamburger before his eyes?