The most surprising thing about Gillian Keegan’s exasperated gush of self-pity – “Does anyone ever say, ‘You know what, you’ve done a fucking good job, because everyone else has sat on their arse and done nothing’?” – wasn’t the swearing. Most people, including politicians, swear casually all the time. Although rarely at the end of a TV interview while the camera is still on, or while they’re still wearing a live microphone, like some gormless pillock.
What was interesting was the “should we, shouldn’t we” deployment of asterisks. Some news outlets (including ITV, the primary source) used decorous bleeping for the clip itself and deployed quaint asterisks in print – demure little clutches of pearls in the f***ing and the a***. Keen Wordlers might have instinctively skewed American and guessed “ass”. That is, after all, how everyone under 40 spells it.
