Stop boiling over about gammon

I was disappointed by the reaction of my fellow conservatives to gammon-gate. For those who haven’t been following this mini-scandal, it concerns the use of the word ‘gammons’ by those on the Corbyn-ite left to describe middle-aged, red-faced, pro-Brexit white men who vote Tory. According to the snowflakes of the right, this is a deeply offensive epithet that manages to be both racist and ageist.

‘This is a term based on skin colour and age — stereotyping by colour or age is wrong no matter what race, age or community,’ tweeted the DUP MP Emma Little-Pengelly. Hard to disagree with that — and she could have thrown in snobbery for good measure. Gammons tend to be working-class or lower middle-class, whereas the Corbynistas who’ve embraced the term are university-educated and have a habit of dismissing ex-Labour voters as ignorant bigots. It’s also difficult to resist the mischievous glee of calling out left-wing puritans for being racist, ageist and classist when they’re so quick to accuse others of those thought crimes.