Should injured chav-champion Catherine Tate be bovvered?

Thursday, 17 July 2008

Catherine Tate had to cancel an opening night West End performance after hurting her ankle on Tuesday just hours before a debate about the use of the word "chav" began.

Tate - who became a household name for playing archetypal “chav” Lauren Cooper in comedy sketch show “The Catherine Tate Show” - was in the middle of a final dress rehearsal for David Eldridge’s play Under the Blue Sky on Tuesday when she sustained the injury.

It forced producers to cancel the opening night while doctors were assessing the damage.

And just as the comedienne was awaiting the results of an x-ray, the BBC reported that a left-wing think tank is suggesting the word “chav” - derogatory slang for a young person of low social status - betrays a deep level of "class hatred" and is "deeply offensive to a largely voiceless group" .

Catherine Tate on crutches (WENN image)

Editorial director of social democrats The Fabian Society, Tom Hampson, says in an article due to be published in the Fabian Review that the word is "sneering and patronising", and compared it to other controversial words such as "faggot" and "pikey".

In the article, he says: "This is middle class hatred of the white working class, pure and simple."

Hampson makes reference to the popularisation of chavs on TV – seen most recently by Tate’s character Lauren and Matt Lucas’ portrayal of Vicky Pollard on Little Britan.

He adds: "It is deeply offensive to a largely voiceless group and - especially when used in normal middle-class conversation or on national TV - it betrays a deep and revealing level of class hatred."

But Simon Donald, the co-founder of Viz Magazine, said the word was meant to be an insult, which is fine.

He said: "Amongst everyone who I can see who uses the term it's meant as a term to put others down and there's always going to be language in society that does that.

"And I think the Fabian Society's attempts to step in and become the voice of the working classes is frankly patronising."

Catherine Tate in a Comic Relief sketch with then-PM Tony Blair (WENN image)