There's a story that's gone round all the British papers in the last few days about a Christian school in Devon banning its school choir from singing 'Imagine' in the end-of-term concert. A Guardian journalist called Caroline Sullivan writes a short and fairly innocuous piece on this in one of the paper's blogs.

Things start to get wanky in the comments.

Some choice quotes:

DrRic: Nice bit of Christian propoganda, didn't realise the Guardian went in for this sort of thing.

Davidell99: It's a shame that the headteacher didn't just ban the song because it's a load of hypocritical rubbish; that would have been a farmore powerful message.
"Imagine no possessions" when you're living a life in the lap of luxury, eh John...?

deus: hold up, hold up - are you saying that only poor people are allowed to argue for a better world? what a load of nonsense!

Kahotep: Well, *I'm* not saying that. I'm saying that it's the height of hypocrisy, akin to buying a hippie tie-dye shirt from a High Street shop. Apart from allegedly making some small donations to a Trotskyite party, what exactly did Lennon do to become a champion of peace? What
practical steps did he take to make the world a better place? Run for office? Give away the profits from the song? Organise protest marches?

Hitlick: .... sorry but most of you sound like fakin' 'nazis'....
it's totally irrelevant that Lennon was rich, what he said was true and it still is! we DO NOT need religion (anymore!) it sucks, it's a power tool, can it be more evident than what's going on in the US right now? Do you get it? You might think you need it or your mom once told you not to do this or that but you know what....? you need to find out by yourself!!

smudger79: Its a non story in the first place, isn't it? so a headteacher doesn't agree with the lyrics to a song...Find something interesting to write about.

WattaPalaver: I am not and have never been a "fakin Nazi". I think maybe Lennon was - arrogant, preachy, do-as-I-say not do-as-I-do, and Imagine is the major tool in his armoury to defend the status quo - don't organise, don't protest, don't believe in anything other than some nebulous concept of "togetherness" that would allow him and missus to live in the lap of luxury in some five star hotel and never get out of bed (and make it look like a "statement") while the rest of us were working up a sweat campaigning for a better world.

Imagine is NOT just a song. It is the officially sanctioned wibble of rebellion tossed to the masses by the people who control our lives. That is why I am surprised that this headmaster banned it. He could have looked so "cool" if he had let his kids sing it and it would not have been in any way dangerous.

A very small wank, but fun while it lasted.