Wed 14th Jan 2009

On my way to work, I have to walk past the Magistrates court. Today there were two lads standing outside the front of the court smoking. This is not an uncommon sight.

I made the bold presumption that one of them was 'the accused' - which probably reveals a slight prejudice in me, since I had only based my conclusions on the fact that one of them had turned up to court in grey tracksuit bottoms, and that they were youths being loud, frequently swearing and brazenly smoking outside the court (even though I see loads of the staff similarly popping out for fags throughout the working day).

A lady in her mid-twenties with longish blonde hair approached the court steps. She was quite voluptuous, wearing a black knee-length skirt, white blouse and had fair complexion. As she walked past, I could see the lad in the tracksuit watching her; his eyes following her figure with a leering gaze. Although she didn't acknowledge or even really see either of them, I could sense that to him, she was the archetypal Daily Star pin-up to his archetypal 'chav rogue'.

The tracksuited lad then looked at his friend with a knowing smile; and through gritted teeth, made a kind of prolonged, deep-throated, money-shot 'phrwrrr'-ing sound.

'I tell you," he announced, 'I don't reckon I'd last long inside that!'

I'd been fully anticipating him to say some sort of sexually-oriented comment, but had expected something more along the lines of 'I wouldn't mind giving her one!' (although I realise that phrase probably hasn't been used since the seventies or something). Yet despite some dubious use of wording (using "inside that" instead of "inside her" clearly implied an obligatory objectification of the woman) there was also something enduringly English and self-depricating in his comments. Seeing past the mild misogyny, his bantering revealed less about machismo and more about his sense of physical self-worth or premature hopelessness. And if the level of relief in his strangely pleasured 'phrwrrr'-ing noise was anything to go by, he was being pretty sincere!

It was the closest to politically correct lechery I've ever witnessed.

Although in reality, the litmus test as to whether a phrase is offensive or not is to turn it back round upon oneself. If someone said "I don't reckon I'd last long inside that" about him, I wonder how he would feel?

If his court hearing goes badly, then my guess is probably relieved.

Especially if he happens to be in the prison showers at the time.