Jack Averty - Diane’s gaff wasn’t stupid – it was an abuse of power

It’s something we’ve all done, and there’s no doubt we’ll all succumb to it again.

It takes different forms and comes with varying degrees of pain, anguish and skin-crawling regret.

If everybody could now just take a minute to remember some of the worst and stupid things they’ve said that’d be great so we can all move through this column together with the same feeling akin to nails running down a blackboard.

Some of the things we’ve said will be funny when we look back on them and we can all channel our inner ‘I shouldn’t have said that’ Hagrid from Harry Potter to deal with it.

I’m sure Wolverhampton’s ‘wagwan bossy’ man from column last week would have said this exact quote after embarrassing himself in the city centre and harpooning our conversation.

Then, of course, we have the things that we will have locked away in some dark corner of our mind hopefully never to be touched again because the memory is just too painful. Both are fine.

Saying stupid things is part of life and most of the time it’s hilarious too. We all have friends, family and colleagues who come out with some of the best nonsensical phrases.

A personal favourite will always be ‘people just look older on trains don’t they?’, uttered from a certain Star journalist who shall remain nameless. A statement that has absolutely no basis and makes no sense whatsoever.

It’s far better to have people who are open and are willing to take the risk of saying stupid things rather than shutting up shop and putting their defences up.

People are fascinating and you should do everything you can to learn all about them.

This writer learnt last week that a family member he’s known for all 24 years of his life was present for the first ever Bee Gees recording.

‘You could tell even then they were something special’, they further announced.

Quite why this information had never been shared previously has been the subject of many questions since, but the fact remains this would not have come about if this person, who has no doubt built up a bank of stupid things said through their lifetime, had been scarred by these experiences.

There’s not really a limit on the amount of funny, stupid things you can say, but there is a limit on the amount of offensive things you can say before they are no longer deemed ‘stupid’.

And this is what has flared up this week, none more so than with former Sun Editor, Kelvin Mackenzie. A quick Google of the man should tell you everything you need to know and fill you in on his latest bile.

You, of course, want to give people the benefit of the doubt, if they say something wrong or offensive and then apologise for it; you want to mark it in the ‘stupid’ category and move on.

But if someone continues to spout offensive vitriol, whether the comments are followed by an apology or not, there reaches a point where they have not just said something stupid, they have purposefully said something mean to drum up a reaction. To then make things worse they then hide behind what they have said and cry ‘freedom of speech’. Katie Hopkins anyone?

These people really are difficult to understand and quite what to do with them remains a mystery. An easy solution is just to stop listening to them and reading what they write.

If someone is a serial offender then just ignore them, they will soon fade into insignificance.

I want to surround myself with good hearted people who say genuinely stupid things, not horrible things masqueraded as stupid.

Another faux pas of saying stupid things is when you’re in a position of power. Worse still is when that position of power is your job and you say stupid things to hide your failings.

Step forward Diane Abbott, Labour’s shadow Home Secretary, who this week, in the space of about two minutes, managed to say her party would, if elected, recruit 10,000 new police officers and pay them £30 a year. No, £8,000 a year. No wait, actually they’d recruit 250,000 new officers. Nope, back down again this time to 2,000, maybe 2,250. It was a staggering interview that reeked of incompetence.

Again this is not just saying something stupid, it is not like she gave a good clear, concise interview with an accidental slip of the tongue and a few mistakes here and there – it was a car crash.

‘People say stupid things’ should be an adoring phrase, used for when someone accidentally swears live on TV or gets song lyrics completely wrong or mispronounces a catchphrase. It should not be used as a get out of jail free card for people spreading hate or spouting incompetence.

Saying something stupid is not something to be embarrassed by either, everyone does it and it needs to be embraced.

Whether it’s in school calling a teacher ‘mum’ or in adult life cracking a joke that flies so far over someone’s head people think they have spotted a UFO. If no one ever said something daft life would just be so terribly boring.

But it is vital lines are drawn for what is classed as ‘something stupid’ and what people try to cover up as something stupid when in fact it is something far far worse.