BBC Radio 1 has decided to censor Kirsty McCall & The Pogues (Shane McGowan) on the on-air broadcast version of Fairytale of New York on the grounds that it might offend. They have muted out the words Faggot and slut. They left in maggot, punk, bum & arse though.

Ironically though, BBC Radio 2 has no such ban and will be playing it as normal.

It was released twenty years ago, was offensive then as well but was meant to be in the context of two old lushes being rude to each other.

In the spirit of “political correctness gone mad”, there has been a certain backlash against this decision. The edit isn’t even very well done…

Here is the (uncensored) video version, there are loads more variants on YouTube. It might not show the start image properly but click the play button to see it.