A TOWN IN NEED OF VERITY

I am loving the audacious 20metre high naked statute of a pregnant woman that appeared on a pier in Ilfracome this week. 

It's honest, it's brave, she wields a sword towards incoming ships, she's just so out there - in more ways that just being naked. Half of her body is missing skin so you can see the insides below.

The sleepy north Devon town of 20,000 people has suddenly woken up and been put on the world map. 

Yet they grump and growl and say it is "a bit Hannibal Lecter-ish" or "obscene". I even heard one woman on the news saying: "There's enough pregnant woman here already, we don't need to look at another one". 

These people are laughable. I forget they are real. I just don't come across them any more, thankfully. These insular-minded stereotypes are surely just over-exaggerated soap characters right? Nope, they're real. 

Watching the news from Ilfracome was comedy. I was left wondering why these sad people can't see beyond their negative programming to appreciate bold art?

Verity, as she's called for all her naked truth, is beautiful. I'm not normally a fan of the attention-seeking Damien Hirst but I love this. 

Is it just because she is a strong female icon out to shock the old fogies of deepest darkest middle England that they're so upset?

"Oh I'm a Middle Englander and I can't bear nudity"

How sad. 

In my misspent youth I used to work for a newspaper who targeted the Middle Englander - it took me years to work out WHO that was exactly: a rare breed of right wing, head in the sand, ignorant, suspicious of change, bigoted, not in my back yard miserable old sod.

It was only when I received a letter from a racist who stated the letter, "As a middle Englander..." that I decided I couldn't work there any more. 

Here's what that particular paper said of the statue this week [link to bile] (ps, don't click on link unless you want to hear the most negative bit of reporting ever).
 
Personally, I would love to have Verity stand proud on the pier that my house overlooks. Sadly it's not. 

You would think that the people of Devon would be delighted to have such a massive tourist attraction. People are going to flock from all over the world to see it. It's going to put the town on the map once and for all. 

Give it 10 years and they'll all have changed their minds. See how much people hated the Olympics 2012 logo when it was first revealed, then suddenly they loved in six years later during London 2012. And what about the Princess Diana water memorial in Hyde Park launched to massive ridicule - yet it was thronged with people when I walked passed it in the summer. 

So be gone, you boring Middle Englanders, open yourself up to truth. Open your minds, you might just be pleasantly surprised by the loveliness that lurks under there.