It is a fallacy to think that Ebenezer Scrooge deserves his reputation as one of the most heartless bastards associated with Christmas in our popular culture. Scratch away at this tale and you will discover that a far more deserving recipient of such an accolade is that insidious pariah of pitiful manipulation, Tiny Tim.
When I say, “scratch away,” I don’t actually mean you should “read” the tale carefully. I tried that once and found that Dickens was too carried away with having thought up such an imaginative storyline that he couldn’t be arsed writing it particularly well. If “A Tale of Two Cities” and “Hard Times” are Dickens’s “Band on the Run” and “Blackbird,” then “A Christmas Carol” is his “Pipes of Peace.” Essentially a good tune, but executed with inept shitness.
Therefore, I have based my re-assessment of Tiny Tim not on the book, but on the1970 musical film version, “Scrooge.” Why read a rubbish book, when you can watch the film? This adage is even more applicable when the film has songs, thanks very much!
Perhaps the most sickeningly cringe-worthy scene from this film is when Tiny Tim stands on a chair in the Cratchit home and starts singing, “On this beautiful winter's morning, if my wish could come true somehow…” What an attention-seeking little prick! If this film was authentic, then surely any self-respecting Victorian parent would have administered a swift, firm slap to the back of his head and reiterated the principle that children should be seen and not heard.
You might surmise that Tiny Tim’s disability afforded him some amnesty from such ill treatment. Granted, his parents were crap, wet as pair of pissed-in knickers and totally indulgent of their one blonde-haired son amidst a litter of gingers. But Tim was a manipulative little bastard. He knew how to pull their strings. He knew he’d get away with singing that fucking horrible song, stood at the dinner table, while his brothers and sisters searched the skirting boards for mice to roast for Christmas dinner. He knew this, because he played the disability card better than anyone.
This was a city in Industrial Revolution Britain. ALL children would have been disabled, if they had in fact not already died from chlorera, typhoid or TB. They worked in factories with machines that tore off limbs, or down chimneys and mines, where they soiled their lungs with coal-dust or ash. Tiny Tim was no exception to his peers, except for the fact that he chose to highlight his plight with a hastily nailed together crutch and a supercilious expression of pathetic suffering designed to elicit pity from anyone soft enough to find his angelic Aryan looks endearing rather than galling. In essence, he thought he was untouchable.
Further evidence of this lies in the scene where he and his sister are gazing longingly through the window of a toyshop, making their poor Dad feel guilty as fuck for not being able to afford to buy them presents. But it’s not just a present, is it Tim? No. What he wanted was some fuck-off big carousel, that would set you back at least £200 from a specialist shop in Guildford High Street nowadays. Greedy little shit!
Worse still, when Scrooge buys the carousel and gives it to him, does he even say thank you? Does he fuck! Watch the film if you don’t believe me and listen. Tiny Tim’s actual words are, “You didn’t steal it did you?” The ungrateful bastard.
Tiny Tim played on everyone’s fear that he would soon die, so that he could shirk employment in the local textile mill, thus heaping more economic pressure on his parents. Bollocks Tim, most other kids were going to die young anyway, why the fuck are you special? Lose the crutch, stop singing, get a job and stop acting like you’re special. You complete bastard.
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