Metro Kieran opens up about looming trial

Metro Kieran, current Community Students Officer of Newcastle University Students’ Union, is currently awaiting a trial by NUSU’s Student Council for unspecified reasons. Since Metro Kieran is a former neighbour of mine and there is a possibility he might wield extreme political power in the future, the Lampoon decided I should talk to him – just in case he decides to award us a shipbuilding contract or something in the future.

This interview was transcribed verbatim. The source video is not legal to publish for reasons my therapist would rather I do not disclose.

What sort of trial is this that you are going to be the defendent in?

Metro Kieran: “This is an impeachment trial and a censorship of Metro Kieran, as he carries out the will of the very fine student people of Newcastle University. Very bad forces in Big Council are forming to try and prevent him pushing through the reforms the People want and usurp his authority.”

“Metro Kieran started his political career as a simple man who wanted to improve the lives of those around him, bringing together both the yellow and green lines of the Metro but has run afoul of those who oppose him. Big Council has their own dark agenda to destroy the hopes and dreams of students and to suppress the freedom of students. This is a massive witch hunt; they’re trying to divert attention away from themselves. What are they hiding? What have the done? Are they hiding the fact they have done nothing? Students need to rise up and fight this, on every level before they lose the greatest PTO they ever had.”

(At this point, Metro Kieran showed me his chest tattoo: ‘Please Turn Officer’ in Gothic script.) [note: would this be funnier if it said “please turn over”?]

Why are you being impeached?.

Metro Kieran: “Jealousy, plain and simple. Metro Kieran is loved by all at Newcastle University, nobody loves Big Council. Never has a PTO been loved as much as Metro Kieran. It is a shameless, unconstitutional power grab from an illegitimate agency. NUSU has failed Metro Kieran but he will not fail you; do not fear.”

What are the consequences of being found guilty?

Metro Kieran: “To Metro Kieran’s knowledge, there are no consequences of being found guilty. This is irrelevant anyway because Metro Kieran is 100% innocent. Besides, it’s not like anyone knows what happens at Big Council and therefore Metro Kieran has not bothered to find out either, he is truly a man of the people. The other reason is that, despite being a shady deep-state organisation, Big Council have no real power and they are cannot achieve anything anyway.”

Do you have any plans in the work for your (presumably inevitable) staying in office?

Metro Kieran: “Metro Kieran’s retaliation will be sharp and swift, without mercy and without hesitation. It’s important that people realise this and pick the winning side in the upcoming struggle before it is too late. After all, we all know that I’ll [REDACTED] anyone who aligns themselves with Big Council as well as [DATA EXPUNGED] to their loved ones.”

How are you feeling about your re-election campaign? Will the trial hurt your chances of holding on to your seat?

Metro Kieran: “Metro Kieran only has one opponent in the upcoming election. Since everyone loves Metro Kieran (or doesn’t care enough to run against him), Metro Kieran will only have to face every candidates mortal enemy: Ron. However Metro Kieran is a sporting man and thus will run a ‘Vote for Ron’ campaign concurrently with his re-election campaign in the interests of scaring Big Council with his commitment to democracy.”

“Metro Kieran can confidently state that his election was won fairly, he will not say this for the other elected officials. Are people looking into this? No. Should they? Maybe. Metro Kieran doesn’t get to decide but he knows what he would do if he did.”

Tits or ass?

Metro Kieran: “For legal reasons, Metro Kieran rejects the notion of calling anyone on Big Council a tit or an ass.”

Worst night out in Newcastle?

Metro Kieran: “Unfortunately every night out is a bad night where it’s illegal to drink on the Metro. Metro Kieran dreams of a world where locals and students alike can delight in openly drinking half a bottle of Smirnoff on the journey from West Jesmond to Central, instead of hiding their journey juice like a blood diamond miner in Zimbabwe.”

Would you recommend a career in student politics to our readers?

Metro Kieran: “Metro Kieran welcomes healthy competition from similarly-Metro-minded people in order to promote public transport amonst the student electorate. However, in an ideal world, Metro Kieran would be the only student in student politics, in order to avoid needless conflicts and/or performance reviews.”

Anything you’d like to share in an official capacity?

Metro Kieran: “Metro apologises, there are delays to services due to leaves on the track between Gateshead Stadium and Pelaw, we apologise for any inconvenience caused.”

At this point, Metro Kieran had to leave after being notified that the Auditor Seat was about to kidnap his girlfriend Ketty Metty. He visually implied that we were never to contact him again.

Newcastle University student endures yet more prejudice following term abroad

A student at Newcastle University has been left “reeling” after a scathing assault following her return from her term abroad. The assault has since been labelled a hate crime.

Rosamund Arabella Humphreys, 21, of Royal Tunbridge Wells, was viciously attacked by a so-called friend (who cannot be named for legal reasons) in the early afternoon of 29 December.

Rosamund, who studies French & Philosophy, was in the process of moving back into her flat for the new year in West Jesmond when the verbal tirade occured. Her assailant greeted her, allegedly asking “How was being an immigrant for a term then?”.

Rosamund is white. Thankfully she survived this devastating attack and called 999 to her address before losing consciousness. The assailant was denied bail and will remain in custody until the trial.

A local middle class person informed this reporter, “As you know, if you’re not a person of colour then you’re physically incapable of being an ‘immigrant’ and to refer to someone as such is equal to slashing at them with a knife.”

“The only people who are ‘immigrants’ are the ones towards the bad end of Border Force’s Dulux charts. White people are only ever ‘expats’, since being an immigrant is a dirty thing.”

Amazon acknowledges that publicly advertising for a spy was a mistake

A spokesperson for multinational corporation Amazon has admitted that a public advertisement for a covert position was ‘not the best way to go about it’.

Amazon, which business experts have described as “like the Legion of Doom but better funded”, pulled the advert after massive public outcry. This outcry was due to the fact that it was not a sexy counter-corporate espionage position but more focused on preventing workers organising for basic rights.

“Let’s be honest,” the Amazon spokesperson continued, “we didn’t become an all-consuming capitalist monstrosity by taking any lip from the commoners we employ. The decision to make the advert public was made on the advice of the same algorithm we use to recommend products based on past purchases. Given that I bought a box of light bulbs five years ago and it still recommends erotically illustrated ski-boots, we should, perhaps, have anticipated this being a mistake.”

The pulling of the advert will slow the formation of Amazon’s own private espionage organisation, “Amazon-Covert”. However, experts assure us that it will have a negligible effect on Amazon’s ascension to a SHINRA-esque global megacorp. In particular, “Amazon Prime Air” (Amazon’s proposed fleet of drones) will be the first stage of the company’s private air force. According to Amazon’s current projections, this will allow them to purge “the unclean” (also known as non-Prime members) by 2022.

Boris Johnson remembers that he has a country to run

Westminster sources have confirmed that Boris Johnson has been convinced to spend a bit of time doing that job he back-stabbed a lot of people to get.

The premier was spotted struggling out of a taxi outside Number 10 with a can of lager in one hand and a raw leg of mutton with bite marks in the other. An aide with dead eyes informed reporters that Mr Johnson would need some time to ‘gather himself’ before he would be available to answer questions. No further information was given about this nor about the crate of beer that was brought into Number 10 shortly after the Prime Minister’s return. When pressed by The Lampoon’s reporter, the aide would only mutter something about Mr Johnson needing to ‘taper off’.

After a few hours, a bleary-eyed Mr. Johnson came out of Number 10 in a dressing gown with ‘trickle-down economics’ written on the pocket. After crumpling what appeared to be some hastily written cue cards, Mr. Johnson explained the details of his early return from holiday.

“Well, with copid… conid… you know, the virus thingy, mostly killing poor people, Dominic said it would be best if I came back and added my signature competence to those Brexit negotiations that are going so well.“

Having given this statement, the Prime Minister let out a loud belch and staggered back inside.

Gazza arrived shortly afterward with a fishing rod and some cooked chicken, but was denied entry to Number 10.

Toon Lampoon slams overuse of the word “slams” in journalism

Journalism is about making a stand, and that’s what The Lampoon is here to do. And for too long, there’s been a cancer eating away at the heart of journalism itself, and we’re not going to sit here and pretend that this isn’t happening.

We are speaking, of course, of the rampant overuse of the word “slammed”.

Look, English is hard. We get it. Not everyone can have writers with a PhD in Creative Writing on staff. But things have come to a pretty pass when the word “slammed” is being forced upon us without so much as a glass of wine to get us in the mood.

Let me tell you, we’re really starting to lose patience with your laissez-faire attitude to this particular word, fellow journalists. And we don’t plan on letting you pollute the pristine waters of our mother tongue with your lazy cliches and tired repetitions. We at The Lampoon pledge that we will not rely on the same crutch that the rest of journalism seems content to. Not for us the easy prop of “slams”: it’ll be a cold day in hell first.

Buckle up, fair readers, because you’re about to get hit with more verbs than a blind man at a book fight. Get ready to hear about how Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez stared into the frantic eyes of NBC as she choked the last rattling breath from its throat. Enjoy hearing about how Kamala Harris painfully dislocated her jaw and ingested an entire QAnon conspiracy theory. You’d better be goddamn prepared to read about Joe Biden belching the holy fire of the righteous at Mitch McConnell in the form of a mild and measured rebuke of the Senate Majority Leader’s tactics.

And as for the rest you so-called “writers”, from now on, when we see the word “slammed”, we’d better be about to read an article about Immortal Hulk Hogan lifting Andre the Giant off his feet and bodyslamming him to the mat at WrestleMania III.

Now, make yourselves comfortable and bear witness as we lower the weathered testicles of journalistic integrity onto the sweat-glazed forehead of the nation.

Rail fares increase to “first-born child”

It was announced today that the price of rail fares, including off-peak long-distance returns, will now include the purchaser’s firstborn child.

Given the government’s eagerness for people to return to their places of work following the coronavirus lockdown, many have viewed the move as “strange”, “poorly thought out” and “a dystopian nightmare”. Ministers defended the move by saying “Don’t answer back, you commoners!”

A government insider, who agreed to meet The Lampoon‘s reporter on the conditions of anonymity and using the reporter as a footstool, laid out the government’s thinking.

“At this point, we’re just trying to find out what we can get away with. We spent 150 million pounds on the wrong type of masks, and we were able to distract people by pointing to families drowning in the channel and calling them the bad guys.”

Upon being asked what the government planned to do with the children received, the source took a sip from his chilled glass of Chianti before answering.

“The Secretary of State for Transport Grant Shapps is planning to start his own chocolate factory when he leaves politics. Naturally, this means he needs a lot of small people who can sing jolly songs in wildly unsafe working conditions.”

No more news for you until you’ve calmed down a little

The Toon Lampoon is here to bring you today’s top story, which is that the news will not resume until you’ve settled yourself down a bit. This follows an earlier story, also broken by The Lampoon, which revealed that it’s high time that you started acting your age rather than your shoe size.

Amidst reports that your behaviour is completely unacceptable for an adult, experts confirmed that they had never seen such a disappointing performance in all their years of putting up with your nonsense. When asked for comment, a source who wished to remain anonymous for their own protection from your goddamn childish attitude said, “It really is unbelievable. The levels of immaturity have broken through every previous record, and they’re fast approaching the point where they will, in fact, surpass the giddy limit.”

Of course, this is not the first time that eyebrows have been raised at your frankly unacceptable conduct. However, sources opined that you really have taken it too far this time and that they’re just glad that your mother isn’t here to see this performance.

The Toon Lampoon attempts in all things to hold itself to a high objective standard. We feel that we must follow our own moral integrity, though, and advise that you buck your ideas up, young man or lady, because you’re impressing absolutely no-one. The Lampoon team would like to add, on a personal note, that we just hope that you’re proud of yourself.

Honestly.