IT'S ENOUGH to make you snort. The world has been reeling in horror since Barack Obama commented that "you can put a pig in lipstick but it's still a pig" in an apparent dig at Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin, who last week likened herself to a pitbull in lipstick. But there's one section of the population (albeit one without a vote) with their snouts firmly out of joint: pigs.
IT'S ENOUGH to make you snort. The world has been reeling in horror since Barack Obama commented that "you can put a pig in lipstick but it's still a pig" in an apparent dig at Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin, who last week likened
herself to a pitbull in lipstick. But there's one section of the population (albeit one without a vote) with their snouts firmly out of joint: pigs.
Who'd be a pig? Ruthlessly maligned, their names used to describe women perceived as ugly or fat, as a derogatory term for policemen, and now being wheeled out for political mud-slinging, pigs have been unable to bring home the bacon when it comes to getting some positive press. Forget Babe, these days pigs are more likely to be hiding behind the barricades.
So what have the pigs of the world done to deserve it? Is it the snout? The curly tail? The well-documented love of mud? As with many political animals, pigs have been badly represented. Because while our pink friends are not averse to a roll in the mud, it's not just for pleasure. They don't sweat, so they wallow around in mud to cool themselves down, while the mud itself protects them from sunburn and insect bites. The average British holidaymaker could learn a lot from a pig.
And, of course, despite all the supposed dirty connotations that go along with being a pig, they are incredibly clean animals, who create their own toilet areas well away from their eating spots, something still sadly lacking in most fast-food restaurants these days.
Their intelligence is well documented, too. Edward O Wilson, the well-known American animal behaviourist and author, dubbed by many as "Darwin's natural heir", ranked the pig as number ten in his list of the world's most intelligent animals (the other spots were taken by primates, the whale, dolphin and elephant). This makes the humble pig by far the most intelligent farmyard animal, and the brightest of all those who deign to rub shoulders with humans on a regular basis.
"Pigs have the cognitive ability to be quite sophisticated," says Dr Donald Broom, professor of animal welfare at Cambridge university. "Even more so than dogs and certainly more than human three-year-olds."
They're sensitive beasts too. A study at Bristol university in 2005 that sought to explore "feelings consciousness" in pigs in an effort to improve welfare on farms, discovered that pigs became stressed by normal farm management techniques such as being weighed, and that this level of stress could actually make them forgetful.
And what's all this about a pig in lipstick as an insult? Try telling that to the vampish and bitchy Miss Piggy, the most glamorous Muppet of all who would, one suspects, have Obama for breakfast and Kermit running for president before lunchtime.
Back in the real world pigs are, despite the efforts of language to undermine them, becoming an increasingly popular pet, particularly smaller breeds such as the Vietnamese pot-bellied pig. They are, many owners say, cleaner, quieter, and far less likely to rip up your favourite sofa than a dog or a cat.
The Chinese have the right idea. 2007 was the year of the pig, an animal in Chinese culture associated with fertility and virility. Those born in the year of the pig are likely to be modest, honest, straightforward and patient, as well as business-like and professional. Lipstick or not, in China at least, a "pig person" is a good person to know.
So what about the origins of the "pig in lipstick" phrase itself? It is believed to have been born in the American south in the early 1950s, possibly out of the used car trade, and was a way of describing a faulty car that had been quickly polished up in hopes of a quick sale. These origins probably drew inspiration from the earlier phrase "buying a pig in a poke", which means buying a high-risk item without properly checking it out.
And Obama is not the only one to have used the term during this election campaign, indeed John McCain used the exact same phrase when referring to a healthcare proposal from Hillary Clinton.
Really, though, all this could so easily have been avoided. You have to ask why Palin insisted on referring to herself as a pitbull – an ugly, vicious breed of dog – in the first place. Next time Sarah, don't wait for Obama to do it, but do us all a favour and compare yourself to the nicer, cleaner, more sensitive, more intelligent, frankly more pleasant, pig.
The full article contains 873 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
