buttonholed by some earnest person

Too right right as well. I've heard a Neo-George Formby type performer do an update which not only perpetuates the racist stereotyping but introduces an element of homophobia on 'Mr Woo Runs a Gar Bar Bay Now (the chorus of which runs oh Mr Woo; ooh, get you...). That people are still singing Mr Woo is worrying; that they see fit to subject it to such a reactionary and quite rancid perversion is even more worrying; that people laugh at it is more worrying still. Forgive me, I'm just one of these old-fashioned types who feel that ethnicity or sexuality isn't a matter for ridicule on any sort of level.

Here's a clicky to the above link which really is a hoot, full of typical reactionary outrage from people who find this sort of thing an infringment of their human rights to perpetuate sugar-coated hate crime. The only thing it lacks is some earnest folkie saying it's political correctness gone mad - or maybe it did, just there's only so much of this sort of thing one can stomach first thing on a Sunday morning:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article3858634.ece

Otherwise George Formby songs consist of good clean (mostly) smut & knob gags, very thinly disguised by way of a pretty irritating sort of moral cuteness. Even as a kid I found this irksome. Are people so hung-up about sex that they find this sort of euphemistic tomfoolery funny? But then again I'll quite happily sing Butter and Cheese and All - so maybe this is deep rooted in the English psycho-sexual collective subconscious?? I saw a classic clip of the George Formby Society at one of their Blackpool Conventions (is Blackpool still the Formby mecca? Saw his Uke on exhibition there recently) - about 100 of them in a theatre strumming their along to film-stock of their hero - of which there is no shortage...