As a result, most of us don't have to have much to do with them. But you can never be entirely free of this sort of thing as long as there's Liveline the natural home of the underdeveloped Catholic. Chronic virgin? Step right up. Puerile, rosary-clutching neofascist?

No problem . . . all part of the public service remit.

On Tuesday, Tom complained that he'd been receiving Youth Defence "literature", so he had phoned their office to ask to be removed from their mailing list. "I would have got a more courteous and professional response if I had rung the al-Qaeda office, " he said.

Tom was abused in "the kind of language I wouldn't repeat on air". (Later, though, he was induced to repeat it, and it consisted of the words "frigging" and "bloody". More tea dance than Tarantino, I'd have thought, but still. ) Eoghan De Faoite, chairman of Youth Defence, came on say he was "flabbergasted", because the receptionist who took Tom's call was in tears after it. "We've been running a public office for 10 years and have never had a phonecall like that, " he said, which, considering it's Youth Defence, beggars belief.

At these moments, Joe Duffy is in his element. You can nearly hear his beard growing thicker and whiter and wiserlooking as he tries to siphon the effluent.

It's a tough job, but RTE seems to believe someone's got to do it.

Tom said he had a recording of the conversation. "So do we! So do we!"

exclaimed Eoghan. It turned out neither side could produce a tape though. Tom said he didn't know how to, which had Eoghan sniggering. "Why are you laughing Eoghan?" asked Duffy, less Solomon now than school headmaster. Come up here to the front and tell everyone what you're laughing at if you're so smart. Sure enough, this approach obliterated whatever progress the 23-year-old De Faoite has made towards adulthood. He reverted to whinging teenager. He became Harry Enfield's Kevin.

Pru the wronged receptionist phoned in then. She has a small, high voice and was prepared to use it to get people on her side. Tom accused her of agreeing to take his name off the "frigging" database. "Oh get out. I can't believe you are saying that!" breathed Pru. Clearly she needed to turn on the waterworks again here but could she do it, could she do it? Yes she could!

Duffy wanted to know what exactly Tom had said to reduce her to tears. "It is just very disturbing, getting shouted at, by a fellow, like, with his big voice, " whimpered Pru. Oh get out. This has to be a wind-up.

The perfect antidote to this sort of classic Liveline is Down the Line now being repeated on Radio 4. A spoof phone-in show that, unlike Liveline, is intentionally funny, it caused outrage when it was first broadcast, at least until people realised it actually was a wind-up.

Last week, callers were invited to discuss religion, so Gary rang in to describe a religious experience he'd once had, when he woke at 2am and saw Jesus in the room.

"I asked what he was doing there but he just smiled enigmatically. But when I woke up in the morning my wife was dead beside me, so that's why he was there.

"It would have been nice if he'd said, 'Shirley is about to have a major heart attack, ring 999' rather than giving me a supercilious grin, but there you go. That's Jesus for you. You can't be too hard on him or he'll take it out on you in the afterlife."

Reviewed Liveline, RTE Radio 1, Tuesday Down The Line, BBC Radio 4, Wednesday