Monday Moan 41

 

RED RAG TO A BULL?

Delegates to the NUT’s Annual Conference at the weekend were being asked to send a message to Education Secretary Michael Gove via the medium of pre-printed forms available for them to complete. 

 

According to Rita Chakrabarti, the BBC’s Education Correspondent, Michael Gove had sent the teachers a message wishing them a very successful conference.  Rita’s analysis of this message from Gove was that it was “a red rag to a bull”. 

 

Oh really?  Either her powers of analysis are lacking, or the teachers are a sensitive lot.  Let’s see what you think: –

 

Which of these statements would you consider to be a red rag to a bull?

(a)    I hope you have a very successful Conference, or

(b)   I don’t know why you are bothering with your Conference and hope you soon realise that it will be just so much hot air and a complete waste of everyone’s time.

 

 

MYTHS AND THE USE OF THE MEDIA

According to the Methodist Church's public policy adviser, Paul Morrison, the British public has "come to believe things about the poorest in our society which are just straightforwardly not true”, including that “the public believes that the major cause of poverty is laziness”.

 

Paul Morrison was featured heavily in the weekend’s coverage of the impending changes in the Government’s approach to welfare and other spending.  Morrison was the spokesperson talking about the joint report from the Baptist Union, the Methodist Church, the Church of Scotland and the United Reformed Church “The lies we tell ourselves: ending comfortable myths about poverty”.

 

The Report is an interesting contribution to the debate. Some might say a more interesting, reasoned and persuasive approach than that adopted by the Labour Party.  However, as a seasoned reader of such documents the first thing I looked for was the evidence to support Morrison’s claims that the public believed certain things, including that the poor are poor because they are lazy.  The Report itself says that “The most commonly cited cause of child poverty by churchgoers and the general public alike is that their parents don’t want to work”,  but in a quick scan of the report I couldn’t find any reference to the source of this statement, or indeed to any evidence that ‘people believe’ any of the ‘myths’ that the report sets out to explode.  Perhaps there is some evidence referenced somewhere in the report to back up this fundamental part of its narrative, but surely it should have been cited prominently?  And I hope it turns out to be a credible source, and not some shaky survey of a handful of people as they left church one rainy morning.

 

 

ROCK & ROLL - REBELLIOUSNESS OF YOUTH

The British ‘summer’ is packed with an increasing number of music festivals, mostly designed to part thousands of music fans from their cash in exchange for a couple of days of living in squalor listening in less than ideal conditions to a succession of artists they might not otherwise have chosen to hear.  Each to their own, of course.

 

The Glastonbury Festival is the king of all such festivals, pulling in huge numbers of people paying extraordinary amounts of money and generating an unbelievable amount of coverage on television and elsewhere.  But as an expression of the rebelliousness of youth (one of the founding principles of early music festivals) it falls far short of its ancestors.  Recent headline acts have included Stevie Wonder, Rolf Harris, Ray Davies, Leonard Cohen, Neil Diamond, Dame Shirley Bassey and Neil Young.  Rock and Roll it ain’t. 

 

This year (after missing a year because they couldn’t find enough portaloos because of the Olympics) they appear to have taken the ultimate step into old age with the promised appearance of the waxworks that are the Rolling Stones.  Perhaps they would have done the decent thing and renamed themselves The Zombies if that name had not already been taken.  The Zombies are actually the youngsters (Rod Argent and Colin Blunstone being only 68 rather than the almost 70 that Mick Jagger and Keith Richard have each (amazingly) amassed!

 

 

BRITISH CULTURAL TRIUMPH GETS JUST REWARD?

What an accolade for British culture - the 2012 Olympics opening ceremony has been nominated as one of six programmes to be the subject of a public vote for the Radio Times audience title at this year's Bafta Television Awards.

 

Apparently, previous winners have included ‘Celebrity Juice’ (a ‘comedy’ game show) and The Inbetweeners (an adolescent sitcom) – heady company for Danny Boyle.

 

Depressingly, Ben Preston, Editor of the Radio Times, thinks the shortlist (which also includes Strictly Come Dancing) captures a ‘sensational television year’.

 

Heaven help us.

 

 

Monday Moan 9

 Intellectual indolence

And there I was, thinking that the i-paper (mini Independent) must be as uninteresting as its grown-up brother.  But I was wrong.  A train journey to Leeds was the catalyst for purchasing the i-paper on Friday and I'm not sure if reading it did much more than suggest to me that it resembles nothing other than a Daily Mail-like publication for people who think they are too clever and refined to read the Daily Mail.

I could put forward any number of examples to demonstrate my point, but two should be sufficient.

Amol Rajan writes in the column 'FreeView from the editors at i'.  In an otherwise interesting article broadly about Mitt Romney and his visit to London (see elsewhere in this week's Moan) he fails quite miserably to make the leap for the moral and intellectual high-ground when he argues that headlines describing Romney's comments as 'gaffes' are written by stupid people. Gratuitous insults are not the mark of intelligence. And his repetition of the tortuous explanation from "the excellent Mark Ferguson" which purports to show why failing to call Ed Miliband by his name was actually a sign of respect is something that will have many reaching for the sick-bags.  But save some space in those receptacles for your reaction to his parting shot that people who see gaffes in what Romney said are guilty of "intellectual indolence".  My, my, it would be hard to come up with a better example of the intellectual indolence he so decries in others.  

And then we have a letter from Val Gaize, apparently one who has not succumbed to the general feeling of goodwill towards the Olympics.  Instead, this reader suggests that we have turned London into a police state ruled by Mammon and that this has been done to allow a middle-aged former Olympic gold medallist to fulfil his ambition.

What a ridiculous and unfounded collection of accusations.  Poor old Val.  Maybe she could hibernate for the next two weeks in order to avoid the possibility that she might explode, Mr Creosote-like, as her righteous indignation ferments relentlessly whilst wall-to-wall coverage of the Games dominates all of our lives? 

Thanks for the advice, Buddy?

A long train journey provides a good opportunity to catch up on a bit of reading - once you have selected your seat from amongst those still unreserved.  Why is it that if two individuals, unknown to each other, reserve seats then the train company will place them next to each other, rather than giving them some space?  Hence the need to select your seat even if you have gone to the trouble of reserving one.

Anyway, on my way back from Leeds last week I had time to read The Economist. I read the leader on the American Presidential campaign and it got me wondering who writes these things, since they are never attributed.  What expertise and knowledge do leader writers have on the topics they write about? Should we take them as serious and authoritative contributions to debates on the topics concerned, or are they no more worthy of note than the thoughts of that lonely and rather sad bloke who props up one corner of the bar in your local pub most nights of the week?

This particular leader in The Economist was telling America what it needed to be debating about the role of Government, suggesting that at the moment neither President Obama nor Mitt Romney seemed "to understand the central domestic challenge of the next presidency".

Pretty damning stuff.  However, I can't help wondering whether we would be universally delighted and grateful if the boot was on the other foot and we received similar strictures from some American magazine.

Maybe we would. Or maybe we would suggest that they butt out of matters they don't understand.

Britain at its best?

 

So, the Opening Ceremony.  That's a tough one.  Do you want to join in with the general applause for all that is good about Britain and it's wonderful imagery that was admired all over the world?  Or do you feel compelled to say that, actually, you thought that the few good bits in the show that never seemed to end did not make up for the boredom and embarrassment of the rest of it?

According to the Daily Express,  Wayne Hemingway (fashion designer and tv personality) said: "The musical bit was perfection from the wit and the guts to put Tiger Feet among the Beatles and the Who and then to give pretty much the whole of Pretty Vacant. Normally it would be brushed over, but the punk spirit which is in Britain was written through the ceremony. Anyone cynical about this has no lust for life, it's just bloody brilliant. I don't think anyone could find a fault. He deserves a knighthood."

OK.  First, I guess I have to declare that I have no lust for life - on Wayne's measure of such things.  Second, it is prefectly possible to express a view at odds with those of Wayne, or anyone else wanting to praise Danny Boyle, without being cynical.  It's called having a different view. And third,  whether or not the "musical bit was perfection" is really not an objective issue on which there is a right or wrong answer.  Would I have chosen different music to represent the best of British culture?  Of course I would - and I'd like to think that everybody reading this blog would have come up with their own, different list.  See, that's the beauty of free will and having opinions.  We don't all have to pretend in the Emperor's New Clothes.

Rush to judgement?

All those empty seats over the first couple of days for the Olympics were bound to create a storm of protest.  The media lapped up the opportunity to be indignant and slam the organisation - thank goodness there was something like this, given that transport and security have not turned out to be be problems so far (watch this space though for transport once people return to work and, if all still goes smoothly, once the main stadium is in use during the athletics).

So we had Jeremy Hunt popping up on our screens to say that the problem seemed to be that the sponsors were not using their tickets and something would have to be done about that.  The media duly repeated this and then in interviews with the public we had it played back from them - confirming that the 'message' had been received. 

Trouble is that a bit of further investigation seems to have revealed that the sponsors were not to blame after all, but that the problem lies with the tickets set aside for the 'Olympic family' - national Olympic Associations, competitors and the like.  Moreover, they don't appear to have actual tickets that can be resold to the public if the seats remain empty, since they are merely reserved areas that members of the 'family' can chose to sit in if they wish.

No doubt Jeremy Hunt was briefed that what he said was true - such a shame that he hasn't been back on our screens so far to apologise for his error in pointing the finger in the wrong direction.