Ashes to Ashes

An independent panel recently recommended adding or returning several major sporting events to the so-called “crown jewels”, events of such national resonance that they should be shown on free to air television, accessible to all. One of the most controversial suggestions was that for cricket, that home Ashes Test series between England and Australia should be included. One of the reasons that prompted it was a comparison of viewing figures from the 2005 series shown on Channel 4 that had up to 8 million viewers and the 2009 series shown on Sky which got about 2 million at its highest point. There is currently no live international cricket being shown on terrestrial TV, and critics of the Sky deal claim that it will be impossible to interest a new generation in the game if they have no TV exposure to it.

La Perfide France

The subject of cheating is rarely far from the agenda in the hyperbole-ridden world of professional sport and its media. Thierry Henry’s handball that allowed France to score the winning goal against the Republic of Ireland in their World Cup eliminator has arrived only just in time to shift the dive by his compatriot David Ngog that won Liverpool a penalty and a point against Birmingham.

The obvious lesson here is that the French as a nation cannot be trusted and probably should be banned from sport altogether, perhaps restricted to playing petanque in town squares in order to look picturesque for the tourists.

Down With Commentators

As the newspaper industry, particularly the “quality” papers, continues its meltdown with Murdoch talking about charging for online content from News Corp in an attempt to protect the circulation of the Times and the Observer shedding half its supplements. While the material being lost is unlikely to be greatly missed, the most worrying observation in that article is that: “The soul of any paper is found in its Comment pages.” Admittedly, in itself, the comment is uncontroversial but it has tended to mean an increasing number of super-columnists who opine each week on the issue of the day, whether or not they know the first thing about the subject.

It would not be particuarly difficult to produce myriad examples of this, but to take the most recent one I’ve read, Catherine Bennett in yesterday’s Observer on England’s bid for the 2018 World Cup. Bennett herself is often an intelligent and insightful journalist, which just makes it more dispiriting when she puts her name to a piece like this. After a bit of laboured irony at the start, she writes off the World Cup itself as just an orgy of drunken loutishness it’d be “perverse” to want to host. The positive side of it, for example the possibility of arousing the sort of emotions displayed in Egypt after their 95th minute goal against Algeria  on Saturday kept their qualifying hopes alive, is ignored. Presumably the joy of the Egyptian fans is all about the prospect of a 3 week bender in Cape Town.

Bennett then goes on to make some perfectly reasonable points about corruption within FIFA. But it’s clear that she’s just done a quick bit of research on the subject rather than it being something she actually knows about. If the Observer wanted a piece that would genuinely enlighten their readers on the dodgy dealings of Jack Warner and FIFA then they would surely have done better to commission someone like Andrew Jennings who actually has a genuine grasp of the topic. But sadly, the Observer seems to be under the thrall of the cult of the celebrity commentator.

Incidentally, I’m aware of the irony of criticising someone for opining on a variety of topics with laboured irony. But hypocrisy is the grease that makes the world go round.

What we need are more MPs

At a quick count there are 127 problems with the current British political system. But a couple of key problems are the significant disconnect between popular assessment of the worth of MPs and their own assessment, and an electoral system that renders a huge proportion of votes worthless and grossly over-represents the votes given to Labour and the Conservatives in the number of MPs they get.

I think both of these can be addressed fairly straightforwardly by splitting up the duties of MPs. Currently they have a dual role, both as those who draft and pass legislation and also as representatives of their constituencies. These roles don’t really mesh particularly well, either in terms of skills required or in terms of overlap of duties. MPs who may be very responsive to the complaints and issues of their constituents may not have the understanding and insight to be good at helping to create good legislation or at holding the executive to account. It also requires MPs to have a home in London (for practical reasons) and one in their constituencies (for political reasons) – one of the factors that have strongly contributed to recent expenses “scandals”.

Free Tapas Solves All Social Problems

Although my memories of traveling round Europe are beginning to fade into a vague mixture of pleasant snapshots, some bits do remain very clear, notably how lovely Granada was. While I’d love to transform British cities to resemble it more closely by  reducing the size of the roads, recreating the Alhambra, transferring the climate and so son, I realise that might present some practical difficulties. However, I think that copying their tradition of offering free tapas in bars is one that can be achieved and that would genuinely help deal with some of the problems people have with excessive drinking leading to anti-social behaviour in the UK.

The BNP on Question Time

Last night saw one of the most horrible sights ever to appear on British TV, one that made me recoil each time it appeared on screen. I am, of course, talking about David Dimbleby’s tie.

There was also the equally horrible sight of an unreformed racist and general throwback to the 1930s appearing on the BBC’s flagship political programme. Overall, I thought that the BBC had no choice but to give the BNP an opportunity to appear on the show and it can only be right for any party that achieves electoral representation to get a chance to put their case, however abhorrent or stupid their views. But I feared that after 10 minutes ritual denunciation Griffin might be able to spend the rest of the show spouting “man on the street” Daily Express style “common sense”. That said, while I think it was great that there were protests against the BNP at Television Centre if they had prevented him from appearing that would have been (to borrow Peter Hain’s phrase) a real Christmas present to the BNP, pandering to their conspiracy theories and paranoia and enhancing their appeal to those who want to register disgust at the political spectrum. It might have been better for him not to have been invited, once he was the only hope was that he appeared and made a fool of himself.

Less is Moir

I’m going to ease back into this blog with the current internet issue de jour, the vile article written by Jan Moir in the Daily Mail about the circumstances of the death of Stephen Gately. The mean-minded idiocy of the article has already been illustrated by a plethora of other people – you can see it demolished by Charlie Brooker or satirised by the Quietus amongst many others. There was also a twitter campaign sparked by Derren Brown and Stephen Fry, asking people to complain to the Press Complaints Commission about the article, which had such a response that the PCC website crashed for a few hours. In response, Moir and the Mail responded with a fairly weak “clarification” that basically said everyone had horribly misunderstood the article. You can see that clarification neatly dissected by The Third Estate.

Naturally, whenever there is an explosion of indignation at anything that appears in the media then other voices come in and mutter about freedom of expression and censorship. For instance, from the Daily Telegraph (which neatly avoids mentioning that Moir has been a columnist for them). And, of course, there is a real point here – that something expresses a view offensive to some people should not, in itself, prohibit its publication. However, I do think there was one part of the Moir diatribe that was so stupid, so wrong that it should not have been published. And as that part was the basis for the rest of the tawdry innuendo and insinuation that filled the rest of the piece, perhaps that would have fallen by the wayside. I’m sure Western civilisation would have struggled on somehow.

The hook to Moir’s article was that Gately could not have died a “natural” death, because “Healthy and fit 33-year-old men do not just climb into their pyjamas and go to sleep on the sofa, never to wake up again.” The point is correctly rubbished by Brooker, but surely the vast majority of the population don’t need to have it pointed out to them, it’s hardly arcane knowledge that its far from unknown for seemingly healthy young people to die for no apparent reason. As someone who has an interest in football, I could quote the tragic deaths of Daniel Jarque, Marc-Vivien Foe and Antonio Puerta in the last 5 or so years.

Now this sort of idiocy kind I of comes with the territory of the opinion pages of modern newspapers, where regular columnists offer their ill-informed opinion on a different issue each week, while people who actually know something about the subject are sidelined. But surely, even in a newspaper as egregiously ignorant of science as the Mail must have someone in place to edit or sub the piece who could point out the howler. That they don’t, I believe, renders the piece not fit for publication.

If Gately’s death was “natural”, and Moir has no grounds for challenging the coroner’s version that it was not, then all the speculation about his lifestyle evidences nothing beyond Moir’s prejudices. Ultimately, she is (as pointed out by the Daily Quail) simply alleging that he died of a fatal case of the gay.

Decline and fall of civilisation

Cardiff University has recently proposed closing down its entire Humanities classes from its Lifelong Learning programme, denying adults the opportunity to enhance their understanding of a variety of subjects including: literature, history and archaeology, music, creative writing, philosophy, art history, religion, photography and Welsh.

Obviously this decision has a lot of personal resonance for me, I taught a history course at Learn, and it was probably the most enjoyable teaching gig I’ve done, with people really interested in the subject. Several friends still do work there and they are threatened with losing that employment.

More generally though I think it’s a shocking indication of the retreat from what a university should be – an institution engaged with its local community seeking to advance knowledge and understanding – and a move towards simply becoming a vocational skills training centre, not interested in anything but readying people for employment and getting private sector funding.

The decision has not yet been taken and if it can be made clear to the university that there is considerable opposition to this move then they may be persuaded to reconsider. If you are a right-minded individual (and if you aren’t, why are you reading my blog) you will doubtless be horrified and appalled and will want to join the facebook group (http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/group.php?gid=87834969960) or if you’re a bit old-fashioned, write to the Vice-Chancellor and/or Jane Hutt AM, the Welsh Assembly Government Minister for Children, Education, Lifelong Learning and Skills.

Dr. David Grant,
Vice-Chancellor,
Cardiff University
Main Building
Park Place
Cardiff
CF10 3AT
V-C@Cardiff.ac.uk
Telephone 02920 874835

Jane Hutt AM
Minister for Education and Lifelong Learning
Welsh Assembly Government
5th Floor
Ty Hywel
Cardiff Bay
CF99 1NA

Correspondence.Jane.Hutt@wales.gsi.gov.uk

Stay out of school, kids.

Obviously when I become absolute ruler of the world, minor inconveniences such as global poverty, hunger, conflict and injustice will be instantly eradicated, which would allow time to attend to far more complex and intractable problems – such as how to improve the functioning of British Universities.

The massive expansion of student numbers in recent years has placed a high demand on university resources, in terms of teaching staff, books and computer equipment, as well as for government in terms of paying for tuition fees. Universities have responded in various ways, but in almost every instance the increase in numbers has led to an increase in teaching workload, increased class sizes and reduced access for students to books and staff. The government meanwhile has responded by gradually increasing the amount that students, or their parents, are required to contribute towards first living expenses and latterly tuition costs.