Football is fascist in the most profound sense

Frenzied responses across the political spectrum to the "di Canio is a fascist" furore. 

Sundar Katwala is typical, although there are many thousands of other examples of weedy lefty intellectuals bigging-up their masculine man-of-the-people credentials by expressing an over-the-top interest in football (although curiously Alastair Campbell has yet to make a statement).

Kevin Maguire has written a huffing and puffing article in the Daily Mirror expressing outrage but not saying much else:  http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/paolo-di-canio-fascism-row-1797425

What no-one has yet done is to point to the obvious correlations between football and fascism.

Football is fascist in the most profound sense of the word:  the myth of an all-conquering all-powerful master elite; the cult of an all-knowing leader who can work miracles; the insistence on complete obedience to the leader; the celebration of hardness and toughness and (let's be honest) brutalism; the idea of the physical perfectibility of humanity and the rejection of anyone injured or disabled; the culture of masculinity with (straight) men as the only ones who matter and women reduced to adoring spectators; the populist excitement of the masses and their simultaneous impotence in decision-making; the hatred (not an exaggeration) of the masses for rivals and competitors; the commitment to the idea of unending perpetual struggle that will never be resolved...

I could go on.

I am surprised that Zoe Williams or Marina Hyde or Julie Bindel has not already rushed to print with a feminist rejection of the fascist way in which football dominates society (and dominates politics if the enthusiasm of Sundar Katwala, Alastair Campbell, Damian McBride et al is to be taken seriously).

Sheffield is to close the Don Valley Stadium

The Labour-controlled Council in Sheffield is to close the Don Valley Stadium.

This is significant on a number of levels.

It is a microcosm of socialist economic incompetence.

The stadium was constructed in the days of the "socialist republic of south Yorkshire" in an act of aggrandisement and hubris associated with the city's hosting of the World Student Games in 1991.

Despite warnings about it becoming an expensive white elephant, the Council insisted that the stadium went ahead, loading local taxpayers with debt far into the future.

The Games, as predicted, were a flop.

The stadium has had a half-life ever since.

Now it is to close and be demolished.

The debt remains.

The Labour Council is supposedly closing the stadium as a high-profile way of "highlighting" the Coalition's cuts, despite the significance the stadium has in Labour's self-reverencing mythology.

I am reminded of the Goya painting Saturn eating his own children.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-20978073

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_Devouring_His_Son

Sergio Ramos interviewed by Sid Lowe

In today's Observer Sergio Ramos interviewed by Sid Lowe:

Ramos has a tattoo, in English and borrowed from Nelson Mandela, that declares him the owner of an "unconquerable soul, master of my own destiny".

We really did unite a country and with all their problems people needed that. That imposes responsibility on you – we're conscious of our social power, what we represent...

Ultimately, what matters is your own demands. A coach can encourage you with praise or criticism but you have to want to.

...the values, the history. What they have always represented, the philosophy they transmit, the ideals they inculcated...

Difficult but necessary question

Today is the penultimate day of the Paralympic Games.

If you recall, the Olympic Games spurred Toby Helm and Sunder Katwala and others to tell us "At least a third of Britain's 65 medals reflected the positive contribution of immigration and integration to Britain over the last three generations."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/aug/19/olympic-poll-positive-britain?CMP=twt_fd

Therefore it is somewhat puzzling to see that the overwhelming ethnicity of the Paralympic British gold medal winners is not due to "immigration and integration".  In fact they are overwhelmingly white.  Whiter than Greg Dyke's BBC. 

All sorts of questions arise:

Is the selection process for Paralympic athletes so mired in racism that almost no Black & Minority Ethnic athletes were selected to represent the United Kingdom?

Or does it mean the Black & Minority Ethnic communities so despise the status of people with disabilities that for cultural reasons they have entirely shunned participation in the Games?

Or (difficult but necessary question this one) does it mean that the participation of Black & Minority Ethnic athletes in the mainstream Olympic Games was artificially inflated for political reasons? (and if so who authorised this and for what motive).

Toby Helm and Sunder Katwala and all the other commentators who have lectured us on the multi-cultural multi-ethnic Olympic Games (one thinks of Paul Mason, incontinent with left-wing excitement as he read out The Sun's editorial verbatim on Newsnight) - all these people have some explaining to do.

Lack of school playing fields was not the issue

I was educated at a comprehensive school and my experience of sports is that the three PE teachers were interested in their football and rugby teams (about forty boys out of a school population of 1,200) and that was it.

No-one else mattered and no-one else was taught anything.

For instance, there were lots of free weights in a large storage area and I never saw them used once.

Typically PE was two afternoons per week, with several classes (30 or so to a class) taking part.  We would be split up into different football matches and the PE teachers would look after one match (with their star players) and the rest of us were just expected to get on with it.  Same with rugby. 

Only one summer term in all the time I was at the school did we do athletics (which I was quite good at). 

A few boys got to play tennis but no idea how they managed it, except that the really keen tennis guy was the son of one of the teachers, and like most teachers' sons got special treatment.

Lack of school playing fields was not the issue.

The problem was the teachers not doing the job they were paid to do.

Lazy worthless teachers.

In this respect, if no other, London 2012 resembles Berlin 1936

Half-way through the Olympic Games and the United Kingdom seems to have given itself over to a cathartic expression of collective nationalism (presumably related to the fact that "we" are currently third in the medals table).

That the Olympic Games represents the most naked celebration of nationalism (short of actual war) is an axiomatic statement.

That a large section of the British population enjoys this Olympic-themed nationalism at four-yearly intervals is well known.

What is unusual is that this time the Left has felt able to join in.

Even Miranda Sawyer, in her Observer column today, indulged in a sort of right-on nationalism, describing how it is "all Team GB" in her house, how she took her six-year-old son to see Great Britain "beat" Brazil at women's football, and how her mood matches the "celebratory madness" that has taken over British radio.

What is happening here?

Possibly Danny Boyle's Opening Ceremony, with it's left-leaning imagery (Shadow Minister Andy Burnham is reported to have burst into tears at the socialist beauty of the pageant) has given left-wing people permission to love their country.

In a half-page article in the Guardian yesterday writer Stuart Jeffries talked about the emotional impact that Danny Boyle's Opening Ceremony had on him.

But before we accord these Olympics the title "the People's Games" (as Blair would have done) there is an inconvenient fact to be explained.

Despite the way the Opening Ceremony lauded socialism "British sporting success is once again disproportionately reliant on the private schools" (to quote the Guardian's editorial).

In this respect, if no other, London 2012 resembles Berlin 1936.  Both Opening Ceremonies presented an ideological vision of the host country, breathtaking in ambition and compelling in spectacle.  In both cases the hubris of propaganda found itself undermined by the achievements of the athletes (the Nazi vision undermined by Jesse Owens; the Danny Boyle State-Is-Good vision undermined by the achievements of the privately-educated athletes).

This is not to defend private education per se.  Often when I meet public school educated people I find myself disliking them.  But for showing up the limitations of totalitarian socialist education policy one has to be thankful they exist.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/london-2012-olympics-blog/2012/aug/03/london-2012-olympics-blubbing-emotion

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2182328/London-2012-opening-ceremony-Danny-Boyles-genius-taken-Marxist-propaganda.html

PS so there should be no misunderstanding I am not attacking the Olympics as a whole or the British athletes or indeed the validity of nationalism - my objective it to examine the behaviour of the Left in all this.

Eddie Mair introduced Charlotte Leslie MP and Independent journalist Owen Jones

Driving home today I listened to PM on BBC Radio 4.

Eddie Mair introduced Charlotte Leslie MP and Independent journalist Owen Jones and they began discussing whether private or state schools provide better sports education.

Charlotte Leslie was right to identify lack of a competitive ethos in state schools, but I think this is not simply a matter of political correctness (although that is a big factor).  Laziness is also a reason teachers do not make any effort (I am speaking as someone who has experienced the inner city comprehensive system at first hand).  And I think we need to look at the way teaching has become an increasingly female occupation - attitude surveys indicate women tend to have less interest in sport than men.

Owen Jones was right to condemn all governments, both Conservative and Labour, for allowing local authorities to sell off many school playing fields, but he might have found the generosity to praise the work of the Duke of Edinburgh as President of the National Playing Fields Association.

You can listen to the interview: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qskw

Above:  the PM interview was later discussed on Twitter.

Note the condescending way in which Owen Jones refers to "red brick universities" as if they were on a lesser level than Oxbridge.  One cannot blame him of course.  Oxbridge inculcates such arrogance and disparagement - it would not be possible to go through the Oxbridge process and remain unscathed.

Indeed, the whole socialist debate on private education is flawed as it fails to acknowledge that one of the primary reasons parents send their children to public schools is to ultimately get them into Oxbridge, so that they can coast their way into elite positions of power.

Owen Jones might pause to consider that the Oxford University he attended is accorded an elite position on a flawed (indeed, rigged) grading system that aggregates all its constituent colleges.  London University on the other hand has all its colleges and institutes graded individually.  If London was graded on an aggregate basis it would easily outscore Oxbridge and Owen Jones would have no reason to make his snooty remark.

"Red brick" indeed!  Who is he to call other people red brick.  If Friedrich Engels were alive today he would probably have referred to such Oxbridge snobbery with his most famous condemnation.

The John Terry verdict

Within minutes of the John Terry verdict being announced it was re-announced by Diane Abbott MP on her Twitter microblog.  Note that she did not write anything, she merely "retweeted" what someone else had written, therefore sidestepping making an actual comment (having been given a good kicking by Ed Miliband earlier this year for making racist statements herself viz "white people like to play divide and rule").  Perhaps she is being archly ironic with this "Just saying" form of commentary, perhaps she is being intellectually dishonest.

Personally I am pleased John Terry has been found not guilty.

I am more than pleased, I am delighted.

Since the incident occurred John Terry has been treated by many people as if he was guilty.  In particular, left-wing commentators (in the Mirror, Guardian and Independent) have been salivating over the prospect of a guilty verdict.  It has been a witch-hunt, both unpleasant and unjust.

It benefits no-one if the principle of innocent until proven guilty is abandoned.

Some of the nastiest vilification of John Terry has been carried out by Guardian writer Marina Hyde (she practices a Roland Freisler style of journalism).  Is she now going to apologise for her evil words? (rhetorical question, of course she won't).  But at least we can be pleased for John Terry and happy that he has an unblemished character and will continue as a great player and (I hope) great future manager.

Presumably the FA will have to apologise, and there will have to be resignations at the highest level.

Stephen Fry is to be the voice of the Olympic mascot

Above:  at the top of my In Box this morning was an e-mail telling me that Stephen Fry is to be the voice of the Olympic mascot.  Why Stephen Fry?  Are we so bereft of talent in this country that Stephen Fry has to appear in EVERYTHING?

Or was he just the safe option chosen because every other creative director chooses him for every other voice-over?

"Approval of what is approved of, is as false as a well-kept vow" (Betjeman quoting Oscar Wilde).

Above:  the first thing visitors from Paris see when they arrive in London by Eurostar are these giant Olympic rings.  Personally I am already bored by the Olympics, especially as all the tickets have gone (I did try to buy some for the boxing).  For me it is just going to be a television event.

Sarfraz Manzoor on Newsnight yesterday

Above:  cricket is as English as fish and chips (?).

Very muted coverage in the Guardian today of the England victory over India at the Oval, with an enigmatic announcement in the top left of the front page (will mean nothing to someone who does not follow cricket) and then almost buried coverage on pages 6 and 7 of the Sports section - I suspect had India beaten England they would have put a main article and picture on the front page.

Annoying item by Sarfraz Manzoor on Newsnight yesterday complaining that asians (by which he seemed to mean Muslims) were under-represented in English cricket.  No doubt his thirst for representative equality is very laudable.  But when investigating the "hundreds" of asian cricket teams in the Birmingham area did he ask other pertinent questions about equality, for instance how many gay players were welcomed into these asian teams?

If it is allowable to imply that English cricket is institutionally racist, surely it is also reasonable to ask whether asian cricket is institutionally homophobic.

UEFA Under-21 Championship

Given the importance of sport to the functioning of a well-balanced society, it's disappointing that the Under 21 Championship is not available free on terrestrial television.  Disadvantaged homes cannot afford Sky television, and it is not good to encourage young people to go into pubs to watch matches (which they can't do anyway until they are aged 16).  The department of Media Culture and Sport needs to intervene.

Coverage in the printed media has been poor.

John Terry is back as England captain

"Personally I'm glad John Terry is back as England captain."



"I'll second that. He's... just the type we want, if I might say so."

Aged 31. Described as "bionic". Belittled by the press, his reputation among other professional football players is extremely high.

On a wider cultural level his influence is significant, especially among C2, D and E social groups (and also among the large "C2 plus" category - individuals whose income and status might be high, but who psychologically regard themselves as "working class").

For many individuals John Terry represents an ideal: in terms of achievement; in terms of ambition; in terms of physique and body image; in terms of hegemonic masculinity; in terms of leadership and courage; in terms of generosity.

Still sells

England play Bulgaria at Wembley today (7.30pm).

It is the first international match for the England team since ejection from the World Cup.

You would think that after a less than successful performance in the World Cup everyone would have been keen to forget about the competition.

But World Cup 2010 lingers on in the national consciousness:



Above: in the weeks following the end of the World Cup you could still send off for this Limited Edition Official England Glass. Which I duly did. My brother drinks Stella from it.



Above: even a month after the Final you could buy these England USB drives. And strangely, I was motivated to make a purchase, even though I work in marketing and know that the link between these objects and the England football team is tenuous in the extreme. It was almost as if I had an out-of-body experience and could watch myself falling for the marketing hype.



Above: only two weeks ago I passed the Churchill pub still flying the England flag and with a big sign up saying it was the home of the World Cup.



Above: and on Monday of this week I noticed that White Van Man still had a big flag up on the side of his house.

What is going on here? Why this romantic nostalgia for an episode that was undeniably a failure (Marina Hyde describing it in such exaggerated gotterdammerung terms that you would think she was referring to the fall of Singapore in 1942)? Obviously England's World Cup 2010 campaign still sells over two months after England lost to Germany on 27th June.

Probably it represents the power of myth and fantasy over reality. Even in defeat the England team is a powerful cultural and psychological phenomenon (like artists in France, in England footballers are the "cherished children of the nation"). Few other psychological machines can harness the collective emotional energy of the masses in quite the same way.

As Zervos said: "It is impossible to deny that the collective is satisfied with opiate ideas".

World Cup

The World Cup starts today.



Above: I have botched this photograph. This is of the Black Swan pub displaying World Cup banners. However I have taken it at an angle where you can't see the Black Swan sign (if you click on the image to enlarge it you can see the Black Swan name either side of the door). What I meant to imply by this image is that England are the "black swans" in the tournament. Unsuspected by the other teams, and unregarded by the media, the England team have all the attributes necessary to win. And I confidently expect them to win.



Above: the World Cup is also a great marketing event. This is a "limited edition" milkshake. Many of the flags that are currently covering the country have been put up at the insistence of children, which demonstrates how the competition has captured the imagination of young people.



Above: sports-related headline that appeared in the Daily Mirror. I may change my newspaper during the period of the campaign (or buy an additional newspaper) as the Guardian seems incapable of saying anything positive about the England team. The irony of the Guardian sports commentators is continually tipping over into sneering.

Censorious old bag

The bullying of former England captain John Terry continued over the weekend.

One of the features of this episode has been the re-emergence in English life of the censorious old bag, a type that had become almost extinct. Carole Malone in the News of the World, Melanie Phillips on Question Time (a particularly self-indulgent performance), and yesterday Kathryn Flett in The Observer. Frustrated old crones have formed a perennial commentariat throughout most of English history, particularly voicing opinions on the sexual behaviour of younger generations, but were thought to have largely died out in the 1970s.

Kathryn Flett’s piece yesterday accused John Terry of sleaziness, venality, duplicitousness, narcissism, stupidity and callousness.

One could turn this list against Kathryn Flett herself. Is it not sleazy of her to plagiarize a tabloid story that has not been substantiated in any concrete way? Do we not detect venality (in the sense of prostituting her talents) in the way she seeks to make money out of this unhappy story? Did it not occur to her that her article, with its extended auto-biographical paragraphs, was itself narcissistic (a word that could also be applied to her unnatural air-brushed face, although her rougher hands give a clue to her real age). Is it not stupid of her to trash her reputation (and that of The Observer) by writing a page of celebrity tittle-tattle? Did she not stop to think how callous she was being in publicly ridiculing someone else’s marriage?

Is the world not already full of cruelty without Kathryn Flett adding to it?

Also in her article she compared John Terry unfavourably with Roger Federer. But she omitted to mention that while Federer had a comfortable middle-class upbringing in wealthy Switzerland John Terry came from a working-class family in the East End. And this I suspect is the real reason he is being vilified and judged by hypocritical standards.

The Fog of Games

Above: the lecture at the LSE.

Last night I went to a very interesting public lecture at the London School of Economics.

Entitled The Fog of Games: Legacy, Land Grabs and Liberty - Reporting the London Olympics the two speakers (film maker Mark Saunders and photographer/writer Martin Slavin) talked about the negative impact the Olympic Games is having on the East End, including destruction of the beautiful Lee valley and its wildlife (this environmental impact will be permanent - the landscape will never recover its original beauty).

"In the press the story has been about the fantastic transformation of the East End, but academic studies have begun to highlight significant negative impacts... Our own government in 2002 produced a document called Game Plan which identified five categories of benefits and said they would be more about celebration than economic benefit... It represents strategic misrepresentation by politicians seeking to appropriate scarce resources..."

"How did London win the Olympics? They were a reward for participation in the war on terror... The IOC is among the world's least accountable organisations, non-representative and insular... The IOC doesn't pay tax anywhere in the world..."

"The benefits so far announced have been double accounted - they were going to happen anyway... We're not looking at any meaningful green legacy, just golf-course style development that looks nice but isn't really green... The speed of the approaching deadlines overwhelms the planning process..."

"The Olympics is a television event not a sporting event - in Australia during the Olympics television-watching rocketed and never dipped down again..."

Big Brother tactics: "Use of anti-terror laws will be stepped up during the Olympics, for instance to log onto the site for the Cultural Olympiad you have to tick a box saying you will behave in a certain way..."

Seemingly unaccountable individuals running the 2012 Olympics: Dennis Hone - "it's a huge area, it's an important part of London, and this guy is making up policy on the hoof"; Ray O'Rourke - "he is at the centre of control of every single contract, a massive transfer of public money into private hands"; mystery sponsor Atos Origin needs investigating.

Population issues: "the people being moved off this site will not be moved back... thousands of volunteers will put themselves forward and Atos Origin will benefit from this free labour... there is a big scandal over the payment of living wages to all those who are working on the Olympics..."

More: http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/LSEPublicLecturesAndEvents/events/2009/20090312t0857z001.htm

More: http://www.gamesmonitor.org.uk/

The way the European world has been designed

Today is Maundy Thursday, in the middle of the most sacred week of the year. It made me think about the way the culture of religion continues to influence the way we look at the world (and the way the European world has been designed). Many people will tell you society is now completely secular, but that is very far from reality...



Above: an early printed copy of the Bible on display at our local museum. For centuries every village in the country would have been familiar with the idea of a huge book, kept in the parish church, illustrated with iconic images (using "iconic" in its literal sense). This book held all the values of English culture - linguistic, metaphorical, historical, behavioural, aspirational, inter-communal etc.



Above: I was walking through Covent Garden recently and I saw in a shop window another huge book (with a stratospheric price tag). It was a collection of signed images of Manchester United Football Club. On the left you can see a hooded Wayne Rooney, and on the right you can see Christiano Ronaldo with his shirt off (again). The format of this publication appears to be (subliminally) based on that of an illustrated medieval Bible. The images could be those of St Francis and St Sebastian. The grey text you can see was on the glass of the window and is a quote by Albert Einstein (which added a surreal touch to the display).

The earliest portrait of St. Francis by the Master of San Gregorio in the Benedictine Sacro Speco of Subiaco, near Rome: https://segue.middlebury.edu/repository/viewfile/polyphony-repository___repository_id/edu.middlebury.segue.sites_repository/polyphony-repository___asset_id/958145/polyphony-repository___record_id/958146/polyphony-repository___file_name/fra_port.jpg

St Sebastian and St John the Baptist by Piero Della Francesca, 1416-1492: http://www.arthistory-famousartists-paintings.com/images/stsebastian2francesca.jpg

2008/09 Rugby Union season

Above: The 2008/09 Rugby Union season is coming to an end. The Six Nations tournament was particularly enthralling. Very impressed by Joe Worsley.



Above: At our local club the last fixtures are being played. This game started slow but became more aggressive after the first half hour. What I like about the club is that you can turn up most weekends and see a great game completely free.

Coverage of rugby is of varying quality, although Tom Jenkins’s photos are an exception. Some of the images he takes are incredible. Sometimes a good photo is on its own worth the price of the newspaper.

More on Tom Jenkins: http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/gallery/2008/dec/18/sports-photos-of-2008-jenkins?picture=340885820

Zidane, un portrait du 21e siècle

Douglas Gordon's film about Zinedine Zidane was on BBC4 last night. Seventeen cameras were used to film the football player during a single match. The material was then edited into effectively a feature-length music video.

The film chopped up Zidane into his component parts (feet, hands, cheekbones etc) in what was literally a deconstructuralist approach. You could also see him running and walking and occasionally looking bemused. Surprisingly for a top soccer player he didn't seem all that vocal (or has the verbal communication been edited out?).

The film convincingly conveyed the speed, confusion and aggression of a typical football match.

Interesting example of Image Music Text in the Barthes style.

http://www.uipfrance.com/sites/zidane/ba2.html

The match got under way and started well

Above: over ten years since I last attended a local match, and as I went through the (ultra-stiff) turnstyle and up onto the stand I was touched to see my old seat, unoccupied, as if waiting for me. Not that attendances had improved at all. This was still a club bumping around the lower reaches of a minor league.



Above: at nearly three o'clock the air was still freezing, although bright sun was shining from a clear sky. I watched the warm-ups and thought about getting a cup of coffee before things started (although the "crowd" was so sparse there would be no problem slipping out and back again at any time during the game). The greasy smell of chips made me feel hungry.



Above: the teams came on promptly at three. Amber home team and red enemy. Raucus cheering from a small section of the crowd far away to my right.



Above: the match got under way and started well for the amber players. No 2 arched his back as he walked in reverse, No 5 spat vigorously, No 8 kept rubbing his right shin. After about half an hour everything seemed to slow down, and rude comments were shouted onto the pitch by a big-mouthed spectator to my left.



Above: a goal by the home team transformed the mood (briefly). The amber players walked around for a few minutes as if not knowing what to do next (unused as they were to success at any level). The shadows grew longer as the sun sank down.



Above: the last rays of the sun, just before the lights came on, created a golden nimbus around the amber players. It seemed to emphasise the romantic nature of their hopeless position (the red team had equalised and were taking command). This sense of doomed failure is why I like dead-end low-skill no-hope football - always expecting defeat and never being disappointed.



Above: Fever Pitch has been recommended to me so many times that eventually I bought a copy, although I still havn't got round to reading it. I suspect the irony is going to be a bit too heavy. The Wayne biography was retailed at £9.99, then discounted to £5, then discounted again to £1 (at which point I thought it was a fairly low-risk purchase).