Modern heroes

A splendid chap by the name of Darren Groom has struck a blow for common good manners with a simple act which has brought him to the attention of the Beeb. This short item shows a man who was trying to serve people good coffee but, through their own inconsideration, was finding himself unable to do so promptly and properly. So he's decided that, if you're on your mobile while you try to place your order in his shop or at his coffee stall, he will not serve you.

Now anybody who knows me well will immediately recognise a story which will have me nodding vigorous agreement, and this is one of them. This chap is in the vanguard of what I hope will become a backlash against the sort of anti-social, savant behaviour exhibited by some people while they use these things, clamping them onto their ears like some kind of electronic limpet, enslaving themselves in the process.

Mr Groom, I salute you.

Easter messages

A pleasant Easter weekend, featuring my 41st birthday (what a dread phrase that is), passed by with much chocolate and occasional football, and a very pleasant evening in the pub on Good Friday night. But let's not get all positive and happy about this, when there's perfectly infuriating stuff to write about from the same weekend(!) There is always, at Easter, the Pope's message to get worked up about. During his visit to Britain some time back, I wrote about the anger his speech in Hyde Park had prompted, during which he complained about people viewing religion as a matter of choice. Well, this Easter he's again let us all know that this opening of eyes as the years pass, the awakening within people that they do have a choice in whether to follow the Church or not, is clearly a Very Bad Thing.

Apparently, his Holiness thinks we're all in 'darkness':  "The darkness that poses a real threat to mankind is the fact he can see and investigate material things but cannot see where the world is going or whence it comes, where our own life is going, what is good and what is evil."

Well, I think I can tell what is good and what is evil, but I know I can tell what's tosh. That word 'material' is particularly misleading. He should perhaps have said 'physical', but that wouldn't have carried the negative connotations he wanted. We can see and investigate the universe almost back to its beginnings, and are beginning to pick at the very strings of reality itself as humanity starts trying to understand quantum physics. It may indeed be true that plenty of western kids grow up thinking only about material things, but that doesn't mean the entire human race is in darkness. And those western (and other, of course) cultures are also producing the sort of minds which are working to understand the nature of the universe itself. If we are in darkness, it's only because we're such a young species and are only just beginning to light up some of reality's gloomier recesses.

The Church, of course, doesn't see it that way. But I find it mind boggling that an organisation which clings to an anti-condom message, in an age where AIDS is ravaging parts of Africa, for example, and which teaches the concept of original sin, and still prevents women from joining the priesthood, has the gall to tell non-believers like myself that we're the ones in darkness. The automatic fear of God, and the thrall in which that enabled all the Churches to keep ordinary people, has largely gone in many western cultures. People's eyes are open, not just to their choice in the matter of theology, but to their right to question religious dogma which can be far out of touch with many of the societies they purport to serve. Is it any wonder, when some of the messages coming out of their Churches' highest offices are so apparently antiquated, that people are secularising?

As always, while I entirely respect the views of an elder, I'd respect them more if they came from an elder who had not lived out most of his existence within he strictures of a religious ideology. I don't mean this disrespectfully, but I don't think an 84-year-old man who hasn't lived outside the Catholic church since he was a child can teach me anything about how to lead my life in the early 21st century. I genuinely believe that lights are going on all over the place, banishing the darkness of the Church, not the other way round.

Nothing to hide, nothing to fear?

News coming out on April Fools' Day should always be treated with suspicion, but just occasionally, you get one that's so bizarre it has to be true. This story, of the latest Government plans to be able to monitor email and web communications on an individual basis, without first obtaining a warrant, is nothing short of scandalous.

Labour were bad enough in office, eroding the ability to protest peacefully where they didn't like it, and stamping down so hard on dissent within their own ranks that they resorted to using security guards to physically remove a pensioner from their conference because they didn't like his t-shirt. They were, though, unable to push through the sort of powers which we see proposed here because of very strong opposition, not least from the Tories.

Those same Tories evidently see things differently now they're in office, but don't see the contradiction between their position now and their position while in opposition. These powers, though we'll doubtless see them implemented in some shape or form, wouldn't be out of place in some dystopian, Orwellian vision of our own future. To say they're an infringement of civil liberties does not even begin to describe them – they sound like some nightmarish foundation work for the building of some future police state. It's not common to hear a senior politician within government openly dispute a policy, but David Davies has done exactly that, which is a measure of the discomfort that even some of the senior Conservatives must be feeling about this.

Imagine you were writing a thesis on religious extremism, or the effects of terrorism on democratic policy – you may very well visit websites which could then draw you to the attention of the authorities for entirely the wrong reasons. Then there are those who could be exposed, for example, for cheating on their partners. Wrong, of course, but not illegal, and a private matter for those involved to sort out. There will, inevitably, be cases where people suddenly find themselves under suspicion and possible surveillance when they've done nothing wrong. Allow this to happen, and where will it end? Exactly how much of our lives should they be privvy to? Will we soon all be compelled to open our post for the inspection of government officers, just in case?

The defence of the case by a spokesman is particularly unconvincing: "It is vital that police and security services are able to obtain communications data in certain circumstances to investigate serious crime and terrorism and to protect the public," a spokesman said." Err, they already can. If there's genuine need to monitor email or internet activity of somebody suspected of, for example, terrorist activity, then that can already be achieved without alerting that person by using the existing legal framework.

There will be opposition within Parliament and hopefully from the Lords. In a move of extreme daring on their part, the Lib Dems' Chris Huhne has even suggested there needs to be 'a balance', so we could also see some signs of life from within the coalition's erstwhile sleeping partner. It's only to be hoped that there will be sufficient resistance to these proposals that they at least be watered down, and at best be scrapped.

Religious belief does not excuse prejudice

If you'll forgive me for infecting this blog with another story of a sportsman, this entry is actually, again, not in fact about sport. At least, not directly. Some of you may be aware that the position of England football manager is currently vacant, with a search under way for (preferably for many in England) an Englishman to fill the role.

Perhaps due to a dearth of suitable Englishmen, one name which has come up is a certain Glenn Hoddle, one of the finest footballers England has ever produced and a man who has in fact managed England before. He has been quoted as saying he's interested in doing the job again and has received support from some of the influential names within the game. A strongly religious man, he was dismissed from the role first time round because of the fall-out from an interview he gave to The Times newspaper, in which he said this:

"My beliefs have evolved in the last eight or nine years, that the spirit has to come back again, that is nothing new, that has been around for thousands of years. You have to come back to learn and face some of the things you have done, good and bad. There are too many injustices around... You and I have been physically given two hands and two legs and half-decent brains. Some people have not been born like that for a reason. The karma is working from another lifetime. I have nothing to hide about that. It is not only people with disabilities. What you sow, you have to reap... You have to look at things that happened in your life and ask why. It comes around."

(The ellipsis dots are mine. They're in there to show gaps where he went on for a bit but I have not edited out anything which would change the meaning of the words.)

He was, after a storm of criticism from all quarters (including then Prime Minister Tony Blair) sacked. He blustered and thundered, saying he'd been 'misinterpreted', 'misconstrued' but, tellingly, not misquoted. There was not much in the way of demurral at the time. But now there are, suddenly, plenty of people who in the last few days have been saying that his dismissal for non-football reasons was wrong (I even read one piece which described it as 'scandalous').

Do those who now support his appointment think he's 'served his time', perhaps? Or that he's done nothing wrong? This is the latest in an irritating trend where people are using religion to excuse statements or behaviour which would not be countenanced anywhere else. A recent example is the guest house in Marazion, successfully sued by a gay couple after its owners refused to allow them to stay there. Despite such actions by businesses being specifically outlawed, there was considerable sympathy for Peter and Hazelmary Bull, the owners in question, from Christians. Now it seems Glenn Hoddle is receiving similar sympathy, though for doubtless very different reasons. I realise his bizarre views are personal, and genuinely held, but all he had to do was keep his mouth shut, and he'd have kept hold of his job.

For me, what he said was absolutely outrageous and he should not be allowed near such a prestigious and influential job as the England management again. Religious belief should not be allowed to be used as a stick with which people can beat those who don't fit their holy book's ideals. Otherwise, why not let them get away with burning the heretics next door while they're at it? It is, again, an example of religious dogma not being flexible enough to move and reflect the society from which its flock is drawn.

The judge in the guest house case got it, for me, spot on. I hope the mandarins at the Football Association responsible for the selection of our new manager remember that Hoddle's views will not have changed merely because he hasn't been stupid enough to open his mouth again since – he hasn't recanted his theism or retracted what he said in that interview. Unless he at least does that, they cannot possibly give him the job again.

The power of prayer?

Though this entry is about a sportsman, it's not about sport. No doubt, even if you have no interest in football, you'll be aware of what befell young Fabrice Muamba, the Bolton Wanderers footballer, during a game at Spurs a few days back.

It is, of course, wonderful to see him apparently recovering and doing so well, as a football fan and just out of common humanity. But one thing about his case has disappointed me hugely. A few details need filling in, just in case you're not familiar with them.

The 23-year-old had a heart attack on the pitch, collapsing face down, unconscious, unresponsive, not breathing. He was treated for some time on the pitch by some half dozen paramedics, and a heart specialist, Dr Andrew Deaner, who happened to be in the crowd and ran onto the pitch. The game was abandoned of course, the other players in tears, and he was taken to hospital with his heart evidently not beating of its own accord. In fact, it seems that, according to one of the specialists who treated him, he was effectively dead for 78 minutes, and his heart did not beat unaided for two hours. He was given no fewer than 15 separate shocks from the defibrillator, none of which restarted his heart.

The fact that he is now, just a few days later, conscious, speaking to people, moving his limbs and apparently recovering, is scarcely believable. So incredible, in fact, that his recovery seems to have been put down to nothing less than divine intervention. In this most secular (fortunately) of countries, suddenly a rash of imprecations from all around to pray for the lad. If his immediate family and friends draw comfort from this during his suffering, that's a good thing for them, of course. But the headlines in some of the tabloids reflect a baffling race to give credit for his recovery to the man upstairs.

'It's in God's hands', boomed one paper during the early stages of his treatment, quoting his family. And as he improved, 'All your prayers are working. To God be the glory', his fiancee wrote on Twitter. Now, I understand that the people who actually saved his life, the medical staff on scene and the heart specialists at the London Chest Hospital, do their jobs because they want to help people and are doubtless getting a job satisfaction from his case that the rest of us will probably never fully appreciate.

But this removal of the credit from them and placing it into the hands of some deity is taking faith to the point where it does them a singular disservice. Where was the glory to them? Where was the 'All their hard work and dedication is working'? If his recovery thus far is a miracle, it is one of modern medicine, and of the enormous hard work, skill and dedication of the medical people who didn't give up on him when they might have done.

The only power of prayer as far as I can see it is that it makes the people offering them feel better. They must alleviate a sense of helplessness, of an inability to do something when you desperately want to. But if it's all down to God, all down to prayer, why bother with the medical care in the first place? If it's the prayers, would the faithful leave the man in bed, not worry about actually treating him and just let prayers do their 'work', given the choice? Exactly how much faith in prayer is there here, compared to a trust in medical expertise? I sincerely hope that, when this remarkable story hopefully ends with him walking out of hospital fully recovered and with a smile on his face, that same family also remember to thank publicly the remarkable medical people who should have praise and gratitude heaped upon them. Drs Deaner, Tobin, and all the other medical staff who saved the man's life, to you be the glory.

Not exactly selling the family silver, but still stupid

The Tories are, once again, demonstrating their blind dogmatic belief that they can solve any problem by simply selling stuff off and ridding themselves of responsibility for it with this news that they're looking into privatising the road network.

No doubt, exactly as with their plans for the NHS, fierce opposition from much better-informed parties will not stop them charging on with their eyes closed and nothing more than a bull-headed belief that they're right to sustain them. The AA, who should know a thing or two about the roads, already think it's a bad idea. But why listen to them when there could be money to be made and more responsibilities discharged into other people's hands? Batter against the door of reason with a thick enough forehead and eventually it will give way.

Look at the disaster that the national rail network sell-off has become. Companies driven exclusively by profit giving rise to increasing fares, increasingly packed trains, increasingly poor service and the various stakeholders simply blaming each other when there's a problem on the network. My own brother used to work maintaining the railway network, and he told me stories of work going undone because the company which maintained the infrastructure would not pay the companies who owned the trains to get their crews to the sites which needed work. You can imagine the ramifications for service and safety something like that had – but it's an almost inevitable consequence of privatisation. Had that sell-off not happened, instead of pushing through an environmentally catastrophic agenda of expanding road capacity (which, as has already been demonstrated in the Smeed report, merely increases traffic levels), the government could pump money into improving public transport. But they can't – they sold it during John Major's administration.

Clearly they've learned nothing from this. We'll end up with a huge increase in road building, cutting a swathe through already damaged green areas of Britain, sticking extra lanes or new roads down for drivers who can barely afford to run their cars now. Just take a look at the different traffic volumes on the M6 toll compared to its free sister road for an indication of how many people are prepared to pay to use a road.

The idea is so stupid that it has in fact, some years ago, already been parodied quite effectively in Ben Elton's Gridlock. That this government is considering measures which have been used as material for jokes before would be funny if it weren't quite so potentially damaging. Not a peep from their Lib-Dem bedfellows yet, of course. Unless the coalition collapses, 7 May 2015, the likely date for the next general election, already cannot come soon enough – one can only hope this bunch of neo-Thatcherite dogmatists are removed from office before they can do too much permanent damage.

A sense of loss

It's a good thing I don't believe in God, because if I did, on days like yesterday, I'd absolutely hate Him. Seeing pictures of that Belgian coach destroyed in the accident in Switzerland, killing 22 children and 6 adults, you can only see such an occurrence as an accident, entirely without design or will behind it. Anything else is so horrible as to be beyond reason – it would be the most vicious, cruel and wanton evil imaginable if it were any kind of act behind it, or any kind of act of omission of act by something or someone, that could stop it. Surely, surely no supposedly benevolent deity would do such a thing, or allow it to happen?

I cannot begin to imagine the suffering of the parents of those kids, perhaps especially those travelling to Switzerland who still don't know the fate of their own child(ren). Seeing the face of the pastor of one of the schools were two of the dead adults and several of the children worked or attended, he looked like a man who had no idea how or why this could happen, a man struggling to reconcile his own beliefs with the reality of the event which confronted him and the others it had affected so horribly.

Friends and relatives gathered at a church, I guess as a point of shared contact for the human comfort it affords, being with others who truly understand and share your suffering, because I cannot imagine there can be any comfort drawn from the belief that those kids now sit with a God who chose to take them. It's an awful contradiction and one of the reasons I can never understand faith. Indeed, even the priest conducting the ceremony was forced to face a question which must have been in every one of those suffering minds – has God abandoned us, he asked, presumably rhetorically.

No, of course not. What I suspect is abandoning some of them, entirely reasonably given the circumstances, must be their sense of trust in God, their certainty of His existence. It's easy to say this of course, sitting here miles away, not knowing any of the victims, but the only way to rationalise this awful tragedy is as a horrible accident, the cause of which, doubtless eventually to be ascertained by investigation, had nothing to do with anyone or anything's design, celestial or otherwise. That will not, of course, help the parents with their grief, but may help them feel less angry about it later, if they're able to come to see it like that. Like I said at the start, if I thought somebody were behind this, or could have stopped it and did nothing, I'd absolutely hate them.

A weekend of Kop and curlers

Working 12-hour days lately, and doing so through a horrible bug for the last few of them, has left me unable to write here - sorry about that. So this entry is a few days out of date. But it's worth mentioning last weekend, spent in Liverpool, and what I learned from it.

Firstly, Liverpool as a city has changed beyond recognition if you haven't been there for a while. The last time I spent any time there during daylight hours and did anything other than head straight to Anfield, it still had some of the vestiges of the decay, neglect and depression of the Thatcher era. Don't get me wrong, walk around Anfield and you'd think nothing has changed, but that's a peculiar exception brought about by the club buying so many of the houses in the area for a stadium development that has not yet, and may never happen, and leaving them empty. But check out the city centre and the docks in particular, and you'd think you were in a difference city to the one Mrs T so shamefully abandoned.

Our little group was fortunate to have two local guides, one of whom got me into the Kop for the first time in my life, while the other 'sacrificed' her time to spend it shopping with the girls as we did the footy thing. I did though, before the game, have a bit of a wander round town with the group, and there was one thing in particular that raised eyebrows. It seems that, among a certain stratum of Liverpool culture, the done thing if you're going out on Saturday night is to show the world you're doing so by wandering round during the day with enormous curlers in your hair. You may think this makes one look ridiculous, but evidently it's a bit of a status symbol to the cognoscenti. 'Look at me - I'm going out. You're not even getting ready yet, are you? You're clearly going to sit in and play Scrabble or something, you sad bastard.'

I'm sure there's an entry in itself which could be written about how this is perhaps driven by the inexplicable televisual celebration of a certain type of nitwit exemplified by Desperate Scousewives, Geordie Shore and the like, but I'd only be treading a path that's well-worn on these pages. Our Scouse friends, of course accustomed to this sight, unlike us southerners/Spaniards, explained the whole thing with a slight air of resignation. We decided that we'd be able to chance going out for a bit of dinner without having first indulged in this Liverpool ritual, and managed to have a few drinks, a bit of grub and a chat without being pointed and laughed at, despite our peremptory preparations. (I say peremptory - we actually prepared for going out by going to the pub...)

Anyway, thanks so much H and R for being such splendid hosts. We had a great time. Liverpool may have its curler set, but it's also of course very well known for the wit and friendliness of its citizens, and two finer examples of those qualities I'll warrant are not to be found anywhere in the city.

If you're going to do something, do it properly

Two themes dominate Spanish news and conversation at the moment. One is the lack of rain – it's been an extraordinarily dry year there so far and there is a severe danger of total crop loss in some regions. One area which had 195mm of rain in the first three months of last year has so far had 2mm this year, for example. A genuine worry and another sign, if any were needed, of the increasingly rapid changes to our weather patterns.

The other is the alleged mendacity of the King's son-in-law, one Inaki Urdangarin. More details here, but one datum which is missing is the size of the alleged misappropriated pot. Spanish news channels claim up to €17 million is missing and there may yet be criminal charges. The case has divided opinion in Spain along the lines you'd expect in a country where left and right are politically still much more clearly delineated than they are in Britain. He's been condemned as a thief by an already convinced left, defended as innocent until otherwise proven by a more pro-Monarchic right. It's a case which promises huge ramifications for the Spanish monarchy already, even more so if it turns out he's a criminal.

What struck me, as usual, though, was an odd side-effect of this story. Spanish celebrity culture makes our own seem like an amateurish, high-brow, passing fancy. In the birthplace of Hello magazine, this case is manna from heaven for the countless gossip channels (yes, channels), magazines, newspaper columns. On shows (nicknamed tertulias, though the word has much more genuinely artistic roots than the sort of telly it now applies to) filled with z-list celebrities – often former Big Brother contestants, to give you an idea – people literally yell and scream at each other about the latest celebrity scandals. Often they will invite friends and relatives of those involved on to the show, so they can yell at them too, and show clips of other shows in which to give yet more z-listers a chance to respond to, or with, some slur. And so the cycle of self-feeding continues. It makes Jeremy Kyle's show look like Melvyn Bragg discussing poetry with Will Self and Will Gompertz. High-brow it most certainly is not.

On one occasion last week, around lunchtime, one such show was in full swing. Two lines of four guests, I have not the faintest idea who any of them were, faced each other and variously sat, stood, pointed, gesticulated and sulked as they exchanged opinions on the Urdangarin scandal. I cannot understand a word of this as they all shout at the same time, and we were going out anyway, so we switched it off. We went out, had a coffee and a chat with friends in a bar, went for a quick beer and another chat with more friends in the village square (it's that sort of place), then went for lunch. A leisurely lunch was followed by another coffee in another bar, and then a few frames of pool in yet another bar. (It's that sort of place too). When we came home some hours later, the same show, with the same host and the same guests, was still on, talking about the same thing. Indeed they were now showing clips from a few hours earlier in their own show to invite comment from yet more guests, and the people who'd been on there all along.

That kind of commitment to celeb gossip, to scandal, and to shouting at each other, is awesome in its way. I have nothing but disdain for this kind of thing but at the same time a kind of grudging admiration for just how sedulously they go about it. If this were British TV, at some point, a real programme would have to be put on, and not much short a royal wedding, or the death of a Royal Family member or serving PM will clear the airwaves in such a fashion.

I'm due to return to Spain in July at some point. I can only wonder if the same show, with the same bickering, exhausted, furious, empty-headed panellists will still be going at it then.

Life imitating comedy

I've spent the last 10 days in Spain, of which more in another post. The first seven or so of those ten I'd spent in some discomfort, let's say pain in fact, with what felt like a trapped nerve in my shoulder. Therefore, as part of a couple of days spent in Valladolid, the old capital of the country in the days of Felipe II, it was arranged that I see a physiotherapist who'd helped my girlfriend's mum when she'd been rendered all but unable to walk with a similar problem in her hip.

My girlfriend came in with me, to translate, should it be necessary. As it turned out, my pidgin Spanish (and, OK, his flawless English) saw us cope alright – she needn't have been there. That made her all the more pleased to have remained in the room given what followed. I'd had my shirt removed, of course, not a pleasant sight as it is, so I'd been variously sitting on the edge of the table, laying face down, laying face up as instructed, in such a state while he worked his arcane stuff.

About 40 minutes in, I was invited to stand up, move to the end of the table and then sit down astride it with my back to him. I'd rather lost the inhibition inherent in sitting with no shirt on because I was already starting to feel the benefit of his work, so I sat down confidently, directly facing my girlfriend at the other end of the room.

There followed what can only be described as the sit-com sound of the loud ripping of my jeans, as they split in farcical fashion, right across what would delicately be called the nether regions. I looked up in shock at my girlfriend, who was unable to breathe, absolutely helpless with mirth, mainly at the face I was evidently pulling, the memory of which it seems will sustain her for some time if she needs a laugh.

Now here's the thing. I'm a fairly reserved individual, easily given to embarrassment at my own public misfortunes. So this is something I can easily believe reddened my face considerably. But what was actually running through my mind was that I had on, basically, a pair of comedy underpants. Let me explain. We're fortunate in having a house in a beautiful part of Spain, in a small village in the Galician mountains overlooking a lake, in a region not unlike the Lake District. There are few people there, so there are few shops. The market comes twice a month and it's a major event, with everybody from the area around the village coming to shop, to exchange gossip, to sell their home-grown food.

This is where many people buy their clothes. I do not take many clothes out there when we go, preferring to travel as light as possible and keep clothes in the house, but this compels me in some cases to buy clothes at the market. Carnaby Street it ain't. The clothes are not there to satisfy the whims of the fashion conscious. I had been unable to buy my preferred plain, black boxer shorts, so had instead assembled a stock of garish, multi-linear, multi-coloured boxer shorts of varying degrees of tastelessness, because that's pretty much all there's been available out there when the market has come.

Therefore, on leaving the physio's premises, I had to walk the busy streets of Valladolid with my coat held in front of my body to hide my shame, and find a menswear supplier who could outfit me with replacement trousers.

I shall, I think, check in a bag next time we go and, take a stock of black clothes out there with me. I will, after all, have to hold a funeral for my stone-dead pride anyway.