RESPECT
Feeling a bit weary when I came home, I did something I rarely do. Sat on the sofa and turned on the telly in the hope of finding something interesting. There might be a decent tennis match on.
Instead I found myself watching a bit of that world cup thingy that's on for the next few months - sorry, weeks. On. And on. And on.....
It must be several decades since I consciously sat down to watch a football game. (Was there a world cup in '94, I seem to remember doing the ironing while something was on?). But this only had about 15 minutes to go, so I thought I'd try to figure out what all the fuss was about. And came away with new found admiration for those hardy souls who will be sitting watching this stuff for days on end. How have they mastered the art of coping with that much tedium?
I watched those 15 minutes (and by "watched" I mean "looked up from my tablet screen whenever the commentators seemed to get a bit shoutier") and was mostly struck by just how slow it all was. At the end the 'experts' (I think one of them might have been Gary Lineker, but as I didn't see a packet of crisps I couldn't be sure) felt a need to go over it all and reassure us what a great game it had been (really?!). To me it felt like the only excitement was that the underdog had won, something I'm all too used to identifying with.
What I saw were players walking about, occasionally some will break into a trot, maybe even a bit of actual running when the shoutiness levels were up. They are kicking around an object pretty much as big as their own heads, trying to hit a target that's about the size of a large barn door laid on it's side. While walking/running on a nice flat grassy surface. In shoes specially designed for walking and running on flat grassy surfaces. And nothing much happens except they kick it to each other for a bit, then the other lot do it, and occasionally, at the shouty bits, it gets a bit nearer one of those barn doors, which they then proceed to miss. Sometimes, if they are feeling particularly energetic, the ball can be end to end in.... what, about 30 seconds? And that's the exciting bit. Have I missed anything out?
Trouble is, after several seasons I'm now too used to watching hockey. Where the players can be moving up to 25mph, the 3 inch diameter puck gets up to around 100mph, and play is end to end in less than 5 seconds, all the time wielding a big stick like it's a part of themselves. Where the target is only 6 feet by 4 and there's guy in the way with another big stick and a lot of padding. Where, if the puck is in play, something is happening and nobody is fannying about hitting it back and forward in the middle. Where, despite the tiny size of the goal, players find creative ways to get that lump of rubber flying into the net.
Oh, and did I mention they do all this on contact points 1/8 of an inch wide, on a surface most of us would struggle to stand up on?
So well done all you footy fans, feeling content with a second rate alternative to a proper team sport, I don't know how you do it....
Sunday 17 June 2018
Sunday 10 June 2018
From Suffragettes to bullies....
100 YEARS, AND WE AREN'T THERE YET
Today we went up to town to watch thousands of women, and a few men, march past to commemorate, and celebrate, the centenary of women first being given the right to vote in the UK. Well, some women. At the time it was only those over thirty, and with some claim to property rights, who were included, and it would be a further ten years before proper equality of voting rights was established. Even now there remains a part of the UK still holding out against equal rights for women. Maybe a reunited Ireland can sort that one out....
The march was a joyous affair, noisy, friendly, enthusiastic, with the widest possible range of ages and backgrounds taking part. And plenty of colour, the organisers having handed out bits of material in the three colours of the suffragette movement, green, white and violet. There was a lot of imagination being shown in how these might best be worn. And imagination, and humour, in many of the banners and placards being carried. Plus a cogent recognition that progress to full equality of rights has yet to be achieved.
The UK certainly wasn't the first state to extend voting rights to all people, regardless of gender, but it was still relatively early in world terms. Looking through the timeline of when various countries implemented equal voting rights, it's still a shock to remember that, even in progressive Europe, it was a change well within living memory - France in 1944, Switzerland in 1971, and tardy Liechtenstein only in '84. So there are plenty of women who can still recall when they were officially second class citizens.
Which is what makes the current series of The Handmaid's Tale, and Atwood's original novel, so chilling. What was so recently gained can always be reversed, and there is nothing about the dystopia portrayed that's hard to imagine happening. Especially in a world where a petulant orange manchild can become president of the USA.
Still, maybe he has some qualities that could come in useful. I can just about imagine him and Little Rocket Man getting along, because they have so much in common. Except I'm not sure puerile bullies are ever going to tolerate one another in the end, with such fragile egos involved.
Today we went up to town to watch thousands of women, and a few men, march past to commemorate, and celebrate, the centenary of women first being given the right to vote in the UK. Well, some women. At the time it was only those over thirty, and with some claim to property rights, who were included, and it would be a further ten years before proper equality of voting rights was established. Even now there remains a part of the UK still holding out against equal rights for women. Maybe a reunited Ireland can sort that one out....
The march was a joyous affair, noisy, friendly, enthusiastic, with the widest possible range of ages and backgrounds taking part. And plenty of colour, the organisers having handed out bits of material in the three colours of the suffragette movement, green, white and violet. There was a lot of imagination being shown in how these might best be worn. And imagination, and humour, in many of the banners and placards being carried. Plus a cogent recognition that progress to full equality of rights has yet to be achieved.
The UK certainly wasn't the first state to extend voting rights to all people, regardless of gender, but it was still relatively early in world terms. Looking through the timeline of when various countries implemented equal voting rights, it's still a shock to remember that, even in progressive Europe, it was a change well within living memory - France in 1944, Switzerland in 1971, and tardy Liechtenstein only in '84. So there are plenty of women who can still recall when they were officially second class citizens.
Which is what makes the current series of The Handmaid's Tale, and Atwood's original novel, so chilling. What was so recently gained can always be reversed, and there is nothing about the dystopia portrayed that's hard to imagine happening. Especially in a world where a petulant orange manchild can become president of the USA.
Still, maybe he has some qualities that could come in useful. I can just about imagine him and Little Rocket Man getting along, because they have so much in common. Except I'm not sure puerile bullies are ever going to tolerate one another in the end, with such fragile egos involved.
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