Dadblog

So, what did you think of that? Personally, I thought it was rather moving, but let’s make no bones about it: I’m a huge fan of TB. And he was, of course, given a pretty easy ride by the Commons, particularly by Cameron, who was vaguely embarrassing in his eulogy.

One thing stood out for the immediate commentators: Iraq, and the “shadow” it will allegedly throw over Blair’s legacy. Bollocks to that, I say. Two things stood out for me. The first was how, on several occasions, Blair was able to respond to questions from local MPs with a series of frankly amazing stats. Primary school attainment up and up. Hospital waiting lists down and down. One question was greeted with a statement that the constituency concerned had benefited from five new schools and 15 completely refurbished schools. The confidence with which these stats was rattled off bore testament to a distinct truth (and one which, to his shame, Jonathan Freedland steadfastly refused to refer to in his commentary): that Blair and Brown have changed the country through the rebuilding of its infrastructure. And that that rebuilding would not have been undertaken on anything like the same school under anything but a Labour government.

The second thing that stood out was the moment when Ian Paisley rose to speak. How many times have we clenched our buttocks when this happened, in readiness for tirade of sectarian abuse, dogma and spitting defiance? I was half expecting something offensive about Blair’s flirtations with the Beast of Rome. What we got was something else: an old warrior acknowledging respect and admiration for the man who has guided all the old Ulster warriors down an extraordinary road. Blair seemed genuinely moved.

Northern Ireland, hospitals and schools. Whatever you think about Iraq, you can’t ignore those things. I will, when all’s said and done, miss him enormously.

So come on Gordon. 70 seat majority at the next election. You heard it here first.

Been reading lots of reviews of the iPhone this morning, and I’m already shifting from scepticism to lust. But in Steven Levy’s otherwise excellent First Look: Test Driving the iPhone, this sentence stands out like a sore thumb:

Maybe I’m a spaz, but I’m only beginning to get the hang of two-thumb typing.

Wow. Is it OK to say “spaz” in America? Or does it have a completely different meaning to the UK, where it’s short for “spastic” and probably about as offensive as you can be?

I was going to blog about John Humprhys’ series of reports from his hometown in Wales, part of a series of Today programme reports, but David Hepworth got there before me: And Another Thing: Let’s hear it for Harumphrys!

Unlike your average guilt-ridden middle class BBC reporter, what Humphrys is not afraid to bring out is that some people don’t want to better themselves because they can get by on benefits and anyway it’s all the immigrants’ fault.

That was certainly an interesting point about Humphrys’ report - his willingness to ask difficult questions of people outside pubs, along the lines of “there’s jobs in town, why don’t you get one.” To which the response from one guy was “there’s no jobs I want to do”, while another said “I don’t want a job, I’m happy doing this.”

Of course, the plural of anecdote is not data etc. etc., but I do wonder if the BBC-led decades-long campaign to encourage fairness, see both sides of the debate, and be inclusive (all of which are of course necessary) has led us to the point where something like the Humphrys interview is a distinct rarity. And also whether it’s led us to often ignore a significant truth about Britain. I thought this when I saw the research about working class white boys significantly underachieving in education, and when I heard Humphrys (again) arguing in another interview that the middle classes had a “stranglehold on state education”. And that truth is that plenty of people, maybe millions of people, in Britain don’t give a stuff about personal achivement and aspiration.

A close friend of mine works as a deputy head in a south London comprehensive. He cares passionately about what he does, and he’s very very good at it. He’s seen results at the school, and particularly in the groups he’s responsible for, climb steadily over the last seven or eight years. But the school struggles to get past 50% of its students getting five or more GCSEs. There’s lots and lots of reasons for this, of course, but really the single biggest reason is the one we find it hardest to talk about - that a great many of the parents of children at this school really couldn’t care less what results their children get. It’s an unpalatable truth, but a truth nonetheless. A combination of typical British (actually, maybe English) traits - a suspicion of intellectualism, a disdain for individual achievement, and a lingering lack of concern or interest in children - has an obvious result: many families seem to have little or no interest in their children’s education. I bet if you compared attendance at parents’ evenings at state schools in, say, Germany or France with attendance in Britain you’d see some interesting things.

How to fix this? Don’t know. But at least acknowledging it would be a start. But here’s a thought: what if the government smothered these communities in opportunities to learn? What if libraries sprang up on every corner, evening classes were parachuted in like food aid, lectures were held, seminars organised, a thousand e-learning websites began to bloom? And what if you particularly aimed those efforts at mothers, for the simple reason that they’re more likely to be around  and, frankly, to care? Wouldn’t that be something which could begin to shift this lingering perception among millions of people that personal educational development is something to be mildly suspicious of? What if we encouraged people to think of Simon Schama in the same way they think of Wayne Rooney?

And our first, middle-class, thought is, of course “ridiculous idea.” But is it? As every educationalist will tell you, the path to low achievement is paved with low expectations. And if we don’t even talk about this fact because, frankly, it’s rather embarrassing to talk about someone else being a bit lazy and a bit thick-headed (particularly when they haven’t had our “life chances” - and how pernicious has the phrase “life chances” become in closing off debate on this topic) then we’re not going to make any progress at all, really, are we?

• Heather Hopkins - Hitwise UK: YouTube to Overtake BBC in UK Visits
  “Last week, BBC.co.uk ranked #14 among All Categories of websites with 0.82% of all UK Internet visits compared to YouTube’s #25 ranking with 0.81% of UK Internet visits. The gap between the two websites is closing rapidly. Last week, BBC had a 1.6% lead
  (tags: bbc youtube audience)

From Hari Kunzru’s entry on Wikipedia:

Although he was also awarded The John Llewellyn Rhys prize for writers under 35, the second oldest literary prize in the UK, he turned it down on the grounds that it was backed by the Mail on Sunday whose “hostility towards black and Asian people” he felt was unacceptable. In a statement read out on his behalf, he stated “As the child of an immigrant, I am only too aware of the poisonous effect of the Mail’s editorial line…. The atmosphere of prejudice it fosters translates into violence, and I have no wish to profit from it.” He further went on to recommend that the award money be donated to the charity Refugee Council (UK).

The man’s a bloody 21st century hero! He’s going on the Amazon wishlist, which is the best form of support this jaded 21st century prosumer can offer.

Finally! Home secretary defends Rushdie knighthood | Special reports | Guardian Unlimited:

John Reid today insisted Britain stood by the knighthood awarded to Salman Rushdie and would not apologise for the honour, despite anger in some Muslim countries.

The issue was “sensitive”, the home secretary said following a speech in New York, but the protection of people’s right to express their opinions in literature, argument and politics was “of overriding value to our society”.

and

He added: “We have very strong laws about promoting racial intolerance. It isn’t a free-for-all. We’ve thought very carefully about it.

“But we have a right to express opinions, and a tolerance of other people’s point of view, and we don’t apologise for that.”

It’s not exactly Henry V, but it’s not bad. Praise be.

Well, today the Guardian answered my question “who put Rushdie up for the award” with its article Rushdie furore stuns honours committee. It says this:

It was chaired by Lord Rothschild, the investment banker and former chairman of the trustees of the National Gallery. The other committee members are Jenny Abramsky, the BBC’s director of radio and music; novelist and poet Ben Okri, who is vice-president of the English chapter of PEN International, which campaigns on behalf of writers who face persecution; Andreas Whittam Smith, former editor of the Independent; John Gross, the author and former theatre critic of the Sunday Telegraph; and two permanent secretaries, one from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and one from the Scottish executive.

So, the great and good. Only Whittam Smith comes out with anything in this piece, and all he says is that the award was given “on merit.” But the piece does contain three extraordinary comments from Rushdie’s fellow writers. The worst is from someone called Ruth Dudley Edwards, whom I’d never heard of, she writes crime novels or something. She thinks this about the award:

“There is only one explanation why Rushdie has been singled out. It is that Tony Blair … wants to put two fingers up to Iran as well as to extremist Islam everywhere.”

I’m not even sure what she means, but she seems to mean that Rushdie was only given the award because Blair wanted to annoy Muslims. Which is so effortlessly insulting to both men that it’s almost admirable in its depravity. But it gets worse, because then Will Self, a man with a brain, says this:

“Given the furore that The Satanic Verses occasioned, it does strike me that any responsible writer might ask himself whether the fallout from accepting such an honour was really worth the bauble … it is surely better that writers decline any form of honour.”

As normblog points out, this is really saying two things, one of them OK - writers shouldn’t accept awards - and one of them very far from being OK - Rushdie shouldn’t accept the award because of the fuss it will cause. I find this view of Self’s extraordinary - as someone who has assiduously courted offence in his works, often spectacularly, how can he possibly argue that someone should act in a certain way to avoid causing offence to religious maniacs.

So thank God for Hari Kunzru:

“The idea that it is some kind of calculated insult is an absurdity. The real insult - to the intelligence and decency of ‘the world’s 1.5 billion Muslims’, for whom people such as Mohammed Ejaz ul-Haq presume to speak - comes from the ignorance and paranoia of leaders who feel so threatened by a novelist that they’ll call for him to be killed.”

The irony is that someone of mixed British and Kashmiri heritage should be the one who most pointedly demolishes the howls of anguish from the sub-contintent. Britain should be proud that its traditions have produced someone like Kunzru and, crucially, someone like Rushdie. They should be celebrated. And Will Self should know better.

In a piece which finally has someone in British authority talking about ‘Deep concern’ over Rushdie attack comments (the High Commissioner in Pakistan, no less), the Guardian has this:

Labour peer Lord Ahmed said: “It’s hypocrisy by Tony Blair who two weeks ago was talking about building bridges to mainstream Muslims, and then he’s honouring a man who has insulted the British public and been divisive in community relations.”

It is believed Mr Blair was not involved in the decision to knight Rushdie, who has expressed delight at the knighthood. His name was recommended to the Queen by a cabinet office committee.

In the context of yesterday’s remarks and what’s going on around the world, Lord Ahmed’s remarks are contemptible, but they do raise the question: who was involved in the decision to knight Rushdie, if it wasn’t Blair, and why on earth don’t they come forward and show a little bit of backbone? Who speaks for England, please?

Ooh, it’s a particularly Godless day on Dadblog this morning. Again, this would normally go on Tumblr: David Aaronovitch - Times Online - WBLG: The virtues of blackmail, misery and cheating: 

Let’s not make this just about Catholics. There are all kinds of people who, for religious or cultural reasons, wish to see greater social control over what women, homosexuals and youngsters are allowed to do. They would like the rules on divorce tightened, the morning-after Pill discouraged, women to wear modest headscarves so that their hair doesn’t drive men wild with misplaced sexual desire. They want clear and stringent rules on what people may and may not do. They forget that, from Saudi Arabia to TV evangelism, such illiberalism always runs on the black hypocrisy of cheating husbands, punished women, blackmail, misery and self-slaughter.

“The black hypocrisy of cheating husbands.” In some blissful secular future, they’ll stick that on the headstone of organised religion.

Some time ago, I posted that Richard Dawkins should avoid the lecturing and return to science. Well, this Father’s Day my son bought The God Delusion for me (the fact that he did this is in itself something of which I am infinitely proud), and yesterday I started reading. And reading. And reading. I’ve been reading in that desperate kind of way you do when something has grabbed you and grabbed you hard and there aren’t enough hours in the day to get it read.

It’s an amazing undertaking. Somehow, all the faults that started to ascribe to Dawkins - a slight tendency to bullying prose, an occasionally clumsy bit of overreaching, an overall flat refusal to acknowledge that other human beings may be wired rather differently - somehow all these things feed the argument in The God Delusion, they do not detract from it. Biggest revelation (word chosen carefully) so far has been the paean to America’s founding fathers and their thinly-disguised atheism. With Islamists being thunderingly offensive about Rushdie, this is the perfect time to read this.