8:31 am, just north of Doncaster. I’m afraid my phone-camera does not do justice to the deep pink of the sun. Nor do the grotty windows on this GNER train help matters. But I think the cooling towers rising out of the haze are reason enough to post this.
Fifteen minutes later, and the sun is already golden. But it has yet to burn off the morning fog.
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Dave Hill amusingly plugs his book 33 times over at Comment is Free. The novel is called The Adoption and is of course available online. I fear this plug may be too late for Christmas, however.
I do enjoy Dave’s blog – especially his thought on such slippery subjects as multiculturalism and political correctness – and I recommend his novel on this basis. It is interesting to see many others do the same: This is not merely a case of blogger-boys-club-back-scratching, but recommendations based on sincerely held beliefs about the quality of a writer’s output. Having said that, a novel is a very different type of writing than blogging, and there may not be a correlation between lengthy fiction, and pithy political opination.
Elsewhere, I hear that Highbury cult-figure Perry Groves’ autobiography is massively outselling Ashley Cole’s offering, due in no small part to the campaign for that very thing over at Arseblog. Dave Hill bemoans the focus in the book-trade in pushing a few bestsellers, leaving the less high profile authors to fend for themselves. The alternative model he suggests – that of bloggers bypassing the marketing hype and recommending alternatives – seems to be working in Groves’ favour, and at Cole’s expense.
Ashley now earns more in a week than Perry’s transfer fee to Arsenal twenty-years ago. He may be more famous at the moment, but will be remembered amongst the Arsenal fans for his involvement in the ‘tapping up‘ scandals, and being married to someone from Girls Aloud. In 2006, it seems an online campaign has snowballed, as readers come to realise that actually, Cole is a less interesting character than someone who has been out of the game for a decade.
To find that it is Perry Groves who has benefited from this phenomenon is unsurprising, as he was always a cult figure anyway. Often on the bench, he never reached the stratosphere of later stars such as Ian Wright and Tierry Henry, or even team-mates like Charlie Nicholas (for whom he set up the winning goal in Arsenal’s 1987 League Cup win). Nevertheless, Groves’ work ethic, bionic throw-ins, and an odd appearance (his nickname was ‘Tintin’ which is why I remember him so well) made him a Highbury favourite.
To come full circle: All this talk of cult figures (and of footballers marrying C-List celebrities) reminds me of the essay by digital artist Momus, which I quoted in my article on the Impact of Blogs for Writer’s News earlier this year. Momus’ point was that the new, digital media could allow people to by-pass the bottleneck of the mainstream outlets. The online world promised to be fertile territory for the unadulterated cult-figure. From my article:
Pandering to the lowest common denominator in the ‘mainstream’ can be a debilitating process … Through online publishing, an idiosyncratic writer can find viable target audiences, without diluting their work.
Attaining this niche-fame – a kind of cult following, perhaps – becomes increasingly attractive to the serious writer. As the digital artist Momus said: “In the future, everyone will be famous for fifteen people.” We live in an era where mainstream celebrity seems entirely unrelated to talent. Finding a small, dedicated audience online may be a better measure of success, than C-list recognition in the mainstream.
President Richard Nixon, on 20th July 1969:
Because of what you have done, the heavens have become a part of man’s world. And as you talk to us from the Sea of Tranquility, it inspires us to redouble our efforts to bring peace and tranquility to Earth. For one priceless moment in the whole history of man, all the people on this Earth are truly one, one in their pride of what you have done and one in our prayers that you will return safely to Earth.
Don’t forget that there is another Shuttle Mission in progress at the moment: STS116. I’ve been listening to the cockpit communications this afternoon, which (as I have mentioned before) I find quite medative.
CFrew of STS-116, 9th Dec 2006 (Photo © NASA)
It might be a cliche to draw attention to the diversity of the shuttle crews (much was made of the fact that the ill-fated Columbia crew included an Indian and Israeli astronauts). To point out that this person is a woman, or that person is black, seems an odd thing to do when they are in orbit, hundreds of miles above the earth.
But, when we continue to see so many examples of intolerance and racism in the world, I think it is worth re-emphasising, and celebrating the equality of race, gender and religion we see aboard the space shuttles. These people, the vanguard of human exploration of space, are drawn exclusively from the group of those who have transcended prejudice and tribalism to become representatives of, simply, humanity. Do you suppose someone with Ahmedinejad’s world-view could muster the attitude of co-operation necessary to explore the heavens?
Well well. Technology analysts Garter predict that blogging will peak next year, levelling out at the 100 million mark (via CleanthesPhilo).
This kind of scare-mongering is manipulative and irresponsible.
Gartner analyst Daryl Plummer said the reason for the levelling off in blogging was due to the fact that most people who would ever start a web blog had already done so.
A fallacious argument, as any economist worth his stall will tell you. As technology changes, so new types of previously under-exploited blogs might grow in usage. People who are currently not blogging, in places such as Africa or the Alaskan Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, could find the practice to be rewarding and profitable.
Let us also remember that the supply of bloggers, while technically finite, is at least a renewable resource. Although these extra bloggers are not available to us at present, I think we can rely on human nature to provide us with an exponentially increasing supply of new bloggers, when the first wave begin to die off. Improbable though it may seem, some of the best bloggers may not even be born yet.
And yet, we notice that the biased BBC does not mention this. Instead it misrepresents the views of one firm of publicity seeking analysts, as a complete consensus accross the entire analyst community! Bloody typical.
The use of a Nativity scene on the CRE’s Christmas Card is an interesting and contemporary choice. It is at this time of the year, every year, that the ‘Political Correctness’ phoenix rears its ugly head, and indeed Jamie Doward’s article about the card in The Observer veers onto precisely that reserve. We hear from the Archbishop of York, who complains that “crib is in danger of being thrown out of Christmas” and it is secularists who are being blamed for this decline. On Saturday, The Daily Mail found that only 3% of Christmas cards now carry a ‘traditional’ message – that is, some depcition of the Christian Nativity:
Religious groups and MPs last night warned that the multi-million pound Christmas card industry was losing sight of the real reason for celebrating the festive period. … Conservative MP Philip Davies said card manufacturers who ditched Christmas symbols were falling victim to “politically correct madness”.
No. It is the MPs who are falling victim to the propaganda put out by the religious groups. In fact, it is the Christian establishment who are peddling the politically correct line here. And, just like the worst examples of ‘PC gone mad’ which infuriates so many people, they frame themselves as the victims of prejudice. Then they demand everyone else make changes to fit their (Christian) agenda.
And so we endure this sanctimonious talk about Christmas, and its “true meaning”. The complainers forget that a Winter Festival long pre-dates the celebration of Christ’s birth. There were pagan, ‘Yuletide’ festivals held in the winter anyway. Indeed, a feast period during the coldest days of the year is hardly an innovation unique to the followers of the Nazarene! I tell you what: If I was the founding father of some cult or culture, then I reckon this month would be ideal for a festival of some sort. Now is the perfectly logical time to take stock of the year gone by, (and in agricultural communities, literally ‘take stock’), make plans and resolutions for the year to come, and, with my family, welcome the light and prosperity promised by spring.
And, Lo! In this age of technology, mass communication and commercialisation, this is precisely what we do. For all the whines about us ignoring that Bethlehem story, we still see most people in this country spending time with their family, feasting, and spending some of the hard earned fruits of their labour. Sure, in pagan times, these were actual fruits and other farm produce. That in today’s world, the fruits happen to take the form of, say, a Nintendo Wii is, I think, merely a matter of detail… I wish people would stop forcing upon us the lie that this is, in itself, a bad thing.
We should remember that for the past thousand years or so, the dominant religion has succeeded in labelling “The Winter Festival” with the brand-name “Christmas”. On the surface, the focus was narrowed to just the Nativity… but all the while, up-and-down the continent, ordinary people also retained the wider traditions of family, feasting, and welcoming the new season. Festivals can and do have more than one meaning.
In the twenty-first century, we see the older meanings bubble back up to the surface. Some will sneer, and label these values ‘secularist’; I call these values simply ‘human’ and inclusive. The pious, exclusive dogma is marginalised. No wonder those who see their power, influence and world-view on the wane are beginning to complain. Their own re-branding excercise, imposed by the Christian Roman Emperors, is now being reversed, and “Christmas” once again becomes “Winter Festival”.
It is nevertheless ironic that they complain about this. By lobbying to retain the Christian label for what has clearly become a secular festival, it is Christianity that is undermined. “Christ Mass” is obviously a word invented by Christians, with a specific meaning. If people really want to celebrate this ‘true’ meaning (i.e. The Birth of their Saviour, Jesus Christ) then perhaps they should do so on December 7th, along with their friends in the Orthodox Church. Free of the guilt that their chosen religion inexplicably ladles onto their heads, they could then celebrate a more generic festive season on 25th December with the rest of us.
Adherents of minority religions have been doing this for centuries. Jewish people celebrate Hannukah at some point in December (this year, I believe it begins this Saturday, 16th December). This observance does not stop them enjoying the festive season with the rest of us, indulging in an excessive feast just like everyone else. They do not winge that their neighbours’ conception of this time of year might be diffferent from theirs.
So, it is actually all these MPs, Bishops, and Stephen Greens who miss the point of these imminent celebrations. Worse, they seek to hi-jack it, by trying to define for everyone else what the winter festival is for. This impedes and bores the rest of us, who are just trying to have a bit of fun with our family and friends.
Update: Pickled Politics points out a couple of good links on this subject. Oliver Burkeman at The Guardian explodes the ‘War on Christmas’ myth, while Wordblog says that the shrill campaigns for Christmas fosters division and Islamophobia at a time that is supposed to mean ‘goodwill to all men’…