Last week there was a minor kerfuffle in the press and social media about a photography book. This doesn't happen very often because, well, in the age of Instagram and selfies who needs someone else's photos to make your coffee table look sharp? Beats me, but a market there remains nonetheless. What I See is, well, a compilation of photos by Brooklyn Beckham of what he, um, sees. Photos of family, photos of dinner, photos of friends, photos of holidays, it's all entirely unremarkable and what you'd expect any budding 18 year old photographer to try their hand at. Then why the interest? In case you hadn't noticed nor paid attention, our Brooklyn is David and Victoria's lad, the heir to the empire and, as such, a product of Brand Beckham. Therefore whatever he decides to do can only but generate interest. Here, I'm not interested in that per se, rather what is interesting is the interest and, ultimately, what this says about the reproduction of the ruling class in the 21st century. Celebrity offspring can usually be found trying to cut singles of their own, getting into acting, or just providing the paps with Sidebar of Shame fodder, and so straight away Brooklyn has distinguished himself among his peers. However, as a person of interest decreed by his parentage, by dabbling with photography he is straight away positioned as an illegitimate outsider by the arbiters of art and taste in the field. After all, how many teenagers have a photography book to brag about? Therefore Brooklyn's celebrity capital has forced an entry into a field in which the requisite entry fee - years of work, networking, apprenticing, exhibiting - is entirely bypassed. For instance, arts editor for The I Alice Jones had a snarky look and Brooklyn's efforts that just about summed up the professional response to it. And yet there has proven no shortage of defenders, including no less a personage than the BBC's arts editor. It would be easy to agree with the esteemed Gompertz and others who would defend him. As his publicist puts it, "What I See is a book for teenagers, by a teenager, which gives Brooklyn's fans broader insight into his world seen through his unique and creative perspective." A case of misrecognition by the photography community, then? This is common enough. Remember when Fifty Shades of Grey was the big cultural event? Ridiculously, you had literary authors and critics weighing in to attack it for being a sloppily written dull slab of porn pulp instead of an exquisite work of literary erotica. As if it was ever conceived to be anything other than trashy sex with light BDSM and dodgy gender politics. A case of snobby gate-keeping here then? Perhaps not. In early 2016 Brooklyn was hired by Burberry to shoot its fragrance campaign. At the time, fashion photographer Chris Lloyd argued,
David and Victoria Beckham represent sheer willpower and graft. Especially her, she’s climbed that mountain all by herself. They represent hard work and then their 16-year-old year son comes along and it’s sheer nepotism. He hasn’t done it from hard work, which is counter-intuitive to what his parents represent.
Joe Gorrigan, another photographer said,
It infuriates me because I learned my trade and other photographers learn their trade but he’s not learning his trade. I can understand why they’re doing it, getting the younger generation interested in Burberry. It definitely annoys me. Names sell, don’t they?
They do indeed. Brooklyn represents a double threat. The first, of the traditional imposter muscling in on a field and flouting its conventions. Think the nouveaux riches getting marked down as vulgar upon their admittance into 19th century society, but could not be ignored because of the wealth they represented. The second, however, speaks of the anxiety gripping photography as a profession and as an art. The explosion of digital cameras and embedding them in smartphones threatens the field with devaluation, both in terms of status and the fees all but the most specialist photographers can command. Linked to this is the ubiquity of Photoshop and the filters that can be applied on Instagram. When everyone is a photographer, no one can be a photographer. Brooklyn therefore condenses the anxiety toward the outsider every field feels, and the fear of a deskilled future in which the techniques photographers take years to master are rendered obsolete. Who cares about lighting when the computer can sort it for you? There is something else these Beckham junior episodes sum up, and that's the visibility of ruling class reproduction. In 21st century capitalism, so much of what used to be hidden is now explicit. Most crucially of all, the hidden character of exploitation that was hidden behind the wage relation is coming into the open. To demonstrate, in most occupations the wage hides the real state of affairs. It appears to be a private contract between equals: in return for working x number of hours, you shall receive y amount of pay. As noted here recently,
Capital employs labour power to make commodities, be they material, like the laptop I'm writing this blog post on, or immaterial, like knowledge or a service. The worker, or proletarian, receives a wage or salary for their time doing whatever their employer asks of them - an experience, ultimately, not without serious consequences. However, from the point of view of the worker a great deal of time spent in the workplace is completely unnecessary. Say in a five day week, our worker produces £2,500 worth of commodities and receives £500/week in wages, the value of their labour power has been generated on day one. Effectively, for Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday they're undertaking surplus labour. Labour, that is surplus to their requirements. When these commodities are sold, that extra value, surplus value, accrues to the employer. Some of it is advanced to cover the next round of wages. Other bits pay off loans, rent, etc. Some is put aside for reinvestment, and what is left is squirreled away as profit.
Basically put, workers in capitalist society are exploited because they are denied the full value of what they produce. They are compelled to sell their labour power or suffer the indignity of unemployment and the petty tyranny of the dole office. However, with the erosion of workers' rights, the weakness of the labour movement, and ongoing changes to class, we are seeing more gratuitous and overtly exploitative forms of wage labour become more common. Zero hours contracts renders naked the power differential between capital and (atomised) labour. Uber, Deliveroo, but bogus self-employment contractors like the poor sods who harass you on the high street can see the revenue their labour generates and how much of that is directly appropriated by the app/employer. And in both examples, their status renders them ineligible for most rights more "conventional" workers enjoy. As the exploitative relationships capital depend are starting to light up like Christmas trees, the coupon snipping class who live off it sees their reproduction strategies move into popular view. Like many celebrities, the Beckhams are simultaneously a concentration and accumulation of capital. Certainly not capitalists in the Scrooge (or Scrooge McDuck) mode, their business model is basically identical to that of the big sportswear multinationals Naomi Klein covered and critiqued in No Logo. She looked at how Nike, among others, divested themselves of the trappings of a clothing manufacturer and shrank itself down to a branding operation concentrating on product design, image, marketing, advertising. If you like the cognitive functions were retained and almost everything else was contracted out. Brand Beckham and other celebrities work entirely alike. Victoria designs a new range for her label, David lends his name to a new cologne. The messy business of production and distribution is taken care of while they reap the lion's share of the rewards. Therefore everything they and the A-list celebrity set do, each bit of publicity in traditional and social media enhances their celebrity capital which, in turn, supports their economic capital. And that, in turn, feeds their status to the point where they are intertwined and inseparable. To be a celebrity, to maintain one's capital means playing the celebrity game, and the cheapest, most convenient investment of keeping you visible is your Instagrams and your Twitters. The problem is that as you live your life out online, your relationships with the milieu in which you mix become transparent too. Usually what results are the preserve of the gossip sites and magazines, of who Calvin Harris is shacking up with, who Nicki Minaj is feuding with, you know it, you probably read it. Apart from this, however, you see how celebrities cross-promote one another and back each others' ventures through endorsements, or reach out to anoint someone else into their circle. This is pretty much what is happening with Brooklyn Beckham. He emerged into to world cradled by celebrity capital, and as part of the firm - whether consciously divined or not - it paved the way to his ambitions, whatever they may be. We know, everyone knows, not least Brooklyn himself, that he owes his position in the firmament entirely to this. The sorting of his Burberry job, the book, the celebs who drift in and out of his Instagram, the cognoscenti who defend his book, it's simply reinforcing the fact that talent plays second fiddle to who you know, and if you're part of a wealthy celebrity dynasty, people will want to know you. It has always been thus. Public schools, the traditional gentlemen's club, the salon, Society, these were the private spaces where the well heeled got together, gave out jobs for the boys, sorted marriages, went into business, and so on. Not everything among our heavily mediatised celebrity class is on display, but enough of it is. How they police their boundaries, how they relate to one another, how they reproduce themselves as members of the ruling class and induct new members into it is there for the world to see. And this presents a problem for them and their system, because this cannot be dissociated from the increasingly stark modes of exploitation capitalism increasingly depends on. When social mobility is locked, and when large numbers of young people are socialised into graduate jobs that simply do not exist in sufficient numbers, the spectacle of someone like a Brooklyn Beckham, effortlessly settling into an enviable line of work by virtue of who is is and not what he's capable of doing helps keep growing heap of frustration and grievance keep ticking over.
2016 continues to exact a grim toll among the celebrity set, and the latest victim is George Michael. There are few things I can add to the stock obituaries proliferating across news sites, except for what he meant to me. Because, among all the other much loved celebrities who met their demise this year, George Michael was perhaps the one I felt closest to. This closeness, of course, is an illusion, an effect of how the celebrity system in the advanced industrial societies work. As we've discussed previously:
As celebrity has become even more ubiquitous, the option is there - and it's readily taken - for people to form simulated relationships with celebrities of their choice. Whether one is a self-described superfan or is moderately interested in the doings/work of a particular star there is a one-way, "inauthentic" relationship. Despite never meeting them, seeing them, or getting a reply on Twitter off them they can become as meaningful to someone as a real, flesh-and-blood friendship can be. Sometimes even more so. Zygmunt Bauman, the diagnostician of what he likes to call 'liquid modernity' nevertheless observes that for all their inauthenticity, relationships of this stripe can reproduce the agonies and ecstasies just as well. The relation one might have with a certain celebrity might be more real than real, more human than human. It's a strange coming together of supplicant and replicant, of a real person "meeting" a simulated person through the intermediaries of multiple media technologies.
Illusions can seem real. And if they present as real, they can have real effects. George Michael provided a soundtrack that was always playing in the background during the formative years of millions of people. His songs rotated heavily when I was a little kid glued to Top of the Pops. This continued at university with his songs getting regular spots on cheesy (boozy) nights out in local clubs and down the union. In other words, George Michael's work is bound up with some of the very happiest times of my life. But also, strangely, so is his person. Throughout the last 30-odd years, his celebrity has been a constant, a background presence that has helped anchor me and masses of other people in an otherwise turbulent period of accelerated social change. That, ultimately, is one of the social consequences of the celebrity system, and why I feel his passing so keenly. George Michael was a big star with few peers in pop. But he was also culturally significant in a number of unstated ways. There were surprisingly few stars from the 1980s who actively collaborated with other big names, but he was one of them. Aretha Franklin, Elton John, Queen, Mary J Blige all teamed up with him and turned out superb pop moments. Today, collabs are so utterly frequent they barely merit mentioning. George Michael can arguably lay claim to inventing designer stubble. The manner of his forced outing by the LAPD in 1998 landmarked the strides taken towards gay acceptance as no one was really bothered, which in turn he sent up in Outside. In more recent years, he was fodder for the gossip sheets with his admissions of drug taking, self-deprecating confessions about a rustling in the bushes on Hampstead Heath, and the bizarre incidents of his crashing into a photography shop and subsequent falling out of his car on the motorway(!). Having reached such a level of fame, it's almost as if he took a delight in an eccentric subversion of it. But nor should we forget that George was a frequent target for the tabloid press. As with any celebrity megastar, they reveled in his low moments. Gloating when his contract with Sony was upheld in the courts, prurient as they tried to break the studied silence about his sexuality and personal life, and hay making when he was done for cottaging. George Michael was - is - loved, but for the press that helped make him their attachment was purely cynical, their heartfelt headlines entirely hypocritical. Despite their best efforts, he epitomised what it meant to be the 'good celebrity'. George Michael's working class background kept him grounded and socially conscious (Wham! played a Miners' benefit gig at the height of their success). Once forced out, he was utterly unapologetic about his sexuality and made a point of not caring what people thought about his cruising and drug taking. His intolerance was directed at the intolerant, an ethic everyone involved in progressive and socialist politics should seek to emulate. And he was a generous man, refusing to partake in celebrity charity fests and preferring to help people out quietly and anonymously. In all, he was a lovely bloke, and one of the reasons why he meant so much to so many. 53 these days is no age, and the world already feels the poorer for his passing. Goodbye George. We will miss you.
Growing up in the 1980s, there were huge pop megastars. There was Madonna, Michael Jackson, and there was Prince. Madge and Jacko were total tabloid favourites. Madonna for her colourful private life and ceaseless assaults on hypocritical sexual conventions. Michael for his eccentric behaviour which, as we know, later took a darker turn. And there was Prince, whose aloof and controlled persona managed the trick of object-of-media-fascination without having his life splashed across the front pages. Of the three, he arguably preferred to let the music do the talking, and the image rode to popular consciousness off the back of their pull. Like Bowie, I wasn't what you'd describe as a fan. But as per the aforementioned, Prince was always in the background, a celebrity deity who'd remind you of his existence on occasion, and latterly soundtrack the odd YouTube or Spotify splurge. This is why his premature passing will be a wrench for a lot of people, regardless of whether his music plays a big part in their lives or not.
Two stories involving press intrusion into the lives of the rich and the powerful. Is this ever justified? Let's have a look at the first story. Well, as much as our friends at the injunction-happy Carter Ruck will let us. As reported everywhere else in the world except England and Wales, a celeb has been caught with their pants down in a threesome behind their spouse's back (apparently) and there are added claims of extra-marital jollies in a £500-a-night hotel. In other words the kind of story that is the gutter press's stock-in-trade, and one bound to linger in the collective memory for as long as it takes the next scandal to come along. Then we have the tale of John Whittingdale, the government's so-called Minister of Fun and leading figure in Vote Leave. Whittingdale, as everyone knows thanks to this week's disclosures, was previously in a relationship with a sex worker. The question therefore arises whether we, as punters who read the output of our wonderful British press, have a right to know about the comings (ahem) and goings in celebrity and politicians' bedrooms. The unsatisfactory answer is it depends. As someone who grew up in the golden age of Tory sex scandals in the 1990s, in hindsight no one really needed to know about David Mellor's affair, or the unfortunate circumstances attending the premature passing of Stephen Milligan MP. Everyone has the right to a private life, regardless of the peccadilloes and moral hypocrisies that inhabit it. In my view, what is private is fair game for scrutiny if a clear public interest beyond prurience and gossip can be demonstrated. Being in the public eye should not make you fair game. For our "anonymous" celebrity and their family no such public interest justification exists. Whittingdale, however, is a different matter. You could argue that his relationship is nobody else's business, and that argument would be correct. Not that that prevented hacks from three different papers from prying into his affairs. Yet for all three of them to then sit on the story? Hmmm. For three papers to sit on a story they had invested time and resource in investigating, especially when two of the titles ordinarily dress up tittle tattle as news is a touch suss, shall we say. Were the papers uncharacteristically reticent because they feared Whittingdale would implement Leveson's recommendations if they stung him, or were the stories saved up as leverage to hold over the minister? That in itself becomes a matter of public interest trumping Whittingdale's right to privacy. The disclosure is a necessary casualty of the public interest. And then there's today's splash in the Mail on Sunday about another of Whittingdale's relationships. Hardly scandalous, but claims that Stephanie Hudson - a woman on the fringes of celebrity Z-listdom - was privy to confidential cabinet papers is also a matter of public interest. As such, The Mail were right to publish. Whittingdale has a serious case to answer, and the longer his stays schtum the more it will add to Dave's growing encumbrance of woe.
"We'll never see their like again" is a refrain common to the passing of major league celebrities. With David Bowie this was because of his profound influence on pop music and performance, an impact that is probably impossible for anyone to repeat ever. And then there is Terry Wogan who, I would suggest, is of a similar type of celebrity. What? As beloved Terry Wogan is, can he as a Radio 2 presenter, former talk show host, and longtime commentator on Europe's silly song contest be considered to have much in common with our culture-defining legend? Yes, and it comes down to the political economy of celebrity. Anyone with a passing similarity with the sidebar of shame knows there's a gradation in the level of celebrity. At the very top are the A-listers of hot pop and film stars, and genuine legends who have distinguished themselves in their chosen fields. Their stardom is usually international in scope - to have made it big in America is more or less a prerequisite. The next level down are national celebrities of import. These can be actors, warblers, presenters, comedians, etc. In this way of grading matters, here is where you'd probably locate Wogan's celebrity. The next rung down are your soap stars, DJs, and various species of presenter and talk show host. And then at the bottom are your Z-list'ers of reality TV stars (amateur and "professional"), talent show contest hopefuls, paparazzi fodder, glamour models, and so on. This is hardly scientific, of course, but if you can think about celebrity as a broad field in which people jostle for media attention and exposure, you could certainly make a plausible stab of segmenting it in this way. Approaching celebrity as a field has its advantages, but an emphasis on mapping out contemporary positions might ignore the specific routes taken to fame by those at the top of the tree, and miss how celebrity once worked differs from its operation today. And this is where the substantive similarities between Wogan on the one hand, and Bowie on the other start to show up. One does not have to be a paid up aficionado of postmodern social theory to accept that what it did get right was identifying the tendency to cultural splintering and fragmentation that started in the 1960s, and accelerated in the 80s and 90s. The consequences of which are much disputed and need not detain us here (though more here). Yet over the same period there was a strong counter-tendency to homogenisation and uniformity. This didn't express itself 1984-style, but rather the mass media as was had a narrower range while commanding audiences unheard of these days. When Wogan presented Wogan, at one point 20 million people were regularly rocking up to watch. This wasn't because the past was a foreign country (though it is), it simply reflected a lack of choice. At the time of Wogan's peak we had four terrestrial channels and a small offering on satellite. Go back even further, and TV viewers had fewer options. This meant, culturally speaking, that millions of people had common viewing habits to such an extent that these shared media reference points worked as social glue. It was then, and to a degree remains now, a common currency. Celebrity-wise, it meant stars who made it under these conditions became a huge deal. There were a plethora of bands and singers when the rocket blew up under Bowie's career, but vast audiences on radio and TV for his work throughout the 70s conferred legendary status upon him. Consistent exposure, which was matched by only a few of his contemporaries, embedded him as an A-list fixture of the star system. And Wogan was exactly the same. A regular on BBC radio since the 60s, and a familiar television face from the 70s, Wogan attained the status of feted national treasure by ubiquity and familiarity. Whereas Bowie's fame (initially) courted notoriety, Wogan's was a gentle, if wry conformity. He wasn't someone you'd meet down the pub or in the queue at the checkout, but his was a presence, and therefore a passing, felt just as keenly by millions of people. Terry Wogan was a survivor of the old celebrity system as it worked here in Britain. We won't see his like again not simply because he was a one-off. There are plenty of quick-witted Irish men who've made a home at the BBC, after all. No, the way it works now, that fragmentation I talked about, materially rules out the re-emergence of someone who would grow into Wogan's standing. There will always be loved and fondly remembered celebrities for as long as there are celebrities, but to have that reach and deeply held connection between a person and the thoughts and feelings of tens of millions? That time has passed.
Apart from waking up to a river flowing through your bedroom, starts to the week don't get much shittier than this. I was up five minutes after Bowie's social media announced his passing to the world, and all day I've carried around this ball of melancholy and loss. David Bowie was part of my life for all of my life, and now he has gone away. Yet by any standards, you couldn't call me a fan. His tunes have blasted out of my speakers over the years, but not with the kind of regularity suggestive of an aficionado. I am someone who liked his material, knew all the big tunes, didn't own any of his music, and yet still felt thrown and sad by the Thin White Duke's passing. Judging by the clutter on social media and politicians claiming to love Bowie's works, there seem plenty in the same position. From the late 19th century, millions have felt connection to celebrities of all kinds. The monarchs, military figures, politicians, and dictators of the early 20th were overtaken by the non-genocidal but by no means less colourful figures from film, music, television. Their power to reach masses in their homes, in the car, at work, out and about afforded them a certain kind of ubiquity, and one that helped smooth over the fractures of our real social relationships. When the likes of Saint Etienne and ABBA were played over the in-store speakers, working for a certain Bradford-based supermarket chain made the experience less of a chore for me, 20 years back. It's these kinds of moments, the everyday infusion and infiltration of pop, television, and the stars they made into places we visit and inhabit that inculcates a peculiar familiarity with famous folk, even if we're never likely to clap eyes on them in real life, let alone meet them. In the age of the internet, this ubiquity is enhanced by first, the works of our favourite performers always being at the ends of our finger tips, provided one is accompanied by a wifi-enabled mobile device of choice. And second, the illusion of a collapse of distance between us normals and our idols. If I had nothing better to do, I could spend my day trash-talking Justin Bieber, trolling Miley Cyrus, sending love poetry to One Direction, and offering Lady Gaga style advice. Very occasionally, they or one of their people may respond, and many millions buy into that anticipation - though winning El Gordo without buying a ticket offers better odds. Mega-celebrities are effectively simulated people, but that doesn't mean the emotional responses from those who follow their exploits are confected and inauthentic. Camilla Long, please note. Long-term readers might recall me writing about the sad, early death of Peaches Geldof a couple of years ago. What jarred was the snuffing out of a young woman's life who was very much in the public eye. She had become part of the background that, day-to-day, you expected to occasionally find on the telly, keeping the paps in work, and populating the sidebar of shame. The overwhelming majority of those who felt her passing in some way had this sideways glancing relationship with her celebrity, and felt it when she died. The same applies in David Bowie's case. In addition to his huge talent and influence, why many people genuinely feel something is because he was a part of their lives, whether they actively embraced him or not. As a kid growing up in the 80s, he was there in my background, occasionally releasing music and regularly performing. He was felt. And, as I've got older, I've gained an appreciation of just how deep his impact on British and American pop has been. That presence remains but, unfortunately, Bowie the man no longer does so. If you want to mourn, you have every right to do so and are in very good company. Celebrity lives are a collective phenomena experienced collectively, and when someone dies, it's understandable and reasonable for people to feel it. I'm not going to finish on a downer. I'm going to play out with my favourite Bowie tune. It's not Let's Dance, but go on, let's dance.
Hand on heart, I'm not Simon Danczuk's biggest fan. Of all the Labour MPs of this Parliament and the last, his record has been downright appalling. At times when UKIP were surging, he courted will-he won't-he defection rumours in the gutter press. He's taken to the airwaves to attack socialists as the equivalents of the BNP, and we shall not forget that Danczuk was paid handsomely by the two most right-wing rags in the land to dump all over Labour's general election efforts, and then use those same pages to say oh-so provocative things about the party that has provided him a damn good living. As far as I'm concerned, he's no better than a scab, a Westminster equivalent of a working miner who taunted pickets with wads of fives and tens. He brought himself and his office into disrepute a long time ago, and it's a miracle it's taken this long for him to get his comeuppance. Better late then never, I suppose. And it's fitting his former employers The Sun and The Mail are the ones to stab him in the front, to borrow a popular Westminster phrase. I'm sure readers know the allegations made about him by now, and seeing as he's owned up we can treat them as established fact. Let's just be clear though, what any MP or anyone in the public eye does in their private lives is matter for them. It only becomes a topic of concern and therefore the party's, and possibly Parliamentary standards, when moral transgression puts them on the wrong side of political norms, rules, and perhaps the law. It is therefore right the party have swiftly suspended him pending an investigation. It's exactly what has happened in dozens of cases involving lesser known party representatives over the years. Please take note, Jacqui Smith. Nevertheless, I agree with Jon Lansman: Danczuk is entitled to fair treatment and a fair hearing by the party. I want to move on to something more substantial, what you might call the figure or person of Simon Danczuk. Or, more properly, his narcissism. The last time this blog looked into narcissism was - ironically - in the case of the paedophile rock star, Ian Watkins. While Danczuk has not plunged into the depths of criminal depravity, framing him in terms of a sociological understanding of narcissism makes a lot of sense of his behaviour. Starting with Danczuk's own account of his actions, he's variously described his behaviour in terms of suffering depression, having a drinking problem, and possessing a "weakness" for young women. While he does deserve a smidgen of credit for avoiding a non-apology, we are being invited by him and those who alibi him to view his behaviour as the playthings of characteristics somehow external to his character, a bit like Nigel Farage blaming his own xenophobic comments about Romanians on tiredness. Now, of course, none of us are prisoners of our problems and our desires. We, as social beings, are a culmination of all the relations that have ever bared down on us since before we were born. These however do not determine who we are, but they condition our existence, our thoughts, our decision-making. The same is true of one's addiction to the bottle, one's mental health, one's sexual predilections. But what they cannot do is excuse our actions. That we are conditioned by our social being does not alter the fact we choose what we do. Social structures structure our agency, but they do not determine it. The same applies to mental health conditions. The fact of the matter is that the self-important, self-publicising Simon Danczuk we know and loathe is a creature of his own concoction. In her series of interviews over the new year, his recent ex-partner Claire Hamilton portrays a man prepared to do anything to get his name in the press, and say anything to inflate his already swollen bank account. A typical exhibit is his recent call for overseas aid to be scrapped and spent on flood defences instead. Effectively, he's Westminster's own Katie Hopkins and it's unsurprising that they would have a long-running coverage-generating feud with one another. We all know that Westminster is pathologically self-referential. As the seat of government power its comings and goings receive a great deal of media attention. There are people paid to write about it, film it, interrogate it. There are even absurd hobbyists providing comment about it off their own bat. And, as we know, if you're lucky (and wily) enough to become one of its inhabitants, a gilded existence can await: £74,000/annum, staff, living costs, power, a profile and, for some, a certain aura that attaches itself to the office. All of these are very attractive to prospective MPs, and helps explain why everyone who was anyone in my local party flung their keys into the fruit bowl when the constituency became vacant in early 2010. Okay, you do have to fancy yourself a bit to take on the responsibility of being an MP, but for people of a certain personality type it's easy to get seduced by the conceit attached to the position, that to have got through a selection and bested an election requires something lesser folk haven't got. A bit like a business owner who thinks their success has nothing to do with the work and ingenuity of the staff they employ. This is Danczuk down to a tee. Over 20 years he's time-served as a councillor, a regional board member, a campaign manager; so having dragged himself through the structures of the party and having seen many a selection, election, and career fall by the wayside it;s understandable why he thinks himself a bit special and therefore entitled to behave as he does. His Parliamentary position flatters his ego, and what flows from that - the press attention, the telly appearances, the selfie-loving Karen, and, of course, sexting with a young women 32 years his junior all flatter his ego. And his political interventions, if they can be called that, around the floods, around Jeremy's leadership, around Ed Miliband before him, even with regard to the late and unlamented Cyril Smith, are each ostensibly about other matters but ultimately it is Danczuk who is at the centre. This is Danczuk the courageous naysayer and campaigner, or rather Danczuk inviting people who follow such things to see him in this light. In the most self-referential of locales, he is the most self-referential of its citizens. That in mind, I'm afraid anyone hoping that Danczuk will do the decent thing and resign his seat are going to be disappointed. If he gets expelled by the party (which is likely) but the police and the Commons take no action against him (which I also think is likely), he'll soldier on as an independent. There is no job with a nice salary waiting on the outside, and no one that would give him a serious media gig. His bankability with the gutter press is dependent on remaining a Labour MP. Once gone, no one will care for his anti-Jeremy and anti-party ranting. Though some might shell out for a well-publicised journey through rehab, and he has the right kind of tarnish attractive to producers of Celebrity Big Brother. Either way, the time is soon when Danczuk and his galloping narcissism shall disappear from our political horizon. Let us hope no one fills the huge gap his ego leaves behind.
Celebs and dodgy photos, eh? The latest pair to succumb in this fashion are ex-EastenderDaniella Westbrook and the chunky, hunky Dr Christian Jessen of C4's Embarrassing Bodies. In case anyone missed the last two editions of the Daily Star Sunday, both have been caught somewhat in flagrante. Daniella apparently became infatuated with a man she met on Instagram and sent him some samples from her adults only collection. Dr Christian was similarly skewered. A sent a gent he met on Grindr a series of snaps that left very little to the imagination. Some might say if you're a celeb and you're using this wonderful marvel of the digital age to hook up, then you get what you deserve really. I'm not so sure, however. From a moral viewpoint, this is not like the so-called "fappening" (ah, such wit) that released hundreds of intimate pictures of celebrities - the vast majority of whom were young women - after stealing them by hacking their accounts. The investigation into the theft hasn't turned up much so far, except the confiscation of a man's computer equipment in June. If anyone is eventually convicted for this that can look forward to doing a stretch - another hacker got 10 years for breaking into Mila Kunis's and Scarlett Johansson's account. Nor is it the same as the revenge porn treatment recently meted out to TOWIE's Lauren Goodger and UKIP staffer Lizzy Vaid. Readers will recall the attempted slut-shaming of both these women after ex-partners released intimate films and photos of both. However, despite crimes being committed in both cases there have not been any arrests or prosecutions to date. In Lauren's case this might have something to do with her dating the culprit again. Where Daniella and Dr Christian are concerned, neither set was stolen. But can they fall into the category of revenge porn? In the first case, the photos Daniella sent were apparently unsolicited. And - though not familiar with any dating app - I assume Dr Christian's pics were exchanged once a romantic word or two (or whatever passes as such in hook up culture) were exchanged in the ether. Yet there's something deeply uncomfortable about both. Salacious gossip is par the course for sleaze rags like The Star, but none of it is really in the public interest, but I've always found it pretty distasteful that the other party to this case - in Dr Christian's it's the would-be hooker-upper - emerges with their anonymity protected and probably a couple of K in cash. Even worse is Daniella's case. The man concerned, one Alfie Southion, claimed she was sending 30 messages a day, some of which with intimate pictures and other apparently asking for sex. As he puts it, "When she started sending me naked pictures I couldn’t believe it. It was a bit sad and degrading. In the end I had to block her. To be honest she scared me a bit ... She didn’t seem in a good place, I think she needs help." So our Alfie believed that Daniella was suffering mental health problems and needed specialist assistance. So by way of rendering her aid he flogged the images and publicly slut-shamed her in the pages of a national daily, presumably in return for a few grand. What a loathsome, morally reprehensible creature. Helpfully, The Star clarifies the law here as :
Individuals who publish explicit videos or images without consent and with intent to cause distress could face jail. Under the new legislation, offenders will face up to two years in jail for sharing images on or offline without the subject’s permission. The law defines revenge porn as “photographs or films which show people engaged in sexual activity or depicted in a sexual way or with their genitals exposed, where what is shown would not usually be seen in public”. Newspapers are entitled to publish such images if they believe it to be in the public interest.
Basically, as far as the paper is concerned they can republish the photos because a) the public are interested and b) they're censored anyway. However, The Star are certainly in breach of the spirit of the legislation and can under a wide interpretation be considered to have broken it. It appears young Alfie and our friend from Grindr may have as they shared explicit images with a third party without permission. I do hope Daniella and Dr Christian make complaints to the police. Was it unwise of our two celebrities to make and share pornographic images of themselves? Considering their position, probably. But ultimately that is immaterial. What they do with their phones and fiddly bits is up to them, and it's no one's place - not hypocritical rags, not opportunists on the make - to breach their trust and use sex imagery to embarrass, traduce, and shame.
A comic novel with Adolf Hitler as the main character? Really? Quite apart from the humourless fanaticism that characterised Hitler and the regime he founded, isn't it still a bit early to turn the most notorious name in modern history into a sympathetic figure of fun? Yes, it is. Or at least it's something that's very risky. As Gavriel Rosenfeld puts it, Look Who's Back flirts with "the risk of glamorizing what it means to condemn, giving voice to racist ideas in the process of making fun of them". What's the fuss all about? The novel finds Hitler waking up and reeking of petrol on a vacant Berlin lot, which the reader is left to assume was on the site of his famous Führerbunker beneath the Reich Chancellery. Having no clue what has happened and puzzled by the lack of bomb damage and young people sans Hitler Youth attire, he's taken in by a friendly newspaper vendor. He learns that it's 2011 and has to adjust to modern times. Taken for an impersonator that never breaks character, the comedy lies in his entirely inappropriate answers to every situation. And very quickly this Hitler becomes famous. Finding fame on a skit show, a YouTube slot quickly follows along with a dedicated show and a list of awards. One of the funniest moments of the book is where he pays an impromptu visit to the headquarters of the National Democratic Party (NPD), the far right outfit that foreswears but unofficially has considerable continuity with the Nazis. Needless to say, Hitler is far from impressed and hilarity ensues as he unknowingly tries to trap the hapless chairman into admitting their fealty to national socialism on camera. I don't want to give too much away, except to say Look Who's Back is a very funny novel. It's also perhaps surprising that it originated in Germany where, understandably, Hitler remains very much a taboo topic. Problematically, there are almost moments when Hitler is cast in a sympathetic light, especially when he is roughed up by a couple of Neo-Nazis who take him as a Jew-orchestrated send up of their beloved inspiration. Having read Mein Kampf, which is not an experience I'd recommend to anyone, in may ways Vermes captures Hitler's character well. While not the rasping, ranting demagogue of the newsreels, the monomaniacal self-belief is there and the exceedingly limited racialised way of looking at the world is well-rendered, though understandably without the kinds of terms Hitler would have thought with. Where Vermes goes off-piste with Hitler's character is that the narrative convention of novel writing means rendering the fuhrer coherent and well-expressed. As his semi-autobiographical rantings and musings demonstrate, this was definitely not the case. Of course, this book isn't really about Hitler. It's not even about standing attitudes toward his legacy. It's about modern Germany. One thing that always strikes me about reading modern European literature in translation is how similar societies over the channel are to dear old Blighty. It's the Americans who are weird. Therefore, Look Who's Back it's about us too. Vermes has the superficiality of celebrity culture in his sights and exposes the impossibility of authenticity under these conditions. Our Hitler is the real Hitler, but his "authentic" offerings can only be viewed as a simulation of the real thing, his declarations for lebensraum, musings on the "interracial mixing" of dogs, and attack on the cowardly lampooning of other nationalities (yes, really) are taken as affectations of an impersonator, his message - which is deadly earnest - a bit of harmless distraction to be laughed at. Like so many offensive celebrities, as per Clarkson and Hopkins, Hitler is allowed to peddle his nonsense because there is money to be made. The consequences, which are a coarsening of public discourse and an evacuation of sympathy and feeling from popular culture always play second fiddle to ratings. It's also a polemic against the the disappearance of history. No one in the novel takes Hitler seriously, but his reappearance allows for the characters - mainly his media support - to indulge in some dubious recrudescences. Replying "jawohl mein fuhrer!", indulging a mass sieg heil by the production staff, saluting him, and providing him a chat show adjutant replete with SS uniform speaks of the amoral, ahistorical grinding of an entertainment industry that repackages and effaces the past as it sees fit. Even something as disgusting as the Nazi period. In all, a very funny read. The satire and the criticism isn't particularly cutting edge - it's been done before. But this is about chuckles, not chin-stroking.
If the inhabitants of these fair islands get the politicians they deserve, can the same be said about the professional commentariat? I feel moved to ask because Brendan O'Neill, the faux ra-ra-revolutionary turned tedious troll has indecently exposed his idiocy, or his cynicism depending on how you see these things. Let's step back away from things for a moment and consider the object of O'Neill's ire, the newly-named Caitlyn Jenner. Quite apart from her politics, which are iffy; and the privilege wealth has brought her, which is considerable; many millions who've tracked the press rumours and followed her from celebrity (ex-)husband and Kardashian hanger on to coming out as someone undergoing a transition from one gender to another will have been touched. Not a few are likely to have been educated and forced to confront their own misunderstandings and, in some cases, prejudices. Nor should the personal courage of Jenner be underestimated either. Imagine the mental strain of living your entire adult life - Jenner is 65 - feeling at odds with your body, and then risking your relationships with family and friends, as well as general shunning, to come out as someone who wishes to change their gender. It's a bloody terrifying prospect. In my view, anyone who takes that step deserves commendation and support through what can be, and often is, an unimaginably difficult time. And that includes someone like Caitlyn Jenner. O'Neill's 'Call Me Caitlyn, Or Else', which is supposedly aimed at a progressive audience, tries so hard to drape itself in the tradition of leftist cultural critique, but fails spectacularly. Ostensibly a criticism of the celebrity grown up around Jenner and, understandably, some of the sharp defences of her, what O'Neill betrays is a snobbish semi-Nietzschean disdain for the herd. Not for one moment does he consider that some people really do find her story genuinely life affirming for all kinds of reasons, nor that Jenner's coming out represents a blow struck for trans-acceptance when this is a community of people on the receiving end of bigotry and violence. I'm supposing the notion of solidarity went into the shredder along with his many unsold copies of Living Marxism. No, this is a spiteful piece that basically objects to a) the existence of trans people, and b) the very idea they should have a political voice. The things some former socialists will say for a couple of hundred quid. Now, O'Neill can't be a congenitally stupid man. Getting a regular paid writing gig these days requires a bit of nous and some familiarity with the hot button issues of the day. And as someone who is plugged into the media for a living, I have to assume O'Neill isn't ignorant of some facts around trans issues. That, for instance, the incidence of mental illness is much higher among trans people than the general population. That hate crimes against trans people are on the rise. And that in the USA, seven trans women were murdered in the first month-and-a-half of this year, all of whom were not white. O'Neill cannot but know this, and yet still turned in a piece of sophistry that punches downwards. There are many names for doing such a thing, but "progressive" isn't one of them.
A Frost/Nixon for our age? No, but the media reaction to Russell Brand's encounter with Ed Miliband is out of all proportion to what was said. The actual content of the interview is pretty innocuous, at least from the standpoint of grizzled lefties and hardened politicos. Yet where Brand's core audience are concerned, the teens to the mid-30 somethings who tend not to pay politics anywhere near as much mind as the likes of you and I, it's a different story. That is why Ed was absolutely right to seek him out and take whatever ra-ra-revolutionary verbiage cum cheeky banter on offer, and once again the expectations of the commentariat were confounded. The worst they could fault him for was dropping his tees and gees which, all told, is a bit pathetic. This was the right move for another reason. For the first time in this campaign, a major media commentator - for that is what Brand is these days - has asked questions about issues that would never trouble the prompt sheets of your Paxos and Brillos. Class. Ownership. Capital. Change. The whole point of voting. The legitimacy of mainstream politics. These are matters absolutely crucial for understanding 21st century Britain, for getting to grips with the forces that structure and condition our politics and political debate. While it's right professional interviewers should scrutinise the details of party programmes, no one is interested in the bigger picture, of understanding how we as citizens can hope to change things with our individual votes when power is concentrated in huge, unaccountable private institutions? If Brand isn't going to ask these questions, then who will? Andrew Marr? Kay Burley? Ed Miliband, for his part, made the case for linking voting to wider project of progressive change, of tentatively stepping beyond the remit of representative politics. He rightly made the point that change can be slow, but that government is one avenue that can assist. Ed would have done well to have added that if none of this matters, then why are the Tories, their overseas fellow travellers, and their helpful friends in the city are pulling out all the stops to win - including today's helpfully out riding for what professional political comment thinks:
But I can’t understand why leftwing feminists have not come out in their droves to condemn Miliband for going anywhere near Russell Brand. By his own admission he has slept with more than 1000 women, including prostitutes. I find that man abhorrent and I think it is such a bad idea for a politician to have anything to do with him. It was unbearable to watch Miliband (who might not be 100% my cup of tea in lots of ways, and some of his ideas are bonkers, but he is a genuine supporter of women and I’m sure he would put his hand on his heart and say he is a feminist) be lectured by Brand on the uselessness of the female vote. The suffragettes would have hung, drawn and quartered Brand.
I'd take Allsopp's whinging more seriously if she gave a fig about what's happening to women less fortunate than her under the Tories. She has every right to criticise Brand for his sexism of course, which plenty of feminists have done before it became politically convenient to do so, but Allsopp's voice has been curiously silent during the destruction of women's shelters, the closure of children's centres, cuts to the public sector and social security, and the increase in low paid insecure work - all of which affect women disproportionately. And as she does so, at least Brand is making amends for past behaviour. Solidarity around the Kurdish struggle against Islamic State and, in particular, the leading combat roles taken by feminist comrades in that fight; and of course supporting the women of the New Era estate in their victory over an unscrupulous property developer. Actions speak louder than words, Kirstie. Allsopp's remarks condenses the rubbish that gets written about Brand. People on the right and the centre left lecture him about his behaviour and his views, but for many of them politics is something they write about in the office. They don't give their free time to 'doing stuff', they don't weigh in and use whatever pull they might have to effect change. Politics is something others do. They observe and record, and that for them is enough. Brand doesn't fit into that mold and, in his own way, despite his wonkish aspect neither does the Labour leader. Yet he gets the big interviews, the book deals, the Question Time slots, the column acreage. His productions are anarchic, he plays fast and loose with the dialectic of serious vs unserious. Why use one word when seven will do is Brand's favoured approach. But ultimately, what Brand exemplifies is fear. Comedians are public figures, and Brand as Britain's current king of the pile is a working class boy done good who's muscling in on their turf. If hundreds of thousands can hang on this upstart's words, so other proletarian and semi-lumpen voices might also reach places polite, established debate cannot touch.
Petrolheads everywhere, sob into your empty oil cans. For Top Gear is, as was, no more. The verdict couldn't have been anything else. Whatever you might think about Jeremy Clarkson, which in my case is not a lot, it was impossible even for him to cling on to his job after a 20 minute tirade, followed by a 30 second assault - all because a steak dinner wasn't available. At a stroke, Clarkson became a demi-god to babymen everywhere but cost him a prestige job and an international audience numbering in the tens of millions. We know why Clarkson is feted by so many, but what I'm more interested in are the displays of solidarity from his establishment friends. Expense-fiddling Maria Miller blames the BBC for not dealing with "its larger than life characters" properly, as if somehow it is responsible for Clarkson's punching out a member of staff. "How stupid can BBC be in firing Jeremy Clarkson? Funny man with great expertise and huge following" tweeted Rupert Murdoch; "The BBC is like a distant planet. Alien and out of touch” scrawled Katie Hopkins in her Sun column last week, and Dave: "I hope this can be sorted out because it [Top Gear] is a great programme and he is a great talent." By far the most egregious example comes from our good friend Louise Mensch, professional ex-MP, gobshite, and cheerleader for all that is rancid. Here's a petard. Go hoist yourself with it, Lou:
@LouiseMensch Serious? You think it's okay to hit someone, at work or anywhere else? Wimps if we say violence is unacceptable? Peace & love
— Laura Marcus (@MissLauraMarcus) March 25, 2015
@LouiseMensch Blimey... so if you and I ever meet and your inane remarks piss me off so much that I lamp you one, that's okay is it?
— Laura Marcus (@MissLauraMarcus) March 25, 2015
What a risible spectacle. Is there a better demonstration of how deeply the view that laws and everyday common decency doesn't apply to them runs among the entitled, hypocritical, and monied imbeciles clustering like coprophilic flies around Clarkson's person? Why though? Is it because the conservative establishment, whose raison d'etre is continued political dominance, are simply falling over themselves to help out a mate? Yes. And no. Clarkson's establishment creds are very well-established, and nothing extra needs adding to that. There is something else that has left them deeply anxious, and it's this: they're losing. Conservatism as it stands now is time-limited and on its way out. Even if by an awful miracle they pull off a general election win, the decline will continue unabated. Dave's calling time on his premiership presumptuously, the EU referendum, UKIP, and jockeying for life after Dave will ensure that a moderate, centre right makeover some are pleading for is not happening any time soon. As their movement is in slow-mo collapse, so their cultural bastions are crumbling. Sure, in many ways the neoliberal charge Thatcher led in the 1980s is deeply embedded in the social fabric. Her attempt, shamefully aided and abetted in the Blair years, to encourage a cost/benefit homo economicus as everyone's default mental apparatus, is still with us. It took a generation to bed down, and will probably take just as long to root out. Their moment of triumph is also the occasion of their historical defeat. It has become dislocated from the Conservative project. In successfully encouraging Britain's wage and salary slaves to look to anything but collective organisation based on class for salvation, increasingly large numbers merely treat work as a means to an end, an inconvenience to be got over with as quickly as possible so one can live. As the crisis posed capital by an unruly labour movement is resolved, so another starts to open around the legitimation of work itself. Hence why 1970's-style radical workplace economism has comparatively little purchase, but likewise why the Tories and so-called Tory values have a hard time cutting through - particularly with younger cohorts. Traditional family values, no. The mapping of Britishness onto whiteness, no. Overt stupidity and bigotry, no. Mean-spiritedness, increasingly not. The union itself, increasingly shaky. If we wish to flatter it, it's telling that conservative intellectual firepower is all concentrated in the declining Tory press whose readership tends to be middle-aged-to-elderly. Apart from occasional stabs at tabloid telly, usually to rile up antipathy toward a powerless minority or those in receipt of benefits, our heavily mediatised cultural landscape is almost a no-go zone for conservative figures. Clarkson stands out because he is part of a dying breed. There are few, if any, that command the genuinely wide following he does, and this is why the conservative establishment are squealing like a pig recently parted with its knackers. Their cultural standard bearers are dropping off the TV schedules and commanding zero following out there. When celebrities do come out as Tory supporters, like Gary Barlow did, they're pilloried. Alternatively, there's nothing at all wrong with burnishing one's lefty, social justice creds a laPaloma Faith. The cling to Clarkson because, increasingly, he's the only "non-political" figure they've got putting across their tedious, small-minded commonsense. They instinctively feel their Gramsci even if the left does not. I'm sure Clarkson will wash up with his hangers on elsewhere. He is bankable, after all. Nevertheless, to be edged out of what probably remains the most trusted and well-respected broadcasting institution in the world is a significant devaluation of whatever collective cultural capital the conservative side of things have left.
If you weren't a certain age in the late 1980s, it's difficult to describe how massive Michael Jackson was. Almost six years dead, he's a bit of a joke. The man with the plastic face and an alleged unhealthy interest in children. Yet at the peak of his powers in the late 80s Jackson was part of the elite of megastardom, a space he occupied with few figures - Madonna, perhaps Prince, assorted bankable Hollywood folk. He carried about him a venerable aura. The press, of course, had a field day with Jackson before those allegations came to light but then, rumours of oxygen tanks, purchases of the Elephant Man's remains, Bubbles, and the fairground attraction on his ranch made him all the more beguiling. Especially to kids. The back-to-back success of Thriller and Bad was followed in short order by Moonwalker. As a film, I remember thinking it an unholy mess, an opinion that hasn't been assuaged with the passage of time. It's a series of extended videos threaded together without any narrative fidelity, except for the figure of Jacko getting into scrapes and capers. Most will remember Moonwalker for its bizarre main segment, a wee adventure that sees Jackson defeat an evil plot. A Mr Big (not that Mr Big) wants to conquer the world, and plans to do it by getting children addicted to drugs. Queue some dancing and bad guy killing that sees Jacko transform into a death-dealing robot. As per most action-oriented films from the late 80s on, the license went out to tender and it was promptly snapped up by Sega. They churned out a creditable arcade game, and the topic of this very blog post. Moonwalker landed on the MegaDrive not long after its North American launch. As Nintendo had all the big stateside publishers locked down with a dodgy and subsequently illegal set of agreements that prevented them producing the same game for rival formats, Sega attempted to command attention by getting top celebs (mainly, nay almost exclusively major sports stars) to put their name to their games. Who then bigger than the King of Pop?
If anything, Moonwalker the game works much better than it ever did as a film. Based loosely around the Shinobi engine that was getting an outing in the contemporaneous E-SWAT, Dick Tracy, and, unsurprisingly, The Revenge of Shinobi, Sega's interpretation of Jacko's hubristic masterwerk is actually a jolly, competent and (whisper it) good action platformer. You take on the role of Jackson in his Smooth Criminal get up over five levels, offing goons, dogs, spiders, and zombies. You have to explore every nook and cranny, because you won't be allowed to progress unless you collect all the, um, children. Each level borrows a theme from the flick, with the exception of the third, which is inspired by the grave yard featured in Thriller. As per gaming conventions Jacko has to face a not-terribly taxing boss before progressing to the next stage. Four or five swipes with your magic powers normally does the trick. And then, with level five done and dusted Jacko morphs into a spaceship(!) and you do battle with Mr Big in a first person dog fight. All the while, the MegaDrive does an admirable job of rendering his big hits chip tune-stylee. This wasn't the first game to be based around a celebrity or pop star. That accolade probably belongs to Frankie Goes to Hollywood, but what Moonwalker managed was the capture of an artist's image. In contrast to other film adaptations, this was a slickly programmed affair full of fantastic - and even then unintentionally hilarious - little touches. Contemporary reviews waxed lyrical about Sega's rendering of the smart bomb mechanic, which by then was a staple of gaming. Keep your finger down on the magic bottom and boom! Jackson leads the assembled bad dudes in a synchronised dance performance, after which they all drop dead. Brilliant. Even dogs and spiders merrily join in too.
It couldn't be any other way, really. Jackson was reportedly consulted on the development of Sega's titles so, if you like, the progammers had to work towards his ego. When you've collected the children, Bubbles appears and guides you to the end-of-stage face off. Attacking in the air sees Jacko striking a trademark supercool pose. Hold down the magic button without setting the dance bomb and your hat turns into a deadly projectile that can slice through several enemies. And there are a few moves that serve no game mechanic at all. You can grab your crotch, stand yourself on your tippy toes and, yes, moonwalk. In fact, there is an argument for regarding the Jackson sprite as the most studied avatar up to that time capable of multiple animations. Regardless of what he's doing he always looks effortlessly cool, a lesson Sega took and applied later to Sonic the Hedgehog. The second point is the in-game scenery. Being able to manipulate your environment is standard in modern games, but back then, not so much. Sure, Mario was able to bump along breaking open boxes with his bonce. Players were familiar with traversing obstacles and the like, but interacting directly with it was less common. Not so in Moonwalker. It sees you opening doors and windows, breaking into car boots, and smashing down walls of rock all in the background scenery. What is better though are small, unnecessary, but delightful touches. Walk on the baby grand on the first level, and you get the plinky-plonk of random piano notes. Stand on a fire hydrant and spin, using the water to kill off your enemies. And why not smash up Mr Big's computers just for the hell of it? Okay, such interaction with the backdrop is strictly limited, but it was virtually unseen in 1990. If environmental manipulation had an originating point, this was it. Moonwalker these days is one of the more sought after titles for the MegaDrive and Master System, possibly because of the notoriety attaching to Jackson's name as it isn't particularly rare. Au contraire, it sold well in all of Sega's key markets. For my money, Moonwalker is an important game, though not recognised as such by the keepers of the video game canon.
Asked nobody ever, but stay with me. I can just about remember the first Red Nose Day. In the build up there was a palpable sense of excitement among us kiddy-winks. What crazy capers could we get up to? Our school alas, while paying lip service to the possibility that the dull norms of classroom life could get breached, ruled out stunts like walking-backwards-for-a-day and clowning about on a pair of stilts. It was 'elf and safety gone mad before it, um, went mad. As with most things, the advance hype didn't match up to real life. A few kids wore their red noses to school (not all day, those bloody things hurt!) and one really got into the swing of things ... with a sponsored silence. The biggest deal at the time was watching the Comic Relief show on telly. It's difficult to countenance now, but it was very rare then for so many celebrities to share a billing. It was very novel. Remember, the celebfest of Band Aid had only topped the charts a few months previous. Now, when it comes to charity I'm not too charitable. I occasionally patronise charity shops, use them to offload unwanted but otherwise functional gear, and will back someone's stunt if they present a sponsorship form at gunpoint. Oh yes, the occasional emergency appeal when something ghastly happens somewhere might get a contribution, but that's your lot. Like a lot of political people, my thoughts about charity are heavily conditioned by the critique of it. For the right, their argument can be taken as a rationale for I'm-alright-Jack selfishness. i.e. Giving to charities and supporting needy people renders them dependent, they don't look to their own agency to get themselves out of a pickle so why should I help? You can almost hear Scrooge snapping "so much the better to help reduce the surplus population." The left critique is superficially similar: charity dresses recipients up as a deserving poor fallen on hard times and erases the various structural configurations of power and resource ultimately responsible for this sorry state of affairs. The answer therefore is political activity, not hand outs. Charity has its own political economy. As of September last year there were 164,097 registered charities with a combined income of £64bn. Just shy of 70% of this cash flows to the top 1,990 organisations with an annual take it excess of £5m. Examining this anatomy is a none-too-pleasant task. At the top of the tree the chief executives and big fundraisers can take home quite a packet. Some have proven more than happy to link up with businesses to provide a human face for an outsourcing arrangement or takeover of a former public asset. Pay for many workers in the charity sector is low and can be highly exploitative, as any of their "self-employed" contract fundraisers who go door-to-door or stand in high streets affecting faux bonhomie will tell you. And where there is a market, there is inevitably duplication of effort and much waste. Not everyone is aware of the machinery behind the collection tin, but it is difficult to avoid charity's ubiquity. No town centre is complete without Shelter, Age UK, Scope, Douglas MacMillan, Sally Army stores, and the very local charity shops (my favourite is Stoke's own Iris's Cats in Need). Yet the shops and the chuggers, the telethons and conspicuous displays haven't put Britons off giving. As our institutions suffer a crisis in confidence (except for the Royals and the military), charitable giving goes from strength to strength. As does Red Nose Day. Since its 1985 debut, Comic Relief has hoovered up over a billion quid. Last night a further £70m was given/pledged, so how does it escape the the cynicism and the sneers so successfully, especially now it's very much an establishment fixture? Part of Red Nose Day's early success was its very clear pledge that money raised would go to UK-based charitable concerns as well as needy people overseas (if my hazy memory of contemporary pie charts serves, at the outset some 20-25% would stay here). For miseries who'd grumble about sending cash abroad while not tackling poverty at home, their proto-UKIP consciences could rest easy. Also, riffing off the infamous Michael Buerk report from Ethiopia, from the start Comic Relief/the BBC parachuted celebrities into God-forsaken places to report how awful things were, and who for their part were clearly shaken by their experience. In subsequent years TV crews would return - as they still do - to see what difference donations have made. What Red Nose Day makes visible is what was previously taken on trust, the TV screen links the giver to the recipient. It also helps that - for most - Red Nose Day's televising is quite entertaining, as is Children in Need, the other BBC charity juggernaut. That probably helps explain why ITV's Telethon, which ran continuously for over 24 hours, was only repeated the once. There is more to it than collapsing the distance between donor and recipient. Many a social theorist, particularly Bakhtin have been fascinated with the occasional eruption of the carnivalesque. Back in the days of serfs, squires, knights, and lords the carnival was more than a few days of feasting and debauchery. Social roles were also upended. Think of it as mediaeval cosplay, albeit an occasion when social relations were disinterred from the dressing up box. Peasants could strut about town like aristocrats, children could subvert the authority of their families, and where the local baron and his clique of high born hangers on would have a right larf pretending to be poor. This palaver had a purpose. Not only did it throw together locals and yocals in a rare display of social mixing across a highly stratified society, but reminded them of their interdependence. Red Nose Day is a very safe, modern analogue of the same. It appears it's virtually compulsory in schools for children to dress up and get down with the sanctified fun. Adults can regress to big kiddery too by going to work in fancy dress or doing something else reallywacky. It doesn't serve to heighten a sense of interdependence a la our feudal predecessors, but it helps create affective bonds between participants. How many of yesterday's little kids who spent their school day reciting bad jokes, doing The Conga, and having a good laugh can draw on a nice convivial memory to look back on in future years? More widely though it's all being done for charidee the collective act of fundraising allows for a temporary suspension of self-seeking behaviours. Sure, if we want to be cynical we can point to celebrity participation as typical profile-raising, but not so for the hundreds of thousands who did something daft and raised a bit of cash. In a primitive, half-formed and distorted way, Red Nose Day's carnivalesque prefigures a society in which instrumental relationships between people are kept in a box, and where affection, solidarity, mutual support are the hallmarks of what it means to be human. This, however, is but a glimpse of one pole of future possibility wrapped in all mass acts of popular charity. To work, charity has no choice but to play on summoning a particle of that in the here-and-now. That dependence on the very best of human feeling is harnessed and delivers social goods to those who need it. Yet at the same time it subsidises social problems that shouldn't be left to the beneficence of private individuals, and has the baleful consequence of reinforcing the distinction between the deserving and undeserving poor or, in this case, recipients. The solidarity of charity therefore is solidarity in its lowest form. Any subversive potential is immediately recuperated. That glimpse, however, can lead some to politics and the struggle for a better world, but that has to take place outside of charity's confines.
Jeremy Clarkson has been suspended by the BBC for an alleged "fracas" with a producer for Top Gear. Innocent until proven otherwise and all that, but it does come after years of nudge, nudge, wink, wink racism and associated vicious stupidity. Needless to say, I don't particularly like him and avoid his shows like the plague. Yet Top Gear and his contrived alpha male personage is popular and millions tune in every week for fast cars and funny haha cheeky banter. Far be it for me to stop them. Yet in the celebrity firmament Clarkson occupies something of a unique position. There aren't many out-and-out right wing celebs knocking about in a culture where a paper-thin veneer of leftyism is usually de rigeur. And he also trades on this too. He says what he thinks, won't be cowed by the PC brigade, and is not afraid to acknowledge that he shares the dodgy bigoted views of some of his fans. He's the carefully constructed maverick, the outsider whose huge BBC salary, media appearances, and member of the Chipping Norton set who's anything but. Reminds you of any other faux anti-establishment media personality? In fact, the parallels with Nigel Farage are quite striking. Then again, one right wing demagogue is interchangeable with another. It's all about saying the unsayable, of cocking a snook to a largely imaginary lefty establishment, of rubbishing climate change because we sometimes still get snow, etc. etc. But what Clarkson shares above all with Farage is less a man-of-the-people thing - the media commentators keep getting that one wrong - but as someone primarily middle aged men can relate to. As most working class blokes during their lives have come across a gaffer who showed his workers a grudging respect and gave it to them straight, as per NF, Clarkson has been middle aged since Top Gear first broadcast in the late 80s. He's not so much what they call these days 'a lad' and more a down-at-heel playboy. You know the sort. Could never be bothered to get married. Always seemed to have a new sporty motor. Owned his own home. Boast about his womanising down the pub. Clarkson isn't any of these things, of course. He's a happily married got-lucky journo, but the hair (as was), the jeans (oh my life, the jeans), and the swagger evoke a personality millions of people can place in their social circle. His politics too have a certain coherence about them. In the mid-80s, Mike Dreher, another terribly tedious but oh-so-anti-establishment hard right populist founded the Motorist Party of Switzerland. This before climate change was widely accepted by scientists and politicians, Dreher campaigned against conservation measures and denounced claims about acid rain. Like the kippers today, the acceptance of scientific evidence was not his strong suit. The Motorist Party also wanted speed limits raised on the country's roads, especially on motorways so they could let rip. It was so-called libertarianism before the internet made libertarianism a thing. You can see how car ownership is a handy condenser (and propagator) of this kind of politics. Cars give drivers freedom to roam. The road is their domain to push the motor to its limits, of being free from all authority in one's enclosed four-wheel personal space. Bikes, pedestrians, buses, they all get in the way and should be kept off the roads. Nothing should interfere with the right to drive. This ideology of the road also underpins (traditionally American) lifestyles, and is not-so-subtly promoted by Top Gear itself. Clarkson could be Dreher too - he doesn't like cyclists, thinks the state is too nannying, and rejects climate change because it threatens his inalienable right to tear arse around the world in growling, gas-guzzling, CO2 emitting monsters. He is a living, breathing middle finger to anyone who wants to make the world a half-decent place to live in, and instantiation of all that is petty, small-minded, and selfish. Unfortunately, a not inconsiderable minority of voters habitually relate to this stuff. That is why Clarkson is so potent. He bridges the gap between political mindset and social circle familiarity. When you think about it, Clarkson is perhaps the ideal celebrity replacement for Farage should the great leader come unstuck in South Thanet. What an awful thought. If that's the case, Save Clarkson!
