Spitting Image, Fitbit Anxiety, Lockdown Nonsense, Social Media, Letters
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| A Grotesque Accouchement Pietro della Vecchia (1603-1678) (attributed to) Photo Credit: Wellcome Collection [Public Domain] |
The good news is that Spitting Image, the satirical puppet show that lampooned politicians and celebrities, is back on our screens this autumn. The bad news is that the current climate of fear around causing offence means that the new show could be a politically cowardly imitation of the original, which glorified in pushing the boundaries of the acceptable.
The early signs are not good. Senior ITV executives have already held meetings to discuss how high-profile figures such as the Duchess of Sussex, Beyoncè and Kanye West should be portrayed amid concern that puppet caricatures could prompt accusations of racism. Kevin Lygo, ITV's director of television, said that the conversations covered "What's OK, what's not OK.
This question itself shows a certain tone-deafness about what makes for good satire. Surely the whole point of a show like Spitting Image is to explore what some might deem "not OK". In its prime, during the Eighties and Nineties, no public figure was exempt from humiliation and the puppets were deliberately grotesque caricatures: Margaret Thatcher was dressed in a man's suit, becoming more manic and domineering with each passing year; John Major's glove puppet was entirely grey; and Norman Tebbit was portrayed as a menacing skinhead in a leather jacket. It's what made the show a hit.
What chance though of anyone daring to push such boundaries in the new series? There's already talk about "getting it right" by committee: code for PC jokes as well as steering clear of anything sensitive.
Apparently issues such as whether only a black actor can voice a black character and whether only black writers should write for black puppets are on the agenda.
...Will black actors be banned from voicing white puppets? Can a black actor not do the voice of a white politician? Will it now be a hate crime for a man to do the voice of a woman puppet? ...being the best mimic is all that should count.
...If it's a choice between politically correct and unfunny, and hilarious but potentially offensive, I know which kind of comedy wins hands down every time.
(Jawad Iqbal, The Times, 2020)
Isn't ridicule the whole point of satire and isn't this achieved by means of irony, sarcasm, invective, wit and humour? No doubt intended viewers will be reminded before the programme begins that some of the sketches may cause offence. They may even be given a telephone number where they can express their outraged feelings. Sensitive souls should use the remote.
*...Thus the Queen Mother was portrayed swigging gin, ... the home secretary Douglas Hurd as half-dalek, the Labour leader Neil Kinnock broke into No 10 to see what it was like, the shadow chancellor Roy Hattersley covered everyone in spit, while David Owen and a little David Steel from the newly formed SDP-Liberal alliance were usually in bed together, with little David apologising for wetting himself.
Margaret Thatcher, whose reign turned out to be essential to the show, which withered after her resignation, used the gents' loos, smoked cigars and, in one of the best-remembered sketches, sat with her cabinet in a restaurant, ordered raw steak and, when asked, "What about the vegetables?" replied, "They'll have the same as me."
(Stephen Armstrong, The Sunday Times, 2020)
*...The revival of Britain's most celebrated satirical series is not being screened in the US after the television network NBC backed out at the last moment for fear of offending powerful people, The Times understands.
When Roger Law, the show's co-creator, confirmed plans to revive the comedy last year, he made clear that America, rather than Britain, would be the show's primary target.
"If you're going to go after the bastards you may as well go after the biggest bastards there are."
... Executives may have decided that the show's raucously insulting British humour - the first episode includes Donald Trump tweeting from an unlikely part of his body - would not play well with American family audiences.
The number of media and tech executives lampooned in the show, from the Amazon chief Jeff Bezos to Facebook's boss Mark Zuckerberg, could also have proved a complicating factor.
(Matthew Moore, The Times, 2020)
Fitbit Anxiety
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| 'Anxiety' Head of a Girl Jean Baptiste Greuze (1725-1805) Photo Credit: Victoria Art Gallery [CC BY-NC-ND] |
For heart patients at least, the added stress this brings can offset any health boost that comes from using them.
...It's not the first time an overreliance on trackers has been shown to have a detrimental effect. In a paper published in the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine Dr Kelly Glazer Baron, an associate professor in the Division of Public Health at the University of Utah, suggested that an obsession with sleep tracking has resulted in some people sleeping less well because they are so preoccupied with the stats.
...Meanwhile, Julie Ward, a senior cardiac nurse at the British Heart Foundation, urges anyone with a chronic condition "to discuss their particular choice of tracker device with their GP or specialist, to ensure they are comfortable with how to interpret the readings". A little data can be a dangerous thing.
(Peta Bee, The Times, 2020)
*Smartwatches can tell us how many calories we burn, how well we sleep and even track menstrual cycles, but now a new one can monitor a key feature in our busy lives: stress levels.
Fitbit claims that its latest smart-watch is able to measure electrical impulses on the skin called electrodermal activity (EDA), which can reveal signs of stress. The Fitbit Sense, which costs £300, was described by the US company as its "most advanced health smartwatch".
James Park, Fitbit's co-founder and chief executive said: "Our mission to make everyone in the world healthier has never been more important than it is today."
...A new mindfulness tool is being added to the app, from which users can set weekly goals and reminders, log their mood and meditate.
Fitbit, which is being bought by Google for $2 billion, is in need of a hit product. Once the leader in the smart wearables market, its market share dropped to just 2 per cent in global smartwatches in the first half of the year.
(Tom Knowles, The Times, 2020)
So there we are. Are you really trying to make everyone in the world healthier, James? Goals, targets, aims and objectives are now being applied to the human psyche. What happens if you don't reach your daily targets? Does the smartwatch gently encourage you to do more? Or does it take a more robust line? Does the response depend on one's nationality?
Lockdown Nonsense and then, thankfully, some sense.
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| Ennui Walter Richard Sickert (1860-1942) Photo Credit: Tate [CC BY-NC-ND] |
I fully accept the psychological stripping-down we've all undergone. Maybe life is not about striving. Maybe it's about resisting the weird nouveau-riche yuppie impulse to have a big lockdown makeover and boast about it. Maybe we need to learn how to sit with discomfort and stop thinking that life is meant to be some kind of perpetually unfolding adventure, a scintillating journey where we're always asking: "What next?" Why do we have to turn our psyches inside out to find our transformed, improved, optimised and actualised best selves?
...In a situation such as a global pandemic, clinging to elaborate fantasies about what life might be like when it's all over is much less practical than looking at what you have and deciding it's OK...
(Bidisha SK Mamata, The Guardian, 2020)
Why are some people trying to find a "meaning"? Why do some struggle with the idea that there is no hidden meaning to find? Aren't most of the things that happen to us pure chance?
Social Media
He was the actor who slew every sacred cow and whose memoirs set a new bar for rudeness by a Hollywood insider.
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| Young Witches at Play in the Night Sky Ernest Procter (1886-1935) Photo Credit: Penlee House Gallery & Museum [CC BY-ND] |
Now Rupert Everett is scared to be honest because of the judgemental "cauldron of hags in the virtual world". Everett, 61, an actor, director and writer said that until this year he had felt free to "say it as you find it".
... At The Times and The Sunday Times Cheltenham Literature Festival last night Everett... referring to the former East German security service said
"We are in such a weird new world, a kind of Stasi where if you don't reflect exactly the right attitude you risk everything being destroyed for you by this judgemental, sanctimonious, intransigent, intractable, invisible cauldron of hags in the virtual world."
Everett... admitted to a fear of being cancelled despite having a tough carapace.
... In a separate talk at the festival the author DBC Pierre warned of "data rape" by social media companies.
"Under all the digital instruments we are using, and particularly social media, there is this data rape going on in the background which is extremely aggressive and designed at great expense to bypass our awareness."
He said that all online actions were being run through algorithms and reduced to data, which meant "we have ceased to be the client of those digital services ... we are just the fodder".
Pierre added that to ensure the digital revolution remained beneficial people should reclaim control of their own data and stop accepting "that is somehow the quid pro quo for a free service or connectivity".
(David Sanderson, The Times, 2020)
*Companies collecting data for pubs and restaurants to help them fulfil their contact-tracing duties are harvesting confidential customer information to sell.
Legal experts have warned of a "privacy crisis" caused by a rise in companies exploiting QR barcodes to take names, addresses, telephone numbers and email details, before passing them on marketers, credit companies and insurance brokers.
... Gaurav Malhotra, director of Level 5, a software development company that supplies the government, said data could end up in the hands of scammers.
"If you're suddenly getting loads of texts, your data has probably been sold on from track-and-trace systems," he said.
... Ordamo, which provides track and trace services for restaurants, states that data from website visitors is "retained for 25 years", a duration Hazel Grant, head of privacy at Fieldfisher, a law firm, said would be "very difficult to justify". Ordamo did not respond to requests for comment.
(Shanti Das and Shingi Mararike, The Sunday Times, 2020)
Letters
Sir, I am not sure that the student whose placard read "Oi gavin! Our Teachers are qualified to give grades. Yo'ur not!" should expect high marks.
(Rosemary Freestone, Devizes, Wilts, The Times, 2020)
Sir, Tom Stubbs's letter reminded me of the early morning when my daughter, aged three, accompanied me to the valley below our house in Bath to bury a much-loved rabbit. On our return journey my daughter became emotional. Imagine the look on the faces of the parents dropping off their children at the local primary school as they saw me with a shovel over my shoulder as my daughter screamed "I want my mummy!"
(Simon Edwards, Sarremezan, France, The Times, 2020)
Sir, The person from Ilfracombe who was directed by Test & Trace to the centre in Swansea was lucky: my attempt yesterday to book a test in Cardiff resulted in my being offered a slot in Inverness in five days time, a round trip of more than 1,100 miles. Still, at least it would have given me time to get there.
(Alan Jones, Cardiff, The Times, 2020)
I was disappointed to see the former Manchester Guardian describing Birmingham as "the UK's second city". Here in Manchester we absolutely know which is the UK's second city. It's London.
(Peter Milburn, Manchester, The Guardian, 2020)
The next day
We in Liverpool agree that London is the UK's second city which makes Manchester the UK's third city.
(Mike Flatley, Liverpool, The Guardian, 2020)
and the next
If London is the UK's second city, how do we differentiate between Liverpool, Manchester and Birmingham for third, fourth and fifth?
(Stuart Nisbet, Glasgow, The Guardian, 2020)
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