tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27375507034626514612024-02-18T18:33:14.724-08:00Blog without qualitiesThe unpublishable ramblings of a man whose published ramblings are posted on his <a href="http://www.dbfreelance.co.uk">website</a> and who is on Twitter as <a href="http://www.twitter.com/DeeBeeFree">@DeeBeeFree</a> Davidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03662243675288847759noreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2737550703462651461.post-47764559189027836752017-10-06T04:05:00.002-07:002017-10-06T04:09:30.972-07:00Dreams & Miscellanea <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
DREAM: 30th September 2017<br />
<a href="http://telegra.ph/Dream-30th-September-2017-09-30">http://telegra.ph/Dream-30th-September-2017-09-30</a></div>
Davidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03662243675288847759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2737550703462651461.post-68454006522860370902014-07-10T13:58:00.000-07:002014-07-11T06:24:25.447-07:00Hunger close to home<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<b><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Food banks in Lewes, the town of Bill's breakfasts, artisan loaves
and gourmet everything? There must be some mistake... surely?</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="color: black; font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My weekly food shop (just for me – I’ve no
dependents) usually comes to about £65. It must be affordable, since I rarely
check the total as I’m clicking away filling my virtual basket. It’s hardly
decadent, despite the odd cake and bottle of beer. I’m neither a high earner
nor a compulsive eater, but I can – and do – buy enough food to satisfy my
appetite’s every whim. The weekly shop is just the start; I live in Lewes,
after all, where the culinary temptations are manifold.</span><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Barely a weekend goes by without my splurging an
addition £20 or £30 on a meal at the Snowdrop, an Indian from Chaula’s or a
pizza (plus pudding, naturally) from Waitrose. Oh, and I buy fresh bread from
my local shop St Pancras Stores at £3.30 a pop – pricy, yes, but delicious, so
why not? That makes it at least £80 per week on food… not yet fat, not yet
broke, so no problem.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">I was taken aback, therefore, to learn that some of
my neighbours, people who live just five minutes’ walk up the road, rely on food
banks to save them from going hungry. How could it be?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">How could it be that people from our almost
parodically affluent town need charitable support of this most basic kind? It
was difficult for me to believe, as it is for many Lewesians, according to Pearl
Zia, manager of De Montfort food bank.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">“When I was outside Waitrose [fundraising for the
food bank], people said to me, ‘We don’t have food poverty here. We have money;
we can buy our own food’. I told them that that’s not true. </span><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">They just close their blinkers, and you’ve got the
poor people who are working yet don’t have money to cover the basics and are
going hungry.”</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">I meet with Pearl at the flat in Ousedale Close
where she runs the De Montfort food bank, the biggest of Lewes’s four food
banks – the others are Malling, Landport and the Oyster Project (the latter is
specifically for people with disabilities). De Montfort is a part of Lewes I’d
never visited or even passed through before, tucked as it is between Western
Road to the south and the tree-lined boulevard of Prince Edward’s Road to the
north (in which, incidentally, the average property price is £680,000*). Pearl
tells me that, of the 150 homes on the estate, only one is privately owned; the
rest is social housing.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">De Montfort’s was the first food bank in Lewes, set
up by Pearl in December 2012. When I arrive, the ground floor flat from which
the service is run is stacked with crates, tins and packets everywhere; the
food bank has just received a large delivery from <a href="http://www.fareshare.org.uk/">Fareshare</a>,
a charity that collects surplus stock from supermarkets – food that would
otherwise go to waste – and delivers it to charities and community groups like
this one. Delivery man Dave tells me that he and his colleagues salvage and
redistribute 400 tonnes of food each year in the Brighton area alone (more on
food waste in Brighton and a cameo by Pearl in <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/mar/27/brighton-food-waste-collective">this <i>Guardian </i>piece</a>).<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">What motivated Pearl to set up the food bank?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">“I had a need for a food bank myself when I was in
temporary accommodation, nearly four years ago. That’s what pushed me to do it,
because I know what it’s like.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Knowing what it’s like means understanding the reality
of finding oneself alone and at the mercy of strangers when one's life veers unexpectedly from the plan. Pearl had lived in London all her life, was earning a good
salary as a retail manager and then as a PCSO, until a marriage breakdown “and
other circumstances” left her homeless and forced her to relocate.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">“I went into temporary accommodation in Brighton,
but couldn’t get housed there, so I ended up moving here. The only person I
knew was my housing officer.” The sense of isolation was short-lived; before
long Pearl was actively involved in community-improvement projects and groups,
and now speaks with great pride and fondness for her hometown. “I think now I
know more people in Lewes than people who’ve lived in Lewes all their lives.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Pearl tells me how she sits down with each new user
of the food bank and goes through their needs so that she can package
provisions for them accordingly.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">“Most of the people who come here are families with
young children, so I make sure that in each bag they have enough to make them
meals for a couple of days.” <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">We have not been chatting for long when Pearl’s
helpers begin to arrive – volunteers who assist with the weekly task of sorting
through the food and making up bags ready for collection. I meet Tim, former
food bank user turned helper, a big, quiet man, aged about 50, at a guess. By
way of introduction, Pearl says, “Tim was living in the woods for a couple of
years.” Tim nods but says nothing. I’m not sure how to ask, or rather where to
begin. Living in the wild for years? All year round in the open?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">“Well, in a two-man tent, yes,” says Tim,
matter-of-factly. Wasn’t that horribly hard? “To start with, yes, but you get
used to it.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Gradually more details emerge: Tim ran an army
surplus shop in Exeter which went bankrupt. He “lost everything” and ended up
trekking west to east across southern Britain surviving as best he could with
nothing except his camping equipment. Didn’t he seek help from welfare
services?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">“Yeah, but you get the same answer all the time:
they say you’ve made yourself homeless so we can’t help you, plus being a
single chap you’re low priority. It was like the Spanish Inquisition; they ask
you every single thing, and make you feel like that.” He indicates tininess
with thumb and forefinger. “So I decided I wouldn’t bother anymore.”</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Tim tells me how he survived by gathering dropped
or discarded coins from pavements until he had enough to afford a packet of
own-brand Rich Tea biscuits. And during cold snaps survival was even more
gruelling. “The Christmas before last, I couldn’t get out, there was about
three foot of snow, and I was in the tent, and all I had to drink was melted
snow and nothing to eat for about a week, and no heat. That wasn’t very nice.
That was pretty rough.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">While he was sleeping rough in a patch of woodland
near Plumpton, Tim was chanced upon by an inquisitive mountain biker who asked
about his circumstances. “I didn’t realise at the time, but he worked at the
council,” Tim recalls. “He said he’d bring me some food, and so he did – he
turned up the next week with a couple of tins of soup and a packet of biscuits,
and he brought me a radio, and he gave me Pearl’s details and told me to come
and see her.”</span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Pearl provided Tim with food and put him in touch
with the relevant people to get him re-homed and, effectively, back into
society. Tim may not be a typical food bank user, but his story is a stark
reminder of how people down on their luck easily become marginalised, and how
marginalised people easily become invisible.<o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">The more typical way to end up at a food bank is
via a referral from an organisation or professional formally authorised to
assess need, for example, the Job Centre, a health visitor or Citizen’s Advice
Bureau. If you presumed that food banks were hubs of no-strings-attached
hand-outs, you were way off the mark, at least insofar as this one is
concerned.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">“It’s all referrals,” Pearl confirms. “Unless
you’ve got a referral form, you can’t come back.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">That said, she is not a stickler for the rules;
exceptions are made. “If there are children involved… I won’t turn anyone away,
not if I know they’ve got young children. I don’t know if they’ve got any [food
at all] indoors; I’m not privy to their cupboards.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVNL6HxhmyM1E5p0UNQcQivbSJbReF5U0Sli4B3xgjW1u536SrIY22RMU3g8NTCn-mFA5dxbfsWXWYx5wlnClc9GkEhA8yBppbXOo_CrHrFPpgg15fM6YVwV9u7SBRyUUqVbQpA5ITFaCM/s1600/Pearl+Zia+food+bank.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVNL6HxhmyM1E5p0UNQcQivbSJbReF5U0Sli4B3xgjW1u536SrIY22RMU3g8NTCn-mFA5dxbfsWXWYx5wlnClc9GkEhA8yBppbXOo_CrHrFPpgg15fM6YVwV9u7SBRyUUqVbQpA5ITFaCM/s1600/Pearl+Zia+food+bank.jpg" height="320" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pearl Zia, founder of De Montfort food bank</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">I am keen to know whether demand on the De Montfort
food bank is growing, and if so, why.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">“Yes, it’s gone from serving 10 people to serving
40 people a week,” says Pearl, “and also now we’ve got a mobile food bank, a
van that lets us go out and do visits to Chailey.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Subsequently I learn that Landport and Malling food
banks have witnessed similar growth in demand. Bearing in mind that most of the
recipients have families, many with young children, it’s fair to assume that in
any given week more than 200 Lewes residents are fed by this emergency provision.
It’s a similar picture across the country; the Trussell Trust, a church
organisation that supports many of the UK’s food banks, recently reported that
the number of people receiving emergency food has risen almost 15-fold since
2010. </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="h.gjdgxs"></a><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">As I am asking
Pearl for more detail as to why so many people are finding themselves in
desperate need, she gets a fortuitously timed visit from Mike Cahill, manager
of East Sussex County Council’s Discretionary Support Scheme (a service of last
resort for people literally on the breadline). He’s possibly the perfect person
to ask: Why are more and more people having to resort to emergency help with
food?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">“The biggest cause we’re seeing is people having
their benefits messed around with, the biggest by miles. Since October, when
they started sanctioning more people’s benefits, the demand has just jumped
up.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Why would authorities choose to sanction the
benefits of people who have little or nothing to fall back on?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">“The biggest reason given is people apparently not
attending medicals with Atos, even though some of these people are housebound
and cannot attend, [in which cases] Atos have said, ‘OK, well, we’ll send
someone to you’, but then their benefits get stopped anyway. Or they have
turned up [for a medical] and there’s no one there, and their benefits are
stopped anyway. It’s shocking. They seem to have got a whole lot stricter.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Mike explains that he has seen a surge in people
having welfare payments stopped at short notice for no legitimate reason and
then having to wait days or even weeks to get the decision overturned –
meanwhile unable to make ends meet. He has also seen an increase in claimants
with ill health being told they must sign on for Jobseeker’s Allowance and seek
work – even though who are blatantly too unwell to do so.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">“There was one person who had a lung problem where
he couldn’t lie down. If he lay down, he was going to die. He had to sleep
sitting up. And they told him he was fit for work, and they stopped his money.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">At the same time, council support services are
falling victim to ongoing budget cuts; funding allocated to Mike’s own scheme,
which was £1.2m for the current year, is being slashed to zero from next April.
And his scheme is one of the luckier ones. “East Sussex County Council is doing
what they can to keep it going and trying to find the funds elsewhere, but
across the country it’s going to have a massive impact.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Mike tells me he has worked in welfare provision
for more than 20 years. Are these the most pernicious reforms he has seen
implemented?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">“Oh yes, by miles. Most changes that have happened
in that 20 years, they sort of make sense. Jobseeker’s Allowance, for example,
makes sense [in principle]... Tax credits, yeah, maybe. Now, though, [payments]
just seem to be cut – without thinking about the effect it will have.” And the
system for claimants may be about to get even more bewildering. “Universal
credit is coming, and in theory it’s logical, but rolling up benefits into a
monthly payment including the housing benefit that would have been going
[directly] to the landlord, that’s going to get very confusing for
people.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">*Source: zoopla.co.uk</span></span></div>
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<i><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"><a href="http://www.lewes.gov.uk/news/21695.asp">Lewes food banks</a> welcome donations. For more
information on the De Montfort food bank, contact Pearl Zia at:
pearlzia@ymail.com.</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
</span></div>
</div>Davidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03662243675288847759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2737550703462651461.post-51509170139972596272014-04-01T05:44:00.001-07:002017-08-29T07:53:09.989-07:00Land of Mo-hope and bygone glory<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" id="docs-internal-guid-52e269fa-1ce1-dc7d-4703-459a8dcc5b43" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<i>Published in truncated form in </i>Runner's World<i> May 2014</i><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span><br />
<br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">In
1984 Britain was a global force in marathon running, complete with the
world record and an Olympic medal. Now, 30 years later, we pin all our
hopes on one man who’s yet to make his debut. What went wrong, and can
we ever return our winning ways?</span></div>
<br />
Photography: <a href="http://justinwood.co.uk/" target="_blank">Justin Wood</a><br />
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">When
Mo Farah toes the start line of the 2014 Virgin London Marathon, the
buzz of expectation surrounding him will be electric. His thousands of
home supporters – the Union flag-waving, moboting multitudes – will line
the capital’s streets in frenetic anticipation. We have been waiting a
very long time. Twenty-one years have passed since a British man last
won the London Marathon: Eamonn Martin in 1993. A whole generation of
Britons have grown up never witnessing a fellow countryman break the
tape, not just in London, but in any world-class marathon. Could the
wait finally be over?</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">London
will be Farah’s debut marathon, just as it was for Martin in 1993, but
the challenge facing Mo is vastly different. Martin, 34 at the time and a
former Commonwealth 10,000m champion, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/athletics/22178190">out-kicked Mexican Isidro Rico to clinch victory on Westminster Bridge in 2:10:50</a>. Taking nothing away
from Martin’s achievement, his winning time was the slowest since the
inaugural race in 1981, and is six minutes 10 seconds outside the
current course record, set by Emmanuel Mutai in 2011. In distance terms,
that’s a gap of more than 2km. The Kenyan averaged an astounding 4:45
per mile and covered the decisive 10km split from 30km to 40km in 28:45
(4:38 per mile) – faster than any British man ran for 10k last year.</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">With
the exception of the 2013 race, which was unusually poorly paced, the
slowest winning time in London over the past six years was 2:05:19 in
2010. That’s nearly two minutes faster than Steve Jones’s 28-year-old
British record. Can we really expect Farah to win on his first attempt?
His Olympic medals are solid (gold) proof that he has the talent, the
outright speed and the guts – plus, he holds the UK half-marathon record
of 60:59. But does he have the even deeper store of endurance needed to
hang with the leaders over 26.2 miles, covering their inevitable brutal
surges before outkicking them to victory? Bear in mind, he will have to
sustain sub-2:06 pace (4:48 per mile) – 10 seconds per mile faster than
Martin in 1993 – just to be in with a chance.</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">We’ve
every reason to feel optimistic for Mo; after all, the form-book deems
him the best distance runner in the world. Yes, a British runner is the
best in the world – well worth repeating. But, as gratifying as that is,
it raises an awkward question: does Farah’s ascent to the top herald
the UK’s return to the front of the pack in world-class marathon
running? Sadly, the answer is a resounding no. Farah is an exception, a
freakishly fast outlier, vastly more successful than all his British
contemporaries. The same was true of Paula Radcliffe, whose 2:15:25
world record from 2003 remains nearly three minutes ahead of the
second-fastest-ever woman, and an astonishing 7:47 quicker than the
next-fastest British female.</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The
story of British marathon running over the past 30 years is one of
bottom-up decline, where only the very top has defied the trend. Paula’s
achievements – and Mo’s potential – distract us from the dire reality,
which is that no other British marathoners, male or female, are getting
anywhere near world-class standard. Our fastest man in 2013 ran 2:15:04 –
nearly 12 minutes adrift of the world lead (Wilson Kipsang’s new world
record of 2:03:23), while our fastest woman clocked 2:30:46 – 10 minutes
wide of the world-leading mark and some 15 minutes slower than Paula’s
world record. Britain’s prospects beyond Mo are quite literally too few
to mention.</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">It
was not always thus. Thirty years ago, Britain was arguably the best
marathon-running nation in the world, with not only star performers but a
huge depth of talent too. In 1984, no fewer than 75 men broke the 2:20
mark, and the hundredth-fastest man that year clocked a speedy (by
today’s standards) 2:21:32. These days we’re lucky if a dozen men break
2:20 each year, having hit a low point of just five in 2007, when the
hundredth-fastest man clocked a very modest 2:37:14. The extent of the
decline is startling and disconcerting – especially when you consider
how over the same period UK marathon running, in terms of sheer numbers,
has grown spectacularly. So what’s going on?</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">I
decided to seek out and draw together, within my home county of Sussex,
two people who together should be able to shed some light on what has
changed: the county’s fastest marathoner from then, Derek Stevens, who
ran 2:12:41 in 1984, and our fastest now, Jon Pepper, who clocked
2:19:10 in October 2013. Derek’s PB would easily top the UK rankings
today, but in 1984 it was only good enough for eighth spot. Jon’s best
put him 11th in the UK rankings last year, so his and Derek’s fastest
marathons are of equivalent merit relative to the standard of their day.
Equivalent yet separated by six and a half minutes – more than a mile
of running. How to account for this generational slowdown? Or, more
bluntly, why can’t Brits keep up in marathons anymore?</span></div>
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">***</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Derek
is now 59, recently retired from a senior position in local government and runs only
occasionally to keep fit; Jon is 25 and squeezes in twice-daily
training around his full-time job as a school science technician. The
three of us meet at Lewes athletics track and take our seats for a
roundtable discussion in the upstairs of the club-house overlooking the
home straight.</span></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; height: 262px; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right; width: 347px;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2_oDxTV_DwXGqfvrn0TZYVxC4AC7CbW6XAtxMGS0l5WC70ULmTJDBLJp4_o7ZDCLEdIDRceCzx3CxxonuSbNr4wLSMSYwVNtLOdaCnNljIqVpG5T-kMxFU6QSqsOf-_TFO-bE_D3kKJQM/s1600/DerekandJon_sm.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2_oDxTV_DwXGqfvrn0TZYVxC4AC7CbW6XAtxMGS0l5WC70ULmTJDBLJp4_o7ZDCLEdIDRceCzx3CxxonuSbNr4wLSMSYwVNtLOdaCnNljIqVpG5T-kMxFU6QSqsOf-_TFO-bE_D3kKJQM/s1600/DerekandJon_sm.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Derek Stevens (PB 2:12:41, set in 1984) and Jon Pepper (PB 2:19:10, set in 2013)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">I
begin by quoting Charlie Spedding – whose 2:08:33 from 1985 still
stands as the English record – from an interview in the Independent
where he is responding to the question, why is British distance running
in decline? </span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“There’s
not one straightforward, simple answer. There are several factors.”
Spedding lists the ones he thinks are most significant. “Children are
not as active as they were 40 or 50 years ago… Teenagers [nowadays] see
people running in fancy dress or trying to lose weight [rather than] as a
serious sport. It’s just not seen as a cool thing for teenagers to be
involved in.”</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Derek
is nodding eagerly. “Charlie is right. When I was six or seven years
old [in 1960-61], I was running more than a lot of the athletes today
run. It was play. We used to run and cycle everywhere. Televisions were
still black and white. I think my generation was fundamentally just so
much fitter by the time we got to secondary school.”</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“I
definitely agree with that,” Jon says. “I’ve worked in schools since
graduating, and I can’t imagine kids being any less fit [than they are
now]… I’ll do a lap of the field as a warm-up and I’ll find only one out
of 30 can do it without stopping.”</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The
suspicion that children have become less fit is backed up by strong and
mounting scientific research. A recent study undertaken by the American
Heart Association involving millions of children of various
nationalities found that on average nine-to-17-year-olds today run 90
seconds per mile slower than their counterparts did 30 years ago –
representing a decline in cardiovascular fitness of five per cent per
decade since 1975.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">And
children who are generally less active are naturally less inclined to
get involved in a physically demanding sport like running. Jon sums up
the catch-22 situation:</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“If
your level of fitness is low, why the hell would you want to go and
run? It’s horrible when you’re unfit! You can’t really blame them.”</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Childhood
activity not only lays the physical foundations for distance running,
it also triggers the urge to compete, often in response to a direct or
perceived challenge thrown down by a rival or role model. Consider this
classic example from Derek:</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“Our
school’s sports field was half a mile up a track. We had this cocky
teacher – I was only 11 – and he said, ‘I’ll give anyone a shilling if
they can beat me up to the field’. And I beat him!” His eyes sparkle as
he recalls this seminal victory – the satisfaction is still there,
undimmed over the decades.</span></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgD_SEL9BQ_lbwopoBoEKNb-DfUO3MomhJyncwHDTEq6lNx8WqB-64lm0A-IaelDWyKbbnsjF3_8pLh7WTX7pUGcL-02PUFjiPkLx6w-UaqBBSo330F0D98vHTU4SewQzkBn4YuqBgpLB4Z/s1600/DSC_9171.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgD_SEL9BQ_lbwopoBoEKNb-DfUO3MomhJyncwHDTEq6lNx8WqB-64lm0A-IaelDWyKbbnsjF3_8pLh7WTX7pUGcL-02PUFjiPkLx6w-UaqBBSo330F0D98vHTU4SewQzkBn4YuqBgpLB4Z/s1600/DSC_9171.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jon quizzes Derek on how to nail 26.2 Eighties-style</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">In
Derek’s heyday, he and others like him had an abundance of role models
to follow: world-beating marathoners like Jones and Spedding, not to
mention track icons like Seb Coe and Steve Ovett. At regional level too,
there were more runners competing at a higher standard, and most clubs
had at least one or two admired high-achievers. Derek’s first club
Bexhill AC counted among its members one of Britain’s all-time greats,
Dave Bedford. “It was a great moment for me, as a 12-year-old, to be
running with the man who was then the best in the world over 10k.”
Later, Derek joined Hastings AC and often travelled to other Sussex
clubs to train among the best in the county. “You need to seek groups
out,” he advises Jon. “I used to come over [to Brighton] and run with
Ovett and Mark Rowland [who still holds the UK record for the 3,000m
steeplechase], and knew I’d get hammered! But you need to do that.”</span></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhf5efKmCIJ497Wgn8Q7fVeFsIMKp7cE_CR7dJc0clRR_SCGV09ASt6RUMHRoiCbvF9KDAEhS_6NaN_VV4NAZGYWup17GK4F0qDNAFZD1qxoI7cuUwIY4tKoUGuuQfWyNV_1HrI5g1cQqaw/s1600/DSC_9443.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhf5efKmCIJ497Wgn8Q7fVeFsIMKp7cE_CR7dJc0clRR_SCGV09ASt6RUMHRoiCbvF9KDAEhS_6NaN_VV4NAZGYWup17GK4F0qDNAFZD1qxoI7cuUwIY4tKoUGuuQfWyNV_1HrI5g1cQqaw/s1600/DSC_9443.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Derek: "I'd train with Ovett and get hammered!"</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Jon’s
first club was Enfield and Haringey, and, like Derek, he was inspired
by the man at the front in training. “The top guy in our group was a guy
called Andy Coleman, whose highlight was coming second in the Great
North Run [in 2000]. He ran 62 minutes and nearly won it and was on TV.”
Witnessing his club-mate perform so well in a prestigious race clearly
had a huge impact. “Seeing that, it makes it very real to you, and I was
never looking back then because I realised I could do that. Without
that, who knows; it could have just petered out for me. That was
massive.” </span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">But
unlike Derek and his peers, Jon’s generation has never witnessed
first-hand fellow countrymen winning world-class marathons. Instead, Jon
has admired the stars of Derek’s era in hindsight by poring over
historic results and becoming a self-confessed “running anorak”. “It
seems quite distant,” he admits. “Like something that’s not that real
because you’ve never seen a Briton run that fast.” Indeed, it was not a
Briton but a Kenyan, Sammy Wanjiru – winner of Olympic gold in Beijing
aged just 22 – who inspired Jon to step up to the marathon while still
in his early 20s.</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Enchantment
with East African runners is nothing new, of course – Derek reveals
that his boyhood hero was Abebe Bikila, Ethiopian winner of the Olympic
Marathon in 1960 and 1964 – but the competitive balance has dramatically
shifted. Last year alone, East African runners racked up over 130
sub-2:10 performances, whereas not a single Briton has run that fast
since 2005. Have would-be British contenders been put off by what seems
like unbeatable opposition?</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“No,”
says Jon. “It should still be a motivating factor to be the best in
Britain.” He flatly rejects the notion that upcoming athletes like him
are put off or held back through drawing international comparisons. “It
must be something within the British running scene that’s the problem.”</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Derek
agrees. “It wouldn’t worry me that the East Africans are so good,
because I’d want to be the best in Sussex and the best domestically.”</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Former
world cross-country runner-up Tim Hutchings’ diagnosis is that
Britain’s best runners no longer race against one another often enough.
Derek broadly supports this theory, though he emphasises that his
marathon preparation always took precedence over interim races. “I’d
race five or six times within a 16-week schedule, sometimes racing off
100 miles a week.”</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Jon
takes a different approach, preferring to taper for tune-up races
rather than sustaining a high volume; he believes structured preparation
with specific efforts works better for him than constant hard training
with frequent racing on top.</span></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; height: 367px; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right; width: 317px;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXPTaU_NWXUOaADXjYDU2lTydA96r-ic1ZLO_Lljt0wJ6ez_FjVTnK-9K2NGQ8sP9UFcBqcSS6cm7BB8w04kX-EO5DMHc0zjlEN7Azg_W1B6TAimoOAsj5Q1y4fztYMoTA-lCskcxp_QhL/s1600/Derek+Stevens+1+001.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXPTaU_NWXUOaADXjYDU2lTydA96r-ic1ZLO_Lljt0wJ6ez_FjVTnK-9K2NGQ8sP9UFcBqcSS6cm7BB8w04kX-EO5DMHc0zjlEN7Azg_W1B6TAimoOAsj5Q1y4fztYMoTA-lCskcxp_QhL/s1600/Derek+Stevens+1+001.jpg" width="232" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Derek won the Grandma's Marathon in Duluth, Minnesota, on 16th June 1984, clocking 2:12:41 </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">As
regards the particulars of training, then versus now, it’s striking how
little has changed – despite presumed advances in sports science.
Derek’s regime was based on Arthur Lydiard’s time-honoured principles: a
periodised plan with base-building, strength and anaerobic phases, and
high overall volume.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“I
could always train really hard. Three intense sessions [each week], and
good distance stuff, at a good pace… Over the 16-week build-up, I would
average 95-100 miles a week.”</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Jon
has had more injuries to deal with, so his training log reveals more
recovery days between intense sessions and slightly lower overall
mileage. Even so, his and Derek’s training plans are fundamentally
similar, and I doubt that picking apart the minor differences would
yield any telling insight.</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">The
fact is, Jon and Derek are of the same athletic breed – dedicated,
disciplined and fiercely competitive – but it’s a breed that has become
vanishingly rare. Which is the crux of the problem. Marathoning success
is a numbers game; each nation needs a critical mass of its population
to start young and build a strong aerobic base before undertaking
several years of hard, consistent training. Far fewer Britons are doing
that now, and among the tiny number who are, ‘excellence’ is defined in
relation to one another, so the decline is self-perpetuating.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“I
guess it’s easier now for someone like me to say I’ll try to run 2:18
or 2:16 [rather than a world-class time],” admits Jon, “because I’ll
still be one of the best in the country and that’ll be all right.”
You cannot blame him; reaching sub-2:20 standard requires enormous
commitment - why push even harder when you’re already the best in your
region and one of the best in the country?</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; height: 247px; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left; width: 362px;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrtlVH5pqukNar5d_Nl1phlnhp6iREVBLJWfPvQjWGNIVOl-xpcwwNSeIsVyhETk_JKr-i0hyphenhyphen-NVYP3963YJy1__gHi4FRd5duJFJ8nuzjrD5DNCv1XSxdf1Ocw93wRqP-ZTYK9YwTE4sr/s1600/Derek+Stevens_top+50+001.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="202" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrtlVH5pqukNar5d_Nl1phlnhp6iREVBLJWfPvQjWGNIVOl-xpcwwNSeIsVyhETk_JKr-i0hyphenhyphen-NVYP3963YJy1__gHi4FRd5duJFJ8nuzjrD5DNCv1XSxdf1Ocw93wRqP-ZTYK9YwTE4sr/s1600/Derek+Stevens_top+50+001.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Clipping from 1984 notes how Derek's achievements are hardly noticed by the press </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">
The root of the problem lies not within UK running but around and beyond it. British leisure culture has evolved along the lines of ‘the survival of the unfittest’; with the introduction of new technology and gadgets, sedentary amusements have replaced outdoor play. British youngsters while away their spare time socialising, shopping, or in front of screens, tweeting, texting, gaming – and putting on weight while their aerobic potential withers. Meanwhile, Kenyan kids are outdoors being physically active for as much as 3.5 hours every day – while dreaming of emulating their champion compatriots. It’s no wonder we’re lagging so far behind.
<br />
</span><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
</div>
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">
<br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Can
Britain return to aerobic health and fall back in love with competitive
marathon running? There are glimmers of hope; at last November's <a href="http://www.runbritainrankings.com/results/results.aspx?meetingid=82387">Leeds Abbey Dash 10k</a>, the top 82 runners finished inside 32 minutes – a greater
depth of quality than had been seen in recent years. A reinvigorated
domestic road running scene is a must if we are to revive a culture of
competitiveness and draw in new talent. Standards have slipped back a
long way, but a turnaround isn’t impossible. Mo Farah’s Olympic success
lifted the limit on our dreams by proving that Britons can still reach
the top; who knows what competitive hunger he can reawaken if he makes
his mark over 26.2.</span></span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Alternative theories for the decline</span></div>
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="margin-left: 0pt;">
<table style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none;"><colgroup><col width="298"></col><col width="298"></col></colgroup><tbody>
<tr style="height: 0px;"><td style="border: 1px solid #000000; padding: 7px 7px 7px 7px; vertical-align: top;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">1980s, Derek Stevens</span></div>
</td><td style="border: 1px solid #000000; padding: 7px 7px 7px 7px; vertical-align: top;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">2010s, Jon Pepper</span></div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">‘Trainers have become overly cushioned and heavy’</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="margin-left: 0pt;">
<table style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none;"><colgroup><col width="301"></col><col width="303"></col></colgroup><tbody>
<tr style="height: 0px;"><td style="border: 1px solid #000000; padding: 7px 7px 7px 7px; vertical-align: top;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“I used to run in a pair of Tiger Cubs, which had no sole to them. It does make you wonder.”</span></div>
</td><td style="border: 1px solid #000000; padding: 7px 7px 7px 7px; vertical-align: top;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“I’m dead against thick-soled, very cushioned shoes. We weren’t born with half an inch of rubber under our heels!”</span></div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">‘Athletes aren’t as competitive anymore’</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="margin-left: 0pt;">
<table style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none;"><colgroup><col width="301"></col><col width="302"></col></colgroup><tbody>
<tr style="height: 0px;"><td style="border: 1px solid #000000; padding: 7px 7px 7px 7px; vertical-align: top;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 5pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“I was quite ruthless to other athletes. I’ve been in fights in races before. It could be quite cruel.”</span></div>
</td><td style="border: 1px solid #000000; padding: 7px 7px 7px 7px; vertical-align: top;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 5pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“Losing really does piss me off. If I’m really up for a race, I’ll talk it up in my mind to beat someone”</span></div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">‘Football has become too popular, too dominant’</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="margin-left: 0pt;">
<table style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none;"><colgroup><col width="298"></col><col width="298"></col></colgroup><tbody>
<tr style="height: 0px;"><td style="border: 1px solid #000000; padding: 7px 7px 7px 7px; vertical-align: top;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“That hasn’t changed. Back in the Eighties, we even had quite a good national team.”</span></div>
</td><td style="border: 1px solid #000000; padding: 7px 7px 7px 7px; vertical-align: top;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“Aged 11-12, I was really into football but my team was awful. We lost regularly with double-figure scores!”</span></div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">‘There isn’t a big enough financial incentive’</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="margin-left: 0pt;">
<table style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none;"><colgroup><col width="299"></col><col width="297"></col></colgroup><tbody>
<tr style="height: 0px;"><td style="border: 1px solid #000000; padding: 7px 7px 7px 7px; vertical-align: top;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“It’s no different. The appearance and prize money in the Eighties was minimal. It was never a motivation, only a bonus.”</span></div>
</td><td style="border: 1px solid #000000; padding: 7px 7px 7px 7px; vertical-align: top;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“I
don’t think anyone who’s a distance runner [in the UK] these days is
doing it for the money. If they were, they’d be an idiot!”</span></div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Going back to go forward</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Super-ambitious
Michael Crawley, 26, decided to follow a training schedule from the
1980s in an attempt to emulate the success of his coach</span></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4xgnBM6OQtJFBd75g76O1r4jKF38OOA0qmZeXrZYKhzixUCdiGDN4d_u73HmSycgpmDZTsmdVI5pKYIupcOGPEyC9KIuoqoN_ikTMLmbHDRWAlqHfWTX3JkiI4I1cvu9TcHWPRqYgh8_H/s1600/Mike+Crawley_cr.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4xgnBM6OQtJFBd75g76O1r4jKF38OOA0qmZeXrZYKhzixUCdiGDN4d_u73HmSycgpmDZTsmdVI5pKYIupcOGPEyC9KIuoqoN_ikTMLmbHDRWAlqHfWTX3JkiI4I1cvu9TcHWPRqYgh8_H/s1600/Mike+Crawley_cr.jpg" width="258" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mike Crawley has made huge progress since following <br />
his coach's schedule from the early-Eighties</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">"At
the beginning of 2013, I persuaded my coach to lend me his training
diaries from 1981 and 1982 (when he ran a marathon best of 2:14). My
intention was to compare my training with his every week, using his
schedule as a template to build towards.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">"The
diaries are heavy on numbers (9,037 miles, to be precise) and light on
description. By far the most frequently used adjective is “tired”, with
only occasional elaboration (“tired, knackered actually” or “eight miles
hard, 5.30am”). The sparseness of words on the page is a reminder of
how simple training really is; it involves, principally, a lot of
running.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">"The
entry on 7th August, 1981, reads: “10 miles inc. 29mins 53.6secs for
10,000m (22nd), good.” Two days later: “22 miles alone – tired.” The
near-constant tiredness was getting him somewhere, then. In how many
races in Britain today would you expect to break 30 minutes for 10km and
finish outside of the top 20? (answer: none).</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">"After
I ran 50mins 52secs for 10 miles, in September, and finished second,
feeling quite pleased with myself, I found an entry where my coach had
run 50mins flat and finished outside the top five. I re-evaluated what
constituted good running.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">"Since
then, I’ve built up my mileage to 100 miles most weeks, and run as many
as 110 on a few occasions. The change is probably best summed up in
‘more running, less worrying.’ I threw away my GPS and heart-rate
monitor and threw a decent chunk of caution to the wind. I stopped doing
easy runs unless I was really knackered, and core stability didn’t
exist in 1981, so that went too.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">"One
session that particularly stands out involves running a set distance
(usually four miles) flat-out in the morning, then doing it again in the
evening, on the same course, and trying to go faster on tired legs.
This isn’t ‘tempo’ or ‘threshold’ running – those terms didn’t exist 30
years ago. It’s just called ‘hard’, and it is.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">"I
realised early on that I wasn’t going to be able to replicate every
week of my coach’s training, but after five months my training diary is
looking a lot more like his. It now contains what he calls ‘proper’
training, and I’ve got faster – by 1min 20secs over a half marathon (new
PB, 66.52) and 50secs over 10km (new PB, 30.03).</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">"So
it turns out that training like runners did in the Eighties isn’t very
scientific, is often hard and very tiring, but it works!"</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Read more about Michael’s training experiment on his blog:</span><a href="http://acceptableintheighties.wordpress.com/" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline;">http://acceptableintheighties.wordpress.com/</span></a></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Other experts asked...</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">What is the single biggest cause of the decline in British marathon running since the Eighties?</span></div>
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“Modern, overprotective society. Kids are aerobic monsters and need to be let loose at every opportunity when young!”</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><b> Jon
Brown</b>, former European Cross Country champion (1996) & twice fourth
in the Olympic Marathon (2000, 2004), with a 2:09:31 marathon PB (2005)</span></div>
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">“Secular
trends in physical activity are primarily responsible for the general
demise in physical fitness, which in turn has had a devastating effect
on sporting performance. School and university sports, now almost
extinct in the UK in comparison to other countries, have done very
little to reverse this general demise in physical fitness with dire
consequences for health and sporting performance.”</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.15; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><b>Yannis Pitsiladis</b>, Professor of Sport and Exercise Science at the University of Brighton</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">UK male marathon times 1980-2010 comparison</span></div>
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-indent: 36pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">1</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 8px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: super;">st</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> 10th 20</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 8px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: super;">th</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> 50</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 8px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: super;">th</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> 100</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 8px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: super;">th</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">2010 2:13:40 2:18:21 2:22:49 2:28:20 2:33:06 </span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">2005 2:09:31 2:18:47 2:24:02 2:29:49 2:35:20</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">2000 2:11:17 2:18:49 2:22:47 2:28:39 2:34:09 </span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">1995 2:10:31 2:15:02 2:20:17 2:24:57 2:29:57</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">1990 2:10:10 2:16:03 2:18:57 2:23:01 2:27:50</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">1985 2:07:13 2:14:20 2:15:31 2:18:34 2:21:31</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2000000000000002; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">1980 2:11:22 2:16:04 2:17:52 2:21:11 2:26:25</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Top 10 UK marathons: now versus then</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">2013</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">1 2:15:04 Nicholas Torry </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">2 2:15:21 Dave Webb </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">3 2:15:52 Ben Moreau </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">4 2:16:50 Derek Hawkins </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">4 2:16:50 Craig Hopkins </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">6 2:17:43 John Gilbert </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">7 2:18:28 Ross Houston </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">8 2:18:50 Paul Martelletti </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">9 2:19:01 James Kelly </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">10 2:19:07 Phil Wicks </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">(11 2:19:10 <b>Jon Pepper</b>) </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"></span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">1984</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">1 2:08:05 Steve Jones</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">2 2:09:57 Charlie Spedding</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">3 2:10:08 Geoff Smith</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">4 2:11:41 Kevin Forster</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">5 2:11:49 Fraser Clyne</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">6 2:11:54 Hugh Jones</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">7 2:12:12 Dennis Fowles</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">8 2:12:41 </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> Derek Stevens</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">9 2:13:24 Martin McCarthy</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1a1a1a; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">10 2:13:49 Jimmy Ashworth</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Author's note </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">My
own marathon PB of 2:28:46, set in 2012, snuck inside the UK top 50
that year, a fact that I'd been tempted to regard as boast-worthy. During the
writing of this feature, my ego trip was brought to a crashing halt when I discovered that, had I been running in the mid-Eighties, my time wouldn't have
made the top 300!</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Any thoughts on the above, tweet me —</span><a href="https://twitter.com/DeeBeeFree" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline;">@DeeBeeFree</span></a></div>
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<a href="https://twitter.com/DeeBeeFree" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></a><br />
<a href="https://twitter.com/DeeBeeFree" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></a><br />
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Davidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03662243675288847759noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2737550703462651461.post-62071456601098202192013-10-06T15:05:00.000-07:002013-10-09T03:01:58.252-07:00Break it to me gently, doctor, how long have I got? <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">Also published on HuffingtonPost.co.uk here:<span style="font-weight: normal;"> </span></span></b></span><span style="line-height: 16px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="http://huff.to/19ePKsI">http://huff.to/19ePKsI</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></b></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b id="docs-internal-guid-4685cee4-8fc8-bc91-913d-85a74a32b646" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">A notice on the wall of my GP’s surgery reads, “Do not discuss more than one problem per appointment. </span></b><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">Remember, you are allotted only 10 minutes.”</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">It was a message reiterated to my dad during a consultation in early 2011 when he mentioned a second concern: a lump on his head. The primary concern was a larger, as-yet-undiagnosed lump on his shoulder.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“This is a 10-minute appointment,” the GP said firmly. The implication was clear: he didn’t have time to look at the growth on my dad’s head.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">Three months later, Dad was dead. The lumps were cancer that had spread from his lungs. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">I’m not blaming the GP for my dad’s death. The cancer had metastasised and there’s little chance it could have been halted by swifter medical intervention. I am not blaming; I am asking: when did GPs run out of time for their patients? What changed? </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">You don’t need to know much about biology to realise that the body is a holistic system: the component tissues and organs interact and affect each other. It’s not uncommon for a symptom in one part to be traced to a root cause in another. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">We rely on GPs to be crack detectives of physiology, seeking out as many clues as possible to home in on the underlying malady. Our lives are in their hands, and that shouldn’t be an unsettling thought.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 1; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">For many of us, it takes guts to book an appointment and tell a stranger about our worries. (Not to mention the added stress of negotiating time off work, etc.) We’re often scared, especially if we fear it might be something serious. We also worry that we’re wasting the doctor’s time, even when we know deep down </span><span style="font-style: italic; line-height: 1; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">something is wrong</span><span style="line-height: 1; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. We’re easily put off by brusque treatment, made to feel feeble and even more apprehensive; next time something hurts, we think twice before seeking advice.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">A detective wouldn’t cut short a witness: “Stop blathering about the colour of his clothes and cut to the bit where he pulls the trigger.” So why does a GP in pursuit of diagnostic pointers discourage a patient from describing fully their concerns? </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 1; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Yes, I know time is money (a GP’s time, </span><a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/9567689/More-than-700-GPs-earned-200000-despite-overall-drop-in-salaries-figures.html" style="line-height: 1; text-decoration: none;"><span style="text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">lots of money</span></a><span style="line-height: 1; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">) and <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/nhs/10352129/GP-practices-facing-catastrophic-400m-financial-black-hole.html">money is limited</a>. I know too that some people waste GPs’ time with untreatable sniffles etc, but that can’t be helped except through patient (in both senses of the word) education. If the system is buckling, let’s at least take notice and fight to save it. Institutional cursoriness isn’t a solution, it’s surrender. </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Postscript</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">I’m a sniffling time-waster, perhaps: there’s probably nothing seriously wrong with me, but a couple of times lately while running my heart rate has leapt up to 220bpm. My usual ‘maximum’ is 185bpm. It didn’t hurt but I felt a flutter in my chest and running suddenly felt harder. The first time it happened I wrote it off as a one-off glitch and did nothing; the second time, I figured I should get checked.</span><span style="line-height: 1; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 1; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The GP referred me to the practice nurse for an ECG, which came back as abnormal. The length of time between the electrical signal telling my heart to finish a beat and the beginning of the next one, to start the next beat, is longer than it should be. Having an </span><a href="http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/long-QT-syndrome/Pages/Introduction.aspx#death" style="line-height: 1; text-decoration: none;"><span style="text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">over-long QT interval</span></a><span style="line-height: 1; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> is associated with dropping dead while playing sport. </span><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">“I want some advice from a cardiologist on this,” said my GP. “We ought to get an answer quite swiftly, so I’ll have a fax sent today. In the meantime, don’t push too hard.”</span><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">That was a fortnight ago. I’ve heard nothing. I phoned the GP’s surgery and the receptionist told me to contact the hospital cardiology department directly. So I rang the hospital, and was told that the relevant paperwork would be impossible to find unless I knew the name of the consultant to whom the fax had been sent. </span><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Which consultant was the fax sent to?” I asked the GP’s receptionist.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: inherit; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“We never specify a consultant, we just send it to the department.” </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: inherit; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“But… But please, I don’t know what else to do.” </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Well, I shouldn’t be doing all this chasing-up. We’ve been told not to. We don’t have time,” she huffed, before reluctantly agreeing to resend the fax. “Try calling us next Monday to see if we’re heard back.” </span><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">She didn’t sound confident.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">I don’t feel entitled to urgent attention; I suspect my heart is OK – I’ve been running for years and I figure that if my ticker were going to fall fatally out of rhythm, it would have done so before now. Even so, what if there were a serious risk? </span></span><span style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 1; white-space: pre-wrap;">What if I did have a timebomb in my chest? Would the NHS have the time to tell me? Who knows.</span><span style="font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></div>
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Davidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03662243675288847759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2737550703462651461.post-33813318519865368122013-05-19T08:56:00.000-07:002013-10-09T03:52:07.656-07:00Not seeing: the funny side<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b>First published on Guardian.co.uk on 17th May 2013, under the heading</b> <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2013/may/17/facing-blindness-cope-sight-loss?CMP=twt_gu">'Facing blindness by seeing the funny side'</a>.</i><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE7vc5vC64im4W369jxnR2LMo36TDrTcw0qF1-Q_lDvnhKaNBKTXz7dZ2P71bQ5ThlyJAa19N-9oJ03wXTOi_m6HnSgtp2CaMui52qZXL4DvbA0oU_2tMFdgVaBEbqSk2WA_m_o5Id-iHX/s1600/Come-As-You-Are.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE7vc5vC64im4W369jxnR2LMo36TDrTcw0qF1-Q_lDvnhKaNBKTXz7dZ2P71bQ5ThlyJAa19N-9oJ03wXTOi_m6HnSgtp2CaMui52qZXL4DvbA0oU_2tMFdgVaBEbqSk2WA_m_o5Id-iHX/s1600/Come-As-You-Are.jpg" height="192" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The film Come As You Are depicts blindness, disability and illness </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">with humour, compassion and a striking lack of queamishness </span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">What would you do if you were told you were going blind?
Quit your job, cut loose and rush to live out your most lurid fantasies? Nice
idea, but your mates are still at work, and wealth doesn't increase in inverse
proportion to eyesight, alas. Still, you'd be expected to react, so what would
it be: fury, despondency, soul-searching, or would you try to see the funny
side?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">In the summer of 2006 I was diagnosed with <a href="http://www.rpfightingblindness.org.uk/index.php?tln=aboutrp" title="">retinitis
pigmentosa</a> (RP) – an inherited condition that affects the retina of
the eyes, often leading to complete blindness. It was picked up by an optician
at a routine sight test after I casually mentioned my exceptional clumsiness
after dark (how I'd fail to spot big things like cars and ditches which, I'd
noticed, everyone else managed to avoid). That's how RP begins, with
night-blindness and accidents, followed by a gradual erosion of peripheral
vision and more accidents.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">When I told my family, they frowned gravely and muttered
terrible portents like "devastating" and "life-changing".<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">But I didn't feel as though much had changed. I might go
blind; I might not. I might walk into the path of a bus; I might hop on it and
go on a fantastic journey. The future remained unforeseeable, and the splotches
of peripheral vision whose absconding I had barely noticed remained unseen – as
well as unseeing. Blindness was already here in a ghostly, imperceptible sort
of way; I felt more perplexed than devastated.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">My mum, realising that half the genetic flaw causing my eyes
to self-destruct came from her, was overcome with guilt. Learning about the
randomness and odds-defyingly bad luck inherent in inheritance didn't help. Nor
did it help when I stressed that I was not merely unresentful, but <i>grateful </i>to
her for having had the particular genetic accident – coding error
notwithstanding – that made me.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">None of this was funny. I don't remember crying, but I
definitely didn't laugh. Now, seven years on, when kindly folk ask – as they do
– "How are your eyes?", what am I meant to say: "Still
rotting?" Hardly amusing, I grant you, but what else?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">There's no natural or comforting response to sight loss. A
couple of years back, a Channel 4 documentary-maker leapt to the presumption that
I'd want to go on a grand sightseeing expedition to curate a memory-gallery of
sights to console myself with in years to come – a proposal I turned down after <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2013/may/17/www.dbfreelance.co.uk/HullBradford_v2.pdf" title="">emailing the blind academic John Hull</a> (PDF).<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">"The supposition is that the life of a blind person
will be retrospective, living in the past," replied the media-wary
professor. "But one must affirm one's grasp of life as a present reality,
not live in nostalgia."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I also emailed the American memoirist <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Knipfel" title="">Jim Knipfel</a> –
who went blind as a result of RP in his 20s – who explained how he too was
approached by a film-maker of a sentimental bent. "Upon meeting me she
said, 'Oh, how wonderful it must be to be blind – you're living in a whole new,
magical world.'"<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">What possible response? "My first impulse was to grab a
letter-opener and let her find out first-hand what blindness is like. Instead,
I warned her that her belief in magic might not survive watching me try to get
across my apartment without tripping over anything."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">In fairness to these film-makers, it's not easy to depict
sight loss in a visual medium – and at least they wanted to try. All too often,
blind people are omitted from film and TV for fear of depicting them in an
insensitive way or unsettling the audience. This lack of representation is
creating a problem for visually impaired citizens of the US, reckons Knipfel.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">"Kids no longer grow up with images of bumbling blind
people in cartoons and on sitcoms, and so no longer understand the white cane.
This move to make everything 'nice' has resulted in an incredibly dangerous
situation, as all those people I've run into can attest."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Which is one good reason among many to endorse the daring
exceptions, films such as <a href="http://www.comeasyouaremovie.co.uk/" title="">Come As You Are</a> (to be released in UK cinemas on 7th June) – a funny, moving and distinctly unsentimental
story about three young men, one blind, one paralysed and one who has cancer,
who go on a road trip in pursuit of sex.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Knipfel's writing is a masterclass in seeing the funny side
when you can't see much else. Now 47, he has honed a knack for dragging readers
deep into the awfulness of a situation before bursting the pathos with an
acerbic joke. His grimly mirthful memoir <a href="http://www.missioncreep.com/slackjaw/" title="">Slackjaw </a>–
lauded widely, even by the usually reticent Thomas Pynchon – details some of
the dire predicaments Knipfel got into as a young man with deteriorating sight. <span style="line-height: 13.5pt;">The worst was when, aged 20, he collided with a lamppost so hard that it left
him with a brain lesion and permanently reliant on anti-seizure medication. His
vision continued to recede and he was registered blind by the time he was 30 –
the age I am now – yet he remains relentlessly sardonic and self-mocking. Is
that what I should do, take my sight loss less seriously?</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">"Well, humour has always been my reaction to a world I
find absurd," confesses Knipfel, "especially when the people around
me seem to take it all so seriously. When I went blind, that seemed as
ridiculous as anything else, so I reacted to it in the same way."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">But does it help to cope with sight loss, this refusal to
take the world seriously? "To be honest, blindness has never really
bothered me that much. It's an annoyance – like a head cold or hangnail. The
best thing about mixing blindness and humour is that I can now get away with
even more than I did before."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I admire Knipfel's insouciance, but it's not for me, I fear.
The prospect of worsening sight scares me, and I don't find it easy to make
light of the gaucheness it causes. Remember when Gordon Brown, who is blind in
his left eye, roused hilarity by <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K68THqDqPKc" title="">appearing to shun a
handshake from a policeman on the door of 10 Downing Street</a>? I felt a stab
of vicarious embarrassment because I suspected that Brown's failure to spot the
officer's outstretched hand had been caused by his limited peripheral vision –
it's a mishap that has befallen me several times. OK, such faux-pas are
comical, but isn't it just plain cruel to laugh?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjN29r7K8vGdEMMK5EwX5JITYhQZQOlmuRxD5fH2LAQSJqwHJOiQ_DaklgdWsBbHRQj4OiWrAvyZ557EghCtz6SOsWq55pqjFdNzJXEtIK4RCb2GrjLucRx3mhyphenhyphenuB38t-CTxTXNAPK5dp8S/s1600/Jim+Knipfel.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjN29r7K8vGdEMMK5EwX5JITYhQZQOlmuRxD5fH2LAQSJqwHJOiQ_DaklgdWsBbHRQj4OiWrAvyZ557EghCtz6SOsWq55pqjFdNzJXEtIK4RCb2GrjLucRx3mhyphenhyphenuB38t-CTxTXNAPK5dp8S/s1600/Jim+Knipfel.jpg" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Author Jim Knipfel wears a fedora - for safety reasons</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; line-height: 13.5pt;">"Not at all," insists Knipfel, who wears a fedora
because the brim gives a "split-second warning" before his head hits
another post. "All of us – blind people, sighted, disabled, mentally ill,
whatever race, whatever religion – we all have attributes that can and should
be amplified for comic exploitation. We're all fodder!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It's hardly comforting, the prospect of becoming ever
riper-fodder for ridicule, but I suppose it's preferable to being disregarded
or patronised. "Damn right. The blind are, for the most part, a fairly
hapless group. You deny that and, as I mentioned, before long no one will know
what a white cane is or what blindness entails, and that's no good for
anyone."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">"OK, Jim, I'll do my best," I resolve to email
back. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to buy a sombrero. Even if it
doesn't save me from handshake blunders or lampposts, at least it'll hide my
blushes."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<br /></div>
Davidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03662243675288847759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2737550703462651461.post-29470522720326745802013-02-04T05:39:00.000-08:002013-02-04T15:23:19.243-08:00This is not a running blog<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><i>Updated version of 'Why I run' – originally posted on 20th January 2011:</i></span></div>
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYg6_p8_cUaUSwq_8sL7QE8df2czBzhZ196SIRpt6qGHPHNycYcfd8TlD0Lrmcr8WwI01IUjbFiKE_OanDsHVPgJsZLBcgYINHXHnlmG4XTQ81LAq6UPaJkZzK9G6sHy0ztVJi4asIQ6Jn/s1600/Pain_cropped.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYg6_p8_cUaUSwq_8sL7QE8df2czBzhZ196SIRpt6qGHPHNycYcfd8TlD0Lrmcr8WwI01IUjbFiKE_OanDsHVPgJsZLBcgYINHXHnlmG4XTQ81LAq6UPaJkZzK9G6sHy0ztVJi4asIQ6Jn/s1600/Pain_cropped.jpg" height="320" width="170" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Running can be painful but not as <br />
painful as running blogs</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">I’m not sure about running
blogs. Running is what makes life worth living, that’s true, but people writing
about their running, well, it seems to me the potential for being dull heavily outweighs the scope for being original, insightful and/or
entertaining.</span><span style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"> </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">What’s enjoying about running is
running: the act itself. Like sex, it’s rhythmic, invigorating, <i>animal</i> and difficult to describe beyond the basic mechanics: one foot in front of the other,
repeat. The enjoyment <i>is</i> the doing: absorbed in the moment, body in motion,
mind quieted, undistracted. When I am running, I am running.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">Writing about running for other runners of similar standard is fine – we indulge each other as a means to ever deeper self-absorption – but for a general audience? No, no way. The last thing I'd want to do is add to the web-swell
of boring blather about split times, barefoot shoes (eh?), journeys and goals.
I’d fail to capture the appeal; I’d be anal and puritanical about training
routines; I’d pointlessly deride slower runners; I’d be that most loathsome
thing, a running-bore. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">But there is one question that
people, including and especially non-runners, want answered: why? Why do we go
outside for prolonged periods every day, come cold and rain, come leg aches and
bleeding nipples, to get our fix? It is baffling, we must accept, and it warrants
an explanation. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">So, this is not a running blog;
this is a one-off attempt to explain why. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">Hitherto I’d not felt called on to
explain it. It was just something I’d fallen into the habit of doing every day,
like walking the dog, only faster and without a dog. Explaining why – accounting
for being apparently as burden-tethered as a dog owner while not in possession
of a dog – wouldn’t be easy. But then I read a book assessing why men read men’s magazines. No, not porn, but laddy-lifestyle mags
such as <i>Men’s Health</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">, <i>GQ</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">, <i>FHM</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">, etc. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">It was a sociological study by a
trio of academics, exploring why men enjoy reading articles about how to ‘get
ripped’, ‘craft a washboard stomach’, ‘dress to knock her dead’ and ‘steer
clear of gold-diggers’, that kind of thing. I will make extensive reference,
for reasons that will become clear, to the chapter entitled “Consumption and
the sociology of the body”.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">That’s quite enough preamble;
without further ado, <b>this is why I run</b></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><b>1. Because my job is too easy</b></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">I run because my job doesn’t
tire me out or make me feel manly and important. I do not earn money by digging
holes in the ground, like my father did. His job kept his body lean and
muscular (and tired); it was a job for life; it fulfilled a useful function
with obvious benefits to society; it earned him money to feed his family. My
job involves sitting at a desk all day (burning very little energy), fiddling
around with words no one needs to read, earning money to fritter away on my own
amusement. I run because it makes me feel as though I am doing real work,
helping me feel fit and alive, and giving me a project on which to expend
surplus energy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><i>“Capitalism is no longer
dependent upon the condemnation of sexual and physical pleasure and the
maintenance of strictly disciplined forms of manual labour. Instead, the body
in consumer culture is both disciplined and hedonistic. In such a culture, the
body becomes a vehicle for pleasure, youth, health and fitness; that is, it is
increasingly viewed as a passport to the good life… Life itself is a project
within modernity.”</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><b>2. To feel superior</b></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">Running makes me feel as though
I have an advantage over others. I have no power over others in my job or in my
relationships (unlike my father, who was indisputably head of our family).
Running is an arena in which I can strive to dominate others, to try and be
exceptional; keeping fit makes me feel less fallible, less likely to need
emotional or medical help.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><i>“[Running] prepares men for
the atomised world of late capitalism, providing them with crucial ammunition
in helping them gain a competitive advantage… The hyper-competitive social
relations of late-capitalism manifest themselves in male relations at work, in
friendships and in relationships. The need for intimate human relations that
men have found so difficult to recognise within themselves are displaced
through myths of self-sufficiency and independence.”</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><b>3. To forestall my body’s
decline</b></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">I'm 30 now, so my body
is about to begin its slow yet inexorable decline towards old age and death. My
job is not tough or tiring enough to distract me from this awful truth. But,
all the time I am getting fitter and faster, I have firm proof that my body is
an anomaly, defying science – not only evading deterioration but <i>improving</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">. Working hard at running provides definite,
measurable evidence – in the form of improving PBs – that my body is
flourishing; I’m not just outrunning the Grim Reaper but lapping him, making
him look stupid.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><i>“Just as men face an
increasingly uncertain future in the workplace, so their bodies become places
of intense anxiety and scrutiny in terms of their inevitable decline. In order
for this decline to be halted or at least temporarily arrested, the body
becomes something that needs to be invested in and worked upon… The body
becomes a new site for social discipline.”</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><b>4. It gives me an identity</b></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">How do you define yourself?
Which single word best sums you up? The first adjective in my Twitter biog used to be “Runner” (until writing this made me self-conscious about it) – I defined myself by my hobby, first and foremost. In the past, most
people defined themselves by their profession, but less so these days.
Nowadays, it is not sensible to get too attached to one’s job (consider all
those people employed in the public sector to whom the government has said:
“You’re not required anymore, and probably never were”.) Our jobs are
uncertain, unsafe and of questionable utilitarian worth.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><i>“In the new world of flexible
employment, the rules are made up as we go along, the ability to adapt and
change is the most prized of possessions and the act of departure valued above
that of reaching the destination.”</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">Indeed, some of my fondest
memories involve handing in resignation letters and leaving jobs.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><i>“… the idea that our skills
may well become redundant in the future means that the workplace can only offer
the most insecure of identities. The body, then, becomes a domain to be ‘worked
on’ and regulated. The body requires finely itemised forms of labour in order
that it might produce measurable effects. This process of physical
transformation grants the masculine subject a sense of security and continuity
denied him within the workplace… Uncertainty converts the body into a new
project of identity.”</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><b>5. To be a machine</b></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">The fallibility of my body is
unbearable. Consider my eyes – one minute, they’re fine, seeing everything
normally; the next, they’re destroying themselves and I’m going blind because
of some silly little genetic quirk. Being trapped inside a human body is
ridiculously perilous. It is far better to be a machine. Runners look upon
their flawed carcasses as embodied apparatus – hard, robust and responsive to
fine-tuning.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><i>“Men’s relationships with
their bodies is often represented as being purely instrumental… The application
of instrumental logics… [and] tips and advice keep the body ‘running along
smoothly’. The most often used metaphor in relation to the body and sources of
food and energy is that of ‘refuelling’… [Men] seek to convert the body into
something that can be controlled by scientific forms of rationality protecting
the self from having to develop a more vulnerable relation with the body’s own
needs.”</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><b>6. To flee from death</b></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">As discussed above, my body is
about to begin its decline towards death. I am unable to accept my own death,
for it is too terrible a prospect. While I’m running and getting fitter, I feel
very alive; so it follows that running is the opposite of death and, as such,
keeps death at bay. I know that immortality is a questionable corollary to
“feeling very alive”, but the illusion makes existence more tolerable and helps
me forget the terrible truth. Besides, no one has anything better to offer.
Religion isn’t taken seriously anymore, and “a problem shared is a problem
halved” doesn’t seem to apply to death – believe me, I’ve tried; it’s my
favourite topic of conversation down the pub.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><i>“The culture of bodily
fitness and exercise is bound up with a fear of death and mortality… In the
face of death we often go silent, because we lack a common language in which to
frame the experience… Death is something to be hidden away and privatised
within modernity. Fear of death becomes… as Castoriadis argues, ‘that
everything, even meaning, will dissolve’… Death is that which cannot be
mastered and controlled, despite all our efforts to mould and shape the body.
These concerns can be forgotten about, or at least this is the expectation,
through daily regimes that invite us to keep an ever-watchful eye on our
health.”</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;"><b>Source</b></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">: <i>Making Sense of Men’s Magazines</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #434343; font-family: Georgia;">, by Peter Jackson, Nick Stevenson & Kate Brooks, published by
Polity Press, 2001.</span></div>
<!--EndFragment-->Davidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03662243675288847759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2737550703462651461.post-72190279071188825312012-11-06T10:05:00.000-08:002012-11-10T14:22:59.599-08:00Blogging: farce or chance? <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE3T9vw_74BafTJt0cwyVSZ2Dor4fcez5tZkxZwQJTk9d3zr9RDrPwMF-wM0LXcNmF_5yjTRLd9PAI8MdRUpahndwDrB4V819ZN9PK25no8mu3lBdaPZpNj077scO9nDwPGUllXKu1SPpV/s1600/Chris+Hunter.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE3T9vw_74BafTJt0cwyVSZ2Dor4fcez5tZkxZwQJTk9d3zr9RDrPwMF-wM0LXcNmF_5yjTRLd9PAI8MdRUpahndwDrB4V819ZN9PK25no8mu3lBdaPZpNj077scO9nDwPGUllXKu1SPpV/s320/Chris+Hunter.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Chris Hunter's blogging success poses the question: Why go to work when you could sit <br />
at home in your comfiest chair, drinking from your favourite coffee mug?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Why on earth would any sensible person write a blog? Unless you're a known brand (a 'celebrity') or can publish from a known brand's platform, no one cares what you have to say. "Another blog?" they'll groan. "No thanks, don't have time." </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">... so I'd assumed. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Then I wrote an article for <i>Motorcycle Trader</i> (a trade mag for bike dealers) about the sorry fate of mainstream motorcycle magazines* – and stumbled upon a successful blog written by a normal guy. Successful? Yes, getting loads of hits and making money and everything. </span><br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">My brief was to investigate: "What's next for the motorcycle press?" - are websites killing off paid-for print? The answer, to cut a long feature short (the long version: from page 28 of </span><a href="http://www.motorcycletrader.net/MCT%20DIGITAL/SEPTEMBER%202012/" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">this</a><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">), is yes. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Bloggers don't make a living from blogging, of that I was certain. In fact, I'd assumed that not many websites make much money, either, unless they're the DailyMail.com or some such filth.com, getting a gazillion hits per second by publishing spy shots of Harry’s arse and Kate’s tits. But then I found Chris Hunter’s blog, </span><a href="http://www.bikeexif.com/" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Bike EXIF</a><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">…</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFmuTzKJjZXM77ASzJiIQtuHdD3ljoe49tBSDSKtGURqbSuLOlcJGb8XWjoSKzg9-z5Ylgp_YXAov4yvN6efTmulS7LvE_x_fcttWwFjPGKk_0r-aJCK4yqtx10WHKcEq3NXoEnCvLnyS4/s1600/Bike+EXIF+2.png" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="244" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFmuTzKJjZXM77ASzJiIQtuHdD3ljoe49tBSDSKtGURqbSuLOlcJGb8XWjoSKzg9-z5Ylgp_YXAov4yvN6efTmulS7LvE_x_fcttWwFjPGKk_0r-aJCK4yqtx10WHKcEq3NXoEnCvLnyS4/s320/Bike+EXIF+2.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: x-small;">The Bike EXIF homepage</span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">This one-man site publishes photos of highly trendy custom-built motorbikes – not the chrome-festooned cruisers favoured by portly, goatee'd middle-age-crisis victims, but artfully minimalist, stripped-down designs. They’re the engined equivalent of the fixed-gear bicycles so beloved of urban hipsters; the kinds of machine Steve McQueen might've kept shiny for use on the days he wasn't anticipating jumping any ditches. These bikes are sometimes called café racers or retro sportsbikes, but many of them are too quirky and cool to slot into a category.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjD9lmJrzeLZyIzanwlwu9o6pdKRS-9KS07OZZU6dYWMe18tNhmkQ3tWtAXCphhTE6cilRSgTrpVWyzpWcrHJGR0n2rf_5Z_CiG5GVE2cMLQztpwXdNrSU0OZjmOibTbnSRi9lvT35x0QX6/s1600/siegl-ducati_2.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="206" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjD9lmJrzeLZyIzanwlwu9o6pdKRS-9KS07OZZU6dYWMe18tNhmkQ3tWtAXCphhTE6cilRSgTrpVWyzpWcrHJGR0n2rf_5Z_CiG5GVE2cMLQztpwXdNrSU0OZjmOibTbnSRi9lvT35x0QX6/s320/siegl-ducati_2.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: start;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: x-small;">Siegl custom Ducati 900SS, recently featured on Bike EXIF (Photo: Jason Brownrigg)</span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Hunter set up the blog in 2008 as an experiment, as bloggers do, to see what level of interest it attracted and “ready to drop it quickly if it didn’t work”. His gut instinct was that interest in these über-hip bikes was a) strong and growing; and b) not catered for by the mainstream press. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">At the time he was employed as a creative director in a large Australian advertising agency. His blog experiment struck a chord with bike fans and took off. It now attracts more than 400,000 unique visitors every month and rakes in a healthy amount of advertising income. 'Healthy' meaning more than enough to pay the bills; Hunter quit his day job at the end of last year. He’s now a full-time blogger; and</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> it isn't that he's taken a pay-cut to downsize and sit around gazing at pretty-bike pictures all day. Not at all…</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> “It’s very much a business now, and has been for the past couple of years. I now run the site full-time. The income it produces doesn’t quite match my old salary yet, but it will do in the future.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The first thing Hunter’s success story proves is that your blog doesn’t need a catchy or enticing name.</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> “Bike EXIF is a strange name, yes,” he admits. “EXIF stands for Exchangeable Image File – it’s the data that’s stored in a digital camera image, a nerdy reference to our focus on photography. If I’d known the site would become so big, I’d have thought of a better name! Too late now…” <br /><br />What’s more important than the name – as the <i>Daily Mail</i> knows too well – are the photos. Your images must be crisp and high-quality so that visitors can zoom-in and drool to their heart’s (or other throbbing bit’s) content. If the photos are too small or blurry or simply lack ‘impact’, people will stop visiting. More pictures, less text - always. More than 400 words is too much – one reason why this (my) blog is a dead canary. <br /><br />Online content, unlike print, has a cost-free global reach, and Hunter knew that the appeal of funky, retro custom bikes transcended national boundaries. He also knew how to schmooze advertisers – not difficult, he insists.<br /> “I have relationships with senior execs at most of the main moto and apparel manufacturers and their country-level distributors,” says Hunter. “There’s no secret to it… If you have the stats to back it up – and they need to be very big stats with the right audience breakdown – relationships can turn into advertising.” <br /><br />Then there are the potential side-lines… Bike EXIF already produces merchandise – namely, an annual calendar that last year “outsold the official and licensed Harley-Davidson calendars on Amazon in the US”. <br /><br />Hunter isn’t a smug web-geek who wishes painful death on print publishing; on the contrary, he’s a magazine-lover who thinks print will survive for many years yet, provided publishers learn how to fully exploit the internet to complement and market their hard-copy publications.<br />“The two worlds [print and online] will merge; they are getting closer as each month passes. The old guard in the magazines will move on, and the new guard will be more open to collaboration. I’m actually a huge fan of print, and it might be a part of the EXIF stable sometime in the future. I’m a total magazine addict… but if we go into print, it won’t be anything like the magazines you see on UK newsstands today.” <br /><br />So, there you have it: Crap magazines are dead (or dying); long live the smart, web-savvy ones. And if you're a canny three-in-one writer/publisher/ad salesperson, you might, just might be able to make a living blogging about your hobby.<br /><br /><span style="background-color: white;"><b>How to create a money-spinning blog</b><br /> Bike EXIF founder Chris Hunter lists the five most important qualities needed if you’re serious about making money from a blog</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">1. <b>A unique vision or voice. </b>If you’re producing the same content as other people or constantly chasing their tails, you’ll always be playing second fiddle. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />2. <b>A good marketing brain. </b>There’s no point in creating an amazing website if you don’t have an innate understanding of effective promotion and search engine optimisation. <br />3. <b>Generalist abilities.</b> If you have to pay someone every time you need to change a line or code or restart a server, you’ll never make any money. Unless it’s a vanity project, you need to be a one-man band in the early days. <br />4. <b>Lots of stamina. </b>It’s hard work and late hours. Can you do that for several years? Do you have an understanding family? <br />5. <b>Design taste. </b>A lot of print magazines seem to get away with pretty average design, but online, there’s nowhere to hide. Good aesthetics and navigation are critical.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">*The motorcycle press is dying a slow, agonising death. I know this because I used to work for <i>SuperBike</i>, which, when</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> I joined in 2005, was selling more than 60,000 copies per month. At the latest ABC count, sales had fallen to 16,000 – a decline of 75 per cent in six years. And my inverse Midas touch wasn't to blame this time.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The title was flogged in 2010 by its then owner IPC Media to Vitality Publishing, who went bust earlier this year, at which point </span><i style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">SuperBike </i><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">was ‘saved’ (along with sister title Loaded) by a </span><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/apr/29/loaded-magazine-men-baxendale-walker?INTCMP=SRCH" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">porn star</a><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">. The mag's laddishness has increased; not so sure about sales - it's been withdrawn from the ABC audit. </span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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Davidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03662243675288847759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2737550703462651461.post-9399829054514591912011-10-26T13:33:00.000-07:002012-12-27T13:41:16.199-08:00Gay boy from Damascus<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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First published on HuffingtonPost.co.uk on 26th October 2011:<br /><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/david-bradford/gay-boy-from-damascus_b_1021474.html">http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/david-bradford/gay-boy-from-damascus_b_1021474.html</a><div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
Hani Homsi (not his real name) is young, Syrian and gay. He now lives in the UK, and has agreed to meet me to talk about his formative years in Damascus, as well as his perspective on the current Syrian uprising.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
But first I want to know what he made of the<a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-13744980" style="border: none; color: #058b7b; cursor: pointer; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_hplink"> 'Gay Girl in Damascus'</a> hoax - a blog purportedly written by a young lesbian living in the Syrian capital but which, it turned out, was the work of a 40-year-old heterosexual <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jun/13/gay-girl-damascus-tom-macmaster" style="border: none; color: #058b7b; cursor: pointer; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_hplink">American man</a>. Probably not the representation gay Syrians had been longing for?</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
"I don't think it helped in any way." Hani's voice falters slightly as he looks around the room, leans forward, and fixes his gaze on the tape recorder between us. We are in a secluded corner of a sprawling café but he is nervous, and I will soon appreciate why. I reassure him that neither his name nor any other identifying details will be published. He sits back, takes a breath and continues:</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
"A tactic of the regime has been to say, 'It's all fabrication'. They could have said about [about the blog], 'Look, this is something westerners are bringing you which we're sure you don't want'."</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
Hani provides further clarification when he tells me that the word "gay" does not easily translate into Arabic, and the notion of being gay is widely regarded in Syrian society as a "corrupting western invention". He believes that the hoax could have made it easier for anti-gay religious groups to advance their cause. As for the regime's attitude to gay people, "they have bigger things to worry about now" and don't meddle in citizens' personal lives "as long as you support them and don't interfere politically".</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
Political interference, as far as President Bashar al-Assad's government is concerned, means any detectable expression of dissent, no matter how peaceful. The regime's response to opposition demonstration, as we are seeing reported on an almost daily basis, is violent and merciless.</div>
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Hani has heard many stories from his family about "friends of friends" who have been brutally tortured, murdered or have simply disappeared. "It is just unbelievable the amount of cruelty they [the regime] are capable of. Really, you would rather die 100 times than be taken by them."</div>
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The last time Hani saw his parents was several weeks ago, when they met him outside of Syria. He was shocked by how anxious and wary they had become.</div>
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"When we were talking, they were just whispering. They said they were not used to speaking [at normal volume] even in the privacy of their own home - because there may be listening devices. I found that shocking - very, very different to when I last lived there [in Damascus]. Watching the news, on channels such as Al Jazeera, they drew the curtains, as they felt they couldn't afford to be seen watching these channels."</div>
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It is a stark reminder of Hani's bravery in speaking to me. He has spent many years keeping quiet, bearing a double burden of secrecy - about his dislike of the regime and about his sexuality - but he is not holding back now, spilling out vivid, articulate sentences in perfect English. I take my chance and venture a more personal question: when did he realise he was gay?</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
"I always sensed I was different," he pauses. "No, I knew I was different."</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
How did he know? How does a gay Syrian explore their sexuality, given the prevailing attitude among fellow citizens?</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
"This is a bit private. Do you want to know about it?" He grins at my enthusiastic nodding. "I did have an underground affair with a next-door friend of mine. We did actually have an affair. Our families knew each other; he was just one year older than me; he went to the same school."</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
Hani's eyes light up and he giggles as he remembers the guileless way in which the affair began.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
"I was 14, and I remember it was winter. We were all watching a film, me, him and his sister... Suddenly there was a power failure, as there had been a snow storm - every time there's snow, the city gets completely cut off... so we decided to play hide-and-seek. We [Hani and his male friend] ended up hiding together, under the bed, we were really close. And we felt something, and it started then and there... both of us were so sort of thrilled by it. It was almost a surprise and so convenient - he lived just next-door. I remember saying goodbye, and saying 'I'll see you here tomorrow'."</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
The clandestine relationship lasted for six years, throughout the boys' school days. Once he was old enough, Hani would occasionally borrow the family car and drive with his friend into the mountains north-west of Damascus - preferably in mid-winter, to maximise the likelihood of getting snowed-in. Was it a love affair?</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
"We never talked about each other as a couple, let alone using the word gay to describe ourselves. At one point, he even started going out with a girl." So his friend wasn't gay? "I think he was worried about his social image: he wanted to have a girlfriend. And he was very, very good-looking, so any girl wanted to go out with him. Thinking about him now, I think he might have been bi [-sexual], if you want to use that categorisation." <br style="border: none; display: block; list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 4px; padding: 0px;" /><br style="border: none; display: block; list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 4px; padding: 0px;" />I am surprised that the pair's illicit rendezvous continued so frequently over such a long time, not least because I had always assumed that in less tolerant societies there is greater pressure on gay people to curb and conceal their sexuality. Hani turns this supposition on its head, explaining that the scarcity of "gayness" in Syrian culture and public discourse equates to a certain degree of obliviousness. Male relations are "more queer" inasmuch as they are "less defined" (as straight, gay or otherwise); men kiss when greeting each other and may hold hands in public "without anyone really noticing". <br style="border: none; display: block; list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 4px; padding: 0px;" /><br style="border: none; display: block; list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 4px; padding: 0px;" />The boyhood friends keep in touch but have not met for more than three years. I detect no sense of regret in Hani, who is now in his late-20s and openly gay among his British friends. I wonder what it is like living so different a life now, and watching from afar the escalating troubles in the country that remains his family's home. Does he believe the Syrian people will manage to overthrow their oppressors, as the Egyptians did?</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
"It's difficult. The difference is, the Egyptian army wasn't being controlled by the government. In Syria, the state is everything; whether you're from the university, the hospital, from anything, you are all controlled by one entity. The army is very much the heart of it, and they have the power."</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
If President Assad's time is running out - and surely it is - will his departure mark a hopeful new beginning for Hani's family and former neighbours? I am surprised by the cautious, ambivalent tone of the response: before the uprising, Hani explains, the regime had been slowly loosening its stranglehold on civil liberties and was consequently gaining support among "an emergent class of relatively wealthy Damascene and Aleppan merchants". The president was beginning to seem almost 'progressive' (in the western-capitalist sense) - at least in comparison to his father Hafez al-Assad, whose leadership style was shaped by Soviet communism.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
"They [the regime] were starting to allow lots of things" - such as private TV channels showing satirical drama (satirical in a "disguised, Shakespearian" sense), and some non-state-controlled newspapers with articles criticising the government.</div>
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Assad's fatal mistake, according to Hani, was to ignore the discontent in poorer areas of Syria, "where people thought, 'No matter what I do, I can't improve my living circumstances, I'm just going nowhere - but the people next door have done it, so why can't we?'... The fact these people have been neglected is ironic, given that Hafez al-Assad's revolution [when he became president, in 1971] was pretty much a peasant uprising against the landowning classes of Damascus and Aleppo."</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
I want to ask Hani about his hopes for his family and whether they know he is gay, but it is getting late and café staff are shuffling in around us, wiping down tables and preparing to close for the day.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
We exchange emails the following day, and he makes a startling disclosure: his parents have suspected he is gay since his father "found some stuff in my diary", about five years ago. This "stuff" revealed nothing about the affair, but Hani's mention of having felt attracted to other men was enough to elicit furious non-acceptance.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
"We had massive row... They were some of the worst days in my life. I really thought I'd lost them forever." An uneasy truce was reached, whereby Hani "was made to promise to change and become 'normal', i.e. heterosexual - otherwise, I would have been disowned".</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
To this day his parents remain "very suspicious" and "don't dare ask questions" about his personal life. When his mother expresses her wish that he one day marry a woman, he plays his part in "a game of perfect pretence".</div>
<div style="background-color: white; border: none; font-family: Georgia, Century, Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px; list-style: none; margin-bottom: 14px; padding: 0px;">
Except it is not a game - games are fun, like hide-and-seek. Syria may be drawing near to a new era of free expression, but for gay Syrians like Hani one realm of secrecy will remain as compulsory and oppressive as ever.</div>
</div>
Davidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03662243675288847759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2737550703462651461.post-91587826186736743532011-10-20T08:49:00.000-07:002015-10-22T08:44:01.355-07:00Having a go, un-heroically<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6khiuZ4Dy6tJGEZVsv6pfLKg780fRsHaRJWIzTcJMa-pqZCrbzdOgsoCrqplfsx47tcdi7m75WTeU_PpCLbTDc7GRz_LPYf1RVLhugy8lP1jtvdpx_ySSM5XRCeQIsYci_5A_XJp6qg-O/s1600/Alcoholics+corner.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6khiuZ4Dy6tJGEZVsv6pfLKg780fRsHaRJWIzTcJMa-pqZCrbzdOgsoCrqplfsx47tcdi7m75WTeU_PpCLbTDc7GRz_LPYf1RVLhugy8lP1jtvdpx_ySSM5XRCeQIsYci_5A_XJp6qg-O/s1600/Alcoholics+corner.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Alcoholics' Corner: site of 98.6 per cent of crime committed in Lewes (roughly)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">As a child, I dreamt about
getting my chance to act like a superhero. I had the strength and bravery, I
was sure; all I needed was the occasion. The fantasy never completely died.
Since becoming a keen runner, I’ve often thought: Wouldn’t it be great to put
my fitness to heroic use? – to run down a criminal and teach him a harsh lesson
about the foolishness of committing crime while in a state of mediocre
cardiovascular health. Well, my chance came today.</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 13.85pt;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">It was meant to be a routine,
easy run. I’d set out from my house and was jogging along Southover Road
when I heard some commotion. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 13.85pt;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">“Oi! Stop! Come back here!” </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 13.85pt;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">It was a male voice, urgent,
almost frantic. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 13.85pt;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">He’s yelling at his runaway
dog, I concluded, uneasily. But the shouts grew louder. The fugitive, it soon
dawned on me, was a man, not a dog. I looked back.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">Not one man, but two, both
middle-aged, grey, and gaining on me fast. How could this be? I was running yet
being caught by old blokes in overcoats. The leading veteran runner, I
realised, was being pursued by the other, but it wasn’t so much a race as a
chase. “Stop him, he’s a thief,” shouted the chaser. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">By now, the pursued was a mere
20 metres away. I had a decision to make.</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">Questions and doubts shot
through my mind: 1. Is the chaser telling the truth? 2. Is the chased dangerous?
3. Should I help? Damn it, am I superhero material? </span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">My ad hoc answers revealed a
fair few prejudices, I’m ashamed to say. 1. Yes, the chaser must be telling the
truth – he isn’t dropping consonants. 2. No, the chased isn’t dangerous – he’s
puny, pallid and probably a smackhead. So hell yeah, 3. This is your chance to
be a hero!</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">What happened next I can’t
quite explain. I made an attempt. Or did I? I stuck out an arm with about enough
purpose to intercept a wafting balloon. He palmed me off, easily, and kept
going. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"><br />
Across Station Street he dashed, and then, for some reason, just sort of
gave up. The chasing man clinched him in a bear-hug and wrestled him to the
ground. It was impressive, heroic even. </span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">I’ve repressed whatever might
have happened next. I can only assume I was standing around, leaning on
something, dazed.</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">My only excuse: confusion. Was
the chasing man’s allegation genuine and correct? What if it had all been a
mistake and the chased man was innocent? In hindsight, it was no time for moral
ambivalence; after all, the chased man <i>ran away</i> – people
wrongly accused of theft don’t run away. </span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">The next thing I r<a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="_GoBack"></a>emember: two stockier, less ambivalent citizens arrived on
the scene and helped pin down the alleged thief, while I stood around shivering
in my running kit – clingy base layer and flimsy gilet – trying to assume an
“I’m on hand to help if help is needed” expression. </span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">Meanwhile, the accused man
moaned (though didn’t swear) about being uncomfortable, pinned down on the
pavement. Another bystander, a smartly dressed woman, kept him informed, at
regular intervals, that she had no sympathy, in light of his (alleged) offence
– though she didn’t qualify it ‘alleged’. </span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">After an agonising wait of at
least 10 minutes, one police car arrived, then another. The officers - two
calm, seen-it-all-before women - handcuffed the accused and bundled him into
the car. “He ran like an athlete,” the accuser told them. I couldn’t help but worry
about the context: Like an athlete <i>compared to the skinny, limp-wristed
jogger whom he so effortlessly deflected.</i> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">The accused had stolen a
woman’s handbag from the family history bureau, alleged the accuser, and had discarded
his swag in an alley before the chase caught up with him, and me.</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">Still, it’s one man’s word
against the other’s. What if the accused man was innocently researching his
mother’s uncle’s mysterious estranged son when the accusing man – who, let’s
conjecture, is a paranoid fantasist – shouted at him “Oi! Thief!” The accused
man simply panicked – his mind full of Victorian family feuds and barbarism –
and fled in fear. Perhaps. </span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"><br />
</span><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"><br />
Or what if the accused man is the long-lost brother of the accusing man and had
stalked him to the family history bureau to steal his historical documents
(stashed in wife’s handbag) in an attempt to prevent the uncovering of a dark family
secret? </span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;">Hard to believe? That depends.
Some people reckon super-heroes wear Spandex… </span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 0pt;"></span></div>
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Davidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03662243675288847759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2737550703462651461.post-34360359908814890102011-01-20T08:05:00.000-08:002013-02-04T15:28:37.060-08:00Why I run<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>Updated as 'This is not a running blog' - 4th February 2013</i></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqtALHfqiZ0K2Ml5ulQITsusSnCfRt5AAdlQCg6o8vnZT2-_JoEqZok5NlxCSurShC_sRupB3yiGGMIU_yFd1O6sqQSFxPy9ZVAXZ04G7NnG1UxKrWlaGM787HqXPZCbmkO1FrfVXf6zgU/s1600/Suffering.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqtALHfqiZ0K2Ml5ulQITsusSnCfRt5AAdlQCg6o8vnZT2-_JoEqZok5NlxCSurShC_sRupB3yiGGMIU_yFd1O6sqQSFxPy9ZVAXZ04G7NnG1UxKrWlaGM787HqXPZCbmkO1FrfVXf6zgU/s1600/Suffering.jpg" height="320" width="212" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Sunday morning, fighting futilely against a brick-wall-strength headwind.<br />
Why? Not sure really...</td></tr>
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Davidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03662243675288847759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2737550703462651461.post-41364988733995613022010-08-17T07:39:00.000-07:002015-04-20T05:00:28.259-07:00Is it 'cos I is Lewesian?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhozmnbsOfeV588YoaNfkvu3tCpS4JqC6ukiV9nKRQvNimg2Yj7fi4AEVJGLRI1TAO9gdnAR9LprHNmgc43Qb6CqoKgSC8dvC5UOddwqEnI_c6JCeuyCutSZPFE3rVNpeIAzpr33c7gfHKs/s1600/DJS.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhozmnbsOfeV588YoaNfkvu3tCpS4JqC6ukiV9nKRQvNimg2Yj7fi4AEVJGLRI1TAO9gdnAR9LprHNmgc43Qb6CqoKgSC8dvC5UOddwqEnI_c6JCeuyCutSZPFE3rVNpeIAzpr33c7gfHKs/s1600/DJS.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">David James Smith and his family</td></tr>
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<br />
It’s now just over a week since<em> The Sunday Times</em> published a feature by David James Smith (DJS) about the racism he, his black wife and their mixed-race children have encountered in Lewes since moving to the town in 2005. When I read the feature for the first time, I was indignant at halfway, and laughing so as to avoid crying at the end. I was, in a word, bewildered. It was like nothing I’d read before.<br />
<br />
Once I’d collected my thoughts, I tried to summon the equanimity to defend DJS for having had the courage to spark off a thorny debate. We all know there’s still racism (and homophobia, misogyny, etc.) on the streets – and in the suburbs – of Britain, and it’s brave to point a finger at the perpetrators. Then again, having the pluck to start an argument is not inherently valuable, not unless you’re a) addressing the right target and b) making your case effectively and in good faith. I’m content that DJS struck on an interesting concern, and the question “Is racism still a problem in ostensibly tolerant places such as Lewes?” is an important one. The trouble is, he completely wasted his chance.<br />
<br />
The feature’s hypothesis – that racism is rife in places usually considered pleasant – is set out at the beginning. The headline “England’s green and prejudiced land” and the standfirst “When our writer moved to Lewes, the BNP neighbour came as a shock, but it was the smaller subtle incidents of racism that most dented his faith” leave us in little doubt about the presumption-shattering endeavour at hand. So far, so intriguing.<br />
<br />
So, what’s his evidence? The first exhibit is a former neighbour who, DJS discovered, was a member of the BNP. He names the man and, just for good measure, includes a photo of him. I read on in a state of trepidation, expecting to find out that this person had directed racist abuse at DJS and his family. No such revelations; the only dirt dug about the man is that he had, at some point, anonymously added “poisonous posts” on a racist US website. DJS’s public denouncement of his ex-neighbour is founded on speculation about “him on the other side of the wafer-thin walls that separated our semi-detached homes, spewing out bile on his computer in the small hours”.<br />
<br />
Speaking of ‘wafer thin’, <em>is that it</em>? What does the manifestation of this man – regardless of his late night web-browsing habits, imagined or real – tell us about racism in towns like Lewes? Hardly anything. It merely reminds us that BNP members do actually exist, and that some of them exist in average houses in normal towns – not just in council properties on run-down estates in Bradford. No shit. DJS doesn’t even bother to cite Lewes’ general election results (594 votes for the BNP candidate), which would have at least given his anecdote some statistical context. Roughly one in every one-hundred voters in the Lewes constituency supports the BNP – there, I’ve done it for him.<br />
<br />
Moving on, exhibit two is bonfire night in Lewes, for which a small group of people from a certain bonfire society dress up as Zulus – which involves ‘blacking-up’. I’ve no desire or grounds on which to defend this practice; it is, like the anti-Catholic rhetoric of bonfire night, outdated, unnecessary and oafish. But the question, again, is what does it tell us about the prevalence of racism in Lewes? Is there broad support in the town for ‘blacking-up’ – which would signal, at least, a worrying reluctance to put others’ feelings before the desire for ritualistic silliness – or would most Lewesians prefer to see it dropped from bonfire night proceedings? Unfortunately, DJS doesn’t seem to have asked around. [Sigh.]<br />
<br />
So, he’s ticked off community (BNP ex-neighbour) and culture (bonfire night); next up, education. DJS describes how, having installed his kids at local schools, they become victims of racial prejudice. In the first instance: “Our eldest daughter’s dance teacher at the local secondary school also used the word ‘coloured’ to describe black people,” and in the second: “Mackenzie [DJS’s son] came home from school with the news that a mother had confronted him in the playground after school with an account that he had hurt her son,” which “We saw… in clear terms: a white woman’s perception of the tough little black/mixed-race kid who could do with a reprimand and was not to be believed.” Why<em> clear terms</em>? DJS states his conclusion as though it’s the natural one, self-evident to all. But it’s not. Was the mother in question being (excessively) protective of her child because she believed the boy who hit him was mixed-race? We’ll never know because DJS doesn’t grant the woman the right of reply.<br />
<br />
On another occasion, a teacher grabs and yanks Mackenzie. Again, DJS makes the assumption that this happened because his son was mixed-race, and again, we don’t get to hear the teacher’s side of the story. The final example of “racism” at his children’s school is another one-sided account; a (different) teacher draws attention to his daughter’s hair: “The teacher turned to a colleague, making a big circle with her hands to exaggerate the Afro, laughing and saying it had been ‘all frizzy’ last week.”<br />
<br />
Second-hand, one-sided tales from the schoolyard aren’t, I feel, the firmest or fairest type of evidence. Equally, though, I’ve no reason to doubt DJS when he tells us his kids were upset when these events happened. The image of a slighted child’s sad face is a powerful one, but the arena of debate is no place for sentimentality. What I want to know is whether the aforementioned happenings provide proof of racism and, if so, whether they indicate that racism is endemic in Lewes.<br />
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On the first point, DJS provides an answer of sorts. He recognises that the incidents he’s described do not constitute racist abuse of the traditional brand; they are, instead, “micro-aggressions” – smaller, less-overt specks of prejudice that add up to a hurtful smear. Here, he is using a term from a US academic discipline called Critical Race Theory, according to which “race is the centre of everything” and “negative perceptions about black people remain part of our daily lives”. Sadly, that’s about all that DJS tells us about Critical Race Theory. For one suspenseful moment, he tempts us with a morsel of meaty theoretical stuff… with citations and everything… No, it couldn’t last.<br />
<br />
My initial reaction to the theory about “micro-aggressions” is that it’s interesting, and I’d like to know more about it. But I’m worried that it’s an idea that could easily be misapplied to instances where the “micro-aggressor” did not intend to cause harm. Were the teacher who described DJS’s daughter’s hair as “frizzy” and the child who described his son’s nostrils as “big” being <em>aggressive</em>? No, they were being <em>insensitive</em>. The distinction between aggression and insensitivity is an important one, containing within it the question of intent. Using a term implying deliberate violence, dubiously, to describe unwitting <em>faux-pas</em>, serves only to accuse, eliciting defensiveness, and does nothing to encourage empathetic behaviour.<br />
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Perhaps that’s the main problem here: DJS isn’t interested in making us weigh our words and actions more carefully. He just wants to pick a fight; he’s out to avenge the wrongs inflicted on his family – a journalist doing a vigilante’s job. Even when it seems he’s being nice about Lewes folk – conceding that there are some “decent, ordinary [and] accepting” people in the town – it’s stingingly conditional: “It is probably no coincidence, though, that our friends [in Lewes] are almost all ex-Londoners.” (I took this particularly badly because I’ve lived in Lewes for five years and grew up in a village that’s a walkable distance away, so I’ve little choice but to consider myself a ‘local’.) Who’s the one feeling like a victim of prejudice now? Yes, ‘tis I.<br />
<br />
Enough, enough; I must draw this to a close. Almost every one of DJS’s anecdotes warrants, if not repudiation, then at least a paragraph of calm reflection… but I can’t go on, I’m running out of space and energy. He concludes the piece with yet more on education, telling us how a school in Brixton is getting brilliant results from its students by employing a draconian regime. At this point, it’s as though he loses his thread completely, launching into a long digression about the virtues of ultra-dictatorial schooling techniques: “Pupils move from class to class in total silence… they are not allowed to form groups of more than six… [they] line up in single file.” By this stage, DJS’s original question, “Is racism a lurking menace in pleasant-seeming places” is so utterly and blithely abandoned that it’s as though he’s given up on journalism completely, in favour of becoming a demonic headmaster. His dreamy conclusion imagines the paradisial school in Brixton magically wafting its way to Lewes and curing us all, by means of silent reading in small groups, of our narrow-minded, mono-racial despicableness.<br />
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For several days, I struggled to come to terms with DJS’s feature. I couldn’t understand how a national newspaper editor had deemed it appropriate for publication. Was I protesting too much, out of jealousy or repressed prejudice? All I knew was that I couldn’t put my astonishment into words (and, evidently, I’m still unable to write a concise blog post about the piece). Thankfully, a couple of friends I spoke to last week – both of whom are Lewesians, one a teacher, the other a journalist – were more succinct than I have been able, so I conclude with their comments. One recalled finding the feature so ridiculous that he’d thought it was a spoof. The other decided that it could, after all, serve an educational function: “If I were teaching journalism students how <em>not</em> to write a feature, this would be my set text. I’d challenge them to identify, say, 50 things wrong with it.”</div>
Davidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03662243675288847759noreply@blogger.com0