Can we just calm down a bit please
DON’T you think more and more of our news is generated by faux outrage? Take the hysteria about Sunderland football manager David Moyes, who told a female reporter after a post-match interview that she’d been “a bit naughty” and if it happened again she might “get a slap”.
Yes, sure, not the most elegant way of showing she’d got under his skin (which is what journalists are supposed to do anyway). But anyone who has seen the video of the exchange will have realised that Moyes’ tone was mild and he was obviously, if clumsily, joking.
He shouldn’t have said it but the reporter Vicki Sparks laughed amicably with him, has not made a complaint and accepted his apology afterwards. Surely that should be the end of it? Alas no, as the usual suspects, Twitter and the monstrous brigade of radical feminists who are trying to stifle and demonise free speech, said his language would “normalise violence towards women”.
What rubbish. Moyes, a manager in a macho sporting world, was annoyed by Sparks’ perfectly legitimate question and being human he let it show. Surely no one thinks this woman was truly under threat? And yet for a while it looked like Moyes might lose his job.
And then there’s all the fuss about the National Trust’s annual Easter Egg Trail being renamed the Cadbury’s Great British Egg Hunt.
Oh the outrage of certain columnists at the dropping of the word Easter in the name of commerce and branding. Of course PROOF that the BBC’s raft of excuses for poor sound on dramas such as Jamaica Inn and Taboo (it was our fault for owning flat-screen TVs with rubbish speakers, the muttered dialogue wasn’t muttered, it was “authentic”, we needed our ears syringed, etc) was utterly bogus came on Sunday night with the lush production of Evelyn Waugh’s Decline And Fall.
No mumbling. No intrusive background music. You could hear every syllable. Give that sound recordist a Bafta. Easter is a tremendously important occasion in the Christian calendar. But it’s also a tremendously important chocolate feast for millions of small children.
If you want to mark Easter as a religious festival no one is stopping you. You can observe Lent and go to church on Easter Sunday. Thousands do but the reality is that most don’t.
When our children were small we’d go to our parish church in Cornwall and after the service the genial vicar would initiate an Easter egg race down the steep hill of the adjoining lane. He’d roll little chocolate eggs along the vertiginous slope and all the kids would gleefully race after them. Frankly, it was this promise of fun and chocolate that got our children to church in the first place.
Various harrumphers have also vigorously disapproved of the new trend to have special Easter crackers on the table along with the roast lamb at the traditional Easter Sunday lunch. I think it’s a lovely idea. I am a Christian but we all know that Easter is not just about the resurrection. It also recognises ancient pagan rites of spring. The egg motif doesn’t signal religion but fertility and rebirth – and that is without mentioning the chocolate bunnies.
If our little granddaughter joins us for lunch, those pretty crackers decorated with sugar pink, blue and yellow chicks, would entrance her just as surely as the reindeers and robins on Christmas crackers.
Lighten up, people. Let’s enjoy life and make the most of every celebration. Don’t be a puritan, grab happiness where you can.
how tv is supposed to sound