So the king has been to Paris. He and Monsieur Macron didn’t quite get to hugging but apparently their relationship is a bit touchy-feely, in that pat-on-the-back way that gentlemen can do. Their lady wives did the whole kiss on the cheeks things. Later the ladies also played ping pong, in totally inappropriate posh-lady dresses, at a sports centre they all visited. Charles is reported to be a fluent French speaker, like his mother apparently. As a linguist, I’d be interested to hear what his accent is like but I couldn’t bring myself to watch any video footage.
One report told us: “After all, France was one of the countries Queen Elizabeth II most visited during her long reign, and where she enjoyed five state visits. The affection runs deep.”
Goodness! Think of all the hundreds of years of France being our traditional enemy, reflected in those expressions that work in opposite directions depending on the language: to desert is “to take French leave” or , in French, “filer à l’anglaise”. Other examples exist but some of them are rather rude. Then of course, we had De Gaulle not wanting to accept us into the Common Market. If any of our politicians decide that we should apply to rejoin the EU, will Monsieur Macron stand in our way?
Things past have a way of popping up again. Recently it was once more the question of statues of rich men who made a good deal of money out of the slave trade. Professor Robert Beckford, whose very name presumably comes from his forbears having “belonged” to plantation owner William Beckford, objects to the decision to keep a statue of that plantation owner, a former master of the Ironmongers’ Company, on display in the Guildhall in London. “A plaque on a statue can’t cover a cruel slave trader’s mass murder. My ancestors deserve better,” he says.
No doubt they do deserve better. There’s no way to justify one person “owning” another. But removing the statues wholesale is to some extent sending the embarrassing memory of those times down the memory hole (where the Ministry of Truth in George Orwell’s “Nineteen Eighty-Four” disposed of embarrassing historical documents and effectively rewrote history). Better to make sure the plaques are large enough and noticeable enough to remind us not to repeat history, and indeed to combat the slavery that still exists in the modern world.
Personally I also favour this suggestion that I culled from a link in my friend Colin’s blog :
“Perhaps the best solution to any cultural controversy in recent years has come from the sculptor Anthony Gormley. In 2021, he suggested that the statue of Cecil Rhodes at Oriel College, Oxford should be turned to face the wall in shame. Playful and novel, that creative solution feels like the most sensible form of protest I’ve seen in an increasingly febrile debate.”
Further to my recent comments about our PM reversing plans to reach net zero on carbon emissions, here’s a link to some worries about the recent wildfires on Canada.
Not Mr Sunak’s responsibility I know, but all events that change a carbon saver into a carbon emitter are worrying. In this case, it seems that the decision over time to grow more combustible trees has contributed greatly to the problem. Making profits trumps saving the planet!
“The immense blazes that roared through much of the country are, in part, due to a legacy of poor forest management. The logging industry has long prized conifers and has gradually reshaped the landscape with lucrative – but highly combustible – trees. Decades of fire suppression, as well as a shift away from prescribed burns practiced by Indigenous communities, has left much of the forest floor littered with flammable deadfall.”
And I find myself thinking of wildfires in Galicia and Portugal where highly combustible (non-native) eucalyptus trees have also added to the problem.
Something else that has been on my mind is the question of armed police in the UK. I read yesterday about armed response officers in the Metropolitan police force refusing to go on patrol in case they find themselves in trouble if they use their weapon, accidentally or deliberately. This arises, of course from the case of the driver who was shot through the windscreen of his car, leading now to the police officer concerned being charged with murder. I don’t know any details of the shooting but it seems to me that if a policeman doesn’t routinely carry a gun he’s not going to shoot anyone, accidentally or deliberately.
I wondered how many of our policemen were armed. The information was quite hard to come by but here’s something I found:
“There were 18,262 police firearms operations in the year ending March 2021, a 6% decrease (-1,131) compared with the previous year and the second consecutive year-on-year decrease.
The two largest police forces, Metropolitan Police Service and West Midlands Police accounted for 34% of these operations.
Of the 18,262 operations, 92% (16,713) involved an Armed Response Vehicle (ARV), a similar proportion compared with the previous year (91%). There has been a gradual increase in the proportion of operations involving ARV’s since records began in the year ending March 2009 (81%).
There were 4 incidents in which police firearms were discharged. This compares with 5 incidents in the previous year.
There were 6,543 armed officers as at March 2021, a 1% decrease (-41) compared with the previous year. A similar decrease (-37) was also seen in the previous year. The total number of armed officers includes those operationally deployable as of March 31st 2021. This excludes officers who were absent due to sickness, those on paid leave, and those who were isolating due to COVID-19.”
So there it is. I think we’re still some way from seeing our police officers routinely carrying guns. I hope so,anyway.
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone! J
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