Coke en stock

Steven Spielberg is about to hit another rich vein of media revenue when he releases The Adventures of Tintin later this month.

For four years, however, Bienvenu Mbutu Mondondo, a Congolese citizen has been conducting a case of racism against one of the earliest books, Tintin in the Congo. The book was banned in Britain in 2007 for making Africans look like monkeys and talk like imbeciles, however, it is from a bygone age and the publishers when defending the charges have described it as like taking a knife to Charles Dickens works based on his portrayal of Jews.

While Belgium's record on slavery in the Congo still causes emotions to run high, The Red Sea Sharks, the nineteenth of the Adventures of Tintin, written and illustrated by Herge, features the young reporter Tintin and his side kick Captian Haddock as the hero's, when they battle against slavers in West Africa.. Indeed the books original French title is Coke en Stock a codename used by the villainous antagonists of the story for African slaves. This might have been a better book to use as an example of the exploitation of the Congolese population when looking for a racist test case.

Good game, good game.....

You get to know when Christmas is sneaking up on you. The television running order begins to be dominated by programmes, the format of which is decided by viewers preference.

The X -Factor must be the market leader in this particular category, so it is difficult for other networks to pitch against it and expect to do well. As a best effort, the BBC put their own celebrity tomfoolery fest, Strictly Come Dancing, on a tad earlier in the hope of maintaining the audience later into the evening. I doubt it works, and i do wonder how they continue to pay homage to the doddering old fool who comperes it.

Many years ago Bruce Forsyth was a marvellous performer in the old Victorian music hall traditions. He was multifaceted and as a result got many major roles in theatre and television.
He is best known for hosting Saturday Night at the London Palladium in the late 1950s and early 1960s, and hosting high profile game shows like The Generation Game, Play Your Cards Right and The Price is Right. All in all he had a long and successful career.

Not satisfied with that, however, he suddenly decided he should be Sir Bruce Forsyth, and started a very public and, to my mind, distasteful campaign to obtain his ultimate goal. He is a fairly ruthless individual on the golf course, where he takes the attitude that if he is playing everybody else should get out of his way, and he brought the same attitude to his knighthood campaign. He solicited the help of high profile friends and colleagues, and eventually in the 2011 Birthday honours list he achieved his aim.

Personally I think it stinks. I have always thought the award of an honour by the Queen should be something which surprises as much as rewards, and to be blatant about such a thing would immediately disqualify the person from ever receiving it.

Sir Bruce, however, got his award and he continues to crack puerile jokes and struggle to read his q- card every Saturday night, so at least those watching Strictly can see at first hand what a bumbling buffoon he has become. Didn't he do well!

Fork 'andles

I've a rugby club golf trip coming up shortly and one of the evening themes is ecclesiastical dress.
I just popped into the local fancy dress shop and asked for a dog collar, she passed me a collar for a dog!
I felt like The Two Ronnies!!!

Once a policeman, always a policeman

When I started this blog in 2007 there was a Rugby World Cup scheduled, in France, and my trip to Bordeaux was documented, as were other aspects of the event. England you may recall got thumped by South Africa in their group game, were panned by the press, had a player revolt and eventually reached the final where they lost again to South Africa.

This year England stuttered through the group stages before they lost yesterday to an average French side in the quarter finals. To describe the French as average may be heaping too much praise on them, only their performance against Wales in the semi final will see whether I am being fair or not.

One expects French teams to have you on the edge of your seat every time their three-quarters get the ball. Alas that has not happened for a number of years as constant rule changes have seen the space on the field condensed into narrow corridors of opportunity which are swiftly snubbed out by brick outhouse size players.

Consider the game today when Australia beat South Africa. South Africa had 74% of the possession and Australia made a whopping 147 tackles in the game, that's nearly two a minute.
It was exciting but for totally gladiatorial reasons. There was little running rugby in the match.

England, of course, can't play running rugby. They are often starved of the ball by the opposition and the good sides use that superiority to run England ragged. Ireland in Dublin this year, New Zealand and South Africa at will, and now France.

The boys do go out on the lash occasionally in reverence to the old game of rugby which I and my peers played, but unfortunately the British press, particularly the red tops, are less inclined to reminisce about the good old days. Its a game for today and sadly England are a team for yesterday.

The coach Martin Johnson has not yet fallen on his sword, and with the RFU without a CEO and CIO equivalent, there is nobody to unsheathe it for him. Rob Andrew is a chartered surveyor by trade. You would think he would be able to identify the structural damage which the Johnson era is causing to the English game.

He indicated in his press conference that this group will get better as they are a young side. I suspect Cuerto, Shaw, Tindell, Thompson, Deacon, Easter, Moody and Wilkinson will be flattered by such accolades. There were young players Johnson could have picked, but he builds a team in his own (public) image, dull, grumpy, unimaginative and uninspiring. Move over and let someone else have a go. The game is still the low point of a day out at Twickenham, it needs to change

Move that aerial a bit will you......

Today was a pivotal one in so far as the broadcasting of Premier League football in pubs and bars is concerned.
While it may now allow these establishments to screen events for a much cheaper rate, and ensure some of them stay as viable businesses, let's not lose sight of the wider implications.

It is, after all, great news for Greece, perhaps they can now use the income from their cheaper signal decoders to reduce their budget deficit!!!