The Joy of Six 1476

Chris Dillow argues that if government wants to foster economic growth, it will have to fight for it: "Right now, the social transformation needed to raise growth requires the government to face down the powerful interests of, if not capital in general, then at least the more regressive elements of it such as rentiers, monopolists and media barons."

Virginia Heffernan investigates Jeffrey Epstein's favourite intellectual salon, Edge. She finds that it infiltrated Harvard, muzzled the humanities and preached master-race science.

"'Free School Meals' and 'Free School Clothing' were an absolute lifeline for us ... That support meant I could walk through the school gates looking like everyone else, focusing on my education rather than the clothes on my back. It taught me that while education is a right, the cost of accessing it can be a barrier we must actively dismantle." Shaffaq Mohammed on the importance of the Lib Dem amendment, passed by the Lords, that will put a price cap on school uniforms.

Lauren Leek crunches the numbers to see why so many pubs have closed: "So here’s the political economy of pub closures. It is not: people stopped going. It is: pubs became collateral in leveraged buyouts, debt costs were passed down as higher rents and lower investment, and the pubs that couldn’t sustain the extraction closed, while the ones that could were reshaped into higher-margin branded concepts serving a wealthier clientele."

Did climate change lead to greater persecution of witches? York Historian weighs the evidence.

"Whenever a performer had a Muppet on their hand, they never broke character. So all the time in between takes, Gonzo would still be Gonzo and I was still talking to Gonzo, not Dave Goelz, who is the performer of Gonzo. I believed that Gonzo and Rizzo were my friends, and we were on an adventure together. Rizzo in particular, Steve Whitmire, was so funny. We would just play all day long." Kevin Bishop shares his memories of playing Jim Hawkins in Muppet Treasure Island with Brian VanHooker.

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"Since February, an isolated former RAF base near the village of Manston, in Kent, has been used by the Home Office to warehouse migrants reaching England’s southeastern shores on small boats. These are desperate people fleeing conflict, persecution, immiseration, environmental degradation and other crises. Most of them claim asylum. They all deserve better." Joseph Maggs argues that Manston refugee camp is a "politically manufactured crisis": the foreseeable result of government policy towards the vast majority of the global poor who are unable to access "safe and legal routes" to the UK.  

Stephen Glenn explains why he is not watching the Qatar World Cup.

George Cunningham on the challenges facing the Lib Dems' federal international relations committee. He lists getting the party leadership back on track concerning Europe among them.

Social media accounts from far beyond the city stoked tensions between Hindus and Muslims in Leicester at the time of this autumn's riots, says The Indian Express. 

"Many of the songs were suggested to the band by A.L. Lloyd, the self-taught folklorist who went on to become co-founder and artistic director of Topic Records and co-compile The Penguin Book Of English Folk Songs with Vaughan Williams. Mike Waterson once called him "a guru to us"; Lloyd also directed the subject matter of their songs. "We sang one and he said, 'Mm, we shan’t use that one. It’s too subservient.'" Judge Rogers on The Watersons and the re-release of their album Frost and Fire.

Bobby Seal presents a list of his favourite psychogeography books of 2022.

The Joy of Six 1007

I have long regretted choosing 'Six of the Best' as a name for a feature on this blog. I mentioned this in a recent post and, thanks to a suggestion there by Epictetus, I have my new title.

At least I can be confident that I will never come to regret using one based on a naff Seventies sex manual.

So on we go...

Shev Fogarty blames the Jersey government's new licensing system for the current fishing dispute.

"Having spent time in 2005 asking people around Scotland how they planned to vote, and why, the most common answer to the second question was ‘that’s how we’ve always voted’, often with an invocation of a father. ... These days, the most common answer is 'I’ll see what they have to say'. The SNP didn’t become a part of people’s identities in the way their old parties used to be. It just convinced them to be open-minded." Adam Ramsey explains how the Scottish political landscape has changed.

James Kirkup says education, not class, is Britain's real political divide.

Amanda Perkins talks about her experiences working with farmers, ornithologists and volunteers in the Shropshire hills on curlew conservation.

"By the time he wrote The Owl Service, [Alan] Garner was subverting both the style and the narrative structure of fantasy, creating a distinct voice and a numinous experience. Garner’s fantasy novel focuses on the angst, loves and rivalries of its teenage protagonists: what is at stake is the home and the family. And what disrupts them (but also offers the possibility of redeeming them) is a coherent mythological tradition: in this case, Welsh legend." Dimitra Fimi celebrates a novel that broke the rules of fantasy.

Ben Clifford takes us on six walks that encompass Croydon’s boundaries and history.

There's nothing wrong with calling our national flag the Union Jack

It's featured in Doctor Who, and the last person I heard making the claim was Jim Davidson.

I don't know where the idea that it's wrong to call the UK's national flag the Union Jack comes from - on no evidemce. I suspect QI - but it's bollocks.

If you don't believe me, talk to Cdr Bruce Nicolls OBE RN (Retd) of the Flag Institute:

It is sometimes claimed that the Union Flag should be described as the Union Jack only when flown in the bows of a warship, but this is a relatively recent idea. From its earliest days, the Admiralty often referred to the flag – however it was used – as the Union Jack. 

In 1902 an Admiralty Circular announced that either name could be used officially. And in 1908 the UK Parliament approved this verdict, stating that ‘the Union Jack should be regarded as the National flag’.

Cdr Nicholls's article featured in a Six of the Best here long ago. I still enjoy collecting links for this feature, but I find its name increasingly embarrassing.

Does anyone have a better idea for something to call it?

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Rafael Behr says there is only one thing certain in the court of King Boris: it will all end badly: "Johnson is driven by a restless sense of his own entitlement to be at the apex of power and a conviction, supported by evidence gathered on his journey to the top, that rules are a trap to catch weaker men and honour is a plastic trophy that losers award themselves in consolation for unfulfilled ambition."

"The unreadable in pursuit of the unelectable" Mic Wright deconstructs my old classmate Allison Pearson's interview with Laurence Fox.

Ian Sanjay Patel is interviewed about his book We’re Here Because You Were There: Immigration and the End of Empire.

Children read more challenging books in lockdowns, reports Alison Flood.

"Aunt Lucy gets to see firsthand that Paddington is okay and know he is loved and being cared for with the utmost sincerity. It’s all one can ever hope for when they have to give a child up for adoption." Mike X. Nichols says the two Paddington films get a lot right about adoption.

"One of the key British films of the 1950s, Pool of London was far out ahead of the crowd in tackling racial issues on screen. This classic dockside noir was directed by Basil Dearden." Adam Scovell goes in search of the locations used in the film to see what remains.

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Anne Applebaum says Alexei Navalny is showing the world what courage means: "Nothing is secret about the poisoning, false trial, or harsh imprisonment of Navalny. Like the multiple attempts to murder him, these things are playing out in public, in the open, for everyone to see."

"For 48 hours, soccer stood on the brink. Fans took to the streets. Players broke into open revolt. Chaos stalked the game’s corridors of power, unleashing a shock wave that resonated around the world, from Manchester to Manila, Barcelona to Beijing, and Liverpool to Los Angeles." Tariq Panja and Rory Smith on how the Super League fell apart.

T.J. Coati explains what's wrong with Secure Schools.

In 1982 the South African government bombed Islington. James Morris has the story.

"A fascinating essay by Tom Holland describes a mysterious artefact which may show a West Indian slave playing cricket and then follows C L R James in analysing cricket as a pathway to equality." Richard Heller and Peter Oborne argue that the new Wisden is a global record of war, plague, racism and environmental change.

Jessica Pickens looks back at juvenile Oscars - 12 were awarded between 1935 and 1961.

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"Essentially ,,, Britain is being run by children in adult bodies for whom politics is little more than a fascinating game."  Jörg Schindler examines the baleful effect of Eton on our politics.

"Fundamental to holding onto hope of living in harmony with nature is modernising the UK’s Anglo-Norman land ethic. This cannot abide the idea that land is the core natural asset of the nation and of the planet. Instead, it gives primacy to any private benefit that may accrue to those who choose to exploit it." Laurence Rose says we shall have to be radical if we are going to save nature.

Daniel Button asks if the government will finally act on social care: "The problem with the Care Act ... was that the reality came nowhere near the aspiration. The wellbeing principle lacked teeth, was passed into law while councils were being cut to the bone and the social care system was simply not set up to deliver on these principles."

The Rest is History podcast weighs the importance of the year 1066 to British history.

Owen Hatherley interviews Jonathan Meades about his new book Pedro and Ricky Come Again,

"What a Crazy World is far from your average pop film. Its songs are a blend of music hall and rock'n'roll, and for all  the lightness of tone their subject matter is essentially gritty: unemployment, petty thieving, fighting, the generation gap." Pismotality celebrates this 1963 release.

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"Western democracies are not simply embracing neoliberalism in the sense of deregulating the economy. Elites are pursuing something aptly described as a new form of feudalism, in which entire realms of public law, public property, due process, and citizen rights revert to unaccountable control by private business." Robert Kuttner and Katherine V. Stone offer a sobering analysis.

Andrea Barry replies to the Sewell Report: "While some black British have better education outcomes, this does not translate to better labour market outcomes. Again, this is not just one individual, but a majority. Pay and Curriculum Vitae (CV) studies, which are widely available, showcase the difference in experience in the labour market for BME workers, regardless of education."  

Prince Philip's death has unearthed the fake patriots, argues James Belchamber.

Samantha Rose Hill marks the 60th anniversary of the trial of Adolf Eichmann by looking at Hannah Arendt's account of it.

"The Innocents took the British horror genre away from the Hammer films of the mid-1950s, which were drenched in lurid colour, visual excess, graphic sexuality and bloody violence, back to the shadows, suspense and ghostly figures of its Gothic beginnings." Hollie Starling looks at the use made of children in British genre cinema in the 1960s.

The Tolkien Society has made back numbers of Mallorn, its peer-reviewed journal, open access.

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"The scenes we all saw of the police using force against those at the Clapham Common vigil were entirely foreseeable, preventable and unnecessary." Brian Paddick is critical of the inspectorate report on the policing of the vigil for Sarah Everard.

Alison Faulkner offers a depressing analysis of the Commons debates on the review of the Mental Health Act 1983. 'The Expert' - the psychiatrist - was characterised in the debates by knowledge, training and an assumed trustworthiness, while 'The Patient was associated with non-compliance, potential risk and impaired decision making.

Stefan Collini reviews two books on meritocracy: "There have long been individuals from less advantaged social backgrounds for whom education has been the route to advancement (‘the scholarship boy’ was one of the most celebrated, and most obviously gendered, of the tropes used to represent this possibility). This, too, is an important truth, not simply to be disparaged as ‘elite recruitment’. But the fact that such individual stories stand out is an indication that education does not work in this way for the majority."

"The management at ABC spotted something: when they showed a play that was a bit more avant garde or intended to challenge the viewer’s opinions or lifestyle, viewing figures went up. Against the conventional wisdom, it seemed that people in the late 1950s liked having television that took them on full in the face." Russ J. Graham offers an appreciation of Cathy Come Home, 55 years after it was first broadcast.

Richard Coles talks to Lucy Walker about his love of music from Motown to Benjamin Britten.

We look back to the days of Jim Cumbes, Chris Balderstone and the days when it was possible to be a professional footballer and cricketer with Vince Cooper.

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"Most British governments since Thatcher’s have sought to stamp out what they see as a spreading ‘European heresy’: the notion that supreme law should stand above parliaments, that judges in a democracy may reverse the will of an elected government if it violates a constitution." So says Neal Ascherson, reviewing a book by Linday Colley.

What did Richard Kemp know about Liverpool's scandals?

Matthew Pencharz says that Londoners opposed to low traffic neighbourhoods will be glad of them in the end.

Are you local? Sophia Adamowicz explores the blend of the macabre and the mundane in the work of Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith.

Huw Turbervill offers his selection of cricket's best (and worst) moments on film and TV: "Peter Davison's fifth Doctor wore a cricket costume and showed his skills in the two-part adventure, 'Black Orchid'. He looks an adequate seamer but could use his front arm more, but is a slogger with the bat. The director Ron Jones errs, though, allowing the umpire to signal a wide when a four is struck."

Look Up London tours the City's orphaned church towers.

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Congratulations on reaching number 1000? Up to a point. 

I seem to recall that something went wrong with the numbering of this feature early on and I am increasingly embarrassed by its title.

I sometimes think that the best links should get there own post and the average ones should just be a tweet, but I enjoy putting Six of the Best together and with so much of my time spent looking after my Mum these days I am not in the mood for radical changes,

Edward Docx says Boris Johnson is a clown: "Instead of uniting his country, he now finds himself facetiously hastening its breakup. And it is the Conservative and unionist parties that have facilitated him. They licensed their comforting fool and told themselves that he could restore a glorious past. But a leader who personifies tomfoolery and nostalgia is eloquent of sharpening decline not renaissance."

"There are now political academics who use the term ‘distributist’, shorn of its Catholic accretions, as a shorthand for the bearded sandals wing of the party. As one of that persuasion myself, I feel myself increasingly alone and misunderstood by either technocratic wing – neither right nor left seem to understand why I might be against big business but in favour of small, why I might be in favour of entrepreneurs but against corporates." David Boyle is drawn to the liberal distributist tradition in British politics.

Former BBC journalist Patrick Howse believes the corporation’s biggest mistake was to court and give a platform to extreme voices.

A bus for every village, every hour is possible argues the Campaign to Protect Rural England.

David Southwell, landscape punk and creator of Hookland, is interviewed by the Spirit Box podcast.

Victor Ambrus, book illustrator and the resident artist on Time Team, is eulogised by Britain is no Country for Old Men: "He was in Budapest during 'The Siege', the 50-day-long encirclement by Soviet Russian and Romanian forces in which about 38,000 civilians died through starvation or military action, before it unconditionally surrendered in. He later recalled 'the smoke and the rubble' he had seen and would have then witnessed Russian soldiers and tanks on the streets of Budapest."

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Stephen Williams makes the case for abolishing Bristol's elected mayor.

Samantha Rose Hill examines Hannah Arendt's writings on the links between loneliness and totalitarianism: "Arendt’s argument about loneliness and totalitarianism is not an easy one to swallow, because it implies a kind of ordinariness about totalitarian tendencies that appeal to loneliness: if you are not satisfied with reality, if you forsake the good and always demand something better, if you are unwilling to come face-to-face with the world as it is, then you will be susceptible to ideological thought."

With evidence for efficacy so thin, and the stakes so high, why is electroshock therapy still a mainstay of psychiatry? John Read explains.

"Nottinghamshire has a long history of libraries, from the old penny libraries prior to the establishment of a public library service. If none of these had existed and I could design a new world the first thing I would want in my utopia is a place where knowledgeable staff help you choose books you can read *for free* then take them back for someone else to have the same pleasure." Ross Bradshaw on the wonder of public libraries.

Aris Roussinos.argues that Paul Kingsnorth has emerged as Britain’s foremost critic of industrial modernity and the  literary heir to a strain of thought that has survived in the English imagination, on both Left and Right, since the very beginning of the Industrial Revolution.

Didn't you used to be Josh McEachran? The former Chelsea starlet reflects on his career and why things did not work out for him at Stamford Bridge,

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"Not so long ago, Britain was the envy of the world. It had the world’s best healthcare system. You could walk down the street, go to the doctor, and literally have the world’s best healthcare on your doorstep. It had the world’s finest public broadcaster - the BBC. The middle class was expanding, growing in wealth and happiness. It was part of the world’s most successful political union, the EU - and Brits had the right to live and work across Europe, something that many Americans would kill for." Umair Haque on how Britain became the dumbest society in the world.

Matthew Green says the Royal Family is a factory of human misery. He's right.

Eliane Glaser argues that homeschooling has revealed the absurdity of England’s national curriculum: "Six- and seven-year-olds are now expected to know prepositions, conjunctions and subordinate clauses; eight- and nine-year-olds, noun phrases expanded by the addition of modifying adjectives, preposition phrases, fronted adverbials and determiners; nine- and 10-year-olds, modal verbs and relative pronoun cohesion. I don’t even know what some of these terms mean, and I’ve got a PhD in English."

An internet that promotes democratic values instead of destroying them - that makes conversation better instead of worse - lies within our grasp, say Anne Applebaum and Peter Pomerantsev.

Andrew Nette chooses his top 10 British gangster films.

"Hidden away in the valley close to the village of Chilworth, near Guildford, are the ruins of an industry that dominated the area for almost 300 years – the manufacturing of gunpowder." Caroline Swan of Flickering Lamps takes us there.

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"Many Liberal Democrats don’t know that the late great Paddy Ashdown leaned heavily on the concept of a Basic Income as a fundamental component of his 'Citizens' Britain', arguing that 'every step we take towards a basic income liberates power in the hands of the citizen.'" Daniel Mermelstein believes universal basic income is a fundamentally liberal policy and a vote winner.

Shane Burke says the status quo in undercover policing threatens political rights.

"It seemed obvious to me that despite what everyone said, schools were not primarily about education. Formal learning made up a minimal fraction of the activity there (and the part adults later find the least memorable). The real purpose and priority of the school system was to instil the habit of obedience, of deference to our superiors. Learning was to be discouraged if it interfered with this end." Lorna Finlayson explains why she walked out of school at 13.

Henry Grabar looks at what New York could do if it took a quarter of its roads away from cars.

"Upon arrival in Scotland, Heron was thrown in for his debut against Morton in a League Cup tie; the Jamaican adding Celtic’s second goal in a 2-0 win with a 20-yard first-half strike." Did you know Gil Scott-Heron's father played for Celtic? Craig Stephen will tell you all about him.

Stefan Sagrott looks at Edinburgh's Innocent Railway.

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Sally Dawson pays tribute to Maureen Colquhoun, Britain’s first openly lesbian MP, who died earlier this month. She sat for Northampton North between February 1974 and 1979.

The coming Holyrood elections should be about the life draining from Scotland's hills and glens and the need for rewilding, argues Adam Ramsay.

"Politically speaking, Popper had lived through much. He had seen the dissolution of the old Austro-Hungarian monarchy. He was part of the subsequent intellectual revolution that, among other things, produced the Vienna Circle, of which he was a peripheral part. He witnessed first-hand the rise of the Nazis and, with equal dismay, the rise of Communism." David Cohen remembers Karl Popper.

Caitlin Green looks at the evidence that there were people named Muhammad in medieval England.

Adam Chapman studies an apparently innocent landscape by Ronald Lampitt and finds a wealth of information about the changes to British agriculture after the second world war.

"If Leeds was somewhere to escape from then the Yorkshire Dales were somewhere to escape to. Jake Thackray’s Swaledale was similar to James Joyce’s Dublin: a quasi-magical place rooted in a real geography containing the world’s multitudes." Will Ainsley celebrates the genius of Jake Thackray.

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Martin Barrow argues that the privatisation of children’s services is bad for children and bad for taxpayers.

Charlie Brooker and Adam Curtis discuss Curtis' new six-part BBC series 'Can't Get You Out Of My Head: An Emotional History of the Modern World'.

"In the suburbs of Seattle, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Philadelphia, the problem isn't that the children do not play in their front yards; the problem is that they don't even play in their backyards. And it is not because those backyards are unsafe but because their parents could be deemed 'neglectful' simply for allowing their children to go outside beyond their direct purview." Bridget Foley says childhood independence is on the verge of extinction in America.

Tim Dee celebrates the achievements of the environmental writer Richard Mabey.

"We had Moore, Hurst and Peters at their peak and the incomparable Gordon Banks in goal. Extravagant young talents like Peter Osgood, Alan Hudson and Charlie George were also on tap, so what could possibly go wrong?" Brian Penn looks back at England's failure to qualify for the 1974 World Cup.

Robert Andrews on the hunt for the medieval façade of Wakefield's bridge chapel.

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The Liberal Democrats are making the same mistake that doomed the Liberals a century ago, argues Nick Barlow.

Ian Dunt says liberals can redefine national pride and reclaim the flag from nationalists: "Liberal patriotism ... It starts and ends with the individual. It is a personal love story which springs from within, not a slab of uniformity imposed from above. It therefore cares about every individual in the country."

Dominic Dyer on the politics of the badger cull.

"Next Thursday 18 February 2021, it will have been eight years since the town walls fell at the back of St Laurence’s. There is no sign of the repairs beginning this year." Andy Boddington suggests Ludlow’s collapsed town wall should be registered as a Monumental Failure and become a tourist attraction.

Chris Orton offers an appreciation of Moondial, the BBC children's drama series from 1988: "Children’s drama in this era was thought-provoking and intelligent, with real care and attention made during the productions. The BBC seemed to go to great lengths to produce high quality programmes that made children think, entertained them and which didn’t belittle them."

"She loved to perch herself on or near a windowsill, surveying the outdoors for hours. It strikes me now how quintessentially feline that behaviour is: a docile carnivore balanced on the border of a human home, alone and content, yet with all its senses tuned to the world beyond." Ferris Jabr asks if cats are really domesticated.

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Chris Grey has good news: Brexit is coming apart at the seams.

"It’s been more than 100 years since the Commons took away the power of the unelected Lords to block legislation. Yet, here we are, still with an entirely unelected second chamber despite decades of tinkering. Johnson’s largesse would make a Renaissance pope blush (Ian Botham, for services for Brexit; Evgeny Lebedev, for services to lavish parties; and his own brother, for services to Johnsons)," George Chesterton says Britain's absurdly undemocratic second chamber needs urgent attention.

How are children coping with school closures? Surprisingly well, finds Peter Gray: "Forty-nine per cent of the children agreed with the statement, “I have been more calm than I was in regular school,” and only 25 per cent disagreed."

Sue Brunning looks at how The Dig compares to the momentous excavation at Sutton Hoo.

J.D. Collins rescues Nineties favourite 2point4 Children from the realm of cosy sitcom blandness to explore its supernatural undercurrents and brooding production values.

The LNER and Great Central used to cross on the level at Retford. Signalboxes,com has pictures of the building of the Great Central's dive under between 1963 and 1965, which meant heavily laden coal trains no longer had to cross the King's Cross main line.

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"A bill for the compulsory sterilisation of certain categories of 'mental patient' was proposed, with the Labour MP Archibald Church wanting to stop the reproduction of those 'who are in every way a burden to their parents, a misery to themselves and in my opinion a menace to the social life of the community'." Stephen Unwin explores how some of our most civilised and intelligent thinkers have supported eugenics.

Jennifer Quellette uses insights from the study of folklore to reveal how conspiracy theories emerge.

The Antipope of Mar-a-Lago: Michael Kruse on hat a medieval religious schism can teach us about Donald Trump’s unprecedented and radically antagonistic approach to the ex-presidency.

Chris Heather and Andrew Munro look into the accidental death of an aristocrat near Manton Junction in 1902.

Adam Scovell goes in search of locations from the James Fox and Mick Jagger film Performance.

Can you name the author of a first novel, originally published in Britain in September 1965, that became a more or less immediate best seller, and the fans of which included Noël Coward, Daphne du Maurier, John Gielgud, Fay Weldon, David Storey, Margaret Drabble, and Doris Lessing? The answer to this question from Lucy Scholes is "Irene Handl."

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"The status quo is no longer acceptable: it’s either federalism or independence. It’s time for the Liberal Democrats to fight for what we believe, rather than define ourselves by what we’re against. Let’s either make federalism happen or go down fighting for it." Andrew Page on what should be the Lib Dem response to the growing support for Scottish independence.

Regina Keith outlines the long history of school meals in Britain.

"An inadequate train service and vanishing high street are common complaints of Barrovians – and visitors will say those complaints are justified. Portland Walk in Barrow’s town centre lost Topshop, River Island and Marks & Spencer stores in 2020, to name just a few." Adam Payne asks what the Conservatives' claimed "levelling up" agenda can offer Barrow-in-Furness.

Edward Lucas pays tribute to his father J.R. Lucas, Oxford philosopher and Cold War champion of the Czechs.

We have Charlie Chaplin to thank for the blockbuster, argues John Sturgis.

Flickering Lamps discovers an ancient cemetery in the heart of Greenwich Park.