A Very Big House In The Country

I came across the existence of Longleat Safari Park in England. It’s one of those drive-through safari parks. What's weird about it is that it's on the grounds of a historic stately mansion. Of course, you have to wonder how that happens: A safari park isn't really what you associate with British aristocracy. Okay, you might imagine a rich British person with a private collection of exotic animals, but that's not what this is. Picture a huge and luxurious Victorian house in the English countryside; then imagine the camera shifts a little to the side and you see a middle-class family in their sedan watching the monkeys converge on the car looking for handouts, and the family is going from delight to a slight panic as more and more monkeys show up.

And yet, this cultural juxtaposition isn't that unusual. I remember going to an amusement park called Alton Towers, which is also on the grounds of an old estate. It seemed a little weird; I mean, I realize they need to put the theme parks and Safari parks somewhere in England, and they also have historic Manor houses. And since there's not much room, they could be side by side. But you'd think the historic Manors would want nothing to do with the entertainment of the common people. You know, build a tasteful wall between them. At the very least, don't name the park after the house.

But apparently, running a massive luxurious house is all fine and dandy when it's the nineteenth century and you have tenant farmers paying rent, and you're not paying any taxes, and there aren't many factories to outbid you for your workers. But in more modern times, these big houses became unaffordable even for the wealthy, and many were torn down or sold off. Others had to find new sources of income, and that's how a few of them came to have attractions for the masses on their grounds. Even at Alton Towers, the amusement park wasn't enough to make ends meet: the interiors of the house were sold off, and only the stone shell of the building remains. 

Anyway, part of the reason for my interest in this concept is that I just read Pride and Prejudice, which mostly takes place in such homes. One of the odd aspects of the setting is that the heroine’s family, the Bennetts, are on the poor side of rich. They may lose their house and their income, and probably end up in a Dickens novel. So you have to keep reminding yourself throughout the book that even though their cohorts look down on them, they're still much better off than most in that era. 

But now that I've seen the fate of such houses, I can't help but wonder what became of (spoiler alert) Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy's descendants. By now Mr. Darcy's estate at Pemberly is either gone, or maybe  home to Europe's third largest water park. 

Yes, I know, it's actually a good thing that these houses are no longer focused on a wealthy few. And this is a win for society: the welfare state and market forces combining to deliver a deserving comeuppance to an exploitative system. 

Maybe it's my English blood, but it still feels sad to see an end as undignified as Pemberly Splash Xtreme (Liz Darcy VII, proprietor.)

At The Prime Meridian

Britain has produced a lot of world-renowned musicians over the years. That often leads people to assume that we (people outside the country) know all the famous British musicians. But no: there are some artists that make it big in the UK but not in the rest of the world.

I’ve always been amused by the fact that the British themselves are kind of oblivious about this. You might see reporters on BBC World breathlessly reporting that Robbie Williams has hinted at a Take That reunion, unaware that much of the world has no idea who that is.

In most cases, the explanation of British-only stars is that there was an American substitute. For instance, Take That were around in the glory days of boy bands, so it’s not too surprising that they couldn’t pry Americans’ attention away from Backstreet Boys and NSYNC. But there are also situations where a British artist’s work just doesn’t translate well to outside audiences.

Which brings us to Blur. Music news sites have been buzzing that they have a new album coming out.

If you’re not familiar with the story, in the Britpop era of the nineties, Blur and Oasis were the two leading bands, sort of like, well, Backstreet Boys and NSYNC. Oasis made it big world-wide — like much of the western world, I still have “Wonderwall” going faintly through my head — while Blur scored a minor hit on the North American alternative charts with. “Girls & Boys.” Then, to make the story even weirder, Blur made a tongue-in-cheek fast rock song — "Song 2," probably better known as the “Woo-Hoo” song — and scored a transcendent, world-wide hit. So now most people around the world think they’re a grunge band, even though their music was largely a reaction to grunge, and this sort of odd band who would have been named, “Seymour” if the record execs hadn’t insisted on something more marketable, will forever be played in stadiums and included on lists of the best Jock-Jams.

If you listen to their music, it’s not hard to see why it didn’t translate outside the UK. It’s rather terribly British. Not British in the commemorative-royal-family-tea-set way, but in the dryly satirizing everyday life sense.

Of course, whenever I see something like this in another country, I naturally ask myself if there is any Canadian equivalent: If there can be a band so British that only the British really “get” it, can there be a band so Canadian that only we “get” it. Of course, we do have that: The Tragically Hip. Which then leads to the shocking revelation: The Tragically Hip is Canada’s answer to Blur? (Okay, The Hip started a few years earlier, so Blur is the U.K.‘s answer to The Tragically Hip, but still, the point is that it’s a weird comparison.) Really, they're bands that take very different styles to their music, with Blur's irony and satire and The Hip's cryptic can-lit and history references. It would be interesting to see someone take Blur's playful approach to life and focus it on Canadian culture. Although, arguably, those different levels of irony are themselves a reflection of the national identities of the respective bands. Okay, now my head hurts.

This leads me to wonder how many other countries are sitting on something like this: a band they love that never made it with the outsiders. Obviously, many countries have a language barrier that keeps local musicians from making it big world-wide. But this phenomenon even keeps some English-speaking performers local, even from countries that have produced world-famous musicians.  So I googled, “Australian bands that weren’t popular outside Australia” and found a list of the best Australian bands as voted by Australian musicians. In among the usual suspects, AC/DC, INXS, Midnight Oil, and Crowded House, there was Cold Chisel, whom I had never heard of. They’re described as a "pub band" who leaned in to the wild rock lifestyle of the 70’s-early-80’s and known for wild live shows. 

Reading the comments, Australians showed a feeling of nostalgia for their music that seemed reminiscent of The Hip, that they speak to the experience of growing up and living in the country. I guess every country does have that band that couldn’t be exported, even if they vary wildly stylistically. 

Keep Listening

Like a lot of Canadians my age, I have fond memories of Muchmusic. Not just silly, embarrassed memories, but some genuine appreciation. Although it could be juvenile and amateur, they offered a wider variety of music than any radio station, and so cultivated a more mature appreciation of music that we would otherwise have had. Also, their many genre-based shows allowed young music fans a deeper dive into their favourite music than you could get anywhere else at the time.

As a young proto-hipster, I especially enjoyed their alternative music show, The Wedge, and its predecessor, City Limits. They introduced me to musical possibilities a kid in small-town Ontario would never have had a chance to be exposed to, some of which would become life-long favorites.

But like I say, it wasn't perfect, and I think it's time for a reckoning of some of Muchmusic's crimes. For instance, they sometimes gave musicians a poor introduction. I'm still kind of ticked that I didn't get into The Smiths until years later because Much convinced me they had nothing more to offer than "Girlfriend in a Coma." Is not a bad song, but not the catchiest in their catalogue, and surely not the one you would use to introduce people to the band.

But that sort of thing tended to happen: they'd arbitrarily overplay one song in a bands ouvre, denying viewers the chance to get a better idea of their music. To be fair, they were limited by the fact that is a video channel, and have a mandate to choose good videos. But I suspected that we were also at the mercy of taste-makers behind the scenes, and if someone at the station had a thing for a particular song, then we were just kind of stuck with it.

Which brings me to fellow Mancurians, The Fall. The only song of theirs that I ever recall appearing on Muchmusic was "Eat Y'self Fitter," which I thought was one of the worst songs I'd ever heard. So for years, I had a very negative view of them.

Occasionally, I'd see The Fall mentioned alongside legends of the Manchester Scene, which would confuse me, having written them off as talentless weirdos. Eventually, though, between Internet radio and YouTube, I got to hear some of their other songs, and was surprised to find that they were much better.

After the recent death of The Fall's singer-songwriter Mark E. Smith, there were more accolades for the band, so I checked out some more of their songs on YouTube, and again, they fit into a fun, creative flavor of post-punk that I appreciated. After a few songs, I noticed that "Eat Y'self Fitter" appeared in the list of suggested videos, so I tapped on it to see if it was really as bad as I remembered.

Indeed it was. I'd describe it as the musical equivalent of one of those terrible Saturday Night Live sketches where they repeat the same joke over and over, and it's not just unfunny, you're not even sure why it was supposed to be funny. So I Googled the song to see if I was the only one that had the same reaction, and I was shocked to find that it is one of the all time favorites of British uber-DJ John Peel.

So I guess the lesson here is that not everyone's tastes line up. And never judge a musician by one song.

Moving Time

In the wake of the Grenfell tower fire in London, there's been a lot of anger, and questions being asked. If you aren't up on it, I'll point out that a lot of people are focusing on the cladding added to the outside walls a few years ago. The Times has revealed that they used cheaper flammable cladding for a total saving of £5000.

The Guardian published a controversial column by journalist Simon Jenkins claiming that residential towers themselves are just too dangerous, and we need to push society away from them.

That really seems to be coming out of nowhere. One thing this incident had made me appreciate is how safe buildings normally are. In looking for precedents for this fire, journalists have gone to a fire in Melbourne in 2014. Not to diminish the tragedy of either event, but given the huge number of of residential towers, the fact that they had to go back two years and the other side of the world shows how seldom big fires do happen. Fires in apartment buildings happen all the time, but the fact that they so rarely consume a whole building is a tribute to how well our building codes work, and why this fire needs to be put under the microscope.

Also, his attempt to lay all of society's ills at the foot of tall buildings seems strange. He contends that they destroy communities and cannot be part of a livable city - which is of course news to people around the world. But the argument is especially odd given the out-of-control housing prices around the world, and at epic levels in the UK. Moving away from apartment blocks would make that problem much worse. Solving phantom societal problems with no concern for the less fortunate is what we would expect from Britain's tabloids, not the Guardian.

Of course, this is all rooted in the British experience with high density housing. Scores of ugly, poorly thought-out blocks were thrown up quickly in the mid-twentieth-century. So Britons associate them with slums, instead of luxury condos or that first apartment you had out of college. Essentially this article is the old American problem: a judgement based on that nation's own experience, oblivious to the fact that it would be disproven with even the slightest knowledge of the outside world.

But the big difficulty going forward will be to change the culture. For years the western world has believed in the idea that regulation is inherently bad and getting rid of it is always the right thing to do. For instance, here's former British PM David Cameron five years ago, saying that he wants to kill the health and safety culture.

I'm seeing the same pattern that we had in Canada after the Lac-Mégantic train accident: the public asks how this could happen in such an advanced country, oblivious to the decades of deregulation that preceded it. At that point, many excitable journalists saw this anger and frustration coalescing into a political issue that would demand greater accountability for public safety. I, on the other hand, felt that you just needed to give the public time to forget, and then they'll go back to their attitude of slow-motion Galtization.

In the British case, I could more easily picture it becoming a shift in political thinking. For one thing, they have an aggressively left-leaning party with all the momentum, and a right-wing party that's in disarray on several fronts. But more than anything, the issue has become a class matter, with poor people feeling like this is a personal struggle. That's in sharp contrast to this side of the Atlantic, where the fury that's getting all the play is coming from the middle class.

A good symbol of the start of the shift is the call by Labour's Jeremy Corbyn to house the fire's homeless in the many empty houses in the area that are owned by absentee landlords. This has lead to one of those political situations where the two sides are so completely opposed that they are each trying to demonize the other simply by quoting their opponents, without even needing to exaggerate or twist their words. That's the point at which there is no doubt that there are different visions, rather than different spins on a general consensus, so it may well be that a lot of Britons have truly shifted their political sensibilities.

Boldly Vote

There's an election in Britain today, so remember everyone...

... get out there and vote in Spock as Prime Minister.

Let England Shake

It history, they talk about the "Great Man" theory, which is the idea that most of history is guided by a few strong individuals. Given that no one has bothered updating it to "Great Person," You can surmise that it's not a very popular view anymore. Today, historians are more likely to see the path of history guided by big movements among many people. For instance, both world wars were, on the surface, triggered by individuals. But both wars were the result of much bigger societal and economic forces, and probably would have happened eventually anyway, even if they weren't triggered as they were.

But I still find it interesting to look for those times when an individual makes a decision that impacts history. I mean a situation where the decision is not pushed by outside considerations, but instead is an individual's judgement. I'd say one example would be the Cuban Missile Crisis, where Kennedy and Khrushchev could have taken any of a number of actions, and that could have had huge impacts on the course of history.

Another example would be Brexit. I know, that sounds like the complete opposite of what I'm taking about. It was a referendum of a large country, not an individual's decision. But it was an individual - Prime Minister David Cameron - who decided to hold the referendum. It wasn't because of a recent change in support for the European Union in Britain; it was a calculated strategy.

British politics in general, and the Conservative Party in particular, have always suffered from the distraction of euroskeptics, those who dislike and demonize the European Union. The intention with the referendum was to get the public to agree to remain in the EU, thus disarming euroskeptics in the future, since the country would have very publicly endorsed membership in the EU.

Of course, it didn't go at all according to plan. The public surprised everyone by voting to Leave. What I find interesting in this is that Cameron's gambit has changed the direction of modern Britain, and it's all due to nothing more than timing: young people were disproportionately in favour of staying in the EU, Britain's membership in the Union would get more popular. So if Cameron had chosen a different strategy for dealing with euroskeptics, there never would have been a referendum for another decade or two. That hypothetical vote would have gone the other way. Today's young people, who mostly wanted to Remain, will eventually be the majority. But they'll live the rest of their lives in a more isolated country outside the EU, even though that wasn't their choice.

This all comes to mind because the Brexit referendum seems to have changed the entire mood in Britain. You may have already seen the reports of a troubling increase in racist attacks since the referendum, as the nation's bigots seem to feel empowered. The country's already nationalist newspapers were all-too happy to make their biases more open. But on top of that, the new post-Cameron Conservative government has embraced the anti-foreigner feeling, with disturbing promises to name and shame companies employing non-Britons.

So essentially, Cameron's strategy not only failed, it actually worked backwards: instead of discrediting the euroskeptics, the referendum discredited those who believed in a more international, interconnected country. I don't know how long this new attitude will last, but for now it appears that the entire country is going quickly in a new direction. And it's a direction that it really didn't need to go.

It certainly seems hard to stop. While all this has been going on in government, the opposition Labour Party is having its own crisis. It's currently lead by Jeremy Corbyn, who seems to be Bernie Sanders without the endearing anti-charisma. He's not popular with fellow politicians or - according to polls - the general public. But he's super popular among left-leaning people, so they put him in the position, then confirmed him when his own caucus tried to kick him out.

Of course, this sort of situation comes up a lot in politics: should the party choose the middle-of-the-road candidate the general public will like, or the ideologically-pure candidate the party members want? Essentially, both American political parties struggled with the same choice in the primaries. Yet with Labour, there seems to be no one arguing for moving to a leader that's more palatable to the electorate. Of course I don't know all the nuances of the situation, but in the discussion online, I've noticed that when anyone argues for centrism, Corbyn's supporters are quick to invoke the name of Tony Blair.

Their view seems to be that Blair made the deal that if the party moved to the centre, they could get into power, even if they didn't get everything the membership wanted. That worked, until he made the uber-blunder of joining George W. Bush's war in Iraq. That move wasn't merely unpopular, it was everything the party membership hated. Honestly, it was worse to them than anything Margaret Thatcher ever did. So Labour Party members felt like they'd been tricked into electing a might-as-well-be-Conservative government. That's poisoned the concept of moving to the political centre, and it is a non-starter among party members. Every liberal party may have is hardliners who say that moderates like Hillary Clinton are no better than their conservative opponents, but at Labour, they appear to believe it.

So all together, it seems like the United Kingdom has really lost it. But really, the crumbling seems to be concentrated in England. Scotland had far less problems with post-referendum hate crimes. And they voted solidly to stay, so now they're eying the exits. And people started talking about Irish reunification. And you know things are bad when even Wales is talking about leaving. But that's where they make Doctor Who. Great, another British institution that could pay the price.

England's problems are deeper than politics and economics; it's beloved soccer team has been a sort of metaphor for the country recently, first getting booted from the Euros by small but united Iceland, then losing their new coach after just one match thanks to bizarre bragging about rule-breaking. It's hard not to come to the conclusion that England has Jumped the Shark. Or, whatever the national equivalent of jumping the shark is. Actually, this could coin a new phrase. I suspect that centuries from now, people will be saying that China is no longer the country it once was, and that maybe it's "Voted to Leave."

Did You Lie When You Spoke To Me?

The United Kingdom voted to Brexit rather than Bremain, and now there's a lot of Bregrets. Many people were horrified to find that the second most popular Google Query from Britain the day after was "what is the EU?" This comes as Nigel Farage admits that his claim about the amount of money going to the EU was wildly inaccurate and pro-leave campaigners are admitting that immigration levels won't really go down. I'm left wondering how much of this big decision was actually based on any real facts.

(As an aside, I was surprised that the New Yorker cover somehow linked Brexit to John Cleese. So it wasn't just me.)

Now there are several news reports coming in of "Leave" voters who regret their vote. I suppose it's understandable that a person will question a big decision, but some are coming right out and saying that they didn't actually want Britain to leave, even though they voted for it. So if, like me, you wish the referendum had gone the other way, you can at least console yourself with the knowledge that these morons will get exactly what they deserve.

By the way, I wish the media would be more responsible and not broacast things like that. There could be aliens listening in, studying us. If they hear humans say, "I wouldn't have voted for X if I'd known X was going to win," it not only reduces the chances the aliens will see us as worthy of communication, it greatly increases the chances that they'll finally decide we're too dangerous and just nuke us from orbit.

These voters with Brexiter's Remorse help to explain what happened in the vote. Many were confident that "Remain" would win, even though the polls kept showing it as a dead heat. So why did they think that? You might think it was just the arrogance of "The Elites" who are supposedly the only people in favour of European integration, and forcing it upon everyone. And that's the interpretation that some journalists have decided to accept. But the sudden market corrections that came after the vote show that people who had a financial stake in predicting the result got it wrong anyway. Again, you might say that even though they had incentive to get it right, they were still elites out of touch with the common person. Well, fine, but there was another group that had a financial interest in getting it right, and are not part of these devious elites: The bookies. They still had "Leave" as 4:1 underdogs right up to the end.

The reason for the over-confidence was that voters tend to shy away from more radical stances in the last days of a campaign. I once heard a Canadian pundit call it the "NDP Swerve." The voter tells pollsters that they're mad as hell, and going to vote for the NDP, then gets in to the voting booth, and says, "what am I thinking, I can't vote for the NDP!" And goes back to the same party they always vote for. Along similar lines, there was an assumption that the "Leave" campaign was going to lose a few percent at least from whatever the polls were showing.

But it didn't happen. There was no swerve. And judging from the comments of regretful voters, it's because those angry voters didn't have their big change of heart in the booth, because they didn't think it would matter. I suppose it shouldn't surprise us: There have been lots of times recently when voters seem to be voting to "send a message" that doesn't really correspond to what they're actually voting on. They may use a referendum to pass judgement on the current government, rather than the actual issue. And various Quebec elections and referendum votes have been based on messages to various governments or grabbing leverage, rather than the (seemingly important) issue of separation.

So that's why some people are serious about wanting a second, this-time-we-mean-it referendum. Personally, I don't like that idea, even if it would be a second chance at the outcome I prefered. Aside from, you know, principles and crap like that, there's the dangerous precident. This referendum has shown everyone on Earth what happens when you don't take your votes seriously. A do-over would give flaky voters the confidence to make more silly votes they don't mean with whatever imagined intentions behind them. Whatever else it is, the Brexit vote is a great teachable moment for democracies everywhere. It's unfortunate we had to sacrifice a large country to do so, but if it convinces Americans not to protest-vote for Trump, it will be worth it.

Having said that, here's a scenario that wouldn't surprise me: The British government now has to negotiate a departure from the European Union, while also negotiating new treaties with countries and trading blocs around the world to maintain the same access to markets they had in the EU. That's probably going to take longer than expected, especially when you consider than the EU is probably going to make the negotiations difficult to make an example of the UK for any other countries thinking about their own exits. And there's the problem that the next British government(s) are going to have to make a lot of painful changes to get ready for separation. Let's say this all takes five years instead of the two that the pro-Brexit crowd has planned on. After such a long time, and with negotiations probably taking place under a new government, there might actually be a reasonable case to have a second referendum on the completed deal.

Would there be a different result on that one? It's hard to say. They will have seen a preview of what the UK economy will be like outside of Europe, and the initial signs are that it won't be pretty. But the flip side is that a sinking economy could just increase the anger and fear that the far right thrives on. If any of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland separate, that will remove a whole lot of "Remain" voters (note that England voted to Leave by a fairly large margin.) But then there's the age demographic. A few more years will allow demographics to shift a little more towards the younger, pro-EU voters.

So You Got To Go And Text It / Should I Remain Or Should I Brexit?

On Thursday, the people of the United Kingdom will vote in a referendum on whether to stay in the European Union or to leave.

I haven't really followed it closely, and I don't have real strong opinions either way. I've kind of instinctively supported the "Remain" side because:

• I generally support people working together rather than walking away because they can't get along.
• All the stupid people are supporting "Leave"

Of course, the latter is a silly reason to support something; just because the stupid, childish, and intellectually-lazy like something doesn't make it bad. I started to realize this when I saw that John Cleese is in favour of leaving. Sure, he's no political expert, and despite being a geek, I'm not a Monty Python fanboy who takes his word as gospel. But he does seem to be fairly thoughtful and intelligent. And in the same way that I don't trust the stupid, I do tend to trust the funny.

So I thought I'd look up what other famous Britons have said on the issue. I know, I may seem like the last person to make a serious decision based on the word of celebrities, but I'm treating this as an experiment to see if I can get a feel for the issue based just on the kind of people supporting it.  Here's a small sample

Stay

David Cameron (Prime Minister)
Tim Berners-Lee (creator of the World Wide Web)
Billy Bragg (singer)
Simon Cowell
Jeremy Clarkson (former Top Gear host)
Bob Geldoff
Eric Idle
Ian McKellen
JK Rowling
Emma Thompson
Stephen Hawking
Richard Branson
Alex Kapranos (singer, Franz Ferdinand)
Benedict Cumberbatch
Eddie Izzard
Helena Bonham Carter
John LeCarre
Jude Law
Keira Knightly
Philip Pullman (writer, His Dark Materials)
Richard Curtis (screenwriter, Mr. Bean, Four Weddings and a Funeral)
John Hurt
Derek Jacobi
Patrick Stewart
Steve Coogan (comic actor, Philomena, 24 Hour Party People)
Peter Higgs (of the famous boson)
Arsene Wenger (longtime Arsenal manager)
Danny Boyle (director, Trainspotting, Slumdog Millionaire)
Daniel Craig
Daisy Ridley (Rey from The Force Awakens)
Idris Elba
Chiwetel Ejiofor (actor, 12 Years a Slave)
Lily Allen (singer)
John Major (former Prime Minister)
Gary Lineker (former soccer player)
Chris Martin (singer, Coldplay)
John Oliver (comedian, Last Week Tonight; here's his take on a Brexit)
Florence Welch (of, "and the Machine" fame)
Alt J (music group)
Peter Gabriel
Elton John
David and Victoria Beckham

Leave

Boris Johnson (former London mayor)
Bernie Ecclestone (Formula 1 CEO)
Rupert Murdoch (media tycoon)
Julian Assange (Wikileaks founder)
Michael Caine
John Cleese
Joan Collins
Roger Daltrey (singer, The Who)
Bruce Dickinson (singer, Iron Maiden)
Peter Hitchens (journalist, brother of the late Christopher)
Elizabeth Hurley
Right Said Fred
Irvine Welsh (writer, Trainspotting)
Milo Yiannopoulos (controversial blogger)
Sol Campbell (soccer player)
James Dyson (of vacuum cleaner fame)
Julian Fellows (Downtown Abbey creator)
Ian Botham (former cricket star)

And here is Wikipedia's even more comprehensive list. So here's my reaction to the lists:

• Really? Morrissey doesn't have an opinion on this?
• I wonder if Cleese and Idle have clashed on this, and will they sell tickets?
• There's a surprising mix on both sides.  Both have their side of intellectuals, and both the lovable and hatable. 
• Though there are old and young on both sides, the Leave side seems to be older on average.

In my still poorly-informed and ultimately irrelevant opinion, I'd still stick to the remain side.

Fleet Foxes

Do you know someone from England, or perhaps a sports fan with an interest in international sports? Are you confused as to why they're suddenly raving about some guy named Lester? Allow me to explain:

In European soccer leagues, there are usually several divisions, in a hierarchy. At the end of each season, the top few teams in each division are "promoted" - allowed into the next division up next season. The bottom few teams are "relegated" - moved down to the next lowest division for the next season. To win the overall championship, you have to finish first in the top division - there are no playoffs.

Also, in sharp contrast to American sports leagues, there are no measures to help teams that are unsuccessful either on or off the field. Revenue sharing, salary caps, drafts, limited free agency, luxury taxes, tampering rules - they've got none of them.

So generally, each country has a small number of teams that stay at the top of the top division because they have all the money. Take for instance, England's top division, the Premier League. Over the last 24 years, only four teams have won it.

And this is why this year has been so remarkable. Leicester (pronounced "Lester", nicknamed "The Foxes") was only just able to avoid relegation last year. Coming into this season, they were 5,000 to 1 longshots. As many people have been pointing out, British bookies will give you the same odds that the Loch Ness Monster will be found. But they had a miraculous year, leading most of the season. When second place Tottenham failed to beat Chelsea today, Leicester clinched first place.

This title is being listed among all-time upsets

This could be a new era of competitiveness in English soccer. At the very least, everyone has some hope today. Now your wildest dreams have some foundation, as you know an underdog really can break through. But it's bittersweet for me. See, at the same time I'm cheering on Leicester righteously slaying the game's elites, I'm also mourning my family's team.

Aston Villa, the dominant team of England's West Midlands, is going to be relegated. Since the modern creation of England's Premier League in 1992, they were one of only seven teams that had never been relegated to the lower divisions. But no more. They're in last place, with no mathematical chance getting high enough to avoid relegation this year.

Blue, the Aston Villa bear, says wait 'til next year

An unwillingness to spend on players, an inability to groom young players fast enough, and a revolving door of coaching has caught up with them. After years of being mediocre, or just "not terrible," the bottom fell out and they won just three games out of thirty-six. Yes, we should have seen this coming when the team was bought by the guy who owns the Cleveland Browns.

So at a time when my family should be optimistic, we're feeling hopeless. At a time when the whole world is looking at the Premier League standings, we're right there at the bottom. If the league were Good Will Hunting, we'd be Ben Affleck to Leicester's Matt Damon. So we'll just have to use this new optimism to believe that we'll be back to the Premier League again soon. Or we'll just resort to the usual dream, for a new billionaire owner who'll spend his way to the top.

Darlin', You Gotta Let Me Know

Last week, Britain had an election. The Conservatives won again, though this time with a majority. Since their ineffectual minority partners, the Liberal Democrats, didn't make much of an impression anyway, it's hard to see how this election made any difference.

Outside of Scotland, anyway. One interesting aspect is that the separatist Scottish National Party won nearly every seat in Scotland. So it's official, Scotland is in full Quebec mode: not wanting to work with the rest of the country, but also not quite willing to commit to a split.
Speaking of people who won't quite separate, the big news is that the Conservatives will be holding a referendum on whether Britain should leave the European Union. It's such a big deal, they've even given it the already-grating name, "brexit," for British exit.

This decision should be interesting, since the British have developed a strange relationship with the EU: everyone seems to hate it, bit no one does anything about it. It's fitting that they use the word, "Eurosceptic" to refer to someone who dislikes the UK's membership in Europe, yet you never seem to hear anyone described as simply, "Anti-Europe." Politicians - including PM Cameron have used Europe as a crowd-pleasing punching bag, but now they'll have to put their money where their mouths are.

But I'm not sure they will. Someone over there floated the idea of renegotiation. That is, the idea that, rather than accept the obvious options of stay or go, there's also the possibility that they could just renegotiate the terms of their membership. And that's the second Quebec connection: they've introduced a hypothetical possibility that they can get the best of both worlds through the magic of negotiation.

I'm certainly a fan of talking, negotiation, and compromise. But I recognize that they are limited by the obvious fact that there's another side to the dealings. I'm amazed at how often people get taken in by this idea that they can get anything through negotiation, even when it's clearly something the other side would never agree to.

So this whole process could get frustrating to watch, but at least we'll have the satisfaction of watching the UK simultaneously separator and separatee.

We Come From The Land Of The Ice And Snow

There's an election coming up in Britain.  Any election means there's going to be a variety of campaign handouts to promote the parties' platforms.  Here's one from the left-leaning Labour Party that's been getting a lot of attention:

When you see that, a number of questions may occur to you.  Can a liberal party win over the centre successfully with a few highlighted promises? Will they lose the support of their base?

But probably, you're wondering what kind of a stupid campaign gives out mugs?  Whatever happened to pamphlets?  You'd think that if you were going to use any beverage vessel to win over xenophobic Britons, you'd go with a teacup.

As an aside, here are some of the other images that came up when I searched for the mug picture.  I don't know how Bieber got on there, though Google might just group all the embarrassing mug shots together.

As political strategy, it (the promise, not the mug) doesn't make sense. At a time when the Conservatives are facing a big vote split with the even-further-to-the-right UK Independence Party, Labour just needs to get its base to turn out in big numbers.  Instead this has really alienated them.

But more to the point, it's incredibly bad timing.  While Labour is trying to harness the fear of foreigners, Europe's migration problem has taken a turn for the tragic.  Europe and its constituent countries have scaled back patrols of illegal migration in the Mediterranean this year, and at the same time the situation in Libya and other parts of Africa and the Middle East have gotten worse.  The result has been a huge increase in deaths during attempts to cross the sea.

Something that's really bothered me about the coverage of the migration crisis is the way the recent history of it has been explained.  The usual story is that Europe cut-back on patrols in the hopes that the lack of a safety net for desperate, dangerous journeys in the Mediterranean would discourage attempts.

To put it in terms the locals will understand: Bollocks.  This wasn't some clever strategy to discourage migrants, it was European leaders doing the only thing they ever seem to do: ignoring a problem and hoping it goes away. Usually that just makes a few investors nervous, but this time a thousand people died.  With their economy still poor and far-right anti-immigrant parties making gains, spending money on illegal immigrants isn't popular, so they did the easy thing, whatever the results.

Europe is going to have to face the fact that its bigotry is dangerous.  Usually we think of the problem as caused by a small number of Neo-Nazis. I have no idea how prevalent they are, so I can't comment on the seriousness of that problem.  But the fact is that the mainstream fear of foreigners is beyond what you should see in a civilized society.  Of course, this is an issue everywhere, but the amount of social-acceptance of it, the quickness to scapegoat, and the number of politicians cashing in on it, is a serious problem with real consequences.

Archived Files

They announced this week that they're bringing back The X-Files.  At first, that seems like typical risk aversion of the entertainment industry: why take a chance on a new idea, when you can recycle an old idea. That might be what inspired it, but I think it could work.  I watched the show for a while, but then drifted away when it seemed like the writers were just layering on layer of conspiracies on top of another just for the sake of filling episodes.  Since this revival is for a limited time (and creator Chris Carter has had a decade to think about it) it should have a well-thought-out plot.

And it's further evidence of the Britishization of American television.  On the other side of the pond, TV seasons are shorter and made at irregular intervals.  That way there are fewer filler episodes and less of the out-of-ideas shows blundering along looking for inspiration.  And actors aren't committed to doing only that show and no other projects for years on end. 

Between the specialty channels and on-demand services, the audience has come to accept more free-form television formats.  The original X-Files could have benefited from it, hopefully this new incarnation will succeed because of it. 

Identifying The Stigma

The British (but widely-exported) TV show Top Gear has been in the news this week. Host Jeremy Clarkson has been suspended after his latest incident of bad behaviour.  That's been followed by an on-line campaign from fans to have him returned.  Clarkson appears to be following the same cycle of public offence and forgiveness as Don Cherry and Rush Limbaugh.  Each is fuelled by a fan following in their respective countries that loves their idol more than they're willing to admit, and a public that has a short memory.

It's reminded me that I've been meaning to revive my lapsed attempt at a regular feature, Things I Should Like, But Don't, examining things that seem to be right down my pop-cultural avenue, but that I somehow don't appreciate.

I Should Like:
Top Gear 
 
Why should I like it?
Cars, sarcasm, British humour: there haven't been three things I like this much in one TV show since Sex, Toys, and Chocolate. (Which I didn't like either.)

Why don't I like it?
The problem is that Clarkson and friends don't understand the Jon Stewart Principal of Televised Snark:

• If you're going to be very critical of people and things, you'd better back it up with evidence.
• Being widely critical is easier to take if it's served up with a big dose of self-deprication. 

Dry British sarcastic humour rides a knife edge: when combined with a righteous cause, it can be highly cathartic. But when applied arbitrarily, it comes off as sadistic. And that's my problem with Top Gear. Rather than being interesting or informative, it just seems like three guys being jerks because they can. What could be a fun skewering of the absurdities of modern cars devolves into Simon Cowell Goes Driving.

Tell Me Now How Do I Feel?

Today was Blue Monday, reputed to be the most depressing day of the year.  This is based on things like weather, time since Christmas and debt thereof.  Of course it's really just a concoction in which a company creates a self-serving news story.  In this case, it's a travel agency that wants to make us feel bad in the middle of winter.  And apparently the company in question isn't even in business anymore, thus demonstrating the power of viral marketing.

But today didn't really seem that bad.  In fact, whenever I've been made aware of Blue Monday, it never is a worse-than average feeling day, at least for a winter day.

I suppose part of the reason is that the concept comes from Britain, so there are going to be different factors involved.  For one thing, the British seem to get a lot of their winter melancholy from the limited daylight, while we in Canada get most of it from the cold, which reaches its peak a month or so after the winter solstice.  The Americans surely weren't depressed, as this was Martin Luther King Day, which - while solemn - is a day off for many.

So I'm wondering what factors you'd use to figure out a saddest day of the year in Canada.  I would suggest the following factors:

• Accumulated snow on the ground
• Remaining road-salt reserves
• Time until Leafs' playoff elimination
• Number of times The Weather Channel has used The Red Screen Of Death
• Snowmobiles at the bottom of average lake
• Percentage of TV ads that are for sunny vacations
• Average Number of times a snow plow has blocked the end of your driveway

Pub Reporter

I'm always surprised at how people see pubs. I have a British background, so they're part of my cultural heritage. But I thought that even the most myopically North American had the basic idea: it's like a bar, but built around taking, eating and drinking, rather than dancing, dating and drinking. It's more classic than modern, they have food you've never heard of, and fries are called chips.

And yet, people throw the name around to mean pretty much anything. In university, I wrote an article for the math students' newsletter lampooning the university's food services for listing gyros under the heading "pub grub". That lead to someone writing a snarky letter pointing out that the university's pub served gyros. That didn't seem like much of a justification, since that establishment didn't seem very pub-like either.  Yes, I know I'm sort-of committing the True Scotsman Fallacy, but I don't think that a place University students go to get drunk is an exemplar of pub culture.

And now Chunky soup has a line of "pub inspired" soups. I'm sure they have soup at pubs, but it's not the first thing you associate with them. A quick search for "pub food" seems to confirm that in most pubs, the favourite soup is not Chunky, but Guinness.

And the flavours don't even pretend to fit pub culture. Alehouse Shepherd’s Pie is fine, but Blazin' Roadhouse Chili-Style? Chipotle Sirloin Burger? Meatball Bustin’ Sausage Rigatoni? And stranger, they're marketing these soups as an antidote for emasculation. Apparently, there's a big market for products that help men convince themselves they are men, but Chunky is really stretching it. Also, pubs don't seem like centres of masculinity, at least on this side of the Atlantic. And soups aren't real masculine as foods go. It seems like marketers drew topics out of a hat and thought they could associate them together through sheer repetition.

St. Andy Talking

So the Scotts said no. It seems like a very British near-separation, with everyone being polite and putting a positive face on it. It also seemed to be surprisingly rational. Of course, I’m watching from an ocean away, but the discussion I saw had surprisingly little delusion and dirty tricks, despite what I talked about earlier in the campaign.

People really emphasized that the no vote doesn't mean business as usual, and there has to be further devolution of power. I hope that works. Partly because it could end up with my own dear Birmingham becoming the capital of the province of West Midlands. But also because with the closer cultures, lack of language differences, and vaguer desires, Britain may actually come up with a long-term solution. No, I'm not saying that no one will want independence ever again - there'll always be hardcore separatists - but they have a chance at satisfying enough people to sap the movement of its softer support. That's if the federal government acts decisively. Prime Minister Cameron, though, doesn't seem like the grand-gesture type, so I’m guessing that reforms are headed for committee hell. And yes, I know the British don't call it the federal government; but if they're serious about devolution, they soon will, so let me be the first.

This could be interesting to watch in the future: The nations of Britain will be reassessing their role vs. the federal government. At the same time, Britain (and likely a few others) will be reassessing their membership in Europe. And Europe will be, um, trying to make things work. There’s potential for this to be a much-needed re-examination of what countries and nations are and what we want them to do. But I suspect it will be business as usual within Britain, while it caves to staunch conservatives and leaves Europe, and the EU will continue living off of Angela Merkel’s credit card.

Why England Suddenly Hates Us

Britain's Guardian has an op-ed piece titled, "Why Canada Wants Scotland To Vote 'Yes.'" I of course, said, "we do?"

I doubt that headline is true. It's quite a case of wishful thinking on the part of Canadian journalist Stephen Marche. The article is based on some old-fashioned conceptions of both Canada and Britain. As I've said before, people who try to understand the Britain of today using the ruthless, amoral empire-builders of the past end up looking quite silly. And his conception of Canada as gullible masses lead by an England-loving elite is nearly as dated.

The weird thing is that beneath everything, I do agree with his philosophy: by basing its identity around its British roots, Canada has never looked to its own characteristics and accomplishments for identity. Like him, I wonder what Canada would do in the wake of a Scottish separation, which might force us to reassess a British heritage we aren't really ready to give up yet.

In his defence, the headline - which he likely didn't write - is misleading. He does actually acknowledge that there is very little desire in Canada to dump the monarchy, so he does make it apparent that the wish for a separate Scotland is a personal desire. Essentially, the article misrepresents reality, and the headline misrepresents the article, resulting in a headline that has no basis in fact.

I haven't seen any surveys on the subject, but I find it hard to believe that most Canadians are looking for a "Yes" vote. I'm sure people with direct Scottish roots probably would like to see them independent, and many Quebec separatists would like the precedent. But for Canadians who don't have a dog in this fight, i'm guessing they will be hoping for a no vote, because of the precedent for Quebec and the British basis of our national identity.

This has really stressed me out, so I'm going to have to order one of The Guardian's Scottish Separation Squeeze toys.

Uncommon Wealth

It's time for the Commonwealth Games again!  The Commonwealth Games are in that second tier of international sporting events.  In the first tier, you've got your Summer and Winter Olympics, and the World Cup.  Then in the second tier you've got your continental games like the Pan Am Games and a few types of Youth and University Games, the Gay Games (in Cleveland this year?) and so on.

The Commonwealth Games are pleasant enough; who doesn't like an excuse for international sports, especially if it's going to be less pushy than the Olympics.  But then you stop and think about what it is: A pleasant sports event open to places that have nothing in common other than being colonized by the same country. 

I can understand the existence of the Commonwealth: these countries do end up with some political and cultural commonalities.  It's just hard to believe we celebrate this history.  Well, we in Canada would; we love any excuse to revel in our British origins.  But India?  Didn't they go through a lot to get rid of British rule?  Why don't we just invite the Americans while we're at it?

The Games are a great example of the weird way we look at Britain in the world today.  There are plenty of countries that still have resentment and anger at them, and with good reason.  And at the same time, the British have achieved a reputation for being calm and civilized.  It's hard to imagine any other former empire having a sports event ("Former Subjects Of The Mongol Hordes Games.")  So the British really know how to craft an imperial legacy - Americans, take note.

We Love It When Our Friends Become Controversial

Morrissey has now condemned all of Canada for the seal hunt. In a letter addressed to "This Sorrowful Canada" he condemns the hunt, Fisheries and Oceans minister Gail Shea, and declares Canada "regrettably fashionably dead."  I wonder if he always writes in the form of discarded song lyrics.

I'm not a fan of the seal hunt, but I am getting tired of Britons collectively condemning us for this one event. For one thing collective punishment never works. And on a national level, it usually backfires by promoting the target's national togetherness. It certainly has with the seal hunt; fur has really disappeared from the national culture, despite its being such a part of our early economy. But by attacking us as a country, it encourages people who normally have no love for fur to come to its defence.

But aside from the obvious futility of the attacks, they are also hypocritical. Britain's animal-rights hands aren't clean either, yet British activists fighting to ban British fox hunting didn't target their entire country in their protests.  And look, they successfully managed to get that hunt banned.

Having said all that, I do have some sympathy. Yeah, I'm an omnivore, so I can't claim so great a dedication to animal rights; but it always strikes me as unconvincing that people defending practices such as the seal hunt are always quick to resort to feeble excuses of tradition and economic hardship. And it really disappoints me that Canadians have gone along with defending the seal hunt out of nationalistic zeal rather than a rational discussion of the issue.

I noted that he claimed that the seal hunt has corroded our national reputation, saying "Canada’s sorry image is due entirely to its seal slaughter." That's ridiculous; the tar sands have done way more damage.  Of course, that's another issue where celebrities have lined up against us, and we've reflexively defended ourselves, thus aligning the country with something most of us wouldn't normally support.

So it occurs to me that Morrissey is anti-Canadian. I don't mean, "against Canada" (although he is that, apparently.) I mean that he is essentially the opposite of a Canadian. You can rely on him to be relentlessly combative and us to be politely pliant.

Vive L'Écosse Libre!

Scotland is going to be voting on independence later this year.  As a Canadian watching from abroad, it's fun to watch for the similarities to Quebec's sovereignty struggles.

The campaign seems to have come to the point where the separatists' promises of an easy independence are hitting the brick wall of reality.  It turns out an independent Scotland wouldn't just automatically get to use the British Pound, nor would they automatically get into the European Union.  In fact, they'd have to do all the boring and expensive things any independent country has to do, not just fun things like giving Mel Gibson honourary citizenship, and staring trade wars with Canada over Irn-Bru

Do all separation efforts run this same con?  I know, it's inevitable that the supporters of any political initiative are going to put a positive spin on the results.  And they're going to gloss-over the negatives.  But when it's something as big as creating a new country, you'd think that the potential ramifications would be so big that they can't be ignored.  It's pretty ridiculous that Scots would just assume that the rest of the UK would happily continue giving them a say in control of the Pound.  And yet the British government has to point that out.  You'd think that even the most starry-eyed Scottish nationalist would have assumed this, and come up with a counter-move ahead of time.

But for some reason, it seems that separatists on both sides of the Atlantic have the common fault of believing their own claims, to the point that they are caught off-guard when reality imposes itself.