Telegraph columnist claims beards are no longer a symbol of Britain’s imperial power.
A Daily Telegraph columnist Michael Deacon has claimed that beard wearing has become a symbol of ‘left-wing self-righteousness’ with beard wearers being suspected of being lefties. According to Deacon in the nineteenth century ‘beards were a symbol of British Greatness’
If nothing else this suggests that Deacon’s grasp of beard history is a little lacking. He has apparently not heard of two of the greatest, UK based, beard wearers, Marx and Engels. In the modern day he also seems aware that the current Tory Cabinet is almost entirely clean shaven. On Deacon’s analysis this would mean correctly that’s its not left-wing but it would also mean that it doesn’t represent or aspire to imperial greatness, which is also clearly true.
Beyond Deacon’s entertaining if rather silly column is a harder reality. Facial hair is not left or right-wing, it all depends on culture, context and a genuine understanding of follicular history.
As a result, I fear that facial hair will forever now be associated with Left-wing self-righteousness. It’s a sad thought. Once upon a time, beards were a proud symbol of British greatness. During the Victorian era, every self-respecting man in Britain had a beard the size of a yew tree. And those, don’t forget, were the days when Britain ruled the world. The zenith of our nation’s power and status. Can it really be mere coincidence that as the popularity of the beard waned over the course of the 20th century, so too did our country’s global influence?
Tony Benn on the importance of Channel 4 & the fog of war
The Government plans to privatise Channel 4, set up by Mrs Thatcher, as a Government owned but commercial TV channel that funds itself. No doubt there are numerous Tory benefactors thinking about buying it.
Content may be uneven as with all broadcast media but it does have a reputation for covering some of the awkward issues that others don’t.
Tony Benn wrote in his diary (3rd January 1996) on a particular example:
This evening there was a marvellous programme on Channel 4 called How to Tell Lies and Win Wars. Maggie O’Kane revealed the lies told about Iraqi brutalities in Kuwait, lies organised by a PR Company and how Bush took them up. Depleted uranium has caused quite serious radiation problems and there were very evasive answers from Tom King. The programme dealt with the burying alive of Iraqi soldiers by American bulldozers, the oil slick caused by the West bombing oil tankers in the Gulf… it also dealt with the media and how it had been taken in.
A reminder that truth is invariably the first casualty of war and that while some journalists are well aware of this and report carefully, having independent media like Channel 4 is key to that.
Beard of Spring 2022 poll opens with competition expected to bristle
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that voting is now open for the coveted Beard of Spring Award.
Beard of Spring is the second of four seasonal awards that lead to the Beard of the Year in December.
The campaigners say that while the second seasonal award of the year traditionally focuses on new beard growth, the focus in 2022 is as much on those whose beards have appeared in a positive public light during the quarter.
BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, the Beard of Spring poll sets the beard-benchmark for the period ahead when beards can be flaunted in public as the weather improves.
The vote is open now and will close at midday on Good Friday, with the winner announced on Easter Saturday
Free COVID Tests hit profits. As in the 1830s they are more important than people
Yet COVID is still with us. 5th April 2022 saw 50,202 new cases reported and 368 deaths. Infection rates are rising across most of the UK.
Yet Boris Johnson stopped free COVID tests at the end of March, and had already ended a requirement to wear masks, socially distance or self-isolate if you have COVID.
Two years today since the first lockdown & we’re still not learning from our history. Sajid Javid has said the rise in Covid cases is of ‘no particular concern’. Chris Whitty examining the reality suggested otherwise
In short Johnson is still putting profit before people as he did 2 years ago and as ultimately back to the nineteenth century pro-market Governments have always done. Richard Evans in Epidemics and Revolutions: Cholera in Nineteenth Century Europe (Past and Present 120) noted that as control measures against the Cholera epidemic of 1830/31 Governments ‘were to some extent giving way to pressure from merchants, traders and manufacturers’
The cost to individuals who get sick in 2022 is fortunately not usually as great, in the main as it was in March 2020 but nor is it pleasant for many who catch COVID now. Still Johnson, Javid and the rest have moved on. Profits are at stake. The problem that the Tories have is that profits are made by people.
Campaigners say J K Rowling’s dislike of beards is a matter of her personal choice
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said the author J K Rowling’s dislike of at least some beards is a matter of her personal choice, and beard wearers may take a view of the matter likewise.
The campaigners say that while people do wear beards for cultural and religious reasons, and discrimination in these areas may be illegal, for most wearing a beard or not is a matter of personal choice.
J K Rowling, whose views have been amplified in an opinion column in the Daily Telegraph, has a perspective which seems to be that there are ‘woke’ beard wearers who she regards as ‘beardsplainers’ and who spend their time being sexist towards women.
The Beard Liberation Front says that it is a well-known stereotype that all men with beards are boring self-obsessed pedants. By definition stereotypes don’t work if they are not rooted in an element of reality but people wear beards for many different reasons and most don’t fit the caricature that Ms Rowling seems to have created.
BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, one of our founding principles is that all people should be able to dress and appear as they want. That goes for beard wearers as much as J K Rowling. She may well be right that some beard wearers are at best tiresome individuals but such people can be found in every walk of life including of course authors.
Two years on campaigners renew call for Starmer to grow a Keir Hardie beard
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has renewed the call it first made on Labour leader Keir Starmer two years ago to the day when he was elected to the post.
The campaigners have urged Sir Keir to follow his namesake Keir Hardie, who was the first leader of the Labour Party, and grow a beard.
Keir Starmer succeeded the late Frank Dobson as MP for Holborn and St Pancras, and so should be fully familiar with the importance of beard power in political life.
BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, Keir Starmer has had his ups and downs as leader over the last two years but he has taken Labour into a modest poll lead over the Tories. However for many he lacks a defining image, still coming across as a clean shaven man in a suit. While Boris Johnson has a clear image- hair uncombed, clothes untidy, Sir Keir could impress with a gravitas adding Keir Hardie style beard.
2 years since Starmer was elected Labour leader. Are the polls getting better?
Its 2 years (4th April 2020) since Keir Starmer was elected Labour leader. There are a great many things that could be said about what some see as his Great Moving Right Show but in this post I focus on some English empiricism.
What interests many voters who have other things in their lives than pondering the state of the left is whether Starmer can lead Labour to eject the Tories from office. We’ll only find out when an Election is called obviously but in the meantime polls provide a very rough guide.
Labour (Starmer’s personal standing is another matter) have been ahead in the polls since November 2021 although not by all that much. A Redfield and Wilton poll taken on 3rd April shows Labour on 42% and the Tories on 36%. Its just one poll and the margin of error is around 3% so two years on its work in progress one might argue
Following an increase in the scandals surrounding Boris Johnson, including his Downing St flat refurb and Downing St Xmas parties in 2020 and in May 2021 and apparently at lots of other times too. Labour has had a consistent lead in the polls. Anyone who would like to see the back of not just Johnson but the Tories in general must see this as broadly good news.
Poll leads though are not everything. They usually appear because the incumbent Government is messing things up. They are maintained to a successful Election victory if the opposition in this case Labour is able in various ways to harness the discontent to a positive mood to support it
We can see this in the period 1992-1997
We can’t obviously be sure what moves the polls but I do think that there is some evidence that there are particular events which change people’s minds on a long-term basis, as Black Wednesday seems to have done in 1992
By 1992 Thatcher had been forced to resign over the Poll Tax debacle and was replaced by John Major. Major, unexpectedly and quite narrowly, beat Labour, led by Neil Kinnock, in a General Election on 9th April 1992. For the few months afterwards the Tories led Labour on average by 5 points in the opinion polls.
Then came Wednesday 16th September 1992, ‘Black Wednesday’. On that day the Tory Government withdrew the pound from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM). In order to protect the pound Chancellor Lamont raised interest rates from 10% to 12% in the morning, and then up to 15% in the afternoon.
The following day interest rates returned to 10% but the damage was done in terms of electoral standing. Voters with mortgages, perhaps more inclined to vote Tory, had seen the spectre of the cost rising by 50% in a day. If it had happened once clearly it could happen again.
By November 1992 polls were showing ratings of around 30% for the Tories and 50% for Labour. They changed little until the eventual election in 1997. Labour’s lead was nothing to do with Blair, who wasn’t Labour leader in 1992, rather it was the late John Smith, but with an event so potentially cataclysmic in its impact that it stuck in voter’s minds.
It’s worth pointing out (thanks to Lindsey German for this point)that the October 1992 pit closure crisis underlined and amplified the Tory crisis. The Tories had spent the mid-1980s demonising and defeating the miners on pit closures. But when Heseltine tried again in 1992 the mood was very different. Public support swung behing Arthur Scargill and the NUM’s efforts to stop further closures.
One wonders if the latest scandals to surround Johnson will see the solidifying of the same long term poll trend? The next months will tell us. Whether you think Starmer is a decent Labour leader or not, it won’t be that much to do with anything he does or doesn’t promote, at least at the moment. What 1992 suggests is that it’s about Tory crisis and whether the left and labour movement can galvanise the mood around that which has the real impact in particular the cost of living and energy crisis.
In short polls, crude though they may be, simply reflect much wider currents in society, and whether Labour can successfully associate itself with and sometimes lead efforts to suggest things can get better. Work in progress.
Whose Justice? Government Ethics chief fined £50 for June 2020 lockdown party. Tottenham man fined £2,200 for driving car without ‘reasonable excuse’ (Jan 2021)
Helen MacNamara a former ethics civil servant has apologised for taking part in a Cabinet Office party on 18th June 2020 in contravention of first lockdown regulations. Meanwhile Evening Standard Courts reporter Tristan Kirk @kirkkorner has been tweeting today about the case of a Tottenham man who has been fined £2,200 for being out in a car (on the North Circular Rd) in January 2021 in contravention of third(England) lockdown regulations.
Justice does not seem to have been delivered equally although of course in neither case are full details of what actually transpired are available. Should we be surprised?
2022 Beard, Shorts & Sandals Pre-Season re-opens with warning on Telegraph shorts guidance
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that the 2022 Beard, Shorts and Sandals Pre-Season has re-opened following its suspension due to inclement weather at the end of March.
The 2022 pre-season began a month earlier than 2021 recognising a spell of dry and warmer weather across much of the UK. The weather pattern to Easter appears mixed but prudent wearing of a beard, shorts and sandals will be possible.
The campaigners have said that ‘advice’ given by Stephen Doig in the Daily Telegraph (March 23rd) that shorts wearing should be left until ‘summer’ is wrong. Firstly because shorts wearing in the pre-season is essential to adapt for the new season after winter hibernation. Secondly because there is no guarantee that summer weather will be any better than it is now.
2022 Pre-Season guidelines
1] Shorts should ideally be three-quarter length-‘culottes’ for the 2022 season. The length of shorts is particularly important as climate change may mean that unprotected legs get sunburnt.
2] Footwear should be casual. There is a considerable range of sandal type footwear now available. Some leaves parts of the feet and toes open to public view, while some does not. The BLF is not prescriptive about the matter.
3] Socks should usually not be worn. However in the pre-season they are optional
3a] If the beard, shorts and sandals are to be displayed in relatively busier urban areas it is likely to be prudent to wear closed rather than open casual footwear and ankle socks, not visible to others may be worn.
4] There is no prescription or definition on what type of beard may be worn, or how this may match with the shorts and sandals. This is left up to the individual.
BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, the Beard, Socks and Sandals season has been a major influence on summer fashions in recent times and we expect the 2022 season to be no different. We don’t think the Daily Telegraph is a reasonable source of advice on the matter however.
Lord Lebedev will not be on Beard of Spring 2022 shortlist
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has confirmed that Lord Lebedev will not feature in the Beard of Spring 2022 shortlist, unveiled later this week.
The Beard of Spring is one of four quarterly contests that lead to the coveted Beard of the Year in December.
Lebedev has appeared in Beard Polls on occasion over the last decade. He was on the Beard of the Year shortlist in 2011 and a contender for Beard of Spring in 2018. In neither case did he attract many votes.
The campaigners say that Lebedev is not banned from future contests. However while he maintains a magnificent beard a key criteria of the quarterly contests is that beard wearers must be promoting a positive image of the hirsute. Recent controversial events suggest Lebedev could struggle to meet that criteria in the view of a significant number.
BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, Beard Liberation Front polls are about beards and not judgements on people’s character or politics. That said they are designed to promote a positive image of the hirsute in the public eye. At the moment at least some may judge that Lord Lebedev is bringing the hirsute into disrepute.
