Pseuds Corner

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Pseuds Corner is a regular feature in Private Eye magazine, described as:

Listing pretentious, pseudo-intellectual quotations from the media.

Events online yesterday led me meanderingly to these paragraphs, which would fit right in:

Through our own individual and collective identities as artists, critics and curators, we situate ourselves as both outside and inside the art world, and it is from this position that we choose to comment on structures within the artworld as well as navigating broader frameworks, such as identity, history and locality.

Our work has thus developed into a form of critical practice, a kind of site-specific ‘rugged conceptualism’, which almost always engages with the parameters of the event we find ourselves a part of.

In a tongue in cheek way we explore our own complicity in the art and socio-political spectra, as well as the often-hidden mechanisms involved in constructing meaning, identity and history, seeking always a balance between the politically engaged and the seriously playful.

Yes folks! It’s arty-farty bullshit!

Quite how this sort of thing (see also the second part of this post) can draw any kind of funding while so many people in this country are still hungry and homeless is completely beyond me.

Over the Broad walk

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…or none walk, as it were.

I’m catching up on a few blogs I should have read earlier. One of those is from Brian Micklethwait and it’s about Stuart Broad’s decision not to “walk”, ie. declare himself out when the umpires didn’t give him out in the first Ashes test.

That incident sparked howls of derision locally, cries of “cheat”, comparisons with Mr Suarez and somewhat desperate hopes for some sort of lengthy ban for Mr Broad. Despite being an England fan, I agreed with Brian:

England’s subsequent progress somehow didn’t really count.  That’s how it felt, to me.

But then I got over it. It might not be nice, but everyone’s at it, not just Stuart Broad, so let’s drop the exceptionalism, shall we?
When Adam Gilchrist walked again Sri Lanka in 2003,  Australian captain Ricky Ponting was actually rather annoyed:

Gilchrist staggered Ponting and the rest of the Australian side by walking off as umpire Rudi Koertzen was saying “not out” during the 48-run semi-final win over Sri Lanka at St George’s Park today.
Ponting’s deputy saw Koertzen’s rejection of the Sri Lankan appeal for a caught behind but he headed for the pavilion anyway despite the enormity of the occasion and the importance of his innings to the Australian cause.

“I won’t be encouraging any of our batsmen to do it,” said Ponting. “It’s up to them. I won’t tell any of our batsmen what to do – whether to walk or not. It’s how they see it on the day.”

So “cheating” is fine, depending on the day, then? Evidently, Broad chose a “not ok” day though.

Nowadays of course, there’s technology to help the hapless umpires out, but Australia had already used up their quota of referrals earlier in the day, having unsuccessfully tried to get England players out when they weren’t. However, even with this obvious handicap to the “cheating” batsman, Ponting continued to pick and choose his days:

During the Australian innings, captain Ricky Ponting clearly edged a delivery from Mohammad Hafeez into the gloves of wicket-keeper Kamran Akmal. Both men appealed enthusiastically, almost certain they had their man. Ponting held his ground.
Umpire Marais Erasmus deemed the Australian skipper hadn’t hit the ball and gave him not out. Inevitably, the Pakistan team requested a review of the decision and video replays confirmed the number three batsman did in fact make contact with the ball.
Ponting surely can’t claim he was uncertain as to whether he hit the ball, as the replay showed he got a lot more than a faint edge. In cricketing terms, he ‘hit the cover off it’.

But anyway, the umpires are there to decide if it’s in or out, not the players. Brian again:

…expecting batsmen to walk when they know (but the umpire doesn’t know) that they are out introduces an unfair imbalance.

After all, if you are given out, but you know that you are not out because you missed it by half a yard, but if your team has run out of referrals (as Australia had yesterday) or if no referrals are allowed in the first place, you aren’t allowed to say: “Ah well, you see, I know that I’m not actually out, so, actually, I’m going to have to over-rule the umpire on this particular occasion.  I’m going to stick around.  Sorry and all that.  Carry on everyone.”

This is not allowed, unless you are W. G. Grace.

On the other hand it would, I think, make perfect sense, if a batsman walks (Gilchrist style) having been given not out by the umpire, if the umpire were then to say: “Heh!  Where d’you think you’re going?  Get back here!  I said: Not Out.  How dare you over-rule my decision.  Outrageous dissent.  Totally against the Spirit of Cricket.”

Yet it would seem that The Spirit of Cricket, as expounded by all those who were saying yesterday that Broad had gone totally against it, says that the umpires are not after all the sole judges of fact.  Odd.

Indeed, some dichotomy there.

Perhaps Geoffrey Boycott summed it up best:

When you’re given out wrongly, you have to go.  So if the umpire makes a mistake in your favour, you should be allowed to stick around.  It’s up to the umpire not to get it wrong.

The umpires are only human, and though they have the help of technology, that option wasn’t available this time around, because the Aussies – being only human – had used up their referrals by making mistakes as well.And even then, as we saw with Jonathan Trott’s unjustified first innings dismissal, even that technology is only as good as it’s human operators. And who’s to say that Trott wouldn’t have added a lot of runs if he hadn’t erroneously been given out?

Either way, as we’ve seen before here and here, what goes around comes around. I just hope it comes around sometime after England have got the series all wrapped up.

This will probably not end well

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There are people who have examined the complex politics of South Africa in minute detail and there are others who have studied the mining industry of the country for many, many years.
These people have earned the right to use the moniker of “expert” in their particular field.

I are not these people.

I can, however, like to venture my opinion on the current situation regarding the wage demands and negotiations surrounding SA’s gold mining sector. And my opinion is that I don’t think things are going to work out very well.

That’s because generally, wage negotiations in SA seem to go pretty much the same way:
Employer offers low percentage – let’s say, for example 5%. Unions demand higher percentage – maybe 13%.

There are strikes, strife, usually a bit of violence and some threats. And then, after a while, and a lot of posturing, they meet halfway. Which would be 9% in this case. The overall increase just about enough to drive inflation up a bit further, but for the individual workers, not usually enough to make up for the pay they missed out on while they were striking. Perhaps the latter is why they then demand a bit more the next time around.

Of course, if I can work this out, then the employers and the unions are probably also aware of it. Thus, they come out with more extreme percentages as their starting points. Which brings me neatly back to current events in gold mining.

The employers – citing falling productivity, the lower price of gold and spiraling costs – have suggested 4%. Not a massive decease on their usual offerings, but then they don’t have a lot of space to place with. That’s not the case for the unions though. Although they have certainly outdone themselves – and each other – this time.

Solidarity (not the Polish one) has demanded 10%.
The NUM has demanded… *drumroll* 60%! Lolz all round.
Oh yes, and AMCU has asked for 159%.

I’d like a pay increase too. 10% would be lovely. 4% would even be quite nice. But with this news, I’m tempted to hold out for 159%. And once I go for it, I will only back down ever so slightly (and maybe I’m guilty of showing my hand a little here, but no further than 158%).

But seriously, with the parties starting so very far apart, the upcoming mining wage negotiation are going to take a while. And all that time, tensions, frustration and desperation are going to increase. And just in case you have no memory, there is history here.

Colour me pessimistic, but I really can’t see this working out well.

Scoop is Five

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Happy Birthday to our younger bundle of fun, who reaches the milestone of five years old today.

Here she is looking rather peeved. She has been known to smile as well though, especially when given a rusk.

As with most 5-year-olds these days, she is already well on her way to becoming a proper independent teenager, but thankfully, she still needs her Dad’s hugs from time to time.

I going to cherish them while they’re still on offer.

MU

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The kids are huge fans of Monsters Inc, so today, I took them to see the new prequel, Monsters University:

image

Putting it simply, it was superb. I had been concerned that it wouldn’t live up to the first film, but it really did. The animation was – I don’t know – sharper, better. The characters were well thought out and believable (yes, I know they are monsters). But, as ever with Pixar, it was the attention to detail which made the movie, especially the many clever links to scenes in Monsters Inc.

One word of warning for parents of young children though: as with the original film, there is a short animation piece before the main event. With Monsters Inc, this was the bright, funny, brief For The Birds. For Monsters University, the intro piece is called The Blue Umbrella. No doubt that it demonstrates brilliant animation, but it is dark, lengthy and actual quite distressing in parts. Totally out of place in front of the main feature, and not great for your four year daughter or similar. So be aware.

Otherwise though, 10/10. Brilliant.
Go. Enjoy.