Once upon a time, not so long ago, if you heard a person
talking to themselves in the street you assumed they were mentally disturbed or
deficient. Now you assume they’re talking to someone somewhere else.
That someone may be sitting in a restaurant or bar ignoring
the person they’re actually with. But that’s OK, because that person too is
present in body only.
Their mind is on the friend far away who they are texting,
or Facebooking, or Skyping, or Snapchatting with.
All those invisible waves, all those conversations, all that
mostly pointless information filling the air between us all. It’s pretty weird
when you stop to think about it.
As a society we’ve become addicted to our mobile phones and
estranged from the world that’s really around us.
Which is a pity, because there’s a lot of stuff to see if we
keep our eyes open to it.
Like birds, those wonderful, fascinating, beautiful
creatures that live lives so different from ours while largely sharing our
space.
Look about you, especially at this time of year, and there’s
a David Attenborough-style wildlife documentary permanently going on around us.
I had a great illustration of this the other day as I was
crossing the green near my home.
A few yards ahead of me a young woman was walking into town,
eyes glued to her phone.
Suddenly she recoiled in shock, uttering a cry that may have
been: “What the…?”
She hadn’t noticed the blackbird that flew fast and panicking
close by her. But she couldn’t fail to react to the sparrowhawk pursuing it.
It was so intent on its prey that it only avoided flying
straight into her face by doing the hawk equivalent of a handbrake turn.
Some wild things just never seem to notice all the amazing
human life that goes on around them all the time.
----
England reach the World Cup semi-final only to lose a
desperately close match 1-0 to the host nation.
They then lose the third-place play-off too, 2-0 to highly-fancied
Argentina. Unlucky, lads.
Not a prediction, but genuine events of the weekend just passed.
The lads in question are the England hockey team.
Meanwhile, in the footy, England won their seventh World Cup
match in a row. The women’s 3-0 win in Belarus means they are all but certain
to finish top of their qualifying group and go into next year’s finals in
Canada among the favourites.
If you missed those achievements by our national sides, you
can perhaps be forgiven on a weekend of so much sporting excitement.
There was the first cricket Test of the summer, with England
struggling to take full advantage of Joe Root’s imperious double century at
Lord’s.
There was the second Test in New Zealand, where England’s
rugby union side were soundly thrashed by the All Blacks – 28-27. (And where a
streaker was variously described by BBC radio co-commentators as “well-endowed”
and “he or she”, either frustrating or tickling your imagination, depending on
your imagination.)
There was England’s Justin Rose trailing in the wake of
Germany’s Martin Kaymer in a vain bid to retain his US Open golf title.
There was England’s (or Kenya’s, if you happen to be Kenyan)
Chris Froome unsuccessfully defending his
Critérium du Dauphiné
cycling title – with much more
than one eye on the next title he has to defend, the Tour de France.
And Scotland’s Andy Murray, who also has a rather more
significant defence coming up, failing to keep even one hand on the trophy at
Queens Club.
No shame to you, with all that going on, if you happened to
take your eye off the hockey ball.
In case you missed the final too, England’s conquerors
Holland were whupped 6-1 by Australia.
With all this important sport to keep track of, small wonder
if more trivial matters such as the increasing domination of the global economy
by a small cabal of multi-national companies slip out of the global news
agenda.
----
“It’s a very traditional British landscape image,” the
artist says. “A classical British landscape, rolling hills and little stone
houses.
“The surveillance
base is just another element in the landscape.”
The Constable-inspired image, shot in North Yorkshire, is
the work of photographer Trevor Paglen. It will be unveiled on Thursday at Gloucester
Road station in London, home of the Art on the Underground project. The 60-metre
long print goes the full length of the District Line platform.
It is part of a series of photos the American Paglen has
taken of surveillance installations from Nevada to Afghanistan. The “blank
spots on the map”.
“I think mass surveillance is a bad idea,” Paglen says.
“When people understand that they are constantly monitored they are more
conformist… and that kind of mass conformity is incompatible with democracy.”
He’s right. Check him out at www.paglen.com
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