Let's Not Casterspersions

There has been much written and said in the media this past year concerning the gender of the South African 800m runner Caster Semenya and the manner of her win at a meeting in Berlin last night has brought about more negative press response.

But is it justified?

The simple and honest answer is no of course but how on Earth did we ever get to a position where a female athlete has her very being questioned merely because she is different from the norm? Perhaps I might offer an opinion.

In a world where it used to be super cool to be an adherent of the Andy Warhol philosophy of form over substance, shallow imagery and mediocrity being an able substitute for real talent, it is now only cool, perhaps tepid, to be merely different from mainstream. The market has become satiated. The world of art has suffered aesthetically, the world of comedy has suffered humorously and the performing arts have suffered per se. Warhol was a purveyor of illusions, he sold the Emperor’s new clothes whilst wearing raggedy ones himself. He blinded our senses in such a masterful way we would prefer to look at his interpretations of everything from the mundane to the iconic rather than see the actuality. Sheer genius!

Warhol’s influence grew like Christianity, slowly at first with great gushes of inspirational artists each having their own devoted followings, but unlike Christianity the true message became distorted and disciples lost their way. You see, the message Warhol preached through his work was that individuals are interesting. Andy was an individual. He mocked the world. He turned himself into a glorified silk screen printer and churned out manufactured goods. He invented the word Superstar and eventually became one himself. He said everyone would one day be famous for 15 minutes and then the world set out to prove him right.

Andy Warhol preached individuality but, unlike Jesus Christ, he was never meant to be a role model. The problem is Andy’s followers imitated the man and in an effort to sustain and prolong the illusion of cool they drew on the negative energy of his message. So initially we were fortunate to have great free-thinking artists such as David Bowie and John Lennon who were influenced to varying degrees and no doubt would have found ways to express their genius in any case but unfortunately the next generation of less gifted adherents concentrated on Warhol’s perceived surliness and cynicism – which is where we are now.

If you have ever watched a David Bowie interview you will see a man who truly looks at life a little differently from other people, naturally and unforced, although somewhat tortured. I am loathe to give examples of the next generation of artists in this field, particularly as I am a big fan of the likes of Goldfrapp, Madonna and Lady GaGa, but all I’ll say is that art imitates life and living people definitely imitate artists.

The world’s media is the natural progression of Andy Warhol’s influence in all walks of life - Cynical, judgemental, caustic, irreverent, voyeuristic, duplicitous and downright cruel. The press have a vested interest in concentrating on the negative and quite often they will actually create the negative to pander to public taste that they themselves procured. It is a totally self-perpetuating money-making racket that has given us the likes of Katie Price as the ultimate page-filler when a story is required. Without Warhol there would be no Jordan.

As for Caster Semenya – she has now been proven to be a woman although I can’t think why it has taken so long. If I were to drop my pants I would automatically be disqualified to run against women! Her times are good but not manly. I have run much faster for my local Crawley athletics club and I was but a rank and file club athlete. Teenagers often improve in great leaps from year to year and her naturally gifted strength may just make her a precociously talented child. Of course if she begins to run under 1min 50sec for 800m and knocks 20 seconds off her 1,500m time thereby bringing an unnatural element to the table then her case might require monitoring again (hopefully behind closed doors) for future benefit but please let’s leave the poor girl alone and let her live her life. Another South African runner Oscar Pistorius has a similar problem to Caster Semenya and is almost certainly on the same hiding to nothing as the young teenager. The blade-runner is allowed to run against able-bodied athletes and is accepted all the time he is mediocre at international level but how quickly things will change if he ever became a world beater – and it is possible. I have watched him many times and his starts are so abysmal and the middle part of his race so good that I believe that if he stepped up to 800m he would be able to break the world record (incidentally, broken at the same Berlin meeting last night) and that would set the cat among the pigeons.

I for one will be cheering for Caster Semenya to win gold in Delhi later this year. She trains has hard as anyone else, she is not particularly attractive to human senses but so what – the bottom line is she has definitely not tried to defraud or cheat in any way – end of (a phrase I’m sure would not have existed but for Andy Warhol : )

Beadle and Bytheway - gone but not forgotten

It was with mixed emotion I watched the Jeremy Beadle tribute on ITV last night.

Selfishly, I miss the great man as I can no longer call on him to help with some event that I might be involved with. At the moment I am putting together a charity event involving the celebrated Eggheads team, as part of the new schools 14-19 diploma initiative.

All the elements have Jeremy Beadle written all over them and he would have thrown himself into the event and ensured that I had no worries and the evening raised many thousands of pounds and a good time would be had by all.

Also quite selfishly I miss the vibe that Jeremy brought to every conversation we ever had, every situation, every meeting – positive, glowing, ambitious, enthusiastic and real.

Perhaps I didn’t learn too much new about Jeremy. I was actually working with the new production company of You’ve Been Framed just after Jeremy was dropped as presenter and I know, despite what David Liddiment might now say, the reason he was replaced was that they wanted someone cheaper!! This was typical showbiz false economy and with the best will in the world Lisa Riley found Jeremy a very hard act to follow.

I remember telling Jeremy this story and until then I had no idea how genuinely hurt and upset he was at this decision. You see Jeremy was not driven by money, although he could make it very easily, and he would have found a compromise.

In all honesty Jeremy was probably bigger than the show and it occurred to me that is probably why he didn’t get the opportunity to diversify into chat-show hosting.

Ironically, Jeremy kick-started the career of Jonathan Ross and yet he could have shown him a thing or two about interviewing techniques but when you are such a huge star, as Jeremy undoubtedly was, the public find it very difficult to accept you in another guise.

Jeremy was pigeon-holed as a prankster and yet he was one of the most knowledgeable men in television. Give me the choice between Jeremy and Stephen Fry for my quiz team and it would be Jeremy every time. Not to undermine Stephen’s qualities at all but I would know a lot of the comedian’s areas of speciality whilst Jeremy would always come up with the weird and wacky facts no one else would know.

Anyway, it was an ironic tribute from the company that let him down in a way, but all the same it was great to see Sue, Cassie and Bonnie in such good form and if I learnt anything at all it was that Jeremy was much sicker than he ever let on.

This programme made me think of another great friend who has just died prematurely.

Mark Bytheway was a similar animal to Jeremy in some respects. Great knowledge befitting a former World Quizzing Champion and current British champion, but a man who defies description such is his uniqueness and unpredictability. Blessed with an almost unequalled intellect Mark managed to live life to the full and balance the enforced lonely existence of a professional quiz player with bouts of gregariousness only known to those errant ‘never miss a session’ drinking types. Not your average world champion was Mark, but fiercely loyal and respectful. He quizzed with Jeremy too and on one occasion actually had Jeremy literally hurling trivial pursuit questions at him whilst he was cycling for dear life – don’t ask!

Mark also had an infectious enthusiasm which couldn't help but rub off on you and on many occasions we played in a team together and he involved me in professional 'quiz attacks' long before we had a recognised circuit. We had great successes together and just loved it when a plan worked. It is difficult to describe Mark's personality but imagine if Jeremy was Hannibal then Mark would be Murdoch!

I literally couldn't get to Mark's funeral, which has played heavily on my mind, but I loved him like a brother and know that his partner Jo has a magnificent support system in his local Swindon quiz fraternity and in particular my old friends Tim Westcott and Eric Kilby. I would occasionally play D'artagnan to their Three Musketeers but they were true brothers-in-arms.

RIP Jeremy and Mark - your like will never be seen again

Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?

I am probably in the minority but I actually like the revamped Who Wants to be a Millionaire?

I know the excitement of fastest finger has been taken away and to some extent the unravelling of personality as the wretched contestants no longer squirm in the chair for inordinate lengths of time (at least not for the early timed-questions), but judging by the one show I’ve seen so far, the contestants have been chosen very well and are most deserving.

It is an open secret that many of the changes were forced upon the production team by highly professional quiz syndicates who worked together to spread the wealth. This in itself was a very sensible exercise in my opinion but one that was open to abuse when taken to extreme measures.

To offer my experience of the show as an example might help to clarify.

I was not part of a syndicate and made my five calls to the show myself and also my five internet entries. I struck lucky. I must admit that subsequent to this I did receive some help by the pros who had heard about my good fortune. It was for instance a great help to be able to practice the fastest finger on a simulated machine and this did help my confidence although I should add that on my big night I was the only one of the ten contestants to get the question correct so speed was not of the essence.

After bumbling my way to the 32K question I decided to ask the audience on a question that I felt quietly confident I knew, until that is the result came back and 94 per cent of the audience disagreed. I went with the overwhelming verdict of the audience before Chris called for an ad break and I remained in my chair feeling rather smug.

Chris gave me no signs whatsoever and when we returned from the break and he looked in my eyes and said “It’s the wrong answer” I was momentarily taken aback although wore my best poker face.

At the time I felt a little aggrieved at Chris because he constantly wound the audience up by telling them I was definitely going to win a million and even when I pleaded for the audience not to press unless you know the answer for sure Chris interjected “they’re not going to take any notice of that, they’re on national television”

I mentioned this story to Chris’s PA last week but what I failed to mention was that Chris’s unprofessional approach probably only made a very slight difference to the skewed result - the largest wrong answer in the history of the show!

A few days after the show aired I received an email from an audience member who expressed her sorrow at my loss and explained to me that someone in the audience had told her the wrong answer and she pressed accordingly. No names were mentioned but the description of the individual did fit someone I knew to be in a syndicate and I had met in the queue for the recording a few hours before the show. A few further enquiries made it perfectly clear what had happened and at least it allayed my fears that the whole audience hated me. It seems this person, a big winner himself, had a history of thwarting the chances of non-syndicate members by pressing for wrong answers and this is the ugly side of syndication I'm afraid.

I can see the funny side of it though. This chap actually had the chutzpah to come up to me immediately after the recording to commiserate and assure me he had pressed the correct button (one of only six per cent it seems!). He still remains blissfully unaware that I know what happened but what the heck I would not fall out over something so trivial as money. On the positive side at least I knew that the production company had not stitched me up or the whole of the studio audience hated me : )

One of the nine other contestants on my show was a Mr Ingram Wilcox, a very accomplished quiz player. Ingram had made the final ten several times but had not made it into the chair so it was fantastic to watch him finally succeed in 2006 and walk away with the million.

Speaking of millionaires, I read Bill Gates’ views today in the newspaper and agree that if only billionaires would give just half their wealth towards alleviating poverty then we could wipe out so much of the unnecessary suffering in this world. It occurs to me that no one really cares about those less fortunate people otherwise the rich would not be getting richer and the poor poorer. Third world countries have no say and have been abandoned I’m afraid. I would cap wealth at a million personally. We are so fortunate in the west, and in this little island in particular, but it is time Governments, perhaps the UN, stepped up to the mark and came up with a plan to make life more equal around the world. I often feel ashamed to be human on so many levels. We cannot be trusted to do the right thing, NEPOTISM in all its guises creates corruption and when nepotism is practised as a nation then spiritual chaos is all that's left.

Thank God for Michael Bloomberg, David Rockefeller, Warren Buffet, George Soros, Charles Feeney, Ted Turner, Oprah Winfrey, Eli and Edythe Broad, John and Tashia Morgridge, George Lucas, T Boone Pickens, Barry Diller and Diane Von Furstenberg, Baron Hilton, Ronald Perelman, Larry Ellison and of course Bill Gates. I understand all these people have pledged half their wealth and they are also preaching the merits of philanthropy to other billionaires. I would go a step further and ask people with two million to donate one of those million. The benefits are indescribable. Wealth is an illusion - a drug like any other. Striving is important - beneficial - poverty prevents creativity, motivation, ambition and drive. It causes criminal tendencies. We need to strike a balance but this is beyond human collectivity. Governments need to tax the super rich for their own good and the good of the world. It is obvious.

I agree with everything Prince Charles says about saving our planet but the truth is it will all be in vain unless we change as a people.

Sorry to end on such a serious note

As I write I have the radio on in the background and here are three jokes I have just heard

1) I hate those little Russian matryoshka dolls - they are so full of themselves!

2) My friend got a job in a bowling alley today. “Ten pin” I asked. “No” he replied “permanent!”

3) There was a young lady from Saigon who felt Limericks were three lines too long