Peter Rhodes on horses, warfare and why we should always be wary of videos
In the wake of the Olympics horse-whipping scandal, the British eventer Tom McEwen says he's shocked. He insists that Team GB’s horses are treated like “kings and queens”. A strange thing to say in France where kings and queens tend to get their heads chopped off.
You may recall the BBC presenter Maryam Moshiri was in trouble a few months ago for apparently flicking an obscene, middle-finger gesture at the camera. A photo showing the incident, coupled with her sullen gaze, surely proved her guilt.
But a few days later the full video of the incident appeared (you can still find it on YouTube). It shows her, hand raised, counting down the seconds to a bulletin. It was playful, amusing and dextrous. Her expression was not sullen but comically deadpan. As Moshiri had claimed all along, this was a private joke with her crew, a split-second of mirth which, taken out of context, looked damning.
I was reminded of Moshiri's embarrassment when the Manchester Airport video showing a police officer kicking a suspect suddenly burst on our screens. Guilty as seen? Maybe so. But the emergence of new videos, posted by people with a different viewpoint, and possibly a different agenda, tells another story. It's a reminder, if one were needed, never to take any video at face value until you have seen what went before.
In 1914, only 37 days elapsed between the assassination of the Archduke in Sarajevo and the outbreak of the First World War. Today, according to the new head of the Army, General Sir Roland Walker, Britain should be ready to fight a war in three years. How bizarre it is that we can see a threat so far in the future, yet do so little to prevent it. Many groups protest against gas, oil and global warming but no-one marches against war. Where in what Gen. Walker calls this “increasingly volatile” world, is the Pacifist Party?
Or are we doomed to re-live the catastrophe of 1914 when no-one understood why we were going to war but anyone speaking against it was a traitor, worthy of a white feather?
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