society

A Dalek has a better chance of appearing on the cover of the Radio Times than a black TV star does, writes David Herman, so who is representing non-white Britain on our screens?

What do Doctor Who, Sherlock and the team captains of Have I Got News for You have in common? Here’s a clue: they have the same thing in common with the ITV FA Cup Final panel, all the presenters on Newsnight and the commentators on Test Match Special. They are all white.

Lenny Henry recently attacked the whiteness of this year’s Baftas. The awards, he said, were a disgrace for not celebrating black talent. “There weren’t any black people at the Baftas; there was no black talent,” Henry told the Daily Telegraph. “In 200 years’ time, our children are going to look back to now and say: ‘Remember that really weird period when there weren’t any black people in any programmes?’ It’s unthinkable, but now we’re having to live through it.” He is absolutely right. Out of 31 nominations or special awards for individual categories, 31 went to white actors and performers.

The Baftas are by no means exceptional. Take the peak-time programmes on a recent Friday. On BBC1 was The One Show (two white presenters), followed by A Question of Sport (white presenter and six white panellists), Would I Lie to You? (white presenter and six white panellists), Have I Got News for You (white presenter and four white panellists) and The Graham Norton Show (white host and four white guests). On BBC2 it was Gardeners’ World (two white presenters) and QI (white presenter and four white comedians), followed by Newsnight (white presenter).

It’s the same story wherever you look. From Call the Midwife to Broadchurch, Top Gear to Match of the Day, the presenters, guests and main leads are white. Do you like arts programmes? Whether it’s Melvyn Bragg or Alan Yentob, Andrew Graham-Dixon or Howard Goodall, Mark Kermode or Jools Holland, the presenter is white. Every major sports presenter and commentator is white, though there are one or two black football and athletics pundits, and the occasional black cricket commentator if the West Indies are touring. Chat-show hosts and quiz presenters are white. So are the people who appear on the cover of the Radio Times – the Doctor’s assistant last week, Robert Peston the week before that. There’s a better chance of a Dalek appearing on the cover than a non-white TV star.

The most serious example is in news and current affairs. All the presenters on Newsnight and the three main Radio 4 news programmes, nearly all the TV newsreaders and nearly all of the editors and main reporters are white.

Why does this matter? First, how can the experiences and realities of non-white viewers be represented properly when nearly every major personality in television is white? The situation is especially worrying when all the figures of cultural authority – newsreaders, current affairs presenters, people who run all the TV and radio networks – are white.

Second, what about non-white talent? Surely they must feel discouraged about their chances of breaking into television or radio when there are so few role models and when what they see and hear is, in the immortal words of Greg Dyke, “hideously white”?

Finally, what kind of society do we think we live in? Is it as white as the 1950s and 1960s or is it properly multiracial? If we think we live in a diverse society, why are there so few non-white faces on TV or behind the scenes, in charge of networks? As the media run endless stories about Asian grooming gangs, immigrants sponging off the welfare state and alleged terrorists such as Abu Qatada, where are the positive images of non-white Britain? Lenny Henry started out in the mid-1970s. Who would have thought that, almost 40 years on, things would have changed so little?
© David Herman

Posted 26 June 2013

This article appeared originally in the New Statesman, 24-30 May 2013.

Reprinted with kind permission from the author.

Cartoon by Gary Edwards

Nearer his end than his beginning, Dick Skellington reveals just how he might end up. 

Around the time of Margaret Thatcher’s funeral (the Iron Lady was indeed cremated) I was taken aback by a tabloid newspaper headline which ran: MY GRAN'S BECOME A LAMP POST.
 
It seems that metal body parts from the dead are being turned into road furniture across the kingdom. Steel hips, plates (I have one in my skull following a road accident), screws and even teeth fillings, are collected after cremation and sent for recycling, stimulating a new private business enterprise.
 
Increasingly, our former body parts are being melted down for road signs, lamp posts, and even to provide valuable titanium and cobalt which are used in teeth implants. What started in a starburst might end up in an aeroplane or a motor vehicle.
 
Over one half of the nation’s 260 crematoria have so far signed up to the scheme.  Estimates put the total potential amount collected each year at over 75 tons.
 
What does seem clear is that my relatives may choose my body to be donated to the nascent recycling industry, or if they wish, they can keep the metal parts for themselves as mementoes.  
 
I rather think my metal plate would be best converted into a footpath sign, since I so love the countryside.  I am not sure if I can be that specific, but I am thinking of changing my will to make sure.
 
One of the benefits of the new scheme is that polluting metal substances are not buried underground. Nice to know when I go I might be environmentally sustainable.
 
However, I think, once the metal has been removed and recycled, my ashes should be buried at sea. Did you know there are three designated marine graveyards, one off the Northumbrian coast, one near Newhaven, and another near the Isle of Wight?
But since 2001, only 140 people have been laid to rest in watery graves. It was something to which former sailors seemed particularly inclined. In 2002 there were 21 sea burials, last year only 4. Perhaps all the old sailors from Second World War convoys have been laid to rest.
 
Back in Nelson’s time, around the turn of the 19th century, dead sailors were simply trussed up in their hammocks, a final stitch inserted in the deceased’s nose (to ensure that the dead was not in fact merely unconscious!), and a lead weight tied to the feet. 

I do not think I will go that far. Just send my metal to the recycling plant and scatter my ashes over the waters beneath The Needles.
Dick Skellington 13 June 2013

The views expressed in this post, as in all posts on Society Matters, are the views of the author, not The Open University.

Cartoon by Gary Edwards

Dick Skellington reflects on our disunited kingdom in his holiday postcard from Sardinia.

Alghero, Sardinia, 11 June 2013
What disturbing times we face. We seem to be living in a climate of suspicion and division where the weakest and most vulnerable members of society are being demonised, reviled and marginalised by politicians and media alike.

I was born just after the Second World War which cost the lives of millions combating tyranny and racial hatred. A friend who was born a decade earlier expressed his concern about what he sees as disturbing parallels between the present and the thirties – the longest downturn in modern times, the persecution of minorities, mounting stigma against the unemployed, and antipathy towards those living on benefits and immigrants. All this in a gathering storm of Islamaphobia. 

We do seem to becoming more mean-spirited and
selfish, and more antagonistic towards outsiders. Of course, as someone famously put it, we must beware of generalisations, even that one, but I am sure I am not the only one who has been struck by some of the dispiriting political rhetoric and media hysteria of late, especially after the brutal killing of a soldier in Woolwich. 

I left for my holiday in Sardinia with UKIP's popularity running at nearly 30 per cent in some opinion polls. The streets of the country are witnessing far more frequent demonstrations from fringe Far Right organisations such as the English Defence League. It is as if UKIP's resurgence has pushed the country further to the right, making intolerance of difference a badge of honour for some. Its gathering support is a symptom of disempowerment among the white working class. UKIP supporters are more likely to earn below the national average wage, be white, male, and over 60.
 
As I left for my holiday the spectre of further corruption allegations against Ministers and Members of the House of Lords dominated the quality and tabloid newspapers, adding fuel to the fire of political disrepute.

Meanwhile, the festering boil of banker corruption remains to be lanced at a time when banks are still reluctant to lend, while little progress has been made on tackling the twin problems of tax evasion and tax avoidance. The focus has always been on the soft target of benefit scroungers. 

The Government struggles to resolve some of the most critical problems of the day. The lack of adequately paid jobs, falling or at best stagnant wages for many, a shortfall in affordable housing, the absence of growth especially in regions beyond the Greater London area where major cities and urban conurbations face further local government cuts in spending in the next two years, youth unemployment at record levels, underemployment rising too, a stalled deficit and increased borrowing. The Labour opposition meanwhile seems incapable of promising anything too different from the current spate of austerity. Across mainstream politics membership is plunging. UKIP and others will reap the harvest of this disaffection.
 
All these failings are making it easier for more extreme fringe parties to secure greater political respectability.  We are at greater risk of becoming hostages to an unrepresentative band of right wingers. I am in Italy where, of course, they know much more than we do about the perils of ignoring the threat of intolerance; and where austerity is struggling to tackle deficits with similar outcomes, if not worse, for young people and the vulnerable. And yes, I hear you shout, you could have holidayed in Portugal or Spain, more riddled with economic stagnation than the UK, then you might get some context. Just look at what is happening on the streets of Turkey's big cities this month. The UK is by comparison perhaps not so bad. But from here, where the sun shines, our problems seem the more acute to me. We seem to be harking back to an alleged golden age, back to the little Englander mentality of the 19th century.

Our country remains in extensive care. It is living through a lost and traumatic decade, especially for the young. It is nice to be away from it all, if only for a few weeks. Britannia does not look so cool from here.  Wish you were here.
Dick Skellington

The views expressed in this post, as in all posts on Society Matters, are the views of the author, not The Open University.

Cartoon by Catherine Pain