The death of saving

I was intrigued to learn from Tom Daley – that young man who became famous for jumping off a platform into some water – that homophobia is a ‘legacy of colonialism’. The Ugandan President, Yoweri Museveni, begs to differ. He believes that it is homosexuality which is a legacy of colonialism and had been brought to his benighted country by effete whitey – and so he may well think Tom is indulging in the disagreeable act of ‘whitesplaining’.

However, it is possible, if not likely, that both Tom and Yoweri are correct – after all, it is difficult to be homophobic if you have around you a complete absence of homosexuals, as I have discovered since moving back to the north-east of England. Tom made his comments on the occasion of the newly woke Commonwealth Games, where organisers have encouraged sports men and women to speak out against political injustices and that ‘the more fictitious or imagined your adolescent drivel and woo woo about victimhood, the more we will applaud it’. Actually, the organisers didn’t quite say the last bit even if, listening to Tom, that is precisely what it seems that they said. Organised sport (as opposed to just running away very fast from a cheetah) is also a legacy of colonialism, so perhaps we should boycott all of it. Especially if they keep kneeling down or whining.

Tom’s interesting observations were reported on the BBC News, but the main story was about what is going to happen when we can’t pay our fuel bills this winter. Almost all the discussion has been about the crisis facing the poorest households, and I don’t doubt it will hit them hard. Almost no airtime, however, has been devoted to the effect price rises will have on small businesses – nor have there been demands for help for this sector from the opposition and the BBC.