Jonathan Wilson raises the prospect that football in its current iteration – a sportswashing mechanism used by states with no regard for human life or rights – might suddenly disappear (“Just like the hat, football’s grip could suddenly go out of fashion after Qatar”, Sport). This would be a cause not for regret but for celebration and can surely be hastened by adopting a concept used to fight apartheid South Africa: no normal sport in an abnormal society. Thousands of migrant workers have died for the World Cup to be staged by a misogynistic and homophobic state that values dollars over deaths, and the society of the spectacle over the substance of humane practice.
Darryl Accone
Johannesburg, South Africa
I admire Joanna Cannon’s stance in deciding for moral reasons not to watch the World Cup (“To watch it would make me complicit. A passive approver of homophobia”, Comment), but wonder whether she will also be boycotting her beloved Liverpool’s games against Newcastle United, who are owned by the equally unpleasant regime of Saudi Arabia?
Ken Gambles
Knaresborough, North Yorkshire
Art and artificial intelligence
While Laurie Clarke is right to draw attention to the dangers of generative AI in matters such as copyright, this is not a purely materialist issue (“AI can create pictures – but can it make art?”, New Review). The very term “ownership” is always problematic, especially now, with its more modern, Californian twist. Worse still is casual use of the word “create” instead of “generate”. Images generated by AI, like the amusing image shown of a Renaissance person sitting at a laptop, are universally “flat”. However realistic or clever, they lack that element of sensate appeal that is the key element in genuine art.
In an age of more and more photographs, films, TV and images on phones, we should be mindful that it is the connection between the human eye and the pulsing human brain that determines the value of art. In the performing arts of course, that brain also feels voices (not just words), melodies (not just sounds) and the ambience of “the room”. This is what defines art, not “pix”.
Steve Gooch
Robertsbridge, East Sussex
Whom to trust on NHS data?
Thank you for your excellent report on the collection of NHS patients’ medical records to create one of the world’s biggest health data platforms (“Trump backer’s firm ‘lined up’ for £360m NHS England data contract”, News). It is of huge concern that the contract for this “federated data platform” looks likely to go to Palantir, a corporation known to have provided surveillance technology for the CIA, among others, and with a reputation for eroding privacy on an unprecedented scale.
The lack of public consultation about a federated data platform is shameful, not least because of the claim that patients’ privacy will be protected due to the data being “de-identified” or pseudonymised. It’s worth remembering that Prof Ben Goldacre, commissioned by the government to review how the inherent value of NHS data can be extracted effectively and safely, admitted to a Commons inquiry that he’d opted out of a previous plan to mine patients’ data. This was because he mistrusted claims that pseudonymisation ensured privacy.
The public should have a voice on how their data is used and who can be trusted to do this.
Jan Savage
London E1
Caution: bullies at work
Workplace bullying is poorly understood (“Westminster behaviour should not be tolerated in the modern workplace”, Editorial). We all recognise it when a co-worker says “slit your throat” but this is bullying at the severest end of the spectrum. It is the serial undermining, ridiculing, making mountains out of a molehill, intimidations (cc’ing everyone), shifting blame, false accusations and feigning of victimhood that wears down workers without recognising that they are victims of bullying.
When you call it out, the bully feigns victimhood and indignation that you dare suggest that their behaviour is inappropriate, making you believe that you might be in trouble. They turn into the ‘tone police’ and often with the help of their enablers who are not themselves bullies but want to be in the bully’s good book.
Bullies bully to deflect from their inadequacy, usually incompetence, but it could be plain laziness or criminal activity. An incompetent worker lasts less than a year, but an incompetent, bullying worker lasts until retirement. Unless their bullying is too manifest; example is the incompetent nasty that is Gavin Williamson. Workplace bullying is around 20 years behind the understanding of domestic violence. We used to only recognise it when there was “wife beating”. Now we recognise coercive abuse. Marriage counseling for domestic violence is now rightfully recognised as further abuse (mediation for workplace bullying is further abuse too). We no longer blame the victim of ‘provoking’ her husband.
We have a long way to go with workplace bullying.
Dr Ellen Kriesels
London EC1
Stop whining, ENO
Melvyn Bragg argues that arts money is being “stolen” from London (“Levelling up is a worthy aim. But stealing arts cash from London is cultural vandalism”, Comment). Living in the east Midlands, I can assure him the opposite is true. Londoners will get around £17 of Arts Council money spent on their spoilt little heads; here in the east Midlands, we’ll get around £4.
The English National Opera needs to put the emphasis on national, stop whining and get on an overpriced train and move up to Manchester. Just like everyone else has to do when they want to access their arts in London.
Sharon Maher
Wigston, Leicestershire
All aboard the skylark
As head of natural capital for Nattergal, the new owners of the Boothby Wildland project in Lincolnshire, it is important to correct the assessment of Boothby’s current ecological baseline (“Villagers divided over giving ‘bread basket of England’ back to the birds and the beavers”, News).
While we expect to see huge ecological gains in our project across the intensively farmed arable land, it is contentious to refer to Boothby as “bereft of insects, [with] only a few skylarks… and precious little life”. Through our ecological baselining this summer we have come to learn that the field margins, cover crops and woodlands at Boothby are hotspots for nature, with diverse insect communities, high populations of skylarks, hares and yellowhammers and some rich floristic margins.
While the intensive arable itself is of low biodiversity value, the agri-environment plots and areas historically managed by the farm and shoot provide a strong head start for life to recover from across the rest of the land. We must move away from binary language, polarised positions and the idea that there is only one route forward, working together and through dialogue, there is space for us all.
Ivan de Klee
Horsham, West Sussex
Protect children online
Of course children should have the strongest protections in the online safety bill, but scrapping the need to take action on legal but extremely harmful content would be a huge own goal for sites and undermines any suggestion of the UK being a safe place to go online (“Children’s online safety at risk if key bill is made weaker, minister told”, News).
Harmful suicide and self-harm online content doesn’t suddenly become safe the moment you turn 18, and research shows that the internet has a role to play in increasing suicide risk. We urgently need protections for people of all ages from this material, whether it is on a large and well-known site or a small forum. The online safety bill has been five long years in the making; we can’t allow this to be ripped up now.
Julie Bentley, Samaritans chief executive, Ewell, Surrey
