Butt ugly

Yesterday, necessity brought us to the heart of the Manx third world, i.e. Strand Street, Douglas.
On principle, usually only two things cause me to venture to Douglas these days. One is paid work, the other is meetings related to what you might term good works. Those apart, I really see no reason to dwell in the heart of darkness any more. Almost everything colourful, unique or interesting has been closed or knocked down in a redevelopment blitzkreig that began in the late 1980's.
The latest excuse for the dead-eyed air of the place is a supposed move away from local shops (or even just real world retail outlets staffed by real people) and on to the internet, but this is a lie and the problem is much older.
It began 25 or so years ago, when urban planners decided the area needed regenerating to stop it looking like every other Northern seaside town at the peak of Thatcherism. Inevitably, the “solution” was also Thatcherite and involved winkling every small family business out of their property or tenancy, then replacing them with soul-less shopping centres whose “key tenants” would be major UK retailers, working on the theory that once these were in (rent free for years if necessary) smaller retailers and new local businesses would follow.
We now know how well that worked. With proper planning and a little research into the theory and practice of the socio-economic model they were using, the planners could have too. Or perhaps they always have known, and also know, like career Thatcherites, that the real beauty of free market urban redevelopment is that it is a job for life. The scam works, very simply, on the basis that most businesses simply fail while even the successful and well planned ones have a predetermined shelf life, but that regional governments must always be seen to understand and be managing such change, rather than being as frightened and confused by all the strange noises and flashing lights as their most ignorant ratepayers.
But, returning to yesterday.... all three of us had outstanding gift vouchers which could only be cashed in at Douglas-based major retailers, so we held our noses and dived in for an hour or two.
In the past, we usually take a break halfway through, grab a sandwich from one of the genuine local businesses and munch it on a bench in Regent Street before continuing. But yesterday we discovered, to our horror, that even the newish tramp-unfriendly Regent Street benches had been removed in favour of.....
I still shudder now at the brutalism of the replacement grey slabs of undulating concrete - nominally intended as seating. The latest monstrosities are of a kind seen only in 1930's fascist public art, regional British 1960's shopping centres and Manx millennialist kitsch. Off-island readers who need a reference point could try the current Jonathan Meades TV series in which, in his usual straight-faced style, he deconstructs such horrors and all the screwed up venal, totalitarian scheming which caused them while, nominally, reclaiming them as “good architecture”.
The sheer ugliness (disguised as “function over form”) and impracticality of the new seating area had me idly wondering if T. Dan Smith has distant relatives (or at least admirers) amongst the Manx “redevelopment” fraternity. I also wonder if Douglas Degeneracy Parsnips have shares in Amazon. If not, why else are they so set on making Douglas town centre – 25 years ago a decent if unadventurous example of a typical Northern seaside main drag – so ugly that nobody but the blind can bear to be in it in broad daylight, or while not so legless that they never notice or care what it looks, smells and sounds like?
Answers on a seaside postcard to...well, frankly anybody but me. I neither care nor want to know about a centre of excrement I need not even pass close by unless somebody pays me to do so.

Art attacks

 I was struck by  the news (see http://www.energyfm.net/cms/news_story_222843.html) that local artists are being invited to submit ideas for ‘public art’ in Laxey and Ramsey. In particular, I was amused by the time at which the government culture muppet planned to introduce the scheme.

Who but the usual gaggle of pensioners and dossers have time to meet some Arts Council bigwig mid-day? And who else would want to anyway?

Really?

Seriously?

Back in the 1980’s, I knew the few vaguely competent Manx art pros who still lived here, and they all had day jobs. That wasn’t because the general populace failed to appreciate the arts (not any more than the general populace anywhere else, anyway), but because the only commissions on offer were to produce ambient tat for yuppies or oil paintings of and for the same wealthy inbreeds who run this gaff today. If you were serious, or just had any self-respect, you produced if and when you could for patrons elsewhere and held down some rubbish job to feed your family. Most eventually moved away, leaving the field wide open for the idiot spawn of bankers who now hoover up contemporary art commissions (as none of them can even hold down a cleaning job in Daddy’s office, never mind take over the firm).

 So, looks like the Kulchur dumsters are about as serious as they ever were about tarting up the town. And…. oh Lawdy Lawdy…. we do got public art in Ramsey already!

For a start we have the infamous ‘Two crusties playing chess’ sculpture inside our dull if functional Town Hall (though if the sculptor had really been paying attention those fictional figures so finely rendered in stone from some quarry clearance sale would be doing the 10^th century equivalent of grumbling about their benefits amongst discarded Special Brew tins, just like their descendants).

Then we have that odd and ugly ‘millennium’ slab outside Shoprite which nobody can figure out or find a use for. Presumably it is meant to signify something Christian (and could only have been approved by an entire committee of godbothering rednecks), but is more like a logo for a dodgy fascist cult - as conceived by the architect of a brutalist 1960’s multi-storey car park or council housing complex.

Oh, and never forget (if only we could!) ‘The Muriel’ in the picnic area by the Swing Bridge, which serves the same purpose as one of those ultrasonic devices meant to deter kids from gathering in public areas. It seems to work. You certainly never see anyone there under the age of 60 and mentally competent enough to dress themselves.

So, what do we make of this latest breathless announcement then?

Can either the talent of today’s generation of artists or the taste of today’s generation of culture bores bring something new and exciting to this town?

That would be a ‘No’.

Crime and prejudice

I also read today (see http://www.isleofman.com/News/article.aspx?article=34682 ) that the Clarksons have had fence posts and gates ripped up around their Langness cottage.
Locals will know that there’s a long-drawn out battle over rights of way going on between the Clarksons, other landowners and what journalists euphemistically describe as ‘ramblers’ (and most others just recognise as rubber-necking, bobble-hatted, slack-jawed simpletons with scabby dogs).
In the 1980’s a Falklands vet working at a nearby hotel memorably christened these loons ‘Bennies’ (after the Crossroads character). Apparently the name was originally given to the stylistically challenged Falklands islanders by the Marines during the invasion. The name stuck, though no Manxman will admit it since A.A. Gill caught on to the term on a weekend visit here and told the world through a Sunday Times article that even upset our Chief Benny.
A local paper today reported that the Bennies have denied involvement in this vandalism.
Well they would, wouldn’t they?
But I tend to believe them, because digging up fence posts is hard work, while for most Bennies, the nearest they get to a hard day’s work is pressing their noses against the house window of someone who has a job.

Bennies throwing bennies

Even before anguished squeaks over Jagger’s suggestion that the Isle of Man should be used to test cannabis decriminalisation had died down, the Manx governed mental are whining again. Funnily enough, the guy who set them off was also commenting – more obliquely – from off-island on the same issue.
This time it was A.A. Gill, already the arch enemy of our dimmest, most inbred elements for previous snide comments when, while staying with Jeremy Clarkson, he had the misfortune to witness Castletown's World Tin Bath Championships.
To fill some space while standing in for Rod Liddle at the Times, he snapped of Jagger’s ‘helpful’ suggestion: “The denizens of Ile de l’Homme fall into two types. Hopeless, inbred mouth-breathers known as Bennies. And then retired, small-arms dealers and accountants who deal in rainforest futures. I have never been anywhere that would be more improved by a glut of class A substances. They believe in fairies and fascism. This was the last place in Britain to legalise homosexuality. The Isle of Man, twinned with Malawi. Bring on the crack.”
Read it all at http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article7134122.ece if you want.
Obviously, this soon got picked up by the Manx papers at http://www.iomtoday.co.im/news/Anger-after-Times-writer-blasts.6315352.jp , and has led to an outpouring of self-pitying wank from various losers, including the Chief Benny himself, who today chuntered: “Although AA Gill is not a news journalist but a satirical columnist meant to entertain through his outrageous comments, I, like all Manx residents, find his remarks to be misleading, unfounded and insulting to every man, woman and child on our Island. Unfortunately, AA Gill has, for some reason, a personal dislike of the Island and its people, as is clear from his latest abusive comments.” (see http://www.gov.im/lib/news/cso/chiefministerres.xml for the rest - and grab a sickbag before you click on it).
And, by the way, far from all Manx residents feeling insulted, all the ones I speak to are roaring with laughter. Mind you, they also work for a living.
Now, of course, Gill’s attack will have nothing to do with a planning decision which prevents his chum Jeremy Clarkson from fencing off a path behind his holiday cottage which was chiefly being used by bobble-hatted loons to gawk at Motormouth’s family. (see http://www.iomtoday.co.im/news/Langness-inquiry-decision-announced.6287496.jp for more). Nothing at all, honest, especially as they never, never pressed their noses against his window or let their scabby dogs off their strings, leading to a local farmer losing sheep over a cliff. Honest.
And another funny thing. The disgruntled locals claim not to know what a Benny is. Funny that, because when I worked next door to the disputed paths at Castletown Golf-Links Hotel in the mid-1980’s and also knew the family who lived in the lighthouse (now Clarkson’s cottage) ‘Benny’ was the term used by hotel staff, golfers and everyone else who lived or worked around there for the clueless gawks who were apparently too disorientated to stick to the paths to the coast, instead wandering across the course, and on at least one occasion into the hotel kitchen itself.
This all started when an ex-army chef, who’d served in the Falklands, said that the woolly-headed loons were remarkably like the Falklanders who marines nicknamed ‘Bennies’ after the simple-minded Crossroads character. Benny stuck as a label, and even developed into ‘Benny jokes’ told in the kitchen and after hours at the nearby flying club bar, where the term spread to local light aircraft pilots, and I’d take a good guess to Clarkson and the Top Gear team when they were over filming….and we can all guess where next.
And some other funny things.
No-one has mentioned the previous planning enquiry in the late 1980’s, when the then CGLH management wanted to extend the course over the same disputed area, or the fuss a century before when the forebears of the same landowner also tried to fence off the paths. This led to the restrictions Clarkson observed to protect various rare flutterybyes and flowers, when Manx National Heritage gave evidence at the aforementioned 1980’s enquiry.
No-one mentions the other party to the current enquiry, the current owner of CGLH and a man with ministerial friends and much advertising revenue to distribute, who might be keen on seeing the paths fenced off to revive the golf course extension idea. No-one mentions either that there is a lot of bad blood between him and Manx National Heritage (and their own partners in government) because of his previous claims for recompense in return for developing other sites of Manx historic interest.
And no-one is looking at MNH’s success a few years back at quietly putting through legislation which, in effect, puts all public Manx land under their stewardship, thus allowing them (if they wish) to put restrictions on all ramblers who might choose to wander around beauty spots that MNH see have commercial potential as ‘heritage sites’ (or as us commoners might say, ‘tourist traps’.).
And absolutely no-one mentions MNH’s track record of using their participation in planning committees to close down local businesses or even whole towns (e.g. Peel), or in quickly moving in to ‘rescue’ a beauty spot complete with a scenic café when, due to their insistence that the only nearby road could not be improved lest it destroy the natural ambience, the café owner (or maybe his bank manager) finally admitted defeat.
Yet aren’t they all coincidences so funny that, in comparison. anything A.A. Gill has to say about us seems quite dull?

New threat to children announced

The recent announcement on the Manx government website of a ‘working group’ chaired by the Education Minister, Anne ‘parson’s pal’ Craine, to ‘develop and enhance children and young people’s facilities within the community’ (see http://www.gov.im/lib/news/cso/newinitiativeonf.xml) is bad news for several reasons.
Bad news firstly because it is under Craine’s regime that evangelicals have been allowed to use schools for depraved gatherings on Sundays – for which several sources suggest they don’t even pay.
Bad news because when it says they will consult churches, in practice it is even worse. There are only three churches likely to be on this bandwagon, and none of them are places where your child would be safe.
The last time one of them ran such a project it was closed, as far as I can tell finally because nearby residents objected regularly to the police about the number of kids sitting outside, purely because it was a handy meeting place (although the church tried to claim them as ‘members’ in funding bids). However, even before that there was the matter of a cleric, finally imprisoned for offences involving an underage girl, but before that families of others were ‘advised’ against alleging that he’d known them biblically on youth club nights .
Then there was the curious affair of the vanishing sound system. Originally this was highly publicised as an example of the kind of misguided youth the project dealt with, only for investigations to stop when another suspect to emerge was a volunteer who, on closer analysis, had never quite severed past links with loyalist thugs.
The last time another of them planned such a project, back in the early 1980’s, it didn’t even open! That didn’t prevent a six-figure legacy being spent and a building meant to entice kids away from strong drink being sold to a brewery and turned into a nightclub.
Then there is the more recent planning application by Southern rednecks to turn a former country pub in the middle of nowhere into a ‘youth social centre’. I’ve speculated on that before (see Youth facility? Don't bet on it!).
It also worries me that at least two local developers have stooges on the management committees of these churches, curiously always well briefed enough to guide the churches towards likely public funds at times when the sale of property they own would secure said developers key spots for future developments.
There used to be a TV advert which asked ‘Do you know where your kids are tonight?’
I tell you bluntly, if yours are ever at a ‘youth facility’ run by these chancers you need to be very worried, for their physical safety and their sanity.

Youth facility? Don't bet on it!

A small item in this week’s Examiner has me wondering if local kids are about to get groomed by quite unsuitable adults. IOM Newspaper staff notoriously avoid investigative work which upsets the local elite, so I suspect the story only fills a hole on the page, but still curious.
The dreaded Living Hope Community Church (AKA 'the Southern Daft Cult') have a change of use planning application in for the old Lancashire House pub, a tumbledown dump out in the Santon wilderness. They want to turn it into a ‘youth social centre’, which is curious as there are only half a dozen houses within miles in either direction.
'The Lanky' was a handy watering hole halfway between Douglas and Castletown in horsedrawn days, flogged off by the brewery years ago as it hasn’t brought in drinkers for decades. It was bought by a local entrepreneur who made millions from contract services to the hospital and prison building schemes -always remarkably well informed and ahead of the contractor queue in such things.
He seemed to be on another winner, setting up a child day care centre on the main road halfway between two major centres of offshore finance activity. Despite family connections which should have brought in the richest rugrats on the island, that also failed. Again – curious.
But there’s something else – either again curious but a total coincidence or worth looking at.
A couple of miles away is Mount Murray, whose history is already rather eventful (see, for example, http://www.privy-council.org.uk/files/other/mount%20murray-final.rtf, and if you really have the time http://www.gov.im/cso/crown/mountmurray.xml and http://www.gov.im/cso/crown/mountmurrayparttwo.xml). Now Albert Gubay, the real figure behind Mount Murray, is talking of developing a casino there (see http://www.iomtoday.co.im/news/Major-holiday-development-planned-for.4793630.jp).
Of course, we already have an island casino, at the Douglas Hilton, owned by George Ferguson Lacey, who also owns the vacant Castle Mona hotel site and is therefore in a position to quickly develop another nightspot – whenever the heritage and other government grants come through judging by his previous record with other ‘heritage sites’ (Bishopscourt, The Nunnery, Rushen Abbey…).
And Ferguson Lacey is a keen sponsor of various local evangelicals, who even tells folk he once hung out with Billy Graham and Richard Nixon. Curious clash of interests considering the usual religious objection to gambling (and folk enjoying themselves in general).
Similarly, Gubay has been known to court religious interests once or twice in a career originally built on a supermarket chain which flouted the old Sunday trading laws. So take note of the statement in the iomtoday article that: ‘It would be his intention to give 20 per cent of the yearly profits from the casino to worthy causes. A committee would be appointed to decide which causes would benefit.’
I wonder. Could we be in for a bidding war involving two of the island’s most ambitious developers trying to buy off the ‘moral majority’ in the form of the island’s scuzziest religious racketeers?
Whatever happens, if local youth services cannot get basic government grants while six figure sums get thrown at fundamentalist throwbacks for ‘youth outreach’ it's a safe bet the immediate future for Manx youngsters is a bleak one.