Trivial Pursuits

Was I the only person who watched the news a week or so ago and was unimpressed and unexcited by the prospect of Ellen MacArthur having succeeded in her round-the-world sailing attempt?

Maybe it's me, and my own disillusionment with the whole idea of competitive sport (that set in when I was about 12), but I struggle to understand the importance that people attach to these sporting activities, never moreso than in relation to the nautical ones which don't even satisfy a tribal instinct in the way that , for instance, football teams do.

In fact, apart from wasting vast amounts of money (provided for by corporate sponsors, usually - couldn't they lower the prices of their products instead, please?), my other feeling about these sorts of endeavours is that they're so unnecessarily dangerous. Poor kids might join the army at a low level, whereas the children of the well-off go into these risky sports activities. It reminds me of the time Prince Charles and a load of his cronies went off skiing somewhere they shouldn't have and ended up having to get mountain rescue out to save them. I certainly don't think the taxpayer should have to pick up the tab for that sort of thing - if people require mountain rescue, or the RNLI, to save them, chances are they've been off somewhere doing something dangerous based on a lack of danger and uncertainty in their real lives. Ditto for all of those middle-aged men who go off trying to reach the North Pole or whatever. They're the product of a generation that never had to fight a war and therefore has to invent its own dangers.

And while I wouldn't detract from MacArthur's good works at a human level - her charitable foundation is a worthy cause - the idea of her being some kind of heroine just doesn't stack up, for me. Somebody who slogs his/her guts out to feed the children is far, far more remarkable.