I love cooking. I find it a little frustrating that as a woman I actively enjoy spending hours in the kitchen, but hey, it can't be helped. I like spices, I like herbs... Heck, I even like stirring things. And I love cookery shows. Or at least I used to before it became passé to produce a cookery without a section devoting to cooking for "our boys", "our brave troops", or - my personal favourite - "our heroes".First it happened on Masterchef and now in its fourth series Great British Menu has emerged as a BBC cookery show practically devoted to pro-war propaganda. In this particular show, Britain's top chefs compete to produce a culinary masterpiece deemed fit to serve to troops returning home from Afghanistan. Has the Ministry of Defense branched out into television cuisine? It certainly appears so, because anyone wishing to watch the cooking and ignore the propaganda, will have to filter out tens of references to "the war heroes who defend our country" every episode. Bleugh.
Wouldn't it be nice for some talented chefs to cook for us anti war activists for a change? Or for that matter for some nurses, firemen, cleaners, road sweepers, ambulance drivers, carers (you get the drift...)
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4 comments:
I quite like cooking too - I just never really find the time to bother to cook properly - or am too strapped for cash when i do have the time - or am just cooking for myself and find that a little sad putting so much effort into something just for myself.
I don;t think its just cookery programmes where they do the our brave boys stuff though, sure i've seen other stuff, but can't remember what as i'd have probably turned it off and not watched it again.
when I served all I wanted was a meal and go to bed must be different now, and I wanted comfort food like fish and chips pie and mash, things I eat at home. But of course most army chefs are highly trained and the curry, sweet and sour, went down well. Steak and chips, to be honest after being on duty for 36 hours all I wanted to do was hit the bed most of the time.
Maybe someone should cook for the poor people that were cut off welfare to pay for their stupid war.
I think the source of this emergence of 'pro-war, pro-army'propoganda in our BBC programmes could be the fact that there is a massive amount of uncertainty about whether the BBC should be getting public money anymore. Now that the idea of TV and Radio is starting to shift massively due to the dreaded internet, some big questions are being asked in the halls of the mighty about whether it's worth putting money into the BBC anymore.
So the BBC's response is to pander quite cringingley to the agenda of the Government, which is at the moment trying to gain support for the war. The fact is that there should still be widespread public outcry about the army's activity at the moment. But we are letting the whole thing blow over.
The fact is that yes being a soldier is a hard job, and yes its not their choice necessarily how the army is used. But for me the army should be a source of embarrassment not pride. We should all feel shamed that this is the way we solve our international problems. Every member of the British public should be longing for the day that we no longer need an army of any number or force. By putting the focus on the soldiers, rather than the ideology behind the war, we are put in a position whereby to be critical of the war is being critical of "our brave boys".
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