Greek fags, bottle blondes

A great divide

Climate change was not high on the agenda of the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg last month, but with the enticingly named Eighth Conference of the Parties to the Climate Change Convention just around the corner (New Delhi 23 Oct – 1 Nov) the issue remains high on the international agenda.

Equity in Climate Change: The Great Divide, a new study by Benito Mueller throws a clear light on one of the greatest challenges: how to deliver climate change policy that works and which is fair. Mueller, who set out some key elements in his thinking with openDemocracy earlier this summer, diagnoses a fundamental divide between global North, which sees climate change primarily as an ecological and technological problem, and the South, which sees it above all as a challenge to human welfare. He argues that priority needs to be given to disaster response measures. A summary and details of how to order the report can be found at www.OxfordClimatePolicy.org.

Spilling the beans

At last! A week of female diaries.

In Britain, former Prime Minister John Major was embarrassed when the ‘saucy’ (the broadsheet judgement) diaries of former Health Minister Edwina Currie began serialisation in the (London) Times. The ex–premier (Major), known for his back–to–basics conservatism, his greyness, and his habit of tucking his shirt into his underpants, was revealed to have indulged in a four–year affair with the ‘still a bit in love’ Currie.

Major’s stock immediately rose, although his habit of firing ministers during the nineties in a series of sex scandals suddenly begins to whiff of hypocrisy.

Exposed: former Prime Minister Jospin

But that’s enough of that. To France, where former Prime Minister Lionel Jospin has been exposed by another woman with a busy pen: his wife.

Professor Sylviane Agacinski, feminist philosopher (or 'teacher of philosophy', as the International Herald Tribune insisted), is publishing a diary chronicling her husband’s disastrous presidential election campaign that fell apart in April, when he came in third to Jacques Chirac and Jean–Marie Le Pen. Those still worried for the state of social democracy will, no doubt, be interested.

But so will others. ‘What went wrong with Jospin?’ is a big question in Europe, and Chirac’s France is still trying to make sense of it. It doesn’t seem long ago that Jospin was tipped for the Presidency. No–one has heard from him since the election and his retirement from public life.

Mrs Jospin’s diaries look set to be lacking in sordid revelation, but still might titillate those with a penchant for modern political trends. Journal Interrompu (also the tabloid nickname for the Currie diaries) has not been on the reading list of the Diary, but the BBC reports that it “records the sense of isolation that both [Agacinski] and her husband felt at the time.” “I have a feeling we are campaigning separately,” she writes. “I do not understand why they make him run around so much. He has no time to stand back and collect his thought.”

Thrilling stuff.

Even better, Ms Agacinski goes after the media. “Most papers these days seem to be written only to make us loathe mankind,” she notices. Hence the publication of the Currie diaries?

Modesty - never a common trait in Left-Bank intellectuals - appears to be lacking somewhat. "He [Lionel] radiates a physical aura that is particularly evident at the podium," she gushes. "He isn't supple, but he has an erectness of posture that corresponds to his moral straightness and to his pride."

What, no prejudice?

Anyway, as for Jospin himself, he continues to stay in the shadows. “He will express himself again when he decides to,” his wife promised Le Monde, “and he will do it himself … Sometimes people approach him in the street and say: “Come back, we need you, why aren’t you there?” He answers: “On April 21, I was there. You were the ones who failed to show up.”

Touché!

Fags out

If you weren’t already, spare a thought for the Greeks. On Tuesday, EU no–smoking regulations came into effect. In Greece this is a big deal. It is Europe’s biggest smoking nation. A whopping 45% of the population smokes. They smoke at work. In the cafés. They even smoke during parliamentary debates. An estimated five to six thousand die each year from lung cancer.

It’s part of being a Greek.

“Greeks can’t go on without smoking,” Athens travel agent George Zarifis said, “they will not accept it.”

But now, the habit of smoking in public spaces is coming to an end, sort of. No–smoking signs hang on the walls. Cafés are split in two. Those who don’t smoke can now enjoy a full yard or two between themselves and the high–tar puffer with the shot of black coffee.

Those who fail to apply will be fined. The idea is to clean up the nation’s image before the 2006 Olympic Games. Smoking is not thought to be a sufficiently athletic past–time.

Bloated superpowers

An extraordinary editorial appeared in the New York Times this week, lamenting the spread of chronic obesity into the National Football League (NFL).

“Never in the history of professional football have so many players been so gargantuan, so overstuffed, so much larger than seems healthy, for them or for those they crash into,” it said.

And judging by the figures, the paper might have a point. Last month, the Dallas Cowboys cut the league’s largest player, who weighed in at four hundred and ten pounds. In the last twelve years, the number of players over three hundred pounds have flabbed sixfold. The number currently stands at more than 300. Being generous, the Diary calculates this at ninety–nine thousand pounds of flesh.

The Cowboy’s offensive line, as it were, averages at three–hundred and thirty–five pounds per man. That’s a lot of man.

The NYT is worried. Aside from the inevitable heart issues, the nation’s best athletes will likely be plagued by cartilage problems, chronic arthiritis and severe back pain as they grow in years.

Well, any superpower gets flabby in the end, right? The joints begin to creak, and they start wheezing? It’s inevitable really.

Sad job

The amazing news broke this week that housework is officially depressing.

Scientists at the University of Glasgow have discovered that domestic chores – such as dishwashing, vacuuming, and cleaning the scum from the between the bathroom tiles – fails, like many other activities, to boost the spirit, and in fact, lowers people’s moods. Well whaddayaknow?

Hundreds of domestic Glaswegian slaves were used as guinea pigs and attached to a depression monitor (known as the hospital and anxiety depression scale) then made to mop, dust and scrub.

"With vigorous exercise, the effect is clear; the more you do, the better it is for wellbeing. With housework it is the opposite – the more you do, the more depression you report," explained Professor Nanette Mutrie.

Meanwhile, a spokesman for the mental health charity Mind told BBC Online: "Sometimes, doing a pile of ironing, or vigorously running the Hoover around the room gives people a small sense of satisfaction. But I think most people can relate to a situation where a big pile of ironing or having to clean the bathroom can actually bring you down. It really just depends on individuals’ coping mechanisms."

Results are not set in porcelain. Professor Mutrie wondered aloud whether the negative effect of housework could be the result of other factors – such as having to stay home with the children. "It may be that there is a psychological explanation, such as the fact that housework is viewed as a chore – that people feel they have to do it," she added.

very popular already

Dumb evolution?

They have more fun. They’re dumb. Gentlemen prefer them. But will they be extinct in two hundred years?

Reports ran this week that 'experts in Germany' had declared blondes an endangered species. Extinction looms in 2202, they said. The last natural blonde will be found in Finland. There are simply too few blonde genes left.

Further, bottle–blondes were blamed. It appears that fake–blondes (such as Marilyn Monroe, Pamela Anderson, and former Tory frontbencher Anne Widdocombe) are more attractive to men, and are chosen over natural bondes as partners.

'Better stop dyeing!' everyone panicked.

Sadly, even the Diary was taken in by the story. That is until the New York Times ran a story saying that the "Forecast demise of fair hair had no roots in truth." The World Health Organisation says it has no knowledge of the extinction claim, and, contrary to reports, has produced no studies on the subject. "[We] would like to stress that we have no opinion of the future existence of blonds," a statement said.

Where the story came from is a mystery.

Keep your eyes open for openDemocracy’s new series on Hair, coming next month in the new Arts and Cultures theme.

Quotes of the week

“Usually the businessmen prefer to say ‘Other’.” Larisa Sokolova, a census taker in Ozyorny, Russia. The census is the first since the fall of the Soviet Union.

“Nobility is a nice feature in a president, but not as nice as wisdom.” Robert Wright, from an op/ed in the New York Times.

“Our best hope is to get President George W. Bush to put on a pink coat and chase a fox – no doubt Prime Minister Tony Blair would fall right in behind him.” John Mortimer, defending the British fox–hunt in the New York Times.

“Al Qaeda had a first–strike policy too.” A sign held by Paul Rubenson and Trish Bright, two of thousands who marched their way to Dick Cheney’s house on the weekend, in protest to the prospect of war in Iraq.

“The don’t know from one day to the next whether they’re going to have the money to keep going.” US Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill on the economic woes of the Afghan government. Hamid Karzai took a tour of the Arab Gulf States this week, hoping to secure some more aid for his country.

Contact the Diary editor:Dominic.Hilton@openDemocracy.net