It is a regular theme and tool of mine to compare sports and politics, comparing our representatives from arguably our two most prevalent social arenas. I'd like to take this opportunity to make it clear that I’m not writing footballers into gubernatorial likenesses from some unfortunate misguided idolatry; I can assure you I deplore as much as anyone what the lucky anointed have done to our fair game, but the similarities with politics don't stop there. To borrow from von Clausewitz, sport is certainly a continuation of politics by other means.
My current simile is to look at the fate of our poor stricken David Beckham. Now I won't wax lyrical on the man but there is much to be learned from him. For all his distractions and detractors, it must be remembered that he has been a loyal, dedicated and fervent servant of his country in the best way he knows how. Not for him the sulky retirement from international duty with the onset of proud age, he wants to serve until the end, as this may well prove to be.
Now yes, he's vastly rewarded for it and yes, we expect nothing less. But as I watched innocuous images of his campaign-thwarting injury, I wondered what it is that we nowadays expect from our politicians. Let us compare our current self-fancying political poster boy, David Cameron. Now, with all the myriad unanswered questions about policy, purpose and portent from the public, there is validity in asking whether he actually has a clear idea himself of what we want from him in the first place, of why we want substance, of what we as a crowd in the stands expect from our players on the field. Is there a plan and a formation? Is there a focus on what the electorate wants and a sight as to how to deliver it? Or is it all just as vapid and self-aggrandising as that poster?
In the US as a political student, when studying the patterns and science of elections we learned very quickly that one of the cardinal rules is to get your name known. It's why home-window support posters there carry candidate names as opposed to the party allegiances shown here; the simple logic being that people can't vote for someone if they don't know their name and that if all else fails and is proved pointless and unmemorable, the plebeians will at least be able to recall a moniker. Is that what Cameron's hoping for, that we’ll simply go with the face we prefer or see more often? Have all the forces of a party attempting to claim rule of the land been centred on the blank visage of their leader figurine? The policy statement attempted on the poster has been thoroughly ignored in the mainstream and replaced with jovial and mocking arguments as to the extent of the airbrush applied to his features.
Beckham's image is undoubtedly a cosmic force of nature and pulls in much of the support he enjoys with jovian gravity. But Cameron would do well to note that Beckham earned that privilege through having his efforts and motives scrutinised beyond reason and coming out the other side. The substance came first; he didn’t just whack his face on a flag. Where is Cameron's line in the sand, his purposeful statement pointing to a brighter future? Beckham gives the people what they want. To give the people what they want and expect of you, you must first know what that is. Unfortunately for Cameron, his face is not the answer and the more pointless and patronising prods he makes like this at our collective consciousness, the more he reminds the majority that perhaps the reason he doesn't have an answer is that (again unlike Beckham) he isn't from quite the same Britain as most of us see. Gone are the days when politicians could just utter vague words and command votes, too much has happened to batter our confidence in them and he needs to show understanding of this to tie himself back to our reality. Going the other way and trying to tie himself to reality media is not going to survive any real scrutiny; the danger again is that we begin to think he doesn’t want that scrutiny at all.
The right image is entirely priceless. This has been true since record of gargantuan greatness began, from Achilles to Best to Oprah. But it must be earned by great deeds and Cameron has to earn the right to promote himself via his visage by showing us his true colours. Images and faces must stand for something other than themselves. You garner a camp by dividing the masses, not by waving a feather under the feet of the populace and offering a vague tickle for all and then slapping your mug up on a wall to be revered. If Cameron wants to earn the right to legitimate poster boy status he has to act and could do worse than trying to know what we want and at the very least trying to play to it to show some incite. This poster attempts that but an overplayed line on the budget that extracts little more than a ubiquitous “how?” from all readers is a poor attempt. We want the substance, the meat in the sandwich, not just the air in the balloon. To make so massive an image-based statement without tied to an image-based announcement of political intent suggests that after these many, many months of speculation, the reality may well be the lack of actual substance that we fear.
(And ok, this has been something of a lauding of Mr Beckham; I did wax lyrical a little bit. But I’m in good company in that regard.)
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