Talking too much
Kate Chisholm
Something so weird has happened to the way we live now that Radio Two has decided it needs to dedicate a week’s programming to Let’s Talk About Sex. It’s designed, says the billing in Radio Times, ‘to encourage parents to speak more freely to their children about sex and relationships’. But there’s already so much ‘talk’ about sex on film, on TV, in the adverts, do we really need any more? And in any case what teenager with any sense of rightful pride would welcome a ‘conversation’ with The Parent about it? I can just imagine the scene: teenage boy in kitchen, just off the soccer field and starving hungry (or having dragged himself away from his computer only because he’s desperate for dinner) being accosted by his mother and given the full monty on the physical mechanics and the possible outcomes. Where’s the mystery, the excitement, the sense of self-discovery? Sometimes talking just isn’t good for you.
In the end, Monday’s first sex session on The Jeremy Vine Show was upstaged by the astonishing news at the weekend that the former DPM John Prescott had secretly suffered from bulimia for about ten years. Vine wanted to know what his listeners thought of these revelations, and their timing, just as Prescott’s autobiography is about to hit the shelves and Brown’s government is under threat from its determination to cut the 10p tax rate. Opinion from those who phoned in to his programme was divided; but no one made what seems to me the obvious point that eating disorders, when they’re truly bad, take over your life to such an extent that you cannot, you absolutely cannot, continue as normal. It’s just not realistic to think that you can hold high government office and be that ill.
Does Prescott, a heavyweight politician of a certain age, really think he can influence any teenage girls (or boys, for that matter) who are suffering from bulimia? Is talking about a problem guaranteed to make it seem less impossible to overcome? We are now prepared to talk about anything and everything and yet are far less realistic and honest than those arch hypocrites the Victorians about human frailty and our capacity for insensitivity and intolerance.
As it happens, I’m really glad I tuned in to Vine’s programme. He’s quick-witted, charming and has a great sense of timing, knowing just when to cut off the phonebores and ranters. But there was nothing much about sex talk and teenagers on his programme, nor did we hear from the real victims: those children born to teenage parents who can’t cope and who have no support from an extended family. A quick glance at the Radio Two playlist tells you all you need to know about the average age of its audience — Roxy Music, Fleetwood Mac and Free with the odd concession to something contemporary, such as The Script, but nothing too dangerous. And their opportunities for education, work, family support meant that any hiccoughs in their life trajectories were not going to be too disastrous.
Parents of teenage rebels might have found solace on Radio Four on Sunday, when Mark Tully beautifully illustrated the delicate business of generational transition through his selection of readings and music for Something Understood, which this week focused on ‘Roots and Wings’. Tully was exploring the delicate question of how to balance love with the necessity of letting go; how to protect but not to crush the independent spirit of the child. We heard from the Hindu poet Champa Vaid, whose mother told her to remember that as a girl she should ‘Do whatever you are told to do/ Learn to cook and endure’, and the mesmerising choir, Libera, teenage boys from south London who have been given a new future by being given something to do, to sing.
The utter failure of words sometimes to convey the important truths was powerfully revealed in Monday’s Afternoon Play on Radio Four. In Grace, by Mick Gordon (who also directed) and the philosopher A.C. Grayling, Tom horrifies his mother (the eponymous Grace) by declaring that he wants to be ordained as a priest. Grace is a scientist and a fundamentalist atheist who cannot tolerate the idea of her son being seduced by religion, ‘the most pernicious source of conflict in our world today’. Tom, however, cannot deny what has happened to him, ‘this feeling’, this belief that has come over him. He can’t explain in terms that his mother would understand, he just knows what he must do. A stimulating debate for mid-afternoon on Monday, with a shocking and discomfiting dénouement. Life doles out its cards and leaves us no choice but to accept with what grace we can muster. The cast was impressive (with Paola Dionisotti as Grace and Will Keen as Tom), supported by original music (by Jon Frankel) and once again that elusive credit, ‘Sound Design’, this time by Simon Willey.
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