Horizon: How Violent Are You?
BBC 2
The Incredible Human Journey
BBC 2
I FIND Michael Portillo quite intriguing. He seems to be more riddled than most with contradictions. There’s the former Thatcherite firebrand who gave up politics (for now anyway) without turning a hair; the shy and laidback individual who threw a vast, ego-boosting party in Alexandra Palace and who pops up in the press and on television at every turn; the dignified political commentator who seems to relish taking part in embarrassing reality TV. Those who remember his spell as Tory Defence Secretary would certainly have boggled to hear him describe himself as a “pacifist” at the start of Horizon: How Violent Are You? “I don’t have an aggressive bone in my body”, he assured us. “I’ve never hit anyone or been in a fight in my life.” It seems he was brought up to resolve all conflicts peacefully, cannot bear to watch boxing or wrestling and is (or was) mystified as to the causes of “extreme acts of violence”.
In order to enlighten himself, he jetted off to the Bolivian Andes right away, there to witness the bizarre Tinku festival. This involved the local peasants – men, women and children – engaging in an orgy of vigorous fist-fights, designed to let off steam and settling niggling disputes. Apparently, few of these rucks end in death, which, the local GP explained, was no bad thing as it served as a blood sacrifice to ensure a good harvest. Ah, the wisdom of ancient cultures. Not to be excluded, Portillo donned a boxer’s helmet and colourful Bolivian knitwear to take part in his own slapping contest with a little old man in a woolly hat.
Back in Blighty, he consulted the usual array of white-coated boffins, who informed him that violence was hard-wired into all of us as an evolutionary survival mechanism and could be a lot of fun, as it releases (potentially addictive) endorphins. So far, so predictable. It was at this point that the programme-makers began to turn nasty. In a ruthless attempt to goad the unflappable Portillo into an outburst of gibbering rage, they subjected him to ultimate test – caring for a pair of screaming twin babies (devilishly realistic robots) over a sleep-deprived 60-hour marathon. When that produced only mildly paranoid grumblings (the sort that most of us feel every day on hearing the alarm clock), they gave up on him and wheeled on the notorious Milgram Test of 1961. You know – the one where human guinea pigs were instructed to administer increasing electric shocks to an unseen victim in the cause of a “scientific experiment.”
The result was even more depressing than in 1961. Three-quarters of the programme’s secretly-filmed dupes went all the way, prepared to electrocute a stranger on the orders of a man in a white coat. What did this mean? That most people – especially when young – are lacking in moral gumption and human empathy? That some of the test subjects didn’t believe the experiment was real or that they felt that way about life in general? For Portillo at least, it was “pretty shocking”. He could now, he revealed, “understand crimes of passion and how any one of us could crack”. I was very happy for him. But the more interesting question seemed to be: did this and his other reality TV gigs show a pilgrim soul in a genuine quest for self-knowledge? Or was it all part of an elaborate plan to enhance his popular image and gain some role in David Cameron’s cuddly new Tory Party? I suspect it may be both.
More boffinry was on offer from The Incredible Human Journey – another quest for knowledge with an affable presenter. Medical doctor and anthropologist Dr Alice Roberts (a slim, televisual blonde) set off round the world to answer the question: how did our human ancestors colonise the whole globe?
She trudged through the Ethiopian desert to find the exact spot where the skull of our earliest humanoid ancestor was discovered. She poked a thermometer in the ears of local tribesmen and she spent a jolly scary night alone in the bush. Why? Then she told us that we are all descended from one tiny tribe of humans who left Africa – why? – 70,000 years ago. What she failed to mention was that many other experts would argue with this. But would they look half as good in cargo pants and a singlet?
Helen Chappell
