Social media
The SO is a bit of a social media bunny and spends hours embroiled in on-line arguments with complete strangers in far flung corners of the internet-enabled world. On the trip to Kenilworth, we were laughing over his inclusion in a militant Facebook group debating the merits of feminism. The group was populated by the sort of ‘burn your bra’ type that does not tolerate commentary from anyone with a Y chromosome, no matter how sensible their point and I was advising the SO to cut his losses before the inevitable lynching ensued.
And then we arrived on course and I felt rather like adding my bra to the pile. I have previously bemoaned some of racing’s dodgier attempts at glitz and glamour (with the emphasis being on glamour, and not the positive kind), but whether it was the Facebook bra burners or whether I was just feeling snarkier than usual, I’m not sure, but our on-course presentation ceremonies really annoyed me beyond all reason.
Why don’t we save everyone the short drive to Spearmint Rhino or whatever the equivalent is here and just get their girls to shimmy down to the track and hold up the RA sash? I understand that the ‘young’ opt for wearing underwear as outerwear these days (hey, we’ve all been there), but judging by some of the outfits on display, it rather made me wonder we already haven’t. I clearly wasn’t the only one.
2014 Merchants Stakes winning connections and two girls holding a sash
A young family happened to occupy the space on the rail next to me – your textbook white, middle class family with two young children, out for a day at the races. They were, on the surface, absolutely everything we would ordinarily wish for – respectable, with disposable cash to burn and they had brought their children along, which gives us the chance to indoctrinate, er, I mean expose them to the wonders of racing early. They’d even gone so far as to allow the boys to choose their fancies and place bets on their choices and the eldest had picked Tevez and was at the rail to see his hero being led in. Entirely unprompted, the mother commented that the girls on the podium looked a bit chilly, to which the father replied that they looked out of place and were rather more the sort of thing one expected to see announcing the round number at a boxing match. And I overheard several other comments along the same vein across the course. Yes, in some cases less is more, but sometimes less really is just less. Less classy, less respectable and downright less intelligent.
We know sex sells. Do we have to sell it at the races though?
People, this is 2014. Taking advantage of young girls and dressing them up like that is sexist, it is demeaning and if nothing else, it just plain ruins the photographs. I mean really, can you imagine showing the photograph of your Gr1 winner to friends and family in 20 years’ time and someone asking – ‘Who are the scantily dressed dolly birds?’ Well, will anyone be able to answer? What exactly is the point of having total strangers forcibly photobomb your winning photographs on the strength of the fact that they look good in a frock? Well, negligee, but let’s not split hairs. OK, so the RA pay for those photos and hand them to owners for free, so I guess they’re entitled to put whatever they like on the podium, but still. Why should owners have to suffer the indignity of sharing their moment of triumph with some under-dressed stranger? I would love to know just exactly whose brainchild it was to install these girls, because whoever it was deserves credit for manipulating the owners’ body into financing their cheap thrill.
But the indignity did not end there. Oh no, that would be too much to hope for. We popped upstairs to see the Instant Grasses in action on the first floor and I had no sooner walked through the door than my sight was arrested by the cover of a glossy magazine lying on a nearby table. Most of the nearby tables as it turned out. It was of a rather pretty girl, standing on a beach, clad in the tiniest of bikini bottoms. Fortunately her hair was long enough to cover the extremities of her generous assets. But only just. Fascinated, I paged through the book and found quite a few more photographs, some entirely sans bikini or long hair. The pictures were all beautifully shot of course, but well, I couldn’t help wondering what the point was. Are we really struggling THAT hard to sell ourselves? Or is it simply a commentary on what and who the racing community is these days? Because I for one am seriously starting to wonder.
Morgan Deane Smith
At the Met draw in January we had embarrassed-looking owners picking pins off the chest of an equally embarrassed looking model, last year’s July draw had girls dressed in French maids’ outfits no less and last week’s CTS Ready To Run draw ceremony featured the exquisite misery of a very gorgeous Morgan Deane Smith, attired in a gravity-defying dress being forced to try and protect her modesty, while scratching around on the floor for the fallen scraps of draw paper. I’ve never felt so thoroughly sorry for someone looking so utterly glorious.
Surely we have a hard enough time justifying having children in a gambling environment without exposing them to soft porn as well?
As a joke, we snapped a pic of one of the inside pages of the magazine and uploaded it to the bra burning forum – the SO was summarily banned. Which just about says it all really.
Quite honestly, whoever thinks we’re returning to the Golden Age of Racing can kiss my ass.
