July 6, 2023 - 11:00am
More than three years on from the first Covid-19 lockdown, we can begin to take a more critical view of those weird times. The ferociously enforced yet largely pointless restrictions on outdoor recreation; the bizarre Thursday night routine of Clap For Carers; the enormous amounts of time, money and energy devoted to the mostly useless theatre of surface cleaning and “social distancing”. Yet in some respects, none of these were as strange as the emergence of Captain Tom Moore, the fundraising centenarian who caught the nation’s imagination by walking laps of his garden, and who was later knighted before his death in early 2021.
Now, naturally, in the week that we mark the 75th birthday of the NHS, his story is back in the headlines. His daughter has reportedly been ordered to demolish a “spa and pool complex” erected at her home without proper planning permission. Apparently the Captain Tom Foundation’s name was used in the initial application, without permission from the trustees. The Foundation itself has been under investigation by the Charity Commission for a year and has stopped accepting or seeking donations.
As with the peculiar social media afterlife of Harry Leslie Smith, another Second World War veteran who became politically prominent late in life — his son, bizarrely, continues to trash talk Captain Tom on Twitter — there is an unmistakeable whiff of something not being quite right. One could be forgiven for thinking that the British public’s appetite for sentimental stories involving old soldiers has turned into a very nice little earner.
Captain Tom was an ideal hero for our era. For one thing, he was a veteran of the Second World War — that straightforwardly good and noble conflict in which we defeated fascism, and in whose aftermath were sown the seeds of the new British founding myths: the NHS, the Windrush generation, the welfare state. For another, he was raising money for a worthy cause. Crucially, he was also extremely old, meaning that the public presentation of his personality, life story and opinions could be carefully stage-managed. After all, people who were already adults by the time of Second World War, and well into middle age when the permissive society took off in the 1960s, do not always fit well into contemporary social mores.
The Tom Moore story exposes some striking confusions and tensions in modern Britain. This is not simply down to the fact that he acquired saintly status by raising money for Our NHS, an institution which is increasingly venerated in explicitly religious terms that would have seemed bizarre only a decade or two ago.
Consider also that, while we still feel obliged to look back fondly at the generation who defeated Hitler and Imperial Japan (Moore’s active service was in Burma), the country which they knew, and for which they fought, is now profoundly alien to most of us in its manners, morals and culture. So we occupy a curious halfway house. Men like Tom Moore are held up as folk heroes, with their long-ago military service valorised in abstract terms. As a nation, we do not really want to know anything about where exactly he fought, or why, or how he and others like him viewed their service at the time.
The war is understood through the prism of the post-war settlement, with its implicitly anti-traditional and modernising character. Our perception is also coloured by the modern ideological preoccupations that draw their moral authority from the putative “refounding” of the country after 1945: most obviously equality and diversity, suspicion of patriotism and national feeling, and attachment to the state as liberator and moral arbiter.
It might be a step too far to say that the promotion of Captain Tom by the media and politicians was a deliberate or conscious attempt to further embed this new understanding of our recent history. Similar accusations have certainly been levelled at his family members in recent days. Yet, intentionally or not, the new British national story has taken hold.
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SubscribeFollowing the formal exposure of his daughter’s grift that had always been visible from outer space, no one mentioned that it should never have been Colonel Sir Tom Moore’s job to fund the NHS, that centenarians doing sponsored laps of their gardens was no way to do so, and that we were back to the Bullseye of my childhood, with people playing for the money to buy equipment for their local hospitals. All three parties have been in government, so they are all to blame.
Why should those of charitable instinct not help the NHS buy extra equipment? Whatever one thinks to the shambles that the NHS is. It is a worthy thing to do and praise to him and others like him for doing it.
Charity is a good thing, except for those who believe everything should be state-funded and we should all therefore be deprived of the opportunity to help as individuals.
For example, why is it such a bad thing that ordinary people are providing food banks with goods and funding to help out those who are temporarily struggling? Isn’t it a sign of the essential goodness of human beings that they choose to help out those less fortunate when they themselves have more than they need? I’m an atheist but most religious organisations see that as an essential part of their core mission, which I applaud.
Indeed the overweening State and its supporters is eager to weaken the sense of social solidarity that is expressed by charitable giving. But against the odds plenty of social organisations such as churches, Rotary, Masonry, charities etc persist in lending a hand to their fellow citizens by donating out of the meagre funds that remain after the State has taken its giant share. It seems to be an instinct that many desire to express despite the State’s wish to be the principal source of help to its dependents.
I’ve worked with and for extremely rich people for decades. They all have a common characteristic, namely that they wouldn’t give you their toe-nail clippings. Rich people are rich for a reason. If, in a divided community, you’re relying on random handouts to keep the indigent alive, well, I marvel at your naivety.
I’ve worked with and for extremely rich people for decades. They all have a common characteristic, namely that they wouldn’t give you their toe-nail clippings. Rich people are rich for a reason. If, in a divided community, you’re relying on random handouts to keep the indigent alive, well, I marvel at your naivety.
Well put
Indeed the overweening State and its supporters is eager to weaken the sense of social solidarity that is expressed by charitable giving. But against the odds plenty of social organisations such as churches, Rotary, Masonry, charities etc persist in lending a hand to their fellow citizens by donating out of the meagre funds that remain after the State has taken its giant share. It seems to be an instinct that many desire to express despite the State’s wish to be the principal source of help to its dependents.
Well put
Charity is a good thing, except for those who believe everything should be state-funded and we should all therefore be deprived of the opportunity to help as individuals.
For example, why is it such a bad thing that ordinary people are providing food banks with goods and funding to help out those who are temporarily struggling? Isn’t it a sign of the essential goodness of human beings that they choose to help out those less fortunate when they themselves have more than they need? I’m an atheist but most religious organisations see that as an essential part of their core mission, which I applaud.
Why should those of charitable instinct not help the NHS buy extra equipment? Whatever one thinks to the shambles that the NHS is. It is a worthy thing to do and praise to him and others like him for doing it.
Following the formal exposure of his daughter’s grift that had always been visible from outer space, no one mentioned that it should never have been Colonel Sir Tom Moore’s job to fund the NHS, that centenarians doing sponsored laps of their gardens was no way to do so, and that we were back to the Bullseye of my childhood, with people playing for the money to buy equipment for their local hospitals. All three parties have been in government, so they are all to blame.
Given what we know now about government stage-management, I wouldn’t be surprised if the whole thing was a psyop by the forces of Big Nudge.
I and millions like me never gave a moment’s care to some old guy waddling round his backyard.
Do you think he never existed but was a Big Nudge fantasy cartoon? Or that he was manipulated by the forces of darkness into his daily walks? Not, surely, that he was a nice old bloke who did it because he wanted to help out, even if his efforts got distorted by media and family?
I instinctively hated the sanctification of “Captain Tom”, but his charitable gesture was clearly well-intended. Gestures like this are are something we need to care about.
PS ~ is the evil clown picture a cry for help ?
I did not doubt it for a second
Millions like you? One certainly hopes not.
Do you think he never existed but was a Big Nudge fantasy cartoon? Or that he was manipulated by the forces of darkness into his daily walks? Not, surely, that he was a nice old bloke who did it because he wanted to help out, even if his efforts got distorted by media and family?
I instinctively hated the sanctification of “Captain Tom”, but his charitable gesture was clearly well-intended. Gestures like this are are something we need to care about.
PS ~ is the evil clown picture a cry for help ?
I did not doubt it for a second
Millions like you? One certainly hopes not.
Given what we know now about government stage-management, I wouldn’t be surprised if the whole thing was a psyop by the forces of Big Nudge.
I and millions like me never gave a moment’s care to some old guy waddling round his backyard.
Something people seem to be forgetting – all the money raised directly by Sir Captain Tom went to NHS charities. The Foundation was set up after his death by his daughter and son-in-law and is a completely separate issue from his own fundraising efforts. As far as the foundation is concerned, it certainly looks like there have been some dodgy dealings there – even aside from the poolhouse.
Something people seem to be forgetting – all the money raised directly by Sir Captain Tom went to NHS charities. The Foundation was set up after his death by his daughter and son-in-law and is a completely separate issue from his own fundraising efforts. As far as the foundation is concerned, it certainly looks like there have been some dodgy dealings there – even aside from the poolhouse.
Isn’t it a lot more simple. We all needed a good news story amidst the gloom and Captain Tom was it.
Isn’t it a lot more simple. We all needed a good news story amidst the gloom and Captain Tom was it.
The author can find nothing malign about Capn Tom, it’s all just snide innuendo.
Absolutely not: just look at the actual details of his service record, in India mending motor cycles: it was a cynical social media con job.
Indeed. He’s doing his miserable best though
Absolutely not: just look at the actual details of his service record, in India mending motor cycles: it was a cynical social media con job.
Indeed. He’s doing his miserable best though
The author can find nothing malign about Capn Tom, it’s all just snide innuendo.
I’m sorry, but UFOs are real. My wife and I and scores of others on the freeway saw one slowing moving west of SFO. There was a small article on the inside page of the SF Chronicle a couple of days later. I think governments are concealing their existence because of fear of social disorder. This comment is meant for another article but I couldn’t delete it.