Why do we root for the underdog?
Is it because of a deep-seated compassion that exists in all of us? Is it because of a sense of justice and fairness? Or perhaps because we know that we are all just two or three strokes of bad luck away from being underdogs ourselves?
Whatever it is, the triumph of the underdog is an ancient story that never fails to delight. And this week the Upside got down with the underdogs to tell their stories.
Firstly, Steve Morgan hung out with a group of blokes who despite various disabilities are still mean cricketers. The message from his piece is that no matter what the setback, there’s a sport for you out there.
And maybe a surgical remedy too. Science is continually pushing back the boundaries of what is possible in terms of treating the medically unfortunate. Sarah Boseley found out about the latest breakthrough – restoring movement to the paralysed.
In Prague, Bob Tait investigated a David-and-Goliath story of the obscure mayor standing up to one of the world’s most powerful nations. And while we’re talking about mayors, Amsterdam’s is moving to protect the exploited of the city’s red light district, as Daniel Boffey discovered.
Lastly, India. No shortage of underdogs here. Tens of millions don’t even have shoes. Kalpana Sunder found out what is being done about this.
Lucky numbers
Women are not just powering to the fore in the EU: they now take up a greater proportion of board seats in big British companies than ever before. Almost one third of FTSE 100 positions were held by women as of 1 June, up from 12.5% in 2011.
Meanwhile, climate scientists have estimated that a vast tree planting gambit over the next 50 years could have a significant impact on climate change by removing as much as 200bn tonnes of carbon from the atmosphere (that’s about one-fifth of all the carbon up there).
Where will you plant yours?
What we liked
A Christian Science Monitor piece about a novel approach to homelessness that takes advantage of the American love of cars. Also, this Quartz article about boring jobs and how they can make you more creative.
Life after hummus meanwhile is a community project teaching Londoners how to cook to prevent food waste. The project lead, Farrah Rainfly, said:
On Monday evenings, not too far from your HQ in London, 30-35 adults join us after work to just cook together. Learn a little bit about nutrition and hands-on prepare three to five dishes. Free to attend thanks to funding. We even involve the use of some food surplus (from the Felix Project) to keep costs low. Most of our produce comes from a third generation family family farm: Ted’s Veg.
We are BME-led and we’re hitting 40% BME engagement. We’re showing that the BME community do want to get involved in tackling climate change, etc, if you give us a space.
What we heard
This rather arresting poem by Alister Scott, co-author of The Little Book of Making Big Change Happen. Extract below, full oeuvre here.
Our own nature
Where are you?
Now as the world dies
A thousand deaths
Acts of inattention
Or greed, brutality
Yes, the urangutan
Shot to clear the way
Her forest an inconvenience
To the palm oil magnates
Greta’s “few people,
Making unimaginable
Amounts of money”
The lion, elephant
Shot for the fat man’s
Entertainment
The Pangolin, or shark’s fin
Slaughtered for soup
Need I go on?
Yes, I think you need, Alister.
Meanwhile, Robin Stott rather imaginatively suggested something good coming from something bad.
Something I’ve never seen mentioned is the colossal potential created by the melting and disappearance of glaciers. Glaciers erode, crush and transport rock. As they melt they leave behind an assortment of rock debris. Given plenty of time it would be colonised by lichens, ferns, alpine plants and shrubs. Tree seeds would blow in, or be dropped by birds, and the pioneer species would form scrub, then forests.
But time is short. There seems every reason to give this natural process some human help.
Where was the Upside?
Great Torrington, and also Scotland. But not Soho.
