The Times - UK (2020-06-29)

the times | Monday June 29 2020 2GM 15

News

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have
joined a campaign calling for large
companies to withdraw advertising
from Facebook until the platform takes
action to stop the spread of hate speech.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex
have given their support to the #Stop-
HateForProfit campaign, backed by
Coca-Cola and more than 100 compa-
nies that have withdrawn advertising
from social media platforms that fail to
rein in offensive material online.
Coca-Cola has boycotted Facebook
for 30 days, despite Mark Zuckerberg,
the chief executive, announcing policy
changes on Friday, including a promise
to label, but not remove, political posts
that violate its rules on misleading and
dangerous content.
The Baltimore-based civil rights
group NAACP tweeted thanks to
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle for
“their leadership” and “commitment to
truth, justice, and equality”.
Stop Hate for Profit accuses Face-
book of turning a blind eye to incite-
ments to violence and voter suppres-
sion and says the changes will not
“make a dent in the problem”.
Mr Zuckerberg had declined to act as
recently as last week, until Unilever
withdrew its adverts from Facebook,
Instagram and Twitter for six months.
Honda, Ben and Jerry’s, the US tele-
communications company Verizon and
Lululemon, a sportswear brand, are al-
so supporting the boycott.
About 98 per cent of Facebook’s $

Celebrities including Dame Judi Dench
and the comedian Ricky Gervais have
called on the prime minister to end the
trade in exotic pets.
They have signed an open letter sent
on behalf of the World Animal Protec-
tion charity and the Campaign to End
Wildlife Trade, which includes 24
conservation groups.
The organisation warns that animals
are being taken from the wild or farmed
in cruel conditions to meet the de-

End exotic pet trade to stop diseases spreading, stars tell PM

mands for exotic pets, traditional Chi-

nese medicine and tourism.

Thousands of protected wild

animals, including tortoises, pythons

and monitor lizards, are captured and

legally imported into the UK each year.

Their capture is also a primary cause of

the emergence and spread of diseases

including Covid-19, according to the

group.

The letter has been signed by NGOs

including Compassion in World

Farming, Four Paws UK and Cruelty

Free International. Among the celebrity

signatories are the comedians Sue Per-

kins and Paul O’Grady; the actresses

Evanna Lynch and Alison Steadman;

the singers Alesha Dixon and Leona

Lewis; and the television presenters Liz

Bonnin, Simon Reeve and Michaela

Strachan.

It says: “The demand for wild animals

and wild animal products is a primary

cause of the emergence and spread of

zoonotic diseases and a severe risk to

world health. Covid-19, like other zoo-

notic infectious diseases including Sars,

ebola and Mers, is believed to have

passed from wildlife to humans. With

your global leadership, we must ensure

a zoonotic pandemic like this never

occurs again. Therefore, we are calling

on you to lead the G20 to end the

international trade in wild animals and

wild animal products, asking global in-

stitutions and bodies to put in place

mechanisms to develop, facilitate and

implement this ban.”

Reeve said: “This global pandemic

has had a devastating impact on all our

lives and tackling the source of the prob-

lem must be a priority. Ending the ex-

ploitation of wildlife for use in the exotic

pet, traditional medicine and entertain-

ment industries will take us one huge

step closer to safeguarding our health

and the future of the natural world.”

Sonul Badiani-Hamment, from

World Animal Protection, said: “To

build back stronger we need to tackle

the causes of the virus, avoid the

inaction following previous epidemics

and work together with countries

around the world to end the wildlife

trade and help prevent future zoonotic

outbreaks.”

Katie Gibbons

Sussexes back

anti-racism bid

to pull adverts

from Facebook

billion annual revenue comes from ad-

vertising. On Friday, its shares fell 8.

per cent, shaving $7.2 billion off Mr

Zuckerberg’s personal wealth.

Speaking about the duke and duch-

ess’s involvement with the campaign, a

source told Town and Country maga-

zine: “As we’ve been developing Ar-

chewell, one of the areas the Duke and

Duchess of Sussex have been keen to

address is online hate speech, we’ve

been working with civil rights and racial

justice groups on it.

“They have been working to encour-

age global CEOs to stand in solidarity

with a coalition of civil and racial justice

groups, which are calling for structural

changes to our online world.”

Last year Facebook was fined a

record $5 billion by a US regulator after

Cambridge Analytica, a UK firm, har-

vested the personal information of tens

of millions of users without permission.

The pressure to moderate hate

speech has grown in recent weeks after

Facebook refused to flag President

Trump’s suggestion that looters would

be shot during anti-racism protests,

prompting a staff walkout. Mr Trump’s

post remains live on the platform.

“I’m optimistic that we’re going to be

able to make progress on these challen-

ges,” Mr Zuckerberg said.

Critics said that the changes are inad-

equate, only five months before a US

presidential election ripe for foreign

and domestic interference.

Jessica Gonzalez, of Change the

Terms, a coalition of civil rights groups,

said: “We need more enforcement, not

words that remain unfulfilled.”

Charlie Mitchell Ottawa
Katie Gibbons

I

t has long been a

cornerstone of

horse-breeding lore

that thoroughbreds

are descended in the

male line from three

Arabian stallions brought

to England in the 17th

and 18th centuries (Mark

Bridge writes).

The pairing of these

“hot-blooded” stallions

and mares of native

breeds such as Scottish

Galloways was said to

have given the

thoroughbred its good

looks and racing edge.

Now a DNA study of

hundreds of horses is set

to rewrite equine history

by indicating that the

Darley Arabian, the

Godolphin Arabian and

the Byerley Turk

— reputed, despite

its name, to have

been an Arabian

— weren’t

Arabians at all but

Turkomans, a

different Asian

breed with origins

in Central Asia,

around modern

Turkmenistan.

The paper, in

the journal

Scientific Reports,

indicates that the

that the founders were of

this different lineage and

may have been misnamed

due to a historical

misapprehension that all

horses foaled in the

Islamic world were

Arabian.

The Darley Arabian

was acquired in Aleppo,

while the Godolphin

Arabian was said to have

once belonged to the Bey

of Tunis and the Byerley

Turk to have been

captured from the

Ottomans.

Douglas Antczak, of

the Baker Institute for

Animal Health at Cornell

University, one of the

authors, said: “We could

detect almost no genetic

contribution in the

thoroughbred from the

Arabian.” Describing the

differences between the

breeds, he said: “The

Arabian has what most

people would say is a

prettier, finer head, with

a dished nose and pointy

ears and a lovely arched

neck... the Turkoman

has a different-looking

head.” Turkomans were

faster than Arabians, he

said.

Andrew Hemmings, of

the Royal

Agricultural

University in

Gloucestershire,

said: “From a

functional

standpoint and

from a breed

health standpoint,

it doesn’t matter.

But from a

historical

perspective I can

see that this will

ruffle feathers.”

How thoroughbreds

really got their speed

Lore says that all

thoroughbred racehorses,

such as Frankel, are

descended from one of

three stallions, including

the Darley Arabian, below

ALAMY

A

U

G

s

fu

s

fr

h

it

B

h

p

s

r

contribution of Arabian

genes to thoroughbreds

was negligible, looking at

the Y chromosome,

passed down the male

line, and autosomal DNA

inherited from all

ancestors. It found that

thoroughbreds possess

Turkoman Y

chromosomes, suggesting

Glorious Glastonbury reprise was a bittersweet sofa symphony

Glastonbury 2020

BBC Two, BBC Four, iPlayer

HHHHI

The Germans have schadenfreude.
We British have Glastonfreude: the
joy of watching Glastonbury on
television and imagining how awful it
must be. Seeing festivalgoers sink into

a bubbling swamp of mud is almost as

good as being there.

This year, those of us who would

have been attending tried a bit of

Glastonfreude ourselves, imagining

the horror of arriving at Worthy Farm

in a Thursday heatwave or getting

stuck in a Sunday downpour, but it

didn’t work. The BBC’s weekend-long

celebration for what would have been

the festival’s 50th anniversary did too

good a job of capturing the magic this

pop-up city on a dairy farm exudes.

As if to emphasise the loss, the

BBC’s presenters turned up on the

empty site, conspicuously socially

distancing. Mark Radcliffe and Jo

Whiley sat around a campfire, the

skeleton of the Pyramid stage behind

them. Lauren Laverne and Clara

Amfo introduced an acoustic set by

Laura Marling, who performed

Strange Girl to an audience of cows.

In contrast, highlights from

Glastonbury past brought it all back.

In 1994 Oasis, on the brink of

superstardom, played Live Forever

and Supersonic with all the

enthusiasm of men queueing up to

receive unemployment benefit, and it

was electric. To see Jarvis Cocker,

usually such an ironic frontman,

being overwhelmed by thousands

singing along to Pulp’s Common

People in 1995 is to be reminded of

how affecting being part of a

Glastonbury moment can be.

Three sets stood out. After finding

himself out of fashion in the 1990s,

David Bowie sang Heroes and Ziggy

Stardust in 2000 and was never

unfashionable again. In 2003 Arthur

Lee of the LA folk rock band Love

performed Forever Changes in its

entirety, note perfect, bringing to a

wider audience a 1967 cult album that

never got its dues first time round.

And in 2013 the Rolling Stones

played Sympathy for the Devil as a

giant metallic phoenix opened its

wings at the top of the Pyramid stage.

A bittersweet experience to witness

all of this at home, then, but also a

reminder that, like the phoenix under

which Sir Mick Jagger darted about,

Glastonbury will rise again.

Pop Will Hodgkinson