Quote Originally Posted by noel View Post
It must be hard trying to make a positive impact when it's greeted with this type of negativity.
I don't think that's a fair comment Noel, and I certainly don't agree that he's trying to make a positive impact - quite the reverse.

If someone (and particularly a sports personality) stands up to publicly make a bold rather furious moralising statement, that has dire implications for poorer people, and it's one I or anyone else believes is fundamentally wrong, I think there's a justifiable right to challenge it. Don't you agree?

That's far from being negative. Indeed, we need a sensible debate about these issues, and certainly we need to challenge those who make a simplistic pious argument that people should behave negatively and 'stop', 'desist', 'reduce' , 'renounce', doing something or living their lives in a certain way, particularly when the pronouncing 'puritans' evidently fail to follow their very own dictates.

So, I look forward to next year's Spine, which hopefully will focus on running and not be co-opted by anyone to make some personal, political/moralising gain.