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Cro-Magnon man |
Primitive man takes over streets
Prof tells radio listeners: I’m surrounded by repellent
Cro-Magnons not modern humans
BEHAVIOUR on the streets of Camden Town has sunk to primitive levels, a leading geneticist warned this week.
Professor Steve Jones, of University College London, said revellers behaved like Cro-Magnon man, who lived in Europe 40,000 years ago. The warning came as one of London’s best-known music promoters, Vince Power, voiced concern that Camden Town’s creative energy was being “smothered”.
The latest debate about street behaviour kicked off on BBC Radio 3’s Night Waves cultural review on Tuesday.
Professor Jones, a respected academic who lives in Camden Town, said: “I walk through Camden Town of an evening and often think I’m surrounded by Cro-Magnons rather than modern humans. They behave in exactly the same way. They behave in an entirely irresponsible and repellent way which no doubt they did 50,000 years ago.”
Cro-Magnons were similar to present-day man in physique but lived in huts and hunted for food. They survived Neanderthals, who were more backward than homo sapiens.
Professor Jones’s comments were picked up by neurologist and opera director Sir Jonathan Miller, a fellow guest on the show.
Sir Jonathan, who lives in Gloucester Crescent, has been a critic of Camden Town street life. He compared behaviour today with that of 50 years ago.
“It’s a peculiar form of repellent behaviour in Camden Town,” he said. “Having lived there for more than 50 years I can see how different the Cro-Magnon behaviour in the streets now is from the behaviour of these comparatively primitive people 50 years ago when I first moved here.”
Meanwhile, in an interview with the New Journal, Mr Power, who has moved to Primrose Hill, called on the Town Hall to help put the spark back into Camden Town.
He said: “The energy of Camden is beginning to be smothered. I blame the councillors. They don’t seem to have any overall strategy for Camden. I remember going to the Roundhouse and seeing weird bands. There were loads of hippies and squatters in the 1960s.”
Mr Power is credited with helping to establish artists such as The Pogues and Billy Bragg by showcasing them while he was at the helm of his Mean Fiddler chain of venues, which he sold in 2005.
He said: “The perception is that everyone is on drugs but it’s not true. In any case we should be allowed to suffer the consequences in my opinion.
“I suppose if the drug dealers know there are 20,000 kids coming to Camden it’s an easy target.
“There used to be bank raids every Friday but now there are easier ways to make money. But I’m concerned that the whole thing [Camden Town] will eventually be developed and we’ll just end up with several Top Shops, a few Matalans and a couple of Starbucks.” |
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