Wild and unpredictable. Really?

Watching Living Planet, the magnificently filmed programme about our wonderful home, narrated by the veteran David Attenborough, it occurs to me that much of his narration is no more than a mass market soma, that by design or ignorance, portrays nature very much as 'red in tooth and claw'.

Too many of his tales are of danger, fear or risk, and pay little respect the the cultural history of the peoples who have survived there for thousands of years.

Attenborough talks about the 'Extreme lengths that people will go to, to catch fish'. It's what people do when they go fishing, and sure, it may enhance the salacious spectacle of 'angry water' (wtf?) for armchair viewers, yet bears little connection to their reality.

David, it's time to step back and give a more balanced view that stops portraying nature as a monste, out to get us: "even he (a kayaker) succumbs to the force of the Mekong's surge. His kayak is sucked under by the powerful current and sucked downstream. After a few worrying minutes, Mick reappears, safe but shaken."

Melodrama of the worst kind.

Living Planet