The Damaging Depiction of UK Metal Detectorists on BBC4

"would have more pride buying their own cabbages 

rather than hiding them under lorries to retrieve later"

muckyluck » Fri Oct 10, 2014 11:28 pm

"Could be brass, no need to report it" (Lance)

Last week the character Lance in the true-to-life comedy series "detectorists" was depicted as stealing  from his employer. I did not mention it. This week I mentioned it on my blog and suddenly in the thread on a metal detecting forum near you discussing the programme we have detectorists pointing out in mock seriousness "not that I condone such behaviour". Not that a single one of those metal detectorists will even hint that they are aware of the existence of these comments on this blog (which they all pretend does not exist to avoid addressing the issues it raises about their activities).


Here then is another comment about how true to life the series is in depicting real detectorist attitudes that they can also try to ignore. It seems to me that the writer of this series has done a real hatchet job on detectorists depicting them to BBC4 viewers as a group of low-income, quiz-show-watching, ill-dressed social inadequates, prone to dishonesty (petty thieving, refusal to report the concealment of potential Treasure) and conflict. Yet the forums inhabited by real metal detectorists seem not to notice that, they consistently record the opinion of hobbyists that the situations depicted are so true to life that the writer must have been to many club meetings. John Winter (Fri Oct 10, 2014 8:27 pm) hints in big bold letters "he had a good adviser!" - though the NCMD refused to be drawn into it.

So, let us note the consistent depiction here of intolerant exclusionist attitudes which is at the root of tekkie attitudes to interaction with the rest of the heritage community. This is expressed in the programme not only towards the "beardies" (archaeologists and museum professionals) and Lance's anti-student comments in Episode 1. It is also seen in the typically puerile teen-testosterone but then homophobic comments addressed to the effete rival detectorist (with the Arado who is affiliated to the local Museum). Most of all, note the way they (Lance and Terry) talk down to the token brown-skinned detectorist in the metal detecting club. Such racist attitudes bubble just below the surface on many metal detecting forums (readers might remember the fuss made about Romany 'Travellers' near the Staffordshire Hoard PACHI Monday, 15 October 2012, 'Focus on UK Metal Detecting: Bigotry, Fear and Loathing in Hammerwich').

Talking of which, who noted the mention of that discovery in the context of "nighthawking" (Crook invented a new term: "stubble surfers")? Metal detectorists recently have been falling over themselves  trying to deny that a series of holes that appear at intervals on the hoard field (documented by concern group Heritage Action) are anything to do with illegal metal detecting on the hoard site. Here we have a reference to the "Staffordshire Hoard" being used as the eponymous site denoting the phenomenon as a whole. Note that this was not denied by any artefact hunter on any forum near you. They were just hoping nobody had noticed.