Islam, Politics and society, Prejudice

So, what’s the problem with Racism?

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Throughout my life, along with most people in western society, I have been taught that racism is bad. That idea is so ingrained that I never question it. Of course it’s bad! It goes without saying. But with the increased fear of violent extremism and terrorist attack I have seen a rise in racist commentary on social media. Often this commentary has been shared by people that I count as friends and know to be good people. We have a tendency to address racism with a label and an assumption that the person espousing it is just a bad person. But this shuts down the debate and simply indulges our feelings of righteousness without even an attempt to understand or change minds. So I have found myself analysing my own opposition to racism and why I feel that way.

I am a white anglo male, and so by a quirk of genetics and history have found myself on the privileged side of this issue. I have only ever lived in white Anglo majority countries and so have never experienced racism directed at me and am unlikely to. So when I am told by the media that me and my loved ones are in danger from extremists, doesn’t it make sense to ban Muslims from entering our countries? Doesn’t it make sense to put the ones that are currently here on a register so that we can monitor them? Yes I know these ideas are racist and will make the lives of those people miserable and possibly put them in danger, but on the balance of risk for me personally, does it makes sense and is it worth it to protect the people that I love? So why am I opposed to racism on such an instinctive level? Am I just a really good person who cares about all the people of the world, while others are just nasty and purely selfish? I find that hard to believe. So I found myself thinking about the history of the issue and the implications of unchecked racism for me, a white Anglo male in a predominantly white Anglo country.

Racism is a form of prejudice, which is defined by my dictionary app as, amongst other things “unreasonable feelings, opinions or attitudes, especially of a hostile nature, regarding a racial, religious or national group”. Over many years our culture has evolved to consider such feeling bad, we have laws against acting on such feelings. Why is this so? The answer is because it is better for everyone. While it is true that the recent terrorist attacks that have been perpetrated against the west have been carried out by people identifying as Muslim, this is a single characteristic amongst many characteristics of these people. 30 years ago, most if not all, terrorist attacks carried out in the UK were by Irish Catholics, but it was never true that all Irish people, or all Catholics were terrorists. It’s a characteristic amongst many. And if we use this one characteristic to single out people for special treatment such as refused entry into our country, for monitoring or incarceration we set a precedent. 
From that moment onwards it becomes acceptable to single out a person based on a single characteristic for special treatment, and that’s when it becomes my problem. Because while I’m a white Anglo male, I do fall into some minority groups, as do the people I love, everyone does. Whether it be people with tattoos, short people, tall people, gay or transgender people, atheist people, people that don’t drink coffee, vegetarians, or people that don’t like sport. We are all a minority somehow and as soon as we make it OK to accuse an individual based on a characteristic such as race or religion then we make it acceptable to accuse someone based on any characteristic it takes our fancy to pick. How long before they come for you or your loved ones. 

The recent election has seen Pauline Hanson reenter the Australian senate. Pauline wants to ban Muslim people from entering Australia, as she did with Asian people prior to that. Now let’s look at a scenario where Pauline becomes Prime Minister. Muslim people get banned from entering Australia. Australia will still have problems and so Pauline turns the blame onto any foreigner who is still in the country, and throws them all out. But Australia still has problems because it wasn’t foreigners causing the problems, and so Pauline has to find someone else to blame. If she doesn’t people will blame out leaders. Who’s next? Hitler didn’t stop with the Jews, he rounded up and locked away the polish, the Roma, the homeless, the mentally and physically disabled, the idle, the homosexual, and many others. Eventually, characteristics will get made up as an excuse to target anyone who disagrees or may cause trouble for the person or people in power. 

“Now come on Barry, who’s being paranoid now?” I hear you say. If we ban Muslims from entering the country right now, what is the chance that it will escalate into another holocaust? My answer is, very high! Because we have so many examples from history when this has happened, the holocaust is just one example, and not even a recent one. In fact, it happens more often than not. Why do you think we have the laws that we have to protect us against prejudice? They were not a result of some people sitting around abstractly thinking about what might happen, they were a reaction to what has happened time and time again. Human nature and the nature of people in power means it will most likely happen, without mechanisms to ensure that it doesn’t. 

So my opposition to racism is not a result of me being a super good person who cares about others more than everyone else, my opposition is because I care about myself and my loved ones and I want to protect the very privileged and comfortable lives that we enjoy. To treat all Muslims as terrorists is to remove the safeguards that prevent our countries becoming like the ones that so many refugees are trying to escape! In a country where you can be persecuted due to a characteristic such as race, religion, sexuality or opinion. Unless you are the person in power, you risk being the persecuted. 

The values that our society is built on are not “nice to haves”, they are absolutely essential to our way of life.

Uncategorized

What is it we were aiming for?

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Watching the policies of the current Australian Liberal Party since their election in September 2013 I have found myself with one overriding question. What does the Australia that we are trying to create look like? The Government openly propounds economic liberalism, small government and reduced public spending in order to promote economic growth. But economic growth to what end?

Surely without a clear coherent vision of what we want Australia to look like we are just blindly following a methodology without the ideal in place that created it, like buying the ingredients to a meal without deciding what meal you wish to create. The overriding belief appears to be “as long as people are getting richer then everything will be better”. All the people need is more money and they will be happy and fulfilled. Is this the goal, more money at any cost?

Let’s break this down, why do we want more money? Money itself is simply a vehicle to have other things, any remotely reflective person knows this. It’s numbers in a bank account and has no real value apart from what you do with it. I have never seen two friends relaxed, smiling and laughing while comparing bank balances. Surely the modern goal of economic growth was to provide freedom to the masses?

Let’s define this freedom that we wished the masses to have. This was freedom from economic insecurity, the ability to buy food, pay the rent and bills and not end up on the streets. This was freedom from pain and disease, the ability to get medical treatment and buy medicines when required. This was the freedom to get an education and this was the freedom from violence and crime. This was also freedom from oppression, from having to work 12 hour days for little money and no holidays. I note that many of these freedoms appear to be reduced not heightened as a result of Neoconservative and Neoliberal policies. The wealth divide in the UK, USA and Australia gets bigger, not smaller each year. Controlled distribution of wealth ensures freedom not a wealthier top 1%.

Once the masses are saved from the oppression of poverty, we continue to work towards greater comfort. I would like to look at this increased comfort in a little more detail. Now don’t get me wrong, I like my comforts! I like the fact that I have air conditioning, my nice car, I love my smartphone, or more specifically what it does. I love the fact that I can afford to spend time with my friends, eat great food and drink fine wine, and visit foreign countries. But this all seems contrary to some other truths. I came from a working class family and was taught that I had to work for whatever I wanted, and I take a huge amount of pride in the fact that I did work hard, often in jobs I hated to get where I have got to. It doesn’t take much to have me harping on about the hardships of my youth, (my apologies to everyone who has had to experience this), because it is a source of pride to me, as it is to many others. Any pride I take in the money I’ve made – and this is by no means substantial by modern western standards – is because I made it, not because I have it.

Australians are proud of their history and the hardships that were traditionally endured on one of the most inhospitable continents on the planet.  Americans are proud that their ancestors fought hardship and the British to establish their democracy. The ancient Greeks wrote not about wealthy people and the luxury they lived in, but hardship, tragedy and the heroes that endured it.

In life it’s adversity that defines us, builds character and strength and also brings us together. Having to save for a while to buy a new TV or car didn’t do anyone any harm, built self-discipline and made us appreciate what we had more. I believe that we pay for everything in life in more than just money, and losing the psychological advantages of enduring hardship should be remembered as a non-monetary cost of increased comfort.

I guess the trick is to check which comforts we so desperately want. A washing machine can reduce the amount of time spent washing clothes and a car can reduce the daily commute to work, both therefore create more free time. But a better car, a new hi fi, games console or TV are amusements. These things are not really enhancing our lives more providing us with distractions from it. And while I have no objection to these amusements, and enjoy them myself, if we end up working longer hours to pay for them that would seem illogical.

I do believe in the free market economy, it gives people the ability to fulfil their ambitions. I agree the competition that it promotes leads to innovation and better ways to do things, and too much government intervention stifles progress. But Capitalism and Socialism are not opposites, rather different ends of the same scale. The 70’s in the UK saw a swing too far to the left which resulted in uncontrollable inflation and ultimately a reduction in the freedoms discussed above. But a swing too far to the right, which appears to be happening now in many countries also results in a reduction in those freedoms. When large corporations make huge profits in an unregulated market and become powerful enough to have disproportional influence over government policy we are heading back towards oppression of the masses and minority rule.

Modern media seems to sell us rich people as role models or heroes of some sort. But when we look back through history the people we revere are not because they were rich – although many were – it’s because they were heroic, because they overcame challenge with nobility and courage. The great leaders that we hold aloft as examples from history are not the ones that made more people rich, but the ones that made more people free, the ones that fought tyranny and held lofty ideals. I struggle to find these lofty ideals in the current politics of Australia and the UK. Interestingly in the USA we have recently seen healthcare and other reforms implemented by the Obama administration, that if they are not reversed by the next, inevitably Republican government will in the future be held aloft as an example of good government.

I don’t think that money is the goal unto itself, and therefore economic growth should be designed around creating more freedom not having more stuff. I recognise that in the not too distant past more money did create more freedom by lifting the masses, the majority of which lived a life of hard graft and struggle, out of the constant search for the next meal or a roof for the night. Nowadays it seems to be a self-perpetuating cycle where money creates a need or desire for more money for which we work more and are less free. We seem to have got caught up in the detail and forgotten what the goal was. As a society, were we working towards having more money or was the goal equality of opportunity?

Next time the government promotes economic growth at all costs, with a loss of social services, with a loss of social safety nets and with the erosion of democratic process and option, make sure you ask why.

Politics and society

In defense of Political Correctness.

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I have read a number of statements recently in response to terrorist attacks proclaiming “this is not a time for political correctness” or in the case of Rupert Murdoch recently after claiming that all Muslims must be held responsible for Jihadist attacks, “Political Correctness makes for denial and hypocrisy”. Political Correctness has become a toxic term often used by the right as an attack on left wing ideas. It is a general criticism of anyone proposing a modest viewpoint or trying to avoid attacking or apportioning blame to a specific group within a community. So what is modern political correctness and is it a bad thing?

In its modern sense the term Political Correctness arose in response to progressive ideas about education, multiculturalism, racism, homophobia, etc. Herbert Kohl proposes that the political right’s use of the term is “to insinuate that egalitarian democratic ideas are actually authoritarian, orthodox and Communist-influenced, when they oppose the right of people to be racist, sexist, and homophobic.” (Uncommon Differences: On Political Correctness, Core Curriculum and Democracy in Education – June 1992 ). This seems to fit with my experience of the term.

Modern Political Correctness is typified by the belief that women shouldn’t be objectified, that an entire race shouldn’t be blamed for the crimes of individuals, that we shouldn’t make fun of the characteristics of a certain sub group within the community and that we shouldn’t deliberately say things that upset others sensitivities.

On the one hand I am in favor of Political Correctness when detailed as I have above. I do not believe that anyone should be a target for discrimination due to their race, gender, sexual persuasion or political position. I think that society has demonstrated that often what would once have been labelled Political Correctness is now considered societal norm. More and more people in the western world are outraged if they witness a woman being treated as a second class citizen, or witness blatant racism. Recently Professor Barry Spurr was suspended from the University of Sydney after emails were leaked from him containing racist, sexually abusive and generally discriminatory language. I support Professor Barry Spurr’s right to express his opinion in any way he wishes, but I equally support the rights of anyone who wishes to take issue with and criticise his opinion and also the rights of the University of Sydney to not want to be associated with a person who holds those opinions.

On the other hand, I believe that “Political Correctness” has the potential to go to an extreme which ceases to be a positive. If concern for peoples sensitivities stifles legitimate debate, or imposes on anyone’s Freedom of Expression it becomes a bad thing. No idea, individual, group, race or in fact anything, should be immune to question and criticism. This risk exists in the world of art and satire, where the purpose is often to provoke debate or outrage or to titillate and appeal to parts of the psyche that society insists we keep hidden. Interestingly, in these situations Political Correctness tends to be exercised by the conservative right. Comedy is often politically incorrect and I have no issue with this. Although I and I suspect most become uncomfortable with political incorrectness if the comment fails to be funny!

In regards to the comments made by Rupert Murdoch in regard to acts of terrorism committed by individuals who identify as being Muslim. He appears to be using the criticism of Political Correctness against anyone who disagrees with his opinion. In making a tired, outdated and easily disputable comment such as he has, he has invited a barrage of criticism, and as much as I support his right to state his opinion (and he is probably the individual with the most opportunity to do so!), I also support others right to call him an arsehole. I welcome debate regarding the inherent nature of Islam as well as any other religion, and I can certainly see the lazy logic that leads to the conclusion that all Muslims should be held responsible for the actions of Jihadists. But it takes virtually no intellectual effort to argue that holding an entire group responsible for the actions of 0.001% is not in any way fair, useful or leading to a solution. To call a religion inherently violent when 99.999% of its followers are peaceful also requires careful explanation. There are countless other arguments against Murdoch’s opinion, and the frustration of his critics as that this debate has happened, the arguments made over and over again and his position has lost every time!

In this case Political Correctness is actually upholding the values that modern society has been moving towards for a very long time. Values that promote harmony, peace and equality. Political Correctness is opposing discrimination and arguing logic and reason. When the term Political Correctness is leveled as a criticism, it is usually someone saying “I have a right to spout some bigoted, poorly thought out, incendiary opinion and I will use this term to criticise any disagreement and avoid detailing my reasoning”.

Existence

What are you worrying about? My philosophy Part 1

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I’ve long been interested and frustrated by written philosophy in equal measure. On one hand, the search for more accurate ways to look at reality that may result in a better understanding can be earth shatteringly interesting. On the other hand, the overly intellectual, abstract or often patronising way that it is presented frustrates me. I believe that the value of what is written is limited by how many people can actually understand it.

Demonstrating your intellect to fellow academics may gain the writer kudos, but to me seems self-indulgent and rarely serves to inform the masses, who are unlikely to read or understand what is written. This makes “understanding” an exclusive little club which leaves the masses religion as their opiate. Philosophy aimed at a more widespread audience is often patronising and seems to add a rose tint that I do not believe is required or helpful. You can tell me that I’m a unique and beautiful soul but that doesn’t provide me with many answers, is irrelevant, untrue (both unique and beautiful are relative terms), and only serves to temporarily prop my fragile ego.

So over the years I have read books and thought long about this existence of mine and through applying things that I have read to my own experiences I have, what I believe to be a coherent philosophy that I think reflects the truth. I realise that is a huge unwieldy statement, but I seek your indulgence.  The reason behind starting this blog was to get some of this stuff down on paper, even if it simply helps put it in order.

I would like to start with Chaos Theory, nice and simple! Although I should probably start a little further back by stating that I need proof, or at least I need a theory to be logical and align with my empirical experience. So that rules out God, Fate, Destiny, Santa, the Easter Bunny and many of the other leaps of faith that find their way into the theories of others. Maybe I will justify this in another post but for the sake of this one, I will leave it at that.

So, Chaos! You may have heard of the Butterfly Effect. This, a little tongue in cheek, states that a Butterfly can flap its wing in Tokyo and cause a hurricane in New York that wouldn’t have otherwise occurred. Put another way this explains that in a nonlinear system a small variance in input can, over a large enough distance and time result in a dramatic difference in output. The reason is that there are variables that affect other variables, and this became known in Chaos Theory rather unimaginatively, as “sensitive dependence on initial conditions”. This explains why long term weather prediction is impossible; we cannot possibly take account of every variable, and in fact we are one of the variables in the system we are trying to study. “Nonlinearity means that the act of playing the game has a way of changing the rules” (Gleick 1987). Sounds dull but bear with me.

Let’s present this in a way more appropriate to our daily existence. If our lives were linear, then I could reasonably assume that if finding $20 makes me a little happier, then winning $1 million would make me a 50,000 times happier. But our experience does not support this assumption. I know that although payday often makes me happy, there are other influences that can easily result in me being miserable on payday. In fact, there is a chance, and we have read many examples of this among lottery winners, that the $1 million can actually be the catalyst for misery!

This is because our existence is nonlinear. There are multiple influences on our lives and these can all affect our moods, happiness and every other variable. A change of boss could suddenly make a job that you have always previously enjoyed into a nightmare, or falling in love could suddenly make all of your lives ambitions seem meaningless. Just as the butterfly effect indicates, a small change in one influencing factor can and often does completely change the outcome of your life.

Put another way, how did you get here? Generally, and ignoring advances in modern medicine, two people, who you may or may not call your parents got together and had sex. So how did they meet? Was it in a pub, or maybe they were introduced by friends? It’s reasonable to say that had one or the other not met that particular friend or frequented that particular pub, for whatever reason they did, then you would not exist. And logically, we can also deduce that you definitely wouldn’t exist if the set of variables that led to your grandparents meeting and doing the dirty had been different and they had never produced your parents. And if your Great Grandparents had not met, and so on and so on.  When you think about the chain of cause and effect stretching back into time, the only slightly logical starting point from which to study the causal chain that produced you, is the Big Bang! And a small variance in one of the huge number of events in this chain would have very likely resulted in you not being you!

It’s at this point many people reach for their bible or Chakra Beads. This uncertainty is terrifying, and religion or some belief in fate or destiny provides some certainty where it doesn’t exist.

“This is all very interesting, but what difference does this make to my life?” I hear you ask, or I’m talking to myself. Well this to me demonstrates what little ability we have to determine the outcome of our own life. We make decisions, and then we fret and worry about ensuring that those decisions result in the way we planned, while in reality what we are doing at best is attempting long term prediction of a nonlinear system, which as mentioned previously is impossible. This is because you cannot possibly predict the variables that are around the next corner and you also have no idea what the result of the alternative decision would have been. At best we are “giving an extra shuffle to an already-well shuffled pack of cards. You know it will change your luck, but you don’t know whether for better or worse” (Gleick 1987).

But do not despair, there are patterns within this “Chaos” that we can and do use to make short to medium term prediction. I can make a fairly broad assumption based on anecdotal evidence, that if I inject myself with heroin tomorrow and the next day, there’s a good chance that my life will take a turn, and that turn will not be for the better. “Better” in this case is based on my existing set of values, which determine what experiences in life I predict will be of more value to me and those around me. Now that is not guaranteed, I may meet some interesting people among the drug using fraternity and learn some incredible truths that I would otherwise have missed out on. But we have to use something to make our predictions and probability based on experience is as good as any.

There are patterns within the chains of cause and effect that again we can use to establish probability and guide our daily lives. I know from experience, and can logically deduce that if I am rude and obnoxious to everyone I meet then I can expect a similar treatment in return. If I do not enjoy others being rude and obnoxious to me then such behaviour will result in my unhappiness. Again, it must be remembered that these are predictions and the opposite is still possible, my rude and obnoxious behaviour could attract a woman in that “couldn’t care less rock star” way and result in sex.

If we can’t possibly predict the long term outcome of our decisions with any accuracy, then what does that mean for our daily lives? Well for starters, worrying about the future becomes nonsensical. You just do not know, and so stressing out over this detail or that of our life is pointless. Failing Maths at school is one of a huge number of variables that will influence your life and happiness, and it must be viewed in that context. The same as not getting that dream job or splitting up with your partner. Yes these things will lead to short term misery, but they certainly do not mean you will never be happy again and there is value in the short term misery that should be welcomed.

Ultimately this realisation means that attempting to engineer particular outcomes is futile, but the reasoning, motivation or morality behind the decision becomes much more important. The “right” decision is the one which is intellectually and morally correct, not the one which I think will result in personal gain, because the personal gain is in no way guaranteed, but the decision making process, my motivation,  is within my control.

This is part 1 in a series of posts that I intend to write which will add more ideas and context to what is written above.

Existence

How to pick up Chicks

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With all the talk in the media recently about this so called “Pick-up Artist” douchebag and his advice on how to forcibly obtain women as a possession, I thought I would present my own advice for picking up chicks. Having spent the majority of the past 4 years single, and managing to stay virtually invisible to the fairer sex for most of my life, I believe I am well qualified and experienced to advise on such matters!

So, here goes:

  • Take care over your appearance. I don’t mean dress smart or in any particular style, but dress deliberately;
  • Definitely take care of your personal hygiene;
  • Keep fit. I believe that there are many characteristics more important to women that physical appearance, but it will make you feel better about yourself and if you genuinely feel good you are less likely to act like an arsehole!
  • Strive to present the best version of you at all times. Yes we all slip up occasionally but we should at least have this intention;
  • Be a positive influence in the lives of everyone you encounter. You don’t have to be Mother Teresa, but be aware that you do have an effect on the lives of others so make it a good one;
  • Be knowledgeable, but don’t do it for kudos, do it to inform and be interesting;
  • Be interesting, and interested;
  • Be confident, or if you are not confident, at least be confident enough to be honest about your lack of confidence. It will help to increase your confidence;
  • Be humble. Humility and confidence are actually bedfellows, in fact true confidence can only come from humility;
  • Be fun, be lighthearted, definitely do not take yourself so fucking seriously! you’re not important and don’t ever expect anyone else to think you are!
  • Have interests, hobbies, passions. Have a life!
  • Care! And not because it will ultimately benefit you, just care because it’s good to;
  • Be kind. For the same reasons as stated above;
  • In fact, while we’re on the subject, don’t have ulterior motives! Be genuine in your actions;
  • Be honest. This is paired with being confident and humble. If you have to lie or conceal the truth, then you are not proud of yourself and you should deal with it;
  • Be patient;
  • Accept that not every person will be attracted to you, in fact maybe no one will, and that’s absolutely fine!
  • Converse in earnest. The conversation you are having with the person in front of you may not lead to sex, a relationship of even another conversation, but that doesn’t mean that it has no value. Enjoy conversation for the sake of itself, connecting with another person in some small way, and to provide entertainment to the person you are speaking to;
  • Your paranoia’s, demons, insecurities and general shit is yours to manage, not someone else’s to accommodate! Be aware of it and fucking deal with it!
  • Bring value to every encounter, bring something to the metaphorical party. Give someone a reason to be interested in you.

Gentlemen, I have no idea if any of the actions above will lead to you getting laid, and you should never expect to anyway. But it will make you a better person, and so if by chance someone does pay you the huge compliment of sharing their time with you, and equally huge compliment of sharing their bodily fluids with you, you may be a little more deserving of such attention.

In short, BE A DECENT HUMAN BEING!!!!

Politics and society

Ask yourself these questions when reading anything in the media (that includes the internet, Facebook, Twitter etc).

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The internet has undoubtably revolutionised the way we receive information. Not only has it created a huge number of new sources of information but it has effectively deregulated the traditional media sources too. With so many sources of “news” competing for your attention it is inevitable that said competition will change the quality of the information we are being provided. When it comes to quality, few would argue that greater volume is better!
But realistically, what are we actually using this information for? We may use it to adjust our lifestyles, support or find new interests and hobbies and adopt new fears and prejudices. Still the most important function of news in our democracy is informing our voting choices. And the news outlets (or the people that own them), and politicians know all too well how the news can influence the way we vote! For example, the majority of working class people in the US, UK and Australia vote for right leaning parties, although it is surely in their best interests to vote for left leaning parties who support greater redistribution of wealth. Two liberal Australian governments have been voted in based on misrepresentation of information about “illegal” immigrants arriving in the country. In the UK the administration of Tony Blair won support for a war based on blatant lies published in the press regarding the government of Saddam Hussein, non existent weapons of mass destruction, and the ability to attack the UK within 45 minutes.
So with all of this information readily appearing in front of us, on TV, in the papers and on our smart phones, how do we know whether what we are reading is of use to us in our search for the truth? I thought I would have a go at creating some simple questions to ask ourselves when reading any news article but most of these questions apply to any information you receive. I’m sure we could collectively add to this list almost indefinitely, so I present this for discussion and amendment.

Does the article you are reading sound probable?
Seriously! Read it. Does it actually make sense? There have been innumerable stories in the press over the years that are simply not true, and even more don’t make much sense. Such as various stories in the British anti European Union press that EU officials want to ban bent bananas, want to change the name of Bombay Mix to Mumbai mix or that they were going to legislate on how much cleavage a barmaid could expose. More seriously, as mentioned above stories in the British press regarding the Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. This story continued even after the Hussein regime had been overthrown. Now to believe Iraq was the treat to the UK took a stretch of the imagination and a complete ignorance of history. But to believe an insane dictator had a huge stockpile of weapons and didn’t think to use them when a foreign army was invading his country, is plain gullibility!
The positive thing about the volume of information that is now available to us is that we can quite easily check the validity of the information we receive. A few minutes on Google will give you more information as to whether a story is real or a twisted mass of misinformation. Those few minutes may save you from looking like a fool, and actually make you look quite clever when you rebut the fool that is reciting the story without checking.

Do you have any empirical evidence of what is being reported, (does this story fit your own experience)?
Have you, personally, experienced evidence of what you are reading? Many of us are quite happy to believe what we have read even though we have no personal experience to back it up. I have read numerous stories of schools banning nativity plays at Christmas or councils refusing to fly a national flag so as not to offend immigrants. Firstly, does this sound probable? Only because we keep reading similar stories. But I have yet to find a single example of someone I know actually experiencing this phenomenon. Surely any headmaster or council would be inundated with complaints, protests and trouble if they were to propose such a policy.
Another example is the reports of Muslims who have immigrated to western countries and want to impose sharia law. I’m not saying that they don’t exist but have you ever met one? What was your reply when they told you of their desire? Does it make sense that someone would escape a country only to wish their new country to be like their old one? That’s like me moving to Australia and then wishing the weather was shittier! Unless you are regularly bumping into Muslims campaigning for sharia law in your country, then these news reports are more likely a massive exaggeration intended to stoke your fear and hatred of other cultures.

Why has the source reported this particular story to you?
In the modern age of 24hour instant news and instantaneous global communications there are huge numbers of news stories that could be reported to you each day. So why has this particular story been reported? Why is it of more importance than the other stories that could be reported to you? Right leaning media sources tend to report much more crimes committed by people with a different skin colour or culture than the masses, but rarely report crimes committed by someone from the majority. Environmentalist news sources will enthusiastically report to you stories of governments and big businesses abusing and destroying the planet, but almost never report on successful environmental progress if it was championed by the same government. This selective reporting has two purposes. Firstly it aims to influence your voting choices by only revealing information that will encourage you to vote a certain way. Secondly it appeals to your existing values and aims to maintain your patronage.

What is the agenda of this particular news source?
Rupert Murdoch, arguably the most powerful media tycoon in the world openly supports right wing parties in democratic elections, and therefore will more likely report stories true or twisted, that present a better picture of the conservative movement or demonise the opposition. In fact most media these days is partisan. Fox is blatantly right wing whereas CNN and MSN are almost as passionately left wing. So any information that is received must be considered in the context of the agenda of the reporting organisation.
But does this make the information worthless? No, is the simple answer. Firstly, just because the information is biased it doesn’t mean it’s untrue. Also, the stories reported give the reader insight into the reporting organisation and their leaders. You can quite easily establish their agenda and that of their cohorts.

Does this information help to inform your voting choices?
With regards to all of the celebrity news we receive, obviously not. It serves to distract you from the information you need to make voting choices. Other news, may seem relevant to voting but on further investigation is not. Reporting on crime takes up a huge amount of news space in the modern media and as a result many people live in fear of being a victim of crime. The truth is crime rates have been steadily dropping in most western democracies for decades. Which means that you may be tempted to vote for a party which promises to be tough on crime, when in reality it’s a non issue.
The constant media debate about immigration, when viewed with the knowledge of statistics, how much of the population is actually immigrant, where the bulk of those immigrants come from etc, is revealed to be a non, or at best minor issue. But  said media coverage did wonders to distract from the Australian Liberal Party’s questionable economic policies during the last election campaign, and is still distracting people from other, much more important issues.

So there are some questions to ask ourselves when we are scanning the news. But a no answer the any of the above doesn’t render that particular article worthless. The article is still providing you information on what a certain organization wants you to read, and therefore gives you clues as to their agenda or often gives you clues as to what they don’t want you to think about.

Please, don’t believe everything you read, question it all! Even what is written here! And especially if what you are reading happens to support your existing biases, fears and prejudices. There’s a fine line between informing and indulging yourself.

Existence

Thoughts on my first post

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It seems odd, now I come to think of it that I haven’t jumped on this blogging thing before. Being someone who has always had an opinion on, well everything. If this medium had appeared 20 years ago I’m sure I would  have been all over it, spouting angry, probably ill informed rhetoric on every possible topic and current issue. But instead it appeared while I was either too busy, too distracted or too disengaged to take advantage. And as I have grown older, I am no less opinionated, but maybe somewhat more cautious in those opinions. Not because I fear contradiction, it’s something that I welcome and appreciate, but because as I have experienced more, read more and understood more about my existence and the human condition, I have realised that there are few absolute, unequivocal opinions that a person can hold and still claim to seek the truth.

The truth is rarely black and white. It is filled with nuance, variables, further considerations that modern society, or at least modern media (surely a reflection of modern society) loves to overlook for the sake of simplicity, a punchy headline or economic use of space. A simple binary opinion is so much easier to live with and to shout about. Its much harder to shout detail, you’re in danger of losing your voice and your audience. So I have found myself less inclined to shout, but more inclined to explore the detail and try to understand the wider context, to study the ripples on the water, and the hand that threw the stone, as well as the moment of impact and who got wet.

So I’m going to write down some thoughts as they come to me and if anyone reads them, I’m sure my ego will get a little tickle. My intention is to write my thoughts and ideas on whatever happens to be occupying my mind. You will find no three word slogans or angry but ultimately indefensible opinions, and you will not be able to simply shout or stamp your agreement or disagreement. But you may be able to question the methodology of analysis, hopefully you will be inclined to further explore the idea, but probably you’ll not give a crap and move on to look at cats or porn, which is also good.

Well, there you go! My first! Hopefully Blogs are like cars and this will be my first, cheapest and crappiest of many.

I thought I would start a blog. Why? I would like to write down my thoughts, and maybe someone would like to read them.