Archives for category: Social justice
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

“How damaged is eurozone and EU by Greek debacle?”

July 14, 2015 //
3

I borrowed this title from the BBC because it frames nicely what I wanted to say.

First of all I’m at a loss to understand why so many people considers this to be a ‘Greek debacle’? Did the Greeks lend money to themselves and then refused to pay or this whole mess started years ago, when some private banks supplied huge amounts of money to a country notorious for her shoddy ways?
Then, when Greece was way outside the European norms about how much debt a country might have if it wished to join the Eurozone, the Greek Government lied blatantly and the European officials knowingly turned a blind eye in that direction.
Later, when Brussels started to make noises about this issue the Greek Government, instead of finding a way to pay some of the debt, used another ‘creative solution’ – a currency swap organized by Goldman Sachs. This time Euro-stat rubber-stamped the deal. Now the blame is put entirely on Goldman Sachs.

In 2010, after it became apparent that Greece was no longer able to service its foreign debt – at that time owned mostly by private banks, a first bailout plan was arranged. In 2011 a second one. This way ownership of most of Greece’s debt was transferred from private to public hands.

On the other hand giving Greece a ‘haircut’ now, before they had even started to mend their crooked ways, would be an insult towards the Irish, the Portuguese and the Spanish – who had all swallowed the bitter austerity pill.

And yet.
Moral hazard aside we have to consider two things. Greece is different from the rest of the Euro-zone and Greece’s accrued debt is so huge relative to it’s GDP that none in his right mind would ever expect it to be payed back. In this respect what is happening now is nothing but an exercise of ‘kicking the can down the alley’.

Now let me explain in which way Greece is different and why this is important for the future of the EU.
s

Samuel Huntington has put forward a very interesting theory in which he argues that “The fault lines between civilizations will be the battle lines of the future.” And as you can see in this map, borrowed from Huntington’s book, via Wikipedia, Greece does not belong to the same cultural space as the ‘Western Europe’.
Huntington has drawn that map using the dominant religion as a criterion, in Europe as well as in other parts of the world. Nevertheless he probably has ‘felt’ that his method has it’s shortcomings. America is divided into ‘Latin American’ and ‘Western’ but Europe is not divided into ‘Catholic’ and ‘Protestant’.
And rightly so because what happened in Catholic South America is currently happening in ex Soviet dominated Eastern Europe AND in Greece: rampant and casual corruption that tears apart the social fabric.
What if the nations that inhabit these two cultural spaces have something more in common than ‘top-down’ religious systems – both Orthodox and Catholics have a rather rigid ecclesiastical hierarchy?
Relatively little experience at being independent? At thinking with their own heads, as nations? At being proud of their constant success as teams instead of defining themselves relative to something that had happened in their distant past?

A modern independent nation is, or more precisely used to be, defined by the fact that the elite understands its mission and takes it seriously. Because of that – the positive results, that is, the masses are content with their current elite and follow it – consciously or not so consciously.
A country where the population hasn’t fully reached the ‘national’ stage of development experiences an almost schizophrenic situation. The individuals who should gather together, coalesce into an elite and run country are more preoccupied with their individual short term well being than with making sure that their own children will be able to live in a fully functional country when they grow up. For this reason the general public doesn’t trust the ‘leaders’. And this mutual distrust/disrespect has a very practical consequence: corruption becomes the modus vivendi of the entire society.

It is relatively simple to understand that a relationship of mutual respect between the elite and the general public needs a rather long time to develop and that the process has to take place unhindered by outside intervention. That’s why it cannot take place while the country is dominated by a colonial power, by an imperium or in any other way.
That’s why the peoples that live in South America have only recently started to make peace with their politicians – and not in all countries yet:  they might have conquered their independence from Spain and Portugal almost 200 years ago only their elites had everything in their minds but the general well being of the countries they were running. On top of that the former colonial powers and later the US have all intervened in the daily life of their former colonies/neighbors, further hindering their natural development.
Same thing happened in Eastern Europe. The Baltic States, Poland and Hungary have been, on and off, under foreign occupation but not for so long as to severely damage their development. In contrast Romania, Bulgaria and Greece had not enjoyed real freedom since the XIV-th century. And after they did became independent their elite went looking elsewhere for inspiration. Towards Western Europe at first and to the Soviet Union afterwards.  A somewhat natural thing, given the circumstances, but which did little to forge fully functional nations out of their populations.
Meanwhile the ‘man in the street’ has developed a particular strategy for surviving. He trusts nobody but his family  and close friends and doesn’t pay taxes unless he really has to. He has no qualms to take ‘bribes’ from the state – early retirement, subsidies, etc. – but that doesn’t mean he will trust the politicians that ‘distributed’ those ‘gifts’.

What is happening now, when the European elites are supposed to take their cue from Brussels, is not helping much. Ms Merkel is preoccupied primarily with her own constituency and the EU top brass are fully aware that Berlin has the last word about who gets what top notch European position. Any wonder smaller nations feel ‘neglected’? We should keep in mind that, as Great Britain is just one example, that Europeans do not feel towards the EU what the Americans feel towards the good old US of A.
Eastern Europeans have a particularly hard time. They want to get in the EU – they are both fed up with their local politicians and would like to be part of a working environment but at the same time they have a rather ambivalent attitude towards the EU institutions. This institutions enjoy a lot of respect from the Easterners, because they had worked properly – until not so long ago, at least, but at the same time they are watched with great apprehension. People who have had to take, in the past, their cue from ‘foreigners’ are somewhat weary of this whole thing.

So yes, I’m afraid that the euro-zone will be damaged by the current crises only I don’t think we should be speaking of a ‘Greek debacle’.  In fact the union itself – the European elite, to be more precise – has not entirely fulfilled its duty.

The sooner we understand that, the sooner we’ll know what to demand of it. And maybe we’ll be able to bridge the cultural divide mentioned by Huntington.

The alternative would be dire. The Russian elite – not the Russian people itself, only a fragment of its elite – will grab the opportunity to extend their influence. And by doing so to continue to hinder the natural development of the Eastern European nations. Including Modern Greece.

Tags , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories Choices we make, corruption, Frames of mind, Mutual Respect, Social justice

Rape culture

July 12, 2015 //
2

Or ‘what can be learned from a stand-up comedian’s long standing career?’:

OK, there are at least two sides of this and until recently there was no sure fire way of ascertaining either:.
1 – he did it and then we have to ask ourselves how come nothing came up for so long or
2 – he didn’t do it and then we have to ask ourselves how come such an obscene thing can happen to a ‘pillar of the society’: “You’ve got to stop beating up your women because you can’t find a job, because you didn’t want to get an education and now you’re (earning) minimum wage,”

Now, after “newly unsealed court documents revealed that the comedian has admitted to giving at least one woman quaaludes before sex”, we have to answer a very clear question. One that every rape victim that has not yet find justice has been yelling at us since the moment of her being violated:

“Why are we so willing to overlook the really aberrant behavior of the perpetrator while attempting to make excuses that throw the guilt on the victim?”

(I used quotation marks because I borrowed this from a FB wall. I didn’t provide a link because the owner of that wall has a ‘friends only’ policy. Nevertheless, this is my way of offering thanks for a very well asked question. So well asked in fact as to prod the following answer:)

The fact is that we, modern humans, are so entangled between two conflicting emotions that we sometime behave quite erratically.
On one hand we admire success and successful/powerful figures and on the other we hate/fear failure.
This conflict that tears us apart drives some of us to admire the ‘predators’ – at least as long as they are not caught – and to despise the victim – as long as it is not one of ‘us’.
This might appear as a perversion but maybe this is exactly what we need to do in order to survive as conscious human beings: to constantly adjust our behavior as close to the straight and narrow as possible.
After all it is us who came up with the concept of ‘the end justifies the means’… which, seen from the other side, might be read as ‘Be careful what you wish for, lest it comes true’.

Some of Cosby’s victims might have doubted not only the ability of the judicial system to adequately take care of the matter (“The district attorney on the case told the Daily Mail that at the time, he thought Cosby was probably guilty, and he wanted to arrest him, but he didn’t have sufficient proof of the alleged assault.”), the consequences of filing a complaint but also their value as a person: “What could I say? I was 19 years old. I felt, ‘He’s Bill Cosby. He’ll lawyer himself up. I don’t have a lawyer. It’s going to be he said, she said, and they’ll look at me like I’m crazy.’ … My reputation would have been ruined.”

There is also a way bigger problem. This attitude of ours, the inner conflict, manifests itself in even more pernicious ways.
The German culture is a very strict one. It’s almost inconceivable for a German national to offer a bribe to a fellow German. Yet Siemens had no qualms to shower graft money on foreigners: “Siemens and the battle against bribery and corruption“.
Same thing is valid for the US. Most of the world thinks, backed by the very strong anti-corruption legislation that has been put in place there and by the insistence with which American government officials preach abroad on this subject, that the Union must be a corruption free heaven. Yet things are not exactly as they should be. “An associate warned him that he’d have to “pay to play” “, “Judge Gets ‘Life Sentence’ for Prison Kickback Scheme”, and “Lockheed Wants Out of 40-Years-Old Disclosure Demand”.

This attitude also influences International politics. Putin was lionized in the Western media up to the summer of 2014 despite his ‘antics’ (or rather because of them?!?) and even now almost 22% of the Americans still have confidence in him…not to mention his huge popularity at home, bolstered precisely after the latest events.

The explanation is quite simple. What happened in Putin’s case, as well as in the Siemens/Lockheed Martin developments, follows the pattern we can discern in the dual career of Bill Cosby – stand up comedian and sexual molester. For as long as the perpetrators are seen as being successful, they garner strong collections of fans. As soon as enough of those fans understand that it’s precisely those ‘successes’ that jeopardize the general well being – including their own, the erstwhile fans suddenly wise up.

” “Completely disgusted,” tweeted singer Jill Scott, who had vociferously defended her mentor.” 
PS. Now what about this:
“Bill Cosby’s private art collection at Smithsonian withstands controversy”
““It just raises a little eyebrow that a trustee of a museum is lending [her] own collection, funding part of the exhibition and the exhibition is highlighting works … by less well-known artists whose work is considered by some to be undervalued,””
Normal development or over-reaction?
Tags , , , , , , , ,
Categories altruism, Choices we make, corruption, Frames of mind, Psychology, Social justice

Moral Hazard.

July 8, 2015 //
3

“Why should the European taxpayers bail out the profligate Greeks?”

That’s the mantra I’ve been hearing for some time now, even though a way bigger, and darker, cloud slowly builds up on the other side of the world.

As almost all mantras there is a small nugget of truth in here, even if things are not at all as some want us to believe. Jan Strupczewski wrote this almost prophetic article for Reuters, more than two years ago.

So?

First of all I’d like to quote the definition proposed by Investopedia.com for ‘moral hazard’:

“The risk that a party to a transaction has not entered into the contract in good faith, has provided misleading information about its assets, liabilities or credit capacity, or has an incentive to take unusual risks in a desperate attempt to earn a profit before the contract settles.
Moral hazard can be present any time two parties come into agreement with one another. Each party in a contract may have the opportunity to gain from acting contrary to the principles laid out by the agreement…..
.
.
.
Moral hazard can be somewhat reduced by the placing of responsibilities on both parties of a contract….”

The way I understand this definition is that it is the job of both parties who enter into a contract to perform every diligence they see fit before committing to that contract  and to assume the responsibility afterwards.
Let’s see if this definition sheds any light on today’s subject.
The Western World tends to act as if all countries were functioning as communities. If we don’t like what Putin does in Ukraine we impose sanctions that hurt the entire Russia in the hope that people will do something about the situation. That tactic works very rarely – see what happens in N. Korea and in Iran. Even more, sometimes it even backfires. Look at how popular Putin has become after the sanctions have been put in place.
Coming back to Greece we have become fed up with the shenanigans of the Greek politicians – right, left and middle – and now we insist on harsh ‘austerity measures’ in the hope that the Greek voters will somehow find among themselves an honest knight in a shinning armor that will appear from somewhere and teach them to pay their taxes – and by doing so they’ll dully repay the entire debt that has accrued over the time.
After all it’s their responsibility, isn’t it?
It was them, the Greek voters, that have elected the corrupt politicians in the first place. It was them, the Greek voters, that didn’t do anything when they noticed that their Government was corrupt. Even more, some of the ordinary Greeks must have helped the corrupt politicians – nobody can be corrupt by it’s own, somebody must be at the other side of the deal. On top of that dodging taxes was, and still is, a national sport in Greece – well, that’s actually a rational thing to do: ‘who in it’s right mind would willingly pay his taxes, knowing that most of the money would be squandered away’?
Does that mean that the Greeks should be made to reimburse, in integrum, what their creditors demand of them?
OK, lets forget for one moment that this not possible and that if Greece defaults not only the Greek people will have to endure harsh conditions for a while but also the creditors will loose a considerable amount of what they are due.
Let’s presume that a completely different Tsipras somehow convinces the Greek people to accept pension cuts, tax hikes and, lo and behold, to pay their taxes in an honest way.

Then we’ll still have a fine example of ‘moral hazard’.
We have just established that in a democracy the voters have the final responsibility for the actions of those elected/hired into meaningful positions.
And what did the elected officials, from Brussels as well as those from the rest of the EU capitals? Turned a blind eye when Greek politicians ‘cooked the books’ before Greece was admitted into the EU and, after that, into the Euro zone? Then, when the private banks that had unwisely extended credit to the profligate Greeks had troubles recouping their money, the same elected officials said nothing while Jean Claude Trichet, the then president of the ECB, helped transfer the entire burden – mind you, no ‘haircuts’, unto the ‘wider’ shoulders of the European tax-payer? Who said absolutely nothing!
Only now some of the elected politicians, afraid that their constituents might finally protest, have started to notice the irresponsible attitude of Greece, to demand harsh austerity measures and to refuse even the idea of any debt relief.
So how come we can speak of moral hazard when we describe what the Greeks (governments, tax dodgers and general public) did but never mention in this context the lack of financial responsibility displayed by the investment bankers that helped the Greek governments cover up their shenanigans, the European officials who turned a blind eye to what was going on and the wide European public who didn’t care about what was done with their money by those hired to take good care of the European finances?
What is going to happen from now on?
Before trying to gouge that we need to understand what sets Greece apart from the countries that have dragged themselves out of the worst phases of the latest crises – Ireland, Spain and Portugal: Greece is a country deeply divided by rampart corruption.
In most of Europe corruption is a cancer that reaches across the entire social organism, in Greece it divides the population in two almost equal parts: those who work for or do business with the Government and all the rest.
The situation is made worse by the fact that Greece has become independent rather lately, specially compared with the Western Europe. Furthermore, the process was a lengthy one, it started in 1821 and ended right after WWI, only to recommence during WWII. Add to that the long list of authoritarian leaders and you’ll understand the deep mistrust between the people and the Government – which is not at all ‘their’, despite Greece calling itself a democracy. I have a distinct impression that even those who work for or do business with the Government doesn’t really trust it – they know too much about what is going on there. Small wonder, in these conditions, that dodging taxes is a national sport…
What we have now is, on one side, some European leaders who were elected on a conservative/popular ticked and who have already introduced some austerity at home and, on the other side, a leader who has promised to end austerity.
For these people to reach an agreement both sides have to admit failure: the European leaders must accept the past errors and take responsibility for them and Tsipras must convince his constituents that they need to change their attitude. Completely.
Does any of this have any chance to come true?
Tags , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories 1989 and the Global Financial Crisises., Choices we make, Economy, Frames of mind, Money as goal, Mutual Respect, Psychology, Social justice

“Faith versus fact”

July 4, 2015 //
1

“Science might be based on a foundation of rational thought and trial-and-error, but the roots of religion lie in something much more incalculable, and thus much harder to counter.”

I haven’t read the book so I’m not going to comment on it, yet.

What bothers me is the idea of countering ‘religion’.

Why would anyone do something like that?

If any of us sees an error in the ‘scientific’ realm that error is brought forward and fixed but nobody questions the entire realm.
Meanwhile if a religious individual does a stupid thing, like all of us have done in our lives, quite a lot of people blame it on ‘religion’ and ‘faith’.

Rather irrational – hence unscientific – don’t you think?

After all science and religion are about something different.
Science is about how the nature works while religion (‘reliegare’ in Latin means ‘connecting’) is about the ties that transform a mob into a community. Some religions use Gods to achieve this, some don’t – Buddha was a ‘mere’ teacher and Buddhism has no need for any God.

So, again, why counter ‘religion’?

The real problem produced by ‘organized religion’ is that it encourages some people to act in blind faith instead of thinking with their own heads while it offers come callous manipulators the opportunity to use religious teachings as a way to further their petty interests.
‘Faith’ can induce blindness very easily, you know.  No matter if that faith is placed in a religious hierarchy/teaching or in the power of rational thinking.
Just as reputable scientists, Herbert Simon and Daniel Kahneman  among others, have amply demonstrated the human thinking process is not at all infallible.That’s why our pride about our ability to think scientifically should not be allowed to grow into self-sufficiency. After all that was how Marx, on the footsteps of Plato, reached the conclusion that it was possible for a small number of people (the ‘enlightened’ communists) to know better than the rest of the population how things must be organized… The Soviet Union, the biggest social experiment ever, was ample proof that he was plain wrong.

On the other hand the one thing that all religions have in common is that they teach their members to respect each other – something that the ‘scientific communists’ never did. Some religions even teach that all human beings, irrespective of their creed, are to be respected. Just think about how most nomad people welcome visitors – those that come in peace, of course.

So how come there are so many ‘scientists’ are ready to counter, entirely, something as wide as ‘religion’?

Faith versus Fact, Jerry Coyne

Can Religion and Science coexist? Jeffery Tayler

Tags , , , , , ,
Categories altruism, Choices we make, Frames of mind, Mutual Respect, Psychology, Social justice

Abortion rights.

June 10, 2015 //
0

“An Amnesty International report reveals what the human rights group calls the ‘devastating impact’ of Ireland’s ban on abortion”

The same report asks us to take action and “urge” the Taoiseah (the prime minister of Ireland) to:
”

The troublesome amendment reads like this: “The State acknowledges the right to life of the unborn and, with due regard to the equal right to life of the mother, guarantees in its laws to respect, and, as far as practicable, by its laws to defend and vindicate that right.”

On one side it make a lot of sense. What could be the difference between the life of the mother and that of the unborn and how could somebody choose between these two?

On the other side it unveils an ugly truth: “The State…”…

What we have here is a blatant example of an organized crowd – “the State” – imposing it’s will on a minority of it’s members in a matter that, in reality, doesn’t affect anything else but the feelings of the crowd. Besides the entire life of the mother, of course.

The point I’m trying to make is that we cannot equate the life of an unborn, specially so if the fetus is less than three month old, with that of its mother.
It makes a lot of sense to recognize the life of a self contained human being – once that it was born – and a lot less to impose as a sacrosanct value that of the life of a fetus that cannot survive, under any circumstances, outside the womb of its mother.
A child that has already survived its birth or a sick person can be successfully taken care of by the community. Same thing is not at all valid for an unborn fetus that is less than three months old.

So when discussing the relationship between the life of a mother and that of her unborn child we have two situations. When the fetus is too small to survive outside the womb it practically belongs to the mother and she should be the one who decides about it.
Only after the fetus has reached the stage from which it could survive a miscarriage we enter the realm described by the 8Th Amendment. Only from that moment on the life of the child becomes equivalent to that of the mother and only from that moment on the pregnancy should be terminated only if the life of the mother is in immediate danger, as specified by the current Irish legislation.

Tags , , , ,
Categories Choices we make, Frames of mind, Psychology, Social justice

“Dirty eyes see nothing but dirt”

June 1, 2015 //
0

That was how an old friend of mine – thanks Oache – was treating anyone who complained too much.
And there were plenty reasons to complain about during Ceausescu’s communist rule over Romania.

Five minutes ago I found this in my inbox:

A  young couple moves into a new  neighborhood.
The next morning while they are  eating breakfast,
The young woman sees her  neighbor hanging the wash  outside.
“That  laundry is not very clean,” she said.
“She  doesn’t know how to wash correctly.
Perhaps  she needs better laundry  soap.”
Her  husband looked on, but remained  silent.

Every time her neighbor would  hang her wash to dry,
The young woman would  make the same comments.

About one month  later, the woman was surprised to see a
Nice  clean wash on the line and said to her  husband:
“Look, she has learned how to  wash correctly.
I wonder who taught her  this.”
The husband said, “I got up early  this morning and
Cleaned our  windows.”

And so it is with life.   What we see when watching others
Depends on  the purity of the window through which we  look. 

I’d go even further than that.
The way we perceive what’s going on around us depends heavily on the ‘filter’ each of us chooses to use when trying to make some sense of this world.
Catalin Zamfir, a Romanian sociologist with a keen interest in the decision making process, has studied how individuals try to assuage the feeling of acute/constant uncertainty experienced by each of them during the constant (social) encounters that constitute ‘daily life’. In one of his early books, unfortunately not yet translated in English, he explains that ‘ideology’ is not only a blue print for future action but also, and maybe even more important, the lens/filter through which we perceive what is going on around us. An interface that translates ‘reality’ into ideas that make sense for each of us.
The interesting thing about ‘ideology’ is that it isn’t fixed. Each of us can choose from whatever is available in his time or even ‘write’ his own.
Granted, the process of selection/rewriting incurs costs/risks. Some obvious, like adopting a contrarian stance, and others very well hidden in plain view, like the dangers that arise from indiscriminately following a herd.
And this is exactly why we should strive to keep our windows/ideological eyes as clean as possible.
Tags , , , , , ,
Categories Choices we make, fail better, Frames of mind, Psychology, Respect Mutual., Social justice

Better failing

May 27, 2015 //
0

“Hope is a mistake. If you can’t fix what’s broken, you’ll go insane.” This muddled piece of dialogue grunted out by Max (Tom Hardy) is a pretty spot on summation of my thoughts on Mad Max: Furious Road. The fact that this film has somehow slipped into the consciousness of the masses, winning the heart of critics and blowing the minds of audiences, is an anomaly to me. With a staggering 98% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, I’m still questioning if I happened to miss something or not. I had hoped this would be the heart-thumping action film that others promised. I wanted to bawl over in joy becoming lost in a ridiculous, yet intelligent world created by director George Miller and his fellow screenwriters Brendan McCarthy and Nico Lathouris. But alas, Max was right. Hope is a mistake.” (The Cinephiliac)

OK, so is there anything to be gleaned out from here?

Firstly, hope is a mistake only if not followed through.
Yes, people might get mad if not able to fix what’s broken.
But there are alternatives.
Like next time fail better.
This way even if you don’t succeed at least you end up trying. Way better than locked up in a loony bin, specially so if the cell itself is of your own making.

Secondly, the 98% approval rate on Rotten Tomatoes bears a very clear message.
The audience is fed up. Basically with everything.

I just hope people will find a way to vent their grievances before they flare up and that the powers that be pay attention before the things go too far down the Fury Road.

Tags , , , ,
Categories Choices we make, fail better, Frames of mind, Social justice

The man in charge.

May 21, 2015 //
0

Does he have any ‘right to exert his authority, inside the limits that have been delineated for him’?

Somebody who has real authority enjoys a certain degree of autonomy, if not outright independence. ‘Authority’ is almost never clearly delineated, there is always a gray area where the discretion of the individual in charge is the one that calls the shots.
More over if we, the ‘subjects’, consider that he has ‘the right’ to exercise that authority then it’s us who are in deep trouble.
‘Exertion of authority’ ‘smacks’ of the situation  when the ‘authority man’ had conquered his position against the wish of his subjects – like the emperors of the old. (Or like the communist dictators of not so long ago, only they pretended to exercise their authority for the benefit of the people while the emperors of the old were more straightforward and declared themselves ‘gods’)
Nowadays, at least in the democratic states, authority is, theoretically, used as a tool, towards the accomplishment of what the person in charge is supposed to achieve, not as a right enjoyed by that person.
In fact the notion of a right to exert authority inside some limits is akin to what has been described as ‘feudalism’, a social arrangement not that different from the Athenian democracy. The people were divided in two categories, just as in the previous situation – the ‘imperiums’ of the Antiquity, the difference being that in an imperium the top class was inhabited by a single individual – the emperor/dictator, while in feudalism/Athenian democracy the top class was inhabited by the free people, whose authority/freedom extended only as far as it started to encroach the authority of the equivalent individuals. I have to remark here that in many circumstances feudalism has very quickly degenerated back to imperium – for instance in absolutist France, ‘L’etat c’est moi’, or in tsarist Russia, while England successfully avoided that due to the spirit enshrined in Magna Charta.
The difference between feudalism/Athenian democracy and the modern democracy being that currently we can no longer speak of individual authority simply because nowadays no one has the “right” to own slaves – as the Athenian ‘democrats’ had, nor even enjoy extensive authority (bar the right of life and death) over other people – the serfs, as the feudal barons did not so long ago.
Tags , , , , , ,
Categories 1989 and the Global Financial Crisises., Choices we make, Culture, Frames of mind, Psychology, Respect Mutual., Social justice, The kind of world we live in

The innocent bystanders and the abetting spectators.

May 15, 2015 //
2

So.

© YouTube Donna Beegle and family were escorted off the plane by police at a Utah airport

A not careful enough mother ‘blackmails’ a hot meal  (normally reserved for the first class but she payed for it) out of a rather reluctant stewardess for her autistic daughter and a somewhat rigid pilot – but who acted completely within the limits of pertinent regulations) – lands the plane in the middle of the flight and has the family deplaned. All in the name of ‘safety for the rest of the passengers’ – who didn’t felt threatened, at any moment.

So what’s the big deal?
The mother should have brought along some food for her child or made sure in advance that she could order food inflight and nothing would have happened.
The stewardess could have taken it as an emergency instead of harshly judging the mother of an unfortunate child.
Or the pilot could have acted a little more considerately towards the very passengers whose safety he was so preoccupied about and continued the flight – if we are to take at face value the situation described in the article at no moment any of the passengers had been in any real danger. (The ‘obtrusive’ mother could have been ‘charged’ at the destination as well if the pilot really felt that she had to be given a lesson.)

What I’m trying to suggest here is that a lot of the unpleasant consequences experienced by the ‘innocent bystanders – a planeload of people loosing at least an hour of their lives, if not more, and UA footing the bill for a lot of additional fuel – could have easily been avoided if at least one of the three people involved – mother, pilot or the stewardess – would have acted just a little differently.

But the picture is even more complicated than that. To understand what I mean click on the picture above and jump to the comments section. It’s amazing how people who have not been there are so easily willing to pass definitive judgement about what had happened so far away from them and to apportion precise amounts of blame to the parties involved. It doesn’t matter which side they choose, I’m just amazed at their willingness to judge so easily a rather delicate situation, based exclusively on a sketchy report published by a reporter who wasn’t even there when the incident took place.

Exactly this fact, that modern people tend to jump, head on, to conclusion even without having access to a lot of the pertinent details does not bode well for our future.
Following ‘procedures’ – and giving up thinking with our own heads – is indeed easier but it somehow demotes us from the status of wise (sapiens) humans to that of disciplined (impulsive) apes.

And no, ‘disciplined’ is not that far away from ‘impulsive’. You see, ‘procedures’ are structured instructions devised, by some instance who doesn’t have much trust in those who get to apply the instructions, to be followed exactly in those circumstances when the judgement of the operators has been found unreliable by the those who came up with the idea of procedures in the first place.
In their turn, the operators – realizing that no matter what they’ll do their judgement will be second guessed – no longer take their time to carefully consider the situations and determine what procedure would be appropriate . They just apply the first pertinent procedure that comes to their mind and hope for the best. This way they unload faster the psychological burden felt by anyone who is compelled to make a controversial decision – hence both the impulsiveness and the desire to conform to the rules. The fact that the spectators have no qualms to pass judgement based on the scantiest information only adds to the pressure felt by the people who are liable to be judged. Besides the need to solve the current situation and the angst about the outcome now the ‘performers’ have to deal with what, and how intense, the public reaction will be. Knowing that most of the time the public is less than sympathetic doesn’t help things.

And if we add the fact that the public seems to favor ‘decisive’ action versus more ‘inclusive’ measures (which are perceived  as ‘wishy washy’) we start to understand why the contemporary world has become way more polarized than it used to be.

Who loses?
At first glance ‘the innocent bystanders’ – those who happened to be caught close enough to the action as to be directly affected by the interaction between the active parties.

But if we distance ourselves a little bit and take a closer look at the whole business we might arrive to a different conclusion.

Contemporary world has become so complex and is moving so rapidly that each of us is simultaneously involved in many situations, playing various roles. In some of them we are the active participants, in others we are just caught in the middle – as ‘innocent bystanders’ – and we learn about a lot more others from the media – as ‘distant but abetting spectators’, as in this case.

And it’s in front of the telly that we contribute the most to what’s going on.
This sounds strange, isn’t it?
When are ‘actively participating’ we don’t have much time to reflect about what is going on – so we act according to the prevailing social norms. In fact according to ‘the procedures’.
The whole thing usually starts when we innocently suffer the consequences of others behaving ‘abruptly’: we convince ourselves about the need to take our lives into our own hands and to never again allow others to prevail over us.
We usually exercise this new found resolve as spectators – our most common situation nowadays – only in that instance we are far from the actual action and not directly affected nor command much information about the whole thing so we consider the situation in a detached manner and without having enough information about the matter.
Even more, here, ‘in front of the telly’, instances are succeeding so fast that we don’t have time to at least consider each of them carefully. Hence our rather abrupt calls. After all why bother to analyze them in any depth? We don’t intimately know the persons involved nor do we have comprehensive information about each case…

This is how we set the stage for future abruptness. By allowing ourselves to pass fast – and rather inconsiderate – judgments about everything we effectively condition ourselves to a ‘black and white’ attitude towards the world. Small wonder then that we act so ‘decisively’ when we are involved as ‘active participants’ and even smaller that we have to suffer the consequences of the so much abruptness that is going on around us.

Don’t blame ‘procedures’ for that. In fact they are almost natural.
Reflexes, both those that are ingrained in us and those we learn during our life time are nothing else but Mother Nature’s way of doing things easier for us but none the less ‘procedures’.
Cultural norms are also ‘procedures’ only they have been adopted before the concept was coined and the term itself invented.

Only we can do something about this. It’s us who suffer the consequences so we need to take time and consider a lot more carefully before passing judgement. Or, even better, pass the ‘opportunity’, specially so if we don’t really need to.

Tags , , , ,
Categories Frames of mind, Psychology, Respect Mutual., Social justice

A different aproach to economic imbalances

April 23, 2015 //
0

Bill Gates Alex Wong Getty Images

Bill Gates disapproves of Thomas Piketty’s method of leveling the play-field – levying a capital tax – and proposes a different tack: a progressive tax on consumption.

While I agree with both Gates and Piketty that extreme economic imbalances are bad for the society I profoundly disagree with both about how we should deal with them.
First things first. Extreme economic imbalances being bad has nothing to do with morals and very little to the fact that the poor feel bad when exposed to the excesses of the ‘filthy rich’.
They are bad simply because the dirt poor cannot express their creative potential and because the rich end up concentrating too much of the decision power. The society as a whole – including the super rich – looses, specially on the long run.
Taking the decision power from the hands of the super rich and giving it to the governments, through increased taxation, would only complicate matters. Not to mention the byzantine mechanism needed to enforce Bill Gates’ consumption tax.
Encouraging the rich to donate more would somewhat alleviate the problem but not much since until the money were distributed, if ever, the decision power would still remain too concentrated for our own collective good.
How about those same very rich people, now that enough of them have understood the perils associated with extreme economic imbalances, simply setting an example and start calculating wages using a completely different principle than is used today?
What if instead of ‘as low as the market allows’ they would ‘compensate’ their employees, all of them, as generously as their businesses can reasonably afford to? Somewhat in line with what Ford did back at the start of the XX-Th century, with more than excellent results for both sides? And does again now!

And how about the same rich and powerful individuals using their ‘political muscle’ and insisting on better governance? After all if their businesses and trust funds would have been run as most governments are run today they would have gone under a very long time ago…
And then, after the governments would have been ‘fixed’, and tax money not wasted anymore, how about the very same 1% start paying in earnest their ‘normal’ taxes, like the rest of us?

Surprise, surprise…

The real dangers of extreme economic imbalances: https://nicichiarasa.wordpress.com/2014/10/29/extreme-fragility-dead-ahead/
Why Ford increased wages back then: http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2012/03/04/the-story-of-henry-fords-5-a-day-wages-its-not-what-you-think/
Ford increases wages now: http://www.wsj.com/articles/ford-to-move-hundreds-of-entry-level-workers-to-higher-pay-rate-1423026005

Tags , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories 1989 and the Global Financial Crisises., politics, Psychology, Respect Mutual., Social justice, The kind of world we live in
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »