Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Cornel West, Barack Obama and post-racial America
George W. Bush’s presidency has come to an end and Barack Obama's inauguration has taken place. The event marks the beginning of a massive change, not least in the economy, for the environment and war, but also on the subject of race - a decidedly evocative topic of conversation in America. (Read on)
Sunday, January 18, 2009
John Zorn: The Paul of Klezmer Music?
The mission of St. Paul, the “Apostle to the Gentiles,” according to the Romans 15:16, was to carry out ‘a priestly ministry’ at the service of God in order that ‘the offering of the Gentiles might be acceptable.’ Theologians, and of late philosophers promoting political universalism such as Giorgio Agamben and Alain Badiou, note Paul to be the figurehead of the break from Jewish racial particularism resonating in his words ‘There is neither Jew nor Greek’ (Galatians 3:28) ‘For you are all sons of God in Christ Jesus (Galatians 3:26). It was universal faith in the resurrection of Jesus which was most important, as instructed by Paul, and that the worship of the God of Israel could be undergone by Jew and non-Jew alike. (Read on)
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
The New Radical Establishment
What the Left have always said about white-collar crime is now woven into the fabric of the establishment, hopefully this time for good
In a statement that buttresses so-called Tory “modernisation,” David Cameron recently called for the ‘day of reckoning’ against bankers who triggered the economic crisis, saying that the nation’s modest earners – “nurses and cleaners and [sic] teachers” – should not have to fund the “multi-billion pound taxpayer bail-out of the banks” adding "[t]here cannot be one law for the rich and another for everyone else."
Cameron had pledged support for a similar appropriation used by the Americans for those caught cheating the system – a prison sentence of up to 24 years in jail. “Justice” as Cameron was quoted as saying by the Evening Standard “is only effective when it is seen to be done — for the thug locked up for mugging people on the streets to the highest executive in the biggest firm who's been swindling the books.”
With its stylistic similarities to Woody Guthrie’s song Pretty Boy Floyd (“Yes, as through this world I’ve wandered, I’ve seen lots of funny men; some will rob you with a six-gun, and some with a fountain pen”) what Cameron’s message maintains is that the notion of ‘white-collar crime’ and economic determinism is now fully woven into the establishment after spending many years way out on the fringes.
What I mean by economic determinism is simply that the underpinnings of a working economy effects society as a whole. In this sense, it will not be unheard of, for example, that the economic crisis ‘see [a] rise in crime rates’. This might seem an obvious statement, but it does have its critics (and these critics would have traditionally found support from within the ranks of the Tory party). That the economy might be a factor towards the crime rate finds its critics waxing lyrical about genetic factors in crime development, crime occurring as a result of single parents or broken families, or even, in the spirit of Durkheim’s functionalist view of deviance, that crime is inevitable and even fairly beneficial for a society in small doses.
One other factor that obviously needs to be writ large in the assessment of crime is the neglected likeness of a “thug,” as Cameron describes, to a criminal banker. The obvious difference between the two criminals is that one performs a fairly evident crime, one in which has fairly accurate report figures. We see this type of criminality every night on the news, we know what it looks like and know the effects it has on society. Whereas on the other hand, a white-collar criminal is well concealed by the cover of an economy that, when at its best, fluctuates between high and low days.
Early in 2008, philosopher Slavoj Žižek published a book entitled Violence: Six Sideways Reflections in which he aims to describe the differences between the violence we see on the news in the form of thuggery and the violence incurred by the workings of the rogue bankers tweaking the economy. The difference, for Žižek, is the difference between “subjective” and “objective” violence. That is to say, “subjective” violence is the perceptibly obvious violence seen on the streets in the form of “crime and terror, civil unrest, international conflict” whereas “objective” violence is the unseen form of violence that takes the form of either the “symbolic” (bound in language and its forms), or the “systemic” (the catastrophic consequences of our economy when it is functioning as normal). The very notion that this objective violence is unseen sustains the level with which we perceive something as subjectively violent.
Žižek readily points to the likes of Bill Gates and George Soros as figureheads of a new type of business ethic that implicitly incorporates objective violence. They create a philanthropic standard for themselves at which they desire to be perceived, when in fact the more appropriate standard to which one should perceive them is at the concealed level of their function in the economy, an economy that determines the fate of individuals and whole nations. For instance when their philanthropy is contrasted to a street robber it might seem obvious who the violent criminal is, but when we start to analyse that which may not be readily perceptible – objective violence - , we start to understand their violence at another level, which the philanthropy has been used to camouflage.
Incidentally, we should extend this level of objective violence to the way in which George Bush has dealt with the Iraqi journalist, Muntadhar al-Zeidi, who threw a shoe at him last week, by which I mean, although neither him nor Nouri al-Maliki have sought charges, Bush has not come out in protest against Judge Dhia al-Kinani who said he does not have the legal option to drop the case, nor has he criticised the handling of al-Zeidi who was beaten and tortured into apologising for the incident. The level at which Bush desires to be perceived is one of him not holding a grudge, and not callously calling for viscious beatings on the journalist (he told ABC’s Martha Raddatz that he actually thought the shoe-throwing incident was “amusing” and that it was “a sign of a free society.”). But that is simply because the cruel punishment was always going to work in the way Bush wanted it to, he needn’t call for al-Zeidi’s imprisonment and torture, it will happen regardless, and Bush’s lack of motivation behind curbing Iraqi brutality only demonstrates that he embraces it. Surely his excuse will not be that he did not feel obliged to interfere in Iraq’s political and judicial system? Is this same mode of public image not true, also, of Tony Blair’s outgoing messages on the Iraq war, where despite the speculation that he was firm and convicted about sending troops in to overthrow Saddam and to find the Weapon’s of Mass Destruction, his appearances on television depict him as someone who battled with his own morals, and that whether history proves him wrong, “Hand on [his] heart, [he] did what [he] thought was right.”
Žižek, as a commentator, is obviously quite radical, but his views on the level of violence are now being employed by the least likely members of the British establishment. David Cameron even called for a “massive state intervention” into curbing white-collar criminality and what he called Labour’s “inaction”. This doesn’t marry rebellious anti-capitalism to the Conservative Party, but rather to show that the economic crisis has aroused – on the left and the right – what commentators on the left have been saying all along, that crime levels are bound in a pool of cause and effect and maintained by the current economic system.
Further, and this brings us full circle on the specifics of what Cameron said when he referenced thugs, white-collar criminality is usually concealed by the level of criminality addressed on the news, and often interpreted as moderate in comparison, certainly nothing to concern benign politicians about. But this is all set to change in the run of British parliamentary politics, and hopefully for good because opinion on the contrary to it is an inestimable error.
In a statement that buttresses so-called Tory “modernisation,” David Cameron recently called for the ‘day of reckoning’ against bankers who triggered the economic crisis, saying that the nation’s modest earners – “nurses and cleaners and [sic] teachers” – should not have to fund the “multi-billion pound taxpayer bail-out of the banks” adding "[t]here cannot be one law for the rich and another for everyone else."
Cameron had pledged support for a similar appropriation used by the Americans for those caught cheating the system – a prison sentence of up to 24 years in jail. “Justice” as Cameron was quoted as saying by the Evening Standard “is only effective when it is seen to be done — for the thug locked up for mugging people on the streets to the highest executive in the biggest firm who's been swindling the books.”
With its stylistic similarities to Woody Guthrie’s song Pretty Boy Floyd (“Yes, as through this world I’ve wandered, I’ve seen lots of funny men; some will rob you with a six-gun, and some with a fountain pen”) what Cameron’s message maintains is that the notion of ‘white-collar crime’ and economic determinism is now fully woven into the establishment after spending many years way out on the fringes.
What I mean by economic determinism is simply that the underpinnings of a working economy effects society as a whole. In this sense, it will not be unheard of, for example, that the economic crisis ‘see [a] rise in crime rates’. This might seem an obvious statement, but it does have its critics (and these critics would have traditionally found support from within the ranks of the Tory party). That the economy might be a factor towards the crime rate finds its critics waxing lyrical about genetic factors in crime development, crime occurring as a result of single parents or broken families, or even, in the spirit of Durkheim’s functionalist view of deviance, that crime is inevitable and even fairly beneficial for a society in small doses.
One other factor that obviously needs to be writ large in the assessment of crime is the neglected likeness of a “thug,” as Cameron describes, to a criminal banker. The obvious difference between the two criminals is that one performs a fairly evident crime, one in which has fairly accurate report figures. We see this type of criminality every night on the news, we know what it looks like and know the effects it has on society. Whereas on the other hand, a white-collar criminal is well concealed by the cover of an economy that, when at its best, fluctuates between high and low days.
Early in 2008, philosopher Slavoj Žižek published a book entitled Violence: Six Sideways Reflections in which he aims to describe the differences between the violence we see on the news in the form of thuggery and the violence incurred by the workings of the rogue bankers tweaking the economy. The difference, for Žižek, is the difference between “subjective” and “objective” violence. That is to say, “subjective” violence is the perceptibly obvious violence seen on the streets in the form of “crime and terror, civil unrest, international conflict” whereas “objective” violence is the unseen form of violence that takes the form of either the “symbolic” (bound in language and its forms), or the “systemic” (the catastrophic consequences of our economy when it is functioning as normal). The very notion that this objective violence is unseen sustains the level with which we perceive something as subjectively violent.
Žižek readily points to the likes of Bill Gates and George Soros as figureheads of a new type of business ethic that implicitly incorporates objective violence. They create a philanthropic standard for themselves at which they desire to be perceived, when in fact the more appropriate standard to which one should perceive them is at the concealed level of their function in the economy, an economy that determines the fate of individuals and whole nations. For instance when their philanthropy is contrasted to a street robber it might seem obvious who the violent criminal is, but when we start to analyse that which may not be readily perceptible – objective violence - , we start to understand their violence at another level, which the philanthropy has been used to camouflage.
Incidentally, we should extend this level of objective violence to the way in which George Bush has dealt with the Iraqi journalist, Muntadhar al-Zeidi, who threw a shoe at him last week, by which I mean, although neither him nor Nouri al-Maliki have sought charges, Bush has not come out in protest against Judge Dhia al-Kinani who said he does not have the legal option to drop the case, nor has he criticised the handling of al-Zeidi who was beaten and tortured into apologising for the incident. The level at which Bush desires to be perceived is one of him not holding a grudge, and not callously calling for viscious beatings on the journalist (he told ABC’s Martha Raddatz that he actually thought the shoe-throwing incident was “amusing” and that it was “a sign of a free society.”). But that is simply because the cruel punishment was always going to work in the way Bush wanted it to, he needn’t call for al-Zeidi’s imprisonment and torture, it will happen regardless, and Bush’s lack of motivation behind curbing Iraqi brutality only demonstrates that he embraces it. Surely his excuse will not be that he did not feel obliged to interfere in Iraq’s political and judicial system? Is this same mode of public image not true, also, of Tony Blair’s outgoing messages on the Iraq war, where despite the speculation that he was firm and convicted about sending troops in to overthrow Saddam and to find the Weapon’s of Mass Destruction, his appearances on television depict him as someone who battled with his own morals, and that whether history proves him wrong, “Hand on [his] heart, [he] did what [he] thought was right.”
Žižek, as a commentator, is obviously quite radical, but his views on the level of violence are now being employed by the least likely members of the British establishment. David Cameron even called for a “massive state intervention” into curbing white-collar criminality and what he called Labour’s “inaction”. This doesn’t marry rebellious anti-capitalism to the Conservative Party, but rather to show that the economic crisis has aroused – on the left and the right – what commentators on the left have been saying all along, that crime levels are bound in a pool of cause and effect and maintained by the current economic system.
Further, and this brings us full circle on the specifics of what Cameron said when he referenced thugs, white-collar criminality is usually concealed by the level of criminality addressed on the news, and often interpreted as moderate in comparison, certainly nothing to concern benign politicians about. But this is all set to change in the run of British parliamentary politics, and hopefully for good because opinion on the contrary to it is an inestimable error.
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Bees and Sex sans Benefits
At the time of writing this Brentford FC are at third place in Coca-Cola League Two after drawing 1-1 with Gillingham, with a game in-hand (exciting!). Although only twenty games into the season (about halfway) things might be looking up for The Bees, especially as they are, currently, in the promotion zone (oh yes, they could be heading up to Coca-Cola League One at this rate). For this to take place, however, every goal counts, and to be sure for every shot scored, there will be an overflow of enjoyment attained by he who shoots.
Allow me to work my magic here; The Bees will gain an excessive reward of pleasure (or a benefit of some sort, perhaps money) for every time they shoot successfully! But where might this not be the case? Well, those of us, like myself, who hold a certain soft spot for football and botany, will already see the antagonism here, and it rests in the obvious; pseudocopulation in the bee population.
But of course, in usual pollination a mutual benefit is achieved by plant and animal, whereas in pseudocopulation, no such benefit is attained by the pollinator, in this case our poor bee.
Allow me to explain pseduocopulation; in basic terms it is the attempt at copulation by a male insect with a female flower. The bee, attracted to the scent or sight of the flower, may well try to have his end away with it, knowing little or nothing about its being a flower at all. The flower is involved in a matter of deception.
The bee himself is wooed, in the case of the orchid, by the release of osmophores which are identical to the pheromones let-off by the species. Common, too, is the occurrence of visual mimicry in plants where a flower might appear like a sexually receptive female, in the case of the orchid it might appear as female Hymenoptera so as to be inseminated by an unlucky male of this order, only for him to find that he has been duped, probably humiliated and will, no less, carry a stigma (those of us, like myself, versed in botany and paronomasia will be truly grateful for the play on the word ‘stigma’ here, noting the reference to the stigmatised bee, and, of course, stigma as in the reproductive part of a female flower).
The most taxing taxonomic unit of orchid, especially for a seduced wasp, surely must be the Drakaea. Their labellum, or flower lips, contains calluses that have evolved into the shape, colour and touch of a female wasp in waiting. The male, probably red with delight, after some complex knocking manoeuvres involving his thorax and the flower’s pollinea, picks up the pollen and delivers to the next flower, who also deceives him (this bee just goes round being screwed over by these pollen hungry lady flowers).
We might be tempted to call the female flower’s systematically complex, and perverted deception here a form of body language, and if so, I call for this language to be identified as copulatic language. My reason for this name is that it obviously looks to relate with the word copulate. But, also, it is very reminiscent of Coptic Language, which is a minor spoken language in Egypt, of the Hamito-Semitic language family. It uses the Greek alphabet in its written form, but also borrows additional characters from Demotic script, which in turn has roots in Egyptian Hieroglyphics, which in turn has variations such as Cursive Hieroglyphics, and Cursive Handwriting is a type of handwriting more commonly referred to as joined up (give it a chance!).
Allow me to work my magic here; Cursive Handwriting, a root in Coptic Language, is a written word constructed using a single stroke, from the latin cursivus for ‘flowing’. Another term for this is, crucially, joined-up writing - that is to say, the joined-up set of symbols used to formulate language! And is this not what the flowers do to the bees? Do they not precisely form their own body language to join-up with bees, who in turn carry that element of the flower’s communication, in the form of pollen, to another deceiving, sex perverted flower?
As the Bee Gees have rightly pointed out on this very same topic, in the form of song, "Its only words, and words are all I have, to take your [pollen] away." Like the victimised bee, I feel that my message has now been sufficiently communicated.
Allow me to work my magic here; The Bees will gain an excessive reward of pleasure (or a benefit of some sort, perhaps money) for every time they shoot successfully! But where might this not be the case? Well, those of us, like myself, who hold a certain soft spot for football and botany, will already see the antagonism here, and it rests in the obvious; pseudocopulation in the bee population.
But of course, in usual pollination a mutual benefit is achieved by plant and animal, whereas in pseudocopulation, no such benefit is attained by the pollinator, in this case our poor bee.
Allow me to explain pseduocopulation; in basic terms it is the attempt at copulation by a male insect with a female flower. The bee, attracted to the scent or sight of the flower, may well try to have his end away with it, knowing little or nothing about its being a flower at all. The flower is involved in a matter of deception.
The bee himself is wooed, in the case of the orchid, by the release of osmophores which are identical to the pheromones let-off by the species. Common, too, is the occurrence of visual mimicry in plants where a flower might appear like a sexually receptive female, in the case of the orchid it might appear as female Hymenoptera so as to be inseminated by an unlucky male of this order, only for him to find that he has been duped, probably humiliated and will, no less, carry a stigma (those of us, like myself, versed in botany and paronomasia will be truly grateful for the play on the word ‘stigma’ here, noting the reference to the stigmatised bee, and, of course, stigma as in the reproductive part of a female flower).
The most taxing taxonomic unit of orchid, especially for a seduced wasp, surely must be the Drakaea. Their labellum, or flower lips, contains calluses that have evolved into the shape, colour and touch of a female wasp in waiting. The male, probably red with delight, after some complex knocking manoeuvres involving his thorax and the flower’s pollinea, picks up the pollen and delivers to the next flower, who also deceives him (this bee just goes round being screwed over by these pollen hungry lady flowers).
We might be tempted to call the female flower’s systematically complex, and perverted deception here a form of body language, and if so, I call for this language to be identified as copulatic language. My reason for this name is that it obviously looks to relate with the word copulate. But, also, it is very reminiscent of Coptic Language, which is a minor spoken language in Egypt, of the Hamito-Semitic language family. It uses the Greek alphabet in its written form, but also borrows additional characters from Demotic script, which in turn has roots in Egyptian Hieroglyphics, which in turn has variations such as Cursive Hieroglyphics, and Cursive Handwriting is a type of handwriting more commonly referred to as joined up (give it a chance!).
Allow me to work my magic here; Cursive Handwriting, a root in Coptic Language, is a written word constructed using a single stroke, from the latin cursivus for ‘flowing’. Another term for this is, crucially, joined-up writing - that is to say, the joined-up set of symbols used to formulate language! And is this not what the flowers do to the bees? Do they not precisely form their own body language to join-up with bees, who in turn carry that element of the flower’s communication, in the form of pollen, to another deceiving, sex perverted flower?
As the Bee Gees have rightly pointed out on this very same topic, in the form of song, "Its only words, and words are all I have, to take your [pollen] away." Like the victimised bee, I feel that my message has now been sufficiently communicated.
Monday, December 22, 2008
Why I am not an agnostic
“If God did exist”, asks the advert for the Alpha course that I see on a regular basis in London tube stations and across buses “what would you ask?” After spending a couple of minutes deciding what I’d ask God (namely, why am I an atheist?) I wonder why Alpha has chosen to present the question with the indecisive subordinating conjunction if. The atheist bus advert, too, adds its own measure of uncertainty: “There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.” (I’ve added my own italics for emphasis). (Read on)
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
German Economy waits for Gold, Frankincense, and Merkel (A Modern Day Keynesian Controversy)
Despite criticism from leading bankers and other European leaders, German Chancellor Angela Merkel remains defiant on her refusal to spend her way out of the recession, criticising the short-term initiatives employed by Britain, the US and France. Proof of her distinct agitation and non-compliance, if proof were needed, reverberates in her recent joke during a cabinet meeting: “What’s the difference between Communism and Capitalism? Communists nationalised companies first before running them.”
Her blows were swung at the US who she accused of using “cheap money” as a means of fiscal boost and French President Nicolas Sarkozy who voiced his aggravation with Berlin, saying, “While France is working, Germany is thinking.”
The motive for Merkel’s and her Coalition’s’ rebellion is not simply contrarian as might be suspected from the apparent stubbornness of German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrück “we are not obliged to copy what all other countries are doing,” when he unveiled plans to insert 31 billion euros to help boost the downturn. Rather it is her way of remaining loyal to the “Stability and Growth Pact” (SGP) originally proposed by the former Finance Minister Theo Waigel at the beginning of the 1990’s and agreed at the EU summit in Dublin in 1997.
The purpose of the pact – that has the backing of both Merkel’s Christian Democrats and Steinbrück’s Social Democrats – was to tune the euro so it would be able to compete with the US Dollar and strengthen the stability of the euro-zone. It has strict criteria which is the fountainhead of the present dispute.
Merkel also contends whether the aid for Commerzbank – the first commercial lender to seek Governmental capital - meet the terms of the 500bn euro rescue fund, approved by the EU, adding "Europe must, I say this clearly in relation to the German bank rescue package, act speedily".
The way other European leaders have tackled the financial crisis and the nature of Merkel’s rebellion should provide analysts with lessons of a modern day battle of Keynesian economics and its antagonists (It will be of no surprise that the SGP has its roots in the Keynesian-Monetarist controversies of the 1960’s-1970’s). The picture painted of Merkel by her critics as “faint-hearted” has been due to the perceived weakness of her stimulus plans, which amount to €11bn over two years, a mere pinch on the €480bn used by the by government as bank rescue.
Whereas the fashion is to stay true to Keynesian economics, namely book IV of Keynes’ General Theory entitled “Inducement to Invest” which instructs a reduction on interest rates and allowing a minimum of capital efficiency in order to promote governmental investment, Merkel has put Germany’s brakes on.
To critics that appeal to the lack of quick and effective relief in 1929 such as Peter Coy of Business Week, Merkel has claimed that the crisis cannot follow “an old script we can turn to”. Save for the extraordinary parallels Merkel’s plans have with the SGP and the clear reaction to the neo-Keynesian approach taken by her European peers – plans akin, in other words, to a script – the dispute does make for an interesting battle of economic theory in practice, and could be a decider for future crises.
Like Ela Soyemi for The Guardian has rightly pointed out “it is worth taking a good hard look at Merkel’s point.” In spite of financial hard times, conclusions may be drawn for the most appropriate action a government should take – fiscal boosts or hands on heads.
Her blows were swung at the US who she accused of using “cheap money” as a means of fiscal boost and French President Nicolas Sarkozy who voiced his aggravation with Berlin, saying, “While France is working, Germany is thinking.”
The motive for Merkel’s and her Coalition’s’ rebellion is not simply contrarian as might be suspected from the apparent stubbornness of German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrück “we are not obliged to copy what all other countries are doing,” when he unveiled plans to insert 31 billion euros to help boost the downturn. Rather it is her way of remaining loyal to the “Stability and Growth Pact” (SGP) originally proposed by the former Finance Minister Theo Waigel at the beginning of the 1990’s and agreed at the EU summit in Dublin in 1997.
The purpose of the pact – that has the backing of both Merkel’s Christian Democrats and Steinbrück’s Social Democrats – was to tune the euro so it would be able to compete with the US Dollar and strengthen the stability of the euro-zone. It has strict criteria which is the fountainhead of the present dispute.
Merkel also contends whether the aid for Commerzbank – the first commercial lender to seek Governmental capital - meet the terms of the 500bn euro rescue fund, approved by the EU, adding "Europe must, I say this clearly in relation to the German bank rescue package, act speedily".
The way other European leaders have tackled the financial crisis and the nature of Merkel’s rebellion should provide analysts with lessons of a modern day battle of Keynesian economics and its antagonists (It will be of no surprise that the SGP has its roots in the Keynesian-Monetarist controversies of the 1960’s-1970’s). The picture painted of Merkel by her critics as “faint-hearted” has been due to the perceived weakness of her stimulus plans, which amount to €11bn over two years, a mere pinch on the €480bn used by the by government as bank rescue.
Whereas the fashion is to stay true to Keynesian economics, namely book IV of Keynes’ General Theory entitled “Inducement to Invest” which instructs a reduction on interest rates and allowing a minimum of capital efficiency in order to promote governmental investment, Merkel has put Germany’s brakes on.
To critics that appeal to the lack of quick and effective relief in 1929 such as Peter Coy of Business Week, Merkel has claimed that the crisis cannot follow “an old script we can turn to”. Save for the extraordinary parallels Merkel’s plans have with the SGP and the clear reaction to the neo-Keynesian approach taken by her European peers – plans akin, in other words, to a script – the dispute does make for an interesting battle of economic theory in practice, and could be a decider for future crises.
Like Ela Soyemi for The Guardian has rightly pointed out “it is worth taking a good hard look at Merkel’s point.” In spite of financial hard times, conclusions may be drawn for the most appropriate action a government should take – fiscal boosts or hands on heads.
Sunday, December 7, 2008
Holes and Hot Air: What can be done for the North America-sized hole in the Antarctica?
Scientists from the United States government agency National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have released figures regarding the size of this year’s ozone hole over Antarctica. It is now around 10.5 million square miles wide and four miles deep, the fifth largest size since 1979. (Read on)
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