Soft targets
"Representatives from more than 100 countries are to meet to discuss outlawing the use of cluster bombs. " Not attending are US and China, and other nations that produce and store them. The Pope does support the cause - though its not clear how the Holy See effects munition deployment policy.
Even years after combat is over, the bomblets from cluster bombs can still main and kill hapless civilians. This of course makes the weapon seem particularly callous. But beyond tacit agreement between warring parties, I'm not sure that it is useful to go through a catalogue of weapons and say "this one is good", but "that one is really beyond the pail". Designed correctly, a
ll weapons are dangerous. Maybe the problem is the war they are used in?
Trite, I know. Maybe there are so many small conflicts that are really beyond the judgemental worlds control, that even superficial fixes seem worth making. But that's much like asking armed robbers to please not use shotguns, because of the terrible noise they make when they go off.
The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament was flawed in a similar way. Instead of focusing on the problems that capitalism and communism were (and still are) producing, members protested that they didn't want to die in a nuclear war. Well, I wouldn't like to be hacked by a machete either.
We now accept that communism was a much bigger blight than any war could achieve. And the West is slowly accepting that results of unfettered capitalism are keeping vast numbers of humans in poverty. Continuing to reconcile real problems is lengthy, boring and sometimes futile but gesture politics is truly callous.
Crime and Punishment
"We cannot and should not pasteurise the streets of this city. They will always be full of life and excitement, but they can be safer, and they will be."
That is a very sound statement, but Mr Johnson, the new Mayor of London, has a brand new crime manifesto. If the voters were specifically concerned with crime, they had a real ex-policeman to choose from. But Brian Paddick came a distant third.
For a Conservative, talking about crime is code for a respect for private possessions, the right to hold accumulated wealth and defence from the unruly. In short, the speaker has no socialist leanings. This posturing is irrelevant in modern London, where we all walk pass the stinking rich and the homeless everyday. A Londoner accepts extreme socialism and extreme capitalism without blinking.
Serious crime in any big city defies prediction and often understanding. It certainly cannot be legislated for by a Mayor. The number of sociopaths attracted to a city dwarfs the size of any organised policing system. Indeed, it probably subsumes any policing system.
What there is left to talk about is anti-social behaviour and marginal crimes. And there is a never ending conversation about how to deal with these. Whatever initiatives the Mayor adds to the list I somehow doubt they will stop some ruffian nicking your bike, picking your pocket or puking on your tube train. And you will be rightly riled when it happens.
Measuring the quality of city life by how long you can go without being touched by crime is pointless. In the same way that measuring happiness by the number of consumer goods you have doesn't really work. Society only advances when large numbers of people live and work close to each other in relative freedom. And so does crime.
Fixing broken lights, cleaning up graffiti (unless its by Banksy of course) and creeping gentrification is how most cities successfully improve themselves. Mr Johnson does have other plans that he will hopefully spend his time on as opposed to confusing the Metropolitan Police any further.
Amateurs
Truth is quite a separate thing from opinion. To calculate 24 plus 36, would you ask 100 people for their answers and take the average? We have all heard multiple diverging descriptions of a single event enough times to realise that even with the truth in plain sight, people report things wrongly or are hopelessly prejudicial. Sadly, you have to be trained to observe accurately. Opinion, however, is cheap to produce and cannot be countered.
A very worthwhile new documentary entitled
The Truth According To Wikipedia brings up some interesting points about the wisdom of crowds, and the quality of information. One accusation levelled at that the founders of the webs Encyclopedia is that they are libertarians. And its true that the ageing hippies responsible for the current state of the internet are probably the digital equivalent of a survivalist state militia who hate authority, formality and control.
The author
Andrew Keen gets a reasonable amount of time in the film to expound his 'elitist' views. For him, experts are more right than amateurs and the blogosphere weakens quality media. The opposite view may lightly be characterised by the Zulu term
ubuntu - all information lacks meaning in isolation and all views should be equally respected. As facts have to be placed in a useful human context - there is lots of "truth" that won't help anyone live - there should be value to local truth as well as just absolute truth. It may be Einsteins universe, but we live in Newtons world.
Not all of the films polemic hits Wikipedia accurately. Where an aggregate medium excels is in the collection of knowledge. While no amount of opinions can somehow coalesce into truth, capturing the knowledge of millions creates a dynamic picture of any topic. In most situations you don't actually require the sharply focused truth, just a helpful sketch. And the chaotic democracy of Wikipedia is actually held together by some fairly sensible sentinels - whose access looks suspiciously hierarchical. Another saving grace is that a vandals attention span is mercifully short.
Keen's point is more relevant when examining how (western) society is fragmenting into millions of personal self interested bubbles. He refers to
digital narcissism when talking about internet culture. Even if the bubbles collaborate on occasion with other bubbles they know, its hard to build up knowledge if everyone starts from their own position. Equal access to information leads to all information being equal. So importance on the internet is just popularity, and thus quality loses meaning.
The combination of pure democracy and anonymity seems to have very specific strengths and weaknesses. Wikipedia may represent both of sides. Whether the web can assert quality or just increase fracture should become apparent in the next few years. At the moment, it could be Lord of the Flies.
Zombie
While watching the credits roll for "There will be Blood" in the comfortable Curzon Soho, I noticed that the film was based on a book by Upton Sinclair.
Then I remembered why this Upton Sinclair bloke sounded familiar. He featured in a strange novel called "U.S.!" by Chris Bachelder ( the author of the brilliant "Bear vs Shark"). In the book, Upton Sinclair is an old school "muck raking" socialist who believes that with just a bit more persuading, America will become socialist. He is continually assassinated, and resurrected. The technicalities of resurrection are not discussed - this is just something that happens. After reading it, I confirmed that Sinclair was indeed a real (but properly dead) politician of the American left.
What is particularly odd is how reasonable the whole thing seems. Despite the massive conceit, the book engineers itself in such a way as to make socialism in the USA the only truly unlikely idea. I can believe in Zombies, but not state control of the economy.
And indeed this is probably intended. There is still a trace left of an anti-capitalist message in "There will be Blood", yet one does not really notice it. Its as if the oil economy, which is the driver for every character in the film, somehow is just a backdrop. It is now very hard for our western minds to conceive of any system other than free market capitalism. Even an imminent banking collapse seems not to disturb this.
It probably requires a logical impossibility, or at the very least a large shock, to test our belief in capitalism sufficiently to question it effectively. An atomic bomb was needed to check Japanese belief in the infallibility of the Emperor. A lengthy depression combined with a minor environmental disaster may cause not just a change of heart, but a violent swing away from what we have now.
Markets are as old as crossroads, but normally the price of anything is related to its value. The logic that ties the value of your house to a pyramid scheme of faulty loans, promises, consumer spending, credit debt and fractional-reserve banking is one that most people are willing to ignore while things are good. When confronted with the truth we are forced to take either the blue pill or the red pill. But the economy may only be working now because we have chosen to swallow the blue pill for such a long time.
Dusk till Dawn
Before long, your DNA data will be held on a database, and you will have given it willingly. But the database will belong to a private company, and you will be paid good money for it. But that's the near future.
For now, it looks as if the police have done everyone a favour by bringing up the issue of
compulsory DNA collection before it could be silently introduced without debate. By shining a light on the issue before the necessary spin could be readied, the Home Office have been forced to deny interest in the idea.
The fact that being arrested (not convicted) is sufficient to have your DNA recorded, and that it is near impossible to remove the record is a legal blemish being tackled by a number of human rights lawyers. Interestingly, serving police officers must give a DNA sample, but this is removed from records as soon as they retire. The upshot has been the human rights argument that either everyone's DNA should be recorded - or no ones should be.
But it maybe dangerous to play this bluff, because circumstances can quickly change. We have already seen how one terrorist incident has led to the removal of hundreds of liberties and long held values throughout the world. Had the wheels spun quicker, we would all have been walking around with biometric identity cards by now.
If it was simply about solving crimes, then most people would agree that a DNA database addresses the symptoms not the cause. Clearly a nationwide dusk till dawn curfew will abruptly reduce crime. In fact I can think of all manner of liberty denying ideas that I hope will never be implemented in peace time. The current administration, however, have few qualms about borrowing the tactics from police states if there are votes in it, or quotas are satisfied. More to the point, they are upfront with the moral challenge - if you are innocent, you have nothing to hide.
While identity may be an issue with a lot of bloggers, it isn't to the public at large. Which is where privately held databases holding your DNA come in. They will effectively become brokers to interested parties. Researchers, insurance agents, and a lot of other people would like to peruse a large sample of geolocated human DNA. How would it work? You sign up, you get swabbed, and you get paid. Your DNA is public - but whose DNA belongs to who is not released; it is public, yet anonymous. If the police arrest you, but can't find the DNA they are looking for in the database(s) you registered with, you are in the clear. People with no hereditary diseases will join exclusive databases for insurance perks - the same way safe drivers do today.
Naturally criminals will not sign up - so the position will be the exact opposite of how it is now. Again, liberty will be successfully brokered by the private sector. Because whatever people feel about trust, convenience and money are always the number one concerns.
Old battles on new fronts
There were a lot of "demos" back in 70's London. A demonstration would usually involve thousands of people, with crudely daubed placards marching down Park Lane, maybe meeting in Trafalgur square. With plenty of aggressive unions, fashionable terrorists, spiralling inflation, less than frank government and the likelihood of thermonuclear destruction, people had a choice of issues to protest about.
A demonstration is only as good as its media coverage. But the "new media" path to finding and covering current events is a bit different - what follows is an example from this morning.
After noticing an interesting remark on
Twitter , I was directed to a site that carried live feed from
mobile phone cameras. I was surprised to see a live demonstration, outside the Scientology building close to where I work in Blackfriars. Indeed I've mentioned the cult and their occupation of a historic building
previously. Shaky footage of casually dressed twenty somethings, complete with placards, confirmed that this was indeed an old style demo.
The self anonymisation of the protesters was interesting. Many were wearing masks, scarves and hoodies. While this was partly to get in the mood, the inevitable presence of filming observers and plentiful CCTV cameras provided another reason to cover up. The police presence appeared to be visible but restrained. The video mentioned 300 or so protestors.
The other interesting feature was the "back channel". While the live streaming video was coming through on the site, instant message style text comments from other web viewers was published below the images. This is a fairly common concept today, underlining that very little media need be passive. It would be quite reasonable to assume some of the protestors would see some of these comments; indeed there were comments directed to that end.
The nature of the protest was interesting. How do you protest against Scientology? It is a fairly daft venture even for a cult, but seems to have quite a bit of money behind it. The protesters did not seem well practiced in throwing live insults, and indeed the back channel tried to give hints and inspiration. They were also unsure whether they should "present" what was happening, or just point the camera. Many on the back channel wondered when the BBC would cover the protest. The main direction of complaint centred around the cult's secretive nature, the fact that it isn't free, and their habit of stifling complaint by litigation. There is also the distinct feeling that the movement seems to escape government scrutiny.
While the guiding hand of main stream media was evident in what occured, it has been the case that from seeing the link to writing this entry I have not turned on the radio, the TV or visited a recognised news website. I do still feel the need to see events reflected somewhere - the need for official blessing is strong. But it seems less fanciful to imagine that before long what was the source of news, slowly morphs to the lesser position of archive.
Do-gooders
If Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) sounds like an oxymoron, then maybe you believe that no company will ever do anything "good" unless it is legally obliged to do so. However, many modern organisations are often prepared to do good things without being forced to, usually in a philanthropic manner (Bill Gates comes to mind).
This can be seen as a relatively new idea, or the old Victorian concept of charity, depending on your point of view. The Economist mentioned in its lengthy special report that the goal of CSR is often to mitigate against social disasters (e.g. sorry about polluting the atmosphere, but we now grow nice trees) or to show a worthy side while recruiting naïve graduates. It is sometimes just boardroom waffle.
Obviously the flip side is that the more a company does to behave, the less government has to do. This allows a minister to pass the buck to large corporations when things go wrong. If kids are fat, it's the fault of fast food producers. If roads are smelly, blame car manufacturers and so on. Either way, the state gives way to the private sector.
Can this principle work elsewhere? Can a company push against government regulation in other areas because it is can take responsibility for itself?
When I was dropped off a block away from the entrance of Glasgow airport a week ago, it took me a few minutes to remember that it suffered from an attack by terrorist doctors, in the middle of last year. To stop any more car bombers, three foot steel barriers now protect the entrance to the terminal buildings. That should be sufficient to foil any further terrorists planning to do exactly the same thing again. Lets hope they are deeply unimaginative.
As yet another plane was delayed for no clear reason, it was easy to see how the airline industry has become beholden to forces other than economics. Clearly airport authorities feel that safety is more important than flying planes. But this is probably only because they have been told to see things that way. Few customers entirely agree with the current balance.
It is fairly obvious that running an airline smoothly is more important to society than following government inspired fear regulations. It might be that CSR should inform airlines that it is to everyones benefit to run what is already an environmentally harmful industry as efficiently as possible. It might be that I trust an airline to judge security concerns more than I trust government because they are not trying to justify illegal wars.
Usually companies fight regulation quietly with lobbyists. But it might be better for them to try and make the process more transparent. As we have seen recently, handing politicians unattributable amounts of money in lieu of services just gets them in trouble. Better to stop the backhanders to government and try airing the unpleasant issues in public as well as the nice ones.
