Why Bullying Still Exists

The other day I was listening to an interview with the United States Senator Amy Klobuchar, being conducted by the British economics magazine, The Economist.

The interview was on Big Tech and monopolies, e.g. Amazon, Google, Facebook etc. but after the main interview the interviewer, Anne McElvoy, asked Ms Klobuchar about, confirmed, reporting of behaviours from her which would fall under the category of bullying. Ms Klobuchar responded by saying that we, to paraphrase, live and learn. Ms McElvoy then went into reminiscences about how, when she was starting out in the media (she is in her later 50s now), people used to throw phones at people and engage in other behaviour which seems to fit under the bracket of bullying (if you have read Michael Lewis’ memoir about his time at trading firm Salomon Brothers,  Liar’s Poker, you will have a rough idea of the kind of things that went on in business in the 1980s). Ms McElvoy then asked Ms Klobuchar if the actions would have been reported if she were a man.

Let’s break this down. An elected official is asked if she bullies people. Her answer/non-answer says yes. The journalist then shares, with delight it seems from hr voice, happy memories about when she used to be witness, and possibly party, to such behaviours. This was then passed of as something we probably couldn’t do now…

The argument being made here is that bullying behaviour which used to be acceptable is no longer acceptable as people are too soft, an argument you hear often. For example, in football, former players brag how managers would grab players by their throats and scream at them whilst smashing their heads against the wall. Sir Alex Ferguson’s legendary ‘hairdryer treatment’, where he would go face to face with someone and scream abuse at them is seen as something which, unfortunately, is no longer in the game. The likes of Graeme Souness, who once instructed a player (Don Hutchinson) to ‘two-foot’ (jump in at them with two feet which is now known as a ‘leg-breaker’ tackle/foul) so that the opposition manager would be angry so that Souness could fight him and Roy Keane, who once deliberately broke another player’s legs, ending his career, as revenge for an accident where the other player injured Keane, are paraded over the television to slam players for being ‘too soft’ and not being as they were as players and managers.

One was to look at this is that people are ‘too soft’ (bloody millennials). Another way to look at this is that behaviour which would result in prison time probably should not be acceptable in sport or politics or finance or media etc.

The second part of the defence, that Ms Klobuchar is female, is as insulting to women as it is to men. The suggesting being that bad behaviour is good, unless women do it and are unfairly called out on it.

Whilst it would be nice to see these as isolated events, everywhere in society we see the same such behaviours. Recent movements in gender and social equality, and the opposition that they receive, just goes to show that away from the individual and enablers carrying out such actions, these actions are very serious and can have lasting, and at times tragic (suicide, for one), consequences. That they are still able to carry on in the 21^st Century just goes to show that this problem is deep-rooted within society itself.

It is no secret that bad behaviours are carried out by those who are insecure about themselves, their lives, their social status etc. and, as these people obtain senior positions in society, those who are younger, finding their feet must conform or face punishment, again sometimes very severe, such as loss of employment or becoming the focus of bullying, or even crucifixion etc. Thusly, society is broken because those who broke it are too weak to admit that the fault lies in them, not in their parents (sorry Freud), and attempt to fix it. Until this happens, bullying, rape, war, misogyny, racism etc. will continue until one day the last human looks around at the world, sees no one to blame but their self and dies of shame.

‘till next time     

Proportional Responses

For the last 70 odd years there has been conflict in the Middle East. The conflict is, primarily, between Palestinians and the State of Israel (note: when offered their own state after World War II, the Palestinians declined). I, as with 99.9% of the people who speak on this subject, am woefully unqualified to speak on this subject. Rather, in this piece I wish to look at the perception of the situation and perform a critique. (Note: this is not to condone actions on either side, just to try to understand the perspective of those involved)

Nowadays, it seems, to be a liberal one must condemn Israel and support the Palestinians without question. This, one might note, is the very principle which liberals criticise Conservatives for with the, for example, United States ‘unwavering’ support of Israel, a support which, one might note, is not ‘unwaving’ as the Obama Administration took a hard line with the Israeli Government.

The other day I was watching the excellent Last Week Tonight with John Oliver. For those who don’t know, the show looks at news stories and gives some depth and perspective with the host, John Oliver, using far too much obscenity and sexual inuendo to make himself ‘interesting’.   It would be unfair to lay all of the criticism and praise at his feet for, if one sees him on unscripted appearances, such as chat shows, he seems your average unremarkable person, thusly, the persona he adopts for his show is partially his and partially his writing team, or as he calls them, ‘my staff’.

On the show he was talking about the recent escalation of the conflict. The show over the last few years has condemned ‘whataboutism’, which is the principle of where bad behaviour for one is excused by bad behaviour of another (we spoke about it here a couple of weeks ago, if you are interested it may be worth reading), yet Mr Oliver’s argument, in relation to the Middle East conflict, went along these lines:

(in condescending tones)

Yes Israel was attacked, but they have what they call and ‘Iron Shield’ to protect them, an antimissile section, so when they retaliated they were attacking a people without an ‘Iron Shield’, therefore they are wrong and have committed inexcusable actions.

He later went on to condemn a member of the Biden administration for saying that the deaths of Palestinian and Israeli children was equally bad.

Let’s break this down. Mr Oliver states that one country was attacked and defended itself and then retaliated meaning that the original victim was the only one to blame. He also suggested that human lives aren’t equal, for he was saying that the death of a Palestinian child is more tragic than the death of an Israeli child, which is an acceptable loss.

This, as you can see, is completely and utterly stupid. The conflict was caused by the inaction of the Allied Forces (UK, US, France etc.) and the murder of Jewish people (the Israeli state was created out of guilt post-WWII) and centuries old religious differences. For decades the official policies of the surrounding Muslim Nations has been to ‘drive the Jews into the sea’. Whilst, for many this policy may not be official now, the sentiment is still there. As the Arab states also refused to help the Palestinians by giving them safe harbour, these two displaced peoples find themselves in a predominantly desert country trying to scratch out a survival, a situation which could have been easily avoided if the countries who created the conflicts had shown more leadership and action.

The response by the Israeli’s to the current attacks has been called ‘disproportionate’.  By a country with a better army using its strength against a weaker army. But let’s look at why this is. If Israel went for a proportionate response, i.e. the Old Testament notion of ‘an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth’, then they would fire small rockets back. As we have seen, this is a longstanding conflict, and, if Israel, respond in kind, others may become emboldened. Israel is a state of 6 million Jewish people surrounded by 336,700,079 (85.5% of the Middle East) people who have an ingrained cultural and political policy to drive the Jews of off the face of the earth. Thusly if every country takes pot-shots, emboldened by a proportional response, then pretty soon the State of Israel will witness genocide. To prevent this, Israel has but one choice, not to ‘turn the other cheek’ or respond ‘an eye for an eye’ as this will, probably, just hasten their demise. Rather they have to respond in such a manner that people will think twice before attacking again.

The reality of the situation is that these are two people desperately trying to survive, to clean up the mess created by the so-called Superpowers. Whilst, historically, it is far too complex to understand, I doubt there is anyone alive now who really understands it, if indeed anyone ever did. Going forward the policy should be simple. No longer should Liberals shout how Jewish lives are worth less than Palestinian lives, rather people should realise that all lives are equal and instead of watching and condemning actions, people should try to find a real solution. After all, we are to blame for creating the mess, so we are responsible for helping to clean it up.

‘till next time

(I wrote more on this topic in the book The Ethics of a Global Community if you wish for a deeper study)

Gender Biases in Language

The other day, when being instructed, I replied, ‘Yes, Master’. The person (lady) to whom I was talking did not respond to this well. She pointed out that, as she was a lady, it was inappropriate for me to refer to her as ‘master’, as master was a word used to denote males. I replied, with my apologises, that I was using the word ‘Master’ in the original Latin context to denote one who has authority, regardless of gender. Indeed, for those who are curious, it is only once the word entered the French language did it take on gender roles for, as you know, the French like to separate words into genders (note: how do you know if a table is male or female? Lift up the tablecloth and have a look).

My hesitance in using the modern female form of the word ‘Master’, ‘Mistress’, is that, with many words which have male and female denotations, the words gain connotations which are not often consistent. For example, a Master is known as a strong leader who demands respect. That so many people demand the word ‘Master’ in relation to other people (think slavery) or others thought of as inferior (think pet ownership) goes to suggest at the significance that this word can have in relation to the most pathetic of all of God’s creatures, the human ego. Likewise, the word ‘Mistress’, also has connotations not intended in the original formation of the word, yet, as the male form of the word was designed to show power, the female form is designed to show weakness, indeed the mistress may be the property of the master (think sexual politics; how a man can have a wife and a mistress, the mistress being something owned by the man and having connotations less than flattering).

One thing I have noted previously about a lot of what I call pseudo-feminism is how negative stereotypes created by language are embraced by those who call themselves, but who are not really, feminists. Let’s look at a couple of examples.

It has been said often that the worst thing that someone can be called is a c**t. This one word creates a level of perverse reaction not seen by any other word. Indeed, it is a word considered worse than others such as ‘slave’, ‘paedophile’, ‘rapist’ and other words which professional, and other, comedians use to create hilarity on mainstream TV shows such as Saturday Night Live (SNL) in America (note: for those who don’t know, SNL is a sketch comedy TV series which specialises at mocking people, not for substantive things, such as racism, misogyny etc. but rather for things like; oh look, that famous person talks funny, let’s mock them! oh look, that famous person suffered a personal indiscretion, let’s highlight it and humiliate them).

Let us consider the word c**t. What is a c**t? It is an informal term for female genitalia. You can see why it might be offensive to call someone genitalia, right? But the male equivalent, for example, a c**k, carries little or no connotations, indeed, some people in business, and other walks of life, want to be thought of as ‘BSD’ (Big Swinging Dicks), an early precursor to ‘Ballers’. So why is female genitalia considered so much more offensive than male genitalia, so much so that whilst male genitalia can have positive connotations (if you’ve been kicked in the head by a horse, that is), female genitalia cannot? The answer seems to be along the lines of gender bias, something supported by many pseudo-feminists.

Another example is the difference between male and female canines. To be a male canine, a ‘Dog’, is seen as the animal version of the BSD. A man who is promiscuous is called ‘A Dog’ as a flattering term. The best personification of this is in the excellent TV show Frasier, in which one of the characters, the host of the sports’ radio phone-in, is called Bulldog whose main shtick is that he barks at women and sleeps around. People rolls their eyes at him, but his behaviour is encouraged by the radio station, even when the owner is female. To call someone a ‘bitch’, a female dog, does not carry the positive connotations as being a ‘Dog’, nor are the ‘eye rolling’ aspects tolerated. Even if the word has entered the mainstream vernacular, for example the B word is often heard on TV and not just on the ‘we-have-no-stories-so-we-just-appeal-to-the-lowest-common-denominator’ shows such as Game of Thrones or Friends, but in everyday TV. The phrase is never used as a positive, rather it is considered a good put-down to say, ‘she is a bitch’, or that, ‘she is bitchy’, or that, ‘she was bitching’. However, it is important to note, that whilst the male form ‘Dog’ is used for a man who is promiscuous, the terms for a woman who is the same is much worse.

Attempts to rectify the gender imbalance in the mainstream are as idiotic as they are pointless. A new film I saw advertised is about a lady who pretends to be drunk to find ‘nice guys’ to take her home so she can accuse them of raping her to strike a blow for feminists everywhere. This, as you can see, is not feminism, it is hypocrisy, the female equivalent of the male version. The fact this is advertised as a great film is deeply concerning as it will move everyone further away from the equality which feminism is truly about, not creating division but creating equality so that, instead of relying on ‘affirmative action’, people will focus on people as they are not how they appear aesthetically. If people really wanted to create a more equal society they would first look at the building blocks of our reality, language, and either remove the stigma of words to create an equal meaning, or, even better, find other words to express themselves without having to rely on negative connotations to make their point, a point often not worth making.

‘till next time  

On Kindness

A few years ago, I started work on a Unified Theory of Ethics. Having created the theory, the next step is how to implement such a theory in practical terms. Whilst that is a story for another time, it got me thinking about human behaviour. A lot of what we are is behavioural, yes, influenced by our natures and nurturing, but formed through habit and repetition, as the adage goes, practice makes permanent. However, there are some aspects of who we are which are beyond our control. I am referring to who we are instinctually, behaviours which stem from the unconscious mind.

One group of people, of whom I have written before, which I found particularly interesting are those who are considered to be so smart that they have mental health issues/disorders. As we spoke of the other week, these stigmas are often created by those who are on a ‘lower’ level of thinking not being able to understand ‘higher’ levels of thinking, but they are also created by an inability to, as the Native Americans said, ‘walk a mile in their shoes’.  This got me thinking, for, often we find that people with extraordinary levels of intellectual and emotional intelligence are very kind and generous people, although maybe distant in a physical and basic emotional sense. I am referring here to the likes of the French writer Marcel Proust, the physicist Albert Einstein, the pioneering Ukrainian writer Gogol, whom the great Russian writer Dostoyevsky expressed the debt all post-Gogol Russian literature owes to Gogol, who, in turn, the German philosopher Nietzsche expressed a debt to, et al., the point I’m making being that these are people at the very pinnacle of their fields.

The question here is, what is it about these men (yes, there are women too, but as this trend is irrelevant of gender I think we should consider them people not genders, anyway) which makes them seem so kind? The answer is, as we can see in, for example Gogol’s masterpiece The Overcoat, in which he looks at depth at the role of poverty for the individual and the individual and his poverty within society, is that that aforementioned have great levels of empathy. For example, whilst much fiction is superficial and focuses on the aesthetics (if I read one more fantasy/sci-fi novel which described an older lady as ‘still attractive, despite her obvious age’, I’m going to get grumpy- as if I could!) the writings of the aforementioned, in different fields have seemed to follow closer to the words of the great Dutch philosopher, Spinoza and his assertion that;

‘I have striven not to laugh at human actions, not to weep at them, nor to hate them, but to understand them’,

which manifests itself not only in their writings but in biographical reports of them (auto and other).

Given their exceptionally high levels of both intellectual and emotional intelligence, they seem to have an ability to empathise with other people, be they the downtrodden poor of Dostoyevsky, the upper class twits of Proust or the plight of the Jew in Einstein’s non-physics work. Indeed, one could very easily borrow from a Bob Dylan song here and say,

‘…[they] know too much to argue or to judge’.

Whilst Dylan’s meaning, although reverent, is ambiguous, I think we can deduce that, as in the case studies above, Dylan is saying that if you have great levels of intellectual and emotional intelligence, not only are you less likely to be judgemental as you can understand better from the other’s perspective, but you are more likely to be kind.

It is important to note that both intellectual and emotional intelligence must be at a high level for one to reach these elevated states. Many intellectually smart people have been very unpleasant or have excused exceptionally bad behaviour due to an emotional bond with the one doing it (think liberal pioneer Hannah Arendt’s acceptance of Heidegger’s active Nazism due to having been lovers), also many emotionally smart people have caused great harm not being able to use their emotional intelligence well, yet I think that, evidence suggests, when you get that rarest of all blends- high emotional intelligence and high intellectual intelligence, the oft misused word ‘Genius’, then what manifests is the greatest of all human attributes, what I would argue is either the by-product of true genius or partial cause of (I have no idea which, maybe both),  true kindness.

But even if we aren’t Prousts or Einsteins, we can all still be kind, for after all, what is a better thing to be?

‘till next time