Tuesday, August 26, 2003
A nation of spivs
I have just finished reading a really great book by Donald Thomas called "An Underworld at War: Spivs, Deserters, Racketeers and Civilians in the Second World War".
This book really was a inisight because the second world war is rosily remembered as a time when the British people buried their differences to work together against a common enemy - a period of unity in adversity, with the armed forces bravely carrying the torch for democracy and selfless civilians building an honest and upright Home Front.
Over the years, several historians (among them Angus Calder and Corelli Barnett) have tried to correct this sentimentalised self-portrait. But Donald Thomas is the first to concern himself exclusively with the wartime criminal underclass - the spivs, swindlers, traitors, looters, gangsters, deserters, robbers, rapists and racketeers. This is the story not of the dogged British Tommy but of his dodgy brothers, Flash Harry and Jack the Lad.
As Thomas says with understandable nervousness at the outset, it's not his intention to deny the heroism and self-sacrifice. But so comprehensive is his demythologising that you begin to wonder whether there was anyone who wasn't on the fiddle. The criminality came, in part, from the privation. With so many basic items subject to rationing - meat, butter, clothes, paper, petrol and cigarettes - even men and women who were instinctively law-abiding found themselves turning to theft and fraud. Everything from paint to coffin lids was subject to pilfering.
When goods belonged to the state, no one was hurt by them going missing; when "fair shares" weren't being given, they had to be grabbed; when nobs were stockpiling provisions, proles had every right to use the black market - so the justifications for dealing and stealing ran. But it wasn't just the poor who ended up in court or prison. Among the celebrities who ran foul of the law were Noël Coward, fined the equivalent of £64,000 for failing to declare investments, and Ivor Novello, sent to prison for four weeks for the private - and therefore prohibited - use of his Rolls-Royce.
Burglary, offences against property, GBH: all increased during the war, with an especially sharp rise in crime as hostilities drew to a close. The average citizen was 85 per cent more likely to be a victim of violence in 1945 than in 1940. But the vast majority of transgressions were minor (counterfeit ration books, over-charging, goods falling off the back of a lorry), and many offences wouldn't have been offences at any other time. The applauded peacetime profit-maker became the derided wartime profiteer. There was more lawbreaking because there were more laws to break.
One of the more bizarre crimes under the Defence Regulations was the spreading of "alarm and despondency". A Mrs Rycraft of Wood Green was found guilty of this in 1941, after telling her local housewives' club "we will never win the war" and encouraging them to demand bigger rations; a Mrs Hayward of Brighton was fined £25 (no paltry sum when the average weekly wage was £4.50) for remarking to a shop assistant, "we do not get true news in the newspapers because journalists are all crooks". Undaunted, Mrs Hayward was soon back in court for uttering pro-German sentiments and was sentenced to a month's hard labour.
Some offenders were shopped by their neighbours. But the state also appointed its own snoops and narks, whose methods smacked of Stalin or the Gestapo. "I am suspected, inspected, examined, informed, required and commanded so that I do not know who the hell I am and where I am, or why I am here at all," one small trader complained to his MP.
Shopkeepers took the brunt of the petty officialdom. The attractive young woman inveigling the butcher to give her an extra ounce of steak might turn out to be from the Ministry of Food. The sneakiest example of entrapment was the army car driven round London with a union flag on its bonnet and only the driver inside - anyone failing to "salute the flag" would then be arrested by the military police following behind.
By today's standards, punishments were severe: hefty fines, long sentences, even execution. Though rape was not a capital offence under English law, the Visiting Forces Act gave the US power to administer its own code of justice, and eight American servicemen were hanged for raping British women. The darker their skin, the less forgiving the authorities.
One example that for some reason caught my attention was the case of Leroy Henry, a black truck driver from St Louis, Missouri, was courtmartialled and sentenced to death for raping a 33-year-old married woman near Bath, though the evidence suggested she was a willing partner; it was only thanks to a campaign by the Tribune and the Daily Mirror that Henry was reprieved.
(0) comments
I have just finished reading a really great book by Donald Thomas called "An Underworld at War: Spivs, Deserters, Racketeers and Civilians in the Second World War".
This book really was a inisight because the second world war is rosily remembered as a time when the British people buried their differences to work together against a common enemy - a period of unity in adversity, with the armed forces bravely carrying the torch for democracy and selfless civilians building an honest and upright Home Front.
Over the years, several historians (among them Angus Calder and Corelli Barnett) have tried to correct this sentimentalised self-portrait. But Donald Thomas is the first to concern himself exclusively with the wartime criminal underclass - the spivs, swindlers, traitors, looters, gangsters, deserters, robbers, rapists and racketeers. This is the story not of the dogged British Tommy but of his dodgy brothers, Flash Harry and Jack the Lad.
As Thomas says with understandable nervousness at the outset, it's not his intention to deny the heroism and self-sacrifice. But so comprehensive is his demythologising that you begin to wonder whether there was anyone who wasn't on the fiddle. The criminality came, in part, from the privation. With so many basic items subject to rationing - meat, butter, clothes, paper, petrol and cigarettes - even men and women who were instinctively law-abiding found themselves turning to theft and fraud. Everything from paint to coffin lids was subject to pilfering.
When goods belonged to the state, no one was hurt by them going missing; when "fair shares" weren't being given, they had to be grabbed; when nobs were stockpiling provisions, proles had every right to use the black market - so the justifications for dealing and stealing ran. But it wasn't just the poor who ended up in court or prison. Among the celebrities who ran foul of the law were Noël Coward, fined the equivalent of £64,000 for failing to declare investments, and Ivor Novello, sent to prison for four weeks for the private - and therefore prohibited - use of his Rolls-Royce.
Burglary, offences against property, GBH: all increased during the war, with an especially sharp rise in crime as hostilities drew to a close. The average citizen was 85 per cent more likely to be a victim of violence in 1945 than in 1940. But the vast majority of transgressions were minor (counterfeit ration books, over-charging, goods falling off the back of a lorry), and many offences wouldn't have been offences at any other time. The applauded peacetime profit-maker became the derided wartime profiteer. There was more lawbreaking because there were more laws to break.
One of the more bizarre crimes under the Defence Regulations was the spreading of "alarm and despondency". A Mrs Rycraft of Wood Green was found guilty of this in 1941, after telling her local housewives' club "we will never win the war" and encouraging them to demand bigger rations; a Mrs Hayward of Brighton was fined £25 (no paltry sum when the average weekly wage was £4.50) for remarking to a shop assistant, "we do not get true news in the newspapers because journalists are all crooks". Undaunted, Mrs Hayward was soon back in court for uttering pro-German sentiments and was sentenced to a month's hard labour.
Some offenders were shopped by their neighbours. But the state also appointed its own snoops and narks, whose methods smacked of Stalin or the Gestapo. "I am suspected, inspected, examined, informed, required and commanded so that I do not know who the hell I am and where I am, or why I am here at all," one small trader complained to his MP.
Shopkeepers took the brunt of the petty officialdom. The attractive young woman inveigling the butcher to give her an extra ounce of steak might turn out to be from the Ministry of Food. The sneakiest example of entrapment was the army car driven round London with a union flag on its bonnet and only the driver inside - anyone failing to "salute the flag" would then be arrested by the military police following behind.
By today's standards, punishments were severe: hefty fines, long sentences, even execution. Though rape was not a capital offence under English law, the Visiting Forces Act gave the US power to administer its own code of justice, and eight American servicemen were hanged for raping British women. The darker their skin, the less forgiving the authorities.
One example that for some reason caught my attention was the case of Leroy Henry, a black truck driver from St Louis, Missouri, was courtmartialled and sentenced to death for raping a 33-year-old married woman near Bath, though the evidence suggested she was a willing partner; it was only thanks to a campaign by the Tribune and the Daily Mirror that Henry was reprieved.
Friday, August 22, 2003
Its been a long day today and I had a sudden "demand" made on me for some code. I've never known my boss to panic so much, but anyway I got some code working so he can go on holiday next weekend with some peace of mind.
I will need to get alot done in the next few days to ensure I don't have to panic before I head off to Nigeria next month. Its been 4393 days since I last put foot on Nigerian soil and despite the large hole it has made in my pocket I find myself smiling without control at the thought of going home. Although I have to say I have a bit of an unresolved crisis when asked where I'd consider home.
This is because I've come to realise the "patriotism", of those still with crusader like mentalities who believe God or destiny appointed them to "civilise" the "uncivilised" do not tolerate criticising shameful aspects of their countries past and that doesn't appeal to me, neither does the racism that hides behind the pretentious pragmatism of "taking care of your own" against foreign entities bearly able to feed themselves.
If home is where the heart is, my heart tends to roam, but if asked where I'd like to finish off I'd have to say Nigeria.
My brother says home is wherever we happen to find ourselves. I tend to agree.
I am emotionally reserved (cool I like to think :P) though I don't know how I'll react when I see old faces and smell the warm humid air in Lagos. I guess it will be cool to see my room preserved in the time warp of an 11 year old's world. I hope to come back more appreciative of things I take for granted although I have seen no evidence of such humble mantra from friends who have visited Nigeria recently.
I have been to Nigeria twice now. I was too young to remember my first encounter with Nigeria, I was 2 yrs and all I'm told of it was that I got ill and almost died. I wasn't surprised to hear that Nigerian doctors made things worse by trying to feed me water through my head. My dad suspects they were trying to prolong my stay in hospital and thus increase the hospital bill.
Nigerian "healthcare" is terrible to say the least. My younger brother just shared a story with me and told me how a Nigerian doctor broke his finger. Private hospitals are an alternative but considering most Nigerian can't afford the cost of state hospitals, this is the preserve of the well-off.
To paint you a picture of Nigeria's health crisis, if you needed a drip to keep you alive in a Nigerian state hospital, you'd first be marched to the pharmacy in a semi-conscious state to first purchase the drip.
I have to also mention Nigeria boasts the worst roads you'll find, constant petrol shortages and frequent power cuts.
All this is hard to accept considering Nigeria is Africa's biggest oil producer and the world's 9th largest and the fifth-biggest source of US oil imports. Despite this, it has to import oil to meet domestic need whilst it sells its own to the powers that be.
The recent strikes in Nigeria suggest this is even harder to accept by Nigerians who consider affordable petrol their birthright from a state that does little else for them.
Nigeria has a history of military dictators who have stolen billions of petro-dollars and hidden them in Swiss bank accounts whilst borrowing from the world bank to the tune of $30 billion. This has been the ongoing story since the 60's and as oil has kept flowing criticisms have been few from western governments who have continually sold arms to successive ruling military juntas.
At one point there were rumour that Nigeria's new "democratic" government might stand up to the IMF and demand to know why it lent money to non-existent projects and would demand to see evidence of these project before making repayments.
However these proved untrue after Obasanjo himself went cap in hand to the IMF requesting more loans to "safeguard its return to democracy".
Obansanjo can be pretty confident he'll get it since IMF Managing Director Michel Camdessus promised IMF aid if "Nigeria demonstrated that it is fully committed to reform" which Nigeria has already begun by selling off state companies such as the power and telecommunications utilities and oil refineries.
I think its only a matter of time until the IMF dictates Nigeria's state hospitals consider extracting and selling patients healthy body parts to western clients in some sort of exhange program whilst in hospital to pay for drug treatment.
Somehow the idea seems very free-marketish.
I am sure its the sort initiative they would applaud and might even guarantee Obasanjo further IMF loans.
Furthermore imagine in true capitalist tradition (like the terrordaq index the pentagon proposed), the prices of organs were floated on some organ stock market, so despite only seeking treatment for a yeast infection, if kidney prices had plummeted you'd have to sacrifice a kidney, 12 pints of blood, part of your liver and some marrow.
George Monbiot (www.monbiot.com) makes an interesting point, he says "Poor nations possess an invincible weapon. If you owe the bank $100 you are in trouble. If you owe them $100,000 the bank is in trouble. What if you owe the bank $2.5 trillion. If you defaulted on your debts at once you could bring down the entire global financial system. The point of possessing a terrifying weapon is that you don't necessarily have to use it. The fear alone can be sufficient to get results. Nowhere does fear do its work more effectively than in the great concrete towers of the financial markets. We should seek then not to overthrow globalisation, but to capture it and to use it as a vehicle for humanity's first global democratic revolution."
(0) comments
I will need to get alot done in the next few days to ensure I don't have to panic before I head off to Nigeria next month. Its been 4393 days since I last put foot on Nigerian soil and despite the large hole it has made in my pocket I find myself smiling without control at the thought of going home. Although I have to say I have a bit of an unresolved crisis when asked where I'd consider home.
This is because I've come to realise the "patriotism", of those still with crusader like mentalities who believe God or destiny appointed them to "civilise" the "uncivilised" do not tolerate criticising shameful aspects of their countries past and that doesn't appeal to me, neither does the racism that hides behind the pretentious pragmatism of "taking care of your own" against foreign entities bearly able to feed themselves.
If home is where the heart is, my heart tends to roam, but if asked where I'd like to finish off I'd have to say Nigeria.
My brother says home is wherever we happen to find ourselves. I tend to agree.
I am emotionally reserved (cool I like to think :P) though I don't know how I'll react when I see old faces and smell the warm humid air in Lagos. I guess it will be cool to see my room preserved in the time warp of an 11 year old's world. I hope to come back more appreciative of things I take for granted although I have seen no evidence of such humble mantra from friends who have visited Nigeria recently.
I have been to Nigeria twice now. I was too young to remember my first encounter with Nigeria, I was 2 yrs and all I'm told of it was that I got ill and almost died. I wasn't surprised to hear that Nigerian doctors made things worse by trying to feed me water through my head. My dad suspects they were trying to prolong my stay in hospital and thus increase the hospital bill.
Nigerian "healthcare" is terrible to say the least. My younger brother just shared a story with me and told me how a Nigerian doctor broke his finger. Private hospitals are an alternative but considering most Nigerian can't afford the cost of state hospitals, this is the preserve of the well-off.
To paint you a picture of Nigeria's health crisis, if you needed a drip to keep you alive in a Nigerian state hospital, you'd first be marched to the pharmacy in a semi-conscious state to first purchase the drip.
I have to also mention Nigeria boasts the worst roads you'll find, constant petrol shortages and frequent power cuts.
All this is hard to accept considering Nigeria is Africa's biggest oil producer and the world's 9th largest and the fifth-biggest source of US oil imports. Despite this, it has to import oil to meet domestic need whilst it sells its own to the powers that be.
The recent strikes in Nigeria suggest this is even harder to accept by Nigerians who consider affordable petrol their birthright from a state that does little else for them.
Nigeria has a history of military dictators who have stolen billions of petro-dollars and hidden them in Swiss bank accounts whilst borrowing from the world bank to the tune of $30 billion. This has been the ongoing story since the 60's and as oil has kept flowing criticisms have been few from western governments who have continually sold arms to successive ruling military juntas.
At one point there were rumour that Nigeria's new "democratic" government might stand up to the IMF and demand to know why it lent money to non-existent projects and would demand to see evidence of these project before making repayments.
However these proved untrue after Obasanjo himself went cap in hand to the IMF requesting more loans to "safeguard its return to democracy".
Obansanjo can be pretty confident he'll get it since IMF Managing Director Michel Camdessus promised IMF aid if "Nigeria demonstrated that it is fully committed to reform" which Nigeria has already begun by selling off state companies such as the power and telecommunications utilities and oil refineries.
I think its only a matter of time until the IMF dictates Nigeria's state hospitals consider extracting and selling patients healthy body parts to western clients in some sort of exhange program whilst in hospital to pay for drug treatment.
Somehow the idea seems very free-marketish.
I am sure its the sort initiative they would applaud and might even guarantee Obasanjo further IMF loans.
Furthermore imagine in true capitalist tradition (like the terrordaq index the pentagon proposed), the prices of organs were floated on some organ stock market, so despite only seeking treatment for a yeast infection, if kidney prices had plummeted you'd have to sacrifice a kidney, 12 pints of blood, part of your liver and some marrow.
George Monbiot (www.monbiot.com) makes an interesting point, he says "Poor nations possess an invincible weapon. If you owe the bank $100 you are in trouble. If you owe them $100,000 the bank is in trouble. What if you owe the bank $2.5 trillion. If you defaulted on your debts at once you could bring down the entire global financial system. The point of possessing a terrifying weapon is that you don't necessarily have to use it. The fear alone can be sufficient to get results. Nowhere does fear do its work more effectively than in the great concrete towers of the financial markets. We should seek then not to overthrow globalisation, but to capture it and to use it as a vehicle for humanity's first global democratic revolution."
Thursday, August 21, 2003
News junkies anonymous
But first a bit of background. Since the end of April after completing my Cooperative XML editing project I have been a little bored at work.
Whereas I used to be an 18 hrs a day workaholic and regularly used to bring my sleeping bag into my office, I now bearly hold concentration for more than 20 mins a day in total and can't wait to leave at 5:30.
I ashamedly attribute alot of my recent distraction to my "news" addiction. My daily news ritual goes something like this:
(1) I arrive late to work.
(2) I shamefully rush to check the ever increasingly boring Guardian newspaper like someone who can't afford to miss a ransom demand.
(3) I have breakfast.
(4) Half an hour later I then begin checking a plethera of other online "news" sources.
I guess this interest began sometime in March but has now become an addiction thats included me reading news source I despise such as the BBC online, reuters, the independent and the NYtimes and more recently ananova.
Reading these leaves me with the feeling you get when you drink lots of cheap orangeade but despite not really likely it, you can't bring yourself to pour it down the sink.
This ritual is all the more bizzarre since I loathed most of these news sources, along with the ranting of most of their columnist and their editors.
For instance there is Mr Alan Rushbridger editor for the Guardian who I think showed incredible cowardice in turning his anti-war newspaper into a pro-war paper during the Iraq war. Whilst keeping up some pretence at fair and balanced journalism by now flashing a banner advertising "Iraq: the war we could not stop".
This charge which is not just some fantasy of mine but was confirmed to me by friends all around the world who read the guardian online. I guess Rushbridger probably justified such cowardice as being the need to show "fair and balanced" reporting.
Furthermore its list of columnists are getting ever more annoying and banal. Those who would win awards in this category are David Aaronovitch who I am convinced is Peter Hitchens from the Daily Mail writing under a pseudonym and Julie Bruchill. Mr Aaronovitch was pro-war and regularly got a column slot blurting his illogical rantings and the need to bomb Iraqis in order stop the world's greatest proliferator of nukes, and other super space-age WMD his mind could conjure up. As the evidence grew weaker he joined the group of "humanitarians" who saw the need to "liberate" Iraqis. He doesn't even seem capable of the eloquent deception some right wing columnists manage.
I no longer bother reading anything by Mr Aaronovitch.
The second columnist that baffles me is Julie Burchill. Although politically inept (but pro-war), my beef with her stems from her supernatural ability to be banal.
She either regularly states the obvious and then tries pass it off as her own unique social commentary or she simply writes about something no one could possible care about.
A prime example are her numerous articles claiming Madonna has no discernable talent. I think she has convinced herself by now that her viewpoint is cutting edge and radical. Upon first reading such obvious commentaries a year ago I first thought "Yes ! Someone is finally saying it !" until you realise the whole world is probably in agreement on this, so why say it.
I often get that feeling and I have learn't to be more critical of it. The feeling where you think someone is making a point that is good or "deep" only to realise it is recycled and you have actual encountered it times before.
For example I was recently reading Eleven Minutes by Brazilian author Paulo Coelho. In it he says, "What is more important in life, living or pretending to live?" It made me stop for about two seconds, I thought good question but then realised that is also the centre of Madame Bovary, that's also the centre of Anna Karenina, Heart of Darkness etc.
I guess my beef with such columnists in general is why the need for them ? Especially those who write articles that bears no relation to current events.
Suddenly the BBC Online (which I regarded as the Daily Mail's online representative) which never seemed particularly pressed to update its news page) became no less attactive than the guardian.
My beef with the BBC orginally stems from the fact it offers you news depending on where you live.
I thought nothing of this at first but soon began to realise that if you follow the "I am reading this from the UK" link, you would in effect be asking to be lied to.
Like BBC1's 6'O'clock news it is assumptive, overly-simplistic and knows its bounds. (None of us are fooled by the patronising smoke screen that is the Hutton Enquiry).
A report published by the University of Cardiff concluded that the BBC had infact been just as pro-war as FOX news.
A quote from the Guardian reads:
"A detailed study of peak-time television news bulletins during the course of the Iraq war shows that the BBC was more reliant than any of its rivals on government and military sources."
Consider then the fact that Greg Dyke then gave a lecture at University of London Goldsmiths College criticising FOX news for warmongering.
To make my argument one simply needs to observe the difference between BBC's Newsnight (targetted at a more political class) and the 6 O'clock news (which is weak in any rigorous journalism, assumptive and very patronising).
The question I ask is why the difference between both programs ?. Why does the delivery, tone and infererence have to change ?
To me the answer is simple. It allows the BBC to point to Newsnight (which is tucked away on BBC 2 at 10:30 pm) as evidence of its ability to be informative and to debate whilst feeding the majority junk "news".
The only good thing about the Independent are Robert Fisk articles, exclude these and you have another boring broadsheet. The independent can also boast its own group of banal commentators like Yasmin Alibhai-Brown. (I am sure there are many more there).
You may be asking yourself why haven't I included other broadsheets like the Telegraph, Times and FT. Well maybe I should.
However the Telegraph under ownership by Conrad Black has now become dangerous. The Telegraph was a prime cheerleader for invading Iraq and has been so weakened by his influence its editor bows to regularly publishing Mrs Black's ill-though mantra.
Black's wife, Barbara Amiel, frequently writes for the Telegraph and has been described as "a zionist fanatic". (Read her work and make your own conclusions.)
The fact that the Telegraph, owned by Conrad Black, is part of the Hollinger group made the George Galloway "discovery" all the more miraculous.
What further adds to this tragedy is that Richard Perle is a director of Hollinger, and a friend of Black. Both are friends of Ariel Sharon. Conveniently Black also owns the Jerusalem Post, (a right wing Israeli newspaper.)
Considering the company Black keeps one shouldn't discount the possibility of a less reported "sexed up" dossier.
I have traditionally stayed away from the NYTimes because of commentators like Thomas Friedman but it is still a source for what is happening in the US.
I enjoy alternative news such as www.zmag.org, Le monde diplomatique and Indymedia. Although with regard to the latter I must admit it too can sometimes be over simplistic and patronising. Regardless of whether you are right you should still make some attempt at being objective. Maybe that is too harsh a criticism for a news outlet up against the odds in a corporate dominated arena but good journalism requires debate.
Anyway as with all other addictions they say the first step to recovery is acknowledging you have a problem and so I decided to seek help only to realise no group catered for my addiction.
And so it fell to me to set up the world's first NJA (News Junkies anonymous) meeting. I attended my first meeting today but didn't have to travel far, in fact I haven't had to travel at all because I resourcefully decided to convene this NJA meeting at my desk. I drew up a plan to ween myself off the drug and began by introducing myself.
"My name is Paul and I am a news junkie in recovery. My sobriety date is August 21, 2003. At the moment I'm just taking each day as it comes, I guess I'll have to see how I do tommorrow."
(0) comments
But first a bit of background. Since the end of April after completing my Cooperative XML editing project I have been a little bored at work.
Whereas I used to be an 18 hrs a day workaholic and regularly used to bring my sleeping bag into my office, I now bearly hold concentration for more than 20 mins a day in total and can't wait to leave at 5:30.
I ashamedly attribute alot of my recent distraction to my "news" addiction. My daily news ritual goes something like this:
(1) I arrive late to work.
(2) I shamefully rush to check the ever increasingly boring Guardian newspaper like someone who can't afford to miss a ransom demand.
(3) I have breakfast.
(4) Half an hour later I then begin checking a plethera of other online "news" sources.
I guess this interest began sometime in March but has now become an addiction thats included me reading news source I despise such as the BBC online, reuters, the independent and the NYtimes and more recently ananova.
Reading these leaves me with the feeling you get when you drink lots of cheap orangeade but despite not really likely it, you can't bring yourself to pour it down the sink.
This ritual is all the more bizzarre since I loathed most of these news sources, along with the ranting of most of their columnist and their editors.
For instance there is Mr Alan Rushbridger editor for the Guardian who I think showed incredible cowardice in turning his anti-war newspaper into a pro-war paper during the Iraq war. Whilst keeping up some pretence at fair and balanced journalism by now flashing a banner advertising "Iraq: the war we could not stop".
This charge which is not just some fantasy of mine but was confirmed to me by friends all around the world who read the guardian online. I guess Rushbridger probably justified such cowardice as being the need to show "fair and balanced" reporting.
Furthermore its list of columnists are getting ever more annoying and banal. Those who would win awards in this category are David Aaronovitch who I am convinced is Peter Hitchens from the Daily Mail writing under a pseudonym and Julie Bruchill. Mr Aaronovitch was pro-war and regularly got a column slot blurting his illogical rantings and the need to bomb Iraqis in order stop the world's greatest proliferator of nukes, and other super space-age WMD his mind could conjure up. As the evidence grew weaker he joined the group of "humanitarians" who saw the need to "liberate" Iraqis. He doesn't even seem capable of the eloquent deception some right wing columnists manage.
I no longer bother reading anything by Mr Aaronovitch.
The second columnist that baffles me is Julie Burchill. Although politically inept (but pro-war), my beef with her stems from her supernatural ability to be banal.
She either regularly states the obvious and then tries pass it off as her own unique social commentary or she simply writes about something no one could possible care about.
A prime example are her numerous articles claiming Madonna has no discernable talent. I think she has convinced herself by now that her viewpoint is cutting edge and radical. Upon first reading such obvious commentaries a year ago I first thought "Yes ! Someone is finally saying it !" until you realise the whole world is probably in agreement on this, so why say it.
I often get that feeling and I have learn't to be more critical of it. The feeling where you think someone is making a point that is good or "deep" only to realise it is recycled and you have actual encountered it times before.
For example I was recently reading Eleven Minutes by Brazilian author Paulo Coelho. In it he says, "What is more important in life, living or pretending to live?" It made me stop for about two seconds, I thought good question but then realised that is also the centre of Madame Bovary, that's also the centre of Anna Karenina, Heart of Darkness etc.
I guess my beef with such columnists in general is why the need for them ? Especially those who write articles that bears no relation to current events.
Suddenly the BBC Online (which I regarded as the Daily Mail's online representative) which never seemed particularly pressed to update its news page) became no less attactive than the guardian.
My beef with the BBC orginally stems from the fact it offers you news depending on where you live.
I thought nothing of this at first but soon began to realise that if you follow the "I am reading this from the UK" link, you would in effect be asking to be lied to.
Like BBC1's 6'O'clock news it is assumptive, overly-simplistic and knows its bounds. (None of us are fooled by the patronising smoke screen that is the Hutton Enquiry).
A report published by the University of Cardiff concluded that the BBC had infact been just as pro-war as FOX news.
A quote from the Guardian reads:
"A detailed study of peak-time television news bulletins during the course of the Iraq war shows that the BBC was more reliant than any of its rivals on government and military sources."
Consider then the fact that Greg Dyke then gave a lecture at University of London Goldsmiths College criticising FOX news for warmongering.
To make my argument one simply needs to observe the difference between BBC's Newsnight (targetted at a more political class) and the 6 O'clock news (which is weak in any rigorous journalism, assumptive and very patronising).
The question I ask is why the difference between both programs ?. Why does the delivery, tone and infererence have to change ?
To me the answer is simple. It allows the BBC to point to Newsnight (which is tucked away on BBC 2 at 10:30 pm) as evidence of its ability to be informative and to debate whilst feeding the majority junk "news".
The only good thing about the Independent are Robert Fisk articles, exclude these and you have another boring broadsheet. The independent can also boast its own group of banal commentators like Yasmin Alibhai-Brown. (I am sure there are many more there).
You may be asking yourself why haven't I included other broadsheets like the Telegraph, Times and FT. Well maybe I should.
However the Telegraph under ownership by Conrad Black has now become dangerous. The Telegraph was a prime cheerleader for invading Iraq and has been so weakened by his influence its editor bows to regularly publishing Mrs Black's ill-though mantra.
Black's wife, Barbara Amiel, frequently writes for the Telegraph and has been described as "a zionist fanatic". (Read her work and make your own conclusions.)
The fact that the Telegraph, owned by Conrad Black, is part of the Hollinger group made the George Galloway "discovery" all the more miraculous.
What further adds to this tragedy is that Richard Perle is a director of Hollinger, and a friend of Black. Both are friends of Ariel Sharon. Conveniently Black also owns the Jerusalem Post, (a right wing Israeli newspaper.)
Considering the company Black keeps one shouldn't discount the possibility of a less reported "sexed up" dossier.
I have traditionally stayed away from the NYTimes because of commentators like Thomas Friedman but it is still a source for what is happening in the US.
I enjoy alternative news such as www.zmag.org, Le monde diplomatique and Indymedia. Although with regard to the latter I must admit it too can sometimes be over simplistic and patronising. Regardless of whether you are right you should still make some attempt at being objective. Maybe that is too harsh a criticism for a news outlet up against the odds in a corporate dominated arena but good journalism requires debate.
Anyway as with all other addictions they say the first step to recovery is acknowledging you have a problem and so I decided to seek help only to realise no group catered for my addiction.
And so it fell to me to set up the world's first NJA (News Junkies anonymous) meeting. I attended my first meeting today but didn't have to travel far, in fact I haven't had to travel at all because I resourcefully decided to convene this NJA meeting at my desk. I drew up a plan to ween myself off the drug and began by introducing myself.
"My name is Paul and I am a news junkie in recovery. My sobriety date is August 21, 2003. At the moment I'm just taking each day as it comes, I guess I'll have to see how I do tommorrow."
Wednesday, August 20, 2003
OK let get this started. I've always thought most web logs crass. A chance for people to extol their junk philosophy or to express their supposed "uniqueness".
The weblog has been the perfect medium for these infidels, now armed with those stupid faces that dipict ones mood.
In my abundant arrogance I've gathered the nerve to get bored of reading so many sub standard weblogs and newspaper columnists that I feel a divine calling to bear the standard and show people hows its done.
Please don't misunderstand. By starting this weblog I am probably aiming in the same direction, but maybe, just maybe this might be a weblog with a difference.
Xercs
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The weblog has been the perfect medium for these infidels, now armed with those stupid faces that dipict ones mood.
In my abundant arrogance I've gathered the nerve to get bored of reading so many sub standard weblogs and newspaper columnists that I feel a divine calling to bear the standard and show people hows its done.
Please don't misunderstand. By starting this weblog I am probably aiming in the same direction, but maybe, just maybe this might be a weblog with a difference.
Xercs
