Political Slogans

Some context for overseas readers: the Green Party has suffered some embarrassment recently after it was revealed that Green Party members, including the partner of the co-leaders executive assistant, were involved in vandalizing around 700 National Party billboards by adding satirical “slogans” such as “because the rich deserve more” and “drill it! mine it! sell it!”

Both childish and unethical, of course, but I thought the “slogans” themselves were kind of amusing.  So, along the same lines…

VOTE FOR THE GREENS because …

… trees are people too

… the economy isn’t going to ruin itself!

… you hated your science teacher, right?

VOTE FOR LABOUR because …

… New Zealand needs more debt

… we did OK last time, right?  Right?

VOTE FOR MANA because …

… Pakeha should just bugger off

… there are too many white <expletive deleted> in Parliament

… the Greens aren’t crazy enough

VOTE FOR ACT because …

… Maori should just bugger off

… National isn’t crazy enough

VOTE FOR NEW ZEALAND FIRST because …

… we made MMP what it is today!

VOTE FOR THE PIRATE PARTY because …

… have we got the coolest name, or what?

 

The United Nations and Palestine – A Missed Opportunity?

I’m sure everyone is aware that Palestine has applied for full member status in the United Nations.  At present, to the best of my understanding, this seems unlikely to happen.  Under current circumstances, it probably wouldn’t be helpful if it did.  But I can’t help wonder whether the UN is missing an opportunity here.

What if they were to offer full membership subject to the condition that the Palestinians accept a UN-negotiated treaty with Israel?  Negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians have been unproductive, but negotiations between the UN and Israel need not be.  (Of course, the UN would first have to accept that the Green Line is not a particularly useful starting point, which might be politically unpalatable to many member nations.)

Any such treaty would be significantly more favorable to Israel than the Palestinian negotiators have ever been willing to consider.  They probably wouldn’t get East Jerusalem, and Israel wouldn’t be accepting the return of any refugees.  Even so, it would be a difficult offer to turn down when the prize is United Nations recognition of a Palestinian State.

Would this have worked?  Maybe not – but I don’t suppose we’ll ever know for sure.  I think it would have been worth a try.

Wikileaks vs. Facebook

Authors note: I was recently involved in a discussion on a private mailing list about Julian Assange’s recent diatribe against Facebook concerning privacy.  I suggested this was hypocritical, and was asked why I thought Wikileaks had invaded people’s privacy.  This is my reply, with only a few minor edits.

I believe that employees, including government/diplomatic employees (such as ambassadors) are entitled to a reasonable degree of privacy with regards to their work in the absence of evidence that they have misused it.  This privacy was violated, IMO, by the public release of confidential advice (the diplomatic cables) that they had given their employer.

For my part I would certainly consider my privacy violated if my work email was publicly released, although I don’t think I have a great deal to be embarrassed about.

Mr. Assange is reported to have said that diplomats should only “write reports they are proud of” or something to that effect.  This doesn’t make sense to me.  A diplomat might be justifiably proud of accurate reporting and/or insight, but this doesn’t mean that the report won’t cause embarrassment, and quite possibly harm their career, if made public.

Facts exist, they aren’t something to be proud of or not.  It is in the interest of everybody that the people making decisions know the facts as accurately as is possible, even if it is not reasonable under the circumstances to release them publicly.  (For example, the public release of allegations of misconduct or criminal activity when you are unable to provide evidence would be unfair to the accused; the public release of information on the idiosyncrasies of foreign leaders would lead to your diplomatic service being expelled.)

HOWEVER, even if you disagree that diplomats have any right to privacy, the release of the cables also invaded the privacy of those that the diplomats were writing about.  Making public various allegations of misconduct, when you have no knowledge yourself of the truth or falsity of these allegations, surely counts as an invasion of privacy?

Mr. Assange is also reported to have complained about the public release of the Swedish police report concerning the allegations against him.  I see this as an even clearer case of hypocrisy, since the police (like the diplomats) are a Government agency; if the US diplomatic service shouldn’t keep secrets about third parties from the public, why should the Swedish police do so?

If only those cables (if any) that spoke to misconduct of the diplomats or of the US government had been released, I wouldn’t have any complaints.  But so far I don’t think I’ve heard of a single released cable meeting that criteria.  (If you would like to propose an example, please post a comment.)

Cultural Values and Racism

The honorable Tariana Turia MP was quoted today in the New Zealand Herald as saying “But when someone denigrates another culture then for me that’s racist.”  I like this quote.  I think it nicely sums up that aspect of our responsibility to treat one another with due respect.

There are two particular points I want to make about it: firstly, this needs to work both ways.  Let me make it clear that I have absolutely no complaints about the honorable Ms. Turia’s behaviour, but the name of one prominent Maori leader does spring to mind whose attitude towards Pakeha culture has often been less than respectful.

Secondly, there is an important difference between denigrating a culture and questioning it.  Where cultural values are in conflict (as in the case of the foreshore) it should be possible to at least discuss our differences openly and respectfully, so as to hopefully reach a reasonable compromise.  I don’t really understand politics, but it seems to me that one of the big problems with the foreshore debate is that this isn’t happening; the Maori party and the National party have reached a compromise, which seems to me [1] to be reasonable, but the discussion was not (as far as I know) open and the philosophical basis (if any!) for the various decisions has not been presented to the public.

Since this is a widely emotional issue, I will refrain from presenting my own viewpoint on the foreshore debate.

Harry.

[1] From what little I understand of it.

Outrage over Gaza Flotilla Deaths Premature

So the world, it would seem, is outraged over the deaths of activists during the Israeli raid on the Gaza flotilla.  While, as mentioned in my last post, I’m beginning to have doubts about the neutrality of media reports on the subject, there seems little doubt that a significant number of people have leapt immediately to the conclusion that the deaths were deliberate murders by the Israeli military.

The New Zealand government has condemned the deaths – without assigning blame – and expressed concern to the Israeli ambassador.  It has also pointed out that an Israeli investigation “is not going to suffice in these circumstances”.  All of this is entirely reasonable, and doesn’t justify the sensationalist headline it was reported under.

On the other hand, of course, the Greens are also in on the act.  Keith Locke says the action was a “murderous assault”.  Really?  Isn’t that just a tad premature, since as yet there is no actual evidence (nor even so much as a credible claim [**]) to refute the Israeli assertion that the soldiers were attacked and had to defend themselves?  I doubt even the most hard-line partisan could assert that this is an implausible scenario, or at least not with a straight face.  Palestinian activism, on the whole, is not exactly well-known for a Gandhiesque approach to conflict.

I also have to wonder what motivation is Israel supposed to have had for sending soldiers onto the deck to shoot at the activists in question.  If they wanted to kill them, wouldn’t it have been a whole lot safer to do it from the air?  They could have sunk the entire ship from a distance, for that matter – the only reasonable explanation I see for sending in soldiers is that they intended (or at least hoped) to take control of the vessel peacefully. [*]

Israel has hardly benefited from the deaths.

By all means let’s have an independent investigation.  In the meantime, let’s not overreact to a tragedy that may, sadly, have been largely of the activists’ own making.

Harry.

[*] I suppose there’s an outside chance the attack was a cover-up for the assassination of a particular person that Israel wanted badly to kill and knew was on board, but that seems an awfully far-fetched scenario to me.

[**] Added 4 June 2010: this may no longer be true, although Ms. Enchmarch seems to stop short of explicitly claiming that the soldiers had definitely not been attacked first.

Andy Haden and the Storm in a Teacup

So, Andy Haden [*] is in trouble for using the “d” word.  I’m not going to repeat the word here; I wouldn’t want to get in trouble myself!  Oddly enough the mainstream media don’t seem to be worried about using it (see the New Zealand Herald article) which seems perhaps a little hypocritical.

No doubt they would argue that they are merely discussing other people’s use of the word.  Which is kind of the point, really – that’s exactly what Mr. Haden was doing.  Taken in context (oh my!) it seems perfectly clear that he was using the word he believed the Crusaders franchise would use, in order to imply that they are outright racists.  (I will leave aside the question of whether this claim is to any extent justified or not, as I wouldn’t have a clue.)

I’m not sure whether it is the press or the general public that is incapable of understanding subtleties like context, but either way it’s a sad state of affairs.  (Actually taken in combination with my other topic of the day, I’m starting to wonder if the press simply prefer to interpret everything in whichever light makes the best story.  I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised if this is true, but I prefer to take a hopeful view and assume that journalistic integrity hasn’t completely disappeared from the world.)

Harry.

[*] Whoever he is exactly – what on earth does a “rugby ambassador” actually do?

Harsh Penalties Won’t Make Drivers Superhuman

Jennifer Speakman was sentenced last week for an accident in which her car hit a pack of cyclists, injuring several, one severely.  I was quite relieved at how reasonable the sentence was, considering the consequences to the victims.

An article on Saturday quotes one of the victims of the accident, and another victim was quoted today calling for harsher penalties.  I suppose this is legitimate news, but it seems coldhearted to preserve a permanent record of words spoken in anger, by men trying to come to grips with a life-shattering personal disaster – words they might reconsider later, but will never be able to take back.

I certainly don’t want to argue that the victims shouldn’t be angry, or to trivialise their suffering.  In fact, if it were just a question of the victims’ words, I wouldn’t say anything at all.  However, I’ve seen very similar opinions stated elsewhere, and suspect that it isn’t uncommon, particularly amongst fans of cycling.

Harsher penalties won’t make drivers superhuman.  I suppose cyclists are naturally inclined to blame the individual drivers involved in particular accidents because it helps them ignore the risks they choose to face; that’s a very human sort of reaction.  Also, we’re always keen on a quick fix, and talking about “educating drivers to share the road” sounds like just the ticket.  (Drivers and pedestrians make the same sort of assumptions; I don’t mean to single out cyclists in particular here.)

The stark, unpleasant truth is that this was an accident that could have happened to anybody.  Any one of us could have been behind the wheel on Tamaki Drive that day.

Ms. Speakman made two mistakes.  First and foremost she failed to see the cyclists.  Now, this sounds stupid.  We tend to believe that we see everything in our field of view, and that we couldn’t possibly miss a group of cyclists in orange vests.  Unfortunately, this is an illusion: humans really aren’t all that good at spotting things they aren’t expecting.

The next time you approach a T-intersection and are turning right (if you’re in a right-hand-drive country, make that a left turn!) or better still when you leave the intersection, think about where you looked.  You looked left at the traffic you were going to be merging with.  You looked right at the traffic that was coming towards you.  Odds are you didn’t look ahead into the intersection; there’s never anything there.  Except this time there was.

This is also the reason that airport screening is much less effective than you’d think.  The thing that really seems crazy if you’ve never learnt about how the brain works is that you can’t just choose to pay attention all the time.  Your brain won’t let you.

The other mistake Ms. Speakman made was to roll through a stop sign.  It isn’t immediately clear to me whether this would have made any difference, although I suppose stopping would have lengthened the amount of time her visual cortex had to process the shapes of the cyclists and raise an alert.  However, even if we assume that it would have prevented the accident, the same problem occurs – stop signs just aren’t very common these days, so we don’t get a lot of practice at stopping at them.  It doesn’t help that stopping almost never prevents an accident.

I take the bus to work most days, but sometimes I drive.  If I’m driving, I usually go through a stop sign on the way to work.  At a rough guess I remember to actually stop about half the time.  I’m not deliberately flouting the law, and each time I notice that I’ve done it I swear at myself a bit, but I haven’t managed to improve much.  Perhaps you do much better, but if so, I’m guessing you’re either a relatively new driver (and hence still driving consciously rather than as a routine task) or you happen to regularly go through an intersection where you really do need to stop.

Harsher penalties might make cyclists feel better.  But it won’t make them any safer, and it certainly won’t be any fairer.  If cars keep sharing the same roads with bicycles, and continue to be driven by humans, sooner or later this sort of accident is going to happen again no matter what else we do and no matter how carefully we drive.  I think we need to face up to that, and, as a nation, make the hard decision as to whether bicycles should be allowed on the road or not.  If we decide they should, that’s fine – but we need to be willing to accept the unpleasant, unavoidable consequences.