This is an attempt to put a lot of thoughts together. Hopefully I will find time to come back to it, redraft it, improve it. If not, I already understand my argument a little better. Take it for what it is. Or do not take it at all. But at least I’m trying to understand.
In 1995 I visited the USA. It was incredibly exciting. My family and I went to Florida; saw the magical kingdom of Mickey Mouse, a space station, crocodiles, manatees and hours of sunshine. When it was time to leave, I wasn’t ready. The whole place seemed like a magical kingdom to me. I was eager to return and see the rest of the country. California, New York, the White House. Skyscrapers! Grand canyons. My return was utmost in my mind for years afterwards.
But recently the idea has dulled. The country still appeals to me. I really would like to visit New York, even though I’m really not a city person. And there are all those people I’d like to meet whom I only know over the Internet. But I really don’t want to go there right now. I’ve been put off.
I’m not sure if reality is as bad as the stories I’ve heard. But one point of this essay is that stories are more important than we sometimes give them credit for. If I believe I’m going to be ripped to shreds when I pass through customs at the U.S. airports, that’s enough to stop me going. If the prevailing story is a negative one, then I figure the best I’m going to be greeted with is a stern look and a disgruntled cough. That’s not the image of America I want to remember. Why are they trying to spoil my memories?
First impressions count and whatever impression they give me, is the one I’m going to be thinking about for my entire trip. I want a ‘welcome to the U.S.A’ and an ‘enjoy your stay’ and I want it from the security guards, damn it. We humans remember well what happens first; it’s called the primacy effect. And we remember what happens last; it’s called the recency effect. We remember some things in between, but we remember the first and last bits particularly. For most visitors to a country, this means airports. So if the U.S. wants to leave a good impression, they better get their airports right.
If you think heightened security (which is mostly security-theatre) and a look of distrust is a good thing for your country, you are mistaken. Do what is necessary, do what you must, but do no more. Security always has negative effects; so don’t overdo it. Always question its necessity. Every step you take beyond what is necessary will bring about a negative reaction.
Some parents believe that it is their right to look through their children’s bags, search their cupboards, read their diaries. In reality, it demonstrates a lack of respect and trust, and it is a terrible constraint on a child. If you know your parents are reading your diary, the audience changes. Maybe you constrain yourself and the diary become fruitless. Or perhaps you rebel against mistrust and start giving your parents what they’re looking for. But when you write for an audience who is uninvited, the chances of writing anything profound or particularly introspective disappears. The children know that if they write something that reveals their raw soul, an insensitive audience can utterly destroy it.
Privacy and trust is important. If we have it and lose it, we want it back more than anything in the world. If we never have it, we can never know its value. When a State mistrusts its people, it creates that self-fulfilling prophecy. Why do you think so many people think it is morally correct to download music and film that they haven’t paid for? Why do so many people think it okay to speed when they know there are no cameras to catch them? Why do people believe it is okay to talk in the cinema when there are no ushers to shine their torch of disapproval? Nanny us, and we will never grow up. Impose the law everywhere and it becomes meaningless. I’m guilty and so are you.
But my apologise to the USA. I pick on them not because they are an exception, but rather because they are a prominent example. And most importantly because I do not live there. This is an outsider’s view. When once the story of America appealed to my sense of migration, now it discourages me. Things change, and it is a loss of those fundamental ideals of freedom that has done so. I respect the need to detach from British rule, but it upsets me that they are essentially now a clone of us. Or us of them. Or both of us of each other.
Yes, England and America are not too dissimilar. Perhaps not surprising if you consider globalisation, but I rather hoped that the value of freedom would be the commonality we prided. Instead we are both losing it.
England fought for freedom too of course. I guess we all do. Round in circles it goes.
It’s just a shame that we can’t see when we slowly lose it again. Will the inevitable fight have to happen so we can regain it? Do we have to travel that far before we realise we’ve made a terrible navigational error. The chance never crossed my mind until I strode into my 20s.
When I was in primary school, I remember visiting some of the old WWI trenches in France. My school chums and I were young and so we played in them. We played soldiers. Ran around in the grass, shooting each other with imaginary guns. It was fun. Kids playing. We didn’t think of them as killing fields. When you are so young, I don’t think you can.
As I grow older, those killing fields seem closer and closer to reality. I’m 25. Four of my lifetimes ago, and I would have been there. Less than that and I would have been involved in WWII. As I grow older and learn more of how lucky I am to be born not only in this time but also this country, I find these thoughts sobering. I’m lucky to be here, and the thought of us throwing that away stirs something. Last November 11th, when the country stopped for a moments silence to remember our brave soldiers, I silently cried for over half an hour. I only stopped from exhaustion. Somehow, it’s all becoming more real to me and more emotional with it. I rarely cry, but the passion has stayed with me and I use it to give me energy. The memory matters.
A few weeks back I was listening to talk radio. They were discussing a hair-brained judge’s idea to take DNA swabs from tourists to add to a huge DNA database of everyone in the country. It feels like science-fiction. I think some people read 1984 and think to themselves: ‘now that’s a good idea’. One elderly gentleman emailed the show. A man who had the importance of freedom engraved in his memory and a mnemonic cast in his arm. He drew the comparison between the database and the tattoo the Nazi’s planted on him in the 1940s. The presenter responded with heartfelt, but declared how different this situation was and how the comparison was not just. The show continued.
Somehow many of us have it in our head that comparing anything now to the horrors of WWII is somehow inane. But I have a funny feeling that one reason we read history is so we can learn from the mistakes of our ancestors.
Major mistake of that past era? Denial. Example: when the Nazi’s invaded Holland they did something very clever. They did very little. Everybody had a belief that it would be traumatic when they invaded, but it wasn’t. They won the trust of the people, kept a presence on the streets that made everyone feel safe and were even friendly to the Jews. Things didn’t really seem all that bad and it became easier to ignore the odd story and enjoy the benefits of going with that Nazi flow.
By the time they started using hand-grenades as a protest calming measure, it was too late.
I don’t believe we are anywhere near that threat, but denial and an unwillingness to discuss the similarities does scare the hell out of me. Remember that there are members of the racist British National Party in our local governments. People of this country voted them in. You really don’t need a grand imagination to draw comparisons.
Each and every one of us could make the same mistakes more easily than we can imagine or dare to admit. Being aware of that, I believe, is our greatest chance to not fall into that trap. We should take these things seriously. Look inside and admit that there are moral weaknesses inside us; we have a duty to find them and mend what we can. It might be fear. It might just be a desire to walk on by. Or a belief in our common sense even when the common sense of others also feels right to them.
It doesn’t matter how relatively good things are in the here and now. The subject is serious enough that even minor steps in the wrong direction should be heeded.
When Nanny State says she will look after you and make everything okay, this is one of the most dangerous beliefs you can fall for. It will make you weak. It will stop your questioning. It will take over your caring.
Another similarity to that painful era in the mid 1900s is the willingness to accept any measure if it promises to solve a major problem. Whether it be major issues with the economy or crime, a solution is a solution. In desperation we accept anything without really listening to its merits. Today people are fearful of crime in this country, fed up with insolent teenagers, worried about the levels of immigration, annoyed by the many people taking unfair advantage of unemployment benefits and terrified of terrorism. A database will sort this out (we are told) and so we accept it. Identity cards will slow illegal immigration, solve crimes and stop terrorism; and what fool wouldn’t want that? Minor inconveniences are worth it for our safety.
And yet, there is no proof that it will help and plenty that it will cause problems. Financial and administrative ones for starters. Billions of British pounds going into a scheme that doesn’t add value and hurts the economy. And noise: false positives showing up all over the place. Oh, and a database of invaluable information that cannot be made hack proof or flaw proof or human error proof. Or government proof.
And it’s easy to forget that when yesterday you said you’d like more police on the street, or perhaps more prisons; you can’t have them now. The government does not have unlimited pots of money. It might seem like it, but they really don’t. Money spent on DNA databases or ID cards, is money taken from something more important.
If you are fine with this because ‘you have nothing to hide’ then you are simply missing the point. Sure I could retort this argument by talking again about how trust and privacy is important, but it is a difficult argument to make, and it is best to debate the arguments above which are a lot clearer.
Most of all, why are we keen to impose controversial schemes at the expanse of schemes we know will work?
In this case some sense prevails and an ignorant judges opinion doesn’t matter when the government deny any possibility of this database happening. But still, there is a worrying number of people that think this is a good idea. And, of course, we can hardly deny that we are increasingly becoming a Big Brother state. We just start arguing that is a good thing.
Whether you personally trust the government’s declaration that Britain’s crime is dropping or not, the perception certainly exists; and again perception matters. The story is important.
A disturbing meme has cast itself over this nation that says “don’t bother calling the police, they won’t do anything”. I’ve even heard police officers say it. But I was particularly upset when the victim of an attempted mugging (my friends and I frightened them off) decided to walk straight passed the police station just moments after the incident. “They won’t do anything,” he said.
And so the crime figures continued to drop.
Our nearly mugged friend was the victim of unruly teenagers. Our unaffectionate name for them is chavs. They are the kind of kids you’d think are every parent’s nightmare; except many of them are parents themselves. Some are just idiots. Some of them just like to disturb the peace. Some are criminals. And more occasionally than is acceptable, some end up killers.
Britain has a growing problem with youth crime, social disobedience and a disturbing trend to gun crime too. Sometimes I listen to talk radio and the common public sense seems correct to me. Build more prisons. Put more police on the streets. Yes, the British public get it. Thank God for that.
So why on one day do they argue that the problem is that the police don’t show up when we call them; the next that we need to give the police more power. The same red tape that holds them inside their offices writing reports, is the same centralised control that will bring us ID cards. Giving them more power doesn’t mean they have more power to solve crimes; it means they have less. You won’t learn this in schools. Who do you think provides the National Curriculum?
There is something I rather respect about kids who play truant from school. Those who rebel against The Rules. They tend to be the kids who say ‘no’ to a crappy 11 years of schooling and decide they want to be in control of their own damn destinies. Some are lucky, smart or find a role model and make this work for them. We call a good portion of these people ‘entrepreneurs’. Many others, being the uneducated kids that they are, fail in their quest for a better life and instead become the bane of society.
So what’s their problem?
Bad leadership. Not just dysfunctional home life in the sense of abuse, but a complete lack of respect and real guidance from anyone. We believe good leadership is telling kids what to do and them obeying. That’s not how it works. Not if you don’t have a stick to beat them back.
Bad leadership. And now it’s hitting it’s second generational wave; losers leading losers.
We disrespect kids. We say ‘you are not ready to do anything important. You have to study for eleven years before you can even consider using any of it. Then, don’t believe that’s going to be anything important unless you study another 3 years or more.’ What’s it like arriving at High School at eleven years of age and knowing you have another eleven years until you can do anything useful? That’s another lifetime studying. And what use will all this be eventually? Kid’s ask this question all the time. I asked it. The teachers almost never knew the answer.
I don’t believe you can have any self-worth unless you’re contributing in some way now. Feedback that what you are learning matters. An understanding that what you do can have a positive impact on your life and the lives of others. A concept of how learning can be turned into power. What it means to have responsibility or achieve a dream and what it means to pursue that with some success.
Kids need guidance. Mentors. What they don’t need is to be locked up in a classroom all day and told exactly what to read and when to read it.
The 20th century was one of industry where workers were forced into obedience in the name of efficient, robotic workmanship. Now that we have reached this new century we have electronic robots to do much of this menial work instead. Beating obedience into kids is no longer going to produce useful workers. We understood this and outlawed beating. But we never replaced it with anything useful.
Teenagers, remember, are a relatively new concept that did not emerge until the latter half of the 20th Century. Before that, they were considered young adults. For some reason we believe its a good thing to keep children in their Peter Pan state for as long as possible. When I was a pre-teen I used to dream of being 18 and being an adult. When I turned 18 I realised I wasn’t one.
I should have been. Let’s stop believing it is morally right to extend childhood. Mine lasted too long and now I feel like I’ve wasted too much time. The faster children have the opportunity to be treated as adults, the sooner they will act like them.
Today, even adults are treated as children.
If you want the freedom to be an adult, you have to fight for it.
So right now the British government is toying with the idea of putting tracking devices in all our cars so that they can charge us for the mile. The idea is that it will cut congestion and help the environment. It’s a bad idea in so many obvious and not so obvious ways, but that isn’t the point I want to make. Instead I’m interested in the response.