Despite being American, Americans sometimes get it right

Posted on 02/06/2022 by Jim Stewart

On the afternoon of November 19 1863 Lincoln gave a speech. Apparently it was only 271 words long, short and pithy. One quote from it has always stood out to me “government of the people, by the people, for the people”. People will often use this as a description of democracy, but I think it is much more powerful. It is an aspiration, an ideal, and an ideal that we are unlikely to ever achieve. It is a guide along the path to good government. And it is a good tool to measure how we are governed.

Some time ago I visited China as a guest of the government. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that I had a friendly face discuss my political views. I remember discussing Chairman Mau. I think I surprised my host when I compared him to Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell (back in the days when Britain was a republic). Both were dictators, and both (in my view) moved their countries along the path toward good government.

I have often said that a major error in Iraq and Afghanistan was the attempt to install a touchy feely Westernised version of democracy. That was not where they were on the path to good government.

Sometimes government FOR the people competes with government BY the people.

I hear many people talk about how we can improve electoral systems by ideas like proportional representation. I view many of them with suspicion, since they all tend to empower political parties – and we risk ending with government for the political party rather than for the people.

So where are we today in the UK? What does partygate tell us. Well if you measure it against the Lincoln criteria pretty much nothing. It is certainly an issue about personal behaviour, but if I can accept Cromwell as a dictator as a way forward I can certainly ignore internal rule breaking. What I use as my judge is whether the government are working for the benefit of the people – all the people.

To me a lot more telling is the energy “crisis” which sees poor people struggling to pay bills while rich energy companies are forced to make massive profits (that was the essence of a recent news report – those poor energy companies had no choice but to make the profits because of the market structure).

I have a lot of problems with the House of Lords. I think when Jamie Lee Curtiss (the actor) attended the House it really brought home how dumb the system was that allowed people living all over the world to decide our laws simply based on their parentage. Even after the reform there are major issues. There are 92 heredity peers, of which 75 are allocated to political parties – 42 conservative, 2 labour, 3 lib-dem, 28 others. In other words the political heredity peers are permanently heavily skewed by political party. At the same time I get the impression that the House of Lords currently does a good job of government for the people, certainly better than the house of commons. So yes, I want reform to see more government BY the people, but not at the expense of government FOR the people.

And that brings me on to today. The jubilee. The principle of somebody being a leader of a country because God ordained them through birth does not sit right with me. If we look back less than 100 years we can see examples of where the monarch in the UK exerted power. They ruled the country and instructed government, possibly not always in the best interest FOR the people (to put it mildly). Our current queen has been different. The more I see of her actions the more I get convinced that she governs FOR the people more than our elected representatives. And there I am conflicted. But I choose to place government FOR the people above government BY the people. And that means as somebody that would prefer a republic can easily say today “God save this Queen”, because I really really don’t want to have a republic led by ANY of our current politicians.

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I’m wonderful – you are stupid

Posted on 04/04/2022 by Jim Stewart

No I don’t really think that, but sometimes I think I hear people say it. I have been struggling with comedy for some time now.

I used to watch “Have I got News” regularly, but it seemed to transition at some point to a bunch of people saying how dumb everybody else was (and by inference how amazing they were). After not watching it for a while I turned it back on and cringed. Had I really thought that was funny?

Then there was taskmaster. Quite funny – always made me laugh. But I started to feel uncomfortable about the presentation – it was almost a celebration of being a bully. Then there is the fact it is all about contestants being made to look stupid.

One by one my list of comedies has reduced. I still have Red Dwarf, Room 101, Auf Wiedersehn Pet (despite the warnings about content) and “Would I lie to you”, with a sprinkling of QI. So not terrible.

I’ve also been looking at safeguarding recently for young people. What behaviours do we need to challenge? If I saw kids acting like taskmaster would I think I would need to intervene. The answer is yes. Of course the contestants on taskmaster are adults and have chosen to be made fun of. Or have they?

Then there are a couple of recent events- there is the “joke” told at the Oscars about Jada Pinkett Smith. Would I stop a kid from making fun of another kids medical problem? You bet I would. And then Jenny Tonge posted an unflattering photo of Boris with a snarky comment. Would I accept that type of behaviour from kids. You bet I wouldn’t.

But am I forgetting, they are all adults and it comes with the job? They should expect to be made fun of. Then tonight I had a realisation – that argument has the same roots as the rape defence “she was asking for it”. It is the Harvey Weinstein defence. Make the victim have to stand up to say what happened to them is wrong – put the victim in the dock. No this is not about Boris, or Jada Smith, it is about the behaviour of those that think it is funny to mock people. This is about the jokes being unacceptable, not whether somebody has the right to object to them.

And sadly by my taking part in the behaviour I have to admit to being part of the cheering crowd. I need to review the comedy I enjoy. I don’t know when we moved on from “A man walked into a pub with a USB stick on his head…”. Kids emulate the adult behaviour they see. If we don’t want this behaviour in them then we need to call it out as unacceptable.

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The pursuit of perfection

Posted on 22/12/2021 by Jim Stewart

I saw an advert a few times recently for a perfume called “Perfect”. It has a lot of people one after another where people say “I’m perfect”.

It’s an interesting thought. What they are saying is that we value diversity. But there is a subtext that I am not sure is always healthy.

I remember a Larry Norman concert where he talked about Father Christmas. It stuck with me. The idea of the naughty and nice list. But the story of Christmas is about tearing up the naughty list – binning it – it isn’t important. Over the centuries Christians have focused on the wrong – monks have whipped themselves to make themselves pure – people have paid money because of their wrong. We are wrong we are nasty we all deserve to be punished until we can make ourselves perfect.

There is a little quoted phrase in the bible where Jesus says “I bet you are going to say to me doctor make yourself better”. Why? What would he heal himself from? The suggestion of some is that he had an obvious physical impairment. What, you mean he was not a blonde beautiful man?

This takes me back to the subtext in the advert. That we should all be perfect. I am not sure it is healthy for us to consider ourselves perfect, because that is the walk toward a fear of the naughty list. To me accepting imperfection is a healthier approach to life. So I am not, and never will be, perfect. Deal with it.

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The evil eye

Posted on 16/12/2021 by Jim Stewart

There is one quote by Douglas Adams that I really like.

The major problem—one of the major problems, for there are several—one of the many major problems with governing people is that of whom you get to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to them.
To summarize: it is a well-known fact that those people who must want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it.
To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.

Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

I think he captures one of the issues that will be reported in the history books about this and the last couple of centuries. Globally we have moved to representative systems of government from autocratic systems.

I remember when I visited China walking through Tiananmen Square and seeing a poster of Mao. I ended up discussing Cromwell with my hosts and describing how he created a dictatorship to move the country from one that was ruled by a monarch to one that was democratic. To me there are a lot of similarities between what Cromwell did and what is happening in China.

But there is a clear tension between people that want to rule and people that want to serve.

There is the famous quote

that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth

Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg, 1863

As an aside there is a slightly earlier version of this quote that suggests a slightly different interpretation

This Bible is for the Government of the People, by the People, and for the People.

John Wycliffe, 1382

But even the US constitution contains this

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Preamble to the United States Constitution

“We the People”.

I heard a statement recently by a political leader saying it wasn’t the law but it wasn’t an option. That rang alarm bells for me.

I see politicians from all sides of the political spectrum that want to rule, and others that are more inclined to serve. I think one good indicator is the way politicians change where they stand in order to get elected – it is more important that they are elected than they should represent a specific group of people where they live.

In the UK party politics are a problem for me – “vote for what I think”. It puts the emphasis on the political elite rather than the people they are elected to represent.

I think the republican/monarchy argument is also interesting. If you go back to the Douglas Adams quote you might pick up that the current queen is a much closer match to somebody that is fit to rule than most presidents are.

Right now I see a battle between representation of the people and ruling by an elite. I don’t think the outcome is obvious. I don’t think democracy is guaranteed for the future – and I don’t think left, right, up, down, top, bottom, charm or strange (physics joke) political views are exempt from anti-democracy.

But don’t listen to me, listen to a former world chess champion Our generation will either renew democracy — or lose it forever. I don’t think it is by chance that so much of the fake news attacks the idea of democracy.

Perhaps not “The evil eye”, but actually “The evil I”.

And then we come to Christmas. The story of the ultimate ruler – God – being born in a barn, wandering homeless and being executed. And that radical servant message

the last in line put at the head of the line, and the so-called first ending up last

I guess I see autocratic leadership as being in opposition to the Christian message of Christmas, which might be why I feel uncomfortable when I see it. So maybe as we head toward a New Year it is time to renew the effort to challenge leadership that is there for self aggrandisement – no matter what colour of politics they represent.

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Don’t Panic

Posted on 29/11/2021 by Jim Stewart

I started to imagine Corporal Nicola running in circles shouting “Don’t panic, Captain Boris!!!!”. My fence is coming tomorrow, should I used it instead to barricade my door? Just how much trouble are we in? Truth is the facts tell us we are somewhere between the end of the human race and “Oh dear, I’ve stubbed my toe”.

The daily rag that shall not be named is warning us that this new variant has trebled in the number of cases (that means 2 to 6). The attitude of panic being generated is disturbing – because panic take effort away from where it is needed. Panic kills.

So given the doom sayers are so vocal I thought it might be worth setting out the other side of the picture for this new variant. What do we know and what could it mean?

The information from SA suggests this variant is more infectious than others – apparently the clusters are an indicator of this.

But then there was that interview with the doctor in the middle of the area where the new variant has been discovered. She said there are no hospitalisations, and most people don’t even have a cough. Given the low vaccination rate in SA this is good news.

And what about vaccination – well we expect it will still protect us from serious disease.

For a virus to survive it needs to be infectious – the more infectious the better chance of survival. For a virus to spread it needs the host to survive (a virus that kills quick is not as good at spreading as one that kills slow). So an infectious variant with mild symptoms could easily become dominant.

In short, if you put all this together, this new variant could be a pandemic ender. It could bring about the end of restrictions. It could take us back to normal as soon as New Year. And that is the other en of the spectrum. So we are somewhere on a wide range of possibilities.

Just one thing hinted to me the way things are turning out. If this really is a pandemic ender we would need to reduce the incidence of the current variant before releasing restrictions – and if you go back and listen to what Boris said he as much as said the new restrictions were intended to fight the current variant. Maybe it is too early to panic

It got me wondering about the thought process behind the doom sayers. Why are they so quick to be so negative? It struck me that the new variant is different and we don’t trust it – we need to fight it. For many the distrust of the different comes natural, whether it is a new variant, or a different skin colour or a different religion. Hate of the others is a natural home for a nationalistic politic. Is that why people are reacting so strongly against this new different variant – because they hate the different?

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BREXIT is the problem – no them Europeans are

Posted on 09/10/2021 by Jim Stewart

I keep seeing people continue to post about BREXIT, some saying “See we told you” and others saying “The Europeans are causing us problems deliberately”.

I’m getting bored by it.

Part of the reason is that both ideas are typical of the poor science that is becoming so common in our newspapers and social media. People look for problems and then create a link to their agenda. That link may well be true. However there could be many more cases where there are benefits that people are ignoring. Looking at one side of the facts and shouting about them is just politics – it isn’t a balanced view.

And life is a lot more complicated than the political simplifications would have us believe.

There were two basic sets of rules with the EU, those related to countries in the club, those related to countries outside the club. This country were asked which set of rules they wanted and they chose the rues for outside of the club. We now have that.

People that opposed BREXIT, you voted against it because you thought this was the case. So why are you surprised?

People that supported BREXIT, you asked for the out of Europe rules to apply, they have not changed, so why do you complain about them being applied?

But just to add my experience – here is the story of my belongings from Vienna. I had a couple of boxes of mixed stuff (about £250 worth). To send them to the UK would have cost about £200. To send them to my house in Spain cost about £20. But more than that there were customs forms for shipment to the UK. If you have a pallet of the same items it is easy. But two boxes of mixed household goods requires a few pages of forms, and possibly payment of a fee before delivery. That isn’t a surprise to me – I have had to do the same when sending things to and from the USA. These are just the normal rules for anybody outside the special EU club.

This isn’t a complaint, I voted against BREXIT because I knew the rules that would be applied. I’m not surprised, and I don’t blame the EU for applying the rules we chose. This is just the life this country voted for. Complaining will not change it either way.

But the underlying issue to me is the way people like to choose the problem that proves their politics. The confrontational approach to life. The biased approach to life. Sometimes things in life do not go the way we want because we live in a society that might think different to us. Sometimes a country will vote for something we don’t agree with. Sometimes other countries will not treat us the way we want to be treated. This is life – sometimes we need to just understand we are living in a less than perfect society.

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White privilege is something I don’t accept

Posted on 27/09/2021 by Jim Stewart

It’s a term I have heard used by a lot of people, but I’m sorry I just can’t accept it. It started with a feeling that this isn’t right. So I thought hard about why I felt that way.

My first conclusion was that it was a term that is quite positive in nature because it focuses on the white grouping. It isn’t bad for people to be able to achieve things, so focusing on the things white people achieve tends to hide the issue. It would be better to use a term non-white disadvantage, because that at least recognises the problem.

But as I thought longer I realised my main problem was with the fact that it is very passive terminology. It doesn’t drive action.

I thought longer about it. I started to think about the old ideas of sins of commission and sins of omission – the idea that not doing something can be wrong. It fitted for me.

I like the idea of racism of commission and racism and racism of omission. So rather than using the term white privilege I would rather call it racism of omission, because it has a focus on the problem and drives action.

But then it doesn’t roll of the tongue as easily.

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Cheering on the street fight

Posted on 23/05/2021 by Jim Stewart

I’ve watched several of the fly on the wall documentaries about police on duty. Several of them show the Friday or Saturday night town centre work. The sort of thing that has not been happening recently – crowds of drunks wandering between clubs.

Often there would be a street fight. A couple of people are knocking lumps out of each other as their friends stand around. The police have to step in and separate them. Sometimes the friends will step in and pull their friend away and walk them somewhere else – that often has the best outcome. Sometimes the friends try to shout at the police about how the other person started it – and all that seems to do is prolong the problem.

There has been a street fight going on in the Middle East. I have friends that support both sides. I have watched social media posts about it with dismay, but I have avoided commenting. Yesterday a friend posted a pro-peace image, taking no sides. Almost straight away a reply came saying (paraphrased) that there would be no peace until the other side was got rid of.

Most of my friends post in support of their friends, whichever side they consider a friend. But so many of the posts of support are actually about how bad the other side is. So give this a little thought.

There are people that fly the flag you support that are suffering – that are being killed.

There are people that fly the flag you support that are killing innocent people on the other side.

There are people that fly the flag you support that want to eliminate all of the people on the other side.

Communication is as much about what people hear as what people say. I know most of my friends on both sides want peace. But some of the language I have seen, particularly in posts that simply share things from others, has not been the language of peace.

At this point in time it is important that both sides pull their friends back from the street fight rather than cheer them on. Because no matter who is right or who is wrong we know that both sides in a street fight will get hurt.

So think about how people will hear what you post, particularly that last group. Do they hear a cry for peace, or do they hear a battle cry when they read your post?

And please remember what I said – I have friends that fly both flags, so please do not respond to this with any comment about how right your side is or how wring the other side is.

regardless of your political position, please don’t justify killing your neighbor but learn from the prince of Peace who taught us how to love in difficult situations. Bless, pray, and do good to those who are different from you. Listen and be humble. Don’t jump to conclusions. Seek a long term solution that both Palestinian and Israeli Jews can live with. Seek this solution without losing your commitment to love or Justice. May the Lord help all of us and save Israel/Palestine from hate, bloodshed, and all forms of injustices.

Rev. Dr. Yohanna Katanacho, Academic Dean of Nazareth Evangelical College

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Double booking an oven

Posted on 22/05/2021 by Jim Stewart

Big day tomorrow. About a month ago my kitchen circuit went pop. Something had gone. I tried everything (amazing how many things were plugged in). It turned out to be my oven (I only finally discovered that after I ended up with a 30 minute cooked cold meal). It had been on a cooling cycle which was why I didn’t think it was the oven, but the circular element had blown. Not a disaster – you can replace the elements fairly easily, and they are available for my oven. And there still was the top element, so I can grill things.

However the automatic lock on the door was also bust. That just stopped the cleaning cycle – so I just needed to manually clean the oven. Not hard.

But the display had also gone dim – and when the sun is shining I can’t read it. On bright days I had to set the temperature by listening to clicks – like I am a safe cracker. And there are no replacements for that. I could take the display apart – it probably just needs a new capacitor.

But that was just the final straw – time for a new oven. It has taken a few weeks to get here (so a few extra salads has helped my weight reduction). It arrives tomorrow.

But I almost had a disaster – I nearly double booked tomorrow. And I have suddenly discovered my diary is getting pretty full – I find a couple of things booked for every day. It seems to have happened suddenly – just last month I had a booking every two weeks. I had actually got out of the habit of checking my diary before making a booking – because nothing ever clashed – because there was nothing there.

And yesterday I got an invite to visit Bosnia next month. Remind me again, how do you arrange international travel? What do I put in my bag? Toiletries, I need my travel set. Where did I put them?

I remember it used to take me just three weeks holiday before I had to think carefully before re-starting work to make sure I had everything right.

And now I have had a year long vacation from so many things. Boy this is going to be a challenge. How do you live life?

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Woke racism

Posted on 21/05/2021 by Jim Stewart

It was interesting seeing the complaints about the Home Office raid in Glasgow. So many of the comments I saw talked about how terrible it was to carry this out during Eid. Imagine – detaining two Indian guys on such an important holy day.

One thing stood out to me – the comment by the Sikh organisation. And if you look carefully you will see that one of the men has the surname Singh. They were not Muslim, they were sikhs.

And that is something that made me think. I wonder how many people assumed the two men were muslim simply because of their skin colour.

A but, I hear you say, this was a muslim area. Does that mean there are zones defined by religion? Or maybe we are talking about zones with a skin colour that people assume are muslim? Nicola described it as “in the heart of our Muslim community”.

So I went and looked up the census data for the postcode. The area is predominantly Christian. In fact it is only about 25% muslim.

What really got to me was the way the race and religion card were assumed to be valid as part of a woke argument. I am not talking about whether these guys should have been detained, the policy, or the protest. I am talking about the response of people that were only aware of the social media headlines and how their attitude depended on the ability to pigeon hole people based on skin colour.

I just wonder, if somebody is truly blind to race and religion – they see everybody as totally equal and treat them as perfect equals – can they be woke?

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