my thoughts for this day

so, the books on my desk today include

Short History of Tibet by Richardson
The Pan-African Nation by Andrew Apter
Perspectives on Growth and Poverty - van der Hoeven
The Dragon in the Land of Snows - Tsering Shakya
The Status of Tibet - van Walt & van Praag

with respect to Nigeria and Africa in general part of my interests lay in the attempt by indigenous folk to reclaim their resources and the story of Ken Saro-Wiwa in particular

to that end there is a book by his son Ken Wiwa - In the Shadow of a Saint (2000)
[VPL 966.905 S24w]; another one for the list

till next time

what are facts?

i've been thinking about this whole tibet thing and trying to find out more about what happened but this led me to discover that facts are hard to discover, especially about politically charged topics

the britannica website describes the geography, climate, industry of the tibet but only has a brief mention of the conflict between tibet and china; other websites done on google lead to politically charged pages that seek the freeing of tibet from chinese rule

what was the reasoning for the chinese government to "incorporate" tibet - strategic positioning in the geopolitical realm? resources?

and what about the lack of international response by britain and india, supposed tibetan allies?

obviously more research is needed on my part

this questioning leads into the psychology of why people do nothing, or at least very little, in matters that are so distant yet where human rights issues are involved - understanding these situations would help prevent them from occuring in one's own backyard and they can, just look at the PATRIOT Act in the good old U.S. of A.

buying into credentialism

i'm reading the vancouver sun today and come across an article about how some grade 12 students are going to private schools after school to get better english marks to ensure they have a good mark on their transcript for university entrance applications

students are allowed to replace their public school mark, which is often lower, with this new mark yet when these same 'A' students fail their provincial exams

i see this as students and their parents buying into credentialism, described by jane jacobs in her book dark age ahead

this ties into something else i read about the masters degree being the new bachelor's with respect to the work place; it's ridiculous how you needed a high school education, then a university degree, and now it's a post-graduate degree - that's a ridiculous way to judge a person's ability to work and think because from my personal observations of university students, they don't seem to have learned much

student's are so focused on the credential they forget to learn; it is in part why plagiarism rates are increasing; student's are so pressured into performing well that they will do almost anything to get a good mark and they forget that part of the purpose of going to university is to actually learn

aiming for good grades is a commendable goal but to cheat to achieve that goal defeats the whole purpose; one should aim to actually learn something rather than going through the motions because if you didn't actually learn anything from a class why did you take it in the first place?

i think what this rant is about is go to school for yourself and learn something; don't do it to impress future employers or your parents

why we fight

i watched why we fight by Eugene Jarecki a while back - it describes the military industrial complex (coined by Dwight D. Eisenhower) and the possible necessity to start wars in order to maintain the war machine

so i went down to the local libary and read a little bit from The military-industrial complex: a historical perspective by Paul A.C. Koistinen; i'll admit i got into the first article but it raised an interesting question about how the military is designed to support and protect a democracy yet it in itself is a non-democratic organization with the possible danger that it cannot truly identify with what it is protecting

it was a curious observation and perhaps it makes it easier to understand why "civilians" and the "military" are at odds at times

population growth and economic ruin

well, the title was longer than i wanted...

i keep reading articles (one from the guardian weekly in particular - 2007/02/09, John Vidal, Fuelling the Future feature) that talk about the growth of population to 10 billion by the middle of the current century and how competition for resources will lead to economic collapse

is "economic collapse" a new euphemism for massive deaths? and why do we place so much faith in these projected population numbers?

oil will run out before that time, at least at affordable prices and with no oil the whole foundation that the current capitalist society is based on will collapse and there will be deaths associated with that collapse; who really cares about some rich people losing money? aren't human lives more important...yet i worry the problem will be dealt like all crises, in a reactionary way

by focusing on "economic" issues people are only thinking about themselves and their own well being; people need to shift towards social/human issues such as HIV, malaria, woman's rights, poverty, justice, equality

well, this soap box is getting wobbly so i'll return to the multiplicity of issues at a later time...

robert mcnamara

i've been reading in retrospect by robert mcnamara which is his telling of the events surrounding the vietnam war

i was surprised by the revelation that u.s. military policy in the late 50's was based upon nuclear deterrence and that non-nuclear forces were most likely inadequate; to have a policy based on nuking the enemy was/is frightening

and i'm no expert but it seems to me that many of mcnamara's observations about the vietnam war parallel many things occurring in iraq right now

i guess it is true, those that don't study history are doomed to repeat it

more to come...

praise or scold?

so, i'm lined up at choices waiting to pay for my stuff, dutifully carrying my cloth bags and the women in front of me has amongst her purchases tissues and toilet paper made from recycled paper which i thought was great of her but then she gets her purchases placed in plastic bags even when there are paper bags openly available and cloth bags ready for purchase

i'm wondering, is she truly conscious of her choices or does she get the recycled paper products because someone else in the household asked for it?

that's part of my issue with so called environmentalists like al gore and his $30000 utility bills or sustainability pushers in hollywood

nickel and dimed continued...

some excerpts from ehrenreich's nickel and dimed

Any emphasis is by me...

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Work is suppposed to save you from being an "outcast,"...but what we do is an outcast's work, invisible and even disgusting. Janitors, cleaning ladies, ditch diggers, changers of adult diapers - these are the untouchables of a supposedly caste-free and democratic society. (p 117)

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How do they feel...about the owners, who have so much while others, like themselves, barely get by? This is the answer from Lori..."All I can think of is like, wow, I'd like to have this stuff someday. It motivates me and I don't feel the slightest resentment because, you know, it's my goal to get to where they are." (p. 118)

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So if low-wage workers do not always behave in an economically rational way, that is, as free agents within a capitalist democracy, it is because they dwell in a place that is neither free nor in any way democratic. When you enter the low-wage workplace - and many of the medium-wage workplaces as well - you check your civil liberties at the door, leave America and all it supposedly stands for behind, and learn to zip your lips for the duration fo the shift. The consequences of this routine surrender go beyond the issues of wages and poverty. We can hardly pride ourselves on being the world's preeminent democracy, after all, if large numbers of citizens spend half their waking hours in what amounts, in plain terms, to a dictatorship.

Any dictatorship takes a psychological toll on its subjects. If you are treated as an untrustworthy person - a potential slacker, drug addict, or thief - you may being to feel less trustworthy yourself. If you are constantly reminded of your lowly position in the social hierarchy, whether by individual managers or by a plethora of impersonal rules, you begin to accept that unfortunate status. To draw for a moment from an entirely corner of my life, that part of me still attached to the biological sciences, there is ample evidence that animals - rats and monkeys for example - that are forces into a subordinate status within their social systems adapt their brain chemistry accordingly, becoming "depressed" in humanlike ways. Their behaviour is anxious and withdrawn; the level of serotonin...declines in their brains. And - what is especially relevant here - they avoid fighting even in self defense. (p. 210-211)

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Ehrenreich references two articles that relate to the animal depression and lack of self defense mentioned above

Shively CA, Laber-Laird K, Anton RF Behavior and physiology of social stress and depression in female cynomolgus monkeys. Biological Psychiatry 41(8): 871-882, 1997.

Blanchard DC, Spencer RL, Weiss SM, Blanchard RJ, McEwen B, Sakai RR. Visible burrow system as a model of chronic social stress: behavioral and neuroendocrine correlates. Psychoneuroendocrinology 20(2): 117-134, 1995.

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i've always found it strange that we (in the West) live in democratic societies but that the work environment is typically non-democratic; we fit into a hierarchy and fill our roles often without question even if it endangers our health and well being

and all for what?