Why I won't be purchasing a "Kony 2012" bracelet

- As written by Christopher Landau

Foreword



Since Monday the 27th of February 2012, Dreadbook/Egobook/Wastebook and other social media sites have been awash with a pervasive and infuriating viral video campaign that quickly took the world by the testicles and squeezed extraordinarily hard. After a rather hasty crash course in the politics of Northern Uganda, it seems to even my untrained eye that the “Kony 2012” campaign has a number of serious and glaring flaws.

Primarily it reduces a complex problem down to a collection of emotionally charged and misleading sound bites that entirely fails to capture the voice or thoughts of the subjects it portrays as helpless victims. ‘Kony 2012’ smacks of patronizing, gimmicky, post-colonial orientalism in its purest and most destructive form, and is entirely counterproductive to the cause it claims to advocate. By framing the issue as they do, the filmmakers have made it impossible to imagine anything like an appropriate vision or methodology to resolving a long standing and nuanced issue. Rather we are left with the injunction to ‘spread the word’ in order to raise awareness and presumably speed up the execution of Kony’s death warrant.

Before I open myself up to a legitimate claim of hypocrisy however, I should say that I am not an expert on the region, its people or its complexities. Yet, as nobody involved in the online firestorm that I have encountered has any better access to information than I do, it seemed appropriate and important to do my very best to martial the arguments against the film and its ostensible objectives. This I must confess was largely motivated by the accusation that I was engaged in fomenting a ‘conspiracy’. A charge I felt needed to be addressed head on.

Introduction

The last few days has seen one of the most profligate and insidious ‘human rights based’ viral campaigns of recent times take off into and out of the stratosphere. Whilst there is undoubtedly legitimate praise to be leveled at the film’s makers ‘Invisible Children’, the aim of this blog is primarily to focus people’s minds away from the filmmakers (Seen posing with Ugandan soldiers above) and onto the content and subtext of the film itself. Much of which presents a distorted image of the everyday lives of northern Ugandans, their trials and tribulations.

The multitude of people that have loudly and arrogantly rushed to defend the film against anyone daring to make critical remarks includes the usual bunch of Armchair Interventionists, Clicktivists and idiots who claim to represent the interests and views of the Ugandan people without knowing anything at all about them beyond what they saw in ‘Kony 2012’. Whilst many if not most of them are surely well intentioned, the road to hell is paved with their naïve desires to save the poor African children that incidentally, hardly feature in the ‘Kony 2012’ film at all.

To paraphrase an excellent blog, ‘Justice in conflict’, I will set out to examine both the explicit and implicit claims made by the ‘Kony 2012′ campaign and test them against the historical and empirical record. However I will also attempt to make the further point that this film and its acolytes only perpetuate US efforts at the geopolitical steering of Africa and thus are actually working against the interests of the very people they purport to defend.

Omitting history and context is always dangerous.

“We are not makers of history. We are made by history"

Citing the marginalization of the Acholi people as justification for The LRA's indiscriminate use of violence and cruelty in northern Uganda, Kony and his army of child soldiers has for the last two decades waged a campaign of terror not only in northern Uganda, but also the south of Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Central African Republic. In what some would surely call a farcical response, Kony et al have been indicted by the International Criminal Court and placed on America's terrorist black list. A list that as recently as 2008 included the former head of the African National Congress – Nelson Mandela.

What “KONY 2012” omits from its simplistic and binary narrative, is that the conflict in northern Uganda was (the civil war is now over) multifaceted and highly complex. Deeply rooted in the immense trouble of reconciling the interests of the warring southern kingdoms and the smaller, clan-based regions in the north. Kony’s notoriety in the region in which he operates is legendary and well deserved, stemming primarily from the period when tensions between the central governments of Uganda and the Sudan erupted into a vicious war by proxy. Both countries instigating violent insurgencies within each other’s borders.

This of course does not justify Kony's past or present actions, however before we take the “Kony 2012” assumption that Ugandan forces are: “better equipped than that of any of the other affected countries” to deal with Kony, at face value, we might note that the Ugandan government's own ‘counter-insurgency’ operations were arguably more brutal than that of the LRA itself. Much like with the Tamils in Sri Lanka , the Chechens and Ingush peoples in the North Caucasus and of course Al-Qaida in Yemen and Somalia (not to mention Afghanistan, Pakistan and post invasion Iraq) a simplistic “we must catch the terrorist evil-doers” interventionist narrative and accompanying justifications belay not only immense naivety, hypocrisy and hints at ‘the white man’s burden’ but embody the deluded and pervasive assumption that state sponsored counter-insurgency interventions are primarily benign.

During the primary period of hostilities, the Ugandan government (the same government that the makers of ‘Kony 2012’ implore us to trust) have (according to U.N estimates) been largely responsible for the internment of between 1.5 and 2 million civilians in "internally displaced persons" camps where mortality rates were shockingly high. Former UN under secretary general Olara Otunnu and Democratic party leader Norbert Mao (Both of Ugandan origin) insist that many atrocities were committed within the camps, and those that profited were primarily the Ugandan army officers and senior figures in the military industrial complex. Many of whom succeeded in stealing vast swathes of land from the interned refugees fleeing the violence and savagery committed by both the LRA and the Ugandan army. It has also been claimed by some (although I was unable to verify this) that this land grab led individuals within the leadership of the Ugandan army to deliberately prolong hostilities in order to further benefit from illegal land appropriation.

‘Kony 2012’ omits any mention of this important historical context whilst also failing to mention that the U.S has already sanctioned operations in Uganda to remove Kony and the LRA in the past, all of which succeeded only in splintering the LRA into smaller groups and pushing them out of Uganda into the surrounding countries. (Primarily Sudan, the Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of Congo; this in turn lead to a disastrous and counterproductive increase in tensions between Uganda and the DRC.) The U.S sanctioned these military operations with the express intent of killing Kony and his militia (Operations Iron Fist and Lightning Thunder), but in both cases failed to ‘get their man’ and this failure lead to retaliatory killings and kidnappings which effectively removed any diplomatic solutions from the table.

One regional commentator outlined some of the problematic implications the failure of these military ventures entailed: “Future missions involving four states with prickly relations will be even more diplomatically and logistically daunting. The indictments against the LRA appear to rule out non-military options. With the door closed on negotiation, efforts to corner Kony on a "battlefield" that spans four countries are likely to press him into further acts of murderous bravado”. All of this the unintended consequence of a hasty rush to violent intervention in the first place. As I have mentioned, many northern Ugandans themselves actually favor a negotiated settlement with ‘traditional reconciliation mechanisms’, (i.e. not mechanisms that involves special forces, drones or any other form of American imperialist power) but their beliefs and ideals don’t seem to matter to the makers of ‘Kony 2012’. The north Ugandan voice is thus entirely removed from this debate, and thanks to the actions of the U.S government and its cheerleaders, any attempts to listen to it are now far more difficult.

Of course this also assumes that killing Kony would solve any of the problems so emotively illustrated in the film. Even if Kony were to be eliminated tomorrow by U.S or Ugandan forces, the entirely western led campaigns for retributive and violent ‘justice’ could very well end up fueling the very violence that the assembled battalions of armchair interventionists claim to deplore. Whilst such complexities are simply ignored by US pressure groups. (of which ‘invisible children’ is quickly becoming a leading light) it has to be said that this lack of nuance didn’t stop them from being extremely effective in mobilizing bipartisan support in the U.S congress with the “LRA Disarmament Act” approved last May. These advocacy groups have undoubtedly made the destruction of the LRA a fashionable and zeitgeisty cause amongst predominantly white, middle-class, activists, bloggers and journalists. But to quote the excellent ‘securing rights’ blog: “stories can inspire [but] at the same time, inspiration runs the risk of perpetuating problematic, unintended cognitive biases. A “single story,” […] can obscure a complex, multi-layered web of perceptive analysis, underscoring cultural stereotypes and simplifications.”

The United States – ‘World police’?

“The enemy aggressor is always pursuing a course of larceny, murder, rapine and barbarism. We are always moving forward with high mission, a destiny imposed by the Deity to regenerate our victims while incidentally capturing their markets, to civilize savage and senile and paranoid peoples while blundering accidentally into their oil wells.”

The role of the U.S as portrayed in the film is as a benevolent but overly cautious ‘regional’ power that is more than capable of completing the proposed ‘solution’ offered by the filmmakers - namely ‘stopping’ Kony. The fact that this might not actually solve any of the systemic problems in the region is, naturally, not mentioned. It seems to me that these assumptions require careful examination and reflection before we even think of proselytizing them. Have we already forgotten Bosnia? Have we already forgotten Somalia? Have we already forgotten Nicaragua? (Since 1945 the U.S has attempted to intervene and overthrow 50 sovereign governments, so I will refrain from listing every instance of a disastrous U.S led intervention)

These kinds of interventions are always couched in the language of defeating the evil doers and of moral necessity. Sadly, judging by a recent Guardian opinion poll that showed roughly 80% of its readership support U.S senator John McCain’s injunction to bomb Syria, the answer to the question ‘do we remember?’ is either ‘no’, or more worryingly ‘yes, so what?’. It seems clear to me that most people do remember something, but only what we were told to believe happened by our leaders regarding these ostensibly ‘successful’ interventions, not what actually happened.

The U.S interventionist strategy for Uganda so far (Instigated by AFRICOM) is necessarily sparse on details, as is any operation primarily consisting of deniable Special Operations assets or to use the common euphemism ‘American advisors”. The mandate provided by congress to “remove Joeseph Kony and senior LRA commanders from the battlefield” explicitly consists of a “multi-year commitment [to provide] enhanced logistical operational and intelligence assistance”. So whilst it is indeed speculative to claim that this might be used as justification for increased U.S military presence in Africa, it is far from a ‘conspiracy’.

The Obama administration’s decision to send around 100 additional troops was not motivated in any way shape or form by altruisic tendencies. To claim so is naiveté of the highest magnitude, as Matt Brown of the 'Enough project' argues: “The U.S. doesn’t have to fight al-Qaida-linked Shabab in Somalia, so we help Uganda take care of their domestic security problems, freeing them up to fight a more dangerous – or a more pressing, perhaps – issue in Somalia." However the sending or reinforcment of any contingent of ground troops in Africa sets a dangerous precedent. Especially if we look at the external factors driving U.S troop deployment in the region more generally. To quote one blogger: ”It is clear that the ‘Kony 2012′ campaign sees the 100 US troop allotment as inadequate. Here they are right – 100 US troops is not the solution. But their own answer is highly problematic."

We know what the makers of “Kony 2012″ believe should happen but they won’t say it explicitly, except to say that Kony must be “stopped”." By 'stopped' we can infer that the filmmakers really mean 'killed' which plays into the narrative created by the ‘Kony 2012′ campaign that what actually happens to Kony and the LRA soldiers is unimportant - death or otherwise. Having said that, we are forced to draw our own conclusions as to the actual meaning of the filmmakers, the unspecific aim of “stopping” him is meant to be sufficient despite its obvious ambiguity. Who after all, doesn’t want Kony to be 'stopped'? But this is begging the question somwhat, does the removal of one man end the LRA? How do you reconcile what happens to the deeply traumatised children of Kony's militia with our desire to see an evil man dead? ‘Kony 2012′ offers us nothing here.

With its long and sordid history of unilateral and protectionist intervention in foreign states, the increasing power of China in Africa and the perpetual interest amongst U.S hawks in maintaining U.S global dominance, is it far from paranoid to be concerned about the supposedly benign motivations of U.S strategic planners. Writing this as I am from the occupied territories of Palestine, I would argue it is clearly not so. To quote Guardian journalist Nick Young, part of what actually motivates U.S intervention is that: “American support in mopping up the LRA is a payback for Uganda's contribution of (US-trained) peacekeepers in Somalia.” He goes on to say that the: “US, whose defense budget is now higher than at any point during or since the cold war, is gearing up for "strategic" competition with China in Africa, seizing opportunities to strengthen military alliances.” In this sense there is a odd coalition forming between U.S hawks/ neo-cons and young American and European idealists who: ‘find Kony the perfect hate figure’.

“Kony 2012 must be good because it raises awareness”

“Change is certain. Peace is followed by disturbances; departure of evil men by their return. Such recurrences should not constitute occasions for sadness but realities for awareness, so that one may be happy in the interim.”

The idea that popular opinion can be leveraged with viral marketing to induce foreign military intervention is incredibly dangerous. It is immoral to try and manufacture the consent of the peoples of the Empire and its satellites with a sanitized vision of foreign intervention that entirely neglects the fact that many innocent people will die as a result. Of course that doesn’t really matter to us westerners, because we will never have to see their bodies or learn their names, and as other non-people of the world, they will inevitably fall down the ‘memory hole’.

This is not even to question the moral efficacy of targeting somebody such as Kony who runs an army consisting of many children. Many of these supposedly ‘legitimate’ targets are also victims themselves. Can the killing of a nine-year-old child forced into slave labor (of whatever kind) be justified on the grounds that his captor is a psychopathic monster?

Following on from what Mark Kersten has said about this on his blog, one of the most questionable assumptions behind ‘Kony 2012’ is that the more people that ‘get to know’ Kony, the greater the chance that the world will act to remove him. Firstly this arrogantly assumes that because people in the U.S and Britain don’t know who he is, it must be that rest of the world is similarly ignorant. Secondly it presupposes that awareness alone solves problems. To take one obvious counterexample, I would hope that we all know of the cruelty, suffering and death imposed upon the Palestinian people by the racist state of Israel (and it’s U.S and European backers) over the past sixty years, but what changes do we see as a result of this awareness?

In an even more abject display of questionable moral reasoning, ‘Kony 2012’ argues that the use of celebrities is a crucial part of this awareness campaign. To quote the Huffington Post newspaper, part of this awareness drive involves: “encouraging 20 cultural tastemakers and 20 policy makers, including the likes of Angelina Jolie and Oprah Winfrey, to take a stand.” George Clooney is also quoted in the film as saying “I'd like indicted war criminals to share the same celebrity as me[…]that seems fair." That is what these bombastic and unsupported claims about the utility of informing (or miss-informing) people boils down do, merely another excuse for the PR industry to commodify suffering and indoctrinate us further into the cult of celebrity.

Again to quote Kersten: “I am actually stupefied that any analysis of the ‘LRA question’ results in the identification of the problem being that “Kony isn’t popular enough”. The reality is that few don’t know who Joseph Kony is in East Africa and the Great Lakes Region, making it all-too-apparent that this isn’t about them, their views or their experiences.” Again we find ourselves with an entirely western-centric view of the problem that excludes those most affected by our actions and rhetoric. Shockingly ‘Kony 2012’ features almost no participation by the very people it describes. Where exactly are the northern Ugandans in this film? Kersten later argues, compellingly in my view, that: “It is hard to respect any documentary on northern Uganda where a five year-old white boy features more prominently than any northern Ugandan victim or survivor.” Of course it is easy to see why this might be the case, as I have argued elsewhere in this essay, the vision presented by ‘Kony 2012’ is simplistic, reductionist, and if it weren’t an internet phenomena, irrelevant.

The views of the northern Ugandans cannot be considered by the film makers for a simple reason, because they don’t fit the chosen narrative framing. An interview with a survivor of an LRA attack that wanted Kony brought before a local tribal judge, rather than executed by an American special forces soldier or Ugandan artillery shell confuses the binary narrative that is so effective at rousing people’s emotions but so dangerous in matters of peace and war. One final quote from Kersten: “‘Kony 2012′, quite dubiously, avoids stepping into the 'peace-justice question' in northern Uganda precisely because it is a world of contesting and plural views, reports suggest that the majority of Acholi people continue to support the amnesty process whereby LRA combatants – including senior officials – return to the country in exchange for amnesty and entering a process of traditional justice. Many continue to support the Ugandan Amnesty law because of the reality that it is their own children who constitute the LRA. Once again, this issue is barely touched upon in the film.”.

The conflict in northern Uganda is not seen by most Ugandans as primarily an issue centred on the LRA in any case. It only takes a brief internet search to discover that many citiziens of Uganda lay the blame for nearly 25 years of violence not only on the LRA and the government of Uganda, but other regional players such as militias of the South Sudanese (as well as the government in Khartoum) who have their own long and appalling record of human rights abuses. There is also no mention in the film that northern Ugandans are currently enjoying the longest period of peace since the conflict began in the mid eighties. The inevitable triumphalism brought about by the supposed success of ‘Kony 2012’ in mobilizing the Obama administration to action obscures these key realities. In conclusion, we mustn't let a well edited video, light on facts and heavy on emotion set a new precedent in the world of online activism. If we do I fear the first facebook sponsered war could be just around the corner. "Iran 2012" anyone?.

'Whatever you do - don't let them occupy your mind.'

Today was my first real experience of the Israeli occupation up close. I rose earlier than was strictly necessary, partly out of a sense of excitement, but mainly out of fear. Last minute doubts had me near paralyzed in bed for a quarter of an hour.

By the time I'd made the short walk from my hostel (on the edge of Jerusalem's old city) to the bus station at Damascus gate, I would have laughed at my early morning self - so brimming with confidence and eagerness was I. The clock read 9.30 am.

I was heading to the small Palestinian village of Bil'in, the site of a long running dispute between the local Palestinian population of countless generations and Israeli settlers and their military proxies. The Israelis had annexed large swathes of the village behind - to use the Israeli euphemism - a 'separation fence' in recent years, but the dispute went back to the Israeli expansion of 1967 when the village was first occupied.

This fence - or to avoid the euphemism - a series of three parallel fences (one of which is electrified) encircle the village on two sides. (To see what this looks like from the Israeli side watch 'Louis Theroux and the ultra Zionists') This ugly, artificial, blight on an otherwise resplendent landscape cuts families, friendships and ancestral lands in two - and is illegal under international law.

Every Friday afternoon for the past few years have seen hundreds of local Palestinians and a handful of international activists attempt to conduct a peaceful protest up to the primary Israeli guard post where the two sections of the 'fence' intersect.

After a short ride by local bus to the West bank city of Ramallah, I found a willing taxi driver to take me the 10km or so to Bil'in. Highlights of this journey include my enthusiastic driver producing a pristine photograph of his 22year old son Hasan, proudly posing in the full regalia of one or other of the Fatah military units - complete with black beret and thousand yard stare. My driver Faizul assured me numerous times that his son's Shotokan karate skills are second to none, and in between praising Yasser Arafat and Barcelona football team, kindly gave me some pitta and spiced fishcakes to sate my rumbling belly.

Arriving a couple of hours before the march was due to depart, and much to the amusement of the locals, I set off into the surrounding foothills to get a better sense of the terrain, the town and the man-made barrier that divides them. To sum up the look and feel of the village of Bil'in concisely, imagine a sleepy rural mountain village in the south of France - complete with the rhythmic drone of cicadas and the slow pace of life attendant to country living.

By the time I returned to the center of town from my brief foray, a small but growing assembly of protesters had gathered around the house of a leading local activist. The house also doubled as an operations room of sorts for the expanding protest, from which protesters young and old helped prepare banners, signs and Palestinian flags. Here I met a number of other internationals, Israelis (from the group "Anarchists against the wall" and local activists. Two of the internationals were - like me - affiliated with the I.S.M (International Solidarity Movement).

John and James (I have changed their names here for security purposes) hailed from Sweden and the USA respectively. Both had been in country for a number of weeks already, and James was on his second 'tour'. Out of the three ISM activists in attendance, I was thus the greenest and naturally bombarded them with endless questions. Whether or not they sensed my nerves - they showed no sign.

Within the space of an hour the assembled crowd had swollen to approximately (by my own shoddy estimate) 2-300 protesters and over a dozen local and foreign journalists. Almost all of these journalists carried gas-masks, wore full length flak-jackets, helmets, and knee pads. A sight that despite the inherent dangers of facing the I.D.F (Israeli "Defence" Force) had me literally laughing out loud - it was such an incongruous sight in this sleepy little village, especially considering the lack of any such protection for the Palestinians they had come to report on.
With retrospect, I made an underestimation here on two counts. 1. The disproportionate force that Israel utilizes in any encounter with Palestinian demonstrators (peaceful or not) and 2. The sheer bravery and courage of the Palestinians (especially but by no means limited to the children).

Just as the procession looked to be heading out, I broke off from my ISM friends and darted inside an abandoned building overlooking the intended route. After a quick scrabble up a ruined staircase, I set up my camera on the first floor to capture some aerial views of the march beneath.

As the protest eventually set off , the accompanying sounds of the Muslim call to prayer echoed down the narrow village streets. Men and boys affiliated with Fatah mounted their bright orange and green flags on the front of a truck that doubled as a mobile musical accompaniment to the march (via a rigged up loudspeaker)and as the lead vehicle (at least initially) in the column. This loud and colorful procession moved slowly down through the thin winding streets of Bil'in and up the old road towards the Israeli lines.

After running up and down like some kind of demented paparazzi, snapping pictures from every conceivable angle I could manage, I rejoined the front of the march alongside a young Palestinian man named Mohamed, riding at quite a pace out in front in his red motorized wheel chair.

I'm sure that given enough time I could write a novel about Mohamed, but in the interest of concision all I will note is that this man survived an Israeli sniper's bullet to the base of his neck nearly a decade ago - at the beginning of the second Palestinian Intifada (Intifada translates as 'shaking off'). After receiving a wound that would likely kill most people, Mohamed went onto marry and, remarkably - sire two children.

As the procession led by Mohamed began to ascend the few hundred meters up to the ridge line and the first fence, a bright yellow bulldozer pulled out of a side street and immediately took up position as lead vehicle. The bulldozer, occupied by a lone Palestinian, was quickly swarmed by young men wielding the green, black, red and white livery of the Palestinian flag. As I was to discover later, the intention of this lumbering piece of heavy machinery was primarily symbolic - although the role of driver remained fraught with danger. Big slow moving objects are not hard to spot - and it takes a brave man to steer something that obvious(and percievably threatening) towards the fourth largest military in the world.

By this point I had dropped back 20 meters or so from the front of the march, leaving the heaped and crowded bulldozer, Mohamed and his motorized wheel chair, and a number of Shabab (local kids - the ones you see throwing stones on the telly)at the front of the noisy procession. As the shimmering reflections from the Israeli guns ahead glistened menacingly in the mid-day sun, it seemed momentarily as if they might allow our peaceful march to reach the gate unmolested.

Suddenly a quick succession of loud pops and an angry rasping buzz heralded the arrival of the American manufactured high velocity tear-gas canisters (developed to punch through concrete walls). Amazingly, the first volley fell somewhat short of the front ranks of the march - to much whooping and hollering from the shabab out in front. By some small fortune, the wind actually blew some of this gas back towards the Israeli lines.

With the second volley however, we weren't so lucky. The I.D.F conscripts had clearly received a talking to from their commander because before I even knew what was happening, six or seven canisters were cascading down from the sky like fallen stars. Unfortunately for myself and those around me, this volley landed but a few meters away.

For those of you that have never been tear-gassed, I should emphasize that tears are the least of your worries. Within seconds I was doubled up and retching, with the distinct impression that somebody very heavy was sitting on my chest. Speaking personally, I found the worse symptoms to be the primordial fear that the gas taps into, the instinctual reaction is to run as fast and far as possible, yet it leaves you physically incapable to do so. Many protesters on this and other marches were to succumb to the pressing, cloying suffocation of the gas.

After the initial shock and pain, my legs finally kicked into gear and I began to stumble back down the road only to find my path blocked by a wall of gas produced by a canister that had landed to my rear. I honestly cannot remember exactly what happened next, but I was either bundled or pushed aside and found myself face down in a shallow gully by the side of the road - mercifully out of the path of the oncoming gas. Gasping for air and totally blind I felt like I was drowning - my mind wandered to the furthest reaches of the cosmos asI found myself, if only for a second, wishing for annihilation. At least in death one doesn't have the dreadful sensation of panic brought on by a lack of oxygen to the brain.

Some minutes passed before my ragged gasps were replaced with the sweet sensation of regular, steady breathing. I still could not see more than a few feet in front of me and my eyes streamed with tears that, full of gas, burnt the eyes horribly. My relief was short lived however. As yet another barrage of gas began to fall around me I forced myself up and half ran and half fell back onto the road and down the hill. At this point cries for a medic reached my ears from the front of the now fragmented and ramshackle column. These cries were then repeated and relayed further back down the line to the incredibly brave medics of the solitary Red Crescent ambulance in attendance at the rear. Later it emerged that the injured included an old man and a number of children suffering from gas inhalation.

By the time the ambulance had passed by, a quick glance up the hill told me that apart from the bulldozer and perhaps a dozen shabab the only protester that had made it to the gate was - amazingly - Mohamed in his motorized wheel chair. (By the way this was not because the Israelis did not try to stop him) Like me, the vast majority of demonstrators had retreated a considerable way back down the road.

Arrogantly determined not to let a bunch of kids and a wheelchair user go it alone, I took a quick sniff of my indispensable ethanol sachet (it reawakens your senses after the gas )and pushed on up the hill.

As I drew closer to the gate, I saw and smelt one of the I.D.F's nastier weapons systems in use. 'Skunk' as it is colloquially named, is a disgustingly foul smelling sludge fired out of a high pressure hose attached to a tanker truck. According to Wikipedia the smell remains on clothing for up to five years. Days or weeks on the body. At the time of writing this, I still get the occasional whiff from the invisible particles borne on the wind and onto my skin. By the time I was close enough to see what was happening clearly (my eyes were still half closed at this point) I could smell the fetid stench hanging thick in the air.

What I saw next shocked me, Mohamed sat solitary and unmovable at the front of the now significantly diminished protest, whilst he, the bulldozer and a number of shabab came in for a sustained and terrifying bombardment with 'skunk', tear-gas, flash-bangs, sound grenades and rubber coated steel bullets. Watching the onslaught ahead of me, I moved warily up the hill. As if guessing my intention three more tear-gas canisters fell around me, one literally at my feet. Once bitten twice shy goes the saying, and I promptly ran as fast as I could back the way I had come - not looking back even once.

These violent scenes were repeated for another fifteen minutes or so before, to my astonishment, the yellow bulldozer (now more of a grey brown color) retreated past me and the other demonstrators at the foot of the hill, looking much like it had been hit by a missile. One of the enormous industrial tires had almost completely separated from it's axle, creating a hideous grinding noise as the exposed metal was dragged slowly along the road. All of the windows had been blown out by sound grenades and rubber coated bullets with the exception of one, riddled with bullet holes but still hanging loosely in its frame. As it passed us the new paint job became explicable as the stench of 'skunk' filled up the nostrils. A girl kneeling beside me started vomiting into the coarse dry grass.

During all of this chaos Mohamed stayed pretty much where he was up by the wire. A lonely figure silhouetted against the ridge line, the embodiment of the brutality of this long and squalid occupation but also its possible salvation. If all of the demonstrators had shared his bravery, one wonders what the Israelis could have done to stop us reaching them.

Some thirty minutes later it was all over, only a few shabab attempting to throw stones remained anywhere near the 'fence'. After the chaos and the frenzy, myself and a number of other internationals, Israeli Anarchists and local Palestinians retired to the nearby house of one of the village elders for warm pitta, humus and black coffee. Sharing tales of the fallen comrades that had died but a few hundred meters away - at the hands of this same Israeli unit.

A couple of hours later I hitched a ride back to Ramallah with a few international development types. Discovering to my annoyance (that is an understatement) that my memory card had inexplicably ceased to function, rendering my frantic photography attempts entirely worthless. Nevertheless I vowed to return for next weeks march, where scenes similar to that I have described are sure to be repeated in this quiet and beautiful Palestinian village of Bil'in. C


For footage of yesterdays protest use the link below:

http://www.youtube.com/user/haithmkatib

Neo-liberalism, Libya and the left - The false choice of interventionism

- As written by Christopher Landau

Of the many conversations with leftist friends in recent weeks and months, many have focused on the extraordinary and developing situation in the Middle-East. The popular character of the uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, Bahrain, Libya, Morocco and Syria is undeniable and easy to 'support'. However in recent days I found a widespread assumption that the revolutionaries in Libya needed to be supported militarily - and by a U.S led military intervention if necessary. What surprised me most about this was not only the lack of historical knowledge of the region, but also an ignorance of the long and sordid history of Western interventions more generally. Instead a simple and reductive moral choice was offered to me. To paraphrase a recent interlocutor: 'if we [the west] don't intervene, there will be a massacre in Benghazi. Therefore we must intervene.’ However, if we do take a quick look at the history of Western Interventionism, it quickly becomes clear that 'intervene or be responsible for a massacre' is simply a false choice.

This is not a piece written to defend the Gaddafi regime, nor demean the noble and incredibly brave actions of the Libyan revolutionaries. But if people of the 'left' are using the same imperialist language as our leaders, it’s a cause for concern. An injection of history and scepticism into a debate light on facts and heavy on assumptions is therefore essential.

As I have written before on this blog, journalists tend not to be great readers of history, but it seems supposed leftists are just as guilty. Happy to regurgitate the same Imperialist bile used to justify previous disastrous interventions in Bosnia, Somalia, Iraq and Afghanistan - without even a cursory glance at the history of lies, duplicity and of course - Empire - that has directly led to over half a century of chaos, bloodshed and dictatorship in the Middle-East.

Thus I claim that any 'conclusions' reached by the assorted ranks of armchair generals, lining up so bravely to sacrifice the lives of other peoples children - are not only ignorant but immoral. To base a prescription for intervention solely on the recent corporate press coverage of Libya is sheer folly. Advocating war based on emotion, assumptions and leftist dogma is no way to approach a decision with potentially severe ramifications for the people of Libya. If we allow the political, media and intellectual elites to bang the drum for war yet again, free of critical challenge -I fear the left is well and truly dead.

Of course it goes without saying that the motivations, methods and ideologies of the revolutionary movements exploding across the Arab world are diverse and distinct. However, in a Newsnight interview with Jeremy Paxman last week, Noam Chomsky emphasised repeatedly that: 'Libya is a special case', later adding: 'it is a civil war'. According to Chomsky there are many comparative examples to the events transpiring in Libya, where according to: ‘a standard game plan that they've used over and over, Marcos in the Philippines, Duvalier in Haiti, Chun in South Korea, Suharto in Indonesia -there comes a point when you cannot support your favourite dictator any longer.’ He later adds: ‘The same thing happens every time; support them as long as possible, when the judgment is it cannot be done anymore... come out with ringing declarations about love of democracy and how you're on the side of the people'

The bravery and doggedness of the Libyan revolutionaries efforts to overthrow Gaddafi have been met with appalling brutality; ranging from 'shoot-to-kill' policies to the indiscriminate use of artillery and snipers against unarmed civilians. Into its fourth week the Libyan uprising was reaching a critical point. With Gaddafi's armour massed on the outskirts of Benghazi and other rebel held towns, a massacre looked imminent (although on what scale will never be known). The Arab league and some Libyan opposition leaders called tentatively for a severely limited U.N backed intervention in the form of a no fly zone; this request was put before the U.N; and resolution 1973 shortly followed. The appearance of foreign warplanes over Tripoli and Benghazi within hours was greeted with thunderous cheers and shouts of 'Merci Sarkozy!' by rebel forces; and as the first night of bombing obliterated Gaddafi's aging fleet of Russian tanks, morale increased exponentially. However, this rosy picture is far from complete.

The forgotten mistakes of the past metamorphose before our eyes into bitter ironies - ironies that one might think a descending horde of journalists would be interested in. Thus my first objection to this intervention (and certainly the weakest) is the sheer hypocrisy of it all. What motivates the revolutionaries of Libya today are the same demands for equality, democracy and justice that motivated the revolutionaries of the 1969 ‘Green’ revolution that installed Gaddafi in the first place - on a wave of popular support I might add. It is the degeneration of the 69 revolution into the inevitable crony capitalism of dictatorship, that brings us here to the 2011 revolution - as the same greedy and powerful Western interests that first attacked (killing his adopted daughter) and then supported the Gaddafi regime are now free to destroy him – whilst one assumes - leftists cross their fingers very tightly and hope for the best.

Two, more serious objections to the events taking place in Libya are the historical record of Western intervention and the vested interests of the states involved. This view is shared by Asli Ü. Bâli, professor of law at UCLA who noted in Aljazeera yesterday that: 'The desire to act in solidarity with the Libyan people demands that we assess the available options against the core principle of legitimacy that any intervention must satisfy: Do no harm (that is, do not do more harm on balance by intervening).' Bâli argues that the likelihood of a 'coercive' intervention satisfying this principle is: 'severely constrained when evaluated against the historical record, logistical realities, and the incentives and interests of the states in a position to serve as the would-be external interveners'.

The Historical Record

As per the Washington Consensus, launching supposedly altruistic and humanist missions of peace and liberation in order to conceal wars of conquest and exploitation is nothing new. Of course we can never know the true motivations of the political classes in any specific case, but what we can know is that the plight of the Libyan people is always going to be low down their list of priorities – secondary always to protection of petroleum reserves, continued ‘stability’ and the interests of the domestic (i.e. Western) population – in that order.

There are two recent examples of ‘no fly zones’ in action, though it seems politicians are loathe to discuss the details. A fact evidenced in Prime minister’s questions yesterday when Ming Campbell [former leader of the Lib Dems] stood up to praise Cameron’s ‘necessary and moral’ actions, with an unchallenged reference to the ‘successful’ Bosnian intervention that he claimed was an example of a 'successful no fly zone that saved thousands of lives'. This is a gross misreading of history; when we look at the facts rather than the rhetoric we see that not only did the most savage and brutal atrocities on Bosnia occur after the NATO bombing and imposition of the no fly zone, many atrocities were motivated by the widespread civilian casualties inflicted by NATO in the first place.

The second, more relevant example of a failed no-fly zone was imposed on Iraq for almost 12 years (1992 – 2003). The main objective in Iraq was much the same as in Libya; the destruction of a brutal dictators ability to use air power to achieve his goals in suppressing domestic dissent (In Iraq this meant Kurdish forces in the North, Shia groups in the South). Unfortunately for the Kurdish resistance fighters and Shia militia- men, a no fly zone is pretty much useless when your enemy can still muster significant ground forces. These brave fighters who, like their Libyan counterparts, welcomed Western intervention with open arms – died in their droves, buried to this day in unmarked mass graves. Further still, the no-fly zone served as a predicate for the subsequent invasion and occupation of Iraq: 'insofar as the ongoing use of this coercive measure against the regime from 1991 until 2003 was cited in support of the argument that there was "implied authorisation" to forcibly topple the regime.'(3)

If we want to move beyond a no-fly zone however (which looks increasingly certain as Gaddafi and his now polarised forces entrench themselves deeper into the population centres of Tripoli)the moral hazard increases. Put simply - coercive external intervention to alter the balance of power on the ground in Libya in favour of the anti-Gaddafi revolt is likely to backfire badly.

Of course we must remember that the costs of this intervention are borne not by those who call for it here, but by the Libyan people with whom we hope to show solidarity. Embracing the Libyan call for solidarity thus demands of us a realistic understanding and analysis of the interventionist option - exactly because the attendant risks will be borne by Libyan civilians.

Vested interests

At no time has a well informed debate on this subject been needed more urgently. Yet in the media and the house of commons yesterday there was widespread consensus. At a time of ideological crisis for advocates of the Washington Consensus , the Neo-Liberal project and indeed NATO itself, we cannot underestimate the hubris of the political class. I would not be surprised in the least to learn that many pledges of support from Western leaders were motivated more by the opportunity to resurrect a useful narrative than a concern for Libyan civilians.

Whilst the questionable motives of the intervening countries does not necessarily invalidate intervention, it should remind us that the fluffy rhetoric heard in recent days is just that. It also remains far from clear what kind of regime will emerge to fill the political and bureaucratic vacuum (police states tend to be heavy on bureaucracy) left once/if Gaddaffi is removed - again if history tells us anything -temper your optimism.

There is probably no need to repeat any more history here since the failure of such past interventions to advance the humanitarian welfare or political aspirations of local populations is well-established. But bizarrely intervention is being touted in leftist circles as not only the obvious solution but the only one. I haven’t even heard one mention of the possibility of using AU (African Union) and AL (Arab League) forces to intervene instead.

To quote Bâli again: ‘While humanitarian considerations are often invoked in defense of intervention, humanitarianism is far from the only issue on the table. Other reasons that have been adduced in favour of intervention in Libya include vindicating international norms, re-establishing the leadership of the US in the region, preventing spill-over of the refugee crisis into Europe, and the stabilisation of world oil markets. The Libyan people are struggling to change their regime on their own terms and there is no reason to presume an overlap between these various logics of intervention and their interests.’

The historical record demonstrates clearly that any notion of an external intervention based on mixed motives - even when accompanied with the usual claims of humanitarianism – places the strategic and economic interests of the interveners first: ‘Indeed, the discord currently evidenced among Western powers concerning intervention in Libya is precisely based in their doubts as to whether their strategic interests are adequately served by such a course.’

'In the final analysis, if we are to support an external intervention in Libya it requires that the motives of those executing the policy are clearly aligned with the interests of Libyan civilians.' This is clearly not the case. Thus it seems probable that more bloodshed, not less, will result. Some of the responsibility for this must lie with those so happy to advocate intervention from the comfort of their own living rooms. As the bombing enters it's fourth night, spare a thought for the Libyan people, most of whom don't call themselves revolutionaries, as they must now endure not only 'shock and awe', but a far from certain future.

In that same Newnight interview with Paxman, when asked about the prospects of western military intervention in Libya, Chomsky replied simply: 'you've got to remember, the West is hated for good reason'. C


Bibliography

(1) If you’re interested in Bosnia I recommend you read Robert Fisk’s ‘The Great War for Civilisation’ (his dispatches from Sarajevo are award winning)and Noam Chomsky’s ‘The New Military Humanism’(Where not only does he examine the Western PR campaign to re-write the history of the Bosnian intervention - and demonstrate the hawkish position adopted by a certain Mr A. Blair - in a review of the Dayton Accords explains how, in the appendices of these agreements, American military officials wrote the Constitution of Bosnia-Herzegovina themselves, and how, with no popular base, this Constitution imposed a colonial government by handing the reins of the economy over to the West)

(2) Chomsky interview part one - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_oMslFIYaVk

(3) http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/03/201132093458329910.html

Does our anger offend you?

There is a debate raging amongst the people of "Middle" England today. Played out at tables and other clichés around the country. The debate amongst the Middle people is identical to the debate amongst the chattering classes - down to the very last word.

'Kettle', 'Anarchist', 'Phalanx', 'Surge' - journalese now a common term of reference to the average Middle viewer of corporate news; no matter how debased the terms have become. The question that has come to dominate the debate for the chattering classes and thus the Middle is simply this: ‘do you condemn violent protest? Or don’t you?’.

The problem with this formulation is that the chattering classes have missed the point entirely. News editors typically don’t like to ask ‘why?’ questions you see, it involve too much pesky, time-consuming history. Twenty first century news is perpetually fixed on the zeitgeist of the now. The problem with the debate over the rightness or wrongness of violent protest is therfore inevitable and simple.

Violent protest is happening. It is a fact of life no more and no less than any other. The salient question then is not one of morality, but history. Anyone who saw the footage or was at the protest yesterday will know that of those involved in the violence, almost all were young, working-class men. So the obvious question should be - 'Why?'

Thatcher's children

During the eighties Britain was in the clutches of another Conservative administration. Thatcher oversaw and enacted massive and unprecedented free-market reforms that, as she well knew, would destroy the chance of a decent job for large swathes of the working class. An outsourcing of manufacturing, the destruction of native heavy industry, finacial de-regualtion, curtailments on the welfare state and a move to a so called ‘knowledge’ economy left millions facing crippling poverty of every kind.

If you are prepared to take away a person’s dreams - replacing them only with vivid nightmares - you best be prepared when they wake up. Thatcher knew this, Cameron knows it too. One only need peruse publicly available police and government literature to see that the militarization of the Metropolitan Police is progressing swiftly. The use of private security contractors at the Topshop protest last weekend tells us something too.

Austerity means poverty. People are waking up to this truth all over Europe, some later than others. According to France 24 the standard of living in Portugal after the recent sovereign debt crisis has collapsed in a way: ‘not seen since the 1930’s’. Similar stories are to be heard, in Greece, Ireland, Spain, Iceland and within the next few years Britain too. It seems obvious but it is rarely said, the outpouring of anger seen on the streets of London and around the country yesterday was not just anger over student fees or any one particular issue, it was symptomatic of growing civil unrest at the cuts agenda.

When the children and the grandchildren of those who suffered under Thatcher see corporate banks getting bailed out whilst their communities are targeted for a third round of neo-liberalism’s terrifying ‘progress’ - they get angry and violent. Why is this such a shock? First they came and took away working class jobs, decimating industry and pushing milliuons below the poverty line. Now they come back for the benefits and support mechanisms that kept those very same families fed and housed.

Whilst violence as a means of protest is not necessarily constructive, it certainly has been many times in the past. Of course, anger without direction can be dangerous and I always question the notion of attacking the tools of the State and not the State itself; even if the police do have their own violent agenda. Violence begets violence and it is inevitable that when you threaten the interests of the poorest in our society with the violent and destructive act of dismantling the welfare state, attacks on public sector workers, students and minority groups - there are inevitably going to be ramifications.

The gulf between rich and poor in England today wider than it was thirty years ago, or even a hundred. If our journalists did their jobs properly, we might be compelled to reflect on this fact more often than we do. As it stands however, most hacks seem content to chatter amongst themselves and with the confused Middle about trivialities.

What we should always remember is that these superficial moralistic debates about the rightness or wrongness of violent protest are academic and not useful for addressing the fundamental 'Why?' of the matter - why it is that people feel the need to resort to these tactics in the first place.

Hacks and politicians are always going to claim that violence is by default - mindless, nihlistic and self defeating. But for those who truely side with the disenfranchised, ignored and downtrodden in our society there is an acceptance that this is simply a tool in a limited arsenal. To quote several thousand anoynoumous demonstraters - You say cut back? We say fight back. CJL

Arguments from Design as a pointer to the existence of God

In “An introduction to the philosophy of Religion”, (Cambridge University Press; 1 edition 2008) Murray & Rea (MR) set out a variety of arguments that aim to show that something exists, which has many, if not all, the characteristics of ‘God’. Since antiquity, people have sought to offer explanations for how we came into being, many of these rested on the presupposition that the very reality of the world and universe was solid confirmation for the reality of God. These are often called ‘arguments from design’ or ‘teleological’ arguments. The existence of the universe according to this set of arguments demands an explanation and the only satisfactory explanation of its existence is God. A modern variant of the teleological argument is rested upon the concept of a ‘fine-tuned’ Universe, it is this specific argument that I will explore here.

A more technical name for the fine-tuned argument is the “Cosmological Anthropic Principle” (CAP). I will lay out the salient features of the CAP and explain its most common detracting theories. I will also make reference to “Science and Religion: An introduction” (Wiley-Blackwell, 2005) in which Alistair McGrath (MG) also sets out the CAP, its key problems and his replies. Neither MG nor MR come to any firm conclusions regarding the principle; both say that they feel the objections to the CAP fail but concede that the decision is ultimately down to the interpretation of the reader.

There are many variants of the “anthropic principle” which actually refers to a collective name for several ways of asserting, roughly, that the observations of our physical universe must be compatible with the life observed within it. MG says that the most common interpretation of the anthropic principle is the cosmological interpretation. This was notably defined in the 1986 study by Barrow & Tipler (BT) entitled “The Anthropic Cosmological Principle” (Oxford University Press, 1986). BT posit that for our Universe to be capable of sustaining life, a number of cosmological criteria have to be met. These are the so called dials of the “fine-tuner”, which are tuned so that if they were altered even a fraction, our universe would not be capable of forming or sustaining life. One example given by MR is the ‘strong force’ that is required to hold together the protons in an atom. The strength of this force and its direct proportion in relation to the electromagnetic force is absolutely necessary for all heat, light, and therefore, life in the universe.

MG is initially at pains to assert that although the anthropic principle may be compatible with a theistic worldview, it by no means offers irrefutable proof of the existence of God, but is merely consistent with the theistic position.
However, according to MR this apparent cosmic fine-tuning, leads some to favour the following argument:

1. The universe exhibits fine-tuning of a sort that makes it suitable for life.
2. The existence of fine tuning is probable under theism.
3. The existence of fine-tuning is highly improbable under atheism.
4. Therefore; Fine tuning provides strong evidence in favour of theism.


MG and MR point out early one possible criticism of this interpretation of fine-tuning theory. Namely, that it is a form of “carbon chauvinism” or in other words, it fails to consider that life might be possible in many different forms, not necessarily only our specific carbon based species.

Another possible problem with the CAP theory elucidated by BT, is that despite the arguments for the CAP, there may be no need to seek a further explanation of the universe at all. If the constraints of the Universe were not just as they are now they argue, we wouldn’t be able to observe the universe in the first place. In the BT analogy, the fact that anyone is observing anything, reflects the fact that the universe possesses certain features which permits the evolution of life, capable of observing some of those features. MG dismisses this argument as ‘not especially persuasive’ because it fails to address the underlying issue - ‘Why?’ He points us instead to another analogy first proposed by Richard Swinburne.

Swinburne wants us to suppose that a madman has kidnapped somebody and shut them in a room with a card shuffling machine. This machine shuffles ten packs of cards simultaneously and then draws a card from each pack and shows them to the victim. If the machine shows anything other than an ace of hearts then the hostage is killed in an explosion. The machine draws the cards and by some amazing luck all the packs of cards show ace of hearts. The kidnapper reappears and says that it is “hardly surprising” because if the machine hadn’t drawn the aces, you wouldn’t have been able to observe anything else at all. The point that Swinburne and MG are trying to illustrate is that the existence of the observer has no bearing on the probability of the events being observed. As Swinburne notes:

“If a series of highly improbable events give rise to an observer who can note this improbability, they are nonetheless improbable.”

However, there is another salient objection that might help explain why it is that we are the lucky ones who get to exist in a universe fit for life. It is called the “multi-verse objection” (MVO). MR state that according to the MVO the existence of one finely tuned universe is impossible. Instead there are multiple, possibly infinite other universes, each with its own distinct laws and forces, making it inevitable that at least one of these universes would be life permitting. In fact, many of these universes could be life permitting in ways we cannot possibly imagine.

MR dismiss the MVO because they anticipate three objections. Primarily, they dismiss it because they claim there is no verifiable evidence of any sort to date; perhaps ironically, claiming the principle of parsimony should be applied here. (If there can be no natural extrapolation from what we already know to the conclusion of multiple universes, then it should be rejected.) Secondly, MR state that even if we accept that there are multiple universes, why do we arbitrarily assume that they have distinct laws of physics. Could they not show continuity with each other? Lastly (and most interestingly for the non-theist), some physicists have reasoned that for there to be multiple universes it would require a “universe generator” of some sort. According the CAP, this universe generator would presumably also be fine-tuned for this purpose.

As MR point out, this raises a very basic question; if the universe generator exhibits complexity that requires some kind of explanation, wouldn’t we assume that the designer is also in need of explanation? MR directs us to the classical theological ideas of a “necessary” and “self explaining” God. A God that is ‘de re’ necessary. However, if we apply MR’s same rigorous logic to this idea, I think we find them somewhat lacking in testable hypothesis or credibility. Scientific and metaphysical explanations are not interchangeable and do not share the same level of importance when giving an account of cosmology.

Arguments from design such as this should convince us no more than the argument from the intricate ‘designs’ of species should have convinced pre-Darwinians. The fine-tuning argument for God’s existence is in effect a piece of natural theology. Natural theology takes agreed facts about the world, from the intricacy of a bird’s wing, to the supposed occurrence of a certain event in scripture, and argues that theism is the best or only explanation. As MG and MR would probably concede, the CAP is just one possible explanation for our origins. None of the reasons advanced for thinking it a better explanation than the alternatives seems particularly persuasive. The claim that God created a life-permitting universe is not backed up by any scientific epistemology, so we should be cautious when offered explanations of the vast cosmos that fundamentally rest upon recently discovered scientific truths corralled into an the awkward synthesis of theology and science. CJL

What I saw at Millbank

For hour after hour the 24 hour media machine ‘reported’ from the foyer of the Milbank building in central London. Although just yards from the headquarters of the British secret service MI5, the assembled crowd or protestors and the accompanying hordes of journalists were largely oblivious to their mysterious neighbours. The angry buzzing of the Police and BBC helicopters that hovered over head occasionally drowned out both Protester and Hack alike, whilst outside and inside a building that houses the headquarters of the British Conservative party, several thousand predominantly young human-beings attempted with their own diverse methodologies, to project their voices into the Great Media Narrative.

Despite the success, at least in terms of numbers, of the largest demonstration against deep education cuts and a threefold increase in tuition fees seen so far. The pre-ordained narrative laid down by the chattering classes so tried and tested, was to be too strong yet again. Just as with the protests of Seattle in 1999 and Copenhagen ten years later, this narrative was not one concerned with the future chances of a generation, or even the masses of human beings that had come from far and wide to voice their outrage; but rather instead, of the ‘violent minority’ of ‘masked’ and ‘hooded Anarchists’, a ‘tense atmosphere’, ‘angry scenes’ ‘disgusting chaos’, ‘arson’ and the failure of the rule of Law. But why exactly are we accepting this narrative? Laid down to us as it is, by the very same people that have the strongest interest in maintaining the status quo.

The instant that the first window was smashed, it was all over for anybody hoping for the long dormant journalistic talent of Fleet Street to maintain some proportion in the coverage of a subject of such national importance. With one or two exceptions, this media narrative was monolithic. The coffin was nailed firmly shut when the cowardly head of the NUS Aaron Porter appeared on the BBC within hours claiming to be: ‘absolutely disgusted’ at those who as he claimed were: ‘in jeopardy of undermining the entire protest’. In that one pithy sentence, the head of the NUS, the man responsible for advocating student rights and mobilizing support against the Tory cuts in the first place, had surrendered an important sound bite to this famished media narrative, a morsel to be regurgitated throughout the syndicated mediascape.

Later in the day, as if to add further insult to injury - men, women and children with real fears for the future educational welfare not of themselves, but of complete strangers, were reduced to no more than ‘loutish thugs’ by Met commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson. Thousands of demonstrators who were not themselves students, but nonetheless spoke both for the future and the past garnered no media attention at all. They too had been ‘undermined’ my the ‘violent minority’. A little detail by the way, which seemed to quickly drop out of the mainstream media coverage, was that whilst the windows of Tory HQ were being torn down, those doing so were cheered on by a crowd of thousands.. This was not a ‘violent minority’, but the tip of the majorities spear plunging deep into the soft underbelly of the Conservative beast. Almost every person in that crowd I would think, would have happily led the charge. To the media and politicians however, this sort of thinking is outside the boundaries of permissible discourse.

Of course the explicit message was always going to be one of condemnation for any and all ‘violence as a legitimate means of protest’. But this only highlights yet again the paradox involved in the corporate media’s reporting of demonstrations in general. Violence is sexy. It sells. It captivates. Once caught by the voyeuristic media lens, scenes of violence are repeated endlessly throughout the news cycle. How many times will we be made to watch and re-watch the scuffles between riot police and ‘criminals’ over the coming days? Jonathon Jones at the Guardian Newspaper offers a mixed analysis of why the media (not all but most) has taken the view that is has, on the one hand asking: “Are the media exercising their nasty arts to make students look like a mob? and answering ‘no’, but then going on to say: “This image has made the front pages because it is exciting. Its violence is liberating to contemplate, in a dangerous, Dionysian way.” For Jones, the violence is not newsworthy in and of itself, but rather precisely because it appeals to our most primitive emotions. Well fine, but is he telling us this is all we have to expect of our journalists today? No more than an extended freak show - a lesson in emotional manipulation. I ask myself.

I also wonder, how exactly one goes about ‘undermining’ a protest anyway? What is a legitimate protest and what is not? To my simple mind, a protest is where an individual, or more likely a group of individuals decides to perform a largely symbolic action in the name of a particular cause, in the hope that this totemic act of resistance could in some way effect actual change. Throughout history there have been many struggles for human dignity, equality and solidarity. Many of these struggles feautured a violent component to their methodolgies. Can we honestly say that when we look back now, we should unequivocally condemn those members of the suffragettes willing to break the law for the dignity of women? Must we condemn in the strongest terms the members of the Nelson Mandela’s ANC for their often violent struggle for equality in South Africa? Must we label as ‘disgusting’ and ‘undermining’ all those that use violence in solidarity with the Palestinians?

I’m not trying to equate the protests over British higher education cuts and fees to any of the historic (and ongoing) struggles I mention above. But don’t be fooled by how the media has framed the issue. My heart beat rose and my adrenaline pumped when I saw the plated glass begin to buckle, not out of any prehistoric blood lust, but because for the first time in my life I was conscious of the roaring voices alongside me, all as alienated from Westminster as I was, who demanded in their own way to be listened to by a giant with no ears. Perhaps I got ahead of myself when I claimed they had cut into the underbelly of the beast. But we certainly stamped on his toes, and ears or not, the giant's gaze is sternly fixed on us, just as it should be. CJL

Theories of Human nature: Biological, Social and Christian perspectives

After a conclusively inconclusive election, I thought it best to avoid politics for a little while. Instead and in keeping with my original remit for this blog, I intend to upload one or two of my own philosophical essays - written during my time in Sweden. This short essay below is an analysis of "The rise and fall of Socio-biology" by Augustine Lawler.

- By Christopher Landau


The subject of this essay is the ongoing debate over the fundamental form of Human Nature and how this manifests itself. There are many differing theories, but for the purpose of this essay I will focus on three of the most prominent concepts. Firstly, the synthesis of scientific disciplines collectively termed “Socio-Biology” which I will compare and contrast with the exponents of the “Social Constructionist” world view. These two schools of thought are both connected to and distinct from a third view. Or rather an overarching project, “Biotechnology”. Not as a belief system, but as a mechanism, one which involves using our knowledge of human biology and our improving technology, to try and improve the quality and length of human life. In “The rise and fall of Socio-Biology” Augustine Lawler starts by examining these three contrasting views of the relationship human beings have with their nature. He begins his essay by briefly laying out the foundational premises of these models.

In summary, Lawler states that socio-biology is the concept that humans have their own intrinsic value, their own nature, and a natural purpose to fulfil. In this world view Lawler says that our nature and purpose makes sense within the context of Darwinian evolution and could lead one to conclude that we are in fact not so different from the other animals. The conflicting Social Constructionist model takes the view that the idea of human nature itself is irrelevant. It is our Society, Culture and Institutions, that are responsible for defining how we perceive ourselves and thus define our nature. Human nature under this view is not already set by biological factors, as all our ideas of Human Nature are open to change at the whim of our society, culture, taught values, upbringing etc.

Lawler says that these contrasting belief systems should be seen as offering us a significant, yet necessarily reductionist account of Human Nature. As Lawler writes: “Each presents part of the truth about being human by disfiguring the whole.” The third part of the picture involves one point of human distinction from the other animals; namely our ability to use scientific knowledge to marshal the forces of nature under human control. Human technology is not a more sophisticated version of primate tool-making, but rather our technology is distinctly human. As Lawler puts it, “it is a response to the dilemmas and possibilities of being the only moral, rational, and death-haunted animal.” The reason that Lawler offers this mechanism as an alternative to the socio-biology and social constructionist concepts is that many see Bio-technology as having the potential to completely re-define what it means to be human. Not as a definition of human nature then, but as a means of changing it.

Any debate about Human Nature is necessarily complex and the scope and range of thought that fall under the headings Socio-biology or Social Constructionism is such that the models outlined above should be seen as a fairly narrow interpretation. This contentious subject is still fiercely debated amongst academics and politicians as it touches many potentially controversial historical and contemporary issues. Lawler writes “Each of these views is more an ideology than a science, more a program for human reform than a truthful account of the way things are”. Without wanting to create a Straw Man, Lawler states that neither of the views outlined above, can give a whole account of human nature. The question does not become cliché; “nature or nurture?”, but to what extent do we have a nature at all? And if we accept that we have some sort of nature, how much of it is formed in our genes and how much in our society?

In his essay Lawler focuses on the rise and fall of socio-biology in terms of a scientific dogma, explaining its usefulness and its weaknesses. Arguing that he application of socio-biology to humans was immediately controversial. The late Stephen Jay Gould for example, said that socio-biology was intrinsically biologically determinist and open to manipulation. Just as similar ideas had been used in the past to justify the status quo, Gould feared a certain understanding of human nature could only further entrench the ruling elites in place in certain societies, thus legitimizing authoritarian political and social programmes. It could be argued that this fear has indeed been realised, manifesting itself in the form of various atrocities, such as the genocide of Jews under the Nazis. The socio-biological account has also been viewed as taking away the ‘meaning’ from life, nature offering us only a short, contingent existence as individuals. Lawler thinks this view “is unlikely to halt or limit our desperate turn to biotechnology in pursuit of the happiness that nature by itself does not seem to give us.” The exact nature of our denied happiness is not elaborated upon by Lawler, however I don’t see why we must assume that a “meaningless” existence is any less important or potentially enjoyable than a “meaningful” one. Can I not be a good person, living a happy and fulfilled life without a purpose? I think so, and I belief so does Lawler, who finds it not at all contradictory when he concedes that it is possible for socio-biology to be consistent with the view that human nature can be created out of nothing (social constructionism) or remoulded to a particular end (biotechnology). If this is true, then it seems there would be little problem taking the socio-biological view to the extent that we accept Darwinian evolution and we accept that we have no pre-determined path, but at the same time we can not only construct our own meaning and purpose in life adaptively if we want to, but can exist just as existentially satisfied without one at all.

Whilst it is Lawler’s opinion that neither the socio-biologists nor the social constructionists give us a complete, or even nearly complete, account of our nature, he accepts that “We have animal natures, which are not fundamentally different from the other animals in being determined to some degree by our evolutionary genetic inheritance”, he calls this the partial truth of socio-biology. What is particularly interesting about this point is made clear later when he also says that: “the truth of socio-biology is an unstable middle position between unscientific ignorance and biotechnological wilfulness. Socio-biology is true until we know it is true.” What he means here is that once we have understood how human nature works on an evolutionary and biological level, we are empowered by this knowledge with a capacity for improvement and change in this very nature itself. This seems to be the paradox of Socio-biology and if true, Lawler is right to look for a more encompassing explanation of our nature than merely, our genetic inheritance.

In “Human Nature after Darwin” Janet Richards contributes to this ongoing debate by focusing on the implications of the Darwinian revolution for understanding our own nature. She explains that although the term Socio-biology represents a coherent set of beliefs it has become a somewhat tainted term in academic discussion. Perhaps due to the earlier alluded to political and social implications of some of its ideas. Many critics make a connection between socio-biology and the biological determinism of the early 20th century. This is still relevant because many believe the Darwinian “revolution” is not yet played out in terms of its potential, especially in combination with the development of bio-technology. The potential of bio-technologies not only raises the value-driven science debate in terms of the driving ideology behind future technology, but if actualised, could raise moral questions previously consigned only to the realm of Science-fiction. Richards asks in this extract, whether there really are serious implications, to the theory of Darwinian evolution, and if so, are they of a biological or perhaps even metaphysical nature. One such implication that scientists, such as Richard Dawkins see; is that Darwinian materialism leaves no room for God. Even as an atheist I tend to believe that this is not the case. At least I have yet to see a convincing argument as to why an understanding and acceptance of evolution is anything other than merely consistent with an atheistic view. If I was to accept consistency as enough evidence for the non existence of God, then conversely I would have to accept that the Fine-tuned universe oft cited as consistent with theism, was evidence for the existence of God, which is clearly nonsense.

Metaphysical questions aside, criticisms of the scientificity and moral/political purpose of socio-biology can and certainly have been made towards various social constructionist projects as well. Lawler takes the examples of the Marxist and Feminist movements, explaining that the Utopian visions of the social constructionists are typically conceived on the premise that we lack a real reason to maintain many of our beliefs. Including that we as humans share certain responsibilities, independent of our society and culture, and that those human responsibilities connect us implicitly with birth, love, and death. These social constructions which we take for granted as part of being empathetic emotional beings have, according to the constructionists, been fitted into the routine of human life without biological mandate and therefore can be removed.

Lawler disagrees with these sentiments when he states: “while social constructionism is right to see that human beings are distinct from the other animals, it errs in believing that our distinct quality is total freedom from nature.” What I believe is starting to become evident as I read more of Lawler, is that he believes in a synthesis of the three views discussed above; building first on the foundation of mechanistic Darwinian evolutionary principles, whilst accepting the need for certain cherry picked, social constructionist concepts that we might use to address the imbalances within our society. A good example of this synthesis can be seen if we look at the Feminist movement I briefly mentioned earlier. Lawler states that they absolutely failed in their radical attempt to remove traditional gender roles from society, but that they succeeded in many parts of the world, to quite an extraordinary degree, in creating a fairer, more egalitarian environment for women. This seems to support the view that the two contrasting ideas of socio-biology and social constructionism can be combined and integrated without contradiction or need to accept one or the other.

So where does this leave us in terms of defining our own nature? Lawler concludes that in the end, although Bio-technology is important, it is not the game-changer that many believe it to be. It is not ever going to satisfy us entirely, because the tantalizing possibilities of progress will always remain in one form or another in our future. We also cannot accept the Ultra Darwinian view of our nature that excludes the importance and need for individual and culturally determined human constructions and excepts merely a crude materialism. Instead Lawler argues, we need a: “richer, more truthful account of human nature, one that comprehends the excellences and passions, the joys and miseries, of being the only animal who knows, loves, and thinks about death”. I think that Lawler’s broader point here is correct. Both the socio-biologists and the social constructionists have described human nature in reductionist terms which should be avoided if possible. We should instead embrace a far more comprehensive view of our nature. Incorporating the great benefits we have gained from a better understanding of evolutionary biology whilst at the same time accepting there limitations and the need for further understanding of our distinctly human characteristics which are often so hard to quantify.

Whilst some will not be convinced by anything other than an all encompassing, materialist understanding of evolution. Those of us that accept our Darwinian ancestry as part of our nature can be even more greatly rewarded, when we realise that there is no destiny that we are being driven towards. We are formed by our genes, but we are not merely a blank slate to write on and we have the capacity to define ourselves by our own actions and beliefs (even if we are only too aware that Darwin was right on the stamp of our lowly origins). Its best I think to accept that we are part of the natural order, that we are not a specially created species with unique privileges. Because bleak as it may seem to some, it doesn’t mean we have to live without irony, humour, solidarity or any other of the things that make human life bearable and indeed possible. C