Everyone! At last! It’s finally here! The world takeover begins! And remember, you heard about it here first.
Let me explain. It is a world takeover through art. Very very good art. Very pretty art. Well, how will that happen, you’re thinking, aren’t you? Just trust me. It will. When the queen gets a look at this stuff, she’ll be raving about it to anyone who’ll listen. Trust me.
Guess what, everyone? I have talented friends and sometimes I like to show them off. Today, I want to show off my friend, Kevin, because he is a brilliant brilliant artist and I think you’re going to like his pictures.
Hi all, it’s the guest blogger again today. Enjoy!
Just before getting into this week’s topic I thought I’d ask if, after last week’s post, any of you decided to do some three-word daily diary stuff. Here’s mine for the last few days:
Thu 31.1.13 Hospital blood test
Fri 1.2.13 Virus check done
Sat 2.2.13 Weekly shop done
Sun 3.2.13 Projector malfunction again
Mon 4.2.13 Projector fault found
Tue 5.2.13 Sun after snow
(A note from lazylauramaisey, mine for today is “loving new piano!”)
Ok so on to this week’s subject.
YES, I HAVE SOME BANANAS
I wonder if you know the derivation of the word BANANA? Etymologies differ and one suggests it is from a West African language spoken in Senegal & the Gambia and introduced by the Spanish & Portuguese who it’s believed first discovered the word; the other suggests an Arabic root from their word banan meaning finger. Both sound feasible; take your pick I suppose.
Banana facts: they are a good source of vitamin B6 (25% of our RDA), vitamin C (about 15% RDA for a non-smoker) & potassium (25% RDA). The fruit releases into the body dopanine and serotonin which are good for the brain. Bananas are picked green and start to ripen straight away. What actually happens to turn them from green to the yellow we’re familiar with when we eat them? After they are picked, the hormones in the fruit convert certain amino acids into ethylene gas. This gas then causes the production of enzymes that change the colour and also the texture and flavour of the banana. The reason they can arrive here still green is because they are carried in a temperature controlled environment with a certain amount of ethylene in it so that the ripening process is slowed down.
Check out the label here on the bananas I bought this week at my local supermarket.
I wonder if you ever look at the labels on the food you buy. You may check a sell by date, best before date etc. How many of us look at the ingredients? Certainly those with allergies have no choice but anyone else is probably just rushing round as quickly as possible to get out of the supermarket or wherever the goods are on sale. I was intrigued last week to note the label on my bananas said they were a product of Ecuador; this week, as you can see in my picture, it was Cameroun. Ecuador apparently produces one third of all the bananas grown for export “in the world”. In 2004 there were 130 countries producing bananas; bear in mind the UN has 192 countries and the world has 195/6 depending on who is defining which land areas actually count as countries. That means basically two thirds of all the countries in the world produce bananas.
It got me thinking about the product. Where are the world’s bananas grown? How much? Here is a table showing production levels of the top 10 in the year 2011. However these figures are for both the main types of banana produced: plantains & dessert. Plantains are for cooking; dessert are the sweeter, and for eating raw out of the skin. You can see that Ecuador, supplier of last week’s bananas, is the 5th largest producer; Cameroon is 9th.
# 1 India: 29,700,000 metric tonnes
# 2 Uganda: 11,100,000 metric tonnes
# 3 China: 10,700,000 metric tonnes
# 4 Philippines: 9,200,000 metric tonnes
# 5 Ecuador: 8,000,000 metric tonnes
# 6 Brazil: 7,300,000 metric tonnes
# 7 Indonesia: 6,100,000 metric tonnes
# 8 Colombia: 5,100,000 metric tonnes
# 9 Cameroon: 850,000 metric tonnes
# 10 Tanzania: 3,900,000 metric tonnes
In terms of exports the order is 1.Ecuador 2.Costa Rica 3.Colombia 4.Philippines 5.Guatemala
However as we go about our weekly shopping do we think about how the supermarkets are able to bring us this fruit at such a cheap price. My bunch of 5 bananas weighed almost spot on 1kg so about 200g each; they cost me £0.79 ($1.25). They’re very good value. But how is this possible?
Think about this – the journey time by sea, on one of the largest shipping lines in the world, is about 28/29 days from the port of Douala (Cameroon) to Felixstowe (UK). Bananas require a temperature-controlled container for transport to keep them fresh (13.5-15⁰C). They then have to have an artificial ripening process, as they’re shipped very green, followed by delivery across the UK to warehouses and stores that need the supplies. There are a lot of links in the chain from producer to consumer.
Today’s world production of bananas is controlled by 4 companies nicknamed “The Wild Bunch”: Chiquita, Dole, Del Monte, Noboa
On the website freshplaza.com/news there is a headline “UK Supermarket blamed” & “Documentary exposes exploitation of banana workers in Cameroon”. You can read about a Scottish film maker, Jan Nimmo who got access to some of the plantations in Cameroon. She reported on the adverse conditions that employees are having to work in. Perhaps this is why my bananas are cheap. The difficulty is in knowing whether it is the supermarkets that drive down the price they’re willing to pay to their suppliers or whether it is unscrupulous bosses at the supply end who force workers to accept low wages to maximise their own profits; or maybe it’s a bit of both.
Perhaps next time I go I’ll look for the ones with the Fairtrade stickers on. I read that Sainsbury’s switched to getting their bananas from only Fairtrade producers over 5 years ago. The benefits to the local communities where these agreements are in place really do make a difference and in some cases mean that producers no longer have to take risks crossing borders to get better prices for their goods. Fairtrade purchases by the supermarket, in the Windward Islands (Dominica, St Lucia, Saint Vincent & The Grenadines, Grenada), have resulted in local communities being able to buy computers for schools, fund scholarships, sponsor a school bus and bus shelters as well as enabling local farmers to invest back into their own businesses. It is reckoned that about 10 million Fairtrade bananas, from the Windward Islands and South America were consumed at the London Olympics.
Anyone fancy some Banana Trivia?
Here we go then:
1- Canadians eat approximately 3 billion bananas a year.
2- Bananas do not grow on trees. They grow on the largest grass in the world.
3- 90% of the world’s bananas are NOT grown for export
4. 99% of bananas grown for export are of the Cavendish variety.
5. Four million 40lb boxes of bananas are imported into North America every year.
6. In 1998, the entire banana crop of Honduras was wiped out by Hurricane Mitch.
7. Bananas are the fourth most important staple food crop in the world.
8. Bananas were first imported to the UK in 1878 from the Canary Islands by Fyffe, Hudson & Co
What about bananas in songs?
If you fancy watching this check it out. It’s the video for the song Juanita Banana. If you don’t think you can make it through the whole 2.5 minutes just go to the point where the lady starts wailing. It’s worth it just for that bit!
The song tells the story of a Mexican banana farmer’s daughter who has operatic ambitions and with a chorus which is an adaptation of Caro Nome from Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Rigoletto. Just the sort of subject for a song you’d think of writing – right?
You’ve got to have a watch of this one as it gives you the deep meaning lyrics. It’s the Banana Boat Song. I’m sure you’ll recognise it as soon as you hear the opening lines:
You think this is a joke song? Just wait till you see who’s covered it: Shirley Bassey, Harry Belafonte, a group called A Bunch Of Coconuts & Stan Freberg. It’s even been used in the film Beetlejuice.(Check out that version on Youtube if you’re interested.)
Also remember that 1967 album by the Velvet Underground & Nico with this cover:
And finally – how about banana art? Check this one out:
Then ask yourself – how long will this stuff last once the skin starts to age. It’s clever but it’s not going to last. I guess that’s why he’s got the pictures.
And all that from a tiny oval sticker on my bunch of bananas. Food for thought anyway!
Before I start, the answer to yesterday’s blog about how much I spent on a ‘small’ shop in Waitrose was £64 – which I felt bad about to start with, until the guesses where closer to £100. Now I feel quite restrained and pleased with myself!.
Today, we have another post from my regular guest blogger on a subject I’m sure a lot of us can understand….
I wonder if you’ve ever started to read a book and then not wanted to finish it; perhaps you did finish just because you started it and didn’t want to be beaten by it or perhaps you didn’t and just put it back on the shelf, passed it on, threw it away or whatever.
There are some books which you begin reading and you lose interest in. Sometimes it’s the story line: you don’t think it’s that good or believable. Sometimes it’s the characters: he/she/it just wouldn’t or possibly even couldn’t do that in your view. Maybe the characters themselves are a little “thin” or superficial so you don’t feel as if you can empathise or even marvel at things they do. Maybe the plot of the whole thing just doesn’t work or some of its parts don’t hang together very well. I’m sure you’ve been there. I’m also sure, like me, one of those books you’ve put down was praised beyond belief by another reader or even critic who has reviewed it. You sit there thinking “Is it me? Have I missed something?” I’m sure you’ve got a few of those T-shirts – I know I have. You’ve only got to look at some (of course not all) of the various prize winners of the many different awards to know it’s true. Literature has a way of dividing opinion just like music, art (and sculpture) and other cultural areas. It’s very personal. It’s your experience. Normally no-one else shares it with you. When you read a book you’re in your own little world for a time; you don’t usually read the same book with someone else there and even if you did it wouldn’t be at the same speed. It’s a solitary experience although you can be in a crowd while it is happening: on the Tube/Subway, on the bus, in a car (not driving of course), on the beach or even in a library. If anyone speaks to you it’s like they’ve interrupted your mind’s interaction with the book. It’s like they’ve “butted in” when you didn’t ask them to. Your imagination runs wherever you want to go with it for a while and you want to enjoy the “dream” and not have people “waking you up” as it were. Been there? You know, you look up and give them the “Do you realise you’ve just spoilt my reading experience” glazed look or a more serious “keep away” snarl. You may try to be friendly through your gritted teeth. You might even try a half smile when they ask “Good book?” and you reply “Yes I’m just at a really exciting point here” hoping they’ll take the hint and leave you alone. Perhaps a Reading – Do Not Disturb T-Shirt could be a winner; (now where are those phone numbers for GAP, Calvin Klein & Tommy Hilfiger?) You can speak to me when I’ve put my book down, when it is closed with its bookmark sticking out of the page I’m up to; you don’t fold over the top corner of the page, do you? Of course you don’t, one just do that sort of thing!
But there are some books which you begin reading and you don’t want to finish because they’re SO good. You want the experience of reading that novel or biography or straight factual book to go on so you can enjoy it for longer. You’re in that imaginary world of where the text on the page has taken you, even captured you. Perhaps it’s generating emotions of love or dislike of a particular character; perhaps a mystery is unfolding and you’re enjoying all the twists and turns and trying to work out the “whodunit?” yourself; perhaps a relationship is formed and you don’t want it to end but you can see the signs. All of these things can make us want to prolong the experience of reading that particular book although you know it really does have to end.
Knowing there’s a sequel or even a number of sequels because it’s going to be a series may make you get through the book more quickly as you want to find out how things progress.
So why do I not want to finish the book I’m reading right now? If you’re wondering which book – it’s called The Land Of Painted Caves by Jean Auel. It’s part of a series called Earth’s Children. Let me give you the series list with each book’s first published date (it is relevant):
1. Sep 1980 – The Clan Of Cave Bear (also film)
2. Sep 1982 – The Valley Of Horses
3. Sep 1985 – The Mammoth Hunters
4. Nov 1990 – The Plains Of Passage
5. Apr 2002 – The Shelters Of Stone
6. Mar 2011 – The Land Of Painted Caves
Overall 31 years from book 1 to book 6! As you can see there’s quite a variation in the length of time between each of the novels; the longest gap was from book 4 to 5 – 12 years! I came to the series in the late 1980s beginning with the book & film.
Book 1 got me hooked and I’ve read the rest over the years since then. Each paperback is a kind of “brick-sized” thickness; the last one is 782 pages so a good size to keep me busy. The action is in a pre-historic world of Southern Europe involving tribal groups of Cro-Magnon & Neanderthal origins. I’ve watched characters grow together, sometimes grow apart, go on long journeys, make friends and lose friends; I’ve seen them age & have children; I’ve seen some move up the social scale and some down; I’ve seen them discover things about their world and about each other – some likeable, some not. It’s a bit like everyday life today set in this early world. You may not agree with some parts of the story in terms of personal belief but this is their world and it’s what they believed in their world at that time.
By about page 200 I was thinking – this is the last book (so far as the, now 76 year old, author has herself said) and this imaginary world which I’ve been a visitor to for just over 20 years will come to an end. These familiar characters will stop – frozen in time at the end of this book. I don’t know what they might do in the future because there is no future for them – they will cease to develop any further whilst I, on the other hand, will not. Time for me will continue (without my imaginary friends from the book) as it will for everyone but I just don’t want to leave these folks behind. I suppose, in a way, they will stay with me in my mind, because I know about them, because I’ve visited their world, but there will be no more stories about their lives. So what did I do? I picked up another book and read that for a while. Soon however I wanted to find out what was going to happen in that world of Earth’s Children’s so back I went to The Land Of Painted Caves. I read some more and got to page 300 & then 400. Then, guess what? I put the book down again and picked up another one, different to the book I read after 200 pages. And I read that for a while, hoping to keep The Land Of Painted Caves alive for a bit longer. I only got another 100 pages or so before putting it down again and going off with another book. It’s tough as, inevitably, I was drawn back once again to TLOPC. As of today I have reached page 629 so just about 150 pages left. Even if I restrict myself to 10 pages a day I’ve only got 2 weeks left. I know it’s got end but I just don’t want it to be now. Maybe I’ll pick another of those books up and spend some time with them. Eventually, I know and you do too, that TLOPC’s Jondalar, Ayla, Jonayla and their “Cave” & the other “Caves” and “Hearths” of their world will draw me back. You see the big difference with this book, which wasn’t true for the other five, is that I know there will be no more. If the author had just said nothing I would quite happily have read through to the end and just waited for the next one – maybe 2, 3, 5 or however many years.
I’m curious though. Is it just me or have any other readers found a book or series of books so fascinating they just didn’t want them to end? Have you actually stopped and then gone back later?
I feel I’m on the fringes of addiction here but not sure what the cure is. Where’s my nearest literature re-hab centre? I wonder whether I’ll meet some of you there; I’m “virtually” certain I will.
I’m handing over to my regular guest blogger again today… Enjoy!
Well, I suppose it had to happen – an art exhibition about “invisibility”. I couldn’t see the point really but at the moment there is a gallery in London which has an exhibition on called – Invisible: Art about the Unseen 1957 – 2012. (£8 entry fee!)
One of our national newspapers, the Daily Telegraph, reported that the gallery “will gather together 50 ”invisible” works by leading figures such as Andy Warhol, Yves Klein and Yoko Ono for its display of works you cannot actually see.” Now just read those last 7 words again. Yep that’s right you can’t actually see them. It is thought to be the first such exhibition staged at a major institution in the UK. At this point I’m struggling with the concept of “display”. The gallery director says that “….art is not about material objects but about setting our imaginations alight…..” Oh well that’s ok then. As well as empty plinth on which Andy Warhol once stood, Yoko Ono will be contributing a series of typed instructions encouraging visitors “to conjure up an artwork in their minds”. Are you getting the idea now?
Check out the picture below and ask yourself can you believe this? Someone who has paid £8 to look at nothing!
A woman at the gallery looks at Tom Friedman’s ‘Untitled (A Curse)’, 1992
The Daily Telegraph also conducted a survey using the following question:
Can an empty plinth and a blank piece of paper be classed as art? The two possible answers were:
1. Yes – art is about the concept or
2. No – there is nothing there.
The results are surprising – “No” has got 2,714 votes (86.3%) & “Yes” has got 431 (13.7%). Now it’s not surprising that the “No” vote is winning but it is surprising that 431 people thought looking at nothing could be classed as art.
Some of the comments about the gallery & the exhibits are quite interesting:
Dbarry said this: “Tried to pay the entrance fee with invisible money. Needless to say it didn’t work.
Maria Sol said, “Am I studying History of Art for this kind of nonsense?? I’d rather be unemployed, than an advocate for this snobbish “idea” of what art is. JMW Turner, please, COME BACK!!!!”
Ajikan said, “Since it’s all in the mind, there can be no point in going to the trouble of making the trip to the Hayward Gallery and forking out the admission charge to ‘see’ a load of formless ideas. Since there’s nothing to see in the first place, why not just publish the catalogue of exhibits and be done with it? After all, the logical conclusion of all this is an exhibition that doesn’t happen at all and occurs only in the mind.”
Don’t know about you but I can’t disagree with any of those.
But hang on a mo’. It’s given me an idea – what about having my own exhibition? Here are the first three exhibits. On a recent visit to a couple of memorable sites in Liverpool I was able to get the following pics.
See No.1 below. What – nothing on the pavement? Of course there is! All I want you to do is imagine you can see Paul McCartney, stepping on these two old paving slabs and then walking in through the front gate of his home at 20 Forthlin Rd in Liverpool. These are the two actual paving stones he would have walked on to get to his house. (The newer white ones, to the left of the picture, would not have been there when he was there.) I’ve added a view of the front door and the sign in the hedge outside just in case you thought I’d taken a picture of just any old paving stones. Now you’ve got it haven’t you?
1. Paul McCartney – “Coming Home”
Front Door of 20 Forthlin Road
National Trust Sign outside the house
The second site was the school John Lennon attended (1952-57). Nothing on that piece of ground? Of course there is! All I want you to do is imagine you can see John Lennon walking across that piece of ground into the school. (I included the bottom of the gates in the pic so you could see, in the second pic, that they are they actual gates to Quarry Bank School -its name was changed to Calderstones some years ago following a tri-school merger.
2. John Lennon “Going To School”
Front Gates to Quarry Bank School
Now for the third exhibit. I don’t normally allow people to see my private art collection but in the context of today’s blog I think it would be helpful. Here, on the lounge wall, is my picture – Polar Bear in a Snowstorm (by the artist Ian V. Zeeble). It’s unique – the artist told me there are no copies or prints so it may well accumulate value in the years to come! It’s there just to the left of the plant. Can you see it?
3. Polar Bear in a Snowstorm
A friend was visiting a couple of days ago and suggested it really needed framing. (He has a similar picture called: 3 Skiers Buried By An Avalanche by the same artist.) I hunted round and eventually decided I would buy a wood finish picture frame. Here’s the result of the framing:
I’m not sure about you but I feel this does not really add to the aesthetics and in fact may prove a distraction to people as they look at the main picture. Think I’ll probably leave it unframed but I’m definitely getting into this invisible art thing. Wow factor? Off the scale!
So there you have it. Probably a new experience for you but quite exciting eh? At least it should have “set your imaginations alight” as the director of that gallery said. Well it has, hasn’t it?
In the spirit of the blog, I was going to paint my reaction to the exhibition in London but I think Edvard Munch has done a rather better job than I could do. Here’s his effort (sold in May 2012 for $119.2 million!)
I’ve decided that it’s time to give my list of Stuff I’d Like To Do Post-Exams another go. I’ve done Getting Excited About Stuff, which was good. I think next I’ll do Being Sporty. I mean my version of sporty, by the way. Which I think is most people’s version of mild exercise. I’m ok with that.
Yesterday I went on the most epic walk along the river, which was amazing. I came across a boat race, a mariner’s club open day, an outdoor art installation, open air theatre, a jazz concert, a music festival, an open-house day at a group of artists’ studios, two schools’ open days and a wedding in a gallery. It’s lovely what nice weather can do. I discovered loads of things that I’ve been walking past for years but never gone in. Huge stately homes and beautiful gardens. Funny little islands and secret passageways. Fantastic statues and royal residences. It was such a lovely way to spend a Saturday.
Even when rain threatened to stop play and I didn’t have a jacket, I soldiered through and it stopped in the end. Even when my shoes threatened to tear apart the backs of my heels (silly me for wearing the trainers I hardly use for a long walk), I found a shop and bought plasters and kept going. I had a London Walks guide book with me and had just picked the first in the list and was reading the information as I went around. It was great fun.
So I decided this week I am going to challenge myself to do something active every day. Not just a ten minute stroll to Waitrose. Actually active. I’ll keep you updated.
I also started NaNoWriMo a few days ago (National Novel Writing Month). You write 1667 words a day and in a month you have a 50,000 word novel! Finding time for it is a bit of a challenge but I’ve kept it up so far
It’s the final in my guest blogger’s series on Freedom.
We now come to the 6th & final instalment of the series on Freedom. There is obviously a lot of ground we haven’t been able to cover but if you’re still with me thank you for persevering. What I want to do is try and bring the series to a close by drawing lessons from the first five parts but also by giving you some further food for thought.
I hope you’ve seen that each of the areas we have looked at (music, art, literature, internet) has its own problems with regard to freedom. However there will always be those who want more freedom than they have. What I’m about to say now may strike you as being a bit odd: total freedom equals total chaos! How so? Let’s look at a couple of examples from real life. Take the network of roads across whichever country you live in. Ask yourself what will happen if drivers have complete freedom? They can drive on whichever side of the road they want at whatever speed they want, they can ignore road signs and traffic lights particularly if they’re in a hurry and so on. What is the result? – Probably lots of accidents, no claims because everyone can do what they want so no-one is responsible, and therefore general mayhem. Roads & drivers, and indeed all road users (cyclists, pedestrians etc), need rules otherwise the system breaks down.
Now think of sports or athletics. In a game of football, baseball or whatever – what happens if you allow all the players to do whatever they want? What happens if runners on an athletics track can deliberately trip up other runners or ignore the lane they have been given to run in? – Once again chaos because there is no order to what is going on. Imagine watching a game or an athletics event with no rules! How long would you stay? Rules are needed for there to be a meaningful competition between opposing teams. It just doesn’t make sense to have no rules.
Try this one – Draw a circle or rectangle on a piece of paper. Put the point of your pen inside the line(s). Now move your pen wherever you want to within the boundary of the figure you drew. You can go wherever you want; you have complete freedom inside the lines, you could draw, sketch, paint, crayon or whatever. If I gave you a piece of canvas 77cm x 53cm (30in x 21in) what could you do? I would probably just have a mass of lines and colours not looking like much. (However, looking at some of the pictures in recent exhibitions featured in the news, I think I might have a chance!) Perhaps you would do better. Not many could produce a picture like the one of Lisa Gherardini, wife of Francesco del Giocondo – (Mona Lisa, in case you were wondering.) Da Vinci, in the early 16th century, did. The painting had to have boundaries and within those boundaries he produced a fantastic piece of work.
Transfer these analogies to real life and let’s ask the question again. How can society function if everybody does whatever they want because they want the freedom to do that? They do not want you or me or some authority telling them what to do. They don’t want boundaries on their behaviour. Why should the idea of rules be any different for a society of human beings than for any other activity they engage in. We must have rules otherwise we and our society can’t function. The real problem arises when we try to specify what those rules are or should be. Who is going to make them up? Who is going to police them? And who is going to apprehend & prosecute those who do not obey them? In a democracy we give that responsibility to the elected government & its law enforcement agencies – they are the law makers and enforcers.
Do you think it’s best to live in a democracy because that gives the most or the fairest rights to those living under it? Most will agree it’s better than say a dictatorship. We tend to believe that democracy equals good, non-democracy equals “not as good” or even potentially bad. Would you consider the following example and seriously ask yourself if you still agree after reading it? Suppose you’re on a ship and the ship is sinking. The alarm goes out to “man the lifeboats” and the crew begins loading people in and lowering the boats into the water. Let’s say each boat is built for say 10 people and has emergency food rations for that number. Once the boat is launched and has been rowed or drifted away from the sinking ship you find that there are 11 people in the boat. The boat is unstable with 11 (6 one side, 5 on the other), it’s too low in the water and there are not enough rations to support 11. A vote is taken on who the people think should be thrown out of the boat. It’s democratic and it’s fair and YOU are picked. Are you still a big supporter of democracy? Or are you now frantically trying to state your case? – Why you should be kept in the boat and someone else, who in your estimation, is less worthy should be thrown out. Do you see the problem? Democracy is great until it’s you that has to leave or be sacrificed for the greater good. This is not a “balloon debate” – this is real life. What gives them the right to throw you out? Errr..Democracy actually!
Another quite serious example from the TV last Sunday – would you or your town/area want nuclear waste dumped underground there (in safe containers of course)? In the area of Cumbria, where the Sellafield Nuclear Plant is located, in a survey, 68% of people (just over two-thirds) agreed with the proposal to use their area. A democratic result but those who oppose it simply won’t accept that. In other words, in a democracy when a vote is taken, you want (and probably have) the right to object to it. So a democracy which produces a majority decision must allow those in the minority to oppose that decision which means a democracy may not produce a democratic outcome. Or at least only a democratic outcome in certain areas because some people don’t like the result of the democratic vote. Hmmm….
Bring it, literally, nearer home – suppose the people in your street decide they don’t like you and don’t want you living in their street. You have to move. What gives them the right to force you to move on? Democracy again. It’s not as easy as you thought is it?
This is not a new problem. Almost 2,400 years ago Plato was considering exactly the same sort of issues in his work The Republic. Philosophers and thinkers down the ages have wrestled with the same problem. Plato believed the best way for a just society to function was to divide everyone into one of the following groups: producers (those who literally make stuff: food, objects, etc), auxiliaries (warriors or upholders of rulers wishes and making producers obey) and guardians or philosopher kings (rulers). (Social mobility is not allowed; once you’re in one group or class you stay there because that is your function. Seems like a precursor of the caste system perhaps? Also with the restriction of medical care to certain classes we see a worryingly early form of eugenics. Not a freedom, I hope, any would espouse. You might be surprised at some of the supporters of “The First International Congress of Eugenics” in 1912 which included our own Prime Minister at the time!) When the three groups, in The Republic are in the right relationships with each other, and the people in them understand and perform their functions, everything will be fine. Interestingly, personal freedom isn’t considered important and is subject to the good of society which comes first. He also believes poets need to be banished from this proposed ideal society (Book X). If you want to know why and the answer to other questions you might have but don’t fancy reading the whole treatise there is an excellent summary on the Sparknotes Website at:
So we can say quite clearly freedom has to have boundaries, has to have limits beyond which we cannot go. What that means is that you can do whatever you want within the boundaries – in a sport for example that’s where we can see the skill of a player. One person can do things another person can’t because they don’t have that ability. Look at footballers with their ball-controlling skills, watch them as they dribble around other players in a match because of their superior skill and applaud the goal or home run or whatever is achieved within the rules. A referee decides on penalties for those breaking the rules. The admiration comes from recognising their abilities working within the rules of whatever sport is involved. And so it is with society. It is just a fact that things will work better and people will feel safer if there are rules and people keep to them. Those who want to push the boundaries have a big problem – how far? And who says how far? And once one boundary is pushed are we then waiting for the next person to come along and push even further? Again, I have to ask, “but how far?” Each new level simply proves that people are never satisfied because they want always to push a little harder, to go one step further. (In the newspapers, a couple of days ago, we read of the fastest selling paperback since records began (beating Harry Potter & the DaVinci Code!). It is described as an explicit novel and last week alone sold over 100,000 copies. Another boundary pushed! I hope you can see the inevitable consequences of this pushing. They’re actually all around us in the state of our societies.
Plato had an idea that the values a society needs to live by could come from someone or somewhere outside the people living in that society. Now there’s a thought – what happens if we don’t really know best? Who’s going to admit that – musicians, artists, writers, bloggers? What happens if freedom really does exist only within the rules not outside of them?
That’s the end of our look at Freedom in various fields and in society as a whole. Whilst it has only been brief I do hope you’ve asked yourself some important questions and perhaps found some answers or at least the road to some. I’d like to finish with the proposition of Democritus who said that a life of contentment cannot be achieved through either idleness or pursuing worldly pleasures but only by being satisfied with what you have, giving little thought to envy or admiration. So there you have it – the freedom to be content! Or not? It’s up to you. More to it than you thought? Of course there is!
The next installment of our guest blogger’s thought-provoking series on freedom….
After Freedom Rules, Freedom Music, Freedom Art & Freedom Literature we now come to Part 5 which I’m calling Freedom Internet. As you probably guessed I’ve been covering elements of what most people call popular “culture” (music, art, literature). I think we have to accept that the internet has now become an element of culture in its impact and coverage. Not only is it an element of the culture here in our society but it also affects most cultures in societies across the world. Wikipedia has become the ubiquitous reference tool despite not having the reliability of the printed encyclopaedia. In the past, print had to be far more rigorous in what it published but today’s Wiki sites have only to say: “No ref” or “Citation needed” to indemnify themselves against claims of being conduits of false, confidential or potentially malicious info. And here lies a far bigger issue – unsubstantiated info appears alongside verified stuff with the result that people end up not being able to tell the difference.
The first thing to notice is that “the internet” or, as its altruistic creator Tim Berners-Lee called it, the World Wide Web, does not exist as a separate entity or area like which previous freedom subjects did. Remember his original idea was simply to enable scientists to share info & research without having to resort to paper, telecoms (telex, fax, at the time) & postal connections. There is no unique place called the internet. It exists only on computer chips, in telephone lines and on many different servers across the world. It is actually an open network of linked servers with various files which can be shared. It’s a bit like a library, not of books but of other libraries all across the world.
From that point of view what you see as “on the internet” may not be what someone else sees: take China, North Korea & other nations who severely restrict the access of their inhabitants to it. Their “internet” is not the same as mine or yours. One server owner may agree to content which others may not. These server owners then become the arbiters of what will or will not be released into the public domain. Quite simply they have now become the ones who, to put it mildly, “push the boundaries”. More bluntly they have become the source of much of today’s morality and the setters of standards apparently deemed acceptable. How so? Well think of it this way – to whom are they answerable? There is no ruling body for “the internet”, no high council (or committee) who decide the rightness or wrongness of putting a particular site up for public viewing. It is completely in their hands. The internet is an open network with no controls – except the consciences of the server providers! Comments made in print, film or artistic endeavour are more rigorously scrutinised because of the potential for libel claims. Where the internet is concerned, people can just “hide” behind made up names and identities.
The potential for criminal activity is greatly increased. I don’t suppose there are many of us who have not received an email telling us that upwards of $100,000,000 is lying in a bank account somewhere in Nigeria and that we are the only ones who can unlock this vast store of money. Why would you believe a totally anonymous stranger would want to give you a huge chunk of money? Most don’t; email deleted, move on, no worries. But, and it’s a big but some DID believe it and sent their bank details. Their accounts were emptied, no-one was caught; they suffered the complete embarrassment of being taken in by the scammers. Then there are the internet sellers who simply take the money and no product arrives or, if they’re buying, receive the product and stop the payment. And so it goes on. Starting up a proper trading company takes a lot more effort than sitting in front of a keyboard and conning people. Are we surprised so much of it goes on?
Then there are the “Munchausen Syndromers”. The internet has many forums for people with various illnesses and disorders. It’s an ideal breeding ground for attention seekers. A recent UK radio prog discussed the issue and interviewed people who had gone onto cancer sufferers’ web forums pretending to have cancer and how they were managing day-to-day. Not only was their condition fictitious but they often invented other family members: girlfriends, boyfriends, children to make their situation seem believable. (I think most people will agree that it’s one thing to pretend to like sport on a sport website forum but quite another to pretend to have a terminal disease.) People were befriended and some completely taken in by the person who was not ill at all just pretending they were. (LLM’s “Chat” blog from yesterday referred to it in para 3 without actually naming it.) There is a further condition known as Munchausen by proxy but we don’t have space to go into that one here. In the internet world Munchausen’s Syndrome has become known as MBI (Munchausen by Internet). Those duped by such people are (rightly) devastated to learn that they have been conned, sometimes out of money they offered to help a situation which really didn’t exist. How can the forums’ hosts check out everyone who joins them? They rely on the trust and truthfulness of those who join to give the site the credibility so that people can feel secure revealing details, often very personal, of their condition and their feelings about it.
In real life, meeting someone talking like this you would pick up a number of signals from their body language, facial expressions and the like. On the internet all these human interface reactions are not on show. You are, or you become, what you type because no-one can see you. Only the perceptive or the ones who’ve been through a similar experience and pick up on stuff that doesn’t ring true will see through the lies. That incidentally is how a number of these cancer phoneys were found out. Very soon after they take their details down, disappear and some admitted they just create a new identity and begin the whole process again.
Recent surveys in the UK highlighted the age at which kids admitted they had first viewed pornographic material on the internet. Some admitted seeing it between 10-12 years old and from that I think we could assume that they had done so at a younger age but were wary of confessing to that so they said an age that to them seemed acceptable. Is a button asking them to confirm their age going to deter them?
Further areas of intimidation or “cyber bullying” as it’s called have resulted in a number of suicides over the past few years here in the UK and I suspect in other countries as well. How can it happen? Simply because if one person wants to call another person names or say things about them which are untrue they can. Until a complaint is made any comment is allowed, it seems. Even then the damage can be done and taking the comment down does not reverse the effect on the person hurt.
Without an overall arbiter of web content we should not be surprised that things have gone rapidly downhill in the moral sphere as well as the practical. The genie is well and truly out of the bottle; closing the barn door will be no good, the horse has clearly bolted and we’re not going to catch it. But how many really want to catch it?
Imagine standing at a bus stop and a bus comes along but it has no destination on the front. Would you get on or would you ask the driver where it is going? Even if it’s going the right way would you like it if the route was decided by the passengers shouting out where they want it to go next and not by the bus company. If I travel from say Glasgow to London I will see signs along the way telling me, as I get nearer, that London is 400, 300, 200 and so on miles away. It’s there on a blue metal road sign at the side of the motorway. I know where I’m going and I know how far it is. As you’re reading this you’re obviously on the “internet bus” and probably got on some years ago. Are you just on to enjoy the ride? A Magical Mystery Tour? Perhaps serendipity? Or do you worry about where the bus is going? Will you get off if the bus starts going down a road you don’t like and get on one that doesn’t go that way? A different service provider for example.
The internet has done so much good in many different areas and undoubtedly is greatly beneficial in the realm of study & research, commerce, communications for families and so on. That is to be welcomed and applauded. However we will reap what we sow and sadly we’re seeing a lot of negatives. Whilst I can only raise a few pointers to the current situation I hope you can see that unless controls are introduced the whole thing will continue down the road of decline. Freedom on the internet has had very serious consequences for us all. In a way it is breaking down societal norms and the differences between societies because those with unrestricted access can see what others are doing or how they are behaving. They then press their governments for change and, if successful, their society and culture changes. But to what? – To be more like ours? Why should ours be better than theirs?
Perhaps I can finish with some crucial questions: “Where do you think we as individuals and society in general are heading in this very difficult area? Are we, in reality, just being led by the internet? Can you see any signs? Is freedom helping us get there?”
Now moment of truth! If you look in a real mirror you see what you really look like. If you could look into an “internet mirror” what would you see?
Once again this is a vast subject and I can only take a brief look at it. Hopefully it may prompt a few thoughts in your mind. I’m going to take just a couple of examples and, as in previous pieces, ask some questions. Let me start with: how is freedom portrayed in literature? And what sort of freedom? There are plenty of biographies about people who have fought for causes to free others or for their own freedom. There are those written about bringing new freedoms to situations or to countries where they don’t have them. I’m going to take just a couple of examples from novels to illustrate how a couple of writers have treated the subject. You may have others you feel illustrate the point as well.
Let’s begin with Indian-born George Orwell (1903-50, real name Eric Arthur Blair) and his novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (1948). In the land of Oceania The Party rules and Winston Smith imagines how he could rebel against Big Brother. Once again the loss of basic freedoms is apparent from very early on as we see how the society works. The rebel, the main protagonist, in this book and in Bradbury’s below, is a heroic figure battling the discriminatory dictatorship ruling his world. As soon as we read of his situation we want to side with him and see him victorious. We want to see the lost freedoms he is fighting for restored.
Next, Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 (1953) written just 8 years after the end of WW2; a film followed in 1966 and it’s well worth catching if you can. Like Orwell’s book Bradbury’s has been described as a dystopian novel and, at times, has also been banned or considered “intellectually dangerous to the public” (Wikipedia). It looks at American society in the future where books have been banned; the freedom to read taken away and, in this case, replaced by the government’s TV broadcasts. However not only are the books banned but they are burned by the authorities. The people employed to do the burning are called “firemen”. (Throughout history the burning of books has been undertaken by various regimes or groups within a society as a means of control.) The aim is simply to stop the spread of ideas contrary to what those in power want. In Bradbury’s novel the burning campaign is quite extensive. Even so, the firemen are always looking for more books to destroy and for people who may not be obeying the rules. Given the risk of being discovered some individuals, who oppose the government policy, come up with a plan: they will preserve the content of the books by memorising them. They have to move out of the city to somewhere in the countryside to avoid detection. One person, in the group, memorises one book, another person another book and so on. Although the book is gone, the knowledge of that book will not be lost to future generations.
The freedom to write whatever you want is probably epitomised by the content & style of James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake (1939). Most readers of more than just a few pages, without a commentary or notes on it, will struggle to remember what they’ve read and what might it mean.
Nonsense verse has a number of famous examples. For just a couple, think of Lewis Carroll’s Jabberwocky, (begins ‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves, Did gyre and gimble in the wabe) and Edward Lear’s The Owl and the Pussycat,(begins, The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to sea, In a beautiful pea green boat, They took some honey, and plenty of money, Wrapped up in a five pound note). The Mayor of Scuttleton by Mary Mapes Dodge and Oh Freddled Gruntbuggly by Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz (Douglas Adams) add to the list of meaningless poems. So freedom may produce nonsense; interestingly forms like this do, however, use a regular form of poetry to do it – hmm..).
The minute we move into the controversial areas of politics, religion & sex in literature we come to that, now familiar, territory of whether I should consider if I am causing someone, who reads my writing, to be offended. Should I care? Or should they just “Get over it”? Does the society I live in have the right to legislate about what I can write? Do we need censorship & specific rules to govern the publishing process? If we don’t have them what happens?
Among the many books which speak of freedom, you may be surprised to know that The Bible has these words, (in the book of Galatians): “..do not use your freedom as an opportunity to do wrong but through love serve one another.” Here the emphasis is very much on the responsibility that comes with having freedom. This has to be a vital element in the smooth functioning of any society. If individuals don’t take responsibility for the consequences of their actions it will be a very selfish society that is created – a sort of “I want whatever I want – no matter what you think.” Not good.
I wonder what you or I would do if we had to take charge of the publishing industry. What would we allow into print? And what not? It’s tough isn’t it. If we allow anything, we could easily be accused of letting corrupting influences take hold; if we restrict, we may be accused of being too negative or censorial in our attitude. Should publishers be accountable to the society they release material into? Are there books you would not like your children to read? Why?
There are so many questions because it’s such a difficult area. Perhaps you’d like to make a comment on a blog. If the blogger doesn’t like it, it won’t show or will be taken down if already posted. Is even that restricting your freedom? The further you look into it the harder it gets.
Should revealing details of the operations of the military and security services, in print, be banned? Just this last week, it was reported in the UK press, that the Ministry of Defence tried to block a book written about British forces in Afghanistan. The author said, of those responsible for the situation: “To paraphrase George Orwell, if liberty means anything at all, it means the freedom to tell people things they don’t want to hear….” Is the author right?
As with the other areas, Freedom Literature seems to raise more questions than it answers. Surely somewhere along the line there must be some form of literature control otherwise anyone could publish whatever they want about whatever subject or person they choose? And then we run into the scenario in the poem at the end of my previous Freedom Art blog that morality ceases to exist in this area. Can that be right?
Interestingly, this day (30th May) in history has not been kind to writers:
1. In 1593, English dramatist, Christopher Marlowe died.
2. In 1744, English poet, Alexander Pope died.
3. In 1788, French writer, François-Marie Arouet de Voltaire died.
4. In 1960, Russian poet & novelist, Boris Pasternak died.
Finally, in 1431, although not a writer as such, Joan of Arc died. (She wrote a number of letters to various groups & people.) She is most famously remembered for the bringing of freedom to the city of Orleans which had been under siege by the English, 1428-9. (This eventually led to the restoration of the monarchy under King Charles VII.)
After Freedom Rules and Freedom Music we now come to Part 3 and Freedom Art. Thanks to Therabbitholez for last week’s comments on areas I’d not had space to include.
Much has been written on the way art embraces or represents freedom. I’m not going down those roads particularly or into the work of individual artists’ (save one) as there just isn’t the space. What I want to do is ask, in the context of our approach to the previous two subjects, should art and artists be governed by any kind of rules? Throughout history there have been many “schools” or groups in art who have sought to “push the boundaries” of taste, decency & style. Here are just some with an example of one who painted in that style: Impressionism (Monet), Fauvism (Matisse), Cubism (Picasso), Surrealism (Magritte), Abstract Expressionism (Jackson Pollock), Pop Art (Warhol) and finally the anarchists of early 20th C Dadaism who challenged the established ways of painting or presenting art. Artists claim they want to have the freedom to paint or draw whatever they want. Should they?
How many of you would, for instance, want a young child to see pictures like those displayed in the 2004 Biennial International Exhibition in Liverpool by Yoko Ono? In the town centre, in the main shopping area, pictures of women’s breasts and crotches were displayed on large posters hanging from lamp posts – one picture, from the local press at the time, shows 10 down the side of just part of one street. Despite many complaints from parents concerned about these images being displayed where the very young could see them the exhibition went ahead. Is this the type of freedom you want? A repressive political regime restricts those under it but, in this case, a town council forced its people to look at images which many did not want to see. (There have been many other examples across the UK.) So what happened? Locals complained; visitors to the city complained; objections were overruled; objectors were vilified as “stick-in-the-muds”, frumps or puritans. Is that freedom or repression? Can you see the problem? Once again we have a situation where people who want one form of freedom override others who want a different sort of freedom.
If we talk about TV, books or exhibitions then the answer is clear – if you’re offended, turn it off or don’t look at or buy them, or don’t go to them. You are not forced to see these things just so you can complain. However, in the Liverpool example, in public streets with so many pictures, it’s difficult to avoid seeing what you’d rather not see!
If we introduce rules to keep “offending” material out of public areas then, providing it is legal, it will be shown at galleries or maybe in private exhibitions. That’s all well and good but are we then creating a kind of underground class of avant-garde arty types? – Do they become the ones who want to accept what the wider society rejects? Of course that division already exists and probably has done for hundreds of years. You can choose to be part of it. You can choose to reject it. At least you have the choice – the freedom to choose! In a public place you don’t.
The website Blurb.com has an interesting book from 2008, entitled Freedom & Art. The look inside preview is excellent and well worth a visit. (I’d be interested in any comments you may have on the individual quotes.) It is “dedicated to Nobel Peace Prize winner Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and is a fundraiser for Amnesty international. 74 international artists from 27 countries have donated art and written about the synergy of freedom.” (The Burmese pro-democracy leader had been under house arrest for 15 of the 21 years between 1989 & her release in Nov 2010.) It contains quotes from each of the artists who work is featured in the book. I can’t remember any which particularly acknowledge any responsibility being attached to the perspective on freedom which they espouse. Once again much of it seems to be mostly about the “me-me” view and not about whether my freedom has any effect on yours. It’s dangerous territory! It means that I, as an artist, am entitled to force my work into the public domain and you can’t stop me because then you will be limiting my freedom. Are you ok with being forced to see stuff you don’t really want to see? Is that the price of having a “free” society?
I hope you’ve spotted a key element in each of these lines of thought – offence. Without going too deeply into it – perhaps a topic for further investigation – it’s another difficult area isn’t it? I’m offended by something which you’re not; you’re offended by something which I’m not. Is either of us right? In a democratic society is it the majority that is right? Or do they just get their way because there are more of them? So 51% = right, 49% = wrong?
Just as with freedom in music so we face a similar problem with freedom in art. I suspect you can now see that freedom as a concept is becoming slightly more difficult to define – amorphous even. If freedom were a tree it would have many branches: political, religious, societal, musical, artistic etc. The trouble is these branches do not grow independently outwards and upwards. They are intertwined and, at times, may appear almost symbiotic. Trees, in the natural world, grow by a process called photosynthesis. An outside agent (in that case, the sun) provides the means by which they, and other plant life, grow. Where are we going to find the photosynthetic agent, if there is one, for our freedom tree? How does it or can it grow in the future? And who says whether my freedom tree is better (or more worthy) than yours?
Perhaps we’ve set out on an impossible journey. Perhaps the key is finding out how personal freedom is possible without infringing someone else’s but living within the laws of a society where the rights of the individuals in it are acknowledged and respected. Can those free-thinking inhabitants of “Art-Land” show us the way? Realistically, how can art help us in our quest especially when its practitioners seem to reject the very idea of rules governing what it & they can do?
Here’s a thought from A.P. Herbert (1890-1971):
“As my poor father used to say,
In 1863,
Once people start on all this Art,
Good-bye moralitee!
And what my father used to say,
Is good enough for me.”
lazylauramaisey 