Happy Birthday Mother

I forgot to buy my mother a birthday card this year. It should have been okay, her birthday isn't until 29th January, but she jetted off on a birthday holiday on Friday, and had I been organised, she would have had a birthday card to take with her. The guilt of forgetting her card kept me awake at night and I was unable to concentrate in my usually engrossing Political Theory from Hobbes lecture. My mind was on other things, most notably the disappointment I knew I would see in her eyes upon her return. I spent the Thursday before her flight in a Nero coffee shop watching 24, desperately trying to reconcile the situation by not telling her and telling myself I would send one for her to arrive home too. Problem solved. Of course, my mother had a better idea. Unbeknownst to her, she gave me the perfect idea when she sent me a whatsapp, telling me she expected a "nice blog" about her for her birthday. It's both a birthday present and a card. 

I've already written one of these and, indeed, I wonder if my mother's suggestion is purely so that she can have what she terms "tweeter material". She needs to keep her thousands of loyal followers happy somehow, after all. But anyway, here we go, a nice blog about my mother:

I would be a wealthy man if I received a pound for every mention of how cool she is or how much someone wanted to meet her. Whether it be the interesting auto-correct incidents (Assad being referred to as a frantic decorator rather than a fanatic dictator being a nice example); the constant twitter presence or the insistence on spending every meal taking as many selfies as is humanly possible, there seems to be something about my mother that intrigues others. And right they are to be intrigued. 

To describe my mother is difficult. Adjectives and superlatives lose meaning - I am, of course, talking about a woman who has looked after me and raised me; spent the last 19 years providing for me and pushing me to achieve what she thinks I am capable of; and, of course, managed to resist the temptation of calling me 'Nimrod'. I always say you can tell a lot about a man through the relationship he has with his mum and the way he treats his mum. Well, anything you can say about me, there can be little doubt that my mum is in a huge way responsible for it. For that I can only ever be eternally grateful. Raising me always went beyond working hard and earning money to give me the best education and the constant, "RAPHAEL! You worked harder last year. Why aren't you things? Go and do some work, stop not working, things work, you need to things and work, if you want to things." My earliest memories are of things like a slightly overly enthusiastic guy in the National Gallery harping on about a Turner and visiting museums like they were all about to close down. Those experiences, and many others, shaped me, there can be no question about that. And of course, the "WORK HARDER" has had some influence as well. And yes, I could have been called Nimrod. Get over it.

Amazingly funny, often without realising, kind, generous, giving, relentlessly positive, hopeful, creative, hard-working, caring and, of course, completely and utterly mental in the best way possible. I wouldn't change a thing. 

Sophia Loren once said: "There is a fountain of youth: it is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring to your life and the lives of people you love. When you learn to tap this source, you will truly have defeated age." If ever there was a person that embodied tapping into that fountain of youth, it is my mother. As she reaches a milestone birthday (30, I believe), it is quite clear that she really has defeated age. 

It isn't your birthday for 3 days, but here is an early birthday present, considering I forgot to buy you a card in time to give you initially.

Happy Birthday Mum, I love you

Boobs Really Really Really Are Not News

Recently, the Warwick Debating Union hosted the No More Page 3 Campaign, Helen Goodman MP, Natasha Devon, founder of Body Gossip, and Raheem Kassam, editor/founder of Trending Central, to debate the motion "This House Would Ban Page 3" (for clarity, the former two spoke in proposition, whilst the latter two spoke in opposition). I was quite disappointed that I had to leave the debate midway through, having only listened to Helen and Raheem speak, especially when, in a short twitter conversation with Natasha, it was revealed that I missed a "fiery" one. Going off the two speeches I was lucky enough to see, there is no doubt the opposition should have won the debate, in my opinion.

I was rather bemused by Helen's speech, which began with her reading out a newspaper article and included the customary mention of her constituency. Other than confirming that she was not in favour of a government ban, there was not much of note. The point about a government ban is an interesting one. For what it is worth, I can understand that the campaign, and Helen, are not in favour of actually banning Page 3 via legislation, but rather are in favour 'of asking the editor nicely' but, to be frank, that campaign must be considered a failure. Of course the petition has been largely successful in terms of signatories but ultimately, if the Sun was going to 'voluntarily' drop Page 3, David Dinsmore would have done so by now. Instead, he has come out in support of the feature and this, obviously, points towards its continued presence in the magazine. Continued pressure and campaigning might be successful in ensuring the removal of the Sun from universities or individual shops, but ultimately, this will not have much effect on the Sun's decisions regarding Page 3. The Sun will continue to sell millions of copies regardless of whether my local corner shop or the Costcutter on campus stocks it - and I cannot see this changing. Making the safe assumption that there is not great pressure from the Sun's readers for Page 3 to go, there are two reasons for Dinsmore to remove the feature:

1. Removing it will see an increase in sales. 
2. The Government either makes Page 3 illegal or imposes the same conditions of sale on the Sun as are imposed on Nuts or Zoo

One would only be the case if the readers themselves started campaigning for its removal or if outlets like Tesco starting dropping the Sun in protest and I cannot see either happening, whilst both the No More Page 3 Campaign and Helen Goodman confirmed that they did not support option two, so it seems that Page 3 is here to stay, regardless of any disapproval of it. It is interesting that No More Page 3, and others, have written numerous articles about hugely negative effects deriving from Page 3, yet do not want to ban it, especially considering what I believe to be the current state of their campaign. 

As I have already made clear, I thought Raheem won the first half of the debate, the text of his speech has been uploaded to his website Trending Central and can be found here. Raheem, and I believe Natasha's, case goes beyond arguing for or against a ban, summed up neatly by the following statement: "Well, we're telling women, "No. You can't voluntarily pose for a newspaper. No. You must cover up."" Irrespective of whether No More Page 3 and Helen Goodman are calling for a governmental ban, there is a distinct dictating to Page 3 girls what they should and should not do by campaigning against Page 3, which seems to go very much against Liberal (and Feminist) values. I wish I had heard Natasha Devon's speech - from her tweets, I think it would have been along the lines of Page 3 actually promoting healthy body image with the variety of dress sizes, no breast implants etc, something that I think complements Raheem's point. 

For what it is worth, I do not really like Page 3 but my disapproval of Page 3 and its presence of the Sun is irrelevant really. Yes I understand the fear that boys/men seeing Page 3 girls and thinking that is what girls all look like or the fear that it can lead to the objectification or sexualisation of women but removing Page 3 is addressing that potential problem in the wrong way. Firstly, as Natasha tweeted after the debate (and no doubt said in her speech), to assume that Page 3 makes men think women are objects and so on is not only false (without blowing my own trumpet, I happen to have seen Page 3 and also happen to not think women are objects, and I am sure I am not alone) but is also simply offensive to all the "decent" men out there. Secondly, and more importantly, if we grant the assumption that Page 3 girls can lead to the sexualisation of women by men, the problem is not Page 3, the problem is those men.

In fact, much more dangerous than Page 3, in my opinion, are things like Smart Insurance's advert. For anyone who has not seen the advert, and cannot be bothered to click on the link, it depicts a man as coming home from work and arranging life insurance to help his family in the event that the worst should happen. The implicit message from this advert is that it is the man who is the bread winner, it is the man who needs to ensure his family is protected should the worst happen and that his wife could not possibly survive without his earnings. The advert itself is not explicit at all, but there can be little doubt that it could be seen to be reinforcing the gender stereotype and male breadwinner view that is prevalent in our society. I think there are many more people who are prone to influence by adverts like Smart Insurance's, whose implicit message is much more subtle than the bare breasts on Page 3. I am sympathetic to the fears of the No More Page 3 campaign, and others who disapprove of Page 3, but the issues they raise - the sexualisation and objectification of women, for example, should be combatted by education and other means, in my opinion.

Ultimately, the issues highlighted by the campaign are far deeper rooted than being caused by a woman having her boobs out in a newspaper. 

Arab Spring or Islamist Winter

On Monday 7th October, the Warwick Debating Union hosted a public debate on the motion THB that the Arab Spring has caused more harm than good. Whilst I was not organising this specific debate, I was particularly excited by its motion as it was the one that most chimed with my interests. Clearly the student body agreed, with the room packed to capacity and the live stream being watched by many, when it decided to work. Just for reference, Barak Seneer and Maria Holt proposed the motion, with Noel Brehony and Meg Munn MP in opposition and the motion did not carry, in fact it failed by quite a large majority.

The obvious points, as you would expect, came up - violence against women, the question of Political Islam and Democracy, Syria, whether the West is arrogant to assume imposition of its view of morality and system of government as right/good amongst others.

The panel, in the main, actually seemed to agree with each other on some of the major points - the failures of the governments that came in to replace the dictators; that there was a long way to go; and that women's rights were a serious issue, yet were consistent to their opposing sides of the debate. Ultimately, the debate seemed to come down to optimism beating pessimism. Seneer spoke about the lack of any indication that Liberal and Democratic forces "winning" in the region, whilst Brehony spoke of the (relative) successes in Yemen. Similarly, both Holt and Munn spoke of the awful assaults, sexual harassment and violence that women in the region were victim of and their lack of political and social rights. However, Holt stressed these facts, whilst Munn also made the point that the Arab Spring had large woman involvement in protests and calling for social and Political change and also noted the example of Tunisia whose parliament's make up is 27% woman - 5% higher than our own, according to her stats.

Perhaps we do have reason to be optimistic. No one denied the awful situation in Syria, no one denied that Political vacuums had been filled, often, with Muslim Brotherhood Islamists and extremists and no one tried to make it seem like women suddenly lived in some utopia. There was an acceptance of the cold hard facts on the ground, which ultimately made for much more credible opposition side than I initially anticipated. I, however, disagree with the majority of the students watching. I share Barack Seneer's pessimism, perhaps summed up when he answered a question by stating, "I hope you're right and I am wrong, I really do," and went on to further analyse his point about looking at the Arab Spring from a 2013 perspective and not seeing the signs that it could be a success, referencing the 'lack of seeds being planted' in the first place in reply to the generic point that you need to plant seeds for anything to grow and that takes time. Maybe in 100 years time, Barak and I will both be proven wrong. Let's hope so.

As George Will once said: "The nice thing about being a pessimist is that you are constantly either being proven right or pleasantly surprised."

It is all Blair's Fault

I recently saw this tweet from Piers Morgan on my Twitter timeline:

"Cameron got punished for what Blair did. Simple as that #Iraq" (https://twitter.com/piersmorgan/status/373208889866457088)

Ok, you got me. I follow Piers Morgan on Twitter. I am not his biggest fan and I do think he is the most awful interviewer, incredibly arrogant and full of himself but, with all that in mind, his views are, at the very least, thought-provoking. Sometimes I even find myself agreeing with him - gun control, for example. Here I am not so sure. I agree that, to an extent, there is a sense that the British public and British MPs are (rightly) more wary about intervention in Syria after Iraq (and Afghanistan) than they would be if British troops had remained on home soil. The implication, however, is quite clear - that without Iraq, British MPs would have voted for the motion that was brought before the house yesterday. That is an altogether different point, and one I am not so sure about. (See, thought-provoking.) 

My stance on Syria is simple. There is nothing we can do. We are condemned to listen to George Galloway rant about how Israel supplied the chemical weapons to the rebels via Al Qaeda; to listen to our MPs try and score political points out of such a tragedy; and, ultimately, we are condemned to sit idly by as Assad, with the help of the Russians and Chinese, brutally murders his civilians until there are no more Syrians left for him to kill and he deems the job done. On the one hand, I understand the arguments against intervention and there are, of course, some MPs with a genuine opposition to intervention (then there is George Galloway). On the other, do we not have some moral responsibility to act, if we can? Perhaps the crucial point is exactly that: that, with the best will in the world, we cannot improve the situation and, as I say, we are condemned to watch on in horror. Diplomacy has failed and will continue to fail, whilst intervention seems only to mean that Syria's children are killed by our bullets as well as Assad's.

With that sobering thought firmly in your minds, let's return to the question at hand: Do we think British MPs would have voted for yesterday's motion had we not intervened in Iraq? I think Piers has a point, especially considering how close the final vote was, but it's not as clear cut as he is suggesting (or perhaps is forced to suggest with only 140 characters to play with).

I leave it as an open question - feel free to comment a response.

Peace In Our Time

The big news coming out of the Middle East, if one ignores Syria as so many seem so capable of doing, is the announcement of a return to peace talks between the Israelis and the Palestinians. I'm an Economist, so let's make a few assumptions. Let's assume that peace talks begin; that both sides want peace; that negotiations could be fruitful and heck, that a solution is reached. Picture the scene, Netanyahu and Abbas could stand arm in arm on Temple Mount each waving a piece of paper to the gathered masses. Palestinians and Jews would embrace, the status of hummus as a joint Israeli-Arab dish would be assured and the respective leaders heads of state would proclaim, "(real) Peace in our time," or whatever the Hebrew and Arabic equivalent is, ignoring the previous connotations of that phrase. We could head to my uncle's bakery for a sandwich and then on to a local falafel and shawarma joint to really kick-start the party, sharing many a tale from the past few centuries of conflict joking about how we have managed to fool the West into believing it all began in 1948. Does that not sound all so amazing? I cannot wait.

But then you come back to the real world. You realise that even with the best of intentions on both sides, the above picture is a distant dream regardless of whether Abbas and Netanyahu want peace or can negotiate peace. Many will argue that neither truly wants peace in the first place, so there is not much point in starting them off on whether a negotiated settlement is possible. And even pulling on our Economist caps on, assuming those problems away, it does not look much better. There are many obstacles to peace, on both sides. There are many that a good, honest desire for peace could help erode. There is (at least) one, however, that no desire for peace can erode; one that makes the smell of falafel and hummus together on a sunny evening disappear quicker than you can say 'pitta bread'. That one obstacle is Hamas and the Gaza/West Bank divide.

Abbas may command (minimal) legitimacy in the West Bank (ignoring, as you must, the lack of elections and rampant corruption to mention but two problems with his leadership), but he cannot even see the other half of the territory that he claims to represent with binoculars, let alone step foot inside it. Whether you want to argue that Hamas is the legitimate representatives of those Palestinians (some will argue they were democratically elected) is neither here nor there. What is impossible to argue is that Abbas represents the Gazans. He simply does not, that is just the cold hard truth. For him to be negotiating a peace deal that Hamas has already rejected (http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2013/05/201353144052527593.html), on behalf of Palestinians under Hamas rule, makes a mockery of the proposal. Abbas simply has no authority to negotiate a Palestinian state that includes Gaza which it surely would.

I hope you can forgive my obvious pessimism about the latest announcement. I do sincerely hope, pray and (dare I say it) dream that we will see peace in our time. The Palestinian and Jewish people deserve a lasting peace that has a viable Palestinian state alongside a Jewish state with its security guaranteed. The latest round peace talks, however, can, at best, end with Abbas declaring a Palestinian state in the West Bank with Gaza continuing to provide the home for rocket fire into Israel. That is not a peace that any Israeli leader can or will accept.

Turn off the ovens Binyamin, falafel and shawarma will have to wait.

It's the Thought that Counts

There is a fantastic quote by everyone's second favourite Danish Philosopher Søren Kierkegaard (second to, obviously, my Philosophy teacher Dr Jonas Green) which goes as follows:

"People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought they seldom use"

It rings true when thinking about people who appeal to their freedom of speech to justify saying some truly hateful and horrible things that any decent human being would not dream of thinking, let alone saying. There are countless people like this, people who benefit from living in a democracy where we have to put up with views that not only we fundamentally disagree with but also that we find abhorrant. As much as there is a bit of me that believes freedom of speech should only be a right for those who also exercise freedom of thought before they speak, I would not change that. 

That quotation seems to fit nicely when thinking about Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer (and the EDL and, of course, radical Islamic clerics and so on) - all people who say things that, perhaps, are only justifiable by appealing to freedom of speech but who choose to abstain from thinking (or at least, are unable to think what I would term 'properly'). You may think I am now going to proceed with an article broadly along the lines of defending freedom of speech and, yeah-we-may-not-like-what-they-say-but-that-does-not-mean-they-don't-have-a-right-to-say-it and all the rest of it. If you were hoping for that sort of article there are plenty to be found on the web (like here) but I will not be indulging in one here. It is a relatively easy point to make, one that I think has been made to death on social media and, indeed, in articles like the one I have linked. In addition, when you see tweets suggesting David Cameron is a Nazi sympathiser because of this decision, you wonder to what extent you really can defend freedom of speech. If you were, however, looking for a different take on the decision then read on.

This post is simply about what an awful decision I think May has made. Not because of freedom of speech. Not because there are plenty of other people that we are forced to put up with in this country that we disagree with (isn't it slightly telling that the only examples all these bastians of free speech and democracy can think of, however, are Islamic radicals? It is almost like they have some sort of agenda...) No, rather, it is simply because being banned from speaking in the country is almost better for Geller and Spencer (and their supporters) than being allowed to speak in the country. It has turned what is a relatively routine occurrence - people whose views other people do not agree with or even find hateful etc, flying to other countries to spout the very views that those other people did not agree with or found hateful, into news. In fact, it has almost turned Geller and Spencer into the victims of oppression, namely the oppression of their free speech. What an absurd turn of events! You will have read all the articles on freedom of speech, double standards and all the rest of it. Those articles, those arguments are only made possible because of Vaz's proposal and May's decision to ban them from entering the country. No one would have even known about Geller and Spencer had they simply been allowed to spew their hatred and been done with it.

Freedom of speech is wonderful because it allows us to see what people really believe, to see what people say when they are free to say whatever they want. Freedom of thought allows the rest of us to make up our own minds about whether we agree. 

Israel and higher moral standards

"I'm not singling out the world's only Jewish state, I merely hold Israel to a higher moral standard because it claims to be a democracy."

A line I have encountered many times. So here are some thoughts:

If Israel were not a democracy, would you ignore the crimes you claim Israel is guilty of in much the same way that you currently ignore the actual crimes of states like Syria, Iran, China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, North Korea, Egypt, Lebanon etc etc?

If you would ignore Israel's crimes should it not be a democracy, are you suggesting that Netanyahu declare himself dictator and suspend all elections?

If you would continue in your anti-Israel activism, what justification would you now offer seeing as it is on the same moral standings as nations you previously chose to ignore because you felt you could hold Israel to a higher moral standard?

I'm genuinely interested, please answer simply.