Bel is thinking

The Lab Gallery in New York has incurred the displeasure of the US-based Catholic League. It is displaying a milk chocolate sculpture of a naked Jesus on the cross, entitled ‘My Sweet Lord’.

My view? As a practising Christian, I am not at all bothered by the image. I can see why the Catholic League is upset, though. Catholicism seems to have a greater affinity for symbols than do other branches of Christianity. For me, the image is nothing more than what someone somewhere believes to be the likeness of Jesus. I do not expect non-Christians to have reverence for my religion. It would be nice if they did, but if they don’t, that’s also fine. If it upset me, I’d just stay away from the Lab Gallery until the sculpture was removed.

I wonder what caused the greater offence, the depiction of the sculpture at all, or the fact that it was made with chocolate. Making the sculpture in milk chocolate shouldn’t really matter. I know Jesus didn’t mean it in this context, but he did actually say in the Bible: ‘whoever eats my flesh … has eternal life’.

Seriously though, my message to the Catholic League is to lighten up a bit. Let people mock your religion if they want. Surely your God is strong enough to withstand that.

On a happy note, no death threats or threats to bomb the gallery. Perhaps some other religions could learn from that.

UPDATE. The exhibition has now been cancelled.

UPDATE 2. Just seen Sky News coverage of this story, complete with pictures of the chocolate sculpture. I just wonder, would they have dared show any pictures if it were, say, a chocolate sculpture of Mohammed?

I don’t even want to comment on this because a part of me believes it couldn’t possibly be true:

Children should be taught “life skills” instead of facts and figures because they can look up all they need to know on the Internet, teachers’ leaders claim today.

…

[Association of Teachers and Lecturers] acting deputy general secretary said youngsters could learn to walk in a variety of ways, including techniques needed for catching trains and exploring cliffs.

Martin Johnson said:

“There’s a lot to learn about how to walk. If you were going out for a Sunday afternoon stroll you might walk in one way.

“If you’re trying to catch the train you might walk in another way and if you are doing a day’s cliff walk you might walk in another way.

“If you are carrying a pack, there’s a technique in that.

“We need a nation of people who understand their bodies and can use their bodies effectively.

“Since in a green world people will be walking more than western societies are currently doing, it would be as well that we spent an hour or so of compulsory education in teaching young people how to walk efficiently - and the joy of walking.”

He said physical and manual skills should have greater prominence in the school curriculum which should no longer prescribe facts and figures and specific subjects.

Hilarious. And he goes on:

“For the state to suggest that some knowledge should be privileged over other knowledge is a bit totalitarian in a 21st century environment.

“We are arguing that knowledge which traditionally has got high status should not be privileged over other kinds of knowledge.”

Where does one start?

If true, the worst part is that he probably means every word of it.

I agree with him in only one thing. I don’t think the State should be prescribing what we teach our children, anyway. This is because I don’t believe in a National Curriculum, certainly not in the form it takes in the UK.

As to the rest of the article, like one of the critics interviewed by the Daily Mail, I wondered whether it was April Fools Day already. I am willing to believe that Mr Johnson either was misquoted, or is the victim of a cynical trickster.

According to the Telegraph:

Lecturers at some of the new universities are calling for a public debate on standards because they say functionally illiterate students are being passed so they do not drop out of courses.

Yes, yes. But why the need for a ‘public debate’? Have we now reached the point in this country where standards have to be debated? Should it not be an open-and-shut case if standards are not good enough?

David Miliband writing in the Telegraph today, setting out his political beliefs.

His theory can be summarised thus:

• In the years after 1945, the people of Great Britain said ‘I need’, and the Labour Government stepped forward to meet that need (NHS, education etc).
• In the 1980s, people said ‘I want’, and the Thatcher Government, in trying to meet those aspirations, ended up leaving behind the weaker citizens.
• Since 1997, the people have been saying ‘I can’, so it is now up to the Government to empower citizens, by devolving power to the people etc.

In summary, we have passed through three phases in the last 60 years, I need, I want, and I can.

A bit seductive at first glance, but under proper scrutiny, the whole thing falls apart.

David Miliband’s first error is to assume that society is speaking with one voice, and it is saying only one thing at a time,  ’I need’, ‘I want’ or ‘I can’. I put it to him that it is not. During what he termed the ‘I need’ generation (ie post-1945), does he really believe that there were not as many ‘I want’ or ‘I can’ voices even then?

There have always been people with needs (I need), aspirations (I want), and ambition and ability (I can); the only difference is that at different times in the political life of this nation, one group of people was being listened to more than the others. I submit that it is not, as Miliband would put it, a question of citizens changing their status (from ‘I want’ to ‘I can’, for example). Rather, it is a question of politicians changing their focus. It is the politicians who have switched their focus from one group of people to another, depending on their own interests.

Perhaps in 1945, the Labour Government was more attuned to the desires of its natural constituency (ie the ‘I needs’). Similarly, by furthering conservative ideals of personal responsibility, individual enterprise, and limited State control, the Conservative Government of the 1980s was suited to the ‘I want’ group. It is therefore not a question of different time phases, rather it is a question of political focus. These three groups have been with us from time immemorial, and to pretend otherwise is simply naive. The ‘I needs’ and ‘I wants’ were there in 1945, and they are still here today. Similarly, there has been a clamour by the ‘I cans’ ever since 1945. Why is David Miliband only hearing them today?

There are reasons why one particular group’s voice may be louder than the others at any given time. These reasons could be socio-economic, cultural, etc. Politicians simply respond to the loudest voice they hear.

This puts me in mind of Perelman’s concept of justice. Perelman was a philosopher of law who contributed much to the theory of justice. He believed that there were six criteria for determining justice, and that once a society has decided on which criterion to use, it must ‘treat like with like’ within that criterion. His six criteria were as follows:

1. to each according to his works
2. to each according to his needs
3. to each according to his merits
4. to each according to his rank
5. to each according to his legal entitlement
6. to each the same thing

To analyse Miliband’s theory using Perelman (loosely), I would submit that the 1940s concept of justice was as in (2) above. The Labour Government focussed on distributing social goods etc according to the needs of the people. That was their definition of justice for that time. In the same way (and note, I am doing no more than extending Miliband’s theory), the Conservative Government of the 1980s would have chosen (1) or (3) above as their starting-point. Far, therefore, from being a phase, ie a shift among the citizens in their status or priority, it is instead a shift in political focus. As far as the ‘I can’ generation of the 1990s is concerned, what has now happened is that politicians have sensed the urgency coming from the hardworking, aspirational part of society, and have conveniently changed their language (if not their acts) to garner the support of that constituency.

At this point, I should note another weakness in his theory. By Miliband’s reasoning, we have come out of the ’I want’ phase and are now in the ’I can’ phase. I submit that ‘I can’ cannot possibly be a phase, in the sense that he says. Far from being a phase on its own, it is no more than a means by which one satisfies either a ‘want’ or a ‘need’. For example, ’I want’ alludes to desire to acquire, but says nothing about how to meet this desire. It could be by private enterprise (’I can’), or even just as valid, it could be by social security payments. I think it is therefore misleading to claim, even if his theory stood up by other means, that there is a valid ‘I can’ phase.

But even if I were to accept wholesale every word in his article, I have difficulty seeing what this Government (with which Miliband dines at high table) has done to address the desires of the so-called ‘I can’ generation. Is it the torrent of legislation pouring out daily from the pen of our ministers, or the acres upon acres of red tape? Is it the high tax burden that has stifled private enterprise, and led to the fall in disposable income? Is it the attempts to control what we say and think, and to regulate our every move? Or perhaps it’s the growing information-gathering powers that this Government accords to itself at every stage.

Whichever way I look at it, the message from this Government is clear and unambiguous: ‘you can’t’.

A comprehensive school has been fined for sneakily selecting clever pupils:

Pupils applying for places were assessed on a points system which awarded marks for such things as primary school references, the child’s attendance record and punctuality, and the extent of parental support.

The children were also asked to write a description of themselves and their family lives which Mr Redmond said was very likely to have favoured the more articulate family and more able child.

Selecting in this way? How very dare they.

She thinks that Labour politicians are being self-obsessed, enthusing over a leadership non-contest about which nobody outside Westminster is even the slightest bit excited:

Look at the widespread interpretation of Mr Straw’s appointment as a “coup” for the Brown campaign. Only in a sort of fantasy Westminster politics it is. Mr Straw, as is obvious to anyone with half an eye on politics rather than a living in it, is simply interested in a plum position in the subsequent Brown Government. Securing Mr Straw’s agreement to be campaign manager must have been about as hard as securing a donkey’s agreement to spend a day in a carrot shop.

Quite.

I am reading through the crime review proposals launched by Tony Blair today. They are contained in a large pdf here.

In particular, I am interested in the proposals for ’summary’ action against criminals. One of the proposed measures is the introduction of new forfeiture powers:

[to] allow the police to seize and forfeit movable non-cash assets that are suspected of being both the proceeds and instrumentalities of crime up to a certain value threshold (for example £100,000). This would mainly affect vehicles; …

Leave to one side any human rights or constitutionality issues. I am interested in the word ‘instrumentalities’. I take this to mean that if a movable non-cash asset, rather than having been bought with the proceeds of crime, is being itself used as an instrument to commit a crime, then that asset may be seized by police under the new rules. Applying nothing but a formalist approach to this measure, I would say that it makes sense. The police may be able to seize a suspected getaway car, or a car suspected to have been used in a kidnapping, even if the car was bought with legitimate money. This would satisfy the ‘instrumentalities’ condition of the measure, even if not the ‘proceeds’ condition.

But consider the next paragraph, in which it is proposed that the measure may not just be restricted to vehicles, but:

possibly extend to all non-cash assets (lifestyle assets like jewellery, plasma TVs and laptops) up to £100,000. This would be a highly powerful tool against bad criminal role models, … [emphasis mine]

While I can understand how a a gold necklace could be seized on suspicion of being part of the proceeds of crime, I am a bit baffled as to how it could qualify as an ‘instrumentality’ of crime. It is not a weapon, and unlike a getaway car in my example above, it is hard to see how jewellery could be used to commit a crime. Same goes for a plasma TV, except maybe if it is used to smash someone over the head. I suppose you could always strangle someone with a thick gold necklace; that would meet the ‘instrumentality’ definition, but somehow I don’t think that that is what the Government is getting at.

Bearing in mind the sentence I highlighted in the above quotation, I submit that what the Government is trying to say is this: ‘even if we cannot prove that the jewellery you have around your neck is from the proceeds of crime, we can still seize it if you are a criminal, because by displaying such flash ‘lifestyle’ goods, you are encouraging young people to follow you in a life of crime.’

This is wrong. The Government would be breaking its own rules if it implemented this measure. If the rule is that goods are to be seized because they are either ’proceeds’, or ‘instruments’, then that is what the rule is. A gold necklace or a plasma TV bought by a gangster out of legitimate money is neither proceeds nor instrument. It may well serve as an incentive to impressionable children to emulate the gangster’s behaviour, but on the strict reading of the Government’s measures, I do not see why that should lead to seizure of the offending items. The best that can be said for it is that it is a generous extension of the definition of ‘instrumentality’.

The ‘bling seizure’ proposal may never see the light of day, though. The document itself admits that including these measures ‘could increase the risk of human rights challenge’. No kidding.

In writing this post, I have deliberately refrained from discussing whether it is even right for the police to be given these powers at all. This should not be taken to mean I endorse wide-ranging powers for the police to usurp the role of the judiciary. I do not. I spend a lot of time on this blog writing about what the law ought to be, rather than what it is. That in itself is an exercise in futility, especially given the political circumstances of our time. The law is what it is, not least because our lily-livered Parliamentarians are prepared to sit back and let this Government ride roughshod over every constitutional right and principle. The point of my post is that, even on a positivist reading of these proposals, without considering their intrinsic merits and demerits, the Government would still be wrong to attempt to seize ‘lifestyle property’ bought with legitimate money. 

Tessa Jowell is getting tough. She has set her sights on television phone-in shows, warning them that they face being shut down and prosecuted if they ‘operate as lotteries’.

In order not to be classed as a lottery, a phone-in show must offer free internet entry for those who choose not to call the premium rate line.

Tessa will be watching, hawk-like, for any television phone-in shows that fail to do this.

So a television phone-in show, drawing its audience from adults, all of whom have the choice whether or not to take part, dare not act as a lottery. On the other hand, a local education authority may decide, with Government approval, to allocate school places by precisely that method.

Wonderful.

Another day, another ‘wide-ranging review’ by Blair. This time, it’s on crime.

Tell me, what has he been doing for the past ten years, then?

Busy with work right now, will be back soon. In the meantime, I have put some interesting articles on my Shared Items page, which you can access here. Have fun.