I have for some time been amusing myself by collecting mangled cliches, that is, cliches which people have heard just a little bit wrong, creating their own, interesting variations. The best examples are two I have seen a frighteningly large number of times. "It takes two to tangle" and "mix and mash". However, there are a number of others out there, a few of which I have mentioned elsewhere in this blog.

Today, I happened upon a new one, which, while not quite as amusing as some of the others still deserves to be included in the list, and that is "using brains instead of brawl." Its origin is pretty obvious, just as with "it takes two to tangle", the word "brawn" is uncommon enough that many do not know it, and so they substituted a common word which seems to work (sort of) in context. As I said, not as amusing as some others, but one I fear will appear more and more often as the average vocabulary shrinks to match the "where U @?" expectations of our age.

I just saw one of those news trailers that try to get you interested in the lead story. Tonight's topic? Abuse of Maryland's free cell phone program. Imagine that!

To be fair, I have not yet seen the story, so I don't know what the particular abuse is, though one clip showed someone saying she had six in her purse. My guess is, this program, which I always found a waste of money anyway ("We Have Won the "War on Poverty"") is being abused by individuals who obtain multiple phones, likely when they don't even need them.

What amuses me more, though, is that no one finds the whole program laughable. When we are complaining about massive deficits, why are we spending money to give away phones? The left pretends that without welfare people would be starving in the streets, but the truth is, our welfare goes for air conditioning, prepackaged food, gas for cars, cable bills, cell phones and expensive clothing. In short, we don't have poverty, we have relative poverty, and were welfare to end, we would not have people dying in the streets, we would have people who would have slightly less than they do now.

But somehow no one seems to grasp that. Even after being confronted with absurdities such as the "digital divide" or free cell phones, they still believe we are living in a mediocre Steinbeck novel, when, instead, we are simply providing individuals with an excuse not to work, and giving others additional income. We are far from preventing starvation, we are doing nothing more than redistributing wealth.

I was recently working my way through (what survives of) Polybius's history of the Mediterranean during the second Punic War and the Roman intervention in Greece and Macedon, but happened to misplace my copy today, so I began to read (for the fourth or fifth time) Shirer's The Collapse of the Third Republic. From his career (journalism) and his political asides in this and his more famous work, I think our politics differ considerably, and some of the assumptions he makes in the book concerning economics* and politics strike me as wrong headed,but the factual content, which is most of the work, is quite interesting, especially given the amount of first hand material, and it is a rather light read for such a serious subject, one I can put down and pick up weeks later and rejoin without a lot of effort. Along with Kinross' The Ottoman Centuries and Oman's A History of England Before the Norman Conquest, it is one of my favorite light readings in history, good for doctor's appointments, flights and the like.

What is interesting is, every time I revisit these books, and not just these but most books of which I am fond, I always seem to find some new revelation, some novel discovery, and many times, especially when reading history, that discovery helps to shed light on modern issues.

In this case, I recognized two points which have bearing on modern phenomena. Specifically, (1) the relationship between the left, right and authoritarian, especially nationalist, movements, and (2) a particularly apt comparison between the nationalist leagues of France in the 1930's and our own Paulbots.

Before beginning, I suppose I should revisit a point I made long ago in "The Political Spectrum". Left and right are common terms, but also mostly worthless for discussing politics. For example, the idea that somehow Fascism grows out of conservatism is a strange concept. Or maybe not. I suppose it all depends on how one uses the nebulous term conservative. As I described in "The Political Spectrum", the term came mostly from Europe, where what the liberals were fighting for was individual freedom, what today would be called "conservative" or "libertarian" in the US. And the conservatives, far from defending freedom, were fighting to retain aristocracy or even monarchy. The transplanting of the terms to the US was hampered by another problem, that happened in both Europe and the US. The socialist and labor movements, rather than appearing as independent political factions, had a tendency to emerge from among the more traditional 19th century liberals, and so the term "liberal" came to be used for both those fighting for minimal government, free markets and liberty, and those fighting for the opposite, under the banner of socialism. Similarly, "conservatives", came to embrace not just aristocrats and monarchists, but their sometimes allies among authoritarian nationalists. And, in the US, during the early to mid-20th century, thanks to the progressive and populist take over of the Democrats, their opponents ended up in the Republican party, at that time a party mostly in favor of protectionism, easy money and mercanitlist policies. And so conservative came to mean, in the US, those favoring protectionism AND those favoring less government. And somehow it was assumed these were the same as the European conservatives, who included not just nationalists, monarchists and elitists, but -- although the majority of the export of US-style Goldwater liberalism to Europe would not take place until the late 20th century -- a handful of individuals fighting for less government. (And, to confuse things more, in the mid 20th century, Europeans often called small government advocates "radicals" or "radical liberals", even "socialists", to make it almost impossible to identify one's true political identity. -- See  "Reticent To Adopt a Title", "A Possible Designation" and "The Right Identity".)

I mention all this, because it is important to ignore the terms "right" and "left" in what follows, or at least recognize we are using them in a 1930's French sense, and so they have little to do with modern usage. Though, the conclusion does have applicability to modern, as well as historical, matters.

For those unfamiliar with Pierre Laval, he was Marshall Petain's right hand man, and likely for most of his post-1940 career, probably the man behind most of Petain's decisions. And for those who don't know who Petain was, he was the head of the rump French nation established by the Nazis after they defeated the French in 1940. The Vichy government, as this state was called, was, for all intents and purposes, the French version of Hitler's Germany, or Franco's Spain, or Mussolini's Italy. It was thoroughly authoritarian, as well as largely subservient to the Germans.

I mention this, not because I wish to use the infamous "Hitler comparison", apparently no longer allowed in poltical debate, but because Laval actual provides an interesting model, which I have seen many times in my reading. According to many modern pop-political theories, fascism and nazism arise out of the "political right", by which they mean either small government movements, or at least those favoring free trade and reduced government involvement in business, as well as fewer welfare services. However, Laval would seem to argue against this. He started his political career as an extreme left wing socialist. Granted, he left the party when it became subservient to Lenin's Third International after the Russian Revolution, but he remained in the remnant socialist party loyal to the Second International for a long time, and even after leaving was an "independent socialist" for years. He did spend some time in the mainstream, before shifting into the nationalist camp, but all evidence is his beliefs remained extreme, even if he pragmatically joined more moderate cabinets.

This is worth noting because it seems to follow the pattern of many "right wing" authoritarians. It is often forgotten, but Mussolini started as a Communist agitator and journalist. And the early Nazi party took the "socialist" part of "national socialist" seriously, including many former Second International socialists and labor union members, who differed with traditional socialists only on their position of internationalism. (Hence the party name.)  Nor are they unique. Time and again, it seems the most ardent nationalists, fascists, phalangists and nazis all began their careers on the far left, jumping  to what many call the "far right" with ease.

And that is my point. It seems, from both policy and personal histories, these supposed "right wing" movements share much more with the far left than anywhere on the modern right. (The historical right is, as described above, too muddled to mean much of anything.) It seems again and again, individuals, and even whole movements, have shifted from communism and socialism to fascism, phalangism, militant nationalism, authoitarian technocracy, nazism and all those other supposed right wing beliefs. I know I have argued this before ("Misplaced Blame and A Power Play", "The Political Spectrum"), but it really does seem that these movements are poorly categorized as "right wing", at least in modern usage, and would be better described as variations upon the far left. (The way both nationalism and monarchism shared the designation of "right"a t one time, despite little common ground other than opposition to traditional liberals.)

The second thing that struck me was, how often, during periods of political collapse, it will be the children of the middle and upper classes who jump into the most extreme authoritarian movements. In this case, the French nationalist movements. Though, across the border, many of their German counterparts were joining up in equally militant German nationalist movements.

This strikes me as interesting, as I have recently noticed, both in 2008 and now, that many children of relatively affluent families are joining, not just the Ron Paul movement, but the flaky, semi-bigoted, lunatic fringe, conspiracy theory wing of the movement. Those middle and upper class college students who would normally be espousing some mild liberal positions they would later outgrow are now taking up a banner normally held by a handful of fringe individuals on the right and left. And that is somewhat troubling.

Fortunately, unlike the eras in question, those joining the fringe are still a minority (if a noisy, annoying one), and many of the young still mindlessly parrot liberal propaganda, so we are hardly in the same boat as the Weimar Republic. But it is a bit troubling to hear brainless 19 year olds spouting gibberish usually reserved for LaRouche tables outside post offices or sixty year old unemployed alcoholic dock workers who corner you at neighborhood bars.

Hopefully, 2012 is Ron's last gasp, and the Paulbots, deprived of a focus, will begin to fade from view, the hard core returning to their conspiracy blogs, mimeographs and "Bush=Hitler" stickers, with the majority recovering their sanity and drifting back into political apathy. But it is troubling to see something that, even in a small way, evokes memories of the 1930's, either in Germany or France.

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* It is interesting to see how much liberalism changed with time, however. Despite his obvious sympathy with the labor movement, his ill-concealed hostility toward industrialists (sometimes degenerating into outright suspicion of their motives), and a clear sympathy for "moderate" socialists, such as Blum, Shirer avoids the Keynesianism which is endemic to moderate liberals of today, or the outright communism of the far left, and actually credits austerity measures, balanced budget and fiscal responsibility with positive effects. I have many problems with Poincare's solution to France's woes, but much like Reagan's imperfect solution to the problems introduced by Nixon, it was better than the alternative. And yet I doubt a single modern liberal would credit Poincare with saving France's economy. (To clarify, the inflation which ravaged the US in the 70's was, though worsened by some Carter measures, the result of Nixon's closing of the "gold window", itself the logical outcome of FDR's efforts to divorce the dollar from gold. -- See "Inflation and Uncertainty", "Bad Economics Part 7", "Bad Economics Part 8", "What Is Money? ", "What Is A Dollar?", "The Gold Question, Not "Why?" But "When?"", "Monetary Issues Made Simple Part I", "Monetary Issues Made Simple Part II" and "Stupid Quote of the Day (January 7, 2012)". I am not trying to shift the blame from Carter, I just recognize Nixon bears a far greater responsibility for that particular woe of the late 70's. Carter is to blame for enough others we can be honest about his role in this one. See "Memories of Jimmy")

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POSTSCRIPT

One other thing struck me as interesting. As the idiot twins who comment on this blog seem determined to convince me that all Jews are evil incarnate, openly plotting to destroy the world and are the single force behind communism and who knows what else, it was interesting to see Leon Blum mentioned, as his career makes me curious how these nutters would explain him. Blum was Jewish, and was a socialist. So far, he fits everything they claim is true. However, when the Third International attempted to assert communist control over the French Socialist party, Blum walked out, leacing the party to others, who, after a number of Trotsky-directed purges, were largely gentile. So, how does this fit with the vast Zionist conspiracy? The Jew Blum left in defiance of the Jew Trotsky, who then threw out other Jews to appoint gentiles. What happened? Did they not get the proper memos from the conspiracy? (Of course, Stalin's treatment of Jews always made me wonder how anyone could claim Jews were behind communism, but I am sure they would bring up a variation of  the ludicrous, if offensive, "Jews created the Holocaust for sympathy" argument. As with most conspiracy theories, this one seems immune to evidence.)

The idiot twins have made my decision for me.

I have been trying for some time to transfer the 4000+ posts from this blog onto one on Blogger, along with the 50 or so from my other two discontinued blogs ("Examining the War on Drugs", "Nation of Whiners"). I have moved about 600 or so, but I have been slow in finishing the task. And even then, I was never quite sure if I was going to continue posting here and duplicating my work on the new blog, or if I was moving to the new blog completely and just discontinuing this one.

Well, I am not sure whether or not I will be copying the posts here, but I think once I can finish moving my posts, I will start using the blogger site as my primary home.

Why?

Because Blogger allows blog owners to delete offensive, vile and stupid comments -- well any comments, but I wanted to point out I intend only to eliminate the most pointless and vile ones -- unlike TH where our only recourse is to flag as offensive and get ignored.

Since I really don't want to spend the rest of my life reading vile antisemitic rants from the idiot twins, or other nonsense, and don't think my few readers do either, I am going to be moving as soon as I can get everything copied. Of course, given the quantity, it may still be a few months, but it will happen.

Thanks idiot twins, for making that decision so much easier.

As I have said I will be posting less than usual, I figure I should be clear about what I intend to write in the next few days.

For the most part, I hope to finally complete my series "Liberalism, Its Origins and Consequences", as well as begin the series I described in "Upcoming Series". Beyond that, I may try to complete the remaining posts I mentioned in "Upcoming Posts", though I doubt I will finish that list in the near future.

Given that lengthy list, it should be more than enough work to fill several weeks. However, as I can't seem to resist spur of the moment writing whenever an idea strikes my fancy, as well as occasional off-topic writing, I am sure I will post any number of other essays as well, no matter how busy work may be.

We are all well aware that over time the body types that are considered desirable have changed, and that even across different cultures there is a general lack of agreement about what traits are or are not attractive. However, I am curious if the same applies to what facial features are considered attractive.

I ask this because I can look at, say, a Chinese movie star and would find her features attractive. Similarly, the faces of ancient sculptures are clearly attractive to moderns, when meant to be. So, it would seem that the standards of beauty in terms of facial features may be much more consistent than ideas about body types.

On the other hand, it is possible there has been enough cultural contact between Europe, America and Asia that the common agreement on beauty is simply an artifact of that contact, and the historical standards match modern ones because such detailed statues only really survive in great numbers from Greco-Roman sources, which obviously had quite an influence on the modern western standards. (A few other cultures left detailed sculptures, but many of them were highly stylized and thus lacked the realism needed to determine what their standard of beauty might have been.There are a handful of exceptions, such as a few naturalistic sculptures from Egypt and Mesopotamia, and they do seem to argue for a commonality between ancient and modern standards. Though a few exist which seem to argue for the opposite as well.)

It is an interesting question. Is there some universal agreement on what facial features are attractive? (At least in broad outlines, clearly there is a great deal of dispute even within a single culture over specifics.) Or is the standard of beauty as diverse in terms of facial features as it is in terms of body types?

I have written before that I have a seven year old son, so I have watched a ton of children's programming. We have moved beyond the most childish of programming now, and started to enjoy slightly more sophisticated cartoons (which is good for me). My son has a particular fondness for Looney Tunes, which is fine with me, as I don't mind watching old favorites from my youth over and over again. However, he also watches a number of new cartoons as well, and even a few of those have managed to amuse me while watching with him. (Being male, I can hope he will never buy books off the rack I once saw labelled "Young Adult Supernatural Romance" -- read "Twilight rip-offs" -- but I am sure, at some point, he is going to fall in love with something I despise. I just hope it isn't anything too annoying.)

Recently, while watching Johnny Test with him, I was struck by how often a single theme appears in cartoons. In this specific episode, Johnny is granted super powers, and uses them to save the people of his town. However, after repeatedly saving them, he realizes they are running him ragged and not doing anything for themselves, so he has to arrange to fake his own destruction, to escape their demands.

It is interesting because it was a theme which also appeared many times in the programs I watched when he was much younger. I mentioned before a particular episode of Little Bill, in which Bill was trying so hard to help a friend that it ended up offending that friend. And it was hardly the only place I saw that theme used. ("So They Understand the Principle...") Time and time again I saw children's shows where either one person's efforts to help another either upset that person, or else prevented that person from helping themselves.

In short, it appears that the many people who create children's shows, who are mostly on the political left, seem to grasp that doing too much for others is harmful, that it is better to make others do things for themselves. In fact, it is a theme we see in other areas of childhood, for example the emphasis on making children do things for themselves to build up self reliance.

All of which makes me wonder, if so many people recognize this principle, that it is better to make others do things for themselves, that doing for others breeds dependency and makes them behave in irresponsible ways, then why is it so contentious to argue against the welfare state? It would seem, given how widespread these beliefs are, that it would be a universally held belief that the welfare state is harmful.

And yet it persists.

Unfortunately, I have no easy answer for this one. In part, it is because some believe those on welfare are uniquely incompetent, and could not cope on their own without help. And others believe the system is particularly evil, and would harm these welfare recipients if we did not protect them. And others simply fail to recognize that the principle applies to welfare as well as child rearing. And for these reasons, and many more, the obvious answer manages to elude many, and we end up acting in a way which directly contradicts the stated beliefs of many of the advocates of welfare.

POSTSCRIPT

I actually hope to investigate this in one of the final chapters of my series "Liberalism, Its Origins and Consequences", looking into how people justify welfare when it conflicts with their other beliefs. So, for now, I will not look into this in any more detail, but trust me that it will be the subject of a future post in my series.

I have noticed a troubling tendency in political debate to substitute emotion for proof. What was once a common trait of liberals, criticized by conservatives as "substituting feeling for thinking" has now become part of conservative thought as well.

For example, when I argue for ending the war on drugs as it is not part of the proper function of government, and its underlying philosophy of "protecting you from yourself" can be used to justify any authoritarian theory, the response is not to argue the theory, but to ask about children on drugs or to tell horror stories of addiction.

The truth is, any solution, good or bad, will allow for some negative outcomes. Life is full of bad things, and no matter what we do, some bad outcomes will happen. And, even more troubling, when we allow people freedoms, they can abuse them and harm themselves. However, the alternative is to tell those people what to do, to effectively enslave them, and that is worse.

Allow me to give an example. Suppose I am in favor of sequestering all women in harems for their own good. I argue that women face threats daily, and so it would be best if they were kept under guard. When someone argues women should be free, instead of arguing about freedom, all I do is bring out horror story after horror story of rapes, abuse, and murder. I ask how you would like it if your 12 year old daughter were raped. And I then put forth the proposition that anyone who favors eliminating harems and the sequestering of women must not care about women as he wants them to suffer these horrors.

Absurd? Of course, but only because we do not have such sequestration of women. Had we done so for years, this argument, silly as it is, would sound as sensible to those happy with the status quo as all the addiction horror stories have to those who want to maintain the war on drugs.

One point, neither argument is right. Emotion is no substitute for reason, and individual misadventures is no subtitute for reasoned argument. Think of it this way,we have all those addiction horror stories even with drugs banned, so why does it follow that removing that ban would make things worse? Perhaps it would, perhaps it wouldn't, but we have pretty clear proof bans do not stop such horrors, so why does simply reciting a litany of present bad outcomes, under the ban, make an argument in favor of the status quo? If anything, wouldn't it suggest it is time for a change?

But that is neither here nor there, I am not arguing about drugs here, and that was just an aside. What I want to point out is that emotion, or anecdotes designed to elicit emotion, is no proof, and conservatives once knew that. What has happened that we no longer do?

I saw an advertisement today for "Chernobyl Diaries" on television and felt strangely annoyed. Not because of the movie, it looked like a pretty standard, stupid, teens in woods meet bad things film. No, what bothered me is the same thing that often annoys me when seeing movies, video games and other mass media with Russian theme. And that is the use of Cyrillic characters to represent Roman characters.

The problem is, even those of us with a rudimentary grasp of Cyrillic try to read them as the actual characters and end up seeing absolute gibberish. For example, the film in question reads as "Sneyapovoo" with a final unknown character. ("L" does not exist in Cyrillic.) I know, it is a silly complaint, but when I see a "ya" or "pe" or other character that is clearly Cyrillic, my mind shifts to Cyrillic, just as seeing a Hebrew character switches me into Hebrew (which is why I also hate those Jewish shops which use pseudo-Hebrew or pseudo-Yiddish fonts, as sometimes they look close enough that I see apostrophes as yods.), and for a few moments I am absolutely confused. And even after, try as I might, seeing that "backwards R" (or ya in Cyrillic), I always try to read it as a vowel, not as the "R" that it is used to replace in pseudo-Russian fonts.

I know, few will find this interesting in any way, I will probably get the same disinterested replies I got when I criticized the historical inaccuracies in Gladiator, but I had to say something, as this drives me mad. So, having put in my two cents, I will let it go once more.

And now back to our somewhat more relevant posts.

I have long been a critic of Wikipedia for many reasons. However, the main argument I have made, again and again, is that, at any given moment, you have no guarantee a statement you are reading is correct. Even if we buy into the Wikipedia model that good writers will replace mistaken statements when they see them, at a given moment, who is to say what you are reading is the result of such knowledgeable editing? After all, the mistake does have to appear for some time before it is corrected, and you could be reading it at that very moment. In short, you may be reading the equivalent of the best encyclopedia on earth, or the earliest rough draft of the same.

Or a hoax.

And that is the other problem. There is nothing to prevent anyone from putting absolute nonsense in Wikipedia intentionally. In fact, once, to demonstrate how easily absurd conspiracy theories spread, I thought of creating a number of pages promoting an absurd anti_Israeli, anti-military conspiracy theory. Figuring such a theory, hitting on many popular subjects would spread quickly, I could then use it to demonstrate how easily the public, or a segment thereof, will buy into anything that matches their own presumptions. To do so, I planned to insert many mentions in blogs I would create, as well as in strategic corners of Wikipedia. I never got around to doing it, but had I done so, it would also have shown how easily Wikipedia can be used to promote error as well.

Now, it seems, I don't have to. While reading on IMDB about a film, I saw someone cite Wikipedia in their argument about why we should boycott the current horror film set in Chernobyl. Someone, criticizing their argument, admitted that he often places incorrect information into Wikipedia to see how long it remains. As I have no reason to doubt him, this is yet another argument for completely ignoring that foolish, failed experiment.

Not that I needed any more.

POSTSCRIPT

My earlier arguments can be found in "Why I Won't Be Contributing to Wikipedia", "The Taxonomy of Trivia", "The Tragedy of the Creative Commons", "Grind Those Axes, WikiEditors!", "I Found It" and many more.

I never really thought about it, but Wikipedia, with its anarchic model (though with some oddly authoritarian exceptions), provides a pretty sound argument against those who would try to argue for anarchy as a valid system of (non) government. (See also "The State of Nature and Man's Rights ".)

Wow, two days without a post from the idiot twins. I know I haven't written much in those two days thanks to work, but the idiot twins didn't need me to write to fuel their rants. They would just babble back and forth to each other, even after I stopped responding entirely.

Two days. I can hope.

I want to remind people of two things we heard over and over again from 2001 to the present.

First, ever since 9-11, we heard that if we fought against Islamic terrorism, if we sent over troops, it would just result in more violence, more terrorism, and we would suffer "many more 9-11s". Anyone notice the problem? That's right, it didn't happen!

Second, I would like to point out that in 2008 there were a whole lot of intelligence analysts saying Iran was certainly not working on a bomb. No way, no how. The same men now saying "Well, they probably are." (See "Told You So", "Can Everyone See It Now?" and "Iranian Weapons".) However, Bush was pilloried in 2008 for believing Iran was a threat.

I just want to point this out so no one forgets that all those experts on foreign affairs who spoke with such certainty and told us Bush was an idiot and "neocons" were going to destroy the western world were wrong. And it is important to recall as they have not stopped speaking with the same conviction despite a miserable track record.

I will write more on this alter, when I am not working, but I wanted to mention it, as I noticed one of my anarcho/conspiracy theorist squatters still thinks the NIE is valid, so I had to bring it up. (Of course, why Iran, with tremendous reserves of both oil and natural gas would want to develop "peaceful" nuclear power always puzzled me. As did the fact that CIA analysts could not figure out the refining process used for peaceful nuclear power could easily be adapted to weapons, making "peaceful" research the same as the first 2/3s of military research... See "Another Thought On Iran", "Heads I Win, Tails You Lose", "I Told You So", "I Don't Get It" and "Our Friend Iran")

It is interesting how much our cultural environment shapes our popular entertainment. Even more how just a decade or two can twist a single character.

I was watching Dr. Who this morning, unfortunately the recent series, not the original one, specifically the series with David Tenant, when I was struck by how much our era has changed the character. In the episode I was watching, in which the Doctor faces off against Davros in one of the series finales, Davros mentioned that the Doctor abhorred violence, never even carrying a gun. To which I had to say "What?"

The Doctor in the original series was something of a nonviolent individual, but hardly the pacifist he has become.  I am not expert enough in the first two actors to play him -- William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton -- to say much one way or the other, but John Pertwee was quite a proficient sword fighter, who also had no objection to picking up a gun and using it when it was needed. He might not have gone about armed, but he was no pacifist. And, if at times he chided the reaction of humanity to other  species, it was less out of pacifism than out of his concern for the shortsightedness of mankind. Tom Baker, who came next, was a bit more pacifist, but still not adverse to violence when needed. He did say he didn't carry a gun, but his reason was, when you did others tended to point them at you. He also tried to keep Leela from killing people, but at times, such as when she killed a man stalking them in "The Talons of Wen Chiang", he accepted it as necessary. Now, Peter Davison was much more pacifist (and preachy), but I always viewed him as the odd man out in the series, more akin to the modern series than the original. (Though his preachiness was mild compared to the modern version, though overwhelming -- at least to me -- at the time.) And, even Davison was not a complete pacifist. The next two doctors, Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy, were far from pacifist. They still didn't go about armed, but they were capable of violent action when needed.

I know, this is of little interest to most of my readers, but it is somewhat relevant. You see, the character of the Doctor has been pretty well established. From 1964 until 1989, he was drawn --and redrawn, I admit -- many times, but his basic character was pretty well established. He was a moral man, concerned with the ethical problems involved in, say, exterminating an entire species, even if it was a violent one.  He also had a strange, non-human perspective on things, which made sense as he was not human. And he was more prone to try to talk through problems than fight. But he was no pacifist, and certain was not the media hound, fame seeking space Jesus that the new series made of him. (Though a disturbing first step in that direction came in the bizarre movie Fox made in 1996, though some fans have tried to excuse the strange changes Fox made to the character. But I think they are more concerned with saving a character who was redeemed through novelizations and radio plays rather than excusing the dreadful "eighth doctor" movie.)

What is of interest is what the changes say about our culture. (Though it is a British series, the two cultures are similar enough, especially in their entertainment media, I feel comfortable using British media to examine Western culture in general And American culture in particular, especially given the appeal the series has in the US.)

First, there is the change I discussed before in "Musings About A Television Series", "More Off Topic Musings" and "A Final Digression On the New Dr. Who", taking a character who was a relatively unknown wanderer, who went from world to world, time to time, helping people, but almost never recognized beyond a handful of individual, and turning him into a superstar, known to the masses, gathering strength from broad popular support. (The Doctor was known on a few worlds in the original series, but he never had the sort of self-congratulatory praise that appeared in several of the recent episodes.)

Second, there is the focus on pacifism, as well as other issues, such as homosexuality. Now, I grant the second was likely due to the series head, and even modern fans think it got a bit tiresome, but the pacifism is interesting, as it shows how moderns could misinterpret past episodes, ignoring contradictions, and imagining the character was always the pacifist they wished.

Finally, there is the most modern aspect of the series, changing from an adventure tale focused on the Doctor's adventures to a reflexive series, focusing more on the Doctor, his problems and "story arcs". In other words, it is no longer enough to have good tales, we must have a troubled character who spends time thinking about himself rather than things around him. I know people think it quite sophisticated to run "story arcs" through a serial program, but it has now reached the point when I long for the simpler, episodic shows of the past.

I am sure I could find other changes that are disturbing, such as the introduction of romantic storylines between the Doctor and his companions. (Though that was predicted in the 1996 film.) However, I think these three are more than enough to point out how much we have changed since just the 1980's. And it is surprising. The 80's were hardly a prudish, conservative time, much less the 1970's, yet the stories from those eras seem positively reactionary compared to what we have today.

As I have said many times, it is amazing how much things change in a relatively short time.

POSTSCRIPT

What has struck me recently, while watching old programs from the later 1970's and early 1980's is how much more explicit sexual material appears in popular media. Having a seven year old, I am constantly reminded of how hyper-sexual our society has become thanks to trying to figure out how to explain things to him. Society was hardly repressed in my youth, yet many of the things which are commonplace on television and in films today would have seemed quite shocking back then. It is surprising to see how far we have lowered the bar in those few decades. (See, for example, "Faux "Maturity"" and "Argh! Enough KY Ads Already!".)

In response to Occupy Wall Street's May Day protest,I intend to stage my own counter protest by going to work, sending my son to school, buying groceries, watching television, and generally living my life as I do every day. I know this counter protest will probably go unnoticed but it led me to a plan to truly undermine Occupy Wall Street. What if all of us, to counter them, did the same thing every day? That is, if we went about our lives as normal and ignored the human offal littering public parks and streets in New York, Washington and elsewhere? If we completely ignore their massive tantrum, and treat them as the spoiled overgrown toddlers they are, may it not eventually frustrate them enough that they give up and go away?

Maybe, maybe not. Either way, I am going to give it a try. From this day forward, barring some truly extraordinary reason, I will not write about, or even mention, the Occupy Wall Street movement again.

Since most Americans seem to know as little about Canada as they do about, say, Laos¹, most Americans don't realize the degree to which our northern neighbor abhors the free market, even though they pay lip service to it.Americans are well aware of the drug subsidies and socialized medicine, but that is not so unusual, America is rather unique, or was until the current administration, in avoiding the stupidities of socialized medicine². However, Canada goes much, much farther. For example, Canada maintains a massive subsidy for children's programming produced in Canada, using Canadian talent, which explains why so much of children's programming has a Canadian pedigree^3,4. And then there are movies and television, which form the basis of my essay today.

Canada tries very hard to maintain a domestic film and television industry. To a degree, this is just part and parcel of their European-style state socialism, which demands the state own and run broadcast television. Canada is not quite as successful at this as most European nations, as Canada's neighbor tot he south has many non-state networks which often reach well north of the border. But Canada still tries. And, to provide content for this state television network, as in Europe, Canada must have domestically produced content.

However, most of Canada's efforts, especially in the realm of film subsidies, is the outcome of Canada's envy of her southern neighbor's domination of the entertainment market, not just in North America, but in the world. Of course, much of the world envies the success the United States has enjoyed in selling entertainment worldwide, but Canada seems to suffer a particularly strong case of envy, perhaps because of a general feeling of jealousy for her neighbor. Whatever the reason, Canada has shown a determination to maintain a domestic film industry unmatched in much of the world⁵.

Canada has, so far, avoided the periodic calls to require domestic cinemas to display a quota of Canadian content, but that such a call could be made at all, and taken seriously, shows how strongly Canadians believe in their efforts to subsidize a failed entertainment industry⁶. And it is that particular failure, and the reasons behind it, which interest us, and about which this essay shall concern itself.

Economic theory tells us that subsidies will always result in producing more of a good than is desired, leaving the market filled with good no one is consuming. Obviously, that is not a model which fits entertainment precisely, as entertainment is not used up in the way bread or shoes are, but there is still no doubt that subsidies result in the production of unwanted goods. In this case, movies that few people want to watch.

Of course, subsidies change the dynamics of film making as well. In a free market, film makers tend to be concerned first and foremost with viewers, and so they produce films they think will enjoy popularity, and once they have made them tend to market them heavily to ensure success. Subsidies change both dynamics, resulting in content which is divorced from public interest⁷, and in films which are weakly marketed, if that. Not only does the system of subsidies allow films with little prospect for success to be made, but they create an atmosphere where there is little incentive to try to improve the marketability of the film through advertising as the like⁸. The system is designed in such a way that it creates an environment where the participants are content to make middling failures which are mildly profitable thanks to subsidies.(As well as the sale of television rights to channels mandated to buy a certain percentage of Canadian made films.)

And then there is the problem of how to select which films to make. In a commercial environment, the answer is easy, the investors fund films they expect to make a profit. If they succeed, they make more money and can make more decisions, if they are wrong, they lose their money and gradually lose their voice. (The exceptions being in those lands with strong government involvement, such as the tale -- true or not -- that Uwe Boll continued to find German backing because German tax laws allowed a 100% write off of funds lost on an unprofitable film, making his record of non-stop flops a magnet for tax shelter money.)

But government funding is not interested in success, it is there to create "culture", or "develop a domestic industry" or some other mandate which is open to an infinitely subjective interpretation. And the investors are not held accountable for losses either, so there is no need to worry about the returns. All of which means that such funding ventures end up becoming the private domain of one clique or another, which can hand out money based upon their own vision, whatever that may be. In short, the money of the people is taken to fund the pet ventures of a small group with political connections.

And that is where the subsidies end up creating unconsumed content. Obviously, it is not the same as foodstuffs, or cars, but it has the same result. In terms of subsidies, what we have are, first, films being made which would not be made in a competitive market, and, second, films receiving funds all out of proportion to their anticipated audience size. In other words, money that would have funded a film reaching tens of millions in a competitive market would be spent on a film reaching hundreds of thousands, if that. Or, to make it more economic, the dollars paid per amount of satisfaction received is many times higher in a subsidized system than a competitive market.

Of course, those who favor subsidies claim they are preserving art, but one must ask how. Who is defining what is art worth preserving and what is not? And how did they gain that status? In the end, the truth is, the subsidies are forcing one particular vision of art on the market, just as the commercial model does, the subsidy model differs only in being based on political connections rather than broad appeal.

And that is the result of the Canadian film industry. They have produced endless films no one has seen, all so they can boast of a national film industry.

What is amusing is, if they truly wanted to have a thriving film industry, they could probably succeed on a smaller scale, by following the model of Vancouver. Vancouver has become a magnet for low budget television production because of the lack of union pay scales. If Canada in general were to create an environment friendly to lower budget films, they could probably do away with subsidies entirely and develop a thriving market in US-Canadian co-productions designed to keep costs to a minimum. Of course, it would not allow the strong nationalist boast of a purely Canadian film industry. Then again, economic nationalism is as disastrous as all nationalism, and so probably should be forgotten.

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1. It is odd, but most people I have met seem to know more about France, England, even Turkey, Egypt or South Africa, than they do about Canada. We in the US have a general impression of Canadians as mild-mannered, rules obsessed, and somewhat rustic individuals obsessed with printing everything in two languages, but beyond that general impression, we really don't know much about them. Nor do we seem very curious about them. Which probably explains the lack of knowledge.

2. For those who did not read them, my criticism of universal health care, or whatever the current term is, can be found in "Preexisting Conditions", "The Absurdity of Mandatory Insurance", " High Cost of Medical Care", "Medical Reform, An Overview", "Of Wheat and Doctors", "Redefining Insurance... To Actually BE Insurance", "The Insurance Sham" and "Cost Conscious Medicine".

3. See my article "Am I Getting This Right?".

4. Low budget television is similarly dominated by Canadian, specifically Vancouver-based, productions. However, this is not so much the product of subsidies as the ability to avoid paying the union (SAG, ACE, etc) wages demanded in the US.

5. Canada is not the only nation to subsidize domestic films -- some nations even control which films are allowed and which are not -- but Canada seems unique in continuing to subsidize those films even when there is little expression of public interest. Of course, other nations have enough linguistic and cultural differences that domestic film industries offer something Hollywood cannot, while Canada must compete with highly successful, popular films made in the same language from a roughly similar culture.

6. I suppose I should differentiate between Canadian movies, Canadian domestic television and television productions made in Canada by foreign companies, or by private domestic firms for foreign consumption. The film industry is the most clear cut case of failed subsidies. Canadian domestic television was once the same, but the hunger of US cable networks for cheap programming has given that industry a boost. The final category, or pair of categories, really don't apply, as many receive no subsidies, and those that do receive them only incidentally, and their main focus is, as mentioned before, avoiding union costs in the US.

7. Some would argue this is the benefit of subsidies, they allow artists the freedom to follow their calling without worrying about how commercial their output is. However, that can be stated in the opposite direction as well. Subsidies force the public to pay for movies in which they have no interest. (Not to mention that subsidies do not grant artistic license, like grants they simply replace the ability to curry favor or impress bureaucrats and panels for pleasing the public at large. They are not a ticket to total artistic freedom as many claim.)

8. I won't go into this in great detail, but the basic reason is easy to understand. Film making is risky, and advertising is costly. If a film cost little enough that the subsidies allow it to break even, then any earnings are pure profit. On the other hand, if money is put into advertising, it is possible to suffer a loss. Since advertising does not guarantee success, and on average more films fail than succeed, the net result of advertising, barring an occasional blockbuster, would be to suffer a net loss. As Canadian films have a relatively bad reputation, mostly due to subsidies, the likelihood of a blockbuster is small, and thus advertising looks like a losing proposition.

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POSTSCRIPT

An interesting take on this topic, at least in terms of English language Canadian films can be found in the article "English Canadian Films: Why No One Sees Them". One quote from a film insider stands out:

"It's a public service, paid for by the Canadian people. But we are not making movies that people want to see. If we made roads that nobody wanted to drive on, that would be hard to defend as a public service."

That is actually the best statement ever for ending arts subsidies. If arts enjoy popular support, then they will thrive on their own. And if they don't enjoy support, if no one wants them,. then why should we fund them? I have said it many times, but it bears repeating. Subsidies do not grant artistic freedom, they simply change the need for appealing to the public to a need to appeal to regulators, or boards of artists. In other words, it replaces the market with patronage by a select clique. How can anyone claim that is "artistic freedom"? It simply replaces pleasing a mass audience with pleasing a restricted one, but one with political pull.

On a final note, I do not agree with all the statements made in the article, as it seems much friendlier toward subsidies than I am, but it is interesting to read how even a subsidy booster finds Canada's system horribly broken.