Pelshval

Antropologiske betraktninger om pelshvaldrift

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Vårnatt på stølen

10.04.2016 /

Som artsnavnet mitt nok tilsier, trives jeg best i sjø. Men sjøen er ikke hva den var. Den er full av plastikk og tungmetaller, og langs den norske kysten, som før var så idyllisk, hviner hurtiggående privatbåter som mygger til sent på kveld. Så jeg har trukket opp en av de store elvene og funnet meg et krypinn på en hylle i en bratt kleiv.

Her føler jeg meg i kontakt med historien, fordi menneskeheten, som jo styrer verden på godt og ondt, til alle tider har foretrukket å bo, ikke bare langs sjøen, men også langs de store elvene. Nå for tiden vil de riktignok aller helst bo i byer, hvor det er litt lettere for dem å være samfunnsnyttige forbrukere og trendfølgere, og hvor de regelmessig kan bytte kjøkkeninnredning, garderobe, hårfarge, tenner og pupper.

Men de som enda bor langs elvene gjør det antakelig fordi de faktisk liker seg der. Husene her likner i alle fall litt på husene man bodde i for 100 år siden; sosialdemokratiske boliger, med dekorative karmer, blomsterbed og kanskje geviret etter en elg over døren. Jeg finner til og med kuer i dette landskapet. Dem ser jeg ellers bare på Nasjonalgaleriet, i malerier fra tidlig på 1900-tallet. Jeg antar de sågar melkes av mennesker, ikke av roboter.

Hit til hyllen i klippen kommer jeg når jeg er sliten. Det var jeg nå. På stien til den vesle plassen hilste jeg blåveisen velkommen i år som i fjor. Lukta som slo mot meg når jeg låste opp, var bare kald, ikke den gode lukta jeg visste ville være her etter at jeg hadde bebodd plassen noen timer – lukta av kaffe, vedovn og våt ull. Så det første jeg gjorde, som alltid, var å tenne fyr i ovnen med frøsne fingre. Og gleden når ilden fatter, er like stor hver gang.

Når jeg kommer hit, lever jeg som om hver dag var min siste. Dagene mine er ikke enda talte, så vidt jeg vet, men det er grenser for hvor lenge selv pelshvaler kan leve. Gikta har allerede kloa i meg, og den vil bare ta mer og mer av meg for hvert år. Hvor lenge vil jeg klare å klatre opp kleiva mens jeg lytter etter svartspetten? Hvor lenge vil jeg få lov til å tørke av meg på beina på trammen her oppe og kjenne lukta slå mot meg fra vedovnen? Hvor lenge vil jeg få lov til å ligge på sofaen med kikkert og følge med redehullene i bjørka og ospen?

Da jeg var her sist tok jeg en stor beslutning: De dystre grantrærne på tomta – så praktfulle de enn måtte være – måtte ned. Alle sammen. Jeg betaler for å få dem slaktet mens jeg enda har en lønn jeg kan avse litt av, tenkte jeg.

Trærne ble sagd ned og kappet opp i 40 cm lange kubber. Alt for lange kubber. Jeg sa så eplekjekt til ham som tok ned trærne at det holdt med 40 cm, og det er sant at ovnen min tar 40 cm, men å kløyve 40 cm… Alle vet at kubber ikke skal være lenger enn 30 cm.

En kollega foreslo å kjøpe vedkløyvemaskin. Andre kolleger sa jeg heller burde leie en.
Maskinene som var til salgs for under NOK 3000 var ikke store nok til kubbene mine. Uansett: For det jeg betaler for en slik maskin, kjøpt eller leid, kan jeg kjøpe ved for mange år.

Jeg ble helt besatt av problemstillingen, leste alt jeg fant på nettet om vedkløyving, vedkløyvemaskiner og økser og fant til slutt ut at jeg måtte ha en øks produsert av Fiskars. Det var to som var aktuelle, Fiskars kløyvøks, og Fiskars sleggeøks. Ingen kunne fortelle meg definitivt hvilken var den beste. Men det var ikke tvil i min sjel om at det var en Fiskars-øks jeg trengte.

Jeg fikk dra og se på dem, og jeg gjenkjente dem fra bilder straks jeg kom inn døren i butikken. Et smil spredte seg fra den ene til den andre delen av min hjerne, et stort smil av saliggjørelse. Hadde det stått noen mellom meg og de to øksene, ville jeg rett og slett ha spradet rett over vedkommende. Med skjelvende hånd grep jeg sleggeøksa, løftet den av kroken, viftet litt med den og ble fylt av skuffelse. Det var derfor med en viss skepsis jeg tok tak i den andre.

Ah! Hvordan vil jeg noen sinne kunne beskrive mitt første møte med Fiskars kløyvøks! Igjen kjente jeg smilet – merkelig fenomen dette med smil – bre seg gjennom hele kroppen min som en sprekk i tykk is.

Siden gikk det hele 6 nesten uutholdelige dager før jeg fikk satt meg selv og min nyinnkjøpte øks på prøve. Seks hyperaktive dager da jeg arbeidet som en gal på jobb og klarte å bli ferdig med en storoppgave tidsnok til å kunne be meg fri på fredag.

Den første kubben kostet meg en time. En hel time! Det kunne ha tatt motet av enhver. Men noe av det jeg nylig har skjønt, er at pelshvaler får selvinnsikt når de eldes. Så sliten jeg var etter en time, gikk jeg derfor likevel løs på kubbe nr. 2. Den tok 5 minutter. Da tok jeg pause (selvinnsikten igjen). Jeg hentet hunden, som jeg hadde måttet stenge inne, og vi gikk en times tur, opp dyretråkket til toppen av knausen. Der oppe er det 180 graders utsikt, blåner i sør, blåner i øst og blåner i nord, men først og fremst den store elva, elva på sitt største, i all sin majestetiske, rolige bredde før den deler seg.

Jeg hadde på meg regntøy av den typen man tar på barnehagebarn, og la meg ned i den bløte våte lyngen for å høre på fugler. Jeg hørte riktignok ingen fugler fordi hunden insisterte på å ligge på det varme, tørre håret mitt og knaske pinner.

Men hvile var det! Da vi kom tilbake,stengte jeg hunden inne igjen og kløyvde på strak arm og på en time 10 kubber, 40 cm lange, 23-28 cm i diameter. Jeg har aldri prøvd stimulerende rusmidler (amfetamin, kokain, osv.) men jeg nekter å tro de kunne ha gitt tilnærmelsesvis samme rusen.

Dagen etter kløyvde jeg 10 til, blant dem de 2 største (32 cm diameter). Det jeg kløyvde på to dager tilsvarte kanskje et årsforbruk for meg.

Jeg gleder meg allerede til neste gang jeg holder min kjære Fiskarsøks i hånden. (Ja, dette er skamløs reklame, men jeg sverger at Fiskars ikke vet noe om den.) Nytelsen ligger blant annet i å vite at du kontrollerer hvor slaget skal treffe slik at du hemningsløst kan legge all kraften din i det. Å svinge en øks fra bak på ryggen og ned på kubben… nei, det har jeg aldri turt før. Dette gjør jeg et par-tre ganger til øksa sitter akkurat der jeg vil. Når jeg virkelig får klaff, ser jeg det oppstår en sprekk foran øksa. Så slår jeg etter med slegga på øksehodet og lytter. I opptil ett minutt etter sleggeslaget knirker det i kubben, idet sprekken sprer seg bortover og nedover. Herlig lyd, altså! Som å stå alene på isen en mørk natt og høre drønnet og se, plutselig, at den tykke isen under deg sprekker. Det er like skummelt hver gang, selv om du har opplevd det mange ganger før. Nå har jeg brukt is-metaforen to ganger på to sider. Da er det på tide å avslutte.

Og skulle du lure på hvor det ble av vårnatten på stølen som tittelen lovet, så var det bare lokketoner til andre pelshvaler.

Yippee

04.04.2016 /

I knew, of course, that this is done, and I knew, roughly, how; how some of the rich and powerful, as opposed to most of us, manage to pay little or no taxes. (Hear for instance BBC’s “file on 4”, “Dirty Money UK” of 11 October 2015).

The problem is that more often than not, these people (some of the rich and powerful) are able to avoid paying taxes without breaking the law. Hence the fine verbal distinction between tax evasion, which is a criminal act, and tax avoidance, which is not.

They find loopholes. And the loopholes don’t get closed because the greedy bastards (excuse my French) have contacts in important places (or bribed flunkies in various countries’ civil services, including  – I have no doubt –  our own) and because the tax avoidance schemes are so complex that even the most adamant prosecutors can’t crack them (cf. my post “Speaking of Crime” a while back).

If an honest prosecutor can’t unravel these cases, how is the general public supposed to? So, to my grief, the general public in each country has until now, at least, been mute about the monumental siphoning off of what should have been tax money. While the lower and middle classes pay for the upkeep of their countries – and the penal sanctions for not doing so are very harsh, indeed – some (I really must insist on this some) of the filthy rich do not. No penal sanctions, no public outcry, no nothing.

Mind you, not only tax money! Once you have obtained a secret little series of PO Box companies in distant lands (or more probably, on islands) to which you can divert the proceeds of your business – and why on earth should you bother to do that, unless the purpose is to cheat your compatriots – you can very easily embark on a criminal career in a big way, all the while apearing devout and well-meaning back home.

But now… Oooo, what an exquisite moment I have just enjoyed! In the wake of the monumental release of the “Panama Papers“, I have been watching an Icelandic Prime Minister trying to explain that he was absolutely innocent of cheating the taxman – and besides, he did not know anything about it – and making such a blessed fool of himself that finally his long-suffering countrymen have been vindicated a little bit:

First Iceland was raped by the country’s bankers, bankers’ friends, and bankers’ government flunkies, and the country more or less collapsed in 2008. (The crooked bankers had victims abroad as well, as many Britons will bitterly remember.)  Iceland had to accept gigantic loans to pay for the running of the country, a debt that its citizens are paying dearly, to this day. Most of the funds that had been siphoned off by the crooked bankers and their friends have not been recovered. They had been sucked into a great black hole. They had been vamoosed.

Next, Iceland was bamboozled by a political party which had in effect nurtured the crooked coterie that brought the country to its knees. In the run-up to the last election, that party (the so-called Progressive Party) lied so outrageously and effectively to the voters that it actually regained the power it had lost after the collapse. (Democracy definitely has its weaknesses!)

The Progressive Party’s leader has now been undressed and humiliated. For the record I express the futile hope that he and his like stay away from Icelandic politics for ever.

More importantly, in a global perspective, the Panama papers are documentation of what we knew but couldn’t prove:  A very considerable part of the planet’s wealth is unaccounted for, stashed away in secret places, vamoosed into black holes.

The Panamanian law firm, Mossack Fonseca  is merely one of many that provide similar services to greedy people.

There is no end to easily accessible statistical material illustating how an infinitessimal proportion of the world’s rich owns and earns far more than the vast majority of the rest of all of us humans added together. I will not bore you with such figures, though they are truly quite stark.

Consider, though, that an unknown but undoubtedly enormous proportion of the world’s wealth is not visible to economists, social scientists, financial researchers, etc, and is not subject to tax. An unknown but undoubtedly enormous proportion of the world’s wealth has vanished down a black hole, has been vamoosed.

Can the planet feed all its inhabitants? If not, why?

Narrative

28.03.2016 /

A word to look out for these days is narrative. Although it might be defined differently in dictionaries, the word narrative has come to mean: an analysis or explanations – in short, a storyline – from a party with whom you tend to disagree on most but not all points. In other words you will not use a frankly derogatory term to dismiss the analysis or explanation in question, but you are subtly letting people know you don’t think much of it.

More importantly, you will find that a narrative, as the term is used today, will tend to be a little tricky to refute.

To wit, it is one of the preferred terms used about references to the Russians’ stand on the war in Syria. The thing is, we (i.e. NATO countries, the EU) need the Russians in Syria, so we can’t tell them to piss off, but we don’t quite agree with them. Why don’t we “quite agree” with them? Well, it’s all a bit awkward: After all, it is true, is it not, that when we (see definition above) did it our way, we made terrible messes of Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya? Also: We are increasingly resorting to surveillance of the general public at a level that we associate with the former Soviet Union and the present Russia.

You won’t hear any reference to “the US narrative”, except perhaps in Russia. I put it to you that the US narrative is: “the Russians are supporting Assad in order to gain hegemony in the Middle East.” Mind you, I am in no doubt that the Russians are attempting to gain or maintain hegemony here and for that matter there. But are not the US Americans also doing their damnedest to do so too? Why else are we all (see definition of “we” above ) such great buddies with, say, Saudi Arabia, where they publicly flog dissidents, not to put too fine a point on the Saudis’ human rights record?

The US narrative may be subtle since it isn’t strictly speaking incorrect, but it is misleading and beside the point.

Had Assad’s so-called “moderate” detractors somehow miraculously won the Syrian civil war, Syria would most certainly not have become a democracy. Assad’s “moderate” detractors may have been moderate, but their opposition was basically only anti-Assad (understandably, to be sure). Theirs was not a coordinated movement to create a “democracy”. Had it been so, they would not have demanded such sacrifices from the Syrian people.

You don’t create democracies through civil wars, at least not in our day and age, when there is no limit to foreign intervention, arms deals and transnational financial cynicism. There is absolutely no denying the Russian narrative as far as this point is concerned.

I wish our own “narrative” were a little more credible.

Crime

27.02.2016 /

A source of income for some, a means of revenge for others – for me and countless TV watchers, crime is just entertainment.

Actually, I don’t watch all that much TV, not even crime, for various reasons, one of them being that what happens on the screen all seems a bit irrelevant. Not that I’m not in favour of a little bit of escapism! I guess my escapism just takes other forms than, for instance, gory on-screen murders.

Sometimes, however, I do actually enjoy even a gory on-screen murder, and over the past week I have been watching the first five episodes (of 10) of an Icelandic film for TV titled Trapped / Innesperret (signed Baltasar Kormákur).

Anybody who has ever been to any of the tiny, remote towns that still dot isolated areas of the western world must have wondered: How do they manage? What makes them tick? Why do people stay? Are they in any way like us? And what if a murder were to happen here just when a blizzard was blocking all communication with the rest of the world?

On the coast of Iceland, blizzards happen all the time, and yes, they do from time to time block all communication with the rest of the world. That’s what the film is about. It tells a realistic story not only of a gory murder, but of a town you can actually see on the map, a town that has survived, survives and will continue to survive against all odds, despite isolation from glitzy honey pots. Although the location Seydisfjördur is real, the characters portrayed are fictional, but they are sure to exist somewhere, because they are the kind of people that are likely to live in any town.

Like any small place, it looses some people, who move to the big world. But all in all, the grandeur and courage of the film’s Seydisfjördur and its people is magnificent. Somehow, the film helps me understand why people I admire actually choose to live in such places, even to move there.

Speaking of crime

27.02.2016 /

Why murder? Why the inevitable corpse in all crime films? After all, the basic plot is almost always that Protagonist A is missing or found killed and that Protagonist B (police officer, accused innocent by-stander, or close relative/friend) sets out to discover what happened, in a life or death race with Protagonist C (perpetrator).

Why do we keep watching these things? What is there to be learnt from glimpsing, for the umpteenth time, a killer’s warped mind? Occasionally, the victim’s mind is as warped as that of the killer. So?

Each murder is a personal tragedy for the victim, of course, and for the murderer, and for anybody who deeply cared for either of them. Say a dozen people, maybe two.

On the other hand, financial crimes, whether or not they have been deemed such in court, can harm, more or less dramatically, all the tax payers in an affected country. In an article 24 January 2016 “We all want Apple to pay more tax”, the Telegraph writes:

About a month ago the bankers Goldman Sachs published a list of the biggest and richest firms in the world. The top three, in order, were Apple, Google and Microsoft – and Facebook and Amazon were also in the top 10. All these tech companies make staggering sums from an avid British population. We love this stuff. We can’t get enough of it. We buy tens of billions of pounds’ worth of American hardware, software and services – and yet these companies pay quite derisory sums in tax to the UK Exchequer: derisory, that is, when you consider how much dosh they are earning from us all.”

The article goes on to defend the practice of tax avoidance schemes. It is true that technically, the Gargantuan tax avoidance schemes hatched out by influential transnational corporations are not necessarily violations of law, but they certainly would be if the average voter/tax payer had a say in the matter. But we voters don’t see and cannot understand the intricate technicalities involved.

Worse, we lack the technical insight to see our own countries’ dirty financial linen. Speaking of Iceland again: The entire country went bust, mostly as a result of the book cooking and irresponsible investments of a few financial crooks who would probably never have been exposed had it not been for the domino effect in the wake of the Lehman Brothers.

In my country, most of us hardly even noticed when the great big multinational Transocean was let off the hook a couple of weeks ago: The public prosecutor who had been pursuing Transocean for years on charges of criminal tax evasion was forced to apologise (!) to Transocean. A rather touching local article describes Norwegian legislators’ reaction as shocked and dismayed after a lecture about multinationals’ tax avoidance machinations. There’s a bad world out there, so bad that most of us think it’s just fiction.

Afterall, how can you fathom, if you run a little shop and pay your weight in gold to the taxman, that Transocean or Google or Apple can cheat and lie as much as they like as long as they have a battery of top ranking tax lawyers on their payrolls. Who can grasp there is so much iniquity in a civilised country?

Whose informed opinion weighs the most, Google’s or the voter’s? By whom is the voter’s opinion informed? Why do we prefer a film about a murder to a film about the effects of multinationals’ crooked machinations? Why don’t we even know about multinationals’ crooked machinations in spite of people’s loosing their jobs and/or homes because of them?

Whose acts, then, are the more sinister, the murderer’s or the multinationals’ crooked machinations? So lets have lots of  crime films about multinationals’ crooked machinations. We might learn something we really  need to know.

The Mujica effect

19.02.2016 /

The former Uruguayan President Mujica has long since left office, but his legacy will live forever, I hope.

In Tanzania a new president has gained so much popularity after his first 100 days in office, that he now enjoys more than 90% support.

What do the two have in common? They slash expenses on pomp and ostentation. For all I know, President Magufuli may never even have heard of Pepe Mujica. Maybe we are approaching a watershed. Maybe the world has grown tired of junk food and tinsel.

Alas, I doubt it. I fear only the Tanzanians have understood, for some inexplicable reason, that national resources are better spent on health and education than on public or private exorbitance.

Among President Magufuli’s first decisions after taking office was to ban the purchase of first and business class tickets for foreign travel by ministers and officials… he slashed the budget allocated for an inauguration dinner by 90 per cent, diverting the money thus saved to healthcare… banned holding official meetings and workshops in hotels (they must now be held in government buildings) …. ordered a review of all privatisation contracts … starting by repossessing five estates… increased the number of businesses that pay taxes …

If things get much worse here in Europe, I might consider applying for Tanzanian citizenship.

Mind you, I would love to own a chateau on the Loire, a trim Colin Archer boat and a private beach cum comfortable cottage in Sardinia. If I had them, I would live simply and modestly, sorting recyclable rubbish according to source material, bicycling to town rather than driving, etc. I would travel by train, if at all possible, rather than by plane. I might even forego having a car.

But I belong to the long-suffering middle class. No chateau, no Colin Archer, no private beach. I, we, have every reason to compensate as best we can, poor things.

Vi og de

02.02.2016 /

I nabolaget mitt har det ikke vært nevneverdige endringer det siste året, bortsett fra at det tar litt lengre tid å komme seg til jobb enn i fjor – og det kan ikke anses som endring da det i fjor også tok litt lengre tid enn året før, og også året før der igjen, osv.

Så av de globale problemene er det fint lite jeg kjenner på kroppen. Globale klimautfall gjør seg riktignok så vidt gjeldende også i Norge, men jeg og mitt ble skånt for orkanen Tor.

Må jeg da nøye meg med å debattere for eller i mot karikaturtegninger så lenge? Det vil si: Er det, eller er det ikke «greit» å lage karikaturtegninger av profeten? Kan det eller kan det ikke likestilles med karikatur av Hillary eller Erna? Osv.

Tro meg, jeg har meninger om saken, men anser den som relativt uvesentlig sammenlignet med at gudane må vite hvor mange titalls tusen mennesker, blant dem også kvinner og små barn, har mistet livet i den dramatiske flukten til Europa fra desperat nød eller krig. Det angår oss i alle fall i den grad Europa en kort stund åpnet sine grenser.

Men akk. Det var så overveldende mange mennesker som kom! Vi stengte grensene igjen og har tatt i bruk det snedige uttrykket «grunnløse migranter» for å forklare at vi i Storskog slenger døren i fjeset på syklende afghanere og selv syrere.

Så det som virkelig bør angå oss er at man i Finnmark nå får kjenne litt av hvert på kroppen. Det skulle bli Finnmark som først fikk merke at den globale virkeligheten er i ferd med å innta Norge. Det er nesten som et aldri så lite gufs fra andre verdenskrig. Enkelte personer, her og der, tar inn og beskytter flyktninger. Loven forbyr deg og meg å gi husly til folk som risikerer livet for å komme til et land der de håpet å finne trygghet, dersom de er “grunnløse flyktninger”. Vet du det? Det ble straffbart i 2008.

Her og der i Finnmark vil hjertevarme mennesker bli tiltalt og kanskje dømt fordi de ikke kunne holde ut tanken på at frosne og traumatiserte fremmede risikerte å bli drevet fra landet, slik jøden blir fordrevet i Wergelands dikt “Juleaftenen”.

Det er ikke bare loven som er ute etter flyktningene og de hjertevarme Finnmarkingene. Mange nordmenn anser det som landsforræderi å slippe inn tusenvis av utlendinger. De fleste av dem tier om det de mener, men en liten minoritet sender trusselbrev. Av disse, igjen, er en ørliten minoritet villig til gjøre alvor av truslene.

Det er for tiden ikke greit å være hjertevarm finnmarking. Jeg regner med at mange av dem lever i kontinuerlig og velbegrunnet frykt. Kanskje må også de søke asyl i et annet land.

Så i Finnmark er det alvor. Hvordan har politiet det der? Det kan ikke være lett for dem heller. De må gjøre det de er pålagt å gjøre, men også politifolk har hjertevarme.

Dette er noe helt annet enn karikaturtegninger!

***

Når Europas grenser forseres av hundretusener av fremmede på flukt fra sine hjemland er det helt naturlig at folk er redde og vil bolte porten og låse alle dører. Jeg mener det! Til alle tider har det vært slik at når trellene gjorde opprør, nøyde de seg ikke med å ta sin rettferdige del: De voldtok og for den del drepte herrefolkets kvinner og døtre og brant deres slott (og kunstskatter). Dette har man også gjort i protestantismens navn, for eks. i det veldige og blodige bondeopprøret i 1625 i Tyskland. Det er altså helt naturlig at folk er redde.

Det som ikke kan forsvares, etter mitt syn, er at mens Finnmark gjennomlever et brått møte med verden, så maser media-Norge om hvorvidt det er «greit» med karikaturtegninger.

Media er også bekymret for at Norges priviligerte økonomiske status kanskje står for fall. Det er igjen et helt legitimt tema, men….

Det ville være enda mer legitimt, etter mitt skjønn, å utforske mulighetene for at også andre land ble levedyktige. Det at landene sør for Europa er så mye fattigere enn Europa at folk i setter livet til for å krysse Middelhavet, representerer en sikkerhetstrussel for Europa, heter det. Hvorfor tas da ikke konsekvensene av den sikkerhetstrusselen? Hvorfor drøftes ikke årsakene til at levekårene i landene «migrantene» flykter fra er så håpløse? Det er sant at det er mye korrupsjon i afrikanske land, men er det hele årsaken til landenes elendighet? Kan det være at for eksempel de nordiske landene bidrar til korrupsjonen? Hvordan er handelsbetingelser for afrikanske land i forhold til Schengenområdet?

***

Jeg ønsker for ordens skyld å understreke at min taushet om Syria ikke skyldes manglende respekt for Syrias ufattelige lidelser.

TTIP

16.01.2016 /

One of the things we should not do – and I mean NOT – is to fail to notice a rather sinister business super-deal looming on the horizon. As we know, big business has a way of devising smart ways of making money and of disregarding all consequences for the physical and social climate on our globe.

When I was a child, I was taught in school that our politicians, government and even big business, mostly, all work for the common good. Now the thing about furry whales, a species to which I belong, is that they can grow very old, and in the end they all reach the point where they have seen just about everything before. Many times, even. So they know that neither politicians, nor governments, and least of all big business, care about the long-term common good (neither do voters, for that matter), and many of them hardly even care about the short-term common good.

You on your part may have been told, when you were a child, that God looks after us, and that everything will work out in the end. Far be it my intention to judder your personal faith, but please consider that your God may – unlike our politicians, government and even big business – have very long-term goals indeed, so long-term, in fact, that cleaning up the planet could mean starting all over again, with uni-cellular organisms.

There is little I can tell you, so far, about TTIP. In fact what little there is to tell is, according to the Guardian’s article What is TTIP and why should we be angry about it? so boring that you will fall asleep if I try, though the article itself is far from boring. (Did you, for instance, know there was an “international coefficient of tedium”, and that it is 25.7?)

All I will say, is that TTIP is the last thing our planet needs just now.

Told you so

16.01.2016 /

It is very rude, in polite society, to say “I told you so”. But I don’t belong to polite society. I’m just one of those solitary creatures swimming around in the sea and observing the growing mess humanity is making of it.

And indeed I did say, again and again, directly and indirectly, that the poor would eventual break down the walls we have put in place, and flood all over our precious continents. You cannot dangle a delicious piece of T-bone steak in front of a mammal’s nose and expect it to shrug and go back to sleep. Dogs, of course, are an exception. They are slave mammals. But humans, who are no less mammals than tigers, will not sleep. They will ponder, lie in wait, mutter and murmur, riot, write treatises and, eventually, one way or another, claim their part of the steak, maybe all of it. If need be, they will do so violently. Violence is, after all, one of the stuffs little boys and girls are made of, and that’s why we have to have laws and courts and armies.

So now it happened: The barriers around Europe broke, and immigrants flooded all over the continent. I shall not treat you to the figures, but they are dramatic.

Determined to shut up for a change, to sit back and watch, I must admit that the way it happened took me entirely by surprise. It was not through violence, not through an international court and not by bilateral agreement that the immigrants gained access, but by appealing to Europeans’ compassion and awareness of injustice.

For months we had been staring aghast at the gaily bobbing vessels slowly coming into sight from our shores, overloaded with colourfully dressed dead or dying Africans. For months we had been the impotent witnesses of scenes from the slaughterhouse that is Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. We knew all too well that sitting along our eastern borders, sore-footed and aching, with nothing to their names but a tenuous link to help or home in the shape of their mobile phones, thousands, tens of thousands, eventually hundreds of thousands of victims sat waiting and hoping. And winter was drawing near.

And all of a sudden, as if by common accord, all of Europe seemed to be clamouring: “LET THEM IN!” I swear I have never in my life been as moved.

But now, Europe has closed ranks again. Disconcerted by the sheer logistical complexity of having to introduce so many aliens to an intricate web of rights and obligations, we find ourselves doubting that we can cope with the task.

Would it not have been better never to have gotten into this predicament in the first place? We knew this would happen sooner or later (or should have known), and it will happen again (or continue happening). The effects of climate change will go on getting exponentially worse, and the number of destitute, desperate people – victims of war, injustice, and/or climate-induced disasters – will continue to rise dramatically.

I ask you – I beg you – to consider:

Where did we go wrong? What did we not do that we should have done? What did we do that we should not have done? And what changes of tack are required of us? I urge you – again, beg you – to please not dismiss this as not being your personal responsibility. Those of us who live in “democratic” societies ARE the law.

Rule of Law

29.11.2015 /

The other day a colleague who is familiar with my slightly subversive views maliciously presented me with a philosophical challenge:

– How come you who so fervently believe in the rule of law defend people like Edward Snowden and Julian Assange?
It is true that I passionately believe in the rule of law, defined by the UN as follows:

“… a principle of governance in which all persons, institutions and entities, public and private, including the State itself, are accountable to laws that are publicly promulgated, equally enforced and independently adjudicated, and which are consistent with international human rights norms and standards.”

(You will find other definitions of the “rule of law”, definitions from which the last clause – “and which are consistent with international human rights norms and standards” is absent.)

Back to my malicious colleague: I took the moral highground: Edward Snowden and Julian Assange did not have the right to violate certain legal provisions; they had a duty to do so.

– Ah, said my colleague with a sly smile, so when you face the enemy, the rule of law no longer applies?

I must admit that my mumbled reply was not very impressive. I saw where he was going, and I am a terrible chess player. He would make sure I’d soon be writhing in a corner (figuratively that is) admitting that to defend my values, we must do whatever it takes, whereas to defend your values – if they differ from mine – we must play by the rules.

Now I am an extremely law-abiding citizen. I don’t even cheat on my taxes, and wouldn’t do so even if I had the chance, for the simple reason that I’m proud of paying my share of the upkeep of this country. Nevertheless, my sympathy for rule breakers does not stop at Snowden and Assange. I also have full sympathy with hackers “Anonymous” when they claim to be taking down the “enemy’s” Twitter accounts (again, on the assumption that their enemy is my enemy, and ISIS certainly is a shared enemy.) Taking down a Twitter account is, however, a far, far cry from “Guantanamo Bay” and universal telecom surveillance.

The self-styled “Islamic State” and Boko Haram are not the only monsters lurking in the shadows. There are other agents of rape and mutilation out there. And some of them are friends of our friends. Take the Uzbek government, for instance – just about as bad as they come, yet several European governments including my own, have invested heavily in Uzbekistan. A recent scandal rocked the press in my country for a couple of days, but all is surprisingly silent now. Was it too close to home for the powers that be?

I quote the Norwegian Helsinki Committee:

It is widely known that authoritarian regimes put as a condition for providing licenses to mobile telephone and internet providers that they get full access to content and meta ‐ data of communications on the systems. The Norwegian Helsinki Committee has inter alia criticized the Swedish company Telia Sonera and the Russian company Vimpelcom (partly owned by the Norwegian company Telenor) for providing authorities in Uzbekistan and Belarus full access to their systems.

Meanwhile, in Sweden (source: the Guardian), the prosecuting authority is taking an Uzbek hit-man to court. He is suspected of having been acting at the orders of the Uzbek government when he shot an Uzbek opposition politician in the head. He did it in Malmö. That’s in Sweden. The impudence!! Yet, Sweden has also been investing heavily in Uzbekistan.

If our own governments don’t play by the rules, how can they expect us, to whom they are accountable, to do so? If our governments practise realpolitik  why should not we also do so, at least in self-defence. The question is: Should hackers in one country, mine for instance, defend violently suppressed people in another, eg, the “ganster state” Uzbekistan?

That, I think, is the real philosophical challenge. Would the consequences be all-bad, as have those of the military intervientions in Afghanistan and Iraq and Libya?

Finally, should it occur to you to you to ask me, let me be clear: Any hacker who, for personal gain, abuses his/her skills (e.g. online bank fraud, industrial espionage, etc.) will find no more sympathy at my door than a medical doctor who kills his/her patients. There are certain things one just doesn’t do!

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