Marbury

dept. of anthropology

The New York Times takes a quizzical look at the peculiar British tradition of panto:

Pantomimes reflect a strange paradox of the British national character: that people can be at once so uptight and so gleefully, childishly uninhibited.

It's panto or being blind drunk that brings it out.

copenhagen: consolations and scapegoats

Two views of what happened up north.

David Aaronovitch sees some reasons to be cheerful:

After Copenhagen the wise business model is green. Who is going to prefer to put their money into dirty technology, when the global search is on for the green kind? After Copenhagen, no one can say that they didn’t know there was a debate about climate change, even if they then choose to ignore it. After Copenhagen no one half-sensible can come out with the glib explanation that it’s all the fault of the Yanks (Barack Obama is the best president to do global business with that some of us are likely to see for a while), or that we don’t understand the Chinese, or that the problem is the timidity of the politicians, or that we are somehow absolved. After Copenhagen, we know better where we stand.

"No one half-sensible", huh? Here's George Monbiot:

The immediate reason for the failure of the talks can be summarised in two words: Barack Obama.

Um. I think China may have had something to do with it. And, as Aaronovitch point out, the sheer impossibility of the task that the participants had set themselves (how do you get 110 countries to agree on anything?).

Monbiot has an unfortunate knee-jerk tendency to blame the Yanks. But the first half of his column - in which he deigns to (re-)explain the problem - is very good, and an encouraging sign that climate change activists are beginning to recognise it's not enough to shout DUH! at the great unwashed whenever they wonder what the big to-do is about.

101 is a crowd

the winehouse pantomime

I know, I know, she's offensive, it's terribly sad and all that...but this is kind of funny:

Amy Winehouse is in trouble again after overdoing the Christmas spirit and causing mayhem at a pantomime in Milton Keynes...Winehouse, who according to the Sun newspaper spent large parts of the show standing up, continually disrupted the performance by shrieking "He's fucking behind you". Many children in the audience of 1,400 were apparently reduced to tears as she shouted: "Fuck Cinders, Prince Charming. Marry me" and laid into the Ugly Sisters, yelling that they were "bitches".

In the end the poor theatre manager had to go and drag her out, getting kicked in the groin for his troubles. Merry Christmas!

brown in copenhagen

The Prime Minister's efforts to wring a truly meaningful deal out of this shambolic summit may have come to naught, but they were little short of heroic. John Rentoul, one of Brown's fiercest and most persistent critics, gives credit where it's due:

The lazy assumptions that I shared - that Brown hates international meetings, that he is shy, awkward and rude, and therefore a poor negotiator - turn out to be wrong. I am told by his spin doctors that he used his relationship with Barack Obama to help save the summit as it approached meltdown on Wednesday and Thursday. They tell me that he chaired difficult meetings brilliantly, and that he chaired so many of them, with such energy and stamina, that he seemed to be directing the whole show. What is really extraordinary is that they are right.

the uncanny power of metaphor

Most politics-watchers are now relatively familiar with the idea that by "framing" policies in terms of powerful metaphors or concepts, politicians can influence the way people think about it. Eg, to talk of "tax relief" frames taxation as an affliction. The politician who gets their frame in first wins a headstart (the linguist George Lakoff is most strongly associated with this analysis ). A recent experiment has pushed this theory even further. It's fascinating not so much for its political implications as for what it tells us about the way metaphors unconsciously influence our thought.

69 Arizona undergraduates participated in what they were told was a study of media preferences. First, they were given two articles to read about airborne bacteria, with half the group reading a piece suggesting that that they were exposed to a significant risk of "bodily contamination". Then, they were given one of two articles to read on US domestic political issues, with half the group reading an article that used country=body metaphors in a discussion of innovation (eg "After the Civil War, the United States experienced an unprecedented growth spurt, and is scurrying to create new laws that will give it a chance to digest the millions of innovations"). In the third step, participants were given two questionnaires to fill out, one of which was on immigration.

The study's results showed that the participants who had read about the dangers of bodily contamination from airborne bacteria were significantly more likely to have negative views on immigration – if they had read the second article which used body-metaphoric language in referring to the United States. Those who read the piece about contamination but hadn't read the article that used the body metaphors weren't affected in the same way.

It's an extraordinary example of the power of metaphor - even at a remove - to unconsciously influence the way we think about things.

Go to Language Log for a fuller explanation and discussion.

the anti-branson

The FT has an absolutely priceless interview with Michael O'Leary, the boss of Ryanair. O'Leary clearly loves his reputation as a cantankerous bastard, and he plays up to it brilliantly, slashing away with abandon at the sacred cows of modern managementspeak, including its formal reverence for the company's employees and customers. Here he is on his staff:

As I try to prise off the worryingly sturdy wrapper on the bagel, he says there are two “great things” about lunchtime in an out-of-the-way office like Ryanair’s. “One, there’s nowhere to go and eat,” and two, the only time staff are allowed to use the internet for personal reasons is between five past one and five to two. “So they all tend to stay at their desks at lunch hour!”

The staff get another pasting as he moves on to talk about management consultants (“should all be euthanised”) and MBAs (“bullshit”). “MBA students come out with, ‘The customer’s always right,’” he says, adopting a whiny voice. “Horseshit! The customer’s usually wrong! And, ‘My staff is my most important asset.’ Bullshit! Staff is usually your biggest cost!”

And on the customer, usually described as infallible:

And then there is that other source of endless aggravation, Ryanair’s passengers. Especially the ones wrecking his efforts to shave luggage-handling costs by checking in their cases (for an extra £30) because they are “too mentally bloody lazy to travel with carry-on bags”.

Whether he's right or not, there's something very bracing about O'Leary's candour...

healthcare excitement nearly over

I'm sure we'll all miss hearing about it.

The Senate Dems have clinched a deal amongst themselves, President Nelson being satisfied that the country's healthcare will be run to his approval, and President Lieberman being content to have made his mark. This means it's 90% certain of passing, probably early in the New Year.

My ignorance of this complex issue is vast, but for what it's worth I'm inclined to agree with Yglesias:

I don’t want to endlessly rehash the intramural argument about whether this bill is worth passing or not, since at the end of the day I’m looking forward to working with all the netroots activists of the world on more and better legislation in the future. But to repeat—despite flaws, I think this is an excellent piece of legislation. Among other things, it represents a return, after fifteen years, of the idea that congress should be trying to pass major legislation that tackles major national problems.

brits have the best teeth in the world

Aged 12 anyway.

Hard to believe, but true.

Score one for socialist healthcare.

happiness is hard work

Will Meek, writing for the BPS Digest, picks his favourite paper of recent years:

Kennon Sheldon (Cal-San Diego) and Sonja Lyubomirsky (Cal-Riverside) creatively examined differences in well-being for university students over the course of several months, capturing real life changes in life circumstances and happiness-related intentional activities. The main conclusions drawn from the three studies were that changing circumstances and engaging in happiness related activities both offer a boost to one’s happiness, but that people habituate to circumstantial changes whereas continuing the activities sustained increases in happiness, subjective well-being, and psychological well-being:

“In other words, our data suggest that effort and hard work offer the most promising route to happiness. In contrast, simply altering one’s superficial circumstances (assuming they are already reasonably good) may have little lasting effect on well-being."

I need a lie-down.

many precedents for obama's statement

This is from a piece that did the rounds a few weeks ago:

The Obama White House is addicted to the “unprecedented.” Perhaps it was a sign when President Barack Obama sat down in January to record his first weekly address and announced: “We begin this year and this administration in the midst of an unprecedented crisis that calls for unprecedented action." What has followed is declaration after declaration of “unprecedented” milestones.

And this is from the president's statement yesterday:

Today we've made a meaningful and unprecedented breakthrough here in Copenhagen.

Hmm...time to strike that one from the presidential vocabulary, no?

bill o'reilly, voice of sanity

I know, I know, it comes to something...

king of a world

A glorious 1950 photo of Sugar Ray Robinson, and Harlem, in their respective pomps (from a review of a new SRR biography).

(George Karger/Time & Life/Getty)

what ophelia wants for christmas

From Letters to Santa Written By Shakespeare Characters @McSweeney's:

— He's Just Not That Into You (book and DVD)

— "All About Me" Lock and Key Diary

— National Geographic Flower and Leaf Pressing Kit

— Coastal Deluxe Automatic Inflatable Life Vest

thom st hubbins

I'm not against rock stars getting involved in political issues per se. But only when they've made an effort to understand the issue they're involved with, beyond the level of slogan. What's striking about this interview with Thom Yorke, who for some inexplicable reason has taken himself to Copenhagen, is that he doesn't seem to have the slightest idea of what he's talking about. He just emits pleasing vacuities, like smoke rings. As I was watching I couldn't help but think... Spinal Tap.