Spanish life is not always likeable but it is compellingly loveable.
- Christopher Howse: A Pilgrim in Spain.
Spain
- Spain's Caminos de Santiago continue to develop. There are now 33 of them and at least one new one appears every year. All 'authentic', of course. And all profitable for those with businesses along them. Hard to imagine that the camino was dead on its feet in the 1960s, with maybe 5 pilgrims a year passing through Pontevedra city.
- Until a couple of years ago, we only had the Camino Portugués going through here. Now we have 4.
- One of these departs from the traditional – increasingly popular – Portuguese route and heads over the mountains, past a monastery and then down to the coast at Cambados. There you can either walk along the coastline or board a boat or a kayak and take a short sea route to the point where St James' (Sant Iago) crew-less, stone boat made landfall after bringing itself from the Holy Land. Or so some believe. Though I can't imagine there are many of these in these enlightened times.
- Somehow or other the island of Cortegada has now got in on this act. As if pilgrims left the land, took a look at it and then retruned to the camino.
- And some people claim the Spanish are not very commercially minded or entrepreneurial!
Life in Spain
- Here's an example of the sort of thing wealthier 'pilgrims' can expect to find on the Camino these days. Click here for more on the lady.
- The yapping dog was at it again yesterday, forcing me to leave the terrace of my watering hole. Again, no one else seemed to even notice the incessant barking, least of all the 2 women it was demanding food from. One wonders if genetic developments have given Spaniards noise filters the rest of us don't have. Or merely very high level of noise-tolerance.
The World
- Only a few months ago, the global economy appeared to be humming, with all major nations growing in unison. Now, the world’s fortunes are imperiled by an unfolding trade war. As the Trump administration imposes tariffs on allies and rivals alike, provoking broad retaliation, global commerce is suffering disruption, flashing signs of strains that could hamper economic growth. See this NY Times article here.
- Liberal democracy is dying as the world converges on authoritarian beigeness, says Allistair Heath in the first article below.
THE EU
- See another article on its existencial crisis below.
The USA
- Fart and his family are being prosecuted by New York state for fraudulent use of moneys donated to the Trump Foundation. Is anyone surprised? God's will, I guess the evangelists will tell us.
- Here's something on the latest of Fart's Hitleresque lies.
- Hang on . . . Praise for Fart. George Monbiot says that Fart was right to kaibosh the Trans-Pacific Partnership. As he puts it: He is right to demand a sunset clause for Nafta. When this devious, hollow, self-interested man offers a better approximation of the people’s champion than any other leader, you know democracy is in trouble. Read the article here.
Social Media
- Yesterday I cited the well-established major downside of the internet. Lionel Shriver is a case study in the new digital inquisition, says Fraser Nelson in the 3rd article below.
Galicia/Pontevedra
- We had a huge treat in the centre of the city yesterday – the Gimme-a-ciggie bawling-beggar Miguel appeared with his shirt wide open and hanging out of his trousers, and displaying a truly vast gut. Not to mention his underpants. Panhandling seems to fund a good life in Pontevedra.
- Things seen in yesteday's flea market in the city:-
Finally . . .
- Click here if you think our Western society is based on Judeo-Christian beliefs. And if you have an open mind.
© David Colin Davies, Pontevedra: 18.6.18
THE ARTICLES
1. The EU is facing an existential crisis – but it is migration, not Brexit, that will be its undoing
Alongside sunburnt Brits, they are one of the modern staples at Southern Europe’s popular tourist spots: Arab and African men selling tourist tat. These men (and occasional woman) come from many places. Some will have escaped conscription or slavery in Eritrea; others have gone in search of a better life from a poor but peaceful village in Tunisia or Senegal.
If they can raise enough cash and get a spot on a boat crossing the Mediterranean, their odds of getting to Europe are high – 98% make it. That is why people keep trying. But once here, joining society isn’t easy. Even those with strong legal asylum cases have to wait months to be assessed. So they end up sleeping rough and hawking fake designer handbags.
When I was a student, I used to think that a land without borders could be a cosmopolitan idyll, where different peoples exchanged ideas and voted freely for governments with their feet. But now we’re seeing what it really looks like: squalid camps in train stations and ports, a thriving people-trafficking industry and a growing underclass of informal workers in places that already have millions of unemployed. As a result, we’ve seen the rise of far-right parties across Europe and the start of what could well be a gradual erosion of the EU project.
The migration surge has been fuelled by technology and growing wealth, which have for the first time brought the means to flee conflict and migrate economically within the reach of millions.
The EU hasn’t created this situation, but with its migration policies, it has removed from national governments the means to address it and, with its legal structure, it has neutered Brussels’ ability to step in instead, since national politicians can’t agree on an approach. And the more that pro-EU politicians try to collectivise policy, the more they fan the flames of populist revolt.
Italy’s disorderly government has raised the temperature. Last week, new interior minister Matteo Salvini ordered Sicilian ports to turn away a ship of 629 migrants from Africa. “There are no homes and jobs for all Italians, let alone for half the African continent,” he said.
Since the “Balkan route” into Europe was closed by Hungarian and Austrian barbed wire fences, Italy has been the entry point of choice into Europe. Last year, over 172,000 migrants arrived there by sea. This year, it’s 61,000 so far. Italy’s unemployment rate, meanwhile, is 11%.
Ignoring this politically explosive context, French president Emmanuel Macron quickly accused Mr Salvini of “cynicism and irresponsibility”.
When the rejected boat found safe harbour in Valencia, under Spain’s socialist government, Mr Macron promised to allow its passengers residency in France – provided their asylum claims are valid. This, of course, is part of the problem.
Assessing claims can take years and Italy is overwhelmed. Rather than become part of a processing backlog, which may require documents they don’t have, most migrants disappear into the black market when they arrive. Nearly 1% of Italy’s population - or 500,000 people - are now thought to be illegal immigrants, most of whom arrived in the last five years.
Of course, the prospect of life in Italy often isn’t the lure for migrants. Many would prefer to end up in Germany or Sweden: places with plenty of jobs and generous asylum systems. Pointing out the pan-European nature of the problem, Rome has for years been begging Brussels for help in policing the Mediterranean and taking in migrants. But the EU won’t pay up and can’t alter its rules on distributing migrants because national governments won’t agree.
Now, the migration issue is even wearing away the solid consensus politics of Germany. Shaken by the sudden rise of the hard-right AfD party, Germany’s centre-right is fracturing. The anti-immigration hardliners are led by Horst Seehofer, interior minister and leader of the Bavarian CSU party. He has threatened to pull out of Angela Merkel’s ruling coalition and collapse the government if she won’t agree to start turning away many non-EU migrants at the German border. Ms Merkel is now scrambling to convene a hasty intergovernmental meeting to get agreement on migration reforms before the EU-wide summit at the end of June. She’s unlikely to succeed.
The problem is that on migration, as with the euro, Europe is stuck. Its pro-Brussels politicians would like to share out new migrants more evenly between member states, relieving Italy and Greece and requiring more of Germany and France. But these same politicians face furious challengers at home who are determined not to let that happen.
Alongside sunburnt Brits, they are one of the modern staples at Southern Europe’s popular tourist spots: Arab and African men selling tourist tat. These men (and occasional woman) come from many places. Some will have escaped conscription or slavery in Eritrea; others have gone in search of a better life from a poor but peaceful village in Tunisia or Senegal.
If they can raise enough cash and get a spot on a boat crossing the Mediterranean, their odds of getting to Europe are high – 98% make it. That is why people keep trying. But once here, joining society isn’t easy. Even those with strong legal asylum cases have to wait months to be assessed. So they end up sleeping rough and hawking fake designer handbags.
When I was a student, I used to think that a land without borders could be a cosmopolitan idyll, where different peoples exchanged ideas and voted freely for governments with their feet. But now we’re seeing what it really looks like: squalid camps in train stations and ports, a thriving people-trafficking industry and a growing underclass of informal workers in places that already have millions of unemployed. As a result, we’ve seen the rise of far-right parties across Europe and the start of what could well be a gradual erosion of the EU project.
The migration surge has been fuelled by technology and growing wealth, which have for the first time brought the means to flee conflict and migrate economically within the reach of millions.
The EU hasn’t created this situation, but with its migration policies, it has removed from national governments the means to address it and, with its legal structure, it has neutered Brussels’ ability to step in instead, since national politicians can’t agree on an approach. And the more that pro-EU politicians try to collectivise policy, the more they fan the flames of populist revolt.
Italy’s disorderly government has raised the temperature. Last week, new interior minister Matteo Salvini ordered Sicilian ports to turn away a ship of 629 migrants from Africa. “There are no homes and jobs for all Italians, let alone for half the African continent,” he said.
Since the “Balkan route” into Europe was closed by Hungarian and Austrian barbed wire fences, Italy has been the entry point of choice into Europe. Last year, over 172,000 migrants arrived there by sea. This year, it’s 61,000 so far. Italy’s unemployment rate, meanwhile, is 11%.
Ignoring this politically explosive context, French president Emmanuel Macron quickly accused Mr Salvini of “cynicism and irresponsibility”.
When the rejected boat found safe harbour in Valencia, under Spain’s socialist government, Mr Macron promised to allow its passengers residency in France – provided their asylum claims are valid. This, of course, is part of the problem.
Assessing claims can take years and Italy is overwhelmed. Rather than become part of a processing backlog, which may require documents they don’t have, most migrants disappear into the black market when they arrive. Nearly 1% of Italy’s population - or 500,000 people - are now thought to be illegal immigrants, most of whom arrived in the last five years.
Of course, the prospect of life in Italy often isn’t the lure for migrants. Many would prefer to end up in Germany or Sweden: places with plenty of jobs and generous asylum systems. Pointing out the pan-European nature of the problem, Rome has for years been begging Brussels for help in policing the Mediterranean and taking in migrants. But the EU won’t pay up and can’t alter its rules on distributing migrants because national governments won’t agree.
Now, the migration issue is even wearing away the solid consensus politics of Germany. Shaken by the sudden rise of the hard-right AfD party, Germany’s centre-right is fracturing. The anti-immigration hardliners are led by Horst Seehofer, interior minister and leader of the Bavarian CSU party. He has threatened to pull out of Angela Merkel’s ruling coalition and collapse the government if she won’t agree to start turning away many non-EU migrants at the German border. Ms Merkel is now scrambling to convene a hasty intergovernmental meeting to get agreement on migration reforms before the EU-wide summit at the end of June. She’s unlikely to succeed.
The problem is that on migration, as with the euro, Europe is stuck. Its pro-Brussels politicians would like to share out new migrants more evenly between member states, relieving Italy and Greece and requiring more of Germany and France. But these same politicians face furious challengers at home who are determined not to let that happen.
Anti-EU politicians, meanwhile, fall into two camps. The first, like Italy’s government, castigate the EU for piling the burden into frontline states and refusing to help them. The second, in power in Hungary and Poland, rage against the EU for trying to make them accept any migrants.
The result is that the EU cannot do much to alleviate the migration pressure, but nor will it let national governments take control. We are therefore likely to see a gradual erosion of the EU legal order as governments take matters into their own hands whether Brussels likes it or not, erecting fences, building detention centres and turning away boats.
Over time, power will move organically away from supra-national EU institutions, back towards governments and the negotiations between them. Ms Merkel’s desire for an intergovernmental migration summit is itself a clear sign of this shift.
The more that Eurocrats resist this trend, the more unpopular they will become. And that will manifest itself in the European Parliament, one of its three main power centres, where voters are likely to start installing more Eurosceptics.
Mr Macron is already scared that Marine Le Pen’s vote share in next year’s EP elections could exceed his. Those elections will be the first held without Britain, but instead of withering away, its Eurosceptic groups will simply start to realign.
I still don’t expect the EU to collapse dramatically, as many Brexiteers have been forecasting for years. But its sacred cows - like free movement and the Schengen zone - will become vulnerable. Its edicts will start to lose force and its authority will shrivel.
Hopefully, this will herald a peaceful and pragmatic transition to a looser, less federal EU. For migrants, more power for national governments will mean a much harsher environment. What’s not clear is whether national governments will have any more success than Brussels in slowing the demographic tide.
The result is that the EU cannot do much to alleviate the migration pressure, but nor will it let national governments take control. We are therefore likely to see a gradual erosion of the EU legal order as governments take matters into their own hands whether Brussels likes it or not, erecting fences, building detention centres and turning away boats.
Over time, power will move organically away from supra-national EU institutions, back towards governments and the negotiations between them. Ms Merkel’s desire for an intergovernmental migration summit is itself a clear sign of this shift.
The more that Eurocrats resist this trend, the more unpopular they will become. And that will manifest itself in the European Parliament, one of its three main power centres, where voters are likely to start installing more Eurosceptics.
Mr Macron is already scared that Marine Le Pen’s vote share in next year’s EP elections could exceed his. Those elections will be the first held without Britain, but instead of withering away, its Eurosceptic groups will simply start to realign.
I still don’t expect the EU to collapse dramatically, as many Brexiteers have been forecasting for years. But its sacred cows - like free movement and the Schengen zone - will become vulnerable. Its edicts will start to lose force and its authority will shrivel.
Hopefully, this will herald a peaceful and pragmatic transition to a looser, less federal EU. For migrants, more power for national governments will mean a much harsher environment. What’s not clear is whether national governments will have any more success than Brussels in slowing the demographic tide.
2. Liberal democracy is dying as the world converges on authoritarian beigeness Allistair Heath
It is all too easy, with the benefit of hindsight, to mock Francis Fukuyama. Writing at the end of the Cold War, the American academic proclaimed the End of History: ideological competition was over, he argued, and liberal democracy had triumphed as the final, ultimate form of government.
This turned out to be hopelessly optimistic. It is possible, we have discovered, to adopt a version of capitalism, as China and Russia did, without embracing free speech and free elections. But Fukuyama had put his finger on a crucial trend. Globalisation is indeed spreading to politics and bringing about the same sort of convergence we see in every other field, from fashion to food.
This is not happening in the way predicted 29 years ago, when America was the uncontested hegemon and much of the world was still classified as “underdeveloped”. Emerging economies today may be in love with Apple and McDonald’s, and are often more pro-capitalist than us, but they – or at least their ruling classes – have proved immune to our political values. In fact, we no longer believe in many of them ourselves, such has been the extent of our philosophical decay.
The shocking reality is that the great democracies, including, tragically, Britain, are becoming steadily less libertarian and less democratic; at the same time, the rising Asian powers are becoming less oppressive overall, primarily thanks to their partial embrace of economic freedoms.
The two models are meeting in the middle, and the result is terrifying. Political systems are becoming less distinct and the old ideological power blocs (such as “the West”) are blurring or even gradually merging into one uniform mush (Bruno Maçães, a former Portuguese minister, talks of the rise of a “Eurasia” dominated by the EU, China and Russia, three entities that share a distrust of liberal democracy).
In a brilliant article for Quillette, the political scientist Clay Fuller calls this new consensus “authoritarian liberalism”. He predicts that, if it continues, it will encourage some to push for a nightmarish world superstate on the basis that “effective global governance would be possible for the first time in world history”.
I prefer to call this emergent global political model “managerialism”. If you want to find some of its more vocal proponents, look no further than the pro-EU “rebel” MPs slowly but surely killing off Brexit: their contempt for real democracy is matched only by their preposterous self-regard. They are typical card-carrying authoritarian liberals, convinced that they know better than we do what is good for us.
Managerialism is now the dominant ideology among the educated classes around the world. It is based on the idea that popular voting is fine as long as it doesn’t change anything, of heavy government intervention in a nominally private economy, extensive social control and a move away from traditional, liberal individualism to an obsession with groups.
There is no one managerialist model: it exists on a broad continuum which ranges from semi-liberal democratic to outright dictatorial. It’s not a new concept either, merely the triumph of Thomas Hobbes’s vision for top-down, “enlightened” authoritarianism and the defeat of John Locke’s rights-based, individualistic liberalism. In Britain’s case, this implies undoing many of the political gains of the past few hundred years.
For other nations, managerialism is a vast improvement, and the averaging out of political models across the world a gain for them. North Korea could soon become the perfect poster child: if Donald Trump’s gamble pays off, it will remain a dictatorship but embrace tourism and trade. Dissidents will still be persecuted but the public will no longer live in the Stone Age. Saudi Arabia is another example: it will still be an absolute monarchy but it will treat women less appallingly.
What makes this convergence so striking is that the West is changing just as much as the developing nations. We are giving up on Enlightenment values, largely because we no longer believe in them; bizarrely, some in the West now even look kindly upon Vladimir Putin’s kleptocratic state.
In Europe and America, the changes have included a massive increase in the power of judges, unelected central banks that egregiously manipulate the economy, the post-9/11 surveillance states and ever-creeping paternalism and social control.
Even more remarkably, previously defunct ideas are back: there is once again an offence of blasphemy, punishable through Twitterstorms. Free speech is outmoded, seen as a form of oppression. Cultural Marxism is running rampant. Right and Left are embracing identity politics. But it is the EU that has done more than any other institution to undermine genuine liberal democracy. Its nomenklatura has deprived the public of any say in the biggest questions, from immigration to economic policy.
There are two problems with all of this. The first is that managerialism isn’t an efficient form of governance: at some point, the eurozone will collapse, China will undergo a catastrophic financial and economic crisis and Russia will go bust.
Elite rule doesn’t work: it is over-exuberant, detached from reality and lacks an error-correcting mechanism. William Buckley, the conservative sage, was spot on when he said that he “would rather be governed by the first 2,000 people in the Boston telephone directory than by the 2,000 people on the faculty of Harvard University”.
The second is that managerialism is unpopular. Brexit is being overturned but it won an astonishing victory against a Remain side that massively outspent it. Emmanuel Macron has admitted that the French would vote for Frexit if given half a chance.
There is huge, pent-up populist anger across the EU, and the rage of the Brexiteers when they find out they have been conned will be something else. The Italians could detonate the entire edifice and if they don’t somebody else will. Many voters in Asia would love to adopt full fat liberal democracy if only they were given the choice.
It will take time, but countries that refuse to succumb to authoritarian liberalism will be proved right. They will emerge as havens of free-thinking, innovation and stability, and attract capital and talent. I suspect that those that choose to resist the managerialist onslaught will include Switzerland, Australia, Israel and some Scandinavian countries. It is unclear which way America will go.
Britain almost broke away; but it seems that the tide of history was too strong for Theresa May’s hapless government. Still, history never ends, and supporters of liberal democracy will live to fight another day, in Britain and across the world.
It is all too easy, with the benefit of hindsight, to mock Francis Fukuyama. Writing at the end of the Cold War, the American academic proclaimed the End of History: ideological competition was over, he argued, and liberal democracy had triumphed as the final, ultimate form of government.
This turned out to be hopelessly optimistic. It is possible, we have discovered, to adopt a version of capitalism, as China and Russia did, without embracing free speech and free elections. But Fukuyama had put his finger on a crucial trend. Globalisation is indeed spreading to politics and bringing about the same sort of convergence we see in every other field, from fashion to food.
This is not happening in the way predicted 29 years ago, when America was the uncontested hegemon and much of the world was still classified as “underdeveloped”. Emerging economies today may be in love with Apple and McDonald’s, and are often more pro-capitalist than us, but they – or at least their ruling classes – have proved immune to our political values. In fact, we no longer believe in many of them ourselves, such has been the extent of our philosophical decay.
The shocking reality is that the great democracies, including, tragically, Britain, are becoming steadily less libertarian and less democratic; at the same time, the rising Asian powers are becoming less oppressive overall, primarily thanks to their partial embrace of economic freedoms.
The two models are meeting in the middle, and the result is terrifying. Political systems are becoming less distinct and the old ideological power blocs (such as “the West”) are blurring or even gradually merging into one uniform mush (Bruno Maçães, a former Portuguese minister, talks of the rise of a “Eurasia” dominated by the EU, China and Russia, three entities that share a distrust of liberal democracy).
In a brilliant article for Quillette, the political scientist Clay Fuller calls this new consensus “authoritarian liberalism”. He predicts that, if it continues, it will encourage some to push for a nightmarish world superstate on the basis that “effective global governance would be possible for the first time in world history”.
I prefer to call this emergent global political model “managerialism”. If you want to find some of its more vocal proponents, look no further than the pro-EU “rebel” MPs slowly but surely killing off Brexit: their contempt for real democracy is matched only by their preposterous self-regard. They are typical card-carrying authoritarian liberals, convinced that they know better than we do what is good for us.
Managerialism is now the dominant ideology among the educated classes around the world. It is based on the idea that popular voting is fine as long as it doesn’t change anything, of heavy government intervention in a nominally private economy, extensive social control and a move away from traditional, liberal individualism to an obsession with groups.
There is no one managerialist model: it exists on a broad continuum which ranges from semi-liberal democratic to outright dictatorial. It’s not a new concept either, merely the triumph of Thomas Hobbes’s vision for top-down, “enlightened” authoritarianism and the defeat of John Locke’s rights-based, individualistic liberalism. In Britain’s case, this implies undoing many of the political gains of the past few hundred years.
For other nations, managerialism is a vast improvement, and the averaging out of political models across the world a gain for them. North Korea could soon become the perfect poster child: if Donald Trump’s gamble pays off, it will remain a dictatorship but embrace tourism and trade. Dissidents will still be persecuted but the public will no longer live in the Stone Age. Saudi Arabia is another example: it will still be an absolute monarchy but it will treat women less appallingly.
What makes this convergence so striking is that the West is changing just as much as the developing nations. We are giving up on Enlightenment values, largely because we no longer believe in them; bizarrely, some in the West now even look kindly upon Vladimir Putin’s kleptocratic state.
In Europe and America, the changes have included a massive increase in the power of judges, unelected central banks that egregiously manipulate the economy, the post-9/11 surveillance states and ever-creeping paternalism and social control.
Even more remarkably, previously defunct ideas are back: there is once again an offence of blasphemy, punishable through Twitterstorms. Free speech is outmoded, seen as a form of oppression. Cultural Marxism is running rampant. Right and Left are embracing identity politics. But it is the EU that has done more than any other institution to undermine genuine liberal democracy. Its nomenklatura has deprived the public of any say in the biggest questions, from immigration to economic policy.
There are two problems with all of this. The first is that managerialism isn’t an efficient form of governance: at some point, the eurozone will collapse, China will undergo a catastrophic financial and economic crisis and Russia will go bust.
Elite rule doesn’t work: it is over-exuberant, detached from reality and lacks an error-correcting mechanism. William Buckley, the conservative sage, was spot on when he said that he “would rather be governed by the first 2,000 people in the Boston telephone directory than by the 2,000 people on the faculty of Harvard University”.
The second is that managerialism is unpopular. Brexit is being overturned but it won an astonishing victory against a Remain side that massively outspent it. Emmanuel Macron has admitted that the French would vote for Frexit if given half a chance.
There is huge, pent-up populist anger across the EU, and the rage of the Brexiteers when they find out they have been conned will be something else. The Italians could detonate the entire edifice and if they don’t somebody else will. Many voters in Asia would love to adopt full fat liberal democracy if only they were given the choice.
It will take time, but countries that refuse to succumb to authoritarian liberalism will be proved right. They will emerge as havens of free-thinking, innovation and stability, and attract capital and talent. I suspect that those that choose to resist the managerialist onslaught will include Switzerland, Australia, Israel and some Scandinavian countries. It is unclear which way America will go.
Britain almost broke away; but it seems that the tide of history was too strong for Theresa May’s hapless government. Still, history never ends, and supporters of liberal democracy will live to fight another day, in Britain and across the world.
3. Lionel Shriver is a case study in the new digital inquisition: Fraser Nelson
About a year ago, The Spectator’s staff met to discuss who we’d most like to sign as a new columnist. The conversation was over in minutes: everyone wanted Lionel Shriver. Her writing has it all: humour, insight, variety, elegance and – perhaps most of all – courage. Unlike most novelists, she has something to say on every topic imaginable, from psychology to cryptocurrency. My pitch: that we would not be able to shower her with money but we could offer her complete editorial freedom – and readers with a decent sense of humour. That swung it. To our delight, she accepted.
There wasn’t much sign of humour in the social media lynch mob that has been pursuing her in the last week, furious about her latest column. She had mocked Penguin for its new policy of hiring authors based on whether they reflect a “diverse” society. This diversity is established by a tick-box exercise so long that it contains (to Ms Shriver’s amusement) options for both “bi” and “bisexual”. Proof, she said, that ‘diversity’ has been “removed from the language as a general-purpose noun”. What about seeking good writers, in whatever shape they come? Her column was funny, rational – and argued with her usual gentle fearlessness.
Uproar then followed and she was plunged into the court of Twitter opinion, charged with ableism, classism, homophobia, racism, transphobia – and worse. After a few days, the mob got its scalp: she was dropped as a judge from fiction awards run by Mslexia magazine. The magazine’s editor says she was aware that quotes had been taken out of context. But “the way it has been taken up by the media” meant that the damage had been done. An “atmosphere” had been created that’s “very discouraging for particular groups of women writers” – so Ms Shriver had to walk the plank. To be accused is to be guilty: a digital Salem.
This is another landmark in the ability of social media to shape and distort debate in the outside world, with chilling implications that are still not properly understood. It did not matter that Ms Shriver said nothing to discourage women writers, or that she is a living inspiration for many of them. It only mattered that she had been accused with enough force, by people seeking to cast her as a bigot. Her army of readers will not be so persuaded, but her treatment sends a message out to others: if you have reservations about the orthodoxies of the day, best keep them to yourself. Anything you can say can be amplified, twisted, held as evidence – and used to convict.
You’d be surprised how many television producers anxiously check Twitter after their shows. Or how many in public life, whom you’d imagine to have the thickest of skins, reach for their social media reviews as soon as they come off air. The historian Niall Ferguson has spoken about how startled and taken aback he was after the first online attacks – to be taken to task not for ideas or evidence but for being a covert racist, Islamophobe or homophobe or worse. If you’re used to handling critics by reasoned argument, and facts, you can have no idea how to handle a Twitterstorm.
As he has found out, the social media mob is at its most lethal in the world of academia, with a ready audience in a generation that is worryingly relaxed about the idea of people being hounded off campus. I was at my alma mater, Glasgow University, earlier this week and heard Sir Anton Muscatelli, the principal, speak about how the importance of free speech needs to be rediscovered from time to time. He quoted from a 1974 report from Yale University, commissioned after concern that too many invited speakers were being no-platformed and hounded off campus. Intellectual growth, the report said, depended on the ability to “discuss the unmentionable and challenge the unchallengeable.” Free speech, it said, guards against the “tyranny” of “majority opinion as to the rightness or wrongness of particular doctrines, or thoughts.”
A new type of this tyranny is now emerging from the digital world, with “wrongness” of thought being rigorously policed and victims swiftly punished – whether guilty or not. My colleague Toby Young, a writer so committed to education that he set up an all-ability state school, found his career in school reform ended by the discovery of a few daft comments he made on social mediaalmost a decade ago. Ought a 3am comment outweigh a decade or more of experience? Those who sacked Toby Young over his ancient tweets saga gave an answer: yes, it does now.
As Michael Gove said in a speech last week, the same pattern can always be seen: any original thinking which challenges fashionable norms is scrutinised for political acceptability. If it fails this test, the author is then attacked personally. The aim is to besmirch a reputation, to use social media to cast slurs and portray the target as toxic. Perhaps an offending sentence can be found, taken out of context and twisted for damaging effect. Then the mob can move on to whoever might be inviting their target to speak. Once this formula works on one victim, it’s tried on another.
In a strange way, the hysteria has made Lionel Shriver’s point perfectly. Take one of her critics, Amrou al-Kadhi, who recently signed a six-figure deal to write a book about becoming a drag queen. They (to use the preferred pronoun) said that when publishers are more open-minded, people from such diverse backgrounds can be signed up. But a point was omitted: the author is also an Old Etonian with a Cambridge degree, so is furnished with the sort of CV that always serves as a fast-track into the establishment. So does this make them an embattled member of minority group, or a product of extraordinary privilege?
Ms Shriver was simply saying that a writer’s background should not matter, because quality of writing should speak for itself. People like good, interesting books – which is why even the trolls on Twitter will not be able to inflict any serious damage on her career. But what of the other writers who are just starting out, seeking a publisher – and share her general persuasion? They will have learnt, from this imbroglio, that it’s best to keep certain opinions secret. And that when it comes to diversity of opinion, there is still a battle to be fought.
About a year ago, The Spectator’s staff met to discuss who we’d most like to sign as a new columnist. The conversation was over in minutes: everyone wanted Lionel Shriver. Her writing has it all: humour, insight, variety, elegance and – perhaps most of all – courage. Unlike most novelists, she has something to say on every topic imaginable, from psychology to cryptocurrency. My pitch: that we would not be able to shower her with money but we could offer her complete editorial freedom – and readers with a decent sense of humour. That swung it. To our delight, she accepted.
There wasn’t much sign of humour in the social media lynch mob that has been pursuing her in the last week, furious about her latest column. She had mocked Penguin for its new policy of hiring authors based on whether they reflect a “diverse” society. This diversity is established by a tick-box exercise so long that it contains (to Ms Shriver’s amusement) options for both “bi” and “bisexual”. Proof, she said, that ‘diversity’ has been “removed from the language as a general-purpose noun”. What about seeking good writers, in whatever shape they come? Her column was funny, rational – and argued with her usual gentle fearlessness.
Uproar then followed and she was plunged into the court of Twitter opinion, charged with ableism, classism, homophobia, racism, transphobia – and worse. After a few days, the mob got its scalp: she was dropped as a judge from fiction awards run by Mslexia magazine. The magazine’s editor says she was aware that quotes had been taken out of context. But “the way it has been taken up by the media” meant that the damage had been done. An “atmosphere” had been created that’s “very discouraging for particular groups of women writers” – so Ms Shriver had to walk the plank. To be accused is to be guilty: a digital Salem.
This is another landmark in the ability of social media to shape and distort debate in the outside world, with chilling implications that are still not properly understood. It did not matter that Ms Shriver said nothing to discourage women writers, or that she is a living inspiration for many of them. It only mattered that she had been accused with enough force, by people seeking to cast her as a bigot. Her army of readers will not be so persuaded, but her treatment sends a message out to others: if you have reservations about the orthodoxies of the day, best keep them to yourself. Anything you can say can be amplified, twisted, held as evidence – and used to convict.
You’d be surprised how many television producers anxiously check Twitter after their shows. Or how many in public life, whom you’d imagine to have the thickest of skins, reach for their social media reviews as soon as they come off air. The historian Niall Ferguson has spoken about how startled and taken aback he was after the first online attacks – to be taken to task not for ideas or evidence but for being a covert racist, Islamophobe or homophobe or worse. If you’re used to handling critics by reasoned argument, and facts, you can have no idea how to handle a Twitterstorm.
As he has found out, the social media mob is at its most lethal in the world of academia, with a ready audience in a generation that is worryingly relaxed about the idea of people being hounded off campus. I was at my alma mater, Glasgow University, earlier this week and heard Sir Anton Muscatelli, the principal, speak about how the importance of free speech needs to be rediscovered from time to time. He quoted from a 1974 report from Yale University, commissioned after concern that too many invited speakers were being no-platformed and hounded off campus. Intellectual growth, the report said, depended on the ability to “discuss the unmentionable and challenge the unchallengeable.” Free speech, it said, guards against the “tyranny” of “majority opinion as to the rightness or wrongness of particular doctrines, or thoughts.”
A new type of this tyranny is now emerging from the digital world, with “wrongness” of thought being rigorously policed and victims swiftly punished – whether guilty or not. My colleague Toby Young, a writer so committed to education that he set up an all-ability state school, found his career in school reform ended by the discovery of a few daft comments he made on social mediaalmost a decade ago. Ought a 3am comment outweigh a decade or more of experience? Those who sacked Toby Young over his ancient tweets saga gave an answer: yes, it does now.
As Michael Gove said in a speech last week, the same pattern can always be seen: any original thinking which challenges fashionable norms is scrutinised for political acceptability. If it fails this test, the author is then attacked personally. The aim is to besmirch a reputation, to use social media to cast slurs and portray the target as toxic. Perhaps an offending sentence can be found, taken out of context and twisted for damaging effect. Then the mob can move on to whoever might be inviting their target to speak. Once this formula works on one victim, it’s tried on another.
In a strange way, the hysteria has made Lionel Shriver’s point perfectly. Take one of her critics, Amrou al-Kadhi, who recently signed a six-figure deal to write a book about becoming a drag queen. They (to use the preferred pronoun) said that when publishers are more open-minded, people from such diverse backgrounds can be signed up. But a point was omitted: the author is also an Old Etonian with a Cambridge degree, so is furnished with the sort of CV that always serves as a fast-track into the establishment. So does this make them an embattled member of minority group, or a product of extraordinary privilege?
Ms Shriver was simply saying that a writer’s background should not matter, because quality of writing should speak for itself. People like good, interesting books – which is why even the trolls on Twitter will not be able to inflict any serious damage on her career. But what of the other writers who are just starting out, seeking a publisher – and share her general persuasion? They will have learnt, from this imbroglio, that it’s best to keep certain opinions secret. And that when it comes to diversity of opinion, there is still a battle to be fought.
No comments:
Post a Comment