Queer bedfellows - the Murdoch press, the Saudis and their bum chums!

As I was writing my post about the Saudis, the Rupert Murdoch/News of the World story broke and I was struck by the parallels between the two.  Beneath what I regard as superficial differences, lies the same exercising of an unhealthy influence in a country in which neither reside nor pay any taxes and through means that gives their message a false authority and legitimacy. 

Both seek to take control of powerful symbols of authority: for Murdoch it is the media, for the Saudis it is religion.  Both then seek to consolidate their authority by appealing to the importance of what it represents and how this must not be questioned: Murdoch by claiming to uphold the freedom of the press and the process of accountability, and dismissing any control or limits as a devious ploy by the powerful to protect their own interests; the Saudis by making themselves the self-appointed guardians and only legitimate interpreters of Islam, and branding any questioning or alternative interpretations as blasphemous – a claim guaranteed to stir adherents into blind ignorant rage.

Of course, people have to invest these symbols with importance for this charade to work and this they readily do.  In the case of Murdoch, it is with the sacred cows of Freedom of the Press and The Right to Know (with all the prurience that it entails); with the Saudis it is fundamental existential questions: fear of the unknown, belief in a god, the uncertainty of death and beyond and with hope of an afterlife and Heaven.  (Morality is only relevant it seems insofar as it aids in pleasing a god who will then secure one a place in his heaven.)

Having captured their audience, both use their substantial wealth to extend their influence: Murdoch through takeovers or majority stake holdings in media outlets, direct approaches to political parties and outright support of one or the other party during elections; the Saudis by financing so called religious education. The Saudis also fund some Islamic centres in universities, but these I think are merely to deflect attention from their orthodox religious activity rather than any genuine belief in these centres’ work. 

In this respect, both seem content at adopting a curiously schizophrenic (and contradictory) approach, depending on their ‘client’.  Thus, Murdoch’s media empire incorporates smut and ‘sophistication’, pictures of topless models and sexually lurid stories as well as more highbrow and ‘intellectual’ organs.  Similarly, the Saudis see no contradiction in financing Islamic centres in western universities to celebrate the achievements of Islamic civilization in the past while simultaneously funding orthodox religious schools that renders the kind of inquiry that led to those same achievements almost impossible.  As one imam said on his blog when discussing evolution, anything that contradicts the Quran must be rejected as false.  So much for inquiry!

In seeking to get a large chunk of the market share, both become the voice of the many which gets easily mistaken for the Truth.  In Murdoch’s case, owning tabloids (rags), broadsheets (more serious) and tv channels makes it easier to claim to be ‘speaking’ for a ‘cross section’ of the population, while also creating the illusion of a majority opinion.  The Saudis too are involved in publishing and the media by producing materials for their ‘schools’ and evangelising in general. Here, they tend to force their view by stocking their Islamic bookshops with their propaganda, so again creating the illusion of the dominant view.  Nonetheless, both achieve the same objective, i.e. appealing to the herd instinct that drowns out dissenting opinions and through sheer pressure lures people into adopting the ‘majority’ view.  Peer pressure, acceptance and fear of rejection are powerful incentives, after all. 

This is not quite so far fetched as it may seem and one has only to remember the role of the media in Nazi Germany or Communist Russia and indeed the role of cultural attaches of both Communist Russia and China. There are also examples of other media barons in British history from the late nineteenth and early twentieth century who had an unhealthy and some would say undemocratic influence on the political process.  For people still not convinced and preferring more ‘benign’ examples of misleading the public, I recommend William Boyd’s excellent novel Restless.  (I use ‘benign’ reservedly here.) 

More recently, I am reminded of a magazine that I came across that has as its stated aim the defence of western civilization and Israel (though I fail to see why the two should be inextricably linked).  Still, at least it is explicit in its aim.   Published on heavy, matt finished paper with suitably ‘aristocratic’ font to match, it is littered with advertisements for fine wines and expensive holidays while carrying unquestioning features in favour of Israel, rabid attacks on Islam and Muslim immigrants in Europe and North America, then reviews on literature and high brow cultural events all in the same issue.  As is rightly said, the medium is the message and when packaged in a sophisticated format, it becomes difficult to disentangle the propaganda from serious analysis.  Indeed, the ‘sophisticated’ content and format is a subtle guise to lend weight to what is nothing more than propaganda.

But why do they do it?  What have they to gain? 

These are questions that unfortunately are not asked or not asked often enough, most being too trusting of the medium, or too preoccupied in following the latest strand of salacious gossip or eager to watch their wretched football (another exploitative venture) on the one hand, or too afraid to question for being branded a doubter or blasphemer on the other.

Reflecting on these parallels, I was reminded again of lifelong learning and constructive recreation - themes that I have written about in previous posts - and wondered if, over the years, these two had not been entirely neglected in one context and steadily eroded in the other, whether the Saudis or Rupert Murdoch would have been able to wield quite the influence they do.  Both, you see, rely on an audience of dullards and morons to whom they can ‘sell’ their wares. 

Underlying the issue is the question of authority, its power and how it is defined.  More importantly, there is the issue of people’s ability to question, deconstruct, challenge and if necessary reject this authority.  But if people have been numbed – whether by religious mumbo-jumbo, unchallenging fodder such as salacious gossip or propaganda dressed up as sophisticated intellectual analysis – can they really pose a threat?  More importantly, do these people even realise how they have been duped – or are they content in delusional, self-congratulatory piety, delusions of cultural or intellectual superiority, or false claims to freedom of the press and freedom more generally?

It is with good reason that literacy curriculums aim to teach that not everything in print is to be believed – or more broadly, to look behind appearances and question the veracity of what is being presented. 

The issue of authority is not one to be underestimated, nor the power of symbols.  One has only to look at advertising: the choice of voice, the dress, the language used – the use of spectacles, a stethoscope, a doctor’s white gown for example, all potent symbols without even a word needing to be said.   It is no wonder that one manufacturer of baby food had its representatives dressed in just such garb to coax mothers in third world countries to abandon breastfeeding in favour of their unsuitable and expensive product.  

However, that Murdoch has been able to get away with wielding his influence is puzzling.  For his audience is the so-called educated, enlightened West – the people and civilisation that the magazine I referred to above seeks to preserve against outside, backward influences.  Yet, it is within this very civilization that Murdochs rags are so popular, so that even our politicians and so-called educated and intellectual journalists are content to write for them.  And then there are the millions who are prepared to read the filth and gossip.  Do they have nothing to do in, and with, their own lives that they delight in prying and reading about the more prurient details of other peoples’ lives?  And then to excuse this by appealing to the public interest and the right to know?  Meanwhile, having had our senses titillated and our brains numbed, we blindly allow our political processes to be manipulated and then pretend that we still elect our leaders!  And our leaders themselves see nothing wrong with all this, shamelessly fawning over Murdoch and his henchwoman and henchmen!  But perhaps that is the game – get the majority plebs on side with filth and gossip, the better to hold those in power hostage?  The recent exposure of phone hacking appears to have put the spotlight on Murdoch and his shenanigans.  But as one head of an advertising agency in the UK astutely commented:  “The public is fickle.  People forget and move on.” (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-14044052)

The Saudi influence, on the other hand, is equally curious.  In the third world, it can perhaps be explained by the lack of affordable education, which makes religious schools (madressas) the only option. In the west, meanwhile, these religious schools offer a sanctuary from the corruption that surrounds them (Why don’t they just go to their parents’ countries in that case?), or a false identity to a clientele who see themselves as ‘lost’ or discriminated against - couched with all the authority of religion.  But this is what makes the chameleon like behaviour of the Saudis all the more reprehensible – they are happy to open grand centres at universities, yet seem incapable or reluctant to divert their money into schools that will educate children, especially in the third world, to think and contribute fruitfully to the benefit of themselves and their country.  And, I suspect, it is just these schools that have groomed young minds towards a narrow, orthodox and fundamentalist view of their religion which has had such disastrous consequences – on the one hand, preventing the countries in question from developing and progressing; and on the other, serving as nurseries that provide ready and fertile minds for more militant tendencies.  It will be ironic if it is this very process that will turn and bite the Saudis and their Gulf Arab chums on the backside one day!

Lifelong learning and constructive recreation

In my previous post, I talked about how my curiosity in how the earth ‘worked’ led me to buy a dvd and a book on the subject to learn more.  All very laudable, I’m sure – even if I say so myself!  And I concede, that my initial literacy was an important contributory factor in motivating me.  However, there is another point that I would like to explore here and that is the privilege of having the opportunity to learn more.  At the risk of sounding an old fart, I can remember a time, when I would also have had the choice of enrolling in an evening class run by the local council.  Sadly, over the years, that option has become increasingly difficult to find. 

The temptation is to blame government cuts that were first introduced by the much celebrated Margaret Thatcher, and that have since continued, under both Conservative and Labour governments, eroding away at what was once a great institution – and all that it stood for.  But I think blaming our leaders is too convenient and - worse - lazy.  Certainly, the leaders – especially when they are as influential (I’m reluctant to use the word ‘charismatic’) as Thatcher and Blair- have contributed to the decline, but the wider society must bear some responsibility too.  (Thatcher, of course, famously dismissed the very notion of 'society', which says a lot about her outlook.) 

For those not familiar with adult education, it consisted of courses in a range of subjects that were offered by the local council’s education department and funded by a combination of local council and central government money.  They were usually held in the evening, made use of local council school facilities and the fees set were, I think, affordable.  Crucially, people enrolled out of interest and for pleasure, not to gain a qualification that they could wave in front of existing or prospective employers.  In short, the courses offered constructive recreation in the belief that learning was a good and worthwhile activity in its own right and a tool for improvement in the broadest sense. 

It was Napolean, I believe, who once dismissed the English as ‘a nation of shopkeepers’.  It was an unjust and unkind assessment - in my experience, every nation, including the French, is to some extent a nation of shopkeepers and thank god for it.  Commerce and trade are vital to the successful functioning and growth of any society. Yet, the shopkeeper’s daughter, Thatcher, was also a person with an outlook so narrow and so narrowly defined it scarcely deserves to be called a vision.  She saw everything through the perspective of a provincial, money-minded upstart and it was a viewpoint that shaped the politicians and business leaders, as well as trends within the wider community, for the generation that followed.  In fact, provincialism under her was almost a virtue to be celebrated. 

And so, over time, the catalogues have got thinner, the range of courses more restricted and adult education has been either amputated or grafted onto an altogether different beast called Further Education.  The New Labour/Blair government rebranded this concept as Lifelong Learning, though in a telling example of just how pervasive the Thatcher mindset was, this learning was largely geared towards gaining a qualification that was marketable.  So, whereas before there was a palpable sense of learning for learning’s sake, the priority now is to get a qualification – any qualification, no matter how manufactured or trivial – that is marketable.  Teaching too is judged on ‘progression’, i.e. whether the student progresses on to another course (and another qualification) or gets a job.  The new mantra is ‘value for money’ and value = economic in their eyes.

Putting this in a wider context, both Thatcher and Blair were also keen to extend pub opening hours and Thatcher sold off council owned sports facilities (tennis courts and playing grounds), a trend that Blair’s New Labour did nothing to reverse.  To me, this is a far greater indicator of their priorities than any rhetoric about nation building that they and their media cronies have thrown at us over the decades. 

Sadly, the people have colluded in this decimation so that we are now also faced with library closures.  With more leisure time, the classes, sports fields and libraries symbolised a constructive alternative to easy and lazy options like the mindless watching of TV, getting drunk at the local pub or shopping – and yet, that is precisely what Britain has been reduced to.

I can remember enrolling in classes ranging from woodwork, badminton, sewing and swimming to studying politics, philosophy and psychology.  Moreover, I did so in the company of like minded individuals and going to evening classes was as much a social event as it was educational – in the broader sense.  As an example, having made my own clothes, I am now filled with a mixture of admiration, awe and anger whenever I see how cheaply clothes are priced in London stores – do the people who crave more and more clothes at less and less cost have any idea what skill, time and effort goes into making these garments?  Would they be prepared to get paid a pittance for the same amount of effort?  "There but for Fortune go you and I", as the great poet once said.  It’s the market say some – be that as it may, in the end markets and demand are shaped by people, but what shapes the people? 

I have nothing against people wanting to improve their or their children’s personal economic circumstances.  Indeed, I am a product of just such social mobility.  However, I think it’s important to also ask the why, what and how underlying this desire for social mobility.  What does moving ‘up’ mean exactly?  Why do people want to move ‘up’, and how will you know if you have moved ‘up’?  Unfortunately, for many, ‘more money’ is the answer to all three questions. 

Since Thatcher, there has been a renewed admiration and respect for money; and both Thatcher and Blair encouraged a sort of cult of not only new money, but fast money.  (Mr Blair’s post-prime ministerial pursuits are ample proof, if any were needed, of this!)  It was not investment for the long-term, but profit in the short-term that became the measure of success; and success was always in terms of monetary gain.  With quick profit, came fast and – worse still - conspicuous spending.  I had thought this was a failing peculiar to the third world and a reason for rampant corruption in these countries.  It was certainly true of Pakistan, where I grew up, and the main reason I wanted to escape. 

This gluttony can be seen in the bonuses that people expect (as if salaries were just for turning up to work?) and the wares advertised and written about in weekend newspaper magazines and television, so that shopping is now a recreational activity in its own right.

Yet, I have met people like my local road sweeper, who saved each month in order to buy a season ticket to the BBC Proms music festival every summer; and a security guard who was a Friend of the British Museum and regularly attended their lectures and events.  They had neither wealth nor degrees, but in my eyes, both these men were far more worthy than those normally honoured in society.  It is their approach, I feel, that should be encouraged.  It is on this kind of attitude that a good society is built.  It is this attitude that makes a country great. 

Instead, it is crass footballers, talentless pop stars, gluttonous bankers and wealthy tax dodgers who are honoured and respected.  Their bombast and strutting leaves ordinary folk in thrall and awe and who then buy into this myth of wealth - ordinary folk like the Thatchers and Blairs of this world; upstarts who have never seen anything and are easily overwhelmed at the first sight of wealth.  Moreover, with money and consumption  elevated to objects of envy, application, effort and persistence are demoted in favour of instant gratification.  It is then that the rot sets in.

Admittedly, there is a wider issue here: is it the role of government to mould a country’s people?  They say "Stateways don’t change folkways”, and in any case, people must be free to decide and choose for themselves.  But these concerns lead one to ask: what is the choice, who provides it and how does one choose?    Some would answer: the market; others religion; and yet others happiness.   I hope to pursue these and similar questions in future posts – and how these issues impact not just on the seeming decline of the West, but on the sorry state of the Muslim world, and indeed the third world in general.