Regulations violated in Alberta tarsands

Our nomination for mascots for the Alberta tarsands industry: Berty the albertosaur and his family. The family that preys together, stays together


link: oilsands infractions go unchallenged

           This article, which appeared last July in the Calgary Herald business column, is a damning indictment of an industry out of control. Freedom of Information requests revealed that regulations "controlling" the tarsands industry are a total farce. American regulators are nine times more likely to go after violators of environmental regulations than is the Albertan government. 

""Alberta's environmental regulations in the bitumen sands region are not being upheld," the report concludes.
Timoney asks how the government can say it is protecting the environment when it has such poor records of what has happened and when industry faces such low odds of being penalized for breaking the rules.
... "We can have the government state that we have very good regulations, but it's not honest for them to say we have very good regulations that are being upheld.""

            Aha! As usual the devil is in the details: the regulations might be good but no one enforces them.. 

            Again, the Harper government is found guilty of practicing "cherry picking", filtering the information the public receives so as to downplay the benefits of green energy options and the disadvantges of our continued relience on fossil fuel energy sources. This is a surprising and disheartening policy on the part of government elected on a platform of transparency, open and responsible government. The only conclusion one can draw is that the Harper government is in the pocket of the oil compagnies. This would explain the use of emotionally charged, populist language in referring to environmentalists as "radicals" supported by foreign money and foreign agendas. The old paranoid "us versus them" rhetoric of the reactionary..

             As the recent Lac Mégantic, Québec train derailment and conflagration demonstrates all too clearly, there is more than just money and oil-soaked waterfowl involved in this all-consuming obsession with economic "growth". In Lac Mégantic, Québec, dozens of Canadians died a fiery death when an unmanned runaway train carrying shale oil from the US crashed and exploded in the town center one summer evening, this July past.

           The Canadian rail industry was deregulated and rail compagnies allowed to "autoregulate". Inevitably security became flaccid. No one really wanted to cause an accident, of course: that's bad publicity and profit loss. But when the bottom line becomes an excessive focus, security measure are cut to raise profit margins on investments. Worse, as a result of penny pinching and flaccid regulation, the rail carrier was insufficiently insured (so tax payers in our deregulated economy end up paying anyway, some with their lives and property..) 

           The rails which carried that load of light crude, were, bluntly, shit: rusty, rotten ties, badly maintained. The oil, from recently opened US shale oil fields, was mixed with volatile, inflammable substances as part of the extraction process. The high degree of flammability was concealed by falsified expedition papers somewhere in the States before the trains crossed the border. The tank cars carrying the oil were not certified for such an explosively flammable product, etc. The litany of faults is long. As one expert on security put it: accidents like this one are a concatenation of errors. Neoconservative penny pinching, over time, sequentially removes one layer of security after another. The resulty, over time, in an inevitable accident because by removing layer after layer of security measures, we incease the probability of a lethal chain of causation establishing itself. If, instead of carrying a two man crew, which was the former practice, trains run with a crew of one, the chance of human error is amplified (driver two can no longer check that driver one has not made a mistake in carrying out a procedure). 

           As of this writing, the long term environmental effects of the Lac Mégantic conflagration on the soil, aquifers, aquatic and human life are not known. They are likely to be heavy: cancers, genetic defects, allergies.. not to mention post-traumatic stress syndrome, the grief of hundreds of mourning relatives, the economic impact of losing a bread winner for dozens of families, etc. How best to describe the Harper government's obsessional focus on the bottom line? Would it not be, "penny wise and pound foolish".

on the fine art of cherry picking data to fit one's ideological prejudices

http://transparencycanada.blogspot.ca/2012/12/running-down-up-escalator.html

internal blog links:

Apocalypse in small Québec town

deregulation: beating a dead horse

in-praise-of-folly: you-get-what-you-pay-for

Book Review: The Moral Animal by Robert Wright

Robert Wright: The Moral animal, why we are the way we are (Vintage Books, NY, 1994), 392 pages plus extensive chapter notes, bibliography and index.

Abbreviations used in review: EP - Evolutionary Psychology, NS - natural selection

        All societies, animal or human, require rules to regulate and organize behavior. Modern industrial societies however appear extremely problematic: our overheated, psychopathological economic activity is fouling our planetary nest. It is evident: we leave our children a depleted world yet we can't seem to help ourselves. Our technologically augmented war machines threaten to plunge us into a dark age. The list of problems seems to grow monthly: ozone holes, peak oil, bats dying off from a mystery epidemic, extreme weather, the Grand Recession.. We appear to be living a planetary crisis, one of our own making. Our very strengths - intelligence, social organization, technology and science - have morphed into powerlessness or, worse, demoniac forces out to get us.

        Can we socially engineer our way out of the fix we got ourselves in? Can we design a society that teaches us live within our means, in relative peace with one another and the rest of creation? Is social engineering compatible with democracy? 

        If social engineering turns out to be a viable option, I believe it must be informed by democratic principles and values and, in practice, be founded upon democratic procedures. There is a (seeming) paradox here: those who are controlled - "society", the citizenry - must, in turn, control their controllers. It's the old chicken or egg story: which came first, the chicken or the egg? Who controls, the controlled controllers or the controlling controlled?

        In a sense, we need to apply the basic principles of tribal village democracy to large scale societies because, as a species, that is the type of environment we evolved in, for which we are fitted. Ignoring this background - and the innate needs and values derived from it - can only drive us collectively crazy, turn us into denatured, sick animals. But a simplistic "return to nature" won't do either. We must also learn to "leave behind" or de-activate some of the innate psychological programming inherited from that archaic hunter-gatherer world which was the native home for tens of thousand of generations of homonids. If we fail in this endeavor to bring forth the best evolution has brought us while de-activating the worst, if we fail to regulate our collective behaviors so that we live in ecological balance with the rest of creation, our technical civilization is doomed. And we have, at best, several decades in which to get things turned around.

       Robert Wright refers to himself as an "evolutionary psychologist". The term "evolutionary psychology" (EP) replaced "sociobiology" which fell into disfavor because of unfortunate associations made with "Social Darwinism", sexism, eugenics and racist ideologies by Left wing opponents. EP is founded upon Charles Darwin's insight that behavior (and its subjective concommitant, emotion) is molded by natural selection (NS) just as the physical form of an organism is shaped by its interactions with its environment. 

   
      Behaviors - and concommitant emotions / attitudes / values - which enhance survival are "selected". Behaviors which do not enhance survival or the opportunity for passing on one's genes are, over time, eliminated from the gene pool and die out. It is assumed that behaviors / emotions / attitutes are, to some degree, genetically regulated (otherwise NS would have nothing to operate on!) Modified genetic regulation of behavior could take the form, for example, of a mutation in a regulator gene controlling the level of production of a cerebral neurotransmitter. If an increase - or decrease - in the neurotransmitter production conferred increased reproductive success, the gene should, according to classical Darwinian theory, propagate throughout the population. Alternative forms of the regulator gene - its "alleles" - might not be eliminated but achive a new level of "equilibrium frequency" with the new gene and with the current physical environment. Gene frequency will then vary as the environment changes and new equilibria between the relative advantages and disadvantages of the various alleles emerge.

         Human nature has been forged in a "recursive" (self-referential) process analgous to the chicken or egg riddle mentioned above. Genes modify behavior which, in a social context, creates a new social environment in which further genetic selection occurs. Genes modify social behaviors which, in turn, modify the cultural or social context in which genetic selection occurs. Chicken or egg. Theoretically, the process could continue forever. The important point, I believe, - and which ties in with my earlier discussion of social engineering - is that it is now human culture, at least as much as the natural environment, which is selecting human genomes.

       There are, from my perspective, various questions which need answering. Is the general picture of human nature given by EP useful in socially engineering a viable technical society? it may be that simply knowing our origins and evolution does not give us any real power to change our collective behavior in practical, positive ways. We may be "hard wired" to be what we are and act the way we do and there may be nothing we can do about it. Even if we do have some limited control over our behavior and our collective destiny, we may end up making bad choices: we may allow religious -  or other - ideologues to usurp control. They would then suppress any attempt to re-engineer social values in positive ways and socially engineer their own vicious agendas. Knowing may not, in these cases, empower..

         Still smarting from the earlier sociobiology / Social Darwinism "debates", Wright goes to great lengths to emphasize that, as a science, EP is - or should - be policy neutral. It is neither politically Left or Right. Thus, argues Wright, sociological data suggest that the current easy divorce, marriage-go-round with its borken and reconstituted families are not good places to raise children from a mental health perspective - one hears the cries of "reactionary!", "sexist!" over the ether. On the other hand, data suggest that societies are generally healthier - in terms of crime, social solidarity, life expectancy - if the gap between rich and poor is not great and wealth is distributed equitably and fairly - now a chorus of "Commie!", "socialist!", "New World Order!" from the other side of the political spectrum.

        I believe that Wright is right here. By nature, EP treads on social policy, morality and values. Thus, if it is being "scienfitific" and "objective", EP should tread on toes on BOTH sides of the political spectrum from time to time. Consider: all political persuasions are full of people with big ambitions whose ultimate goal is personal power and / or who serve vested class or group interests.. Thus, EP could, in theory, provide enlightened politicians with valuable guidelines "to what is humanly possible". 
Otherwise, as Wright suggests, they risk being ruled by short term interest or troublesome - "tribal" - values and attitudes inherited from religion or secular ideologies.

        Since EP's subject matter is the "human condition", it offers its flank to philosophical critiques. These are numerous and some quite profound. There is the general critique often leveled against the human sciences by "hard" scientists (physics, chemistry): if biology is soft science, then the human sciences are squishy soft - to the point we can ask "are they really sciences?"

      Following in the footsteps of older traditional sciences, EP generates hypotheses from observations, makes testable predictions based on questions raised by the hypotheses and then tests the predictions in the field or lab. Thus, remaining primitives societies are studied to discover the effects of cultural differences or to understand the origin of those differences. Differences are evaluated in light of a putative evolutionary processes to paint a portrait of Universal Human Nature. Wright argues that this portrait, this scientific vision of human nature, is necessary if we are to learn to live together in peace. Without such knowledge, he implies, we will not be able to master the potentially destructive technologies our human nature has unleashed on earth's biosphere. Since EP is less than 50 years old, only time will tell if we are seeing the birth of a new science or the passing of an intellectual fad: one thinks of the fate of astrology, marxism, industrial agronomy, psychoanalysis, eugenics, Hitler's race theories,..

         Three of the primary "entities" (or processes) which EP attempts to study are kin selection, reciprocal altruism and social status. From these three much of human behavior, individual and collective, can be understood. Since we are social animals (higher primates) we depend upon others yet are in rivality with them. We natrally seek to aggrandize ourselves - and the groups we identify with - while diminishing rivals the groups our rivals belong to. This, along with sex, is raw human nature. This is what nature evolved us to be. This is who we are. (On the surface, at least,) it is not an edifying picture. But if the name of the game is Survival, we may have to learn to swallow some unpleasant truths about ourselves..

         Since humans are also (partially, at least) rational animals, we also naturally - instinctively -seek to engage in mutually benefical relations with allies, genetically related or not. Evolution assured that we would mutually aid those we recognize as related to ourselves (our kin or extended family). Such mutual aid among related individuals would raise the probability of their "gene pool" being passed on to future generations. Families who were less likely to aid one another had less probability of survival in the long run. The only requirement here is that some, at least, of the determination of the likelihood to aid a relative is genetic in nature.

       Reciprocal altruism is an extension of mutual aid to non-relations: you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours. Here mutual aid is extended to a large network of interacting individual, some of whom are related to us, others unrelated. Much investigation by psychologists has shown how spontaneously and naturally we all keep tabs on who owes whom what in our social networks. We will eventually eliminate "freeloaders" from our network, those who take but contribute little or nothing in return.

       And like our primate ancestors we engage in a constant game of primate politics. We seek to buy the suport of the powerful by offering them something in return for their support. Through mutual exchanges of aid we seek to build social networks we can fall back on in hard times. One of the fascinating and most enjoyable parts of Wright's book was the clever use made of annecdotes from Darwin's life or entries from his journals to exemplify the subtleties of primate politics as expressed in the human.

       Kin selection has turned out to be perhaps the most contentious principle of EP. Studies have attempted to understand how we came to be the social animals we are and how these emerging traits were passed on as changes in the DNA code.

       Since the basic unit selected by NS is the gene, one is forced to answer the question: how are genes encouraging altruistic behaviors since altruistic behavior often ends up reducing the oportunity of passing on one's genes (the altruist risks his life for other and dies..) Kin selection explains this apparent paradox by arguing that the altruist raises the chances of survival of the group to which he belongs. And since humans originally lived in small hunter gatherer clans, the group would share many of his genes. Thus the altruist, in reducing his personal chance of survival, increases the chances of survival of his genetic type. In the long run, altruistic genes came to dominate much of human behavior and social organization, producing a "chimeric" creature possessing both powerful drives toward autonomy and self-expression (sex, status seeking) AND group solidarity, sociality. The paradox - and tragedy - as Wright notes, is that our love of neighbor and kin is payed for by the price of tribal hatred of those who are different and the eternal curse of war. The most social animals - exactly BECAUSE they are social and benefit from the power it confers - are the most aggressive. This applies even to the invertebrate world of insects: the ants are the most social insects and the most aggressive insects.

         Contrary to what some of its critics claim, EP does not really claim that we are "biological robots". Wright likes to use the analogy of a device like a radio. Evolution built the radio, including its adjustable knobs. It is US - living human cultures - that determine the setting the knobs are adjusted to, whether we are listening to baroque or death metal, to a devotional program on God's love or to the ravings of an enflamed hate-monger.

          Wright correctly, I believe, sees human nature as a dynamic phenomenon of evolving and emergent complexity - a work in progress. We are not what our ancestors were in the "ancestral environment" our species evolved in. Our descendants will be different than us in some ways (let's hope so!!)

".. If Nature and man are both the work of a Being of perfect goodness, that Being intented Nature as a scheme to be amended, not imitated, by man" - British utilitarian philosopher, J. S. Mill

           Wright goes so far as to reject the "naturalistic fallacy" which holds that "Nature should be our only guide". This does make sense: since early homonid societies practiced canabalism, should we? In this view, the moral sphere is granted a certain amount of emergent autonomy.

           Given all this, given our origins in animal evolution, how, then, are we humans, living today, to live our  lives? What should our values be? To what should we aspire? What is the good life?

           In the closing chapters, Wright makes a compelling argument for "greater compassion and concern" for our fellow humans - and greater self-criticism, practiced as a daily art form, a way of life..

            On a "higher" philosophical plane, Wright adopts the utilitarian philosophy of his heros, Charles Darwin and the intellectual circle around him (who, generally, considered themselves utilitarians). Acting for the greatest common good (or to minimize the common evil) is the sanest philoophy, Wright argues. Given the destructiveness of modern technology, its hard not agree. One thinks of Lady MacBeth or Hitler in possession of the atomic bomb..

             Wright is cunningly attempting to counteract our natural perceptual bias in the moral sphere: we tend to inflate our virtues (or those of our group) and down play our weak points. Conversely, we tend to inflate the vices of rivals and downplay their virtues. This leads to the dehumanization of others we see in conflictual situations with ourselves. I think Wright is saying we need to counter these tendencies and find, for example, more rational means of conflict resolution than ethnic strife and war.

             In short, as a (fundamentally) optimistic utilitarian, Wright cites a victorian moralist Samuel Smiles with enthusiasm: "the greatest slave is not he who is ruled by a despot, great though that evil be, but he who is in the thrall of his own moral ignorance, selfishness and vice".

             Knowledge shall set you free!

             This is a decent text to start for those wishing to inform themselves on modern science's take on the human condition. When discussing incidents from Darwin's life and times, the text is as lively as any novel. The principles of EP are well set out and illustrated for the unitiated. Despite some stylistic heaviness in places, I give it a good 8 / 10.

Pandora's box: to open or not to open..

 conclusion of previous article: Left wing populism in Québec?

              Straw polls in the Province suggest strongly that the population at large supports the PQ charter of values. In playing the populist card the PQ may have played cleverly - but did it play wisely? Qui vivra verra - time will tell..

             Even though the charter is only a "proposed" piece of legislation, many voices are rising to claim that the cure is worse than the illness (and what, exactly, was the illness that needed treating anyway?) 

             PQ Minister for Democratic Institutions, Bernard Drainville, claims that a priority is to affirm the equality of men and women in Québécois society. Fine! but if the religious headgear is banned then many Muslim women working in day care centers will either lose their jobs or be forced to conform to a law which insults thir religion. How is equality of sexes being promoted when women will, most likely, be affected more than men?

              The PQ like wisely claims to favor integration of the immigrant into the host society and its values. Fine! but the Muslim women - and there are not a few - who work in day cares and risk losing their jobs are, at least partly, integrated already. How will firing them, forcing them into social isolation (and perhaps welfare) improve their degree of integration?

             The more one looks at the charter proposals, the flakier they seem - strengthening the hypothesis that this is an electoral ploy on the part of the PQ.

             Case in point. Jewish professionals in universities and hospitals are used to wearing the kippah. These upper middle class professionals aren't going take the headgear ban lightly. En passant, middle class professionals are one of the traditional target groups the PQ tries to appeal to and recruit from. What was Madame Marois and her team thinking? Did they think - before shooting themselves in the foot?

             Thus hijab wearing Muslim women, kippah wearing Jewish men and turban / kirpan wearing Sikhs are all antagonized by the proposed legislation. Cross bearing christians could be too - if the law were to be equitably applied. A ban on "ostentatious religious signs" in public institutions seems a simple enough proposition but the devil is always in the details. And there are lots of devils and details in this one to go around liberally..

             Case in point. Headgear is out but what about beards worn as a religious sign? How, exactly, do you tell if a guy wears a beard out of religious conviction? Do we start measuring beard lengths as well as crucifix width to determine if they are ostentatious or not? The link below examines some of the confusing potential ramifications of the proposed charter.

 religious symbol police?

              There is also a seeming hypocrisy in the ban: religious signs in public spaces are  out but not the crucifix in the Assemblée Nationale itself -!sic! - because of its "historical" value. Stooping to splitting hairs like this is not a good sign, definitely not good for social harmony. Sophistry is often a sign of intellectual or moral decadance.

             And it gets weirder: representatives in the Assemblée may end up being exempt from charter provisions and free to wear religious signs at work, yesss..

              In short, the charter promises to generate more problems than it solves (this is my personal issue with the legislation). It muddies the waters of social interaction and pits one social group against another. 

              Case in point. Some institutions are allowed to opt out of charter provisions - why? Such arbitrariness is a sure path to social strife and corruption. It is a generator of bureaucratic Red Tape, the same Red Tape our neo-con inspired leaders are so keen on cutting (when it comes to safety regulations or programs to assure social equity for the disadvantaged..) The proposed law says that wo/men are not all equal before it. This is in violation of our sacrosanct principle of Universal Justice. In the long run, stupid or arbitrary laws are unenforcable and breed contempt for the law: the best law is the simplest!

             In defense of the PQ. Their actions are understandable if one considers the situation of Québec in North America: a francophone island in an English speaking sea: no better way to cultivate a streak of latent pranoia in the collective psyche. Québec is by nature a defensive or guarded - some say inward looking - society. In practice, such traits do not make for a closed or hostile society; they merely favor closure and hostility but do not assure them. Coming to Québec from outside, I have found Québécois society (generally) a bit less xenophobe than the anglophone surround, more open on gay and gender issues. Being demographically challenged, though, does establish an increased need to defend boundaries, physical, linguistic, cultural. These "personality" traits will remain as long as Québec continues to exist.

            In addition, some "reasonable accomodations" have been abusive and require remediation: Sikhs refusing to wear a hard hat on construction sites (because of the turban). I contend that such an accomodation is not reasonable because of the (foreseeable) consequences: society will end up paying for the keep of brain damaged vegetables injured by refusal to wear legally required safety gear. Friction and conflict between groups is inevitable but is the charter of values a sensible way of addressing it? Is the cure worse than the illness it purportedly treats..

           As a sociological experiment, the PQ charter of values project is fascinating (if disquieting). It is turning out to be a stunningly divisive issue. One could not have predicted the variety or the intensity of divisiveness.

1- Everybody has a fairly elaborated opinion, rare enough in these politcally apathetic (or cynical) times  

2- Opinions are passionate and, interestingly, highly polarized. Nuancers exist: those who want stronger, more universal restrictions on those who are different or moderates who want weaker, more circumscribed restrictions. But even the nuancers are relatively passionate..

3- Most fascinating: one can be either for or against the charter, no matter where one stand on the politcal spectrum! This is quite an accomplishment - a sort of "uniting Left and Right in their disunity".. :-0    

              I fear, not so much the charter itself, as what it may be saying about our society. Have we engaged ourselves on a slippery slope to a very bad place?               

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/bloc-kicks-out-mp-who-spoke-against-quebec-religious-symbols-ban/article14273942/ 

internal blog link: 

left-wing-populism-in-quebec?

Left wing populism in Québec?

             In its desire to promote Québec as a "distinct society" in North America, the governing Parti Québécois (PQ) has sure found a way to stir the pot a bit. A proposed "Charter of Québécois Values" will, if passed in the Assemblée Nationale (Québec City), severely restrict the display of "ostentatious religious symbols" in many public offices and institutions: provincial government offices, universities, colleges, hospitals, day care centers..

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2013/09/11/f-vp-fitz-morris-quebec-charter.html 

             What to make of this? In the old Québec, before the Liberal "Quiet Revolution" of the 1960s, the Roman Catholic Church was responsible for providing or administrating various social services: education, health, orphanges.. The Quiet Revolution was a wave of modernization and reform which brought the modern liberal welfare state to Québec. The province secularized with a vengeance, religious attendance plummeted, churches were sold off and converted into condos, we became the shack-up capital of North America and among the first in North America to legalize abortion on demand and gay marriage.. Québec separatist sentiments switched from the Right side of the political spectrum to the Left and gained support from the young, relatively affluent, educated Boomers. The PQ held out the promise of a social democratic secular paradise for an independant République du Québec. The sixties and seventies were heady times!

            Under the center Left / moderate Left policies of the PQ, living standards rose. Higher education became accessible to the masses. Literacy levels rose sharply. The salary gap between Anglos and Francos in the Province shrank. Speaking French was no longer a shame or a liability but a point of pride. The downside: it is hard to make a revolution if there is little evidence of the oppression wich feeds revolutionary fervor. Separatist ideologues were reduced to massaging economic statistics to "prove" that Québec would be better off without the Rest of Canada. Federalist ideologues, meanwhile, massaged the same set of states to "prove" it would be better to remain in the Canadian federation. The rise of the neo-con ideology has not helped either: narcissim is hardly compatible with self-sacrifice for the common good..

               Whatever the causes, one has the impression that the separatists movement has stagnated in support for the better part of quarter century, perhaps longer. The PQ can still win elections - they are in a minority government since September 2012 - but few today speak with real conviction of the "Mission": secession from the Canadian union. If they do, it is lip service to a vaguely envisioned Second Coming, not a battle cry to raise the troops.

              Recognizing the existential - and ontological - thiness of their position, the PQ seems to be searching for a means to reconnect with and engage the public. They seem to be searching for relevance, for the old creative spark. They want to return to the days when they could rally the People beneath the Big Tent, before the two defeated referenda (1980, 1995) relegated the independance dream to the dustbin of failed political dreams. One commentator recently observed that the PQ, in the first year of its mandate, tried various themes to revive interest and fighting spirit: the environment, the economy, protection of the French language.. None caught the public's attention for long. To speak truthfully, the PQ did not so much win the last election, rather the public decided to throw out the corrupt provincial Liberals. The PQ "won" by default. The public however, remained unresponsive and somewhat surly toward the new elected PQ who, generally, appeared to waffle and drift aimlessly without a fixed direction. Until now - the proposed charter of values has, at least, the virtue cutting through the apathy.. It is rare, I think, that a proposed piece of legislation manages to offend so many people in so many different ways.
   
             Unfortunately, with the proposed charter of values the PQ seem now to have turned toward populism as a means of currying favor with the electorate. This is a very dangerous move as the racially and ethnically motivated nationalistic movements of the 20th century tragically demonstrated.

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/08/the-horrific-plight-of-hungarys-roma/278955/

           Many people are honestly confused by the current "secularity" debate in the Province, both its content and its timing. What problem is the charter of values intended to resolve? For example, "reasonable accomodations" with orthodox Jews in the Montréal region have existed forever: zoning regulations variations, for example. Friction arises between communities from time to time but usually blows over in a climate of general tolerance and goodwill.

          The last few decades, though have seen the arrival of increasing numbers of immigrants from non-traditional sources: Vietnamese boat people, Muslims, Haitians, black Africans.. New, more demanding, "reasonable accomodations" were sought with the host community: hospitals found Muslim women refusing examination by male physicians. Worse, in the backlash of 9-11, the Muslim community was stigmatized with the suspicion of haboring terrorists, oppressing women, brainwashing children and - in several notorious cases - carrying our "honor killings" against women who had become too occidental in dress and morals. The background level of latent fear and hostility between communities began to rise.

           Into this increasingly tense situation, the PQ decided to venture with its inflammatory charter of values. Are they cracking open the lid of the box of populist hatred, oblivious to the consequences? - like that Greek gal, Pandora..

 

In memoriam: Seamus Heaney

In memoriam: Seamus Heaney 1939 - 2013

"Over the waves, with the wind behind her

and foam at her neck, she flew like a bird

until her curved prow had covered the distance 

and on the following day, at the due hour,

those seafarers sighted land,

sunlit cliffs, sheer crags

and looming headlands, the landfall they sought.

It was the end of their voyage and the Geats vaulted

over the side, out on to the sand

and moored their ship. There was a clash of mail

and a thresh of gear. They thanked God for that easy crossing on a calm sea" 

Seamus has now made the great voyage. Like too many of our great ones and good ones, one feels he has left us too early..

Book Review: Beowulf, translated by Seamus Heaney (W W Norton + Co, NY, 2000), 213 pages, introduction + varia. Rating 10 / 10 

          I confess to a long standing fascination with the Old English epic of Beowulf, a Dark Ages warrior-hero who slays monsters and becomes warlord of the nordic Geats. As good king, Beowulf establishes a reign of (relative) peace and justice, finally, in old age, succumbing in mortal battle with a devastating dragon. Beowulf is certainly the origin of Britain's patron saint, George, the dragon slayer and the ancestor of modern avatars like Swarzenegger's "Conan, the barbarian". 

         I've read the old poem, in translation, several times, in whole or part, but Heaney's is by far the most vivacious and lyrical. He breathes new life into the old bones to the point one forgets the poem is written in what by now a foreign language and not English. 

         In Heaney's translation, the bard occasionally pauses, lifts his fingers from the harp, fixes us directly in the eyes and adds a few personal observations: the meaness of life, the value of honor - expressed as courage before the inevitability of death, or life's pathos as when an old man witnesses the execution of his son or the Geatish woman at Beowulf's funeral, madly prophesying the coming carnage as neighboring warlords reconfigure the regional power balance in the vacuum left by the great lord's passing. 

         This is a powerful text rendered in traditional Anglo-Saxon "scop": two stressed syllables per half-line, cesura, alliteration across the cesura. Vestiges of the old language's phonetics must remain alive in modern English because the poem reads more naturally, more easily than "traditional" English rhyme patterns borrowed from the Latin languages. In my own experiments in poetry writing, I instinctively adopted this pattern - loosely - before I ever head of "scop". Heaney himself admits, "Part of me.. had been writing Anglo-Saxon from the start". Readers of Gerard Manly Hopkins will recognize the rhyme scheme.

           At the beginning of the poem, Grendel, a monster who lives at the bottom of a lake or pond engages in nocturnal attacks on the mead-hall of the Danish warlord, Hrothgar, devouring his knights. Beowulf arrives and slays Grendel in hand to hand combat and then slays Grendel's mother who avenges her son's killing in more nocturnal raids. As Heaney notes, there is something viscerally "archetypal" about the poem. it speaks a truth we grasp - or intuit - through the language - or iconography - of myth, an X-rated fairy tale for adults one is tempted to say. Perhaps in the monsters and the fatal dragon of the end of the poem we encounter an avatar or projection of the society Beowulf lived in. The monsters mimic men: Grendel's mother is constrained to avenge her son's death as men are condemned to slaughter in interminable blood feuds. 

"the poet had performed, a pleasant murmur
started on the benches, stewards did the rounds
with wine in splendid jugs, and Wealtheow came to sit
in her gold crown between two good men,
uncle and nephew, each of whom
still trusted each other; and the forthright Unferth,
admired by all for his mind and courage
although under a cloud for killing his brothers
reclined near the king" (lines 1159 - 1167) 

        Indeed! "Uncle and nephew..STILL trusted each other". "..under a cloud for killing his brothers". This is the society of the blood feud, the vendetta, of honor killing. 

        Beowulf, though a mighty warrior in combat, is held in esteem for his virtue, rising above or transcending the temptations such a society offers for violence and vindictiveness: 

".. so ought a kinsman act,
instead of plotting and planning in secret
to bring people to grief, or conspiring to arrange
the death of comrades.." (lines 2166 - 2169) 

         The Heroic Code is well summed by lines 1383 - 1389:
"Beowulf, son of Ecgtheow, spoke:
'Wise sir, do not grieve. It is always better
to avenge dear ones than to indulge in mourning.
For every one of us, living in this world
means waiting for our end. Let whoever can
win glory before death. When a warrior is gone,
that will be his best and only bulwark.'" 

        The reading of Beowulf with its glorification of violence - even if in the name of justice, stimulates reflection on the meaning, or relevance, of the Heroic Code in technically advanced societies like ours. A fictional example of such a reflection is the SF novel, Beowulf's Children by Niven, Pournelle and Barnes who question or examine the role of the Hero-Warrior in advanced societies. Their adaptation is set in the 24th century on the planet Avalon, newly colonized by humans. 

        One may indeed ask if we need a new Heroic Code for the 21st century. This would be a personal heroism, not for personal glory and the "immortality" it confers but for the common good, the good of all humanity and unborn generations, even - given the state of our planetary ecology - in the service of Life itself.

        Myths often possess an internal psychological / philosophical consistency or unity. Beowulf dies childless. Why? A recognition that as an Ideal for a society founded on war, vengeance and the jockying for power of alpha males, Beowulf is simply too good to be true? Dying after the final battle with the dragon - released by human greed for the all prized gold - Beowulf laments, 

"Now is the time when I would have wanted
to bestow this armour on my own son,
had it been my fortune to have fathered an heir
and live on in his flesh.." (2729 - 2732)