The small island nation of Singapore is like the American TV program, The Wire. I understand that is probably one of the weirdest opening sentences to an article about philosophy and global politics, but hear me out.
Co-creator of The Wire, David Simon, once stated the reason for the show’s success was its ability to mirror every conceivable political bias of the viewership. This was enabled by the many different themes and issues exhibited throughout the show. If you are against the War on Drugs, you will see evidence of its failings. If you support it, you will see evidence it should continue. If you believe that police failings are because of cultural or economic reasons, you will see those perspectives reflected too.
In short, within the entire series, you will see nearly every modern political issue at play as understood by every ‘side’ of said issue. What remains interesting is that, as noted by Simon, the show maintains an ability to “validate” and consequently reinforce the beliefs of the viewers.
As such, the city of Baltimore continues to hold a light to America-at-large and its ongoing issues, even if it aired 21 years ago, finishing just before the election of Barack Obama in 2008. Whether it’s urban decay, corruption, or the failure of the American Dream, what we see in the show are things that existed in the 1960’s and still exist today in this post-industrial broken city.
You can follow this train of thought into the world of global politics, which is not as far away from modern media as I would like to admit. Specifically, we have seen a similar situation emerge out of the success story that is Singapore.
Singapore is like a mirror to any political persuasion that one might have, from which also can “validate” one’s own personal politics. The only real difference is that The Wire (and by extension the city of Baltimore, I say this because the city itself is largely the main character for the entire show) are used negatively, while Singapore is used positively.
If you want to see a thriving multi-ethnic, multicultural, post-colonial state, then you can look to Singapore. If you want to see somewhere that champions free-market capitalism, then you can see it there. If you want to see somewhere with a right-wing government that places a strong emphasis on law and order, not to mention the death penalty, it’s right there between Johor and the Riau Islands.
It remains fascinating to me that a tiny island, one which most people could never find on a map, has sparked such a massive debate on what they ‘see’ when they think of Singapore.
A nation with a population comparable to Lebanon or Palestine, yet more than a hundred leagues above such countries. A right-wing free-market paradise with the best public housing in the world. Those who see its publicly-funded universal healthcare system, one of the most efficient in the world, argue to the contrary. A super politically conservative nation that’s current president is an ethnic minority Muslim woman, racial success story, model minority, etc, etc.
Is Singapore perfect? Of course not. Is Singapore used to reflect general political beliefs about the world? Well, yes. Are a lot of these views correct? Yes and no.
Politically, socially, economically, a lot of different political views and philosophies are validated by the existence of Singapore. Fundamentally, Singapore and Baltimore have a comparable effect on the politically-minded.
Do people get murdered and addicted to drugs in both places? Yes. Are both places being led by an ethnic minority leader? Yes. How we view subjects often depends on the viewer itself, as much as the subject matter in play.
Despite this, Singapore has become a symbol of success whilst Baltimore has become a symbol of failure. Singapore is a model whilst Baltimore is a failure, and nobody wants to see their political beliefs reflected or “invalidated” by the latter.
What is revealing is how two completely different places are so similar, while being so completely poles apart. Everyone can infer whatever they want from either place or still be generally, albeit not exactly, correct.
In conclusion, I think that David Simon is largely correct about this idea of how we as viewers of a thing can be so vastly different, yet so widely validated by its existence. Maybe, it’s more revealing for us, as viewers, to look at places or thematic issues within the greater context of The Discourse, whether political or pop culture, and realize we can all be somewhat right, while also being largely wrong.
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A Quasi-Defence of Classical British Education
A couple of weeks ago, enough to make this piece seem dated, our Prime Minister Rishi Sunak contended that all students should be taught mathematics to the age of eighteen. As one would expect with anyone holding a convicted belief in anything these days, such remarks were held to scant regard and I suspect that like most Toryism of the modern day, that with conviction with give way to that with expedience and this policy will be dropped by the waysides at the slightest pushback in parliament.
However, the criticism that has spawned from this rare moment of genuine conviction from our prime minister is probably far more interesting than his own aspirations of what would have manifest.
As a sidenote, I expect that should this compulsory maths to 18 intention go through, what will likely happen is that the ever-beleaguered adolescent must now come to grips with the ire of all office workers: Microsoft Excel, only too early for their time. It is infeasible in the least that people who struggled to get a 4 in their foundation papers for GCSE maths could go on to study integrals. Maths is unlike other subjects in that one must have a command of the knowledge foundational to the next level, it is not a matter like in history, of switching periods or method of analysis to an area you may find more interesting. There are limits for everyone be it in wit or will. I, much like everyone else reading this article, is likely aware of our own maths limitations, it’s all too human.
But the furore about what should be taught instead of maths, or anything else for that matter, is as I’ve already said far more interesting. Of course, the first conviction of the modern vision of education, a cookie-cutter idea of turning an innocent child into the taxpaying office worker to satisfy the top-heavy pension-state is very tempting. In a world of material, the person is personified by their work, after all. Teach people about taxes! Teach them about compound interest! Teach them how to start their own businesses! Teach them about how to tie their shoes! Et cetera, et cetera.
For someone however who normally takes a very technical view towards things, I’d like to take a moment to defend the British style of education in which people choose their A Levels and focus on honing their skills in a certain area, be it in humanities or technology, as opposed to being taught what the education cynics would prefer people learnt, which is essentially accounting 101 or what the cabinet desire, learn all the maths possible until your brain turns into C++ code.
In the first place, can we please clear up the idea that education is only, or even primarily about getting people ready for work? If you are leaving school at eighteen (good choice by the way) your job is likely going to have nothing to do with what you studied, nor has it ever been like this. The two original skills we most valued in school, maths and English, were primarily about getting people up and ready to learn information by themselves. Economists do not use a “can do their own taxes” rate when measuring educational development, they measure either literacy or time in school. Most people do not learn about their own job, or about their hobby because they were taught in school. For the degree educated among us and who retain passion for their subject, how much do you really owe your subject knowledge to the university instruction and how much to your own passion and research?
Education is, no matter how wearily and poorly it does it these days, a matter of getting people to learn things for themselves and maintain some level of function in society. Before the SNP took charge of Scotland, most state schools still taught Latin and Scotland retained a reputation as one of the premier education systems of the world (that has been dashed, you may finger point at whodunnit somewhere else). No, I’m not saying Latin is what makes a good education, but I don’t think it’s useless either if people are willing to learn it and be passionate about it.
I’m not going to pretend that a society in which everyone is a “critical thinker”, or “free thinking” Twitter user is either realistic or good. The reality is that humans are by and large not critical thinkers. But I think there is something to be said of the idea that education is not about doing your taxes (have these people never heard of PAYE?) but about rounding yourself out cognitively and figuring out who you are amongst peers.
Some of the greatest in British history studied what many would consider ‘useless’ in modern standards. The traditional British education was to go to Oxford or Cambridge and study classics or the law, after which one could study whatever one wanted, or indeed get a premium job in the civil service. All this was during the period of time in which British innovation was the envy of the world. I struggle to see how if more children were taught the properties of triangles during the 1840’s how the Industrial Revolution could have been anymore revolutionary.
I think the likely final avenue here of discussion is the frequently cited immense rise of Asian cognition in the economic space and the pre-eminence of the Chinese and Japanese companies and workers in the tech sphere. To be frank I do not think either that the rising ability of these nations need pose any threat to us in this country unless we decide it does. Liz Truss reportedly after a visit to China thought we all needed to study more maths and I’ll admit, the Chinese mathematics curriculum is terrifying. Calculus in many parts of China is taught as young as twelve, but that alone need not merit fear from anyone. Firstly, China’s economic coming dominance is vastly overstated by their own figures, but more importantly an economy isn’t just data scientists and modellers. Have people ever stopped to think that maybe too many mathematicians is also a bad thing? The most fundamental feature of all economies, the ability to produce food and water, is almost never going to feature maths beyond that which we use in Excel. Nor for that matter do most electricians, plumbers, journalists, chefs, manufacturers, technicians or even IT workers need to know how to find an eigenvector.
Our other example, Japan, is perhaps an even more damning verdict of teaching a high number of students to eighteen mathematics than the former. Japan is a great country and I have little bad to say about them as a culture, but their economy has not been saved by maths being taught to eighteen. If you think the UK productivity figures are bad than Japan’s are lamentable. Japan lags the rest of the west in productivity despite a highly technical education. In spite of this 85% of Japanese Students will take maths to eighteen with math PISA scores that dominate the free world.
It is hard to assess the economic impact, let alone geopolitical impact of teaching everyone maths. But I’m comfortable in saying that if China or Japan are our examples of high-level STEM education, I’m not going to tie myself in knots. Britain’s productivity issue probably lies elsewhere.
I’m not attempting to be biased here, I myself have studied two different STEM subjects at higher education, but for me it seems expertise and skill is unlikely to be unearthed by your schooling. In my view then, don’t make the poor children study maths or accounting; adolescence is a strain unto itself. Let people pick their own interests, and the chips fall where they may.
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Manufactured Consent: The Growth of the Republican Movement in Australia
At the start of June we at The Mallard along with millions of others across the globe celebrated the Platinum Jubilee of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. In the UK especially there was a great show of affection from the people to the Queen, with tens of thousands flocking to The Mall to witness the various parades of the guard, the cavalry, and communities from Britain and the commonwealth celebrating 70 years of Elizabeth II’s reign. For many within conservative circles, the amount of people who showed up seemed to be a clear indicator that the Republican movement in Britain is dead in the water, and far less influential than many smug liberals like to think it is.
Despite a tough couple of years for the Royal Family between the media crucifixion from the Megan Markle debacle and the loss of Prince Philip last year, not to mention the decades of having to adapt to a rapidly changing world, it is clear from the Platinum Jubilee celebration that the monarchy is here to stay, and I for one am happy to see that is the case.
However, the monarchy doesn’t just represent the people of Britain – it is an institution that is supposed to represent the larger commonwealth.
For Australia, in the aftermath of the recent Federal election and the victory of Anthony Albanese and the Labor government, new questions have arisen about the future of the monarchy in Australia.
Albanese’s appointment of Matt Thistlethwaite as the assistant minister for the republic has raised the issue of Australia’s position in becoming a fully independent republic, removing a British monarch as the head of state for a President-type figurehead for the Australian nation.
Of course, this role of “Assistant Minister for the Republic” is an indicator that the current government wants to transition into the “progressive” future of denying Australia’s cultural and historical ties with its mother nation in Europe, and embracing the Asia and America-centric world. Stripping the old oak timber foundations for the steel-beams and glass-panels of the New World Order.
Unfortunately this is nothing new. For decades the Australian government and politicians, both Labor and troublingly Liberal, have exercised their power in order to do away with any formal legal ties to Britain, from the Australia Act 1986, to the Referendum in 1999.
In the case of the 1986 Australia Act, while it may have been seen as a new chapter for Australian sovereignty and control over its own laws instead of being subjected to the whims of a British parliament – it was largely symbolic as Australia had been exercising sovereignty over its own country since its federation in 1901.
As for the 1999 Referendum, while the media and political class, as well as the metropolitan urbanites in Australian cities overwhelmingly backed the transition towards an Australian Republic, the “Yes” vote failed due to the overwhelmingly popular support that the monarchy had in rural and semi-rural areas.
Looking at the map of the vote, it’s clear to see that it would have been a disastrous imbalance for urban hubs to decide the entire fate of the country in relation to the monarchy and having the Queen as head of state.
While past attempts to make Australia a republic failed, that was a vastly different Australia, almost foreign to the one that exists today.
With the massive demographic shifts that have occured in Australian population hubs, both in terms of the sheer scale of the population and the ethnic make-up of these urban areas, the cultural ties that once existed with Britain and the monarchy are growing weaker. This hasn’t been by choice, but rather by effective action by both the government, education, and media to out-populate loyalists of tradition and those with ties to Britain, and guilt-trip any association with the colonial past and the great achievements of Britons in Australia.
In the last 20 years, Australia’s urban demographic has shifted considerably. Particularly due to the influx of immigrants from China and India, and Asia in general. While the majority of the population are still descendants of European immigrants, in urban constituencies the large swathes of non-European immigration have become a point of contention for many issues – most importantly integration into Australian culture. Anyone who has been to Box Hill in Melbourne can attest to the fact that this once very Australian suburb is now just a mini-Beijing.
These sub-communities exist across Australia, focused in the cities, where the votes count most crucially come election time. While some may discount this statement as blatant bigotry or intolerance, it is interesting to note that in the most recent federal election, the traditionally Labor seat of Fowler was won by the independent incumbent, Dai Le, with the constituencies large Asian population playing a huge role in her success.
Trends exist for a reason, and if immigrants or second/third-generation Australians are more likely to vote for candidates that look like them rather than one of the traditional parties, as horrible as they are, what is to say that these same demographics of people feel absolutely no cultural or historical ties with the monarchy and what it represents?
With more and more “New Australians”, what protects the wills and the interests of those who have had family here going back to the First Fleet?
The demographic change is just one issue – the other issue is the shaming of British achievements in Australia, and the constant bleeding-heart antics of politicians and the media to try and make a show of how “sorry” they are because of their ancestors success in building one of the modern world’s most impressive nations.
From Kevin Rudd’s national apology to the Aborigines (aka traditional land-owners) to the consistent vandalization of anything commemorating Captain Cook, and the cringe-inducing rants of “Abolish Australia Day” that is heard around campuses and TV panelists every year in January, the latest generations of Australians, “new” or old, have been taught to hate themselves, hate those who came before them, not see their country as their own but rather that they are trespassers, and that they should do everything in their power to disassemble the “racist past” and “build the Australia for all!”.
It’s become so ridiculous that you have every other person claiming Aboriginal ancestry in the style of Elizabeth Warren, in order to distance themselves from the “evil British settlers” – insufferably referring to Melbourne as “Naarm” or Sydney as “Ku-Ring-Gai” showing the rest of us how “in touch” they are with the land.
While these sentiments may come from a good place, the truth or the matter is that if “Australia is for all” it is really for no one. It is simply just another landmass with a smorgasbord population of random groups who have no ties to each other, no ties to a greater ideal or tradition, and no real unique identity.
Just another “progressive” nation, that progresses nothing other than endless consumption and existence for existence’s sake.
Frankly, if Australia was to have another referendum on the monarchy question I’m not confident that we’d get the same result as we did in 1999 with a rejection of such a blatantly anti-traditional notion. The country has changed too much, too fast, and too little has been done to oppose this in government or on the streets.
I don’t trust the same Australian politicians who overwhelmingly supported lockdowns and imprisonments for dissenters as people capable enough, or morally sound enough to be given the reins of full independence. But, if things continue the way they do, and if Albanese moves in the direction he’s indicated – there will be no stopping these sycophants from cutting the final ties of Australia to its kin on the other side of the globe, and enter the brave new world of Asia-Pacific “progressivism”.
The truth is simple; the Republican movement in Australia isn’t just anti-monarchy or anti-British – it’s anti-Australian.
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Faux-Utilitarianism: The Arm of Power
In a post-Enlightenment society, particularly since Jeremey Bentham and J.S. Mill, the ethical culture of our politics, institutions, and society in general, has been captured by utilitarianism. For clarification, when I say ‘utilitarianism’, I am defining it in the broadest application of the word, meaning that the common goal of increasing the ‘good’ or ‘happiness’ of as many people as possible is what fuels our ethical decision making. It is important to say, if I may, that it is not the aim of this article to either prove or disprove utilitarianism. Instead, I wish to explore the degeneration of utilitarianism into what I call ‘faux-utilitarianism’, which now has such a tyrannical grip over the politics of this country that many are not even aware of its presence – we accept it, just as we accept that the sky is blue.
The processes of public policy research and implementation in this country are dominated by utilitarian motivations. Our political slogans from across the political spectrum – such as Jeremy Corbyn’s ‘For the Many Not the Few’, the Green’s ‘For the Common Good’, or UKIP’s ‘Empowering the People’ – are ripe with utilitarian undertones of a majority-rule common good. Of course, in large part this is due to the nature of democratic elections. In order to receive the majority vote, you need to make the majority of people content. Modern liberal democracy is, almost by its very nature, utilitarian. Within the Civil Service, policies are researched and advised upon through the lens of utilitarianism, in the hope of addressing issues or implementing policies that might increase the common societal good.
On the surface, this might all sound fine and well. After all, why wouldn’t we want to increase the common good of society, making decisions that will benefit majorities? The more people well-off and happier people are, the better, right? But it is at this point within the political discourse that the curious beast of faux-utilitarianism rears its ugly head. When a political culture is ruled by faux-utilitarianism, we focus so much on the theories and rhetoric of increasing the common-good that we actually lose sight of the effects of its practical implementation.
A perfect example of this is the political discourse (or lack thereof) surrounding the National Health Service. Whenever the NHS is mentioned, its utilitarian triumphs are praised to high heaven: it has increased the overall standard of health, giving the majority free access to healthcare and medicine, and so on. As MP West Streeting has very recently discovered, to have even the slightest nuance that, even on an extremely surface level, challenges the utilitarian interpretation of the NHS is to write your own political suicide note. Even if what you are saying is true or will improve things, that does not matter, as it is the utilitarian rhetoric that matters more than the utilitarian outcome. To question the NHS, even in the slightest, as an infallible arm of utilitarian ethics is a dangerous heresy, worthy of the wrath of our Eternal Health Leader, Nye Bevan.
But a spectre is haunting Britain – the spectre of NHS skepticism. Of course most people, myself included, are not suggesting the abolition of free healthcare. But if you look around, you will see and hear deflating groans of dissatisfaction towards the NHS – and they have always been there. During Tony Blair’s time in office, it was people moaning about getting GP appointments too quickly; nowadays it is people moaning about getting them too late. Yet, the political solution to these opposing things is always the exact same: the Government needs an even greater increase of power and money in order to truly establish the utilitarian aim of our social institutions. In faux-utilitarianism, it is no longer the common good as an outcome that matters, but rather the grasping of the political levers by which the “common good” can be controlled.
We see this grasping of the faux-utilitarian levers as clear as day in the recent news surrounding strike action. Apart from workforces such as train drivers or nurses, industrial (if we can really call it ‘industrial’) action has extended itself from the traditional working-class to the middle classes. Only a couple of days ago, it was announced that Civil Service Fast Stream graduates (earning £28k a year fresh out of university) were moving towards strike action, and the last few years have also been plagued with lecturers and professors striking. This is not to say these jobs are perfect and require no change, but it reveals something very interesting about the faux-utilitarian political system. In the faux-utilitarian narrative, all we ever hear about is talk of increasing equality, yet this exact same society has produced a political framework within which well-to-do bureaucratic servants and academics can strike, and receive establishment sympathy for it. But there is no chance for a minimum wage fast-food worker scolding his hands on hot grills of doing the same.
So, how is this justified? This strike action is justified by utilitarian rhetoric. They tell us they are not striking for themselves, but for the future of education, students, graduates, patients, taxpayers, and/or broader society as a whole. A McDonald’s worker, for example, cannot wield the weapon that is utilitarian rhetoric. For it is extremely difficult to make a sound utilitarian defence of McDonald’s (believe me, I used to work there). The moral justification of strike actions, particularly outside of traditionally working-class manual labour sectors, is no longer based upon relative or comparative conditions, or even social class, but rather by a utilitarian checklist that is justified by the mere political administration of these sectors/institutions. It is not a nod towards or battle for truth/justice, but rather a self-justification that is designed to fit within the approved framework of faux-utilitarianism in order to justify their own actions. To be valid, you must be able to prove your utilitarian worth, even if there is no proof of a positive contribution to the majority of society. Without this utilitarian worth, your pay, social class, conditions, hours, or discontent, do not really matter.
But here is the real kicker: it does not matter whether the claims of wielding utilitarian, common-good value are actually true. All that really matters is being able to control the utilitarian narrative, and faux-utilitarianism is precisely this. It is the domination of political discourse and social life through a utilitarian philosophy, but with no interest as to whether we are objectively witnessing utilitarian outcomes. All things politically permissible by the current system are justified by talk of the common-good, yet very little attention is actually paid to whether this common-good is manifesting itself in wider society. What is being defended in modern political discourse is not really utilitarianism, but rather a utilitarian rhetoric that preserves the status-quo of modern liberal politics, that reactionarily allows it to preserve itself against all criticism or change. So long as it can frame the opposing argument as being un-utilitarian, regardless of the proof in regard to policy outcome, no further justification is needed. And we swallow this en-masse daily.
