Back when “tradition warfare” was, well, “traditional” – I stumbled across a book that tried to answer the age old “why do countries go to ‘war’ against each other.”
The researchers where approaching the question from a secular psychology perspective – but I’ll point out James 4:1-10 as kind of summarizing what the researchers found – i.e. the problem seems to be part of that ol’ “human nature” thing.
ANYWAY – this came to mind because (if memory serves – I have a copy of the book somewhere) one of the “phases” on the way to full blown “war” which the researchers identified was the depersonalization of the “other side.”
In my lifetime I can remember when the residents of the U.S.S.R. were “Godless communists intent on world domination and destroying the American way of life” – which at one point may have been true for the leaders of the Communist Party in Russia, but was almost certainly NOT true for the “average Russian citizen.”
There were “close calls” where a full blown “traditional war” could have erupted between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. – but obviously it never happened.
The “why” is beyond me – but the “how” is that the leaders of both nations were always willing to communicate with each other at some level.
In full blown 20/20 hindsight we might say that they realized that “winning” a modern nuclear war isn’t possible – but that is probably an example of the historian fallacy of seeing events as “inevitable.”
I’ve heard it argued that “Dynasty” (the 1980’s primetime soap opera) helped end the cold war. How? Well, ordinary folks in the U.S.S.R. were somehow able to watch the show – and the “conspicuous consumption” obvious in the show wasn’t what they had been told life was like in the U.S.
They didn’t see people waiting in line to buy things, or being put on a waiting list to be able to buy a car. The show was obviously not “real America” BUT then they would have seen the commercials as well – and again they saw “economic prosperity” not “capitalists oppressing the masses.”
The larger point being that they began to see “Americans” as individual people – not as a large anonymous group.
Of course in the “west” you can trace a similar change in attitudes by how “Russians” where portrayed in pop-culture.
The Bond franchise serves as a convenient example – in the “Sean Connery” Bond movies, the “Russians” are anonymous at best. Sure, the U.S.S.R. is never the villain (Spectre is always the “bad guy”). When the villains/antagonists are “eastern European” they are agents of Spectre – but “Russia” exists as an “ominous presence.”
Then in the “Roger Moore” Bond movies in the 1970’s and early 1980’s the “Russians” were “competition” but not “anonymous enemies.” The two sides were “respected opponents” – not “mortal enemies.”
Then by the time the U.S.S.R. collapsed in 1991 the “Russians” had become “co-workers” in the Bond Franchise.
In the late 1980’s and 1990’s we got Timothy Dalton (great actor, not my favorite “Bond”) and then Pierce Brosnan as Bond – and the “bad guys” were drug dealers and “extremists.”
Finally in “No Time To Die” – Daniel Craig as Bond says his Russian is “rusty” …
Extremists
SO – obvious economic, cultural, ethnic differences aside – people tend to be the same where ever you go 😉
The rule of thumb seems to be that “extremist views” are dangerous and must be censored/controlled. The question becomes “what makes someone an extremist.”
It must be pointed out that just because you don’t agree with the message, or don’t like the messenger – does not make the message “extreme.”
e.g. “I think men that button the top button – and don’t wear a tie – look silly.” Agree or disagree (I see enough guys with “top button buttoned/no tie” enough to know that some folks disagree with me) am I an extremist? obviously not.
MAYBE, the easiest way to identify an “extremist” is that they tend to address those that disagree with them as a malicious group – just like the “early phase to war”.
e.g. “I think men that button the top button – and don’t wear a tie – look silly AND they are out to destroy us all therefore they must be censored!” extremist? this time very much “yes”
(oh, and while I’m at it – belt OR suspenders NOT both, and you over there pull up your pants and tie those shoes!)
Expert Knowledge
Silly examples aside – we have run headlong into the concept of “expert knowledge.”
Merriam-Webster tell us an expert is someone with “special skill or knowledge representing mastery of a particular subject.”
Another way to put it is that an “expert” is someone that knows “more and more about less and less.”
SO while I don’t consider myself an expert on ANY subject – I get paid to talk about computers/technology. Sometimes I might appear to “know things” but that is usually an illusion – some form of this quote applies:
It is better to remain silent at the risk of being thought a fool, than to talk and remove all doubt of it.
HOWEVER – a lot of actual research has been done into the “learning process.” I tend to use the term “expert knowledge” because in the early 1990’s the concept of “expert systems” was something of a computing fad (which probably grew into “AI” and/or “computer learning” in the last few years) – but call it the “path to mastery” if you prefer.
When we first start learning about a subject we tend to over generalize as part of “knowledge processing.”
The old saying that someone “Can’t see the forest because of the trees” might be an example of the concept “amateur knowledge.”
e.g. someone first learning about “trees” might go out and look at a bunch of different types of trees in the same area and come away from the experience overwhelmed by information about individual trees.
It turns out that “experts” – as in “those that have ‘mastered’ a certain set of skills/knowledge” – tend to seamlessly go from specific to general and back again.
e.g. the “expert” showing that group of amateurs the trees also has an appreciation for how those trees interact with each other as well as the impact “the forest” has on the larger ecosystem.
Which kinda means that the “expert” sees the trees AND the forest.
Of course there is a Biblical reference – umm, I’ll just point out that those who were regarded as “experts” where quizzing Jesus on the “greatest commandment” – and Jesus summarizes the teachings of what we call the Old Testament in two sentences – which probably also illustrates that there are always more people that THINK they are “experts” on a subject than are ACTUALLY experts …
as always, don’t trust me – I am only a bear of very little brain 😉
Rules, Rules, Rules
From a organizational behavior point of view “more rules do not make people better.”
I’ve worked for a couple of places that wanted me to sign “non compete” agreements – which I was happy to sign because signing the “non compete” agreement was completely pointless.
I understand that the employer wanted to guard themselves against someone coming in and stealing “organizational intellectual property” or (more likely in the tech support arena) an employee stealing “customer support contracts” and starting their own company.
I say it was pointless both because the judicial system rarely enforces “non compete” type contracts AND because if I was the type of person that would actually do what they are afraid of – then no “contract” would stop me from doing it.
The point being that “making a bunch of rules” hoping to change the behavior of lazy/stupid/malicious employees ends up making the “good employees” less productive.
i.e. the people that are doing what the rules are supposed to stop don’t care about the rules, and the people that aren’t doing it will be burdened by having to comply with additional (pointless) rules.
SO there is probably an inverse relationship between the size of the “employee manual” and the efficiency/productivity of the organization – but that falls into the “personal observation” category
… with the obvious addendum that industries will differ and the need to comply with “regulation” is the root cause for a lot of very large employee manuals…
EVEN WORSE
Then add in that the additional rules are (usually) made because of a problem with an individual that is no longer with the organization.
This becomes my favorite example of “incompetent management 101” – i.e. they are “managing” employees that aren’t there anymore.
Hey, I’m sorry the last guy was an incompetent jerk – how about we pretend like I’m NOT an incompetent jerk – you know, just in case I’m NOT that other person that caused you problems.
Yes, that is (almost certainly) unfair – with “interpersonal relationships” of any kind, it is seldom only one sides “fault” – a Hank Williams song comes to mind – but that is a different subject 😉
$600? $10,000? does it really matter?
Those with long memories might remember Eliot Spitzer (for those that don’t there is a documentary called Client 9).
Salacious aspects aside – Mr. Spitzer reportedly got caught in part because of deposit notification rules
“They” (as in the various law enforcement entities involved) have been monitoring “large deposits” in an effort to catch “money laundering” by drug cartels and terrorists for a long time. I’m not sure HOW long, but it has been going on for awhile.
Apparently Mr Spitzer was aware of the rules in question – and so he purposefully kept his withdrawals below the $10,000 limit that was supposed to trigger notification.
It turns out that the people that work in the banking industry aren’t complete idiots – SO they had been monitoring for “suspicious activity” that someone trying to avoid setting off the automatic notification limit might use.
It wasn’t the AMOUNT of the transactions that got Mr Spitzer investigated – it was the suspicious behavior that caused the investigation.
I don’t know if it was still based on a specific limit or not – i.e. did 3 transactions of $4,000 each in the same week equal 1 transaction of $12,000? either way, it doesn’t matter.
The point is that if you are trying to catch scofflaws you need to monitor behaviors NOT specific transaction amounts.
Which PROBABLY means that any law requiring “automatic reporting” to “some gov’ment agency” is also PROBABLY pointless for “law enforcement” purposes and simply becomes gov’ment intrusion on individual liberty – i.e. another step towards “Big Brother” watching you – which might start with noble intentions but becomes the slippery slope to modern serfdom …