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Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Avarice Masquerading as Altruism? The Protracted Struggle to Rebuild Iraq
‘It’s like a huge pot of honey that’s attracting a lot of flies’[1] – Sen. John McCain
The effort to rebuild Iraq has been riddled with problems since the US-led invasion of March 2003. Corruption on all sides, US and Iraqi government incompetence, wanton acts of destruction and terrorism, the ongoing sectarian conflict and Iraqi insurgence’s sabotage of oil pipelines and essential utilities have all ensured a protracted and irascible situation whereby the most basic of services either remain unavailable or function for only a limited duration each day. One particularly worrying example is that only one in three Iraqis has access to drinking water.[2]
Despite there being well over 100,000 contractors operating in the country,[3] not including subcontractors; progress appears to be moving at a sluggish pace while the patience of many Iraqis is waning and for most may well have been abraded into oblivion. Moreover, and to the chagrin of US officials, many Iraqis have pointed to the fact that in the aftermath of the first Gulf War, which decimated much of the country’s infrastructure; Saddam, within a matter of months, was able to restore electricity to most if not all of Iraq’s major cities and population centers.
What of the War Profiteers?
It has been well-publicized that many of those individuals who had been unrelenting advocates of the war have consequently benefited greatly in course of Iraq’s reconstruction.[4] The shenanigans of a number of individuals with ties to the White House can hardly be called news.
Prominent advocates of the war who have benefited either directly or indirectly since the invasion of 2003 include: Richard Perle, former chairman to the Defense Policy Board; Dick Cheney, the current US vice-president and former CEO to Halliburton; R. James Woolsey, former CIA Director and founding member of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq;[5] Joe Allbaugh, Bush’s 2000 campaign manager, and George P. Shultz, former Secretary of State, member of the board of directors at Bechtel and prominent member of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq. The question demands to be asked: is the mutual symbiosis between these powerful individuals’ political lobbying and business interests merely fortuitous and what is the significance of such a symbiosis for Iraq’s post-invasion reconstruction?
There seems to be a clear link between a clique of likeminded individuals in the incestuous milieu that is Washington where former government and defense officials who have since moved to the private sector have come to equate the US or even the world’s best interests with those of a relatively miniscule, albeit incredibly powerful number of corporations in the defense and homeland security industries.
This issue is very much germane to the reconstruction efforts since contracts were dispensed for the most part to firms with close ties to the Bush Administration by means of a closed bidding procedure whereby companies were simply given the bid without as much as a raised eyebrow. Some 80 percent of defense contracting revenues were allocated to a meager one percent of the biggest contractors.[6] The rebuilding of Iraq has been a monopolistic enterprise rather than a matter of the free market’s invisible hand minimizing costs while maximizing efficiency.
The market for companies such as RTI; Blackwater; Parsons; Bechtel; Halliburton, and its subsidiary Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR) has been effectively created by war; a war which influential parties associated with them staunchly advocated. In addition, they have had their competition robustly excluded from competing, while contracts operate under a cost-plus scheme, whereby all costs as well as a tidy profit are vouchsafed by the federal government all courtesy of the American taxpayer. And it is because of policies such as these that there is little incentive for contractors to do the job competently if at all.
Lack of Accountability
There is a great deal of evidence that major contractors like Bechtel have displayed astounding levels of incompetence and horror stories abound as relayed in the reports of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) and independent observers. Raw sewage flooding police departments, shoddily refurbished elevators causing hospital staff to plummet to their deaths, several poorly constructed health clinics as opposed to the original tender for 150.
Moreover, the practice of outsourcing to subcontractor upon subcontractor upon subcontractor has meant that a tender originally calling for an air conditioning unit in every school classroom can dwindle away to an $11 ceiling fan, after the primary contractor and each successive subcontractor has taken his piece of the pie.[7] It is of course the people on the ground who feel the brunt of this practice where there is little, if any accountability.
The US agency USAID which publishes Iraq Reconstruction Weekly Update: Reporting Progress and Good News has been proven by independent auditors on many occasions to either have greatly exaggerated or even fabricated whole-cloth some of the claims made in their reports.[i] Furthermore, when asked by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) auditors the US State Department couldn’t even provide a list of completed projects.[ii] And when the Development Fund of Iraq (DFI) was audited by external accountants KPMG and later Ernest & Young, hired by the UN International Advisory Monitoring Board, its December 2004 report observed that there were ‘hundreds of irregularities’ in the CPA’s contract information; a great deal of contract information was noticeably absent and many contract payments were unsupervised.[iii]
This is only the tip of the iceberg. SIGIR most recently reported that eight of 11 Parsons Corporation rebuilding projects were canceled by the US before they were even completed.[iv] Little has been done to counteract this dire trend and so it has continued unabated. Furthermore, it appears that attempts are currently being made by the President’s Council on Integrity and Efficiency to discredit SIGIR, which has caused some major embarrassments regarding the Bush Administration’s handling of Iraq’s reconstruction.[v]
The paucity of international involvement and regulation is itself highly significant and also finds its provenance in the origins and rationale governing the invasion in the first instance: unilateralism and the quest to guarantee the preponderance of unrivalled American influence in the region. Before and after the invasion, a whole host of comparisons and analogies were made claiming that Iraq’s reconstruction would be the Marshall Plan for the 21st century. Instead, it appears that the Iraqi people have been landed with the Marshall Plan’s dystopian alter-ego.
The Cost of Security
The other side of the story, according to US contractors, is that the security situation is far too volatile and violent than anyone had originally anticipated and so has greatly prolonged many reconstruction projects. For example, the US embassy was forced to cut its budget for rebuilding the water and sanitation system by more than $2 billion to pay for security and repair the damage inflicted by the insurgents and US marines.[8] Security costs often take up as much as 25 percent of the allocated budget for commissioned projects, which leaves less money for development. This is arguably a significant reason why Iraq’s electric supply is presently at about 5,000 megawatts almost five years on, barely exceeding pre-invasion levels and still massively short of the 8,000 megawatts required, even after the US has spent some $4.7 billion.[9]
Some contractors claim furthermore that the vast majority of Iraqis are unqualified to run and manage the newly-installed technologies and so are largely to blame for the fact that many of the new facilities remain defunct or poorly operated. The issue is however, more complicated.
Rather than repair existing machinery that could draw on the skills of Iraqi technicians and engineers, Coalition firms have chosen to import expensive machinery from abroad since costs are underwritten by the US federal government in any case.[10] Consequently, Iraqis who could have otherwise been working have been made redundant and left to join the ranks of the unemployed, which is at about 50 percent of those able to work.[11]
Official Iraqi Corruption
Another reason for the poor progress of reconstruction is Iraqi official corruption, which is said to be rampant. A recently leaked report argues that within the vast majority of Iraqi government ministries, the ethos is such that corruption rather than being the exception has emerged as something more akin to standard practice. The report, which reviews the work of the Commission on Public Integrity (CPI), an independent Iraqi body and other anti-corruption agencies, has concluded that the Iraqi government is replete with corrupt and shady characters who continue with impunity to indulge in illicit activities.[12]
The Ministry of Trade alone has had some 196 corruption claims made against it, and only a paltry eight cases have since made it to court.[13] Unfortunately, for the average Iraqi, many government ministries have been consumed by a culture of bribery, nepotism, cronyism and intimidation. This in turn, undermines public support for the American-backed government and consequently fuels malcontent, resulting in an insurgency whose prime objective is to drive American forces out of Iraq. As a result, reconstruction efforts are slowed even further, which itself only goes to perpetuate the Iraqi public’s legitimate anger and frustration.
[1] Lobbyist Set Sights on Money-Making Opportunities in Iraq, Thomas B. Edsall & Juliet Eilperin, The Washington Post, October 2, 2003
[2] Iraq's Water Woes, CBS News, August 3, 2007
[3] Census Counts 100,000 Contractors in Iraq, Renae Merle, The Washington Post, December 5, 2006
[4] Advocates of War Now Profit From Iraq’s Reconstruction, Walter F. Roche Jr. and Ken Silverstein, Los Angeles Times, July 14, 2004
[5] The Committee for the Liberation of Iraq was a pressure group formed at the behest of the Bush White House in 2002. Its most prominent members included Senator John McCain, Donald Rumsfeld, Eliot Cohen, William Kristol, Bernard Lewis, Newt Gingrich, Joseph Lieberman, Richard Perle, George P. Shultz, R. James Woolsey.
[6] The Profits of Escalation, Ismael Hossein-Zadeh, Counterpunch, January 10, 2007
[7] Newsweek cited in The Money Trail, Faiza Rady, Al-Ahram Weekly Online, November 13-19, 2003
[8] Cronyism and Kickbacks, Ed Harriman, London Review of Books, January 26, 2006
[9] The Iraqi Electricity Crisis, Tiare Rath, Institute for War and Peace Reporting, November 11, 2007; Iraqis Cope With Life Without Lights, IIene R. Prusher and Charles Levinson, Christian Science Monitor, February 10, 2006
[10] Cronyism and Kickbacks, Ed Harriman
[11] For more details see The Occupation: War and Resistance in Iraq, Patrick Cockburn, Verso Books, 2006, p5
[12] Secret Report: Corruption is the ‘Norm’ Within the Iraqi Government, David Corn, The Nation, August 30, 2007
[13] Ibid
[i] Iraq: Follow the Money, Joy Gordon, Le Monde Diplomatique, April 2007
[ii] Ibid
[iii] Ibid
[iv] An American Builder’s Failures in Iraq are Found to Have Been More Widespread, James Glanz, The New York Times, January 29, 2008
[v] Ibid
The effort to rebuild Iraq has been riddled with problems since the US-led invasion of March 2003. Corruption on all sides, US and Iraqi government incompetence, wanton acts of destruction and terrorism, the ongoing sectarian conflict and Iraqi insurgence’s sabotage of oil pipelines and essential utilities have all ensured a protracted and irascible situation whereby the most basic of services either remain unavailable or function for only a limited duration each day. One particularly worrying example is that only one in three Iraqis has access to drinking water.[2]
Despite there being well over 100,000 contractors operating in the country,[3] not including subcontractors; progress appears to be moving at a sluggish pace while the patience of many Iraqis is waning and for most may well have been abraded into oblivion. Moreover, and to the chagrin of US officials, many Iraqis have pointed to the fact that in the aftermath of the first Gulf War, which decimated much of the country’s infrastructure; Saddam, within a matter of months, was able to restore electricity to most if not all of Iraq’s major cities and population centers.
What of the War Profiteers?
It has been well-publicized that many of those individuals who had been unrelenting advocates of the war have consequently benefited greatly in course of Iraq’s reconstruction.[4] The shenanigans of a number of individuals with ties to the White House can hardly be called news.
Prominent advocates of the war who have benefited either directly or indirectly since the invasion of 2003 include: Richard Perle, former chairman to the Defense Policy Board; Dick Cheney, the current US vice-president and former CEO to Halliburton; R. James Woolsey, former CIA Director and founding member of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq;[5] Joe Allbaugh, Bush’s 2000 campaign manager, and George P. Shultz, former Secretary of State, member of the board of directors at Bechtel and prominent member of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq. The question demands to be asked: is the mutual symbiosis between these powerful individuals’ political lobbying and business interests merely fortuitous and what is the significance of such a symbiosis for Iraq’s post-invasion reconstruction?
There seems to be a clear link between a clique of likeminded individuals in the incestuous milieu that is Washington where former government and defense officials who have since moved to the private sector have come to equate the US or even the world’s best interests with those of a relatively miniscule, albeit incredibly powerful number of corporations in the defense and homeland security industries.
This issue is very much germane to the reconstruction efforts since contracts were dispensed for the most part to firms with close ties to the Bush Administration by means of a closed bidding procedure whereby companies were simply given the bid without as much as a raised eyebrow. Some 80 percent of defense contracting revenues were allocated to a meager one percent of the biggest contractors.[6] The rebuilding of Iraq has been a monopolistic enterprise rather than a matter of the free market’s invisible hand minimizing costs while maximizing efficiency.
The market for companies such as RTI; Blackwater; Parsons; Bechtel; Halliburton, and its subsidiary Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR) has been effectively created by war; a war which influential parties associated with them staunchly advocated. In addition, they have had their competition robustly excluded from competing, while contracts operate under a cost-plus scheme, whereby all costs as well as a tidy profit are vouchsafed by the federal government all courtesy of the American taxpayer. And it is because of policies such as these that there is little incentive for contractors to do the job competently if at all.
Lack of Accountability
There is a great deal of evidence that major contractors like Bechtel have displayed astounding levels of incompetence and horror stories abound as relayed in the reports of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) and independent observers. Raw sewage flooding police departments, shoddily refurbished elevators causing hospital staff to plummet to their deaths, several poorly constructed health clinics as opposed to the original tender for 150.
Moreover, the practice of outsourcing to subcontractor upon subcontractor upon subcontractor has meant that a tender originally calling for an air conditioning unit in every school classroom can dwindle away to an $11 ceiling fan, after the primary contractor and each successive subcontractor has taken his piece of the pie.[7] It is of course the people on the ground who feel the brunt of this practice where there is little, if any accountability.
The US agency USAID which publishes Iraq Reconstruction Weekly Update: Reporting Progress and Good News has been proven by independent auditors on many occasions to either have greatly exaggerated or even fabricated whole-cloth some of the claims made in their reports.[i] Furthermore, when asked by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) auditors the US State Department couldn’t even provide a list of completed projects.[ii] And when the Development Fund of Iraq (DFI) was audited by external accountants KPMG and later Ernest & Young, hired by the UN International Advisory Monitoring Board, its December 2004 report observed that there were ‘hundreds of irregularities’ in the CPA’s contract information; a great deal of contract information was noticeably absent and many contract payments were unsupervised.[iii]
This is only the tip of the iceberg. SIGIR most recently reported that eight of 11 Parsons Corporation rebuilding projects were canceled by the US before they were even completed.[iv] Little has been done to counteract this dire trend and so it has continued unabated. Furthermore, it appears that attempts are currently being made by the President’s Council on Integrity and Efficiency to discredit SIGIR, which has caused some major embarrassments regarding the Bush Administration’s handling of Iraq’s reconstruction.[v]
The paucity of international involvement and regulation is itself highly significant and also finds its provenance in the origins and rationale governing the invasion in the first instance: unilateralism and the quest to guarantee the preponderance of unrivalled American influence in the region. Before and after the invasion, a whole host of comparisons and analogies were made claiming that Iraq’s reconstruction would be the Marshall Plan for the 21st century. Instead, it appears that the Iraqi people have been landed with the Marshall Plan’s dystopian alter-ego.
The Cost of Security
The other side of the story, according to US contractors, is that the security situation is far too volatile and violent than anyone had originally anticipated and so has greatly prolonged many reconstruction projects. For example, the US embassy was forced to cut its budget for rebuilding the water and sanitation system by more than $2 billion to pay for security and repair the damage inflicted by the insurgents and US marines.[8] Security costs often take up as much as 25 percent of the allocated budget for commissioned projects, which leaves less money for development. This is arguably a significant reason why Iraq’s electric supply is presently at about 5,000 megawatts almost five years on, barely exceeding pre-invasion levels and still massively short of the 8,000 megawatts required, even after the US has spent some $4.7 billion.[9]
Some contractors claim furthermore that the vast majority of Iraqis are unqualified to run and manage the newly-installed technologies and so are largely to blame for the fact that many of the new facilities remain defunct or poorly operated. The issue is however, more complicated.
Rather than repair existing machinery that could draw on the skills of Iraqi technicians and engineers, Coalition firms have chosen to import expensive machinery from abroad since costs are underwritten by the US federal government in any case.[10] Consequently, Iraqis who could have otherwise been working have been made redundant and left to join the ranks of the unemployed, which is at about 50 percent of those able to work.[11]
Official Iraqi Corruption
Another reason for the poor progress of reconstruction is Iraqi official corruption, which is said to be rampant. A recently leaked report argues that within the vast majority of Iraqi government ministries, the ethos is such that corruption rather than being the exception has emerged as something more akin to standard practice. The report, which reviews the work of the Commission on Public Integrity (CPI), an independent Iraqi body and other anti-corruption agencies, has concluded that the Iraqi government is replete with corrupt and shady characters who continue with impunity to indulge in illicit activities.[12]
The Ministry of Trade alone has had some 196 corruption claims made against it, and only a paltry eight cases have since made it to court.[13] Unfortunately, for the average Iraqi, many government ministries have been consumed by a culture of bribery, nepotism, cronyism and intimidation. This in turn, undermines public support for the American-backed government and consequently fuels malcontent, resulting in an insurgency whose prime objective is to drive American forces out of Iraq. As a result, reconstruction efforts are slowed even further, which itself only goes to perpetuate the Iraqi public’s legitimate anger and frustration.
[1] Lobbyist Set Sights on Money-Making Opportunities in Iraq, Thomas B. Edsall & Juliet Eilperin, The Washington Post, October 2, 2003
[2] Iraq's Water Woes, CBS News, August 3, 2007
[3] Census Counts 100,000 Contractors in Iraq, Renae Merle, The Washington Post, December 5, 2006
[4] Advocates of War Now Profit From Iraq’s Reconstruction, Walter F. Roche Jr. and Ken Silverstein, Los Angeles Times, July 14, 2004
[5] The Committee for the Liberation of Iraq was a pressure group formed at the behest of the Bush White House in 2002. Its most prominent members included Senator John McCain, Donald Rumsfeld, Eliot Cohen, William Kristol, Bernard Lewis, Newt Gingrich, Joseph Lieberman, Richard Perle, George P. Shultz, R. James Woolsey.
[6] The Profits of Escalation, Ismael Hossein-Zadeh, Counterpunch, January 10, 2007
[7] Newsweek cited in The Money Trail, Faiza Rady, Al-Ahram Weekly Online, November 13-19, 2003
[8] Cronyism and Kickbacks, Ed Harriman, London Review of Books, January 26, 2006
[9] The Iraqi Electricity Crisis, Tiare Rath, Institute for War and Peace Reporting, November 11, 2007; Iraqis Cope With Life Without Lights, IIene R. Prusher and Charles Levinson, Christian Science Monitor, February 10, 2006
[10] Cronyism and Kickbacks, Ed Harriman
[11] For more details see The Occupation: War and Resistance in Iraq, Patrick Cockburn, Verso Books, 2006, p5
[12] Secret Report: Corruption is the ‘Norm’ Within the Iraqi Government, David Corn, The Nation, August 30, 2007
[13] Ibid
[i] Iraq: Follow the Money, Joy Gordon, Le Monde Diplomatique, April 2007
[ii] Ibid
[iii] Ibid
[iv] An American Builder’s Failures in Iraq are Found to Have Been More Widespread, James Glanz, The New York Times, January 29, 2008
[v] Ibid
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Ethical Celebrities or the Celebrity of Ethics?
Today, it seems that celebrities and a social conscience are two indissociable halves of a single package. Nowadays every celeb and his mother seems to be peddling his or her philanthropic wares. To advocate a cause is as essential as sporting the newest Vivian Westwood, Prada or Dolce & Gabbana. A veritable who’s who of the Hollywood pantheon are either affiliated with some charity or initiative intended to ‘make the world a better place’: Leonardo DiCaprio is chairman of Earth Day, Pamela Anderson is an active member of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), Bono co-founded Debt Aids Trade in Africa (DATA), and Sean Penn has been over the last couple of years on an unrelenting mission to impeach George W. Bush, while visiting and making quite a bit of noise about Iraq, Iran and Venezuela along the way.
This is but to name a few of the many showbiz luminaries who’ve decided to turn their attention to the many shades of activism and concerned citizenship. Although it’s by no means an entirely novel phenomenon, one only has to look at John Lennon’s impassioned opposition to the war in Vietnam in the 60s and Live Aid spearheaded by musician cum philanthropist Bob Geldof in 1985; celebrities fighting for the mantle of ‘do-gooder of the year’ has become commonplace and subject to massive media attention. Of course the more skeptical are quick to bring celebrities motives under the microscope. They appropriately question if altruism is really at work here, or whether philanthropy has now emerged as the latest marketing scam for enlivening a pop star’s flagging career? The thing however that really irks the skeptics is that when celebrities talk, people listen, and by no means in small numbers, but en masse.
But how did this come to pass? Do many individuals just no longer care, or are they simply bored to tears with the stale and creaking delivery of today’s politicians? The less cynical contend that perhaps only an injection of glitterati is able to bring life to the intricacies of third-world debt relief, the potential for environmental disaster and the mistakes of past and present American foreign policy. As is so often claimed, celebrities are America’s and possibly the world’s new royalty. The reverence for celebrity in Dubai is as fervent as anywhere you’re likely to come by and does not look like diminishing in the foreseeable future.
On the flip side, many allege that it’s preposterous for entertainers to be taking a leading role in the setting of the political agenda. Politicians have been accused of merely pandering to the media circus. Celebrities simply aren’t qualified to speak informatively about the issues, and the fact that many people hang on their every word with bated breath means they should act more responsibly. They are role-models after all who a great many people admire and look up to. Many lament the influence of celebrities is not commensurate with their expertise, which is almost entirely second-hand and delivered by the cronies in their employ. But at the same time one might ask, would you exclude a builder from voicing his political opinion because he doesn’t have a degree from the John F. Kennedy School of Government? Of course not.
Another and arguably more trenchant criticism of celebrity endorsement is that it detracts from the seriousness of the issues themselves, and feeds the self-styled image of ego-maniacal blowhards. In short, celebrity endorsement usually entails lashings of style and little if any substance. Although the jaded reception of what some have called the ‘rent-a-baby’ schemes of Madonna and Angelina Jolie, may well be warranted, the sustained and long-established charity work by Geldof and Bono is of a different caliber altogether. Even though unstinting praise and laudation may have to be held in reserve for the time being, it’s difficult to sully their intentions and efforts on behalf of the world’s most needy.
The Live 8 concerts held in July 2005 were for the most part regarded as a terrific success, bringing enough political pressure to bear for the G8 countries meeting a few days later at the Gleneagles Hotel to pledge to double the 2004 levels of aid given to poorer nations, from $25 billion to $50 billion by 2010. In April of 2007 only 10% of the additional aid promised has been provided by the eight member states.[1] This has led many to conclude that only a sustained political movement can ensure a cause’s longevity and maintain the momentum of ‘grand gestures’ such as the Live 8 concerts.
Skepticism regarding celebrity interventions continues. For example, Bono and the Kennedy clan’s Bobby Shriver’s initiative, Product Red, launched in January of 2006, has come in for a great deal of flak. Many have argued that the initiative fosters the fantasy that the eradication of world poverty can be achieved at a profit, and without forgoing any of our own worldly pleasures. Product Red is a brand that was established in coordination with a host of leading corporations such as American Express, Apple Inc., Microsoft and Gap in order to raise money for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Product Red’s founders have emphasized that the initiative is not a charity but ‘a commercial initiative designed to create awareness and a sustainable flow of money from the private sector into the Global Fund to fight the AIDS pandemic in Africa’.[2]
The benefits of this scheme however remain to be seen and at present it appears to be little more than a lubricant for a rampant consumerism, which on occasion suffers from pangs of conscience. Ethical buying some have argued is just a way of making us feel better about our excessive and decadent spending, since a minuscule percentage of the profits of heavily overpriced goods, goes to help poor Africans in some far away land. The fact that the AmEx board is heavily populated with former CEOs and senior staff from major pharmaceutical companies doesn’t do anything to disabuse its opponents of their hostility. [3] AmEx is not only making money as a result of the Product Red initiative since it can count itself amongst the growing number of ‘ethical’ corporations, but also reaping the benefits of the funds diverted to the Global Fund, which will then go on to buy the antiretroviral drugs the big pharmaceutical companies themselves produce. If this is in fact the case, then it’s as vicious a circle as you’re likely to come by.
These critics argue further that the attempt to marry an ethical consumerism with the mantra of profits at all costs is incapable of providing us with the solutions to poverty and disease which are currently raging across Africa, just as by the time eco-technologies and economic growth fall in sync it’ll be too late to stave of ecological catastrophe. In a nutshell, we are trying to have our cake and eat it and celebrities are merely the handmaidens of corporate greed masking itself as benevolence and largesse. They are just pawns in a much bigger game. Hard choices, sacrifices and trade-offs will need to be made sooner rather than later. The debate is ongoing and we can be sure it will continue for some time to come.
[1] G8 leaders fail to meet African aid pledge, David Blair, The Daily Telegraph, April 24th 2007
[2] Quoted in Why the new Amex card makes me see RED, Daniel Ben-Ami, Spiked-Online, September 28th 2006
[3] Shopping is Not Sharing, Richard Kim, The Nation, October 17th 2006
© Sadegh Kabeer
This is but to name a few of the many showbiz luminaries who’ve decided to turn their attention to the many shades of activism and concerned citizenship. Although it’s by no means an entirely novel phenomenon, one only has to look at John Lennon’s impassioned opposition to the war in Vietnam in the 60s and Live Aid spearheaded by musician cum philanthropist Bob Geldof in 1985; celebrities fighting for the mantle of ‘do-gooder of the year’ has become commonplace and subject to massive media attention. Of course the more skeptical are quick to bring celebrities motives under the microscope. They appropriately question if altruism is really at work here, or whether philanthropy has now emerged as the latest marketing scam for enlivening a pop star’s flagging career? The thing however that really irks the skeptics is that when celebrities talk, people listen, and by no means in small numbers, but en masse.
But how did this come to pass? Do many individuals just no longer care, or are they simply bored to tears with the stale and creaking delivery of today’s politicians? The less cynical contend that perhaps only an injection of glitterati is able to bring life to the intricacies of third-world debt relief, the potential for environmental disaster and the mistakes of past and present American foreign policy. As is so often claimed, celebrities are America’s and possibly the world’s new royalty. The reverence for celebrity in Dubai is as fervent as anywhere you’re likely to come by and does not look like diminishing in the foreseeable future.
On the flip side, many allege that it’s preposterous for entertainers to be taking a leading role in the setting of the political agenda. Politicians have been accused of merely pandering to the media circus. Celebrities simply aren’t qualified to speak informatively about the issues, and the fact that many people hang on their every word with bated breath means they should act more responsibly. They are role-models after all who a great many people admire and look up to. Many lament the influence of celebrities is not commensurate with their expertise, which is almost entirely second-hand and delivered by the cronies in their employ. But at the same time one might ask, would you exclude a builder from voicing his political opinion because he doesn’t have a degree from the John F. Kennedy School of Government? Of course not.
Another and arguably more trenchant criticism of celebrity endorsement is that it detracts from the seriousness of the issues themselves, and feeds the self-styled image of ego-maniacal blowhards. In short, celebrity endorsement usually entails lashings of style and little if any substance. Although the jaded reception of what some have called the ‘rent-a-baby’ schemes of Madonna and Angelina Jolie, may well be warranted, the sustained and long-established charity work by Geldof and Bono is of a different caliber altogether. Even though unstinting praise and laudation may have to be held in reserve for the time being, it’s difficult to sully their intentions and efforts on behalf of the world’s most needy.
The Live 8 concerts held in July 2005 were for the most part regarded as a terrific success, bringing enough political pressure to bear for the G8 countries meeting a few days later at the Gleneagles Hotel to pledge to double the 2004 levels of aid given to poorer nations, from $25 billion to $50 billion by 2010. In April of 2007 only 10% of the additional aid promised has been provided by the eight member states.[1] This has led many to conclude that only a sustained political movement can ensure a cause’s longevity and maintain the momentum of ‘grand gestures’ such as the Live 8 concerts.
Skepticism regarding celebrity interventions continues. For example, Bono and the Kennedy clan’s Bobby Shriver’s initiative, Product Red, launched in January of 2006, has come in for a great deal of flak. Many have argued that the initiative fosters the fantasy that the eradication of world poverty can be achieved at a profit, and without forgoing any of our own worldly pleasures. Product Red is a brand that was established in coordination with a host of leading corporations such as American Express, Apple Inc., Microsoft and Gap in order to raise money for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Product Red’s founders have emphasized that the initiative is not a charity but ‘a commercial initiative designed to create awareness and a sustainable flow of money from the private sector into the Global Fund to fight the AIDS pandemic in Africa’.[2]
The benefits of this scheme however remain to be seen and at present it appears to be little more than a lubricant for a rampant consumerism, which on occasion suffers from pangs of conscience. Ethical buying some have argued is just a way of making us feel better about our excessive and decadent spending, since a minuscule percentage of the profits of heavily overpriced goods, goes to help poor Africans in some far away land. The fact that the AmEx board is heavily populated with former CEOs and senior staff from major pharmaceutical companies doesn’t do anything to disabuse its opponents of their hostility. [3] AmEx is not only making money as a result of the Product Red initiative since it can count itself amongst the growing number of ‘ethical’ corporations, but also reaping the benefits of the funds diverted to the Global Fund, which will then go on to buy the antiretroviral drugs the big pharmaceutical companies themselves produce. If this is in fact the case, then it’s as vicious a circle as you’re likely to come by.
These critics argue further that the attempt to marry an ethical consumerism with the mantra of profits at all costs is incapable of providing us with the solutions to poverty and disease which are currently raging across Africa, just as by the time eco-technologies and economic growth fall in sync it’ll be too late to stave of ecological catastrophe. In a nutshell, we are trying to have our cake and eat it and celebrities are merely the handmaidens of corporate greed masking itself as benevolence and largesse. They are just pawns in a much bigger game. Hard choices, sacrifices and trade-offs will need to be made sooner rather than later. The debate is ongoing and we can be sure it will continue for some time to come.
[1] G8 leaders fail to meet African aid pledge, David Blair, The Daily Telegraph, April 24th 2007
[2] Quoted in Why the new Amex card makes me see RED, Daniel Ben-Ami, Spiked-Online, September 28th 2006
[3] Shopping is Not Sharing, Richard Kim, The Nation, October 17th 2006
© Sadegh Kabeer
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
Valentine’s Day Sham: To Hell with this Hallmark Holiday
I’m not embittered, haven’t been jilted at the altar, nor am I replete with devastating psychological scars from many a lonely February 14th sipping noodle soup underneath a tattered and homely blanket while crocheting a new outfit for Whiskers the most portly of my many cats. So why, oh why do I think that Valentine’s Day is perhaps one of the biggest scams going? I can’t help but take inspiration from Hamlet’s Ophelia who perhaps voices one of the first of many woeful literary asides mentioning Valentine’s Day, and at least according to my own rewriting of that great Shakespearean tragedy her madness and later drowning can all pretty much be flung on the doorstep of this dreadful and regrettable holiday.
The reasons for my diatribe are quite frankly that I believe in all seriousness that Valentine’s Day is a complete and utter sham masquerading as the alpha and omega of lovers' days. Rather than a day of heart-fluttering and butterflies, for many it is one of gut wrenching disappointment and the utmost dejection. Those not strong enough to resist the ineluctable desire for conformity and anonymity become pariahs even by their own evaluation. And if that wasn't bad enough the Übermenschen and Überfrauen amongst us who choose to rebel against the wave of mediocrity poised to engulf and eviscerate us at any moment, are pretty much assured marginalization and to be ostracised by society’s sheep as heartless, selfish misogynists and misanthropes respectively. Calumny and slander is what I reply to the drones that spout off the usual trite and unthinking litany!
Another one of the things that really 'grinds my gears' as Family Guy's Peter Griffin is so fond of saying, is that we've all been corralled into lauding the inane and insipid routine of sending a torrent of pre-programmed cards, which are just that. We've been lulled into forgoing any creative effort, even for those whom we supposedly claim our undying love. Valentine's Day cards are what microwave dinners are to food and culinary talent!
We need to recognise the undeniable corporate agenda which is fuelling this industry and rather than helping relationships along, it is in fact hindering them. Firstly, retailers have exhaustively commodified Valentine's Day beyond any legitimate proportions, setting up peoples' expectations by means of an onslaught of marketing gimmicks and enticing fictions. Expectations then inevitably crash back to earth when the spouse fails to live up to such inflated demands. Secondly, the myriad of bandwagon-jumping corporate bloodsuckers disseminate the delusion that you can slap a price tag on love, while at the same time generating a bountiful source of revenue in a slow financial quarter. The diamond industry was particularly ingenious in this regard, but their MO is clear for anyone who chooses to see through the web of sophisms claimed as endearing.
It’s greatly tragic that we need the likes of Hallmark to celebrate our love for our better half. How many times have you seen whether in fiction or real life one spouse, usually the guy, haphazardly throwing together out of some disingenuous sense of obligation to convention, a bunch of mangled flowers, a half melted and gooey box of chocolates, just to placate a formidable spouse, who herself only cares whether she receives something so as to goad her single friends in re-examining the overwhelming disappointments that they actually have the gall to call the vicissitudes of their lives. The near war-cry made by these Boudica-like women, 'hubby you’re in for a beating and no nookie unless you deliver the goods!', against their so-called friends is that it’s far better to be in a stale relationship than be single, lonely and destined to spinsterhood. This hasty assumption is made by that host of co-dependents (you know full-well who you are!) incapable of living fulfilling and content lives themselves. Valentine’s Day like so many other conventions in our culture is just another instance of our near congenital compulsion to ‘keep up with the Joneses'.
Many guys we can be sure make a minimum of effort so that they are rewarded in turn with favours in the bedroom, while more often than not the girls just what something to brag about and one more reason to sneer at their friends. Justifiably so, many feel marginalised as smug couple upon smug couple vie to broadcast their love, not out of a romantic sentiment but rather the desperate attempt to grab validation and approval on the battlefield for status, desirability and sex appeal.
Where are the authenticity and the heartfelt emotion? Is it all just blather or are we not supposed to strive to show and express our love and care for our better half each and every day? Are a stuffed, crushed velvet heart and a wilting bunch of red roses really a testament to those couples who experience day in and day out a deep-rooted care and affection for one another? The short answer is a resounding NO! Many a Valentine’s Day date is akin to a dress rehearsal where the main event never takes place and yet another instance where societal conventions and mores dictate when and how we are supposed to feel. If we succumb to the corporate agenda with its corporate itinerary we are destroying the remaining vestiges of spontaneity, creativity and imagination that still courses through our veins.
P.S. This was an experiment in polemic - don't believe the hype!
© Sadegh Kabeer
The reasons for my diatribe are quite frankly that I believe in all seriousness that Valentine’s Day is a complete and utter sham masquerading as the alpha and omega of lovers' days. Rather than a day of heart-fluttering and butterflies, for many it is one of gut wrenching disappointment and the utmost dejection. Those not strong enough to resist the ineluctable desire for conformity and anonymity become pariahs even by their own evaluation. And if that wasn't bad enough the Übermenschen and Überfrauen amongst us who choose to rebel against the wave of mediocrity poised to engulf and eviscerate us at any moment, are pretty much assured marginalization and to be ostracised by society’s sheep as heartless, selfish misogynists and misanthropes respectively. Calumny and slander is what I reply to the drones that spout off the usual trite and unthinking litany!
Another one of the things that really 'grinds my gears' as Family Guy's Peter Griffin is so fond of saying, is that we've all been corralled into lauding the inane and insipid routine of sending a torrent of pre-programmed cards, which are just that. We've been lulled into forgoing any creative effort, even for those whom we supposedly claim our undying love. Valentine's Day cards are what microwave dinners are to food and culinary talent!
We need to recognise the undeniable corporate agenda which is fuelling this industry and rather than helping relationships along, it is in fact hindering them. Firstly, retailers have exhaustively commodified Valentine's Day beyond any legitimate proportions, setting up peoples' expectations by means of an onslaught of marketing gimmicks and enticing fictions. Expectations then inevitably crash back to earth when the spouse fails to live up to such inflated demands. Secondly, the myriad of bandwagon-jumping corporate bloodsuckers disseminate the delusion that you can slap a price tag on love, while at the same time generating a bountiful source of revenue in a slow financial quarter. The diamond industry was particularly ingenious in this regard, but their MO is clear for anyone who chooses to see through the web of sophisms claimed as endearing.
It’s greatly tragic that we need the likes of Hallmark to celebrate our love for our better half. How many times have you seen whether in fiction or real life one spouse, usually the guy, haphazardly throwing together out of some disingenuous sense of obligation to convention, a bunch of mangled flowers, a half melted and gooey box of chocolates, just to placate a formidable spouse, who herself only cares whether she receives something so as to goad her single friends in re-examining the overwhelming disappointments that they actually have the gall to call the vicissitudes of their lives. The near war-cry made by these Boudica-like women, 'hubby you’re in for a beating and no nookie unless you deliver the goods!', against their so-called friends is that it’s far better to be in a stale relationship than be single, lonely and destined to spinsterhood. This hasty assumption is made by that host of co-dependents (you know full-well who you are!) incapable of living fulfilling and content lives themselves. Valentine’s Day like so many other conventions in our culture is just another instance of our near congenital compulsion to ‘keep up with the Joneses'.
Many guys we can be sure make a minimum of effort so that they are rewarded in turn with favours in the bedroom, while more often than not the girls just what something to brag about and one more reason to sneer at their friends. Justifiably so, many feel marginalised as smug couple upon smug couple vie to broadcast their love, not out of a romantic sentiment but rather the desperate attempt to grab validation and approval on the battlefield for status, desirability and sex appeal.
Where are the authenticity and the heartfelt emotion? Is it all just blather or are we not supposed to strive to show and express our love and care for our better half each and every day? Are a stuffed, crushed velvet heart and a wilting bunch of red roses really a testament to those couples who experience day in and day out a deep-rooted care and affection for one another? The short answer is a resounding NO! Many a Valentine’s Day date is akin to a dress rehearsal where the main event never takes place and yet another instance where societal conventions and mores dictate when and how we are supposed to feel. If we succumb to the corporate agenda with its corporate itinerary we are destroying the remaining vestiges of spontaneity, creativity and imagination that still courses through our veins.
P.S. This was an experiment in polemic - don't believe the hype!
© Sadegh Kabeer
Monday, February 4, 2008
Saturday, February 2, 2008
The Media and Violence: A Perennial Question
Do violent films promote and engender violence and violent crimes, or do they merely reflect the violence inherent in our societies? Are children and adolescents likely to be influenced by the constant parade of violent images that grace our television screens, or is this just another pretext for self-righteous and overbearing parents to curb artists’ freedom of expression? A recent study presented to the American Economic Association in New Orleans by two respected economists is sure to rouse fierce debate over coffee and at the dinner table. It contends that rather than provoking violent behaviour, violent movies in fact cause crime rates to decline. Speaking to The New York Times, Professor Dahl, a professor at the University of California, San Diego, claims on the basis of extensive research of the correlation between crime rates and exposure to violent movies that, ‘In the short run, if you take away violent movies, you’re going to increase violent crime.’[i]
This isn’t mere chatter on Professor Dahl and co-author Professor Stefano DellaVigna’s part; they have furnished their study with reams of stats in order to support their argument. For instance, the study discovered that on the weekend between the hours of 6 p.m. to 12 a.m. for every one million people watching a strongly violent film, violent crimes decreased by 1.3%, and decreased by 1.1% for every one million watching a film that was only mildly violent.[ii] Perhaps the most startling claim made in the report was that over the last ten years the viewing of violent films in the US has reduced the number of assaults by 52,000 a year! If we are to take the findings of this study seriously it means that violence in the media is not only here to stay but in fact benefits society as a whole.
The most significant reason offered by the study is that violent movies keep that group most likely to commit violent acts i.e. young men, preoccupied and busy either watching their TVs at home or in the theatres, in lieu of stalking the streets inebriated and looking for trouble. Economics ultimately underpins the basic premise of this study: if young men are watching violent acts committed on the silver screen then they must be forgoing various other activities such as drug use and alcohol consumption, which the authors contend are far more likely to engender violent and criminal behaviour. An obvious question comes to mind: why can’t people engage in both a celluloid gore fest and excessive alcohol consumption at one and the same time, and then spurred on by what they have seen commit violent acts against unsuspecting and innocent persons? Why does one necessarily preclude the other? And do the stats negate two millennia of intellectual production beginning with the ancient Greek philosopher Plato, through to Cicero the Roman philosopher and statesman and most recently, the renown French literary critic, Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, all of whom have lent great weight to the idea that humans are fundamentally mimetic beings i.e. we copy and emulate that which we encounter in experience. A massive amount of research in the cognitive and childhood developmental sciences also confirms this near primordial intuition. From such a perspective how can we discount the effect on children and adolescents of being inundated with violence in films, television and video games? Has it come to the point where we have become completely desensitized to the very real violence which we find every time we open the newspaper or watch the news?
A number of other significant objections arise to the study. Firstly, its conclusions fail to address the long term effects of continued exposure to violent images upon childhood development and mental health. Moreover, the study indicates that in the short term an increase in crime would almost certainly be a corollary of the complete cessation of violent movies in theatres, but occludes the possibility of marked benefits to society in the longer term after having weaned ourselves off our addiction to all that is gruesome and gory. This is an alternative that many concerned parents feel should be afforded greater attention by their governments and the bodies which issue film and DVD ratings. It’s also a debate that shouldn’t restrict itself to the US but needs to be seriously discussed here in the UAE. Nor can such a debate limit itself to just movies, but must also assess the effects of interactive media upon child and adolescent behaviour and social interaction. Just the other week I was taken aback by the inordinate amount of glee a friend of mine was getting from blowing off the head of an enemy soldier while he was sleeping, in the huge gaming hit of last year, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. Soon afterwards he was spoiling for a fight with the next guy who had the misfortune of saying the wrong thing or making eye contact in an untoward way. Although my observations make no claim to scientific validity, the change in him was palpable and disconcerting. A number of high profile psychological studies however corroborate my entirely quotidian observation.
A study published in 2000 by prominent figures in the field of social psychology, Professors Craig Anderson and Karen Dill, published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology concluded persuasively that ‘violent video game play was positively related to increases in aggressive behavior’.[iii] A more recent report published in 2005 by Jessica Nicoll B.A. and Dr. Kevin M. Kieffer presented at the American Psychological Association Convention similarly argued for the causal link between an increase in aggressive behaviour and the playing of violent video games. Furthermore, the study found that children who regularly play such games are more likely to challenge authority figures, be more prone to resolve conflict by means of physical altercation and perform poorly academically by comparison with their non-violent game playing peers. Video games were marked out as being even more problematic than other media because of the very interactivity that is integral to their appeal. The ability to virtually ‘experience’ the destruction of enemy after enemy makes them all the more effective in stoking the flames of aggressive drives and even delinquent behaviour in the public domain.
Finally Reuters in November of last year reported a study undertaken by psychology profs, L. Rowell Huesmann and Brad Bushman at the University of Michigan whom reviewed some 50 years of research; the former somewhat controversially in a statement claimed that: ‘Exposure to violent electronic media has a larger effect than all but one other well known threat to public health. The only effect slightly larger than the effect of media violence on aggression is that of cigarette smoking on lung cancer’.[iv] Pronouncements such as these are bound to provoke hysteria amongst some parents as a knee-jerk response is generally the norm in the aftermath such studies. Many an angst ridden mother upon hearing the news will be running to confiscate any consoles and ‘pernicious’ looking games they are able to lay their hands on! Hysteria, however, is not the way to go. Such reports must certainly give us food for thought and arouse our concern for the well-being of impressionable youngsters. An important thing to bear in mind is that video games aren’t intrinsically violent and that many can even perform a welcome educational role in children’s lives. The Nintendo DS’s growing selection of educational games is just one example. Games such as Big Brain Academy, My French Coach, and The Professor’s Brain Trainer can stimulate young minds for the better and in ways that arguably no dreary text book could ever hope to.
In the UAE for example sexual content has been suppressed or sanitized in order to accord with traditional Islamic values. Graphic and gratuitous violence on the other hand has been readily available without intervention or any censorship whatsoever. A close friend of mine thought it highly amusing that you can turn on the tube at 2 in the afternoon and find Al Pacino’s gangster flick Scarface playing with guns blazing, blood gushing and limbs flailing. It’s perhaps high time that the impact of gratuitous violence in films, television and video games on the UAE’s youth be properly examined; especially since juvenile crime has been on the rise over the last couple of years.[v]
Of course the growing number of broken homes as a result of divorce and separation, peer pressure and lack of parental involvement are amongst the chief factors contributing to an increase in juvenile crime rates. Nevertheless, the phrase ‘violence begets violence’ doesn’t simply have a literal meaning, but conveys well the worry that simulated violence can almost imperceptibly transform into the real thing. Some commentators have speculated that video games may have been partially culpable for the bloodlust of Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, the teen gunmen who shot dead 13 people at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado in April 1999.[vi] Harris even placed a modified version of the first-person shoot ‘em up Doom on his personal website, with two shooters and people as targets who couldn’t shoot back. He had in effect set up a virtual precursor to the horrific act for which he and his partner in crime have since gone down in infamy.[vii] Also back in 2005 the defence lawyers of 20-year-old Devon Moore who killed three Alabama state police also cited the Grand Theft Auto series as partially responsible for the fatal shootings. The Associated Press even reported him as saying that ‘Life is a video game. Everybody has to die sometime’. Although these are extreme examples that may well be attempts at passing the buck and abdicating personal responsibility for abhorrent crimes, they can’t simply be cast aside and must be factored into the decisions of film studios, regulatory bodies, and game developers, not regarding issues of content, but of distribution, marketing and ratings.
On another level and irrespective of the benefits to society of violent films claimed by the study with which we began our inquiry there is another blatant incentive for the studios and game developers to continue the onslaught of shockingly violent movies: the shock factor has proven itself time and again to be able to rake in serious moola. With the Saw and Hostel franchises grossing hundreds of millions of dollars there’s undoubtedly an overwhelming demand for frenzied and grotesque violence on our screens. Although we shouldn’t give in to the sanctimonious calls to police artistic freedom in the name of a public morality, here in the UAE we should perhaps take a little more seriously the very real effects of violence in the media upon the general welfare of society and above all those groups most vulnerable to its seduction.
[i] Economists Say Movie Violence Might Temper the Real Thing, Peter S. Goodman, The New York Times, January 7th 2008
[ii] Ibid
[iii] http://mentalhealth.about.com/cs/familyresources/a/vidgameviolence.htm
[iv] http://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSEIC86918020071128
[v] Juvenile Crimes on the Rise, Lina Abdul Rahman, Khaleej Times, September 23rd 2005
[vi] http://mentalhealth.about.com/cs/familyresources/a/vidgameviolence.htm
[vii] Ibid
© Sadegh Kabeer
This isn’t mere chatter on Professor Dahl and co-author Professor Stefano DellaVigna’s part; they have furnished their study with reams of stats in order to support their argument. For instance, the study discovered that on the weekend between the hours of 6 p.m. to 12 a.m. for every one million people watching a strongly violent film, violent crimes decreased by 1.3%, and decreased by 1.1% for every one million watching a film that was only mildly violent.[ii] Perhaps the most startling claim made in the report was that over the last ten years the viewing of violent films in the US has reduced the number of assaults by 52,000 a year! If we are to take the findings of this study seriously it means that violence in the media is not only here to stay but in fact benefits society as a whole.
The most significant reason offered by the study is that violent movies keep that group most likely to commit violent acts i.e. young men, preoccupied and busy either watching their TVs at home or in the theatres, in lieu of stalking the streets inebriated and looking for trouble. Economics ultimately underpins the basic premise of this study: if young men are watching violent acts committed on the silver screen then they must be forgoing various other activities such as drug use and alcohol consumption, which the authors contend are far more likely to engender violent and criminal behaviour. An obvious question comes to mind: why can’t people engage in both a celluloid gore fest and excessive alcohol consumption at one and the same time, and then spurred on by what they have seen commit violent acts against unsuspecting and innocent persons? Why does one necessarily preclude the other? And do the stats negate two millennia of intellectual production beginning with the ancient Greek philosopher Plato, through to Cicero the Roman philosopher and statesman and most recently, the renown French literary critic, Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, all of whom have lent great weight to the idea that humans are fundamentally mimetic beings i.e. we copy and emulate that which we encounter in experience. A massive amount of research in the cognitive and childhood developmental sciences also confirms this near primordial intuition. From such a perspective how can we discount the effect on children and adolescents of being inundated with violence in films, television and video games? Has it come to the point where we have become completely desensitized to the very real violence which we find every time we open the newspaper or watch the news?
A number of other significant objections arise to the study. Firstly, its conclusions fail to address the long term effects of continued exposure to violent images upon childhood development and mental health. Moreover, the study indicates that in the short term an increase in crime would almost certainly be a corollary of the complete cessation of violent movies in theatres, but occludes the possibility of marked benefits to society in the longer term after having weaned ourselves off our addiction to all that is gruesome and gory. This is an alternative that many concerned parents feel should be afforded greater attention by their governments and the bodies which issue film and DVD ratings. It’s also a debate that shouldn’t restrict itself to the US but needs to be seriously discussed here in the UAE. Nor can such a debate limit itself to just movies, but must also assess the effects of interactive media upon child and adolescent behaviour and social interaction. Just the other week I was taken aback by the inordinate amount of glee a friend of mine was getting from blowing off the head of an enemy soldier while he was sleeping, in the huge gaming hit of last year, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. Soon afterwards he was spoiling for a fight with the next guy who had the misfortune of saying the wrong thing or making eye contact in an untoward way. Although my observations make no claim to scientific validity, the change in him was palpable and disconcerting. A number of high profile psychological studies however corroborate my entirely quotidian observation.
A study published in 2000 by prominent figures in the field of social psychology, Professors Craig Anderson and Karen Dill, published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology concluded persuasively that ‘violent video game play was positively related to increases in aggressive behavior’.[iii] A more recent report published in 2005 by Jessica Nicoll B.A. and Dr. Kevin M. Kieffer presented at the American Psychological Association Convention similarly argued for the causal link between an increase in aggressive behaviour and the playing of violent video games. Furthermore, the study found that children who regularly play such games are more likely to challenge authority figures, be more prone to resolve conflict by means of physical altercation and perform poorly academically by comparison with their non-violent game playing peers. Video games were marked out as being even more problematic than other media because of the very interactivity that is integral to their appeal. The ability to virtually ‘experience’ the destruction of enemy after enemy makes them all the more effective in stoking the flames of aggressive drives and even delinquent behaviour in the public domain.
Finally Reuters in November of last year reported a study undertaken by psychology profs, L. Rowell Huesmann and Brad Bushman at the University of Michigan whom reviewed some 50 years of research; the former somewhat controversially in a statement claimed that: ‘Exposure to violent electronic media has a larger effect than all but one other well known threat to public health. The only effect slightly larger than the effect of media violence on aggression is that of cigarette smoking on lung cancer’.[iv] Pronouncements such as these are bound to provoke hysteria amongst some parents as a knee-jerk response is generally the norm in the aftermath such studies. Many an angst ridden mother upon hearing the news will be running to confiscate any consoles and ‘pernicious’ looking games they are able to lay their hands on! Hysteria, however, is not the way to go. Such reports must certainly give us food for thought and arouse our concern for the well-being of impressionable youngsters. An important thing to bear in mind is that video games aren’t intrinsically violent and that many can even perform a welcome educational role in children’s lives. The Nintendo DS’s growing selection of educational games is just one example. Games such as Big Brain Academy, My French Coach, and The Professor’s Brain Trainer can stimulate young minds for the better and in ways that arguably no dreary text book could ever hope to.
In the UAE for example sexual content has been suppressed or sanitized in order to accord with traditional Islamic values. Graphic and gratuitous violence on the other hand has been readily available without intervention or any censorship whatsoever. A close friend of mine thought it highly amusing that you can turn on the tube at 2 in the afternoon and find Al Pacino’s gangster flick Scarface playing with guns blazing, blood gushing and limbs flailing. It’s perhaps high time that the impact of gratuitous violence in films, television and video games on the UAE’s youth be properly examined; especially since juvenile crime has been on the rise over the last couple of years.[v]
Of course the growing number of broken homes as a result of divorce and separation, peer pressure and lack of parental involvement are amongst the chief factors contributing to an increase in juvenile crime rates. Nevertheless, the phrase ‘violence begets violence’ doesn’t simply have a literal meaning, but conveys well the worry that simulated violence can almost imperceptibly transform into the real thing. Some commentators have speculated that video games may have been partially culpable for the bloodlust of Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, the teen gunmen who shot dead 13 people at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado in April 1999.[vi] Harris even placed a modified version of the first-person shoot ‘em up Doom on his personal website, with two shooters and people as targets who couldn’t shoot back. He had in effect set up a virtual precursor to the horrific act for which he and his partner in crime have since gone down in infamy.[vii] Also back in 2005 the defence lawyers of 20-year-old Devon Moore who killed three Alabama state police also cited the Grand Theft Auto series as partially responsible for the fatal shootings. The Associated Press even reported him as saying that ‘Life is a video game. Everybody has to die sometime’. Although these are extreme examples that may well be attempts at passing the buck and abdicating personal responsibility for abhorrent crimes, they can’t simply be cast aside and must be factored into the decisions of film studios, regulatory bodies, and game developers, not regarding issues of content, but of distribution, marketing and ratings.
On another level and irrespective of the benefits to society of violent films claimed by the study with which we began our inquiry there is another blatant incentive for the studios and game developers to continue the onslaught of shockingly violent movies: the shock factor has proven itself time and again to be able to rake in serious moola. With the Saw and Hostel franchises grossing hundreds of millions of dollars there’s undoubtedly an overwhelming demand for frenzied and grotesque violence on our screens. Although we shouldn’t give in to the sanctimonious calls to police artistic freedom in the name of a public morality, here in the UAE we should perhaps take a little more seriously the very real effects of violence in the media upon the general welfare of society and above all those groups most vulnerable to its seduction.
[i] Economists Say Movie Violence Might Temper the Real Thing, Peter S. Goodman, The New York Times, January 7th 2008
[ii] Ibid
[iii] http://mentalhealth.about.com/cs/familyresources/a/vidgameviolence.htm
[iv] http://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSEIC86918020071128
[v] Juvenile Crimes on the Rise, Lina Abdul Rahman, Khaleej Times, September 23rd 2005
[vi] http://mentalhealth.about.com/cs/familyresources/a/vidgameviolence.htm
[vii] Ibid
© Sadegh Kabeer
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