Why the British Today Treat Their Lunatics Worse Than In Hogarth's Day

Theodore Dalrymple, ex-prison doctor, explains that it is due to a misapplication of the writings of people like Foucault - who suggested that lunatic asylums were an expression of the medical "will to power", and of R.D. Laing - who thought that the mad were sane and vice versa.

Such ideas became a kind of official dogma in Britain. This, combined with a wish to reduce the costs of treatment, has led to a dehumanising debacle in which doctors, nurses and prison officers regularly lie and perjure themselves, refusing to deal with the truth about the mad, who are then often treated with appalling barbarity. Dalrymple refers to the gradual "erosion of common humanity," because this evil is not willed by the mostly well-meaning people who commit it, but is the result of laziness, or ambition, or daily routine.


More on Foucault and his misunderestimated insights here.

Link to Dalrymple's article:City Journal Summer 2005 In the Asylum by Theodore Dalrymple

The War on Terror and the Left

Sasha Abramsky, writing in Open Democracy, argues that the left, in opposing the war on terror on the grounds that it is being waged by the right, thus allows the right to dictate the terms on which the war is being fought (and debated). This is dangerous, he says: it is in the interests of all citizens of the open society that this war is pursued and won. It would therefore be more contructive, Abramsky continues, if the left could identify how they might win it better. He gives some specific examples:

- bring Russia's "loose nukes" under control
- reinforce protection of nuclear and chemical plants
- address problem of legal "black holes" for terror suspects.

Good to see a left wing voice saying these things.

Link to Abramsky's article in Open Democracy:Whose al-Qaida problem? Sasha Abramsky - openDemocracy

Hollywood Sex and Drug Scenes Not Politically Correct Enough, Australian Researchers Conclude

A silly study by Australian researchers into Hollywood blockbusters reveals that successful films often show people having sex without specifically featuring condoms.

Nor is the harm that can come of unprotected recreational intercourse adequately portrayed.

Drugs too, it seems, are often shown being used without dramatising the baleful effects of addiction (see The Kate Moss Situation for more insight into this).

Link to Turkish Daily News article about the survey:Turkish Daily News - 'Hollywood fails to show negative consequences of sex, drug use'

Turkey and the EU

After embarrassing, drawn-out "negotiations", the EU's foreign ministers have agreed to honour the commitments made to Turkey about accession. It is now possible that Turkey will be a full member by 2014.

The trouble is that the undertakings made by foreign ministers at EU meetings rarely have any connection with what their voters want. This was so at the time of the original undertakings and remains so now. The role of Frau Plassnik of Austria, in aiming to offer Turkey only a reduced partnership with the EU, gave voice to the concerns of the majority of European voters.

The whole subject of Turkey's accession is plagued by hoary preconceptions. Most Europeans who feel uneasy about it do so because they view Turkey as a large poor country which will have to be baled out by EU taxes. This is shortsighted: it would be true if Turkey were to join today, but by 2014, relative strengths will have changed fundamentally. Turkey has a fast growing economy. Demographically, it is a young country. The EU, by contrast, is neither; it has minimal levels of growth and is an ageing society. It desperately needs more growth and younger people.

The religious question is even more vexed: whilst Turkey is a secular society (and a fine, rare example of how that can be achieved with a Muslim population) it is overwhelmingly Muslim and in an age of Islamist terrorism this obviously worries many. The question here is whether it is really wise for the EU to become an ever-emptier Christian's club of helpless elderly people living on their pensions, trying vainly to keep out the seething masses of Muslims outside its gates. Even if that kind of exclusion were possible, it would be undesirable.

On another level, Turkey's accession to the EU will fundamentally change the political face of the EU. Using the old distinction between ever "wider" and "deeper" union, Turkey will hugely "widen" the EU, its 70 million citizens currently represent the second largest European population after Germany. This will, one assumes, render impossible the "deepening" fantasies of the older generation of Eurocrats of creating a crazed bureaucratic Moloch.

The debate about Turkey is thus also a debate about what the EU should be. The French, Germans and Austrian governments (for example) want a EU which is highly regulated, conforming to a code of EU laws and "guidelines" in every aspect of national life. The British and Dutch (for example) want a looser, less interfering union more focussed on cooperation in trade. To the first grouping, Turkey's accession presents insuperable problems. To the second, Turkey offers an opportunity to chop off some of the spare fat of the EU.

The benefits to Turkey itself aren't especially clear-cut either. On the positive side, the process of joining the EU is benefiting justice, freedom of speech, the role of women, and the elimination of torture. The EU seems to be providing a framework and some helpful impulses here. It may be that these will end up making Turkish society more pleasant for more of its citizens. Then again, if taken too far, and into less obviously meritorious areas, Turkey could end up saddled with a set of outdated regulations.

As I wrote in July, "I am delighted that the Turks are still minded to join us in our gently decaying, would-be superstate." But the devil is in the detail, and one of the details is that some countries will put Turkey's accession to the vote. If current opinion polls are to be believed, some 80% of EU citizens would not support Turkish accession. Not for the first time, the gap between the ambitions of the EU politicians and their electorates is yawning. The reason is simple: being a success on the EU stage has little or nothing to do with connecting to voters. The rejection of the draft EU constitution by voters in Holland and France (despite taxpyer-funded promotion of the document by most of the political mainstream), was a sign of this.

Normally speaking, voters don't get given the chance to speak on such weighty matters. If they did, EU politicians might show them more respect, maybe even opening up debates about the weighty matters. It would be better for all concerned if this happened with the Turkey accession debate sooner rather than later.


Telegraph News Turkey wins deal to start EU talks

Day of German Unity, 2005

A day of quiet reflection in Esens, as we remember the words which heralded the reunification of Germany, some two years after they were spoken:

""General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: - Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!

"As I looked out a moment ago from the Reichstag, that embodiment of German unity, I noticed words crudely spray-painted upon the wall, perhaps by a young Berliner: "This wall will fall. Beliefs become reality." Yes, across Europe, this wall will fall. For it cannot withstand faith; it cannot withstand truth. The wall cannot withstand freedom.

"And I would like, before I close, to say one word. I have read, and I have been questioned since I've been here about certain demonstrations against my coming. And I would like to say just one thing, and to those who demonstrate so. I wonder if they have ever asked themselves that if they should have the kind of government they apparently seek, no one would ever be able to do what they're doing again.
Thank you and God bless you all."

Ronald Reagan, Berlin, 1987. May God bless the great man's soul.

The Kate Moss Situation

Kate Moss, originally uploaded by Hero von Esens.

It seems Kate Moss is off to some drying out clinic in the States to kick the coke and booze. Good luck to her with that, even if seaminess and excess are inextricably intertwined in her image. All the companies who sacked her this week are guilty of the rankest hypocrisy and short-term thinking. I reckon Kate despises them even more now than when she first signed contracts with them.

I doubt "Clean Kate" will sell as well as "Cocaine Kate", but I suspect she's beyond such calculations now. She will have to knuckle down and suffer the infinite tedium of her fellow addicts' self-regarding, self-pitying remorse. Hard to see her in that state for long.

Compassion's Dystopia

William Easterly writes (in Foreign Policy) on how the compassion and financial generosity of citizens in rich countries rarely translates into help for the citizens of poor countries. The reasons? Overambitious goal-setting, bureaucratic overkill, and no follow-through in terms of evaluation. The solution? Not quite "Charity Begins at Home" - but aiming to do less better.

Link to Easterly's article: Foreign Policy: The Utopian Nightmare

Saatchi Gallery Ditches South Bank to Go to Chelsea

After less than three years, the Saatchi Gallery's tenancy of County Hall on the South Bank is sadly being terminated, the result of an unworkable relationship with County Hall's owner, Makota Okamoto. Charles Saatchi said that the gallery couldn't develop "in this malevolent atmosphere."

Okamoto, who sounds like a Guardian pantomime villain, has been accused not only of kicking Gavin Turk's sculpture of a sleeping homeless person, but of denying visitors access to a disabled loo.

So Charles Saatchi is calling time on the 30 year lease, despite the 3 million pounds he invested in the difficult (ex Greater London Council HQ) but interesting spaces of County Hall. The Saatchi Gallery's new home (as of 2007) will be the Duke of York's headquarters, built in 1801, on the King's Road in Chelsea. It is another location that will require the spending of millions. Whilst Chelsea is far smarter than the South Bank, it has much less visitor volume and fewer nearby tourist-traps to swell the numbers. Saatchi is sanguine: "As long as it breaks even, I'll be happy enough."

Link to Guardian article:Guardian Unlimited Arts news Saatchi blames 'malevolent' atmosphere and says sad goodbye to the South Bank

RIP: M Scott Peck

M Scott Peck, who has died aged 69, wrote "The Road Less Travelled" a spiritual growth self-help book especially popular with members of Alcoholics Anonymous. An alcoholic with problems relating to his parents and wives, Peck always saw himself as "a prophet, not a saint."
Telegraph | News | M Scott Peck

Prince Saud: Iraq's Arabian Threat

Saudi Arabia's Foreign Minister, Prince Saud al-Faisal, warns of the disaster Iraq's disintegration would mean for the region.

Prince Saud sees the prime threat not in the wish of the Kurds for self-sufficiency, but in the divisions between the Sunnis and the Shias. He does not believe Iraq is now at civil war, but he warns that the constitution and the elections alone will not suffice to unify the country. He refers to Iran's Iraqi ambitions as a major source of unrest. He underlines mutual Saudi and US objectives in the region.

Saudi Arabia renews warning over division of Iraq

Wild Boar Hunting

The wild boar season has opened and all across the Rhineland countryside hunters are beginning the cull.

Last night when we were asleep an unknown number of wild boar, flying from the guns, converged on our meadow unnoticed and, using their fearsome tusks, ripped open a hundred square metres or so of lawn. By the time I woke and saw the damage this morning, the boar were long gone.

Detremined to avoid a repetition of this porcine outrage, I shall await their return, armed with Hero Oomkens the Younger's fifteenth century tournament lance - the quintessential boar-spearing weapon.

Howard Jacobsen Flays Women's Reading Groups

Howard Jacobsen, the Birmingham-born comic novelist, was in Foyles to address an audience composed largely of the members of women-only book clubs.

"There are 50,000 reading groups going on, but nobody is reading," Jacobsen said. He was especially annoyed that reading groups don't tend to discuss comic novels.

"They don't want to laugh," he snarled. "They're at war with the world."

The women were motivated to join these groups out of "gender rage", he added thoughtfully.

The result of this female anger and failure to read comic novels? Book clubs are "adding to the world's stock of stupidity."


Link to Bookseller's full coverage of the Foyles party:theBookseller.com - Howard's end?