The courage of being an individual

Insights sometimes come from the least likely conversations and they sometimes set a clear path forward. This one seems obvious (at 1.30am), but is rarely (if ever?) mentioned in the battle against racism, sexism, homophobia, Islamaphobia, ageism...

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To be true to our liberal values - which we follow to liberate ourselves and others and live better, more enlightened lives - we seek to see the individual value and qualities of people, refrain from passing judgement based on day-to-day or historic stereotypes, and we seek to be reflective so that we judge on evidence.

This liberating gaze - which seeks to enable us to see as it really is, and not glibly crush the dreams and happiness of the other - asks much of the viewer.

However, what is the responsibility of the viewed? Doesn't she have a responsibility to be an individual? Doesn't she have a responsibility to refrain from defining herself by her group? Doesn't she have a responsiblity to be seen in all her glory; free in herself and her capacity and her personal, individual history? And if she doesn't take that responsiblity, does she renegade on her freedom of being gazed as an individual?

This "thought of the day" type post is thanks to a conversation with a young friend. He was being disparaging about some former friends. These classmates were, despite being only 13 and 14, separating themselves from the majority of the other kids and defining themselves increasingly by their religion. Whilst critical of his knee-jerk response, there was a limit that I could condemn him. When individuals aggressively define themselves by their chosen group, it may be quite appropriate to dislike that person for being too white, Muslim, gay, Christian, black, laddish, Jewish, English...

...because, it is depressingly unenlightened and damn annoying, when people fail to have the courage of being an individual and ask you to judge them on their commonness to a group, rather their uniqueness as an individual.

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If this blog post represents a reasonable thought, the implications for setting the ethical path for our better, more integrated, trusting society shifts away from just the viewer, from which we have focused all our attention, but also to the viewed. If this is nonsense, I'm sure you'll tell me.

Save the electorate

We seem to live in rather bizarre political times. There was a time when a politician could sensibly say that the polls should be read with a huge pinch of salt. Even though you knew the politician was a dedicated pollster (usually a Tory who was humbled by poor ratings), you knew the politician was basically right. Through the Thatcher years where no-one outwardly claimed to be a Tory, but then went on to give the Iron Lady the mandate, polls were an expression of the snapshot mood of a bunch of people (a large chunk who were undecided), not the electorate's opinion on parties' proposals.

Fast forward to the present and we find the polls doing a roller-coaster dance. And more amazingly the polls having the most incredible impact on politics. No longer are they swallowed with a pinch of salt, but they are changing our political terrain.

Just a few months ago I was thinking of writing a polemic of how Brown has assembled an astonishingly impressive cabinet (for example... Jacqui Smith, Home Secretary, who's greatest achievement, and this is truly a great achievement, has been to not be in the news that much; David Miliband, foreign secretary, whose penchant for debate is re-engaging our spurned global partners; Ed Balls, education, who has sought to temper the worst of New Labour's policies and extend the best and, of course, Brown himself with his unfussy politics of performance over show). But now, with a nod to tax cuts by the Tories, and a wobble by Brown, how passée that seems. And with Ming gone due to LibDem diving opinion polls, it seems that a new found respect for the opinion polls has entered politics and the media's analysis of it.

Even BBC's Newsnight has endlessly used Frank Luntz, the American pollster, to get people's mindless and incoherent views on major political speeches in real time (have you seen these votometers? wtf?). Luntz's techniques are only valid (read: popular) as our politics continues its managerialistic phase (as I've commented previously). Pollsters' craft is revered when the only difference between the left and right is who can find the policy (whether it sits traditionally on the right or the left) that will secure them another ladle of middle England votes.

In these confused times, where the electorate are nothing more than consumers of their own experiences through spin, TV and newspapers, we seem to prefer make-overs rather than principles. So suddenly Cameron does a "no hands" speech and Osborne plays the goddamn-it's-so-obvious tax card and they jump ahead in the polls, Brown plays the whole game poorly and collapses in a pile of his own sombreness. And Ming's dynasty is determined by sinking polls that go down as quickly as the public perceive his age to go up.

But is this the true story? What is going on? Who are these people who are changing their minds with such regularity? The simply truth is that polls are snapshots for a feeling about how politicians are thought about at that time... ie they are bollocks descriptions of the electorate's views. But, they are hugely powerful momentum builders or breakers for parties, with currently the Tories riding the wave and Labour and the LibDems washed up in the new democracy of constant polling.

The polls do not represent the true story. The polls do not represent the electorate, but instead infantalise the electorate and create mutual cynicism between voter and voted. Instead of trust building from the supposed communication of polls, it creates disgust at an imaginary fickle public and an actual spineless politics.

The respect given to these polls are such a poor reflection of our political times. Times that are defined by managerialist, target driven, number crunching, low input, high output, what-works policies that has swept aside big debate about how we should live and how best to get there. Even when it comes to huge issues like the environment it is all about a minor tax shifting in a shifty way. These are times that see pollsters' graphs with red, blue and yellow wobbly lines as the holy grail.

To our political and media leaders:

"Please save the electorate, please save us. Because whilst our views should define the political landscape in deep and meaningful ways, we really only need to be asked every four to five years for each set of our representatives. Forget these endless 'representative' polls and just stop asking us so much what we think, because if you sit back and look at it all we just become zombies that you increasingly have less respect for and, vice versa, because you respond to us, we have less respect for you.

If we have a really strong opinion we'll tell you. Remember February 2003? We'll tell you when you don't like things, so listen then. When you ask us endless questions, we just become performing monkeys playing to the internalised political narrative that is not of our making. We both know that this is a mockery of democratic voice.

Leave us alone, and listen."