Sex for Sale

Sex for Sale

Many of our existing prostitution laws are "outdated, confusing and ineffective," says Home Secretary David Blunkett. I’m inclined to agree with him, and am pleased to hear that there is going to be a long overdue and badly needed review of prostitution laws. During this review there will be a number of options discussed: such as the decriminalisation of brothels and the creation of tolerance zones for street prostitution in non-residential areas and away from the general public. I hope at least one of these options is realised – preferably the former. After all, it is quite ridiculous that in the year 2004 government is still dictating that sex under certain conditions between consenting adults is taboo.

Each member of the adult population should be free to do as he or she wishes insofar as his actions do not adversely affect a non-consenting party (but even then there may be exceptions to this general rule). What two or more consenting adults do in private should be of no concern to government, and they should be free to negotiate such private relationships as they see fit. If a man or a woman is willing to pay someone to have sex with them, and another man or woman consents to receive that payment in return for sex, then far be it from anyone else to seek to legislate against them so doing. People buy and exchange goods and services all the time, why should sexual services be any different?

When a poor man sells his TV in order to make it through a particularly difficult time we don’t tend to think he is being exploited. When a woman works a 2nd job in he evening or at weekends providing some service for a business so as to make ends meet, we don’t tend to think of her as being exploited either. However, if a man or a woman receives money in return for sex there is a chorus of denunciation and a plethora of lamentation about exploitation, particularly when women are involved. And yet, there is little difference between the cases mentioned above. It is surely up to the person in question how they earn their money. When we regard one form of earning money as exploitation and another as a legitimate means of gain we demonstrate nothing other than the age-old hang-up with sex and everything sex related.

Prostitution is frequently blasted on the grounds that it exploits women. However, if a woman is well treated and well paid in such a job why should we speak of exploitation? Many prostitutes make middle-class earnings and more, but unfortunately too many people seem to have the stereotype prostitute in their minds: an abused single mother, in the hands of a controlling pimp, trying to feed her hungry children and her heroin addiction. The truth is many prostitutes make good money, have good lives, and actually enjoy their profession. Aren’t 18-year-old secretaries working long hours for low pay for abrupt and disrespectful bosses far better candidates for "Exploited Worker of the Month" award than many prostitutes working few hours for good money in good conditions? I’ve never heard much by way of petition on behalf of overworked and underpaid secretaries. The charge of exploitation is, I fear, but a smoke screen for the real problem: we just don’t want people having sex in ways we find morally repugnant.

Of course, not all prostitutes have good pay, hours and conditions. Many do indeed work in appalling conditions and often find themselves working to feed a drug habit. But, this in itself is not good enough reason to justify the outlawing of prostitution. Years ago coal miners also worked in appalling conditions, but the response was not to outlaw the fossil fuel industry. The proper response is to improve the conditions. Moreover, that people live as prostitutes to feed a drug habit is no more reason to outlaw prostitution than the fact of many other people working as librarians, receptionists, or machine-operators to feed a drug habit justifies the outlawing of those jobs.

We should go even further than this and say that even if it were true that exploitation is the norm in the sex industry, we would still not have established the need to keep prostitution illegal. In any industry, and in most matters of employment, what is required is more careful monitoring and transparency. We should seek to reduce the amount of exploitation, not ban the industry in which it has occurred. In fact, it is fairly obvious that much of the exploitation occurs precisely because the industry is illegal. There are no controls, no security, and little legal or protection. The inevitable happens: the industry disappears underground and continues in a much more insidious form.

When all is said and done the concept of morality needs to be separated from the concept of legality. What we think is immoral is not necessarily what should be made illegal. Law should not control matters of private morality. Along with homosexuality, one-night-stands, and masturbation, prostitution is a matter of private sexual morality. It may indeed be immoral. It may even be dangerous. But, it should not be made illegal on this basis. The question of government interference should only be raised when something of necessity concerns or adversely affects someone else, an unconsenting party. Until such time as this is the case, private matters between consenting adults should not be bound by law.

Stephen Graham B.Th (Hons)

Gender Gospels

The Gospel According to Modern Man

It’s a man’s world, or so we’re told. The fight for equality is a war waged for women against the paternalist hoards. Entire institutions and societal systems are male orientated, apparently, against which women fight an uphill battle. This is the gospel according to St Feminist.

If this were religion (which I suppose it is to a great many people) then it would be condemned as heresy. Feminism has done a remarkable job of getting its gospel accepted as truth, and as common knowledge. Whilst there is truth in the feminist narrative, it is only a partial one. The fact of the matter is that men suffer from gross inequality and discrimination in a great many ways also. This story needs to be told, and thus I begin: The Gospel According to Modern Man.

Today there is an increasing recognition that fathers are not as disposable from the lives of their children as we had been made to believe. But, despite this there remains within our family court system a well-documented inherent bias towards women and against men. The presence of Mum is still viewed as essential, Dad’s just an optional extra, admitted or refused entrance to the life of the child as the woman sees fit, regardless of what a court order might say. In over 90% of divorce cases children end up with their mother. In many of these cases fathers are either unfairly denied proper access to their children by a court ruling, or kept at bay by the mother, who knows full well that rarely is an effort made to enforce a court order granting the father a certain level of access.

Look also at our criminal justice system. The prison population is overwhelmingly male dominated. Of course, it will be claimed that this is simply because far more crimes are committed by men. However, if the statistics ran the opposite way you could bet your ass that every feminist in the country would be up in arms lamenting some gross societal inequality that forced a disproportionate number of women into leading lives of crime. But, when it’s men committing crime and going to prison that’s because men just aren’t so highly evolved and sophisticated as women. We’re just primitive brutes. Moreover, if a woman has a child it will be taken into account in sentencing a woman for some crime, but rarely in the case of a man with a child. This is one of many factors that lead to the situation in which men are more likely to suffer more severe punishments for equal crimes than women. In the USA, for instance, a man is far more likely to be sentenced to death for a capital crime than a woman is.

Through such systems men are told that their lives are disposable. They don’t count for much, and this message is enforced in other ways. When a disaster story is reported on the news, journalists are at pains to tell us the number of women and children who were killed, as if the disaster wouldn’t have been so bad if only adult men suffered and died. Or, next time you go to watch an action movie at the cinema count the number of men slaughtered on screen compared to the number of women. Men are regular cannon fodder in a way women never are. When women are killed on screen it is normally in the context of a horror film: the horror being a woman killed by a mass murder. But, it isn’t so horrible to see a man killed. Perhaps this is also part of the reason for the "women and children" first mentality if a ship is sinking. It’s OK, or better, for a man to die – not for a woman. That’s a message that most men get loud and clear.

One area where feminists have been most vocal is that of employment. We are often given statistic after statistic showing how more men are senior managers or directors or CEO’s than women, as if bare statistics in and of themselves prove that there is some kind of inherent, systemic, discrimination at work. However, there is a very valid reason why women are disproportionately represented in top posts such as these. Most women aged 20-35 will have periods away from work to start a family. Unfortunately this is also the time during which a person builds a career. If a director must choose between 2 employees for a promotion – a man and a women – and the woman has been off work for 4 years in the past 6 because of pregnancies and maternal leave – it is quite likely that the man will get the job. Although this is often presumed to be discrimination, it is not discrimination at all. The woman made a choice to leave work for several years to have children. Julie Mellor, Chairwoman of the Equal Opportunities Commission, complained that, "There have been talented women coming up in business, public life and politics for years. But women are still often prevented from getting to the top because they take on more caring responsibilities than men." Prevented by whom exactly? By men? By their employers? If a woman chooses to take on more caring responsibilities than men then they are prevented from reaching top posts by virtue of their own choices – not by anything external to themselves. Sahar Hashemi, co-founder of the Coffee Republic chain says, quite correctly, that: "Women can make it to the top if they want to. The barriers are down. A lot walk away because they want to live and work differently."

Unfortunately women must realise what men have always known: you cannot have your cake and eat it. You either devote most of your time to work or to your family and children. Men don’t have it both way, why should women? For years men have lost out when it comes to their kids because they have been working and building a career. If women want to work and build a career then they need to bite the bullet and accept that they cannot do this and raise a family at the same time. There just isn’t enough of them to go around. In fact, a survey conducted by Maternity Alliance found that 99% of 2000 mothers questioned would rather not return to work after starting a family. One-third said they would perhaps return to work part-time, but two-thirds said they would rather be at home.

It seems also that men are not blessed by law in the way women are blessed when it comes to parental leave and pay. Women have the choice of taking up to year off to look after children. Men have no such choice. A single father will struggle much more than a single mother ever will, simply because the woman will have greater rights to maternity leave and pay.

In any event, feminists only tend to speak of high-rank large salary jobs. When was the last time you saw a female refuse-collector? And when was the last time you ever heard a feminist complain about that and lobby local government offices to have this inequality over-turned? Exactly – never. Feminists are only interested in inequality in the cushy jobs. Leave the street sweeping and garbage collecting to the men. After all, don’t girls do much better at school than boys? Yes, they do. If men do better at something then, says the Gospel According to St Feminist, there is some inherent institutional discrimination at work causing this gross inequality. When women do better then it’s simply because they are better, more intelligent, sophisticated, and hard-working.

So…men are disposable from the lives of their children…they can be dealt with more harshly than women in matters of criminal justice…they lose out to women in employment through the use of positive discrimination (although it’s never put in those terms)…when they do worse in school it’s just because their female classmates are better…and when they lose their lives, it’s not really so bad.

Is it any wonder why today’s young men are so disillusion with life, and feel so incredibly worthless and useless that they kill themselves at an alarming rate?

Stephen Graham B.Th (hons)

Winning and Losing

It’s Not the Taking Part That Matters – It’s the Losing

Picture the scene. A balding middle-aged man lies on a psychiatrists couch; his head beaded with sweat, his tie hanging loose to one side, his eyes welling up with huge teardrops, and pain etched across his face as his politically correct shrink finally discovers his most life-defining moment: coming third, or dare I say losing, the egg-and-spoon race in primary school. If only his school had adopted the policy that so many others are going for – the dropping of competitive sports and games, to be replaced with "gold medals for all" events – he may have moved through life a lesser scarred soul than he now is.

Or, alternatively, does anyone else think the PC hoards are, once again, as usual, on a trip to Bizarro World? Our little kiddies must be protected from swallowing the bitter pill of losing, thus also denied the pleasure of winning, since winning is a vacuous concept unless there is a loser.

I actually consider the denying of defeat and success to children as a form of child abuse, in the name of protecting children. It is imperative that children learn the importance of as well as the difference between winning and losing, of succeeding and failing. It is also good that they come to realise that the former – winning, or success – is much more preferable to the latter – losing, or failing. God help any child that doesn’t understand this. He or she may as well not know that 1+1=2. They will leave school wholly unprepared for facing the world that smacks them straight in the face the minute they saunter out the school gates for the last time. The world does not reward losers, it doesn’t care why losers are losers and it doesn’t award medals for taking part.

Regrettably, few in our "equal awards for all" culture take notice of this harsh reality. Instead, the orthodox view is that we must all be protected from failure, even if the cost of doing so effectively erases any content from the notion of success.

This spirit of anti-competition has even begun to possess our universities. Undergraduates at Cambridge have been campaigning for an end to the public posting of examination results, lest students be exposed to undue stress and embarrassment for flunking a course.

The fact of the matter is, however, that competition encourages people to better themselves. It provides motivation and drive in the pursuit of a certain end. Whatever our position is regarding the extent to which intelligence or physical ability is innate, there can be no dispute that such characteristics and abilities can best flourish in a climate of competition. And it is natural and healthy for children to desire to be the best at everything, and thus to compete with each other. Competition can actually be good-natured, as long as the significance of winning and losing is kept in proper perspective. When I play snooker with my friends I want to win. In fact, I want to score as many points as possible, and greatly hope that my friends’ score as little as possible – nothing would be good. However, I also don’t mind losing, because losing a couple of frames of snooker isn't terribly significant. Kids too can learn the significance of winning and losing in a variety of contexts.

There is a popular half-truth that is trumpeted as gospel: "It’s not the winning that matters, it’s the taking part." Rubbish! Every child instinctively knows that this is utter codswallop. True, taking part matters and is usually fun, exciting, and challenging. But, seriously, winning doesn’t matter? Almost every human being since primitive man first hauled himself upright and went in pursuit of wild animals knows that winning matters, and matters a great deal.

We may never say it out loud but we all realise that in our mercilessly unforgiving world it is much better to be smart than stupid, attractive than ugly, strong than weak, successful than a failure. Ever heard of a child who when asked what he or she wants to be when they grow up answers, "I’d really love to be one of them stupid, ugly failures you see staggering around the local park after dark." Nope. Didn’t think so. They want to be astronauts, footballers, teachers, doctors, lawyers, and models.

There are only two ways to be successful in the world: you must either be lucky enough to be born into success, or, far more likely, you must fight and compete for it.

The problem with our non-competitive schools is that there is an intense fear of failure, which affects not only the policy adopted towards sports and games, but also that adopted towards academic achievement and grading. Failure is to be avoided at all costs. No-one is allowed to fail – even though this means that people who have been successful are denied their reward of tasting victory.

We would be much better off if we simply accepted the cold hard fact that some people will win and others will lose. But, to do this we must commit what is today regarded as one of the most heinous crimes that could be perpetrated on a person: hurting their feelings. People who lose will quite likely feel a degree of misery and unhappiness about their failure for a time. But such feelings are merely nature’s way of giving us a kick up the backside and of making us pull our finger out. Failure, therefore, should not be rejected, but should instead be embraced as a spur to do better next time. If Joe F. Ailure wakes up each day thinking that he’s not in the job or earning the amount of money that with his skills he should be, he would be wrong to lobby for a ‘Fairness Commissar’ to reduce the more successful to his level. Instead Joe must find ways to better himself, to work up the career level, to educate, to train, and thus, ultimately to make himself more successful.

And so our irrational fear of failure needs to end and be replaced with a proper perspective on failure. Take Tim Henman. He failed at Wimbledon earlier this year – again. His goal is to win the competition, and thus far he is a failure. He doesn’t return to Wimbledon year after year because he likes getting whipped off centre court a game or two before the final, as Henmaniacs hang their heads whispering "not again!" He comes back each year because his continual failure has spurred him on, given him an even greater appetite for winning. As much as he likes the taking part, like any other serious sports person he knows that winning is so much better.

Stephen Graham Bth (Hons)

Abortion and Moral Dizziness

Abortion & Moral Dizziness

Nothing quite brings out the moral hypocrisy and cluelessness in human beings quite like the issue of abortion. And when an abortion goes wrong and a baby that was supposed to die is born alive and kicking the ethical dizziness is compounded. Unfortunately babies do things at the most inconvenient times – like crying for milk at 3am, throwing up their milk over dads work suit, and being alive when they’re supposed to be dead.

Well, according to a recent report in the Sunday Times a number of rather robust babies survive abortion attempts and enter the world pink and wriggling, much to the alarm of medical practitioners. A number of midwives have spilled the beans on how such babies are simply left to die and are not given life-saving medical treatment.

I’m a little confused as to why there has been moral outrage from certain quarters that this should be the case, and even more confused as to why doctors, when faced with a should-have-been-dead baby, don’t see fit to end the lives of these children that they had tried to kill in the womb. Is leaving a baby that is outside the womb to die any worse than killing millions of babies at the same stage of development inside the womb? Hardly. And yet the former distresses advocates of the latter.

There is, however, no moral difference between a 26-week-old human being that has been born and one that is still in the womb. The only differences that exist between them are utterly irrelevant in deciding whether a baby should live or die – physical location, method of feeding, and the mode of taking in air. Why then do people who normally support abortion find the practice of leaving a should-have-been-dead baby to die more repugnant than killing a baby in the womb?

I suspect that the answer lies not in some deep moral conviction or ethical theory, but rather in the fact that we can’t see the baby in the womb (something which is gradually changing with modern technologies). One of the things that the pro-life lobby is 100% correct about is that a great many people would change their attitude to abortion if they were to see what is actually going on in the womb during a pregnancy and then subsequently during an abortion procedure. The contrast between seeing a baby smiling, yawning and sucking it’s thumb (all of which happen within the period that an abortion is legal) and then seemingly struggling for it’s life during an abortion procedure would, rightly or wrongly, significantly move public opinion. As it is we can shut our eyes to what is going on and even pretend it doesn’t happen, just as we can change the TV channel to watch the latest instalment of Big Brother rather than watch the uncomfortable documentary about AIDS in Swaziland. Out of sight, out of mind.

What pro-choicers need to acknowledge much more openly is that abortion ends a human life – fact. Now, I’m not saying that this fact would in itself make abortion wrong. I’m simply saying that it is a fact that abortion ends a human life. Attempts to suppress this fact has lead to moral dithering when a doctor finds him or herself holding a baby he or she thought had been disposed of.

One midwife who experienced the survival for three days of a handicapped should-have-been-dead baby admitted: "Sometimes the aborted babies were alive at birth. . . There was an unwritten policy on the unit that babies would not be given assistance." She went on to discuss her experience of a baby with Downs syndrome breathe and move for almost three hours after it was supposed to have been aborted.

The current practice of doctors in such cases is as horrendous as it possibly could be. Why would they leave a human infant to die, a process taking some hours or even days? If the baby is to die then why shouldn’t the doctor hasten the death? Is it that there is something wrong with killing a baby once it is born but fine if the baby had still been in the womb? But, if there is something wrong with killing a born baby, even if it was supposed to have been killed in the womb, why do doctors make no efforts to save it?

To my mind it’s because a great many people see a difference between killing and allowing to die; with the latter a morally acceptable practice but the former rejected as morally repulsive. This is an awful moral approach the abandoning of which is long overdue. It doesn’t take a genius to realise that the ultimate outcome of allowing to die is the same as actively killing – death. I would go so far as to say that allowing a being to die is often the more ghastly approach in a great many situations. If a group of soldiers are lost in a jungle and one of them is horrendously wounded such as he will not make it, and is in great pain, is it better that his comrades just leave him to die? Or, is killing him a more merciful option? If we run over our dog in the driveway should we just leave it to die or have it putdown by a vet? Or, suppose I am walking through a local park to meet my friends and on the way I see a young child drowning in a duck pond. I don’t want to be late for meeting my friends so I just walk on by, letting nature take its course, and thus abandon this child to it’s fate rather than try to save it. Can I claim to be morally guilt-free by virtue of the fact that I didn’t kill this child but just allowed him or her to die? Could I rightly live with a clear conscious after doing so? I don’t think that any sane rational person could answer those questions in the affirmative. And aren’t such situations enough to make us think that supposed differences between killing and allowing to die are mere phantoms?

Apparently the British Medical Association is going to debate and review practices relating to babies that survive abortions. One potential course of action to be proposed is that babies born after failed abortion attempts should receive the same treatment as babies that are born prematurely. But, all this does is commit the same error I mentioned earlier – the assumption that there is a significant moral difference between a baby that has been born and one that is still in the womb at the same stage of development. Such running in circles like the BMA seems to be doing explains much of the moral dizziness that exists regarding our treatment of developing human babies. We need to either bite-the-bullet and accept the killing of should-have-been-dead babies when they are born alive or we must review the legitimacy of our current abortion practices. Otherwise we will remain moral hypocrites.

Stephen Graham B.Th (Hons).

Fries With That?

Do You Want Fries With That?

It seems that the weird and wonderful world of Leftism continues to churn out it’s intellectual mush. Much has been said of the new "heavy on polemic, low on actual substance" documentary Fahrenheit 9/11 by Michael "Bend the Facts" Moore. But there has been an even more bizarre show released recently. The cinematic treat I refer to is called "Supersize Me," but I was simply too bemused by the content to remember the name of the buffoon who made. It certainly wasn’t Ronald.

Basically the documentary is anti-McDonalds (films made by such types are always anti-something – war, Bush, Blair, America, the West, criminal justice, capitalism, guns, property, wealth, blah de blah de blah). In an effort to persuade us just how bad McDonalds food is for our health, some eegit decided to live off McDonalds meals for an entire month, always ordering a supersize meal when it was offered to him. By the end of the month his physical health had greatly deteriorated; he had put on a significant amount of weight, and his mental state had been worsened (if indeed such a thing was possible).

But his efforts were surely not a total waste of time. We’ve learnt a very valuable lesson, haven’t we, kids? We now know what happens to any naughty little boys and girls who eat McDonalds meals for breakfast, lunch and dinner – they get sick and fat.

Well, Duh! I have to ask: Who is this film actually made for? Are there really people alive on planet earth that need to be convinced that eating junk food morning, noon and night, averaging 5000 calories a day – that’s double the recommended daily allowance for an adult male – is a bad thing? If people are so stupid then it must be time to ‘trim the herd.’ And what better way to do it than allow such people to eat until they pop.

McDonalds is a favourite whipping-boy. Not only does it sell food high in fat to those who can barely fit through its double doors, but also, even worse, it’s a large, successful, global chain. I suspect that the real reason behind this film is not a deep concern for the health of the nation but is rather another chance to take a shot at a large global corporation for it’s gross sin of, well, being successful. Leftists never did like large successful corporations very much. They make money, and money is an evil unless it’s being ‘redistributed’.

Let’s face it the charge that McDonalds makes people fat or damages your health is grossly misleading and inaccurate. McDonalds does not make anyone fat. If someone eats a burger from McDonalds each week then their health or waistline isn’t going to be affected one iota (well, unless, of course, the burger consumed is 20 square feet). But, obviously eating 10 or more burgers will cause us to move up a dress or trouser size or two. There is one primary reason why people get fat – it isn’t because they are brainwashed by corporate advertising and it isn’t because they are genetically addicted to Big Macs. It’s simply because they continue to stuff their fat faces without moving except to press buttons on the TV remote.

It might also come as a surprise in certain quarters to hear that it is possible to get fat without going to McDonalds. In fact, people in the year 2004 (where McDonalds restaurants abound) are actually consuming fewer calories than they did a couple of decades ago (no McDonalds in sight). Even more shocking is the fact that a person can get fat without eating food that is high in fat. Our physical and mental health, along with our waistlines would not be in terribly good shape if we were to dine on nothing but pasta morning, noon and night for a whole month, and pasta is regarded as relatively healthy food. Come on, has Atkins taught us nothing? Our bodies are fat making factories, and we don’t need to eat a lot of fat in order to get very fat.

What a pity the maker of this documentary didn’t just do us all a favour and eat arsenic for a month – supersized portions of it of course. As for me, I’m off for a burger and fries.

Stephen Graham B.Th (Hons).

Sometimes Soldiers Die

Sometimes Soldiers Die

19-year-old Gordon Gentle was killed on duty in Iraq when his military convoy was bombed at the end of June in Basra. He is one of a number of British military personnel to die since the war was officially declared over.

All such deaths are to be regretted, and the families of such soldiers will rightfully mourn the loss of their loved ones. We can all sympathise with Gordon Gentle’s mother, Rose, as she mourns the death of her son.

The case of the death of Gordon Gentle has sparked renewed calls for the withdrawal of British troops from Iraq. Rose Gentle herself has been fairly public with her calls for a British withdrawal, declaring that she hopes to spare relatives of soldiers in Iraq the pain of losing a loved one. Having started a campaign to achieve this end, she says: "[we hope to] help prevent other families from having to go through the loss and suffering we have faced. I am sure thousands of other families feel the same as us and want our sons and daughters home out of Iraq."

It’s fairly normal that family members do not wish each other to come to harm. Which of us would want a masked gunman, or gunman of any ilk for that matter, to aim at and open fire on our brothers, sisters, fathers, spouses, and friends? I personally hope that no member of my family ever has to go into a situation in which they may be killed or injured. However, despite the tragedy of a soldier’s death, we should not make general strategic military decisions on the basis of particular instances such as the death of a soldier – whether he or she is a relative of mine or of someone else. Military operations should not be brought to an abrupt end because a soldier has lost his life, however tragic such an event is. Soldiers are trained first and foremost for war. That is their profession. They fight, using deadly force, when called upon to do so by our government. Unfortunately, enemies are also almost always armed with deadly weapons too, and thus death is always a possibility for any solider on active service. What do they think the hard hats are for? Skateboarding accidents?

Such basic facts seem lost on a number of commentators who give the impression that they think being in the army is purely about playing table tennis at the barracks, getting drunk at weekends, marching around for a bit, and going on an annual hike in the Himalayas. But, we don’t train soldiers for fun: we train them for war. I have yet to meet anyone seeking to join the army who is ignorant of the fact that it will primarily involve being trained for war, and quite possibly actually fighting in one. To complain out of principle about soldiers being sent to a war zone is a bit like a librarian complaining about being surrounded by books. It’s simply part of the job description, I’m afraid, and if you don’t like it then the proper thing to do is to go for a different career. Gordon Gentle was not drafted into the army as a conscript. He chose to join the army of his own free will.

What use is an army that turns its tail and flees the minute it receives a casualty? Millions of soldiers and civilians were killed fighting Nazi Germany 60-65 years ago. The relatives of these people grieved for their loved ones just as much as Rose Gentle is grieving for her dead son. Thank God our military then didn’t run away frightened by casualties and the possibility of dying.

Of course, there may be other, more valid, grounds on which to call for the withdrawal of British troops from Iraq. Perhaps it might be argued that Iraq is now ready to take control of everything without foreign help. Or, alternatively, perhaps it could be posited that our troops should never be used except to defend our own country from attack. Whatever the strengths and weaknesses of such positions, and I myself have much sympathy with the latter, we can be sure that the death of a soldier, and the loss for his or her relatives, is not in and of itself good enough reason to end a military operation. If we were to bring our troops home because a soldier, or group of soldiers, has died then we would in fact be allowing emotion rather than reason to dictate our political policies.

For some commentators it isn’t the death of a soldier that is the major issue, but rather the deaths of young soldiers who have only just passed through their training. This point is a bit of a fudge. When a bomb goes off by the roadside as a military convoy is passing, there isn’t a terrible lot that training can do for you. Bombs do not discriminate against less experienced soldiers, nor do enemy combatants. The fact of the matter is that once trained a soldier is ready to fight. In his or her basic training a soldier will have been taught all that is necessary for armed combat, and it doesn’t matter how much or how little time has elapsed between training and seeing active military service. Once you are trained you can be sent to war.

I have been presenting some cold, hard truths. I fully acknowledge that they can bring no comfort to a grieving family. However, this is no reason to deny these truths, at least, not if reason rather than emotion is to be our guide in politics.

Stephen Graham (B.Th Hons)

Violent Video Games - The New Whipping Boy

Violent Video Games: The Latest Whipping Boy

Another day another doctor with nothing better to do than to call for, yes you’ve guessed it, another ban on something that’s ‘bad for people.’ This time it’s Marie Murray, director of psychology at St Vincent’s Hospital in Dublin, who has spoken out, and on this occasion it’s violent video games that form the target of her pious mutterings.

When in doubt play the "what-about-the-kids?" card. That one trumps everything. And, surprise surprise, that’s the very card Ms Murray plays. She has stated that parents should refuse to allow violent video games into their home and, moreover, that "society" should make moves to "control" these types of games. Why? Well, in the words of Ms Murray, "[violent video games are] a very dangerous milieu to expose children to." She is referring here to games such as Manhunt and Doom 3 (just released), two incredibly violent computer games in which the violence is both realistic and gratuitous.

It should be pointed out at once that games such as these are rated in a similar way to films, with the most violent games, such as Doom 3, rated for sale only to over-18’s. Shops selling the game insist strongly that they adhere to this rule. Not that this is good enough for Ms Murray, who regards the ratings system as "ineffective." She says that, "even if the shops are refusing to sell these game to the underage, that doesn’t mean they won’t be seen or played by younger children when an older person brings them home. For this reason parents shouldn’t allow violent computer games into their homes at all. The information is available to us that violent computer games and violent images can harm children developmentally, yet we refuse to acknowledge this."

I suspect that if Ms Murray was going to be completely honest with us she would have said, "for this reason parents shouldn’t be allowed violent video games. . ." Anyhow, speculation aside, if used consistently this "what-about-the-kids?" argument applies to other areas. Most obviously it applies to films also. Because of the graphic, gratuitous and realistic violence we could, if we were to join the ever-swelling ranks of moralising doctors, lobby for a similar ban on about half the contents of Hollywood. Saving Private Ryan, Gladiator, Reservoir Dogs, Braveheart, Kill Bill, King Arthur, and thousands of other action, war and horror films would never have made it off the film reels and onto the Big Screen if Ms Murray and those of her ilk were to be elected onto a censorship board, and that’s to say nothing of what would have happened to the careers of Al Pacino, Robert de Niro and Arnold Swartzenegger. After all, to paraphrase Ms Murray, "even if video shops refuse to rent these films to the underage, that doesn’t mean they won’t be seen by younger children when an older person brings them home." That there is a chance, however slim, of children seeing something that only over-18’s should see, is not good enough reason for adults to confine themselves merely to Space Invaders and Tellytubbies for the rest of their days.

It’s also interesting that computer games are singled out for special criticism because of the gratuitous, highly realistic violent imagery. The other day on the 6 o’clock news I witnessed the aftermath of a hostage siege in a school in Beslan, Russia. Among the scenes being broadcast 2 hours and 45 minutes before the watershed was the charred remains of a young child partially covered in rubble, the bloodied bodies of numerous children, and footage of gunfire and explosions. Violence, death and killing doesn’t get much more gratuitous and highly realistic than this. Perhaps children should be forbidden from witnessing such scenes, which, incidentally, don’t come with an "over-18’s only" rating, but with a mere "viewers may find some of the scenes distressing." Or, to appease the moralists, perhaps adults should not own a television set just in case younger children might possibly see something that they shouldn’t.

I agree wholeheartedly with Tim Ponting, head of European Corporate Communications for Activision, the creators of Doom 3, when he argues that, "[Doom 3 is] a game suitable for an adult audience, marketed appropriately to adult consumers who make their own choice whether to purchase."

Adult consumers make their own choices about the purchase of adult material, and they live with the consequences of those choices. 1000’s of people play such games, watch violent films and see daily a load of violent images on television, and yet they don’t go out and kill or beat people up as a result. In fact, it is frequently argued that there is a link between violent films and games, and people engaging in acts of violence. However, we are never offered any evidence for such assertions. All we are told is that Bob beat up Fred, Bob plays violent computer games and watches violent films, therefore Bob beat Fred up because those games and films influenced him. This was exactly the reasoning we were offered at the time of the Columbine massacre in America. When two teenage students went on a killing spree at their school, the rock star Marilyn Manson was given the blame because the killers happened to listen to his music, the lyrics of which often contain violent expressions. But this common line of argument is flawed by virtue of making an erroneous leap of logic. In effect the argument says that because some person, P, does some action, B, and also engages in some other action, C, then P does B because of C. However, we need to be given some further evidence as to the supposed causal connection between B and C. In the case of Bob playing violent video games and beating up Bob it is just as plausible to suppose that because he is a violent person he is attracted to violent games and films, rather than to posit that such games and films have caused Bob to engage in violence against Fred.

In fact, given that so many millions of people play violent video games and watch violent films and so very few engage in acts of violence, it is eminently more plausible to suppose that violent people are attracted to violent games, films, music, and other images, than suppose such things desensitise people to violence to the point at which they go out and attack or kill others.

The issue of violent video games is merely the latest in a long line of targets against which our new modern age gurus and high priests – members of the medical profession – have spewed their doctrinal venom. They may, bless them, have our best interests at heart, but lets face it, they tend to treat us as children who must be guided at every point by the priests of the new age. We can, of course, welcome their research and points of view, but, ultimately, adults need to be left to make their own decisions – about what to eat, what to watch, where to go, what to do in their spare time, how to spend their own money, and, most importantly, about whether or not to obey the dictates of the High Priests of Society. Long live heresy.

Stephen Graham (B.Th Hons).

Christianity and Capitalism

Capitalism and Confused Christians

In a telephone poll for Radio Ulster’s Sunday Sequence programme over 70% of callers (the vast majority of which are Christian) stated that they believed capitalism to be incompatible with Christian faith.

This is, to me, a capitalist, quite a worrying piece of information. However, as with any poll, voters will inevitably have different definitions for the terms in which the question is asked. I suspect that the word ‘capitalism’ is not in most cases being understood accurately. Instead, a great many people have a definition of capitalism that is erroneous, an understanding that has been skewed by the opponents of capitalism who have done a remarkable propaganda job of making capitalism a dirty word. Capitalism is now most widely used as a byword for oppression and exploitation: oppression and exploitation of the poor by large and powerful multinational corporations. The word ‘capitalism’ brings to mind images of third world sweat-shops and businessmen lining their pockets without giving any thought to their conduct in so doing. And obviously such things are indeed incompatible with Christian faith.

However, none of the above understandings of capitalism is accurate, nor any of them inherent in a capitalist system. Capitalism itself is about economic freedom - freedom from government interference. Capitalism is the only politico-economic system that upholds the rights of individuals. Socialism, on the other hand, merely treats individuals as means to ends - not as ends in themselves. Individuals, under socialism, are disposable in favour of the collective. Under capitalism each individual is entitled to keep the produce of his own effort. He or she can learn a skill, put in some time applying it, and reap the rewards of his or her effort. This is what capitalism is about.

One of the ironies of Christian opposition to capitalism is that many Christian critics advocate socialism as an alternative. Capitalism is to them an unchristian political philosophy because they think it exploits the poor. However, in advocating socialism they are supporting a political philosophy that effectively justifies state theft of individual property and money in the name of “a fairer distribution of wealth.” Socialism robs individuals of what is rightfully theirs and gives it to those who have no right to it, since they have not worked for it. It also denigrates personal responsibility - which is the very foundation of any coherent notion of morality. This is supposedly more ‘Christian?’

Capitalism is not, as many Christians seem to fear, in tension with the notion of charity. On the contrary, it advocates private charities as opposed to government hand-outs. Historically, it is private charities who are by far the most efficient when it comes to dealing with such matters. Government schemes more often than not are incredibly wasteful of money and resources. Moreover, under private charities people who are most in need of help are more likely to receive the help that they need. Under government systems a great many people are allowed to simply leech off the system with little or no motivation for actually bettering themselves, thus diverting funds from the few who need help to the many who do not.

Capitalism, as I have said, is about freedom - the freedom to choose. This freedom brings with it personal responsibility. This means that individuals are responsible for themselves, and whilst they may be able to get help and assistance from others they cannot expect this help as some supposed ‘right.’ If you want money to buy something for yourself then you need to work to get the money, and save up if necessary. No one has the automatic right to possessions or wealth. One must either inherit wealth and property or, in the vast majority of cases, one must be prepared to work for the possessions and wealth they desire.

I anticipate an objection here in the minds of many people: what happens to those people who find themselves in a position without work, money or possessions through no fault of their own? Some will disagree, but it seems to me quite clearly the case that under a proper capitalist system private charities will be able to assist the very few who are in genuine need. But what if they can’t? If they can’t then that is unfortunate and unavoidable, but still no justification for socialism. We can equally ask - what happens if, after wealth is “fairly distributed,” we find that some people still do not have enough to live decently? At any one time there will always be a finite amount of wealth. In either system there will be a risk that some people simply cannot be provided for. Life isn’t inherently fair. Bad things happen to good people. Nature can be intolerably cruel. We can do everything we can to minimise the impact in the lives of people but ultimately we cannot possibly help everyone who needs help.

That said, under capitalism there is much more chance of additional new wealth being created. When people are encouraged to look after themselves and earn their own wealth, it is quite obvious that more wealth will be created. When more wealth is created, investment and trade increase. When investment and trade increase businesses can grow. When businesses grow there are more jobs. When there are more jobs there is more money. When there is more money the population of the country can in turn spend it on those things that they want to buy, which itself assists trade and investment, and the cycle of growth continues. What motivation is there to create wealth when one loses the product of one’s own effort to those who did nothing to earn it? Under capitalism each person is encouraged to do the best he or she can, since he or she will be the direct beneficiary. Socialism, on the other hand, encourages people to get away with doing as little as they can, for why should they do more work if they do not reap any further benefit? This in turn causes economic stagnation, and stagnation puts pressure on already limited resources.

Interestingly, advocates of socialism will probably argue at this point that the view of human nature I have used above is unrealistic in that it supposes that people will do as little as they can in cases where doing more brings them no more benefit. Instead, they will argue that human beings are much more altruistic than this. But all that this demonstrates is a tension at the very heart of socialism. On the one hand we must assume human beings are altruistic in that they will work primarily for the benefit of other people (which adherence to the maxim “from every man according to his ability: to every man according to his need” requires), but on the other hand we are also frequently told that capitalism is to be avoided because human beings are greedy and will hoard their wealth rather than share it around, that they will tread on the heads of others just to line their own pockets, and that their selfishness will know no bounds (and thus that we need a handful of altruistic, upright, and good socialists to guide the rest of us lowly mortals). Socialists are typically confused about human nature (perhaps one of the reasons why many socialists deny the very notion of human nature), and the contradiction above is proof of that confusion. Capitalism, on the other hand, realises that most people are primarily self-interested - in that they naturally look after their own needs before anything else - but also that most are not so self-interested as to ignore the plight of those who are living a substandard existence.

Capitalism simply allows us to choose whether or not we want to be charitable or miserly. Capitalism does not advocate either, contrary to popular belief that it encourages the latter. It is left up to each individual whether or not they wish to donate money to help others. If Christians or any other group wish to support charities or impoverished people then they are perfectly entitled to do so. Anyone who believes in redistribution of wealth is entitled to do just that - with their own wealth - if that is what they wish. All that capitalism denies to people is the right to redistribute the wealth of others without their complicity.

Sometimes Christian socialism is justified by appeal to Jesus’ own teaching about the poor and the oppressed. However, concern for the poor and oppressed is not the same thing as being socialist, and the fact that many people tend to equate the two is further proof of the fantastic propaganda coup perpetrated by advocates of socialism. I am a capitalist and I have as much concern for the poor as do my more socialist Christian friends. I just consider capitalism to be the best system to deal with poverty: and the best system for each and every single individual who wishes to look after himself or herself. Anyhow, Jesus teaching about looking after the poor presupposes personal responsibility. His message was one for each and every individual. Nowhere does Jesus ever teach socialism or state redistribution of wealth. He teaches freedom, personal responsibility, and moral conduct, and these are actually hindered under a socialist system, which takes the power and responsibility that individuals should have over their own lives and concentrates it in the hands of the administrators of the state. A socialist system does not allow individuals to dispose of their wealth in a moral way. Their wealth is taken from them and used in whatever way the government sees fit - whether that be for homeless people or for the promotion of generally non-Christian ideals - such as gay and lesbian societies. Removing freedom and personal responsibility - thus removing the very basis of morality - can hardly be compatible with the ethos and teaching of Christ. Lets be very clear - to call Jesus a socialist is extremely anachronistic and, moreover, is to ignore some central tenets and implications of his teaching.

The central tenets of capitalism (properly understood) are therefore not merely compatible with Christian faith but directly mirrored by some central Christian themes. If the listeners of Sunday Sequence had a proper understanding of what capitalism actually is, rather than what it’s opponents say it is, I suspect the outcome of the poll may well have been very different.

Stephen Graham (B.Th Hons)