Open letter to Kevin Myers

That pretty well nails it Pax. Any government that did away with poverty would very likely be invaded by the US.

cactus flower wrote:

That pretty well nails it Pax. Any government that did away with poverty would very likely be invaded by the US.

Well 'invaded' is a bit strong....If a country did escape from the process described by Stiglitz and with good development policies then they could create a bad example for others. If they were sitting on a wealth of natural resources (say Nigeria) then they may be subjected to a US supported Chavez/Mossadegh style coup. Using a proxy is preferable to an actual invasion but it's not inconceivable.

Chekov Feeney has an article in "The Village" (current issue 140) headed "The Kangaroo Council". The article evaluates the performance of the Press Council, which was started in January. He views the Council ias nconsistent in its adjudication on public complaints. A public complaint was made against articles by Ian O'Doherty in the Independent about Muslims on the grounds that they were "in breach of article 8 (incitement to hatred) in the Press Council's Code of Practice. Chekov says

Quote :

"The ombudsman's decision was 59 words long and consisted of a sentence defending "robust commentary" followed by an assertion "that the articles...did not cross the boundaries" The problem was the decision didn't even remotely address the complaint.

In order to assess whether something is likely to incite hatred towards towards a group, the robustness of the commentary is irrelevant . The important question is whether the information presented is true, and if not, whether the false information is like to create hostility amongst the readers towards the targeted group".

Chekov concludes that Doherty are "thought free rants...but that he does generally ...make some effort to point out that not all Muslims are mad terrorists" and that he doesn't base his rants on false information.

He compares Doherty with Myers, who is currently the subject of complaints of incitement to hatred to the police rather than to the Press Council. He says

Quote :

"Myers 'robust' articles are littered with sweeping and unflattering assesrtions about the groups that he targets that are demonstrably untrue.

For example, his recent article entitled "Africa is giving nothing to anyone - apart from AIDS" contained a long list of untrue and derogatory statements about Africa, including the sentence "almost an entire continent of sexually hyperactive indigents". His articles are guaranteed to promote hostility amongst anybody foolish enough to believe him.

Chekov believes that the incitement legislation is not strong enough to be effective. He ends by saying "The demonisation and slandering of powerless groups remains a standard means of drumming up interest from the public" in the interests of profit.

Pax wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

That pretty well nails it Pax. Any government that did away with poverty would very likely be invaded by the US.

Well 'invaded' is a bit strong....If a country did escape from the process described by Stiglitz and with good development policies then they could create a bad example for others. If they were sitting on a wealth of natural resources (say Nigeria) then they may be subjected to a US supported Chavez/Mossadegh style coup. Using a proxy is preferable to an actual invasion but it's not inconceivable.

Interesting stuff indeed Pax - is it really true that John O'Shea's outlook is unusual among the other NGO ideas? Does he tow the Washington Consensus line? This was a patronising and erroneous way to deal with developing countries and your analysis above, if true, is very much chilling. Could the US really be such a resource monster? This is possibly stuff for another thread or even an entire forum in itself - at least a blog anyway - but could the US and others be so controlling as to allow a continent to get warped out of shape in order for the local resources e.g. Nigeria to come to them tax free provided by slave men, women and children? As Leonard Cohen put it in a song

"Everybody knows the deal is rotten
Old Black Joe's still picking cotton for your ribbons and bows ...
Everybody knows."

Now, are you saying that Myers could be consciously supporting this hegemonical idea by further villianising Old Black Joe or was his article an awkward, clumsy and boorish attempt at stirring up serious argument about the entire problem and Myers believes nothing of the sort about the US? (or something else)

Auditor #9 wrote:

Pax wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

That pretty well nails it Pax. Any government that did away with poverty would very likely be invaded by the US.

Well 'invaded' is a bit strong....If a country did escape from the process described by Stiglitz and with good development policies then they could create a bad example for others. If they were sitting on a wealth of natural resources (say Nigeria) then they may be subjected to a US supported Chavez/Mossadegh style coup. Using a proxy is preferable to an actual invasion but it's not inconceivable.

Interesting stuff indeed Pax - is it really true that John O'Shea's outlook is unusual among the other NGO ideas? Does he tow the Washington Consensus line? This was a patronising and erroneous way to deal with developing countries and your analysis above, if true, is very much chilling. Could the US really be such a resource monster? This is possibly stuff for another thread or even an entire forum in itself - at least a blog anyway - but could the US and others be so controlling as to allow a continent to get warped out of shape in order for the local resources e.g. Nigeria to come to them tax free provided by slave men, women and children? As Leonard Cohen put it in a song

"Everybody knows the deal is rotten
Old Black Joe's still picking cotton for your ribbons and bows ...
Everybody knows."

Now, are you saying that Myers could be consciously supporting this hegemonical idea by further villianising Old Black Joe or was his article an awkward, clumsy and boorish attempt at stirring up serious argument about the entire problem and Myers believes nothing of the sort about the US? (or something else)

I don't think it's unusual for Myer's to (consciously or,er, unconscionably) wash the sins away of an Empire in his articles. He's a long history of doing so with respect to the British so it comes naturally to such a writer to continue in the same line with the powerful today.

That's not to say that O'Shea's motivation is the same. I really don't think it is, in that his heart is very much in the right place. Having said that he's certainly out of place within the wider NGO development community in a lot of his analysis.
See the blog post below for more on this
http://dublinstreams.blogspot.com/2007/10/goal-s-john-oshea-rogue-charity-nutcase.html

You've raised some other interesting points re resource/commodity control, Leonard Cohen's eternal, well, aptness etc that perhaps should be in another thread or else I'll try and give an input at a later date here...

I suppose this thread is about the literary qualities if such exist of Myers article. We all went quickly into the substance of it though. I just think the man has done himself a bit of a disservice by not being more careful with his choice of words and style - it's just a downright bad tempered piece and could have been a careless spur of the moment editorial decision to let it out. Then again maybe it has literary merit.

And the substance that comes up around it is of course very important - the fact that his generalisations are unjust and gloss wildly over what positive details that are there. It might be the case that his article is just out of date - maybe it had a little spark when published but is now out of date and looks more incompetent than anything else. Had he thrown in some stats and facts and positive stuff it might have got more attention.

The truth seems to be that Africa is in a right mess but shouldn't be - is it America's and other Coloniser's faults? That;s an enormous question...

Pax wrote:

Auditor #9 wrote:

Pax wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

That pretty well nails it Pax. Any government that did away with poverty would very likely be invaded by the US.

Well 'invaded' is a bit strong....If a country did escape from the process described by Stiglitz and with good development policies then they could create a bad example for others. If they were sitting on a wealth of natural resources (say Nigeria) then they may be subjected to a US supported Chavez/Mossadegh style coup. Using a proxy is preferable to an actual invasion but it's not inconceivable.

Interesting stuff indeed Pax - is it really true that John O'Shea's outlook is unusual among the other NGO ideas? Does he tow the Washington Consensus line? This was a patronising and erroneous way to deal with developing countries and your analysis above, if true, is very much chilling. Could the US really be such a resource monster? This is possibly stuff for another thread or even an entire forum in itself - at least a blog anyway - but could the US and others be so controlling as to allow a continent to get warped out of shape in order for the local resources e.g. Nigeria to come to them tax free provided by slave men, women and children? As Leonard Cohen put it in a song

"Everybody knows the deal is rotten
Old Black Joe's still picking cotton for your ribbons and bows ...
Everybody knows."

Now, are you saying that Myers could be consciously supporting this hegemonical idea by further villianising Old Black Joe or was his article an awkward, clumsy and boorish attempt at stirring up serious argument about the entire problem and Myers believes nothing of the sort about the US? (or something else)

I don't think it's unusual for Myer's to (consciously or,er, unconscionably) wash the sins away of an Empire in his articles. He's a long history of doing so with respect to the British so it comes naturally to such a writer to continue in the same line with the powerful today.

That's not to say that O'Shea's motivation is the same. I really don't think it is, in that his heart is very much in the right place. Having said that he's certainly out of place within the wider NGO development community in a lot of his analysis.
See the blog post below for more on this
http://dublinstreams.blogspot.com/2007/10/goal-s-john-oshea-rogue-charity-nutcase.html

You've raised some other interesting points re resource/commodity control, Leonard Cohen's eternal, well, aptness etc that perhaps should be in another thread or else I'll try and give an input at a later date here...

That is an interesting blog on O'Shea. His proposal that the US should construct and manage thousands of schools without letting local people run them brought to mind the post Hurrican Katrina turn over of all the local New Orleans schools to private de-unionised schools (after sacking all the teachers) described by Naomi Klein in the "Shock Doctrine".

I've never known a development agency that wanted to work itself out of a job.

cactus flower wrote:

Pax wrote:

Auditor #9 wrote:

Pax wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

That pretty well nails it Pax. Any government that did away with poverty would very likely be invaded by the US.

Well 'invaded' is a bit strong....If a country did escape from the process described by Stiglitz and with good development policies then they could create a bad example for others. If they were sitting on a wealth of natural resources (say Nigeria) then they may be subjected to a US supported Chavez/Mossadegh style coup. Using a proxy is preferable to an actual invasion but it's not inconceivable.

Interesting stuff indeed Pax - is it really true that John O'Shea's outlook is unusual among the other NGO ideas? Does he tow the Washington Consensus line? This was a patronising and erroneous way to deal with developing countries and your analysis above, if true, is very much chilling. Could the US really be such a resource monster? This is possibly stuff for another thread or even an entire forum in itself - at least a blog anyway - but could the US and others be so controlling as to allow a continent to get warped out of shape in order for the local resources e.g. Nigeria to come to them tax free provided by slave men, women and children? As Leonard Cohen put it in a song

"Everybody knows the deal is rotten
Old Black Joe's still picking cotton for your ribbons and bows ...
Everybody knows."

Now, are you saying that Myers could be consciously supporting this hegemonical idea by further villianising Old Black Joe or was his article an awkward, clumsy and boorish attempt at stirring up serious argument about the entire problem and Myers believes nothing of the sort about the US? (or something else)

I don't think it's unusual for Myer's to (consciously or,er, unconscionably) wash the sins away of an Empire in his articles. He's a long history of doing so with respect to the British so it comes naturally to such a writer to continue in the same line with the powerful today.

That's not to say that O'Shea's motivation is the same. I really don't think it is, in that his heart is very much in the right place. Having said that he's certainly out of place within the wider NGO development community in a lot of his analysis.
See the blog post below for more on this
http://dublinstreams.blogspot.com/2007/10/goal-s-john-oshea-rogue-charity-nutcase.html

You've raised some other interesting points re resource/commodity control, Leonard Cohen's eternal, well, aptness etc that perhaps should be in another thread or else I'll try and give an input at a later date here...

That is an interesting blog on O'Shea. His proposal that the US should construct and manage thousands of schools without letting local people run them brought to mind the post Hurrican Katrina turn over of all the local New Orleans schools to private de-unionised schools (after sacking all the teachers) described by Naomi Klein in the "Shock Doctrine".

I've never known a development agency that wanted to work itself out of a job.

O' Shea is more like a latter-day secular missionary. His letter to the Independent following Myers' pieces was breathtaking in its failure to challenge the ugliness of what Myers said about African people.

cactus flower wrote:

That is an interesting blog on O'Shea. His proposal that the US should construct and manage thousands of schools without letting local people run them brought to mind the post Hurrican Katrina turn over of all the local New Orleans schools to private de-unionised schools (after sacking all the teachers) described by Naomi Klein in the "Shock Doctrine".

That reminds me of something Myers once said, funnily enough. He said we should basically go back to Africa (I'm sure they won't mind, it's for their own good after all) and build enormous desalination plants, fueled by nuclear power. The water would go to agriculture and hopefully we won't have any Johnny Foreigners over here thank you very much.

John O'Shea strikes me as a little misguided, like a Michael O'Leary for NGOs. Very controversial and prominent but in his case it's generally for a good cause.