The Virtual Stoa

Politicians always profess to be principled, but we tend to suspect that they are self-seeking opportunists, and experience suggests that we are usually right so to suspect. Those occasions, therefore, when politicians stand up for principles which will almost certainly work against their short-, medium- and long-run interests are very striking ones. And this is doubly true when it comes to right-wing parties, owing to the lingering suspicion that, as J. K. Galbraith once put it, conservatism might really at bottom just be “the search for a higher moral justification for selfishness”.

But this clearly isn’t always the case. As Donald Sassoon notes, for example, in a (sort of) recent essay on the fluctuating fortunes of socialism in the twentieth century, the longstanding conservative opposition to women’s suffrage across all of Europe was quite principled, as it was widely believed — and it turned out to be largely true — that women were more likely to vote for conservative, religious and traditionalist parties than for liberal, socialist or other workers’ parties. And it was the opportunist Stanley Baldwin who brought an end to years of this principled opposition by equalising the franchise in 1928, thus boosting Tory fortunes at the ballot box.

With that little bit of history in place, then, we should notice Michael Howard’s altruistic defence of the the First Past the Post electoral system in his recent speech in Burnley. “PR always magnifies the opportunities for small, extremist parties”, he declared, “as other countries have found to their cost. That is one of the reasons why I am so resolutely opposed to it”.

He doesn’t tell us what the other reasons are, but I’d quite like to know what he’s thinking of, since I think that we should be more puzzled by the almost unswerving Tory defence of FPTP than we usually are. This part of the Jenkins Commission report into the possibility of an alternative voting system spells out just how badly the Tories currently do under FPTP. And while the reduction in the over-representation of Scotland will offer something of a corrective in the direction of proportionality, there’s no sign that the electoral system will generate fair outcomes any time soon, but that it will remain systematically skewed in the interests of the Labour Party.

It’s fun, of course, for thorough-going anti-Conservatives like me to contemplate an electoral system in which, as Jenkins estimated (a few years back, to be sure, when he was still alive), “the Conservatives would have required a lead of approximately 6 1/2 % to give them an equality of seats with Labour”, and still have that electoral system so ardently defended by those whom it will reliably punish.

But perhaps the Tories may just be terribly aware that their persistent inability to transform themselves into a credibly decent European centre-right civic liberal / Christian Democratic party dooms them to permanent opposition in any system of PR / coalition politics, and so they feel they lack the incentive to campaign for fairer votes.

Or, as I say, they may be significantly more principled than we generally reckon.

Rest in peace Anthony “If it’s the last thing I do, I’m going to destroy every fucking grammar school in England… and Wales … and Northern Ireland” Crosland, Labour politician and Cabinet Minister under Wilson and Callaghan. Born 29 August 1918, died 21 February 1977. Author of The Future of Socialism, 1956, a revisionist tome which, in light of the politics of the present, appears quite fundamentalist.

(Hmm. I can’t find any Crosland pages out there on the web worth linking to. Any ideas?)

Georg Büchner, playwright, propagandist, fish scientist; born 17 October 1813, died 19 February 1837.

One of the reasons I’ve been excited about the politics of gay marriage in the United States in recent months has been the fact that it has been the parts of the country I know and love best making the progressive running. Last year it was the court in Massachusetts — where I lived for most of the period 1995-2000 — that ordered the state legislature to draw up proposals to legalise gay and lesbian marriage; last weekend it was the Mayor of San Francisco — where I lived for much of 1999 — who ordered officials in City Hall to start issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

And there’s an additional reason for me to feel thrilled at what’s been happening in San Fransciso, which these two photos will serve to illustrate…

That photo was taken on 19 March 2001, and is of marriage commissioner Richard Ow officiating at my wedding to Josephine at the top of the grand staircase in San Francisco City Hall.

And this photo, left, is of the same person, Richard Ow, in the same place in City Hall, again, at the top of the steps, this time officiating at a same-sex marriage ceremony on Friday, a day that made the best kind of history that there is to make. (I found it on this page.)

Last week-end’s events have provided the faces and names and photographs to make the hitherto abstract and hypothetical concept of state-sanctioned same-sex marriage in America concrete and real for the watching world. And for me those photographs are marvellously accompanied by my own happy memories of City Hall as a terrific place to get married, and the wonderfully moving email messages I’ve read by people I know in San Francisco, who grabbed their once-in-a-lifetime chance to get their love for a partner officially recognised by the City — and a City they love, too.

And to get a sense of how busy that staircase in the top image was over the weekend, here’s a usefully-labelled snap by local photographer Zak Szymanski…

Below is another pic by Zak Szymanski of some splendid shoes — there are lots more at his authenti-city site, and it’s an excellent visual documentary record of three extraordinary days.

Is John Tavener’s music any good?

Cash family blocks haemorrhoid ad: “The family of late singer Johnny Cash has blocked an attempt by advertises to use his hit song Ring of Fire to promote haemmorrhoid-relief products…”

Hmm. Still worrying away about this one, I’m afraid. On further reflection it might very well turn out to be Die Moorsoldaten (details, including lyric in both German and English, here; sound-clip here).

On one of those occasions when the real world and the blogging world overlap ever so slightly — sitting in the pub with Stephen Marks and the other comrades after a local Labour Party branch meeting, when Marc Mulholland wanders by in search of drink and/or friends — Stephen tells me about the SovMusic site, which I hadn’t seen before, and which seems at first and second glance to be a treasure trove of sound snippets of interesting recordings.

Here’s Paul Robeson singing the Hymn of the Soviet Union. Here’s the Internationale as it was fused with the Prussian marching tradition with a new orchestration provided by the Nazi Propaganda Ministry in order to play at the Berlin Olympics, whenever the Russians won a medal (and, no doubt, was very useful after 23 August 1939). And there are thirty eight songs about Stalin…

And for those who want links to some of the better tunes recommended by the commenters at Harry’s on the best political songs ever, here’s the Internationale in Russian (and Albanian! and Czech!, and various other languages, but not Esperanto — though an Esperanto version does exist); here’s Bella Ciao, and here’s Bandiera Rossa (which, as my brother Mike points out, was usefully pressed into service as a wedding march on a fine occasion three years ago).

Yes, it’s gaypenguinforamerica.com,complete with campaign weblog, etc.

Probably inspired by this story from New York.

San Francisco Zoo, if I remember correctly, once had both a nymphomaniac penguin as well as a pair of lesbian geese. (And I won’t say what the tapir once did to itself. Too unpleasant.)

The Presidential Prayer Team is currently urging us to “Pray for the President as he seeks wisdom on how to legally codify the definition of marriage. Pray that it will be according to Biblical principles. With any forces insisting on variant definitions of marriage, pray that God’s Word and His standards will be honored by our government.”

Any good religious person believes prayer should be balanced by action. So here, in support of the Prayer Team’s admirable goals, is a proposed Constitutional Amendment codifying marriage entirely on biblical principles:A. Marriage in the United States shall consist of a union between one man and one or more women (Genesis 29:17-28; II Samuel 3:2-5).

B. Marriage shall not impede a man’s right to take concubines in addition to his wife or wives (II Samuel 5:13; I Kings 11:3; II Chronicles 11:21).

C. A marriage shall be considered valid only if the wife is a virgin. If the wife is not a virgin, she shall be executed. (Deuteronomy 22:13-21).

D. Marriage of a believer and a non-believer shall be forbidden (Genesis 24:3; Numbers 25:1-9; Ezra 9:12; Nehemiah 10:30).

E. Since marriage is for life, neither this Constitution nor the constitution of any State, nor any state or federal law, shall be construed to permit divorce (Deuteronomy 22:19; Mark 10:9).

F. If a married man dies without children, his brother shall marry the widow. If he refuses to marry his brother’s widow or deliberately does not give her children, he shall pay a fine of one shoe and be otherwise punished in a manner to be determined by law (Genesis 38:6-10; Deuteronomy 25:5-10).

G. In lieu of marriage, if there are no acceptable men in your town, it is required that you get your father drunk and have sex with him (even if he previously offered you up as a sex toy to men young and old), tag-teaming with any sisters you may have. Of course, this rule applies only if you are female (Genesis 19:31-36).

If you have other Biblical injunctions to add to this list, please share them with the Presidential Prayer Team.[Doing the rounds.]

Click on the image for the larger version. [Via Raj.]

Last one for now:

I have a conjecture according to which it strikes me as very probable that Sirius or the Dog Star is the central body in that star system making up the Milky Way and occupies the central point towards which all the stars are related. If we consider this system according to the design in the first part of this treatise, as a crowd of stars which have accumulated on a common plane, then the sun which is similarly located near this plane will have a view of the appearance of this circularly shaped zone with a shimmering white light at its brightest on that side located nearest to the outermost edge of the system. For it is easy to assume that it is not positioned exactly at the central point. Now, the band of the Milky Way is brightest in the part between the sign of the Swan and the sign of the Hunter (Sagittarius). Consequently, this will be the side where the location of our sun is closest to the outermost periphery of the circular system. And in this section we will consider the closest of all locations especially the place where the constellations of the Eagle and the Fox stand with that of the Goose, because there in the intervening space, where the Milky Way divides, the greatest visible scattering of stars shines out. If we then draw a line approximately from the place near the tail of the Eagle through the middle of the plane of the Milky Way right to the spot on the opposite side, this line must meet the mid-point of the system. And in fact it does meet Sirius with great precision. Sirius is the brightest star in the entire heavens. Because of the fortunate combination of this and its preponderant shape, Sirius appears to merit being considered that central body itself. According to this idea, Sirius would appear directly in the band of the Milky Way, if the location of our sun, which with respect to the tail of the Eagle deviates somewhat from its plane, did not cause the visual displacement of the mid-point toward the other side of such a zone.

From the “Universal Natural History and Theory of Heaven“.

On a bit of a roll here. Patchen reproduced this one in Comments a while back, and bicentennial celebrations can bring it out into the light:

The urge to communicate must have been the original motive for human beings who were still alone to announce their existence to living creatures outside themselves, especially to those which emit sounds which can be imitated and which can subsequently serve as a name. A similar effect of this urge can still be seen in children and thoughtless people who disturb the thinking section of the community by banging, shouting, whistling, singing, and other noisy pastimes (and often even by noisy religious devotions). For I can see no motive for such behaviour other than a desire on the part of those concerned to proclaim their existence to the world at large.

From the “Conjectures on the Beginning of Human History”.

Here’s another one (though actually I’ve quoted it before):

A cause whose nature is not directly perceptible can be discovered through the effect which invariably accompanies it. What is an absolute monarch? He is one at whose command war at once begins when he says it shall do so. And conversely, what is a limited monarch? He is one who must first ask the people whether or not there is to be a war, and if the people say that there shall be no war, then there will be none. For war is a condition in which all the powers of the state must be at the head of state’s disposal.Now the monarch of Great Britain has waged numerous wars without asking the people’s consent. This king is therefore an absolute monarch, although he should not be so according to the constitution. But he can always bypass the latter, since he can always be assured, by controlling the various powers of the state, that the people’s representatives will agree with him; for he has the authority to award all offices and dignities. This corrupt system, however, must naturally be given no publicity if it is to succeed. It therefore remains under a very transparent veil of secrecy.

That’s from The Contest of Faculties. Do note, though, that a few pages earlier (and also in a footnote) Kant warned that “a people which has a monarchic constitution” cannot “claim the right to alter it, or even nurse a secret desire to do so” (my emphasis).

Alright, so my favourite Kant footnotes are the same as everyone else’s. I’m not bothered. Here’s another one:

He who does a piece of work can sell it to someone else, just as if it were his own property. But guaranteeing one’s labour is not the same as selling a commodity. The domestic servant, the shop assistant, the labourer, or even the barber, are merely labourers, not artists (artifices, in the wider sense) or members of the state, and are thus unqualified to be citizens. And although the man to whom I give my firewood to chop and the tailor to whom I give material to make into clothes both appear to have a similar relationship towards me, the former differs from the latter in the same way as the barber from the wig-maker (to whom I may in fact have given the requisite hair) or the labourer from the artist or tradesman, who does a piece of work which belongs to him until he is paid for it. For the latter, in pursuing his trade, exchanges his property with someone else, while the former allows someone else to make use of him. But I do admit that it is somewhat difficult to define the qualifications which entitle anyone to claim the status of being his own master.”

Yes, that’s the footnote to the essay “On the Common Saying That This Might be True in Theory But That It Does Not Apply In Practice”, in which Kant explains why wig-makers should have the vote, and barbers shouldn’t, with a nice acknowledgement of the complexity of the question at the end.More soon, possibly.

How better to celebrate the bicentenary of the death of Immanuel Kant than with a celebration of his finest footnotes?

Man’s role is thus a highly artificial one. We do not know how it is with the inhabitants of other planets and with their nature, but if we ourselves execute this commission of nature well, we may surely flatter ourselves that we occupy no mean status among our neighbours in the cosmos. Perhaps their position is such that each individual can fulfil his destiny completely within his own lifetime. With us it is otherwise; only the species as a whole can hope for this.

That’s the classic space-aliens footnote to the essay “On the Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose”.