2008-02-28

for the sake of peace, think of ourselves as animals

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

by Neil Godfrey

Australian Customs ship, Oceanic Viking, has just returned with film footage of recent Japanese whaling for government ministers to study.

Campaigners against cruelty to animals know how to get their message across. Graphic footage works. It is even said to have helped turn public support against the Vietnam war. Nothing worse than eating dinner and being confronted with footage of clubbing seals that look so damnably cute, mulesing sheep which still have that damnable iconic image of innocence, spearing and shooting whales until they eventually stop struggling against their fate, screaming naked children fleeing napalmed villages.

I can’t quite fathom the ethics that prohibit the publication of graphic pictures of humans being dismembered at times when governments call on publics to back their next war.

Why don’t we campaign for community standards that will favour the contempt of media for failing to show — “show”, that is, graphically — both sides of a story?

Anti-war campaigns rightly need to be salted with comedy, funny masks and silly costumes. But we anti-war campaigners could also take a leaf from the campaigners against cruelty to animals. Sure it upsets people. But that’s good. It should.

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Neil Godfrey on The Folly of Bayesian Probability in “Doing History”: “A troll is someone who ignores what is being said and continues their own agenda without engaging with the logic…” Dec 21, 03:26
Petr Jancar on The Folly of Bayesian Probability in “Doing History”: “I am still once more responding, so that you do not think that I am impolite or that I am…” Dec 20, 07:22
Neil Godfrey on The Folly of Bayesian Probability in “Doing History”: “I re-read my earlier reply and can see how you took it as “emotional” — but I can assure you…” Dec 18, 02:43
Neil Godfrey on The Folly of Bayesian Probability in “Doing History”: “I simply asked you to tell me what it is that you think I misunderstand or what, specifically, I am…” Dec 17, 20:26
Petr Jancar on The Folly of Bayesian Probability in “Doing History”: “Neil, I have no interest to engage in an emotional discussion. I felt indebted to you, since I read many…” Dec 17, 19:21
Neil Godfrey on The Folly of Bayesian Probability in “Doing History”: “Why do you ask? What are you trying to argue? I agree and acknowledge that Bayes theorem is a valid…” Dec 16, 09:22
Petr Jancar on The Folly of Bayesian Probability in “Doing History”: “My sentence “I voice several assumptions, testing if we all agree on them:” was meant as a yes/no question; let…” Dec 16, 08:57
Clarke W Owens on Is Everything a Question of Probability?: “Well, the distinction between “public knowledge” and the knowledge of professional researchers is not always crystal clear. For example, western…” Dec 15, 22:34
Neil Godfrey on Is Everything a Question of Probability?: “I spoke of public knowledge but afterwards wondered if I missed your point. You may have been thinking of knowledge…” Dec 15, 22:05

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