Perspective: A Tale of Brownlow and Burma

Today's Headlines, ripped from the Age:

Page One:

"Bartel's Brownlow - Cats' Eyes now on the big prize"
i.e. James Bartel of Geelong wins the Brownlow Medal

Far right side column, continued page 11:

"Masses pressure Burma's regime"
i.e. At least 15,000 monks and 30,000 people take to the streets in Burma's capital Rangoon, chanting prayers and slogans, in the largest protest against the illegally ruling military junta since a 1988 democracy uprising by students led to a brutal retaliation by the army.

Page 1 vs. page 11? I'm dissapointed at our collective nearsightedness. The media has a role to play in forming people's opinions (though of course their bottom line in our capitalist society is selling papers), and ranking an annual jock-award-cum-frockfest in our provincial little game above democracy-in-action is keeping a short-sighted nation continually short-sighted.

Aussie Rules is a great sport, but it's hopelessly provincial. Sports media and event promoters love to bill a given event as "the third largest sports event in the world", this title is pitched around at the Rugby World Cup, the Cricket World Cup, the various Grand Slams of Tennis - clearly, it is obvious that the AFL Grand Final won't ever deserve this obfuscation - it's just not that important. Perspective is a bitch.

On the other hand, the people's revolution in Burma is a protest that inspire. The military has held the nation in a stranglehold of militaristic rule against the result of the 1990 elections that should have brought the National League for Democracy (NLD) and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi into power as Prime Minister.

During these protests, about 2000 monks and civilians were allowed by the military to pray in outside her home, where she has been under house arrest for 10 years.

Her continuing incarceration is an affront to democracy.

As a result, she has as of last Sunday (23/9/07) been imprisoned in the notorious Insein prison, perhaps in part to deny the protesters a focusing symbol of leadership. Is there really nothing they won't do to maintain their hold on power?

It is not power that corrupts but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it.

- Aung San Suu Kyi

As always, use Wikipedia or Google for continued reading, or some fellow bloggers with far greater journalistic literacy then myself.

Oh yea, and buy a CD, please.

Means to an End

On the way home from our 5 our drive from Falls Creek, I had an interesting conversation with Paul Tran about the semi-political global warming documentary An Inconvenient Truth.

Indeed, global warming is a truth that has been ignored for far too long. (If anyone disagrees with me that global warming is a real phenomenon, I would really like to hear from you) Disclaimer: I spent my four years at Melbourne High School as the President of the Environmental Action Group. To everyone that doubted me in those years, I hope you are enjoying Melbourne's water shortages. I told you so.

Anyway, Paul contended that this documentary was good viewing for all, as it brings that facts to the people and makes everyone aware of the issue.

A deeply repressed gut feeling made me cry - "Ho! That documentary is sensationalised. Yes, the issue is an important one, but really - don't it seem a tad odd that this now-sidelined American politician has taken up an issue, made it high profile with classic media manipulation, and is now 'dining out' on it in front of the international community?"

The documentary seems highly exaggerated, and at times it fabricates facts without fully stating the context of research.

Trawl wikipedia for its sources (particularly 61 and 7), if you're interested in supporting and refuting evidence to see what I'm talking about.

I do understand that Gore is trying to put forward "the most important and salient points" in order to "communicate the essence of it in the lay language that I understand." That's all well and good if that's what you intend. However, the problem with non-scientists (and scientists who communicate badly) is that in trying to publicise a scientific issue, they tend to skim over the nuances, the context and the caution with which the scientific method guides us to do.

That's a highly dangerous form of miscommunication.

To tell you a story that illustrates my point: I was told as a child the story of how scientific endeavour under Galileo advanced human knowledge from the simplistic idea of a "geocentric universe" to the "correct story". "The Earth goes around the Sun, not the other way around", said my 3rd grade teacher.

"So... what does the Sun go around?" I asked myself. That simplistic "children's version" replaces a geocentric universe with a heliocentric universe - which of course, is still incorrect!

The Sun, my friends, goes around the galactic core, and the galaxy moves around the common gravitational field of the Local Group of galaxies; the Local Group itself moves around (mostly toward the Virgo Cluster of supergalaxies) amidst a totally gravitationally isotropic universe! That is, in all directions, everything moves relative to everything else - there is no "center" of the universe, and there is no fixed measure of distance.

If you told children that, they would understand the beauty, scale and vast immensity of the universe more accurately, and perhaps (like I did, after later research) automatically realise a basic principle of relativity - that there are no preferred frames of reference.

I digress, but the point is hopefully illustrated: half a truth is not truth - simplified concepts are the resort of those with weak teaching skills; good teachers will explain the truth clearly, correctly, succinctly and understandably.

So Gore should not defend any twisting, embellishment or exaggeration of facts in the documentary as a product of simplification - if you're going to present the issue, present it correctly. This is of tantamount importance to any debate, and for anyone really on the side of educating the global populace about global warming, it should be high priority that all facts remain straight. Only in this way can we expect to be taken seriously, and only in this way can our opinions be respected.

I was very worried, because Paul insisted, insisted, insisted (yes, you did Paul) that since global warming was a worthy end, necessary evils such as oversimplification of the issues and sensationalism was okay.

If you want to win the debate and hold the moral high ground, the ends do not justify the means.

No, it's not okay.

P.S. Please comment if I've misrepresented you, Paul!