Language and politics

I've been having a loooong argument on facebook recently about this article about the use of the phrase 'flesh coloured' to describe Mrs Obama's dress at a recent event. At 45 comments, it's probably the biggest facebook debate I've ever had. I initially re-posted the article simply because I found it hilarious. My friend, however, got on the defensive and argued that the term 'flesh coloured' had nothing to do with the colour of flesh. After a lot of debate about the need to be sensitive with language, I eventually decided to try and find a more solid argument, so here it is.



Let's set aside the emotive, political stuff for a second. I contend that the statement 'her dress was flesh coloured' is factually inaccurate, and here's why.

Grammatically, the phrase 'flesh coloured' could be read in two ways.

In one reading, the phrase acts as a single sentential object, 'flesh coloured', which is a label which refers to a specific colour, a shade of peach. In this reading, the phrase acts in a similar way to 'red', 'blue', or 'green'.

In the second, the phrase is in two parts, 'flesh' 'coloured'. In this reading, 'coloured' acts as a quantifier to describe how 'flesh' relates to 'dress' - the relation of colour. By this reading we could re-arrange 'flesh coloured' to 'the colour of flesh'. This looks weird if we were to replace 'flesh' with 'red', since you wouldn't say 'the dress was red coloured'. But I argue that this is because you know 'red' is a colour, since it doesn't refer to anything else - so you drop the 'coloured' quantifier as it is unnecessary (this fits with Chomsky's 'the language faculty is economically thrifty' explanation of sentence structure). But you don't know flesh is a colour, since it also refers to skin. You could say 'her dress was red', but 'her dress was flesh' has a rather strange initial reading.
By this reading, 'flesh coloured' would equate to 'sand coloured'. Similarly, you might use other objects, such as they sky, to illustrate a colour, 'sky blue'. In this case the colour is an analogy - 'the colour of the dress was similar to the colour of sand/the sky/flesh'. In this case the statement 'her dress was flesh coloured' is false, because not all flesh is that colour, so the analogy doesn't hold - or at least is insufficiently specific, like saying 'her dress was car coloured'.
The sky is not always blue, hence 'sky blue'. If one said 'her dress was flesh peach', it would be more accurate, since 'flesh' would quantify over 'peach' (and, less obviously, vice-versa) in the same way 'sky' quantifies over 'blue', to give a particular shade of blue, and a particular hue of sky.

While I can see why you would think the first is the true meaning of the phrase, I think it makes a lot more linguistic sense to view the second reading as more grammatically accurate. 'Flesh coloured' is, to me, a compound phrase where 'coloured' denotes an analogical relationship between flesh and the object described as 'flesh coloured'. By this reading the statement 'Mrs Obama's dress was flesh coloured' is obviously false, and the humour derives from the very obviousness of this in the case cited.



I would re-paste the whole debate, but I'd have to edit out the names and that would take a long time. If anyone wants to read it, just ask and I'll either do the work or add you as a friend on facebook. For those already my friend, you can find it here.

The thing about prostitution

I think I've been moralising. I was largely saying reasonable things, but I definitely went a bit Victorian.

Induction from a single case/women should be seen (for a nominal fee), but not heard

"Common sense tells us that..." 
Actually, hard facts tell us that between 3/4 and 9/10 of prostitutes are beaten and raped, a prostitute is around 40 times more likely to be killed, and that almost half of people trafficked into prostitution are minors; common sense tells us that fantasies backed up by a single case are misleading, and that portraying such as informed analysis on one of the world's most pervasive media outlets is terribly irresponsible: journalistically, morally, politically and socially.
The introspection of someone who - by their own admission - is entirely ignorant of the subject is worthless (unless, perhaps, the subject is mathematics, logic, or something else purely analytic, but I suspect the reality of prostitution is not an a priori synthetic truth). If we want some understanding of this subject matter, I suspect facts may be more helpful. Research, reports, and facts, gathered from a range of expert bodies invariably show that Dr Magnanti is an exception, and Mr James is mistaken.

Only ignorance will allow one to speculate that the vast majority of prostitutes do not lead lives of pain, misery, exploitation, rape, assault and exploitation, because all research says they do. There are exceptions, but accounts such as Dr Magnanti's do not begin to nullify the horrifying experiences of so many who live a life of brutal, violating slavery. Mr James spins from this account a misleading global narrative that perpetuates myths which many wish to believe, but which defy the facts; by doing so, he, and by his actions Dr Maganati, contribute to this abuse.

Beyond suffering and victimhood, beyond each individual's experience, is the broader societal context in which these events take place: we live in an unequal society, where women are paid around a fifth less than their male counterparts, occupy a lot less of the top jobs, and account for more than half the politicians in only one country in the entire world. Such cold statements reflect a more pervasive, every-day problem: women are not being treated seriously as people. 

Women-as-objects are still more common in our media, advertising, entertainment and, therefore, consciousnesses, than women as thinkers. In fact we are far more accepting of women as objects. Any woman ascending to power herself will quickly be savaged or ridiculed (look at all those female Labour MPs of the last ten years, who upon touching cabinet were torn to shreds by the media), but the wives of politicians may be lauded - but only for their choice of outfit, or for having a nice smile, i.e. in their capacity as eye-candy. Watch any news coverage and you'll see Michelle Obama as the beautiful, well dressed saint, while Harriet Harman is portrayed as a crazy witch with extreme, yet trivial views. For an example, see The Independent's reaction to reviewed rape laws which aimed to prevent women being convicted of murder when they kill their husbands following years of physical and psychological abuse, while making it a crime for a man to kill his wife because of infidelity; Harman the grinch; Harman interrupting the men in that silly way girls do; Harman indoctrinating children; "Harriet Harman is either thick or criminally disingenuous";  Harriet Harman's use of facts completely disguises the truth (with a wonderful link to "Prostitutes are, in effect, blackleg labour, strike breakers. They undercut middle-class women. If men can go and pay for sex with someone like Brooke Magnanti, why on earth would they bother to put up with the endless screaming demands, the controlling behaviour, the constant low-level mental abuse, the endless tears and hissy fits of the average middle-class princess?")
Such drivel is easily satirised and the dubious journalistic standards held to account.

Behind this lies the ever popular Madonna/whore complex (and yes, I have exhibited elements of this myself), which is so deeply ingrained into our collective moralities one wonders if it may ever be removed. Women ought be saints like Mrs Obama, or Lady Diana, and be chaste, quiet and pretty, or they ought be whores and thus give up their rights to human decency. Either way they are not people, we do not treat them as ends in themselves, but as furnishings. This is what must end. This is why a handful of 'happy hookers' will make up for the exploitation of so many: the oppression is not merely an issue for prostitutes, but for us all.

When I worked on a till in Sainsbury's, I made the most of it - I was happy as I could make myself. This does not mean I would choose to be till staff. Choosing to be happy in one's situation does not make one's situation desirable in itself. If you find someone interned in Guantanamo Bay, who's determination makes them happy, does that mean they wouldn't rather be free?

But if freedom is the issue, shouldn't Dr Magnanti be free to do as she pleases, opine as she pleases, and share this with the world? Yes, yes of course she is free to do so, and ought be. But freedom entails responsibility. I am free to step into the nearest pub and kill everyone in it, but I oughtn't.

Though I ought avoid using morality as a stick with which to beat Dr Magnanti. She released her story early as someone else was about to anyway, and it's better to have some control over the presentation. Similarly, I ought be careful about judging her for entering prostitution. PhDs are incredibly expensive (why??). Funding a PhD is a huge challenge to any wannabe academic. Those with inherited wealth needn't worry, while the tiniest minority may get funding because of their exceptional record (this number is infintessimally small), most must beg wealthy corporations to allow them to research, essentially as a slave (working to not get paid, working without employment rights), whatever may be of use to that corporation. All for three letters than give some academic credibility. Dr Magnanti's part-time job at least gave her academic freedom.
And Dr Magnanti ought not be expected to lie. If she enjoyed her work, then good for her. The issue I take is ultimately not with her, but with those who wish to use her story - which endless research reveals to be an exception - as the sole evidence upon which to base a pre-conceived narrative to mislead the public, obscure the truth and justify sex slavery, rape and assault as a 'profession'.

The morality of someone selling their own body, entirely of their own volition, is a divisive issue complicated by the subtlety of societal repercussions; what is indubitable is that the cases in which this question is relevant, where the paid participant can be said to have meaningful agency in the act of prostitution, are the minority.

All we need are sales and recruitment. If you're good, maybe we'll call you marketing and let you out once in a while

If you want to be a professional artist, move to China.

Pride and Prejudice: Why I no longer believe in trickle down economics (using 'believe' in the sense of 'having faith in')

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 Tuesday, 10 March 2009 at 15:24 | Edit note | Delete

For a long time I have been considered politically right of centre among my peers: to the extent that a hush has descended upon a room as I’ve entered it. However, I’m becoming increasingly left-leaning with age and, perhaps – and I only say perhaps – more tellingly, increase of education.

I have always supported a right of centre economic policy as I believed it led to an increase of wealth for any individual by increasing the overall wealth. I held that this was achieved by the ‘trickle down’ mechanism. To illustrate this mechanism, choose any luxury item, say a television. When the television comes out it will cost a great deal of money, say £1500, and only the very wealthy will buy one. Once everyone who is going to buy one at this price has done so the price is reduced and the product becomes available to the next socio-economic class. This process is repeated until the market is saturated and the product is terminated.

This system is not the result of technological or qualitative production potential. For while this stratification occurs amongst TVs, food and beverage products and so on, it is also prevalent amongst trainers, where the technological and qualitative factors remain essentially unchanged amongst any two instances of a given brand’s flagship output year on year.

I have long defended this system on the argument that the start up cost of production of any item is always a great deal higher than the maintenance of that production. A new product must be researched, designed, tested, marketed and so on; there is also the initial expenditure on fixed costs, such as the equipment used to make the product. Thus, I reasoned, the initial cost reflects the initial investment. Furthermore, it is only through this initial skimming of the market that it becomes possible for the poorer elements of society to have access to the products, for if the companies were only able to sell the products at the reduced price throughout the product’s entire life cycle then they would not be able to generate sufficient starter capital to make a worthwhile return on their initial investment, rendering production either unviable or undesirable.

The point is that none of this is the point. That one person’s wealth allows for another to receive hand-me-down trainer fashion when it is his turn does not equate to an overall raising of wealth. During boom years everyone annually upgrades their phone/trainers/car/TV/computer/iPod and during the busts we all realise that we never really cared anyway and that the job we spent 80 hours a week wishing we weren’t at and whatever remainder we were awake trying to forget we were ever at was not worth the extra £10k we only spent on booze, coke and the latest model iPhone. Consumerism is the new opiate of the masses, or at least the middle classes. The consumer is temporarily placated but their quality of life is not improved.

Just because everyone in this country now has a sky dish and a replica football shirt and branded footwear does not mean that there is no working class. People, if they are lucky enough to be afforded the opportunity, work obscene numbers of hours and destroy themselves with stress to ultimately achieve nothing more than trinkets. Will that be your life’s worth: a house stuffed with old, outdated memorabilia that your grandchildren will puzzle at and your children will continually try to dispose of, just like the cluttered old messes you remember visiting in your youth? If you have children, that is. You might decide you’d rather be a careerist than a parent. Who needs reproduction when you can have the satisfaction of a job well done? Of course you work will be under-appreciated and under-compensated but children are so expensive and they’ll only turn against you in the end. You might as well devote your life’s energy to building a career only to receive enforced redundancy at the point at which it is all you have.

I’ve descended into hyperventilating hyperbole. The mixing of passion and argument can be very dangerous. It can be misleading and obscuring. It is often the case that the more passionate one gets in making one’s argument, the less of an argument one has: the passion often covering up the lack of clarity or rational justification concerning one’s position.

I will endeavour to regain some focus in my conclusion. As I said in my introduction, I have become increasing left-leaning in my outlook as I have experienced more of life and read more of others’ reflections on what they have experienced. I think I can sum up what is becoming increasingly palpable to me in one sentence:

Some values aren’t quantified.