We’re moving! To another country! I’m already stressing and I’ve done this more times than the average bear. Customs forms, statutory declarations, inventory checklists, insurance brochures. You’d think I’d have everything down pat by now, but every country has its own forms and procedures. Here is one area where the United Nations could really help out (after all, they standardised airline luggage and routing requirements, and the international postal system), but I doubt it’s going to happen in my lifetime. So, in the meantime, I’m buried in that pile of photocopied paper over in the corner there.

With this — and my always doubtful sanity — in mind, Fusion Despatches will be on hiatus for a week and a half. If everything goes to plan (cue maniacal laughter), I should be back on Wednesday, 18 June, in time to post Chapter Seven of War Games. Apologies to regular readers for any inconvenience.

You want to know the really sad bit? I’m already trying to talk J into moving to a different country in a few years’ time. He laughs and walks away, but I think I’m slowly wearing him down.

The world news is all about rising food and oil prices around the globe at the moment. Different countries have tackled this problem in different ways. In Indonesia, for example, the price of petrol is rising by 30% but the government will be handing cash to low-income families to temporarily offset the increase. Malaysia already has subsidies for staple goods (there is export control on Singaporeans swarming into Malaysia to buy up cooking oil, flour and sugar cheap before heading back across the Causeway), and is looking at measures to lift petrol subsidies for foreign-registered (i.e. mostly Singaporean, nyuk nyuk) cars.

Well, of course, Singapore wasn’t about to take this lying down. So, on 27 May, Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew made a speech about how subsidies (”like welfare systems in Europe”; notice there’s not even a sly allusion to Malaysia) have lowered incentives for their citizens to strive and excel. In other words, where there’s government intervention to help the average citizen, the average citizen becomes lazy and stupid, thus leading to the downfall of Western civilisation.

Answering the complaints of Singaporeans that food and transport costs in the island state should be subsidised, LKY’s counter is that Singapore must instead produce positive economic growth year after year. If you’re wondering how one answers the other, LKY explains that if Singapore produces positive economic growth each year, then Singaporeans will have more incentive to work hard (not like those lazy MalaysiansEuropeans), and will thus earn enough money to pay market prices for food! It’s a wonder the man’s genius isn’t appreciated outside Singapore, he has such a complete grip on global socioeconomics.

A direct quote from LKY: “When everybody knows the cost of what he consumes or uses, he will spend his money more to his benefit.” Isn’t it lovely? I want that one on a t-shirt as well.

Now, here’s the thing. The Singapore government believes that it can guarantee economic growth through population influx. Thus, it is thinking of increasing the population of Singapore by approximately 2 million people over the next decade. All this will do, however, will be to increase the domestic economic figure, or GDP. It will do exactly squat to affect the international economic figures, which is what is driving such things as the cost of groceries and oil.

The Singaporean government, while aware that it has no natural resources or solid manufacturing base to speak of, refuses to concede that this puts it in a vulnerable economic situation, hence the obsession to bring in more and more workers in an effort to spin greater economic prosperity. The fact that it hasn’t helped so far with sharply rising grocery and oil prices is only emphasised by one of Mr Wang’s posts, where he mentions that, for the year 2007, Singapore’s budget had a surplus of $6.45 billion.

So, according to the Singapore government, if you have an annual surplus in excess of $6 billion, no subsidies, and rising basic costs, then the solution is to bring in more people! Elementary, my dear Lee, elementary.

Danger, Will Robinson! Heavy topic ahead!

No resolutions in this blog … I’m just throwing it out there.

I was about to coin a particular term — and felt pretty proud of myself for thinking of it — when I searched and found out that it’s used quite widely already, albeit in a completely different context. Allow me to explain.

A few months ago, I read Mitt Romney’s concession speech. And part of it went as follows:

We face economic competition unlike anything we have ever known before. China and Asia are emerging from centuries of poverty. Their people are plentiful, innovative, and ambitious. If we do not change course, Asia or China will pass us by as the economic superpower…

Okay, let’s forgive the “centuries of poverty” crack and the fact that China is, according to Mitt, not part of Asia, and move on to the rest of the quote. I mean, if Mitt Romney mentioned it, it must have occurred to a couple of other people as well, right?

Am I happy that Asia is emerging as a long-term super-bloc? Yes, I am. Obviously, because I’m Asian myself, it’s nice to see; I don’t make any bones about that. I also think it’ll be great to have a bit of a multi-geographic mash-up going on in the world … think of all the new foods we can eat. Haddock briyani in Selfoss? Bring it on! (Not sure about hakarl in Shanghai … though you never know!) Of course, I doubt all this will occur fully in my lifetime, but I consider it inevitable.

In tandem with the rise in these previously secondary countries is something in the apparently waning primary countries that not many people seem to be commenting about, and that’s the shrinking of the middle class. I notice this particularly in the English-speaking Western countries because, obviously, that’s the news I read. Prices are going up, affordability is going down, and the middle class is getting squeezed by a debt trap they didn’t see coming, exacerbated by the corporate tsunami of offshoring, and governments not giving a fig. These factors combine to drive down salaries — a desperate, mortgage-laden supply of workers outstripping demand in Western countries, coupled with lowball bids from highly-skilled workers in emerging, offshore markets. So that’s the first point of consideration.

If this was a level playing field, then, we would see that — indeed — Mitt baby is right, and the outcome from all this knowledge movement would be the Dawn of the High-Tech Asian Bloc Civilisations (cue scary music) and yellow and brown skins sweeping the world in an orgy of economic dominance. And, I already see that kind of stuff in the local bookshops: row upon row of glossy books with fantastic architectural edifices and glittering cranes on the covers, telling me that Asia, or one of its components, is going to be the next leader in Innovation/Creativity/Supersonic Pizza Delivery.

Not so fast, Messrs. Lee, Hitaro and Kumar. We’re forgetting about one thing — cultural subservience. Now, that term is normally used to describe the alleged kowtowing of Western civilisation to the bearded Muslim hordes (a malignant offshoot of Huntington Madness (copyright 2007, KS Augustin)), but I’d like to strip all such connotations from it and take it back to basics. In this blog, I define “cultural subservience” as merely the subservience of one type of culture (ethnic or otherwise) to another. No sub-texts. Okay?

So, we have the gutting of the middle-class in the West, the rise of the knowledge nation in the East (both of which should naturally lead to Asia’s economic dominance) … and Kaz’s definition of cultural subservience. How does it all fit? All you need to complete the line between all these points is one more tidbit: when looking for their first job in south-east Asia, Asian students with degrees from Western countries get about 20% more than Asian students with degrees from Asian countries. Why that should be, when the general educational standard of students in Asia is higher than that of their peers in Western English-speaking countries, is beyond me. (No, I’m not being elitist, just go check the various UN stats; or the TIMSS (for maths & science) tables here and here, for example.) This unamibiguous measure of ability, however, is tempered by cultural subservience.

Cultural subservience is so visceral, that we have to fight hard and consciously (and sometimes still lose) against it. Cultural subservience tells me that a female astronaut is not as good as a male astronaut, for example (and especially if you’re Charlotte Allen! * snerk *), and that an Asian engineer is not as good as a Caucasian. You could argue that what I’m describing is actually cultural bias, but I’m using the term “subservience” (which includes bias) deliberately for a reason that will become obvious soon.

All regional high-tech crowing to one side, what I see in south-east Asia (’cos that’s where I am) is another manifestation of cultural subservience. Chen must be the superior job candidate (and get a better starting salary) because (a) well, he’s male, duh! (you won’t get any argument from me that Asia is incredibly, diabolically, sexist), and (b) he studied in Dublin, Ireland, say.

Wang, on the other hand, only graduated from a Singapore university and is a woman, thus she must not be as smart. QED She will get 20% less than Chen because of the origin of her degree, and get penalised another 20-30% on top of that because she’s female.

Even worse, British-born Andrew from London will then saunter along on a corporate relocation package and trump both smirking Chen from Ang Mo Kio (via Dublin University) and unfortunate Wang from Bukit Batok (via National University of Singapore) in salary, just because he’s an orang putih (white man) with some corporate backing.

SO IF WE HAVE that cultural subservience of Asians to Westerners (and everybody likes to be coy and pretend it doesn’t exist, but it does),

PLUS the cultural subservience of the darker-skinned Asians to the lighter-skinned Asians (even within the same ethnic group),

PLUS the cultural subservience of women to men,

then — despite the money and skills flowing into the continent — how can Asia truly break free and establish itself as an economic (and, by corollary, cultural) hegemon in its own right? Well, it can’t, can it? Not while it’s openly boastful and yet secretly shamed by its own pigmented and particularly gendered brain power. I have no easy answers for this. I wonder if Asia will ever manage to rationalise itself out of this philosophical, reality-based cul-de-sac. And I’m prepared for the fact that the answer may not even come in my lifetime. But it’s something that must happen if Asia is to succeed.

ADDITIONAL: Even in Western countries, women earn approximately 75% of a man’s salary for equivalent work across the board. There are stats around to analyse if you go searching. In Asian countries, this is compounded by the Western education fallacy. Thus, a female Asian graduate from a local university will probably earn only 50% of a male Asian graduate from a Western university for the exact same position.

Let me speak plainly. Asians are, as a group, currently and overwhelmingly too short-sighted, bigoted and chauvinistic (yep, I’m calling you out, Messrs. Lee, Hitaro and Kumar) to see beyond these significant points of discrimination. And as long as we remain wilfully blind, we deserve to fail.

There’s a small resort nestled in the curve of a sandy bay. We’re talking sandy beaches, palm trees, and tropical weather. It has a supermarket, cinema, bowling alley, some fast-food joints, a golf course and, of course, the obligatory souvenir shop. It’s a bit exclusive, but — and, let’s face it, you normally never see this word in conjunction with “exclusive” — cheap. How cheap? From what I’ve read, US$42 (SG$58 / EUR28) will rent you a self-contained apartment for the night. We’re talking several bedrooms, kitchen, bathroom, and air-conditioning. It’s not in Hawaii. In fact, it’s surprisingly close to the US mainland. Interested?

The name of the resort is the “Taliban Towers”. And it’s situated in the sun-drenched curve of Guantanamo Bay. The Guantanamo Bay concentration detention camp is part of the US Navy base at the southern end of the bay, so I suppose this little pearl of holiday merry-making must be further north. If you were one of the 3,000 construction workers involved, or one of the 1.5 million servicemen and servicewomen within the US military, you can travel to Taliban Towers for a holiday with your family.

The t-shirts you can buy at the souvenir shop have slogans such as:

• The Taliban Towers at Guantanamo Bay, the Caribbean’s Newest 5-star Resort
• Greetings from paradise GTMO resort and spa fun in the Cuban sun
• The proud protectors of freedom

You can get a mug with the slogan “Honor Bound To Defend Freedom”. Here’s a selection of the souvenirs:

I understand that service personnel are humans. I understand that they need time to unwind. But I really wonder at the mentality that enables its soldiers to, not only frolic with their families, near this:

but then also emphasises it by allowing the production of tacky souvenirs with slogans of questionable taste. And by “mentality”, I’m not talking about the soldiers’ mentality, but the mentality of the senior military personnel who made the decision to allow such a thing in the first place.

The full article on this “resort” is here.

As a civilian, I am repulsed by everything Guantanamo Bay represents, and the thought that there may be families swimming in the surf, while people — against whom no charges have been laid for 6 years — are force-fed food through unlubricated and dirty plastic pipes shoved down their throats, a couple of hundred metres away, is enough to make me ill.

As someone with passing familiarity with the military, I am also repulsed by the kind of screwing-over being inflicted on the soldiers, and their families. The handling of prisoners is a very serious matter. There are rules and processes governing this kind of thing. You do not trivialise it (especially if you’re supposedly dealing with “the worst of the worst”) by producing ghoulish dust-collectors for some young child, or non-combat adult, to take home.

Unless…. Unless you don’t agree that War is a nasty business. Unless you want to demean a particular section of the human population and present them as sub-human, and thus not worthy of consideration. If you wanted to, say, start brainwashing the next generation about the superiority of your own country and citizens over everyone else in the world, then I think “Taliban Towers” is an excellent way to do it.

Personally, I don’t think the genius who okayed this decision was really that smart. I can easily imagine a number of senior officers sitting around, saying, “Hey, we could have a place for the soldiers to relax. Y’know, bring their families. Enjoy a little downtime.” And someone else suggesting flippantly, “We can have souvenirs.” The entire room erupts in laughter. “Freakin’ souvenirs! Why not?” And then the next two hours are spent brainstorming the most atrocious strings of words you can put on little dolphins, keychains and t-shirts.

The problem is, what may have started as a joke can easily turn into psychological manipulation. How do you explain the bright and shiny holiday items next to the barbed wire and shuffling, brown-skinned men? Hell, there is even barbed wire on the holiday items themselves, so it’s not like you can run away from it.

What other inference is there but that the brown-skinned men are inferior to you — cowed and beaten. They don’t “deserve” better treatment. They don’t “deserve” any vacation time at the bowling alley or catching “Iron Man” at the cinema. None of these men — lack of charges withstanding — “deserve” to be free. These spouses and children will not only be taking back photos from their holidays at Guantanamo Bay, but also a moral dilemma that they will have to rationalise one way or another. As a student of history, I know which way these rationalisations tend to sort out. And it’s Not Good.

For the kind of holiday shots you can expect from the resort, go here (ironically courtesy of a United States Army officer). And here’s the accompanying article.

And my good friend, Maria, picks up the gauntlet. Welcome to the Land of Righteous Indignation, M! It was getting pretty lonely here for a while.

Both Good Morning Silicon Valley and The Register reported this one, so I couldn’t run away from it. SIGH

Women are four times more likely than men to give out “passwords” in exchange for chocolate bars.

This finding came as the result of the latest annual Infosec survey (held outside Liverpool Street Station), and was held just before the Infosec Europe conference, which is scheduled to start next week in London. Out of 576 office workers surveyed, 45% of women (as opposed to 10% of men) were willing to provide their usernamsnames and passwords to complete strangers in exchange for a chocolate bar (no details on what brand of chocolate bar). The Register was a bit more sceptical in its coverage by adding that:

Little attempt is made to verify the authenticity of the passwords, beyond follow-up questions asking what category it falls under. So we don’t know whether women responding to the survey filled in any old rubbish in return for a choccy treat or handed out their real passwords.

Oh, I really really hope so. Because the alternative is too awful to contemplate. Look, we’re women! Just hold chocolate or ice-cream under our noses and we’ll crumple faster than a modern car’s chassis in a pile-up. Aw crap!

For the original press release, go here.

I don’t know how many of you look at the intertwining of politics and sport. It’s one of my casual interests, I’ll admit. And here’s another brick in the wall of repression that I’m seeing slowly getting built all across the Western world.

Feminism has a long and interesting history, which I really don’t want to go into here for the simple reason that I cannot do it justice. However, the idea that half of the world’s population is entitled to the same rights as the other half seems, to me, neither banal nor apocalyptic. If that makes me a feminist, so be it.

One of the truths in feminism is that women have fought long and hard for equal rights and these rights seemed never so available, never so promising, within the USA until the 1960s and the advent of the civil rights movement, the tide trying to lift all boats, as it were. This was not the recognition of women just because the men were away fighting (as was the case in World War Two), but a need arising from societal change and more professional women in academia and the workplace. (I’m compressing decades of history into two sentences here, so bear with me.)

If you agree that the post-60s era (to the present time) was kinder to feminism than the pre-60s era — and I’m sure most of you do — how do you explain the Sports Illustrated covers? I am entirely indebted to Charles Modiano’s article “Sports Illustrated’s Cover Barrier: Who Will Break the Bikini Line?” on the Cosellout website for providing my casual observations with solid ammunition.

Modiano points out quite clearly that, in the 1950s, “the decade of Sports Illustrated’s inception and hardly a period of progressive feminism, it was quite common to have about an average of five issues per year where a female athlete graced its cover. By the 1990’s that figure had been reduced to about 2 or 3 per year.”

Modiano also quotes Michael McCambridge’s 1998 book, The Franchise: A History of Sports Illustrated Magazine, in which McCambridge says:

“The magazine might have deflected some of these complaints [about the Swimsuit Issue] if it had done a better job covering women in sports. But it became a truism that the only time a woman was on the cover was when she was, in the words of one staffer, ‘a victim or a babe or both’. Monica Seles made the cover alone after she was stabbed in a tournament in Germany, but not after any of her 8 grand slam women’s titles. (She shared a cover in 1990) Nancy Kerrigan graced the cover after being clubbed, but not after winning the U.S. Figure Skating championships …”.

Since 2000, Sports Illustrated has scaled back to one cover of a female athlete a year:

Since 1990, the Williams sisters (Venus & Serena) COMBINED have not received as many covers (3) as Ted Williams — who retired in 1960. In contrast, at least five swimsuit models have graced the cover three times. The record for most SI covers by any woman is five — held by Elle MacPherson.

In 2006, one cover showed 6 athletes, half of them women. In the same year, the cover also sported 8 half-naked supermodels.

2007? One woman. Beyonce. In an orange bikini. Remember how the late-night show hosts were slavering over that issue?

2008? One so far … swimsuit model, Marisa Miller. In, ah, beads and a bikini bottom.

So what, you say? Everyone knows these are sports jocks, and they like (a) beer, (b) giant TVs with remote controls, and (c) women. Okay. But the truly eye-opening thing is that, even within those constraints, the equality quotient, if you will, has been consistently falling. You cannot tell me that Americans in the 1950s were any less sports-crazy than Americans in the present day. And yet, the number of positive female athlete role models on the cover of the same magazine has reduced to … almost zero?

What does that tell you about the progress of feminism/equal rights over the decades? Or, more generally, what does that tell you about progress in general?

I am of the opinion that, as the Western world veers ever more into conservative territory, the rights of all minorities get chipped away. Considering I’m a member of several minorities, this is of particular concern to me, and I keep an eye open to any area where I feel this erosion of respect manifests. (Where respect disappears, rights soon follow.) Sports is one of these areas. Most politically-active readers tend not to watch that arena, but over the past decade, I’ve come to realise that that’s a mistake, because observation of sports gives an insight into how average people think, and — perhaps more importantly — into how large companies think average people think.

Go have a read of Modiano’s article, which I have brutally chopped here to suit my own ends. It’s cogent, eye-opening, and deserves to be widely read.