Of Badges, Banners & Flags: How Dangerous We’ve Become
Whether it’s sports club, political party, or country, we’ve become ever more self-serving and without perspective. We’ve become more dangerous where we need to be more aware.
This is my first Substack, and as is my nature, I’m going to dive right in at the deep end. I’m going to ask the question, where, when and why—or perhaps it should be how—did we as a collective become so excessively biased towards a situation based on our own perspective? By “we” I don’t mean you or I necessarily, although we might sometimes show up in that way. What I’m pointing to for now is the literal “we”, being most groupings of people under a badge, banner or flag.
For example (and it’s the least sensitive one I can find), consider sports stadium audiences who boo loudly in an attempt to influence the ref when there’s the slightest hint of an offence against their own team that the ref might have missed. This as opposed to allowing a person (the ref) to do their job, and make a mistake, and recognise that sport is all about fairness, so let’s be fair ourselves. This happened to such an extent during the recent Rugby World Cup that some refs got death threats and threats against their families; some resigned and chose to change careers.
If I am offended, or wronged, what should my reaction be?
OK, I get it, the world has always been that way and it’s just become louder and more in your face because of social media. So, it’s technology to blame. It’s replays on the big screen. But then there are people who say that it’s not guns that kill people, but people who kill people. So then, it’s not the technology, but the people, is it? Funnily enough, that statement (about guns) is perhaps one of the best examples of what I’m talking about; but please don’t leave if it’s one that you support, let’s look at this together. If I let this become an echo chamber, I’d be guilty of not practising what I preach.
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As I write, we have two major military actions dominating the news, plus attacks on ships in the Red Sea. We have the Republican caucuses taking place. We have Donald Trump’s fraud trial wrapping up, and one of his appeals to the Supreme Court in progress. We have South Africa taking on Israel at the International Court of Justice. That same country, South Africa (which is my country of origin and my home country for most of each year when I’m not visiting the USA), won the aforementioned Rugby World Cup last year, an outcome which was a big deal here and obliquely relevant to today’s topic.
Here’s an extreme example from my own life: I was very nearly a victim of the Magoo’s bombing.
So here’s the thing. If I am offended, or wronged, what should my reaction be? (And for now, let’s leave out the woke version of being offended or outraged by things people say. Let’s talk about actual legal or physical offences and we’ll get to that other version on another day.) Here’s an extreme example from my own life: I was very nearly a victim of the Magoo’s bombing.
In 1986, I was a student in Durban, South Africa. I was with friends at a beachfront bar called Easy Beat. It was on the alternate corner of the same art deco building that the more popular Magoo’s bar was in—they were literally some 50 metres apart. We decided it was time to move over to Magoo’s and were about to leave when one of our party arrived at the table with a new round of drinks. About three minutes later we heard—and felt—a blast; the windows shattered, and we found ourselves looking around to discover what had happened. At first, I thought the speakers had blown. Then I saw and heard the chaos out on the street. We went out, saw the carnage, and it dawned on me that our greatest white South African fear had just been realised: a terrorist bomb blast. Three people were killed that night, and 69 injured. If our friend had not bought that round of drinks, we would have been among them.
What should my reaction have been? If I had followed America’s or Israel’s example, I might have gone out and bombed a township, or shot and killed 300 or maybe a thousand of any person or place I suspected might be associated with those bombers. Thankfully, I did not. I did not have the example and I did not even think of doing those things. Instead, I tried to understand what would drive a person or group of people to do such a thing. I didn’t have to try too hard; it was obvious: apartheid.
I’ll say in my favour that I never took revenge, nor even had thoughts of revenge.
Now from across the void of time, apartheid may seem like a cut-and-dried case, and so of course those terrorists were justified, and of course that should have seemed obvious to us back then. However, as a lived experience, it was more complex. White South Africans feared the prospect of the country going the way of many other African countries: falling into the hands of communists, or spiralling into a corrupt dictatorship, or at best ending up with a highly incompetent government. So even while some of us could see that apartheid was wrong, and we did our best to be aware of our prejudices and not act in a racist manner towards individuals, we also had that collective fear of what life beyond apartheid might bring. I’ll put myself squarely in the middle of that group. A daring thing to say in a world so full of virtue signalling.
I’ll say in my favour that I never took revenge, nor even had thoughts of revenge. Even later when I was conscripted and found myself armed and patrolling the townships, I did everything I could (and succeeded) in not ever knowingly harming anyone. We were attacked many times by youths with homemade weapons. We knew those weapons were unreliable and so we fired warning shots rather than hurt, let alone kill, any of them. This is the honest truth.
Today, the “terrorists” who planted the Magoo’s bomb are the country’s legitimate government. The African National Congress (ANC), who later claimed to have ordered the bombing, is the governing party—it was the party of the late Nelson Mandela. Robert McBride, the head of the cell that planted the bomb, and who was arrested, convicted and sentenced to death, was later granted amnesty by the country’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission. And while he is legally classified as a murderer, he has also served as head of the country’s Independent Police Investigative Directorate and as head of the Foreign Branch of the State Security Agency.
Now, he has not been squeaky clean in any of those positions: he was fired from the former and has been suspended from the latter. The ANC has delivered a relatively incompetent and somewhat corrupt government, though thankfully not a communist one and no absolute dictators. The country is teetering, but still functioning. Many have emigrated to escape some of those problems, but for those of us who remain, we live with these paradoxes and every day we remain a miracle of tolerance, forgiveness, and, for the most part, demonstrate a will to work together.
So, am I saying that America, Israel and sports spectators could learn from this example? Yes, I am. I hear the torrent of vitriol and arguments imbued with certitude that might follow a statement like that. The main one I hear is that if we listen to terrorists, we’re supporting them, or supporting others to do the same. It’s hard to question that and yet I will. Is that just an excuse not to listen to the other side?
Most people would rather get on and make a living in a peaceful way.
Think about it. Most people don’t go about organising and risking their lives just for the sake of it. Most people would rather get on and make a living in a peaceful way. In the book At Home: A Short History of Private Life, Bill Bryson recounts the story of a Chartists rebellion that had been planned for a particular day in London in 1848. There was a fear that they would seize Parliament. The Duke of Wellington went out with his troops—and even wheeled out cannons—to defend the place. In the end, there was a downpour and the poorly led Londoners retired to the pub! In South Africa and its neighbour Zimbabwe, people have put up with an extraordinary amount and still today seek a peaceful means to make a living over armed rebellion. There are many more examples of that in the world than examples of people organising violent rebellions just because someone else did.
And if you disagree with me, then the coach in me comes out and says, in what way might it be useful for you to consider this as a perspective?
And if you disagree with me, then the coach in me comes out and says, in what way might it be useful for you to consider this as a perspective? What if the people who are doing this thing that you’re so angry about and offended by have been pushed to it by something I or we have done, or something that’s wrong with the system that we’re part of? Surely, whether as a partner, a parent, a citizen or a leader, you would be well served to ask that question first, and to consider it honestly and seriously, before you jump to the other, ultimately self-serving, conclusion. Self-serving because it means you don’t have to do anything, you don’t have to take responsibility for anything. You just react, and continue to react. You just become Donald Trump. Or South Africa’s version: Jacob Zuma.
The problem with considering this as a perspective—or any perspective other than your own—is that one you do, you’ll most likely be confronted with unpleasant truths or possibilities. You’ll most likely be stopped in your tracks by things you don’t like. And then what?
Perhaps we can take it down a notch now and return to the sports field. What if you were that person (the referee) doing your job in front of millions of people? What happens when you’re at work and you make a mistake? (Of course, you never make mistakes, but let’s say hypothetically that you do.) How readily do you seek to hide it? What if you had your boss and all your colleagues, everyone in the company, watching your every move and yelling at you every time you mistyped something, then hounding you on social media and never letting you forget, even threatening your life, your family’s lives?
For all of our advancement in knowledge, we’ve become no better at unwinding ourselves from our own perspectives that are based on the badge, banner or flag that we are born under.
Do you see how ridiculous we’ve become? For all of our advancement in knowledge, all our wealth of information, even in the field of neuroscience, we have moved no closer to holding a balanced view of things, become no better at unwinding ourselves from our own perspectives that are based on the badge, banner or flag that we are born under. We’re no better at taking responsibility for our part in things, or at managing ourselves for the sake of a better world or a more peaceful outcome. We are like children, squabbling in a playpen, with no adults to rein us in; and we have big, dangerous toys.
And yes, technology has a role to play in that it has given leverage to our worst instincts. Without that technology our bad attitudes were limited to our physical environments. Only our friends and family got the worst of us. Now those attitudes can be broadcast on the airwaves. It’s clear to me that with more powerful technology available to us, the imperative to self-manage has risen too. The problem is, very few have responded and that has put us on a very dangerous path.
I still have faith in the possibility, though I might be naïve.