Payback

High Grant has suffered at the hands of the paparazzi and celebrity journalism and has paid back in an article in New Statesman.

On one level it simply feels like payback - a topic on which I'll return to in this post.

But while he's used the tools of payback by secretly recording the conversation he has used the interview to skillfully reveal the moral question at the heart of this. As Hugh Grant says his job is acting not being a celebrity, the intrusions cannot be justified on the grounds that his job is being a celebrity.

The former journalist's other defence is based on the wealth of the celebrities - which feels like it is some kind of "social interest tax" argument. It is the same kind of distorted morality that I outlined in an itNews story on copyright.

As I'm want to actually spend time considering morals, this is an opportune time to consider the theory of "payback".

The biblical adage of "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth" is often used as a justification for an approach to justice that extracts direct revenge. As first introduced in the bible at Exodus 21:24 it reads just like that, that the punishment is to be exactly that.

But it is interesting to note that the verse before basically carries the instruction that (in a case where a woman miscarries due to being injured) the victim (well, being patriarchal, the husband of the victim) can set the penalty.

In this context then Exodus 21:24 can be read as an instruction on the MAXIMUM penalty that can apply. That is, you should not exact two eyes for an eye (or cut off the hand of a thief, etc).

Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount used the text in one of his "you have heard it said..." pieces. He repudiates the general tenor and introduces the concept of "turning the other cheek" (Matthew 5:38).

Justice is not retribution. Justice is not about the psychological gobbeledy-gook of "closure" nor about "victims rights". Justice is about the process of getting everyone to follow the rules and having appropriate consequences for not following them. The twin biblical invocations are that the punishment should never be more extreme than the crime, and that the punishment should not be motivated by revenge.

This is the version of "judeo-christianity" that has been successful in building the modern democratic market economy state. But to get there you have to accept that you need a system of rules. That's what the newspapers and their staff in the UK seem to have completely forgotten.

Finally, we return to the question of Murdoch. I've noted the weazel words that News Limited has used thus far. The question remains "did Murdoch know"? If the answer is "yes" he needs to be far more direct about owning up and admitting the error. If the answer is "no" he needs to explain the failure of governance in the corporation and what he is doing about it. But he can't just stay silent.


Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est

It is all too much ...

King John wasn't evil, just a bad politician. It was all just made up by the Victorians (those south of 1900 not the Murray River).

The NBN will help kiddie fiddlers because there will be too many service providers for the spooks to watch. And I thought the real problem was the NBn would be too slow because of the "filter".

The Pope seems to think it important to exonerate the Jews over Jesus' death. I never understood the whole idea of "blaming" them. According to Christian theology Jesus had to die on the cross as atonement for our sins. He had to be resurrected for us to believe in his resurrection. If he hadn't been executed he'd have died a forgotten old man.

Time to go watch some rugby. Go the 'Tahs.


Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est

Faith, hope and love

In the ongoing discussion between "new atheists" and "intelligent design theory" I come to the position of reflecting on my own position.

It has always appeared to me that the attempt by anyone who "believes" to try to support their belief by "fact", be that discovering the historic Christ or intelligen desgn, belittles their faith. The historic "fact" doesn't help the need to find bits to ignore - the hstoric Christ, for example, never spoke against slavery. And intelligent design fails both because of Bertrand Russells response to Parry (??) on the "watchmaker" argument of who made the watch? If the desin needs a maker, then the maker needs a maker. The "odds" of the universe turnng out just like it is are not all these astronomcal numbrs that some design theorists quote, but 1. The odds of getting six heads in a row at a coin toss before hand are 1 in two to the power of six. But after I've tossed six heads they are 1.

The question on the existence of the spiritual is one of faith, and it is one of faith because it IS unknowable.

Given the choice between a rational world and a world with a "spiritual intelligence" the difference is that in the latter there is hope.

And finally there is love. The reason to adopt the Christian faith is that, compaed to all others, it works. And it works by preaching a message of lve.

Faith, hope and love - that is it!