Alpha Mind Blog

It’s almost as if some spy went and told Seth Godin and Christopher Penn what I was saying about them when I recorded Episode -2 last week. Each of them seems to have gone out of their way to underscore my point.

Seth talks about the importance of standing for something.

And Chris recommends Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels as a marketing guru.

In Seth’s case… his post aligns with what I said fairly neatly. When he writes about standing for something, he doesn’t talk about being ethically upstanding, merely consistent. But the simple fact is that the kind of consistency he recommends is a hallmark of the ethically mature. And the extreme of inconsistency is the mark of the shyster.

And as I said in the podcast, Seth doesn’t make his point as if from a position atop some “Mr. Ethics” pedestal. But this particular post is perfectly consistent with the theme of respect for the customer, a leitmotif running through all Seth’s work.

Then there’s Chris Penn.

Oy!

My point about Chris in the podcast was that I don’t see in him the sort of broad concern for the human condition that I detect in Godin and see epitomized in Drucker.

And Chris didn’t merely reinforce my point, but almost parodied it, recommending Goebbels as “your go-to guy” for how to do fear marketing.

Here are Chris and John Wall in last week’s Marketing Over Coffee:

Chris: …it’s one of those things in the marketing world people really really really don’t like to talk about, because it’s almost taboo, but if you go and read the works of Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi propagandist, and stuff like that and stuff like that, and go back and read what he did and how he did it and stuff like that, he’s basically the almost the father of fear marketing. In the sense that you know you need to pick, you need to artificially divide people into groups, you need to pit those groups against each other, you need to have a villain and a scapegoat of some kind so that you get these archetypes of drama that work incredibly well for motivating people to do what you want them to do. And if you’ve decided that’s part of your marketing strategy, Goebbels is the go-to guy if you really want to take those tactics on. If you obviously if it comes out that you’ve been using Nazi propaganda books as the—

John: —foundation of your marketing strategy—

Chris: —exactly, you may have some backlash there. But—

John: —that’s the kind of information your competitors will get about you and so—

Chris: Exactly.

John: —as part of their campaign.

Chris: Best to keep those books at home, guys.

John: Or read them at the library when, and don’t check them out. These days I think there’s no security left on that… once it makes your list it’s on the list.

Chris: exactly…

To his credit, Chris has responded to an email he received from someone who had the same concern about all this that I have. But sadly, his response doesn’t convince me he understands the gravity of recommending Goebbels. In particular, both the podcast and Chris’s response suggest that John and Chris fail to see the distinction between marketing segmentation and the “artificially dividing people into groups” that was the linchpin of Goebbels’s work. Distinguishing between cost-conscious and style-conscious consumers is hardly the same as dividing humankind into a master race and a people worthy to be stuffed into ovens.

Mike Masnick asks: Is Copyright Law Killing The Documentary? The answer is in this video on YouTube. Titled “Eyes On the Fair Use of the Prize,” it tells how an outstanding documentary from the 1980s has been effectively disappeared by copyright burdens:

Someone discusses leadership, and Jim Stroup dissects that discussion. And in the process gives a fine quick overview of one of the prime rhetorical stop signs:

The thing that struck me about this particular presentation was its unapologetic brandishing of the “of course” debating technique. This, actually, isn’t properly debate at all, but rhetorical intimidation. One preemptively dissipates any doubt detected stirring the audience about one’s claim with a half-surprised, half indignant bark: “of course.”

One of these first days I plan to sit down and write about why Andrew Cline’s Rhetorica is at the top of my blogroll. For today, I’ll settle for pointing you to his very brief comment about the state of journalism today

I’ll also add LisaNova’s take on the subject (pretty close to Andrew’s):

Lisa’s YouTube Channel.
YouTube.

Andrew Cline’s post title is wonderful. Captures the absurdity of what David Gregory said.

Even Andrew, sharp as he is, mentioned nothing about how politicians contribute to polarization. At least not the first time around. As I was starting to blog this, though, I went back & found he’d updated the post and made nearly the point I was going to make.

For him, though, the press is even responsible for how politicos polarize:

Various of the structural biases of journalism encourage them to view the actions of political actors as mere tactics aimed at winning rather than as possibly also sincere efforts to solve problems.

One way that polarization occurs: Political actors begin to believe this master narrative. So the actions of political opponents become mere tactics and the motives of political opponents become evil attempts to ruin rather than to build (or fix).

To give him credit, Cline also mentions our political system as a contributor to the problem. He could go farther, and mention how [$2 word alert!] adversarialism is built into most aspects of our culture.

For instance, the legal system isn’t usually what’s meant when people mention the political system. But it’s fully adversarial. Two sides lawyer up and duke it out in court.

Andrew is part of a wave of awareness that there are alternatives. His blog does a tremendous service in analyzing how we are taught to think, (an issue I deal with too). But the awareness progresses on other fronts. Take, for example, the innovation of family courts assigning a law guardian to look after the interests of children when their parents are facing off in a divorce.

As Andrew says, "Are there two sides to every story? Yes, if you stop counting at two."

There’s no need to stop counting.

The first casualty in the war over water? Was it the guy in Sydney, or the truth?

Truth is the first casualty of war.

My fine Aussie friend Lee Hopkins has a slogan with which he ends the episodes of his podcast. “Communicate with passion!” he chirps.

Okay, Lee, I’m about to do just that.

Lee grabbed me with his short post this week, “There will be more blood shed yet.”

I knew that Lee would be paying attention. For many months he’s been noticing, out loud, Australian politicians’ state of denial over dwindling water supplies.

Is Australia’s drought part of a natural cycle or a symptom of AGW (anthropogenic global warming)? We can’t know for sure, but if warming continues and freak weather gets freakier, history’s verdict will most likely be that we, not unassisted nature, caused it.

Lee didn’t mention AGW, but as to violence, he is surely right. It has only begun.

Under nearly every scenario in which global warming kills people, we would be desperately naïve to think that all of those people will die without a fuss or a fight.

Climate change denial is the first act of the next great war (and I mean really great, war by comparison to which USA-on-Iraq is a mere mugging.) It’s a murdering of truth and a murdering of many, many people, of whom those already born probably make up only a small minority. Real skepticism is a fine thing and I respect it and practice it. But only a few points I’ve ever heard made by AGW deniers are honest skepticism; the greatest bulk by far are outright lies.

Being myself a skeptic, I even doubt whether Sydney’s lawn-watering killing is the first such event caused by climate change, if indeed that is what it is. But my best guess is that future history books will name it just that way. (In both respects: related to AGW, and the first murder thus related.)

Truth is also the last casualty of war.

Besides several hundred blog posts, my reading this week included Praise of Folly, by Desiderius Erasmus. This led me to read some literature about the man. I had known little about him except that he influenced the King James Bible. And that Luther called him “an eel whom only Christ can catch.”

In that literature, what struck me most is how little respect Erasmus gets in the Christian world.

The reason, I think, is that he simply refused to participate, on either side, in the Protestant schism.

Here’s what the online Catholic Encyclopedia has to say about him. I’ve emphasized the sentences I think are crucial.

Opinions concerning Erasmus will vary greatly. No one has defended him without reserve, his defects of character being too striking to make this possible. His vanity and egotism were boundless… he lacked straightforward speech and decision in just those moments when both were necessary. His religious ideal was entirely humanistic[:] reform of the Church on the basis of her traditional constitution, the introduction of humanistic “enlightenment” into ecclesiastical doctrine, without, however, breaking with Rome. … Devoid of any power of practical initiative he was constitutionally unfitted for a more active part in the violent religious movements of his day…

I believe what is actually meant here is that Erasmus’ profound pacifism was A Bad Thing. And make no mistake, Erasmus consistently opposed not only war, but the schism which would necessarily bring war with it.

Luther was spiteful, malevolent, and fond of violence. He took joy in the burning of synagogues and Anabaptists. (Erasmus opposed the killing of heretics.) Johann Eck, who opposed Luther after the publication of the 95 theses, was spiteful, malevolent, and fond of violence. His purpose in “debating” Luther was not to sort truth from falsehood, but to find some way of painting Luther into the heretic’s corner, where the full bludgeon of papal authority could be used against him.

For the occurrence of schism instead of reformation, Eck was as responsible as Luther was.

Meanwhile, Erasmus disagreed with Luther but refused to condemn him.

And while the motivations of Luther and Eck dominated both sides in the schism…

while Catholic and Lutheran vilified and killed each other…

while both sides gleefully murdered anyone who dared to live by true Christian convictions…

Erasmus simply tried to stay out of harm’s way long enough to finish a few scholarly projects, including a trustworthy translation of scripture.

The author of the quoted article believes, perhaps, that this desire demonstrates bad character. That Luther and Eck were true solid men and Erasmus wasn’t.

Even in reconciliation, the lying goes on.

The Catholic Encyclopedia was originally published in the seven years up to 1914. Yes, it’s old, and Catholic-Protestant reconciliation hadn’t gone very far in that day. But even now, when the two sides seek as much common ground as they can, who in this movement of unity is singing the praises of Erasmus?

After a bitter war, when the two sides reconcile, they still assume that what matters is the two sides. Catholic-Protestant reconciliation tends to riff on the theme “of course the other side was right in their way, from their point of view.” The two opposing points of view are now reconciled, but also validated.

Which is a great lie.

A better reconciliation would be of both sides to the truth. To the truth that they should never have been sides at war. The truth which would say “we were both wrong and Erasmus has chosen the better part.”

I’m reminded of an account I read some years ago of an early 20^th-century event. Some still-living veterans from both sides of the civil war got together and shook hands and adulated each other for their equal valor.

And there wasn’t a black face in the crowd. None had been invited.

War, born of lies, leads to a lying form of peace. One which says “My!, weren’t we both brave and principled, even if our principles were different!” Not a truthful peace, which would say, “In our thirst for a paltry mastery, we made pawns, we made non-persons, we made carrion of countless other souls whom God loves. May He forgive us. May we learn a better way and teach it to our children.”

In each such lying peace, the smiles and hugs and mutual congratulations are only dirt overlying the seeds of the next war.

The deniers of AGW count on a lying peace, even if the worst scenarios come about. They count on a forgiveness arising out of humanity’s perversity. Humanity’s way of paying attention to the power-wielders on the “sides” of a war, and ignoring the simply dead who never wanted to take a side but wanted to simply live.

Paying attention to global warming isn’t about saving the planet. The planet is a big wet rock. It will do fine even if we leave fewer than ten species to squirm their way out of the deuterordial soup.

No, it’s not about the planet.

It’s about all those other species.

But more…

it’s about our own species, the one that, rightfully, is dearest to us.

It’s about our great-grandchildren.

But more yet…

it’s about war, which God hates and we should, too…

And it’s about saving our souls.

Looks like I’ve got the scoop: this is the first publication of this press release:
———————————————–
POLITICIAN LOBBIES BUSINESS ON BEHALF OF THE EARTH
How Loni Hancock’s Green Passion May Influence California Small Business Strategy

Richmond, California – October 1, 2007. California Assembly Member Loni Hancock’s choice for Small Business of the Year in Legislative District 14 has been invited to help the California Small Business Roundtable (SBR) formulate strategy. Excellent Packaging & Supply, a producer and distributor of earth-friendly food packaging, was selected by Assembly Member Hancock for its green credentials, and now has received the call from SBR on the basis of its dynamic, proactive management. Yet, if not for some coaxing by Hancock, none of it would have happened.

Excellent Packaging, represented by co-owners Steve Levine and Allen King, is one of five small companies invited by SBR to its yearly retreat, which will be held on October 7 and 8 in Half Moon Bay, on the San Francisco peninsula. The five firms were selected from the seventy-five small businesses honored by their local Assembly Members at this year’s annual Small Business Day in Sacramento.

The relationship between the company and the legislator started slowly. King, the firm’s president, recalls that when Hancock’s office first called and asked Excellent Packaging to be part of a Town Hall meeting on the environment in Berkeley, he declined. But Hancock wouldn’t accept that answer, and the invitation was repeated. Here’s how Hancock explains why she pressed the issue: “With over 40% growth in the past two years, and no signs of slowing down, EPS has demonstrated that it is possible to be a successful small business while at the same time doing its part to contribute to the sustainability of the planet.”

The environment is no new concern on Hancock’s part. Her web site proudly announces that hers was the first Assembly District Office in California to be certified as a green business. She chairs the Assembly Committee on Natural Resources, and does all she can to be a green influence well beyond the legislative sphere. For example, she actively collaborates with the Green Chamber of Commerce to educate businesses in how to become green-certified. “So our asking Excellent Packaging a second time was consistent with everything Assemblywoman Hancock does,” said an aide in Hancock’s office.

“When she asked us again,” says King, “I realized she was right.” At first, he explains, he’d thought that EPS had little to contribute. “But then it hit me that since we care about making a real difference, we have a duty to raise our profile a little, and let others see how a green business can succeed.” EPS participated in the Berkeley event, which Hancock considered a success. She went on to name Excellent Packaging the Small Business of the Year for her district.

When King received the award at Small Business Day in May, his brief acceptance message made a strong impression on leaders of the Small Business Roundtable. “We are looking for talented new blood,” says Betty Jo Toccoli, Chair of the Roundtable, “and Allen impressed several of us as a dynamic, proactive thinker.” From that impression came the invitation the Roundtable extended to King and Levine.

The Small Business Roundtable was created to develop strategy for the advocacy program of the California Small Business Association, which represents over 203,000 small business owners statewide. The company has a voice as far away as Washington, through its delegates to the White House Conference on Small Business, as well as, of course, a strong presence in Sacramento. So if, through the presence of King and Levine at the SBR retreat, the Small Business Association’s lobbying has a bit more green to it next year than in the past, Loni Hancock will know that the influence began in her office and is simply coming full circle.