Social proximity

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I find the welcoming rituals of my sons’ generation exotically warm. Young men dole out back-slapping ‘bro-hugs’. Girls treat friends of both sexes to lingering full-body embraces.

The trouble is, they’re still at it. I’d bet the surge in Covid cases among the under-25s has come about because they are habitually touchy-feely. ‘It’s the girls,one twenty-something told me. ‘They hug everyone.’ Watching one female stranger move around the pub table dispensing hugs, he resolved to stick out a socially distanced elbow. But as his turn came, restraint faded and he fell into her arms. ‘It’s funny,’ he said, ‘how peer pressure is stronger than fear of the virus.’”. (Janice Turner in The Times).

Comment: Charming really. But not so heart- warming if you end up in a hospital bed with acute breathing and other problems. The young think themselves immortal. Actually, guys, No!

A Tale of Cruelty and Despair

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The way dementia patients in care homes have been treated during this pandemic “should make us sick with shame and pity”.

Afflicted by an illness that attacks their memory and sense of self, they draw special comfort from the presence of loved ones. Yet in the name of infection control, the Government has seen to it that this vital human link has been denied them. No longer visited, they feel confused; abandoned. But it’s not the fault of the care homes: it’s the grotesquely inflexible official guidelines, which prohibit those who run the homes from devising sensible precautions while still acting humanely towards those in their charge.

That’s why John’s Campaign, a not-for-profit movement aimed at getting the Government to reform these cruel rules, is so worthy of support. One of its main concerns is to ensure that family carers are no longer seen as “visitors”, but instead treated as a crucial part of the clinical team needing the same protection, testing and status as other key workers. The Government must be made to bring this “avoidable suffering” to an end.
(Nicci Gerrard, The Observer and The Week, 19 September).

My take: Yes, Epicurus would have approved, in principle. But the homes seem to be in a no-win situation. I agree – it would help enormously if relatives could help and support the afflicted, who feel abandoned. In the words of a person I know, now in a care home, “They have imprisoned me”.

But you can be tested and cleared one day and contract covid 19 the next. We don’t yet have “instant” tests. So having relatives popping in and out could introduce the virus into the home, which is then accused of a failure to care and in consequence be responsible for multiple deaths. “John’s Campaign” means well, but unless family careers move in semi-permanently, their idea is borderline irresponsible. I think Epicurus would have advocated getting the testing very much better and quicker in order to promote peace of mind for everyone.

British unpopularity

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When citizens of 13 EU member states were asked which of 35 countries they would be willing to offer financial help to in a crisis, the UK came below all but Colombia and Tunisia. On average, the UK received a net score of -8%, compared with 30% for Italy, 29% for Spain, and 17% for Greece.  (YouGov/The Independent)

My response: Not a surprise. Not only is the decision to leave the EU short-sighted, it will also ensure that, after over twenty centuries, Britain will be looked upon in the same way as Roman citizens regarded the island of Britannia. The difference is that in the days of Julius Caesar Britannia had sought-after tin mines, the reason Caesar invaded and his successors incorporated the fogbound islands into the empire.

Current TV in the US carries ads for Jaguar and other formerly British car-brands, with British voice-overs. Alas, car manufacturing left British shores years ago. Financial services will slowly follow. The final outcome, engineered by “Conservatives” is to relegate modern Britannia to also-ran status. Was this stupid? Y……..es. It is frustrating to watch the mismanagement of both American and British current public affairs and to be helpless.

The Supreme Court

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In 2012 Amy Coney Barrett told a class at the University of Notre Dame that a “legal career is but a means to an end……and that end is building the Kingdom of God.” As one Senator said of Barrett in 2017, she has “a long history of believing that religious beliefs should prevail.”

Does she mean by “religious beliefs” the sexual interference with choirboys as practiced by Catholic priests, probably for centuries? Those of us who have Epicurean or just plain humanist beliefs arguably have a better morality than that, without any effort whatsoever. The cheek of it!

The young will suffer most long- term from the pandemic

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“Young people are fuelling the coronavirus.” So suggested the World Health Organisation last month, after youngsters defying distancing rules were blamed for rising infection rates across Europe. In Preston, UK, councillors even urged local youth not to “kill granny”.

But the young are not to blame for this pandemic. They are its “forgotten victims”. UK national debt has reached a “staggering” £2trn – a burden which will take decades to pay off, and which will fall hardest on a generation that has already given up so much. To protect the nation from a disease that rarely endangers them, the young have sacrificed their education, along with all the fun of being young. Already, the number of under-24s claiming benefits has doubled; now hundreds of thousands more young people are entering the labour market at the start of what may be the worst recession in 300 years.

There’s no sugar coating it, the outlook is bleak. There are 60% fewer graduate jobs on offer than at this time last year; and that will put more pressure on non-graduate jobs – at a time when they are also being cut in droves, as restaurants, bars and shops close down. U.K. Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s £2bn Kickstart scheme – creating apprenticeships for under-25s – may help some; but as the furlough scheme draws to a close, it can’t stop the approaching “jobless tsunami”.

Even those who have found work are struggling. Senior staff may like working from home; but for young people starting out, it can be lonely and frustrating: how do you shine, if you only see your bosses in awkward Zoom meetings? In previous recessions, the young could flee abroad in search of adventure or opportunity. Now, that avenue is closed, leaving them festering at home, their independent lives curtailed, their dreams abandoned.

The Tories have a history of rewarding the old, who vote for them; but today’s young have loud voices. If they feel the burden of this recession is falling on them disproportionately, it will have “ugly” political consequences. (Sunday Times, The Week and others 5 September 2020)

My take: When I was 19 I was an army officer responsible for 45 people in Cyprus. Later I hitch-hiked round America and down to Central America, all with the knowledge that there would surely be a job for me later, and when else could I have time for adventure? Now young people can’t travel or find a job. This is really sad, and will not end happily.

The marshmallow test

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“How old were you when you realised that hard work and sacrifice weren’t worth it? Some realise it at retirement, when, after a lifetime of indispensability and missed weekends, they have failed to reach the top and are smoothly replaced and forgotten within a month or two.

For others the revelation strikes later. ‘I wish I hadn’t worked so hard’ is always one the top regrets of the dying. A few precocious individuals work it out in time to fail the ‘marshmallow test’ in infancy. Asked by a stranger with a clipboard if they’d rather have one sweet now or two later, they sensibly surmise that given the inherent randomness of the universe, ‘later’ is just too much of a gamble.” (Martha Gill,The Times)

My comment: Oh, how I relate to this! I had a business in the London area. I worked long hours every day, including most weekends, conscious that I was responsible for a staff which at one point numbered 120. Then, POUFF!! the Apple Mac was introduced and our products were no longer wanted. Caput! My company was history, and was taken over (for very little). The new owner was heartily disliked by the staff, which drifted away. I married my American wife and have lived much more happily ever after, but my former colleagues – well, dispersed to the winds, they probably reflecting that their hard work had been for nothing much, except for the companionship (and the endless jokes that were the hallmark of the company). What did we do it all for? Sad!

In memoriam

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Yesterday, my brother-law, Martin Dean, died of heart failure in a hospital in Taunton, England. He had been in poor health for quite a long time. He was an economic historian, a tourism officer and local Council employee, and author of a book on railways.

Rest in peace, Martin. We will miss you.

(Forgive me, but I don’t feel like posting normally on this blog today)

Couples sleep better together

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It is well established that people in stable relationships tend to have better mental and physical health than singletons. Now, scientists have discovered a possible explanation for this: it seems that sharing a bed promotes good sleep. Humans sleep in cycles, shifting between rapid-eye-movement (REM) sleep – during which vivid dreams occur – and non-REM periods.

Though all sleep is important, uninterrupted REM sleep is thought to be particularly beneficial to both mind and body. For a study at the Centre for Integrative Psychiatry in Kiel, Germany, 12 heterosexual couples spent four nights in a sleep lab, two of them with their partners and two alone. The researchers observed that on the nights when participants slept with their partner, they experienced around 10% more REM sleep, even though they thrashed around more. The authors of the study suspect that physical proximity to a loved one promotes certain sleep-boosting hormones, though more research is needed to establish this. They also note that their findings might have been different had any of the couples been heavy snorers. “That could certainly worsen the sleep of a partner, no doubt about it,”. (Henning Drews,The Times. and The Week)

My take: The conclusions might well be correct, but I am a bit turned off by the fact that only 12 couples were subject to this research.  How can one apply the results to the population in general, using such a tiny sample?  I note that the results of this research are not carried in the New Scientist, for instance.

The myth attached to raising taxes on the super-rich

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“When state governments consider raising taxes on rich people, rich people in those states like to claim that if their taxes are raised too much, they’ll just pack up and leave for another state with lower taxes. If this were true, states raising taxes on rich people would end up losing tax revenue at the end of the day, making it seem like keeping tax rates on the rich low is the best option. But it’s not true, even if it so widespread as to seem like common knowledge. It’s so pervasive that it has stopped even the most vocally progressive Democratic leaders from taxing the rich in any substantive way. So we need to dispel the myth once and for all.

“Despite a couple of high-profile cases of cowardly millionaires fleeing their homes for states with no income taxes, the overwhelming majority of millionaires don’t leave when their tax bills go up. It turns out that all those rich people threatening to leave are almost crying wolf. For years, study after study has shown that millionaires don’t leave in significant enough numbers to affect state revenue when their rates change.

“This makes sense if you think about it. If you’re a rich person, a slight increase in your tax rate doesn’t actually affect your day-to-day life or standard of living all that much. Most rich people can afford to pay more without much trouble, especially considering that many already avoid paying their fair share in both federal and state taxes thanks to a dizzying array of loopholes, tax breaks, and special privileges that help many of them pay a lower tax rate than working class folks. Tacking a couple extra percentage points onto a state income tax isn’t even going to make a dent in their overall wealth, and they’ll likely still be paying disproportionately less than ordinary Americans.

“If anything, rich people are less likely to move for financial reasons. While rich people might like to live in a low-tax state, they’re not going to uproot their lives to avoid paying slightly higher taxes. Their homes are there, their businesses and professional connections are there, their families are there, and their friends are there. That’s a lot to give up for a negligible financial loss.”.  (Patriotic Millionaires, 22 Sept 2020).

My comment: I like Patriotic Millionaires.  It’s very existence shows that not all the super-rich are selfish, greedy so-and-so’s, and it’s opinions have more credibility than the blatherings of the corrupt.

America – land of massive inequality

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The top 1% of Americans have taken $50 trillion from the bottom 90%.  This has been done by way of unemployment, scant benefits, unfair tax laws, and lopsided investment and political give-aways of our money.

Now, the RAND Center has put a number on just how much wealth the top 1 percent has stolen from the rest of the country over the past few decades: a staggering $50 trillion. This analysis sheds light on the dark void of wealth inequality between the ultra-rich and the bottom 90% of Americans – and our desperate need for the government to do its job and reverse the robbery.  (Nick Hanauer and David M. Rolf, Patriotic Millionaires, 17 Sep 2020).

My comment:  This has happened with the full assistance and complicity of politicians.  It undermines democracy and the Constitution, and is actually physically dangerous in the longer term ( read some history!).  How can one have confidence and peace of mind under these circumstances?

 

Voter suppression

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“Between 2014 and 2016, Republicans removed almost 17 million voters off the voter rolls. In addition to the voter registrations being invalidated before the current election, Republicans are enacting a plan to disenfranchise the black vote by rejecting their mail-ballots. It doesn’t get much worse than this.

“Mail-in ballots by black voters are being rejected at the rate of 4.7%. White voters’ mail-in ballots are being rejected at the rate of 1.1%. Black voters have currently mailed-in 13,747 ballots, of the 642 have been rejected. 

”White voters have cast 60,954 mail-in ballots; of them, 681 have been rejected. Republicans will pull all the stops to keep control of the Senate to reelect Mitch McConnell and Donald Trump. The Republican vote cheating strategy is systemic.”

( The Guardian, 20 Sep 2020)

My take:  It is un-Epicurean to talk politics in public. Of course, I know this, but I am also an historian  and recognize creeping coups when I see them.  There is no peace of mind when justice, fair dealing and the Constitution are undermined, all the more so with the support of ardent “christians”.  Alas, where can one find peace of mind at the moment?

Race hatred is not at all confined to the US

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Bromsgrove, Worcestershire, UK

Far-right activists have been filming themselves storming hotels that are being used by the Home Office to accommodate asylum seekers, confronting residents in their rooms, and demanding to know which countries they are from.

In a series of videos posted on social media, activists with the group Britain First can be seen banging on doors and haranguing residents at hotels in Bromsgrove, Newcastle, Birkenhead, Warrington and Essex. On Saturday, a 30-year-old man was charged with common assault after far-right activists entered a hotel in Coventry. However, an apparent attempt by the group to target asylum seekers in Camden, northwest London, failed last month, when its members turned up at a hotel that is being used to accommodate rough sleepers during the pandemic.  (The Week, 5 Sept 2020)

My comment:  At some time in the past, maybe the far distant past, most families have migrated from some other region or country. If you look at, say, one hundred family trees I bet you would find migrants and asylum seekers in most, if not all of them.  My own (Huguenot) family moved from France to escape the Catholic persecution with not a penny to their names, no doubt enduring prejudice and name-calling in London’s East End.

What we should be doing is helping to stabilize the countries whence come the migrants, and incentivize them to stay put, if that’s what these disagreeable thugs want.   The fact is that most migrants make excellent, and enthusiastic, citizens.

An unacceptable taxpayer bailout

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The Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (Cares) Act, the 2 trillion dollar bill passed last March, granted forgivable loans to “qualifying businesses and non- profits”.  The Small Business Administration, which administered part of the Act, declared ( but tried to keep it quiet) that houses of worship and religious private schools qualified under the Act.  It handed out $ 7.3 billion in taxpayer money to over 88,000 religious organizations.  In late July banks started forgiving these “loans”, thus making them grants that don’t have to be repaid.  Five hundred church   representatives were involved in negotiations over this give-away, along with the White House Faith and Opportunities Initiative team, the surgeon General (for some weird reason), and the Deputy assistant to the President, Jenny Lichner.

Churches and other religious organizations are tax-exempt charities that do not have to disclose their income to the IRS.  Not only that, but this whole thing is blatantly unconstitutional (separation of church and state).  Church leaders were assured that no strings were attached and that they were still free to discriminate on the basis of race, gender or sexual orientation!

But maybe the most obnoxious aspect of this story is that the Catholic church, with 17,000 parishes, received $1.4 billion in taxpayer-backed coronavirus aid, with millions going to dioceses that have paid huge settlements (or sought bankruptcy protection) owing to clergy sexual abuse cover-ups. The Catholic church has, in short, received approval for an estimated 3,500 forgivable loans, while holding property which, in 1918 was valued at half a billion dollars (yes a hundred years ago!).

My reaction:  We, dear reader, are paying to restore the finances of a church that has been abusing choirboys and others (for centuries?), and has been universally condemned for doing so.  Which is why I support the teachings of Epicurus, despite a religious upbringing in the Anglican church.

I don’t think the word “corruption” quite captures what we are seeing, do you?

(This post is a precis of an article in The Humanist magazine, Sept/ Oct 2020)