Lessons from History: The Importance of Balance

Another piece for the ECLJ, or as the founder Mr Buttacavoli wittily titles it, Medea's Children. (If you get the reference, it's actually quite ominous. If not, don't worry, it's very obscure). This time, I chart the importance of balance and use a historical context to back my contention.

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As I begin this article, I am having two simultaneous Facebook chats, reading the latest from the Crikey Daily Mail, and finishing my Methods homework – so clearly I know a thing or two about balance.

As we move a period of life where we juggle our various duties sometimes with ease and sometimes with difficulty (a mate of mine reckons he has five jobs, but that’s another story), it actually pays to read the work of a historian (don’t all rush) and see whether history does, in fact, repeat itself.

A bit of exam revision for the Year 10 Lit. students: The Ancient Greeks were really the first culture to articulate this importance. I am of course talking about sophrosyne, the belief espoused, believe it or not, in the eponymous play of the revamped ECLJ - Medea. This belief suggests that everything should be in moderation – it applied to the spheres of arts, politics and domestic relations and many others. It is best summed up by the Nurse, when she says in the first stasimon, that “the middle way, neither great nor mean, is best by far”. Other examples of sophrosyne include the oracle at Delphi’s two most famous proverbs: “Nothing in excess” and “Know thyself”.

Now that’s a good sentiment to have 2400 years ago, but what about sophrosyne in today’s world? Well, believe it or not, a blogger by the name of Astrochronic has started the “Sophrosynist Movement”, which is described as “a new modern branch of Conservatism mixed with Libertarianism focusing on balance, self understanding and moderation.” Now, due to the fact that his blog is on MySpace, I’m not able to check it out for myself, simply because, well, I’m not an über kind of guy. (Again, that’s another story....)

Let’s move on, then, to a similar but more recent movement – the Eight Hour Day.

Due to the Industrial Revolution, unbounded capitalism was brought to the fore. Child labour and unregulated working conditions were the catalysts for social change. But that is not putting it in its proper historical context.

After the defeat of Napoléon in 1815, the conquered European states scrambled to reclaim their territories. The Congress of Vienna was the climax of this period, where the idea of “balance of power” was introduced: that is, the respective powers of the great European powers would cancel each other out. This proved to be irrelevant in the 1840s when two men by the name of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels wrote a little pamphlet titled The Communist Manifesto. Basically agitating the lower classes (proletariat) for change, it arguably was directly responsible for the 1848 Springtime of the Nations. Revolutions, or attempted revolutions, spread like the cold in midwinter and it signalled a new era of nationalism and liberalism. And it is these two political ideologies that are responsible for the Eight Hour Day.

The point is, proponents of these two political ideologies grew to such a number (due to Marx and Engels) that they were able to dictate social reform (“liberty or death”, anyone?) and make the unbounded capitalism of the start of the Industrial Revolution era simply untenable for governments to pursue.

So what happens when these supposed building blocks of society fall apart?

Imagine yourself to be a peasant or a farmer. You’re the stereotypical “man of the house” providing for your family. For you, time is money. So what happens when you lose your money, a la the Great Depression? Logically, you also lose your time.

Think about it. When you’re busy, time is important. When you’re not, clearly time isn’t. And what more physical manifestation of busyness is there besides the watch? So there clearly is a relationship between time and busyness.

So, what happened in the Great Depression, where unemployment was plentiful across the globe? Read this observation of a German town afflicted by lethargy:

Nothing is urgent anymore; they have forgotten how to hurry. For the man, the division of the days into hours has long since lost its meaning. [my emphasis] Of one hundred men, eighty-eight were not wearing a watch and only thirty-one had a watch at home. Getting up, the midday meal, going to bed, are the only remaining points of reference. In between, time elapses without anyone really knowing what has taken place.

But I thought I just said the Eight Hour Day, or “division of the days”, was an important building block of society....

And to continue the Germany analogy, look what happened for the old Deutschervolk to get out of Depression....It had nothing to do with balance at all.

So, balance is an important part of our lives. Whether that be in the form of sophrosyne, (or Astrochronic’s “Sophrosynist Movement”) or the continuation of the eight-hour day is irrelevant. As long as it allows me to maintain simultaneous Facebook chats....

The role of conservatism in everyday life

Roll up, roll up. Actually, I forgot to mention for the last post and pretty much any further ones that I am explicilty writing for the ECLJ - the literary journal for the school I go to - Emmanuel College. So, just be patient if you come across any school references.

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Tony Abbott stunned political pundits last weekend when he said that he would not show bipartisan support in Afghanistan with Prime Minister Gillard but he would instead stiffen the upper lip of the Conservative Party, or Tories, because of fear of jet lag. Now, clearly, what seemed like a good idea has turned into the proverbial hitting the fan for him.

What this episode reveals is a unique insight into the priorities of the two main duellers in Australian politics. But what is more interesting to explore is the role of conservatism with the microscope being trained right over the western suburbs of Melbourne.

But what is conservatism: Is it wearing red Speedos whenever you have something to say, a la Abbott? Is it waxing your eyebrows and wearing green and gold trackies whenever you have something to say, a la John Howard? No. Instead, it is simply holding on and indeed coveting what you have, both material and abstract. It is treasuring and cherishing the worldview that you have – and being quite intransigent whenever someone tries to change it. It is the desire that, to paraphrase Led Zeppelin, the song will remain the same. Nothing ever happens (Midnight Oil) and even though it is pretty obvious that we are living among a time of transition, nothing ever will happen – no room for growth or change is allowed or even wanted.

First of all, let me preface my piece by disclosing that my family is no stranger to change; both sets of my grandparents landed in Australia as migrants seeking a new country and indeed a new life. Since then, the Magusic family has experienced the whole gamut of emotions and events.

I want you to paint a scene: It is a winter’s Wednesday night, and a storm is raging fiercely beyond your bedroom walls. The heater’s on, and you have the doona over you as well. There’s a mug of Milo on your bedside table along with a plate of Tim-Tams. You’re watching Hey Hey on TV. Yes, you know it’s oldschool, especially after the blackface skit in which Harry Connick, Jr, happened to be judging. But, y’know what? There’s that warm glow inside you when you hear Russell Gilbert make a lame dad-joke, or see one of John Blackman’s feverishly-produced cartoons in order to illustrate the chat, or experience the antiquarian attitudes of Daryl Somers and Livinia Nixon when the talk turns remotely to technology. The fact is that you watch it and everybody you know watches it, so what’s the problem? And then you can talk about it next day on the bus with your mates, and thus relive the glory of Red Symons getting pied in the face and the like.

But there is a danger of confusing this love of Somers et al for disrupting, well, growth and even balance. [An issue I hope to address in a future piece].

This belief and confidence is a good thing, especially so in a time of turmoil and change – there are standards that you can aspire to. Kant called this the “categorical imperative” and it is formally known as deontology.

How am I going to apply a lesson in ethics? Watch me.

Think about all the times that you have rocked up to class – not necessarily religion – and you haven’t felt like doing the work? Well, it would be the best time to get a bit of empathy from the teacher. Instead, you stoically struggle on and pretend to give a rat’s about what you’re doing. However, by the end of the class, after the fatwas and jihads and whatnot have been declared on both sides after the slanging match, you realise you have a missed an opportunity to get a bit of empathy. In this way, you both miss out on growing a little. Instead, both you and teacher are happy to continue the same dichotomy of teacher/student. In fact, you are so blinkered by this dichotomy simply because you get the same warm feeling as you get watching Hey Hey. Your level of comfort, at the end of the day, dictates your actions.

Another example: Someone I knew back in Year 9 was really struggling with school. (Let’s call him Jonny). He most definitely was not academically-minded, and other students let him know about it, naturally. Even one teacher who I respected a little less afterwards got stuck into him once in Year 8. My point is, at the start of Year 10, he disappeared. A good mate of mine happened to be related to him, so I asked him about it. My mate told me that Jonny had in fact started an apprenticeship at an auto place. I was surprised that he had the tenacity to start again when he realised that school wasn’t working for him.

I’ll ask you something: How many people do you in your heart of hearts know should not be at school, let alone be doing VCE? 2? 5? 10?

Those 2 or 5 or 10 that you know get the same warm feeling rocking up to school and creating havoc as they do by watching Hey Hey. It’s a fact. They know they are better off somewhere else (and I’m not for a minute suggesting that somewhere else is the Centrelink office, or Tasmania) but they can’t summon themselves, unlike Jonny, to shift to somewhere different. That’s conservatism. And as I said, it’s not the worst thing in the world to have, especially on a winter’s Wednesday night. But it’s completely wrong, to continue the metaphor, on a summer’s Saturday afternoon. And it’s this inability to contextualise situations that keeps generations in the mire and muck of Abbott-red Speedo-type thinking.