Mark Carroll's Journal

I am noticing how attractive I find the idea of subscribing to some coherent ideology. That I have not done so may be much more due to an inability to accept such a belief system rather than my reluctance to. The idea of being persuaded of some unambiguous meaning in life, some goal that tells me what to do and what is worth it to get there, especially if somebody else has already done the hard thinking for me and provided like-minded comrades, is very appealing. In this year's elections I had to again research parties and manifestoes and candidates not because I am proudly independent but just because I have a hard time buying others' thinking, certainly as a complex package. I already knew that I am persistently doubtful about everything from theism to capitalism but I do not think that I had properly noticed how much I would have liked more certainty about fundamental beliefs.

A nice thing about having children is that I find I can draw some confidence in action from that I want to serve their interests. That feeling may be an irrational product of natural selection but at least it is guidance that I actually feel able to buy into.

In The West Wing (1999) the senior White House staffers chronically work very long hours. How does this make sense? Is it good for their cognition to be ongoingly compromised? Can there not be enough staff to take on the workload? Perhaps the problem is that they would not be able to leave notes for each other or that they do not have enough room to put all the people or something. It does seem as if there has to be a more effective way for them to work. Maybe we are supposed to believe that they are so superlatively good at their jobs that even half-asleep they outperform some next-best people who might instead be on duty to catch some acute situation.

An aspect of European Union membership that I greatly value is their focus on personal data privacy. This has similarly attracted me to the UK's Liberal Democrat party but rather less so: given how very little they bother to mention it in campaigning I would guess that they may not care as much.

I have been struck by how poor the BBC's choice is to soon make login compulsory for viewing content online. I have already mentioned how I would be fine with providing my television license number and how I do not want them to attempt to personalize their content for me. The compulsory login indeed relates to personalization: they want age, gender, postcode. In practice this is not yet a great burden to me because nothing in the process prevents me from simply lying for every login; I am a fan of services like BugMeNot. While the BBC do retain these personal details, their corresponding log of viewing history is indexed via some anonymized viewer identity code.

One facet of this that disappoints me is the BBC's naïveté. Their news archives now carry many years of history of very sensitive databases leaking from various organizations whose data security would have been expected to be good. If there are databases of everybody's details and television viewing habits being held by a well-known organization whose funding is often under political challenge then it will very plausibly leak regardless of prior public assurances made by ill-informed representatives. This risk is not so clearly worth the benefit that it ought to be imposed on all.

I am also intrigued by a contrast in attitudes between the US and the UK regarding how governments and corporations should handle personal privacy. Generally businesses are far more restricted in the UK than the US with regard to collecting, using and sharing our data, though perhaps only because of the EU. However, in the US the government is trusted far less: for example, it would be entirely normal for an American local library to not record my borrowing history but locally I am not even permitted to opt out of such.

Of our constituency's candidates, the incumbent Pete Wishart, Scottish National Party, beat the MEP Ian Duncan, Scottish Conservative and Unionist, by only 21 votes out of 51,525 cast, and our constituency wasn't the closest. As usual, Labour were barely on the radar and the Liberal Democrats worse still. Around Perthshire we have plenty of landowners; in the two Dundee city constituencies Labour usually do better than here and the Conservatives worse though the SNP hold those seats comfortably.

After this latest election there seems to be a deepening rift between the Scottish Conservatives who gained seats and the ones down south who lost seats. I find it interesting how the parties up here, even the Greens, typically have their own organization and separate manifesto.

It has been interesting to observe democracy in action in recent times. After the local elections the Conservatives were the largest party in Cornwall with well over a third of the council seats but they appear not to be working with any other large party so the result is a council whose leadership is split evenly among the independents and the Liberal Democrats: a coalition of the second and third largest groups get to run things. The council's new deputy leader used to be in my class at school. The nationalists Mebyon Kernow got a few seats too, only one less than Labour who are also minor in the county.

I am still getting used to being back in Europe with its multi-party politics and I don't recall previously noting independents usefully forming a group in their own right.

( I waited a while before commenting on the bombing )

9/11 may be the attack that made the most emotional impact on me in that it is one of the very few events for which I vividly recall my circumstances when I heard the news, also events later that day. I was a little confused by political pronouncements afterward: especially President Bush's they hate our freedoms speech which, though not wrong, seemed to miss much of the point: bin Ladin himself had explained in quite different terms the concrete grievances. I subsequently ( learned more about terrorism )

This recent bombing, and emperor's recent mention of having watched Calvary (2014), reminded me of the line near the end of the movie, … all those years, did you cry then?. Though it requires some spoiler context for its full impact, it remains an excellent question that reminds me that I should at least pay proper attention even if I do not cry, and I believe that includes understanding why the bombing happened.

We now have some helpful information: it is reported that the bomber's sister speculates that he he saw the explosives America drops on children in Syria, and he wanted revenge though a family friend says how he grew increasingly angry about what he considered ill-treatment of Muslims in Britain. Daesh have themselves given the usual mix of motivation: Western acts against Muslims and their lands abroad together with domestic liberalism. Clearly the sister's words point to the former category but Daesh's talk of the Crusaders and the shameless concert arena suggests some of each. A suicide bomber has considerable choice of target: it would have been no harder to bomb a group of adult professionals but Daesh's shameless may point to one cause being our failure to impose their Medieval conservatism upon our young women.

Just as I was after 9/11, I have been somewhat bewildered by mainstream politics' response to the tragedy. Bill Maher's comment on Politically Incorrect (1993) that the 9/11 attackers were not cowardly appears to be what got his show canceled. After the Manchester bombing politicians have again lined up to call the attacker a coward, ( but I doubt that they obviously were )

I do wonder if this portrait of the bomber as a coward is some kind of psychological offense to dissuade imitators. I do not think that it explains targeting the concert.

The political surprises continue. For example, we have Jeremy Corbyn suggesting that foreign policy may be a cause of domestic terrorism, only to face a backlash of criticism and I agree with none of it. First, it is woolly thinking indeed to confuse explain with justify: in what now appears to be called the blowback theory, which many experts deem to have some credibility, our foreign policy may indeed be a relevant factor, but this ( does not make the bomber any less culpable or wrong )

Additionally, Jeremy Corbyn is being criticized for voicing a version of the blowback theory when the bombing occurred so recently. But, the bombing is of high national significance and government policy both foreign and domestic may have a material impact on such events. Surely, before a general election to determine the shape of our new government is exactly when we should be examining why the attack occurred? ( if that is exploiting the attack then so be it )

When I am in the US I have a strong sense of the state and national identity of my location: I look around and, in terms of what goes on and what applies, local custom and jurisdiction feature strongly in my thinking. I do not have this sense when I am in Britain and I am puzzling over why not.

Scottish law is interestingly different to English law, just as my children now experience the Scottish education system which is unlike anything I knew. I had not been to Scotland before interviewing for my current job. There is no shortage of mention of Scotland on various signs and documents. Both the Scottish and UK independence referenda demonstrate that native residents retain a strong sense of local identity. There are various local customs and foods. It is not as if I am much less familiar with the US: I have spent most of my adult life there and my impressions of it even before first living there were generally confirmed over time.

Still, when I live in, say, Ohio, I am very aware of that it is where I am, as if it brings a welcome sense of extra meaning into my existence. Maybe the difference is that more of one's rights in the US are codified explicitly in a way that conservatives may even regard as being sacred. Or, perhaps Scotland is quite like England and that I spent my childhood in England makes me less conscious of my locality when I am in Britain. It doesn't make sense to me, anyway: I do not see what, say, Scotland lacks that would from day to day make me take for granted that I am here.

I have wondered if civil liberties could provide a clue. The EU has a strong sense of personal privacy from the point of view of confidentiality. The US has a strong sense of personal freedom from tyrannical or even needlessly prescriptive authority. I do not especially notice the UK culturally exhibiting much of either, except perhaps when inventing complaints about the EU, so is that an aspect of what I am missing here? To what extent does it generalize to other social issues? Or maybe it is just about how patriotic people are: after all, for Americans July 4th is a major holiday but in England they do not even get St George's Day off work.

Much of the rural central USA has liberal zoning: one can quite affordably buy a hayfield, have a cellar dug out, put a prefabricated house on top and live there. In Ohio I used to own several acres of land. This is one of the reasons for which I fully expect to move back to the US: I might then actually be able to afford somewhere I would want to live! I do not need anywhere grand or fashionable but I would like it to be my own space, not on top of my neighbors. I was fine in Ohio with our well water and septic system and whatnot.

Here in Britain planning permission makes it very difficult indeed to simply buy some land and have a house built there, perhaps partly because of the much higher population density. In the news I happened upon a quote from Legal & General about how on average houses cost more than seven times one's annual salary. I do not know if it is quite that bad but it does rather look as if over the past twenty years UK house prices have more than doubled relative to earnings. Ten years ago we had the Callcutt Review of House Building Delivery noting a considerable imbalance between supply and demand that seems to persist to this day. Looking further back in time, I see that over the past few decades house construction has been much less than when my parents were young.

I do not know what caused this nor what the solutions are. I am handsomely creditworthy and my bank is quite surprised not to be loaning me plenty for a mortgage but I cannot bear to take a loan that is some multiples of my income: our lovely house in Ohio cost not much more than twice my salary at that time but around here it would take more than triple to afford even a two-bedroom bungalow for the four of us. The situation in the UK feels like an increasing inequality even brushing rentier capitalism. I do not know if, for example, more garden cities are a good idea but any building plan bold enough to truly make much difference would also indirectly cost existing homeowners substantially. I thus do not expect to buy while I live here. Unfortunately, UK credit history is worthless in the US, so once I do return there I then have to begin to rebuild my credit from scratch with secured cards and the like.

In our ward three local councillors are to be elected on Thursday. The options to be ranked are:

Alasdair Bailey, Scottish Labour Party

We received a leaflet. Seems keen on broadband, village doctors, bicycling and buses. Less keen on hard Brexit and Donald Trump but not clear what the local council can do about either. Also not keen on housing.

Hilary Charles, Scottish Green Party

Didn't turn up to hustings in Errol. Seems to (re)tweet a bit.

Angus Forbes, Scottish Conservative and Unionist

We received a leaflet and a knock at the door. His listed address is the control tower at Perth Airport! Seems to know about local things and have time for council matters. Rather against an independence referendum but what that has to do with the local council I don't know. Happy to photograph gay weddings.

Mary Stronach Matheson, Scottish Liberal Democrats

Didn't turn up to hustings in Errol. Hard to find out anything.

Beth Pover and Douglas Brian Pover (a married couple), Scottish National Party

We received a leaflet and a knock at the door. The SNP currently control the council and point out their investment in schools, affordable housing, etc.. They are also keen to point out that they want to provide local services and the Conservatives want to cut them. I couldn't help but snigger when reading their complaint about a Conservative calling Nicola Sturgeon a poison dwarf.

I was shepherding a child to Dundee's Central Library so, while there anyway, I asked an librarian about a book. I was amused to find that she checked Amazon before their own catalog but I guess it makes sense if she was not sure that the library's system would even know of the book at all. I also made the mistake of glancing at the science fiction: I came away with Baxter & Reynolds' The Medusa Chronicles and Bester's The Demolished Man before noticing that if I'd gotten barely past the B's and already grabbed two novels then I had better stop there.

On wandering along Murraygate there were predating I-think-Mormons. When I am taking things easy I may stop to chat with them a little, not sure if that is a rare relief for them, but it also seems a bit of a waste of their time if I am unlikely to be converted. Still, I got to wondering about some of my friends who have directly experienced God and become Christians. One thing I noted is that it has been a while since I prayed and invited God to change my mind too. Another is that I wondered if these revelations to friends have generally been a vaguer inspiration, perhaps involving Jesus' love and using the power of God to have the strength to help others and whatnot, or if there has been any detail specific enough, doctrinally or otherwise, in these divine communications to assist choice of church or denomination.

As I walked in the pedestrianized retail area I found a selection of socialists and communists and whatnot under the banner of Dundee's Trades Union Congress. They seemed to be wrapping up so I did not get to hear what they had been feeling exercised about lately. I have doubted that it makes much sense for me to join a union given that I am salaried and not interacting with students: my contract is that I am to work whatever it takes to get the job done so if I go on strike then I am just inconveniencing myself. However, today it occurred to me that I suppose I would be indirectly supporting other strikers if my union subscriptions were somehow making it more possible for them to strike, e.g., with hardship payments.

I noticed a couple of what seemed like Mexican fast food places: there was somebody advertising a local Mexican Grill and on Nethergate I noticed a new-to-me Wee Mexico. As Nisa is now closed I stopped in at Tesco Extra to buy some whole milk and in interacting with the self-checkout machine I repeatedly failed to properly place the milk. If anybody becomes aware of a store whose machines do not care one jot what items are placed where around the bagging area, or that at least give me an extra shelf on which to put my hat and whatnot, then I would gladly preferentially shop there even more strongly than I avoid those who routinely give discounts to loyalty card holders so for privacy I have to keep swapping the cards with others.

Then, my mother telephoned, so after putting the milk in the trunk of the car I continued to chat to her for a while, sitting on a bench at the university. I have a campus parking permit so on visits to Dundee it makes sense to use it. My mother mentioned that The Red Flag, which I suppose we now associate with Jeremy Corbyn's wing of the Labour Party, is sung to the tune of O Tannenbaum.