5 posts tagged “21st century”

This Google video is worrying, especially as I refuse to carry one of these things except when I am out of town—and even then never in a trouser pocket. Yet some people’s lives are dominated by them—such as this chap’s:

When I was a kid, those predicting the future in sci-fi would say we would drive around in tiny cars resembling boxes and they would run on electricity come 2000. The former was right, the latter was not.
   The Mercedes-Benz A-Klasse was the first sign the 21st century was unfolding. Then we had the Smart. Neither are uncommon here, but there are way more of them in Europe. Another car we see a bit of is the Mitsubishi I, which is kind of a Japanese version of the Mini Spiritual show car from the 1990s.

   A few weeks ago I entered an elevator car which looked like it belonged to Cmdr Straker: The buttons on the side were not raised, adding to the effect.
   It all feels a bit spooky to me some days, like I’m on the set of Thunderbirds or something.

[Cross-posted] Remember Xanadu? It’s become somewhat of a cult hit even though in 1980 it was considered Olivia Newton-John’s mega-turkey. Stylistically, it sits uncomfortably between the 1970s and 1980s, as though there was a vacuum in between the decades. In one scene, Michael Beck insists to Gene Kelly that ‘It’s the ’80s’, but you know that it must have been shot in 1979 and people had not rebelled against disco at the time.
   Of course, reality tells us that you can’t mark off decades so clearly: elements of the 1970s necessarily continue into the 1980s, and some of what we regard as 1980s style had their roots in the decade before.
   But by 1982 there’s no doubt that one was in the 1980s: Rick Dees poked fun at ‘Disco Duck’ on Solid Gold and even ABBA no longer could do number-one hits.
   While there aren’t clear decade-dividers, there is a sense among us, as people, to want to bring new things into each era. Who can forget the sense of optimism we all faced as January 1, 2000 came around, even though it wasn’t technically the new millennium yet? We saw the year number beginning with 2 and it was a big deal. All those science-fiction films predicting a new era in the twenty-first century brought with them a sense of anticipation—and those that didn’t forecast the end of mankind in 1999 suggested that we might be a nicer bunch in the 2000s than we were in human history’s most violent, murderous 100 years.
   Here we are in 2008 and not that much has changed. We definitely aren’t nicer; in western countries we might well be more paranoid. But these are, in my reckoning, not twenty-first-century issues. This is leftover business from the twentieth century that we have not sufficiently dealt with, and we still have the opportunity to do something about it.
   Terrorism and nutty red brigades were with us through much of my childhood but various western democracies thought they could turn their backs on them. Arafat’s PLO came to the fore in the 1970s, not the 1990s. The negative effects of globalization have been with us since the postwar period. As has communism in Red China, which has brought us the censorship that western media are only now, with days to go before the Beijing Olympics, making a song and dance about.
   Just as a new decade does not begin to be “felt” till two years in, a new century won’t be felt till, I reckon, its second decade begins.
   The twentieth might well have been marked by our arrogance and over-dependence on technology as the Titanic set sail. And as that century dawned, indeed we were bullish about globalization brought about by shipping routes and the British Empire. As the Titanic sank, we were reminded that we could never be over-confident about technology. We might have said a few years before that we had too much to lose from going to war, with the expansion of global trade, but humankind sank into the Great War with new innovations of aeroplanes and machine-guns.
   Yet humans remain optimistic as we head into the 2010s. I would say there are more Americans hopeful about Sen. Obama’s race toward the White House than Sen. McCain’s at this stage, regardless of the latter’s attack advertising—because Obama has not defined things well. There is a sense of casting off the twentieth century. You see the same in so many areas as people question the economic system, politics, and how we are exposed to global disasters through the media. You also see questioning of the media. All of this inquisitiveness seems to be happening on a wider scale, maybe sparked off by authors and thinkers writing in the last part of the twentieth century trying to lay some useful groundwork for the rest of us as their ideas got out.
   What sort of century is emerging? We would like to think that we can solve all the world’s problems because we are blessed with the ability and desire; yet institutions seem to constantly thwart our collective wills. Various individuals take matters into their own hands, be they international philanthropists setting up funds for poorer countries or bloggers trying to break the mainstream media’s deadlock on what we are allowed to know.
   Meanwhile, corporations try to feed consumers products as a substitute for Orwellian soma—not necessities which we should look at having, but unnecessary items that take us away from being true to ourselves.
   I don’t have the answers to what sort of century we will face. I know what sort of century I would like to face. One where people from all walks of life can realize their dreams, where people can receive the education they want, and where deceit and avarice are shown to be harmful to the collective good. One where imagination and innovation drive forward human progress, rather than impeded by society or corporations because they view them as threats.
   The answer might lie in examining the changes in style between decades. Were they the result of companies dictating fashion or some deeper change in the Zeitgeist, driven by many individuals?
   I like to think it was the latter. When the end of 1999 came about, I certainly was not told to head into town to see how crowded or fun Wellington city was. I just went. Something drew me to it.
   There is something to be said about people driving the mood of the planet, and how we still have a chance to shape the twenty-first century’s destiny as we cast off the negative effects of the previous one.
   We know where we goofed. We have seen it in the destruction of freedom or the greed of certain parties; we have seen it through a failure to understand other cultures or how institutions block aid from getting to the people. We know there must be solutions, and we now have a twentieth-century invention—the internet—where we can band together, make some noise and maybe generate real progress. We just need to wake up, realize what is useless in our lives, what we can do for ourselves and others, and get back to first principles. Technology, for instance, is here to serve us, rather than direct us into buying the next little toy to waste away whatever precious seconds we have each day.
   We might define the new century through new energies (hybrid cars are so last century—we can do better), through new ways of reaching people in need (which we are already doing through unprecedented dialogue), and through redefining institutions to turn them into agents of change rather than stiflng collectives of people.
   It’s through simplifying our lives and our directions that we can sense what we might want in the twenty-first century. Have a think—and maybe we can just put something out there into that Zeitgeist as this century really begins unfolding.

Former British PM Rt Hon Tony Blair gave the graduation speech for Yale University this year. It was an inspiring, largely non-political address.

So, after 100 years of Class Days, finally you get a British speaker.
   What took you so long? Did that little disagreement of 1776 rankle so much? And why now? Is it because the British election campaigns only last four weeks long?
   For whatever reason, it is an honour to be here and to say to the Yale College Class of 2008: you did it; you came through; from all of us to all of you, congratulations, well done.
   The invitation to a former British prime minister to address a college which boasts five former presidents, many former vice presidents and senators too numerous to mention, is either to give me an exaggerated sense of my own importance or you a reduced sense of yours.
   It was Churchill or Oscar Wilde, and there is a difference, who called us ‘two nations divided by a common language’—actually it may have been George Bernard Shaw—and so we are. You try being in the European Union.
   I had an unfortunate experience earlier in my premiership, when doing a press conference with a French Prime Minister. I speak French, but not quite as well as I thought.  We decided to do the press conference live, in French. I was asked whether there were any policy positions of the French Prime Minister I desired to emulate. There is a particular phrase, in French, which you must use with care. I didn’t.
   I meant to say there are many different policies of the French Prime Minister that I desired to emulate. What I actually said was that I desire the French Prime Minister in many different positions.
   Anyway, here I am at Yale and set to come back for the fall semester. My old Oxford tutor was, I’m afraid, horrified to hear I had been taken on by Yale. His worries were all for Yale, I may say. He said, ‘I only hope for their sake you’re going there to learn rather than to teach.’
   Now, I know you Yale guys are smart. So what can I tell you that you don’t already think you know?
   I can tell you something of the world as I see it.
   Three days ago, in my role as Middle East envoy, I stood in the heart of Bethlehem. On one side of me lay the concrete barrier which now separates Israel and Palestine. On the other, the historic birthplace of Jesus and the land of Palestine beyond.
   A few days before that, I was in Jericho. If you look up from the town centre, to the left is the Mount of Temptation, where Jesus stayed 40 days and nights. To the right, you can see Mount Nebo where Moses looked down on the Promised Land. And right in front of you is the Valley of Jordan.
   My guide, a Muslim, turned to me, and said, ‘Moses, Jesus, Muhammad—why in God's name did they all have to come here?’
   But in God’s name, they came, and for centuries, their followers have waged war in the name of prophets whose life work was in pursuit of peace.
   Today, the land that encompasses Israel and Palestine, which is small, has the conflict symbolizes the wider prospects of the entire, vast region of the Middle East and beyond. There, the forces of modernization and moderation battle with those of reaction and extremism. The shadow of Iran looms large.
   What is at stake is immense. Will those who believe in peaceful coexistence triumph, matching the growing economic power and wealth with a politics and a culture at ease with the twenty-first century? Or will the victors be those that seek to use that economic wealth to create a politics and culture more relevant to the feudal Middle Ages?
   Thousands of miles from here, this struggle is being played out in the suburbs of Baghdad and Beirut and the Gaza Strip. But the impact of its outcome on our security here and way of life here will register in the core of our well-being.
   In fact, if I had to sum up my view of the world, I would say to you: turn your thoughts to the east. Not just to the Middle East. But to the Far East. For the first time in many centuries, power is moving east.
   China and India each have populations roughly double those of America and Europe combined. In the next two decades, those two countries together will undergo industrialization four times the size of the USA’s and at five times the speed.
   We must be mindful that as these ancient civilizations become somehow younger and more vibrant, our young civilization does not grow old. Most of all we should know that in this new world, we must clear a path to partnership, not stand off against each other, competing for power.
   The world in which you, in time to come, will take the reins, cannot afford a return to twentieth-century struggles for hegemony.
   The characteristic of this modern world is the pace and scope and scale of globalization. Globalization is driving the change and people are driving globalization.
   The consequence is that the world opens up, its boundaries diminish, we are pushed closer together. The conclusion is that we make it work together or not at all.
   The issues you must wrestle with—the threat of climate change, food scarcity, and population growth, worldwide terror based on religion, the interdependence of the world economy—my student generation would barely recognize. But the difference today is that they are all essentially global in nature.
   You understand this. Yale has become a melting pot of culture, language and civilization. You are the global generation. So be global citizens.
   Each new generation finds the world they enter. But they fashion the world they leave. So, what do you inherit and what do you pass on?
   The history of humankind is marked by great events but it’s written by great people. People like you.
   Given Yale’s record of achievement, perhaps by you.
   At this point, I would like to thank the seniors, who invited my son Euan to the Yale naked parties. I would like to thank my son Euan for having refused the invitation.
   So to you as individuals, what wisdom, if any, have I learned?
   First, in fact, keep learning. Always be alive to the possibilities of the next experience, of thinking, doing and being.
   When the Buddha was asked, near the end of his life, to describe his secret, he answered bluntly, ‘I’m awake.’
   So be awake.
   Understand conventional wisdom, but be prepared to change it.
   Feel as well as analyse. Use your instinct alongside your reason. Calculate too much and you miscalculate. Be prepared to fail as well as to succeed, because it is failure, not success, that defines character.
   I spent years trying to be a politician, failing at every attempt and nearly gave up. I know you’re thinking: I should have. Sir Paul McCartney reminded me that the first record company the Beatles approached rejected them as a band no one would want to listen to.
   Be good to people on your way up, because you never know if you will meet them again on your way down.
   Judge someone by how they treat those below them not those above them.
   Be a firm friend, not a fair-weather friend. It’s your friendships, including those here at Yale, at this time, that will sustain and enrich the human spirit.
   A good test of a person is who turns up at their funeral and with what sincerity. Try not to sit the test too early, of course.
   Recently, I attended a funeral, and the speaker said he would like to begin by reading a list of all those whose funerals he would rather have been attending, but the list was too long. It was kind of a sweet compliment to our friend.
   Alternatively, there was Spike Milligan, the quintessential English comic who, when he was asked what he would like as the epitaph on his tombstone, replied, ‘They should write: “I told you I was ill.”’
   There was a colleague of mine in the British Parliament who once asked another, ‘Why do people take such an instant dislike to me?’ and got the reply, ‘Because it saves time.’
   So, when others think of you, let them think not with their lips, but their hearts, of a good friend and a gracious acquaintance.
   Above all, however, have a purpose in life. Life is not about living but about striving. When you get up, get up motivated. Live with a perpetual sense of urgency. And make at least part of that purpose about something bigger than you.
   There are great careers. There are also great causes. At least let some of them into your lives. Giving lifts the heart in a way that getting never can. Maybe it really was Oscar Wilde who said, ‘No one ever died saying, “If only I had one more day at the office.”’
   One small but shocking sentence: each year, three million children die in Africa from preventable disease or conflict. The key word? Preventable.
   When all is said and done, there is usually more said than done. So be a doer, not a commentator. Seek responsibility rather than shirk it.
   People often ask me about leadership. And I say: leadership is about wanting the responsibility to be on your shoulders, not ignoring its weight but knowing someone has to carry it, and reaching out for that person to be you. Leaders are heat-seekers, not heat-deflectors.
   And luck?
   You have all the luck you need. You are here, at Yale, and what, apart from the hats, could be better?
   And you have something else: your parents.
   You know, when you are your age, you can never imagine being our age. But believe me, when you’re our age, we remember clearly being your age. That’s why I am so careful about young men and my daughter: ‘Don’t tell me what you're thinking. I know what you’re thinking.’
   But as a parent, let me tell you something about parents. Despite all rational impulses, despite all evidence to the contrary, despite what we think you do to us and what you think we do to you—and yes, it is often hell on both sides—the plain, unvarnished truth is that we love you. Simply, profoundly and utterly.
   I remember, back in the mists of time my Dad greeting me off the train at Durham Railway Station. I was a student at Oxford. Oxford and Cambridge are for Britain kind of like Yale and Harvard, only more so. It was a big deal. I had been away for my first year and I was coming home.
   I stepped off the train. My hair was roughly the length of Rumpelstiltskin’s, and unwashed. I had no shoes and no shirt. My jeans were torn, and this was in the days before this became a fashion item. Worst of all, we had just moved house. Mum had thrown out the sitting room drapes. I had retrieved them and made a sleeveless long coat with them.
   My Dad greeted me. There were all his friends at the station. Beside me, their kids looked like paragons of respectability.
   He saw the drapes. He visibly winced. They did kind of stand out. I took pity on him.
   ‘Dad,’ I said. ‘There’s good news. I don’t do drugs.’
   My Dad looked me in the eye and said, ‘Son, the bad news is if you’re looking like this and you’re not doing drugs, we’ve got a real problem.’
   Your parents look at you today with love. They know how hard it is to make the grade and they respect you for making it.
   And tomorrow, as I know, as a parent of one of the graudate classes, as you receive your graduation, their hearts will beat with the natural rhythm of pride. Pride in what you have achieved. Pride in who you are.
   They will be nervous for you as you stand on the threshold of a new adventure, for they know the many obstacles that lie ahead.
   But they will be confident that you can surmount those obstacles, for they know also the strength of character and of spirit that has taken you thus far.
   So, to my fellow parents, I say: let us rejoice and be glad together. And to the Yale College Class of 2008, I say: well done, and may blessings and good fortune be yours in all the years to come.

An excerpt from a discussion between some of us here on Vox and on Facebook—the part I can share. (Thanks to Ninja and Randy for their thoughts in this.)

I believe in men being gentlemen, women being ladies. I believe in respect, grace, honour, integrity and keeping my word. I believe in facts before assumptions, I believe in truth and not BS.
   I believe in self-determination of people and respecting their paths.
   I believe that no one can complete me. A relationship is about my sharing who I fully am with someone, not needing someone to complete how I see myself.
   But we real men, those of us without sex and footy on the brain, are plain not represented widely. So when mothers consider locking up their daughters, do men like me get grouped with the assholes of this planet? You know, the guys who think Ralph is sophisticated literature?
   And when a magazine domestically says that Marc Ellis is the typical Kiwi male, what heck hope do the rest of us have?
   The last time anyone close appeared in the cultural Zeitgeist was Brendan Fraser in Blast from the Past. And he was made out to be a freak who grew up in a fallout shelter.
   We now return you to our regularly scheduled programme.