By Diana Holbourn
Upset, Discussions and a Bit of Fun During Becky's First Year at University
Book two of the online Becky Bexley series. Chapter 2 continued.
This series accompanies the books about what Becky does at university and afterwards, which you can find out more about on my author website. (The online series is in draft form.)
(To recap: Near the end of the previous page, the issue is raised of people in Germany being fed misinformation before the Second World War and believing it.)
"The thing is, it wasn't just in Germany where people followed leaders without thinking too much and ended up in harm's way and doing harm!" said a student called Daniel. "I studied the history of the first world war at school. We learned about the ways the government of This country used to persuade men to join the army. It seems millions of men volunteered to go and fight without really thinking much about whether it was a good idea and weighing up the pros and cons.
"I heard that the main reason the British government went to war was because they imagined they could influence the way the war went in case their interests abroad such as their influence over countries they ruled far away were ever threatened by other countries that were fighting in it; and the whole thing started for stupid reasons."
A couple of students unwrapped sweets and started eating them. Some of the others thought they were being rude and disrespectful to eat in the lesson, or callous, caring so little that people were talking about killing that they could even enjoy food while it was going on. Really though, they were comfort eating, since they thought the conversation was turning depressing.
Daniel continued, "Most people think the French were victims of an unprovoked attack, but actually, before the war even started, the French leadership for some reason enthusiastically egged Russia on to go to war with Austria and Germany, promising them help because they were in an alliance with them, and because they were perhaps a bit drunk at the time - look it up! They knew Russia could do with the help, because Austria was thinking of attacking Serbia, because they'd felt like doing it for a while, because they knew Serbia would like to have tried to shake off Austrian control over the nearby countries so they could have more influence themselves; so the Austrian government thought they finally had a great excuse to invade. Serbia was also allied with Russia, and if Austria attacked Serbia, then Russia would likely go to war to defend little Serbia, but Russia wasn't really ready for war.
"Austria was a powerful country in those days, not the backwater it seems today; there was an Austrian empire, and one country it ruled was Bosnia, which had a population that was 40 % Serbian. So Serbians didn't like the fact that Austria was in charge, naturally.
"Just why France thought it would be worth supporting a far-away country in their efforts to defend another far-away country, I don't know. Perhaps the French leadership wanted France to compete for power with Austria or something, so they were planning to try to make Austria lose. I don't know. But so often, governments have dragged their people into stupid wars, and while the leadership are safe in their bunkers, the people they've dragged into the wars are getting killed!"
"That's sad," interrupted the tutor. "But it's not really the subject of our class discussion. I'd like it to remain relevant to the topic of obedience to authority please."
"Oh but it is relevant!" said Daniel. "You'll see in a minute."
So the tutor let him continue, not quite sure whether he should.
Daniel said, "Anyway, the German leadership were friends with the Austrian leadership, and also some of them were just warmongers, and they told the Austrian government that if Russia attacked Austrian troops after Austria had attacked Serbia, Germany would help defend Austria against Russia. That's how Germany got into the war. Some German politicians were actually hoping for a war with Russia, because Russia was becoming better and better armed, and they thought that in three years, they'd be well-prepared for war and might decide to attack Germany, so they thought attacking Russia before then when they weren't so prepared for war would be a good thing because they'd have a better chance of beating them. Just what evidence they thought they had that Russia would ever want to attack them, I don't know!
"It reminds me of what I heard about some American government advisors a few years after the Second World War who advised that it would be a good idea for America to attack the big communist countries and start World War 3 right there and then, while they still had more nuclear weapons than Russia. Thankfully, their advice didn't win the day."
"Wow, we could all have been dead before we were even born!" said one student.
"Would that actually have been possible?" said another one with a smile.
"Na, maybe not," said the one who'd suggested it.
"Hey do you believe in reincarnation?" asked another student with a smile. Then she joked, "Maybe you were a moth when that stuff was going on."
"Yeah, and maybe You were a kangaroo!" said someone else to her.
Some of the students laughed. But the tutor said, "Let Daniel finish what he's saying please." They all fell silent.
Daniel said, "Anyway, I want to say that in 1914, there was no real need for Austria to go to war with Serbia in the first place; the heir to their throne was killed by an assassin who was part of a group that had strong links to the military intelligence department in Serbia, which the Serbian government had problems with but found hard to control. The assassination was a very silly idea, especially because if the man who was killed had become Emperor, he would have given the countries Austria ruled more power to govern themselves, so they might have been better off. His attitude was much more liberal than that of some of the Austrian ruling family or government. Just what good the assassins imagined his assassination could possibly lead to, I've no idea!
"But it seems they didn't like the fact that he wanted peace and was planning to give the countries Austria ruled more freedoms and powers, because the people who organised and carried out his assassination wanted Serbia to have more domination over them instead, after appearing as their liberator, with Russia as their ally. Serbia wouldn't have been able to do that if they'd been given more freedoms by Austria."
"I had a Russian watch once," said a student called Paul, completely irrelevantly, perhaps thinking one bit of irrelevance was as good as another. "It was one of the best watches I've ever had."
"How many have you had?" asked a student called Maria, who wasn't really interested in the First World War and welcomed the opportunity to get off the subject. "You make it sound as if you've had loads."
"No, only about four," said Paul.
Daniel was beginning to feel and look a bit flustered by the interruption. But it was allowed to continue for a while.
"Four?! Still, you're not quite as bad as my brother then," said Maria. "He went through a phase of breaking watches - about three in a month, because he did swimming at school and kept jumping into the pool, forgetting he had his watch on."
"Oh I did that once," said another student.
Paul said, "Anyway, what I was going to say is that my Russian watch first belonged to my mum. When she was at school, one day her class was taken to hear a NATO commander speak. He was talking about the history of NATO and the reasons it exists, saying it was important to stand up against communism. She thought it would be fun to go up to him and tell him she had a Russian watch on to see what he said, wondering if he might think she was a traitor or something. She didn't though."
Some of the students giggled. The tutor didn't find it funny though. Still, he was relieved that at least this time, he could be sure that what the students were talking about could have nothing to do with obedience to authority - unless they thought they were going to start talking about mocking it instead - so he cleared his throat for attention and then said, "Let Daniel continue speaking please."
The students fell silent, and Daniel was relieved and continued:
"Anyway, after the assassination of the heir to the Austrian throne, the Austrian government demanded that Serbia let investigators in to make inquiries into anti-Austrian activity there, and ordered them to take action against anyone spreading anti-Austrian propaganda. They were hoping Serbia would refuse their demands, since they'd decided it would be good to go to war and that they'd really prefer that to a peaceful solution, since they thought Serbia had caused trouble for them in the past and deserved to be put down, since other Austrians had been killed by Serbians, not just the heir to the throne. They were really using the assassination as an excuse to start a war. It seems rather strange and stupid that they'd think the solution to a few other Austrians being killed by Serbs was to start a war, since far far more Austrians were likely to be killed even just on the first day of one than had ever been killed by Serbs. But it seems politicians have strange irrational ideas sometimes, and ordinary people have to bear the consequences.
"So when Serbia agreed to nearly all of Austria's demands, Austria ignored what they said and invaded anyway. I think they were really hoping to defeat Serbia so badly they'd make sure Serbia was never a threat to their empire in the future. Well that backfired; by the end of the war, there was no Austrian empire!"
Daniel paused for breath.
"This is an interesting history lesson, but it's strange; I thought we were in a psychology class," said one student sarcastically with mock puzzlement.
"It is a psychology class," said Daniel, turning red with embarrassment. "I just want to go on to explain what stupid, blinkered, callous, unimaginative, uncaring morons the governments who started the war were, and how millions of men didn't realise how semi-brain-dead the authorities were, and trusted that they knew best and put themselves in terrible danger just because they told them to, which proves people are too willing to obey authority."
A few of the students were shocked that Daniel had used such language, and others barely suppressed sniggers, wondering if he was about to be told off by the tutor for using it.
But the tutor remained silent, as if interested in what Daniel was about to say next. Daniel ignored the sniggers and continued seriously:
"The British government thought of staying out of the war at first, but then when they saw France, Russia and Germany gearing up for war, they thought it would be good if Britain joined in, to try to make sure things ended up Britain's way, because they thought that otherwise, if France and Russia won, Russia might be powerful enough to feel they could attack some of Britain's colonies in Asia, and if Germany won, they might be powerful enough to attack other ones or something."
"What were the government hoping Britain would do in the war then, make Everyone lose?" joked one student.
Daniel said, "I don't think so. They were worried that one day Russia might try to take some of their colonies, but they thought they might not if they felt that Britain was a good ally because they'd helped in the war effort. They weren't so worried about Germany taking anything major, so they weren't bothered about keeping Them on side. But they thought it might be as well to go to war with Germany, because they thought if Germany won, it might be the most powerful country in Europe apart from Britain, and then who knows what might happen! A whole heap of 'They might' and 'Gosh, there might be a challenge to Britain's interests if that happened!' Nothing definite!
"There was also the treaty Britain had signed years before where they promised to defend Belgium if it was attacked, but in a cabinet meeting, they'd agreed that that in itself wouldn't be enough to make Britain go to war. The supposed duty to defend Belgium was just an excuse they used to the public to keep them on side, because it would be more effective than telling them they wanted them to fight and die to try to make sure that no other powerful country attacked Britain's colonies in Africa and Asia at some point sometime in the future. And they thought the war would be a great excuse to take Germany's colonies so as to increase the size of the Empire.
"Their ambitions backfired, just as the Austrian government's did! The world wars cost Britain so much, they couldn't afford the Empire any more and had to give the entire thing up, just as Austria went into the First World War hoping to make their empire stronger, but ended up losing it."
One student said, "I heard that the man who became prime minister during the war, David Lloyd George, married for money and then cheated on his wife. And when he did public speeches in front of workers, he used to lie about how poor he was when he was growing up, to win popularity. I wonder, if someone treats people he knows badly and lies in public, should he be trusted to care enough about people he Doesn't even know to do his best to make sure they don't get harmed unless it's absolutely necessary?"
There was a thoughtful silence for a couple of seconds, and then a student called Donna said, "You know, I heard the man who was the prime minister of Britain at the beginning of the First World War, Herbert Asquith, had some revolting habits!"
She didn't get the opportunity to explain just what revolting habits he had, or just how that was relevant to the class discussion, if indeed it had the remotest relevance to it at all, because the tutor asked them again to be quiet and let Daniel continue. He was hoping to goodness that Daniel was about to say something relevant, since he didn't want to realise he'd kept telling the students to let him continue only to discover he was being no more relevant than the rest of them!
Daniel continued, "I'm trying to explain what silly decisions the government made. It seems that when they were deciding whether to send Britain to war, it just didn't occur to them to think:
"'Shall we just wait to see whether any of what we're worried might happen at the end of the war Does happen before making plans?' or, 'Let's try and make peace between everyone', or, 'What alternative ways are there of stopping other powers trying to steal our colonies in years to come - could we make treaties with them, for instance?' or, 'Isn't it actually quite likely that both sides will be so weakened by the conflict by the time they've finished that neither will be in the mood to threaten us or any territory that belongs to us with hostility?' or, 'What if Britain itself is so weakened by this war if we join it that our colonies and all our empire - the very thing we want to protect here - will be a free-for-all?' or, 'Let's think of all the things that could possibly go wrong if we enter this war so we can make a better decision about whether it really is a good thing to do', or, 'What if we win gloriously but Russia ends up stronger because of the war, especially because of our support, and then they go and take over our colonies in Asia just as we're worried they might if they get stronger without us - how can we really tell there will be a difference?' or, 'If we do go to war, what strategies could we use to prevent casualty numbers getting out of hand and try to go for the maximum impact possible with the minimum effort?'"
The students didn't understand why Daniel was talking so much about the decisions of the politicians, but at least some of them were glad he was, since it got them out of the shame of having to answer for why they'd agreed to do the experiment the day before even though they thought the person they were feeding food they thought they hated and cutting the hair of was being put under stress.
Oblivious to their thoughts, Daniel carried on, "It seems they didn't think of any of that!"
He was about to continue further when one student, interested in what he was saying, said, "I reckon if it hadn't been for the First World War, communism wouldn't have broken out and taken over in Russia, because the Russian army would have been stronger to defend the rulers and put down the communist revolution. And just think how many lives would have been saved if there had been no communism! Millions and millions! No Stalin! No Cold War and anti-communist paranoia, and everything That led to - the Vietnam War and all kinds of other things!"
It was a gloomy thought, and some students had begun to feel down. But it didn't stop a couple of others turning the conversation light-hearted for a little while.
One said, "There's a party on campus called the Revolutionary Communist party. Someone mentioned that the other day, and the man in the room opposite mine said, 'I wouldn't have thought there was anything revolutionary about communism', meaning communism's hardly a revolutionary idea now it's been around so long and people are so used to it! Maybe they really mean they'd Like a revolution or something - scary thought!"
A few students grinned. One said, "I've got a blind friend who told me about a funny embarrassing story that happened to him."
The tutor was a bit fed up, thinking he was about to have to tell the students to be quiet yet again! But he wasn't sure whether to or whether to wait just a little while longer, because he thought he might enjoy hearing the funny story. So he decided to wait till the student had told it, hoping it wasn't going to go on long.
The student said, "He went to vote on election day, but because he couldn't see to, he had to tell the man in the polling station who he wanted to vote for so he could do it for him. He wanted Labour to win, but he was in a part of the country where he knew they would, so he thought just for fun, he'd vote for the Revolutionary Communist party. He whispered his choice to the man at the polling station, and was embarrassed when the man said in quite a loud voice, which he thought the people waiting outside just must have heard, "Did you say you want to vote for the Revolutionary Communist Party?"
Some of the students laughed. The tutor was embarrassed that he seemed to be doing a bad job of controlling the class discussion, and pleaded, "Please, please can we stop talking about irrelevant things and get on with the discussion?"
Daniel was pleased the tutor had said he could carry on. He was disappointed that the other students didn't seem more interested in what he was trying to say. He was just about to continue when one student said,
"Do you know, I think this country would be a lot better off if a completely new party came to power, with a name like the Humanitarian Party or something. It could be led by someone who's already very well-known and popular, like a presenter of a consumer programme on television, or a celebrity who's well-known for campaigning for things to improve, or someone like that. If they were popular, and the party promised their government would really care about people, they'd probably get loads of votes, and go from being unheard of to winning an election!"
Astonishingly, the tutor said nothing, but let the discussion continue for a while, as another student said, "The party might have to be Full of celebrities though if it was going to be popular enough to get into power. I don't know if there are that many celebrities who are well-known for doing caring things."
One student said with a mischievous grin, "Maybe they wouldn't all have to. They could have celebrities who did other popular things too, like comedy sketches."
Another student laughed and said, "Yeah, then they could do political broadcasts every night on television, but no one would mind, because they'd all be comedy acts. Maybe first you'd get the chancellor coming on and saying something like:
"'Here's a joke I found on the Internet: An employee of a firm went to see his boss about a dispute in his pay-cheque...
"'Employee: "This is £100 less than my salary."
Boss: "I know. But last month, when I overpaid you £100 by mistake, you didn't complain!"
Employee: "Well, I don't mind an occasional mistake, but it seems to be becoming a habit now!"
"'Of course, in our party, we hope not to make too many mistakes!'
"Maybe he'd go on for ten minutes every night just telling jokes! So after the first one, he might say,
"'Here's an example of the canny financial management you can expect from our party:
"'A businessman walked into a New York City bank and asked for the loan officer. He said he was going to Europe on business for two weeks and needed to borrow $5,000. The loan officer said the bank would need some security for such a loan. The business man then handed over the keys to a Rolls Royce that was parked on the street in front of the bank. The loan officer accepted the car as a guarantee against the loan not being repaid - he knew the businessman would be unlikely not to repay it if he wanted his car back. An employee then drove the Rolls into the bank's underground garage and parked it there.
"'Two weeks later the businessman came back, repaid the $5,000 and the interest which came to just over $15. The loan officer said, "We do appreciate your business, and this transaction has worked out very nicely, but we are a bit puzzled. While you were away we checked and found that you are a multimillionaire. What puzzles us is why you would bother to borrow $5,000?"
"'The business man replied: "Well I didn't actually need the money, but doing things this way got me a fantastically cheap parking space; where else can I park my car for two weeks for fifteen bucks?"'"
The students giggled. "Where did you get that joke?" asked one of them as he smiled.
"I really found it on the Internet," said the student who'd just told it.
The tutor was torn between enjoying the jokes, and trying to control his class by doing his best to make them start talking about something that at least remotely resembled the topic of conversation they were supposed to be having! He waited, silent and confused, but smiling at the jokes, for a few more minutes.
Meanwhile, another student said, "Yeah, and imagine if the night after the chancellor came on the telly, the minister for work and pensions - there is one like that isn't there? I think so. So he would come on and tell jokes, so he'd say things like:
"'This is something I hope would never happen in My party:
"'A boss was going to speak at an important meeting, so he asked one of his employees to write him an impressive 20-minute speech. When the boss came back from the big event, he was furious.
"What's the idea of writing me an hour-long speech?" he demanded to know. "Half the audience walked out before I finished."
The employee was baffled. "I wrote you a 20-minute speech," he replied. "I also gave you the two extra copies you asked for."'"
The students giggled. Becky was eager to join in the joking, so she said:
"And just imagine if the health minister came on the telly the night after that, and said:
"'I was browsing the Internet the other day, and I came across these comments that doctors allegedly wrote on patients' medical charts. Our party might just have to do something about this! They said things like:
"'Patient has chest pain if she lies on her left side for over a year.
On the second day, the knee was better, and then on the third day it disappeared.
Discharge status: Alive, but without my permission.
The patient refused autopsy.
Patient's medical history has been remarkably insignificant with only a 40-pound weight gain in the last three days.
She is numb from her toes down.'"
The students chuckled, and one said, "Yeah, or one day the minister might do some doctor doctor jokes, saying:
"'Our party are planning to improve educational and health and fitness standards in this country. Just listen to the kind of thing that can happen now, and you'll know why things need to be improved:
"'Doctor: We need to get these people to a hospital!
Nurse: What is it?
Doctor: It's a big building with a lot of doctors, but that's not important now!
"'Doctor, Doctor I think I need glasses.
You certainly do, Sir, this is a fish and chip shop !
"'Man: My doctor has advised me to give up golf.
Friend: Why? Did he examine your heart?
Man: No, he had a look at my score card.'"
The students grinned. Still the tutor was silent, wondering whether to intervene or just carry on enjoying the jokes, as another one said,
"And just imagine if after the health minister, the education minister came on the telly and said:
"'My party is hoping to make education more enjoyable for children. Just look at what can happen now, and you'll know why we need to do this!
"'A little girl came home from school and said to her mum, "Mummy, today in school I was punished for something I didn't do."
The mother said, "That's not fair! I'm going to have a talk with your teacher about this ... by the way, what was it you didn't do?"
The little girl said, "My homework."
"'Physics Teacher: "Isaac Newton was sitting under a tree when an apple fell on his head and he discovered gravity. Isn't that wonderful?"
Student: "Yes sir, if he had been sitting in class looking at books like us, he wouldn't have discovered anything."'"
The students laughed. The joking carried on as another one said,
"And just imagine if the home secretary came on telly one night and said, 'Now as I expect you know, I'm in charge of the law courts. Now here's a joke I found on the Internet, all about the scandallous things that went on in court when the last government was in power:
"'A lawyer cross-examined the other side's main witness. He said, "You claim to have stopped by Mrs. Edwards' house just after breakfast. Will you tell the jury what she said?"
"Objection, your honour," shouted the other lawyer.
"'There then followed a long argument between the lawyers about whether the question was proper. Finally, after 45 minutes, the judge allowed it.
"'"So," the first lawyer said, "Please answer the question: What did Mrs. Edwards say when you went to her house after breakfast on December 3rd?"
"Nothing," said the witness. "No one was home."'"
The students giggled again.
Almost all of them seemed to want to join in the joking. Another one said, "And then just imagine if the foreign secretary came on the telly and said, 'Now as you know, I'm the foreign secretary; and just to assure you I take my job very seriously, here's a joke I found:
"'A boy asked his dad, "Who is more intelligent, me or you?"
The dad said, "Obviously I am, since I'm your dad."
The boy asked, "Then you Should know who discovered America."
His dad said, "Columbus Discovered America."
The boy said, "If dads are more intelligent than their children, then why didn't Columbus's dad discover America? Why was it Columbus himself who discovered it?"'"
The students laughed. But then there was a pause, as if no one else could think of any jokes, and the student who'd said it would be nice to have a political party with caring celebrities in it said, "It might be fun to have a party full of comedians like that. Don't you think it would be good if a party with people in it who had a well-known reputation for caring about other people was started though?"
They all thought it would be. Another student said, "I think it would be good if people weren't allowed to become politicians till they'd worked for at least a few years in some kind of caring profession, and got good reports from lots of the people they'd been caring for. But then, I don't suppose politicians would bring in a law like that, when a lot of them Haven't worked in places like that!
"Mind you, maybe they wouldn't mind so much about bringing in a law that said that from the next election onwards, anyone who wanted to become a new MP had to have spent a few years doing some kind of caring - it could be either paid or unpaid. It could even be a person who'd cared for their own children, provided they'd really done a lot of it themselves, rather than just having them and then palming them off on nannies and servants like I think Winston Churchill did."
Another student said, "Yes. Also, the other day I heard a friend of Tony Blair's on the radio trying to explain why the government made this country go to war recently, by saying, 'The prime minister felt that after the Americans suffered such a terrible terrorist attack, they ought to be supported in every way possible whatever they decided to do'. Well that might sound nice, but actually it's dangerous, considering the eagerness to go to war that some people in their government have; and it's just silly to support people no matter what, not making your support dependent on whether it's right or wrong!
"And I don't know if this man was just using the word 'felt' as an alternative to the word 'thought', thinking it meant basically the same thing, but if he really did mean 'felt', then frankly, politicians ought to know better than to be led along by their feelings into making decisions that will end up harming people.
"Actually, if he Had used the word 'thought', he would probably have really meant 'felt', because there can't possibly be much thought put into a decision to follow another person no matter what; a decision like that must be all to do with feelings. So if what he said was true, it's bad! We just shouldn't have politicians who are governed by their feelings; we need politicians who are good at analysing things, and thinking up and through a number of possible ways of tackling a problem, being careful about doing their best to analyse how big a problem it even really is, and then weighing all the possible ways of dealing with it up to decide on the best one. ... We also need politicians who are willing to listen to advice and analyse it to try and work out how good it is, even if they don't much like it!
"Maybe people who want to become politicians should even go on training courses to be taught techniques for doing that kind of thing, such as how to resist the temptation to not do it, before they're allowed to try to get elected as MP's, and definitely before they're allowed anywhere near a position in government! It might stop so many bad things happening in future.
"I actually heard that the Iraq War, and Britain's involvement in the war in Afghanistan, had a lot to do with Tony Blair's ego and dreams of glory, after he received a lot of praise for sending British forces to intervene in a civil war in Africa early in his leadership, which stopped it, so he got a lot of praise. I heard that in Iraq, America and Britain were each governing part of it for a while after Saddam Hussein was overthrown, and things first went horribly wrong for America, but British soldiers were confident they could do better with their part; but then things went horribly wrong for them too, and they'd assured the Americans they could do better than the Americans had done because they'd had experience in Northern Ireland; so when things went horribly wrong for them too, with gangs effectively ruling the place and doing some nasty violent things, the Americans started looking down on the British forces.
"Tony Blair didn't like that, so he wanted to redeem their reputation and his own, so he thought a great way to do it would be to send them into a province in Afghanistan and turn it quickly from a backward place into a thoroughly modern Western-style area. Talk about unrealistic dreams! But when they went in there, their intentions were misinterpreted by a lot of people there as sinister, because in the 19th century, Britain had been defeated by Afghanistan in a war they fought there to try to stop Russia getting hold of the place and possibly crossing the border to invade India which they were ruling at the time. Something like that anyway. They committed atrocities there, like burning villages, it seems.
"Apparently there's a revenge culture in Afghanistan, where people who are done wrong are expected to avenge it; and a lot of people in Afghanistan assumed everyone must think like that, so they thought British forces must be going into Afghanistan to avenge their defeat in the 19th century, and they wondered if British forces were going to commit atrocities there again. So the Taliban sent forces into the area they were in to fight them.
"Tony Blair was actually warned that that would happen. But he didn't listen. It seems he was over-confident that he could achieve something glorious and get a lot of praise for it. That's what I heard anyway. And lots of people's lives were sacrificed, and lots of injuries were caused in the attempt."
There was a pause for a few seconds, while the students felt angry. Then one said, "One thing that bugs me about politicians is that I think it's silly that when you hear them on the news, all they seem to want to do is criticise each other, to score points off making the opposition look bad. They ought to be giving each other helpful suggestions on how they think the others could do things better instead!"
They all agreed.
The tutor finally thought he could intervene without missing any jokes, and said, "Listen, this is interesting, but we need to discuss what we actually came here to discuss; so unless you want this class to take till midnight, we'd better get started again!"
No one wanted to be there till midnight, so there was silence. Then Daniel said, "I'd like to finish what I was saying."
The tutor wasn't sure it would be any more relevant than the jokes, so he wasn't sure whether to allow that, but then he remembered that before a student had interrupted to talk about a new caring party, he had actually given Daniel permission to carry on. He didn't want it to look as if he was contradicting his own instructions, so he told Daniel to continue.
Immediately the mood became sombre as Daniel said, "I wanted to say that another thing that shows up how unfit for leadership the politicians who took Britain into the First World War were was that it seems it just didn't occur to them to think of the cost in British human lives at all in a caring way!
"They calculated that an entire 40 % of the soldiers sent out there would soon be killed or injured so they'd better start recruiting a lot more young men quickly; but it seems they were thinking in a detached unemotional way; maybe it would have occurred to them to think differently if they'd thought of imagining how life would be for a family who had, say, three grown-up boys who all went to war - one getting killed, after which his parents, siblings and other relatives would be grief-stricken for years, one being so seriously injured he was badly disabled for life so he was deprived of the ability to be independent and get out and do things, and had to be looked after by his already overworked family all his life, and one who suffered much more minor but still horrendously painful injuries but recovered in time, but had terrible nightmares for years because he was so upset that he'd seen some of his friends killed.
"If they'd thought of a family like that and then multiplied that by a million, they might have been able to imagine what the cost of their decisions would be on Britain, and then they could have asked themselves whether it was genuinely patriotic to destroy so many of the population of the country they supposedly cared about the interests of so much!
"And it might have helped bring home to them just what they were planning to send people into if they'd inflicted just a bit of pain on themselves, say, by digging a fingernail into another finger, and then reminding themselves that anyone injured would be suffering pain a hundred or more times worse than that, for a thousand times longer or more. They should have asked themselves if it would really be patriotic to agree to something that might result in hundreds of thousands of people suffering such pain."
All the students could sympathise and agree with that. All were feeling serious by then, and some were getting angry. Some were surprised by Daniel's next words though, as he said:
"The fact that they don't seem to have done such things suggests that at least a few of them were psychopaths, possibly including Winston Churchill, who was all for Britain going to war, and said he was fascinated by war. I mean, not all of them thought the war would go on for very long, but that just proves they were pretty brainless as well, because it was never going to be like one of those wars against tribes who just had spears in Africa they could usually defeat quite easily; Germany had loads of big guns and big well-armed battleships, and they knew it! Plus Germany wasn't the only one on the opposing side. Austria was a powerful country with up-to-date industry that could easily be turned to mass arms manufacture in those days."
One of the group said, "I don't think Churchill was a psychopath. I heard he often felt upset towards the end of his life and wasn't sure he'd really achieved anything worthwhile, because the nuclear arms race between Russia and America was on, and Russia had invaded quite a few eastern European countries, so he was worried the world might be destroyed, and felt gloomy that the eastern European countries Russia now ruled had just been delivered of one tyrant only to get another, and said he realised he'd fought down one monster - Germany under the Nazis - only to create another one."
The student who said that might have thought he was standing up for Churchill, but some of the others didn't see it that way; Daniel said, "That just proves the politicians dragged this country into war without really knowing what they were doing! I mean, if, at the beginning of the First World War, they'd really thought about the possible consequences, they might never have taken us into it. I mean, they couldn't have predicted the nuclear arms race, of course, but they could have predicted there might be a few catastrophes along the way!
"I wonder, if they'd thought about whether they, personally, would be willing to die for the cause they were thinking of dragging the country into war for, and if they weren't, they then asked themselves why they shouldn't value other people's lives as much as their own, whether they might have been more cautious about starting the war!"
One student said, "I don't know why, but it seems to me that people with psychopathic tendencies seem to make it to the top in politics quite a lot. Why do you think that might be? I mean, I might be wrong, but it just seems to me that quite a lot of the world's leaders are a bit psychopathic, you know, with the way they start wars, and make their own people suffer if they criticise them, and that kind of thing."
Another one of the group said, "Well I don't suppose this is the whole explanation for that, but think about it: Who's likely to be more motivated to do what it takes to get to the top in politics, someone who really wants to help people and do good for the country, who thinks about things carefully and tries to understand other people's points of view, who really hopes to do some good but is always wary of making mistakes, because they realise they don't know everything and can't predict the future, so they think they need to be cautious about making decisions, or someone who thinks they're going to get a great big thrill from having power over other people, who gets excited at the thought that the more powerful they get, the more they might attract girls to sleep with them, and be able to boss people around, and get lots of money and fame, and watch people having to do what they tell them? It's going to be the one who thinks they'll get a great big thrill from it, isn't it. And someone like that is more likely to be a bit of a psycho than someone who cares about other people and goes into politics to try to help them.
"And some people get a big thrill from taking risks, when more caring people try to avoid risks if they think there's a chance that people might get hurt if they take them.
"And another thing: who do you think is going to be more motivated to push their way to the top, someone who thinks in simplistic extreme ways, like thinking of people as either good or bad, instead of thinking about whether things are more complicated than that, so they can get all enthusiastic or hateful about things like their attitudes to going to war or other world leaders, so they might, say, think things like, 'We need to crush that leader; look what he's done to our country's business interests with his wretched socialist projects that have stopped our businesses in his country making good profits! If I was in power, I'd have him assassinated before you could say "machine gun!" Then we could all get back to business as usual!' Or would it be someone who spends a lot of time worrying over the situation, like thinking, 'I wonder if he'd be willing to change his mind if we negotiated with him; and if we did, I wonder what would be the best way of going about it. We need to look into why he's made the decisions he has. And would getting rid of him really be a good idea, considering that his supporters might rise up to oppose any new leader and it might lead to a civil war with horrendous civilian casualties in that country?'
"It's going to be the one who gets all enthusiastic about his plans and stirred up with hatred against the world leader, isn't it! So it's no wonder the world's in a mess!"
One of the group said, "I've listened to a couple of politicians for a few minutes on the Parliamentary Channel once or twice though, and the ones I've heard haven't sounded like raving psychos or anything; I don't know how representative they are of all of them, but they've sounded as if they've been having a sensible debate about problems; you know, they've sounded like people you could trust to know what they were talking about and to try to make sure some good things get done. And also, surely even if someone went into politics thinking it would be just great to go to war, and that kind of thing, they'd have to often sit down with advisors who would tell them things were more complicated than they thought. And surely anyone who went into politics thinking they'd get a big thrill from having power might get so bored by long debates and things they might realise it wasn't such a big thrill as they'd thought it would be, and get put off it."
The student with the theory about why psychopaths are more likely to make it to the top in politics than other people said, "Oh yes, I'm not saying I think all politicians are raving psychos, or anything like that. Full-blown psychopaths are only a very small percentage of the population anyway, so it would be unlikely. There might be lots and lots of people who go into politics because they're really hoping to help people, for all I know. I'm just saying that one explanation for why so many world leaders seem to be a bit psycho is that people who are all motivated by the thrill and other benefits they think they'll get from taking big risks and getting power, and people who can get all angry or enthusiastic about things other people would be more thoughtful about because they'd be trying to think of things from other people's points of view, and wondering about the possible bad consequences of any course of action that might solve the problem but might just cause more, and that kind of thing, will probably be more motivated to try and get to the top than people who might be doubtful about what the right thing to do really is, and whether they can really do the country good by what they're hoping will work, but who might otherwise have ended up doing the country more good than the thrill-seekers will, because all their thoughtfulness might lead them to come up with better solutions in the end.
"And when you think that psychopaths are often charming and good at persuading people of things, like salesmen can be, and they can be ruthless with people they think of as rivals so as to try to make sure they get the power instead of the other people, then it's understandable that they might be more likely to succeed, and more likely to drag their countries into war. Anyway, this is only a theory. I don't really know why it seems to happen. But there has to be some reason, whatever it is. And that sounds to me as if it might be at least part of the explanation."
Daniel said, "It sounds quite likely to me as well! And one problem is that most of us simply won't know what the person we're asked to vote for at election time is like! Democracy is a sham when politicians can do things they never said they would do in their manifestos, without asking for the public's approval first, and when voters have no idea at elections whether they're voting in decent people, or psychopaths who might bring catastrophe on some of them!
"I reckon people must think, 'People in positions of great power like politicians are in a different league to us; they must have much more of an idea of what's best to do than we do.' but really, why would they? Imagine entrusting the running of this country to your mum. She must be about the same age as a lot of these politicians. Would she know better than anyone else in the country about what to do for the best? If she doesn't, why would a politician know any better than her? After all, I think being a politician - one of the most important jobs in the country, is one of the few jobs there isn't any official training for!"
One student said, "I bet My mum could run this country better than some politicians! She wouldn't send people to war for silly reasons anyway! Actually, I bet most mums wouldn't!"
Another student piped up enthusiastically with a grin, "Hey, how about if a new party was started called the Mums' Party! Imagine this country being run entirely by mums! I bet they wouldn't drag this country into wars!"
One student said, "Don't forget Margaret Thatcher was a mum, and she took this country to war!"
Another student said, "Yes, but I think she was quite a bit more butch than the average mum, and anyway, That war wasn't unprovoked."
The tutor sighed and said, "Please, please, let's get back to the topic this conversation's supposed to be about! I don't want to hear any more irrelevant interruptions! Daniel, finish what you're saying, please."
Some of the students Wanted to hear more of what Daniel had to say. Others, though, were just beginning to feel indignant that the tutor had told them to be quiet a few times, when Daniel was being allowed to carry on talking for ages, though he seemed to be saying things that were just as irrelevant to the topic of obedience to authority as the things they'd said.
The tutor was feeling no better; while he thought Daniel had said some interesting things, when he'd started the lesson, he'd had no idea it would be mostly hogged by one student who seemed to want to keep talking on and on about the First World War all the time. He wondered if perhaps Daniel hadn't read anything about the Milgram experiments, and was trying to cover up the fact by talking and talking so there wouldn't be a gap in the conversation he might use to ask him what he thought about them, or that maybe Daniel was worried he would mention the fact that Daniel himself hadn't refused to carry on giving the food he thought the other person in the experiment hated till it was half gone, to his probable shame, given how much he was criticising uncaring politicians. But he thought it was just possible Daniel did still have something to say that would actually be on the subject the lesson was supposed to be about, so he let him carry on talking. And then to his relief, Daniel did say something relevant that explained why he'd started talking about the war.
He said, "Anyway, in the years since that war, soldiers have been asked why they joined up. It seems all the reasons I've heard of have something to do with trusting that authority figures knew best and were telling the truth about how Britain just had to be in the war and what things were really like. I wouldn't have believed it, but it seems a lot of schoolbooks in those days gave the impression that war was a glorious adventure, and that it was an honourable thing to fight and guard the empire, and that soldiers were smart and impressive and made women swoon or stuff like that. Maybe a lot of politicians read books like that at school and it gave them the impression that sending millions off to war would be exciting, although you'd have thought that by the time they'd grown up, and when they were entrusted with the responsibility of caring for the people, it would have occurred to them to start thinking of war more as a thing that would cause a lot of suffering!
"But I mean, I read an interview with one man who'd volunteered to go to war, who said he came away from school thinking the Charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimean War was heroic and wonderful. Well it was heroic, but it certainly wasn't wonderful! Loads of soldiers were accidentally sent on what was basically a pointless suicide mission and loads got killed because their commanders made tragic mistakes. I mean, it must take some serious distortion to give the impression in a book that that was 'wonderful!'"
"Either that or the boy who thought the book said that didn't read it properly; perhaps he only stuck to what looked to him like the good bits," remarked another student wryly.
"Yeah, possibly I suppose," said Daniel. "But I can't think what the 'good bits' could possibly have been. I mean, war's basically just tragedy and suffering. It sounds to me as if the people who wrote the books were writing propaganda, not real truth; maybe they were sponsored by generals who wanted to breed obedient little enthusiasts to help them get glory in future wars, since after all, it would probably be the generals, not the ordinary soldiers, who'd be treated like heroes if they got more territory or whatever!"
"Or maybe they just wanted to keep gory stuff out of kids' books!" interrupted another student.
A few students smiled, thinking that was far more likely!
"I don't understand why they even want to teach us about past wars at all!" wondered Becky out loud.
Daniel continued: "The thing is though that whatever reason soldiers had for joining up, it seems hundreds of thousands or more of them just let themselves believe what they were being told and didn't really think through whether the messages they were being given were good or bad. The authorities were never going to tell them the whole truth, since they'd know it would put people off going. I mean, not many men could get that enthusiastic over a statement like, 'We think that whenever this war ends, this thing we wouldn't want to happen might happen, and this other thing we think would be bad might happen, or else another thing we don't want might happen, or maybe even that, if Britain doesn't kill half her male population in the pursuit of something half a dozen of us have somehow decided just needs to happen.'
"So instead they told them their country needed them, and that they'd be doing a glorious thing that would be a great improvement on the rubbishy lives they lived in their hometowns, and that each of them was needed to protect their fellow soldiers or Belgian civilians - as if any one of them could have done much on their own! Or they were told they'd be cowards if they didn't sign up! The government managed to persuade girlfriends and even former suffragettes to go around giving men who were still in the country white feathers as a symbol of cowardice; so those girls, despite the fact that they were going right against their best interests, persuading their boyfriends to go and get themselves sliced or shot to bits instead of marrying them, trusted those lying authority figures so much they didn't think to question whether they were really doing the right thing, it seems."
A few students winced at the gory things Daniel said. At about the same moment, the tutor dropped a pen he'd been jotting down a few things with and bent down to pick it up. "My gosh, he's fainted!" joked one student. He quickly got up again and told Daniel to carry on.
Daniel continued, "I think a lot of men signed up because they didn't want people to think they were cowards. But if they hadn't relied on the authorities to be trustworthy, they might have investigated whether it really was a good idea to go to war, and been able to hold their heads up and give good reasons why they didn't want to go if anyone accused them of cowardice."
"And then get themselves put in jail as conscientious objectors!" remarked another student wryly.
"I think they only started doing that after the government had to start forcing people to join the army because the number of volunteers dropped and so many soldiers were getting killed and injured, didn't they?" asked another student.
One student said, "I remember hearing about what stupid priorities the people in charge had. I heard about a marching song the soldiers sang to cheer themselves up a bit. It was about their private parts and said things like,
"'Can you tie them in a knot?
Can you tie them in a bow?
Do you rest them in a pot?
Do you get them in a tangle?
Do you catch them in a mangle?
Do they swing in stormy weather?
Do they rattle when you walk?
Do they jingle when you talk?
Can you sling them on your shoulder?'
"I heard that General Hague, the man in charge who was responsible for such terrible tactics millions got killed, kept on getting men killed without too much concern, it seems, but he wouldn't hear of soldiers singing bawdy songs like that - the words were just too rude to be decent!
"He took a walk to inspect the troops one day as they were marching to their doom, and when he heard them singing that, he called for a horse and rode to the front of the column to protest. The colonel didn't realise he was coming and was singing as loudly as his soldiers. When General Hague reached him, he heard him, and said the tune was OK but the words he was singing were just inexcusable!"
"You know," said another student, "If they'd actually had decent generals who knew a thing or two about good tactics, maybe not nearly so many people would have been killed and injured. The public would probably have been better off if the newspapers had run contests to think up the best new strategies, and not published the results, so the Germans couldn't read them and predict future tactics, but just handed them to the government to sort through and give to the generals so they could decide on the best ones."
"I wonder if politicians could have been trusted to insist the generals followed them though!" commented another student. "They're good at ignoring public opinion, any time except election time! And then you can't trust them to do what they say they're going to do!"
Related to some of the themes in the Becky Bexley story: Self-Help Articles on Depression, Phobias, Improving Marriages, Addiction, Insomnia, Losing Weight, Saving Money and More