Elitist populism
An astonishing conversation with two friends on Friday night. I learned, in rapid succession, that there were moves afoot to instigate a ban on the playing of music on mobile phones on public transport, and that my friends thought this was a capital idea and could see nothing wrong with it. "It's anti-social behaviour," said one. Well, duh.
Where to begin? Of course, I'd prefer it if idiotic children didn't pollute the atmosphere of a bus or tube with the pathetic, tinny attempts at reproducing music made by the average mobile phone loudspeaker. Their music is almost universally awful; and even when it isn't, no enjoyment can be gained from hearing it in such low quality. There can really be no denying that the primary purpose of playing it in public is not, therefore, to enjoy it (even though they actually like it) but to impose it on others: it's the 21st century version of swaggering into a peaceful diner and choosing some obnoxious rock n' roll on the jukebox. But I'd also prefer it if they were gagged when on the public, so that neither did we have to hear their obnoxious conversations about inanities conducted in appalling accents. That, to me, is just as annoying and if anything more intrusive, yet I can't see anyone campaigning for bondage on the buses.
The answer to life's little problems is surely not to keep banning things we find unfavourable, something that you'd think would be appreciated by my friends, both of whom work in the creative arts. No doubt both would argue until blue in the face that no piece of art, however objectionable or transgressive, should be banned no matter how many people clamoured for it to be so - as would I. Equally certainly, both would at this point argue that art is not the same thing as a bunch of chavs on a bus listening to drivel and forcing everyone else to do the same. Leaving aside the notion that public art leaves people equally little choice in observing it, and that much of it (e.g., Alison Lapper pregnant) is dreck and politically-motivated dreck at that, the question is merely a matter of perspective. As the elitist snobs we are, naturally we consider artistic freedom to be of greater importance than that of feral juveniles to listen to music on buses - and so it is, in cultural terms. But the law must be above culture: it must be objective.
Such a law would be arbitrary and would discriminate against a stratum of society, which is undesireable regardless of how much that stratum of society is disliked by lawmakers or "the elite". The best guarantee of freedom of expression in the arts is to observe the same for the feral juveniles - it is the old principle of equality before the law, the maxim that the law is applied equally to all, blindly and without favour. Laws passed to eliminate specific forms of behaviour that are not in themselves illegal but are merely annoying, that do not in themselves cause physical or financial injury or institute coercion, cannot be said to be just under the rule of law, no matter how many people find that behaviour irritating. I personally, as I have said before, find the niqab offensive in the extreme, but I appreciate that banning it is probably not an option, even though the niqab is representative of coercion in a way that crappy music on buses simply is not.
"If it is to survive, democracy must recognise that it is not the fountainhead of justice and that it needs to acknowledge a conception of justice which does not necessarily manifest itself in the popular view on every particular issue." - F.A. Hayek
Where to begin? Of course, I'd prefer it if idiotic children didn't pollute the atmosphere of a bus or tube with the pathetic, tinny attempts at reproducing music made by the average mobile phone loudspeaker. Their music is almost universally awful; and even when it isn't, no enjoyment can be gained from hearing it in such low quality. There can really be no denying that the primary purpose of playing it in public is not, therefore, to enjoy it (even though they actually like it) but to impose it on others: it's the 21st century version of swaggering into a peaceful diner and choosing some obnoxious rock n' roll on the jukebox. But I'd also prefer it if they were gagged when on the public, so that neither did we have to hear their obnoxious conversations about inanities conducted in appalling accents. That, to me, is just as annoying and if anything more intrusive, yet I can't see anyone campaigning for bondage on the buses.
The answer to life's little problems is surely not to keep banning things we find unfavourable, something that you'd think would be appreciated by my friends, both of whom work in the creative arts. No doubt both would argue until blue in the face that no piece of art, however objectionable or transgressive, should be banned no matter how many people clamoured for it to be so - as would I. Equally certainly, both would at this point argue that art is not the same thing as a bunch of chavs on a bus listening to drivel and forcing everyone else to do the same. Leaving aside the notion that public art leaves people equally little choice in observing it, and that much of it (e.g., Alison Lapper pregnant) is dreck and politically-motivated dreck at that, the question is merely a matter of perspective. As the elitist snobs we are, naturally we consider artistic freedom to be of greater importance than that of feral juveniles to listen to music on buses - and so it is, in cultural terms. But the law must be above culture: it must be objective.
Such a law would be arbitrary and would discriminate against a stratum of society, which is undesireable regardless of how much that stratum of society is disliked by lawmakers or "the elite". The best guarantee of freedom of expression in the arts is to observe the same for the feral juveniles - it is the old principle of equality before the law, the maxim that the law is applied equally to all, blindly and without favour. Laws passed to eliminate specific forms of behaviour that are not in themselves illegal but are merely annoying, that do not in themselves cause physical or financial injury or institute coercion, cannot be said to be just under the rule of law, no matter how many people find that behaviour irritating. I personally, as I have said before, find the niqab offensive in the extreme, but I appreciate that banning it is probably not an option, even though the niqab is representative of coercion in a way that crappy music on buses simply is not.
"If it is to survive, democracy must recognise that it is not the fountainhead of justice and that it needs to acknowledge a conception of justice which does not necessarily manifest itself in the popular view on every particular issue." - F.A. Hayek
posted by Novus at 12:08
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