Beards: Feral, Unkempt, or Natural?

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Mar 082013
 

If you spend any time looking ’round the Internet for information on beards – which is admittedly a somewhat odd thing to do – you will quickly come across a certain segment of the “Internista” referring to something called “feral beards”.

This took me some time to figure out, as the phrase summons to my mind the image of a beard that leaps off the face, scurries off into a nearby bush, and growls menacingly at anyone who comes too close. Which I’m pretty sure I’m safe from that kind of beard unless I start feeding myself mind-bending drugs. But what on earth did they mean ?

Well, it turns out they are referring to the kind of beards that grow on men if the man doesn’t start hacking the growth away. The sort of beard that normal people might refer to as unkempt, or even (if they are being sensible), natural. The word feral is used by those who have certain opinions regarding beards – that those who just let them grow are somehow lazy, unclean, untrustworthy, the “rat’s nest“, “shaggy beards“,  etc. Basically these people just don’t like beards, which is fair enough if you are deciding whether or not to grow your own beard. But using derogatory language about another’s choice ?

Even unkempt is quite inaccurate; if a beard looks like a mess, it could be because it hasn’t been combed in a week, or because you aren’t used to seeing real beards. Now there’s always the possibility that what you’re looking at is really unkempt – complete with bits of food, and wild creatures living in it. But the overwhelming majority of men with beards will spend some time working on them – cleaning them at least daily, combing regularly, and perhaps trimming back a bit.

Which is why I say such beards are natural. Which is not to criticise those who indulge in unnatural practices such as shaving, and trimming their facial hair, but; in fact I wouldn’t use the word “unnatural” except to draw attention to the fact that it isn’t natural! It’s natural, trimmed beard, or shaved face.

And if you start thinking “but a beard just makes you look untrustworthy” or something similar, bear in mind you are indulging in the same kind of thinking that results in burning crosses in the front yard. It may not be the same to the same scale (after all I can always shave my beard off), but it is judging someone by appearance in the same way that a racist judges someone by their appearance.

Banksy: Theft and Vandalism

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Feb 242013
 

When you think about what has happened to a certain Banksy’s artwork recently :-

Banksy from Wood Green

The stranger and stranger it gets.

First we have what is legally an act of vandalism, but the community in which that act of vandalism took place seems to approve of that act of vandalism. Vandalism could be defined as the destruction or defacement of some property; which given the protests since the removal of Banksy’s artwork could mean that whilst Banksy’s original artwork was an act of vandalism, so was removing it!

It seems strange for a community to have any rights over private property that is within that community; almost a denial of property rights. But it already exists – planning permission, maintenance enforcement notices, make a property a listed building, etc. Is it going too far to say that the community should have some say in how a building is “decorated” ?

As to the “theft”, people have been very quick to deny there’s been a crime here. But the community itself feels that something has been stolen from it – which is theft. It may not be legally theft, but if the community believes it to be theft, then perhaps the law is wrong.

Graffiti in general is a bit of an issue, as a good percentage of it has very little in the way of artistic value. Perhaps we need a way for a community to vote to protect “street art” and to condemn simple graffiti. That way those who have to live with it, get to choose what to keep and what to whitewash.

As for the property company that tried (and apparently failed) to sell the artwork in question here, it is rather hard to condemn them. If someone were to paint an artwork onto the side of my flat worth thousands, I would have a hard time saying no. Perhaps a ‘community street art protection order’ could expire after a certain period – perhaps 5 years – after which the property owner would be free to sell the artwork.

The Anti-Gun Lesson from Pistorius

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Feb 222013
 

So it looks like he’s out on bail.

He could be guilty of murder, or he could have been trying to protect his home from burglars.

Let us assume it’s the later. There are all sorts of problems with his story of what happened – if you were to tackle a burglar in your own home in the middle of the day with plenty of practice at that sort of situation.

But in the middle of the night ? Woken from a sleep and still in a daze? And not really knowing what to do ? It’s all to easy to imagine me doing something really daft in that situation is all too believable.

Add guns to that mixture, and you have the recipe for a disaster. Which if Pistorius is telling the truth is exactly what has happened.

There are those who argue that it is a right to keep a gun in the house to protect yourself from burglars. Ignoring whether it’s a right or not, it is for most of us a dumb thing to do. Most of us do not undergo the sort of training that will let us make sensible decisions in such a situation, and those that do have the training are not likely to operate at full effectiveness without the right level of caffeine.

Education Standards: Don’t Throw Rocks At The Swots

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Feb 222013
 

There has been a lot of discussion on how top maths students in schools in the UK, don’t keep up with students in schools in Asia. Funnily enough the difference is much smaller for British Asian kids. Which is an interesting thing given that people are concentrating on what the schools should be doing.

Now it’s not wrong to say that schools could do with improvement; no matter how well the school system is doing, it could always do with improvement. In particular for this particular report, looking at the top performers in a class is worth doing – it is natural, but unfortunate that the top performers in a class are often left just to get on with it. They are after all performing well enough even if they could do better if pushed.

But as can be seen from the performance of British Asians, it’s more than just the schools. Things may well have changed since I was at school, but back then there was this weird cultural thing.

Those of us who were seen as being good at maths were always thought of as a little odd — geeks, nerds, swots, and the like. Of course if you were good at other subjects you got it too, but it wasn’t as bad as being good at maths. Not really as bad as genuine bullying, but it generates an atmosphere where it’s ok not to try too hard at maths.

Does this still go on? If so, it would explain these results.

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