{Clear Sight}[27th July 1970]

[Redbook1:170][19700727:0000]{Clear Sight}[27th July 1970]

27th July 1970

            To see with a clear eye is the least that a man can hope for.  Perhaps it is also the most that he has to fear. 

[PostedBlogger31032013]

{Co-education}[24th July 1970]

[Redbook1:170][19700724:0000]{Co-education}[24th July 1970]

24th July 1970

            Apparently King's Cambridge is already full of girls unofficially.  'Unofficial', though everyone knows about them: when one recently gave an interview on television, the Provost (?) is reported to have sent her a note to say that he would be grateful if in future she would confine her comments to the local press.

[PostedBlogger30032013]

{Lawbreaking and Lawmaking}[23rd July 1970]

[Redbook1:169][19700723:0000]{Lawbreaking and Lawmaking}[23rd July 1970]

23rd July [continued]

            One member of government to another: 'You don't seem to realise that if this case goes against us we shall have to get the Law changed.'  (Fictional)

[PostedBlogger29032013]

{Madness in the home [continued]}[23rd July 1970]

[Redbook1:169][19700723:0000]{Madness in the home [continued]}[23rd July 1970]

23rd July

            It's funny how a chance meeting can change one's whole attitude.  B (the elder [sister]) G has practically saved my life.

[PostedBlogger28032013]

{Madness in the home [continued]}[22nd July 1970]

[Redbook1:169][19700722:12.30]{Madness in the home [continued]}[22nd July 1970]

12.30. 22nd July.

            I cannot live within this household, nor can I live without it, outside it, knowing what continues within.

[PostedBlogger27032013]

{Madness in the home}[21st-22nd July 1970]

[Redbook1:168-169][19700721:2400]{Madness in the home}[21st-22nd July 1970]

Tuesday 21st-22nd July 1970.

12 midnight

            I must get this down.

            My father is going mad, or is mad already.  How do I know?  I don't, but the effects are the same, and they are what matter: sudden bursts of motiveless anger over minor points, reducing members of the family to tears or to mutinous silence; or longer periods of irritability which leave us tense and taut, wondering which way to jump.  The effect is plain on M and S; B is growing up behind for his age -- not in work especially -- though he is -- but in living: he bursts into tears, etc..  L also cries much more now.  There must be a connection.

            As for me, I am tied to this house.  Even if I could leave the others with a clear conscience, I am financially dependent for the next five years at least.  Thanks largely to his eccentric and antisocial behaviour I have virtually no friends of my age who could compensate for the impending collapse of my family, nor am I easily capable of 'making' them.  The few contacts I have kept from school seem to drift further and further away, and I hesitate to disturb them again.  By the same token I have no 'sex-life'.  All my efforts seem doomed to failure.  Even my writing, an inadequate sublimation, seems juvenile and shallow and accomplishes nothing.

            I begin to realise, just for example, how much I missed by his refusal to meet people in Sussex -- where I spend most of my holidays -- so much so that, at a critical stage I unconsciously followed his example -- how else can I explain it?  -- and could not cope with new faces, refusing to meet them.  In London all his old friends had younger families, of little use to me.

            I feel that I am wasting away, wasted in a vacuum.  I cannot live without communication, therefore I wither.

[PostedBlogger26032013]

{Train of Thought}[7th July 1970]

[Redbook1:167][19700707:1645a]{Train of Thought}[7th July 1970]

Tuesday the 7th July 1970

4.45.pm. [continued]

            To record a thought process: (reading) Henry II on law -- (thinks) Henry II -- a great step in civilisation: better laws -- essentially a tidy mind? ~ essential -- do not despise tidy minded men -- business men are necessary -- business men are also men first, business afterwards, not v.v. as some seem to think -- the trouble with so many left-wingers, revolutionaries and idealists is that they see the world in simple terms -- although they may themselves be very subtle or devious in their immediate dealings -- I may well be rather simple in living and thinking immediately, but I do, I hope, recognise the terrible complexity of the world which makes nothing certain.

[PostedBlogger25032013]

{Price and Wage Control}[7th July 1970]

[Redbook1:167][19700707:1645]{Price and Wage Control}[7th July 1970]

Tuesday the 7th July 1970

4.45.pm.

            I think governments and people will eventually have to get used to maximum price control by the government and wage control by an impartial arbitration council who will take into account whether a wage increase can be afforded even if it is deserved.  If both unions and managers (including shopkeepers) knew that their needs were being examined by an impartial board who also had to take account of the overall economic situation they might not object so much to controls.

[PostedBlogger24032013]

{Birth Control}[3rd July 1970]

[Redbook1:166][19700703:1005]{Birth Control}[3rd July 1970]

3rd July 1970

10.05 a.m.

            Talking of Birth Control makes me feel funny when I consider that what I am talking about will be in a few years’ time children of flesh and blood, laughter and tears, bounce and quietness, hates and love -- or won't be.

[PostedBlogger23032013]

{The Bugle and the Star}[28th June 1970]

[Redbook1:166][19700628:1310]{The Bugle and the Star}[28th June 1970]

28th June 1970.

1.10 pm

            I remember, from a chance pattern on a bugle, a time several summers ago: The [School] Tattoo, ending in darkness with Crimond* and the Last Post; and as the band grew quieter and the first notes of the Bugle rang out, I saw amidst the blazing, whispering firmament of stars one star that sank into the South, moving with such silent, assured power between the stars that I shall never forget that time: a satellite spinning soundlessly through the heavens and the Last Post, to vanish behind the trees.

*[The Lord’s my Shepherd]

[PostedBlogger22032013]

{The Personal Touch [continued]}[25th June 1970]

[Redbook1:165-166][19700625:2210a]{The Personal Touch [continued]}[25th June 1970]

Thursday 25th June 1970.

10.10. p.m. [continued]

            It is the children I care about most.  Why should they suffer this?  Why, above all, did the parents keep them until the last minute, instead of sending them to friends the day before?  I hate to think what that day has done to those children -- needlessly, for if the responsibility for the eviction was the G[reater] L[ondon] C[ouncil]’s or its officers’, the responsibility for keeping the children in it rests entirely with their parents.  I hesitate to accuse them of using the children as political capital, but they treated them like that at the end -- the woman shouting in particular.  There is no surer way to confuse and ruin a child than to hold him up as an example.

[PostedBlogger21032013]

{The Personal Touch}[25th June 1970]

[Redbook1:164-166][19700625:2210]{The Personal Touch}[25th June 1970]

Thursday 25th June 1970.

10.10. p.m.

            I suppose what is wanted is the personal touch in local government -- in housing and welfare, to avoid if possible these terrible evictions of people who don't want to leave by people who don't want to do it -- on orders from above.  Perhaps it is the system -- but that is of man's making.  Lack of communication is the age-old problem, growing as civilisation grows.

            It* showed you what depths the human being can sink to and not despair, how resilient they are in their misery; how cheerful children can seem in adversity they know, but how a sudden change, an enforced move, can shatter the fragile glass shell of their own world and leave them helpless, naked and in despair: that unending hopelessness, the fear of an infinite world, childhood.

            Having said that, what shall we do?  What can we do?  We are all so busy keeping one jump ahead of ourselves that there is no time for more than a passing tear: and next, the adverts, and then the News (which everyone knows isn’t true, just like the wrestling), and the Cinema program ....  We shall forget, all of us, until the next time.

            The impersonality of it cannot be dealt with by an impersonal system.  The neighbours came round and helped -- but why then, why not before?  Why did they ever let it get to this stage?  They were too busy to look until the danger was actually upon them.

            Who’d be a policeman.

*[A TV programme? <880805>]

[PostedBlogger20032013]

{Man}[24th June 1970]

[Redbook1:164][19700624:2330a]{Man}[24th June 1970]

Wednesday 24th June 1970.

11.30pm [continued]

            Consider the man.

[PostedBlogger19032013]

{Popular Culture}[24th June 1970]

[Redbook1:164][19700624:2330]{Popular Culture}[24th June 1970]

Wednesday 24th June 1970.

11.30pm

A great many people, or the sort who take it upon themselves to judge what they call culture, make the mistake of assuming that something which is simple, or popular -- especially with the wrong kind of people -- cannot have merit.

One of the most frightening pieces of music I have ever heard, one which continues to frighten me every time I hear it -- though I always want to listen to it again -- is Holst’s ‘Saturn’ – the Bringer of old age – from The Planets: both popular and relatively simple, but it terrifies me.  So does the Mystic, in a completely different way.

[PostedBlogger18032013]

{The Awful Symmetry}[23rd June 1970]

[Redbook1:163][19700623:1645]{The Awful Symmetry}[23rd June 1970]

4.45 pm

            The awful symmetry of life.

[PostedBlogger17032013]

{Europe}[23rd June 1970]

[Redbook1:163][19700623:1130]{Europe}[23rd June 1970]

Tuesday 23rd of June 1970

11.30am

            I often think that if only European colonialism and European unity had overlapped a little more the world picture today might have been very different indeed.

[PostedBlogger16032013]

{History and Politics}[22nd June 1970]

[Redbook1:162-163][19700622:2330]{History and Politics}[22nd June 1970]

11.30pm

            The major problems of politics involved causes which one knows to exist and results of those causes in the future which one desires to discover.  Some minor problems involve results which one wants, and causes which one must find for them and make effective.

            History has many results but few certain causes, save that the results of the cause before are the causes of some results to come.

            It is for this reason that history is helpful, not in text-book politics -- if there is such a thing -- but to the individual politician who is answerable, on the whole, for the results of his actions rather than the reasons for his decisions.  He is less likely to say  ‘because in history, this, so now, that’ than to let the knowledge of history affect his whole decision-making process which in turn affects his final decision -- on an irrational and instinctive rather than the rational and logical level beloved of critics, historians and some scientists.  But, of course, there are politicians and politicians.

[PostedBlogger15032013]

{Space and World Unity}[22nd June 1970]

[Redbook1:162][19700622:0000]{Space and World Unity}[22nd June 1970]

Monday 22nd June

            It is possible that the cost of Space will make more efforts in it of necessity World-wide, and that this might in its turn act as a catalyst for World political unity.

[PostedBlogger14032013]

{Voters}[17th June 1970]

[Redbook1:162][19700617:1910]{Voters}[17th June 1970]

7.10pm

            I wonder, are so many voters really swayed by the kind of weather, and whether Britain is still in the running for the World Cup, into voting for or against the Government?  Obviously such things stop people voting or stop them listening, but do they actually actively make up people's minds for them?  Are people really that naive, or that temperamental?

            I wonder.

[PostedBlogger13032013]

{Ideals and Motives [continued]}[17th June 1970]

[Redbook1:161][19700617:1800b]{Ideals and Motives [continued]}[17th June 1970]

Wednesday 17th June

6pm [continued]

            That having been said, it should of course be stated that the reason makes little difference to the final effect: some attitudes and actions, however prompted, help only their holder or instigator, some help others as well as him, some help others but not him, and some help others to his own detriment.  This is what we mean when we talk about selfish motives, co-operation, ideals, and lack of realism.

            So ideal would appear to be a purely hypothetical thing in the sense that it simply does not exist at all without some sort of motive, while to become popular it has to be connected with more obviously selfish motives.  'Do as you would be done by' and 'Be done by as you did' are two sides of the same coin, perhaps even one and the same thing: motive based on experience.  Hence charity, hence co-operation ... hence civilisation? -- that and the hope of future gain, are they at the root of civilisation?

7.10pm

[PostedBlogger12032013]

{Ideals and Motives [continued]}[17th June 1970]

[Redbook1:160-161][19700617:1800a]{Ideals and Motives [continued]}[17th June 1970]

Wednesday 17th June

6pm [continued]

            Of course genuine human compassion has its place -- though one might class that as a motive, being instinctive or inbred, rather than an ideal.  It is possible to argue, equally, that all human feelings are based on instinct; this may be true to a certain extent, but at one end of the scale the connection becomes so weak as to be irrelevant.  This is the trouble; charity for one's own children is a strong instinct and in our sense a motive; at the other end of the scale charity for native criminals in a Far-Eastern Communist prison, by people in Britain, is practically non-existent. 

Can it exist as pure ideal?  A Briton arrives at this prison -- which is unlikely anyway -- and is moved to compassion at the site of the native criminals being appallingly treated (this is a hypothetical example -- only Communist to emphasise how difficult it is to see).  Why is he so moved?  I think there must be two alternative primary reasons: either he has been brought up to feel moved at the sight of suffering -- a form of instinct, hence motive -- or he can imagine himself in the same position -- definitely motive: imagination plays a large part in generosity and charity. 

The conclusion is fairly obvious; but we should carry it one stage further.  Having seen this and having been moved by it the visitor attempts to move his fellow countryman: he advertises in the mass-media of Britain.  He wants to a rouse in them the same sensations he felt when he was actually there.  He tries to arouse their compassion and horror which will come for the same reasons to them as they did to him.  Hence photos, etc.

            Perhaps there are no ideals, merely motives prompting attitudes naturally and motives being used to induce and bolster attitudes artificially.

[PostedBlogger11032013]

{Ideals and Motives}[17th June 1970]

[Redbook1:159-161][19700617:1800]{Ideals and Motives}[17th June 1970]

Wednesday 17th June

6pm

                If we divide the reasons for human action into motives -- basically selfish or instinctive -- and ideals -- basically charitable and not prompted by instinct:

            One of the reasons for the failure of most political movements based wholly on ideals and making no conscious or unconscious allowance for motives is that the vast majority of humans are prompted almost wholly by motives in their ‘natural’ state (of civilisation or savagery): at the best, ideals have to be taught and are easily forgotten; at the worst, people simply will not or cannot identify with the high ideals.

            To make an ideal catch on, one must usually connect it with a motive.

            Communism was pure motive pretending to be ideal: now the old motives ring hollow but have been replaced by artificially imposed motives of security.  Patriotism is ideal kept alive by motive, by a sort of transfer-process: it can be, and basically is very selfish.  Capitalism is pure motive and pretends to be nothing else; at its best, it leaves room for, co-exists with, or even (best of all) encourages ideal.

            To ‘sell’ aid to the Third World, its protagonists (or some of them, rather) often forecast the horrific conflict that will result from the Gap.  That, of course, is a superb example of pure motive being used to support ideal, and some would say it is a great hypocrisy.  It is also tactically unsound: worry people too much, and they will not want to continue to give that world the power to destroy; they will prefer to close ranks in ‘Fortress Civilisation’ and leave the Third World to its own devices -- which is exactly what the protagonists of such aid do not want.

[PostedBlogger10032013]

{Pressures and Attitudes}[16th June 1970]

[Redbook1:158][19700616:0000]{Pressures and Attitudes}[16th June 1970]

Tuesday 16th June

            The great conflict in dealing with men and their qualities and failings lies between one's knowledge that, in one sense, every man's actions are due to the pressures acting on him but that, on the other hand, one's own attitude may be part of the pressures; or in other words, one may sympathise with him but be compelled to show him no sympathy – merely contempt -- for his own good and that of the greater world.  And for one's own.

[contrary to p140??]

[& see p159]

[PostedBlogger09032013]

{Winning in Politics}[10th June 1970]

[Redbook1:158][19700610:2300]{Winning in Politics}[10th June 1970]

Wednesday 10th June 1970

11 pm

            One of the most disillusioning things of all about politics is the fact that one can't always win.

[PostedBlogger08032013]

{Writing and Reading}[10th June 1970]

[Redbook1:158][19700610:1045]{Writing and Reading}[10th June 1970]

Wednesday 10th June 1970

1045 a.m.

(L)       'Nothing is important but the writing -- the reading is to regain it.'

            (A note dotted down several days ago -- I can't remember exactly what I meant to say.)*

*!

[But see p130]

[PostedBlogger07032013]

{De Gaulle}[9th June 1970]

[Redbook1:157][19700609:1130d]{De Gaulle}[9th June 1970]

Tuesday 9th June 1970

11.30 p m [continued]

(L)       De Gaulle’s stature was such that he was enabled to keep his feet on the ground and his head in the air at the same time.

De Gaulle was the greatest enemy of a United Europe -- and remains so.

[PostedBlogger06032013]

{The Worth of Art}[9th June 1970]

[Redbook1:156-7][19700609:1130c]{The Worth of Art}[9th June 1970]

Tuesday 9th June 1970

11.30 p m [continued]

(L)       A travelling* 'critic' (?), of all people, referred to Kipling as a 'second rate poet'.  I shall neither dispute that nor second it; but I should like very much to know how the conclusion is reached.

            Either there is a scientific and exact measurement for the worth of art -- which there isn't -- or it is subjective.  Anything here containing even elements of subjectivity is subjective.  If the process of evaluation of the creative arts is subjective, then either it involves a democratic decision -- the majority are right -- or some are better qualified to decide what is best for the mass than others.  This is inevitable; but which of the left-wing-intellectuals (so-called) who implicitly support it would allow himself to apply such a condition in so many words to, say, politics, or education -- negating democracy, or equal opportunity -- or, really, to life?  Can one really separate them within the process of living?

*(i.e. a critic of/for travel – 12/4/71).

[PostedBlogger05032013]

{Constitutional Development}[9th June 1970]

[Redbook1:156][19700609:1130b]{Constitutional Development}[9th June 1970]

Tuesday 9th June 1970

11.30 p m [continued]

            Britain's relative stability developed through years of trial and error and needed periods of complete dictatorship.

            The USA’s unstable society grew quickly from nothing, based on the most tenuous links with Britain’s.

            Russia’s sustainable society moulds itself and seeks to eliminate its own potential explosion by primitive dictatorship.  Possibly this will result in a more stable society than that of the USA.

[PostedBlogger04032013]

{Loneliness}[9th June 1970]

[Redbook1:156][19700609:1130a]{Loneliness}[9th June 1970]

Tuesday 9th June 1970

11.30 p m [continued]

            All the lonely people who walk alone the streets of London throughout the hot summer nights, searching desperately, despairingly, for some form of recognition.

[PostedBlogger03032013]

{Politicians}[9th June 1970][Age 19]

[Redbook1:156][19700609:1130]{Politicians}[9th June 1970][Age 19]

Tuesday 9th June 1970

11.30 p m

            One of the tragedies of our civilisations is that we need politicians to get us to co-operate.

            Perhaps the real vision that guides, or ought to guide, a particular statesman

 is that one day politicians will be totally unnecessary.  That day will see the culmination of the deeper work of all statesman and politicians who have ever lived -- even though they do not know it.

[PostedBlogger02032013]

{Russian Expansiveness}[14th May 1970]

[Redbook1:155][19700514:1205]{Russian Expansiveness}[14th May 1970]

12.05 pm Thursday 14th May 1970

            I am beginning to wonder if my view of a few days ago concerning Russian aims in the Middle East is not over-kind to the Russians.  If the Russians won the Middle East the way to Africa would lie open before them and Western Europe would be denied the short route to the Far East by land, sea and air.  That proves nothing itself; but the Russians must know it too.

[PostedBlogger01032013]

{Royal News}[12th May 1970]

[Redbook1:155][19700512:0930]{Royal News}[12th May 1970]

9.30am Tuesday 12th May 1970

            I wonder if in, say, fifteen years time the princes Edward and Andrew will be subject to as much publicity and smut-and-sneer-searching as was Princess Margaret before she married.

[PostedBlogger28022013]

{Russian Imperialism}[11th May 1970]

[Redbook1:155][19700511:0000]{Russian Imperialism}[11th May 1970]

Monday 11th May 1970.

            I should have mentioned in Thursday's entry the argument that Russia wants to keep the war going in order to extend its own influence and build up a new 'empire'.  I don't know how much truth there is in this, but I doubt if the Arab states would volunteer to accept Russian domination.

[PostedBlogger27022013]

{European Translation}[7th May 1970]

[Redbook1:154][19700507:2045]{European Translation}[7th May 1970]

8.45pm

            The real breakthrough for Europe, the thing that will make it a reality to be desired by the greater mass of people, will be the cheap pocket translator of basic typed and spoken language -- i.e. in symbols and sounds, for input and output.  I should think that it is about ten years off in that version -- one capable of handling, say, thirty different languages in one model.

            It might well, incidentally, act as its own audio-learning system: constant association by the use of certain words would at length become recognisable.

[PostedBlogger26022013]

{Nationalism}[7th May 1970]

[Redbook1:154][19700507:1355b]{Nationalism}[7th May 1970]

Thursday 7th May 1970 1.55pm [continued]

            I am beginning to distrust nationalism more and more: it is responsible for so many of our present ills as a planet, and it clouds so many issues even more.  But properly directed, it can be essential.

[PostedBlogger25022013]

{The Superpowers and Regional Conflicts [continued]}[7th May 1970]

[Redbook1:153-4][19700507:1355a]{The Superpowers and Regional Conflicts [continued]}[7th May 1970]

Thursday 7th May 1970 1.55pm [continued]

            A further complication in the Middle East is the growth of Israel into a half-superpower on her own account, in military terms, under the stimulus of war.  She will probably have her own short and short-medium range nuclear-warhead missiles by 1975, and then let the Kremlin and the Pentagon look to their rule-books.  At that stage the present fairly safe system (in relative terms) of superpower backing will become extremely dangerous for the whole world.  At the present the quality of Israel's own indigenous short-range military technology -- as contrasted with Egypt's externally provided aid -- is rapidly approaching that of France and Britain.  Quantity is, of course, another matter, and so is political influence -- one hopes.

            Part of the trouble is that the Arabs know very well that Israel, as a country whose technology is deeply rooted in that of the European-based peoples, is almost certain to dwarf them economically within 20 years of the final peace settlement.

[PostedBlogger24022013]

{The Superpowers and Regional Conflicts}[7th May 1970]

[Redbook1:152-154][19700507:1355]{The Superpowers and Regional Conflicts}[7th May 1970]

Thursday 7th May 1970 1.55pm

            There is an essential difference between the present conflicts in the Near-Middle East and the Far East, as far as the superpowers are concerned.  In the Middle East the two superpowers are concerned really only to prevent their champions losing; they are not particularly interested in having an all-out victory for their side.  The Americans know that it is impossible and the Russians know their influence will probably decrease if they did.  They are, therefore, more open to moves towards peace

and even the possibility of super-power collaboration -- if the conflict was in isolation, which it is not.

            The Far East conflict is another matter altogether. Here one superpower is directly involved, with all that implies in terms of prestige, and the other is supporting its champions (with China) for ideological reasons. For the Communists to retreat to the North would be to admit defeat, if only temporarily, for their aim is nothing less than total conquest of South Vietnam.  For the Americans to leave would also be to admit defeat -- as they are doing, or trying to do. We have just seen how difficult the Americans are finding this process of admitting defeat, because it necessarily involves the other side in winning [sic!].

            The point is this: that in the Middle East conflict, where both sides are acting largely to protect friendly but uncontrolled states, de-escalation or disarmament by one side could well lead to similar moves by the other if the exercise was organised carefully. In the Far East, where the conflict is one of basic ideology and of two forms of imperialism (of a kind), -- as far as the two and a half superpowers involved are concerned -- de-escalation (horrible word) or disarmament by one side would inevitably lead to a corresponding escalation by the other, because the motives of the two powers are much more self-interested.  If the Americans retreat we know the Communists will advance with Russian and Chinese support until they hold the whole of South Vietnam, and it seems likely after such a time that if by some fantastic chance the communists were forced to retreat the Americans would also advance to take in North Vietnam.

                        In the Middle East, Egypt would certainly like to destroy Israel but it is unlikely (though conceivable) that Russia would allow her to do so. Israel has already captured much of political Egypt but would be extremely unlikely to invade further and could not do so with[out] American support.  Similarly, it seems likely that the Americans could put pressure on Israel to withdraw from what she has conquered.

            In the Middle East superpower involvement wants to preserve the balance of stability, as is shown on one side at least by Nixon's decision not to supply more Phantoms and by Russian defensive missiles (I hope).  In the Far East superpower involvement is determined to extend its own authority at the expense of the other power.

            Of course, in the ultimate, neither side is the real loser: it is the people underneath and in between what cop it.

[PostedBlogger23022013]

{The Sleeping Giant}[6th May 1970]

[Redbook1:151][19700506:2315]{The Sleeping Giant}[6th May 1970]

11.15pm

            There is a giant asleep in Europe today.  Occasionally he twitches in his sleep, but after the fashion of the spastic giant:  his limbs flail wildly in all directions.  Then he falls asleep again; but each time, he sleeps a little less soundly.

[PostedBlogger22022013]

{Vietnam}[6th May 1970]

[Redbook1:150-151][19700506:2205]{Vietnam}[6th May 1970]

10.05pm

            At one time I fully supported the Americans in Vietnam.  I still support their declared aims; but the means outweigh them in the balance.  Whatever the horrors of Communist life -- and they are horrors, I do believe, in South-east Asia -- this great horror has gone on long enough.  The number of civilians killed by accident or intentionally in South Vietnam by the American forces must now be comparable to the number who would have been executed by the Communists.  Similarly, the degree of suffering cannot be much less than it would have been.  The war has cost America far more in money, in tied-up forces, in world-image, in internal trouble and in potential citizens than could ever have been gained by keeping South Vietnam under the Western influence and than could possibly be regained now even were America to succeed.  If the people are to die either way, as seems likely, let it be the communist forces and not the Western ones, the Christian ones, that do the killing.  If this Cambodian offensive fails, or if it has not succeeded by the date set, then for God's sake pull out and let us have no more of this.

            Otherwise, I fear for the integrity of America.

            ‘Don't worry; we know you did your best.  We also know how hard it is to admit defeat, especially for a nation that imagines itself to be unbeatable.  We shan't despise you for being unsuccessful in a war where not to win is to be defeated -- for your side; in fact, on the whole, we shall like you rather better for it.’

[PostedBlogger21022013]

{Intolerance}[6th May 1970]

[Redbook1:150][19700506:1750b]{Intolerance}[6th May 1970]

Wednesday 6th May 1970   5.50pm [continued]

            I find only intolerance quite intolerable.

            I shall only

                        Question answers

                        Suspect statements

                        Dislike dislike

                        Hate hatred

                        Terrify terror

                        Be cruel to cruelty

            And Kill Death.

                                    Can I thus hope to win understanding?

[PostedBlogger20022013]

{Boycotts [continued]}[6th May 1970]

[Redbook1:146-150][19700506:1750a]{Boycotts [continued]}[6th May 1970]

Wednesday 6th May 1970   5.50pm [continued]

            Nevertheless these comparisons between institutions and individuals must be made because actions among the former so often occur later among the latter.  This might seem even more probable in view of our present ambivalent attitude to individual rights.  One example of this is the way 4 Labour MPs and the Surrey anti-apartheid group (individuals within an institution, and another institution) sent a petition to the Queen (one individual forced permanently to represent, and be, a neutral institution) requesting that she should not meet (partly as the institution, partly personally?) the mayor-elect of Epsom (representing a neutral -- on this subject -- institution) because of his views held (as a person, not for an institution) on Rhodesia (a political institution to which the petitioners are opposed). 

Now, there are several ways of seeing this.  One is to say that the petitioners are within their rights because the Queen represents the Government which does not recognise Rhodesia, and the Mayor-elect (presumably) supports this Rhodesia, and that therefore the Queen should not recognise this man or communicate with him.  On the other hand, one could say that the local left-wingers were trying to get at the local right-winger, with whom they may have other differences and perhaps personal animosities.  I think the first argument is dangerous, and the second one we cannot discuss here. 

My argument is that this becomes dangerously near to the A-B-C pattern of personal relationships outlined above -- and that would be a form of blackmail.  Every man is entitled to his own opinions provided they do not harm others (or, to a lesser extent, himself): the mayor-elect is not an official representative of Rhodesia and he should not therefore be treated as an institution as an individual, so far as his views on Rhodesia ago.  He is a representative of Epsom in local government and was elected by the good citizens of Epsom and/or their elected representatives, who presumably knew about his views on Rhodesia, if the Surrey Anti-apartheid group did.  He is therefore more representative of local people than is the A-AG -- whatever the Government may say at a national level. But as far as his personal views on foreign policy go this is irrelevant, and those views in their turn are irrelevant to (a) the official (local) status in which he might meet the Queen and (b) his worth as a person in personal relationships.

            The reason why I am so annoyed about this is because I can see myself, for example, going to Rhodesia to have a look at what's happening and being pigeonholed ever after as a racialist -- which, oddly enough, I am not!  The principles on which one must not question the thoughts of the leaders because they have been proved right by the people who don't question are (a) infantile and (b) the foundation of tyranny.  There are many reasons for their success -- such as the security they give -- which I cannot go into here, but I instinctively sheer away from movements which accept only converts as people and treat all critics as enemies.

[PostedBlogger19022013]

{Boycotts}[6th May 1970]

[Redbook1:146-150][19700506:1750]{Boycotts}[6th May 1970]

Wednesday 6th May 1970   5.50pm

            A trend which worries me appears in the way political pressure groups are trying to pressurise non-political or unaligned or neutral groups not to communicate with other groups of whose politics the pressure groups do not approve.  Hence: the Indian government recommends that the Indian Olympics committee boycott the Commonwealth Games in order to force the MCC to cancel their invitation to the apartheid-based South African team to come to Britain.  There is something doubly sinister about this: firstly, as I said above, that a politically unaligned group should be pressured to break off relations with its colleagues, and secondly, that a further complication should be added by the fact that the Commonwealth Games organisation, the group that is being directly pressurised by the Indian Government (and others), has no connection (as far as I know) with the MCC, the group that the pressurisers hope to influence -- other than the fact that both are in the same country. 

The implication must be that either (a) the MCC should be unselfish to the Commonwealth Games and cancel the tour -- which, given the MCC’s beliefs, is asking too much – or (b) the [UK] Government should respond (to pressure) and ban the South Africans’ tour -- which under the circumstances would be equally sinister because we are not, for example, at war with South Africa, nor have we declared that we do not recognise it or its people.  It would, in a word, be undemocratic not so much in the act itself, which would be no more undemocratic than many similar government actions, but in its motives and its implications for democracy and our own freedom.

            Let us bring this down to individual terms -- although I must stress that this is only to make the situation clearer, and to warn of possible developments, not to imply [sic] against the ethics of the present situation.  In the simple case, perhaps, A likes B and B likes C but A hates C, therefore A tells B to stop knowing C or A will stop knowing B.  What B does depends on his own character and his own assessment of the situation. 

However, politics is not based on friendship nor on individual welfare -- though perhaps it should be.  The situation would be better described in the following way: W deals [with] X who has fairly close personal connections with Y who deals with Z; W dislikes Z.  W therefore threatens to break off his dealings and/or friendship with X unless Y breaks off his dealings and/or friendship with Z.  He hopes that (a) X will be persuaded to urge his friend Y to do so and (b) Y will feel morally bound to help his friend X by doing so – that Y will feel the burden is on him.  In fact, of course, if Y is wise or has a mixture of ruthlessness, foresight and strong principles, he will realise that the true burden is on W, who has set the conditions of this game and who therefore bears responsibility for it.  Although X should not be harmed unfairly in this way it is not up to Y to help him by giving in, because that would harm Z through no fault of his own -- and the responsibility for that would be largely Y’s.

            Of course you cannot compare political tactics directly with the tactics of personal relationships, but equally, of course, politics is based on masses of individuals, and also on solitary individuals.  So let W be the Indian Government, let X be the Commonwealth Games organisation, let Y be the MCC, and let Z be the South African team and parallels become clearer.  But perhaps the most difficult factor for X and Y is not so much what will happen to X if Y stands firm, it is what the effect on all X’s contacts will be.  That is one of the reasons why direct comparisons are dangerous.

[continues]

[PostedBlogger18022013]

{Limitations on Good Government}[5th May 1970]

[Redbook1:146][19700505:1815f]{Limitations on Good Government}[5th May 1970]

Tuesday 5th May 1970   6.15pm [continued]

(L)       You can't expect the government to do everything (said the head of it): there are some things for the proper guidance of this country which you, the people, must do yourselves.  The government can coerce people but some things cannot or should not be obtained from you by coercion. You, the people, can persuade people, and you can persuade yourselves, to respect the vital things in our civilisation, such as respect for the law, willingness to do one’s bit, compassion, helpfulness -- all the little things that cannot be enforced but can be adopted -- by you.

            These are the things on which our way of living is founded; and in the last resort it is not the government that runs the country, your servants; it is the people, yourselves.

[PostedBlogger17022013]

{Originality}[5th May 1970]

[Redbook1:145-146][19700505:1815e]{Originality}[5th May 1970]

Tuesday 5th May 1970   6.15pm [continued]

(L)       No artistic creation -- no creation of any sort -- indeed, no interpretation -- is truly original.  Creation and interpretation are rather like mathematics, or cookery, or -- better still -- chemistry: one puts together the various influences of a heredity and environment -- which last covers everything, really, including the first -- and you may get just a mixture with the properties of all the original influences relatively discernible; but if the conditions are right, if there is a catalyst in the environment, you may develop a compound-like structure, a completely new approach and attitude: new, but not truly original, for it is wholly rooted in older matters, however different from them it may be.

            What fun this all is.

[PostedBlogger17for16022013]

{Statesmanship and Politics}[5th May 1970]

[Redbook1:145][19700505:1815d]{Statesmanship and Politics}[5th May 1970]

Tuesday 5th May 1970   6.15pm [continued]

(L)       Talleyrand, I am told, said that “the art of statesmanship is to foresee the inevitable and to expedite its occurrence.”

            The art of politics consists largely of foreseeing the inevitable and making it seem as though

                        (a) it is right

                 and (b) you have done it.

[BT, killed while filming abroad last year, gave an entertaining and irritating account of this, I think at UI: on some domestic committee, they discovered soft loo paper was to be introduced, so began to press strongly for its introduction. <870808>]

[PostedBlogger14for15022013]

{Truism}[5th May 1970]

[Redbook1:144-145][19700505:1815c]{Truism}[5th May 1970]

Tuesday 5th May 1970   6.15pm [continued]

            I've just looked up 'Truism' in the C[oncise].O[xford].D[ictionary]. as a check.  An example given is: “I don't like my tea too hot” = “I don't like my tea hotter than I like it” -- the second statement is obviously a truism, but the first?  How else would one say it?  If one said “I don't like my tea hot” one's host could be forgiven for cooling it (the tea) with ice. “ I don't like my tea very hot” -- well, “very” is a relative term and as far as drinking is concerned is almost as much a truism – “ I don't like my tea hotter than I usually drink tea” -- as well as being slightly more ambiguous because one cannot be certain what are the drinker’s heat-resistant qualities.  The mistake made by the C.O.D. is, I think, in assuming that “too hot” means “too hot for me (the drinker and speaker)” -- in fact it should usually be taken by the person spoken to to mean “too hot for most of us”; or in other words, “I don't like my tea too hot” should really be used to say “I don't like my tea hotter than it is generally liked” -- possibly a needless comment but not, I think, a truism.  However, we now come to a distinct warping of the meaning which one assumes the expression to have had originally: for someone who says in conversation, as the tea is being prepared or poured, “ I don't like my tea too hot” actually means (in most cases -- if he means anything at all*) “ I don't like my tea as hot as I have sometimes found it”, or in other words “ I like my tea rather less hot than it is generally or sometimes liked”. (The first stage) This is a definite message of importance and intends to carry a certain relative standard of measurement – the *C.O.D.’s definition of meaning has no intention of message and could possibly correspond to the second stage of the use of the expression by a person, when he says it purely from force of habit -- but a habit which grew out of the first stage.

            All of which is pretty pointless but quite fun.

PostedBlogger14022013]

{Democratic Blocs}[5th May 1970]

[Redbook1:144][19700505:1815b]{Democratic Blocs}[5th May 1970]

Tuesday 5th May 1970   6.15pm [continued]

(L)       A combination of genuinely democratic powers to support endangered democratic governments would get round the problem of the non-democratic veto in the UN, but might awaken a similar non-democratic grouping.  Would it be much more than a simple alliance, anyway?  And what is democracy?  Similarity of constitution does not imply similarity of policy -- a truism.

PostedBlogger13022013]

{Obsolescence}[5th May 1970]

[Redbook1:144][19700505:1815a]{Obsolescence}[5th May 1970]

Tuesday 5th May 1970   6.15pm [continued]

(L)       It would appear that built-in obsolescence is at last becoming obsolescent, at least in a few fields.

PostedBlogger12022013]

{Applause}[5th May 1970]

[Redbook1:143][19700505:1815]{Applause}[5th May 1970]

Tuesday 5th May 1970   6.15pm

(L)       For a speaker, one thing is possibly more disconcerting than making a joke which falls flat, and that is hearing everyone laugh at a joke he has not made.

[PostedBlogger11022013]

{Character and Opinion}[24th April 1970]

[Redbook1:143][19700424:1025]{Character and Opinion}[24th April 1970]

Friday 24th April 1970  10.25pm

            Something which annoys me more than characters without opinions -- much more -- is opinions in people without characteristics or characters: in fiction because it's dull, lazy and unrealistic, in life because it's terrifying.

[PostedBlogger10022013]

[Growing Pains][17th April 1970]

[Redbook1:143A][19700417:0000][Growing Pains][17th April 1970]

17.4.70.

Growing Pains.

                                    Ever since ape-child first began

                                    To push against parental ban,

                                    And joined the Group -- forsook the Clan –

                                                This is the Child

                                                            Becomes the Man.

                                    The same for Chimp, Orang-utan

                                    As Russian, Scot, Malay, Pathan

                                    From Shannon’s Town to North Japan –

                                                This way the Child

                                                            Becomes the Man.

                                    The prince who disobeyed his Khan

                                    Was frowned on by the Artisan –

                                    Whose son, who ATE, washed not the pan –

                                                Who saw how Child

                                                            Becomes the Man.

                                    He occupied the best divan

                                    And commandeered the chief sedan

                                    And rode about where father RAN! –

                                                They knew the Child

                                                            Becomes the Man.

                        The Girl who’s always tired and wan,

                        Obsessed with make-up, songs and tan,

                        And craves for tights, and – “marzipan?!” –

                                    She knows the Child

                                                Becomes The Man.

                        The Boy who tinkers with a van,

                        Affords the world a leisured scan,

                        Or, brooding, kicks an empty can:

                                    This way they Child

                                                Becomes the Man.

                        “He's lost his former joy, elan;

                        For future, not for now, his plan;

                        How shall I last his youthful span?”

                                    -- And so the child

                                                Becomes the Man.

[PostedBlogger09022013]