Assume Some Friendly Data

March 7, 2013
Posted by Jay Livingston

There it was again – the paean to ignorance, the rejection of empirical science as a basis for knowledge or the assertion of facts. We don’t need studies to know that . . . (or more likely, We don’t need “studies” . . .)* I’m not surprised to hear this from the right, but on Sunday it hit from the blind side – the New York Times.

The Arts & Leisure section front page didn’t promise exactly a review of the literature on the effects of violence in the media. Instead, the Times critics would “consider the impact.”

The Times turned loose four movie and TV critics, but in the entire double-truck spread, there was only one mention of any empirical findings: Alessandra Stanley began her essay by dismissing the whole idea of research.

Studies are inconclusive about whether repeated exposure to violence on screen inures viewers to violence in real life, but you don’t need a government grant to assume that scenes of violence on television inure viewers to more violence on television.

At least she was careful enough to use the word assume. But assuming something to be true does not make at true. It’s like the old economists’ punch line: “Assume a can opener.” An assumed can opener cannot open a real can.

Stanley’s assumption is a plausible hypothesis – that after many viewings, Level One violence and gore lose their shock power, and audiences will respond only to Level Two, and so on. But if TV shows have become bloodier (have they? – it would be nice to have some evidence), there might be other explanations.

Stanley assumes that screen violence is like a drug that we develop a tolerance to. The old dose just doesn’t give us the buzz it once did. But maybe rather than video violence raising the tolerance ceiling, that ceiling has always been at the same height, and the media have just been getting closer to it. And maybe the reaction to violence differs among segments of the audience. I don’t need a grant to assume that my explanation is true. But if I want to know how much water it holds, I need good research.
------------------------------------------
* An earlier post on “we don’t need research” is here.

Someone on the Internet Is Wrong

March 5, 2013
Posted by Jay Livingston

At the end of “Wag the Dog,” we hear a voice-over of a TV news item:

 Famed film producer Stanley R. Moss died suddenly of a massive heart attack while sunbathing poolside.  Mr. Moss was 57 or 62-years-old, depending on the bio.

The point of this line is also the point of the film:  big players in Hollywood, Washington, and possibly elsewhere pass off untruths as facts –  facts that fit their personal or political needs.

But how can we know when a Stanley Moss was really born?  I was reminded of this problem on Friday, March 1.  It was the centennial of Ralph Ellison’s birth.  Or was it?  This is what I got when I Googled “Ralph Ellison born.”

(Click in the image for a larger view.)

Some say 1913, others 1914.  They can’t both be right.  Are we rushing Ellison’s centennial? Is the true birth date of this man* invisible?

The Internet shrinks the time and space for the spread of error.  In older media, error doesn’t go viral, but it still can spread.  Lisa Yui, an accomplished pianist and music scholar who teaches at Montclair, told me of trying to track down the precise dates of birth and death of a little-known composer.  She consulted a well-known musicologist  – an older man still throughly immersed in the print era.  She visited him in his book-heavy house and asked how to get reliable information.  His answer: government records and tombstones.  If you can’t trust books, how can you trust Websites?

--------------------------------------

* My favorite Ralph Ellison anecdote was included in this post.

Les Banlieues - Lost in Transition

March 3, 2013
Posted by Jay Livingston

The French translation of suburb is banlieue.  But in connotation, the words are near opposites.  In the US, the word suburbia suggests green lawns, peace and prosperity, happy children at play,a retreat separated from the problems and stress of cities.  Ironic titles like “Suburgatory” and “Disturbia” work because they suggest that behind this ideal picture, not all is well.  That irony would be impossible in France.  The French term banlieue calls up an entirely different image, one something like our “inner city” only bleaker – a place of crime, violence, gangs, unemployment, riots, and people with darker skins.
                                           
In the Hausmann-Napoleon III makeover of Paris in the 1870s, les misérables were pushed to the outskirts of the city and beyond.  Nearly a century later, that was where the post-War government built the high rise HLMs (roughly, “the projects”), primarily for the influx of laborers from North Africa.  

(Click on a picture for a larger view.)

A half-century, the fruits of that misguided urban planning appear in “Banlieue 93,” Arnau Bach’s photo exhibition.  The 93 is the postal/département designation of an area at the eastern edge of Paris. Charles DeGaulle airport lies at the outer edge of the 93 in Roissy. Closer to Paris are places like Bobigny, where Bach took most of his photos.

The entire collection of thirty-six photos with captions is at the photojournalism site Pictures of the Year, where it was awarded first prize.

The Horsemeat Scandal

March 2, 2013
Posted by Jay Livingston

Ikea withdraws Swedish meatballs as
horse contamination is revealed

Ikea halted sales of its Swedish meatballs yesterday as the horsemeat contamination scandal continued to spread across Europe.

Horsemeat was found in 1kg packets of frozen Köttbullar pork and beef meatballs sold by Ikea across Europe.  — The Times (London), Feb. 26, 2013

And the Lord spake unto Moses and to Aaron, saying unto them, speak unto the children of Israel, saying, whatsoever parteth the hoof, and is clovenfooted, and cheweth the cud, among the beasts, that shall ye eat. Of the swine ye shall not eat, though he divide the hoof, and be clovenfooted, yet he cheweth not the cud; he is unclean to you. Of the lamb and the cow ye may eat, for they divideth the hoof and chew the cud. Nevertheless these shall ye not eat:  the camel, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you. Nor shall ye eat of the horse, because, well, because it’s a horse dammit.  You just can’t eat horses, just like you can’t eat people.

Horses aren’t people – we all know that.  But we treat them like people.  There’s a line we draw, and horses are on the people side of it, like the dogs and cats we keep in our houses.  We’d keep horses there too if they weren’t so damn big. And smelly. Little kids don’t write to Santa to bring them a cow or a swine.  But a pony – that’s a horse of another color. 

And just as we do for dogs, cats, and people, we give horses names – different names for each one.  We pay attention to the horse’s individual qualities.  We can have deep and meaningful relations with a horse just as we can with our dogs and cats.  Liz Taylor nuzzling National Velvet – or was it the other way round?

                                                           
All cultures have dietary rules that separate what you can eat from what you can’t.  The rules of Leviticus are based on the characteristics of the animals.  Does a particular species conform to the specs for that category. Fish gotta swim.  They also gotta have fins and scales.  So if a shrimp or lobster swims in the water but doesn’t have fins and scales, it’s not a complete fish.  It’s weird*  Don’t touch it.  Don’t eat it.

But some rules seem to be based on our social relation to the animal. The animals that are closer, the ones that we name and talk to and treat like distinct individuals, of them we shall not eat.

-------------------------

* Anomalous is the term used by Mary Douglas. This post is based in part on an oversimplification of her Purity and Danger. It is also based in part on Edmund Leach.  Apologies to them, and to Leviticus.