Politics

The Unaccountability Machine: Political Madness By The Numbers

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(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com, Steve’s Tumblr, and Pillowfort.  Find out more at my newsletter, and all my social media at my linktr.ee)

I just read “The Unaccountability Machine” by Dan Davies. If you know me and when I get obsessed, be aware I’m about to become insufferable for awhile.

The core of the book is that our institutions have seemed to go mad, and the author finds explanations in the oft-ignored realm of business cybernetics. This isn’t science fiction, it’s cybernetics in the feedbacks/system sense, and how it relates to organizations. A core element is that members and parts of organizations become unaccountable in ways that lead to bad and mad decisions.

The financial crash of 2008. Any number of organizational meltdown. And of course, politics.

One of his points – and believe me, I’ll be dissecting this book on and off for a time – is that when your goal is a single measurement, an organization will go insane. When “line go up” is your only goal, problems occur – if not for you, everyone in your path. People are held unaccountabile for bad choices when “line go up.”

You may be thinking about any number of corporations and stock prices. But also I thought about American politics in light of (checks his calendar) about seventy percent of my life. Now I have my own quite pronounced political beliefs, but I’m going to set them aside to discuss a number.

The amount of votes.

Votes are the goal of democratic politics. It elects people. It gets people power and benefits and determines policy. Everything is about getting someone, often anyone, into office. Politics is a team thing, so as long as one of “Your Team” is in office, you can reach your goals.

This means politics in modern times isn’t just the old repression/gotv routines and campaigning and winning people. It means calculations and triangulations, test-marketing, lawsuits, etc. Anything to Just Get Enough Votes.

Anything for Line Goes Up, sometimes just a bit. Even if it makes you do some crazy things.

I remarked once about a certain political activist organization that it was a “winning machine” – and that wasn’t a compliment. Said organization later got itself entangled almost suicidally in various legal troubles and scandals. I wasn’t sure that they didn’t get the mission, but that they got it too well.

Their goal was Line Goes Up, vote-wise, and they’d do anything.

But also let’s say that you’ve made certain decisions to get votes that, perhaps like this organization, aren’t legal or ethical. Then you want to win no matter what to cover your backside or to soothe your conscience or whatever. Line goes up becomes an imperative, and you’ll deal with the bad things later or maybe you just ignore them or hand-wave them away.

Or maybe your opponent(s) are bad people – or you’re told they are. You want to win to protect yourself! Also anyway telling people those folks are threats makes the voting Line Go Up. Keep telling, keep talking, keep escalating, what’ll go wrong.

Kinda seems like politics, if you’re not careful, doesn’t become about helpful results. It takes a lot of effort to make it meaningful not “what three things can I say to get 0.5% more votes?” It’s so much easier to find what buttons to push – and hey, you’re a good person, right? What could go wrong.

Lots of things. Like many of my columns I want to mention the Latest Thing, but each week is a new Latest Thing. All in the name of Line Go Up.

So as we look at the 2024 election where my prediction is that I don’t know what the hell is going on anymore (look at France and the UK in 2024), I wonder if we’re in the political equivalent of a financial meltdown like 2008. My own (obviously correct) political views aside, it seems like Line Go Up is so important, any and all fallout is ignored, and the most batshit things are tried – and sometimes work.

But the batshittery, the triangulation, all of that might be hitting a breaking point. I’m certainly seeing that as I write this in July 2024.

As for a solution, well we’d have to step back from Line Go Up and ask what we want as society, as people. We’d have to make the Line a tool, one of many. But in this current state, I’m not holding my breath.

Well managed to do that without leaning into my own beliefs. Perhaps those will come later, maybe in the rebuilding.

Steven Savage

How Deep Does the B.S. Go?

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Lately I was speculating on the role of B.S. in our economy, politics, and technology. I’d spell it out (and swear more probably) but I do have some discretion!

We’ve normalized the idea that some people are honestly, lying to us. We expect that we’re being lied to be marketing forces, by the latest trends, and by politicians. It’s honestly so normalized, it seems we can’t imagine a less deception-free world.

(It also makes me realize how people can get blaise about COVID.)

In turn, we’ve also normalized that people we like are lying. Yeah, that famous tech guy is hyping stuff, but we like his product. Sure the politician we voted for is spouting demented nonsense, but they’re our politician. We go to see a movie we know we’ve been sold on in the negative sense or a restaurant whos food is just “OK” but you know, advertising and familiarity.

What’s struck me lately, is that we are probably too used to lying as well.

When I’ve seen people rallying to the defense of people, media, and so on that they like you an hear them repeat talking points. You can tell with just a bit of empathy that many people don’t really or exactly believe what they say. But to defend what they like for whatever reason,

I even found myself tempted to do it (which tells me I do do it, I just didn’t catch myself).

I’m wondering how deep the B.S. in our media-saturated, pundit-heavy, social media culture goes by now. I mean yes humans have always lied to others and themselves, but it feels pretty amplified and survival-adverse in my experience. How much of our lives, as individuals, is just lying about stuff?

I think some of it is definitely internet and media culture. Say the right things, do the right things, and you get money, attention, and might even become some kind of Influencer or Pundit. You can lie for a living if you play your cards right! Whatever B.S. problems we had in the past, you can do it faster, giving less time for experience and other people to provide restraining feedback.

In a time of chaos and climate change, this is even more disturbing. We’ve got a lot of problems to solve, or at least survive, and if we’ve all internalized outright deception to an extent, it’s going to be much harder. When everyone is busy not telling the truth, it gets harder to tell the truth, and even when a bunch of people do, too many might not out of various motivations.

I know at least I’ll be watching myself closer. But this is going to haunt me.

Steven Savage

Diversity: It Is Good

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Let’s talk diversity – I’m all for it. Yes, I’m an older white guy, which ironically means people may listen to me more about diversity. Yes, I accept the irony.

In fact, since I’m being blunt, let’s get to it – arguments against diversity are almost always rooted in sexism, racism, and territoriality. They have nothing to do with making things better and everything to do with people’s bigotries and wanting things to be “for them” which is often a pretty narrow definition of “them.”

So let’s talk diversity in groups, businesses, boards, teams, etc. and why it’s great.

Diversity brings a wider range of experiences and knowledge. Having people be different means they have an understanding that others may not. When you’re trying to deal with complex situations like life, you kind of need broad knowledge.

Diversity also ensures less groupthink. When you have a diverse team or group then people think differently. Yes they may conflict and that’s good. Less homogeneity decreases the chance for everyone to decide the same stupid thing at once. If people make a bad decision, at least it may be a more informed bad decision.

Diversity also means that people may express ideas clearer and learn more. When people are different, then you can express your own differences. You’re also going to pick up a lot more from a diverse crowd than people just like you. You might even learn what you don’t know.

Diversity also brings a range of skills to a situation. You never know quite what you’ll need to solve a problem, and may not even know you need to know. Even when people have the same skillsets, diversity means it’s still different from person to person. Writers, artists, coders, leaders are not the same – and that’s good. Mix them up to get better chances to solve you rproblems.

It all sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? So why do we often hear arguments against it?

As noted, I think it’s bigotry and territoriality.

We know diversity brings broader skills but we hear the tired old bigoted argument of “we should hire by ability” which really means “those people are getting special treatment.” Well when everyone in a team or group or organization is all alike people are getting special treatment – by being like everyone else. I’ll trust diversity to solve a problem over an organization of people who want everyone to be the same and call it “talent.”

That also leads to territoriality – people against diversity as, though they oft wont admit it, they want to be surrounded by people just like them. It’s a peculiar kind of mental inbreeding, and just about as healthy for people as the actual inbreeding of royal families throughout history. Yes, it may be comforting, but if you’re trying to lead a company or solve a problem then comfort may not solve your problems.

Of course as we’ve seen many an organization that was undiverse fail, and people escape without consequences – and that’s part of the problem. People get away with all sorts of crap by being “part of the in crowd.” Diversity challenges that layer of protection – when everyone is not 100% “the same” there’s more chance you might get held responsible.

So I’m all for diversity. I’d like to actually work with people, not a hall of mirrors. The world would be a better place with more of it.

Steven Savage