[governance] Culture sensitivity education (was Re: Bangladesh Govt blocks YouTube)

[Norbert Bollow]

David Conrad <drc at virtualized.org> wrote:
> On Sep 19, 2012, at 3:44 AM, Faisal Hasan <hasansf at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Lack of education is one of the reasons why some people donot
>> understand the seriousness / implication of a small clip that can
>> wound millions of people around the world.
{{These three lines had been written in response to a posting from me in
which I had suggested that "a key aspect of what leads to the making of
such films is that the people who created it (and also their friends and
other people in their social circles who knew about the project and
could have influenced them to stop it, but didn't try to do that) had
too little understanding of what emotions this film would trigger, and
what this could potentially lead to."}}

> This seems reversed to me.
>
> My impression, looking at news reports on the background of how the
> video became such an item of note, is that the creators/distributors
> of the video knew what the implications of creating/releasing the
> video would be

I think that it's important to distinguish here between (a) the
creators of the original English-language video, which as far as I know
did not achieve any kind of notability on YouTube before the
rabble-rousing Egyptian tele-Islamist Sheikh Khaled Abdullah started
drawing attention to it, and (b) that tele-Islamist and other
rabble-rousers who drew the attention of Muslims to this hurtful video.

> and, in fact, were counting on the over-reaction in order to put the
> Muslim world in a bad light.

What is the evidence on which you're basing this assertion?

I do not doubt that the people whom I have above called rabble-rousers
knew what they were doing.

But that does not imply that the creators of the video also understood,
at the time of creating and uploading the video, the potential outcomes
of their actions. And it certainly does not imply that kind of
understanding among the people in their social circle who knew about the
project and who could have used their influence to prevent this risky
course of action.

> The instigators of the rioting (TV personalities and politicians)
> and the people rioting played directly into the desires of the video's
> creators/distributors.

Sure these acts give outsiders a very bad impression of the instigators
and of the rioters, and badly-informed people might confuse the rioters
with Muslims in general. As the same time, a similarly bad impression
is created about the creators of the video, and badly-informed people
outside the US who might just as easily associate the creators of the
video with the US in general. (The latter association is by the way not
totally unjustified as long as US is a democracy and US law protects
the publication of this kind of video as part of "freedom of speech".
Not all countries that have a strong principle of freedom of speech
interpret it so broadly that just any kind of hurtful, hate-inspiring
ideology in included. Under Swiss law for example, "any person who
publicly disseminates ideologies that have as their object the
systematic denigration or defamation of the members of a race, ethnic
group or religion...shall be liable to a custodial sentence not
exceeding three years or to a monetary penalty." [1])
[1] http://www.admin.ch/ch/e/rs/311_0/a261bis.html

And IMO more significant than all of that is the damage to the foreign
relations capability of the US (and possibly other Western nations).

In conclusion, I think it likely that Faisal's assertion "Lack of
education is one of the reasons why some people do not understand the
seriousness / implication of a small clip that can wound millions of
people around the world" is not only absolutely true, but very much
relevant to the events that we have been discussing.

With relatively few exceptions, US citizens generally give (to
people with cultural roots outside their own cultural circle) the
impression of being very poorly educated on matters of cultural
sensitivity.

> There are a lot of crazy people out there who are going to do bad
> things on purpose, regardless of their education.

This is very true.

But some percentage of the bad actions could be prevented by making
these people more aware, in advance of them doing bad things, of side
effects which are undesirable not only objectively but also from their
crazy personal perspective.

And some percentage of the bad things can also be prevented by making
them illegal. This would reinforce the education objective and it
would also have the effect of making it less likely that the whole
nation will be blamed for the bad actions of a few crazy people. My
understanding is that in the US it would be particularly difficult to
achieve the legal change that public denigration of all the members of
a race, ethnic group or religion would no longer be considered protected
"speech" (it would be necessary to amend the US constitution or
otherwise change how the First Amendment is interpreted.) Again better
education on matters of international cultural sensitivity would
probably have to be the first step.

> Given the Internet allows pretty much anyone to be a content
> producer, regardless of their sanity or intent, I would think it
> important to educate everyone else that there are people who, for
> whatever reason, will say things that you don't like, you will find
> offensive, etc., but the correct response is _never_ violence and not
> to assume it is, as one commentator in Egypt said, "100% the US" (or
> whatever).

I very strongly agree.

Clearly it is a good goal to educate all non-crazy people to (1)
protect their computers/phones/etc. against unauthorized access by
crazy people and criminals, and (2) otherwise avoid paying undue
attention to crazy people and rabble-rousers.

But this is not the complete solution!

Culture sensitivity education is also needed.

Maybe the US government would be well advised to request developmental
aid from countries which are more advanced in this regard? Actually
I'd be surprised if Switzerland were really the only country able to
provide assistance regarding this kind of topic. In fact, perhaps some
poor "third world" country could be the giver of such developmental aid
for a change? :-)

Greetings,
Norbert

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