Putting Profit in its Place

Jane Burston: Putting Profit in its Place

Wed, 13 Nov 13 http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/fourthought

 

Jane Burston argues that by placing too much emphasis on profit, companies behave in an unethical way, and it is time for social purpose to take centre stage. Listen to the extract up to minute 6:16 and try to answer the following questions.

     1. Some of the language Ms. Burston uses has been extracted in the following lines. Since some of it refers to banking scandals and circumventing labour regulations, you may need to check some of the meaning through the links provided:

My hopes had been pinned on a lecture called Business and social purpose

Zero-hours contracts

Sub-prime mortgage crises

Libor rate rigging

Large scale oil spillages

A stationery company that had developed a terrible reputation for running the small companies in its sector aground

Reality bites

Cut corners and cut costs

2. According to the speaker in what ways do Friedman and Smith believe capitalism to benefit society?
 

     3. In Ms. Burston’s experience at Harvard, what was the solution put forward to make up for and dispel the company’s reputation?

      4. How does the speaker justify and exemplify the following statement: ‘So long as businesses have profit as the end goal, they will inevitably be unethical’?

     5. What threefold solution does Ms. Burston suggest in order for this business model to be changed?

Drugs in sport

Paul Dimeo: Drugs in Sport

Mon, 14 Oct 13 http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/fourthought

 

Paul Dimeo (Scottish accent) argues that drugs made modern sport what it is today. Listen to the programme up to minute 8:14 and notice both the language used and the ideas conveyed through the following questions:

1. Some of the expressions you will hear in this talk are:

A major sporting event

The glories of human achievement and endurance

Performance enhancing drugs

Part and parcel

A household name

Twenty-five years after Johnson’s ignominy

This is one of the most famous, or infamous, events in sports history

The level playing field

Excellence and rivalries fuelled by steroids

  

      2. Why are Johnson and Armstrong said to have doped?

     3. What reason does Mr. Dimeo provide for the prevailing spread in the use of drugs in sport over the last few decades in the 20^th century?

     4. In what way does Mr. Dimeo say the use of drugs in sports has supported the Olympics and made them appealing to current audiences?

If you want, you can continue listening to the argumentation to the end and we can discuss the arguments provided in this talk, the conclusions reached and their relevance to the current situation in sporting competitions in class. You can find a loose transcript of this talk at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-24329252

What Mandela stood for

No doubt we've all been reading about Mandela's significance and legacy since his death last week. The media will, however, obliterate any mention of the ANC being considered a terrorist organization by Margaret Thatcher, or her support of the apartheid government, except for some independent comentators such as Victor Grossman who, while discussing the situation of the SDP in Germany, does not fail to remember the 20th century towering figure Mandela was and how he had to face the fact that most 'western democracies' backed apartheid: 

 'In the midst of such debates and discussions came the news of Nelson Mandela’s death. All the media joined in the mourning, of course, outdoing one another in praising the old leader, mostly painting a rosy picture of a great conciliator and western-style democrat, somehow smoothing over or ignoring his clear endorsement of armed struggle, his support for Cuba and the Palestinians, his lasting alliance with the Communists. And what they also forgot: while the East German Democratic Republic supported the African National Congress in countless ways, printing its vital exile newspaper Sechaba and providing training to many of its members and future leaders, government and business interests in the Federal Republic, joining those in Britain, the USA and most western countries, backed the apartheid governments almost till the end. Despite all UN resolutions, Daimler, Krupp, the Deutsche Bank and others made over 4 billion euro in profits from dealing with South Africa. This included weaponry of many kinds used to intimidate and kill people and destroy the freedom movement. In those days they castigated the ANC, including Mandela, as Communist terrorists.

But memories are short. Forget that sometimes nasty or dangerous past, bury the truth, turn poor Mandela into a sweet - and harmless - angel of peace, just fitting for the Christmas spirit. Ho ho ho!'

There are also those who flag up Mandela's endorsement of anti-apartheid in Palestine and his criticism of the US as laid out in these quotes to be found in commondreams.org. You can continue reading about this at voltairenet.org.

The Spirit of 45

This documentary by Ken Loach chronicles how the welfare state came about. It covers the period running up to and after the 1945 election where Clement Atlee introduced dramatic reforms to improve people's lives. The reforms included the regulation of the workforce and its rights, the creation of the NHS, public education, nationalisation of public infrastructure, public housing and all the social improvements we have benefited from up to the beginning of the 21st century. Although all the areas covered by the documentary are interesting, I would recommend watching the short clips on life conditions in the 1920s and 30s through the Sam Watts 'Impossible Conditions' and 'We are the greatest empire in the world' videos and more current reflections on the Labour Manifesto where citizens and members of UK Uncut express their views on it in the two clips entitled 'Reflecting on the Labour Manifesto'. You can find them in the Welfare section.

Music

To start off, we'll go over some vocabulary pertaining to realm of music. If you're a musician yourself, you might be familiar with most of these terms. Although it's hard to pick out a single musician or style to deal with, I've chosen this interview with Stanley Crouch, who, in this interview with Tom Ashbrook, talks about his book on Charlie Parker. It is indeed hard to cater for all tastes, so for those of you who might be more into earlier twentieth century music, here's a link to a text on the Twelve-tone Technique (AKA twelve-tone serialism or dodecaphony) by Gary Bachlund.

On the other hand, describing music is by no means far from challenging. This dictionary includes terms we can use to describe sound and the effect a piece has on listeners, and here's a pianist using them to decribe piano pieces (scroll down), what do you make of her descriptions? Might it be also helpful to make use of images to convey a piece? Do you find these analogies satisfactory? Should we forget about it and just acknowledge that writing about music is like dancing about architecture?

Porgy and Bess

A 1935 opera updated for 21st century audiences: Porgy and Bess

Matt Damon reads from Howard Zinn's speech 'The Problem is Civil Obedience' (November 1970)

Lifelong friend of Howard Zinn reads an excerpt from his speech delivered in 1970:

http://daily.represent.us/matt-damon-blows-your-mind/

http://vimeo.com/48834336

1 Here are some quotes out of the speech. What is meant by them and how can they be understood within the whole speech?

      - What does Matt Damon/Howard Zinn mean when they say ‘I start from the supposition that the world is topsy-turvy’?  

   - 'A drastic reallocation of wealth'

   - In what way do Matt Damon/Howard Zinn justify the statement that our problem is ‘civil obedience’?

   - ‘The rule of law is the darling of the leaders and the plague of the people'

   - ‘What we are trying to do, I assume, is really to get back to the principles and aims and spirit of the Declaration of Independence. This spirit is resistance to illegitimate authority and the forces that deprive people of their life and liberty and right to pursue of happiness, and therefore, under these conditions, it urges the right to alter or abolish their current form of government and the stress had been on abolish’

‘  - To stop obeying the laws that demand killing or that allocate wealth the way it’s being done, or that put people in jail for petty, technical offences, and keep other people out of jail for enormous crimes’