Authenticity – a response to Max Atkinson

Max Atkinson’s blog is one of the very best of its kind – informative, passionate and relentlessly sound on the dumbing down of news. I recommend it.

I am a huge believer in the importance of authenticity in verbal communication and I use the concept a great deal. In his new post, to read or not to read, Max calls authenticity ”the most worrying buzzword of the day” and says “I doubt if I’m alone in remaining unclear about what exactly it’s supposed to mean – other than different things to different people.”

I hope I can reassure him – and other professional speechwriters in fear of their livelihoods – that authenticity is a quality needed whether you are talking off the cuff, using notes or reading a script. While I can’t control how others use the term, I want to suggest that it should not be used as a synonym for “unwritten” or “extemporaneous”, any more than the ‘real you’ is the bleary-eyed grouch who falls out of bed in the morning.

Authenticity is about bringing a person’s character, values and personality to their presentation. A nervous wreck, stumbling through random thoughts connected only by “um” and “er”, is no more an authentic presenter than a corporate droid speed-reading paragraphs off a pile of A4.

With practice and confidence, extemporaneous speeches can be highly authentic because speech patterns tend to be most natural, moments of humour spontaneous, and illustrations genuine visualised  connections not pre-prepped metaphorical cliches.

But notes can aid the presenter. Maintaining structure, ensuring key moments are phrased carefully, being accurate in using quotations can all improve an authentic performance if they are used as a support, rather than a crutch. Notes fail when there is an uncomfortable disconnect between the unscripted parts, delivered like a man chatting at a barbecue, and the scripted parts, delivered in the hesitant monotone of an 8-year-old reading the Old Testament at school assembly.

A fully written speech can be highly authentic. Max uses the famous Steve Jobs Stanford Commencement Address as a terrific example of a powerful speech read off the page. But look at the subject matter. It deals with extraordinary personal episodes in Jobs’ life and the lessons he drew from them. His voice is clear, his pace measured and the listener can feel the genuine emotion behind each incident. It is brilliantly written AND authentic – it brings the man’s character, personality and values to the presentation.

Each of us can benefit from digging beneath our workplace persona and revealing something of the real person beneath. I don’t mean starting your pitch with a tangential story about Barney the dog’s trip to the vet. I do mean talking in natural speech patterns, working in appropriate real-life examples, talking about how you feel about things, making us feel that we know who you are. That is authenticity. It is the good speechwriter’s friend.

wrongsaying>wrongdoing?

A Councillor is alleged to have clicked the ‘like’ button on Facebook next to a group calling for the IRA to bomb the Conservative Party Conference. There are loud, instant calls for her dismissal and she is immediately suspended.

An MP is alleged to have headbutted another MP. There are jokes about a big night out and calls for alcohol to be made more expensive in the House of Commons bar. [Update - 11.22 - he has now been suspended from the Labour party. But we still await the wave of public condemnation.]

In the hierarchy of public wrongs, saying things has become worse than doing things. In the age of the Twitterstorm, every statement that offends is now met with demands for a disciplinary response. Yet we have a longstanding blind spot for physical violence – remember Tony Blair successfully laughing off his Deputy Prime Minister punching a member of the public with “John will be John”.

Whatever action ends up being taken, moments like today should make us reflect on our values, and whether we are consistent in the behaviour we condemn in public representatives.

The hollow brick

“So you’re equating homosexuality with incest and polygamy?”

In the definitional debate about the future of marriage, a hollow brick is beating one side to death.

The side being assaulted haven’t given themselves much of a chance. I can’t name them, because they don’t have an agreed label for the cause. Are they Pro-Marriage? Both sides can claim that on their own terms. Are they Traditionalists? – a frame doomed to defeat in an age when all parties claim the progressive badge. It is currently The Side That Dare Not Speak Its Name.

The brick wielders call their cause marriage equality. When the whistle blows – any voice claiming marriage is necessarily between a man and a woman – they raise their arm and strike.

Their manoeuvre is made easier by the tactics of their opponents. Outside Italian football and the hedgehog, nothing is quicker onto the defensive than a British Christian in front of a microphone. He takes great pains to make clear what he is not saying, engaging with the inference of homophobia at length, before returning to the safety of puffing away at the whistle.

Instead, for the good of a very serious public debate, he needs to dig deeper. Supporters of marriage equality are getting away with a glaring act of larceny from their antagonists, without which they are revealed as nothing of the kind.

The violence of the question “so you’re equating homosexuality with incest and polygamy?” stems from its presumption of a shared cultural condemnation of all incest and polygamy. But it is unclear why supporters of marriage equality should see it that way.

Take John and Anna. Anna got married at 18. Her husband subjected her to severe emotional and physical abuse. She ran away from him aged 20. Now 40, she wants to marry long-term partner John and have a child. She has had no contact with her husband in 20 years. Despite being advised it may be straightforward, she fears and dreads the repercussions of initiating divorce proceedings. She sees her old marriage as extinct. Anna thinks she should have the right to marry John.

Or consider Paul and Olivia. They are in their thirties and have been together for five years. Paul was adopted at birth and has only recently discovered that the love of his life is his biological half-sister. She is unable to bear children. Paul and Olivia believe they should have the right to marry.

These are very sympathetic cases involving consenting adults. The first is a request for a bigamous marriage, the second for an incestuous marriage. They want to strengthen their bonds. John and Anna want to raise their child in a family where the parents are married. I would like campaigners for marriage equality to explain on what grounds they would refuse these people their wishes.

To turn the familiar question around: why is any gay couple superior to John and Anna, or to Paul and Olivia? Why should they be able to enjoy rights denied to these other couples? It can’t be because gay couples are more numerous – after all, the campaign is for equality, not the suppression of minority rights.

The campaign for marriage equality is either a radical revolution or an overblown and fraudulent claim. It must be pushed into a clear position to be debated. Is it consistent in its rationalism, supporting the Johns, Annas, Pauls and Olivias of this world? Or will it come clean as just a vehicle for an additional group of people to enjoy the privileges of a highly traditional, messily delineated view of marriage?

Five-a-day parenting

I should talk to, read to, play with, feed well and praise my children. I get it. I scanned the five-a-day list this morning over a bowl of Cheerios, had a think, mentally ticked them off, praised my daughter for finishing the bowl, and got on with my working day.

Yet not only is the Government reported to be excited about plastering buses and filling the airwaves with these messages, the Centre Forum report inspiring them suggests making certain benefits contingent on attending over two years of regular post-natal courses [p.55]. The motivation is social mobility. There is a correlation between parental income and these habits. If the poorest parents suddenly followed them, at the earliest possible age, their children would enjoy greater development, leading to better life chances, the argument goes.

The report – littered with contortionist attempts to remain ‘liberal’ and some ugly name-checking of J.S. Mill – fails the basic Problem:Solution test. It cites no evidence, despite all its international studies, that parents who do not practise the 5-a-day fail to do so out of ignorance. It cites no evidence that parents who practise the 5-a-day do so because they are aware it is best for their child. My one-year-old largely eats what we eat; we have a pretty good diet, so she does too. I have the luxury of time to play with my daughter because I am not a single Mum trying to hold down two jobs. This report assumes that ignorance, rather than absence and tiredness, is why her children don’t get as much time as mine.

So I ask again – what evidence is there that telling parents they should talk to, read to, play with, feed well and praise their children will lead to them doing it?

Beyond this basic failure to demonstrate a causal link between problem and solution, here are some further questions any disciple of Mill should be asking:

How do you make five-a-day, which can be read out in twenty-four seconds, stretch over twenty-four months of learning? Mill was against compulsory schooling of children, let alone Parenting School. If you have additional content in mind, what is it, and why are you keeping it to yourself?

Once you are spending public money on benefits contingent on following the five-a-day, you need measurable outcomes to justify the cash. How will you get them without entering the home, observing and recording how parents interact with their children? How else could you possibly get robust information?

A pleasant sounding case for social mobility is being used as justification for intrusion into family life. We are rushing, under the banner of the Early Years Agenda, towards greater interference in the lives of young families. Look at this quotation from the report [p.33]:

“Children are treated as, essentially, possessions 
of the parent, and interference from outside is seen 
as an unacceptable intrusion. Any suggestion of 
government involvement brings cries of ‘the nanny 
state’ as if nannies were ogres. The implication is that 
all parents can be left to do their job without outside 
support or advice”.

The idea that the state or total isolation are the two options is ridiculous. Parents are able to access all kinds of support – from family, childcare, community groups, the internet – without the need for government involvement. It’s called society. This is a core Cameron insight and I hope the Prime Minister uses it if and when this policy reaches his desk.

Let’s be clear – the only way to ensure uniform childhood opportunities across social classes is to go into the home and enforce certain behaviours between parent and child. It is an unacceptable price to pay in the pursuit of an unachievable goal. A recent health visitor let slip that she considered families who are unwilling to let her in to be ‘vulnerable’. The idea that people might just be able to get by without her had apparently never struck her. This language typifies a sense of entitlement, a suspicion of those who choose to get on with their family life without involvement from state-funded services, a sense that our home is the domain of the state and those carrying out its policies.

Why Guido is right to launch #restore

I see that Guido is seeking 100,000 signatures for an e-petition, worded

We petition the government to review all treaties and international commitments which may inhibit the ability of Parliament to restore capital punishment. Following this review, the Ministry of Justice should map out the necessary legislative steps which will be required to restore the death penalty for the murder of children and police officers when killed in the line of duty.

The findings of the review and the necessary substantive legislation to be presented to House of Commons for debate no later than 12 months after this petition passes the acceptance threshold.

The first impulse, as ever in our grubby public discourse, has been to play the man not the ball. So you think it’s funny that a libertarian should support capital punishment? Perhaps your view of libertarianism is a caricature – after all, a society of free individuals acting as they please within the law is consistent with a state that punishes us severely when we transgress. Still don’t buy it? Your call – but even so, one man’s ‘inconsistency’ wouldn’t make the policy itself wrong. Maybe, like David Allen Green, you think the crucial first argument to make is that capital punishment is more expensive than locking people up for life, as if the cost mattered a jot to anyone interested in justice. Perhaps, like John McTernan, you think the killer point is that we can’t ever break international treaty obligations, whatever the British people think about the laws that govern them. Then you get the bizarre “what-this-is-really-about” arguments, that just raising the issue is irresponsible, that it isn’t the right time, that it’s a publicity exercise, and other smokescreens.

The answer to all of the above is “so what?”. It seems people will say anything to avoid dealing with the awkward fact that 74% of our fellow citizens believe the death penalty should be applied in certain circumstances. Trying to discredit Guido will not address the massive gulf between governing and governed on this big issue.

I oppose the death penalty. But I think it absolutely right that our members of Parliament should be forced to stand up and be counted on issues of great interest to us. A debate and vote in the House would enable people to form their own judgements about their representatives. What’s more, Guido has worded the petition well. It is right that we should know, in the event that both we and our representatives wanted to introduce the death penalty, what steps would need to be taken to get it done.  It seems a mystery to the politically obsessed that the answer “European law won’t allow it” or “treaty obligations forbid it” are deeply unsatisfactory to most of us. Outside Westminster, we cling hopefully to the idea that we live in a democracy, where our settled will shall be enacted by our representatives.

It is my job, as an opponent of the death penalty, to persuade others that state killing is barbarous and counter-productive. I am confident in that case. I won’t change anyone’s mind by smearing those who disagree with me or hiding behind treaties. Let’s have public debates on issues that matter to the public. We had time to hold a referendum on AV; I’m sure we can find a few weeks to debate how we should punish the most gruesome, frightening, chilling crimes against us.

UPDATE: The following morning, and I’m suddenly smacked in the face by strong, substantive cases for and against capital punishment, notably Archbishop Cranmer and Peter Bingle. Welcome obsolescence!

FURTHER UPDATE: The last nail in the coffin of my premise is hammered in by Alex Massie. Articulate and right. We are finally getting the debate.

Philip Davies and the mob

Nothing in the real world – not the persistence of sweatshops, not homelessness, not children living in slums – nothing fires mobbish Twitter rage like hearing someone people don’t like saying something they don’t think people should say.

Philip Davies, the Conservative MP for Shipley, is currently trending, which is rarely good news for a politician. He has been marmalised for saying, in the context of disability, this: “For some people, the national minimum wage may be more of a hindrance than a help. If those people who consider it is being a hindrance to them, and in my view that’s some of the most vulnerable people in society, if they feel that for a short period of time, taking a lower rate of pay to help them get on their first rung of the jobs ladder, if they judge that that is a good thing, I don’t see why we should be standing in their way.”

In response, Rethink tweeted: “MP Philip Davies has suggested people with mental illness should work for less than min wage”.

Via a helpful link to rage beyond Twitter, I saw Labour’s Anne Begg say: “To suggest disabled people should be treated as second-class citizens is shocking and shows just what a warped world some Tories demonstrate they inhabit.”

These short comments are fascinating insights into a dirty war over perception.

The first is unsubtle misrepresentation. I assume Rethink accepts there should be no law preventing a person with mental health issues from picking their nose or telling lies. Yet the tweet “Rethink suggests mentally ill should pick their nose and tell lies” would be unfair. It’s a gutter tactic.

The second makes me want to ask Anne Begg: why do you speak out when someone SAYS people should be allowed to accept less than £5.93 per hour, but not speak out when millions of people ARE paid less than £5.93, under the law, day in, day out?

In Britain, the national minimum wage is £5.93 per hour. If you can’t find an employer willing to pay you £5.93 per hour, you cannot accept work for less money. Instead, the government offers you Jobseeker’s Allowance – just £67.50 per week to live on – if you promise to continue the struggle for £6-an-hour jobs. Refuse to keep it up, and they will give you nothing. The price of being a ‘first-class citizen’ is that you are forced to stay on benefits, so that others need not be outraged by how much you earn in work.

There are ways out. Young adults can choose even-lower-paid work. If you are 18-20, you can work for £4.92 per hour. If you are 16 or 17, you can work for £3.64 per hour. If you have grabbed a place on an apprenticeship scheme, you can go as low as £2.50 per hour. It’s up to you. Astonishingly, these real-life low wages don’t make Twitter buzz, don’t show Labour was evil to allow them, don’t make young people second class citizens and don’t show what a warped world we inhabit. In the weird world of ‘what-you-can-say’, age discrimination against young people is fine and passes without comment, without emotion.

Over 21s also have a few get-outs. You can become an au pair. You can work informally for friends and neighbours. You can risk your life and join the armed forces. If you’re really motivated, you can go and live in a religious community. If you’re not prepared to do any of these things, then it’s back on the dole for you, fighting it out for work with 1.5 million others. Yet these exemptions, which exist today, have not unleashed torrents of righteous anger.

Philip Davies expressed the view that people with disabilities should be free to make the choice to work. But he didn’t put it like that. And he’s a Tory MP. So he must be hated, loathed, despised and ignored. The mob has spoken.