PowerSwitch

SUNDAY 11 MARCH
9:00pm - 10:00pm
BBC2

1/3 - F**k You Buddy

If most factual TV is bangers and mash, this is thick-cut, rare steak. Adam Curtis's previous, visionary series The Power of Nightmares analysed radical Islam and the fear of terrorism. Here, he takes on an even bigger idea: freedom. The gist of his argument is that we have escaped historic limits on our liberty, only to submit to a bleak new idea of freedom - one that rules us by numbers and has no place for altruism. As important as the content of the programme is its woozy style. Curtis's cocktail of archive clips, sound effects and music achieves a kind of visual poetry, unsettling and nightmarish. The Trap is not for the faint-hearted: at times, it feels like you're sitting in an intellectual wind tunnel being battered by huge theories. But it's an energising blast, and quite brilliant TV.

Individual freedom is the dream of our age. It's what our leaders promise to give us, it defines how we think of ourselves and, repeatedly, we have gone to war to impose freedom around the world. But if you step back and look at what freedom actually means for us today, it's a strange and limited kind of freedom.

Politicians promised to liberate us from the old dead hand of bureaucracy, but they have created an evermore controlling system of social management, driven by targets and numbers. Governments committed to freedom of choice have presided over a rise in inequality and a dramatic collapse in social mobility. And abroad, in Iraq and Afghanistan, the attempt to enforce freedom has led to bloody mayhem and the rise of an authoritarian anti-democratic Islamism. This, in turn, has helped inspire terrorist attacks in Britain. In response, the Government has dismantled long-standing laws designed to protect our freedom.

The Trap is a series of three films by Bafta-winning producer Adam Curtis that explains the origins of our contemporary, narrow idea of freedom.

It shows how a simplistic model of human beings as self-seeking, almost robotic, creatures led to today's idea of freedom. This model was derived from ideas and techniques developed by nuclear strategists during the Cold War to control the behaviour of the Soviet enemy.

Mathematicians such as John Nash developed paranoid game theories whose equations required people to be seen as selfish and isolated creatures, constantly monitoring each other suspiciously ? always intent on their own advantage.

This model was then developed by genetic biologists, anthropologists, radical psychiatrists and free market economists, and has come to dominate both political thinking since the Seventies and the way people think about themselves as human beings.

However, within this simplistic idea lay the seeds of new forms of control. And what people have forgotten is that there are other ideas of freedom. We are, says Curtis, in a trap of our own making that controls us, deprives us of meaning and causes death and chaos abroad.

Must watch!

As soon as it's available on the Net.

"The Power of Nightmares" was really, really good.

I just watched it. Good stuff, as before with Adam Curtis he focuses on how powerful ideas diffuse through society with unpredictable consequences. In this part, how game theory reduces human relations to a dehumanised abstraction in which selfishness is the only valid motivation and alienation is implicit. If you want to understand what connects Cold War strategising, Vietnam body counts, Yes Minister and NHS targets then watch this film

If you haven't already seen them, I highly recommended his other documentary series "The Century of the Self" and "The Power of Nightmares". They're both on Google Video still, I think.

I was very surprised to hear that soldiers had body count targets and either lied about them or killed civilians to make the totals up. I'm surprised at the targets, not the lying and murdering.

mocara wrote:I was very surprised to hear that soldiers had body count targets and either lied about them or killed civilians to make the totals up. I'm surprised at the targets, not the lying and murdering.

Knowing McNamara was running the show I didn't find it remotely surprising. Watch "The Fog of War", another quality documentary.

mocara wrote:I was very surprised to hear that soldiers had body count targets and either lied about them or killed civilians to make the totals up. I'm surprised at the targets, not the lying and murdering.

You have to be very careful when setting goals as you might achieve them!

I wanted to watch this last night. Any 'watch again' or youtube links would be very welcome.

There's a summary of the programme on Wikipedia: The Trap (television documentary series).

I enjoyed it, though I missed the first half. I'm sure a torrent will be available at some point.

Missed it - please post here if anybody gets a link.

Found it here:

http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/0 ... 375640.php

I wasn't too certain about what the programme was trying to demonstrate, whether the ideas being portrayed were "good" or "bad". For instance, the prisoner's dilemma may have been the right approach to Cold War nuclear military strategy, but elsewhere it would not necessarily be appropriate. Strategies that work with two players are not necessarily appropriate for more than two players. For instance, non-cooperation in computing could cause three-way deadlock.

It's funny because when we learnt "games" at management training, they basically demonstrated that the "win-win" approach was the best approach to adopt, since if you tried "win-lose" in one move, the next would lead to "lose-lose". In the example presented in the programme (the guys burying the diamonds and the money), they didn't consider the follow-on consequences of either party double-crossing the other (i.e. they only considered the game to have one move, real life is just not like that).

I also coughed at the psychologist who believed that true love cannot happen; it's always a series of empotional manipulations, "gameplay" to gain the upper hand on their partner.

It was interesting about the guy who Maggie T employed to "marketise" the NHS. He had introduced the concept of "Bodycount" during the Vietnam war, to "incentivise" the troops. So they shot lots of civvies. Likewise, a visit to the doctors is now a run through a system that meets targets by getting you to register very quickly then sit for ages in the waiting room; needs of the patients are secondary to "targets".

The programme reinforced my belief that people who indulge in pure mathematics are seriously dysfunctional. I've had so many bad experiences where mathematics has killed their ability to see logical reasoning (commonsense) that I would now explicitly refuse to employ someone with a pure maths background.

If anything, the programme demonstrated how public, economic (and even military) policy should not be too influenced by mathematicians. They seemed to "worship" computer systems' objectivity without realising that a computer system multiplies the subjectivity of the programmer.

I must say I was disappointed at this programme. I liked "The Power of Nightmares" but found this programme to be severely disjointed. Perhaps I spent too much time shouting, "That's b*ll*cks" at the TV

Thankyou Bandidoz - I think you've hit the nail on the head several times!

They seemed to "worship" computer systems' objectivity without realising that a computer system multiplies the subjectivity of the programmer.

You're certainly right there... Garbage in; garbage out! and all that!

Being an FE lecturer I feel the 'incentives' of the system sorely. College gets paid for recruitment, retention and results.... and some students are more valuable than others.... & this changes regularly. And then there's the EMA (Educational Maintenance Allowance) for which only attendance is required for payment - whether they do any work or not is irrelevent! And I hate this daft target setting nonsense we are made to do at the end of each year. (Sorry private rant over.)

I think the programme was interesting because of the "band wagon" effect. Everybody jumps on the latest thing..... and uses it without really questioning.....

Really, really good! Adam Curtis is a UFO on par with Hubbert, with capabilities to look "from outside" on the society, which is like water is to fish for most of us mere mortals. What he does is catch live memes and see them while they are spreading. It's much easier to see outdated memes which dont have any relevance anymore, but to see and describe the live thing is an outstanding feat. Cant wait for part II!

Breathtaking story about how American psychiatry was defaced twice, the second time only by their own hands.

In 20 years it will be possible to do a similar documentary about the hysteria over "anthropogenic global warming".

Bandidoz wrote:In the example presented in the programme (the guys burying the diamonds and the money), they didn't consider the follow-on consequences of either party double-crossing the other (i.e. they only considered the game to have one move, real life is just not like that).

I also coughed at the psychologist who believed that true love cannot happen; it's always a series of empotional manipulations, "gameplay" to gain the upper hand on their partner......

If anything, the programme demonstrated how public, economic (and even military) policy should not be too influenced by mathematicians. They seemed to "worship" computer systems' objectivity without realising that a computer system multiplies the subjectivity of the programmer.

I ....found this programme to be severely disjointed. Perhaps I spent too much time shouting, "That's b*ll*cks" at the TV

Ha ha.... me too! Well said Bandidoz. The cat was quite perturbed at my outbursts, but I had a jolly good time.

Bandidoz wrote:I must say I was disappointed at this programme. I liked "The Power of Nightmares" but found this programme to be severely disjointed. Perhaps I spent too much time shouting, "That's b*ll*cks" at the TV

Hmmm... I'm starting to suspect that you are an American. You took the program at face value and did not perceive the subtle and hilarious ironies sprouting like mad from every single sequence.

Come to think of an episode when I jokingly retold a statement to a bunch of Americans, a statement I first heard from an Englishman, and boy did the Yanks go crazy! Attacking me with the most utter despise and zealot convictions - no distance at all - despite that I was VERY clear that it was just a sick statement from a pervert Englishman.

The statement? Well:

American football seems like such a feminine sport, when considering all the protection and helmets they wear.