The Rise of the Third Culture Kids

We know the term for those people "who live much of their developmental years in a culture other than that of their parents'". They are called TCKs or ‘Third Culture Kids’.

They are now a rapidly growing demographic segment. And they ought to be viewed, I think, just like how ‘Millennials’ or ‘Generation Y’ are viewed.

Image Courtesy - Pinterest

Not because TCK is an attractive segment we can focus on, as a marketing target – it is not - but because we can at least understand the unique pressures they face.

The ‘third culture kids’ however are not endemic to one particular country, and it may not be easy to quantify their number, or to evaluate their unique characteristics.

Uprooted from a culture where they - or their parents - were born, they grow up in a new culture to which they are expected to adapt. And they are taken there, mainly because parents were job seekers or migrants.

The children then become constant strugglers; Caught between the devil and the deep-sea.

On the one hand, they must meet the demands of parents who expect them to not lose the traditions or the language of their ancestors. And on the other hand, they must meet the school’s or neighbourhood’s needs of acclimatizing themselves to a culture which they, or their parents, were hitherto alien.

In the process, the kids get caught up in this strange amalgamation - the third culture.

Most expatriate parents feel an obligation to join kids in social organizations and social activities, around their own native communities, with the intention of preserving their offspring’s connection with their family roots.

Some parents succeed in sending their kids to language, music or dance classes that keep them grounded to their native culture and heritage.

But the balance is still a huge challenge. On one side is the invitation of a rapidly changing world, brimming with new challenges for future. And, on the other side is the beautiful and nostalgic relationship of parents, with their past.

One sad part of this kind of a third culture situation is also the kids’ loss of connection with grandparents, or with uncles, aunts and cousins, whom they left behind.

Loss of the language and cultural connection can prevent effective communication and thereby the much needed connection with relatives.

But who said that preparing young people for future is an easy task? It is not.

I found out that, in the 1950s, Drs. John and Ruth Hill Useem, anthropologists and sociologists, were actually the first ones to coin the term “Third-Culture Kids”.

They used it, apparently, to describe the children of American Foreign Service officers, missionaries, technical aid workers, businessmen, educators, and media-representatives living in India and other countries at that time.

According to them, the first culture is the country from which the parents originated (the home culture), the second is the country in which the family is currently living (the host culture), and the third is the expatriate community in the host country.

The term they coined, I think, is applicable today, more than ever. And the number of expatriate families, in the world, is rising.

The increasing geographic mobility, thanks to the increasing ease of transportation and communication, is changing global demographics. 

With parents working in different countries, and with kids staying with them, one thing is certain. The third culture kids are, in fact, the ‘real global citizens’.

Our focus must therefore be to aid their global citizenship. An awareness and respect for their past, and yet an adaptability and willingness to embrace a new future.

In fact, here is article that gives us the reasons for why 'Third Culture Kids' must be hired. It is titled Five reasons why you should hire Third Culture Kids written by Alice Sergent.

She argues that TCKs have an advantage over others on these: Cultural Intelligence, Sensitivity to diversity & inclusion, Interpersonal skills, Adaptive & high tolerance of ambiguity, Innate curiosity & problem solving skills.

Whether we like it or not, for most TCKs and even others, today, “permanent addresses” are actually email addresses and Facebook accounts.

Click here for the published article in the my column in Bahrain's Daily Tribune.

Business Models: 21st Century's vs 19th Century's

In 1841, an Englishman convinced a railway company to run a special train, between Leicester and Loughborough, for a large group of people.

It was probably the first-ever publicly-advertised excursion train in England.

Trains were still very new at that time. And so was the fascination of people - for travel.

So, within three years, by 1844, this man was organising affordable excursions – or sightseeing tours – by negotiating good deals with railway companies.

Then, during the Paris Exposition of 1855, he went a step further. He took many travel enthusiasts, out of a balmy Britain, by ship, across the channel, to see a fascinating France.

Next year, in 1856, he was leading a big group of Britons on their first Grand Tour of Europe.

Such was the enthusiasm of this man that he took up ticketing agencies, employed tour guides, made deals with hotels and soon his business boomed.

With his son joining him soon, our man Thomas Cook made his company into one of the busiest businesses in Britain. And he was soon organising tours all across the globe.

But, sadly, this week, the journey of this iconic 178-year-old company, called Thomas Cook, suddenly came to a grinding halt, as it announced its bankruptcy.

Of course, the company is no longer owned by his grandchildren or family. But it is a very tragic end to the once-reputed company. And, sadly, it is taking down with it, many of its stakeholders.

600,000 customers of Thomas Cook are now stranded in different places on the globe. And Britain is trying to fly back 150,000 of its citizens from wherever they are. Germany is trying to help its 140,000 travellers abroad too. And, importantly, it has at one stroke rendered 21,000 employees jobless.

It brings us to an important question. Why do great companies fall this way?

The answer is simple. Large global companies are not quick to adapt to environmental changes. Their reluctance to embrace newness and their refusal to see the writing on the wall, ultimately makes them meet their own nemesis.

The adamant belief, that they can manage, simply because of a strong reputation or enormous experience, will not always help.

Today, when people can book travel tickets online, when people can compare and analyse hotel deals online, and when they can make up holiday packages online, all by themselves, how will travel agencies help?

Today’s traveller is a very knowledgeable one. He can quickly see pictures, read reviews, understand maps, and discuss with strangers online and get his travel advice -- without going to any of those huge swanky Thomas Cook offices on high streets of UK and elsewhere. The office rentals could've also been a part of their costs.

I am not saying that Thomas Cook's fall is due to this factor alone. It is not.

Their bad business decisions like buying some not-so-profitable companies, their inability to quickly finance their growing debt, and their slowness in responding to environmental changes have now cost them a lot.

Kodak too, which used to make photo films and cameras, did not see how quickly digital cams and smartphones will make them bankrupt.

Toy R Us did not see how quickly gaming consoles, and online gaming technology, will become one of the reasons for them to become bankrupt.

Blockbuster, a hugely successful video rental company in US, did not see how online streaming of video content will make them bankrupt.

However, some companies react fast.

For example, Netflix, which originally was a video sales-and-rental company quickly understood the power and future of Internet ---- and the corresponding fast growing bandwidths and data-speeds. Now, it is already investing hugely in producing content - Netflix Originals, movies and series - for its video streaming service.

National Geographic, which used to focus on magazines now offers content on many platforms like TV, YouTube, Instagram and Facebook. The last time I checked it had 4.3 million followers on Instagram.

Walmart which was a retail outlet is now selling mostly online. In fact in May 2018, with $16 billion, it bought 'Flipkart', India's second-biggest online store, after Amazon India.

These companies show us that business models must change with time.

A bold vision and quick adaptability are key elements of business success.

Moon Landing: Its fascination in fiction

“There are more than 185,000 songs with the word ‘moon’ in their title”.

That’s according to Spotify, the audio streaming platform which has probably the largest database of songs.

On hearing this staggering number of references to the ‘Moon’, I thought it might be worth dwelling on this topic, as we commemorate, this week, the 50th anniversary of man’s historic moon landing.

Man’s fascination with the Moon – whether in song or in the story – has been going on for centuries. In fact, for millennia.

From poetic expressions in romance to serious inquiry through science, this lovely large white sphere, which hovers overhead, in different hues and in different phases, has captivated mankind for ages.

From a thin crescent to a full moon, and from that full moon back to the crescent, its appearance has helped us mark months and days, in almost all civilizations.

Today, even though the light and smog in our ultra-modern cities, prevent us from enjoying its full beauty, on Moon's metaphoric use in writings, however, man continues to wax eloquent.  And this fascination is unlikely to wane.

But, how did fiction help man to dream, a dream so big, that he thought he could reach the Moon?

What were the small steps in fiction which led to this giant leap for mankind? 

Investigating these questions, I found a wealth of information that somehow inspired 'man' to journey to the Moon.

Many people regard an ancient Greek novel by Lucian of Samosata, a Syrian satirist, written around A.D. 120, as the first true piece of ‘science fiction’.

Titled ‘Vera Historia’ (A True Story), it actually begins by stating that the story is, in fact, an utter lie, and not true at all!

Written around AD 120- AD 125

In the story, the ship of Lucian and his fellow travellers is blown off-course. They are then caught up in a huge whirlwind which blows them up high in the sky - towards the Moon.

The travellers soon get caught-up in a full-scale interplanetary war. It is between the king of the Moon and the king of the Sun, over the colonization of the Morning Star! Both armies have hybrid lifeforms which could make us wonder if the second-century writer has, somehow, got a sneak peek at the aliens shown in this century's ‘Star Wars’ movie series!

The prominent astronomer Johannes Kepler too had written some fiction. In his ‘Somnium’ (The Dream) published four years after his death, in 1634, he talks of a dream in which a demon describes the moon’s inhabitants to an Icelandic boy and his mother who is a witch.

After Kepler’s writings, stories of moon voyages suddenly became popular; even by Cyrano de Bergerac and Daniel Defoe.

Published in 1657

Published in 1741

In 1638, an English historian and author Francis Godwin published a short novel called ‘The Man in the Moone’, describing the adventures of a Spaniard named Domingo Gonsales.  Gonsales trains some migratory swans to wear harnesses and fly him around in an “engine” he had devised. He describes a 12-day journey watching the Earth recede from view as the swans take him to the lunar surface. And he tells us of a utopian lunar society there, where inhabitants are extraordinarily tall, with no illness, with no crime or with no need for any lawyers.

Published in 1638

Around the same time another Englishman, the philosopher, and clergyman John Wilkins, composed ‘A Discourse Concerning a New World and Another Planet’, a full scientific discussion of the Moon and the possibility of voyaging there.

John Wilkins, in 1640, had apparently said, “I do seriously, and upon good grounds, affirm it possible to make a flying chariot, in which a man may sit, and give such a motion unto it, as shall convey him through the air.” (‘Many fictional moon voyages preceded the Apollo landing’ by Tom Seigfried, Sciencenews.org

In 1865, Jules Verne’s book ‘From the Earth to the Moon’ talked of a huge cannon, which can shoot a group of men into space, to land on the moon.

And that was more than 100 years before the actual moon landing occurred.

Published in 1865

Published in 1901

Even in the world of comic books, Tintin’s adventures, in ‘Destination Moon’ and ‘Explorers on the Moon’, were written long before the actual Moon Landing.

Published in 1954

None of us can deny this truth. That sci-fi books, in many ways, inspired the real Moon landing.

These imaginative writers tell us that their writings may be just small steps for man. But they led to this giant leap for mankind, which we must commemorate now.

With great respect.

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Interested readers might like to read this old post too.
(related to science-fiction, on my other blog).

"Why we should pay attention to medical thrillers"
Published on
www.joelsjottings.com

Family Movies: Are they more profitable?

After enjoying the new Disney movie ‘Aladdin’, I decided to do a quick short research.

I wanted to find out how much money this movie is making; in order to test my hypothesis that the producers who invest in family movies are likely to earn higher profits.

For that, we need a sample of family movies, their budgets and their earnings. If we can collect and analyse this data, we will be able to understand if their producers really earned what they wanted.

But, first, a little bit of literature review.

How do we define ‘a family movie’? Typically, the ‘family’ genre of movies has its stories and themes oriented towards families.

Some people differentiate a children’s film from a family film, by saying that the former targets children alone, while the latter offers value for the whole family (Unshrinking the kids: Children's Cinema and the Family Film, a book by Cary Bazalgette, 1995, British Film Institute).

For the purpose of this essay, however, I wish to take G-rated family film and also PG-13 rated teen films into one single category. Since the under-18 kids with families can also watch PG-13 movies, my categorization, I assume, would be acceptable.

If you just type out ‘a family movie’ or ‘family movies’ into your Google search box on your computers, it will immediately return a list of movies it thinks you are looking for.

Among the top family movies, released in the last six years, I found are these, listed in the ascending order: Frozen (2013), Lego Movie (2014), Minions (2015), Moana (2016), Jungle Book (2016), Coco (2017), The Boss Baby (2017), Incredibles 2 (2018), and The Grinch (2018).

In 2019, so far, ‘Dumbo’, ‘How to Train Your Dragon’, ‘Toy Story 4’, and now ‘Aladdin’, have already made waves. And it has not even reached the half-year mark yet.

According to boxofficemojo.com, Aladdin has already made $727 mn, worldwide. And it is not even a month since it released on 24 May 2019. Its production budget was only $183 mn.

‘Frozen’ costed $150 mn to make, but earned a whopping $1.3 bn. ‘Incredibles 2’ was produced at $200 mn, but earned $1.2 bn.

And ‘Minions’ with a production budget of just $74 million earned $1.2 bn worldwide. That’s more than 16 times its cost of production.

Even when we look at PG-13-rated movies made for teens and twenties – especially, the ones with superheroes - the cash registers at cinemas are ringing in loads of dough for the producers.

Last month, in the middle of May 2019, I had stumbled on an interesting piece of news; that ‘Avengers: End Game’ – which had a rousing welcome from movie-goers around the world - has toppled ‘Titanic’ from its second place of the all-time highest grossing movies at the box office.

Now, among the worldwide top-grossing movies of all time, the top five are these: Avatar (2009) made $2.8 bn, Avengers: Endgame (2019), $2.7 bn, Titanic (1997), $2.2 bn, Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015), $2.1 bn, and Avengers: Infinity War (2018), $2.0 bn.

Quite clearly, the investment into children’s movies, family movies, and teen-adventure or teen fantasy movies will make the producers laugh all the way to their banks.

But, sadly, when you wish to treat your family to good movies, in cinema theatres or on Netflix, the choice is almost always limited.

Of course, a limitation of my research is that we did not consider family movies which may have lost money due to bad craftsmanship.

But one thing is clear. The hypothesis that producers who invest in family movies are likely to earn higher profits, can be said to be true.

The Growing E-Waste Problem: Who is responsible?

Do you have old electronic equipment at home? That which is unused or no longer usable? And, is it occupying unnecessary space?

From old mobile phones to televisions, from laptops to DVD players, from headphones to gaming consoles, from CDs and video cassettes to wires and plugs, many electronic items must be lying in our houses.

Throwing them into municipal garbage bins is not a recommended option. And, sadly, there are not many e-waste collection facilities available, for us, to dispose them, safely.



So, despite our reluctance, ultimately, much of our electronic stuff might end up in a garbage heap, or in a junkyard. From there, it may go into an incinerator.

Electronic waste that goes into landfills and incinerators will not only cause environmental pollution but also extreme health hazards. Harmful diseases have been found to result from the burning of e-waste.

A great deal of scientific evidence is available today that proves - without a doubt - that unsafe e-waste disposal is a major health hazard.

And that is why we should hold the producers of electronic equipment responsible - at least partially responsible - for this nightmare they are creating in the form of newer and newer electronic gadgets.

Every enhancement in the new models of mobile phones is making old mobile phones obsolete. Every increase in speed and memory of computers is making old laptops and desktops obsolete. Every development in HD, UHD, and 3D television technology is making the old TVs obsolete. Every development in wireless technology is making all the wired technology obsolete.

Today, instead of making long-term durable electronics – on the pretext of advancing technology, and with greed for more profits – electronics product manufacturers are inundating our markets with new gadgets which are no longer compatible with old hardware. They force us to upgrade and to buy new gadgets, by deliberately reducing the product life cycles.

The TIME magazine says, “…dozens of televisions from the 1970s and 1980s have stopped working only recently. Yet instead, technology companies are speeding the pace of obsolescence. Most smartphone batteries can’t be easily replaced when they stop holding a charge, new laptops don’t accept old cables, and software companies push upgrades that won’t run on old devices. ” (The World Has an E-Waste Problem, TIME, 23 May 2019).

The main reason is this.  The existing global Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) laws, which require manufacturers to establish and fund systems to recycle or collect obsolete products, are not being effectively implemented.

Recently, I found a news-item from India which said: “Premium smartphones and electronic merchandise worth 5000 crore rupees (720 million US dollars) of 10 tech companies including Apple, Samsung, Vivo, HP, and Motorola are stranded with customs after the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) suspended their import permits for not complying with e-waste rules” (Apple, Samsung in a jam with imports held up at customs, Economic Times, 12 Apr 2019).

According to the news item, the Indian government suspended the import permits of the 10 companies for violating Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) clauses. The companies had not re-collected e-waste they had promised they would.

By 2025, Singapore will have extended producer responsibility (EPR) laws in place for both packaging and electronic waste (e-waste) which will make it difficult for manufacturers to dump new products on us, without taking back some old ones.

The USA, the UK, and most European countries have already had legislation to make producers re-buy, recollect and re-use their products, for two decades now. But implementation is still a challenge.

As responsible consumers, we must push our governments to insist that producers comply with Extended Producer Responsibility laws, and show us how much e-waste the producers are taking back.

Only then can we curtail this growing e-waste problem.

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Suggested Readings:


Europe exporting electronic waste despite a ban

What will Singapore’s producer responsibility laws mean for business?

Extended Producer Responsibility: A Guidance Manual for Governments

Each U.S. Family Trashes 400 iPhones’ Worth of E-Waste a Year


Some pictures from where electronic waste is dumped:

Is Populism a threat to Democracy?

Goodreads book link

Whether democracy is a bane or a boon, to the nations that espouse it, is a debate that needs revisiting.

In the aftermath of the 2016 US elections and 2018 Brazil elections -- and especially now, after the 2019 Indian elections and the 2019 Indonesian elections, whose results have, both, just come in, this week -- I think, we should analyse how people ‘really’ elect their leaders.

One of democracy’s salient features, we know, is that people’s mandate is supreme. People’s choice is what matters, and nothing else.

But, perhaps, we should also look at how leaders influence these masses, and sway them, effectively, towards their side, to win at the ballot.

In any democracy, it is the ability to persuade the majority that, if elected, the elected leaders would solve almost all problems, and lead their nations to power and prosperity, that gets the votes.

And within this persuasion is an even more important ability.

It is the ability to convince voters that their political party alone is the best option. And that all other contenders are absolutely unsuitable and completely ineffective.

In fact, they will say, just look at the other contestants’ personal and professional lives. They smack of such low and depraved character that if you really value your nation, you can never vote for them.  If you still do vote for them, you are simply not patriotic. You are an anti-national. You have no desire to make your country great again.

Of course, I was only making an attempt at euphemism, to avoid words like mudslinging, slander, defamation and character assassination, which dominate political rhetoric during election time.

While some leaders could be driven by ‘ideologies’, some could be simply driven by ‘populism’. By appealing to the majoritarian cause --- because, there lies the largest vote bank.

More than the charting of a strategic path for the nation, it is the garnering of the largest share of voters that becomes the main focus.

And, I think, that is the biggest problem, facing democracies, today.

Populist leaders speak as if they are the only real voices of ordinary people. They fight against the so-called elite. They tell the majority that the minority is a threat to the majority. Not only to the majority’s well-being but sometimes, even to the majority’s very survival.

Immigrants coming to steal our jobs, minorities taking away our rights and benefits, and even political predecessors, who've wrecked our nation with negligence, greed, and corruption, are all populist announcements that voters will easily buy into.

 “What Populists Do to Democracies”, an article I found online, showed me how the rise of ‘populism’ could, in fact, become a threat to the original democratic values (The Atlantic, 26 Dec 2018).

“Right now, the four most populous democracies in the world are ruled by populists: Narendra Modi in India, Donald Trump in the United States, Joko Widodo in Indonesia, and Bolsonaro in Brazil. That makes it rather important to know which scholars are correct: Either democracy is in the midst of an unprecedented global retreat, or we’re witnessing a salutary course correction in which citizens are finally holding global elites to account for their failures”, says the article.

According to its authors, Yascha Mounk, and Jordan Kyle, “populist governments have deepened corruption, eroded individual rights, and inflicted serious damage on democratic institutions”.

Followers of populists could give more credence to passionate nationalism and religious revivalism, than to practical inclusiveness and fact-based scientific truths. They can even distort history and falsify information to suit their narratives.

With government institutions in their pockets, populist leaders could re-write history, re-define culture, refute science, and re-classify society, and go completely against conventional knowledge.

And that, my friends, is the big danger democracies must guard themselves against.

Courtesy : transparency.org

Suggested Readings

1. What is populism, and what does the term actually mean?   - bbc.com
2. How we combed leaders’ speeches to gauge populist rise  - The Guardian
3. What Populists Do to Democracies - The Atlantic 

Easter Blasts in Sri Lanka: Who will resurrect 'Reason'?

“An eye for an eye will make the whole world blind”.

This quote, attributed to Mahatma Gandhi, reminds us often that the real threat to the world today is not only violence, by itself, but 'violence' that begets more violence.

When ‘revenge’ is high on the minds of the perpetrators of violence, ‘reason’ gets thrown out of the window. When ‘killings’ are retaliated with more killings - as if, it will solve all problems – it is ‘sanity’ that dies a horrible death.

But, if we consider ourselves civilised humans of the twenty-first century, and if we consider ourselves as sane creatures with the gift of reason, we must strongly condemn the murder and the mayhem that struck Sri Lanka, on Easter Sunday.

We must resurrect the value of reason, and revive the spirit of sanity. We must preach, and we must practice. We must say ‘No’ to violence, in the name of religion; actually, we must say ‘No’ to violence, in any other name.

With 321 people killed, after those seven suicide bombers had struck three churches and three hotels, we now hear that Sri Lanka has arrested over 40 people.

Is it not worrying, that a large network of devious and depraved minds seems to have hatched this deadly plan? Is it not worrying that these heartless brutes were completely insensitive to the value of ‘life’; as they unleashed this deadly carnage -- killing hundreds of innocent worshippers?

For all that we know, the poor victims had probably hurried to church happily, that morning, tugging along their families, in their festive best --- only to be met with this sudden horrific death.

But we must also be worried, by this latest news: “The preliminary investigations have revealed that what happened in Sri Lanka was in retaliation for the attack against Muslims in Christchurch,” said Ruwan Wijewardene, the Sri Lankan defence minister, to a special sitting of the country’s parliament, on Tuesday.

Though the minister has not given us any evidence for this hypothesis, the fact that the New Zealand terrorist had targeted two mosques, and that these terrorists have now targeted three churches, makes the assumption a plausible one.

And the level of detailed planning, that these alleged revenge-seekers clearly employed, shows us the level of hatred, and the mania for revenge, inside them.

According to a news report by ‘The Guardian’, “terrorism researchers have said the sophisticated nature of the attack and the equipment used would probably have required months of preparation, including target reconnaissance, recruiting of the suicide bombers and obtaining explosives” (The Guardian, 23 Apr 2019).

If these attackers’ justification is the New Zealand incident of attacks on their community, and if the New Zealand attacker’s justification is an earlier attack on his community, and if this twisted justification keeps going on and on, where will the ‘revenge’ cycle ultimately lead us to? Will there be an end?

Ironically, it happened on the day when Christians celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who's called the ‘Prince of Peace’ for his radically serene life, and for teachings of peace, which include, ‘love your enemies’ and ‘turn the other cheek’ when you are slapped upon one!

In Jesus Christ’s ‘sermon on the mount’, are these words: “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn to them the other also” (Luke 6: 27-29).

Mahatma Gandhi, who loved this passage from the Bible, popularised these words’ of ‘turning the other cheek’, in India. Even more than the Christian missionaries had done.

In fact, that is why many people think it was Gandhi who said it. And not Jesus Christ, from whom Gandhi actually took the words.

Forgiveness is better than revenge. But, we know, it is easier to preach it than to practice it. That should not however deter us from trying hard.

Because, only by practising love and forgiveness can we make this world a peaceful place.

The Greed Creed: 17th and 18th Century Companies

It is the concept of ‘joint-stock company' that causes the wealth of nations to rise or fall. Or that is what most modern economists believe.

Perhaps, some 17th and 18th century companies can give us insights into how this 'company' has changed.

Let us look at the operations of three famous companies: The British East India Company chartered in 1600, in Britain, the Vereeningde Oostindische Compagnie (VOC) or the Dutch East Indies Company chartered in 1602, in Holland, and the Mississippi Company chartered in France, in 1717.

But before that, first, let us look at a fourth company, the Dutch West India Company (WIC), which gives us some stimulating facts to start us off, on our discussion.

WIC, chartered in 1623 in Holland, convinced its private investors to put money into a desolate island on Hudson River, saying it was fast becoming a trading hub for European countries.

Thanks to one Christopher Columbus, who discovered a sea connection some 120 years earlier, hundreds of ships were - by now - crisscrossing the Atlantic, plying their trade.

The Dutch called the region they developed as ‘New Amsterdam’. But they had to keep fighting the Red Indians, and even the British, to hold on to it.

The British eventually captured it in 1664, and renamed it, ‘New York’. And, on the remains of a wall - which the Dutch had built to fight the British and the Indians – is paved the ‘Wall Street’ on the island of Manhattan.

Today, this street, with most of USA’s chief financial institutions located here, including the NYSE, is often called 'the bastion of financial manipulators able to destabilize national economies'!

Holland/Dutch Purchase. 'The Purchase of Manhattan Island', Painting by Alfred Fredericks, c. 1910.
(Courtesy: Encyclopedia Britannica).

Now, let us go back to the beginning, to learn about the three companies I mentioned.

The East India Company established in 1600, by a Royal Charter by Queen Elizabeth I, was a private enterprise of some 200 odd British investors. The charter she issued created the first official joint-stock corporation or limited liability company.

These investors/share-holders wanted to gain from the East Indian spice trade, which was a monopoly of Spain-Portugal combine, until the defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588.

By getting trade concessions from India's Moghul Empire, East India Company quickly grew to amazing proportions - trading in cotton, silk, indigo, saltpetre, spices and many other goods from India and Indo-China.

Believe it or not, at one point in time, this company controlled almost "half of the world's trade" and was called 'The World's Most Powerful Corporation' of that time.

When its excesses and exploitation increased, it faced stiff resistance from the Indians; Especially, after 1757, when the company made itself into a military power and took over Bengal region in the Battle of Plassey.

In the next 100 years, Indian struggle grew. And, with the 1857 Sepoy Mutiny (or the first war of Indian Independence, as per the Indian perspective), everything changed.

UK Parliament passed the Government of India Act 1858 liquidating the British East India Company and transferring its functions to the British Crown.

Head Quarters: The East India House in Leadenhall Street, London, drawing by Thomas Hosmer Shepherd, c. 1817 (Courtesy: Encyclopedia Britannica) 

The VOC or the ‘Dutch East India Company’ too wielded tremendous power. From Amsterdam, it controlled trade in Mauritius, South Africa, India, Japan, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam.

Indonesian archipelago, in particular, was under VOC’s direct control for over 200 years, as they traded in agricultural produce and other goods.

This mega-corporation too became a military power and oppressed the natives, until the Dutch government revoked the charter and, in 1799, took over the company.

‘The Mississippi Company’ formed in the USA by French private investors in 1717 was a bit different. Its operations ensured the colonisation of Mississippi and birthed the city of New Orleans.

The exaggerated tales of fortune, which investors heard, made the company’s stock price to hit the ceiling.

This was the world's first case of stock prices going higher and higher due to rumours of corporation's success. By the time the investors in France realized, that their speculation of financial growth in faraway United States is not realistic, it was too late.

So, when the stock market came crashing down, it wiped out the fortunes of many and drove many to suicide.

In fact, the bursting of the Mississippi Bubble is one of the main causes of the 1789 French Revolution.

The companies of the 17th and 18th centuries made themselves into military powers, encouraged slave trade, exploited natives and exaggerated fortunes.

But, today, in this 21st century, these activities by joint stock companies are not only against 'Business Ethics' and 'Human Rights', but also simply unthinkable.

New Zealand Mosque Killings and Gun Law Reforms

"Guns don’t kill people, people do."

This is a common refrain from those who support gun-ownership.

But is it a valid statement?

No, it is not.  It is logically fallacious. Or that’s what ‘logic’ teacher David Kyle Johnson says in his article against this phrase (Psychology Today, 12 Feb 2013).

But I am writing today, not about logical fallacies. I am writing today about the need for gun law reforms.

Following the recent shooting tragedy, where 50 people were killed in two mosques, at Christchurch, New Zealand, it was somewhat relieving to hear the country’s leadership discussing gun-law changes.

Jacinda Arden, New Zealand’s Prime Minister, is proving to be an exemplary leader, not only by the way she quickly reached out to the Muslim community that lost its loved ones, but also by the way she quickly announced that her country’s parliament would soon – within days – change laws on gun ownership.

Sadly, until now many have failed to see common-sense logic that, pistols or revolvers aside, civilians simply should not be free to own lethal automatic or semi-automatic assault guns; which this hate-filled terrorist had used on innocent worshippers.

This New Zealand terror draws our attention to earlier two mass-shootings– one in Australia and one in Scotland – which have resulted in tighter gun-laws in their respective countries.

Of course, it also draws our attention to numerous mass-shooting instances in the USA. However, we know that no strong action is taken towards reforms. The powerful gun-lobby there keeps citing the Second Amendment of the US Constitution, which protects their right ‘to keep and bear arms’.

But, take the case of the Australian mass-shooting of 1996. It had shocked the country, when in Tasmania, 35 people were brutally killed by a gunman Martin Bryant.  Intellectually disabled, with a history of erratic behaviour, he had later pleaded guilty, but never gave reason for his gruesome killing spree at Port Arthur.

And what was its outcome, in Australia?

Under the then Prime Minister John Howard, this massacre resulted in stricter gun controls, with a ban on almost all fully-automatic or semiautomatic firearms. The government had even instituted a gun-buyback program which made people surrender some 700,000 firearms. They were later destroyed by the government
(click here for the latest, on gun control following this Port Arthur massacre from NZ Herald).

Interestingly, I had read that the Christchurch shooter had once discussed the Port Arthur massacre, of Tasmania, with one of his associates in New Zealand.

And what is also interesting, is that even the Port Arthur massacre shooter had admitted drawing inspiration from an earlier mass-shooting incident in Scotland.

A month earlier, a gunman had invaded a primary school in the small Scottish town of Dunblane and shot to death 16 young children and their teacher, before turning the gun on himself.

And what was its outcome, in UK?

In February 1997, the UK Parliament passed a law banning private ownership of handguns above .22 calibre; and in November 1997 the ban got extended to all handguns.

Following mass shootings, both, Australia and UK had responded swiftly with tighter gun-laws. And New Zealand too, seems to be on the right path. What about USA’s?

Let’s look at some facts. In 2017, in Las Vegas, Nevada, 58 people were killed by just one man, with assault rifles, who shot into a concert crowd.  In 2016, 49 people were killed by just one man with an assault rifle, at a gay night-club in Orlando, Florida. In 2007, at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia, just one man goes on a shooting spree, killing 32 people. (You can click here to check out "Deadliest Mass Shootings in Modern US History -- Fast Facts" from CNN)

And what was its outcome, in USA?

Zero. Nothing. Nada. Zilch.

Sadly, when it comes to USA’s gun-law reforms, any glimmer of hope is still too faint to be noticed.

Are filter bubbles isolating us intellectually?

Not many of us understood what ‘Filter Bubble’ meant, when Eli Pariser coined the phrase, in 2011.

The Internet activist had said, in his TED talk and also in his book, that the content we see online is now being customized – in fact, personalized, to our own likes and preferences - to such a high degree, that it could be highly detrimental to our collective future.

Picture courtesy: Sticky Digital

Today, what we see, in our searches online, in our social media news feed, and in our web-based interactions, is all based on algorithms written into the software of the companies whose services we use.

These algorithms give us the information we personally prefer, and also target us with advertising, supposedly, relevant to us.

Google, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, and Netflix are all among the many services which now try to read our minds and give us what we want. Or, at least, that’s what they say they do.

But, in the process, they are confining us to our own bubbles – filtering from us, other knowledge that could be useful and important to us.

I believe that in their attempts to make information relevant to us, these companies are ignoring our overall personality; and more importantly, they are snubbing our innate desire - to know more than that we are being deliberately exposed to.

Increasing my exposure to posts that reinforce my previous preferences, and decreasing my exposure to posts that conflict with my personal interests, can deliberately make me live in a make-believe world; a filter-bubble.

The 2018 Facebook–Cambridge Analytica data scandal showed us that Cambridge Analytica had harvested the personal data of millions of people's Facebook profiles without their consent and had used it for political purposes. It swayed opinions.

It brings us to some serious ethical questions we need to answer - on whether we are responsible for creating the filter bubble ourselves, or whether the social media companies, and their partners are conniving to keep us in that bubble; in the way they want us to.

In the past, when newspapers were the only medium through which people got information, the editors had served as real gatekeepers. They screened news – okay, let’s say they filtered news – in order to give their readers what was relevant and useful.

Some newspapers which took pride in environments of a free press, and in the age of independent journalism, even published anti-establishment pieces and tried to become the ‘vox populi’.

Most newspapers adhered to journalistic codes of ethics and became responsible channels which sought out and promoted values such as truth, justice, liberty, and equality.

Today, sadly, fed by unverified social media posts and forwards – and fed-up by the political leanings of some newspapers and TV news channels – the public is losing trust in news platforms, including those on the Internet.

Responsible Internet companies should ensure that whatever information passes through their webpages and apps is trustworthy and reliable. They must allocate adequate resources to fight the spread of ‘fake news’ and ‘rumour’. They must allow governments to hold them accountable.

In these days of high security and privacy – especially, with end-to-end encryption between any two individuals communicating over the Internet – it could be difficult. But, at least regulating social media groups and public posts can make us empowered with balanced knowledge.

In his latest article titled “The Internet Can Make Us Feel Awful. It Doesn't Have to Be That Way” (TIME, 17 Jan 2019) Eli Pariser tells tech companies to “focus on user empowerment and a genuine respect for his or her desires rather than –manipulation”.

Some of us may choose to live in our own filter bubbles. 

But all of us must have the choice to break free.

A Medical Pioneer: The Legacy of Dr Samuel Zwemer

Dr Samuel Zwemer got out of his ship, landing on Bahrain's shores, on 7 December 1892.

For this missionary-doctor from the USA, Bahrain had already been a port of transit, on a couple of earlier occasions.

Travelling to and from Basra, in Iraq, during his stop-overs, he was enamoured by the beauty of this land, and its people. So much so that, this time, he decided to stay on and see how he could be of service.

Thanks to the welcoming nature of the people of Manama (he used to spell it as 'Menameh', in his journals), to the beautiful walks he had had in the date-palm gardens here, and to his soon-developed friendship with a Goan postmaster Gunsalves, he made up his mind. 

He found a room to rent, in the bustling souq area, beside a mosque.

Then, by establishing a little dispensary and a book-shop, Dr. Zwemer distributed books and medicines, and treated people who came to him with medical problems.

It is hardly surprising that, within days, the number of patients who visited this man, who was fluent in Arabic, had increased, by many folds. By February 1893, he had recorded in his journal that over 200 people had already received medicines from him.

The number of patients needing medical care increased daily, and some patients were soon coming, on boats, from the eastern province of Saudi Arabia. They had heard about a doctor and a clinic in Bahrain.

Needless to say, more doctors, nurses, teachers, and their families were needed, and they soon joined Dr Samuel Zwemer.  

And thus, from this dispensary, was born the 'American Mission Hospital'. 

In 1899, with the growing need for a school, for the children of the hospital staff, his wife Amy Zwemer, started what she called ‘The Acorn School’. It had recruited even craftsmen from Bahrain to teach children many useful crafts.

As the saying goes, mighty oaks do grow from little acorns. 

For, from this school has grown the ‘American Mission School’, which is now called the ‘Al Raja School’. 

And it has been consistently producing some exemplary leaders for this country.

In fact, it is my meeting with Mr Gary Brown from USA, the former principal of Al Raja School, which actually spurred me into writing this particular piece, in this column.

Three weeks ago, I had the special privilege of learning from him, and from another veteran from India, Mr B M Gorde, some amazing facts.

The 90-year old Mr Gorde, who came to Bahrain in 1964, is the oldest member of the National Evangelical Church which has always been associated with both, the hospital and the school.

Mr Brown said that the Bahrain of 1970 - the year he landed here - was a lot different from the Bahrain of 2018 that we see today. Americans like him had to speak in Arabic because not many parents of his school children could speak English then, like they can do today.

Even though he is retired, Mr Brown is now back in Bahrain, and is currently working on a book on the alumni of the Al Raja School.

Old students of the American Mission School (Al Raja School) who are interested in contacting him can write to alumni@alrajabahrain.org.

But let us come back to our missionary Dr Samuel Zwemer. I find it pertinent to mention here that the bookshop he had opened became known, later, as the “Family Bookshop’.

Sadly, it is no longer in existence, even though it was the hub of all book lovers in Manama, until as recently as the year 2005.

The legacy of Dr Samuel Zwemer in this beautiful Kingdom of Bahrain will live on, in many ways.  

And one way it will live on - one proof of his pioneering work - will be through a postal address. 

The hospital, school and church still receive letters at: P O Box 1.

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Additional Reading:

1. Missionaries You Should Know: Samuel Zwemer
2. Mission in the Arabian Gulf (East Arabia)