Greetings,
Why is it that every time Australians decide to pay respect to their fallen soldiers some journalist has to jump up and down about war and what a waste it is? It happened on ANZAC Day, and big surprise there is an article in the Sydney Morning Herald by Peter FitzSimons doing the same thing, you can find the article here (https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/comment-the-incontrovertible-truth-about-world-war-i/ar-BBPxljn). Like most journalistic articles about the First World War it focuses on the loss of life during the war and the damage to the soldiers which existed long after the war. Well, the same goes for all wars before and after, including the ones which we are fighting right now as I write.
I have a family history which is somewhat connected with wars. My great-uncle fought and died in France in the First World War, and my grandfather fought in the Second World War. I also have a cousin who is currently serving in the Royal Australian Navy, and I could not be more proud to be related to all of them. Further, I have friends who are or were soldiers, and I am proud to call these my friends. Needless to say, when someone like Mr FitzSimons, who mind you makes part of his money selling books about war, goes and "reveals the truth" about the First World War in such a fashion it tends to strike a nerve, especially on this day of all days. It could have been left for tomorrow, but then it would not have caused an impact and that is what he was looking for.
A person does not write a book about the exact war he is calling a waste without knowing the details of it. What also needs to be known is that this Remembrance Day is not just for World War I, though today is special as it is the centenary of the Armistice, but it is for all wars. It is a time to pay respect for what our servicemen and women have done for us, and also for what our servicemen and women are still doing for us to this day and into the future. Any school-child who has studied their history, and who has sat through the lesson on the First World War knows that the tactics were not appropriate for the technology, and that the loss of life, on all sides of the conflict was severe. An entire generation of young men was lost, what more needs to be said?
To be sure there was a catastrophic loss of life between 1914 and 1918, and I am not sure whether we have really learnt the lessons which this war taught. It sure taught us some lessons which were taken in, but it also delivered some others which were to result in another war some 21 years later, that could be clearly laid at the feet of the so-called "victors" of this war. War and civilisation are something which go hand in hand throughout history and cannot be separated. We have the propensity for killing one another for one reason or another.
However, within that horrible story though, there are stories which can be told which were not even mentioned as they might have showed some level of achievement. There is one, toward the beginning. To put into contrast against Mr FitzSimons, there is another article, "Australian Diggers more likely to have fought as heroes for king than Allies, research shows" (https://www.news.com.au/national/australian-diggers-more-likely-to-have-fought-as-heroes-and-for-king-than-allies-research-shows/news-story/e26f51e39e6d9669ec5bb8eb21e2015f). It discusses how knowing that they were limited to 66 characters on their headstones, the families of the fallen Australians wanted them to appear as heroes, as according to a British study of headstones. To be sure the positive stories and the stories of heroes and self-sacrifice for another are the rare ones, but this is the same for all wars.
To put it in perspective, this day of all days, aside from ANZAC Day, is a day where the servicemen and women should be honoured. They should be placed in positions of honour. On these days servicemen and women should be thanked for their service. Thank for what they have done whether they have seen battle or not, because in joining the services they have committed themselves to putting their bodies on the line if called. This is what it means to be in the military and anyone who has not been in the same situation has no right to be saying anything negative about any service personnel on this of all days.
Cheers,
Henry.
Showing posts with label Sydney Morning Herald. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sydney Morning Herald. Show all posts
Saturday, 10 November 2018
Tuesday, 14 August 2018
The Value of Volunteering: A Response to: "Volunteering doesn't make the world a better place"
Greetings,
I was trolling through Facebook when I came across an article which was posted by a friend of mine. The link to the article is in the Bibliography which you will find at the end of this. The following will address some of the assertions of the author of the article which were made, but will also address and underlying issue which seems to come up again and again, and that is the meaning of "value". I will admit that this article did hit a rather raw nerve because I have done quite a bit of volunteering over my years, but it shows just how much the focus must be toward a fiscal end in every pursuit.
Ms Walsh starts of with addressing her audience with the idea of using their New Year's resolutions to not volunteer. Pointing that volunteering is merely a mechanism for people to make themselves feel good about themselves. Then she questions whether or not it helps at all. In this she points out a simple fact that people who are using volunteering as a mechanism to get some method to feel good about themselves, as "good citizens" or otherwise are not "volunteering" at all but are obligating themselves. This is a theme which flows through the article. When you volunteer, it must be on your own terms because you are interested in doing it not because you expect something out of it.
Of course then Ms Walsh follows this up with the classic feminist argument, and it fits perfectly into her profile of volunteer work. Who she does not take into account is all of the retirees, male and female, who also do volunteer work, and also the unemployed who are often forced to do it on "work for the dole" schemes. They are not all "people who do care work at home," a lot of them do this work for social reasons. This part of the argument raises the "home work" value argument and uses it to reinforce the idea of volunteer work being done by women and thus needing to be paid work, thus to be valued.
Volunteer work is useful. For the volunteer most people think it merely provides resume packing. For people who really volunteer (rather being guilted, or forced into it) it provides self-worth. For the people who benefit from the organization in the cases of social welfare organizations, the measure is difficult to calculate. Yet this article would want to change these organizations to ones in which the employees were paid. In most instances, the regular clientele of the services simply could not afford the services.
The biggest problem here is the concept of "value", why does it always have to be attached to the all-mighty dollar? Why is unpaid work under-valued? There are many recreational organizations in which people give their time voluntarily without pay, expecting not to be paid, quite happily, I might add, because it gives them joy to do so. Does not the joy which they get from this work have some "value"? Does not the joy that they give others through doing this work also give "value"? In many cases if these organizations were set up on a commercial basis they could not exist because of the costs of the work put in on a volunteer basis by the people who do the work.
Not all work should be evaluated on the basis of what dollar value is attributed to it. It should be valued on the basis of the joy or "value" of the benefit of the people and what they gain from it. We need to seriously look at what "value" really is in our current world and no longer put a dollar value to it to really understand the "value" of things and especially volunteer work.
http://www.smh.com.au/comment/volunteering-doesnt-make-the-world-a-better-place-20180104-h0dd25.html
I was trolling through Facebook when I came across an article which was posted by a friend of mine. The link to the article is in the Bibliography which you will find at the end of this. The following will address some of the assertions of the author of the article which were made, but will also address and underlying issue which seems to come up again and again, and that is the meaning of "value". I will admit that this article did hit a rather raw nerve because I have done quite a bit of volunteering over my years, but it shows just how much the focus must be toward a fiscal end in every pursuit.
Ms Walsh starts of with addressing her audience with the idea of using their New Year's resolutions to not volunteer. Pointing that volunteering is merely a mechanism for people to make themselves feel good about themselves. Then she questions whether or not it helps at all. In this she points out a simple fact that people who are using volunteering as a mechanism to get some method to feel good about themselves, as "good citizens" or otherwise are not "volunteering" at all but are obligating themselves. This is a theme which flows through the article. When you volunteer, it must be on your own terms because you are interested in doing it not because you expect something out of it.
"A lot of volunteering we do is inefficient. Schools ask that parents bake cakes to be sold to the children of other parents who have baked cakes. Most school events involve sausages on white bread and fizzy drinks, which is not recommended as a healthy diet. ..." (Walsh, 2018)Many of the "classic" volunteering activities are inefficient and pave the way for other problems which do crop up in the future. This is an argument which will be conceded to the author, however, these are not the only volunteering activities which are out there, they are just the most visible. Volunteering encapsulates many more activities than most people realize, and many people are actually doing unofficial-volunteer or more accurately unrecognized-volunteer work without even realizing it. Coach your children's sports team? Volunteer work. Are you a scout leader? Volunteer work. Officer of a recreational group? Volunteer work.
"Volunteering is not valued. If volunteering was valued we would have a separate resume for it, at parties would ask each other about their volunteering, and hours worked would contribute to superannuation. Volunteering is expected of people who are regarded as having the time to do it, that is, people who do care work at home, looking after their families, primarily women. Because women do care work their labour is not valued. If a job is valued it is rewarded with pay." (Walsh, 2018)Volunteering work is valued, especially by the organizations who use volunteers, and also by the volunteers themselves, something which will be discussed shortly. Why would it appear on a separate resume? It is work done, so it goes on a normal resume, to put on a separate one is a self-fulfilling argument. At parties people do discuss their volunteer work, most often they do not realize that they are talking about it. In some cases it is deliberately talked about (I sure as hell do). If it contributed to superannuation then it would not be volunteer work, it would defeat the purpose of it. It would simply be work.
Of course then Ms Walsh follows this up with the classic feminist argument, and it fits perfectly into her profile of volunteer work. Who she does not take into account is all of the retirees, male and female, who also do volunteer work, and also the unemployed who are often forced to do it on "work for the dole" schemes. They are not all "people who do care work at home," a lot of them do this work for social reasons. This part of the argument raises the "home work" value argument and uses it to reinforce the idea of volunteer work being done by women and thus needing to be paid work, thus to be valued.
"The volunteering that has greatest impact is done upstream and has a measurable outcome. Volunteering works when the aim is to change a broken system, to change a law or policy. This law or policy would be one that sees a requirement for volunteers, fundraising and charities abandoned, so there will be no expectation that the next generation will keep inefficient systems." (Walsh, 2018)Clearly the idea of the article is to get people to use the system that we have by paying taxes and writing to politicians. Or if they must volunteer, do so for organizations with political aims of some description, not that this would be surprising considering her previous remarks with regard to the "who volunteers" subject. In her opinion efficient and effective volunteering is the kind that makes changes in the world, but one that is efficient and effective in its volunteering so that the organization which comes behind does not have to clean up the mess behind. Again, this does not take into account other organizations which have volunteers and the reasons why they join.
Volunteer work is useful. For the volunteer most people think it merely provides resume packing. For people who really volunteer (rather being guilted, or forced into it) it provides self-worth. For the people who benefit from the organization in the cases of social welfare organizations, the measure is difficult to calculate. Yet this article would want to change these organizations to ones in which the employees were paid. In most instances, the regular clientele of the services simply could not afford the services.
The biggest problem here is the concept of "value", why does it always have to be attached to the all-mighty dollar? Why is unpaid work under-valued? There are many recreational organizations in which people give their time voluntarily without pay, expecting not to be paid, quite happily, I might add, because it gives them joy to do so. Does not the joy which they get from this work have some "value"? Does not the joy that they give others through doing this work also give "value"? In many cases if these organizations were set up on a commercial basis they could not exist because of the costs of the work put in on a volunteer basis by the people who do the work.
Not all work should be evaluated on the basis of what dollar value is attributed to it. It should be valued on the basis of the joy or "value" of the benefit of the people and what they gain from it. We need to seriously look at what "value" really is in our current world and no longer put a dollar value to it to really understand the "value" of things and especially volunteer work.
Bibliography
Walsh, C. (2018) "Volunteering doesn't make the world a better place", Sydney Morning Herald,http://www.smh.com.au/comment/volunteering-doesnt-make-the-world-a-better-place-20180104-h0dd25.html
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