By Rei Tanotsuka, 29 October 2019
The Capital is full of gorgeous carriages and gowns,
But you are alone gaunt and sallow despite your gift,
Who is to say that the way of heaven is always fair? Du Fu
The ones who are fit to rule, never do, and the megalomaniacal, war mongering advocates rise to the top, to cull off the remaining semblance of humanity left in the rare few who dare question.
The past 3 centuries of Western dominance, have the efflorescence of rulership through authoritarianism, whereby only ONE god should be worshipped, ONE form of political governance to be adhered to, ONE economic ideology to be pursued and most trenchantly, ONE global leader to be obeyed.
The insurmountable desire to have one leader who is obeyed by everyone else, results in a multitude of Morton Fork dilemmas. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. The most obvious one for us who grew up in the West is, believe in God and follow rules which no longer bear relevance, or refuse God and burn in eternal damnation!
How about a third option? Live an honest life, do your best to hurt no one and believe in only what you can substantiate in the phenomenological sense? The following account is an example typical of what happens under Western rule. The system implemented causes the participant undue grief, because to satisfy one condition, usually means the violation of another, the result netted is one of failure.
My Morton’s Fork
I worked in my previous job, an on site (dispatchment) English teaching company for 16 years. The English Instructors are given assignments in various Japanese companies and schools to teach English mainly to groups, but sometimes one on one classes are available.
We have other assignments too, one being on site interviews to ascertain the English ability of the employees in the Japanese companies, later to be assigned to the classes available.
The grading system runs from ‘A’ to ‘E’. ‘A’ means that the English ability is that of a native speaker. The very tiny sliver, who could be slotted in that category are usually returnees, people who are technically Japanese, but spent a substantial part of their life in a Western country (usually the US).
‘E’s’ are exactly what you would expect. Barely perfunctory English, giggles upon saying ‘hullo’ etc.
When I say it does not take a veteran to make an assessment of the students, I am not being facetious. It will take a person with common sense, probably around seeing 20 -50 students, to ascertain who qualifies as an A, B, C, D or E.
The interviews run for 10 minutes, with a 5 minute interval for the examiner to give the grade. The interviews are all recorded.
When I first joined the company, all the English instructors were under Japanese management. Guess what? We had complete autonomy in how we chose to teach in our classes, and outside of a few skills which were compulsory to test in the interviews ie. compare/contrast, sequencing/order and tenses, we could run the interview the way we wanted. The grades submitted were later judged by an independent body to ensure that the examiner was fair. End of story.
Then the Western ‘Teaching’ Nazi’s came…..
The first foreigner that my company installed as a full time worker in the office (non teaching staff), was an Australian guy, meek, mild and easy to intimidate. He was, and is, ostensibly nice to a certain extent.
As is characteristic of SO MANY Western men who come to Asia, he is unequivocally beta in Australia, however in Japan he became, not alpha, but a definite beta plus.
Before he came to power in the office as the job dispenser, aka teacher assignment coordinator, under the 3 Japanese administrators before him, I made ample change. My schedule was well padded and I was well remunerated. After he took the post? I went from having 4 business classes a week to barely having 2, only during a transition between contracts, would I have 3 business classes.
He was left to his own devices for a few years, then out of the blue and in quick succession, he pulled in 3 of his other mates, all middle aged, White men (no problem if their rank and file was obtained through other means, excepting positive racial profiling ) and THAT’S when the authoritarian rule began.
Schoolag 101
Any authoritarian regime does not begin with an outright culling of our rights, liberty and happiness, it always tip toes towards it.
I remember when these 4 old kids on the block started out, they bore none of the current fascistic rule. In the beginning they declared a new program of regular training for new teachers. This is perfectly reasonable.
Then came part 2, where the ‘veterans’ were ‘invited’ sans pay, to attend workshops and share ideas. This is also welcomed and makes for greater rapport and company unity.
Part 3, suddenly we were told, that our classes were subject to being ‘spontaneously’ filmed (though we were given a brief warning), AND we would now have yearly evaluations by the ‘Head Trainer’ – the dude, who was the same shit kicker as us all, 5 minutes ago.
Part 4, the Interview jobs which I had done for more than a decade was now COMPLETELY WRONG! You would think I left the company for 3 decades, only to return to a world of Macintosh when I was getting my cassette ready for the Commodore 64! I had a brief break from interviews for 3 months or so, before I got the official paperwork to retrain my now, redundant skills.
The Hebetudinous Nouveau Interview Program
Like I said previously, the teachers who have taught for a little over a year, can tell you from the first Hello, the grade of a student. This is not even hyperbole.
However, under the 4 Fascists (4 Fs), a new elaborate web had to be concocted, one complete with bogus terms such as ‘hitting the ceiling’ and other inane terminology, along with the plethora of horseshit they insisted us swallow dry, without even us getting to pick a sauce.
Only I dared to question apparently, much to the chagrin of the Head Trainer.
To cut a long story short, the new system involved a tripartite question series, with questions pertaining to each topic in varying degrees of difficulty.
This is fine, but its no different to the original method for testing of English skills, but this is the linchpin that turned the entire new system, from one of normalcy into a fascistic one.
All our questions to be asked (we had the ‘liberty’ to make up our own questions), needed to be sanctioned, each and every topic, AND once approved, WE COULD NOT DIGRESS!!
On top of that, our interviews ideally, had to run the full 10 mins, the minimum would be 9 mins, however the questions that we could ask needed to run from the spectrum of ‘A’ to ‘E’. So you are looking at up to 5 questions, for 3 topics (12 – 15 questions in total) which seems reasonable UNTIL you find out what Japanese people are like.
The Japanese….There’s no Wong, so everyone must be right….
You can explain until you’re hoarse that technically correct answers in the interview are not necessary and won’t garner high points, but braaaaaaaace yourself, that no one will take you seriously.
The Japanese carry a streak to be technically correct, and as such are hellish in these interviews where you are testing for skill and not factual accuracy.
This is a typical exchange, which can immolate your sanctioned by the 4 Fs interview questions, in around 5 mins.
Examiner: How are you?
Student: Fine
E: What is your job?
S: Engineer
E: Tell me 5 things you did today at work\
S: Read email, meeting, make document, eat lunch …interview, English test.
E: What do you like about your job?
S: Money
E: What don’t you like about your job?
S: Not big money….
Morton’s Fork
So, my dear 4 Fs, WTF do you want us to do?
Obey your tyranny and ask only approved questions, eventhough the interview could finish in 6 minutes OR transgress THE LAW, digress and fill up the interview until we can see 10 mins on the recorder?
When asked, the Head trainer told me to be flexible. On my next interview, I did indeed act flexibly and with some interviewees, padded my questions with adlibbing.
The feedback? ‘Good attempt Rei, though you must get approval for new questions.’ AHHH Go F Yaself!
Macro Implications of this deleterious Morton’s Doctrine
IRAN
Under one American buffoon, we see Iran sending 11,000 kgs of spent uranium to Russia…..and then we see in 2018 under a different American buffoon, sanction IRAN AND ANY OTHER NATION that even touches an Iranian fart, BUT still expect Iran to miraculously get rid of its uranium stockpile nonetheless, EVEN THOUGH the channels for it to do so, are no longer available!
” During the 15 year period, and as Iran gradually moves to meet international qualification standards for nuclear fuel produced in Iran, it will keep its uranium stockpile under 300 kg of up to 3.67% enriched uranium hexafluoride (UF6) or the equivalent in other chemical forms. The excess quantities are to be sold based on international prices and delivered to the international buyer in return for natural uranium delivered to Iran, or are to be down-blended to natural uranium level. Enriched uranium in fabricated fuel assemblies from Russia or other sources for use.“ pg7 JCPOA
VENEZUELA
Venezuela, another country that America decided to give a backway entrance pummelling, it doesn’t deserve. What? Can’t get access to basic food, well then, how about America sanction CLAP (Venezuela’s government food program) some more. Hope it helps – American Assholery with Bolivarian Flair
HONDURAS
How can we leave out Honduras? America went ‘bananas’ over this country inititally, and the 40th President of the USA, that self serving ego maniac , Reagan, decided to militarise it. How lovely! Since depriving the locals of the most fertile lands was NOT enough, Reagan decided to sodomise what ever was left of human rights or political justice in that country.
And now? We have the world’s most petulant, third grade vocab President – Trumptard (In today’s al – Baghdadi speech: ‘Canine…I call dog, a beautiful dog.’), declaring that the bulk of the Honduran Caravan migrants are “stone cold criminals”.
How ironic that the world is so quick to judge petty thievery, when the BIGGEST THUGS – those unscrupulous, ignominious, blood-letters of the innocent, get accolades and congratulatory rounds of applause for their ‘Peace’ efforts?
This world is run by the insane and judged by the stupid!