In Australia, we say, ‘Happy New Year’. Yet, it seems that nothing is new. The issue of Racism keeps on raising its ugly head. Here is a chapter that I wrote in ‘How to Lose Friends and Infuriate Your Boss’. The chapter is called, ‘I’m not a racist, but…’. It explores pride and prejudice amongst our peers. If you would like to understand what racism is, and how it can impact you, and what you can do about it, click on the link below to download the PDF.

Jonar_Nader_Boss_Racism_Chapter

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Anyone who subscribed to the philosophy that ‘September Eleven changed the world’ is lacking a large measure of understanding about world affairs. Indeed, everything is different, but very little has changed.

Terrorism has nothing to do with where they place the next bomb. Let’s not bamboozle ourselves by the seemingly irrational actions of individual terrorists. Instead, we need to identify the real motives behind terrorism. We must marshal our resources and focus on how terrorism differs from crime, and how terrorists differ from criminals.

Criminals set out to break our laws, even though they want the rest of us to retain and obey the laws. It is in their interest for the majority to uphold the laws, so that an advantage can be gained when they alone break them. For example, if a law prohibits an average family from possessing a pistol, then armed robbers can barge into someone’s home, confident that they have the upper-hand. Another example involves Bus Lanes. Criminals want drivers to stay away from Bus Lanes so that they can have a clear run, in or out of the city — driving stolen vehicles while using fake ID.

Terrorists set out to change our laws through undemocratic means. They have no regard for our laws, and no respect for our culture. Of all the terrorists, the ones whom we really need to worry about are the sophisticated strategists who, unlike psychotic serial killers, take no personal pleasure in performing acts of violence. They are cold-blooded, heartless, and ruthless, but that’s not why they turn to violence. They use it to call the shots and set the agenda. They know us to be squeamish and devoid of the ‘political will’ to engage in their brand of brutality that shows no regard for human life.

Tit-for-tat skirmishes will lead us nowhere. Terrorists will not cease their assault until we learn the fine art of intrepid retaliation, and until we understand the purpose behind 21st Century terrorism.

Gone are the days when chivalrous knights would refrain from slaying an enemy if it meant that innocent parties would be hurt in the process. Slowly, across hundreds of battles, we have come to accept and expect that some military missions will cause collateral damage. If a surgical strike against a despotic dictator happens to kill dozens of children, it can be justified as the ‘reality of war’, so long as everyone can attest to it being unintentional or accidental.

Modern terrorism turns the tables. Civilian casualties are no longer classified as collateral damage. Children are no longer the innocent bystanders. Rather, they are the target. They are part of the strategy. As despicable as it is, such is the new reality of war. In this war, there are no soldiers to lure and no battalions to capture; just cultures to modify and customs to alter and laws to change and egos to feed and evil to serve… oops, there goes another suicide bomber. She was only thirteen. Is there a word for that?

Studying terrorism does not help us to understand the mind of the terrorist — no more than studying warfare can help us to understand the motive of the soldier; or studying crime can help us to understand the plight of the criminal.

If we are to comprehend how suicide bombers rationalise their actions, we must peel away the veneer and drill down into their hearts and minds. No matter how haunting it might be, we must rattle the spectre that lurks behind their human mask. Only when we delve into the deepest recesses of their psyche, can we discern the heavy responsibility that burdens our generation.

Throughout the ages, the thing that we have feared most has been the human mind. It is a mysterious tabernacle whose form and structure is as vast as the universe itself. All of us must learn about the enemy’s culture, language, motivators, and innermost rhythm. Policymakers who lack these insights are like lawyers who understand everything about contract law, but have no understanding about the industry in question. I once commissioned a leading law firm to advise me about a publishing contract. After thousands of dollars, it became clear that although they understood ‘law’, they knew nothing about the many opportunities and pitfalls associated with publishing. As a result, my lawyers did not equip me with the right questions that I should have asked the publisher.

What this world lacks most is expertise. It is the experts who immerse themselves in their craft. Are our policymakers experts, or merely spin-doctors who carry violins they cannot play? If our leaders are to maintain ‘law and order’ they must understand ‘pain and suffering’. If they are to secure ‘peace and harmony’ they must intercept ‘greed and corruption’.

Here are two examples of the sorts of questions that will help us if we are to navigate through the quagmire: what do fundamentalist terrorists fear more than death, and what do radical terrorists value more than life? Respectively, the answers are humiliation and honour.

Terrorists would rather die than suffer humiliation, and they will often lay down their life to defend what they see as their honour. Very few leaders appreciate the seriousness of these cultural characteristics, so they devise policies that consequently humiliate and dishonour. As such, they unwittingly infuriate terrorists.

So, how can we triumph? If we know that humiliation is worse than death, and honour is more important that life, then we have vital clues about their nerve centre. To squash terrorists, we must manoeuvre with ‘resolute action at high speed’ and strike them where it hurts most. This is perilous, but do we want to win this war, or are we willing to surrender? If we do not correct our weaknesses immediately, we will not only lose our way of life, but we will be castigated by our children for abandoning them.

Our ‘technological supremacy’ and our ‘great common wealth’ pale next to the tools available to terrorists. Terrorists are strengthened by our own failings. It is through our weaknesses that they are currently generating momentum and amassing power. In part, they are mighty by their resolve, but mostly, they will prevail because of our lack of conviction. We can’t even curb vandalism. A society that both generates and tolerates vandals, is a society that cannot tame terrorists.

Ten types of terrorists

If we do not amend our current trajectory, we are doomed. Before I explain how I arrive at this conclusion, it is important to identify ten broad types of terrorists, ranked here in reverse order of danger, taking into account their varying degrees of discord. In fact, ‘D’ is the operative letter.

10) Daredevils

At the bottom of the count-down are daredevils. These terrorists have a hacker’s mind. They like to pit their ingenuity against the gatekeepers. They don’t set out to harm anyone. They just enjoy the thrill of breaking codes or foiling security systems. Most daredevils are intelligent and highly skilled. Annoyed at incompetence, they set about to embarrass the authorities who might not have done a good job. Some daredevils are demented. Nursing a gripe, they seek revenge and/or publicity for their cause. The danger is that some of them might not understand the implications of their misdemeanours. They could unintentionally put innocent lives at risk and/or cause untold inconvenience and expense. In some perverse way, daredevils are good for a lax society. They keep authorities on their toes. The downside is that they expose weaknesses in systems, and they give clues to others about loopholes and backdoors.

9) Defiant

Defiant terrorists cannot accept the status quo. They refuse to allow their enemy to have the final word. They might have understood that they no longer have a voice, but they will not acknowledge the decisions that are being made for them. Therefore, defiant terrorists will strike in desperation, as a last resort. Yes, defiance is an admirable quality. It refuses to allow anyone to break one’s spirit. Defiant people are steadfast, until all hope is lost. This is when they are ready to lay down their life or to take the lives of others. They hold a high moral ground, but when that is shaken, they decide to inflict pain and suffering on others. They justify this as a ‘lesser evil’ by comparing it to the pain that they or their loved-ones have suffered. The dangerous terrorists are the defiant people who have no solid basis for their grievance. They lose their sound judgement, and choose to strike because they are delusional.

8) Don’t Know

Next are those who, strangely enough, ‘don’t know’ that they are terrorists. If you challenge them, they will insist that they are not terrorists, much like addicted smokers will insist that they smoke because they want to, not because they have no choice but to inhale the nicotine. Arguing with addicts of any sort is draining, and so too is arguing with people who cannot acknowledge their unethical or immoral behaviour.

Muggers who harm old women in order to steal their handbags do not go home and lament their reprehensible deeds. Rather, they count the cash and curse the ladies for not carrying more. When con-artists net a large sum, they are pleased with themselves and boast about their business acumen, without sparing a thought for those whom they had just ‘ripped off’. And so it is with terrorists who don’t know what they are doing. They fall into the category of ‘arrogant power-mongers’ whom I will one day elevate to the second position on this list. This will happen when future technologies fall into the wrong hands.

The future of terrorism is inextricably linked to technology. Terrorists of the future might resemble modern-day directors at respected corporations who find ways to manipulate the technology within the law. The ‘superpowers’ of the future will be those who can conquer the three pillars of wealth-creation, being Nano-Technology, Bio-Techno-logy, and Chemical-Technology. Fuse all three upon maturity, and the world will change to such a degree, that all previous inventions would be deemed inferior. The nuclear bomb would look like a primitive tool when compared with weapons of the tri-technology terrorist (T3) of the future.

By way of illustrating how terrorists can wholeheartedly deny their actions, let us look at the people today who illegally download music or copy films. In their heart, in their mind, in every way they look at it, they are 100% convinced that they are not hurting anyone. Heated debates with intellectual-property thieves would be amusing if they were not downright frustrating. It’s not that they have no shame; it’s that pirates cannot believe that they are guilty of any crime whatsoever. One day, tri-technology terrorists might patent human genes and prohibit people from having life-saving operations unless royalties are paid. They will see themselves as innovative operators deserving of awards, not as agents muscling in for a cut of God’s creation.

Mind you, some T3s will operate underground. Their dexterous discoveries will not be rushed to the patent office. They could not afford to parade their discoveries because they would not want anyone to know of the existence of their concoctions. How could we anticipate invisible weapons when we don’t know of their existence, and when we can’t even imagine the possibility that they exist? [These 
scenarios are explored in my novel called ‘Z’. You can read the first chapter of Z by clicking here.]

7) Disenfranchised

These terrorists feel the pinch in the divide between the rich and the poor, or between those who have and those who don’t. Disenfranchised terrorists seek equity. They fight on moral grounds. They do not mind others being richer, but they bemoan their debilitating and deteriorating condition. They fight on behalf of their wider community that cannot access medication or basic sanitation. These terrorists have tasted fairness and want more. They value peace and will fight for it. They prize freedom and will die for it. They seek justice and will kill for it. They feel cheated and marginalised, and they cannot understand why they are not given the same opportunities as others. Generally, they accuse their oppressors of discriminating against them for being of a certain race or creed, or for their customs and ethics. They made the mistake of nailing their colours to the mast, and now they are paying the price for being ‘one of them’ not ‘one of us’. Poverty begets poverty, so these terrorists feel justified in righting some wrongs. They once had a say, and their vote counted. Now they are not allowed to vote, or if they are, they feel that their votes are quashed by those who rig the system. Within their neighbourhood, they see deprived and depraved comrades who have sold their soul and their vote to a gangster who rewards them for the utmost betrayal — trading one’s conscience for mere existence.

6) Disowned

Unlike the disenfranchised, they have nowhere to go and nowhere to live. Their land is still there, under the rubble that was once their family home. They believe that they are abandoned because help is not forthcoming. These terrorists are forced to watch their children die in their arms, as harsh elements and starvation take their toll. They feel aggrieved and victimised. They know that someone out there sent an incendiary their way, but they cannot imagine who could be so callous, because they have personally never harmed a soul. When they lose all, and have nothing more to lose, they become entangled in a barbaric game of self-preservation. One thing leads to another, and the disowned feel justified to re-acquire. Along the way, they learn more about the phantoms who destroyed their life, so they seek retribution.

5) Disgusted

Disgusted terrorists totally abhor our culture, sense of humour, behaviour, values, and our acceptance of nudity, pornography, alcohol, freedom-of-speech, freedom-of-expression, and freedom-of-choice. They can no longer tolerate our customs and lifestyle that they interpret as a display of indecency and vulgarity. They are not just irritated, but incensed. We might feel that they are over-reacting, and that they are unreasonable, but we simply do not understand how our actions affect them.

In subscribing to the live-and-let-live philosophy, we feel that they are not being gracious. We allow them to perform their rituals. We give them time off work to attend their social and religious events, and we do not disrupt their pleasures. For this reason, we cannot understand why they would object to what we do and how we do it — including our non-observance of certain ceremonies.

It is bad enough that they should object to what we eat, but they also take exception to when we eat. They neither like what we drink, nor what we do in the process of drinking. A sunny day on a topless beach might liberate us, but it inflames them. Their protests are not strictly selfish. They are not trying to stop us so that they can feel better. Nay, they interfere in our affairs for our sake. They are trying to cleanse us, and to help us to see the right path.

Although in our culture we have etiquette, in their culture they have procedures, so for them, there is only one way to do things because there is only one truth. We have voluntary conventions; they have compulsory standards. What we call freedom, they call debauchery. What we call liberty, they call self-indulgence. These terrorists are trying to purify the city by exter-minating unacceptable behaviour. The fact that they were the newcomers into our town, and that they were the outsiders who chose to live amongst us, is inconsequential next to their inherent duty. We value principles. They revere principals who have kindly given us a choice; conform or perish.

Keep in mind that many terrorists are bilingual, and are therefore able to keep tabs on the West. They are unimpressed with the West’s record in relation to social injustice. One day they hear Western leaders espousing capitalism and boasting about corporate governance, and the next day they watch CNN and learn all about corporate crime exemplified by the likes of Enron and WorldCom. They use these examples to showcase the rhetoric of the West. They are sceptical about democracy and freedom, and they cannot buy into the West’s version of truth and liberty, because they perceive the West to be hypocritical. They are disgusted by the West’s double-standards when it publicly disapproves of torture, yet privately practises rendition, which they see as a dirty loophole that facilitates torture. They are bemused when the West is appalled at beheadings, yet via remote-control, it pulverises entire buildings whose inhabitants include innocent women and children. So, they play the same game in return. They torture their captives to degrees that would make our skin crawl, yet they feign rage when they secure evidence that hardship has been perpetrated against one of their own. They cannot fathom the existence of Guantánamo Bay, which they see as a facility used by the Coalition of the Willing to keep people in no-man’s land — a legal limbo where prisoners are protected by neither international law, nor the laws of their homeland, nor the laws of the United States. They see it as a ‘legal black hole’ and a ‘human rights scandal’. They cannot understand why enemy-combatants are deprived of the safeguards decreed under the ‘Geneva Convention relative to Treatment of Prisoners of War’.

The Convention was first adopted in 1929 and revised in 1949. Notwithstanding its charitable intent, it neither addresses nor mentions the dumbfounding issues of terrorism. Perhaps the Convention, like any archaic legal or religious text, needs updating — even if it is just to clarify itself to the modern generation whose new vernacular on the new battlefield does not accommodate old analogies expressed through old language.

The then Secretary-General Mr Kofi Annan said, ‘Our responses to terrorism, as well as our efforts to thwart it and prevent it, should uphold the human rights that terrorists aim to destroy.’ If he recognises that terrorists aim to destroy human rights, how does he propose to deal with terrorists who wish to impose their own laws, and who refuse to adopt any of the UN’s Conventions? It seems to me that we are writing protocols that shackle us morally and physically, while terrorists advance defiantly, backed by recalcitrant dictators and rogue institutions. Contrary to the sentiments of the Geneva Convention, it is foolish to extend all courtesies to our enemies.

4) Desirous

Those for whom self-interest comes above all else, strike because they are jealous. They are the desirous terrorists who see, who lust, who want, so they get. They like what we have, so they take it — just like murderous pirates at sea. No remorse holds them back, because as we know, human desire can be intoxicating and myopic. They want more, and the more the better. They do not think for one moment that we will miss it. If we can afford fancy things, then supposedly we can afford to replace them. But desirous terrorists are not always after material goods. Anything prestigious will do, such as personal profit through power, position, passage, or perpetual patronage. We can see how this fits neatly into the framework of organised crime and powerful gangs. Desirous terrorists see themselves as business tycoons whose only serious threat comes not from governments (officials can be bribed or intimidated), but from other organised criminals — competitors who vie for market share. Drugs, prostitution, money laundering, and people-smuggling are just some of their staples.

3) Devotees or Disciples

Next on the list are terrorists who fight without personal conviction, but with the confidence that their leader knows what to do. These obedient (and sometimes gullible) terrorists are either devotees or disciples. They will follow their master to the grave. In fact, many adore their leader. They hardly understand world politics or military strategy, but these comrades-in-arms feel that they are needed. They are excited by solidarity, and they want to pitch in. So the devotees feel that they are doing for a neighbour what any self-respecting friend should do. If the brotherhood is weak or unclear, it can be strengthened with money. A monthly wage goes a long way to securing loyalty, especially if a devotee’s employment prospects are slim. Warlords don’t mind investing in good soldiers, and none can be better than those who are willing to lay down their life for others. Disciples lead an uncomplicated life. They see the fight in simple terms, as a struggle between the unconscionable enemy and the innocent victim. Simplicity is the key in advertising, and so it is when asking someone to lend a hand. Devotees are plentiful, especially in poorer countries where the monthly wage would hardly keep an Australian’s fridge stocked with beer for a week. Those who do not see money as the great motivator can be persuaded with intangibles, such as fear — come and help us because soon the dark vulture will invade your town too.

2) Deposed or Deported

The second-most troublesome terrorists are the deposed or deported. Indignation fuels their fire. No words can comfort these ferocious terrorists. Theirs is a seething rage. They not only want to reclaim their land, but they are also hell-bent on obliterating the impertinent enemy. Nothing is negotiable. Nothing is acceptable. Not even a total withdrawal will quell their commitment to seek revenge. And when the oppressor is crushed, the terrorists will not settle until they have cast a curse to cripple the enemy’s kith and kin. These terrorists are strategists. Intimidation is but one of their weapons. They know that an anxious enemy is an enemy on notice. An enemy on notice is an enemy on edge. Some might call these terrorists ‘freedom-fighters’. If they play their cards right, they will win sympathy from credible supporters who will inflate their ego or raise their hopes or fund their sorties. If the invader commits atrocities in the process, the freedom-fighters will call on their friends and family abroad to take up arms or to snap at the heels of the brutal oppressor. Here, terrorism combines with patriotism and several other ‘isms’, including the stickiest of them all — nationalism.

1) Divinely-Directed

Topping the list are terrorists who have endless patience and no deadline. These terrorists are on a special mission. Not any old mission, but one allegedly bestowed by god, for god, with god, in god’s name, for god’s glory, and with god’s blessings. These terrorists have no personal gripe. They are like the seasoned executioner who looks at the convicted man and apologises before pulling the rope — sorry, nothing personal. These terrorists have no ill feelings toward us, because we are ‘the scum of the earth’. We are not their personal enemy, not unless we insult their god, in which case things become complicated and convoluted.

Which ‘D’ word do we ascribe to these religious fanatics? It’s a dual-D, being divinely-directed. Their creed is definite; it is absolute; it is supposedly holy; and nothing we do or say can make sense. Besides, they’ve already determined that we are insignificant, so nothing we put forward can be of any value. All our words and retorts are but thorns that jab the nervous system of already miserable terrorists. They are miserable by proxy; they feel sorry that their god has to suffer the likes of us. The divinely-directed terrorists have better things to do, but there’s no immediate hurry because god’s will is paramount, so our elimination is key. Besides, their rewards shall be eternal and blissful in another life. It’s peculiar that these terrorists cannot see the irony in all this. If heaven is the place to be, then what’s all the fuss about down here? Why don’t they just let the unbelievers die on Earth and rot in hell? Alas, irony is for thinkers, and the divinely-directed do not think. They are not allowed to. After a while, they can’t think.

They tell everyone that there is only one god who is merciful, yet they presume that only they have access to him. They believe that god is almighty, yet they think that he needs them to speak for him. They look up to a powerful god, yet they ascribe to him the personality of an impatient teenager. They shoot off at the mouth or from the hip without first asking if the merciful almighty powerful god really wants his Earth to be turned into a living hell. They pray publicly but they have no private relationship with god. They speak and act for him, but they do not consult him. To them, god is the quintessential celebrity whose name they drop into conversations, hoping to show that they have come to know the truth from the source. They have appointed themselves agents of god, without asking if god is so incapable of handling his own affairs that he should want violent angry unforgiving inflexible stubborn warriors on his squad.

The war on terror

Keep in mind that the list above describes individual terrorists. There is a completely different list that ranks state-sponsored terrorism, and another list that classifies world leaders (including dictators, generals, and elected representatives). And don’t forget the tangled web of nations, regimes, and bureaucracies. So in view of these many players, we have to ponder what it means to declare ‘war on terror’.

We have declared ‘war on poverty’, yet thousands of people die daily from hunger. We announced the ‘war on waste’, yet millions of children can’t find unpolluted water to drink. And what of our track record regarding the ‘war on drugs’? Surely nothing short of abysmal. In any case, we would do well to understand that we are not in a war on terror. Terror is not the same as terrorism, which is not the modus operandi of all terrorists.

At this point, let’s look at the anatomy of terror. To do this, let’s first examine horror. Horror refers to a single isolated event generated through the evil machinations of humans. Despite the intensity of the horror, victims quickly understand that the event has passed (even though the trauma might be long-lasting).

Terror is the anticipation of random and recurring horror. Effective terror remains poised to taunt, psychologically and incessantly. It promises more to come, and aims to keep the victims in a constant state of fear. Clever terror is so non-selective, that you know it can reach you or your child anywhere, at any time.

Terror is designed to bewilder us so that we will tamper with our laws and tweak our precepts and make miniscule concessions that, on the surface, seem reasonable and sensible, but strategically, they nudge us across the chess-board into the clutches of a vexatious enemy who knows more about our weaknesses than we do.

No doubt, a conflict beckons. Hence, there are urgent decisions we need to make, and pressing action we need to take, and difficult realities we need to face. Then, having understood the issues, we can rally our forces to fight in the war on destiny. There is a mighty inertia that threatens us. We are destined to lose, because so far, we have underestimated the devious enemy. When I say we, I mean the voting public — the people who want to elect leaders to lead us, but only after we have told them what to do: come lead us, but do what we say, and by the way, 50% of us disagree, so if you upset either camp, you’ll be ousted; and be sure to solve this headache immediately because we come from the now-generation. And be sure to run all your strategies past us first, and if we agree, you can go ahead and do something bold, but let’s first undertake a comprehensive impact study while… Death! This is the ultimate D in the list. Dawdlers do not realise that the nimble terrorist does not understand defeat. We cannot defeat someone for whom the term does not exist.

The enemy in this ‘war on destiny’ literally has no concept of defeat, much like a person who has never feared heights cannot understand why you won’t jump. So how do we vanquish someone who refuses to be defeated? We embrace the decision to destroy. If we don’t have the stomach for it, we are doomed.

The only sensible thing that commentators have said about this ‘war’ is that it is unlike previous wars. Indeed, the new battleground requires fresh tactics. Some people think that we can overcome these hurdles by investing in re-education programs. Not so. People must dispel their current beliefs before their culture can be re-wired. For this reason, re-education is futile. It would be easier to perform a brain-transplant than a culture-transplant. Consider something as harmless as music or fashion. Have you ever tried to convince youngsters to switch from one style of music to another? Have you tried to advise teenagers about their clothes or hair styles? If so, you would understand how concrete they are about their beliefs. They would rather stay indoors than be seen dead in the wrong pair of shoes.

Instead of re-educating the individual, we could discuss the merits of de-educating the mobs, but this is virtually impossible, so why waste limited resources in this area? If de-education is pointless and re-education is useless, it leaves us with ‘education’, full stop. Catch them young and inspire them early. Unfortunately, this is no longer possible. Missions and missionaries have had their day. Rather than try to find ways to reach their children, we need to work out how we are going to prevent them from catching ours.

The intangible war

The materialistic West is distracted because it thinks that victory can be secured on the tangible front. It is desperately trying to protect the three elements that can help it to maintain its stronghold: 1) allies; 2) access; and 3) armoury.

Fearing that it will lose its technological supremacy in the area of armoury, the West is trying to secure its commanding position by hogging the pre-eminent weapon — the nuclear bomb. It knows that terrorists already have two of the three pieces of the jigsaw that comprises: 1) compounds/facilities; 2) components; and 3) competence.

While everyone is being distracted by a sensational tug-of-war on the tangible front, terrorists are making quiet advances on the intangible front — much to their own 
surprise. Unbeknown to them, terrorists have picked up a few tricks from the West: 1) how to package passion; 2) how to sell to the masses; and 3) how to make ideals contagious. These three skills emanate from the power of marketing — something that terrorists have not dabbled in, until now. When public opinion can influence decision-making, we enter an arena dogged by marketing wars.

What must we fear most?

Before I present additional reasons as to why we are almost doomed, we need to answer this question: in the age of terrorism, what must we fear most? Members of the public fear a biological or nuclear attack. They fret about their family’s safety, and they worry about dirty bombs or contaminated water supplies or an attack on vital infrastructure.

In the age of terrorism, what we must fear most is an intangible and invisible disease called ‘corruption’. The D-words associated with this are depravity, degeneracy, and decay — the decay of three elements by stealth, being: 1) corruption of the soul; 2) corruption of the servant; and 3) corruption of society.

In the process of earnestly urging people to ponder the dynamics of corruption, I am aghast at how oblivious we are to it. People in Western democracies so often say that we are not like other cultures, in that we are not afflicted with the disease of corruption. Statements like these elevate my fear to the point of panic. Even the Australian Government’s 
199-page Flood Report, resulting from its official inquiry into its intelligence agencies, did not contain a single mention of ‘corruption’. Corruption does not always involve the exchange of money in brown envelopes. People can nurture corrupt morals and ethics, without even knowing it.

I do not agree with the adage that ‘absolute power corrupts absolutely’. I do not believe that power, in itself, corrupts. It might erode the soul of those who are of dubious character, but it cannot corrupt the upright and mature leader. Corruption is not the by-product of power. It might present opportunities for weaknesses to surface or for flaws to grow, but it does not dilute the resolute person whose ethics and morals have bonded beyond reproach. With this in mind, I cannot see how power is corruption. Rather, corruption is powerful. This is why I place corruption as the number-one disorder, and why I fear it most.

What incubates corruption? The answer is ‘apathy’. And what fertilises corruption? The answer is ‘the simplest, smallest, and most insignificant acts of heedlessness, born of inattention and ignorance’. Here, we have a two-edged sword, in that citizens beg for open government, yet the war on destiny requires decisive action in secrecy, meaning that, with an honourable purpose, leaders need to legitimately withhold information. To preserve our way of life, they must take action that might unfortunately lead to massive conflict that will require the support of the community — but sadly the authorities cannot tell us what they are doing because… because… they cannot tell us why. Hence the double dilemma.

Constituents cannot be told about the larger plan behind the war on destiny, and they cannot be told why they cannot be told. For example, if medical researchers wanted to work out if people who drank six litres of water per day were more likely to lose weight, they would have to lie to their patients about why they want them to consume so much water. If they do tell them that it is an experiment associated with body weight, the patients in the study would become conscious of the experiment every time they reach for a bar of chocolate. Another simple example of this type of predicament happened to me when my boss had to travel abroad. For operational reasons, he entrusted me with a computer password to our firm’s most sensitive and top-secret files. Only two people had previously known the password — he and his boss overseas. He said, ‘Jonar, there can be no reason on this earth that you would divulge this password to another employee, so make sure that no-one finds out.’ He then told me that the password was something like ‘KP5XP7U01’. I could not believe it. That was the same password that the accounts department used for its own systems. What a co-incidence. The computer engineers who installed the system must have assigned the same password to both departments, thereby leading both to believe that it was unique to them. The problem was that the two systems were centrally hosted by the same computer under the same program, which meant that anyone in accounts with basic skills could easily dig into the sensitive files. Two days later, while I was still deputising for my boss, an accountant convinced me that he needed access to the accounts computer to meet a government deadline. His boss was on a flight and could not be reached, so it fell upon me to log-in for him and stand there and watch him log-off after he had interrogated his program. The accountant was livid that I would not trust him with the password, or that I would insist that he log-off in front of me. It all seemed petty to him, but I did not want to be responsible for uttering the password. I felt that I would be betraying a secret, even though many clerks in the accounts department knew that password. My dilemma was that I could not tell my colleague why I was unable to divulge the password. If I had explained that the very same password also opened Aladdin’s cave, he might have told someone, or he might have tricked one of the many juniors who knew the other identical password. It did not matter. Even if I felt that he were trustworthy, I was not authorised to utter the password to another soul, despite this quirky situation. Iron-clad confidentiality was paramount. The accountant accused me of being ‘power-hungry’. All I could say was that I was not in a position to reveal the password, and I was unable to tell him why. This illustrates one simple scenario. Imagine if the consequences were astronomical, as indeed they are in the war on destiny.

Not sharing important strategies with voters, tends to strain the democratic ideals, and puts a society on the verge of losing balance. In an effort to grapple with this, leaders will do their best to justify an attack, even if they have to sex-up dossiers and speak untruths. They will resort to ‘spin’, whether it is about weapons-of-mass-destruction or oil or militant dictators. Their master-plan cannot be revealed. Meanwhile, the sheer incompetence of lackadaisical and arrogant personnel will make a dog’s breakfast of the whole affair and expose the nation to greater risks when they commit the worst of all strategic mistakes — hesitation.

They hesitate because they are uninformed and uncon-vinced, so they consult, discuss, explore, seek permission, ask forgiveness, check opinion polls, submit plans, commission research, conduct media interviews, and prepare a strategy on how to apportion blame — and then resign or get promoted or re-assigned within a short space of time. How can such half-hearted executives (those who have to execute the plans) survive when pitted against an enemy who is adamant, decisive, bold, committed, and down-right single-minded, and who does not have to leave the office at 5:30 for Pilates?

If one thinks of terrorists within the framework of business, what role within an organisation would terrorists hold? Meaning, who would the terrorists most resemble in a corporation? Would the terrorists be like the shareholders, the chairmen, the CEOs, the directors, the managers, or the junior executives? I would say that terrorists are unlike any of these because terrorists would be the entrepreneurs. I describe entrepreneurs as ‘visionaries who give everything they own to test an idea that most people think is unsound’. With this in mind, are we confident that our elected leaders possess this entrepreneurial spirit? If so, can they really operate decisively, boldly, and single-mindedly? Democratically-elected leaders are, in the end, employees who must justify their every move; whereas terrorists are evangelists, missionaries, and combat-ants, all rolled into one.

Death by distraction

In most affluent Western societies, there is a problem in relation to the ways in which the citizens are defocused. By this, I mean that the citizens are themselves split into two groups that are different from each other, in fundamental ways. The first group possesses disturbing Dispo-graphics. Generally, societies are ranked via demographics (age, gender, wealth, suburb…) and psychographics (feelings, beliefs, religion, leaning…). Dispo-graphics is a term I coined to describe people who possess a maturing disposition about life. These people value material goods, but only as tools to a better life. They have reached a point where wealth-utilisation is more important than wealth-accumulation. These are the people who seek the sea-change. Alas, they accelerate the war on destiny because they are too busy inviting friends over. Nonchalantly, they are sucking the marrow out of life, but in the process, they are unaware of wicked eyes preying upon them. Many nations have lost their decadent and sublime lifestyle due to their innocence and naïvety.

The second group that lives alongside those with a maturing disposition is called the distracted population. These are the ladder-climbers in search of a dream. They are materialistic and discontent. They have more than any previous generation, yet they are the least satisfied. They have everything that their grandparents yearned for, including access to better education, medication, and infrastructure, yet they are unhappy. Their daily fixation is on one or more of the six things that torment and distract them: 1) the desire for financial independence; 2) the posturing for social acceptance; 3) the infatuation with body-image to impress others; 4) the hankering for emotional fulfilment through intimacy; 5) the search for happiness and career direction; 6) the need to postpone death, by visiting doctors, popping pills, undergoing surgery, and nipping and tucking to stay vibrant and youthful.

Any Western society whose constituents are preoccupied in such ways is doomed because one lot is befriending the angels, and the other is courting the devil. Neither has their eyes on the ball, and both are outnumbered by the ten types of terrorists and the millions of people who can but lust over the richness of their land, resources, or lifestyle.

What hope have we got?

What are our chances of stopping the needle from plunging into the red zone? Can we survive? The mentality of Generation X and Generation Y is one of hope. We have seen so many advances in our time that we are confident about our future. Even when we are faced with potential pandemics, we are relaxed about the dangers, because we expect that somebody somewhere is doing something clever to solve the problem. We think that nothing is insurmountable if we grant enough money to enough scientists.

Sadly, nothing we try in the war on destiny will suffice — not until we attend to our political, societal, institutional, and personal failings. Below are some of the hurdles we face. If we do not confront these challenges, our future will most certainly be bleak.

A) Distracting discussions

Our society is distracted by committees. Little can be achieved via a committee unless everyone around the table is fully committed to the outcome. Unfortunately, in the individualistic West, committees are a collection of disparate and selfish chiefs who congregate to tell everyone why certain strategies do not suit their personal powerbases.

Once upon a time, the word ‘committee’ was singular, in that it referred to just one person who was committed to supporting the leader; much like an employee (one person) backs the employer.

Committees should only exist if everyone in the room is absolutely immersed in, and loyal to, the new project. Delegates have a duty not to distract a newly-formed taskforce. They are not there to represent their respective members back home. A meeting that comprises a collection of ‘representatives’ is but a gathering of interested parties, not a committee. Anyone who does not make every effort to assist with the outcome of the committee ought to be denounced. Sadly, Western-style committees comprise part-time casual volunteers who attend with suspicion, not with dedication.

B) Derailing diplomacy

Upon committing ourselves to the illusive war on terror, our chief weapons have been politics and diplomacy. These are the wrong tools because diplomacy is only useful in negotiations when the other party has the upper-hand. With whom are we negotiating? In any case, we refuse to negotiate with terrorists. As for politics, this is the wrong tool because politics is the peacetime tool that is used to protect powerbases. Our powerbases are not being attacked. The terrorists who concern us do not place the same value on our treasures because one man’s treasure is another man’s trash. If our powerbases are attacked, it is not so that they can be confiscated, but so that we can be derailed. The war on terror is not a political war, but a war on our system of politics.

C) Despising discrimination

When one person lives by the doctrine of ‘turn the other cheek’, and the other subscribes to the dogma of ‘an eye for an eye’, it is easy to predict who would dominate if they collide.

We have weakened our position because when it comes to multiculturalism, we try to be politically-correct. A society can embrace diversity, so long as everyone signs up to the creed of ‘live and let live’. But when one group tries to enforce its culture upon another, calamity follows. We are allowing divisiveness to sneak through on the back of innocuous cultural shifts and insignificant legal amendments. When we are not looking, and while we are being tolerant and accommodating, foundations are being eroded. Multiculturalism cannot work if tolerant people tolerate intolerant people.

I am not a racist. Rather, I am a ‘meddlist’ — someone who will discriminate against those who meddle, who poke, who prod, and who eventually mould into their likeness (and by force) a street, a community, a country. Those who meddle are difficult to stop. They can only be prevented from starting. Think this through, and the word ‘pre-emption’ creeps into the argument. To be pre-emptive, one requires an intimate relationship with perceptivity.

D) Dismissing disasters

We don’t seem to know the difference between the benefits of being ‘pre-emptive’ and the dangers of triggering a ‘chain-reactive’ process. By all means, we need to pre-empt disasters, and look ahead to halt possible attacks and potential attackers. However, if in the process of pre-emption, we trigger a chain-reaction, then we will soon regret the endless loop that augments a catastrophe.

If you strike a vicious dog, you had better succeed on the first blow, otherwise you will provoke a fiercer attack. Similarly, to curb terrorism, you had better be incisive and decisive, lest you trigger a series of events that feeds the very cycle you were trying to thwart. A chain-reaction is a process whereby two ingredients are attracted to each other. When they combine, they create an unbearable third element that produces more of the initial two ingredients that are attracted to each other… And this keeps on going, but more importantly, it keeps on growing exponentially. If a pre-emptive strike is made upon a country, one had better be prepared to win at all costs. Otherwise, a bigger problem will spawn unabated. Try playing tennis where the number of balls coming at you doubles with every hit.

E) Denying dangers

Sadly, we are neither suspicious enough nor paranoid enough. We quickly forget the warnings. Most of us have not had to suffer the atrocities of war, so we do not even know what the silhouette of suspicion looks like. We don’t pause to think about the loopholes and the backdoors, because we are blind to them.

The fact that Internet scams can still net millions of dollars for fraudsters, shows how gullible society is. Despite all the education and public warnings about identity-theft, people will still answer the phone and divulge information to a total stranger. Credit-card companies even call their cardholders and expect them to undergo a six-point identity check. A major card issuer called me to check a transaction. In so doing, they asked me to verify myself. I objected and spoke with a number of managers, but got nowhere because no-one cared, and those who wanted to care did not understand how identify-theft works, so they did not know what I was talking about, despite them holding the title of Fraud Manager. Six months later, the issuer called me about a different transaction, and again I hit a brick wall.

Organisations go through the charade of security, yet they don’t stop to think that a thief can wait outside to apprehend the courier who hand-carries the backup tapes containing all the vital information. When a drama occurs, they promise a full investigation. How about some healthy paranoia pre-drama rather than post-event?

How many billions of dollars have been spent trying to capture terrorists and criminals, only for them to escape from maximum security prisons within weeks? It is stupidity, peppered with corruption.

On the whole, we see paranoia as an ailment. I prefer to see it as a skill. Sometimes we need more of it. What was that Israeli soldier thinking when a Palestinian lady walked through a checkpoint and triggered the alarm on the metal detector? He told her to retreat, but she insisted that she had an important engagement. He said that no women officers were available to frisk her, so she offered to wait. ‘It will be some time, so you had better wait in the office.’ In she goes through the security doors, inside the citadel, and detonates; killing herself, the young soldier, and seven other officers. This was at a time when suicide bombers were striking weekly. What was that soldier thinking?

F) Dismantling democracy

I understand the dangers of issuing firearms to all and sundry, but we have taken the concept of disarming innocent people to extremes. Countries like Australia have forbidden their citizens from possessing weapons, but not enough has been done to keep weapons off the streets. No matter what the authorities say, gangsters or thugs or fourteen-year-old girls can still acquire weapons. No country is a fortress. Guns, bombs, chemicals, fake passports, and drugs still get through. Even in prisons that are protected by razor wire, cameras, and armed guards, drugs and information still pass through, day in and day out. It is the antithesis of democracy when law-abiding citizens lose power to the outlaws.

This disarming mentality extends beyond firearms. We have also disarmed innocent people by depriving them of vital information. If your daughter is about to marry a shady character, where can you go to find out if he has a criminal history? Nowhere, because no department can divulge private information.

Catch a litter bug, and you catch a whole lot of litter. Stop thugs in their tracks, and you protect hundreds of innocent people. The question is, can a society’s law-enforcement officers be positioned at the right place, at the right time? With a multibillion dollar budget, the US intelligence apparatus failed to foil the 9/11 terrorists, despite the many clues that presented themselves.

On a factory-floor, it is incumbent upon everyone to be a quality-control officer. On the shop-floor, it is the duty of every employee to be a customer-service manager. On the new-age battlefield that has no boundaries, what is the role of innocent people? We don’t want them alarmed, but does it suffice for them to be alert?

G) Disguising dividends

We are in a fix because those whose job it is to combat terrorism, can actually benefit from it. This is the irony of our intelligence and military infrastructure. Who dares to agree with this statement? Who dares to dispute it? It’s an unutterable situation. Alas, those who are assigned to protect us stand to increase their powerbases. Only at the peak of the Second World War did agencies enjoy such support.

Think of the billions of e-mails that circulate the globe. Over 90% of all personal e-mail traffic is spam. In whose interest would it be to rid the world of spam? No-one who makes a living from the infrastructure wants this nuisance to stop. The traffic keeps both the service-providers and the software merchants happy. Every time that a virus is released, millionaires are made.

When a new strain of deadly flu becomes front-page news, what do you think happens to the stock prices of some pharmaceutical companies? I keep urging journalists to ask each of the commentators to disclose their financial interests. When will doctors place a plaque on the wall next to their certificates, declaring their interests? Does your doctor stand to gain from dividends every time a prescription is dispensed for a particular drug? And so it is with intelligence agencies, military establishments, et cetera. They do not wish harm upon innocent people, but they do not bemoan the fact that they have larger facilities, bigger weapons, more money, and an increased staff. And what of security guards who dishonestly apprehend blameless people so as to justify their employment. We saw this when corporations hired dozens of in-house lawyers. They generated writs left, right, and centre. They became litigious because it kept them in a job.

H) Dignifying dogma

The first objective of the Charter of the United Nations is ‘to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war.’ The UN cannot save the next generation from the scourge of terrorism, because it dignifies dogma that ought to be banished.

It is baffling how we have sanctified the word ‘religion’ — the word, not the practice. It has been consecrated and protected by an impenetrable force-field with science-fiction-like qualities. It is astounding how quickly people retreat from an argument when their opponents justify their actions ‘in the name of religion’.

Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states, ‘Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.’

Does this mean that a religion will be struck off the register and no longer recognised as a ‘religion’ if it victimises constituents who wish to change their beliefs? There are significant religions out there whose faithful will kill anyone who opts out. There are religions that refuse to allow others to practise a different religion. Does this mean that the Declaration of Human Rights will not acknowledge any religion that abuses human rights? If so, the Declaration must be re-worded because such an important document must not be nebulous. We must not dignify a dogma that does not allow people to adopt their own brand of religion. The Declaration demands equality for all religions, but it does not offer any protection to victims of religious discrimination. This anomaly voids the Declaration.

A Declaration that protects any and all supposed religions does not serve humanity. The Secretary-General warned that the UN ‘…has reached a fork in the road. It could rise to the challenge of meeting new threats or it could risk erosion in the face of mounting discord.’ He created the ‘High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges, and Change’ to generate new ideas about the kinds of policies and institutions required for the UN to be effective in the 21st Century. He noted that ‘we live in a world of new and evolving threats, threats that could not have been anticipated when the UN was founded in 1945…’

In an effort to revitalise and reform itself for the 21st Century, the UN can make a magnanimous contribution to humanity that will foster peace and sanity by adopting a new declaration that will: 1) define what constitutes a religion; 
2) distribute a list of religions that adhere to all UN conventions; 3) disclose the religions that abuse human rights; 
4) discontinue the membership of any country whose theocracy or dictatorship prohibit its citizens and visitors from practising a different religion; 5) de-register Member States whose official country-name comprises a name of a religion, because this would suggest that anyone living in that country ought to be of that religion, or ruled by it; 6) draft new amendments to the Declaration of Human Rights and the Geneva Convention so that prisoners of war are not afforded religious freedom if their nominated religion is not on the approved list.

If the UN cannot meet these challenges, it would be left with only one course of action: to denounce the Declaration of Human Rights and the various Conventions because there would be no point in having such instruments if they are blatantly ignored by those whose actions would have necessitated their draft in the first place. Nations who abide by the rules are otherwise placed at a severe disadvantage, whereby they are obligated to extend freedoms to enemies who not only refuse to reciprocate, but also inflict indiscriminate pain and suffering in return.

A perplexing question

At the conclusion of my AIPIO presentation, I posed a closing question: what would be worse than not catching a terrorist? I did not furnish the answer. I felt that if the delegates were forced to ponder this question, they would be more likely to understand its significance. I was hoping it would remain unanswered, but one year later, after the London bombings, it became evident. You see, there is something far worse than letting a terrorist get away, and that is to construct an environment within our own society whereby we not only harbour terrorists, but we also create terrorists. The London bombers were home-grown. What could be worse? I was trying to emphasise that terrorists are not always ‘over there’. They can be over here. I saw how we were splitting our 
society into the age-old problem known as the ‘them and us’ syndrome, whereby neighbours began to segregate themselves. This is a massive crisis that requires wisdom that only a seasoned and hardened military general can formulate. It also necessitates action that only a benevolent leader at the rank of dictator can even attempt to instigate. Meanwhile, one of the major contributors to this syndrome is racial profiling.

I cannot over-emphasise the dangers of racial-profiling in mainstream communities. Describing criminals by their eth-nicity is the most damaging thing that a multicultural society can do. It serves no positive purpose. Not a single rational reason can be given.

If in your town there is only one motor vehicle that is made from solid gold and is encrusted with diamonds, then it would be reasonable for the police to issue a media alert to say that the vehicle was involved in an armed hold-up. The uniqueness of the vehicle warrants the description. But if the incident involved a red sedan, what possible advantage does it serve the police to tell the public that a red sedan was involved? Do they expect everyone to file a report every time they see a red sedan? Using this analogy, you will see the futility in publicising a bank robber as being of Middle Eastern appearance. First of all, who is to know what that means? Middle Eastern appearance could refer to anyone from Spain, Italy, Greece, France, Turkey, Armenia, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Kuwait, Oman, Bahrain, Yemen, Qatar, Jordan, Iran, Cyprus, Saudi Arabia, Hungary, Malta, Monaco, and so the list grows. Therefore, what do you expect the public to do? Should people wait outside and contact the police when a person of Middle Eastern appearance walks past?

Furthermore, if four thugs happen to be involved in a drive-by shooting, and supposing that they are all members of the Green Golf Club, would they be called Green’s Gang? Surely not. If they happened to be students of Smith University, would they be called the Smith University Gang? Of course not. So then, why would unidentified third-generation Australian citizens, whose ancestors might have come from Europe and the Middle East, be called a Lebanese Gang? On what basis does anyone know this? Lebanon is one of the smallest nations on Earth. No-one had the wherewithal to take down the vehicle’s registration number, so how did the television reporter know that the occupants were Lebanese and that they belonged to a Lebanese Gang? What does that mean? A professional outfit selected and appointed by the Lebanese Government? How bizarre. I am not trying to protect the Lebanese people’s image. I am warning that such mindlessness will drive a wedge into a multicultural society. It belittles and isolates certain innocent members who feel that they belong to ‘them’, not ‘us’. Make people feel rejected, and you force them to side with those who will embrace them.

In 2005 and 2006, senior figures within the Australian government said that they were evaluating the prospects of deporting anyone who commits a crime. The very thought that an Australian citizen can be deported is fuel enough to ignite anger and loathing in any citizen who swore allegiance to the new country. This despicable proposal is both hideous and embarrassing. Naturally, it can be argued that any law-abiding new Australian would have nothing to worry about; and this would be true. But the fact that senior officials of a multicultural nation can even contemplate this question, proves that they still see the division. It’s as if they have not embraced the newcomers as firm Australians, which means that citizenship is a farce that provides no bonding. It is an arbitrary grant than can be withdrawn. If citizens cannot feel 100% naturalised, they will be forced to re-evaluate their allegiance. Besides, how would such a proposal work when it comes to a child born in Australia, and whose father, grandfathers, and great-grandfathers were born in Australia? Would he be deported and dropped off in Down Town Beirut and told to start a new life in a foreign country? One might as well drop him off in Timbuktu. Under this policy, how many people will be sent back to England, and what will the English do with them? And where will we send Aborigines who offend?

I dare say that many migrants who chose to become citizens of Australia are more Australian than those who had no choice in the matter and were just born at a local hospital. Citizenship, much like marriage, is both an emotional and rational decision. Those who have travelled a long way to disembark on these shores are citizens who made a conscious choice — unlike those whose place of birth was decreed by the arbitrary laws of geography. A country that can disown its citizens is like a wild youth who racks up debts and declares bankruptcy. Both shirk responsibility. Both will pay dearly.

Beyond terrorism

Now that I have highlighted my fears in relation to the dangers of creating terrorists from within our community, I would like to ask another question, and leave you to contemplate its severity: at which point will terrorism stop being terrorism? In other words, when will terrorism morph into a new, deadlier phase? What is the next step from where we are now? For a long time, we ignored terrorism, but now we speak of little else. To what are we oblivious now, and what will soon torment and steal the headlines? I ask you, ‘What’s next?’

The answer to this question points to the subsequent diabolical phase that will plague many nations. There are other questions, of course.

The future of intelligence

Now we come to the function of intelligence officers (IOs). Their role within a society is to gather information so that the larger picture can be brought into focus. This ranges from classical overseas spying by operatives from organisations such as ASIS and MI6, to the security or counter-intelligence work that ASIO performs — sometimes in conjunction with the Australian Federal Police and the state police forces.

Unfortunately, these days many IOs in the ‘security area’ are smothered by surveillance work. It would be better if the job of tracking and spying on individuals moves to a policing role.

Intelligence officers ought to be freed up to ‘perceive and understand rapidly’ so that relevant authorities can take ‘resolute action at high speed’.

IOs require perceptivity to assess risks in terms of, ‘What’s going on, where’s it heading, who’s behind it, and what can be done?’ Nipping things in the bud (through root-cause analysis) would be the most effective. However, no heroes are acknowledged for this type of work. Instead, much hoopla is made when terrorists strike. The invisible work of prevention goes unappreciated.

If we want IOs to nip things in the bud, so that we can take control of our destiny, we require a new type of intelligence organisation — one that knows how to value foresight, not one that waits for confirmations of hindsight. While some people can look at a musical score on a page and hum the tune, others see only a foreign code. Similarly, some intelligence officers run to policymakers to deliver electrifying assessments, but the policymakers insist on proof. In effect, they cannot see, they cannot hear, they cannot understand, until something manifests before their eyes. Some policymakers know that they do not know. The word that 
literally means ‘to lack knowledge’ is ‘ignorance’. Unfortunately, there are many policymakers, managers, leaders, and executives who belong to one of two camps: Ignoramus-FTN who Fail To Notice the signals; and Ignoramus-RTA who Refuse To Accept the evidence.

Before outlining what the new intelligence organisation might look like, it is important to understand that terrorists operate on the basis of AAC — meaning that terrorists attack At All Costs. The only way to neutralise such terrorists is to reform intelligence organisations so that they can operate on the basis of NQA — meaning that intelligence personnel can do what must be done, with No Questions Asked.

If we are uncomfortable with empowering our agencies, then we might as well surrender now. If IOs cannot be trained and deployed, there will be hefty penalties for us all, because terrorists are becoming more sophisticated — soon, they will be undetectable, untraceable, and unperturbed. They will change our laws. We will lose our way of life. And thereafter, they will dictate our right to life.

A society that gives its guardians a brief and then lets them operate freely, is a powerful society, but it is one that exposes itself to huge risks unless it counter-balances autonomy with scrutiny.

Crucially, we need checks and balances. We must not liberate our officers if there is even a hint of corruption or ego or arrogance or incivility or incompetence or self-interest. There is no such thing as half a seesaw or half a pendulum. They must swing both ways in order to be functional. And so it is with powerful institutions. They must be accountable if they are to escape the rot that can so easily destroy the foundations of democracy. I wholeheartedly recommend the NQA method, but only if we appoint independent supervisors to guard the guardians. Giving IOs a free hand within the law does not permit them to dismantle the principles of justice that we have fashioned over decades. The presumption of innocence must reign supreme, along with the right of habeas corpus.

In November 1925, Adolf Hitler told his people, ‘If freedom is short of weapons, we must compensate with willpower.’ Terrorists have now maximised their willpower, and they have marshalled armies in readiness for when they do acquire the weapons. What could Hitler have done with both willpower and weapons? History has revealed numerous ambitious politicians who would have stopped at nothing if given the scope to realise their zeal. Do such leaders still exist? In his early years, Hitler served his country well. Then he flipped. Does our society too readily accommodate potential tyrants?

Divide et impera

Terrorists are uncompromising. If we don’t change how we respond to them, the time will come when, through willpower and weapons, they will destroy our freedom. Is that our destiny? Much evidence points to it.

The warning to us all is that we are doomed unless we can: 1) devise new tactics for an enemy who plays by no rules; 2) desist from shooting messengers who present foresight rather than hindsight; 3) discipline arrogance and other abominable qualities that swell the heads of ill-bred operatives and their subordinates; and 4) divide and conquer.

Beware of those amongst us who try to weaken our resolve with elixirs and sedatives such as ‘false hope’ and ‘popular lies’ about the roadmap to peace. Undoubtedly, many of us would like the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis to end; but that’s not going to happen. Neither the Palestinians nor the Israelis want the conflict to end, because neither side will compromise. They do not strain their intellect in search of an ‘end’. Rather, hardliners on both sides jostle for power in order to eliminate their opponents. Their only frustration is their own impotence. Give them absolute power and they will exercise it without hesitation. They desire to be unleashed, but Westerners keep urging restraint. The only thing they have in common is that they both stipulate total victory. They are not seeking an end to the conflict, but an end to their enemy’s existence.

Both sides are blessed with a new generation of enlightened youth who are amiable and amenable, but these young hopefuls are easily disheartened or defiled when external players, power mongers, nosy neighbours, and arms dealers sabotage their efforts. In no time, youths are stymied by pride and fury. In any case, let no-one tell you that the problems of the Middle East hinge around this prominent issue, or that the drivers behind terrorism spring from our controversial Western polices. Indeed, our Western policies are flawed; in so much as they are executed blunderingly. We Westerners are not perfect, and we are far from competent. We have a lot to answer for. However, Middle Eastern political issues are red herrings that will drag us down while terrorists re-group. We must neither waver from our duty nor desert our posts, lest history mock us for relinquishing the privileges and liberties that our gallant forebears secured for us with their own blood.

If we tarry, terrorists will collude against us. The last thing we want is for the various factions to appoint us as their common enemy. Terrorists will find ‘strength in turmoil’ unless we help them to self-destruct. They have every reason to turn on each other, and they will do this in due course, but for now, they will find ‘strength in numbers’. Despite their differences, they have much more in common with each other than they could possibly have with us. Once upon a time, they would have revered or respected us, but now we have very little to offer. Terrorists are poking fun at us. They see us as glib talkers whose trite promises amount to nothing.

We Westerners can bluff, and sugar-coat, and massage, and sex-up, and spin, but we have now reached the end of the line. This is it. We can no longer postpone the inevitable. In the war on terror, peace is not an option, because peace is a lie, and lies make war.

Speculative fiction, appropriately, is an umbrella incorporating a wide net of genres and sub-genres. On one end, there’s science-fiction showcasing futures where humanity has made bad choices. In the middle are more grounded warnings from the likes of Tom Clancy and Duane De Mello who know dangerous foes are not defeated by playing within black-and-white rules. On the other end, there are simple escapist entertainments by the likes of Clive Cussler and Jack Higgins where technological “McGuffans” are merely the devices that masterminds trot out for world domination, before brave and bold adventurers save us all once again.

Then, after the end of the Cold War, writers like Charles Cummings explored speculative “what ifs” with evildoers representing rogue nations, drug or smuggling cartels, and terrorists that are either Jihadists or literary surrogates for them. Other writers give us novels demonstrating that the most worrisome forces out there today are greedy international corporations with amoral agendas willing to use any scientific and technological marvel to gain power. In such stories, intelligence agents (and even the agencies they represent) are often outmatched, outgunned, and powerless to battle entities with tentacles deep in institutions that the gullible think are regulated by law, government oversight, even international treaties. As a result, fictional heroes who uncover frightful conspiracies aren’t likely to find one handy villain to thwart, but rather onion skins of pawns, front companies, and unseen targets hiding behind elaborate smokescreens and magic curtains.

Frequently, such books are dense, intense, layered. The best of such projects aren’t simple imaginings of what might happen if, say one terrorist group or another pull off some catastrophic event, but rather have themes that are cautionary, eye-opening, educational. Such is the case with Z: A Diary. Z is the first of a trilogy of books by debut novelist Jonar Nader. Z is remarkable for many reasons. It’s remarkable due to the fact Nader, as he discusses in the interview below, doesn’t read novels himself. His fiction is rather a rich scaffolding to set up global events he wants to expound upon in the third book of his trilogy—a book he hasn’t written yet. Equally as remarkable is that Nader is far more an insider of corporate wheeling and dealing than any military or intelligence background, so the dark plot in Z rings with experience of a different kind from most “spy” writers. Much of what Nader calls “Diary One” of his series thus brims with a believability that is alarming in what Nader describes as a “war of destiny,” a war a bit more significant than mere terrorism.

While the Lebanese-born writer claims no literary influences, Nader shows considerable mastery of story-telling techniques. The unfolding drama is framed by a “as told to” structure, so the reader knows we’re looking into a past that changed a planet. It’s chilling to realize that, even stripping the fantasy away, the future can be shaped by but a handful of humans with access to dangerous science who accomplish the worst terrorist attack possible. At its core, Z is the story of Jane Cook, a woman in prison remembering how her life changed after she becomes involved with increasingly dangerous circumstances, set in a hidden communications center under a mansion, and later while on the run from apparent corporate terrorists, ending up on a Chinese ship at sea helped by a captain who becomes a traitor from his own country. At first, Jane is as much an observer as she is a participant among a small circle of men with military, scientific, and industry connections learning about “Octo,” a multi-national organization out for their blood and secrets. In the end, the reader learns how Jane has ascended into a leadership role with consequences that affects every human on earth.

It’s worth noting Z is a book that was released with imaginative marketing. Uniquely, the original hardcover edition of Z had a live battery-operated LCD screen on the front cover. (See note at end—this version is no longer available.) At the end of the story, Nader provides sample chapters from his “How to Lose Friends” books and a link to an online ‘missing’ chapter from what is planned to be “Diary 2” in the series.

So what’s behind this innovative tome? Spywise.net asked Jonar a few questions to dig deeper into his motives, background, and writing style—here’s what he told us:

Q: What were the origins of, and influences on, the creation of Z?

A: When sitting alone at airports, I like to occupy my mind. One thing I do is to ask myself difficult questions. One day I asked myself if anyone in the world could appease all the groups and bring about peace. What could be done to arrive at peace? After months of thinking, I realized that there is no one on this planet with enough power or influence. So then I asked, ‘What kind of person would we need, and what kind of power must we bestow upon them, so that they can have any hope of designing a peace plan?’ These were important questions because many world leaders are only in power for a short time, and even then, they can hardly achieve real change, due to the bureaucracy and red tape. After eliminating several options, I was left with a world government, where the benevolent dictator would have to be in power for twenty years. And even with that scenario, I was unconvinced that we could arrive at peace. Human nature is too complex. Greed and corruption are part of the human makeup. So I realized that no one could ever bring about peace. So then I modified the question, and took the burden away from a person or a system of government, and started to think about an ‘event’ that might get people thinking more clearly about life and its beauty. I immediately dismissed cataclysmic events. A major disaster would change behavior, but not necessarily for the better. People might become greedier in their quest for survival. A major potion or virus that would result in people living for only 12 months would certainly be dramatic, but that, too, would be artificial, and people’s behavior would be erratic, resulting in panic. It reached a stage where I challenged myself to arrive at a situation that would change the world, without changing our daily existence. In a way, I wanted everything to change, without changing the way that we live in general terms. And so I thought about the situation that is brought about through Z. However, I did not really want to write Z. I wanted to write about society’s reaction to Z. But before I could do this, I had to outline, for the reader, how we got into that situation. So in truth, Z was never meant to be written. I was forced to write it to set the scene and explain what had happened. This means that I wanted to write a book that required an earlier story, which in turn that required yet another earlier story. So now I ended up with a Trilogy. Z is now called Diary One. I will have to write Diary Two as well, before I can really start writing the book that I wanted to write in the first place. Diary Three is really where I wanted my mind to go. However, knowing people as I do, they would have too many questions, so I set about to answer those questions first, to avoid conflict with the reader later.

Q: What sort of research was involved to give the situations (scientific, military, etc) the verisimilitude, the believability of your story?

A: Over the years, I have observed human nature, and I understood that people can watch Star Trek, and accept the strangest of things, but only if they can trust that what they are seeing could be possible. However, if they see something that clashes with that believability, they will snap out of the hypnotic ride, or they become distracted. For example, I was watching a modern action film with thirteen-year-olds who could accept that one person could take on a gang of thugs, and that the one person could defy gravity with their karate moves, but the teenagers were disappointed when the hero walked in one door, and came out of the other door dressed in different clothes. They could not believe that anyone could change their clothes that quickly. This means that people might trust the author to take them to worlds that they do not understand. But if the author were to tell them something with which they do not agree, they will start to doubt everything. For example, if the reader is a good skier, or a good card player, or a computer enthusiast, and let’s say that we describe a scenario with a software program and a computer system with which they are familiar, and we say something that they would imagine to be not possible, they will question the author, or worse, mock the author. If the author loses credibility, one is in trouble. For this reason, and knowing that my readers of Z would come from all walks of life, I could not describe a single thing without having it checked. So I contacted experts in every field, and questioned everything about military language, ballistics, sailing, protocol, history, language, explosives, technology, radar, helicopters; down to how large the fuel-tank is, and whether an aircraft can fly that distance on that tank of fuel. Can a listening device pick up from that range? Even the simplest of things, like how someone walks through a door, needs to be checked. For example, in Australia, a revolving door rotates clockwise, and this is how I had originally described someone walking in. Then one day I was watching a British film and I jumped out of my chair, and thought that I saw something peculiar. It played on my mind, so I had to purchase a copy of that DVD and check that scene, and I noticed that the actor was walking through a revolving door anti-clockwise. So I contacted a few people in London and asked them to go to town and check a range of revolving doors. They confirmed this ‘opposite way’, so I had to modify that aspect of my chapter in Z. There is not a single move within the book, about a single aspect of science, geography, or even uniform and dress-code that has not been checked. It was exhausting, and people with whom I checked were perplexed when they, themselves, had never thought about the question.

Q: Especially evident in the debates among your characters, it seems clear you had a number of philosophical points you wanted to make in Z. However, I noticed a far more pessimistic tone to your novel from your far more optimistic “Mission Statement” at your website. Was this because the book is fantasy and not intended to be a reflection of your own views? What themes do you hope readers will consider that were mixed in with the adventure?

A: In all my work and my lectures, I like to leave the audience thinking, ‘I had not thought of that before’. I dislike speakers and lecturers who spin such great yarns that cause people to nod in agreement. It all feels good. The audience then thinks that the speaker was ‘one of us who understood us’. But what did they learn? I go to great effort to inject something new. And so I wanted people to think about things on which they would not normally have time to reflect. The book was not there to serve my voice. I have many ways to express my views via radio and television and my “How to Lose Friends” series. This novel had to stand on its own, and it had to be permitted to take a life of its own. The characters in my book “grew” and did things that I would not do, but the book is not about me. It is about the scenario, and that scenario had to be allowed to morph and develop naturally. So whether a character was good or bad, or pleasant or vulgar, that was not up to me, but up to the scenario as it unfolded. Z is not biographical. Sure, the characters had points to get across, and the points might have been negative, and opposite to my way of thinking about humanity or civility, but the characters had to be allowed to act freely, because that is part of the reality: people can be greedy and corrupt, and I can’t stop them just because I am the author. The theme within Z is to ask why this world is in such a mess. Why do people squander their opportunity to live?

Q: One idea, perhaps best illustrated in the “missing chapter” readers will find at your website, is that Jihadist terrorists aren’t the real threat we face, but that we have more sophisticated groups to worry about. Can you elaborate on this? Do you think our intelligence agencies are missing something?

A: Former President George W. Bush did not send troops into Iraq for any reason that anyone in any of the media articulated correctly. He (and I mean the powers that be) were on a different mission. Sure, it was not WMD and it was not oil. It was something larger than Mr. Bush, but he was the front man. And so it is that all the general ‘above the line’ terrorism that we see, has nothing to do with any of the pawns in the game. Terrorism is not about where they place the next bomb. There are larger plans afoot. So we have a world with puppets on a string. Just go and watch a magician on stage. The audience is expected to watch something carefully, all the while it is something else that is happening before their very eyes which they cannot see. Z is designed to alert people to this. Only last week a friend took me to the Sydney Opera House to see a magic show. It was filled with unbelievable things. Afterwards, my friend was refusing to believe that the magician had switched something around. And I had to keep emphasizing that it is exactly what the magician wanted her to think. So he really did a great job, and she would not alter her perception of what happened, and she would argue with me saying, ‘But I was there, I saw it,’ and I could see how people can be conned and tricked, while they see things in front of them. Now think about the world of people who think they know, yet what they speak about was something they heard from someone else — they were not even in the room at the time!

Q: While many writers have used cold-hearted corporations as villains in speculative fiction, I don’t think I’ve seen one like Octo with so many tentacles into so many arenas of life. Is this fantasy or do you see parallels with what’s happening now?

A: I have worked in corporate life, and I have many clients who are entangled in politics and greed and corruption. What I have seen over the last 25 years is that nothing is what it seems. One phone call can lean on one person, to change the course of a project that concerns the nation or that affects 30,000 people. The power and influence of non-officials is mighty, and they use it to suit their own greedy ends.

Q: You succeeded in establishing circumstances with global impact in rather tight settings—a prison, an underground hideaway, rooms on a Chinese ship. Was this a conscious means to keep the story focused on your cast of characters while establishing a rather claustrophobic realm in which they operated?

A: I was merely trying to show that power and influence takes place from unlikely places, and that little actions in little corners of the world can have grand impact.

Q: Your main cast consisted of intelligent and resourceful characters who were quickly established as independent thinkers. Were they modeled on people you’ve known who also share these characteristics?

A: I am not an experienced fiction writer. I have never read any work of fiction for pleasure. I can say that I have never read a novel. Even at school, when given something like Catcher in the Rye, I did not read it. I was lucky that a week before the exam, the movie was on television. One of my publishers was appalled at this discovery, so she purchased a box of books and insisted that I read one. I did. It was tedious. I hated the waste of time. Having completed the book two months later, I created a special framed certificate and presented it to her, saying that she was the first person in the world to have forced me to read a novel. So this explains to you that I have no idea about novels or how they ought to be structured. I really came to it from a ‘blank’ perspective. I had touched many novels in my time, but after the first para or after the first page, I would discard the book. My patience is very low for books. People had pleaded with me to try to plough through to the first chapter of any book, and I just had no tolerance. So I set out to write a book that would suit my brain. I did not care to appease the literary set. I wanted to write what I thought was a good book for someone as intolerant as me. Having said that, I gave myself the freedom to do what had to be done, without falling into traps. So the book is not about me, and the characters are not people I know. I did not want my world to influence the book’s world. Many of my test readers argued with me about the characters, and that’s because I suspect they saw some characteristics that did not obey their predictable understanding of how certain characters would behave.

Q: The major means of making the takeover of the Chinese ship believable is that the captain has his own motives in terms of a proposed invasion of Taiwan. While this isn’t a primary thrust of your story, does Taiwan seem to be a trouble-spot to be worried about in the future?

A: Yes. The future generation, bit by bit, will appear more recalcitrant towards China, because the future young people would not have had reason to fear China. They would not have had the experience. So they will antagonize China. And China, if it remains of its current mindset, will not back down. So it will have to teach the new generation a lesson. Unless China changes fundamentally, and there is no reason for it to do so, then Taiwan’s rumblings in the future will be too risky for China, so it will have to retaliate. It cannot afford to set a precedent. China will turn a blind eye so long as no-one notices. But if its authority is challenged, it would stop at nothing, and now things would be made worse because the USA is not likely to give Taiwan any green lights. Another scenario is that Taiwan will be used and manipulated by the West, if the West sees China as a threat. Taiwan could be emboldened by way of manipulation. The Taiwanese will think that they are closer to independence, while those pretending to help Taiwan will be using it to spark unrest so as to distract China. But for now, everything is calm on the surface, so Taiwan had better watch its step. But young people will never learn unless they do it the hard way. Incidentally, the first hardcover edition of Z had to be printed in China due to the complex glass electronic LCD display on the cover. The shipment encountered difficulties in relation to the book and its contents. I was going to invite the Dalai Lama for a comment, but was warned that the Chinese would refuse to print the book in China. We were supposed to submit the book to the censors on CD, but we made some excuse and just said that the CD went missing etc, and so the official who was supposed to vet the book, was lazy, and luckily, the book was approved. Had they have had a CD of the file, they would have conducted an automatic search, and found the word Taiwan etc in the book. A year later, when the paperback version was printed in China, someone did notice the Taiwan reference and so we had to do some very quick steps, ship the book, act dumb, and pay a fine. I must have a black mark next to my name now. I had other issues with my books in New Zealand. I landed in Christchurch to commence my national book tour, and that was the very morning that NZ was on high alert after its first terrorist threat with foot-and-mouth disease, and I was detained in Customs. Here was a Lebanese born author touting a book about terrorism, from a publishing company called Plutonium. When they asked me to show them a copy of this supposed book for this alleged book tour, I said that I did not carry a copy. Why? The book has an LCD display on the cover, with electronics and batteries and microchips built inside the cover. Therefore, under an x-ray, the book would look like a bomb. So now we have the words Lebanese, terrorism, bomb, and Plutonium, all in the same sentence. There was yours truly — the defiant fighter, not taking any nonsense from these officials who were on red alert! Fun times.

Q: While it wouldn’t be fair to reveal the twists of the ending, it seems clear you’re about to leave Jane behind and write a sequel based on her “son” on the run. Can you share what readers might experience in the sequel?

A: Many readers do not think that JJ is her son. Throughout the book, some think it is a daughter, until it is revealed. As for the sequel, I can say that you cannot presume that Jane will not play a part. I do not know. However, the sequel could look at how the human race has managed to cope as a result of that scenario that Jane had inflicted upon the world. How would the churches and governments have reacted? Then Diary Three will look at the more natural part of what is happening, and how ecosystems develop under those scenarios.

Z is now only available in paperback. According to Jonar, “The hardcover versions are now no longer working because the batteries have been disabled for security reasons, and there are only a few left in stock. The batteries were causing issues at airports and check-points. The book did look like a ticking time-bomb.”

Here is a link to a TV interview wherein the lady holds up the book, showing the LCD in action:

The following are approximately the first 1000 words from Chapter 1 of Jonar Nader’s book,
How to Lose Friends and Infuriate Your Boss.

Who’s the boss?

Blood, sweat, and fears

If a reputable organisation offered you a job that is similar to your current job, would you take it? If you decline the offer because you are happy with where you are, would you reconsider if the prospective employer offered to double your salary? You would not be alone if you jumped at the opportunity.

Now consider a different question. If you could design a job that fulfils your fantasies, what would that job entail? What would you say if someone offered to give you your dream-job, but said that you had to halve your current salary? For many people, income loses its importance when it is traded with job-satisfaction. Some respondents say that if their dream-job existed, they would try to find ways to reduce their living expenses so that they could focus less on their debts and more on their career. This type of question solicits varying responses based on age, maturity, and family commitments. Typically, those who have become disenchanted with the corporate treadmill are more likely to value job-satisfaction over wealth accumulation.

Many people do not have a clue about how to define their ideal job. Even some of the most senior of executives who are running large organisations have not paused to contemplate what they really want. When someone asks them about what would make them happy, they are unable to articulate what their dream-job would look like. How can you find a dream-job if you do not know what you are looking for?

If you are not sure what you want from a job, this book will help you to build a clearer picture of your career.

If you are the boss, or if you desire to become the boss, this book will help you to understand which skills will be the most important in the future.

If you do not want to be the boss, this book will show you how to become a successful employee who sells services at a premium. It will also show you how you can negotiate better conditions so that you do not suffer the typical ailments of stress and pressure.

Killer diseases

Collectively, we entered the twenty-first century carrying a doctor’s certificate. It said, ‘Suffering from stress. Light duties prescribed.’ What does it mean to be ‘stressed out’? What causes us to feel pressured, overworked, and underpaid?

Every ten years or so, we learn about a new wave of occupational hazards. Most recently, public liability has become so expensive that community events have had to be cancelled and small businesses have had to be closed. Exorbitant insurance premiums have been fuelled by our litigious society, whose members no longer take responsibility for their own actions — even when walking across a field.

Back in the 1990s, employers discovered how costly it could be to handle grievances and ‘emotional damage’ in relation to sexual harassment and unfair dismissal.

In the 1980s, employers refused to believe that ‘repetitive strain injury’ was a serious ailment; not until the courts awarded astronomical payouts to victims of soft-tissue injury. All of a sudden, ‘ergonomics’ entered the vernacular.

In the 1970s, employers and insurers were learning about back-pain and whiplash. For private investigators, business boomed as they spied on unethical workers for whom ‘compensation’ was another word for ‘get-rich-quick’. Lawyers convinced victims to try their luck, promising ‘no win, no fees’.

Despite employers’ best efforts to appease unions, to placate environmentalists, and to satisfy insurance companies, it seems that our places of work are more dangerous than ever. Stress is the new killer that affects workers’ mental and physical health. It destroys both productivity and profitability.

Is it conceivable that, despite earnest attempts to improve occupational health and safety, we have entered an era in which the greatest threat to our workforce is an ill-defined intangible disease that emanates from work itself? Could it be that workers are more inclined to suffer from stress because they are uncertain about their future and because they are not passionate about their work?

Although we can point to many factors that fuel stress, we must find out what triggers it. In my search to understand the essence of stress, I have come to disagree with popular medical definitions. I define occupational stress as a condition resulting from our inability to reconcile our capability with our authority. This means that stress is ignited when we can see a solution to a major problem, and we know that we are capable of fixing that problem, but we have no authority to do so. We are shackled by bureaucracy.

Stress leads to frustration, which in turn leads to a debilitating disease called ‘depression’. I define depression as a condition resulting from our inability to reconcile our inadequacy with our responsibility. This means that depression consumes us when we realise that we are unable to do anything about our own problems. As a result, we believe that our problems will never go away.

Stress test

I have devised a stress test called the ‘elasticity of command’. It enables me to determine an individual’s propensity to suffer from occupational stress. I draw on the analogy of giving employees a piece of elastic to measure the distance between them and the nearest colleague who can obstruct a project unnecessarily. Employees are then asked to compare that by measuring the distance between them and their commander (the boss) — whose responsibility it would be to facilitate a smooth transition for the project.

If the boss is reachable and responsive, the stress level is said to be minimal. If the boss is unreachable and unresponsive, the stress level is said to be extreme.

Stress becomes ‘frustration’ when those who can obstruct us are more powerful than our boss. In industries where everything is processed in real-time, we must be given the tools to make decisions in real-time.

Using ‘elasticity of command’, we can see that the person who is ultimately responsible for work-related stress is none other than the boss (whether it be our own boss, or someone further up the ladder). Bosses, too, can suffer from stress if their superiors are unreachable and unresponsive.

The following are approximately the first 1000 words from Chapter 2 of Jonar Nader’s book,
How to Lose Friends and Infuriate Your Boss.

Have you been naughty or nice?

From performance appraisal to staff reprisal

Performance appraisals affect the majority of employees. Often they are a complete waste of time because they are manipulative, stressful, counter-productive, and ineffective. Most organisations tell employees that reviews are necessary for personal development and for salary adjustments, yet they use them for ‘crowd control’ or as a legal tool to oust non-performers or those whom they do not like. Interestingly, this tool has backfired on employers just as many times as it has been useful in court. As a result, modern review documents are drafted by lawyers, written by psychologists, then edited by personnel managers. By the time they reach employees, they are unbelievably convoluted, irrelevant, and downright impossible to implement because the measurement processes are nonsensical.

Regardless of the final scores, pay-rises and bonuses are determined arbitrarily by those who control the purse- strings. Their game reminds me of magicians who start with, ‘Pick a number, any number… ’ and then proceed to tell us what that number is. Managers often know who they want to reward, so the performance review becomes an academic exercise that is reverse-engineered to fit the pool of funds that has been allocated for certain bands of ‘performers’ — or dare one say ‘cohorts’.

I have no objection to managers using subjective and discriminating means to distribute rewards by way of money, title, position, and power. Why go against human nature? No matter how a review mechanism is designed, and no matter how many computerised forms are filled in, managers will still have their own inexplicable justifications for who they like, who they appreciate, who they loath, and who they wish to promote. These intangible feelings cannot be specified on forms. After all, what mathematical reasoning process do you engage in when determining who you like or dislike? The complex emotional and egotistical methods that are used to categorise friends is not something with which a computer can cope. It all boils down to processes that cannot be measured. For more about human behaviour, see Chapter 8, ‘I’m not a racist, but… ’

Nudge nudge, wink wink

When I was eighteen years old, there was a young chain-smoker not far from where I lived. We used to go for walks in the night air. I cannot recall his name, but what sticks in my mind is that he was honest about being stressed. I never knew what troubled him, and I did not ask, but he would say something like, ‘I’m so stressed out… I am under so much pressure.’ That would not normally captivate me, except that he had an obvious twitch. As a youngster, I did not link the two. I had no idea that stress could cause such visible side-effects — not until I suffered the same problem a few years later.

One of my bosses had the nicest smile. She was petite, attractive, and said very little. I automatically assumed that her demeanour made her an agreeable person. But I was in for a shock. Her intimidating ways left me with a twitch that I could not shake off for eighteen months. I did not link the two until she left the company. It is funny how a clear and present threat can linger with us for ages. It can even go undetected until we are far away from the situation to see the real cause. I was unaware that her subtle, yet unrelenting intimidation had such an effect on me. I reflected upon my neighbour. I had erroneously presumed that his twitch was a result of a mental disorder from birth.

I was angry with myself for being so naïve and helpless in my manager’s presence. I always thought that I was tough and resilient. Although at school I was able to take on bullies of all sizes, I had no tactics to handle adults. Worse still, I was untrained to detect the kind of intimidation that led to my nervous twitch. Eventually, I became aware of such terrorisation, but only to a limited extent because I was caught out again with a new mechanism called the ‘performance review’. Regardless of their intended purpose, and irrespective of how they are implemented, performance reviews are demeaning. The whole notion of bosses sitting employees down and grading them, like farmers grade their eggs, is humiliating. Who do they think they are?

Irreverent logic

For organisations that use performance reviews, it would be difficult to convince them to abandon their entrenched procedures. It would be problematic to engage in a discussion about this because of magnetic thinking — meaning that irreverent logic is used to argue a point about a practice whereby the intention is virtuous, but the execution is flawed.

Advocates of performance reviews could list dozens of benefits. The ultimate and most important one is to improve the company’s performance. With that intention in mind, anyone who argues against reviews would seem to be arguing against improving the company’s performance. This is what is meant by irreverent logic. Of course we should find ways to improve performance. In so doing, managers are warned against using noble intentions to fuel ignoble programs that infest organisations in the guise of excellence.

Over the years, performance assessment schemes have been modified, tweaked, re-cast, and re-designed; all to no avail. For years, performance reviews have attempted to embrace seventeen main areas. These are to: set standards; determine benchmarks; give feedback; coach staff; drive pay-rises; determine promotions; reward on merit; measure performance; document incidents; meet legal obligations; develop talent; outline training requirements; plan careers; highlight weaknesses; raise the alarm for bad employees; give warnings; and justify dismissals.

Any human-resources mechanism would be burdened if it were expected to administer more than one objective; let alone seventeen.

Performance appraisals are not, in themselves, harmful. But the unavoidable side-effects are intolerable. If a commercial medicine caused insufferable side-effects, it would be withdrawn from the market. If a headache tablet worked wonders to relieve pain, but caused hair loss, people would reject it. When the downsides are obvious, it is not hard to understand that an effective product can also be defective.

The following are approximately the first 1000 words from Chapter 3 of Jonar Nader’s book,
How to Lose Friends and Infuriate Your Boss.

Networking

You scratch my back, and I’ll be off

Many people ask me why, on my business cards, ‘Post-Tentative Virtual Surrealist’ appears under my name. I usually joke that it is a diagnosis of a rare medical condition. Here is the real story of how I came up with the title.

At a corporate function, an irritating couple was working the room. It was obvious that they saw the gathering as an opportunity to develop business contacts. They were not at all shy about walking up to each small group, offering their business cards, making some small talk, extracting some information, and then moving on to the next cluster, saying, ‘We’ll call you next week. We have some very interesting things to tell you.’

It was obvious that they were networking. Eventually, they meandered to my corner to perform their ritual — a big smile, a firm handshake that could easily turn into a hug if one were not careful, and the ceremonious exchange of business cards. The four people in my circle obliged by surrendering their cards. The smooth operators read the cards, clarified each person’s title, and made some overly friendly remark that bordered on sycophancy.

‘Oh, hello Jonar. Good to see you here,’ said the woman, gleaning my name from my name tag. She had already given me her card, but noticing that I had not given her mine, she offered another card in one hand and held out the other hand in the hope that it would prompt me to give her mine. I took her second card, but I did not reciprocate.

‘So, Jonar, who do you work for?’ she asked.

‘I’m just here as a guest,’ I said, unwilling to divulge any information to the nosy assailant.

‘He’s with IBM,’ volunteered one of the people in my group, thinking that he was being helpful.

‘Who do you report to?’ she asked.

‘Someone overseas. You wouldn’t know him,’ I said.

‘What’s your title?’ she persisted.

That style of interrogation is not to my liking, so I said that I did not have a title. She refused to believe me. ‘You must have a title!’ she said.

Irritated, I replied, ‘I’m a post-tentative virtual surrealist.’

‘A what?’ she demanded, while maintaining her fake smile.

Talk about a nuisance! Still, I have her to thank for my new job title, which I had just made-up on the spot.

What do you do for a living?

You might have gathered that I dislike networking. Those who know me might be confused, because they think of me as a good networker. I would remind them that I have never called to take advantage of them. I have never asked them a personal question, or probed into their private life or work. Furthermore, at functions I never ask anyone about their work, their job title, or their family, unless they first volunteer that information.

Here is another little secret about me: I am quick to dismiss people who start a sentence with, ‘What do you do for a living?’ Mind you, these days, my work is rather public, so there is less of that. I now have to suffer a new set of repetitive questions.

Although such questions are used as innocent ice-breakers, they show signs of a weak capacity for stimulating conversation.

The fundamental rule when initiating a conversation is to ask yourself if what you are about to say to a total stranger is original enough to be interesting. If the stranger is well known, such as a celebrity or an industry figure, you would have to consider if what you are about to utter are words that the celebrity has not heard a thousand times before.

A rule of thumb when meeting someone for the first time is to observe the first question that pops into your head — and make a point of not asking it. Do not bore others by asking mundane or excruciating questions. You will know how boring this can be if you have ever had to wear a cast for a broken arm or leg. Remember how many people made it a topic of conversation by asking, ‘What happened to you?’ It is the same when you have just had a haircut. People say, ‘You’ve had a haircut,’ as if you did not know.

Therefore, consider what you say, and to whom. Allow people to be who they are, not what they are. When you meet people for the first time, do not ask them stock-standard questions that do nothing more than box them into a social set, while signalling that you are only interested in them if they lead an interesting life. Besides, people who lead an interesting life do not usually want to talk about it with total strangers. They could well be exhausted with the subject, modest or shy about it, or just be in need of some privacy. Successful people long to be accepted — but not for their connections, contacts, or fame.

Do me a favour

Many people seem to think that networking is all about getting to know influential people with a view to securing advantages. The practice is so entrenched in business and in society that formal invitations often say something like, ‘You are cordially invited to our annual celebration where you will have an opportunity to network…’

Networking is damaging not because it is harmful in itself, but because it sets up expectations that could disarm you. Do not become a victim of networking by placing your confidence in people who could distract you and sap your energy.

Fundamentally, networking is a waste of time because your success needs to be built on solid foundations. Those who live in the hope that one day someone will discover their talent, will be disappointed unless they build their own infrastructure.

Do not rely on others to do things for you. If you meet people in positions of power, what you do not know is how they got there, and how long they will be there. Beware the manipulators who hold positions of power. Before you know it, they will be hyping up their life and lifestyle in the hope that you will become enamoured of their connections and capabilities. If you try to seek favours from them, you will be targeted and caught before you know it. While you are hoping that they will do something for you, the tables will turn and you will end up doing something for them.

The following are approximately the first 1000 words from Chapter 4 of Jonar Nader’s book,
How to Lose Friends and Infuriate Your Boss.

The early bird catches the bookworm

For years, I have been a critic of commercialised education, saying that studying at university is, more often than not, a waste of time for those who go there in the ‘hope’ that they might find a direction. Unless they have a specific purpose for obtaining particular qualifications, students are likely to regret their actions. This chapter outlines salient points about how education relates to personal development. It points the way to a satisfying and rewarding career — with or without the help of formal education.

The first step is to acknowledge that no level of qualification is useful for prospective students, until they know the direction that they want to take. Alas, most students approach this problem in reverse, attending a university to find a direction. Such a process is futile. Tertiary studies ought to fuel existing passions, not ignite new passions. Studying a subject merely to seek a qualification, so as to impress employers or peers, is not being true to oneself.

Any criticism levelled at education does not pertain to learning. Fostering an inquiring mind and learning how to develop (and later to feed) an insatiable appetite for knowledge ought to be the second-most urgent pursuit of the intelligent being.

Our uneducated pioneers

Many of the products and technologies that we use today were given to us by uneducated pioneers.

At your next social gathering, ask your friends this question: ‘Think of the ten major inventions or developments of all time that you would deem to have been the most important for society’s progress.’ Perhaps each of the ten would have been given to us by pioneers who, if lined up today, would not pass a basic university entrance examination. In their day, they might not even have been respected citizens.

Imagine attending a concert where you are entertained by sixty leading musicians performing some of the most energising music you have heard. How would you react to being told that the composer does not read music? It seems impossible that such a person can compose breathtaking masterpieces for a sixty-piece orchestra! One such musician is Yanni Chryssomallis.

Who says that Yanni has to read sheet music? Which came first, music notation or music composition? Surely notation and sheet music reflect what musicians do best so that the rest of the world can learn from their talent.

Beethoven composed music while completely deaf, yet many of us would expect that hearing is a prerequisite for composing and performing. We need to adjust our understanding of what it means to be an expert of our craft.

Leading-edge thinkers are years ahead of educators in institutions. Thinkers go about their business by innovating, devising, inventing, building, and paving the way so that other people can benefit from better products and improved processes.

Universities do not create brilliant people. They merely seek the knowledge that brilliant people possess, and re-package it in the form of information. The recent information-technology industry that has changed many aspects of our life (and kept the economy buoyant) was propelled by non-graduates. Universities could not keep up with what these innovators developed. School dropouts were innovative, so universities rushed to observe what was going on. Entire faculties were built to capture the fury of an emerging industry. The innovators were the inspired and talented, not necessarily the university-educated.

Nowadays we are hearing more about the importance of ‘knowledge’. The slogan ‘knowledge is power’ is misleading. Knowledge is not in itself power. Rather, power comes from the application of knowledge.

The grand illusion

Many students are under the grand illusion that they can ‘become something’, merely by undertaking the appropriate course. When they make a decision about the profession they want to pursue, they genuinely believe that all they have to do is get the right marks, apply to a university, and if they are lucky enough to be selected, they can be on their way to reaching their goal.

We live in a world of ‘instant gratification’ whereby we want answers and pleasures immediately. We expect to see results straight away. We are impatient when we go in search of joy and ecstasy. We dislike waiting for medication to work, and we expect speedy recoveries. We want paint to dry instantly, and we want beauty products to enhance our features without delay. Yet, strangely enough, there are still some things for which we are prepared to wait. For example, many people are prepared to go through tiresome routines and long time-frames to attain a goal. Prepared to work hard all year at a job that they do not particularly like, they wait patiently for a holiday, thinking that eleven months of misery can be alleviated by four weeks away at a resort.

It is with the same perverse sense of delayed fulfilment that people are prepared to invest years into tertiary education, hoping that they will eventually find an excellent job. They also believe that the more they study, the more likely they will find employment in an exciting industry, working for an innovative company. This is the promise that many students want to believe in — just like we all want to believe in the perfect marriage and the blissful loving relationship. Unfortunately, the problem with following such a dream is that by the time we find out that we have been misled, it is often too late to reclaim our energy and our youth. Seeking job-satisfaction by undertaking tertiary education is often a gamble. Gambling life away with idealistic fantasies at education institutions that paint rosy pictures, is folly.

Interestingly, institutions espouse the benefits of education, yet they are not responsible for delivering on the promises they make. There are no guarantees. There is no recourse at the end if you find that you do not have an advantage after all.

The modern rationale for tertiary studies

Students have many reasons for attending college, not dissimilar to the varied reasons why some people attend church. Their faith might draw them to worship with their community. Some attend for social reasons, others attend out of habit, or because their parents force them to go. Some might be there to steal a glimpse of their sweetheart. They might pursue their religious activities out of hope, fear, guilt, or custom. Some churchgoers attend for the sake of their partner or children; others attend with neither a sense of purpose, nor conviction, but through obligation or indifference.

The following are approximately the first 1000 words from Chapter 5 of Jonar Nader’s book,
How to Lose Friends and Infuriate Your Boss.

You deserve what you get

Searching for a black spider in a dark room

I can now confidently predict the top-ten questions that I would be asked after my public lectures. Invariably they include queries about the secrets of job-satisfaction and career development. People of all ages, and of all backgrounds, are finding it hard to understand how their work can complement their life. They admit that they do not have a vision for where they are heading. They say that they do not have a sense of purpose. They feel guilty for not engaging in passionate pursuits. They blame themselves for having lost their zest, and they accuse the company of losing the plot.

Even those in well-paid positions within booming industries feel vulnerable and insecure because they know that they are not adequately contributing to their organisation. All that they can do is wait helplessly for something to happen, yet they stagnate as the empty years slip away.

Employees become frightened about their future because they cannot set a direction, let alone see the vision. They think that their only strategy is to engage in further studies in the hope that additional qualifications might lead to a better career. They lose their confidence slowly, much like a punctured tyre loses air. Before they know it, they are depleted and helpless. Eventually, they lose their ability to negotiate, because they no longer believe in themselves. When they reach this point, they become averse to risk. Besides, they have already emptied their energy tank, giving their all to their employer. They have no fuel left to tend to their own nest, so they work doubly hard on the treadmill so that they cannot be accused of disloyalty. Some employees cannot see that they are disposable — until that unfathomable moment when they are dismissed, or retrenched, or eased out one way or another.

No matter how abusive their boss might be, they become numb to the torture because they do not dare to show signs of displeasure. They cannot afford to bite the hand that feeds them. They become professional beggars for financial and emotional sustenance. Like hostages who grow sympathetic to their captor, they become dependent on the boss to stroke their ego, no matter how brutally. Mind you, the only thing more disturbing than abusive employers is surrendered employees. Those who concede defeat will reason that they got what they deserved. Eventually, they attribute their failure to the company and its management, or to fate, or karma, or numerology, or astrology — in fact, to any external force that can explain their demise.

What do you deserve?

There is an old maxim that says you get what you deserve. If only that were true. Do the famine-stricken deserve relentless pain and sorrow? Are the forty million children who live in abject poverty and slavery deserving of their plight?

Every child deserves a loving family. Every family deserves a happy environment. Every society deserves peace. Every nation deserves prosperity. And why not?

Do you deserve a better job? Do you deserve a prosperous life packed with fun and adventure? Of course you do. Everyone deserves wonderful moments to fill the short amount of time we have on this planet. And why not?

Who among us would not feel deserving of a fabulous job? Who would not yearn for an energy-charged career? Who would not desire luxuries to share with loved ones?

The world offers its beauty and invites us to partake in its generosity. All that is required of us is to reciprocate. The law of reciprocity allows us to extract love when we inject affection, to extract peace when we inject happiness, and to extract wealth when we inject value. When we give our best, we can claim the best.

My brilliant career

Central to all of these riches is our career. It is the mechanism through which we toil lovingly so that we can be rewarded completely. Through our work, we can claim our worth. Through our labour, we can claim our rest. Through our craft, we can claim our position.

Our social structures have conditioned us to believe that our status in society hinges on a respectable career. A job is like a name-tag that reveals our identity.

Are you really engaged in a labour of love, or are you merely an employee whose primary objective is to race through the day so that you can get home on time? Is leaving work your main focus when starting work? Is concluding a call your principal goal when answering the telephone? Is finishing a task the main aim when starting it?

When your actions are activities that merely pass the time in anticipation of a brighter future, you can be assured that you will not be granted an enchanting future. Those whose current job is not rewarding, can be certain that their next job will not be rewarding. This means that if you are not happy at this moment, you will not be happy at a later moment because time and place do not govern happiness. The same goes for job-satisfaction; it has little to do with the job itself.

When the vision is blurred

If you are dissatisfied with your job, yet have a deep-seated desire to improve it, you might be wondering what you can do to find your path. You might be searching for something to grab your attention. You might even be willing to surrender your every waking moment to something that can excite you. Alas, you have racked your brain and are unable to find your passion. Nothing takes your fancy — well, nothing within your reach.

You are not alone in feeling that your career is non-existent. You might even still be a student, trying to find a way to embrace your course, without a clue about how your studies can help you to find a direction. Lacking vision (blindness) is one of the nine modern intangible diseases that are explained in Chapter 7, ‘Please cancel my disorder’.

When people ask for help to find an exciting career, I remind them that careers cannot be found because they must be built. There are no shortcuts. Do not confuse ‘position’ with ‘career’. Positions are irrelevant and are of no value. To assume that a position brings contentment is as erroneous as the assumption that living in a mansion yields a happy family.

The following are approximately the first 1000 words from Chapter 6 of Jonar Nader’s book,
How to Lose Friends and Infuriate Your Boss.

Looking into the seeds of time

You can’t reap what you can’t sow

Shakespeare wrote, ‘If you can look into the seeds of time and say which grain will grow and which will not, speak then to me…’

Can you look into your own situation and know where your future will take you? This is difficult. It is for this reason that you are better off focussing on planting the right seeds and nurturing them.

During some of my lectures, I hand out seeds and ask students to tell me what those seeds will produce. They could be holding seeds from which will grow the most intricate of flowers, or the most marvellous of vegetables. No-one is able to tell me, because most seeds look the same. They are brown, hard, small, unattractive, and offer no clues whatsoever about what will spring from them. Even if cut in half, there is no way of seeing the miracles of creation. Deep within the cells reside incomprehensible codes that untangle to unite with the soil, sun, and rain to produce profound beauty. Each seed has an inbuilt reproductive system so complex that it can humble anyone who ponders the intricacy and miracle of life.

The garden of Eden

Each of us carries an assortment of seeds — whether inherited or acquired. All the seeds look the same, so the challenge is to know which to nurture and which to discard. These seeds are sometimes called opportunities, skills, talent, attitude, luck, or fortune. In the style of Vollenweider’s poetry, I maintain that if we harbour seeds of doubt, we will grow vines of confusion. If we endure seeds of tears, we will contend with leaves of loneliness. If we cultivate seeds of compassion, we will raise trees of love. If we develop seeds of understanding, we will produce fruits of forgiveness. If we foster seeds of tenderness, we will sprout flowers of laughter. If we nurture seeds of calmness, gardens of joy will flourish.

So it is with our careers. What we sow today will determine what we can reap tomorrow. Therefore, those who are confused about their careers can easily determine what their future will bring, simply by looking at what they harbour, what they foster, and what they nurture. Take a close look at your life and observe what you tolerate and what you cherish. Observe what you find agreeable and what you find permissible. That which you allow into your life will set the foundation for your future. This means that if you allow energy-sappers into your life, you can be certain of a depleted future. If you accept mediocrity, you can be certain of misfortune. If selfishness is your disease, you will contend with emptiness.

Mission improbable; vision impractical

Many people do not understand what it means to have a mission. A mission is a set of activities that you must accomplish if you are to reach your goal. So start by deciding what you want, then reverse engineer your strategy so that you can determine which seeds you need to accumulate. Never mind trying to dictate how the seeds will grow, because you cannot control the laws of nature. Do not tamper with nature. Instead, learn its laws. For example, if you inject hatred, you will see devastation. If you inject laziness, you will see death.

Your most urgent task is to focus on what you are doing right now. How well did you perform today? How hard did you work? How much love did you inject into your craft? Did you try to cheat anyone?

People fumble when they go in search of that which cannot be found, and when they seek to turn into that which they cannot become. For example, a chef who wants a cake does not set about to become the cake. Furthermore, the chef does not go in search of the cake. Instead, the chef sets about acquiring the right ingredients in order to bake a cake.

This means that when you can see what you want for yourself, you cannot attain it by looking for it because ‘it’ does not exist — you have to build it. This is what is meant by building your career. (By the way, what you ‘see’ becomes your vision, and what you must ‘do’ becomes your mission.)

The first step in any mission is to acquire the appropriate ingredients. These might include knowledge, awareness, attitude, and other soft and hard skills. The second step would be to learn how to combine them. The third step would be to build the stamina to be able to physically unite them in the right proportions so that they blend harmoniously.

This is not as easy as it sounds. In the case of baking a cake, almost every household has the ingredients, yet few would know how to mix them. Although their pantry contains flour, sugar, eggs, and butter, and even though they all have an oven, few are able to bake a mouth-watering chocolate gâteau. So it is with careers. Most people have the ingredients. Sadly, the possession of ingredients is not sufficient to cook up a storm. It requires knowledge and timing.

It is important to learn about the general ingredients you need for success. Set about acquiring them, and learn how to combine them, and build the stamina to be able to undertake any arduous task. Here you will need persistence and tenacity.

Press on

The worst thing that disgruntled employees can do is to ‘work to rule’ (whereby they do only what is required of them, and nothing more). Being on a ‘go slow’ is self-damaging. It would be like refusing to undertake your exercise program just because you do not like the gym instructor. Many resilient prisoners maintain their exercise regime while in captivity. If they refuse to train simply because they do not like the prison and its wardens, or because they feel that they were incarcerated unjustly, they would only be harming themselves.

You need to keep up your personal development program no matter what you think of your boss or the organisation. Whether your boss deserves it or not, you need to maintain your momentum so that you do not slow down. By the time you have built the right attitude, aptitude, and acuity, you will be in a comfortable position to design and build any career you choose — much like a chef can use handy ingredients to make different delicious four-course meals any night of the week. Combining talent and energy to create your own opportunities is more important than lusting over one job. It is better to learn how to cook, than to master one recipe.