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Mother! I just fell on my sword – Cultural differences in dealing with shame

One week ago it was my father in law's birthday in Malaysia and we celebrated it with a visit to the parent's home in the kampong. For a guy that that has everything already and who doesn't care about the rest, at 73 years of age it can be difficult to find something special. But we managed. Some 200 million years ago a rogue meteorite hit mother earth with tremendous force, supposedly wiping out dinosaurs and leaving behind a curiosity called Apache Tears which resulted from the heat and friction of the impact and are a type of black obsidian. When I was still in New Zealand and we were trading antiques at markets across town, I used to wander around the stalls. On a sunny Saturday, 25 years ago, I thus came into possession of two perfectly smooth and one uncut Apache Tears from a kindly New Zealander who was a stone collector, and they travelled around the world with us as a curiosity, to be unpacked in one place and then to be repacked again off to another exotic destination. When I presented the stone to my father, it turned out Malaysia also has such stones, but here they are called Tahi Bintang, literally translated as "Star Shit", an interesting name indeed. My family also advised me that the stones bring good luck and ward off evil, which is definitely a bonus considering they came into being as a result from a giant piece of bad luck for the dinosaurs.

Apache Tears strangely enough carry the same connotation in Arizona as they do in Malaysia, albeit with a more user friendly name, but there is an interesting additional folklore attached. For as the story goes, around 75 Apache warriors faced off a superior US Cavalry force in Superior, Arizona, in the 1870's, home of the stones, and rather than be captured ignominiously, all warriors chose death over defeat and jumped with their horses off a cliff. Their family members, overwrought by the tragedy, shed tears which hit the ground and turned into Apache Tears.

For many years I have been following news of corporate and government misdemeanours in Asia and elsewhere in the world as part of my daily reading, and to check up on any new schemes cooked up by the miscreants. Amongst these are many of our so called corporate captains and political leaders who should have known better. I recall one major case related to train collisions in Japan several years ago, echoing a very good opinion piece which was written after the Exxon Valdez disaster in the 1980's, in which the writer drew a similar example, suggesting the then Chairman of Exxon resign his job in the same way Japanese CEO's do after a major corporate disaster. (See Perspective, Exxon Boss Should Quit over Oil Spill, Copyright Chicago Tribune, 1989, Gary McDougal. www.macdougal.com/trib3.html ).

Interestingly, the then Chairman of Exxon, Lawrence Rawls, did not resign and in fact stayed on until his retirement, in spite of being criticized over his slow responses to the disaster and the handling of the aftermath. In contrast former South Korean President Roh Tae Won did a much better job of it by jumping off a cliff after he was indicted and was to face prosecutors over corruption allegations. His suicide note is quite poignant stating that "Too many people are suffering because of me". I am very impressed with Prescient Roh, who thereby echoed the principle, in words and in deed, which my father taught me when I was knee high. For some reason we were watching a movie about German SS soldiers lining up a number of civilians to execute as part of some reprisals. I asked dad what he would do if he were a German soldier, as it was clear a great injustice was being perpetrated. My dad straight way, without any hesitation, told me that he would break rank, join the civilians, and face the execution squad like a man. He suggested no proper thinking individual with any values or ethics of note would do anything else in such a situation.

We are currently facing many similar catastrophic disasters which affect our environment in different ways but are nevertheless equally devastating to the world at large. These are causing "too many people" to suffer because of the incompetence and deliberate malfeasance of those who should have known better. I am not going to draw up a long list of culprits as it would be wasteful and too time consuming, and likely take a large number of pages on our website.

I will however question why it is not possible for those who have been engaged in unconscionable acts to fall on their swords. Many cultures besides those mentioned seem to require their leaders to do so, rather than to claim that they are entitled to a life time pension after resigning, as the Chairman of the Royal Bank of Scotland did. In that case I am also interested to know why it was so important to have a "con-sensual departure" which to me sounds like a huge orgy on the eve of departure to ensure that none of the carefully hidden skeletons would come out subsequently to embarrass yet more of the fellow captains of industry. The word Con Sensual sounds like incontrovertible images of sexual misdemeanour were captured for posterity at said orgy and are now being kept in a safe in case that…….Remember J Edgar Hoover.

From an early age we have been taught about market economics. After the fall of communism, which J Edgar would dearly like to claim as a personal achievement if he was still around prancing in his pink tutu, the concept that "the market knows best" and the invisible hand theory have been taught to consecutive generations of graduate students by their lecturers, since communism was definitely proven to be a failure. I would argue that the invisible hand has proven, in the end, to be as tangible and reliable as the Emperor's clothing and likely as much of a failure as communism was. If markets are driven by potential rewards for risk taken, then maybe, just maybe, some of our captains of industry and political leaders chose to apply the equation very strictly and elected to ignore any downsides, just like the voters. I think it is about time that there is a change of mindset. If anyone needs a sword I am happy to lend it out.