Do You Work for Love or Money? - The Mercenary's Tale

Note: About Focus Questions: a) Please read them before you come to the meetup. Think about them so you have more than "instant opinions" to offer. b) Feel free to add more focus questions. c) THE FOCUS QUESTIONS ARE JUST A MENU TO CHOOSE FROM. From this menu we can discuss whatever seems interesting. d) Focus questions are not intended to push one viewpoint! You can adopt any position you wish. We actually like friendly disagreement - it can lead to deeper understanding.

Background on the topic: Mercenary soldiers - soldiers who fight for money rather than for king and country - are probably as old as money itself. Today they are more widespread than ever, and play a major part in the fate of nations, though that is rarely advertised. However if we think of work itself, by far the largest number of people work for money rather than following 'a calling'. Their loyalties are mercenary. This too has consequences which we can explore.

1. IN HUMAN RELATIONSHIPS, WHAT IS THE BEST BALANCE BETWEEN MERCENARY SELF-INTEREST AND OTHER HUMAN VALUES? Different cultures emphasize different answers to this question, and may prohibit certain transactions. Prostitution is probably the oldest mercenary type of relationship.

2. THE CORE OF MERCENARY VALUES IS THAT IN LIFE YOU (SHOULD ONLY) GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR. CAN YOU DEFEND, OR CHALLENGE THIS APPROACH?

3. IF YOU HAVE BEEN IN EMPLOYMENT, WOULD YOU CONSIDER YOURSELF TO BE A MERCENARY, OR WORKING AT 'A CALLING' (a vocation), OR SOMETHING IN BETWEEN. EXPLAIN.

4. WHAT PARTICULAR PROBLEMS DO NON-MERCENARY OCCUPATIONS (e.g. social workers, nurses, teachers etc) HAVE THAT ARE NOT SO EVIDENT IN JOBS WHERE PEOPLE JUST WORK FOR MONEY?

5. ARE UNIVERSITIES AND TAFES (AND THE PUBLIC) RIGHT TO STRESS THAT EDUCATION SHOULD OVERWHELMINGLY BE A MERCENARY EXCHANGE OF FEES FOR JOB PROSPECTS?

6. THE QUESTION OF MERCENARY VS OTHER VALUES IS AT THE HEART OF POLITICAL DIVISIONS IN MANY COUNTRIES. HOW SIGNIFICANT, IN PRACTICE, IS THIS DIVISION IN AUSTRALIA?

7. THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION'S VIEW OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS IS PURELY MERCANTILE. WHAT ARE THE ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF THIS APPROACH? A system of relationships between countries that depends purely on maximizing national financial gain and ignoring the interests of other nations is called a 'mercantile foreign policy'. Historically, mercantile (i.e. mercenary) policies have been blamed for wars and economic depressions.

8. WHAT IS THE EVIDENCE, IF ANY, THAT MERCENARY SOLDIERS ARE MORE, OR LESS, EFFECTIVE THAN NATIONAL SOLDIERS?

9. THERE IS A SUGGESTION THAT AMERICA SHOULD FORM A FOREIGN LEGION TO OUTSOURCE ITS WARS, RATHER THAN HIRING PRIVATE ARMIES AS AT PRESENT. WHAT ARE YOUR VIEWS ON THIS? Note: the French Foreign Legion would be a model.

10. HOW MIGHT THE HISTORY OF BRITAIN HAVE BEEN DIFFERENT IF IT HAD REMAINED CELTIC? In the 5th Century A.D. "..tribes of Angles, Saxons, Jutes, and Frisians, may have first come to England as mercenaries in the Roman army. In the wake of the Roman withdrawal British leaders, perhaps under a powerful overking, Vortigern, hired these mercenaries for protection" .. and that was fatal. https://www.britainexpress.com/History/King_Arthur.htm

Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries
by A. E. Housman

These, in the days when heaven was falling,
The hour when earth's foundations fled,
Followed their mercenary calling
And took their wages and are dead.

Their shoulders held the sky suspended;
They stood, and the earth's foundations stay;
What God abandoned, these defended,
And saved the sum of things for pay.

Greg Jericho (19 February 2019) "Counting one hour's work a week doesn't skew the employment data". The Guardian @ https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/19/counting-one-hours-work-a-week-doesnt-skew-the-employment-data [.. a review of what employment statistics actually mean]

Nick Martin (21 February 2019) "Medevac hopes are dashed by Coalition's cowardice and legal sophistry - As Christmas Island reopens, there’s a dawning realisation that nothing has really changed". The Guardian @ https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/20/medevac-hopes-dashed-by-coalitions-cowardice-and-legal-sophistry [Thor, comment: Nick Martin, a GP, was a senior medical officer on Nauru. The Medivac bill, recently forced through Federal Parliament against the present government's vote, has been seized by the Liberal Party to scare the public with a fake threat of foreign invasion before the election in 12 week's time. At the same time they have quietly neutered it by passing authority to evacuate sick people to the Nauru government. The Nauru government won't release the sick for treatment in Australia since it receives a $50,000 annual visa fee (+ benefits) for each refugee. It has banned Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders). Nor will it allow telemedical consultations to assess patients. - How is this relevant to the "Mercenary" topic? It sums up how leaders of governments and large organizations use mercenaries ("outsourcing") to evade responsibility and blame.]

Julia Carrie Wong (23 Feb 2019) "'We won't be war profiteers': Microsoft workers protest $480m army contract - Workers say augmented reality headsets provided to US army risk ‘turning warfare into a simulated video game’" The Guardian @ https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/feb/22/microsoft-protest-us-army-augmented-reality-headsets [comment, Thor: Interesting. Paid word is mercenary by definition, but at least some people want a say in the outcomes of their mercenary activity]

Simon Tisdall (24 Feb 2019) "Trump’s cronies are in secret talks to sell nuclear tech to Saudi. The risks are clear - The congressional report on this multibillion-dollar scheme provides further evidence of attempts to monetise the Trump presidency". The Guardian @ https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/feb/23/trump-cronies-secret-talks-nuclear-tech-saudi-arabia [comment, Thor: There is a (large) class of people for whom money trumps all other considerations, even self-preservation, and even when additional wealth is not needed. I call it a form of mental illness]

Christopher Knaus and Helen Davidson (23 Feb 2019) "Australia's offshore contracts: how millions were spent for dubious outcomes - Paladin is only one of the companies brought in at huge expense to run crucial services for vulnerable people on Manus and Nauru." The Guardian @ https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/feb/23/australias-offshore-contracts-how-millions-were-spent-for-dubious-outcomes

Angela Monaghan (July 16, 2018) "Global workforce will be decimated by the fourth [industrial] revolution, says Siemens boss - Joe Kaeser says it’s up to business and governments to find workable solution" The Guardian @ https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/jul/15/global-workforce-will-be-decimated-by-fourth-revolution-says-siemens-boss [quote: " Joe Kaeser, global chief executive of the engineering giant Siemens, said up to almost a third of jobs could be lost as the transition from combustion engines to electric cars takes place over the next decade, in what will be one of the single most important transformations of all time .... the fourth industrial revolution ... will obviously affect manufacturing massively as it accounts for 70% of global GDP ... The social and economic impact of digitalisation is going to be massive. The least efficient part of the value chain, the middle man, will be cut out. Unfortunately the least efficient part of the value chain is human beings so someone has to do something about the fall out ... Siemens, which employs more than 370,000 people globally and 15,000 in the UK, is already spending €500m a year on retraining and qualifications, with plans to invest more, Kaeser said"] [comment, Thor - There you have it - as Kaiser puts it, we mere humans are the least efficient part of the value chain. So the value is with money, not humans..]

Joe Shute (Oct 2 2017) "The last workplace taboo is older than you think" Executive Style website @ http://www.executivestyle.com.au/the-last-workplace-taboo-is-older-than-you-think-gypgg2 [Thor, comment: people work for money, obviously, but older workers faced with redundancy and the knowledge that they will never get another job frequently want to keep working also because by working they feel valued as individuals. ]

Juliana Piskorz (30 Dec 2018) "Me and my quarter-life crisis: a millennial asks what went wrong" The Observer @ https://www.theguardian.com/global/2018/dec/30/me-and-my-quarter-life-crisis-a-millennial-asks-what-went-wrong? [Thor, comment: people might work for love, and they definitely work for money, but they also work because society expects them to work, expects them to be "useful" and "successful". This is especially potent for twenty-somethings who haven't quite made it yet ...]

Nathan Heller (June 7, 2018) "The Bullshit-Job Boom - For more and more people, work appears to serve no purpose. Is there any good left in the grind?" The New Yorker @ https://www.newyorker.com/books/under-review/the-bullshit-job-boom

Wikipedia (2018) "'Bullshit Jobs: A Theory' is a 2018 book by anthropologist David Graeber that argues the existence and societal harm of meaningless jobs. He contends that over half of societal work is pointless, which becomes psychologically destructive when paired with a work ethic that associates work with self-worth. Graeber describes five types of bullshit jobs, in which workers pretend their role isn't as pointless or harmful as they know it to be: flunkies, goons, duct tapers, box tickers, and taskmasters. He argues that the association of labor with virtuous suffering is recent in human history, and proposes universal basic income as a potential solution". Wikipedia @ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullshit_Jobs

Albert-László Barabási (Dec 11, 2018 ) "What can we learn from people who succeed later in life?" Ideas.com website @ https://ideas.ted.com/what-can-we-learn-from-people-who-succeed-later-in-life/

Shane Rodgers (March 16, 2015) "The career advice I wish I had at 25" Linkedin website @ https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/career-advice-i-wish-had-25-shane-rodgers/

Wikipeda (2018) "Cyborg" Wikipedia @ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyborg

Olivia Solon (15 February 2017) "Elon Musk says humans must become cyborgs to stay relevant. Is he right? - Sophisticated artificial intelligence will make ‘house cats’ of humans, claims the entrepreneur, but his grand vision for mind-controlled tech may be a long way off" The Guardian @ https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/feb/15/elon-musk-cyborgs-robots-artificial-intelligence-is-he-right

Peter Martin (10 July 2017) "Gaming. The shocking reason young men are walking away from work" Sydney Morning Herald @ https://www.smh.com.au/business/gone-gaming-why-young-men-are-walking-away-from-work-20170707-gx6dcj.html

Rasmus Karkov (March 7, 2012) "What drives a prostitute? - In a survey of prostitution, the majority of prostitutes say their own sexuality, sexual curiosity and money are the main reasons they chose their line of work". ScienceNordic @ http://sciencenordic.com/what-drives-prostitute

Resty Woro Yuniar (18 March 2018) "Hong Kong Sugar Babies, Singapore Sugar Daddies – But It’s Not About Selling Sex, These Dating Websites Insist" South China Morning Post @ http://www.scmp.com/week-asia/society/article/2137197/hong-kong-sugar-babies-singapore-sugar-daddies-its-not-about

Chris Leitch (3 May 2017) "Mercenaries: What They Do and How to Become One" CareerAdict website @ https://www.careeraddict.com/become-a-mercenary [i.e. soldiers for hire]

Sean McFate (25 January, 2016) "Return of the mercenaries - Two centuries ago, public armies replaced private ones as the dominant tool of warfare. Now, private armies are back". Aeon magazine @ https://aeon.co/essays/what-does-the-return-of-mercenary-armies-mean-for-the-world [ This article is essential reading for this meetup. Public news reporting of international conflict is a shadow play. The real tools and actors and motivations go inreported. For example, the United States could not have waged war in Iraq and Afghanistan without private contractors : 50% and 55% mercenary personnel respectively. The Russians have mercenaries in the Ukrain and Syria. Frontier Services Group (originally the infamous American contractor Blackwater**) is now Hong Kong Chinese controlled by the CITIC group which has a trillion dollar capitalization and plans to take over "training camps" (concentration camps) for up to a million Uighur people in Xinjiang (western China) where as Muslims, Uighur are seen as a security risk. The fate of entire countries in post-colonial Africa would have been different without mercenaries, and the fate of Europe before 1650 would have been entirely different.{**Blackwater's founder, Eric Prince, is the brother of the Trump administration's controversial Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos }]

David Isenberg (February 1, 2019) "Why America can’t win wars" Asia Times @ http://www.atimes.com/article/why-america-cant-win-wars/ [quote: "An uneasy draw in Korea was followed by humiliating withdrawals from South Vietnam, Somalia, Afghanistan and Iraq – with dire consequences for US policy, interests and reputation .... One of McFate’s prescriptions is bound to raise eyebrows. “It’s time for an American foreign legion – and a British one, an Australian one, a Danish one, and any other country that wants to overcome threats before they arrive at their borders.” .. He suggests following the French model: a globally-recruited force that falls under national control. “The legion’s units would be led by American officers and special forces teams, scaling their missions at a reasonable rate,” he said."]

Nan Bahr & Jo-Anne Ferreira (April 16, 2018) "Seven reasons people no longer want to be teachers - The programs are long and intense, the creativity and relationships aspect of the vocation has been eroded, there is pervasive negativity in the media, and comparatively poor salary and working conditions." The Conversation @ https://theconversation.com/seven-reasons-people-no-longer-want-to-be-teachers-94580 [Thor, comment: my own PhD revolved around this issue. I once made a submission to the Senate of the Australian Parliament on it - a waste of time. At bottom, the problem is cultural. Following the worst aspects of American values (as usual), in Australia teaching as a vocation is held in contempt. To get general respect here your ambitions must be mercenary. Flip real estate and you are a hero].

Peter Dolton (3 October 2013) "Why do some countries respect their teachers more than others?" The Guardian @ https://www.theguardian.com/teacher-network/teacher-blog/2013/oct/03/teacher-respect-status-global-survey

Matthew Quirk (November 2005) "The Best Class Money Can Buy - The rise of the "enrollment manager" and the cutthroat quest for competitive advantage. The secret weapon: financial-aid leveraging" The Atlantic @ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2005/11/the-best-class-money-can-buy/304307/ [comment, Thor: this is a classic article on the debasement by money of tertiary education in the United States]

Angus Grigg, Lisa Murrayand Jonathan Shapiro (Feb 15, 2019) "How a soldier of fortune landed a $423 million Manus Island contract - As diplomats and aid workers fled East Timor in 2006, a former Australian soldier landed in the capital, Dili, looking to profit from the chaos. The world's newest nation had descended into a low-level conflict zone of rock throwing and street battles, all of which presented an opportunity for the newly discharged Craig Thrupp..." Australian Financial Review @ https://www.afr.com/news/policy/foreign-affairs/how-a-soldier-of-fortune-landed-a-423-million-manus-island-contract-20190214-h1b9s0 [AFR subscription required to read this] [comment, Thor: this $423 million contract for managing refugees on Manus Island was awarded by the present Canberra administration to a company registered from a beach shack on Kangaroo Island. The government had to pay millions in advance to this contractor, Paladin, who was given the contract without competition, because it had no funds. People on Manus itself say they have seen none of this money. A smell of corruption? Does the Australian public care anyway?]

Kirstin Murray (25 Feb 2019) "Medicine as a Vocation - An unscripted life". Australian Broadcasting Commission @ https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-25/why-doctor-tim-duncan-is-backing-the-bush/10723588

Thor May (2014) "Fakes, liars, cheats, deceivers, animals in the forest". The Passionate Skeptic website @ http://thormay.net/unwiseideas/FakesLiarst.htm or https://www.academia.edu/8480396/Fakes_liars_cheats_deceivers_animals_in_the_forest [ Is money just the enabler, or the end? Self-deception is all around us. From face lifts to luxury cars on hire purchase, from inflated CVs to exaggerated job titles, from company publicity material to the spin that governments put on their failures and deceptions. At what point does fakery become fraud? Would the world be a duller place without it?..]

Dima Vorobiev (January 28 2019) "Why have Russian private military contractors, flown into Venezuela, in the past few days to beef up security for President Nicolas Maduro, in the face of U.S. backed opposition protests?" Quora.com @ https://www.quora.com/Why-have-Russian-private-military-contractors-flown-into-Venezuela-in-the-past-few-days-to-beef-up-security-for-President-Nicolas-Maduro-in-the-face-of-U-S-backed-opposition-protests