To Mill a Cockingbird

I cannot help it, and so I must apologize for my weakness in advance. I have a terrible weakness, a sin that appalls. I am a mocker, and a scoffer. The problem as I see it is that I don't mind being mocked, I cannot find it in me to mock God (which is foolish no matter how you look at it), but I have this indecent urge to mock some people.

It all has to do with blogging and other aspects of the information age which we are still negotiating. If this age were a blue ocean, some of us would be navigators, some would be commanders, some would be engineers, and some passengers. But there is this large number of people who attempt to sail the blue ocean while saying, 'Ships are dangerous. Signals from ship to ship are worse. Is that an oar or a semaphore flag?' and other such nonsense.

I've mentioned this in previous posts, and I'll mention it again. CEO of a certain service institution:

• "Apple is a failed company, why buy Apple?"
• "Apple, you don't know if it will still be around next year, we must get all students to buy tablet PCs!"
• "Blog is like a diary, why do you want to show your diary to everyone? If you have bad things to say, keep it to yourself! Right-minded people will never blog!"

One would think that the chagrin of being wrong repeatedly would send the offender down to the bilge. But this person is still pretending to be a blue ocean strategist. And he has accomplices too, people who say things like:

• "Blogging is evil!"
• "Your teachers know better than this Wikipedia nonsense!"
• "How can you believe what you read on the Internet and not what is in the newspapers?"

It is all very amusing.

I remember working in a place where if you used the Internet in your work, a few odd things happened. Firstly, you'd be given bonus points for 'IT Usage', which you had to report for every month. Secondly, people would blame you for any manifestation of 'Bad IT'. Thirdly, you would have to fight morons who would claim that showing a Word document on a projector was 'Good IT' while using MSN to communicate with students was 'Bad IT'.

At this point, most people born after 1980 (and some born before that) must be wondering if this is satire, unless they know whereof I am 'making mock'. No, sadly, it is all true. I remember that Word and PowerPoint were classified as 'IT Usage' and Excel and Outlook were not. Haha!

Guess what, dear readers? The SAME CREW is still sailing their ship out into the blue ocean. The SAME CREW that once told me, "It is a far better investment to cable up the whole place than to go wireless. Wireless is too risky an investment, the technology is untested." That was in 2000, many years after the invention of the radio.

How not to mock? And therefore, I have sinned.

Mockery

Sometimes, it is good to mock people. It is good to point out that they are really really silly, take themselves far too seriously, and deserve to be laughed at. Some people think this is a rather unchristian sort of attitude to take, but that's mainly because they don't read the Bible themselves. The Bible is full of mockery.

One of the stories I remember from my childhood is from 1 Kings 18. In that chapter, Elijah challenges the priests of Baal to a trial by fire. Both sides were to place a sacrifice on a hill and pray, and see which sacrifice was devoured by fire. Like Daniel's nutritional trial, this was some sort of scientific experiment.

While the priests of Baal danced around unsuccessfully, Elijah mocked them and their religious practices. He said, "Cry aloud, for he is a god, and maybe he is busy talking or hunting or journeying or sleeping, and must be awakened!" When it came to his turn, he drenched his own sacrifice and its altar in water, and when he prayed, fire fell upon the altar and consumed everything including the water and the stones of the altar.

Mockery, you see, must be followed by action. It is good to laugh at silly people, but you have to show that you are not a silly person yourself.

Also, the target of mockery must be the right target. God is not mocked, and neither should you mock your parents or those who don't deserve it. But people who set up idols in the places of God and who have no idea what they are doing? Ah, those you should mock indeed.

Mockery And Judgement

I remember that in late 2004, I was being pilloried for the contents of this blog. Those contents are still there for you to see, if you're wondering why this should be so. At that time, I remember distinctly the phases of emotional sensation that passed through me.

First, I was amused. I could not believe that people were reading it the way they claimed they were. I could not believe that rational people could do that, anyway. It did not help when the Inquisition got its facts wrong. But then, they were the inquisition, and I was being put to the question. Lesson: the Inquisition cannot bear to be wrong.

Secondly, I was furious. I could not believe they were charging me on the basis of their misinterpretations. I could not believe that they were actually taking a line of peculiar interpretation, applying it in defiance of all hermeneutic principles of analysis, and using it to club me over the head and gag me. Lesson: the Inquisition will always claim the higher ground.

Thirdly, I was defensive. Perhaps, this was my undoing. I believed I was perfectly right in what I had said, that there was no wrong in it. And in a technical sense, I was indeed right. However, I learnt something. If the Inquisition could be misled, it must indeed be true that what I had written was misleading. Lesson: the Inquisition are people too.

Fourthly, I was repentant. If I had misled anyone, no matter what they were or who they were, I was guilty. Whether the rational man-in-the-street, so beloved of law and criminal justice, interpreted me correctly or not, the fact remained that at least three people were confused and two angry about it. Lesson: the Inquisition sets the tone, regardless.

And so, I stepped down from any authority of position I held. I could not totally divest myself of personal authority or the authority of skill and knowledge, but I voluntarily and in a spirit of reconciliation stepped down. I apologised to the community, and I meant every word of my apology. And there the matter rested for a while. But in my heart and mind, I remembered one last lesson: the Judgement of Gamaliel.

In Acts 5:17-42, the apostles were arrested for preaching about Christ. I claim no such apostolic status, and neither was I blogging about exalted matters. But the principle of Gamaliel's judgement remains the same for all unclear and ambiguous cases of new social phenomena: "And now I say unto you, Refrain from these men, and let them alone: for if this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to nought: But if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it; lest haply ye be found even to fight against God."

I make no such claims, I say again, about apostolic legacy. However, I would put these questions, given the opportunity, to the Inquisition: Did you apply the principle of Gamaliel's judgement to my case? Has my blogging enlightened or darkened the world of men? Why did you think what I said was harmful despite the fact that at least one of you admitted it was truth?

The fact is this: God is not mocked, or deceived about the truth – what a man sows, he also will reap. The whole lesson of this episode, for the Inquisition as well as for myself, can be found in Galatians 6:1-10. I fully expect to be rewarded or condemned accordingly. In the meantime, I also know that this applies to all of us, every man and woman alike. God have mercy on us all.