Monthly Archives: November 2011

Onzichtbare despoot

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Niemand weet wie de “financiële markten” zijn, maar één ding is zeker. Het is de hoofdrolspeler, de boeman van de eurocrisis. Als een onzichtbare despoot regeert de markt per rente-decreet, stuurt hele regeringen weg, dwingt tot belastingverhogingen, loonmatigingen en bezuinigingen. De dag na de Spaanse verkiezingen is er maar één oordeel dat echt telt, de markt. Die hield zijn duim naar beneden. Onverbiddelijk.

Gelukkig kan de invloed van de markt goed beperkt worden. Een regering is er alleen van afhankelijk als het structureel meer geld uitgeeft dan het binnenhaalt aan belastingen of als het de markt nog heel veel geld verschuldigd is. Een land dat niet zoveel schuld heeft of maakt, mag gewoon zelf beslissen over zijn financiële beleid en mag gewoon zelf een regering uitkiezen. Fijn.

Als het aan Cohen en Plassterk had gelegen had de markt nog een beetje extra invloed in Nederland gehad. Eindeloos hebben ze geroepen dat Rutte “de economie kapot bezuinigt” en enigszins triomfantelijk verschenen ze vorige week op televisie toen de economie ook daadwerkelijk bleek te zijn gekrompen afgelopen kwartaal. Dat was niet gebeurd onder PvdA bestuur. Die geven meer om groei dan om schuld. Schuld is namelijk niet zo’n probleem als je elk jaar rijker wordt. Dan los je makkelijker af en hoef je minder rente te betalen.

Maar “uit je schuld groeien” is een redelijk riskante strategie gebleken. Een strategie die nog werkte toen de economische groei voornamelijk afhankelijk was van de acties van het Haagse financiële beleid en niet zomaar in elkaar kon klappen door oorzaken die buiten de Nederlandse invloedssfeer lagen. De Amerikaanse huizenmarkt bijvoorbeeld. Of het concurrerend vermogen van je zuidelijke eurovriendjes.

Nu verschijnt deel 2 van de crisis in beeld en zijn er twee mogelijkheden. Of we lenen nog wat extra bij op de markt om te investeren. En hopen dat die namaak economische groei échte economische groei wordt zodat je de leningen die je moest afsluiten ook ooit kan aflossen. Of je speelt op zeker, organiseert extra bezuinigingen, dempt het gat in je begroting en houdt de invloed van de markt zover mogelijk buiten de deur.

Tattoos – the ultimate contempt for the body

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On the last warm Saturday of the year I sat on the terrace of a fashionable café next to a highly fashionable girl. She had large, horn-rimmed glasses, long hair with a fringe, a vintage flowery dress with shoulder pads and cowboy boots. And on her soft, white forearm, which she used now and again to raise her cup, she had a kind of blue-green fantasy bird. A big thing. Freshly made, the edges still red and with considerable swelling underneath. While she quietly gossiped and drank her coffee, her skin offered maximum resistance to the recent bodily harm inflicted by the needle and the anatomically-foreign ink. The bird protruded from her arm as if her body wanted to lift it up and cast it out. In vain. Over the coming two weeks the immune system would withdraw its resistance, incorporate the ink and resign itself to what has happened. From now on there would be a drawing on her arm. A drawing that will be ever-present throughout her life, during sleep, during dinner, during love making, during death, always.

From the terrace on that last warm Saturday of the year I saw once again, on the naked arms and legs of the shoppers as they passed by, the full scale of the epidemic: tattoos. A self-inflicted branding which only ever appeared in a particular realm of society: sailors, Hell’s Angels, criminals, outcasts, the underclass. Tattoos belong in the same class as smoking, drinking, gambling. Hobbies for those with no future. It wouldn’t have mattered much to them if they had any regret; they had little to lose.

Now sociologists no longer need to visit grubby backstreet cafés in order to research their tattooed fellow man. The can simply distribute their questionnaires among their students.  Throughout the western world the prevalence of tattoos is increasing and it is now not only the criminals and bikers who choose this type of permanent body modification. In North America and Europe the tattoo has become mainstream, approximately 1 in 4 is tattooed and some believe this number will increase to 40% in the next decade.  

Just like big glasses and vintage flowery dresses, tattoos are fashionable. The television is swarming with body-modified celebrities: David Beckham has transformed the once-healthy skin of his back and arms into a sea of pictures names and characters. Rihanna used to be a beautiful woman but is starting to look more and more like a walking sketchpad, having drawn words (“thug life” on her knuckles), flowers and symbols on her body, like a self-inflicted skin disease.

Don’t get me wrong. I find many tattoos charming; for instance the Hebrew text dropping vertically down the back of Victoria Beckham. The sentence starts at the hairline of her neck as if the thoughts were dripping directly from her brain. But it is a strange kind of art, the tattoo. Body art is an art form in the same way suicide is a choice; it is an expression which makes every other expression impossible. You have only one canvas you can use: your skin; a beautiful part of the body, it keeps you warm, and can even cool you down, it is soft and supple so you can move about within in, so ingenious that the best engineers have not managed to replicate it. And yet people decide, en masse, that it is a suitable place to carve the names of their children and pearls of wisdom; that a blue-green fantasy bird not only serves as a pretty picture on a bag or a brooch, but that you can also etch it into that ingenious piece of tissue. Like graffiti on a Caravaggio. The ultimate contempt for the body.

Yet it remains attractive for a growing group of people. The enormous number of tattoos in society raises all kinds of new questions. In the job market for example. Is an employer allowed to reject someone because he has a tattoo? It is a complex debate. The tattoos are an individual choice, much like clothing, and therefore a legitimate ground for rejection. However, from the moment the choice has been made, they are indelibly connected with the body of the applicant, just like a lop-ear or skin colour; he cannot do much about it, rejection should be seen as discrimination. Last week the Dutch “Volkskrant” magazine showed a few examples of people whose tattoos had not been particularly appreciated by their employers. One example is Marloes Tiemersma (22). In all her wisdom she had her nickname daubed in big letters on her upper arm, “RevoLOESzjonaire”, (because she sees herself as a revolutionary). When it was warm, her employer said to her, “Put your jacket back on”. Elmer van Engelenburg (33) did not have it easy either. But then what do you expect when you have a so-called ‘body suit’ tattoo, including sleeves? The photo shows how he has, indeed, allowed about 40% of his torso and arms to be impregnated with all kinds of designs. He no longer has a normal skin colour, his complexion is green. Quite appropriate for when he gets upset: “We’re living in 2011”, he thinks when he sees a vacancy which is specifically looking for people without tattoos. He found it exceptionally unfair that he was not allowed to stand at the counter of the computer business where he worked, but instead had to stay in the back and do the repairs. The prejudice that tattoos are antisocial is archaic, he says.

He is wrong. It’s not about the association, it’s about what a tattoo is. A tattoo says that the owner dares to risk his career for something as futile as body art. A tattoo is direct proof that someone is capable of making particularly questionable, yet irreversible decisions. I fully understand why an employer would reject someone on the basis of that. Those aren’t prejudices, they are judgments.

It remains a bizarre decision to abuse yourself in such a way. Even if you decide to put something on your back or your chest, you will have to compromise for the rest of your life on clothing which either does or does not cover your tattoo. I see tattoos as a tragic consequence of an outrageous form of individualism which clearly thrives among the 18-29 generation. This generation does not believe in God, they believe in themselves. The life events, the successes, the losses, the difficult periods and all the wisdom they have picked up defines them, it is their foundation. And when the identity is so holy for you, it is terribly tedious to have it reside in a body which, when undressed and laid bare, looks almost exactly like everyone else’s body. The human body needs customization in order to be able to serve as a stately residence for your unique self.

The tattoo is the ultimate means to that end. If you wish to express you life’s vision then clothing, make-up, hairstyle or, God forbid, a temporary tattoo is not enough. You do not apply your life’s motto with henna or an airbrush. It’s not about the decoration itself, it’s about the commitment for which it stands, as though you are bound in matrimony with that part of yourself, swearing an oath to your identity “until death do us part”.

Every belief has its dogmas and the dogma of the belief in yourself is that your self is some kind of absolute, immutable entity. That your life motto, your style, your convictions, are elements upon which you can always depend, which will always maintain their value. It is precisely this illusion which one can purchase in the tattoo salon. It is there that the multitudes of people record their identity for eternity, for the sole reason that they cannot comprehend the dynamics of their identity, its variation. They make a decision on how they are going to look for the rest of their lives; if they’re unlucky they do so before their twenties, because they lack the capacity to imagine themselves in the future, and that their older selves might not agree with a tweety bird adorning their left shoulder blade.

The mistake is easily made. My first purchase at an art fair was an etching of a woman swimming, which I though I would want to look at forever. And for a few years I did look at it very intensely because that work of art hung in my small, five-by-five student room. It was there the whole time, as I ate, as I studied, as I read, as I slept. Eventually the impossible proved possible: I’d had enough of the swimming lady and did not want to see the etching again for some time.

Not much is known about the percentage of people who feel regret. The wave of regret will come after the wave of tattoos. Furthermore, not everyone will be able to get the tattoos off again. Such a procedure is, in general, long and extremely expensive, or you have to want to inflict third degree burns on yourself so that the scorched skin falls off with part of the tattoo. However, people who want a tattoo seem not to be affected by such stories. Many are convinced that, should the day come when they no longer find their tattoo attractive, it still serves as a pleasant reminder of their foolhardy youth. I doubt that. I think it is more serious. I think old tattoos which you no longer want make you feel as though you have to live your whole life in a pubescent room with Kill Bill posters on the wall and a lava lamp. I think when the fashionable girl has had enough of her blue-green fantasy bird, it will not be a pleasant reminder, but will make her feel like she has to don the flowery dress with shoulder pads every day.

The wave of regret will come, that is unavoidable. Tattoos are going out of style and the untouched, beautiful pink bodies are coming back in. That’s the way of every hype. Even the trend for permanent decoration is a temporary phenomenon, just like individualism; a phase which indeed will pass. Although a whole generation will bear the scars of that phase for their entire lives.

Margulis

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Prof. Dr. Lynn Margulis had verschillende opvattingen die zo controversieel waren, dat er namen voor bestonden. Zo was ze een “AIDS denialist” omdat ze betoogde dat AIDS niet werd veroorzaakt door HIV. En ze was een “9/11 truther” omdat ze niet geloofde dat de WTC-gebouwen waren ingestort doordat er vliegtuigen in crashten.

De andere AIDS-denialists en 9/11 truthers waren blij dat een wetenschapper als Margulis hun gedachtegoed ondersteunde. Maar ze had ook veel creationistische fans, van die “intelligent design”-idioten die haar prezen om haar kritiek op de heersende evolutietheorie. De Neo-Darwinisten zoals Richard Dawkins beweerden dat evolutie voornamelijk door toevallige mutaties plaatsvond: dat planten groen waren omdat er één toevallig groen was geworden en de rest had weggeconcurreerd. Margulis was het daarmee oneens. Zij dacht dat planten groen waren geworden omdat ze ooit groene bacteriën hadden ingeslikt en die bacteriën onderdeel waren geworden van hun lichaam. Mitochondriën, celkernen, de zwemstaarten van spermacellen, het zouden allemaal ooit onafhankelijke organismen zijn geweest die waren geïntegreerd tot één cel. Endosymbiose. Een ridicule theorie, alsof onze lever en nieren ooit los rondlopende dieren konden zijn geweest. Knettergek was ze.

Ik zag haar op een groot microbiologiecongres in april dit jaar spreken. Ze was uitgenodigd omdat dat laatste controversiële idee over evolutie toch leek te kloppen. In allerlei onderdelen van cellen was DNA gevonden dat totaal niet leek op het DNA van het beest zelf.

Haar lezing was een teleurstelling. Er was zweverige muziek. Er waren vage filmpjes. Ter begeleiding spuugde ze haar weinig subtiele woorden met grote kracht in de microfoon. Tegen de tijd dat ze begon over de Gaia theorie, de nieuwste controverse die ze ondersteunde, had een deel van het publiek zich van haar afgewend, vol plaatsvervangende schaamte, ongemakkelijk grinnikend.

Vorige week overleed ze. Lynn Margulis. Ik was nog nooit zo’n autonomie tegengekomen. Zo volledig losgeweekt van waardering, van likejes. Ze gaf niets om de reacties op haar werk, ze was zo onafhankelijk dat ik het moeilijk vond om haar aan te kijken. Een vrouw die werd weggehoond en uitgelachen, maar een leven lang onverstoord doorwerkte. Een voorbeeld.

Steinman

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On Sunday the Nobel Committee tried to phone Ralph Steinman to inform him he was to receive the highest scientific honor. But he didn’t pick up because two days prior to the call he had died of pancreatic cancer. An illness which he may have just fallen short of being able to overcome with his own discovery.

Dendritic cells was the name he gave to the strange shapes he saw in a mouse’s spleen in 1972. They proved to be the orchestrators of the body’s defense mechanism; the missing link between non-specific and specific immunity which had been sought for years. His results, however, received little recognition. Other laboratories were not able to reproduce them so he was not taken seriously and was even derided at conferences – skepticism is what they call it in science. He had to wait nearly ten years before others were able to reproduce his experiments such that they could see what he had seen a decade previously: cells which explained a large part of the functioning of the immune system and which would form the basis of a new generation of cancer drugs and, possibly, an HIV-vaccine.

I don’t know whether our generation is able to do that. Work single-handedly and single-mindedly on one problem. Not for one year, not for ten years, but for forty years. Be abused and ignored, carry on and eventually be proved right, just like Steinman. He risked his career as well as the real possibility that his discovery would remain forever unacknowledged and eventually be forgotten, but he did not have an identity crisis, he did not need a coach and did not consider a change of vocation; he just carried on. Forty years, one subject.

Steinmann also investigated whether dendritic cells could possibly help him with his pancreatic cancer. He mixed dendritic cells with his own tumor cells and injected them under his skin, but it didn’t work. At least not completely. He lived four years longer than the average patient with the same diagnosis. But then again, that could also be a coincidence. He was the only test person and there was no control group. The results of his of his experimental treatment of his own tumor have, so far, been received with skepticism. Typical.

(A dutch version of this column was published in the newspaper nrc.next in november 2011.)

Snaveltjes toe (nrc.next 16.11.2011)

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Of iedereen even zijn mond wil houden? Dat is beter voor de euro, echt waar. Natuurlijk kun je bedenkingen hebben. Je kunt je zelfs afvragen, nu ook de rente op Spaans, Belgisch en Frans staatspapier recordhoogtes bereikt, wat de scenario’s zijn mocht de hele euro ineenklappen.

Maar misschien kun je al die vragen even van binnen stellen en niet hardop uitspreken, laat staan daadwerkelijk gaan onderzoeken. Dat is gevaarlijk, zeggen de economen. Dat is gevaarlijk, zegt Frans Weisglas. Dat is gevaarlijk, zegt Neelie Kroes. Voor de duidelijkheid: het is dus uitdrukkelijk NIET de bedoeling dat Kamerleden een beetje onafhankelijk gaan zitten nadenken of onderzoeken wat de toekomst van Nederland in Europa zou moeten zijn. Gewoon rustig wachten tot Merkozy meedeelt wat er gaat gebeuren, dan kauwen, slikken, geld storten en daarna gelieve uw snavel weer te houden.

De Tweede Kamer keurde 100 miljard euro aan garanties in het noodfonds goed (weet u nog? 18 miljard bezuinigen vonden wij nogal heftig) zonder dat er duidelijk was waar dat geld aan besteed mocht worden of welke rekenkamer het zou controleren. Kamerlid Harbers (VVD) gaf zijn verzet op toen Nederland het laatste goedkeurende land dreigde te worden (dat werd uiteindelijk Slowakije, daar had men wél bezwaren, oh shame). De motie van Kamerleden Schouten (ChristenUnie) en Irrgang (SP) om nog iéts van inspraak over de bestemming van de biljoenentrein te houden werd weggehoond. Slagkracht is nodig, en die heb je niet als je gaat zitten jeremiëren over elke 100 miljard die je uitgeeft.

In hoog tempo is de structuur van de eurozone veranderd, bakken met soevereiniteit zijn weggegeven zonder degelijk debat daarover. We gedragen ons alsof er weer midden in de nacht even snel twee banken genationaliseerd moeten worden. Maar deze crisis is anders, dit is geen donderslag bij heldere hemel. Het is anderhalf jaar geleden dat de Grieken hun eerste miljarden kregen. We weten waar de schulden zitten, we weten dat sommige landen te groot om te redden zijn, we weten dat het voortbestaan van de eurozone in zijn huidige vorm onzeker is. Mogen we dan alsjeblieft hardop nadenken over de mogelijke scenario’s? Toe?