When you are listening to proposals it pays to attend to the metaphors being used. These often shape the argument and the proposals made. When voters are described as punters, for example, the gambling metaphor suggests that the political system is like a horse race in which the politicians are trained owned and trained by others and the well-heeled bookies always win. We would naturally ask whose interests proposals made by the speaker will support. They are not likely to further the cause of an informed democracy.
One of the most popular, and largely counterproductive, metaphors in public conversation is the military one. It suggests that the project commended is a war in which there is an enemy, a campaign to be begun, forces to be mobilised, a public whose support is to be won, and weapons to be used. As in a war, too, the stakes are high — matters of life and death. They commit us to do whatever it takes to win the war.
Proper wars, of course, are between nations. But the military metaphor is often used to describe other aspects of international relations: trade and sport, for example. It is almost always unhelpful because in these relationships negotiation and a level of mutual trust are essential to secure national interests. If we see our negotiating partners as enemies to be defeated, we are less likely to advance our interest than if our guiding metaphor were that of a market in which we bartered.
In sport, too, the military metaphor is rife. Winning at all costs, taking one for the team, dying for the flag, shedding the last drop of blood, winning each battle are gold coinage in sporting rhetoric. Its effects on the behaviour of sports persons are evident. The military metaphor, too, corrodes its military origins. The distasteful association of football games with Anzac Day, with its array of sportsperson’s warrior images, trivialises the commemoration of the death of soldiers in war.
The military metaphor is often used, too, when speaking of health. People are described as fighting cancer and other life threatening illnesses, winning or losing battles with sickness. Chemotherapy and other intrusive treatments are described as weapons, and people are praised for never surrendering in the fight against disease, for being valiant warriors to the last. We all deal with life-threatening illness as we can death as we can, of course, and it is unfair to criticise people for adopting this approach. But there are better metaphors for describing illness. The image of war ignores the central fact that illness takes place within and not outside ourselves, and even cancerous growths are part of us. Death, too, is a necessary end of life.
Certainly we struggle when faced by serious illness, owing to the illness itself, to the effects of its treatment, and to our desire to live as fully as possible. We may also face a spiritual struggle to accept the fact of illness and of our mortality, and still to live as fully and freely as we can in hope of cure and in acceptance of death. The military metaphor sees weakness and acceptance as purely negative, and sets an indomitable will in conflict with a sick body. It is alienating because it separates spirit from body.
'A better metaphor for responding to bushfires may be that of public health, with its emphasis on the causes of illness, the social context in which it flourishes, and the variety of relationships that need to be addressed in its care. In public health the dominant metaphor is one of nurturing.'
In speaking of facing serious illness, we might find a better metaphor in gardening, with its times of germination, growth, pruning, digging, lying fallow, shedding leaves and dying. It can hold the whole of human life in an integrated view without focusing narrowly on one aspect of it.
The military metaphor is also much loved by political leaders, most recently in the response to the bushfires. It diverts people from the larger context of the crisis, encourages the belief that military leaders must enjoy the privilege of secrecy, and focuses attention on the powerful and ritzy technology that will win the war. These political advantages are at the expense of participative democracy and responsible decision making that takes into account the larger context.
In the case of bushfires, the military metaphor is particularly inappropriate. It suggests that the deep challenges of global warming , which can be addressed only by strong leadership and by the mobilisation of local communities, will be solved by a centralised command and control model based on the adaptation of sophisticated technology. The fact that a major Canberra fire was started by an air force plane is a parable of the inadequacy of such an approach.
A better metaphor for responding to bushfires may be that of public health, with its emphasis on the causes of illness, the social context in which it flourishes, and the variety of relationships that need to be addressed in its care. In public health the dominant metaphor is one of nurturing. Clinical intervention is set within a policy of sustaining health and preventing illness.
Even in meeting the public health challenge of responding to addiction, however, governments have preferred at heavy cost to adopt the metaphor of waging war on drugs. That preference itself is a sign of addiction.
Andrew Hamilton is consulting editor of Eureka Street.
Main image: Two toy soldiers pointing guns at each other (Getty images/Jorg Greuel)