Hopes for 2021, a.k.a. the post where stargazer has an opinion

I have a confession to make. In real life, I am quite outspoken. On my blog, however, I try to keep my opinions to a bare minimum. It’s nice just to chat about books.

But when I started to write this post about my hopes for 2021, a few things just spilled out. Don’t worry, after this post I will go back to keeping my non-bookish opinions to a minimum. The flip-side of being outspoken is that I love to hear counter-arguments, so feel free to let me know your honest opinion in the comments. 🀨😁

And with that, let’s look at my hopes for 2021, which is my spin on this week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic. I hope:

1. We will win the fight with Covid 19
Or at least it will stop dominating our lives the way it did in 2020. If I’d read about Covid 19 in a novel, I might have found it an interesting premise, how a virus can change our society completely. Living it out in practice has been less amusing.

2. UK will get a smooth transition out of the EU and London will persist
I am not a fan of Brexit, but I’ve done what I could to prepare. I’ve had to change job, because a huge number of London City jobs are being moved to the EU. I’ve got permanent residency, so (presumably) I won’t be kicked out. And we even got a last minute Brexit deal. I just hope that London, this wonderful city where people from all over the world come together, work together, become friends, marry and produce offspring, who in some cases are fluent in three different languages, will persist. There aren’t actually that many cities globally with this degree of internationality and diversity.

3. Faith in democracy will be restored
Do you believe in democracy? Fundamentally, I still do, but events in recent years have shown serious downsides of democracy or at least in the way we implement it. And what happened in the US the other day??! I hope that was a one-off, but doubt that the underlying currents, which these events reflected, will go away overnight.

4. The woke culture will blossom, but not derail
Believe me, I am a huge supporter of equality and think we should treat everyone the same way, irrespective of race, sex, religion, appearance, sexuality, social background, etc. But it can’t be right, that we have to be afraid of opening our mouth in fear of offending some minority group we weren’t even aware existed. Everybody makes mistakes. Few of us are 100% up to speed with the latest topic we are meant to worry about or the latest phrases we are not allowed to use anymore. Surely, some degree of tolerance, dialogue and understanding must be required from all sides to allow us to move forward. I despise the cancel culture and don’t understand the fact that J.K. Rowling is swamped with death threats. Do people really think that is the way to actually resolve any issues?

Speaking of J. K. Rowling, I saw this discussion of her essay on transexual women over at whyevolutionistrue. The essay was nominated for the Russell Prize 2020, but didn’t win. I think people on both sides of the discussion might find it interesting.

5. Female equality in the job market will become a non-issue
Obviously, I think it’s positive that companies focus on giving females equal opportunities, but I also think it is a complex issue. Having quotas (such as 50% of women on the board of directors as they do in Norway) is in my view not the right way to go about it. If difficult to find enough willing and qualified candidates, it will inevitably lead to women getting the reputation of being second rank employees. Also, I would absolutely hate to be promoted if I am not the best, just because I am a women. It would feel highly unfair and would not by any means make me feel proud or happy.

I actually thought other women in the job market would have similar sentiments; I know it applies to my social circle. But the last time I said something along those lines, someone actually unfollowed me, so apparently I am wrong. What are your views? Should women in some cases be selected, just because they are women? I am all for giving women support, attention and encouragement if needed and I also believe more senior women in leading jobs would encourage more young women to follow. But in the end the best candidate should always be selected.

Finally, there is the issue of senior jobs coming with responsibility and stress. Again, based on my own circle, it might be the case that more women than men prioritise differently and would rather live with less stress and more time / energy for their children. We should be careful not to signal to these women, that they are making the wrong choice. Anyway, I don’t think it’s a straightforward discussion and would love to hear what you think. Also, the discussion applies more generally: Is positive discrimination a viable route to equality or does it make things worse?

Let me finish this point by quoting Gifty from Transcendent Kingdom (yes, I have taken to quoting fictional people now) because this quote perfectly reflects how I feel we should *see* women in the workplace:

β€œI didn’t want to be thought of as a woman in science, a black woman in science. I wanted to be thought of as scientist, full stop”

6. We take responsibility for ourselves and others
In the UK, during the COVID crisis, we have moved from having freedom in our lives to being completely micromanaged by politicians. That strongly goes against the values I believe in. In an ideal world, daily information about risks, numbers and latest results from the simulation models ought to be published. And based on that, each individual would use their common sense to adjust their behaviour. Do I think it would work? Well… Based on my observations through 2020, no, not really. And perhaps that is the most scary part of it all.

7. Book Bloggers will have a great 2021!
Ok, before I start babbling about world peace and sustainability, let me quickly get back to basis, which is book blogging. No matter what life may throw at us in 2021, I hope we will all have fun with and find comfort in book blogging and continue to support each other. That to me is the greatest strength of the book blogging community.

Phew, that ended up being a long post – and very different from what I envisaged when starting out. What are your hopes for 2021?

45 comments

  1. I so hope we get a grip on Covid. I can’t wait for the vaccinations to start here in Italy too, and hopefully it will all go smoothly. I think it would be good for people to use common sense, unfortunately at least from what I’ve seen so far, that doesn’t happen. So my hope isn’t necessarily to not be micromanaged, but instead for people to start thinking about the fact that making some sacrifices now will result in going back to a normal life soon because the virus disappears. I hope your blogging year is also very good. Have a great week and happy reading <3

    • Yes, it will be good to have the vaccination programme rolled out properly, hopefully this will allow us to return to a more normal life. I do believe, some people will act more responsibly, when given more responsibility, but given the huge number of people who still think that Covid 19 is an internet hoax, government conspiracy or just think it won’t hit them or their family, I can kinda understand the government not wanting to take any chances.Thanks so much and happy reading to you as well!

  2. Well, I don’t think you’re going t get much of a debate with me, because I agree with pretty much everything you’ve said. Except perhaps the bit about taking responsibility. As you have pointed out, not everybody does. Though perhaps much simpler, much more consistent guidelines, consistently applied cross the board would have enabled them to remain exactly that – guidelines – not punishable-if-not-obeyed rules. An interesting and thought-provoking piece. Now we can go back to reading!

    • Yes, I think simpler and more consistent guidelines, which didn’t change every other day, would make it easier for everyone. However, I doubt it would make a huge difference for people, who don’t take the virus very seriously. I am tempted to criticise the government for many things during the crisis, but on the other hand, I know how difficult it is to navigate in a scenario, where a lot of the parameters are unknown, and it is fair to say we knew very little about the virus to begin with. Thanks for contributing to the discussion! πŸ™‚

  3. Totally agree about the women thing — I would never want my success to be based just on my gender. It would honestly feel a little insulting, I think. I mean, I want to be recognized for my skills, not something as arbitrary as gender. But I do see how quotas can be useful with those employers who don’t even consider giving women a chance, regardless of their skills.

    Anyway, great post as always, and I really do hope 2021 treats us all a little bit better! Can’t imagine how it could be worse after that mess of a year πŸ˜€

    • Yes, exactly. I can’t see any woman being happy about being given special considerations. On the other hand, it’s a fact in certain industries at least, that women have a very difficult time climbing the ladder, so it’s not a straightforward problem. But still, I don’t think quotas are going to solve it.

      Thanks so much! Haha, no it’s difficult to imagine that 2021 will be worse – but never say never! πŸ˜‰πŸ˜†πŸ€­

  4. I so agree on the women thing. I consider myself a feminist, but I am always wary when it comes to sayings like “For girls to run the world” or “Female power”. It’s not about creating superiority or owerpowering other genders, it’s about creating equality where gender doesn’t really play a role and we don’t base our prejudice on whether it’s a “male” job position or a “female” job position. Like you said, women shouldn’t be considered as “female scientists” or “black female scientists”, just simply “scientists”.
    And ahhh, beloved Brexit. I am hoping to stay in the UK in the nearest future (and hopefully in a more distant future as well), but since I arrived not so long ago, I can’t apply for permamnent residency as of yet. Together with covid-19, it’s all a very stressful situation, but I hope that at least when covid calms down a little bit, I can make some more serious plans!
    Great post, and all the best in 2021, hopefully this is going to be the year of all important changes! πŸ™‚

    • Yes, that is very well put and I couldn’t agree more. We should evaluate everyone as an individual, not a male or a female or a coloured person. Of course things are not that easy and in the corporate world there is a tendency to value typical male traits higher. So somehow we all need to move a bit, men should look at what a different kind a profile than the typical alpha male (or alpha female) can contribute with and (some) women should learn to be louder and more self-promoting. But I think things are moving in the right direction, even if there are excessively few women at top level in the sector I work in.

      Oh, I hope you manage to stay in the UK. Despite of Brexit, Covid and everything, I still think it’s a pretty amazing place to be, at least London is. But I can see it must have been stressful for you, good luck with it all!

      Thanks so much, and yes, let’s hope 2021 will change for the better! πŸ™‚

  5. I can’t wait until Covid-19 is relegated to the history books. Do you know yet when you’ll be able to be vaccinated against it?

    My post.

    • Me neither! I have no idea if / when I will be offered a vaccination. But according to some, every adult in the UK will get the possibility at some point in 2021. I want to see it, before I believe it! πŸ™‚

  6. Great post! Haha, I am also opinionated and try (unsuccessfully sometimes) to keep it off the blog. Unfortunately I’m not going to be able to argue with you because, boringly, I agree with pretty much everything you say here! I too am not a Brexit fan, but the decision was made democratically and the deal was done by a whisker, and I truly hope everyone can now get behind trying to make it work for Britain and the UK, and all the people who live here wherever they were born! Yes, I believe in equality across the board, but can’t stand cancel culture and extreme political correctness – if I ever discover I’ve become woke, I shall bang myself on the head with a hammer repeatedly until I’m unconscious. What else? Oh yes, women in the workplace – see, I never felt that my gender made much difference in my workplace anyway. I never felt I lost out on a promotion through gender, right back to the 70s when I started work – more likely to be clashing senses of humour, or possibly even lack of experience sometimes. And I hate, hate, hate any form of positive discrimination – I think it holds women back rather than pushing them forward, by creating resentment. I need an equal playing field, not special favours, thank you very much! And yes, some women, and some men too, don’t necessarily want to be captains of industry, and that should be okay too. Democracy – that’s tricky. I’ve been saying for decades that it doesn’t work because too many people make no effort to understand the issues or learn about the candidates, and more recently, refuse to consent to losing. But when it’s threatened – for instance, by people refusing to accept the Brexit vote or the Scottish Independence vote (both of which I lost, but that’s OK) – or the current crisis in the US, then suddenly I find myself fighting tooth and nail to keep it. Humans, eh? We’re a weird lot… πŸ˜‰

    • Thanks FF! You know, you didn’t really have to tell me, you are opinionated – I kinda guessed that! Even if we mostly communicate via book reviews, I suppose some of the opinions and personality of the blogger shines through. Which is a good thing. It would be boring if we all wrote generic reviews without showing a bit of ourselves. Yup, let’s move on from Brexit and get the best out of it. It was a 100% democratic decision and I respect that. I am not 100% sure, though, if I believe a matter like Brexit should be put to a general vote. In theory, one of the benefits of representative democracy is, that normal people simply don’t have a chance to get to the bottom of the consequences of an issue like Brexit. It is such a complex and multi-facetted matter with lots of second order effects. Because few people understand that, in the end it all boils down to Eastern European workers and fish (or something like that…). Anyway, as you say, we need to move on.

      Yes, an equal playing field is what I like as well. But do we have that? I’ve seen statistics from the sector I work in and from the company I used to work for. For the grads generation (people hired directly from uni) there is now a relatively high intake of females – up till 40% some years. But as you move up the ranks, the percentage drops off, if not exponentially, then at least very steeply. At top level the percentage of women is frightening close to zero. Some of it is by choice; there is a high price to be paid to reach the higher levels. But that is definitely not the full explanation. So I think, it’s a good thing to have focus on the matter, but still not going as far as positive discrimination.

      You are right about democracy, there are things to criticise, but I guess certain events reminded us that the alternative is a lot worse.

      Thanks for contributing to the discussion, it is always a pleasure to exchange views with you! 😁

      P.S. I sincerely hope you’ll never become woke – the idea of you banging yourself unconscious with a hammer is decidedly frightening!

      • I’m not a fan of referendums either, for the reasons you give. In fact, I hope that one outcome of Brexit might be that politicians are more reluctant to dump these kinds of decisions on the public, now that they know the public can be a bit rebellious in their voting! Unfortunately I suspect there will be another extremely divisive Scottish Independence referendum in the not too distant future, unless a miracle happens.

        I think working mostly in healthcare management shielded me from sexism in the workplace – it’s a field in which women are traditionally over-represented, although even there the very top managers tended to be male. But middle management was heavily female. In my few years in the private sector things were different. At one point I was the only female manager in a management team of 17. Made for fun team nights out, though… πŸ˜‰

        • Yeah, it will be interesting to see what happens with the Scottish referendum – perhaps you can get back in the EU? πŸ˜‰ Of course, you are right – the representation of women in management probably differs a lot depending on what kind of company you are working at. There might even be negative discrimination of men in some sectors. Haha, I could imagine team nights out were fun!

  7. Fab post and agree on every point you made. Here’s to lots of bookish goodness this year in our Covid free post Brexit world, where everyone gets promoted because they are best for the job, and where no-one is frightened of sharing their ideas. πŸ˜€

    • Thanks so much Nicki, glad you agree! Yes, that sounds like a wonderful vision – let’s hope it comes through! πŸ˜€

    • Glad to hear you agree! Apparently, I needed to get it out. Now I will go back to talk about books! 😁

  8. I absolutely agree with your take on Female Equality. I support all sorts of encouragement and empowering efforts to increase education and employment opportunities but I hate it when women are recognised for their gender and not their skill or intellect. I think that quote you used summed it up in a profound manner.
    I hope 2021 turns out better with Covid being less imposing too.
    I think I agree with most of everything else mentioned here! Amazing post!

    • Yes, I understand the reasoning behind positive discrimination, but in the end I think it would do more harm than good. I too like the quote; it conveys my opinion much better than I managed, just using a few selected words. Thanks so much, let’s hope it will be a good year and that we finally gets Covid under control!

  9. I’m glad that you took the time to write down some of the things you judged necessary to share here! Especially when all of these show a pretty positive outlook on the future, something that needs to be reminded for many, that not everything needs to be bleak (I can get that from movies, shows, books, comics, video games!!). I hope 2021 will prove to be a fantastic year where peace and democracy won’t seem like mysterious enigmas.

    • I didn’t plan to write a rant post but apparently I needed to get it out! πŸ˜‰ I normally manage to have a positive outlook – not sure how well that came across in the post. Anyway, I certainly hope 2021 will be a fantastic year, both with respect to real life and to our reading!

  10. I do hope with you that London will be always be the great diverse international city I fell in love with. It will be my first trip after covid and I hope the brexit will not make it harder to travel. And I do agree on your other points too.

    • Yes, let’s hope that. I think, I saw a rough estimate saying that more than 700.000 people with foreign origin have left London in recent time. Of course with Covid and all, the job situation isn’t that great. But in normal times, I believe it’s really the international workforce which keep the city going and they often have jobs, most English people wouldn’t dream of taking. Anyway, let’s hope for the best.

    • Thanks so much, Tony! Yes, I am doing the same, essential shopping and exercise. And take-away sushi today. Not sure that was essential, but boy, it was good! 😁 I really can’t wait to get back to a more normal life, but as you say, it will be quicker if we all comply.

    • Thanks, I don’t know if it was a particularly optimistic post, but actually, I am normally a positive person. πŸ™‚

  11. OK I don’t agree that women should get a job or a position in the board because there’s a quota installed and it should come from their own merit but at least Norway is up front about it and it’s regulated. I’m sure in our countries there’s plenty of unofficial corporate politics. I don’t have a feeling they are doing more for women here, rather the other way around. It’s difficult because I sometimes have a feeling the men want to keep their exclusive men’s club and they can stop the women’s career path if they want to keep their upper hand (I’m sorry to say but even in this day men don’t always want to comply to women, you can see it in some marriages how the dynamics work and it’s not different in corporate life). So I see downsides but I can understand there’s some positive points about it too.
    Anyway, I’m focusing on the positive point in regard to me and my blogfriends and I hope reading and book blogging will get us through 2021 which will hopefully be better than 2020!

    • Yes, you are probably right about men wanting to keep their exclusive club. But I think to a high extent that it comes from the fact that leaders – more or less consciously – look for the traits they possess themselves when appointing other leaders and that tends to give men an edge as long as most of the existing leaders are men. I agree some men are not keen on having a female boss, but it looks like this has improved and is less pronounced in the younger generations compared to the older. Thanks Inge for contributing to the discussion. Let’s hope 2021 will be a great year both in real life and with respect to reading and blogging!

  12. Great post!!!
    I hope for many things that you do – though I also hoped for Brexit to be cancelled – in vain πŸ˜‰
    I feel that the woke culture has been dominated by the cancel culture to such extent that right now it’s difficult to tell them apart. That witch hunt attitude really puts me off. Live and let live, for goodness sake! If people were less prone to offense and more to forgiveness we’d all been happier πŸ˜‰

    • Thanks so much Ola! Unfortunately, I agree with you about the woke / cancel culture. I am sure the cancel culture does more harm than good. Live and let live – that could be my motto as well. Sometimes it feels like people deliberately look to tweak the meaning of certain sentences, so they can allow themselves to be offended. Weird, huh?!

  13. Broadly, I agree with a lot of the things you’ve said. I’m no lover of Brexit, I hope we win the fight against COVID and people (and the government) learn to take responsibility. However, our views do slightly differ in a couple places.

    I absolutely agree that we should be respectful and tolerant of everybody on the planet. I also agree that woke culture takes things a bit too far sometimes, and that they should be more tolerant of people who make an honest mistake. However, I do agree with some of the principles of cancel culture, even if it goes too far sometime. I believe that there are some ideas, like some hateful comments, that we lend validity to by not challenging, and are fundamentally dangerous to society. I think it is this sort of unbridled free speech, which we don’t have in the UK, that has contributed the rise of extreme right in the US. Although there is obviously a fine line, and if we cross it, it becomes censorship, which is also a problem.

    I also think positive discrimination is a good thing (although I think the name sets it up to fail, which shows how serious we are about it). The example I like is the Rooney rule, which stated that when senior coaching and operations positions came up in the NFL, at least one BAME candidate had to be interviewed. This vastly improved the number of BAME people in senior positions for about 15 years. However, recently, when it seemed that enforcement of the rule wan’t being taken seriously anymore, the number has been in sharp decline. Here is a link to a BBC article I found about it (although I haven’t read the whole thing): https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/american-football/53100170

    I definitely understand the concerns about fairness, about wanting to chose the best candidate. However, I really struggle to believe that all the white middle-aged men dominating the senior management roles were always the best suited to the job. It simply defies mathematical expectations of reality. However, all of this being said, I’m not the one that these sort of policies would effect, so I certainly shouldn’t be the one to say how they might affect a person on an individual level.

    I know this is really long, but I hope you find it interesting.

    • Thanks so much for some great input! I don’t mind long comments at all and yours have a lot of merit, even if we don’t fully agree. πŸ˜‰ I guess the discussion is never black and white. Of course you should use your right as a consumer to not support companies and people, who you think behave despicably. But to me that is not what the cancel culture is about, rather it’s some sort of witch hunt. I find it hard to see that it changes anything for the better. The opinion of the hunted will certainly not change, possibly quite the opposite. And a lot of people (including me) will be put off by this kind of behaviour, which won’t further the cause either. In the case of J.K. Rowling it seems like some people just jumped on the Twitter hate campaign without even trying to understand her views properly. I believe they are a lot more nuanced and sensitive than you would think just following Twitter (I am not defending her, just saying how ludicrous it is to cancel someone without making an effort to understand them properly). I believe in a more moderate approach and in dialogue / open discussion as opposed to cancellation. There are a lot of different ways of challenging an opinion and I don’t think the cancel culture is the best way. Anyway, I do see where you are coming from and perhaps it’s partly a generational divide. I bet most students would say exactly the same as you. Generally, I think the discussion of free speech is such a tricky one – I don’t really have a good answer to that.

      Perhaps, if it was guaranteed that a short period of positive discrimination would lead to a more fair representation I could live with it for a while, even if I wouldn’t want to be one of those pushed forward. But I think the development will have to happen organically in order to be sustainable and perhaps the BBC article actually illustrates that. But I agree 100% with you, that it can’t be true that the best management group for the company always consist solely of white middle-aged men. I am relatively optimistic that time alone will help solving the problem, though. Look how far we have come just looking some decades back. Again, thanks for a great comment!

      • I think we are more in agreement than I initially though about cancel culture. I agree that it can shut down nuanced views, and I don’t think that should happen. I don’t have any social media accounts, so I see a lot less of that type of ‘cancelling’, and a lot more news articles where openly racist people are complaining about not having a platform to speak on. It sounds like I might be more harsh on where I draw the line, but, as you noted, I think that could well be a generational divide.

        I completely see where you are coming from when you say that organic development might be more sustainable, and I agree that it probably is. I’m also optimistic that time will continue to improve the situation. However, I do think that positive discrimination has played a significant role in speeding along the developments we want to see, simply by existing as a concept. I think it is just one policies that have been shifting the collective psyche of the nation. Thanks for taking the time to provide such a detailed reply! Not that I ever thought you’d do anything different.

        • Yes, I actually think you are right about positive discrimination helping to highlight the problem to everyone. I hadn’t really thought of that. Anyway, let’s hope that some day we get to a world, where we will all be considered equal and where we (and perhaps white middle-aged men in particular πŸ˜‰) learn that people who in one way or the other differ from the norm, may have different skills and may therefore be able to contribute in a different (and sometimes better) way than people who fall into the “traditional” categories. Not that women are really a minority of course, I believe it’s pretty much 50/50 πŸ˜‰, but in management they still are. Thanks for some great input, it was fun discussing with you! I always enjoy talking to people with a different opinion than me, unless of course they are of the variety, who likes to speak, but refuses to listen. In any case, I agree, even if we have slightly different views, we don’t seem to be too far from each other.

          • It’s been really fun for me too! I love talking politics and society with other people who are equally interested and ready to have an open exchange of ideas. I hope we’ll have more similar conversations in the future.

    • Let’s hope, we will return to more normal conditions in 2021! I like the Can you borrow my book as well. Even if it’s meant as fun, I am sure we all recognise some of it! 😁

  14. No offense…but as a person who read Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harrari i dont believe in any kind of govt system…..like no i am not distrusting, but nowadays i dont seem to rely much…anyways Democracy is a…..moderate way to live…and umm yeah

    • You remind me, that I really need to read Sapiens. There are a lot of downsides to democracy, but I still think it’s the best alternative. Let’s see what I think, after having read Sapiens.

      • Oh do do that! ….. And i dont know why it kind of affected me alot maybe cause i get easily offended or something but if you are a strong believer than maybe it will be just a few holes in a ozone layer …. But yeah to say in modern way it messed me up! Its not that i kind of believe everyone is good and all that politicians promise to us is innocent….but you know he kind of claims everything you believe in to be IMAGINED……religion, class, politics….figmentations…. anyways shouldn’t spoil the book for you! Happy reading!

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