World outlook

Quite some time ago, I was asked a question about the term “world outlook”. Having answered it I let it go, but have since had a lingering thought that this is a question worthy of a column – if I could collect some good media examples.

Happily, I came upon one such example yesterday, in a Guardian story about Barack Obama’s first day in office. The story (Whirlwind hits Washington as President Obama starts work, January 22, 2009) says, among other things:

President Barack Obama yesterday devoted his first full day in office to ditching one discredited Bush administration policy after another - proposing the closure of the Guantánamo Bay prison and offering a new relationship to Iran.... He also phoned world leaders to emphasize that a new president is in charge, with a completely different agenda and world outlook.

Now, definitions.

The word outlook refers to a view. You look out the window from your room for example and you will see a view and that view is an outlook in its fundamental sense.

You may argue that your room doesn’t have a view. By that you will be speaking figuratively, or philosophically meaning that it doesn’t have a good view, a pleasant view. I recall E.M. Forester’s beautifully written book, A Room with a View, began with an exact discussion about the view, or the lacks thereof, from a hotel room in Italy.

Obviously all rooms must have a view – if, that is, they have windows at all to look out of. But what constitutes a view – a good view – is quite another matter. Different people see views differently, as they view everything else differently. Why?

Because they have different outlooks, different ideas about what is good or evil, or, on smaller matters, what is pleasing and what is, er, repulsing.

And that general outlook on things, on the world as a whole and on life in general is called one’s world outlook, or world view.

Not surprisingly, Obama and his predecessor George W. Bush don’t share exactly the same world view, even if Obama is doing what was Bush’s job before Wednesday. Obama is black for starters, and to my own outlook on history, capitalism and colonization are the roots of all evils in the world today. Bush is from a family that’s always been a member of the elite while from the humble-most roots comes Obama, “whose father less than 60 years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant”, as he said in his inauguration speech.

This is among reasons why the Guardian describes the new American President as having a “completely different agenda and world outlook”.

Now, with the Chinese New Year coming up, I want to ask you, my dear reader, what’s your outlook on 2009?

In other words, do you want to make merry, or just make dough?

If I can have it my way and if you can afford it, I wish you would focus on making merry, and let the dough business take care of itself.

And according to my world view, the dough business will more or less take care of itself if you let it – only if you will let it.

Anyways, Happy Chinese New Year!