I found Bookworm's story touching (HT: neo-neocon) and it brought back some uncomfortable memories. Telling friends was not near so difficult as having extended family and coworkers discover I had gone over to the enemy. My mother’s side of the family included many Esperanto-learning One-Worlders, and liberalism was the creed for intelligent people, while conservatism was for people who, er, don’t see things the way that we do, dear. Some of them are very nice people but…. A fair number of their intellectual descendents in the family landed in Northern California. My father and father-in-law are (were) Roosevelt Democrats, certain that the Republicans were always out to screw the little guy.
My coming out was gradual, partly because my conversion was as well. I voted for Al Gore in the 1988 NH Primary, because he was at the time, a conservative Democrat (And people think I’ve changed?). But my families did not know me as a conservative until well into the mid-90’s. In families, political changes raise questions as to whether you are changing internal alliances as well. If you become a Republican, does that mean you no longer think conservative Aunt Edna was emotionally abusive? Her ultra-liberal children want to know.
Ah, but you didn’t come here to read that, did you? I was just establishing my street cred, like a speaker at an AA meeting.
Standard caveats: Everyone has their own style, I make no guarantees, yes, it is different for men and women, yadda yadda ya.
With humor, blame it on the children. This has a basis in reality, as parents do become more conservative as their children grow. “I used to be a liberal until Trevor turned 13. Now I think Genghis Kahn had some valid points.” “When I go clothes shopping with Maddy, I discover how conservative I’ve become.” A variation is to rant about the schools. “I want my children to learn real history instead of this touchy-feely nonsense.” This doesn’t so much stake out territory for yourself but it gives permission and an opening for any conservative ideas that someone else in the group has. You may find unexpected, if only partial allies saying “Yeah, I’m sick of hearing that the Pilgrims gave thanks to the Indians, or having my kids celebrating Solstice,” or “what bothers me is they’re not holding Heather accountable. She passed in a terrible book report and got a B because no one is supposed to feel bad.” Creating an opening for someone else is useful.
Liberal diehards will immediately counter by warning against conservative extremes, perfectly willing to fall out one side of the boat to avoid being on the other. Calming humor also gives permission in the group to dissent, however slightly. “True, but I don’t go to bed at night worrying that Jerry Falwell is going to be speaking at North Bunthorpe Middle School’s graduation next June. I’m more worried they’ll bring in Patricia Ireland and I’ll have to spend the summer explaining to my nine-year-old that Daddy isn’t really a rapist.
That strategy of exaggeration can also be used when some people know, and some don’t about your conservatism. When someone challenges you with anger or sneer, you go up over the top. “Oh, it’s even worse than you think! Since 9-11 I’ve been a right-wing nutcase about the WOT!” This also focuses the discussion on a single topic, rather than the generic, part-of-the-code, socially acceptable antipathy against Bush or Republicans. You can list your liberal credibility that way as well. “I’m still pro-choice, pro affirmative action, pro-whatever, but when it comes to the long-term danger the terrorists represent, I think the Democrats just don’t get it!” The single issue is usually easier for folks to swallow than the whole Dark Side.
You can pick out an eccentric middle ground. As an ex-liberal, this is probably fairly true anyway. This is especially effective if you have some trump card to play. For me, it was taking my vacations working in Romanian orphanages and villages, and having new Eastern European friends. It allowed me to make declarations like “Communism was worse than we ever dreamed. Everywhere. My Hungarian friends can’t believe there are still Americans who think socialism will work.” I have also heard people use their experience working for probation offices or with the homeless as eye-opening. “It’s not like you read in the papers. I was a bleeding heart when I went in, but after a couple of years of that you start understanding that it’s not the minimum wage that’s keeping some of these folks poor.”
If a surprising thread of non-liberal thought emerges in a discussion, and you fear backlash, the exaggerating humor is again calming. “Well, I don’t think any of us will be working on Pat Buchanan’s next presidential campaign, but I’m glad we had this little talk.”
Saturday, December 31, 2005
Friday, December 30, 2005
Multicultural Tips For Human Services
Men from many foreign cultures, including Hispanic and many African groups, have strong cultural prohibitions against homosexuality and are insulted at being asked their sexual preference.
Wealthy people, including children, consider it shameful to be told what to do by people of lesser wealth.
Rural Muslims living under Sharia maintain family honor by killing their sexually-active daughters, and feel demeaned when they sense our disapproval.
Homosexual activists are offended by just about everything. Most other homosexuals are not offended by much of anything.
Many rich people have an especial dislike of poor people of their own race and will insult and actively disassociate themselves from them.
Transgendered people are insulted when providers lump them together with transsexuals.
People from many parts of the world consider it an important part of their culture to hate their national neighbors and try to kill them.
Northern Europeans, and Americans of that descent, are embarrassed by their sons’ interest in toy guns and army men and will try to conceal these activities from others, especially psychologists and social workers.
Attorneys cover their anxiety about lawyer jokes with laughter. And planning to sue your ass tomorrow.
Unattractive people may mistrust attractive providers.
Attractive people may mistrust unattractive providers.
Pedophiles consider Sears catalogues to be part of their cultural heritage.
Wealthy people, including children, consider it shameful to be told what to do by people of lesser wealth.
Rural Muslims living under Sharia maintain family honor by killing their sexually-active daughters, and feel demeaned when they sense our disapproval.
Homosexual activists are offended by just about everything. Most other homosexuals are not offended by much of anything.
Many rich people have an especial dislike of poor people of their own race and will insult and actively disassociate themselves from them.
Transgendered people are insulted when providers lump them together with transsexuals.
People from many parts of the world consider it an important part of their culture to hate their national neighbors and try to kill them.
Northern Europeans, and Americans of that descent, are embarrassed by their sons’ interest in toy guns and army men and will try to conceal these activities from others, especially psychologists and social workers.
Attorneys cover their anxiety about lawyer jokes with laughter. And planning to sue your ass tomorrow.
Unattractive people may mistrust attractive providers.
Attractive people may mistrust unattractive providers.
Pedophiles consider Sears catalogues to be part of their cultural heritage.
Medicare Part D
Medicare Part D is going to be a nightmare. Liberals will blame George Bush, conservatives will blame the idiot Washington bureaucracy. I lean toward the latter, but don't exonerate the former. This program, designed to get prescription drug coverage for seniors and the disabled, is a neither fish-nor-fowl public-private partnership. For the next two months, people will be unable to get their correct medications because they filled out the forms wrong. And no wonder, as the forms are not clear.
Odd edges keep sticking out of this program. If you are a biggish small person, you qualify for benefit X but not Y. If you are a smallish big person, you get both X and Y, but you have to pay extra. Unless of course your smallish bigness is small, in which case the cost is paid by the government, except Part Y, which is only for biggish small people.
Yes, this is classic federal bureaucracy run amok, with lots of unknown people getting the program tilted their way so they can make money while senior citizens tremble that they won't get their blood pressure meds. But George Bush has this idiocy over his signature, and clearly wasn't making simplification a high priority here. Maybe this bells-and-whistles junk got traded for votes on things I also think is important, but right now I'm not impressed.
Odd edges keep sticking out of this program. If you are a biggish small person, you qualify for benefit X but not Y. If you are a smallish big person, you get both X and Y, but you have to pay extra. Unless of course your smallish bigness is small, in which case the cost is paid by the government, except Part Y, which is only for biggish small people.
Yes, this is classic federal bureaucracy run amok, with lots of unknown people getting the program tilted their way so they can make money while senior citizens tremble that they won't get their blood pressure meds. But George Bush has this idiocy over his signature, and clearly wasn't making simplification a high priority here. Maybe this bells-and-whistles junk got traded for votes on things I also think is important, but right now I'm not impressed.
Thursday, December 29, 2005
Plus Four Makes Ten
Full Disclosure: I broke my own rule. I read lots of other folks’ lists and culled some nominations from them. From those nine I am choosing the four last, with discussion included.
I hesitated to choose from the 30 years of my own adulthood, figuring that the long term effects might not be yet visible. Both Jimmy Carter and John Walker are relatively recent, but I think we do have some sense of what their effects have been. In a single four-year term, Carter was able to increase both unemployment and inflation to levels seldom seen in the American economy, a double-whammy made worse when you consider that a President isn’t responsible for the economy the day after he is elected, but only gradually becomes the dominant influence after being inaugurated. My usual delay estimate is that a president can not be fully blamed nor credited for the economy for 18-24 months after his election. Counting that in, the Carter Economy runs from late 1978-late 1982, and looks even worse. Additionally, he gave a tremendous boost to both Islamofascism and Communism with his Talk Loudly And Carry A Small Stick foreign policy. After forcible retirement, he devoted occasional time to providing cover for dictators with a fondness for torture, giving them time to eliminate their opposition. Carter undermined the few promising foreign policy initiatives of Bill Clinton, especially in North Korea. For a president who was supposed to be among the smartest ever, he also wrote books of amazing vacuity, and has been the most vicious and one-sided critic of subsequent presidents in the history of the nation. On the plus side, some people think he meant well, and he built houses.
Within the narrow area of protecting American secrets, John Walker’s effect was simply devastating, worst among a bad lot of American traitors.
I had forgotten about Sir Jeffrey Amherst and the smallpox blankets given to Indians. As the act occurred before 1776, I am not sure it technically qualifies as “American,” and that single act didn’t kill many people. But as the precedent was followed in some subsequent dealing with Native Americans, and Amherst was acting cruelly in an official, rather than personal capacity, it’s hard to ignore.
Joe Kennedy, Sr and Aaron Burr both get high marks for narcissism and complete disregard for the interests of others, but both fail to make the final cut because they only came close to irreparably damaging the republic. They would have if they could have, but they didn’t.
Nathan Bedford Forrest certainly deserves close consideration. Like Al Capone, others may have been worse individuals, but Forrest brought considerable skill to his evil, turning the little KKK into both a political force and a shadow army. Southerners try to retain a fondness for him because he was a helluva general for the Confederacy. The rest of us hardly consider that a positive.
The Soviet Union received no better cover from respectable sources in the West than it received from Walter Duranty, though vice-president Henry A. Wallace approached it briefly. Wallace eventually had the stones to recant and apologize for his support of Stalin. Duranty never did. Duranty lied, millions (millions!) of Ukranians died.
Few could hope to approach Margaret Sanger for meanness of spirit and contempt for those she found inferior. She is Exhibit A of the historical reminders that even though eugenics is not an automatic consequence of abortion, it sure show up often at its cocktail parties. We are fortunate that most of what she wished for the world has not come to pass, and for all that she gets a pass under my system of measuring results rather than intent. She founded Planned Parenthood, an organization staffed mostly by people who mean well and try to help. But that counts for nothing, remember? If you were to identify one person responsible for elevating the prestige of abortion beyond the level of tragic necessity and into the realm of admirable, liberating act, it would be Sanger. But I am not sure that her advocacy was what changed our attitudes.
The previous six are here
The final list, in no particular order:
Eli Whitney
Pete Seeger
Al Capone
Alger Hiss
Boss Tweed
Lee Harvey Oswald
Jimmy Carter
John Walker
Nathan Bedford Forrest
Walter Duranty
I hesitated to choose from the 30 years of my own adulthood, figuring that the long term effects might not be yet visible. Both Jimmy Carter and John Walker are relatively recent, but I think we do have some sense of what their effects have been. In a single four-year term, Carter was able to increase both unemployment and inflation to levels seldom seen in the American economy, a double-whammy made worse when you consider that a President isn’t responsible for the economy the day after he is elected, but only gradually becomes the dominant influence after being inaugurated. My usual delay estimate is that a president can not be fully blamed nor credited for the economy for 18-24 months after his election. Counting that in, the Carter Economy runs from late 1978-late 1982, and looks even worse. Additionally, he gave a tremendous boost to both Islamofascism and Communism with his Talk Loudly And Carry A Small Stick foreign policy. After forcible retirement, he devoted occasional time to providing cover for dictators with a fondness for torture, giving them time to eliminate their opposition. Carter undermined the few promising foreign policy initiatives of Bill Clinton, especially in North Korea. For a president who was supposed to be among the smartest ever, he also wrote books of amazing vacuity, and has been the most vicious and one-sided critic of subsequent presidents in the history of the nation. On the plus side, some people think he meant well, and he built houses.
Within the narrow area of protecting American secrets, John Walker’s effect was simply devastating, worst among a bad lot of American traitors.
I had forgotten about Sir Jeffrey Amherst and the smallpox blankets given to Indians. As the act occurred before 1776, I am not sure it technically qualifies as “American,” and that single act didn’t kill many people. But as the precedent was followed in some subsequent dealing with Native Americans, and Amherst was acting cruelly in an official, rather than personal capacity, it’s hard to ignore.
Joe Kennedy, Sr and Aaron Burr both get high marks for narcissism and complete disregard for the interests of others, but both fail to make the final cut because they only came close to irreparably damaging the republic. They would have if they could have, but they didn’t.
Nathan Bedford Forrest certainly deserves close consideration. Like Al Capone, others may have been worse individuals, but Forrest brought considerable skill to his evil, turning the little KKK into both a political force and a shadow army. Southerners try to retain a fondness for him because he was a helluva general for the Confederacy. The rest of us hardly consider that a positive.
The Soviet Union received no better cover from respectable sources in the West than it received from Walter Duranty, though vice-president Henry A. Wallace approached it briefly. Wallace eventually had the stones to recant and apologize for his support of Stalin. Duranty never did. Duranty lied, millions (millions!) of Ukranians died.
Few could hope to approach Margaret Sanger for meanness of spirit and contempt for those she found inferior. She is Exhibit A of the historical reminders that even though eugenics is not an automatic consequence of abortion, it sure show up often at its cocktail parties. We are fortunate that most of what she wished for the world has not come to pass, and for all that she gets a pass under my system of measuring results rather than intent. She founded Planned Parenthood, an organization staffed mostly by people who mean well and try to help. But that counts for nothing, remember? If you were to identify one person responsible for elevating the prestige of abortion beyond the level of tragic necessity and into the realm of admirable, liberating act, it would be Sanger. But I am not sure that her advocacy was what changed our attitudes.
The previous six are here
The final list, in no particular order:
Eli Whitney
Pete Seeger
Al Capone
Alger Hiss
Boss Tweed
Lee Harvey Oswald
Jimmy Carter
John Walker
Nathan Bedford Forrest
Walter Duranty
Global Wetting
New Hampshire in 2005 has broken its record for annual precipitaiton, according to the Union Leader.
I blame George Bush for this.
I blame George Bush for this.
Something New In The Abortion Debate
An evenhanded discussion of the logical aspects of the abortion issue can be found at Asymetrical Information. Scroll down to November 9. http://www.janegalt.net/blog/archives/2005_11.html
With all the ink that has been spilled over the abortion issue, you wouldn’t think there’d be much new to say.
I have something new to say.
Pro-choice advocates frequently use the language of invasion, even though this makes no rational sense. The clearest expression of this was Cameron Diaz’s TV appearance in the runup to the 2004 election, explicitly equating the pro-life position with rape. Very similar language makes its appearance in prochoice advocacy and fund-raising material. Somehow this resonates with some women. For society to forbid an abortion is perceived as a sexual assault. When something is this irrational but this strongly felt by intelligent women, my initial supposition is that the feelings are not about nothing, but that the attribution (or blame) is misplaced.
The more rational issues of the abortion debate I leave aside here, not because they are unimportant, but because they are covered in many other places, by people far wiser than I. We are unable to get to these rational issues because something irrational, but not necessarily ridiculous or contemptible, is in the way.
Abortions don’t take place in people’s bedrooms. That’s fairly obvious, but the objection persists that the “government has no business in people’s bedrooms.” Initial guess: If I am visibly pregnant, then everyone will know I’m having sex. No one has the right to know if I’m having sex. Therefore, I should be able to have an abortion to prevent this information from becoming public knowledge. That’s not a rational approach to whether someone should be allowed to have an abortion, but it’s not bizarre, either. It’s an understandable sentiment, and may be a more driving consideration among younger or unmarried women.
Note: I am making no attempt here to understand or comment on all the feelings a woman might have when considering abortion. My focus is on this single anamoly or set of related anamolies on this issue of women believing they are being “forced,” in some way, and how this colors the discussion.
Governments do not force pregnancies to proceed. Biology does that. Not-allowing-people-to-stop something is similar, but not quite the same. The phrase “making someone be pregnant” has several possible meanings, but that doesn’t make those meanings logically equivalent. It doesn’t take much sophistication of thought to see that forcible impregnation is simply a different act from staying the hand of someone who wishes to abort. But that connection is powerful for some women, and I don’t believe it is a mere rhetorical device to cheat the argument. Additional guess: Having to continue a pregnancy is reminiscent of the Bad Old Days, when women were culturally “forced” to have children. In the Bad Old Days women were denied status and resources if they didn’t have children, and if a woman were raped there wasn’t much she could do about it. It’s a package deal of old values, and if we can’t have abortions it will be like having to endure rape again. The connection with rape is not logical, but it’s not absurd, either. There is a perceived association of one value with another based on "In the old days, both were more common. Therefore a person holding one of these older views likely holds both of them."
There is also the sense of being invaded by another human being. This accords with the language of rape, even though the baby is clearly not raping the mother. But this presence, this invasion at an intimate level has some analogy to sex. Third guess: I don’t want another person intimately in me without my permission. Being in me without permission is rape. If the government does not allow me to abort, then the government is not allowing me to defend myself against intrusion. Related to this would be the idea that It is intolerable to me to have another person inside me. Therefore, it's not a person.
Less obviously sexual, but carrying some of the same suggestion, is “I get to do what I want with my body.” We don’t mean that about our bodies in actuality, but we do generally mean it about sexual behavior. We don’t believe that doctors should be made to help teenagers pierce their tongues because they’re going to do it anyway and we want them to be safe. We don’t allow people to demand that doctors amputate limbs for no reason. But when it comes to sexual behavior, we are pretty solidly in the camp of "No one should make you do or not do anything. It's entirely up to you."
I have been using the phrases "not logical" or "not rational" throughout. I think I will back off from that here. These associations are not logical in the sense of 2+2=4, but they do fit another kind of reasonableness. On a color wheel, yellow is not red, but the entire path between them is orange. Yellow is close to red in that sense; closer than if you went through green, blue, and purple. I see the connection but less than half understand it.
Wednesday, December 28, 2005
Assistant Village Idiot Appears on a Sweet Potato
That's me on the left, there. Sadly, it really does look like me.
The Ten Worst Americans -- Okay, Six So Far
The actual Worst Americans are people few of us will ever know, serial killers and torturers who seem barely recognizable as human beings. But their evils are nearly always limited by their own lack of power and influence. I choose my list from those whose actions had the worst effects, regardless of intent. Comparing baseness of motive is a fruitless task. Comparing results is relatively straightforward. Identifying the cruelest slaveowner might be interesting, but that person did not produce as much catastrophic effect as
Eli Whitney – the man who perpetuated slavery. Slavery was disintegrating as an institution because it was not economically viable when Whitney’s cotton gin gave it new life. Contrast the well-meaning Eli with the irascible Henry Ford, a miserable SOB who couldn’t give a rat’s posterior about black people, but made the elevation of the lower classes possible with his process improvements. In this era of Ray Kurzweil’s insisting that advances in technology will liberate us all, it pays to remember that even clever things can have dire consequences.
Al Capone – there have been many worse criminals in American history, but Capone’s organizational skills and ruthlessness established a model that others could, and did imitate. Would another Capone have arisen to carve out a place for organised crime in America? Probably, but likely with less effect. Ethnic gangs had been long known in American cities, but the wholesale import of Old-World corruption turned out to be a weed we still can’t eradicate.
Pete Seeger -- Seeger did not much influence popular culture directly, but he was an enormous influence on Leftiedom from WWII on. He was always willing to lie for The Cause, because the true stories weren’t such good illustrations. (See, for example Waist Deep In The Big Muddy, Walkin’ Down Death Row, and I Mind My Own Business.) Seeger’s self-righteousness and genial sneers trained an entire generation of lefties in what was proper to think and what a fascist or moronic rube you were if you disagreed.
Alger Hiss – with nods to Julius and Ethel Rosenberg and Henry Wallace. With all the spite one can still generate bringing up McCarthy, Nixon, HUAC, etc, it pays to remember that there actually were traitors in our government. That they saw themselves as gentle One-Worlders does not remove the fact that they lent active support and credibility to the social system which killed 200,000,000 in the 20th C. None of them had illusions about how communists were operating worldwide, but they ignored that for the sake of a dream they wished to impose on the rest of us.
Lee Harvey Oswald – Political assassination had gone out of the American repertoire for decades until Oswald returned us to the age of anarchists with the assassination of Kennedy. This set off a string of further shootings and attempted shootings of political figures, including another Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr.
William March Tweed – Tammany Hall controlled the Democratic Party in New York City, and was the 800-lb gorilla of American politics for 70 years. Attempts have been made to minimize how damging this was and to paint it as a moderating influence on what could have been a more unstable situation. This is ridiculous. Corruption may be a common way station between servitude and freedom, but it is not the only way station nor a particularly good one. Boss Tweed was the sand in the gears of economic growth for decades, keeping immigrants in enslaving poverty.
The Greatest American? I’m giving the early lead to George Washington Carver. The man invented peanut butter. What tops that?
Tuesday, December 27, 2005
Requisite Apology
Family Christmas yesterday, and a wonderful time with my two brothers and almost all the attachments. Went to my oldest son's tonight to watch the second son's movies from his film study semester in LA. Surprisingly good. I expected his acting to be good, but it was good to brilliant. He had composed his own scores, showing more talent there than we had expected. The excellent camera work was not a surprise, but his willingness to take risks and pull it off was good. The lad still has trouble making the plot clear -- often a product of not telegraphing who is who in the dim lighting. But pieces of the boxing movie were stunning, and his facial expressions in comedy were wonderful. There is a difference between holding down a part and creating a role, and he rose above the journeyman competence of acting at least 50% of the time.
Anyway, tomorrow there will be controversy.
Anyway, tomorrow there will be controversy.
Sunday, December 25, 2005
Answers to Harder List Holiday Songs
26. Chestnuts
27. It's Beginning
28. Bethlehem
29. Sleigh Bells
30. Rocking
31. Home
32. We Wish
33. I Heard
34. Frosty
35. Jolly
36. Wenceslas
37. Rooftop
38. Gentlemen
39. Blue
40. Goose
41. I Don't Want
42. Here We Come
43. Most Wonderful
44. Sidewalks
45. Hark
46. Weather
47. Manger
48. Angels
49. Bleak
50. O Come
51. Night Wind
52. Three Ships
53. Angels From
27. It's Beginning
28. Bethlehem
29. Sleigh Bells
30. Rocking
31. Home
32. We Wish
33. I Heard
34. Frosty
35. Jolly
36. Wenceslas
37. Rooftop
38. Gentlemen
39. Blue
40. Goose
41. I Don't Want
42. Here We Come
43. Most Wonderful
44. Sidewalks
45. Hark
46. Weather
47. Manger
48. Angels
49. Bleak
50. O Come
51. Night Wind
52. Three Ships
53. Angels From
Answers To First Batch of Holiday Songs, 2016.
At our party, groups of 6-8 working intermittently over 90 minutes got most of them. One group got all. Group interaction seems to spark off new ideas better than working alone.
1. Have Yourself
2. First Noel
3. Yarmulke (two versions - disputed)
4. Midnight
5. Deck
6. Silent
7. Jingle Bell Rock
8. On the First
9. O Christmas Tree
10. You Better
11. Joy
12. What Child
13. Rudolph *
14. Hallelujah (this one was harder than I'd thought)
15. Mommy
16. Grandma
17. Dreidel
18. O Holy
19. Feliz
20. Holly
21. All I Want
22. Dashing
23. Come, They Told
24. We Three
25. Dreaming
The first version I saw of this puzzle had "You Know Dasher and Dancer..." After discussion, we decided that as this was not strictly necessary, it isn't the first line, but a separate introduction.
1. Have Yourself
2. First Noel
3. Yarmulke (two versions - disputed)
4. Midnight
5. Deck
6. Silent
7. Jingle Bell Rock
8. On the First
9. O Christmas Tree
10. You Better
11. Joy
12. What Child
13. Rudolph *
14. Hallelujah (this one was harder than I'd thought)
15. Mommy
16. Grandma
17. Dreidel
18. O Holy
19. Feliz
20. Holly
21. All I Want
22. Dashing
23. Come, They Told
24. We Three
25. Dreaming
The first version I saw of this puzzle had "You Know Dasher and Dancer..." After discussion, we decided that as this was not strictly necessary, it isn't the first line, but a separate introduction.
Saturday, December 24, 2005
A Christmas Story (With No Christmas)
I wandered aimlessly west and south until I was quite near Oxford Station in London, and caught the sound of piano music on the breeze. Not just any piano music, Binky, but solid, rhythmic tunes, heartily played. None of this George Winston stuff, or piano lounge faux jazz. Songs, Trevor my lad, actual songs with verses, written more than forty years ago. People gathered around the piano and sang along with whatever the accompanist played. There was a WWII medley, including one I had not heard but found easy to learn, about Hitler having only one ball. There were a smattering of old show tunes, quite a bit from ragtime and flapper eras, a Tom Lehrer tune… all quite jolly. The people knew each other but were quite welcoming to me.
The pianist was a small man in a battered blue blazer, smoking tiny hand-rolled cigarettes -- they were legit, I checked. He comes in most Thursday and Friday nights and plays as long as he feels like. There were a very few people in their 20’s, more in their 30’s, but most of us were 45+. The bar was full and most other customers paid no heed to the 20 of us singing. This struck me as odd at first. Why come to a pub where people sing old songs if you aren’t going to give at least half an ear? In time the mystery explained itself, as individuals from across the room were invited by name and with scattered applause as certain songs were begun. When finished, they usually requested another song be played, sang it, and sat down.
Pale ruined choirs. None of us had excellent voices any longer, though some were still good. I thought I remembered this population from theater parties after musicals or Gilbert and Sullivan productions, oldsters trying to reimpress for one more night. “I used to play for Garland when she came through DC,” they would mention casually on the way to some other story. But they looked at you hungrily, hoping you would ask about it. Vain people, horribly trapped in their own lost talent.
There was something calmer about this group, just happy to sing with each other. The musical ear remains good long after the throat is shattered, and these talented people must have heard what years of whiskey and tobacco and talking over pub crowds had done to their voices.
Yet there were no apologies for not being as good as they once were. It would have seemed out of place, somewhat naïve, drawing us back to the old world, when such things still mattered. To apologize for a strain in range among a people who have long since ceased to measure their range would be embarrassing. It would be akin to chuckling “I was always such a trouble to them in the Westminster Abbey youth choir” -- a false humility, worse than arrogance. For a long minute I misunderstood this atmosphere, worrying that the vocal deterioration was the one awful secret that should not be mentioned. Too much exposure to psychology; I pathologize all I see. Reading Pinter produces the same effect.
This group had it right. Of course we’re all washed up, mate. What of it? If you stop to bother about that you’ll miss the next song. They all may have once sung with someone Known, been one of the many thousands who brush the edge of importance in the music world. I hope these aren’t the only few who escaped through the flames. I fear the others are still dropping names and places, hoping for a moment of admiration. These simply sang, and then sang more.
It may have been a glimpse of heaven and hell. Certainly the hellish picture is much like C.S.Lewis’s portrayal of hell in The Great Divorce, with the unrelenting preoccupation with one’s place and importance.
We will all sing in heaven -- I always thought we would have magnificent voices, but perhaps not. Perhaps that would be beside the point.
Friday, December 23, 2005
Intelligence isn't everything
Years (and years) ago, I was president of the Prometheus Society, one of those tiny up-above-Mensa IQ groups with a supposed cutoff of 164 IQ. (No, I don’t think my IQ actually is that high. I think I’m closer to 150 and fluked in). We wrote articles on everything in the monthly newsletter Gift of Fire and argued the points – sort of a slow-moving, proto-blogosphere in the late 80’s. All you folks who think that the world would be better if the smart people were in charge – drop that idea. I have never interacted with a group that had screwier ideas, listened less, or postured more. Everyone arrived with the idea at long last, people I can reason with, but the discussions were as petty and unreasonable as everywhere else. Higher vocabulary and more formulas, same arguments.
There were a few genuinely wise and reasonable people there, but the overriding tendency was to take a principle and apply it so rigorously as to remove it from realistic context. I likened it at the time to getting a screw cross-threaded, but forcing it in anyway. These people had the raw brain power, the g-factor, the density of glial cells to force a bad idea to its conclusion, and the result wasn’t pretty. There was an Asperger-y quality to every discussion, a sense that it mattered greatly whether something was called blue-green vs. teal. You don’t want your new masters to have Asperger’s. Trust me here, people. I’ve had a very charming, witty boss with Asperger’s before. It’s hellish.
I liken intelligence in the limited sense to height in basketball. Height helps. Everyone would like a little more. But the greatest players are not always the tallest, because other factors become ascendent after a certain minimum. How determined are you? How well do you mesh with others? How fast are you, how coordinated, how intuitive, how well-coached?
Things seem to run better when the folks with SAT’s 1200-1400 are running things.
There were a few genuinely wise and reasonable people there, but the overriding tendency was to take a principle and apply it so rigorously as to remove it from realistic context. I likened it at the time to getting a screw cross-threaded, but forcing it in anyway. These people had the raw brain power, the g-factor, the density of glial cells to force a bad idea to its conclusion, and the result wasn’t pretty. There was an Asperger-y quality to every discussion, a sense that it mattered greatly whether something was called blue-green vs. teal. You don’t want your new masters to have Asperger’s. Trust me here, people. I’ve had a very charming, witty boss with Asperger’s before. It’s hellish.
I liken intelligence in the limited sense to height in basketball. Height helps. Everyone would like a little more. But the greatest players are not always the tallest, because other factors become ascendent after a certain minimum. How determined are you? How well do you mesh with others? How fast are you, how coordinated, how intuitive, how well-coached?
Things seem to run better when the folks with SAT’s 1200-1400 are running things.
40 mpg
The suggestion was to decrease our dependence on foreign oil by mandating that all new cars sold after January 1, 2007 get at least 40mpg.
All those people who don’t like the new models, or don’t like not being able to buy a minivan or a pickup, or the 2007 versions are too expensive – they keep their old vehicle longer and don’t but a new one. That’s several million unsold cars right there. Would you explain to all those auto workers why they were laid off, please? And all the people who make things that go in cars?
Those used pickups and bigger cars, built before the new regs went in – the price of those goes way up, dragging up the price of all used cars. Would you explain to all those poor people why they can’t afford a car anymore?
Then wander over and explain to the guys at the sports car accessory place why they’re going out of busines. And drop by Home Depot and Loews and Walmart and anywhere else whose business depends on people picking up large items and bringing them home, and explain to them why sales are way down and why they have to lay folks off.
The camping and boat people take a big hit as well -- and the small businesses that need small trucks for deliveries or to bring equipment to paint or landscape. Now after we’ve lost all those jobs directly related to vehicles, after those first few million Americans are out of work, only then do we start on the ripple effect on the whole economy, as everyone has less money to spend and buys fewer clothes and dishwashers and magazines.
All those people who don’t like the new models, or don’t like not being able to buy a minivan or a pickup, or the 2007 versions are too expensive – they keep their old vehicle longer and don’t but a new one. That’s several million unsold cars right there. Would you explain to all those auto workers why they were laid off, please? And all the people who make things that go in cars?
Those used pickups and bigger cars, built before the new regs went in – the price of those goes way up, dragging up the price of all used cars. Would you explain to all those poor people why they can’t afford a car anymore?
Then wander over and explain to the guys at the sports car accessory place why they’re going out of busines. And drop by Home Depot and Loews and Walmart and anywhere else whose business depends on people picking up large items and bringing them home, and explain to them why sales are way down and why they have to lay folks off.
The camping and boat people take a big hit as well -- and the small businesses that need small trucks for deliveries or to bring equipment to paint or landscape. Now after we’ve lost all those jobs directly related to vehicles, after those first few million Americans are out of work, only then do we start on the ripple effect on the whole economy, as everyone has less money to spend and buys fewer clothes and dishwashers and magazines.
Tuesday, December 20, 2005
The Post-Christian United States
Stuff that has been hovering in the background for decades has become a Big Deal this year. All of a sudden folks are really torqued about "Happy Holidays" versus "Merry Christmas," and Intelligent Design in the public school classroom has emerged as a major news item this year.
This is a post-Christian nation. I raised my children, now grown or nearly grown, to be aware that they were Christians in a culture where that is unpopular. I don't think riding past waves of religiosity is good for individuals -- though I think it is good for the culture at large.
I don't expect public school teachers to teach my children about Intelligent Design. I expect them to be secular smartypants who think they are wiser than that. I think public school teachers who secretly wish to rescue children from this blinkered, conservative society are the norm. The "new ideas" they wish to expose my children to is the same old crap, but that's okay.
I also don't like it when they undermine my beliefs, and I complain about it. These crusaders do need to be reined in and reminded. I also complain when they push their beliefs in dishonest fashion -- like teaching the speech of Chief Seattle, which is a hoax from 30 years ago, and using it to examine American political values. But they are under no obligation to teach my beliefs.
I expect that merchants will teach their cashiers to say whatever will get everyone in the least trouble. I am not going to pick on a poor shopgirl for saying "Happy Holidays."
Further, I don't expect to be given Christmas off. It's a religious holiday, and people should have to work it. If I want it off for religious reasons, I should take it out of my own time -- or take it unpaid.
America has been a Christian nation, but much of that has been a mile wide and an inch deep. That has had benefits for society that unbelievers refuse to admit, but I think it has been a disadvantage to the Church.
This is a post-Christian nation. I raised my children, now grown or nearly grown, to be aware that they were Christians in a culture where that is unpopular. I don't think riding past waves of religiosity is good for individuals -- though I think it is good for the culture at large.
I don't expect public school teachers to teach my children about Intelligent Design. I expect them to be secular smartypants who think they are wiser than that. I think public school teachers who secretly wish to rescue children from this blinkered, conservative society are the norm. The "new ideas" they wish to expose my children to is the same old crap, but that's okay.
I also don't like it when they undermine my beliefs, and I complain about it. These crusaders do need to be reined in and reminded. I also complain when they push their beliefs in dishonest fashion -- like teaching the speech of Chief Seattle, which is a hoax from 30 years ago, and using it to examine American political values. But they are under no obligation to teach my beliefs.
I expect that merchants will teach their cashiers to say whatever will get everyone in the least trouble. I am not going to pick on a poor shopgirl for saying "Happy Holidays."
Further, I don't expect to be given Christmas off. It's a religious holiday, and people should have to work it. If I want it off for religious reasons, I should take it out of my own time -- or take it unpaid.
America has been a Christian nation, but much of that has been a mile wide and an inch deep. That has had benefits for society that unbelievers refuse to admit, but I think it has been a disadvantage to the Church.
Sunday, December 18, 2005
Wyman Family Christmas Letter -- 2005
I don't know how much my little corner (very little corner) of the blogosphere is interested, but with a week to go before Christmas, I thought I would append this.
The whole batch of us, including Jonathan and Heidi, went to Romania this summer.
Nota, billet, plata
Romanian language tapes teach you to ask for the nota at the end of the meal. At the El Greco café after some confusion, we were instructed that the word we wanted was billet. At the Princepesa, one block away, billet was not the right word, no, no. What could you mean? What could these (stupid) Americans want? You must mean plata. And then of course not plata, but nota two blocks over at Little Italy, after many gestures and consultations. I tried checque once in frustration, which they immediately recognized – and then corrected me. We never once guessed right, but we did short-circuit this game they play with Americans by using nota de plata. Take that, Daria.
“But he’s my father!”
Ben worked at the orphanage in Beius for eight weeks. The children do not see adult males that much, and are often skittish at first. Several little girls took to him quickly however, clamoring for shoulder rides and carryings. When Pamela was chastened by the Romanian women for riding so long when she could be walking, she countered “But he’s my father!” Ouch. Ben would gladly have taken any one of a half-dozen home if he could, and saying goodbye was difficult.
“The house should be right here. Huh.”
Chris and John-Adrian went back to the village of Derna for the first time in 12 years. They walked in the fields where they had been young shepherds and visited the house they had lived in. As the next house over had been torn down and the distant cousins had changed their old house, it was difficult for them to recognize it. They were pleased that several elderly babushkas remembered who they were, and the whole neighborhood gathered around to see them. Derna is fairly remote, with not a lot happening, so the visit by the boys will be a topic there for months, with those who saw them being envied by those who did not. We later learned that Chris was also a grape stomper there.
"Thongs on Parade"
More important, J-A and Chris got to spend a few days with their older brother and younger sister still in Romania, and connect them to their two American brothers. The six of them plus a fiancée, a wife, and several additional friends traveled in a pack through Oradea, including the local pool, where the swimwear is extreme for all ages. Ben blogged wryly that toplessness was less enchanting than he had expected. The troupe even allowed Tracy and I to join them, particularly when we paid for dinner. Chris expects to be back next summer working either at the orphanage or for Habitat, and will time his trip to overlap with Catalin’s projected wedding.
The year of five addresses.
From May 2005 to May 2006, Ben will have lived in Kentucky for one college semester, in Romania for the summer, in NH during vacations, in Los Angeles for a film studies semester, and in the Italian Alps for the Winter Olympics. In between, there have been short stays in Ireland, Budapest, and the Florida panhandle. This level of excitement and dislocation seems more attractive at 22 than it does at 52.
Bat Cave Baptist Church
John-Adrian has started college in marketing at North Greenville University in SC. His dorm room wasn’t ready for the first month, the school server doesn’t block viruses very well, and the campus is at the intersection of two roads going nowhere. Small signs point to unusually named Baptist churches in all directions. But he thinks NGU a good choice, all in all. I think he talks with Chris more now than he did while he was home.
“I just put him down and made him apologize. We’re friends now.”
Chris has transferred to Goffstown High, where he is now learning to be an auto technician. He toys with the idea of entering the military in 2007, then thinks no, he will train to fix BMW’s. His other grades have also gone up, and he might have his first shot at making the honor roll. That is not where he has traditionally pictured himself, but he likes it. Ben and J-A don’t share with us who they’re dating, but Chris, like Jonathan, is more open. We have worried for four years what would happen if Chris got into a fight, praying it would not be like his fights at the state orphanage. When it happened, it was pretty anticlimactic (above).
“I can build you something that looks like a porch from forty feet.”
1) Tracy has always wanted a screened porch. 2) Our old porch was rotting in places. 3) Having someone do the work for me would run about $10,000. Thus, I attempted it myself. Most of my previous construction experience was building theatrical sets thirty years ago, and this type of help is what my brother, who earns his daily bread teaching technical theater at Smith College, offered – as stated above. I had no designs, just ripping off pieces and adding on others. I spent a lot of time staring at the porch, considering options, and obsessing about it from June to November. I finally completed a screened porch twice the size of the previous one, including a metal roof. No major injuries. Chris helped with the labor, and if he occasionally invented his own ways of doing things when I wasn’t there, that is a small price to pay for having a son help. As it was all seat of the pants, his ideas were usually about as good as mine anyway.
I had hoped to split the difference between theatrical construction and real construction, building something that held weight and looked like a porch from 20 feet. I actually did a little better. Come see my porch, and stand about 15 feet away. “Distance adds beauty,” my brother reminds me
The whole batch of us, including Jonathan and Heidi, went to Romania this summer.
Nota, billet, plata
Romanian language tapes teach you to ask for the nota at the end of the meal. At the El Greco café after some confusion, we were instructed that the word we wanted was billet. At the Princepesa, one block away, billet was not the right word, no, no. What could you mean? What could these (stupid) Americans want? You must mean plata. And then of course not plata, but nota two blocks over at Little Italy, after many gestures and consultations. I tried checque once in frustration, which they immediately recognized – and then corrected me. We never once guessed right, but we did short-circuit this game they play with Americans by using nota de plata. Take that, Daria.
“But he’s my father!”
Ben worked at the orphanage in Beius for eight weeks. The children do not see adult males that much, and are often skittish at first. Several little girls took to him quickly however, clamoring for shoulder rides and carryings. When Pamela was chastened by the Romanian women for riding so long when she could be walking, she countered “But he’s my father!” Ouch. Ben would gladly have taken any one of a half-dozen home if he could, and saying goodbye was difficult.
“The house should be right here. Huh.”
Chris and John-Adrian went back to the village of Derna for the first time in 12 years. They walked in the fields where they had been young shepherds and visited the house they had lived in. As the next house over had been torn down and the distant cousins had changed their old house, it was difficult for them to recognize it. They were pleased that several elderly babushkas remembered who they were, and the whole neighborhood gathered around to see them. Derna is fairly remote, with not a lot happening, so the visit by the boys will be a topic there for months, with those who saw them being envied by those who did not. We later learned that Chris was also a grape stomper there.
"Thongs on Parade"
More important, J-A and Chris got to spend a few days with their older brother and younger sister still in Romania, and connect them to their two American brothers. The six of them plus a fiancée, a wife, and several additional friends traveled in a pack through Oradea, including the local pool, where the swimwear is extreme for all ages. Ben blogged wryly that toplessness was less enchanting than he had expected. The troupe even allowed Tracy and I to join them, particularly when we paid for dinner. Chris expects to be back next summer working either at the orphanage or for Habitat, and will time his trip to overlap with Catalin’s projected wedding.
The year of five addresses.
From May 2005 to May 2006, Ben will have lived in Kentucky for one college semester, in Romania for the summer, in NH during vacations, in Los Angeles for a film studies semester, and in the Italian Alps for the Winter Olympics. In between, there have been short stays in Ireland, Budapest, and the Florida panhandle. This level of excitement and dislocation seems more attractive at 22 than it does at 52.
Bat Cave Baptist Church
John-Adrian has started college in marketing at North Greenville University in SC. His dorm room wasn’t ready for the first month, the school server doesn’t block viruses very well, and the campus is at the intersection of two roads going nowhere. Small signs point to unusually named Baptist churches in all directions. But he thinks NGU a good choice, all in all. I think he talks with Chris more now than he did while he was home.
“I just put him down and made him apologize. We’re friends now.”
Chris has transferred to Goffstown High, where he is now learning to be an auto technician. He toys with the idea of entering the military in 2007, then thinks no, he will train to fix BMW’s. His other grades have also gone up, and he might have his first shot at making the honor roll. That is not where he has traditionally pictured himself, but he likes it. Ben and J-A don’t share with us who they’re dating, but Chris, like Jonathan, is more open. We have worried for four years what would happen if Chris got into a fight, praying it would not be like his fights at the state orphanage. When it happened, it was pretty anticlimactic (above).
“I can build you something that looks like a porch from forty feet.”
1) Tracy has always wanted a screened porch. 2) Our old porch was rotting in places. 3) Having someone do the work for me would run about $10,000. Thus, I attempted it myself. Most of my previous construction experience was building theatrical sets thirty years ago, and this type of help is what my brother, who earns his daily bread teaching technical theater at Smith College, offered – as stated above. I had no designs, just ripping off pieces and adding on others. I spent a lot of time staring at the porch, considering options, and obsessing about it from June to November. I finally completed a screened porch twice the size of the previous one, including a metal roof. No major injuries. Chris helped with the labor, and if he occasionally invented his own ways of doing things when I wasn’t there, that is a small price to pay for having a son help. As it was all seat of the pants, his ideas were usually about as good as mine anyway.
I had hoped to split the difference between theatrical construction and real construction, building something that held weight and looked like a porch from 20 feet. I actually did a little better. Come see my porch, and stand about 15 feet away. “Distance adds beauty,” my brother reminds me
Saturday, December 17, 2005
BDS On Broadway
Bush Derangement Syndrome is skewered in Mark Steyn's review over at the New Criterion. A sample:
Even so, if Brantley’s “wondering disgust” has metastasized into “blazing anger in search of an outlet,” why doesn’t he demand some real politics in his theater instead of trying to impose it on a novelty pseudo-opera that can’t support it? You see this all over the place these days. You’re reading the gardening-hints column in Belgium or the recipe tips in New Zealand, and the author suddenly starts in on Paul Wolfowitz. Last year, I glanced at the architecture column in The Toronto Star. In his review of the design for the new customs plaza at the Canadian end of the bridge between Buffalo, New York and Fort Erie, Ontario, Christopher Hume, the architecture correspondent, began as follows: “As the United States descends into fascism …”
Even so, if Brantley’s “wondering disgust” has metastasized into “blazing anger in search of an outlet,” why doesn’t he demand some real politics in his theater instead of trying to impose it on a novelty pseudo-opera that can’t support it? You see this all over the place these days. You’re reading the gardening-hints column in Belgium or the recipe tips in New Zealand, and the author suddenly starts in on Paul Wolfowitz. Last year, I glanced at the architecture column in The Toronto Star. In his review of the design for the new customs plaza at the Canadian end of the bridge between Buffalo, New York and Fort Erie, Ontario, Christopher Hume, the architecture correspondent, began as follows: “As the United States descends into fascism …”
Nations as Personality Disorders
France is a glamorous borderline personality disorder, resulting from repeated incestuous victimization by Germany. It explains everything since the French Revolution. England has been the rescuer of the French from themselves and others, and was thus hated more than the abuser. DeGaulle hated the English more than the Germans as late as 1943. The American rescuer has supplanted the English one, allowing France to have better relations with the Brits.
With respect to the more belligerent Arab nations, I lean toward a diagnosis of Narcissistic Personality Disorder, while drsanity leans toward the more fully psychotic diagnoses -- she sees narcissism more in play with the terror apologists on the left and in the MSM;
neo-neocon (now just "Neo," for you Matrix fans) sees them in terms of shame; and an orgonomist, Dr. Harman has an interesting, but idiosyncratic view.
Russia has behaved like a Paranoid Personality Disorder for years -- not frankly psychotic, but married to misinterpretations bordering on delusion.
Keep playing.
With respect to the more belligerent Arab nations, I lean toward a diagnosis of Narcissistic Personality Disorder, while drsanity leans toward the more fully psychotic diagnoses -- she sees narcissism more in play with the terror apologists on the left and in the MSM;
neo-neocon (now just "Neo," for you Matrix fans) sees them in terms of shame; and an orgonomist, Dr. Harman has an interesting, but idiosyncratic view.
Russia has behaved like a Paranoid Personality Disorder for years -- not frankly psychotic, but married to misinterpretations bordering on delusion.
Keep playing.
Underground DSM-IV: Axis II
If one staff member moves to rescue an Axis II patient, someone else will lean toward punishment to an equal degree. In large groups the mathematics of balance is more complicated but the principle is the same: the group will balance its transference. Moving to the extremes just increases splitting: shift wars, team vs. line staff, community vs. hospital.
Thursday, December 15, 2005
Eat, Drink, and Be Merry
Just a bit of fun.
It’s hardly news, is it, to report that English food is unappetizing? The civilized world abounds with places where bland, uninteresting food is normative. But one does not expect this active badness, these midsentence pauses from each of one’s fellow diners as the food arrives, accompanied by the International Sign[1] for what-the-hell-is-this.
In Scandinavia they serve herring. Fine, then. I can look at the plate and think “That is a herring, and I don’t want it.” There is also a recent increase in unfamiliar but brightly colored vegetables on salads. This also can be easily dealt with. I may decide to nibble on the edge of this unknown vegetable, or not. The English black-and-white pudding, however, is thoroughly intimidating. It’s a dark oversized tootsie roll next to a miniature beige hockey puck. But it’s a pudding, I think, and therefore might be tasty. Fortunately, my lightning-quick mind remembers that British terms for things are notoriously unreliable, and abandon that line of reasoning. If I like it I will have one more choice when looking at an English menu. This is not an inconsiderable upside. And how much worse could it be than the sausages, which have enough fat in them to make a crow vomit?
And yet, I hesitate. I look at my Romanian sons, hoping they will identify the items and reassure me. They are busying themselves with other parts of the meal. Danger, Will Robinson, Danger! This could mean that the item is quite far down on the food pyramid. Down below ground level to the foundation, the places which read “Let animals eat these foods, and then you eat them.”
Tracy thinks the dark one may be a blood sausage, a possibility that makes three of us draw back with disdainful eye, and even John-Adrian show mild distaste. This should settle the matter then. There is no food which complements a blood sausage; it is preposterous to even consider it further. And yet the very mystery of it intrigues me.
What could it possibly be? I know it’s not good, but dear Lord, what food actually would traditionally accompany a blood sausage? The beige color now strongly suggests lard with flavoring, and I begin to be haunted by this item. I move on to the rest of the standard English breakfast, which includes a half-tomato cooked to rejection, a mushroom – which I eat part of – plus the usual egg, bacon, and sausage (Spam, spam spam, spam…). I busy myself with the dry toast and jam for twenty minutes, but cannot get the white pudding out of my mind.
The thought of it still comes to me at night when I am unprepared and undefended. I take it as a reminder from God not to neglect my prayers.
[1] A smile may be the same in any language, as is so often claimed, but it is also true that this slight curl of lip, brief cessation of inhalation, and brow that moves rapidly from raised to furrowed is recognized even by Maori tribesmen.
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