Department Of The Partridge Of The Week
It’s that time of the year again. As has become a tradition much maligned anticipated in our neighborhood, moiself is hosting a different Partridge, every week, in my front yard. [1]
Can you identify this week’s guest Partridge?
Goodbye to Shirley (Mama P), Keith, Laurie, Danny, Tracy – to all the Partridges until next season.
Wait – she can’t just box us up like those friggin’ elves…can she?
* * *
Department Of Putting It All Away
The holiday decorations, that is.
Even Cablefish gets a Santa hat in my house.
The Mantle of Red Pointy Things. ®
This one tried to hide, but I found him anyway.
Farewell, Holiday feasting.
It’s a wistful day. Moiself plays seasonal music, from Misty River’s Midwinter album to Run DMC’s Christmas In Hollis, on repeat, while I pack away the adornments.
* * *
Department Of Here, But Not There, And Why
Dateline: Tuesday morning 7:45 AM. It’s high tide; thus, I’m walking on a road which parallels the beach, and not on the beach itself.
About 100 yards ahead of me a man and his big shaggy dog cross the road and start ambling in the direction I’m going. Out for the morning poop walk, moiself assumes. The dog is sniffing and sniffing and sniff sniff sniff sniffing clumps of grass, driftwood, and bushes along the road. It stops several times for a longer sniff, almost assuming the classic squat position, then continues until it finally reaches the magic point. By then I have caught up to man and beast, as the latter prepares to do his business and the man prepares his picking-up-dog-business bag.
As I pass them by I am wondering about the dog, So, why *that* spot? It looks identical to the one you sniffed fifty feet back. Was it particularly aromatic with…familiarity?
“Oh, I remember! I pooped here yesterday, and it was grand. I’ll poop here again!”
Or, perhaps the pup’s motivation is more sinister than celebratory:
“Aha! This is the poop-place of that poodle I despise. I’ll show him…”
I’m sure many dog owners [2] have their theories (or even certitudes) about the phenomenon of what makes the Perfect Poop Place. ® But the thing is, only the dogs know. And they do not volunteer this information. I’ve tried asking discretely and quietly, when their owners cannot hear me. The doggies have yet to reveal their secrets.
And someone is always watching.
* * *
Department Of It’s Not Too Late To Make A Resolution To Treat People Like People Sub-Department Of The Problems With Cherry-Picking Quotations
I saw this, posted via the Facebook book group, The Christian Left, last week:
“When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.” – Leviticus 19:33-34 (ESV)”
TCL is, as far as moiself can tell, a group of Christians who advocate what they see as the more humane/liberal side of Christianity. Thus, I assume this posting was meant as a wake up (read: shaming) tactic, or reminder to their conservative/borderline-racist Christian cousins, with regards as to how the latter treat migrants and asylum seekers.
Fine; okay. Shame such folks whenever and however you can. However….
How do those on “The Christian Left” react when their conservative cousins do the Bible-thumping in reverse? That is, when conservative Christians share other quotes from their Bible, which they deem equally valid guidelines for modern day living? Such as….
* “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.” Leviticus 18:22 (ESV)
“Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death. Because they have cursed their father or mother,
heir blood will be on their own head.” Leviticus 20:9 (NIV)
* If someone has a stubborn and rebellious son who does not obey his father and mother and will not listen to them when they discipline him, his father and mother shall take hold of him and bring him to the elders at the gate of his town. They shall say to the elders, ‘This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey us. He is a glutton and a drunkard.’ Then all the men of his town are to stone him to death. You must purge the evil from among you.” Deuteronomy 21:18-21 (NIV)
* “Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves.” Leviticus 25:44 (NIV)
* “For six days, work is to be done, but the seventh day shall be your holy day, a day of sabbath rest to the Lord.
Whoever does any work on it is to be put to death.” Exodus 35:2 (NIV)
image from Pinterest “conversative Christian quotes.”
Far better to do the right thing, to treat other people as what they are, members of your own species, because it is the right thing to do and because of just that – that they are your fellow human beings- rather than to have one’s morality based on conflicting interpretations of pre-scientific, Iron age “scriptures” written by people who thought the earth had four corners and floats on water [3] and that their god wanted them to ban handicapped people from making temple offerings or even approaching the altar [4] and that leprosy, aka Hansen’s disease, could be cured by following their god’s detailed instructions, which are, in a nutshell, [5]
Get two birds. Kill one. Dip the live bird in the blood of the dead one.
Sprinkle the blood on the leper seven times, and then let the blood-soaked bird fly away. Next find a lamb and kill it. Wipe some of its blood on the patient’s right ear, thumb, and big toe. Sprinkle seven times with oil and wipe some of the oil on his right ear, thumb and big toe. Repeat. Finally find another pair of birds. Kill one and dip the live bird in the dead bird’s blood. Wipe some blood on the patient’s right ear, thumb, and big toe. Sprinkle the house with blood seven times…. (Leviticus 14)
I go into a laboratory and create a unicellular organism that will kill millions of people. I infect flying/biting insects to serve as the delivery system for that organism. If I release those insects, am I evil? Without exception every theist I have asked says, “Yes.” I then ask them to explain malaria. (anonymous)
* * *
May you be amused by considering the whys/wheres of dog-poop-depositing; May you treat your fellow human beings as fellow human beings; May you put away your holiday to the sound of some excellent tunes; …and may the hijinks ensue.
[5] A most appropriate container, as medical scientists have discovered that Hansen’s disease can be cured with antimicrobial MDT (multi drug therapy).
[6] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists. No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.” Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org
Best Movie; * Best Non-Sequel/Non-Superhero Movie; * Top Twenty-Five Insipid Christmas-Themed Streaming Series; * Best Spotify playlist; * Best Nonfiction Book; * Best Book Beloved By Critics Until Its Author Was Accused Of Cultural Appropriation; * Top Ten Food Delivery Services; * Best Science Podcast; * Least Annoying Comedy Podcast Which In Fact Is Just A Gabfest
Hosted By A Likeable Celebrity Name-Dropping With His Fellow Celebrity Friends; * Best Hostage Exchange; * Best Cancel Culture ® Moment; * Most Predictable Hate Speech By MAGA-Courting GOP Politicians: * Best Surreptitious Recording of Racist City Council Members Eating Their Own Smoothest City Officials Kicking-The-Can-Down-The-Road Regarding
Getting The Mentally Ill/Homeless Off The Streets….
Oh look, it’s a blank list.
Arts & Literature, Science and Technology, Politics and Armageddon culture…. So many categories to rank and rate. But, like moiself titled this post, nope – not gonna do that. Instead, I’ll offer one of my favorites, from the categorizy I’m not devising, that of Best Visual Images From The Space We Hopefully Won’t Fuck Up Like We’ve Done To Our Own Planet (image courtesy of The Planetary Society).
Image from Lightsail 2 of Tropical Storm Mirinae, near Japan.
“The Planetary Society’s LightSail program demonstrated that solar sailing is a viable means of propulsion for small satellites.
Solar sails use sunlight instead of rocket fuel for propulsion. They are one of the few technologies that could be used for interstellar travel
LightSail® is a crowdfunded project from The Planetary Society to demonstrate that solar sailing is a viable means of propulsion for CubeSats — small, standardized spacecraft that are part of a global effort to lower the cost of space exploration. Our LightSail 2 spacecraft, which launched on June 25, 2019 and reentered Earth’s atmosphere on Nov. 17, 2022, used sunlight alone to change its orbit.”
It’s (still!) that time of the year again. As has become a tradition much maligned anticipated in our neighborhood, moiself is hosting a different Partridge, every week, in my front yard. [1]
Can you identify this week’s guest Partridge?
* * *
Department Of Okay So I Lied
Here is one category moiself will dare to rank: Best Nonfiction Book Excerpt.
It’s from one of my favorite reads of the year, zoologist Lucy Cooke’s Bitch: On The Female Of The Species. Context: from the chapter on social animals, the passage cited comes from a segment focusing on a species of termites that have both a king and queen. These termites practice an extreme brand of cooperative breeding:
“…involving a division of labor between breeders and infertile working castes, known as eusociality, from the Greek eu – meaning ‘good.’ Although this is another highly subjective term, since in truth, it is only really ‘good’ for one individual: Her Royal Reproductiveness. The rest of the several million termites in the colony, other than the king, are rendered sterile and kept in their lowly castes by ingesting pheromones secreted by the royal anus, all of which makes the British monarchy suddenly seem quite reasonable.”
* * *
Department Of Confessions
If moiself were compiling my own lists, of say, Songs/Albums Which Got The Most Ear-Time ForMoiself, The Highwomen would be near the top. It’s not a new release; the eponymous first (and so far only) album of the “supergroup” composed of American folk/country singers/songwriters/musicians Brandi Carlile, Natalie Hemby, Maren Morris, and Amanda Shires was released at the end of 2019. There’s not one throwaway song on the album’s 12 tracks; each time I listen I think, “Oh, that’s my favorite…” until the next track plays.
Here’s the confession: cynical smartass moiself can be a sloppy sentimentalist.
Yes; really.
I cannot listen to a certain song from that album without engaging in ugly bitch-baby-bawling. Which is fitting in a way, as the song is so intimate and…tender.
In My Only Child, the singer is both wondering about and trying to explain – to her “only child” daughter as well as to herself – the complicated amalgam of joy and regret that comes from having or being the only child. The Highwomen bandmate Natalie Hemby,My Only Child’s lead vocalist and co-writer, has said that the song was inspired in part by her own experiences, after her “only child” daughter began asking her parents for a baby brother or sister.
To have a single or “only” child, whether by intention or circumstance, is not my life, although it easily could have been. I have two children, [2] yet when I listen to that song I think of both of them: what if either of them had been the “only” one? I think of people I know who have or are only children, who’ve pondered what it would have been like to have and be a sibling…who’ve sometimes rued – or just accepted as a benign fact of life – that they will never fully understand the experience of being able to, for example, commiserate with a brother or sister over their aging parents’ care, or have someone who is not your parent but who has known you for your entire life.
The song’s combination of lyrics and the aching, lead vocal whose whisper-light gentleness belies the gravity of the longing…the haunting emotional lyricism of the mother affirming a decision and also allowing for the regrets of what-ifs – it made me shake, the first time I heard it. And it still makes me cry – softly now, but still, every damn time I listen to it, as though I am hearing the song for the first time. [3]
* * *
Department Of Faux New Year’s Resolutions: The Words We Need To Stop Misusing…
Or using at all.
As per the Unexplainable podcast, “Basic Instinct.“ (12-7-22).
We all grew up seeing the nature documentaries (or perhaps even took classes from professors) that used the term “instinct“- or its cousin harase, “it’s genetic” – to explain how a spider knows to spin her web, or a cheetah knows what gazelles to hunt, or other multifaceted animal behaviors. Turns out, it is So. Much. More. Complicated. ® than “instinct.” Recent studies in ethology [4] show that all animals, even the eusocial ones with so-called “hive minds,” are also individuals who learn and adapt, make errors, etc.
Let moiself entice you (lure you into my web?) with these excerpts.
Noam Hassenfeld, Unexplainable podcast host: It turns out the idea of instinct is a lot less simple than those nature documentaries can make it seem. I talked to a scientist who can’t stand this word (“instinct”).
Mark Blumberg (Unexplainable guest, a neuroscientist): It’s basically a covert expression of ignorance and lack of imagination. That’s it…. I can’t tell you the number of articles, you know, for scientific journals that I review where people just throw the word around. It drives me crazy…. as soon as you say it’s genetic it means you can just skip over all the things that actually get you from that amorphous blob of an embryo or a newborn and get right to the action…. Every animal develops. It doesn’t matter who you are. All of us. We all develop.
NH: So, Mark, where does this idea of animal instinct and innate animal behavior come from? How far back does it go?
Blumberg: It goes back a long, long way….one of the interesting aspects of it is that it actually has its roots in a sort of a religious perspective….it starts as a problem with free will and reason and good and evil…. Imagine that…(as per developing Christian theology)…in order to earn your way to heaven and hell, you have to basically make choices. You have to have free will. You can’t take an animal that cannot make choices about good and evil and put them in heaven or hell. That doesn’t make sense. Humans are the only ones, we have a soul, we have free will, we have rationality. These are all ideas within the religious context, but we’re not letting dogs into heaven or hell. So what you have to do is you have to deny them free will, but you have to explain what they’re doing. And you say, “Well, it’s instinctive.”
“No, honey, it’s not that I’m a shoddy dam builder – it’s my own instinct, to build it this way.”
The podcast host and his scientist guest go on to discuss many examples which show that behaviors we might normally think of as innate animal instincts are actually developed through experience. Some scientists use the term instinct, or genetic for phenomena that are too complex to be currently understood or which no one is (currently) interested in studying. The wording creationists and other religious folk use to describe phenomena they cannot or will not understand in any other way is, “God did it/God made it.” Many scientists, including Blumberg, accuse other scientists of essentially using a more sciency-sounding version of this religious “way out,” when it comes to studying and explaining complex animal behaviors (religion’s “God did it.” = science’s “It’s instinctive.”).
NH: So this idea that, you know, animal behavior is hard-coded, is that still an argument that lots of scientists are making?
Blumberg: Yeah, it’s everywhere. They use the word like, “I’m studying an innate behavior.” And they’re doing it in part because they think that by calling it innate, they’re making their work sound more important…more universal. “ I’m not just studying behavior X, I’m studying *innate* behavior X. Therefore, anything I learn about it must be super important, must have been evolved….” So it’s partly a strategy and partly it’s ignorance about what the words actually mean.
NH: That feels like you’re calling it laziness.
Blumberg: I am absolutely calling it laziness….
NH: Is that why you would say that this debate is important? I mean, it seems like on the surface someone could see it as a semantic debate.
Blumberg: Because it…influences the way science is done (and) which scientists get the resources to do their work. It elevates scientists who are not so great, and it makes it harder for scientists doing the hard work to get the notoriety and the attention they deserve. I see this in conferences all the time, you know, where very prominent people simply throw out the innate word or the instinct word and they get away with it because they aren’t being challenged. And that offends me as a scientist…. You just have to continue to be inquisitive and not search for simple answers to complex problems. You know, this is biology. Nothing is more complex than how animals come to do the things that they do, whatever the cause. And we should be trying to understand the diversity of life and all the different mechanisms that are available.
NH: And we probably still don’t understand it all that well.
Blumberg: No, we’re scratching the surface big time.
The full transcript is here. 22.12.07 Basic Instinct . Better still, listen to the interview.
“Man is a Religious Animal. He is the only Religious Animal.
He is the only animal that has the True Religion — several of them. He is the only animal that loves his neighbor as himself and cuts his throat if his theology isn’t straight.”[6]
May you have a Happy year’s end, whether full of lists or list-free; May you be careful what you attribute to (read: blame on) instinct; May you find a song which is worth weeping to; …and may the hijinks ensue.
[2] And, unlike the song, my nursery walls were not painted pink, for either of my babes.
[3] Sometimes I skip that track when I’m listening to the album, if I decide I just can’t handle red puffy cryin’ eyes right now.
[4] Def. The study of animal behavior in its natural context.
[5] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists. No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.” Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org
[6] Can’t close out the year without less than six footnotes.
It’s that time of the year again. As has become a tradition much maligned anticipated in our neighborhood, moiself is hosting a different Partridge, every week, in my front yard. [1]
Can you identify this week’s guest Partridge?
* * *
Department Of Happy Little Christmas Eve
Whaddya mean, what’s Little Christmas Eve? It’s tonight, December 23, as in, the eve before Christmas Eve.
LCE is an obscure – to everyone but my family – holiday supposedly celebrated in my maternal grandfather’s ancestral, tiny Norwegian village. It was one of my favorite special days, when I was a child. It still is . [2]Moiself has continued that tradition with MH’s and my family. We have a special LCE dinner, but unlike Christmas Eve dinner, which always features lefse, the LCE menu varies year to year. After dinner, each child gets to open one of their Christmas presents. The most memorable aspect about my childhood LCEs was the “rule” that our house was lit only by candlelight, during the dinner meal and thereafter, until bedtime.
I was fascinated by candles; thus, it was a magical night for moiself. Candles everywhere; no electric lights allowed! If you went to the bathroom, you carried a candle.
How we never managed to burn the house down, I don’t know. Guess those elves were watching over us.
* * *
Department Of About Those Elves….
“Oh, yeah, so you all liked thatElf on a Shelfthing?” (Misinformed persons who feel compelled to ask about all the elves in our house during this time of year)
Much of moiself’s house’s holiday décor, in all its tacky seasonal glory, is in homage to my mother, who died six years ago on Christmas Eve.
Marion Parnell loved Christmas and especially her Christmas decorations, which included the tradition (which her family started and mine continues) of placing certain kind of elves – the kind with small plastic, doll-like faces and bendable, felt costume-clothed bodies, [3] all around the house. Like the one above, a rare yellow-green costumed variant.
The idea was that from any vantage point, whether you are sitting in the living room or getting a drink from the kitchen sink, an elf is casting a friendly eye upon you. Some of our elves indeed are on a shelf, but most perch atop curtains, peek out from bookcases, lurk behind candlesticks, nestle behind dishes and clocks and art and….
But, this “Elf on a Shelf” thing? Never heard of it, until recently. EOAS is, apparently, a picture book about…honestly, I don’t know or care what it’s about. I looked it up: the book has a 2005 publication date. Neither I nor MH knew about it, nor had our two children (DOBs 1993 and 1996) grown up with EOAS as part of their kiddie lit repertoire. My extended family on my mother’s side has been putting up elves since the early 1920s, so none of these #!*&#?! EOAS references applies to elves on MY shelves, okay?
Y’all must excuse moiself if (read: when) I respond with a yuletide-inappropriate profanity should you mention that book to me. Actually, moiself finds it funny how much it irritates me when someone, after seeing or hearing about our houses elves, makes a reference to the book – such as the antique store owner who, when I asked if her store had any elves and began to describe what I was looking for, said, “Oh, you mean, like that book?” My customary cheerful/holiday visage darkened, and I answered her with utmost solemnity.
No. Nothing. Like. That. Book.
Which might not be entirely accurate, seeing as how I’ve never read nor even seen the book…which may indeed be about something akin to *our* family tradition. I just want…oh, I don’t know…attribution, I suppose. WE THOUGHT OF IT FIRST, OKAY? So, stick that Elf-on-a-shelf in your Santa Hat and….
* * *
Christmas with a big deal in my childhood. My parents didn’t have as much $$ as many of my friends’ parents did; still, they made sure there were always very-much-appreciated presents awaiting my siblings and I under the tree Christmas morning. [4] Later, when my parents’ children grew up and had children of their own, something…happened.
I don’t remember getting (from my parents) gifts that I thought were inappropriate or that I didn’t want. I made a wish list before the holidays, at my parent’s request, and they usually chose from that. Fast forward to their gifts to MH and my children, their grandchildren. Excuse my yuletide jargon, but whatthefuck?
The following reflection was inspired by a Hidden Brainpodcast on gift giving. When a guest on the show mentioned inappropriate, “message” gifts, I remembered trying (unsuccessfully, I think) to talk my parents out of a gift they were planning on giving to an extended family member. Alarmed by his weight gain and his family history of heart disease, they told me they were planning on giving him a gym membership.
This got my mind going to my parents’ Christmas gift fail with my kids. Which I expounded upon a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away (okay; from my March 2016 post, The Gifts I’m Not Authenticating):
When K and Belle were kidlets, there were many, many, many – and did I mention many? – years where it took us up to four weeks (or more!) post-Christmas to find enough room in the garbage can for all of the non-recyclable packaging materials which were indigenous to gifts that came from A Certain Side of The Family.
Read: my side. Specifically, my mother. [5] Mom was abetted in her trashing of the planet abundantly swathed present-bestowing by the good folks at Lillian Vernon. Are you familiar with that catalog company? If so, you have my sympathy.
My mother discovered the Lillian Vernon catalog (too) many years ago. Once she did, there was no turning back. The catalog became her go-to source for gifts for her grandchildren, and a more wasteful source I’ve yet to encounter. Why a four-inch tin-plated Model T replica needs to be encased in enough Styrofoam insulate an entire Uzbekistan village is a mystery to me…but that, apparently, is the shipping policy at Lillian Vernon.
The excessive packaging was one thing; the gifts themselves, ay yi yi. All made in China, of substandard construction [6] –– and accompanied by a Certificate of Authenticity.
This crap is authentic, guaranteed.
Most bewildering of all was how inappropriate the gifts were. Not inappropriate as in giving a life-size Uzi replica to a five-year-old; rather, inappropriate in that the gifts had no relation to what K and Belle actually wanted.
I’ll never forget K’s reaction the year he opened his present from Grandma M, dug through the layers of packaging and…oh, um….yeah…a set of miniature antique automobile replicas? Perhaps for some child, somewhere, that would have been a welcome present. K had no interest in “antique replicas” (even those that came with certificates of authenticity). Thus K, along with his sister, got an early introduction to practicing the art of Present Face.
It was (kinda sorta) terrible to laugh at the gifts, but we did – after I gave K & Belle the usual parental reassuring (“Grandma means well”). Year after year, my mom gave her grandchildren stuff they neither wanted nor needed. I tried to figure it out, thinking aloud to MH one Christmas, after K & Belle had opened their respective/bewildering (but authentically certified!) LV boxes: It’s as if my mom is using suggestions based on someone’s idea of gender and age:
Here are gifts for Boy Child, ages 9-11, and for Girl Child, Ages 5-8….
Which, I would discover, was exactly what my mother did.
In year three or four of the They Sooooo Do Not Want These Things (the year of the antique replica cars) phenomenon, I resolved to find out what was going on. I tried to be gentle during my Christmas Day phone call to my parents – I tried to tease out what made them think K would be interested in a set of Ford Model A and T cars? I could have used a verbal sledgehammer, for all of my mother’s obliviousness. [7]
I do all my Christmas and birthday shopping from the catalog, my mother explained. (actually, it was more like bragging than explaining). I have all the categories covered – they list them for girls and boys, of any age. When it’s time for a Christmas or birthday I go to the boxes in the garage or under my bed and pick one out!
Hmmm…yeah. Say, Mom, for next year, how about if you ask K and Belle what *they’d* like? Or they could send you a gift list, like you used to have me write up for my birthday and Christmas. K really likes to draw – there’s an artist’s pencil set he’s interested in, and Belle loves Legos, and….
That’s okay, I already have next year’s Christmas presents picked out!
Birthdays, too! I keep them all in a big stash under the bed.
K’s and Belle’s birthday presents are ready to go – it’s so convenient.
Oh, here’s Dad….
I was more direct with my father: “This is difficult to say…I want my kids to be grateful for any gift, but Dad, it’s like the presents are from a stranger who doesn’t know them. It’s nothing they are interested in. Why doesn’t Mom ask them what they’d like? They’d love to tell her.” He just didn’t hear me (“Well, that’s how she likes to do it.“), and changed the subject.
Later that day I sought email counsel from my older and younger sisters. It wasn’t just my family’s dilemma – they’d both dealt with the LV catalog gift-gifting issue, and had tried everything from dropping hints to being directly confrontational. Their advice: Sorry, but that’s the way it is. Learn to live with it.
MH and I raised K and Belle to look at gifts as just that – gifts, not entitlements. We encouraged them to find something about which to feel grateful for any present they received; we advised them to never expect nor request presents, but to be gracious and specific when asked by someone what you’d like for your birthday, or Christmas.
K and Belle dutifully wrote thank you notes to Grandpa Chet and Grandma M. After years of getting presents they didn’t want, it became somewhat of a family joke ritual: on Christmas morning, along with our gift-opening accouterments we also set out a direct-to-Goodwill bag for the Lillian Vernon haul, and there was a special ceremonial flourish when a Certificate of Authenticity assumed its rightful place in the paper recycling bin.
Along with the droll (okay; snarky) comments and laughter which became a part of our gift-opening, there were genuine hurt feelings, for both me and my children. It sliced at my heart, the first time K and Belle looked at me with sad-round eyes and said, Why don’t they ask me what I want?
It was so effin’ impersonal; it showed no interest in them as individuals. My mother took pride in being done with her present shopping months (even years) in advance…and took no interest in finding out what her grandchildren actually wanted. You can learn a lot about children by asking them what they’d like for a present – it can be a segue into finding out about their hobbies and interests and talents, about finding out who they are and what they like to do.
Instead, it was This Christmas Belle gets something from the “Girl Toys Ages 6-9” bag under Grandma M’s bed. My mother even mixed up the presents one year: K got a gift that was meant for his cousin. The gift tag read, “To X, Love Grandma M” (cousin X, my younger sister’s second son, was the same age as K)!
At my suggestion (and with my father’s encouragement), my parents switched to giving checks to their grandchildren a few years back, a practice my mother continued after my father died. Now, the LV catalog present years are the stuff of family lore. Back then, it was Yet Another Life Lesson ® for my children (and their parents) in tolerance, acceptance, and loving people as they are, warts/quirks and all. Looking back, a part of me is even grateful for the experience, which provided us with one of our favorite family code phrases:
Belle: What do you know about that new cafe downtown? Moiself:
I haven’t heard much about them, only that each menu item comes with a Certificate of Authenticity. Belle: Whoa, thanks for the warning.
* * *
Department Of Food (and beverage?) For Thought
In 2020 (the last year for which there is complete information) there were 11,654 “alcohol-impaired”-related auto accident deaths.
Which means that the remaining 70% of auto accident deaths were caused by ijiots who drink bottled water, coffee, soda, juice, energy drinks, et al, and/or talked or texted on their phones and/or were otherwise impaired by their own stupidity, incompetence, and inattentiveness.
“At this season of the winter solstice, let reason prevail.
There are no gods, no devils, no angels, no heaven or hell;
there is only our natural world.
Religion is but myth and superstition which hardens hearts and enslaves minds.”
[2] And arguably, I still am somewhat child-like (or, ish).
[3] Many of the oldest ones have a tiny Made in Japan sticker on them, and date from the 1950s or earlier, or so I was told by one antique shop dealer.
[4] Which, BTW, is the only proper day to open your Christmas gifts. If MH’s family had been a, “We-open-our-gifts-on-Christmas-Eve!” kind of family, we would not have married.
[5] (my mother has since died, but at the time I included this “Content reassurance”): my mother is alive, albeit in poor physical and mental health. We speak at least once a week; she doesn’t remember our phone conversation from the previous week (nor often what I said five minutes ago). She is a shut in, in her own home, with 24/7 care by patient and loving attendants. She has no access to the internet, doesn’t read my blog, doesn’t know I write a blog, doesn’t know what a blog is….
[6] I was going to write shoddily manufactured…there’s just no nice way to put it. That shit was cheaply made.
[7] And it was my mother’s doing. As was common to many men of his generation, my father gladly ceded the birthday and holiday gift-choosing tasks to his wife.
[9] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists. No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.” Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org
It’s that time of the year again. As has become a tradition much maligned anticipated in our neighborhood, moiself is hosting a different Partridge, every week, in my front yard. [1]
Can you identify this week’s guest Partridge?
* * *
And about that fight…. Why am I not ending it? Because the controversies over the issues and principles involved seem to be (still, WTF) lingering in some tight-spirited and fearful minds.
I ran across the sentiments moiself so objects to last week when moiself heard a snippet of a radio interview with some book reviewer. But I was most butt-frostingly reminded of The Fight ® when I recently heard Fresh Air host Terry Gross’s 1993 interview (rebroadcasted 12-14-22) with Octavia Butler, the late great, ground-breaking Black female science fiction author.
Butler, indiscussing how and why she began writing, said she was both trying to get under-represented perspectives a voice (i.e. a voice like hers, as a black female in sci fi), but also she wanted to experience the voice of others:
“…I’ve also explored, and in a strange sense I suppose I also found out, what it might like to be a white male or whatever, you know. One of the things writing does is allow you to be other people
without actually being locked up for it.”
TG: “We’re talking empathy here, right?”
OB: “Uh hum – yes.”
That should have ended the pitiful controversy right there and then. But it’s been a long time since 1993, and “cultural appropriation,” a concept bandied about in academia in the 1980s, wasn’t so publicly applied to works of literature until after Butler’s death.
In case y’all haven’t figured out the connection between this particular blog’s title and content, the fight I refer to would be that against literary censorship – censorship of the worst kind, the kind that makes an author repress herself before she even writes, when she has an idea for a story/plot/character but fears her work will be for naught as she doesn’t have the right “personal” credentials/identity that the self-appointed Saviors of Literary Ownership Police (appropriately acronym-ed) will deem necessary…and thus they will rake her over the cultural appropriation coals.
Moiself has written about this several times in this space (a few of them cited at the end of this post, before the footnotes), and most extensively in my post, The Culture I’m Not Appropriating, 9-16-16. Since it’s my birthday week [2] and since the wise words of Ms. Butler inspired me, I shall rerun that post, which was one of my first single-subject rants examination of a thorny issue:
( from The Culture I’m Not Appropriating, 9-16-16. )
Write what you knowis, hands down/butts up, the Worst Writing Advice Ever. ® Although I despise the aggravating axiom’s existence, I took some solace in thinking that its influence has been waning….
Golly gosh gee willikers, how I love learning new things: it seems that, like intestinal gas after a vegan-chili-eating contest, that misbegotten maxim keeps resurfacing. It has morphed, and rises anew in the form of the term, cultural appropriation.[3]
I grow weary of you appropriating Vulcan culture, Lt. Kirk.
American journalist/novelist Lionel Shriver, who was invited to be the keynote speaker at the recent Brisbane Writers Festival, knotted the knickers of the festival organizers when, as reported in this NY Times article, she [4] disparaged the movement against cultural appropriation:
Write what you know; do not appropriate the culture/experience of another. This becomes translated as,Write what you are. And what you are becomes defined by someone outside of you – someone who decries cultural, ethnic, class and gender stereotypes even as they want to circumscribe your right to tell stories/craft characters based on their interpretation of your cultural what you know.
Seven years ago I wrote a letter to the editor of Poets & Writers magazine, in response to a Very Long Screed ® letter from a woman who passionately pronounced that writers must write about only those characters and backgrounds from whence they came; that is, you must write about what you know, and what you know is what you are. Screed Woman [5] commented at length about what a “true artist” may create, and at one point actually declared the following:
“I will not permit folks like _____ [6] to write of my folk, or Mexican folk, or Asian folk, or Native American folk, of folk of color as though they have a right to.”
Yes, really.
Screed Writer, without having been asked by other writers, “By the way, what do you think I should write about?” and without having been elected to the Board of Literary Permissions, [7] not only felt entitled to speak for all of her “folk,” but also for the folk of which she is not-folk – an incredibly diverse and numerous collection of humanity, whose varying and wide-ranging opinions on the issue at hand she discounted, IMHO, by presuming to speak for all folk-of-color.
Was I out of the country when _____( Screed Writer) was appointed to the coveted, “True Artist Discerner” position? ….I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but behold: for centuries, a legion of writers, from Shakespeare to Le Guin, have composed tales and created characters without your (or anyone else’s) permission. A pox upon the cheeky bastards! ….All those wasted years, merely loathing Jonathan Livingston Seagull for the story itself when I could have really censured it for being inauthentic: “How dare its author write outside his species!?”
Write what you know. Just think of the awful, intrusive, disrespectful novels penned by those who have ignored that advice.
John Steinbeck, born into middle-class comfort in California and educated at Stanford – what could he know of the struggles and dreams of the destitute Oklahoma migrant farmers he depicted in The Grapes of Wrath? And that Cathy Ames character, the initially charming but ultimately evil and pitiful wife/mother in East of Eden – how could a 1950s, upright male citizen like Steinbeck take the liberty to deduce the machinations of a turn of the century whorehouse madam? [9]
How dare Rita Mae Brown, a never-married, child-free lesbian with no siblings, presume to knowthe combination of brass and loneliness of the widowed elderly sisters and mothers whom she featured in her novel Bingo? Not only that, Brown has penned a series of detective novels featuring a cat as a sleuth-like protagonist! The nerve of her, a bipedal homo sapiens, to appropriate the thoughts and actions of a quadrapedal felis catus.
Stephen King had his first great hit with the novel Carrie. He audaciously crafted his shy high school misfit character despite the fact that he, an adult man with no demonstrable psychokinetic abilities who came from a middle-of-the road Protestant background, could not possibly knowwhat it would be like to be a much-bullied adolescent female with telekinetic powers who lived with a batshit-crazy fundamentalist mother.
Alice Walker – well, she can write about her own folk, as long as they are The Color Purple. But as an African American from a rural, Southern, impoverished, Baptist background there’s no way she could knowthe mind-set and motivations of an idealistic civil rights worker from a Northern, white, Jewish, privileged circumstances…and yet she dared to create just such a character in Meridian.
And what could Brian Doyle, a non-Urdu-speaking, white American writer and editor, truly knowabout the inner musings of a Muslim Pakistani barber, as he had the gall to do in Bin Laden’s Bald Spot ?
And don’t even get me started on that uppity Jean Auel, who created the Clan of the Cave Bear books. Auel presumed to tell tales about people who lived and died thousands of years ago – she appropriated cultures that don’t even exist anymore! And what could she, a contemporary middle-aged white woman, possibly knowabout Cro-magnons and Neanderthals of any age, gender or ethnicity?
Have I belabored this point enough? Because, I could go on, ya know.
No, please, provide even more examples; we still don’t get it…
Now then. I do not mean to dismiss legitimate concerns re the historical exploitation of the experiences of women and minorities via the platform of fiction. As one Brisbane Writers Festival attendee put it, “The reality is that those from marginalized groups, even today, do not get the luxury of defining their own place in a norm that is profoundly white, straight and, often, patriarchal.”
I do mean to dismiss three whole ‘nother kettles of wormy literary fish:
the idea that there are any “sacred” subjects – including but not limited to culture, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, religion, politics, socio-economic class, dis/ability – about which writers cannot or should not write;
the idea that writers may justifiably feel entitled to try to limit the variety of voices other writers employ to comment on any subject;
two wormy fish kettles of literary nonsense are enough to be dismissed, for now.
Look: you may like a story’s plot and/or characters, or loathe the same – it’s up to each reader. What is not up to any reader, nor the self-blinder-donning, self-appointed Guardians Of Cultural Appropriation, [11] is to attempt to limit, intimidate or censor the imagination and empathy that writers use to create their stories and characters.
“I often quote myself. It lends spice to my conversation.” (Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw)
Since I am not one to ignore the example of GB Shaw, I shall end this communique with the end of my afore-mentioned response to the afore-mentioned Screed Writer:
_____ (Screed Writer) writes, with all sincerity and good intentions, I assume, that she would not write a character with certain gender/religious/ethnic attributes because she does “not wish to offend with less than authenticity.” Some might think her intentions polite and perhaps even considerate, but what I look for in a compelling story is not that its author has good manners. Go ahead, dare to “offend” me with “in-authenticity,” Better yet, let me – the reader – decide whether or not I am offended, and whether or not I find your characters authentic. Trust me; I’ve been doing this for years. I’ll be okay.
To the Write What You Know gang: can we end this dreary dialog? Go back to your corners; reflect; meditate; supplicate; read the self-help books and take the mood or perspective-altering medications that will enable you to ignore the evil voices in your head that tell you it is your obligation to shepherd, chaperone, and censor. WWYK-ers and others who deny themselves the “right” to write authentic if “different” characters are welcome to deny themselves – and themselves alone – that right. If, whether out of fear, misguided notions of respect, or any other reason, you do not consider yourself capable of creating authentic characters, then by all means, stifle yourself. Do not write beyond your self-imposed limits, perceptions and capacities, If it makes you uncomfortable, you don’t have to write about it if you don’t want to (is this a wonderful world, or what?!), but please consider the following. Throughout the ages, many great writers, painters, and composers have suggested that it is the stepping outside of one’s comfort zone, one’s permitted zone, which is the mark of a “true” artist.
I, for one, am grateful for authors past and present who’ve written out “of the box.” Do not, ever, presume to limit another writer’s capabilities, or be so audacious as to assume you are the granter of people’s right to tell the stories they choose to tell. Gender, ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, class, health status, religion, occupation, political affiliation – all of these authentic, influential and essential qualities ultimately pale in comparison to that most defining human (apologies to science fiction authors) quality: imagination. Write, if you must, only what you think you know, but stop proscribing the imagination of anyone but yourself. My stories will be filled with agnostic, youthful, weak-hearted Southwestern men and with elderly, vigorous, devoutly Pentecostal Asian women; with boldly blasphemous crones, timorous dyslexic adolescents, and someday maybe even a gracious if paranoid Venusian. I’ll continue to write characters who line up with the truth of the story, not those that toe a line drawn in the literary sand by some self-deputized Authenticity Posse.
* * *
Department Of Taking A Break
There; that’s better.
Now, if only I could slap somebody upside the head with a leather-bound copy of the list of challenged, censored and banned book titles as collected by the National Coalition Against Censorship.
“Political parties and ideologies with winning ideas don’t need to ban books. Christian nationalism, however, features inferior ideas that can’t compete in the modern world without cheating.” ( Marty Essen, author, in his op-ed “Christian Nationalism and book banning,” Independent Record, 9-16-22 )
* * *
May you refrain from brutally smiting those who would constrain the creativity of others; May you, upon further reflection, treat such constraints with the scorn they deserve; May you authentically appropriate the power of imagination; …and may the hijinks ensue.
* * *
Thanks for stopping by. Au Vendredi!
* * *
Teasers from previous posts on this topic, in case you haven’t had enough already and/or are suffering from insomnia:
Department Of Oh Please Not This Again It is just as well that I’m a writer, not an editor. Were I editing a newspaper or magazine, I might soon be out of a job. For this is an essay in defense of cultural appropriation.
In Canada last month, three editors lost their jobs after making such a defense. (Kenan Malik, opening lines from, In Defense of Cultural Appropriation ) Excerpt from post The Woman I’m Not Born As, June 23 2017
* *
A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, I had a story and several poems published in two different literary journals, each of which aspired, as per their “mission statements,” to give voice to the concerns of (the so-labeled) Generation X. Not only were Gen X-ers these respective journals’ target audience, the journals…in their writers’ guidelines stated that writers submitting work must themselves be of the Gen-X age range. Which I am not.
And yet, my story and poems were chosen for publication…. Although I snorted with derision when I read the afore-mentioned journals’ guidelines, I did have select pieces that I thought would be a good thematic fit for them. I also noted that neither journal requested contributor photos nor dates of birth, and thus had no way of confirming an author’s generational affiliation…. I chose to dishonor the journals’ guidelines by sending them my Gen-X-themed-fiction/poetry-written-by-a-non-Gen-Xer. The editors of the journal which published my story effused in the acceptance letter about how I had captured the particular zeitgeist they sought – about how the tone of my story was “exactly what we are looking for.”…. (excerpt from the acceptance acknowledgement letter I did not send to them): Gee, thanks – oh, and by the way, that’s the point of being a *fiction* writer. Somehow, miraculously, I was able to *get* the tone without *being* the tone. It’s called craft; skill; experience; imagination; empathy. It’s called creative writing for a reason, you ageist, imaginatively constipated twerps. ( Excerpt from post The Acceptance Letter I’m Not Sending, June 30 2017 )
* *
Department Of More Fun With Writer Sub-Department Of Yet Another Southern Border Crisis?
….American Dirt, in case you haven’t heard, is a novel about a Mexican woman and her son, the only survivors of their family’s murder by a drug cartel, who flee for their lives and head for the USA-Mexico border. AD was chosen as an Oprah’s Book Club selection (which almost guarantees a bajillion copies sold, plus movie options) and received glowing reviews, including from Latina authors and actors such as Sandra Cisneros and Julia Alvarez and Salma Hayek.…until someone pointed out that the novel about Mexican immigrants was written by a non-Mexican, and the cultural identity police dog-piled on. The book’s author identifies as white and Latina and has a Puerto Rican grandmother, but that’s not Latina enough for some. Seemingly overnight the book went being reviewed as a captivating story that could “change hearts and transform policies” (Alvarez) to being “racist” and “filled with stereotypes.” Just as quickly, the author went from to literary prodigy to pariah…her publisher even cancelled book tour appearances because of “specific threats to the booksellers and the author.”
(Excerpt from post The Cheese I’m Not Cutting, February 21 2020 )
* * Department Of Idiocy Makes My Brain Hurt Sub-Department Of Let’s Just Cancel those Pesky Qualities of Imagination And Empathy, Part 102.7 In A Contemptibly Long Series Adjunct to the Sub-Sub Division Of Why My Own Profession Has Left A Bad Taste In My Mouth For Years
….I’ve little doubt that author (Celeste) Ng’s hesitation about her “authoritative voice” was due to her anticipating charges of cultural appropriation (and the very real possibility of being boycotted by publishers, who would fear such a backlash): as in, how dare Ng think that she, an Asian (read: non-Black) writer, could create a full-blooded, multi-faceted, Black character? So: * Although the Asian-American author imagined a Black woman as this lead character, she couldn’t bring herself to actually write her as such; * Nevertheless, this Asian/non-Black writer was so successful in creating a compelling story about “identity and how the roles and the context of our identity contributes to how we live and relate to others in the world” that a Black actor could identify with this lead character as Black; * And it was acceptable for the series’ casting director and other lead actor and producers to suggest casting the character as Black, and the Black actor allowed herself to take the role (“an amazing idea”), which was created by an Asian, non-Black writer…. ( Excerpt from post, The Karma I’m Not Accruing, September 11 2020 )
[2] And thus I can write about whatever I want to…oh, wait, that’s every week….
[3] The term in this context refers to “minority” writers and artists protesting the use or depiction of their culture by other/non-minority writers or artists – even to the point of objecting to “dominant culture” artists creating or including in their work characters belonging to minority cultures.
[4] Yes, Lionel Shriver is a she. She appropriated a male first name at age 15.
[6] An ethnically/culturally Jewish writer, who had previously written about how she claimed the right to write non-Jewish characters and to *not* have to write about The Holocaust.
[7] Even if she claimed to be, it would be election fraud, as there is no such board.
[8] Which was published in P & W. The letter was edited for space and not run in its glorious (read: snarky) entirety.
[9] Excuse me, did I write ‘madam”? I mean of course, Sex Worker Supervisor.
[12] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists.
No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.” Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org
It’s that time of the year again. As has become a tradition much maligned anticipated in our neighborhood, moiself is hosting a different Partridge, every week, in my front yard. [1]
Can you identify this week’s guest Partridge?
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Department Of If You’re Already Sick Of The Holiday Cheer…
Then this might be for you: The entire L.A. City Council racist audio leak, transcribed and annotated by The Los Angeles Times.
Y’all may remember the scandal, which broke in October and which moiself wrote about in my November 4 post. Bare bones summary of a very complicated story: someone(s) [2] secretly recorded a behind-closed doors meeting of three Los Angeles City Council members and a local labor leader, wherein Council President Nury Martinez and other attendees slammed some of her fellow council members, gleefully made racist remarks, and spoke openly about how the city’s political districts should be carved up to advantage certain constituencies.
The council was thrown into turmoil, Martinez resigned, and some long-overdue rumination re revising and reckoning our “tribalism” in politics has been aired, including in a thoughtful op-ed by LAT columnist Sandy Banks.
Banks opens her essay with the story of a hurtful incident which happened to her many years ago. Riding a crowded bus and exhausted from a long day at a new job, Banks was touched when a young Latina woman gesture to Banks to take the seat next to her. The Latina woman had just herself been beckoned by an elderly Asian woman to take the seat beside her, but that same elderly woman reacted with visible disgust when the Latina in turn invited the Black woman to join them…and the Asian woman stood up and moved to another part of the bus.
…It has been several years since that episode, but the hurt, anger and shame it roused in me resurfaced last month when I listened to three of our city’s elected Latino leaders gleefully mocking and insulting Black people. Their tirade made international news, because of the crude and racist language they used to describe Black, gay, Armenian, Jewish and Oaxacan people in a private meeting, secretly recorded, about increasing the political power of Latinos at the expense of other struggling groups.
Then, adding insult to injury in the days that followed, the politicians larded their pseudo apologies with references to serving “communities of color” — when the only color they really seem to care about is light brown. Their own.
And that got me thinking about whether the label has outlived its utility….
Maybe now is the time to scrap the “people of color” label and its “communities of color” twin — along with the pretense that all nonwhite groups can be seamlessly yoked together in the fight for equality by the color of our skin.
It’s becoming increasingly clear that the bonds between racial and ethnic groups in multicultural Los Angeles are weak. We may share economic stressors and even neighborhoods, but we have different priorities, challenges and needs — and apparently little regard for solidarity, given that the leaders of our city’s largest ethnic group were trying to hoard power by chopping other groups off at the knees. The “people of color” frame began to take shape decades ago…. But research by UCLA political science professor Efrén Pérez has found that “the unity behind ‘people of color’ crumbles” when individual racial groups feel their unique challenges are being ignored. “There is nothing natural about camaraderie among people of color,” Pérez wrote in a 2020 opinion piece for the Washington Post. “For every commonality, a point of difference intrudes on unity.” Dropping the label wouldn’t mean giving up on the idea that there’s power in our collective energy. But it would allow us to scrap the fantasy that Black, Latino, Asian American and Indigenous people are the sum of our similarities, and should be willing to sublimate our own priorities to advance others’ needs. And while “people of color” is part of the zeitgeist today, debate over the concept has long been robust in academic and political arenas…. “We have talked about this a lot over the years,” said USC law professor Jody Armour, who specializes in the intersection of race and justice. “I’ve always been skeptical of the ‘people of color’ category.’…. The POC category has replicated this country’s reductive colorism, which strands dark-skinned people at the bottom of its ‘people of color’ hierarchy. It’s become a way ‘of camouflaging anti-Blackness,” Armour says. ( excerpts from “Lessons of the audio leak: Solidarity is dead. Let’s ditch the label ‘people of color,’ “
By Sandy Banks, Los Angeles Times, 11-21-22 )
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* * *
Department Of Bored Of The Rings
Moiself recently read an advice column wherein a man sought counsel on what, to him, seemed a vexing dilemma, and what to me was a “problem” worthy of wanting to give him and like-minded others face-palming so cosmic as to launch them into orbit.
“Incoming!”
The man wanted to propose marriage to his sweetie. His dilemma, as he saw it, was that his partner makes so much more money than he does that any ring he would buy or pick out would not be as fancy or somehow as “deserving” as that which she could get for herself. He did acknowledge in his letter that “she’s just not a fancy jewelry type person,” and that they had already been discussing marriage, and she’d indicated she wouldn’t necessarily want an engagement ring at all.
Oh my… That took me back. But first, this public service announcement.
Men, women – we’ve all have been lied to. Diamonds are not a rare treasure, despite the fact that the jewelry industry in general and diamond pushers in specific want you to think so, and have worked damn hard to equate the color, carat, cut, clarity the of rock to the quality of your loooooooooove. And no one works that scam angle quite like the Debeers company.
“The perfect diamond is a promise of the perfect relationship, because love is supposedly rare and so is this stone. We want the story that tells us our relationship is special. And we don’t want to accept that rarity isn’t all that meaningful.” (“Diamonds Aren’t Special and Neither is Your Love,” The Atlantic, 1-29-21)
Ahhh, the rings. Wedding rings; sure, whatever. But the whole engagement ring thing, where one person in the couple wears one but the other does not, reeks of sexism and the history of marriage as property transfer of a woman, from her birth family (read: father) to her husband. I suppose a ring is a more genteel way than pissing a circle around the woman to declare territorial rights, but it is still a pronouncement of ownership, and not any less creepy to me just because our culture has been injured to it.
Answer me this, moiself asks rhetorically (because no one has been able to give a cogent reason when I’ve asked seriously): Why is it the woman who wears an outward signal of “I’m ‘taken’ ”[3] and the man does not, when the couple are both engaged to be married?
Why are engagement rings still even a thing? It’s just…stupid.
Menfolk, the marketing that is aimed toward you with regard to this “tradition” is truly mind-numbing. It is meant to get men to internalize the idea that the engagement rings they pick out are signifiers of their commitment and worth. Also, let’s face it, the not-so-subliminal attachment message is that the bigger/more expensive the ring he can afford, the bigger the man’s…uh, manliness.
Are you man enough to give her this?
Interesting anecdote: despite the stereotype of women being interested in such things, my “congratulations” to couples who announce their engagement is never followed with “Ooooh, lemme see the ring.” Because I don’t give a flying fuck about such foolishness and wish we’d all move beyond that. I do give a flying fuck about this very-interesting-fact-of-my-experience: the only time an engagement ring has been proudly and insistently displayed to me in those announcement circumstances has been via the engaged dudes. For example: on at least three different occasions – a work or holiday party, or other social gathering – when a couple’s engagement was announced, as I started to say something congratulatory to the couple, the man grabbed his fiancé’s left hand, shoved it in front of my face, and all but demanded that I praise the ring he’d given her.
I suppose that’s a more socially acceptable way to brag than for him to drop trou at the party and display his 14 karat manliness, but….
MH and I have been married for 30 something years now. [4] It should come as no surprise that I did not wear an engagement ring, nor was I given one by MH, because he knew my opinions on the matter. When we were Getting Serious ® and discussing our future together, MH said, just to check, that he assumed I would not want an engagement ring? I told him that I’d never worn rings of any kind, with the exception of my The Man From U.N.C.L.E. ® spy ring and my high school class ring, only one of which I treasured and both of which I lost after just a few weeks of wearing. [5]
Also, I’d never worn much jewelry of any kind– rings, bracelets, necklaces – except for earrings. I had my ears pierced when I was a junior in college, at the behest of one of my roommates who declared one holiday season that I was a difficult person to shop for and “Could you just please get your gawddamn ears pierced so I can always know what to get you for Christmas?”[6]
MH and I laughed when I told him this story, and I joked, “Yeah, so, engagement earrings….”
Not long after that (what I assumed was a) throwaway remark, MH presented me with a pair of diamond “engagement earrings.” [7] I almost convinced him to get one of his ears pierced so we both could each wear one. But he was still young enough and concerned enough with what his parents would think, [8] and respectfully declined my request. Somehow, we both managed to survive our engagement without me wearing the traditional visible marker of such. We chose matching wedding rings: simple gold bands engraved with a weave pattern.
Fast forward thirty years. One evening at dinner MH said something along the lines of, “BTW, in case you’re wondering why I’m not wearing my wedding ring….” which caused me to look at his left hand and see that yep, his fourth finger was ringless. No, I hadn’t noticed. He told me that in the past few weeks at work his fingers had started to ache and swell. He’d visited his workplace’s occupational nurse, who couldn’t tell if the puffiness was the beginnings of arthritis or simply the results of too much clickety-clack time on keyboard, but advised that MH remove the ring now in case the swelling got so bad he had to have it cut off. [9]
Yeah, don’t let it get to this point.
“Oh, that makes sense,” I replied. Then I immediately took off my wedding band and put it in a safe place. I assured MH that I did not do so out of spite or anything negative; rather, for parallel conformity. We are either both wearing wedding rings, or we aren’t.
In the weeks to come MH investigated ring alternatives, while I actually/kinda/sorta felt like I didn’t need it. Sure, I’d worn one for almost 30 years at that point, but a part of me had never gotten used to wearing a ring, and I was always twisting it and found it cumbersome for handwashing. I recalled to him, from my previous life of working in the medical profession, how over the years I’d met and talked with several patients and couples who did not wear wedding rings, typically for one of two reasons:
(2) a dermatologic allergy to the metals used in the ring bands.
Some of the couples fashioned their own bands out of various other materials; one couple chose not to wear rings; at least two couples I met had their wedding rings tattooed around their ring fingers. [10]
MH did some online searching and found silicone bands he liked. They are flexible, come in a variety of sizes, widths, colors and patterns– even camo, for the romantic military fanatic outdoorsman. Bonus: they usually cost less than $30, so you don’t feel bad (and by you of course I mean moiself ) if you lose them. It’s fun, to occasionally change the color and pattern. After all, the only thing that separates us from our fellow primates is our ability to accessorize. Anyway, that is what we have both worn ever since.
“Instead of wondering why I don’t need god to be good, ask yourself why others do. Consider that true morality lies in doing what’s right without expectation of divine retribution or recompense for our actions.” ( Freethought Today, 11-22 excerpt from “Letter to a Mormon mother,” by Oliver Brown, 5th place winner of FFRF’s 2022 high school essay contest, [12] )
* * *
May you reconsider your usage of POCand other group-signifying terms; May you discover the cheap thrills of wearing colorful silicon rings; May you get your gawddamm ears pierced as an easy gift receiving solution; …and may the hijinks ensue.
[2] who, as of this writing, have not been identified.
[3] Which is how one man mansplained engagements rings to me, when I wondered aloud about their meaning.
[4] Don’t ask me to do the math, which I have to do in order to remember. Okay; it’s 34.
[5] My parents insisted I get my high school class ring, because I might regret *not* having one later…why they thought I would regret such a thing, I have no idea. I lost the ring in a bodysurfing wipeout at Newport Beach.
[7] When the horrible news about diamond mining and the “blood” diamonds began emerging years later, I stopped wearing them, first “warning” MH of my intent. I did not fault him, and neither did he: he’d bought them in good faith and had no idea about how dirty the diamond industry was.
[8] After all, he was already dating and now engaged to this crazy older woman….
[10] In discussing the various ring alternatives with our offspring, our generously tattooed daughter was – surprise! – highly in favor of the ink option.
[11] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists.
No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.” Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org
[12] The William Schulx High School Essay Contest for college-bound seniors had this prompt for 2022 contest entrants: “Please write a letter to a religious friend, relative, classmate, teacher, etc., who buys the myth that one can’t be moral without believing in a god.”
It’s that time of the year again. As has become a tradition much maligned anticipated in our neighborhood, moiselfwill be hosting a different Partridge, every week, in my front yard. [1]
Can you guess this week’s guest Partridge?
* * *
Department Of Perhaps The Writer Of The Story Should Rethink The Use Of The Modifier, “Successfully”
Dateline: Wednesday morning. Moiself reads these two opening paragraphs of a story published the previous evening in The Oregonian:
“The very morning he left a residential drug treatment program he successfully completed, a Douglas County man went straight to his former drug dealer and bought a pill. Hours later, (the man’s) grandparents found the 25-year-old in a barn on their ranch in rural Drain, dead from acute fentanyl intoxication….” (“Oregon man dies from fentanyl hours after leaving treatment.” The Oregonian 11-29-22)
* * *
Department Of Yes! Yes! See This Movie, Yes! Yes! But With Caution
Caution as in, perhaps a trigger warning?
I was literally shaking as I left the theater.
She Said. Everyone should see this movie…however, moiself has a feeling that only those who understand the experiences will have the inclination to do so.
Kantor and Twohey shared the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for public service with Ronan Farrow, for their reporting on the Harvey Weinstein sexual assault and abuse scandals.
Harvey Weinstein, that serial rapist and sexual abuser of women and girls (at least three of his victims were teenagers at the time of their assaults; one was sixteen), has four daughters, whose ages range from twenty-seven to eleven. Can you even imagine being one of them?
As I said wrote, I left the theater shaking, not with surprise but by the reminders that, with his goons and enablers and attorneys and accountants and other sycophants, HW almost got away with it. Hell, he DID get away with it. For. Decades. And he wasn’t alone…and in how many workplaces, from Mom and Pop stores to multinational corporations, did and do predators continue to get away with it?
The movie touched on much more than theHW story itself. It brought to mind the universal experiences of women abused by powerful men, some of which came out during the subsequent Me Too movement, some of which are ongoing, and most of which are lost to history, blackmail and extortion, victim-blaming and shame, and fear.
In one scene Kantor, a mother of two young daughters, is talking with Twohey, who’d just recently had her first baby (also a daughter), and who has dealt with some postpartum depression. The story the two reporters are investigating is stressful; particularly wearing on them is the psychological damage they have seen inflicted upon HW’s victims, whose lives have been turned upside down (and careers ruined, in many cases) and who are too fearful to come out on the public record against such a powerful man… [2] …and who live under a dark cloud of futility and despair. I wish I could recall the exact dialog, but the essential vibe of the brief but powerful scene is this: the two reporters briefly wonder aloud about how whether the frustration, fear, and depression experienced by many women might be the result of the pervasive drag-down common to the female experience: of having to deal with the burden of being female in a world where men still overwhelmingly hold and abuse power and act on the assumption that they can do whatever they want to any woman who is lower than them on life’s totem pole. [3]
One of many powerful scenes in the movie involves several minutes of static video – footage of a NYC hotel hallway – while the reporters listen to audiotape of a “conversation” between HW and one of his victims (she was wired by the NYPD after reporting her assault). I need another word for conversation; I found it brutal to listen to, as HW harangued and pleaded and whined and threatened and interrupted the woman as he tried to get her to accompany him to his hotel room for a “meeting” (that’s where he does *all* his business meetings, he insisted, [4] and she is being so mean and unreasonable for refusing him, he pouts, and trying to embarrass him and “nothing” would happen, he promised “on the life of my children” [5] ). And the woman was resisting and trying to get him to listen to her tell him how uncomfortable he was making her feel, and to answer her questions about why he had assaulted her (grabbed her breast) the previous day (“That’s just what I do,” he dismissed her complaint) and he went on and on, not taking her “no” for an answer, and repeatedly interrupting and talking over her….
I’d never had a sexually psychotic, sadistically bullying film producer try to intimidate and/or lure me. Still, it all seemed so…familiar.
Two scenes later, Twohey and Kantor, both women in their early 30s, are seated at a table in a local pub with their editor, a woman in her late 60s. They are there to discuss the HWinvestigation. Two men enter the bar, spot the reporters, and began flirting with them. One of the men approaches their table and invites the reporters to join him and his buddy (he doesn’t even make eye contact with the older woman; it’s as if – surprise! – she’s invisible to him). Kantor is sitting with her back to the man; Twohey politely but firmly declines the man’s invitation. The man persists. Twohey declines again, says that they are having a conversation and don’t want to be disturbed, and the man persists and interrupts and she declines several times (each time louder than her previous decline), the last time rising to her feet and yelling at him that she’d told him “…we are in a conversation and you need to FUCK OFF!” Both men retreat, making smarmy remarks about how they know what those women “need.” Twohey apologizes to Kantor for yelling; Kantor assures her —reminds her – “Don’t say you’re sorry” (for standing up to bullies).
How fucked up is it – that women are conditioned to say they’re sorry, even when rightly and righteously reacting to someone else who is in the wrong? The bar conversation scene, following the chilling audiotapes scene, was an obvious juxtaposition of a specific instance of harassment with What Women Endure On An Everyday Basis ®, in both professional and social situations.
But I can’t get out of my mind something that occurred to me after the movie was over. I don’t think it was the director’s conscious attempt to put that observation into my mind. Still, it is powerful, and it is this:
She Said tells the story of the investigation into sexual assault and harassment, in HW’s Miramax Films in specific, and the movie industry in general. Ironically (or not), a common trope in romantic comedies – one of the most successful movie genres – is that of the ardent male suitor who pursues his female love interest despite her having little to no interest in (or initially even repulsed by) him. He won’t take no for an answer…and the movie rewards him for that, and presents his perseverance in a positive light. He’s a man who knows what he wants! And he goes for it! His love interest is worn down by his persistence and finally says yes to him, whether for the moment or for life.
I repeat: in cinematic romcoms (and often also in “serious” movie love stories) the protagonist is rewarded for his dogged pursuit of someone who is not initially interested in him. Even when the object of his desire says no, it’s his job to change her mind. This kind of character is lauded in romcoms for behavior that in any other situation is essentially stalking. And what happens in the movies? He “gets” his prize. He is rewarded for his stalking persistence; he is rewarded, and praised and even presented as a romantic role model, for not taking no for an answer.
Of course, this convention only applies when the romantic protagonist is male. If the pursuer is a female who is persistent and won’t take no for an answer, then she is presented as a neurotic/sociopath who’s going to boil your bunny.
* * *
Actually…not. Moiself got so twitterpated with the She Saidsubject matter that I’ve no energy left for other topics. Except for maybe a brief interlude considering the therapeutic value of looking at pictures of unbearably cute baby animals wearing Santa hats.
* * *
Punz For The Day Cinematic Edition
Friends ask me how I sneak candy bars into the movie theater. Well, I have a few twix up my sleeve.
Speaking of movie treats, how does actor Reese eat her ice cream? Witherspoon.
What do you call movie a gunslinger with glasses? Squint Eastwood.
I know what you’re thinking, punk. Don’t encourage her.
A French director wants to open a floating cinema in Paris with drive-in boats. I just think that’s in Seine.
Some people forced me to watch a horror movie about clowns by punching me all the way to the cinema. Yep, they beat me to IT.
* * *
May all of our animal friends look unbearably cute in Santa hats; May you always and confidently guess this week’s Partridge; May you always know when to take no for an answer; …and may the hijinks ensue.
[2] The majority of HW’s victims were not well-known Hollywood stars (although there were several of those), but Miramax aides and clerical staff, way down on the totem pole and with no public interest in their stories.
[3] And to such men, allwomen, simply by being female, are lower than them on that totem pole.
[4] And, as HW told so many of his young, naive victims, who were film industry novices, “That’s how it’s done in Hollywood.” Being new to the business, most of them thought he knew what he was talking about and that *they* were ignorant stupid and/or were the ones sexualizing the meeting invitation by even being suspicious of its location.
[5] That was HW’s favorite tactic, to promise (that he wouldn’t do anything sexual, or that he was telling the truth), “on the life of my wife and children” – which one HW associate said was the no-fail tell that HWwas about to lie.
It’s that time of the year again. As has become a tradition much maligned anticipated in our neighborhood, moiselfwill be hosting a different Partridge, every week, in my front yard. [1]
Can you guess this week’s guest Partridge?
* * *
Department Of Yet Another Blast From The Past
Seeing as how MH and I are hosting Thanksgiving/harvest day festivities at our Humble Abode ®, moiself will not be sober enough able to do my usual Thursday night blog editing.
Thus, a rerun.
Apropos of…something I’ve already forgotten, I was recently given cause to look up what I had, previously in this space, written about ancestor worship (from 2-17-17):
As regular readers of this blog know (and new or sporadic readers will likely surmise), I am not a religious person. I was raised by church-going, Christian parents; [2] flirted with/researched a variety of denominations during/post college; was a member (even served as a deacon, holy shit!) of a UCC church [3] for many years; happily (read: finally) came out over 15 years ago as a lifelong skeptic-atheist-Freethinker-Bright.
While I hold a modicum of respect for some of the ideals and practices of, say, contemporary non-theistic Buddhism and Unitarianism and Jainism, I find all religions to be more-or less silly/offensive/just plain fallacious. There is one “spiritual” practice, however, which I can somewhat understand, if only in that it makes a teesny-tiny, infinitesimally wee bit o’ sense:
Ancestor worship.
Yes, really.
Make that, ancestor *veneration,* not worship. For the love of the FSM, [4] get off your knees, open your eyes, and stop bowing your head – nobody should “worship” anything.
Worship: VERB
[with object] Show reverence and adoration for (a deity) 1.1 [no object] Take part in a religious ceremony. (English Oxford Living Dictionary)
Unlike the claims of religions which have one or more deities, you don’t have to take your ancestors’ existence on “faith” [5] – you know they have lived (you yourself are evidence of that); you’ve likely met them one, or two or sometimes even three, generations back. From the photo albums and other heirlooms to the birth certificates, school and county records, family businesses, homes, farmsteads, and kinfolk near and far, you’ve an idea of what they have “given” you, materially, intellectually and emotionally – you’ve some idea what you might be grateful for.
Best of all, you’ve little incentive to argue or go to war with other people over whose interpretation of what their Imaginary Friend wants is correct. Your neighbor’s ancestors are their business, and yours are yours.
Of course, the option of ancestor veneration leaves out a small subset of people: those who have little or no knowledge of their forebears, such as certain kinds of adoptees, [6] as well as those who have just enough information (e.g., children in the foster care system) to…well, I’ll put it this way: if you come from two generations of meth addicts, ancestor veneration might not be the spiritual practice to float your boat.
Now then. By ancestor veneration I’m not talking any kind of belief system wherein the dead are beseeched to intercede on behalf of the living – that’s just as silly as all the others. I do not believe that my deceased grandparents and parents have a continued existence in a spirit world, or that their spirits look after moiself and my family in particular or the world in general, or that they somehow can influence the fate of the living. I’m talking about a practice of honor and appreciation, in which a person might use the roads paved and trails blazed by previous generations as a focal point for remembrance and gratitude.
Thanks for the dimples, Dad.
I’m not sure what brought the previous topic to mind. A likely suspect is the recent death of my mother. Anyway, y’all have my permission to honor your ancestors…as well as my fervent wish that that is as far as your theology goes. However, as I look at the state of the world, it appears that the old superstitions have some staying power. As long as people will continue to proclaim and dispute over whose invisible leader is the best-est, I’d like someone to come up with another dog in the fight.
Putting it yet another way, y’all have my encouragement (if you are religiously inclined) to come up with a new religion, within the following parameters: in this belief system, it is the men who are required, in one form or another, to cover themselves.
That’s it. Yep. That’s the entire theology in a nutshell. [7]
From a light veil or hijab – make, that,he-jab – to a full-body, Bro-burqa, your theology must include all the usual nonsense reasons (modesty; an easily offended deity; protection from your fellow believers who will beat the holy crap out of you if you show any evidence of human form) as to why certain people – in this case, those with boy parts – must be covered in public.
Duuuuude – put a scarf on it.
We swear on Her Holy name, it doesn’t make your butt look big, no, not at all.
* * *
That was then; this is now. Last week, reveling in an awesome autumn day, I found moiself thinking about Wicca and/or the contemporary pagan/nature spiritualities – those which mark the passing of the seasons – as another category of spiritual practices which make more sense to me. This doesn’t mean I am or would consider being a sun or “goddess” worshiper; it’s just that, unlike the tenants of the so-called “revealed” religions, [8] with those nature-centered ideologies we can see and directly experience what is being venerated.
Humans living in extreme regions – i.e., at the poles or the equator (or Southern California) – [9] don’t have the dramatic difference of the four season changes that we who inhabit the middle latitudes experience. Still, the earth has seasons and cycles; we live here; they affect us. But again, this form of spirituality gets my Nod Of Approval® for *acknowledgement,* not worship. As in, after a period of torrential downpour I appreciate the sun; after an unremittingly unrelenting bout of summer heat moiself appreciates the rain.
* * *
Punz For The Day Planet Earth Edition
How can you tell the ocean is friendly? It waves.
I love the way the Earth rotates – it makes my day.
How can you tell Mother Nature watches a lot of Oprahfrom June – November? Because it looks like everybody gets a hurricane.
* * *
May you take care of your Mother; May you appreciate the seasons; May you enjoy those leftovers; …and may the hijinks ensue.
[2] Lutheran, specifically: what was once called the ALC and now ELCA, for those obsessives interested in denominational nitpicking. It wasn’t one of the “synod” denominations (Missouri & Wisconsin), which are closer to Catholicism in their conservative doctrines (e.g. women cannot be ordained as ministers; liking to snipe about other denominations as being the “not true” faiths) .
[3] Which I have, since leaving, recommended to people who, for whatever reasons, are looking for a liberal Christian church experience and/or community.
[5] Although, especially at Thanksgiving when someone brings up politics, you may have to take them with a helluva big grain of salt.
[6] If you’re counting “blood” kin as the only kind of ancestors which matter. Which I hope you are not.
[7] Which is the proper receptacle for all theologies.
[8] Revealed religions are religions based on the supposed revelations of god(s) to humans, particularly as described in the scriptures of those religions. Thus, the existence of these gods depends on revelation by said gods, to humans, of ideas that would not have been arrived at by natural reason alone. Examples of revealed religions are the primary monotheistic faiths – Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Baha’ism, Mormonism, Hinduism, Sikhism.
[9] Growing up in So Cal we used to joke we had two seasons: brown and tan.
Department Of It’s The Little Things Which Make Life Worth Living In These Trying Political Times
Dateline: Tuesday afternoon. Apropos of…whatever, my offspring, son K and daughter Belle, have this exchange on our family messenger group, Yep!!!! Cats!!!! [1] (sans pix; these are my illustrations):
K: I did not realize how truly gigantic Fetterman is.
He’s like 6’9.” Since words and reason don’t work we now have Fetterman to give the insane senators a swirly.
Belle: (thumbs up) First on the list: Mitch McConnell.
Belle: Although I think just turning him upside-down would kill him, probably couldn’t even get to the swirly part.
Moiself walked around the rest of the afternoon with a big smile on my face, thanks to the imagery provided by my offspring.
Relax, Mitchie-boy. Just think of it as your well-deserved spa treatment.
* * *
Department Of Another Good Thing ® About Social Media
There’s no shortage of criticisms of the various social media outlets, and most critiques are legit, I’d wager. [2] Even as I am encouraging those who complain about supporting a certain megalomaniac to drop their Twitter accounts and stop buying Teslas, moiself remains on one social media site: Facebook. Here’s one of the reasons why.
Dateline: earlier this week. A FB friend posts pictures of his grandchild‘s visit to what looks to be an amusement park, and picture shows the child playing that classic arcade game, Whac-a-mole. Seeing this picture prompts a lovely flashback for moiself– a memory I’ve not thought of in decades.
Dateline of memory: A long time in a galaxy far far away (Southern California). I am visiting my parents at their home in Santa Ana. It’s summertime, and the County Fair is on. My parents tell me they haven’t been to a state or county fair in ages, and suggest we go. And so we do. As we walk past the various cheesy games and merchandise and food booths, nothing catches our interest, until we come to an arcade. I espy a Whac-A-Molegame, and instantly am obsessed with getting my mother to play it.
My mother is hesitant, despite my enthusiastic recommendation. She knows nothing about it, she says (Even better!!!,moiself thinks to moiself ) I assure her that it’s a straightforward game, no complicated strategy or levels or scenarios: she simply must hold the mallet and whack the heads of the moles as they pop up from the console.
“Why?” she asks me.
“There’s no time to get existential right now,” I reply. I put my two quarters in the slot, press the game’s start button and put the mallet in my mother’s hand. “You don’t want me to waste fifty cents, right, Mom? Look – there’s one! Pretend it’s digging up your rosebushes!”
Unlike the champ in the above video, my mother is exquisitely awful at Whac-A-Mole. Her timing is atrocious; even so, she soon gets into it in her own way, emitting a high-pitched, “Oh!” whenever a mole head appears, followed by her delayed whack at its head. My father and I, standing to the side of the game console, are doubled over with laughter as we watch my mild-mannered mother, with an increasing maniacal look in her eyes, pursues those pesky moles:
I haven’t gone to a county fairs in years and it’s been even longer since I’ve even seen a Whac-a-mole game. So, then: would that memory have been prompted by anything else, save for a post on social media? It’s not like I would have seen a picture of my friend’s grandchild playing this game – like most of my FB friends, we don’t have a letter-writing kind of relationship.
* * *
Department Of Well That’s Not Up To Their Usual Standards
Moiself is referring to the recent rerun of an interview with (the late) Loretta Lynn on Fresh Air .
It was a tad interesting, due to the skills of FA host, Terry Gross, arguably [3] the best interviewer out there. But IMO it was not up to the usual FA standards. This was because Lynn was (again, IMO)…. There’s no easy way to say it. The guest can make or break the interview. And it wasn’t that Lynn was a “bad” guest, or an audaciously humorless and insufferably boorish one like a notable few TG has dealt with. [4] On the contrary. Lynn was pleasant enough, but it seemed to me that she was also…well… rather…simple, or basic. Not plucking every string on her guitar, so to speak.
In the history of country music, LL’s talent was even bigger than her hair.
LL seemed not at all interested in self-reflection and/or discussing or exploring how she writes her songs. Okay; fine; her prerogative. But then, why agree to be come on a show where the whole point is to talk about your work as a female singer who broke ground in her genre for writing her own songs?
The point of a FA interview with a musician/singer/songwriter is to reflect upon one’s work, technique, inspiration, and so on. Which Lynn summed up in sentences like, “Oh, I don’t really know,” or “I don’t like to talk about that.” Lynn’s songs are personal – she’s said in previous interviews that her husband was, in one way or another, “in every song” she wrote, yet she wouldn’t go further when FA host TG would ask her about *how* or why her husband is in a particular song.
And TG let her get away with it.
LL’s song Fist City is borderline hilarious in some ways and disturbing in others. And TG did not probe into that, as I have heard her done, through the years – the decades now – that I’ve been listening to FA interviews. Gross is insightful and persistent as an interviewer, and respectfully so. She typically does not give up after one attempted conversational diversion by a guest. And her guest was country music legend Loretta Lynn, who has written all these classic country songs about women trying to take her man (including, wait for it: “You Ain’t Woman Enough To Take My Man”), and… hello? What are those lyrics about?
If it had been any other songwriter, I think TG would have asked more persistently about the song’s implications. She did try, but Lynn wasn’t having any of it. “Oh I don’t want to talk about that,” LL would purr, in her soft Kentucky lilt.
I wanted TG to get LL to at least to consider why people might want LL to talk about that problem – about how she was really singing about, writing about, the wrong problem. When LL sang about how some women were ‘after,’ (her words) her man, the underlying problem wasn’t those women.
Loretta Lynn, the woman who wrote so empathetically about birth control liberating women from the life of a brood mare (“The Pill”), and the trials of a divorced woman having people think that just because she’s divorced she’s loose/available (“Rated X”) didn’t seem capable of, or willing to, consider the fact that it was her husband who was the problem. He married her, but chased after other women. But Lynn…wouldn’t go there. And TG, in deference to Lynn’s age, status and/or “sweetness,” didn’t seem willing to push it the way I think she would have with another musician…or politician, or writer or artist or sports figure or….. Is that ultimately respectful, or patronizing?
* * *
Department Of The Big Day Next Week
The more I know about the origins and mythologies (read: lies) about Thanksgiving, the less I want to call it that.
I’ve always had a certain ambivalence regarding Tday. Even as a child, I suspected we weren’t being told the truth about that much vaunted Happy Time Between Indians and Pilgrims ®. Historians are starting to speak up, and…how can I put this? Folks, if the Readers Digest, hardly The Socialist Review, is willing to address this issue, that means it’s way past time the rest of us did.
“Thanksgiving is both uniquely American and full of treasured traditions. But this rosy picture of modern celebrations leaves out most of the real history of Thanksgiving…. Yes, you can still settle down with family to give thanks. But it’s important to know what you’re celebrating and unlearn some long-held myths.”
…. What’s the harm in believing the happy version so many of us grew up with? It’s just a story, right? This whitewashing downplays the long and bloody series of conflicts between white settlers and Native Americans that would occur over the next two centuries…..
‘Narratives of a harmonious Thanksgiving celebration were created to justify westward expansion and Manifest Destiny,’…. The term Manifest Destiny, coined more than two centuries after the first Thanksgiving, was the belief that settlers were destined by God to expand across America and prosper…. Myth: The “first Thanksgiving” started the tradition that founded the holiday. Truth: The harvest celebration of 1621 was not called Thanksgiving and was not repeated every year. The next official ‘day of thanksgiving’ was after settlers massacred more than 400 Pequot men, women and children. Governor Bradford’s journal decreed, ‘For the next 100 years, every Thanksgiving Day ordained by a governor is in honor of the bloody victory, thanking God that the battle had been won.’ We should add that to our list of favorite Thanksgiving quotes as a stark reminder of the real history of Thanksgiving.” (“The Real History of Thanksgiving,” Readers Digest, 11-15-22)
I like the idea of a holiday involving gratitude, and one in which friends and family get together for a celebratory meal. As for what is in the meal, as the years have gone by, my own dietary preferences have changed – although even as a child I never was all that fond of the big bland boring turkey and wondered what all the fuss was about. [5]Moiselflikes the idea of variety feast, rather than a fixed menu. [6]
Moiself also likes that which is practiced by our neighbors to the north. Canadian Thanksgiving, which I and my family have experienced thanks to the generosity of a dear Canadian friend and (former) neighbor, is more of a general harvest celebration, without a traditional fixed menu.
Hmmm, so, how’s about Harvest Fest? Gratitude Day? Grativest Day? Harvitude Day?
Yeah, like that’s gonna fly.
Perhaps I’m being persnickety here. After all, I’m the one who points out the secular origins of Christmas, which I don’t insist on renaming it, for the same reasons that, for example, I call the middle day of the week Wednesday even though I do not worship the Germanic god for whom the day is named. Still, knowing the origins of Thanksgiving and the subsequent mythologies which promoted it, I can’t help but wish for a name change.
But that’s about as likely to happen as Elon Musk is likely to gift the running of Twitter to the Southern Poverty Law Center, sell his holdings in Tesla and donate the profits to Greenpeace, then take a vow of abstemious living and join a Buddhist monastery.
Ah, but it’s good to dream.
* * *
Punz For The Day Tday Edition
How did Ziggy Stardust express his gratitude to the Thanksgiving host for serving her tasty sweet potato casserole? “Wham, yam, thank you ma’am.”
My family advised me to stop telling Thanksgiving jokes, but I said I couldn’t quit cold turkey.
How does rapper Sir Mixalot, who loathes pumpkin pie, express his Thanksgiving dessert preference? “I like big bundts and I cannot lie.”
I’ll give her points for not eating us, but really, these jokes are fowl.
* * *
May you have a good feast with friends and family, whatever you call it; May visions of Mitch-getting-a-swirley warm the cockles of your heart; May you find a whac-a-mole game and go to town; …and may the hijinks ensue.
Thanks for stopping by. Au Vendredi!
* * *
[1] So named, by MH…I can’t remember the specifics, but it had to do with one of us commenting about all of us posting cat pictures yet again. It has evolved into a family message board…with – yep! – lots of cat-sighting pictures.
[2] Wager, rather than aver, because I’m not on most social media and thus can’t speak from direct experience.
[3] As in, you could argue with me about this, but you’d lose.
[4] As in her FA interviews with Bill O’Reilly and Gene Simmons.
[5] My most memorable Tday was when the friend of a host brought a huge chinook salmon he’d caught the previous day in Alaska, and the hosts, my aunt and uncle, roasted it simply, with herbs and lemon juice. I WAS AMAZED.
[6] Also, I haven’t eaten meat for years, so there goes that feast centerpiece.
The book club moiself is hosting – so unprecedentedly named, “Book Club” – is reading a book that, despite being entertaining in and of itself, has some of the more enthusiastic and engaging reviews I’ve run across in years.
But there is one adjective (most of) the reviews have left out. Time and time again they mention how educational and entertaining the book is – you’ll laugh, you’ll gasp, you’ll shake your head and say WTF?!?!? – but they left out the anger part. As in, for all readers with an IQ above their shoe size, this book should also, IMO, make you angry. Angry in that the information contained in it is considered new and/or controversial to some people; angry that, even in the sciences, in fields of (supposedly) open inquiry, so many minds were closed for so many years and so many prejudices and social mores were passed along as biological realities.
From what I’ve written, and from the review excerpts (my emphases) which follow, can you guess the subject of the book? [2]
“I know you can, girls and boys.”
“Fun, informative and revolutionary all at once…should be required reading in school. After reading this book one will never look at an orca, an albatross, or a human the same way again. And the world will be better for it.” ( Agustin Fuentes, professor of anthropology at Princeton University)
“….blows two centuries of sexist myths right out of biology. Prepare to learn a lot -and laugh out loud. A beautifully written, very funny and deeply important book.” ( Alice Roberts, author of Evolution )
“astonishing, wildly entertaining, and massively important.” (Mary Roach, American popular science author )
“An important corrective to the ‘accidental sexism’ baked into so many biological studies… [and] a clarion call that the remaining terra incognita of female biology merits far more comprehensive mapping.” ( Financial Times )
“[An] effervescent exposé… [A] playful, enlightening tour of the vanguard of evolutionary biology.” ( Scientific American )
“… shows what a difference women make to scientific inquiry, asking questions and proposing studies their male colleagues didn’t think of — or didn’t bother with.” ( Bethanne Patrick, LA Times )
“By analyzing numerous animals, this sparkling attack on scientific sexism draws on many scientists — of multiple genders — to correct stereotypes of the active male versus passive female.” ( Nature )
“Who you callin’ passive?”
“In compelling and often hilarious prose, using the scientific authority she has earned as a trained biologist…(the author) confronts the long history of androcentric assumptions baked into evolutionary biology and begins to set the record straight.” ( Jessie Rack, Science )
“…demolishes much of what you probably learned about the sexes in biology class.This may be disconcerting, even confronting for those who feel comfortable in the warm embrace of Darwinian order. But it’s also exciting, and fascinating, and very well might change the way you see the world.” ( Science News )
“…dives into sex and gender across the animal kingdom, dispelling all the misogynist notions of females being the weaker sex…This book elevates not just the science itself but the scientists that have been marginalized for too long.” ( Lucy Roehrig, Booklist )
“In this delightful, revelatory survey of cross-species sexism, (the author) treats readers to an information-dense reframing of the many misunderstandings around sex and sexuality that burden ‘girls’ of all kinds. Come for the promise of some really neat nature facts. Stay for Cooke picking apart the misogynistic underpinnings of Charles Darwin’s fundamentally flawed theory of evolution. ( AV Club )
“A dazzling, funny and elegantly angry demolition of our preconceptions about female behaviour and sex in the animal kingdom… I read it, my jaw sagging in astonishment, jotting down favourite parts to send to friends and reading out snippets gleefully.” ( The Observer )
The male sage grouse’s mating dance has got to be one of those snippets.
“The author has a charmingly irreverent style that, among other things, pokes holes inthe sexist scientific research of old that used cherry-picked data to conclude females weren’t worth studying.” ( Publishers Weekly )
“A top-notch book of natural science that busts myths as it entertains.” ( Kirkus )
“Brilliant… readers will never see the world the same way again… inspires awe in the breathtaking diversity of nature and the evolutionary roots of our behaviour.” ( Times Literary Supplement )
“A glorious rebuttal of everything we have believed about gender since Charles Darwin got it all wrong.” ( Daily Mirror )
In other words, if you *think* you know at least something about natural selection and animal behavior, you need to read this book.
“…since Charles Darwin got it all wrong.”
Pay close attention to that review fragment.
Darwin didn’t get it *all* wrong. He and his peers, [4] whose work led us to the beginning of understanding evolutionary biology, were able to challenge the substantial religious barriers of their time and publish their findings. But when it came to sex and species, they were still men of their times, emphasis on both menand times. They were unable to shed, nor even recognize, their blinkered, Victorian male mindset when it came to observations of pronouncements about the females of the species they studied – any and all species which used sexual reproduction. [5]
Except that they mostly *didn’t* study the females of the species.
One of the most encouraging aspects of science is that, being science, it progresses. Contemporatry scientists add on to the knowledge of the past, and correct the errors. Still, this progress is often glacial, as science was done and continues to be done by human beings, with their flawed assumptions and hidden (even – especially – to themselves) biases. Broadening the scope of knowledge and correcting errors can takes many years, and in the case of Victorian male scientists projecting their cultural assumptions and male privilege onto that of their theories and observations (or lack thereof) re females, it has taken tens of decades – approaching two centuries – for the “phallocracy of evolutionary biology” to be challenged in theory and overturned by the evidence.
Closing in on 200 years after Darwin and Wallace began organizing their theories of evolution, the old boys network many contemporary male scientists still hold on to the past. Even when presented with the DNA analysis confirming what ethologists and biologists observed in the field – that, for example, in the nest of the assumedly monogamous/pair-bonded songbirds, only two of the clutch of the female’s six eggs are actually fathered by the male of the pair – some scientists still cling to the myth that only the males of a species are promiscuous. The lower their blinders; they protest and bluster and try to explain away the evidence right under their prudish noses. [6]
“Close your eyes and think of England.”
“Even the most original and meticulous scientists are not immune to the influence of culture…. The leading academic minds of the Victorian era considered the sexes to be radically different creatures – essentially polar opposites of one another. females were believed to experience arrested development; they resembled the young of their species by being smaller and less colorful…. Essentially, males were considered to be more evolved than females.
These sentiments were all incorporate by Darwin into The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex, which, as the title suggests, used sexual and natural selection to explain human evolution and the sex differences upheld by Victorian society.
‘The chief distinction in the intellectual powers of the two sexes is shewn by man’s attaining to a higher eminence, in whatever he takes up, than can woman – whether requiring deep thought, reason or imagination, or merely the use of the senses and hands,’ explained Darwin. ‘Thus, man has ultimately become superior to woman.’
Darwin’s theory of sexual selection was incubated in misogyny, so it is little wonder that the female animal came out deformed, as marginalized and misunderstood as a Victorian housewife.
….because of (Darwin’s) godlike reputation, biologists who followed in his wake have suffered from a chronic case of confirmation bias. They looked for evidence in support of the passive female prototype, and saw only what they wanted to see.” ( excerpts iv-xv, Introduction, Bitch: On The Female of the Species )
Moiself’s summary/teaser for the book. In Bitch… you will learn how the sexist scientific research of old
* projected their cultural assumptions and male privilege on to that of their theories and observations
* ignored and/or marginalized the science (and scientists) which contradicted their inherited stereotypes of the active male versus passive female
*used cherry-picked data to conclude females weren’t worth studying, and ultimately defined the females of species in terms of the males [7]
*drew conclusions from studying male animals’ behaviors – and even anatomies – which they applied to females
These points cannot be emphasized enough. Thus, I intend to do so, at least 23 times per post, in every blog of mine from here on out.
Just kidding.
* * *
Department Of Moiself’sFavorite Story From This Book Full of Favorite Stories
From Bitch’s Chapter Four: Fifty Ways to Eat Your Lover: the conundrum of sexual cannibalism.
“Most people don’t think of the word flamboyant when describing a spider… (however) the male peacock spider is the Liberace of the arachnid world – an outrageous peformer who just like his avian namesake, employs an estraordinary iridescent tail-fan to win his mate….
When approaching a female…this fuzzy little four millimetre wonder stages an unexpectedly elaborate dance routine by abruptly lifting his furry abdomen into a vertical position and unfurling two shimmering flaps decorated with graphic blues, oranges and reds that could have been designed by Gianni Versace. This peacock arachnid wagles his gaudy butt-fan whilst bobbing his body up and down, stomping his feet and waving a pair of oversize legs in the air. This exhuberant toutine, part Fred Astaire and part Village People, can go on for up to an hour until he’s close enough to make his move. It is an undeniably charming spectacle, made all the more endearing by the fact that the peacock male is, of course, dancing for his life. Up to three quarters of peacock suitors are terminally dispatched by an unimpressed female.”
Betcha I’d be the spider who survived the odds.
* * *
Punz For The Day Biology and Evolution Edition
Some people don’t believe in evolution. They’re primate change deniers.
If evolution’s really a thing, why haven’t hummingbirds learned the words yet?
How do you identify a male bald eagle? All his feathers are combed over to one side.
Oh, honey, don’t be so sensitive.”
* * *
May we always be willing to question the conventional wisdom; May we continue to update our knowledge base; May we enjoy watching footage of the ludicrous sage grouse booty call dance; …and may the hijinks ensue.
Thanks for stopping by. Au Vendredi!
* * *
[1] And if I am a woman lion hear me roar as I mate with every male lion I encounter…much to the distress of many male biologists….
[2] Yeah, I’m going to make you read further before I give the title. Such a tease.
[6] “The female songbird must have been raped!” Cool story, bro, except that, like most birds (97%), male songbirds do not have a penis, and cannot rape their mates. Both genders have a cloaca and must cooperate to share their genetic material, mating with what ornithologists call a “cloacal kiss.”
[7] Male lions are the default; females are the afterthought, the “-ess”es.
What would ushering in the holiday season be without The Dropkick Murphys?
Speaking of holidays, since 2008 I’ve kept track of how many greedy candy mongers trick-or-treaters have graced our porch. The numbers range from a low of 25 [1] to a high of 63, with an average of 45. This year we had 26.
Only twenty-six? MH and I were speculating about the downswing (last year’s count was 60). Combination of a school night and the (at times heavy) rain? It couldn’t be the latter…oh, c’mon, kids (and parents), this is Oregon.
Last year we gave out full-sized [2] candy bars. This year (before moiself knew what would be the lame turnout) I wanted to do something different. I walked up and down supermarket aisles, looking for inspiration. And found plenty.
Here are the things I wanted to give out to trick or treaters: Small jars/cans of pimentos or black olives or cornichons or sweet corn or Liquid Smoke or soy sauce or…Beanee Weenees! Of course, if word got out that we were distributing the latter, the kiddies would leave skidmarks from our neighbors’ porches to our own.
Accept no substitutions.
Here are the things we *did* give out to trick or treaters:
* * *
Department Of The Perspective That Could Save Us [3]
From the podcast Unexplainable, The Gray Area: “On the first episode of Vox’s new podcast, The Gray Area, host Sean Illing talks with Neil deGrasse Tyson about the limits of both politics and science.” What caught my attention was NDT’s assertion that taking a “cosmic perspective” is the most rational and helpful– and arguably the only– thing that can solve our myriad of social, political and environmental challenges. This is an excerpt from their discussion:
NDT: What’s the most intelligent species there ever was on earth?
SI: Oh…you’re setting me up. Um, since you’re asking me, it can’t be people…
NDT: No, it *is* people; it’s not a trick question. So now I ask, who declared that humans are the smartest animals there ever were? Humans did. Whereas a cosmic perspective would say, imagine a lifeform smarter than we are: Is there anything we have done in the history of civilization that (this smarter-than-us lifeform) would judge to be clever?
This was a great 1980s, one-woman play (written by Jane Wagner and starring Lily Tomlin), which was being revived in early 2022, starring Cecily Strong.
NDT:
It’s a simple thought experiment, when we compare ourselves to chimpanzees, our closest genetic relative. We have 98, 99% identical DNA to a chimp. Now, if you’re really into homo sapiens you say, What a difference that 2% makes! We have philosophy and the Hubble telescope and art and civilization! And all the chimp can do is maybe extract termites from a mound, and the smartest of them will stack boxes to reach hanging bananas from the ceiling. But I pose you the question: suppose the intelligence difference between chimps and humans was actually as small as that 2% might indicate. What would we look like to some other species that’s 2% beyond us in intelligence – just the 2% that we are beyond the chimps? Continue on that line. The smartest chimps can do what our toddlers can do. By that analogy, the smartest humans would do what the toddlers of this species can do. Putting all that in context, all I’m saying is that for you to say we’re pretty clever… another species 2% beyond us, there’s nothing we could do that would impress them.
So, that species visiting earth on the rumor that intelligent life had surfaced, after seeing our rampant irrationalities – the wars we fight against our own species, because you live on a different line in the sand, because resources are unequally distributed on the land and in the ocean, because you worship a different god, because you sleep with different people – and we slaughter each other and enslave people…. Those aliens will run home and say, “There is no sign of intelligent life on earth.” It’s a cosmic perspective, offered for your consideration.
SI: This …is (your) central plea…that we take a more cosmic perspective on things…
NDT: On *everything.*
SI: …on everything, and achieve some clarity about what really matters and what doesn’t, and how stupid so many of the things that we *think* are important really are…
NDT: I wouldn’t say stupid so much as just kind of irrelevant. You think it’s important and it’s actually not. That’s a more significant value of a cosmic perspective: it forces you to rebalance your portfolios of concerns in the world.
* * *
Department Of A Cosmic Perspective Is Definitely Needed Here
The LA Times is one of four (online) newspapers moiself subscribes to, and I’ve been watching (as in, reading about) the following scandal unfold for…yikes, is it weeks, now? The machinations of local/Los Angeles politics may be way off most people’s current events radar; however, even those with no interest in such, even those with their heads under the proverbial rock when it comes to west coast politics, by now have likely heard of the LA City Council recording scandal.
The scandal in a nutshell: [4] An anonymously leaked recording of a private conversation among LA City Council members and a labor leader making racist and classist remarks and political scheming regarding redistricting has prompted a state investigation, and led to the resignation of the LA City Council president and said labor leader.
“Behind closed doors, Los Angeles City Council President Nury Martinez made openly racist remarks, derided some of her council colleagues and spoke in unusually crass terms about how the city should be carved up politically…. Martinez and the other Latino leaders present during the taped conversation were seemingly unaware they were being recorded as Martinez said a councilmember handled his young Black son as though he were an “accessory” and described the boy as “Parece changuito,” or “like a monkey.”… Martinez also mocked Oaxacans, and said “F— that guy … He’s with the Blacks” while speaking about Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. George Gascón.
( “Racist remarks in leaked audio of L.A. council members spark outrage, disgust,” LA Times 10-9-22)
Moiself listened to excerpts of the recorded audio tape…as much as I could stand, before switching to reading the key moments of the transcripts. [5] In private conversations among three council members and an LA Labor leader – all Latino and all Democrats – Councilmembers Nury Martinez, Kevin De León and Gil Cedillo scheme with LA county labor dude Ron Herrera re redistricting plans; Martinez disparages Oaxacans as “little short dark people” and “so ugly” and refers to a (white, gay) councilmember’s Black son as a monkey who, in her opinion, needs a “beatdown.” Re LA County Dist. Atty. George Gascón, Martinez said, “Fuck that guy. … He’s with the Blacks.” None of the others present and participating in the conversation disputed or called out Martinezon her remarks – which also included crass and bigoted comments about Jews, Armenians, and other groups….
I felt a little bit left out at some point. Martinez insulted just about everyone but middle aged white ex-Californians who moved to Oregon.
When reading about the scandal, I was reminded so much about what I think is a fact being overlooked here. Nury Martinez was caught acting out one of our collective human traits on steroids: she was revealing her tribalism.
We home sapiens are a tribal species. It’s too bad that the whole concept of race has entered human consciousness, as we are not different “races,” whatever that means. We are not racial – that term is a misnomer invented by European naturalists and anthropologists in the early 18th century. [6]
“More than 100 years ago, American sociologist W.E.B. Du Bois was concerned that race was being used as a biological explanation for what he understood to be social and cultural differences between different populations of people. He spoke out against the idea of ‘white’ and ‘black’ as discrete groups, claiming that these distinctions ignored the scope of human diversity. Science would favor Du Bois. Today, the mainstream belief among scientists is that race is a social construct without biological meaning.” ( Race Is a Social Construct, Scientists Argue,” Scientific American 2-5-16)
“(The tape’s) comments about Black and Indigenous people displayed a prejudice against darker skin that, while not ubiquitous, still runs deep in the community and is rooted in the colonial eras of Mexico and Central America.
‘This is not just four bad apples,’ said Alejandra Valles, chief of staff of SEIU United Service Workers West. ‘We have to use this opportunity as reflection and honesty about the anti-Blackness, the anti-Indigenous colorism and racism in the Latino community. Because that’s happening.’ ”
(“ L.A. Latinos grapple with familiar colorism against Black and Indigenous people in racist tape,” Rachel Uranga, Los Angeles Times, 10-17-22)
Interesting, to me, that comment about the bad apples. Because that’s it – that’s the dang the thing about “race.” We are all from the same apple tree, and yet we pick at each other.
“You want bad apples? I’ll show you bad apples.”
Race. It’s an unfortunate entry in our Lexicon of Life. We are not racial, but we are definitely tribal at our core…maybe I’m just quibbling re semantics. However we define “we,” we spend our lives scrambling like roaches across the floors of an old San Francisco apartment kitchen, trying to make sure we get (what we perceive to be) our share but wanting to hide our maneuverings when the light comes on.
We have obsessive concerns, so majorly illuminated in the LA Council tapes, of alliances between our various tribes and the tribes within the tribes – woe to anyone naive enough to think that, for example, all White or Latino or Black politicians are a monolithic bloc. Read the transcripts; listen to the tape and hear the concern over alliances, over who is from where. Listen as the entrenched Mexican-American politician spews (and thus reveals) the colorism of her ancestral roots as she derides the “short ugly” Oaxacans (who are so irritating as to also want political power [7] ) and that DA who, although he has a Hispanic surname, “Fuck him, he’s with the Blacks.”
Who is in power; who wants power; who can we trust to share the power? Who is one of us; who could be one of us, but “us” doesn’t really want “them” included.
* * *
Department Of This Needs Repeating
The cosmic perspective flows from fundamental knowledge. But it’s more than just what you know. It’s also about having the wisdom and insight to apply that knowledge to assessing our place in the universe. And its attributes are clear:
* The cosmic perspective comes from the frontiers of science, yet it’s not solely the province of the scientist. The cosmic perspective belongs to everyone.
* The cosmic perspective is humble.
* The cosmic perspective is spiritual—even redemptive—but not religious.
* The cosmic perspective enables us to grasp, in the same thought, the large and the small.
* The cosmic perspective opens our minds to extraordinary ideas but does not leave them so open that our brains spill out, making us susceptible to believing anything we’re told.
* The cosmic perspective opens our eyes to the universe, not as a benevolent cradle designed to nurture life but as a cold, lonely, hazardous place.
* The cosmic perspective shows Earth to be a mote, but a precious mote and, for the moment, the only home we have.
* The cosmic perspective finds beauty in the images of planets, moons, stars, and nebulae but also celebrates the laws of physics that shape them.
* The cosmic perspective enables us to see beyond our circumstances, allowing us to transcend the primal search for food, shelter, and sex.
* The cosmic perspective reminds us that in space, where there is no air, a flag will not wave—an indication that perhaps flag waving and space exploration do not mix.
* The cosmic perspective not only embraces our genetic kinship with all life on Earth but also values our chemical kinship with any yet-to-be discovered life in the universe, as well as our atomic kinship with the universe itself.
(“The Cosmic Perspective” By Neil deGrasse Tyson Natural History Magazine, April 2007, The 100th essay in the “Universe” series.)
* * *
Department Of Regarding Next Week’s Elections,
This, Unfortunately, Says It All [8]
“Liz Cheney and I are not brave. We are just surrounded by cowards.” Rep. Adam Kinzinger ( R ) Illinois
* * *
Punz For The Day Political Tribes Edition
I don’t approve of political jokes; I’ve seen too many of them get elected.
Republicans should build their border walls with Hillary’s emails
because nobody can get over them.
I knew Communism was doomed from the beginning – too many red flags.
What do you call a Russian procrastinator?
Putinoff.
I’ll laugh about this later.
* * *
May a cosmic perspective help you to rebalance your portfolios of concerns in the world; May you be cognizant of your own tribalisms; May you value your atomic kinship with the universe itself; …and may the hijinks ensue.
Thanks for stopping by. Au Vendredi!
* * *
[1] Did not do in 2020. Hmm, I wonder what was happening then?
[2] Not the “fun” size featured in most stores, as Halloween staples. For kids, since when does fun = smaller?
[4] An appropriate container…if nuts were the size of 747s.
[5] As of this writing I think investigators still have no idea who did the recording, and who “released” it.
[6] Marked by the publication of the book Systema naturae in 1735, in which the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus proposed a classification of humankind into four distinct races. (“Race and History: Comments from an Epistemological Point of View” National Library of Medicine, )
[7] Indigenous Oaxacans expressed frustration and anger at Martinez’s comments referring to them as “little short dark people” — a racist stereotype often used to demean Indigenous communities. “I was like, I don’t know where these people are from, I don’t know what village they came [from], how they got here,” Martinez said, before adding “Tan feos” — “They’re ugly.” (“For Oaxacans in L.A., City Council members’ racist remarks cut deep,” LA Times, 10-11-22)
[8] And I hope, after next week’s election results, we won’t still be saying it.
Active, reliable, sarcastic, affectionate, bipedal, cynical optimist, writer, freethinker, parent, spouse and friend, I am generous with my handy supply of ADA-approved spearmint gum and sometimes refrain from humming in public.