The Gangs of Baltimore

Tags

Baltimore, police, racism

Watching the events play out in Baltimore is an education to some, to others, it’s a why question. Why didn’t this happen sooner? The fact is whether you like it or not, life in the inner city is purely shit for the average African-American citizen.

Every deck is stacked against the individual trying to survive. Poor schools, no jobs are just the beginning. We see nothing less than a systematic attempt to herd “unwelcomes” into small enclaves and then devote all our money and energies to “other interests.”

We not only condone racism in this country but we grow it.

We demean people even when we give them the pittances we do, by making them take drug tests, and defining what food stamps can be used for, and attaching so many rules and regulation to any sort of assistance that you end up in the “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” scenario.

And when people rise up out of anger and frustration and disgust at the injustices they endure, we blame it all back on them and their “fatherless” homes, where unfortunate black youths learn no morals or sense of obedience to authority. Above all that, they have no respect for their betters.

One young man fairly told Geraldo Rivera to take his white ass and get out of town. They recognize Fox for what it is, purveyors of hate upon their heads. Geraldo, the youth said, you are only interested in filming what you call “thugs” rioting. You and Fox haven’t been interested in coming here to report on the daily injustice that we face.

To those of us who have engaged in the criminal justice system in this country in large metropolitan cities, we know all too well of what the young man speaks. As Alan Dershowitz explained in his Rules of the Justice Game, “almost all police officers lie about whether they violated the constitution in order to convict guilty defendants”, (rule IV) and all prosecutors, judges and defense attorneys are aware of rule IV. Worse, they look the other way. Like it or not, it’s true.

The recent public exposure of these cases of police overreach, abuse and lying comes as no surprise to us. I recall a dear friend of mine, a street cop from Detroit, whom I had argued with good-naturedly about whether police could do their job and still tell the truth. He was called to testify on an arrest and to make his point to me, told the truth. The case was dismissed for lack of “probable cause”. He grinned at me, as he walked from the courtroom. “See what you get when you tell the truth?”

We understood it, and we accepted it as a the way life was. We knew that in most cases the officers were at least sure they had the right guy.

But there is a segment of police officers within each department who do not care. They figure one black body is as good as any other, and they have ambitions, and a host of emotionally based reasons for throwing their authority around and not caring who gets caught up in their game.

Therein lies the problem.

And a solution comes from an unlikely source:

The gangs of Baltimore.

The major gangs have declared a truce, and apparently are devoting their time and efforts to helping their community respond in a politically helpful way to the recurrent injustice visited upon them in general and in the Freddie Gray case in particular.

It boggles the mind. Young men hell-bent on killing each other, and unfortunately any innocents that get in the way, have come together and agreed that for now at least, they will stop the violence against each other, and help organize their community to stop police violence against them all.

This is no small thing. Thinking, educated, above middle-class men and women only a few miles away, encased in a glorious white facade of sandstone and marble, are unable to agree upon even the most basic of things because screwing the black guy in the White House seems paramount.

Yet these young men have agreed to set aside their differences and work together for the common good of their community.

And the gang has a good deal to offer should it choose to actually follow through. Long the center of loyalty, and business acumen (albeit illegal) it mirrors many good traits that the young can well adopt. Strong Black men, helping their community? What’s not to like here. They teach loyalty, respect, and how purpose can bring about change. Somehow in their matriarchal upbringing, they have managed to become quite savvy at things they aren’t supposed to understand at all.

They in a real sense complement their environment, reflecting an honest if not legal response to the tremendous burdens and disadvantages heaped upon them since birth. They have the ability to encourage the younger kids coming up at least in the character requirements of making their way in a racist world while still standing firm for dignity.

No one argues that gangs are stellar examples to our youth. They have not been since the days of the Irish gangs, the Puerto Rican ones or any of the others. But all ethnic groups plagued with the criminal element within have always managed to take those good attributes and bettered themselves and their communities. And the Black community is no different. It too learns the right lessons along with the less savory.

Larry Wilmore, on his show The Nightly Show, did a most important thing on Thursday. He sat down with gang bangers in a diner and just talked. And they were articulate, and politically aware, and sincere. And that matters and should matter, and should make us hang our heads in shame when we cannot expect better from our paid politicians, and we cannot seem to expect more of ourselves in insisting on our own justice from the tyranny of big money and big K Street influence.

Perhaps it will be the gangs of Baltimore that will lead the way in helping us to see that we are not without recourse in our own struggles to retake command of our government. We need merely to stop focusing on our differences and agree that we are not being heard. None of us, for anything. And it’s time to change that. And if it takes a gang to explain that to us, well, more power to them.

And that’s a compliment in case you didn’t realize it.

We participate in SoCS.

 

Why The Dividin’ Works So Well

Tags

culture wars, the poor the poor and the inbetween

If you happened to catch Jon Stewart last week he did what has become classic for him–pointing out the heaping hypocrisy that the uber Right always seems to manage to live with. Entering the head of a right-wing expert is sorta like entering the minotaur’s labyrinth. A normal person gets lost in all the dead ends.

Anyway, Jon was talking about Kansas. Kansas just passed a law and gol’ darn it, Sammy “spittin’ Brownback signed it, removing all restrictions to concealed weapon carrying, including even having a permit. That’s cuz Kansans are so dang trustworthy and kin do the right thing. Kansas is also real big on the notion that poor people are not like regular Kansans. They are akin to kidlets and must be told what to eat and what to buy. If you get assistance from Kansas, you get a list of what you can use it for, cuz you aren’t grown. Jon pointed out that the inconsistency here is that Kansas receives $1.29 from the Federales, for every $1.00 it pays in. Which makes them welfare moochers ya know. So, um, if we wanna be consistent, I guess we ought to be tellin’ the Kansans what they spend their free monies on huh?

Kansas is not alone in this sort of thinking. Republican-led legislatures in many states seek and do impose lots of restrictions on the poor of all sorts, treating them like they are not fully grown, nor citizens. One wonders why Re-huh-ligans think this way. I mean plenty drug test anyone seeking assistance, even though the results of all those tests suggests it costs way way more to give them then it ever saves in “drug users don’t git no help” fails.

It’s all illogical, demeaning, and downright awful and one wonders why, as I said.

See, iffin’ you go back far enough, we were a very tribal species. Sorta like lion prides. New folks from other lands were not invited into the tribe, much as alpha males drove off traveling loners who sought to join the pride. (This all drives fundies quite mad, since they don’t believe we humans go back far enough for that, but fundies seldom can force themselves to take the giant step to actually read out of their comfort zone, so no matter.)

Anyway, we tend to be tribal still, some of us more so than others. The tribe is generally quite artificial these days, but it often relates to religion, or ethnic origin, gender, and stuff like that.

We live with a lot of folklore here as they do everywhere. We were raised on the Protestant Work ethic which should tell you a whole lot just by the name. It had to do with religion and salvation, but has become twisted into some sort of “this is how grownups behave” notion that hard work brings success economically.

Our start as a nation also caused people from time to time to strike out on their own, urged on by such things as primogeniture, to make a life in the wilderness. This became “pulling oneself up by one’s bootstraps”, in other words, making it on your own.

These things, when done successfully give one a sense of accomplishment and capability. Such people like to look a bit down at others who for a whole list of reasons can’t succeed as they did.

Of course, this whole thing gets extended and twisted until it doesn’t really resemble what it started out as. We aren’t any longer a new country with a vast Western virgin expanse where one can strike off and create a new life. You can only invent the hula hoop once. It gets harder and harder to make it on your own, and hard work can end up bringing little more than basic survival.

But as long as one is surviving, albeit at the lowest level, one can still, and one is encouraged, to look down askance at those who have failed to even reach basic survival.

When we have priced education out of the range of most working class kids, it’s time to put down the idea that elite educations matter. All that matters is common sense after all.

The political hacks who do the work of big corporate interests have gotten very good at all this. They keep the barely differentiated in reality yapping at each other for all sorts of nonsensical things so that we fail to see what is really wrong in our country. We break into union/non-union, religious/not-religious, right-kind-of-religious/not-right-kind-of-religious, gay/straight, unregulated guns/regulated guns, and the divisions are infinitely divisible at this point. Somehow it all becomes liberty-loving patriots/commie-socialist-atheists. It all becomes prideful, and the alpha males snarl and gnash their teeth around the perimeter while the king of beasts patrols, defending.

The poor, become child-like, and lazy, because the working poor who are scraping by, must see themselves as successful. The liberals become elites who want to take what little the working poor  have and trade it for votes among the child-like and lazy. The conservatives want to encourage entrepreneurship in theory to “grow jobs” by reducing taxes and regulation, and the workers are encouraged to believe that they could be entrepreneurs if only they didn’t have to pay for the child-like and lazy.

It all is quite silly and wrong and indefensible by the actual facts, but that does not matter since the working poor and barely holding on middle-class wants to believe they are doing all they can, and it’s somebody’s fault. They are actually right. They are doing all they can, and it is somebody’s fault. Just not the folks they think. For the machine works tirelessly to make sure that their anger is directed away from them.

We have gone in this country for feeling pity for the poor to actually hating them. For they are us and deep down we know that. And we are desperate to keep that fact buried deep in our subconsciousness, so that we can go on feeling successful and proud of ourselves.

Not just hate, which we camouflage in “tough love” rhetoric, but bitterness as well. They remind us of not just of ourselves, but of the opportunities we have missed, abused, and let go by while we took the easier course of listening to our “betters” and their constant propaganda. “You could be just like us,” they whisper, “if it were not for them.” And we have listened and we have nodded in agreement, and we have gone back to our Archie Bunkers and laughed uproariously and told ourselves that we are not Archie, all the while we have been Archie and continue to be that caricature in all his bigotry and blaming.

And we feel self-righteous in our demands that you don’t get to buy steak or get your nails done if you are getting my tax dollars. And we claim we are just helping “them” act like us, which is what we have been told is the “right way to be”. And what we do is ugly and mean, and makes people feel bad about themselves and they hate right back.

And the corporate masters cheer and clink their glasses and laugh and discuss the latest results of the polo match and whose going to the Mediterranean this year, and who will be at the Met this season.

And the wars go on. And nothing changes. And we teach these stupid lies to our kids and life goes merrily along for the rich and powerful and we keep dancing.

Is that all there is?
Is that all there is?
If that’s all there is my friends
Then let’s keep dancing
Let’s break out the booze and have a ball
If that’s all there is

 

Wisdom of Ages, or the Aged

I often quote a friend of mine because I consider her wise. In some ways she’s wiser than I, and her remarks generally strike me as more right than not, and always worth a listen. She’s a good bit younger than me, and I was surely not as wise (nay not wise at all) as she at that age.

That suggests that wisdom is not a function of age entirely. I guess there are a number of ways to go as one moves from running to striding to walking to hobbling down life’s hopefully long road of destiny.

One can become everyone’s favorite auntie and grannie, always ready to play a game of Chutes and Ladders keeping the little ones out of the adult’s hair. One can be the always helpful always ready to drop everything to babysit, run an errand, bring a dish, drive a friend, sit by the bedside of the dying. One can go through a second childhood, with a long bucket list of “things to do before I die.” One can specialize in not giving a shit, or in giving too much a shit by championing causes. There are several thousand permutations of all these and more.

A lot of choices, I suspect are not made consciously. Only in the rarefied atmosphere of eccentricity does one start to see really conscious choice. The rest tend to be continuations of personal bents just enlarged with extra time allotments.

Wisdom seems to fall fairly equally along this spectrum, but the type may vary depending on the persona. I suspect the ever helpful grannie is considered most wise when it comes to child rearing and things that have to do with keeping households running smoothly. Some become wise in how to game the system, and do pretty much what they want  with as little bureaucratic interaction as possible. “Honey, here’s what you do to get around that Medicare donut hole.” If you get my point.

But I prefer myself the sort of wisdom that is Socratic in nature, not as in method, but as in, the reason people of his time sought him out and listened to him. Because he had something to say, a new way of thinking, a better way of deciding, a new evaluation of how to live. So did Aristotle for that matter. I guess it’s why I love guys like this, and the women who forever will probably be nameless but also pushed  the world forth. People who think about really eternal questions are my idols.

This sort of wisdom, I think comes from examining yourself first. Socrates said, that “the unexamined life is not worth living.” And he was correct. And he was in a minority of people who actually did it and do it. To not know why we do what we do is to be nothing more than a fairly dumb animal with a slightly bigger brain. Who wants to go down in history as the creator of the hula hoop? I’ve watched shows that show a factory in full operation making plastic spoons. People stand at their stations, gathering up groups of spoons and stacking them for boxing, or some other functional equivalent. I imagine doing that for a living for thirty years.

I cannot find the sense of accomplishment somehow. Other than one has shown incredible patience and stick-to-it-tiveness. A legacy of something I guess.

At least one has all the time to examine one’s life during the eight hours of stacking spoons, but I doubt much examination is going on. For if it were, the only thing to do is walk away, and quickly.

As I said, most people don’t do it. If they did, we would not see generation after generation re-enacting their parents lives with the same scenarios of working, grass cutting, fishing, knitting, raising kids, being grandparents, and onward, with no variation on a theme. Or we would see those re-enactments, but they would be real choices and not default, “what else is there?” surrenders.

I wrote a few days ago, that as I grew up in a household peopled by parents I did not understand nor much like in the end, I often wondered who was the alien, them or I. I’m still not quite sure of the answer. It depends on from what perch you examine the question. We were of different species attempting to ignore our blatant differences and pretend that this is what we bargained for.

They never examined the question clearly, but I did. And that forced me into examining me in-depth. It is not a difficult process in one sense, and requires no education in anything. It’s simply asking “why did I” to the enumerable stupid things we do and sticking to that question. “Why did I say that stupid thing at the party last night. Why do I never think before I speak?” That’s where it starts.

Then you answer the question. But beware the first five answers are never true. That’s the part of you that tries to defend the ego and blame it on something/someone else. With every answer comes the response, “Really?” And then the realization that you are just excusing the behavior not finding out why you did it. “My old boyfriend wasn’t supposed to be there, and I was so angry that I spoke without thinking.” Nope. Nobody “makes” you angry. You control how you feel. Keep going. “I was nervous because I didn’t know many people there.” Yep, that is a fact, you were nervous, but was it really because there were strangers there? What about strangers should make you nervous?

The process can take a lot of time, and you must be ruthlessly honest with yourself. Most people stick with the “old boyfriend” excuse and renew their anger, and that leads to a rehash of old pains, and nothing is learned. But if you take the time, you will get to the bottom of it. An answer that will no doubt leave you feeling vulnerable and raw but at least free to figure out a solution. The truth is you are unsure of yourself, feel inadequate, and feel you have to put on a pretense of being popular and witty and smart in front of all these “new” faces. That makes you nervous, and when nervous you can’t think wittily or smart.

See how it works?

You do this process relentlessly. Why do I always pick that type of friend, significant other, boss? Why do I always take that position in the office hierarchy? Why do I get into a fight with Uncle Mike every Thanksgiving?

Then when armed with the real reasons you do what you do, you can make intelligent choices to do what you choose to change the outcomes. That’s a wise thing to do.

Why do I believe this? Why do I feel that? To understand the answers is to understand why others don’t believe as you believe and why they don’t feel as you do. That broadens you in some ways, and explains a good deal in any case. You begin to see the fallacies that dog others that you are now free of. You admit your own negative proclivities and allow them theirs. You can view others engaging in blame and excuses and know the probable deeper motives at work.

If nothing else it gives you an edge. Used poorly it’s manipulation of the worst kind, used well, it can be the best of mentoring.

Me? I’m very sure that I am not patient enough to help people undo the tangles of their self-explanations. I point out the errors, and this is met often with anger and the charge of “you think you’re so smart”. That’s okay. I do think I am “so smart”, in fact I have the IQ testing to prove it, although that is not at all the point. The point is I’m smart enough to know that I don’t know a hell of a lot of things, but I can learn what I need and want to know. I don’t have to be like the herd and merely have “opinions” based on filmy desires, hidden fears, and ignorant  misinformed conclusions of what’s best for me.

I’d like to be eccentric, and wise. That’s what I’m shooting for. I prefer to give a shit a lot about life and humanity, and not give a shit about what anybody thinks of me, because in the end, the only thing that matters is that I cared about something important. I want to wear bright yellow and red because I want to be noticed. I want to laugh loudly, and curse magnificently, and be quotable often. I want to poke a stick at stupid people as I DEFINE THEM, and torture them endlessly with logical arguments that make them cry uncle. I want to be absurd about absurd things. I want to call out bigotry and shame those that hide behind false doctrines that allow them to feel good about hating.

I’m very secure in me, the only one there is. For that reason alone, I’m a good thing. I won’t come along again.

I will organize me as I choose and never give a damn what you think, but rather laugh at your “fitting in” however you define it.

And I applaud those of you who do the same. We are dancing, albeit a bit stiffly these days, down the lane leading to who knows what. We are not going kicking and screaming, but rather noting everything along the way, savoring every instant, nodding to fellow travelers, and thumbing our noses at the sleeping hoards. If I piss you off, well that’s a plus.

Now that is what I call being self-indulgent, and many will read this that way. But to those of you who are young and thinking, you just got a bit of a blueprint for living the good life. I’m sure you’ll use the information wisely.

 

 

Chit I Learnt on the Facebook

I am all for learnin’ as much as possible. I figgure it all works for better job placement in heaven. I aim for something big like Minister of Silly Walks. Or maybe Heavenly Math. I am purdy sure it’s a damn sight easier than Earthly Math.

Anyways, I’ve taken to the Facebook for extrE-curricular learnin’ and boy I ain’t a been let down a smidGeon.

I am gonna share some with ye all, so you ain’t quite so dis- un- (one of those) informed.

Firsty, go to the “Wall” of the people you are seekin’ in enlightenment from. The Wall is where they post personals about theyselves, like height, weight, eye color (no that’s the drivin’ card shit).  Anyways, they share stuff.

Like, relationships: some say “none yer bizniss”. This means it ain’t but that just makes ya try all the harder to find out if they are gay. If’n that matters to ye, well, they got “pages” where you can be against that sorta thing or for it as the case may be,  and argue with people who just like to argue about everything.

Beware of relationships that say: complicated.  They ain’t actually no complicated about it. They wife kicked them to the curb and says they are dirty dogs, but they are hoping to stop drinkin’ long enough to win ‘er back, sumday in the near future, if the price of beer goes up too high and TVLand stops showin’ reruns of Andy Griffin.

Then look at they EduKashun: Some just tell ya flat out, “hell I gave it all up after the state stop makin’ me go.” Others write a laundry list of letters and high-falootin’ universe-ities. You can look ’em up I guess, but most don’t bother I don’t think.

If it says, “studied at” then ya know they took a couple courses at the local community college that they needed for their job. Like “hey Fred, can you try to do the books too? I hear that the col-lage here has a bookkeepin’ class.”

I mentioned “pages”. There be thousands of those I think. They are usually about specific things, like stamp collecting (always a good subject to know when you can’t find a stamp. Collect ’em and you’ll never have to be late on that ‘lectric bill agin. (I like to give ya tips along the way folks. Just an added pleasure of mine and a bonus for readin’.)

Anyway, you can find pages on most anything. Like how to cook better brats and how to make a better mouse trap (sit real quiet by a piece of cheese with a hammer works darned good) TIP #2.

I been to some that invites Godly people with UnGodly people. Those are a hoot. The Ungodly people call the Godly people names like “insane believer in pretend imaginary friend” and the Godly people pray for ’em and warn ’em they is headin’ for HELL. These folks never tire of the back and forth.

I had one on one of them pages tell me that according to his Atheist Starter Kit, it was dang impossible for a believer in the Sky God to also believe in evo-looo-shun and the old universe. He said that was insane. If that there Bible ain’t true in one little part, it ain’t true in any part. So says Atheist fil-loss-ofe. That must have come as a shock to that there Monsenior Georges LeMaître, a Catholic priest who sorta discovered the big bang theory. The Atheist,  he dint believe me, cuz that fundamentalist mind wouldn’t let him.  Can’t be shatterin’ illusions no way.

Oh, I forgets. Back at that Wall thing. Peoples sometimes write a little short ditty about themselves, like “mom to two frolicky kiddos and  wife to a super handsome husband, and maker of ceramic angels, for sale on my Etsy shop.” Stuff like that. If you see the word “conservative” or “liberal” don’t get into no conversation with them. They is gonna talk you ear off.

But beware of the conservative more than the other one. The liberal loves them some of that ed-U-Ka-shun and will just load you up with sites you never knew existed! They loves them some FACTS. So you cans act-tuly learn ya somethin’ from them if you can get ’em to shut up long enough to go look. The conservative likes to conserve they brain cells (being mighty short of them in the first place), so they just tell ya shit and hope ya will buy it. They make it sound purdy, which is a tip-off they is lyin. (Tip #3)

Most Conservatives tell ya stuff they remember hearin’ on Fox. Even though everybody smart knows that Fox just lies, Conservatives don’t know that or don’t care and it’s not important which, cuz it all leads to the same end. They hates them people and things that don’t fit their world. See, long ago, each and every one of them Conservers looked about at the big old world and got scart as hell. And they created a safe place with people who looked like them, talked like them, acted like them, and thought pretty much like them. That made them feel safe, even though it didn’t make them that way.

So anyway, if anything is different it scares the bejesus out of ’em and they start shootin’ at anything they see. Natcha-ly they are sure to make guns easy to git! You can unnerstan that now can’t ya? Why one of them Conservers told me, he’d a damn sight rather have common sense then a “librul arts edgy-kashun”.

Now you may wonder what this common sense is. Well common sense is to us folks, that which as I like to say, keeps a body from peeing on the potted plant in the front parlor as ‘pposed to the rightful place, the privy. But to a Conserver of the past and the way things never were but coulda been without all them others, common sense is the  magical ability to run most anything without knowing hardly anything about anything.

See, to us, common sense is given to most everyone, cept the really really stupid that would pee in the potted plant, but the Conservers it’s sumpin God gives to thems that don’t have no edgy-ka-shun in place of actual smarts that makes ’em “feel” better about their lack of knowin’ about stuff. They gets them some in-2-ishun about how to do stuff and figures it works just fine. So they can spend their extrE time fishin’ and bowlin’ and making ceramic angels rather than readin’ them a book about say, astro-fizics.

They do ‘ppreciate them some smarts in a few things like doctors and such though. And they are might happy for ‘lectricity and planes that fly them fast from one place to ‘nother and so on. Practical science they calls it. Cuz their God said that was okay, practically speakin’.

I guess we could do okay even with these funny Conservers, if’n they didn’t vote. That’s the kicker. They vote and some of theirs run which is way worse than votin’ I tell ya. This years crop is full of the usual stuff that makes them happy conservin’ away. It’s just hard, cuz the smart people just wanna help fix ’em and they won’t allow nobody to, cuz it’s safe where they are and they ain’t a gonna let nobody upset that shinin’ lamp they got stuck on they imaginary hill.

Oh beware most of all anybody who posts a lot of “if you love God” post this stuff. They are always thankin’ God for everything. I mean not that God shouldn’t be thanked of course, but I thinks that Jesus suggested  one do that in the privy of one’s own “closet” though why I gotta go in my closet I never been quite clear on.

I noticed that a whole bunch of those people who are all Godly now, well, I never heard ’em once when we were kids ever talk about that stuff. Never mentioned, “oh gosh we had such a good sermon yesterday”. Never saw the hint of a prayer before lunch neither. But they got some Godly now. Which means God mostly must be talkin’ to old people cuz the older ya get on Facebook, the more Godly ya get it seems. God is prolly dying for some good hip-hop conversin’.

Anyway, I say beware of ’em because I think they post that stuff as a way of trickin’ God. Cuz they sure are against things that would seem to be God’s ways, like feedin’ the hungry, and tendin’ to the sick. They don’t like the gov-mint to do it that’s for sure. And since the church ain’t be able to do it for better’n 2,000 years, well there’s a lot of hungry and homeless and sick folks that aren’t bein’ tended to.

That’s all I’m sayin. They talk real God-like, but they sure don’t act very much like God. Least as how I figure a good God would act if He wasn’t ‘spectin’ us to act for him. that is.

Anyway, that’s some of what I been learnin’ on the Facebook. What have you been learnin’?

Metaphors and Analogies Galore

Tags

American Exceptionalism, GOP insanity, love of country

My friend Mimi asked an important question that inevitably got me to thinkin’.

Rudy 9/11 Giuliani opens his gums and spouts off as to how this President, really doesn’t love America as we do. Rude then goes on to explain that Obama was raised “diff-rent” from you and me, and none of that stuff is racist cuz ya know he had a white mama.

Rather than pick apart the blatherings of a has-been irrelevant hack, let’s look at the whole concept of what it means to “love one’s country.”

I’m not sure exactly what it means myself. I have no idea what it means to love a thing like that. I mean the concept is quite foreign to me, and I suspect it is to most people of they were pushed to tell exactly what they meant by it. Most people work from metaphor, taking it to mean that they support what the country was framed to stand for, and they think voting is a requirement of good citizenship.

I am not a boundary person you see. I look at maps and say, “oh dear, that makes no sense. Why is that line there?” Most of that stuff arose from long ago times and most dealt with wars. A bit of it is due to natural features of the land. Most of the lines throughout the Middle East are arbitrary and stem from meddling from the West, and truth be told, it’s why things are in such turmoil there today.

I do love humanity, which I think is quite natural being a part of it. I figure I’m one of the lucky ones, and I figure I’m no more entitled than anybody else. The accident of birth landed me in a land that allows me to pretty much do as I wish and do it fairly pleasantly. Someone’s being born in Bangladesh should entitle them to no less. So I’m all for making things a lot more equal. I’ll happily give up some if I can improve the lives of people who have almost nothing.

I recognize everyone doesn’t believe like I do, because they have been raised by parents, governments, businesses, and media to “want it all” with fine phrases like “work ethic” and “bootstraps” and “survival of the fittest”, to name but a few. They deserve more because they work harder and they judge their value and others by what’s in the garage of life.

If ever a metaphor was made for the GOP it’s the black hole. The GOP is on the event horizon. That’s the spot on the edge of a black hole from which there is no return. Destruction is inevitable since the gravitational pull is stronger than any known counter force to pull out. Yet to the observer, the person or thing poised on the event horizon seems to remain there forever. It’s basic astrophysics.

Or one can use the analogy of catch 22. Either works fine.

You see the GOP is always damned either way at this point. It is all of their own making, so there is no desire to rescue them. They are caught in the black hole of the tea imbibing community of dunces. They must feed the tiger lest the tiger eat them alive which of course it inevitably will since one must go mad under that sort of pressure eventually, and thus falter and succumb to the fangs.

The GOP cannot get away from the tea crazies. So they invariably make remarks such as Rudy did. And the Walkers of the party will continue to be non-committal in rejecting such tripe. One cannot poke the tiger, after all. Meanwhile, they remain mired in place at the event horizon while in reality, bit by bit they are eaten alive.

There is no meaning to “loving my country” any more than there is to “supporting our troops”, wearing flag pins or saying loudly that America is Exceptional! Similarly, the idea that one must confess one’s Christianity in order to be viable is without merit. The latter particularly is egregious, since there is a no religious test clause in the very constitution that these flag wavers so profess to be willing to die for.

In reality, constitution protectors don’t really mean it at all. They mean the constitution as they interpret it, and with the parts left out that they don’t like.

Do you love your country or only the ideal of it? Do you love it in spite of its true history or do you doctor that up to meet some standard you have erected to satisfy your personal needs and wants? I read where one woman in talking to her right-wing relatives learned that they opposed the current state of teaching American history because it “just wasn’t necessary to rehash all that old stuff. Sure slavery was bad, but we ended it. We should concentrate on what makes America great.”

Does anybody have a clue where that sort of nonsense leads? Well, not to  go into that of course, but it does, you have to admit, lead to all sorts of entitlements based on “we’re just so damned superior” and “you can’t manage without our guidance.” Anyone smell the odor of Arian purity and world domination in there?

President Obama has less than two years left to serve, and the Republican day care school replacement brigade still can’t talk of much else. Meanwhile it would appear that Jebbie  hasn’t read a newspaper in six-plus years, since a big chunk of his foreign policy team is made up of his brother’s fine collection of idiots that led us into the morasses of both Afghanistan and Iraq.  He doesn’t know that Wolfowitz was one of the architects of the Iraq policy with his pre-emptive strike crap? He doesn’t know that along with Cheney and others, the Iraq foray was something these fools had wanted to do for a decade or so and found 9/11 a good excuse for? They are liars and arguably war criminals if we collectively had the stomach to clean up our own shit behind us.

Yet this is where we live today. In a world steeped it seems in a party which is caught between the tiger which is devouring it, and reality which it can only spit niceties  at as it throws yet another bone in the other direction.  Stop being the party of stupid, Bobby Jindal said, while being stupid. We welcome everyone, except not Log Cabin Republicans to CPAC. I’ll take a pass on that evolution question if you don’t mind, I’m not a scientist.

We live in a world where David and Charles Koch, family owners of Koch Industries, owners of subsidiary ALEC, writes the legislation word for word of the bill their CEO Scott Walker of their other subsidiary Wisconsin, signs into law regarding “right to work” (which is really nothing but right to work for next to nothing), causing  even old timer Republicans who still have some shred of decency left in them, to say, “this is just fucking wrong.”

Is this love of country? They would surely say yes, the country they want to have, wherein all decisions are filtered through the prism of “is this good for the bottom line?”

Love my country?

Only an insane person would love this. Place that constitution, the preamble will do, against the fabric of stupid today and see how well that fits. A person could stand on a stump and recite non-stop this bundle of crazy for weeks without end. Today, we will pass a law that says sex education must never allude to the possibility of enjoyment but only procreative elements that are of course abstained from by good little girls, and winked at by bad little boys. Today we will ban yoga pants, cuz damn I wanna do what’s right for Merika. Today I’ll suggest that good education money is wasted on them blacks who just collect welfare anyway. Today, I’ll work hard to make sure only “our sort of folk” can vote. Today, I’ll cash that check from Exxon-Mobile and vote to let them drill baby drill in your fucking front yard.

Love my country?

Are you serious?

 

 

 

 

Anti-Vaxxers and Their Troubled Logic

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anti-vaxxers

I’m not one to shrink from controversy and when I weighed in on this issue, I did it knowing full well that it would probably go exactly where it did.

Anti-vaxxers as they have become known introduce yet another instance of retrograde civilization at work. The group it hails from is a shocking one in some respects–the upper middle, and supposedly well-educated.

While those on the liberal left have a healthy dose of scepticism when it comes to big Pharma, the anti-vaxxers have as Keegan Michael Key would say, have “taken it to a whole ‘nuther level”.

I don’t intend to debate here. As the Chicago Tribune said yesterday “There is no other side to the vaccine debate.” It is like evolution and climate change. There is only one side, the plain truth.

Let me set the stage:

A person on Facebook posted something about her conclusion that vaccinations ought to be a matter of choice. I’d reproduce that statement accurately, but she’s taken down the entire thing as best I can tell, so I cannot. She expounded in at least one or two additional comments.

I suggested that if she had a right to choose then of course schools had the right to choose not to allow her kids in the building which would force her to homeschool. Additionally this could also lead to groups (I would suggest organized sports and artistic groups) to banning children who could not provide vaccination records as well. Other parents might well determine that their children were unsafe in her children’s company.

All told, I argued, that such restrictions as might reasonably be placed upon her children might so segregate her children from the rest of society that some people might suggest that that amounted to child abuse.

She responded by private message, telling me this:

I deleted your comment. Child abuse? My kids have had some vaccinations, but I’m done with the bs of infecting others and fear. It DOES need to remain a choice. If vaccines become forced, what’s next? I’ve worked with too many vaccine injured children/people to know otherwise. No human life is above another. I’m all for a good debate/conversation, but have no more patience for inflammatory responses.

I was not permitted to answer the message. I tried to go to her page and was advised “no such person can be found” the telltale sign of being “unfriended.”

I wrote this on my Facebook wall:

hahaha, unfriended by a woman who took offense that I indicated that her “choice” not to vaccinate her children impinged on the choice of other children who came in contact with hers. She sent me a message saying she deleted my comment as “inflammatory” and then of course unfriended me in revenge. As I expected she would…..How can some people be so incredibly selfish…She seemed offended that anyone might suggest that she would have to homeschool her kids and keep them from others to protect other children and that some people might call that child abuse…Beware of (name omitted)

I received the following messages from her during the evening:

Really?

Your post about me was both inaccurate and untrue. Sorry you feel that way.

Why would you post that? Most of it is not even true.

Expected no answer. . Meaningful discussion is too scary? You’d rather slam me on Facebook? Maturity? I considered responding, but why? I’m not angry.? I’m not against vaccines. I’m for choice. I’m not the one who is offended. What you choose is fine.

The last is rich indeed. Is it I too scared to confront? I did not delete your comment lady, nor block you from replying any way you wished.

But let’s get to the meat of your argument.

“I’m not against vaccines” Apparently you are, since you said “my kids have had some [emphasis added] vaccinations.

“I’m for choice.”

Have you even spent once single moment examining that? I mean, yes, choice just sounds right doesn’t it? Choice is always a better word than “required, compelled, ordered. So I do get it. A lazy mind would always prefer choice to any of those.

What does it mean in actuality?

It means you can make a meaningful decision that is rational and based on objective facts. You can evaluate all the information and come to a logic-based conclusion.

What does that mean here?

1. There is an actual debate as to whether vaccines are safe and whether they should be given to all but a few situations which involve compromised health that are known. THERE IS NO SUCH DEBATE. Go to the CDC vaccine page and read all you want. The Mayo Clinic has a full discussion as well. Or go to Parents. The fact is that the Internet provides the ability of every crackpot in the world to set up a bunch of “sciency-sounded arguments” and claim that vaccines are both dangerous and unnecessary. The autism connection has been well proved to be a complete lie, and the doctor in question has been stripped of his license.
2. You as the average parent have no expertise in this area and cannot begin to “evaluate” the evidence and the websites that try to tell you there is a debate out there. You must trust, as we all do, those who have expertise. Those are scientists around the world who are telling you that there is no responsible study that justifies your avoiding protecting your child from all these nearly eradicated diseases. Vaccines are the reason why we don’t have polio any more and children don’t live in iron lungs.
3. There is no test that I am aware of to determine whether your child is that one in 50,000 or 1,000,000 who will have a seriously adverse effect from immunization. All states allow exemptions for children with known allergies or known medical conditions that would put them at risk. There is no “general” test to take. Therefore, there is no “choice” to make here.
4. You do not therefore have the right to unilaterally decide that you are not going to take this small risk on behalf of your child. That is not the bargain you made.

Bargain?

What am I talking about?

Sister, you are not living in isolation, you live in community. Our country was founded in part upon the concept of social compact. We deliberately then, and by inference now, agree that in return for certain agreed upon protections, we give up certain individual rights.

One of them, it seems to me is this: we do not have the right to make a choice of personal freedom that involves not being immunized when to do so threatens the herd. Whether you accept it or not, your “choice” to selfishly go your own way does exactly that.

Society has an absolute right to deny you that right or to explain that you will have to segregate yourself from the benefits of society if you insist. You may be “done with the bs about infecting others” but that is neither an answer or true. It merely suggests that you no longer care since it impinges on some right to do as you please regardless of how it affects other.

The record of immunization is very long and very successful worldwide.

Frankly, I do not think that simply by being a biological component of another life you have the right to make decisions that can so deeply affect their health and well-being. That’s the subject of another post entirely.

Your “choice” is no choice at all. It is simple an  appearance of “taking charge” over an issue you are utterly ill-equipped to decide upon. It makes you feel like a “good” parent when in fact you are arguably the very opposite.

Is that confrontational enough for you?

 

 

 

An Open Letter to Stupid People (written in crayon for your comfort)

Okay, I know this is hard. Life is hard. I’m trying to keep this humorous because a lot of smart people read this, and frankly, you stupid people bore them, hence the levity. But I am serious. You gotta stop being so stupid.

First let us define terms. For you stupid people, it’s what we smart people do when we want to discuss a subject. It keeps us all on the same page if you can catch that drift.

Stupid: having or showing a lack of ability to learn and understand things.

Here’s some synonyms (words that mean stupid)

airheaded birdbrained bonehead boneheaded brain-dead brainless bubbleheaded chuckleheaded dense dim dim-witted doltish dopey dopy dorky dull dumb dunderhead empty-headed fatuous gormless half-witted knuckleheaded lamebrain lamebrained oafish obtuse opaque pinheaded senseless simple slow slow-witted soft softheaded thick thickheaded thick-witted unintelligent unsmart vacuous weak-minded.

Stupid may be inherent (big word meaning you’re born with it) or simply the result of being either unexposed to information or pure laziness. If it’s the former, we commiserate and have one sentence for you to memorize: MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS AND STAY OUT OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS. If you are unexposed to information, tell us how to help you. If you are the latter–GET OFF YOUR ASS BEFORE WE GET REALLY MAD.

We smart people are well aware that progress in civilizing the world occurs if there are only 10% of us, since we find you stupid people everywhere. Since God would not make things this way (we surely trust), your very existence proves Darwin was right. I know, it’s too hard for you to understand, but trust me, it’s true.

We are prepared to shoulder our burden of running the world, but you guys, fueled by jealousy it seems, continue to meddle in things you can’t or won’t understand. It’s time to stop, since you are on the brink of catapulting us all over the precipice of no return.

Worse yet, there are a whole brand of mostly not so dumb people out there that prey upon your determination to not know as much as a rock. They are called all sorts of names, but politicians is one of them. Advertisers is another, shyster  is another.  There are many. They exist to get you to do stupid things by tickling your brain just enough make you think you are acting smart. You are not. You are either giving them your money or your precious “freedoms”.

For instance, they have convinced you that you don’t need to do any study, because common sense is good enough to decide most things. It is not. Common sense, is well, common. It’s what makes you pee in an appropriate facility rather than the potted plant in the living room. It can be used only for really basic things. It will not explain to you anything much about economics on the national scale or  the age of the earth.

They have told you that science is “suspicious”. It is not. It’s why a ton of you are alive today. Advances in medicine, metallurgy, chemistry, and so forth means that many of you are not dead from things that killed your caveman brothers a long time ago. They tell you that scientists don’t believe in God, which is not actually true, (many do), but also has no correlation to doing research accurately. (Correlation means that there is a relationship between two things, as in causation).

Tip: you cannot shortcut the discovery of truth by reading any ONE book. It requires the reading of many. Yes, bible readers, this means you. While the bible contains a good deal of useful information, it is not God’s manual. It was written by PEOPLE for more reasons that Carter has liver pills.

It is not our fault that you decided that college was “not fun” or “too hard” or “not the social party” you expected, and so quit for that little no-thought job you exist in today, or your small business making furnace filters. There is nothing wrong in doing the jobs you do, nothing at all, and if we are all going to be happy and comfortable somebody has to make coasters after all. But this doesn’t entitle you to sit at the big people’s table and tell us your views on the situation in Yemen. That requires that you actually know something.

You see, you are entitled to an opinion, and you can have it on just about anything you desire. But you see, having an opinion means little. My dog has an opinion on what he should eat and how much of it he should eat. I don’t often agree. And I am right and he is wrong, because he’s a dog. You are the dog here. Opinions have to be based on things called verifiable facts, logic and scary stuff like that. Otherwise they are a waste of everyone’s time.

The fact that some people encourage you and tell you you are right changes nothing. Refer back to the explanation of politicians and shysters.

Part of your problem is that you are afraid that because you don’t understand something, people will take advantage of you. That’s why you express a distrust for smart people and call them “elite intellectuals”. While we sympathize with your fear, the answer to this problem is not turning to people who talk to you in simple words and tell you you are right. Again, refer to shyster.

The answer is two-fold. Either stay the fuck out of stuff you don’t understand, or actually learn something.

You may have missed it, but there are places called libraries in most every town and they are filled with books about all kinds of subjects. Try using one some time. It may surprise you.

The Internet is a fine place to learn, but when you are taking baby steps, it’s best to be careful. Not everything you read there is accurate, in fact most of it probably isn’t. Until you have developed a modicum of “critical reading and thinking skills” be wary of the Internet.

Some rules of the road:

1. If it sounds like it’s something you would like, treat it with caution, look for the shyster!
2. If it tells you that you are the real strength of America, look for the shyster.
3. If it gives you simplistic answers that are painless to implement, look for the shyster.
4. If it mentions the word “trickle down” run like hell.

SOME BASIC FACTS THAT YOU MUST LIVE WITH:

1. The earth is round.
2. The universe is really really old, like in billions.
3. God did not make everything in six days.
4. Darwin was essentially right, you were once pond scum.
5. Vaccines do not cause autism and they are safe for the vast majority of people.
6. Climate change is real and man-made and we have to fix it.
7. There is a limit to fossil fuels. God won’t make any more for you.
8. Whether God exists or not is a personal conclusion and it’s none of your business what others conclude.
9. Nobody “chooses” their sexual orientation. It just is.
10. When people live in communities, it means that not everybody gets to do what they want no matter how much they want to do it.
11. EVERYONE is entitled to be fed, clothed, housed, educated, and maintained as a basic human right.

If you disagree with any of the above, you need to shut the fuck up, because YOU ARE STUPID.

In return for being good, we will make sure that you get the full benefits of #11.

Come join us! We want to welcome you to the ranks of the intelligent.