It’s a Crying Shame I Tell Ya

Tags

ethics, GOP, greed, McDonnell, Politics

While I never have enjoyed pulling wings off of flies, I must admit that I chortled with delight at the news that Bob McDonnell and his wifey were convicted on a bazillion counts of bribery the other day.

Yes, my halo must sadly await placement upon my sacred head for a while longer, for I did indeed revel in the anguish of my fellow man and woman. I am but a flawed human still, though I continue to trudge through the sludge of humanity ever confident that I too shall emerge at the end of this life with a robe of white.

Bob said something similar as he stumbled from the courtroom, no doubt shocked that anyone would think him guilty of wrongdoing, spouting that his “faith remained in the Lord” or words to that effect.

Everyone talks about how “sad they feel” for the kids and grandkids who must suffer the public humiliation of their parents and such, but heck, all of us sooner or later discover that our parents are in fact mere mortals with feet of clay don’t we? People who choose public life necessarily put their good character out front to be sullied and blasted rightly or wrongly by a notoriously hungry and uncaring press and public who hunger most of all for juicy tidbits of naughtiness to make themselves feel superior in all their stellar tract homes of existence.

Take no prisoners is my call.

Good old Bob decided in some desperation to play the “Adam card”. I say in desperation since it appears that given Virginia’s rather lax laws regarding ethics in public office, Bob and Maureen thought that they could trade influence for pretty shiny things with impunity. When indicted, there was precious little “defense” available to them.

Thus, Bob and his ever trusty sidekick Maureen decided, either jointly or severally, that Maureen would serve herself up as the Eve of all Eves–evil temptress seducing the unsuspecting and beloved by God, Adam to bite and then bite again (and again too numerous to count) of the apple of bribery. Adam  (Bob) would claim “the woman made me eat!” So awful was the spector of Bob talking to Maureen, that there could never be a collusion of purpose. The two plainly lived in one house but in separate wings however quickly put together. In fact, to bring himself closer to the Lord, Bob took up living with a Roman Catholic priest, and was (it is reported) once seen touching with real humility the brown robe of a monk for that picture perfect  photo op. (Okay, so I sorta embellished there.)

Alas for Bob and Maureen, the jury was not exactly impressed.

Perhaps it was because, for all this, the McDonnells had been so darn good at putting on the face of marital bliss as recently as 2012 when they were both courting the Mittens team in an attempt to soothe the savage beast of greed for that Christmas present of all time–POWER.

This sort of suggests that the McDonnells are well versed in the art of sleight of hand and/or pulling the wool over the eyes of their subjects or betters as the case may be. It may well be that the average jury has the collected IQ of something less than the actual IQ of any single member, but that stupid they are not.

Which all leads to the conclusion that one cannot pretend to have a normal marriage and then “admit the awful truth” just coincidentally when it appears necessary to save your sorry skin. Fakery screams loudly in the night, and in the daylight as well it seems.

I suppose that as scandals go, this one is somewhat tame. Nobody was secretly dressing up in tutus and screwing obese diaper-clad bearded old men, but it was still fun to behold. While the “better class” talks about how sad it was to watch this downfall of such a promising politician, I remind them that, like the usual “low class” gawker, they too were not able to avert their eyes at the bloody accident, but indeed did GAWK. And in reality these “better” people will, with appropriate shaking heads and tsk-tsk, discuss the scene of execution for weeks to come at all their soirees of note.

In a world in which Russian has invaded a neighboring state in the hopes of resurrecting Tsarist Russia’s might, where young men with great firepower dream of world conquest by laying waste all those who oppose them (ISIS or Duck Dynasty [convert ’em or kill ’em] Phil Robinson, your choice), where a virus threatens to decimate portions of Africa and spread worldwide, where droughts threaten to become decades long in the Southwest of the USA, and on and on, it’s a small thing to find a bit of relief watching the crash and burn of two very stupid people.

I for one am not sympathetic to their situation nor apologetic for my enjoyment of their self-absorbed/induced misery.

 

Me Tarzan, You Jane, Nobody Knows What the Chimp Thought

Tags

American Exceptionalism, ethics, evolution, Fox News, happiness, History, humanity, John Boehner, Media, morality, Nazism, psychology, religious right wing, Sharron Angle, sociology, teabaggers, the Family

We are a dualist species. We think of most everything in either or, left or right, up or down, in or out. You get the drift.

We are red state, blue state, we are elites, average joes, we are adventurous or skittish. We define binarily, we do it all the time.

Mostly we define us, them. We’ve always done this, in fact those in the know claim they know of no society or people who doesn’t have some concept of themselves versus others.

So, are we to throw up our hands and just give up and in? Are we doomed to any real concept of unity? Are we perpetually at some level of war with anyone not like us?

No. At least so says Erich S. Gruen, in a new book called, Rethinking the Other in Antiquity. Gruen posits that we make that a choice, it’s not an imperative. Basically, he looks at ancient groups and teases out the nuances of their relationships with others. While superficially, they may appear us-them, in practicality such was not really the case.

While perhaps not totally convincing, Gruen at least points to the fact that we are not in a hopeless adversarial situation,  never to be solved. In a world increasingly divided, this is good news.

***

If you are just dying to engage in some deep philosophical thought, (and who isn’t), then pop on over to read about morality and the good life. Can you achieve happiness without living morally? Is morality a virtue for its own sake? Should it be? Now that you are thoroughly all jiggly with desire to know more, go on, get over to read more! (Whew, now I feel like I’ve done my moral duty in presenting you some uplifting material.)

***

Good grief, the most funny stuff seems to be coming from Iowa these days. You better sit down for this one. It seems Sharron Angle, (remember her?) was in Des Moines, IA, no doubt for some teabaggery thing. She admits she’s thinking of running for President! Hip, hip, Hurray! Now just think. The handlers/caretakers of Bachmann, Palin and Angle gather the ladies together for a good old DEBATE. Can you just imagine the fun? Oh Please God, Oh Please!

***

Foxy Noise should leave well enough alone. Some days ago, that idiot Megan Kelly chastised a guest for claiming that Fox regularly used Nazi references to people they don’t like. Kelly said this was untrue, she watches all the shows and Fox NEVER does such a thing.

Of course this was too much for Jon Stewart, who a couple of days ago ran a montage of Fox “Nazi references, including Beck of course, but also O’Reilly. Well Billo couldn’t resist defending himself. You can read it at Crooks and Liars. Somehow, his calling Huff Po Nazis is not the same as some congressman calling the GOP Nazis. Billo—you are an idiot.

***

It wasn’t that long ago. Just a couple of years. Remember? Our foreign policy was in shambles. Bush’s cowboy diplomacy had angered most of the world. He epitomized the idea of “ugly American” and strutted around like we had no need of allies. Nobody could touch our stuff.

Yes, well it seems that most of the GOP potential presidential candidates continue in the same vein. American Exceptionalism continues to rear its ugly head.

This idea that we are the greatest, the best, the God-ordained perfection in the world is troubling. As we become more and more a global economy, and our political and security needs are necessarily entwined, boasting about our superiority is decidedly a stupid thing to do.

But morons like Palin, DeMint and others seem determined to alienate everyone. What’s worse, it’s being tied to a  religious element that is even more unsavory. A blatantly revisionist history, a call for a spiritual renew all seem aimed at reclaiming our rightful place as God’s favored.

To be so blind and obtuse as to not see how ugly this appears to the rest of the world is tragic. To not realize that every country’s people like to think well of their own homeland is short-sighted in the extreme.

Worse yet, these folks are starting to have a negative and embarrassing influence within other countries as they support groups and leaders who are properly Christian, as they see it, although they may be acting in decidedly unChristian ways.

It’s a long article at AlterNet, but well worth your read. (The Family raises its ugly head again.)

***

I admit to a good deal of ignorance. I’m totally ignorant why Tunisia is up in arms. Ditto for Egypt. I think I’m supposed to be for the Tunisian uprising, but not so about the Egyptian. Anybody want to explain it in a nutshell? I’m not so much a follower of international news. My bad.

***

No one mentioned it. But I saw it. I figured John (Eye’s the SPEAKER!) Boehner was most aware that he was on camera during the SOTU. And it put him in a conundrum of sorts. I mean President Obama kept saying things that were universally good, and it would not look good to not applaud.

So John seemed, a good deal of the time, trapped into half-hearted clapping that he really didn’t want to do, but thought would look bad if he didn’t. Then there were other times that his face looked for all the world like he’d been chewing a lemon. How to keep a calm face when he desperately wanted to yell in the best GOP wacko form: “YOU LIE.”

I thought it was funny at least.

Plain Meaning?

Tags

bible, ethics, Jesus, love, Matthew, violence

Today’s Gospel is Matthew 10:34-39. To those who are deeply trained in biblical scholarship and know the difficulties of interpretation, this passage brings shudders.

Shudders, because in the hands of those who believe that there is such a thing as “plain meaning” much evil can be wrought from it.

I had no desire to tackle this passage myself, but unfortunately apparently I am supposed to, since I read an article in a theological journal this morning on Christian ethics and integrity and authenticity, and, well, this passage simply makes the point so well.

So you see, I really had no choice. I’m learning that being hit over the head once is sufficient, thanks be to God!

If we are to live an ethical life, the writer argues, then consistency is called for. He claims a couple of ways of looking at it. First there is the “purity” paradigm wherein the person claims a dominate value (loving God) and subsumes all of life’s decisions to it. The other is called the integrity paradigm and reflects a coherence among all life’s capacities and needs coming to unity in a richness of existence. ¹

It is a bit technical but what I think the author gets at is the idea that we can become quite rigid under the purity paradigm. We get caught up defining what constitutes proper “love of God” by how ever we interpret that to mean, and by what means we use to determine it. Biblical literalists would obviously see it differently than a social justice progressive.

Along comes Jesus, telling us that:

Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.

We are headed for trouble here. The literalist can easily in his “plain meaning” mode, suggest that Jesus here endorses violence to attain the ends he promotes. Certainly those demented souls who shoot doctors who perform abortions, so read the passage. Loving God means upholding their interpretation of what God wants. They must wield the sword.

But as we say again and again, context is everything here. First of all, read the entire chapter. If you do, you will see that Jesus is telling his disciples what they will encounter in spreading the message. He sends them out to do good words and to preach the message of love, hope and repentence. But he warns them that they will not always be met with friendship and welcoming.

The Word is a sword, calling forth extraordinary effort that some are unwilling to make. To these the disciples are admonished to leave those towns “shaking the dust from your sandals.” They are not told to beat unbelievers into submission or to stone them. Hardly are they told to take up sword against them.

No, Jesus, merely reminds them that the Gospel message, though one of hope and joy is also a difficult one to live by, and there are powers who will find it in opposition to their lives of greed and priviledge.

So difficult is this, that entire households will be split between those that will come unto them and those that won’t. They are not to fear, for God is with them and will protect them.

If indeed families split over his teachings, then let it be so. For love of God does comes first, or should. But indeed, remember, it is following Jesus that is the way to show that love of God. And Jesus message is always about healing, forgiveness, love, and hope. There are simply too many references to Jesus’ admonishment of violence as not the “way” to think otherwise.

When Jesus says at the end,

Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.

he does not speak, in my opinion of martyrdom so much as he tells us that we only think we have life. Until we are willing to risk all for love and justice and our neighbor, we have no real life, only a shadow ephemeral life. When we are willing to set that aside, and offer our lives fully to other, then we will finally gain our real life in God.

The cross is not suffering on behalf of Jesus or God. Rather it is the willingness to actuate love in all circumstances, regardless of consequences. We find love at the center of all things. We support and congratulate love. We celebrate it in each other without reference to status, gender, orientation, or any other human thing. For God made all to his good desire.

That is the sword–the sword of radical love-that will one day be beat into a plowshare when all bend the knee of the heart and confess that God is where we each and every one of us move and have our being.

Amen.

———

Footnote

1. Schweiker, William, Consistency and Christian Ethics, The Anglican Theological Review, Vol. 90, #3, Summer 2008, pg. 567.

It’s Always a Matter of Perspective

Tags

Avatar, compassion, Earth, ethics, God, humanity, poverty, progress, The History of Us, wealth

As usual, a bunch of junk has rattled around in my head and finally coalesces into something that seems printable, if not entirely coherent.

So, anyway, we saw the movie Avatar on Pay Per View the other night. I know, we didn’t really get the grandeur of it all, because we didn’t see it on a big screen, let alone in 3D. I get that.

That’s number one. Number two, is that some nights, the news is so damned depressing that I can barely stand it. The oil and all that. It just suffocates me with it’s intransigence, and insolubility, and how those to blame (a cast of hundreds no doubt, but certainly BP, the oil industry, Dick Cheney, and well, we could go on but why bother) will never be horse whipped or worse like they deserve.

Number three is that we have been watching the History Channel’s, The History of Us, which is not especially good, but not especially bad either. Last night we saw the beginning of the big up tick of industry, thanks to Carnegie and the Bessemer steel process. And of course, the rich at the very tippy top got obscenely wealthy, and the poor lived in squalor that recalls Dickens’s expose` of the London slums.

And well, like I said, all that mixed together in my mind, and I wonder–have we ever been much better than  we are now, or as we getting any better? Sure, we know that throughout history, life has been cheap, short, and miserable for vast numbers of human beings. Look at every major building adventure in the world, including the US and you will find “industrial accidents” just part of doing business. No muss, no fuss, 136 dead here building this canal or dam, something like one quarter of all those steel walkers who built our skyscrapers, died in the process.

Today, that has improved, and we demand safer practices from our giants of industry who build. But nobody has been outraged at the 13 who died on the oil gulf rig, nor the 11 who died in the last mine explosion. Both BP and the mine owners had received countless citations for unsafe working conditions. But that shuts nothing down. Death is part of doing business still.

The wealthy of the so-called gilded age, played in Manhattan while tens of thousands lived lives of pure misery, holed up in tenements that remain hideous today. A journalist couldn’t get his pictures of the obscenity published in newspapers who considered the photos “too” awful. He finally started having symposiums to show the rich how the other 80% lived. The tenements were overhauled in less than 30 years, but only to a degree.  They grew back with the great migration from south to north in the 30’s and 40’s or so.

Enter Avatar, a simply gorgeous movie with special effects both amazing and beautiful. Such a lovely world Pandora is. And this takes place far in the future and we, meaning earth, has found a way to travel to far places in the galaxy. So far so good. But that’s as far as the good goes.

We seem, for all our technological advances, to have progressed zero when it comes to our respect for other sentient beings. We apparently have no idea that there is an ethical issue at all in raping another land. We find out near the end, that Earth has been pretty much ecologically destroyed, so there is some urgency, but still, we have learned not one thing about doing what is right.

The rambo military leader is such an utter caricature of his calling, just so utterly devoid of rationality that one has to wonder. As Leonard Malkin said at the beginning, the story is rather poor. Poor is not the word I would use, it is bankrupt. One lone scientist and a couple of assistants try to take the path of understanding, but clearly they are superfluous and have no authority.

It’s hard to believe that we could be so barbaric in our behavior, but then again, looking at the world today, and reviewing the world of yesterday, perhaps it’s not so far off really. I’m not sure we have progressed much. We have prettied it up, tied some ribbons about, and we talk about “going green.” Hell, BP talked about green technology, in all those ads it placed before our television eyes. Note to self: when a ecologically suspect company spends money to tell me how wonderfully caring they are of the environment–beware. They are probably raping the hell out if it.

Which all says to me, that the world is still controlled by the rich as it always has been, for their amusement. The vast majority of us are simply the fodder for the war/industrial machine. We are thrown crumbs, sometimes more, or sometimes less, as little as can be gotten away with. The rich are always looking for ways to maximize profits as much for amusement as for any need on their part. Money is simply the way to keep score.

There are always philanthropists aplenty, who from their largess try to work on some “problem” or other. They are never more than marginally successful, because they can never convince the rest that there is anything short term worthwhile in doing so. And since, the fat cats die just like the rest of us, long term is a waste of their time.

I have to hope that things incrementally get better over time, but God must be utterly frustrated at how snail like we move. I contemplate all those who have died in war this day, and struggle to figure out if we have learned one damnable thing from time immemorial. From Cain and Abel, forward I find it hard to see that we are any more our brother’s keeper than when we were on that fatal but metaphoric day.

So, eat, drink, and be merry as the Ecclesiastics writer intoned. All is vanity. For tomorrow, rich, poor, powerful, or powerless, we die. As we traverse this time of life, some of us, hopefully, more of us, will seek to do good on this small blue dot. Believer or atheist, just because it’s the right thing to do.  Amen.

Watercooler Philosophy

Tags

Desserts, ethical dilemmas, ethics, golf, homicide, Recipes, rice krispie treats, Serena Williams, spousal homicide, Survivor, Tennis, Tiger Woods

Ethics is a messy business. At least most of the time. There are often competing considerations and the trick is to figure out what is morally required and what causes the least harm to other ideals imagined or real.

As we gather among friends and family, or nestled within our immediate families this Christmas coming, I figured you might like a few topics to discuss over the cookies and nog, ribbons and used wrapping paper.

We watched Survivor this fall. We don’t always, but we generally like it. Sometimes we watch it part way, then depart in disgust as people play too stupidly or only lousy folks are left. I had that urge several times this season given the rather evil machinations of one “Russell” who coupled with a bizarro woman called “Shambo” to get on my last nerve.

Russell, self styled rich guy who has an oil business, began from the beginning to sow dissension and chaos within his “tribe.” He referred to the women of his group as “bitches” and “girls who would do his bidding before he got rid of the dummies.” He was the typical “Napoleonic complex” sort of dude.

Shambo was on the other tribe. She felt excluded. Perhaps from the out of date mullet hair do replete with cloth headband that she wore at all times around her forehead. (Wore a blue one at the reunion show too so it’s her legit attire) Shambo was ex-Marine though you would be hard pressed to know, since she wasn’t much in physical competitions. She double-crossed her tribe real quick and was a lap dog to Russell after the merger of the tribes.

In the end, Russell was in the final three, along with a young woman from his original tribe and a guy who had been chosen leader of the tribe at first. Russell told them both that only he deserved to win, and challenged the “jury” (discarded members of the tribes) that if “either of them out witted me or out played me, then give them the money.” He was arrogant and increasingly belligerent as he began to get the idea that the jury was not enthused.

During the questioning process, a jury member suggested that Russell’s thoroughly unethical behavior (he made alliances with everyone and honored almost none, lying to literally everyone) was not necessarily more worthy of reward that the woman who had stayed quietly tucked into the background and “ridden” the coattails of others. Why, he argued, should we reward bad behavior instead of good? Was not her methodology as valid and worthy of reward as his bad?

In the end, the jury voted the woman to get the one million. Russell, was utterly incensed and made that clear. Ring one up for the good guys I thought. Character appears to count at least here.

Juxtapose that with the AP’s determination of who should be the winners of male and female athlete of the year. The choices were Serena Williams of tennis fame, and Tiger Woods, from golf. Interesting choices, since both are undoubtedly supreme athletes in their sports, yet both are under indictment as being rather unethical or otherwise “bad” role models. Serena was thoroughly nasty and over the top in her public attack on a lines person in the US Open. This garnered her a rather hefty fine from the Tennis Association. Tiger’s behavior is all over the news these days and needs no further remark.

I thought it an interesting choice. Clearly the voters here decided that technical ability comes first, and has no character component. I  personally have no respect for either of the persons named. I am glad that Serena was smacked down hard, since nobody wants to return to the days of John McEnroe and his vile abusive behavior on court. Parents  no doubt feel the same about their children looking to Tiger as a person to emulate.

I’m not sure what it says about us. We seem always to respond to money and power and to shrug our shoulders and  sorta slink away as we ignore the character-driven individual. Sorry pal, but ya know, people like celebrity even if bad. You can examine all the “entertainment” sites online and see whose getting all the press, if you don’t believe me.

I have an ethical dilemma of my own. Not as shocking no doubt, but I think women like me should consider the problem. It seems that every few months another woman disappears, and inevitably the husband becomes the focus of the investigation. Most of the time, he is charged in the end with the awful murder of his once beloved.

Now, I think. Crimes of passion are unpredictable no? That is their essence. No one knows what last nerve, last button gets pushed and someone turns into a homicidal maniac. I don’t think I would be one, but we don’t know. So seemingly nice spouses might be pushed in some moment of high drama to swing and connect and oops, fatally wound a husband or wife.

My dilemma is this. Whenever it comes up appropriately, I’m very fond of smiling broadly and announcing that my husband is a jewel among well jewels. You’ve heard me say that here, and I say it everywhere. It happens to be true. But. . . .

What if, well, you know, I turn up missing? Here I have left this corpus of gushing love about the Contrarian. They will read it, investigate, talk to neighbors and friends, and every one will agree–she never said a bad word about him. He was perfect as far as I know.

So I’m just sayin’ . . . . well how exactly do I put it? Well, he is wonderful, but just remember, if I turn up missing. . . .well, that doesn’t mean he didn’t snap! Probably he didn’t, but. . . .

Finishing up, hey, did ya know that you can make rice krispie treats without rice krispies? Yep. I substituted corn chex, but I think Cheerios and shredded wheat might work as well. Just use the rice krispie recipe (3 TBSP butter, melted, and melt 10 oz of marshmallows, pour over 6 cups of cereal, add whatever junk you want, choc. chips/nuts/dried fruit and pat into a buttered bowl quick). Tasty!

Morality: From Where?

Tags

atheism, creationists, ethics, evolution, evolutionary ethics, faith, God, morality, religion

 

I ran into an article the other day, that seemed to support my contention that morality is independent of faith in God. As you might expect, I was rather impressed with the logic expressed by the writer on the subject.

I have long been told by, especially conservative religious types, that religion, specifically Christianity, is responsible for moral behavior in humanity. In this, I have always contended that they are quite wrong. I have long concluded, through both reading and study, and personal observation, that morality is part of the human condition, and is subject to evolution like many other things.

Frans de Waal is of the same opinion, and shows how animals can be shown to exhibit traits that are akin to real caring and empathy for others, and moreover, they can make choices to indicate their preference for cooperation and sharing rather than ego driven personal selfishness.

He claims that certain people who are creationists object to evolution for this very reason. They cannot accept, and believe somehow that religion will fail, if morality is not tied to God. Their conclusion is that man cannot evolve morality, but it is a precept that goes hand and hand with God.

I think that thinking rather shallow, and certainly not in accordance with the evidence. I refer of course to the growing fields of evolutionary brain study, and ethics. Taking, as countless other scientific disciplines now do, the evolutionary model as their start, those who study the brain and human ethical systems, are more and more convinced that morality is a natural outgrowth of man’s evolving life.

Yesterday’s liturgy consisted of readings in Job and in Mark. They both raise interesting possibilities. The issue in Job is whether humans will worship a God only if there is a reward or if Job will continue to follow Yahweh even when he is visited by unimaginably wretched calamities. Does Job change his tune when his life devolves from happy and fulfilled to miserable and seeming abandonment?

Similarly, in Mark, Jesus tells the young wealthy man to go and sell everything and give to the poor and follow him. In return he will gain everything in life and eternal life in death. Pretty neat rewards wouldn’t you say?

Evolutionary ethicists and others are rather concerned about a reward/punishment system that is the basis for being “good.” And well they should be. I suspect there are few people indeed who would claim that fear of God’s retribution is the only reason for their “moral” behavior.

There is every good reason to conclude that morality is independent of God belief. Certainly humans were well along in cooperating and helping each other, sacrificing purely personal motives for the sake of the group, well before anyone suggested a “being” might be in control of the universe.

I’ve discussed the issue of evolution and the dilemma of the creationist with a lot of people, and from many different angles. Some scientists simply won’t engage, finding the discussion wasteful. The creationist has everything at stake in being right, and thus cannot engage logically with the issue. I too subscribe to this conclusion, but sadly continue to find myself drawn into argument. The argument always ends the same however, since the average creationist would rather listen to a self-styled “expert” (read no credentials), rather than one who is actually trained in the area–namely evolutionary biology.

I had, honestly, never seen the issue of morality as being tied to this issue. But de Waal certainly makes a good case. However,  there are those who, at this point in time at least, still place little credibility on the entire field of evolutionary ethics or brain development.

For me, I am suspicious of any religious conclusion that starts from the proposition that we are coerced into behaving well. I find nothing free in being presented with two alternatives, one good, the other bad. That’s not choice, that’s simply following the logic of doing the least harm to self.

And moreover, as most of us know, realizing that morality is a natural development in evolutionary growth, has nothing to do with reducing God to some smaller sphere of influence. God is still God and has always been God. Releasing ourselves from outdated and I would argue harmful conclusions about God are both mature and useful in the journey to discover who God really is.

Let me say that I think that the correct reading of the Mark story I mentioned above, is not that Jesus promised reward for following him. In fact, desiring the reward would be counterproductive in the end. One must, to do it right, be selfless in our service to others. And I think the Christian theology is quite clear on this point. But what is clear theologically, is not always how it comes across to Joe Coffee at the plant. It comes across as coercive and thus not free.

The non-believer is right to sit back with arms crossed and demand explanation. Our complicated philosophical ruminations don’t ring true in Average America. It seems to me that it is better to acknowledge the truth:

We are moral because we have evolved to that, to whatever degree that we can claim it today. We share that with the higher forms at least of the animal kingdom. Religion serves as a mighty re-enforcement and that is a good thing. But our non-believing brethren deserve more than our claim that only in faith can we be moral actors in the world.

Just sayin’.

Dirt is Good

Tags

child safety, ethics, honesty, morals, parenting, psychology, religion, sociology

One of  the Contrarian’s   aunts was often heard to say, that “you gotta eat a peck of dirt before you die.”

While that may or may not be exactly true, it’s close to the mark I think. We are becoming a people who over-obsesses (can you over obsess?) about cleanliness and germs.

That’s perhaps a dumb remark given the flu epidemic and the fact that I am taking wipes to church and dunking my host these days, but let us continue.

This goes hand in hand with our obsession to keep our kids safe, against dangers real or imagined. This came to my attention when a woman in NYC was roundly accused of being “the worst mom in America” because she sent her seven year old off on the subway alone.

At least so America weighed in. Yet the woman in question says her son rides the subway regularly with her, is mature, wanted to go alone, and was sent with appropriate money and instructions. Now I’m not about to declare whether she is right or wrong. Not being a parent, I hesitate to try to place myself in that situation.

Yet that story was preceded by one in which a woman had developed “gloves” for kids to put on when entering public bathrooms where they might touch germy toilet seats. The reporter suggested that this, along with oodles of other “safety” items now available to parents was getting a bit “over the top.”

Some of this is I guess understandable in a post 9/11 world. Some of it is understandable in an urban versus suburban/rural world. Some of it is understandable in a information overload which tends to focus on the sensational murder/abduction case ad nauseum because they have to fill time. Plenty of women kill their husbands and plenty of men kill their wives. Most don’t make the national news unless there is some mystery to hang a story on.

But are we adults becoming paranoid to the point that we are teaching our youngsters to be fearful, reticent, and down right withdrawn from the world? Are we in fact encouraging the Internet junkie and computer game addiction in the name of “knowing where the kids are?”

I recall that as even a young child, I had a lot of time unsupervised. From the time I could ride a bike, I could pretty much travel on the dirt roads which gave me a 1 x 1/2 mile area to wander in. It was easily by age eight or nine that we were crossing the four-lane highway to get a loaf of bread or McDonalds (yes they had them way back then, but they were 15cents a burger!). My time to come home was when the “street lights” came on. (I was forever getting in trouble, since they came on not all at once but in a rotation, and the one on our corner obviously came on before the one where I was at did.)

The Contrarian is of the opinion that there was a lot less asthma and allergy illness when kids were allowed to be kids, i.e., wallow in dirt all day long, and wash most of it off before bed. Farm kids, who come in contact with the poop of many a critter besides dogs, seem to be the healthiest of all.

Now we have wipes handy in car and kitchen, ready to clean up that face and hands. Hey, who hasn’t tasted dirt? And a number of kids actually ate it. The grit still makes me shiver, like nails on a chalk board.

So I ask you, are we raising a generation of fraidy cats with compulsive hand washing obsessions? I dunno. Just askin’ the question.

On another and far distant note, I ponder the following. Several people, somewhere in the US have a bank that mistakenly credited their accounts with about a quarter million bucks. A woman, so blessed, notified the bank of the mistake. So far, Americans across the country have sent her nearly $2000 in “reward” for her honesty.

This is nothing new of course, but is now routinely done for anybody who does the right thing. And I wonder, why exactly is that? Aren’t we supposed to be honest? Isn’t that the norm?

Some religious do believe that morality can only come through religion, but that is bunk. There are perfectly logical reasons why non-believers conclude that honesty is the “best policy.” Its rational to be honest. Rational because dishonesty has unpleasant consequences first of all. Moreover, and one would hope more compellingly, empathy draws us to honesty. We can easily put ourself in another’s place and feel how we would feel should they suffer a loss due to thievery, or mistake or negligence on their part. We realize how someone might suffer by our unexpected opportunity.

If we start gifting the honest person, then we tarnish their honesty. We turn it into a compromise, wanting to keep it, figuring you might get caught, and the hope that you’ll get a sizable “reward” for being good. The altruism is ruined and we are poorer for it. So I say, don’t reward what is expected of every human being. It sends the wrong message.

A little creativity can be used. There are usually plenty of good reasons to “reward” anyone. Find one that doesn’t pat them on the head for doing what they should.

End of lecture for today. There will be a test. I’ll reward those who study hard. Oops, that would be reward for doing what is right. I could reward you for reading this, but then, that is also the right thing to do. At least in my world of what’s morally right!