Current Events

Power Smoothies

Over the past decade or so, whenever my daughter and I had a day off together, we’d go to our local lunch place “Power Smoothie”. It’s a Millennial take on the sandwich shoppe, serving  a variety of wraps and rice bowls with interesting combinations, and an extensive menu of Power Smoothies. These are shakes made with fruit, and sometimes yogurt, to which one can add vitamins and other supplements. This establishment tends to attract body builder types and other fitness devotees. My daughter and I, usually among the few patrons not in workout attire, like the sandwich wraps and sometimes enjoy a smoothie as a treat. For us, a fruit smoothie (just the fruit) is a treat–not a fuel. It is not about the “power” for us, but just a tasty blend of fruits that can be quite refreshing, especially on a hot day. But the Power Smoothie–it’s not only the Nectar of the Bods.

We’ve seen some Power Smoothies of a different sort in the news lately. The most serious (and threatening) Power Smoothie is Vladamir Putin. His reclaiming Crimea while the Ukraine’s interim government leans toward the EU has caused  a tense situation. Not long before this maneuver, some Americans were relishing Putin’s strength, particularly in opposition to their characterizations of Obama. This has been rather disconcerting. President Obama’s detractors have acted like they had a crush on (muscle-man) Putin, and when Putin behaved like the bully, placing troops along the border of Crimea, the Obama haters blamed Obama, insinuating that Obama was weak, which caused Putin’s actions.

People respond to flexed muscles. They see strength and power and like shows of force. For some, brashness is strength, and attaining power by showing strength is most important.

There has been another media sensation over the last several weeks, although this Power Smoothie is far outside the realm of geopolitics. Miriam Weeks, aka Belle Knox, is a freshwoman at Duke University. She has created quite a kerfuffle because she also works in porn. At first she hid her porn identity, Belle Knox, but after she revealed her identity to a frat guy, it wasn’t long before everyone else knew. Imagine that. She maintains that she works in the porn industry to help pay tuition. (Her parents just found out!) She has been on the talk show circuit recently, including Piers Morgan and The View, defending her right to work in porn. She insists that she feels “empowered” by this work,and that it is her choice, and shame on anyone who judges her negatively. She has received quite a bit of attention, including supposed death threats. The death threats, if true, are despicable, but her attention seeking is beyond combating death threats. She is brash and loves the attention, and knowing that she chooses to exploit her body, and feign innocence while insisting that she is empowered and should not be judged, is quite manipulative and disingenuous. For so many, sex trafficking and sex work is not a choice and is horrific and demeaning and ruins lives. If Miriam (Belle Knox) Weeks is happy to choose sex work, great for her! Even if she does need to work to help with tuition (which is questionable), she obviously does not consider sex work to have a demeaning side.

Choice is power. She thinks that she deserves respect because she has chosen her work, and she disparages those she thinks disparage her. For some, getting attention is intoxicating. It’s a sense of power. Miriam Belle Knox Weeks may feel powerful for being desirable doing porn at 18, and for causing a sensation at Duke and on national media outlets, but this Power Smoothie is not healthy. Real power is more than doing what one feels like when and where one wants. Power must include the strength of consideration of ones actions and words.

One more Power Smoothie has been on my mind for a while: Sheryl Sandberg. Sandberg is truly an upstanding and outstanding citizen. The COO of Facebook, Inc. has been ranked as one of the 50 most powerful women in business by several influential business magazines and journals. She is incredibly accomplished and engaged, having served on many boards and given numerous addresses, and last year, released her first book, Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead.  While I appreciated her intentions with Lean In and her attempts to create a new movement, I am not aligned with her. I thought the unintended consequence of her attempt to empower women to “lean in to their ambitions” was that it was supportive to those women lucky enough to choose when and where they want to work. For most women, other structures of power need to be transformed beyond a woman’s attempts to lean in.

More recently, Sandburg suggested banning the word “bossy”, as it has historically been used when referring to certain assertive behavior exhibited by girls (and sometimes women). This “Ban Bossy” campaign took off with some celebrities attaching their names, including Beyonce, Jane Lynch and Condoleezza Rice. While it might seem like a catchy title for a campaign to empower girls, I respectfully disagree with banning the word bossy. Being bossy is not the same as being a good leader. Bossy behavior is not a catch all for female assertiveness. Being bossy is being obnoxious. Bossy girls may garner temporary power and think they are strong, but we should be clear about what effective leadership is and isn’t. The bossy girls I knew did not become dynamic leaders–just demanding (and usually just demanding for themselves).

Rather than banning “bossy”, let’s teach leadership and make distinctions between leading and demanding; debating and obstructing; elevating and pushing. Bring back dignity, but let’s not pretend that nastiness and obnoxious behavior, or even doing whatever one wants whenever and wherever one wants is somehow just misunderstood leadership. Being bossy is not the same as being an effective or good leader. Let’s keep bossy in our lexicon to remind ourselves of negative behavior.

The Power Smoothies, although very different from each other, have attempted to push boundaries, claim territory as though there were only certain considerations, flex muscles for attention, and seek to shake things up. There are Power Smoothies in every domain. Certainly not all are nefarious, but power and strength are tricky.   Everyone seeks some sort of power and needs strength. The kind of strength and power that we want to extend can’t be left to Power Smoothies.  Whether it’s co-opting language from historic movements or moments that generate visceral responses, or grandstanding, we need to remind ourselves and our children of the power of critical thinking; of consideration and consequences (intended or not); of distortions and distinctions. The Power Smoothies blend it all together . Some are bossy; some are bullies; some are oblivious. Some are well intentioned, but it is in our power to clarify and to educate; to provide healthy alternatives.

Going Upstairs Backwards

There’s nothing like pain to make us aware of our habits. Spasms redirect our attention to clenched muscles that seem to control us, rather than the other way around. Shooting, stabbing, burning, stinging, throbbing, aching,  hurting, sore…pain. Sometimes mere discomfort distracts us from our automatic lives, and asks us to pay attention. Agony is overwhelming, and suffering is more chronic misery. But the regular discomforts often steal our focus and energies, and ask us to do something different. With a different focus, we may adjust our posture or stance, or where we sit and how we proceed.

This is true of any sort of pain. Physical, emotional, psychological, existential pain asks us to attend to the sensation. We often get stuck when confronted with pain. Too often we compensate with unintended consequences. Sometimes we  consciously ignore the signals, as though giving in to a toddler’s temper tantrum will reinforce the tendency for eruptions. It is often hard to know how to deal with discomforts and pain so that they are  not reinforced or cause other damage. Some people wallow, others martyr, most numb themselves. Dealing with discomfort and pain as a lesson, is often reduced to avoidance.

Over the last 10.5 months, while strengthening myself physically, and taking the time to better manage my physical health, I decided to write. With no timeline in mind, or even a  roadmap or GPS, I wanted to experiment in a way that I had never attempted before, and create conversations. Forever committed to strengthening parenting and family life, education, Culture and culture, and healthy homes, schools and communities, I learned that I could be  critical  while optimistic. Moreover, I could learn from everyday discomforts and sometimes pain and even agony, both my own and societal, that there are always lessons. In looking back over the essays that span less than a year, I am reminded of political events and societal changes that, for some, were painful or uncomfortable . Some moments have been liberating culminations of long, painful battles that now demand societal realignment. Some moments seem to be flare ups of old wounds or negative habits. Time seems to move more quickly than it used to as we are exposed to so much more information at lightening speed, and it is easy to forget moments that affected us–that gave us opportunities to not merely get over the pain, but to learn from it. In reflecting upon the last 10.5 months, I am amazed at what is possible in less than a year. Some pain is chronic; some acute. Discomforts are inevitable, but as we redirect our focus and energies, and adjust our postures and stances, and even where we sit and how we proceed, we may not only mitigate some pain, but move ourselves further ahead in ways that we may not have even considered.

With a recent flare of back trouble, I have been having immense pain sitting and in many positions. Walking up the stairs has been another difficulty. This is not a new situation, but like most aches and pains (and worse), the situation flares from time to time. This time, I decided to try walking up the stairs backwards. It takes me a little longer (not much) and at first I needed more support. But I get up the stairs now! With fewer spasms! Of course looking back one sees how far one has gone, but more than that, sometimes looking at where we were and how we held ourselves and then tweaking it, allows us to be in a better, more comfortable and healthier position to elevate ourselves.

Guys’ Guise

Timothy Egan wrote an op-ed in today’s New York Times (January, 17, 2014) offering a thoughtful response to Brit Hume’s recent comment that Chris Christie is merely a “Guy’s Guy”–an apparently endangered species.

You may have heard Brit Hume, that is, Senior Political Analyst Brit Hume of Fox News, refer to Governor Christie’s problem. It’s not that he’s arrogant, paranoid, testy, bullying or too blunt for the P.C. culture. It’s just that he’s an “old fashioned guy’s guy” in a “feminized” world — an endangered species adrift on a floe of mush….

…He said, “By which I mean that men today have learned the lesson the hard way that if you act like a kind of an old-fashioned guy’s guy, you’re in constant danger of slipping out and saying something that’s going to get you in trouble and make you look like a sexist or make you look like you seem thuggish or whatever.”

I appreciate Egan’s clarification and answer to a particular concept of masculinity (which  Brit Hume, et al. equate with strength):

If you say something that genuinely offends women, it’s not because you’re a brawny dude, speaking freely, or even standing up to the culture patrol. It’s because you’re insensitive to people in general — the daughters, wives and mothers of many a manly man. Or, at the least, it’s because you’re outdated, like showing up for work at a tech company with a cellphone the size of a shoebox.

What has been missing from the discussion, however, is the subtext that being “feminine” or our supposedly “feminized” culture is an insult. “Masculinity”, whether defined by Brit Hume, Bill O’Reilly, Rush Limbaugh, or articulated through Chris Christie, Phil Robertson (of Duck Dynasty fame), Sarah Palin, or many others who seem to defy the laconic male icon of yesteryear, seems to refer to a particular paradigm that they conflate not merely with gender, but with strength and superiority. Calling someone “a fag” or a behavior “gay” is meant to be insulting in this crowd. Small mindedness, is somehow rebranded as assuredness and strength. In this crowd, it’s bully for the bullies! Shooting from the hip is preferable to being hip–which, to the “Guys”, is just a feminized subculture of spineless socialists. In that universe, there is not a ying-yang balance of energies that we call masculine and feminine, each with attributes valuable to the health of humanity. It’s right and wrong (wrong = left, feminized); strong and weak; makers and takers. These are the masculine and feminine types of that world. In that world of “Guys and Dolls”, guys play with dolls.

The guys’ guise is feigning strength and security through righteous impasse. They not only feel threatened, and reject even their own possible evolution, much less the evolution of culture, (not to mention nature), but suggest that that which they describe as feminine is what undermines them. The ideals of strength and honor are not gender specific. Moreover, gender is beyond biology. It is a cultural construct, and like it or not, cultures evolve.

Our job as parents and educators and citizens is to build a better society and a healthier culture that elevates and broadens. Under the guys’ guise, being a loudmouth or intimidating is just being a guy, and guys are now victims of this henpecked culture. The guys’ guise is not really political (although it could easily be construed as such). It’s cultural. There are small minded people everywhere, and thugs and trolls left and right. Strength is not a guy issue. It is not the same as intransigence. Flexibility is not a gender issue. The habits of mind (and culture) that include thought, reason, consideration, reflection, flexibility, appreciation and expansion build strength. That’s not a guy thing, despite the guys’ guise.

Target

Yesterday, the revelation that over 40 million people may have been hacked at Target over the last few weeks was stunning and terrifying. I suspect that Target wasn’t the only target. I would not be surprised to learn that other stores were also targeted. Certainly the holiday shopping season (the fifth season from Thanksgiving to just after New Year’s) is the perfect time to breach a retailer’s system. Of course, it’s not just the retailer who is ruined. Millions of lives are, at best, disrupted. For some, the impact may be horrific, especially at this time of year.

It is easy to feel paranoid these days. So much seems out of our control. To be up to speed (which is quite fast), one must surrender to more and more channels and networks, further and further removed from an original action, that through incredible technology, allows actions and transactions to occur instantaneously. We tend to forget that because so much of our transactions are instantaneous, that there is actually a network out there–wherever there is. It feels immediate and therefore gives us the sense of interaction. Or maybe we are just more willing to surrender to what seems so much easier than waiting. We feel like we can accomplish so much more than we used to. But, there are daily reminders of nefariousness. It is easy to feel like a target.

Like terrorism, cyber hacking seems to prey on obvious targets through innocent civilians who are merely living their lives. It is cruel and terrifying, and after each incident, we redouble our efforts to create better protection. But the fear and paranoia lingers as we increase safety measures. There is a sense that we are always targets.

When we are able to put aside the threats of terrorism and hacking, we worry that we are being targeted by the NSA, or advertisers, or even by political ideologues. It seems as though we are targeted by anyone and everyone. While some target us for our potential business or donations, others target us as “the other”, and therefore the problem: teachers; unions; single parents; poverty stricken; Wall Streeter; drug addicted; super wealthy; politician; left; right; religious; atheist; ……You are either with us or against us. Marketers seek their target audiences. We target others and get targeted by others all the time.

While it is easy to be concerned about nefarious targeting and the fear of being an innocent victim, I am actually more concerned about the prosaic targeting that is part of our culture and constantly exhibited by individuals regardless of beliefs or station in life. We live in echo chambers. It is tribal. We seem more focused on targeting frustrations at others than on working through problems, integrating different components. Yes, compromising.  The holidays may be a time to reflect upon targets. We like New Year’s resolutions as they redirect our attention toward personal improvement (usually not at the affect of others). When we target others, we diminish them. They become one dimensional. When we include others–even differing opinions and ways–the target shifts toward building; toward more dimensions.

2013 was a year of many difficulties that became compounded by targeting individuals or agencies for blame, rather than acknowledging what (or who) was problematic and  focusing on improvement.  We had plenty of target practice this year, perfecting the aim with our weaponry, literally and figuratively.  We can aim for much better–changing the old targets. There is so much that we can’t control–or rather–there is only so much that we can control. We can choose new targets that do not diminish. The narrow targets, those that are from a single point of view, diminish. This holiday season, when we try to take a break from our troubles and  enjoy our families and some peace, we can redirect and begin a new target practice. Don’t target others. Aim positively. Happy Holidays!

Blurred Vision

In a world where we use our pocket sized phones to take instant pictures, it’s easy to assume there is no need to learn about apertures or even focusing. Just notice something that grabs your attention and click. Attention grabbing seems to be the force that propels us, keeping us flitting from one distraction to another. It used to be that grabbing one’s attention meant that someone’s  curiosity and interest could be stirred and then engaged and focused. Grabbing one’s attention was a prelude to a deeper encounter. More and more, it seems like grabbing attention is an end in itself. No need to focus much any more. Something else will grab our attention in an instant.

Of course, attention grabbers have always been around, but our capacity to focus and sustain attention seems to be diminishing, as more and more of us seem to be constantly distracted. Like a person who struggles with sustaining attention in several domains– most notably in academic and other executive type pursuits as well as social ones, but may be “hyper-focused” in highly specialized activities–our culture seems to be struggling, even disabled, by our current disorder. This attention grabbing and emphasis on distraction is being played out most cynically in Congress. The focus on governing has been lost to attention grabbing. We need to refocus.

I have often suggested in my comments on culture, education, and policies, that we can think differently and be more creative in all those domains. As a culture, we are losing focus on what matters because we have blurred vision. Many on the right and the left have 20/20 hindsight. They refer to earlier times when their visions produced focused agenda that had clear (positive) results (while the other side clearly had negative results). Now, in a divided country, it’s as though there is either a right eye or a left eye, and to use both might cause us to become cross eyed and more visually impaired, rather than binocular. Binocular vision gives us depth perception–the ability to see in three dimensions. Just as we need to adjust our eyes to different light conditions, we need to adjust our eyes to the conditions that darken our lives today and that cause us to lose focus . Crafting lenses that allow us to see more clearly close up as well as in the distance must be usable for both eyes. (Some of us like progressive lenses, but at least bi-focals are in order!) Some would say that the right and the left each have clear vision, but the eyes don’t function together and thus leave us impaired.

Blurred vision is cloudy. It is unfocused and can lead to confusion and potential danger. Corrective vision allows us to refocus and yes, to see better. We have been myopic, and allowed our attention to be grabbed continuously as we have lost focus on policies that enhance our lives and improve our culture (and education). We need to correct our vision in both eyes,not merely try to weaken the other. We need greater perspective and depth to enhance our vision and sharpen it. Attention grabbing won’t go away, but we can strengthen our ability to focus on what is central and necessary, rather than on what is peripheral. Perhaps, in order to correct our blurred vision and see more clearly, we will have to get a new prescription. It’s important to have regular examinations. I think some of the prescriptions we’ve tried are past their expiration dates.

Making Change

What do cashiers have to do with The March on Washington? It’s probably not what you think.

As a child, I was regularly asked to walk to the neighborhood market a few blocks away to get some groceries for my mother. The grocers knew my family, along with many others in the neighborhood. Still, my mother taught me to always check the receipt (and give it to her), and she taught me how to make change. If the items totaled $17.45 and I gave the grocer (or cashier) $20.00, I had to know how much change I should get back.

As a young child, mental math (as we used to call it) was not my forte. In early elementary school we were taught math facts. We were drilled with flash cards. It was basic memorization of addition and subtraction, and then, multiplication tables, soon to be followed by short division flash cards. As one who never had a flair for remembering numbers or dates, or memorization at all, this mental math approach was arduous and mostly problematic for me. Yes, I did force myself to learn elemental math facts, but I was utterly turned off and avoided whatever I could. At least I did learn the basics. I learned that I had to subtract: $20.00-$17.45= $2.55.

But subtracting in my head (especially when I was quite young) was likely to lead to careless errors. So, my mother taught me how to make change. Essentially, she was teaching me that I could add instead of subtract. I remember struggling with the concept because I didn’t get that I was merely doing addition instead of subtraction. It just seemed like a magic trick that it all added up. Then, when I got the concept of counting back change from the total to the amount I gave, it was no longer like a magic trick–just magic in the way that something perfect seems magical.

Flash forward several years, and cash registers become calculators. Cashiers no longer  need to do anything but make sure that if the cash register says $2.55 change,  they can count the correct bills and coins. They do not have to figure out the change. For a generation now, cashiers have not had to do any math beyond counting what they are told to provide. On the occasions when I do make cash purchases, I am always dumbfounded that cashiers don’t (and often can’t) make change. They can’t figure the difference. There’s no human agency in making change; no critical thinking. I suppose it doesn’t matter all that much if cash registers are more efficient calculators than the people who use them, but I wonder about this ability (or lack thereof) to make change.

For me, the process of making change resonated more than merely knowing the numbers. That has always been true for me. It struck me this week as we have been commemorating the 50th anniversary of The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom,  that while August 28, 1963 marks the historic date, the processes of change inform how we make change. Noting the differences from where we started to where we are now is not sufficient if we are to be the ones who make change. We must understand the processes of change–of additions, subtractions, multiplications and divisions, and miscalculations.

The March on Washington 50 years ago was historic for many reasons. Of course, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream ” speech was pivotal, and remarkable, and truly one of the greatest pieces of oration in our history; but the peaceful participation by so many was equally historic and inspiring. Everyone who rallied at the mall in Washington was participating in making change, and inspired so many others to become agents of change. It is easy to just take the change that others make. It is easy to allow changes to be dictated by technology. It is more important, though, to be able to make change.

Summer Camp

July 2013 is winding down, but summer camp is still in session. Detroit officially declared bankruptcy, the largest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history thus far, and there has been significantly more media attention on Britain’s royal baby, Boy George, and on Carlos Danger, aka Anthony Weiner. The hype over the royal baby has been almost comical, as it has no bearing on anything in the near future. As for tragi-comedy….the over exposure  of Anthony Weiner (yes, that’s right) is beyond absurd. Have we had enough of this camp?

There is so little discussion of issues of importance, whether they relate to the future of Detroit and other cities, or the other candidates in the New York City races (besides Spitzer and Weiner and their overly public so-called private lives). How many people know about the political experiences and stances of the other candidates? Municipal government has become increasingly more important as urban population growth continues to rise. While the decline of Detroit has been known for some time, the actual effects on public services and foreclosed buildings, among other issues plaguing the city, have recently been illuminated in light of the declaration of bankruptcy. These are important matters for all of us– for Detroit and for metropolitan areas across the country.

Unbridled ambition, tangled sexcapades, attempted redemption….this is the stuff of the arts, not politics. That doesn’t mean that we ignore ridiculous behavior of politicians or other potential leaders. We know the stories and the arguments. We’ve lived through this too many times in real life, much less in literature, theater, opera, symphonies, ballets, poetry, art…. The most unsavory part of these stories isn’t the sins that were committed or mistakes made, but the attention seeking that keeps the rest of us from getting beyond the drama (or cartoon) that has become what we refer to as news.

This summer camp has not been a refuge from school and parents. This sort of camp has been great for comedians, and I’ve enjoyed the late night fodder. If only it were just the stuff of the arts or entertainment. It’s been over the top, at the expense of seriously considering policies and actions that could actually improve lives. There are endeavors that we can take in our communities that elevate us, and that contribute to positive discourse and impact others in positive ways. Everyday actions that inspire and support deserve more attention than the distractions from important matters and those who seek the attention of gawkers. After summer camp, it’s back to school.

Live and Let Die

When you were young and your heart was an open book 

You used to say live and let live 

(You know you did, you know you did you know you did) 

But if this ever changing world in which we live in 

Makes you give in and cry 

Say live and let die 

What was originally the theme song to the  James Bond movie “Live and Let Die” in 1973  has more recently become not only a subculture in American society, but law in several states.

http://criminal.findlaw.com/criminal-law-basics/states-that-have-stand-your-ground-laws.html

Under the Stand Your Ground law, a person who feels threatened has no obligation to retreat.

(Live and let die) 

Live and let die 

(Live and let die) 

Until recent years, the duty to retreat helped  define what “reasonable” threat meant. Stand Your Ground was seen as an extension of The Castle Doctrine, which allowed people who are threatened in their own homes to stand their ground in their own homes and defend themselves without having to flee their homes. Thus, with Stand Your Ground laws, the concept applied to one’s home has been extended, as long as one is engaged in legal activity.

What does it matter to ya 

When you got a job to do 

You gotta do it well 

You gotta give the other fellow hell 

But standing one’s ground, which of course has it’s place in certain contexts, has become a distorted cultural attitude across the country, as much as an atrocious law leading to the tragic death of an unarmed teen, Trayvon Martin, in the Zimmerman case.  We have stopped considering unintended consequences of behavior, speech, politics and laws.

You used to say live and let live 

(You know you did, you know you did you know you did) 

But if this ever changing world in which we live in 

Makes you give in and cry.

When did we become a culture of “Live and Let Die” ?

Sir Paul McCartney:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JK2hKzZss5Y

Get Smart

One of my favorite old  television shows was “Get Smart”. It was a hilarious send up of James Bond and other spy shows, that tapped into the zeitgeist of the mid Sixties and the Cold War attitude that prevailed. While the show was a satire of the secret agent genre, it was loaded with physical comedy, sight gags, and funny catch phrases alongside action and romantic chemistry. Although the show was amusing in it’s silliness, it was also brilliant in its use of satire. CONTROL was the name of the U.S. government counter- intelligence agency based in Washington, D.C.  Maxwell Smart, aka Agent 86, the bumbling, nasal voiced, comedic version of the James Bond type (or Man from U.N.C.L.E. or many other suave spies of the era) inexplicably saved the U.S. (and presumably the world and all that is good) from the evil doers, particularly  his arch nemesis, Siegfried, head of the rival organization, KAOS. With a colorful cast of characters, including Agent 99 and The Chief, who was the head of Control, Larrabee, 44, 13, and other number secret agents, Siegfried’s right hand man, Shtarker, as well as the robot Hymie, each episode was essentially Smart and his malfunctioning gadgets (including the original Smart phone) in his attempts to bring down KAOS and save the day. So… in order to keep control, we must be smart against chaos. Oh, and the Cone of Silence never worked properly. 

In light of Edward Snowden’s recent leaks regarding U.S. data-mining programs, I am concerned about control and chaos, and the cone of silence that has pervaded both the government and our culture. We have known since 2001 when The Patriot Act was signed and took effect, that we are living in a new age with curtailed civil liberties while being hyper-connected through various gadgets. Some of us were quite apprehensive about the law then.  Also during the last decade, the business sector, with the aid of the tech industry as well as internet companies, have been mining personal data and phishing with hardly any protest from consumers/citizens. I feel as though these recent leaks have sparked a response like Maxwell Smart’s, “I asked you not to tell me that.” Perhaps there are truths to all sides of this story, not merely one of control versus chaos. Are people reacting based on political party affiliation? In this age of immediacy, the habits of mind that encourage intelligence seem to take a back seat to instantaneousness. Depth, reflection, willingness to challenge perceptions, and examining ramifications are practices that seem to be almost forgotten. To me, the data mining does not seem particularly revelatory, but it does seem to have struck a chord.

I have always found that the names The Patriot Act and Citizens United were rather ironic names. The terms Patriot and Citizen are used to name laws that favor government data mining and corporate anonymity.  I think most good citizens are concerned about privacy and security. There is a fine line between tragedy and comedy. Sometimes the art of comedy allows us to think differently and with some reflection without the emotional weight of tragedy. With the Snowden leak, we have an opportunity to re-examine our notions of liberty and security, and maybe some of our laws. But this is serious stuff that needs serious thought, not knee-jerk party-line reactions. It’s time to seriously get smart!

If Memory Serves….

Originally called Decoration Day, Memorial Day, celebrated today, the last Monday in May, is observed in remembrance of those who died in service to our country. More accurately, Memorial Day is a national holiday recognizing military personnel who died during war. For many, the memorial aspect is secondary to the barbeques  and pool openings and retail bargains and the unofficial commencement of summer. For others, Memorial Day is about patriotism. For them it is literally about their loved ones being wrapped in the flag.

Decoration Day was initially a day set aside to place flowers or other decorations on the graves of Civil War soldiers. It was not a national holiday at the outset, and Northern states observed Decoration Day on a different day from Southern states. After WW1, the nation as a whole began to commemorate soldiers who died in war, and Memorial Day has become a tragic tradition that unites us in loss, as so many have died in so many wars,with the expectation that there will always be more.

Unlike the Civil War, or even the World Wars , Korea and Vietnam, today the country acknowledges those lost in wars, but many citizens have not experienced the loss personally. Military families are no longer all families. But service should be in all families. Whether or not it is military service, perhaps we can use this Memorial Day to consider service in its myriad possibilities for bettering our communities and our country.

Many people give their lives to service. They may not lose their lives to service, but find that in serving others, they are creating better communities. We need to consider these acts of national pride as well. In addition to military personnel, police and firefighters have chosen careers that put themselves in harm’s way in service to our communities. We should remember them. We should acknowledge them. We should be more connected to those members in our communities who service us. Teachers service us. No, they do not risk life or limb except in unusual circumstances, but the choice to teach kids is in service to our communities and to our nation. We have begun to encourage young people to serve–not just militarily, but in numerous ways in their communities. This Memorial Day, as some decorate graves of fallen soldiers, and others fire up the grill, let us consider the prospect that the term servicemen or servicewomen need not be limited to the military. If memory serves, then let us all be servicemen and servicewomen. Let us give more of our lives without losing them to violence in the name of freedom.