$12.95 get's you salvation and free admission to the song and dance theater

LIVE! RUDE! GIRL!
Welcome to Florida's biblical theme park
by Neva Chonin
San Fransisco Chronicle
Sunday, January 15, 2006
(Note: This column was published on SFGate on Feb. 9, 2001.)

Heaven on Earth
News: When theme parks get religion
Mother Jones
December/January 2006

City of Revelation Theme Park
According to the Mother Jones Article, this theme park is up and running and features an "authentic Jewish Wedding." If so, the website is horribly out of date.

The Holy Land Experience
According to Chonin's article, this theme park was master minded and created by park founder Marvin Rosenthal.

Chonin says:
"A few fortunate visitors might experience the added attraction of seeing authentic members of the...Jewish Defense League protesting outside the gates, sans robes and special effects. It seems the JDL suspects Rosenthal, a Baptist minister who was born Jewish and now heads the Orlando ministry Zion's Hope, hatched Holy Land as a nefarious scheme to convert Jews to evangelical Christianity."

Why do people think that taking their philosophy and religion and turning it into plastic keychains and life-sized cosumed characters is a method of 'teaching' and 'immersing people in the experience' and 'spreading the word? wht part of rollar coaster rides and cotton candy brings a person closer to god or nirvana or enlightenment or simple trust in a higher power that might lead to a kind of relaxed happiness?

I guess the jokes about the Mouse God that is workshid in Florida must be true, because the Christians are awfully determined to imitate his method reaching out and making converts (not to mention a little cash) from all over the country.

Better a nursing home than babysitting

Born to Serve: The State of Old Women and Widows in India
By Priya Verma
Off Our Backs
Vol. 35, no 9/10
Sept-Oct 2005

Articles like this one always set my instincts on point. Off Our Backs can be an angry and in your face magazine. There are good articles, and some effective coverage of conferences and news, but this is interspersed with articles and essays whose overall tone is one of women’s anger and proof that women should be angry.

While there is plenty for women to be angry about, I ran across several articles that seemed more like propaganda then analysis or well thought out opinion. This article did not strike me as propagandistic, but it is a harsh criticism of traditional Indian culture.

I have never lived in India and I have never known anyone from India outside of academic and professional circles. Therefore, I have no real experience or knowledge to determine whether this article is on target or not.

Having said that, the reasons for my concern are the women-in-India-have-the-worst-possible-lives tone of the piece. While Widow houses sound decidedly horrible, and the tradition of burning a living woman on the same funeral pyre as her deceased husband is something I simply cannot understand (having no knowledge of or contact with the culture), the analysis of the lives of old women leaves me with the desire to ask an old woman from (or in) India.

The integration of old women into the family is described as ‘exploitive’ because they provide childcare and physical labor for their children and grandchildren. Verma insists that women are unwilling to leave Widow Houses (where they are required to beg and prostitute themselves in order to survive) because each of them is “free to live her own life,” while living with her family “obliterates her identity and ordains for her a kind of social death.” Verma then ends by stating that all of this must be fixed through government welfare programs.

Plenty of people in this country (and others) rely upon grandparents to help out with the childrearing. Many do it because the parents are unable to handle it themselves (due to time constraints and other commitments), can’t afford to pay for childcare, or prefer to trust the care of their children to family members. More than one grandparent that I have known has not only done this willingly, they have offered to do it more often because they want to see their grandchildren. To suggest that a woman is forced to care for her grandchildren, and that the act is a form of drudgery and enslavement, is both extreme and offensive.

There is a difference between being a part of the family, helping out with the day-to-day workings of that family, having your needs met through your family, and being forced into an abusive slave-like existence. Is Verma so offended by the idea of childcare and housework that she is appalled that women past childbearing age would be forced to endure involvement in such activities?

While I admit that her point about women not being given any kind of choice within these situations is difficult to hear and difficult to live with, but the reality of life is that all people (male and female) live in the exact same situation. It’s neither realistic nor admirable to suggest that a person has a right to being catered to and served and given the means to do anything they please. We all have our struggles and caring for a family is one of the most difficult, complicated, economically challenging, and rewarding experiences of any person’s life. Why is the incorporation of the grandparents into this life supposed to be so offensive while shuttling them off to nursing homes and providing them welfare checks is such an improvement?

Personally, I am very much of the opinion that Western culture needs to learn from Indian culture, not the other way around. Nursing homes and day care centers are income generating businesses that have become the standard when, ideally, they should be the last resort or the occasional fill-in when other options simply aren’t available.

Granted there are, and always will be, people who abuse a tradition or a system, but the possibility of abuse does not, necessarily, prove that a tradition is without value or need.

I’m already wearing purple…

Practicing for Age: Embracing the Old Woman Within
By Roxanne Friedenfels
Off Our Backs
Vol. 35, no 9/10
Sept-Oct 2005

Over the Hill and Out of Sight
By Janice Keaffaber
Off Our Backs
Vol. 35, no 9/10
Sept-Oct 2005

Thoughts of a Fifty-Nine Year Old Feminist
By Carol Anne Douglas
Off Our Backs
Vol. 35, no 9/10
Sept-Oct 2005


Recently I decided to make a very large decision – I’m going to cut my hair. This isn’t about style or letting go of what has grown to be reasonably long, it’s about age. I started going gray, I have been steadily getting more and more gray over time, I have been overly focused on (and convinced of) getting old, and it’s time to just get over it. So, in about 2 months I’m going to have all of the dyed hair cut off of my head, leaving nothing but what is growing there naturally, and I’m going to leave it that way for a minimum of one year. This means that I will be cutting my hair shorter than it has ever been at any time in my life (the reason why I’m waiting a few months – going bald is a little more than I can handle at this point), and I will be looking at myself with no-longer-nearly-black hair.

It’s going to take some getting used to, but it’s something I have recently realized I need to do.

Friedenfels mentions the same thing occurring in her life – but made the decision to refrain from dying it or doing anything to change the fact that her hair is also thinning out. She’s focused on embracing the process of growing old. Truthfully, this is a process and an honor that is dangerously distant from the society I live in. I am told that we should be grateful for every day we are given. There is no guarantee that you will live through the next moment, much less then next decade, so thank whatever powers you believe in and be grateful for what you’ve been given. If someone reaches a point where they’ve put together many decades worth of days, then they’ve been given something exceptional. They’ve survived something that will, eventually, kill us all: time.

So, why are we so obsessed with youth? Why are we so angry with age and/or the old? Why is there this reaction of failure to someone who has done something that you may not even come close to accomplishing?

Keaffaber describes reactions people have to her because of her age – refusing to acknowledge her existence in a clothing store, pretending she’s not there at a checkout counter, finding herself to old for protests and trainings because they were for ‘youth,’ and newspapers taking photographs that clearly displayed herself and other women over 50 in a crowd of other protesters while providing a caption stating that “young activists protest…”

It’s like we become more and more invisible the older we get.

It’s also strangely important that things like activism be constantly focused on ‘youth.’ Sometimes I notice a trend (even among activists themselves) to present everything as though it were a special event catered to the young and spirited. As though activism and concern about issues in this country and abroad were something that people grow out of – a phase that young adults go through while they’re still learning about how the ‘real world’ works:
They’re to young to really understand, but with time they’ll come around. Humor them; it’s a good learning experience. They can build leadership skills and then apply them to life when they’re done playing around. The reason there are no middle aged or old or retired people profiled is because everyone knows that the people who actually grew up and matured are no longer doing those things. If someone is still involved, they clearly have not let go of their younger days and taken on real responsibilities…Rather interesting twist of perspective, isn’t it? After all, if the entire age span of a community were to be involved, then the issue at hand might have more validity and importance then the powers-that-be would like it to have. If it’s just the kids and their chaperones (read: the invisible non-youths in the center of the picture) then it’s really nothing more than an elaborate field trip, is it?

Keaffaber states that she doesn’t want to be a mentor or a font of wisdom or a woman working for the future generations or even wear purple all of the time. She just wants to be herself. Personally, one of the things I simply love about people decades older than me is their ability to cease to care about the opinions of other people – they are what they are and you’re just going to have to deal with it, damn it. Granted, this isn’t every person in a given age range, but it’s something I’m drawn to and one single powerful reason I have for actually looking forward to growing old. The ability to say “At my age, you just don’t worry about it anymore” must be wonderfully freeing.

And, quite frankly, I wear purple right now. I wear a lot of purple. More than I probably should. My room is filled with it and it’s been ‘my color’ for as long as I can remember. Does this now mean something about me and my age and my attitudes about age? Is it akin to men who wear pink (the recent trend of pink-everything notwithstanding)? The trappings that become stereotypically associated with a person, place, position, culture, race, gender, identity, or thing have a cascading affect on the rest of us. Yes, there was a poem stating that part of the glory of growing old is the ability to wear any color, or combination of colors, you very damn well chose. The author chose purple clothes and a red hat, so now the red hat society revels in the spirit of the thing by wearing exactly those things. It’s fun and it’s empowering and there’s nothing wrong with it.

It also has nothing to do with me, or my many years of choices in color coordination, any more than it has to do with Keaffaber’s sense of self or desire to be respected for who she is and not her age.

All of which sounds very feminist and decidedly current: women are invisible, women are judged by what they wear, women are expected to wear certain things, women have no voice in matters of importance, women are expected to fulfill a certain role at certain times and even the press pretends they do not exist because of it, women must fulfill the duties expected of them and all women like them (read: of the same age)…

Yet, all of it gets passed over because the young are the constant center of attention and are often made the center of attention by the very people who need to be heard themselves. How many times have a group of people chosen to take on the role of ‘chaperone’ while attending an activist event/action because letting the young have their chance seemed to much more important?

If you want to be heard, you have to open your mouth.

Also, never forget the fact that people come and people go. Some chose to stay with a cause and others chose to buy into the idea that it was just a phase in their wild and untamed youth. People live long lives and people die young.

Douglas does an excellent job of expressing her concerns about growing older, but really emphasizes her fear of being the last radical feminist of her generation. She doesn’t want to watch all of her friends die and find herself left without people who “understand what I’m thinking.”

Seems like a bit of wallowing self-pitying arrogance to suggest that no one alive could possibly understand you now that all of your friends are gone. Of course, Douglas is talking about fears, not reality, and it’s both valid and important to talk about fears for the very fact that other people feel exactly the same way that you do – including the thought that no one can possibly understand what you are thinking. Strangely enough, that connection based on the conviction that no one understands proves to both persons involved that someone else understands.

It’s one of those mysteries of life.

Ultimately, what I understand Douglas to be saying is that she’s afraid of being alone and helpless. The nursing homes, the slow-killing disease that takes your mind before your body (e.g.: Alzheimer’s), the passing of one close friend and family member after another, and the ever shrinking circle of people who have known you for longer than a few months, or years, or decades. Change is scary, but inescapable solitude is terrifying.

If we are constantly working for future generations, then shouldn’t those generations be growing up around us, and with us, and in our homes and communities and lives? Wouldn’t it seem logical to expect a large network of human beings filling the life of people who have been consistently involved over the years, like a gardener surrounded by flowers? Why does the work result in a barren and empty garden? Why do the efforts to create solidarity and community ultimately result in a collection of cliques that rely solely on themselves while other cliques form around them?

Why does our human connection end with the friends from our youth and in our circle of similarity instead of branching out, both up and down the age range, through the simple act of collaborative action? If we are working together, if we have the same objectives and goals, if we are part of the same community, then why are we so divided?

Ultimately, I have more questions than answers, and I’m simply hoping that cutting my hair and spending a year facing myself, and my age, in the mirror, every day, will help me to understand, if not fully answer, at least some of them.

The Problem with MS

MS Magazine
The year 2005

If you look through this blog, you’ll notice that there are no articles from MS magazine listed or discussed. The reason for this is because I did not get my last copies of the magazine and, therefore, could not read them. (This blog was started after the first few had been read and passed along to other women.)

MS comes out 4 times a year (and costs far more than it should). However, if you move at anytime during your subscription and fill out the change-of-address from on their website, you will get an interesting email informing you that it takes at least one issue to complete an address change – regardless of when that address is changed in the course of year.

The Nation, Technology Review, and WIRED had no problem changing my address immediately, but MS magazine seems to be unable, or unwilling, to do the same.

I did a little digging on their website and looked over my emails from them again, and realized that MS does not consider itself to be a publication – it’s an association. It’s something that women join so that they can say they are card carrying feminist and have access to all of the inside things that associations provide. Honestly, I can’t tell you if MS provides much in this respect because I never used my membership for anything more than the magazine.

Quite frankly, I am disappointed in MS and the association connected to it. The whole thing is very elitist – never mind the fact that I hate using that word and get my dander up every time I hear someone else use it. At this point there’s a lot of prestige tied up in being published in MS, being interviewed in MS, being mentioned in MS, having your organization or work covered in MS, and otherwise being recognized by the flagship of feminist involvement. Whatever it may have been in the past, it is now a ruler by which women can judge (or value) their involvement in the feminist movement. It is proof that someone else is doing something worth supporting. It is the source of all things feminist and, therefore, read with unquestioning awe of the un-challenged expert.

So, I guess they feel perfectly justified in telling a nobody like me that I will simply have to let go of at least one forth of my annual subscription because I moved. Maybe mail forwarding is something they offer to people who purchase the more expensive membership.

The other half

Rabbis’ Wives: Then and Now
By Shuly Rubin Schwartz
Lilith
Winter 2005

I have no idea what Rabbi’s wives do (or do not) do. I have no experience with them. However, I do have experience with the wives of various Christian leaders and the secretaries of Catholic Priests (many of whom follow their employer from one congregation to the next).

I’ve heard people talk about the roles women play in many scenarios where the husband is in power, or the leader, or the holder of religious/spiritual…whatever…and she’s brought along for the ride.

I’ve wondered about such things as I’ve watched women present themselves as the wife of the Boss, the Owner, the CEO, the Sergeant, the Politician, the Professor, and the Athlete. And, I myself have been the wife of a man with a high profile job who went to a good number of events she had no interest in because he needed ‘the wife’ (a title we occasionally, jokingly, tossed around) to be there.

It’s a role, just like any other role, and it has its duties and it’s expectations because history and society and the necessities of the particular relationship in question have placed them there. Call me complacent, but I have no strong feelings about the nature of any of these roles, one way or another.

At least, not when the roles are chosen. Actions between consenting adults are their business, not mine. What they choose is what they choose and bless them on their road ahead.

What annoys me is when there are no other options and creating them requires a massive amount of effort, energy, time, and negotiating. But, things that have been created over time are not going to be changed over night, and roles caste in the expectations of society (like ‘the wife’) are not a recent fad-like development in this country or the world.

While I find no reason to be offended by it, also find no reason to accept it as inevitable or the only option. However, I am no longer married (and he is no longer in a high profile job), and my time as ‘the wife’ was spent resenting the role instead of using it or changing it. Granted, I was young and idealistic and less than happy about living where I was living, but I occasionally look back and regret not having the wherewithal to recognize the position I was in and what that really meant (or could mean).

By the same token, I learned from the experience that I am not suited the role of ‘the wife’ at all. It’s not something my personality is going to settle into without loud and angry complaint, so it’s something I will not do again. I’m not unique in this – most people don’t realize how ill suited they are to something until they try it.

Which is what brings me to the one thing that I have always felt-thought about the role of ‘the wife’ – it’s a job. There are things that need to be done, details that need to be handled, people who need to be appeased, situations that need to be organized, and things that have to be addressed by more than one person whenever a position of leadership or power or prestige is being filled. Traditionally this role has been filled by ‘the wife’ because it made the most sense – she’s there, she’s going to be involved in some way (regardless), she already focuses on the things all women/wives focus on in the society in which she lives…it’s something that is/was simply practical when you stop to think about it.

But, that does not mean it’s the only logical possibility. It also does not mean that it’s suited to our current society. If a person is in a position that requires (for whatever reason) showing up to various events with a person on his/her arm (or as a companion of any sort) who will effectively navigate the crowd and the culture and the conversation and the event for whatever reason, then why not hire the position out? People talk disparagingly of escorts because of their association with prostitution, but what about the reality of finding a personality who handles a social situation in a manner that is needed? The person could be male, female, bilingual, smooth, cool, bubbly, sweet, intelligent, streetwise, blunt, argumentative – it could be anything that the event needs and the needs could change from one event to the next, which means the person hired could (logically) change from one event to the next.

Organizing, entertaining, and managing a crowd are talents and skills, and they do not (necessarily) have to be handled by the same person at every event.

Cooking, cleaning, and organizing the physical details of an event or a home are also talents and skills that do not have to be handled by one person, or the same person, at any given time.

Caring for children – same thing.

There’s a lot of talk out there about people taking on the roles most suited to them, instead of assigning roles based on gender, marital status, race, class, and whatever else people might be in the habit of using. What this article got me to thinking about was the reality involved in taking that concept and transforming it from talk into action.

It’s more logical, realistic, and possible than we might think – and the change will occur when we stop theorizing about the possibility and start passing the work around.

Tell me about the women with guns

Through a Different Lens
Women Bring the News from Israel
By Helen Schary Motro
Lilith
Winter 2005

Women journalists, soldiers, mothers, and residents of Israel and Palestine do their jobs despite patriarchal oppression – that’s one point.

Women journalists are both competent and more inclined to focus on the human aspect’ of the story – that’s another point.

Women journalists are able to interview women, and connect with people, in this region because they are female (women are not allowed to speak to men outside of their immediate family in this region) and they have stories about children and family that they can use to connect with the people they are interviewing – that’s yet another point.

On the one hand I found the discourse on what women journalists tend to cover (as opposed to men) interesting. Why is it that covering the ‘human’ aspect of a story is considered so much ‘less’ an avenue of reporting than counting the number of bombs, or trucks, or soldier, or dead? Isn’t the affect on human lives, due the large and weeping events occurring around them, the whole point?

But, that said, I also found myself wishing the journalists would spend less time talking about being journalists and more time talking about the women they mention in passing. The photograph of the three soldiers watching from the women’s section of the Netzarim synagogue as Torah scrolls are removed from the ark keeps drawing me back to it. Three women, each with an enormous gun slung over her back, a pointy tail down her neck, and matching green military uniforms, are standing close and intently watching something the camera does not show. On the one hand, they aren’t allowed into the main part of the synagogue because they are female. On the other, they are allowed into combat military while women in the US have to protest and fight for the same…privilege?…opportunity?…right?…(I’m really not sure how to describe being allowed to go to the front lines of a war – even if you want to be there).

I want to know more about the women in the uniforms. I want to know more about the settler with the baby in a sling around her neck. The Gaza Strip really isn’t a place I’ve ever wanted to go. Neither is Israel, but that’s more because I’ve never really thought about (and because I’ve always known that it’s one of those exceptionally dangerous places to travel). These photographs make me want to go there and meet those four women.

The article itself was interesting, but not so near as interesting as the photographs. Is it because the photographs don’t have a story connected to them? Would I be as interested if the article detailed their story and their lives? I think I would, but I might be more interested if they followed this story up with that one. Photographic teaser from one article to the next, I guess.

Regardless, I keep looking at those three women, in front of the white wall with the white curtains, standing close, arms around each other’s waists, as though the guns over their shoulders weren’t even there.

Words like swords

Words Can Hurt
By Karen Propp
Lilith
Winter 2005

This article is about verbal abuse and it's frequency in the jewish community. Until I moved to Philly, I had never lived in (or, to the best of my knowledge, near) a Jewish community, so i really can't comment on what is frequent and what is not. However, it makes some interesting points about abuse.

Verbal abuse is something everyone experiences - particularly if you're female. It seems to be the way girls fight. quite frankly, I've often wished more women would learn how to use their fists on occasion...but that's another topic for another day.

The hard thing about verbal abuse is identifying it. When has someone gone to far? Just like physical abuse, there are times when it's obvious, but there are times when it's not.

Recently I was told by a person I know who is a Psychologist that verbal abuse can 9and will) have the same afect on the human psyche (and the body) as physical abuse. It's a form of trauma that can/will cripple a person just as effectively as a brutal attack or regular beatings.

There's a disconnection and a pointed insult of human worth when verbal assaults are thrown, but there is that difficult to identify aspect of personality. some people will be bruised and broken by the very same interaction that will not bother another person at all.

Identifying the abuse between a couple has to occur between that couple, as the affects are indicated by their relationship and moods and psychological health. between people who are not in an intimate (or familial or work) relationship, there's (usually) the possibility of removing oneself from the interaction altogether (in a work based relationship there are usually options for this that don't occur elsewhere) and it may be a matter of the person recieveing the assault recognizing the effects on themselves and taking the action necessary.

If someone you can walk away from and avoid contact with is brutalizing you physically, would you go back? Why should verbal abuse be any different?

I guess it comes down to society and personal struggles and people learning to see the affects of their own actions - even when those actions are both accepted and expected among their own family.

It's a complicated problem.

Why do I read this?

http://www.pennyandaggie.com/

Why do I do this to myself? The only person this comic really focuses on is the wicked yet beautiful Penny. I like the character of Aggie, but every time I read this I feel like I'm slowly driving past a horrible car wreck on one of the massively busy highways around Philly.

Rubbernecking the horror that is (was) high school.

Is there something about teenage hormones that makes people inherently evil, or is it something about our society, or the assembly-line-factory-worker-training-inspired set up of schools everwhere? Is it just what happens when you shove that many teens into a small space and force them to deal with only each other a precious few people ouitside of their age range?

Shudder

Every time I look at it I get this sick feeling of memory combined with resignation that nothing has changed over the past few decades. Torture thru talk is the reality of women everywhere, and the vicious basics are still a core portion of the curriculum in our lovely school system.

So, why do i keep reading it?

I guess I just keep wishing that Aggie will come back - I remember her from my own years in Hell High...fondly.

you did what?

Taiwan breeds green-glowing pigs
By Chris Hogg
BBC News, Hong Kong
1/12/2006

Pigs that glow green at night when a blue light is shone on them.

Pigs that are created by injecting jellyfish genes into embryos and then implanting them into sows.

265 pig embryos were implanted in eight different sows - and only 3 male piglets were born.

They are hoping the pigs will breed more glowing green piglets by mating with normal pigs.

They want the glowing green pigs for genetic research 'casue it's easier to find the glowing green genes injected into OTHER animals.

Many jellyfish are poisonous...deadly in fact.

Which jellyfish did they use? How many artificially inseminated embryos usually survive (without the genetic manipulation)? Does this affect the eating habits or water based needs or skin texture or personality of the pigs?

When do they start injecting human embryos with jellyfish genes? We could have an entirely new (and man-made) race just as green and glowing as any fantasy novel fairy. perhaps they'll even find a way to create pointy ears.

I guess this is proof that human beings (scientists included) like to think of themselves as having god-like powers. The ability to create new and fascinating beings...beings which they will (of course) be able to control.

Silly, silly, human.

Not the anarchy you might expect

The Dispossessed (Paperback)
by Ursula K. Le Guin
Publisher: Eos
Reprint edition (December 1, 1994)
ISBN: 0061054887

A wonderful novel about worlds far and distant from our own, however, like all good literature, the novel has solid characters and explores philosophies of life and possibilities of experience…not just descriptions of fantastic places and wild (and often violent) adventures.

Gushing praise aside, the most fascinating aspect to this novel was it portrayal (and exploration) of anarchism.

To be perfectly honest, anarchism has never held much interest for me because the people who I’ve known to be involved in it were often angry (or fringe…or just plain lazy) young adults looking for an excuse to break the law or justify bad and destructive behavior. It has also seemed like an excuse to wear black covered in symbols that shock, offend, or annoy the status quo. In short, I have not explored the philosophy because of the personalities and lifestyles of the people (who I myself have met) living it. It just wasn’t a crowd I was impressed by or interested in hanging with.

That said, this novel has me wondering if the philosophy and the youthful expression of it are in conflict with one another (or, merely, being expressed in an overly I’m-on-my-own-and-living-in-a-way-that-my-parents-don’t-approve manner). The anarchist society, and the problems it is facing in this novel, are fascinating both from the perspective of how a truly anarchist society might be formed/lived, and the problems/issues it might settle into after nearly 200 years of practice without intervention from (or even contact with) another form of society.

It has me considering exploring the true meaning of anarchism and it’s origins.

Protection is something you gotta pay for

Fear Inc
By Evan Ratliff
Wired
12/2005

The jist of this article is as follows:

all sorts of companies, both new and old, are making bucket loads of money off of the government through developing technology and strategy for preventing, addressing, and cleaning up after disasters. The government’s primary interest is terrorists (and, possibly, invasion). One business owner (many are venture capitalists who find funding for scientists and then market their products to the government and private industry) made the point that homeland security is to important to leave to the government.

It struck me as odd that private industry was handling the security of this country and doing it primarily out of necessity and need on the part of the government when (I thought) that was one of the primary reasons government exists.

Are we going to have to start paying these companies directly to get any protection at all?

Random catastrophe? Famous people eating hamburgers? Your phone photos for cash!

Wanted: Your Low-Res Pics
By Erin Biba
Wired
11/2005

Create an account on http://www.scoopt.com and send any and all pictures (taken with a digital camera or a cell phone, it doesn’t really matter) of significant or newsworthy events that you happen to be lucky enough to witness to your account on the site, and Scoopt will peddle them to worldwide publications. The newspapers, magazines, and online news pays for the pict, and Scoopt splits the cash with you 50-50.

The simplicity of submission and the elimination of the hassle that comes from dealing with publications makes this awfully appealing.

It's ok, the robot didn't die

The Biotech Crash Test Dummies
By Eilene Zimmerman
Wired
11/2005

Robots are being using to test drugs and chemicals, instead of humans or animals. The robots combine human cells with human cells and various chemicals, and the record the reactions. It’s a good idea that the drug companies like because it’s faster and more efficient than the traditional testing method (while PETA will be happy to hear the number of test animals are dropping, the reason for the drop is money, not an affinity for their cause).

While the robots are interesting, I’m still waiting for that Star Trek examination machine that scans you body and tells the doctor everything that is right and everything that is wrong. I’m looking forward to the day when the annual physical consists of stepping into a machine that returns an amazingly thorough listing of every possible aspect of your body.

You're not healthy I tell you! You're not! You're not! You're not!

A Disease for Every Pill
By Ray Moynihan and Alan Cassels
The Nation
10/17/2005

The drug companies are spending more money on ads that sell directly to consumers (read: the people the doctors prescribe pills to) and creating descriptions of diseases that don’t even exist. The article focuses on the repackaging and renaming of Prozac for the purpose of selling it to young women for pre-menstrual issues. They’ve given it a name and the symptom are nothing more than the normal mood swings a woman goes through right before she gets her period.

This really isn’t anything new. I’ve seen drug company created questionnaires that are written in such a vague and misleading way that anyone could be said to have the disease in question (why doctors choose to hand these things out to patients, I will never understand), and the diet industry has been making a whole lot of money off of the I’m-ugly fears of young women for decades (if not longer). Addictive diet pills have replaced the purposeful infection with a tapeworm (popular in the Victorian era).

Drug companies are in existence to make money, advertising is in existence to convince people to spend money, drug companies using phrasing and technique to sell things via advertising is nothing more than standard big business practice.

Besides, we are still firmly imbedded ion the better-living-through-chemistry age. Better to take a drug than to address things in your life that might allow you to fix (or, at least, live with) the issue chemical free.

Where’s the money in that?

I saw a comedy routine by Chris Rock where he made the point that “You make your money on the come back.” That is dead-on analysis of the situation, if you ask me. It’s not about addressing ailments, or finding cures, it’s about creating products that people will be tied to for the rest of their lives, thereby pulling in a hefty bottom line.

Kind of makes me wonder how many diseases have actually been researched to the point of a cure, only to have the cure withheld from public announcement or distribution. You can’t sell things to people who aren’t (or don’t believe they are) sick.

Advertising good, privacy bad...understand honey?

Don’t Call It Spyware
By Annalee Newitz
Wired
12/2005

What it comes down to is this – the largest creator of spyware was making a whole lot of money while, at the same time, angering a whole lot of people. Court cases and lawsuits arrived on their doorstep, so they changed a few tactics and the company name. Yeah! Now the business and legal world is happy and the company (now known as Claria) will sue YOU if they catch you calling their stuff spyware (it’s adware, thankyouverymuch).

The power of money and advertising in this country is astounding. Do you ever take a look at the annual financial concerns for this country (and the world) and find yourself thinking that the true role of U.S. Citizen, on the global scene, is to buy more stuff than anyone else? Never mind the huge extensions of credit or the massively long hours at 1 to 3 jobs, we must spend money to keep everyone else a float!

What better way to keep US Citizens at their nationally designated task then to force advertising in their face, make it illegal to complain about (or, possibly, remove) the unasked for ‘feature,’ and then push ‘click here and buy!’ windows in their face so that they’ll either be pulled away by the allure of pretty things or will accidentally click their way into a new state of ownership.

Man, I'm not just gonna bike down that mountain, I'm gonna bike the Mississippi river. Bet you $20 bucks i can do it!

Biking the Mississippi
By Michael Erard
Wired
12/2005

Modify a bike, put on top of a boat, hook up paddle wheels to the contraption, and pedal your way downstream. Morgan Simmons was trying to come up with an excuse for his desire to bike his way down the Mississippi with his experimental bike-boat, and is now giving lectures (on the river and the path water takes from New York to the Gulf) and having his picture taken.

Excuses for taking long trips through wilderness and water…damn! I’ve been trying to think of one for years! Hmmm…what do I have around the apartment that can be modified…?

Girls with computers...

Note: the title of this post is inspired by (just in case you've never heard of it):
Artist/Band: Wynonna Judd
Song: Girls With Guitars
Album: Tell Me Why


She’s Got Code
By Jennifer Gandin
Wired
12/2005

Afra Karim Randhawa is a Pakistani girl with a genius streak. At the age of 9, she became the youngest Microsoft certified professional in the world. Bill Gates wanted to meet her, so they flew her to Redmond, WA, and she proceeded to grill him about the number of women he had working there. According to Afra, there are a lot of women interested in technology in Pakistan and Bill just needs to come to her country and meet them.

Forget Bill. I say we get a whole bunch of women geeks together and go to Pakistan ourselves! Good opportunity for the girls to go over some open source ideas, wouldn’t you say?

I want my paint to clean itself

Brushes with Greatness
By Monya Baker
Wired
12/2005

Paint that does stuff, like absorb bioterror pathogens (e.g.: anthrax) and crunches them into little bits (as long as they fall on the item/wall covered in the special paint), or sterilizes itself, or heals metal by sensing nicks in the paint and fixing them (no touch up required), or remain cool in super hot temperatures, or simply won’t burn (thereby protecting things like wooden staircases from house fires).

Two thoughts – 1) how will we know if something goes terribly wrong? (read: the sterilized paint on the operating room walls is actually breeding toxins…), and 2) is there something disturbingly wrong about the amount of work we simply aren’t willing to do...or is it just me? Seems like cleaning walks, rebuilding staircases after a devastating fire, and touching up paint are perfectly good jobs to keep our own lazy hands doing.

Good parents invest in possible scientific lifesaving cures for rare diseases that don't have cures...yet

Should I Bank my Baby’s Cord Blood?
By Clive Thompson
Wired
12/2005

It’s a new market to new parents – guilt them into thinking they’re bad parents if they don’t hundreds (thousands?) of dollars to collect and store the blood from their baby’s umbilical cord. The idea is that stem cell research (never mind the hot political debate surrounding the technology) will, someday, be able to use the cells in the cord blood to save your baby’s life. According to this article, parents with a child already suffering from cancer should do it, everyone else should consider it a luxury item or simply donate the cord blood to a public bank for research purposes.

What is it with commerce in this country? While selling science is nothing new to the history of humankind, taking potentially serious research and turning it into a new-baby gimmick to be touted by wealthy parents who’ve gotten over their $1000 baby carriage is…annoying.

Are the oil reserves half empty or half full?

Running on Fumes
By Sasha Abramsky
The Nation
10/17/2005

Why $5 Gas is Good for America
By Spencer Reis
Wired
12/2005

The reality of increased gas prices for the blue collar, working class, and poor in remote regions of the country, is an inability to get to the places they have to get to in order to survive – work, school, the store.

The reality of increased gas prices for the world of science is more interest (and, therefore, more funding) for alternative sources of fuel and power.

The thing that stuck out to me the most was the absolute reliance upon gas that the people in the remote California town of Yreka. They were cutting back on food so that they could pay for gas. I have lived in highly remote places with no viable form of public transit. I know that what is described is real because I have lived under those conditions myself, however I am lucky enough to have done so during periods of time where I could (just barely) swing the price of gas on either full or part-time jobs.

This is one of those realities that many people in public office neither think about nor address because they have not experienced it themselves and the people living it have nothing in the way campaign contributions or political power to make their situation of interest.

It’s also something (I guarantee you) that is being celebrated by the oil companies. That kind of importance placed on a product is the kind of customer loyalty (or need) all companies simply drool over. It’s the ultimate power and the ultimate income security. Which means that no one is going to do anything to address the needs of the people in these smaller towns because that will push them to support the continued fight and search for more oil. It’s money in their pocket and soldiers at their frontline. What more could they possibly ask for?

On the other hand, scientists are looking at the situation as a prime opportunity to push for further support of things they have been developing for ages. Some of which have been in use for ages, but have been traditionally undercut by the low cost and easy availability of oil.

In my opinion (if you care to know it) there is neither reason nor benefit for either members of government or managers at oil companies to take this time and find ways to get past it by reducing (or eliminating) our need and reliance on oil. This is one of those situations where the most logical course of action will not be taken until there is absolutely no other possible option. They will push us to the edge and beyond before they stop to think that…maybe…they may have gone to far.

So (again, my opinion), this is an issue that would e best addressed by activists and individuals and basement scientists (and actual working and credentialed scientist, if they could be persuaded to join in). There are other options, and here are a few examples:

1) Reduce the need for a vehicle and transportation. There was a time in history when people lived and worked in their towns. No long commutes, no need for distance travel (save on special occasions or in emergency situations), and supplies brought into the town were a community concern. No one had a Wal-Mart or a fast food chain to instantly supply them with whatever they thought they needed at any time. The development and support of small businesses (most particularly NON tourist trade) providing for the needs of the community (in more than one way) is an excellent place to start.
2) Reduce reliance on outside sources of products and energy. Manu factor (or create by hand) the things everyone needs in town. Identify what is needed to get by (for example: a survey of the town and the foods everyone states are required on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis) and find ways to meet those needs locally, and through bulk purchases that are shipped in.
3) Sustainability. Houses, businesses, and schools that are built to provide heat and air conditioning through the technology found in green architecture (read: solar energy, greenhouses in buildings that provide heat, composting toilets, etc) will reduce the cost of maintaining the building and reduce the reliance on outside sources for things like heating oil. Also, farming practices that purposely work to provide as much as possible to meet the needs of the local community, and the community support of the foods provided by these farms, will reduce the need for outside sources shipping products in, increasing prices, or becoming a necessary (and, therefore, political) presence in a community completely dependent upon them for supplies. Combine that with focusing as much farming as possible on plants and animals native to the area, and the ability to sustain the production will be increased.
4) Biofuel and generators. Find a way to replace the vehicles with diesel, set up a system for creating BioFuel in every home (or with a general depository serviced through recycling bucket style pickups throughout the town) out of discarded vegetable oil (and similar items like corn and soybeans), and help people to identify when they need to drive and when they don’t. The less they rely on outside sources for their diesel, the better.

Now, that’s a lot of change and probably just the beginning. But, what I’m illustrating here is the fact that it’s possible. A determined group of activists with connections in the environmental and sustainability communities would be able to pull together the information, and some work and networking could turn up sources for supplies. As always, finances will come into play, but with the increase in funding for research, a town could (potentially) offer itself up as a ‘research experiment’ managed by the likes of MIT.

Or, they could work out a plan that allows them to make changes slowly, over time, and with the most immediate needs (or actions that are simply possible to achieve) being addressed first.

One way or the other, it would have to be a community effort coming from within the community and made a reality through everyone’s involvement. Don’t expect anything except discouragement and roadblocks from the government, because their interests lie more with the oil companies than with its citizens (disagree with me if you like, but I am not seeing evidence to the contrary).

Essentially, I am not saying the government SHOULDN’T do it, I’m saying the WOULDN’T do it. There’s a difference between can, should, and will.

These suggestions are not the same as the philosophies and actions various survivalist or separatist groups across the nation, because it’s not an attempt to cut off the rest of the world, simply to reduce (or eliminate) the NEED for the outside world. If your community can survive (albeit with tightened belts and careful budgets) without any help from anyone outside the city (or county) limits, then contact from beyond is only going to improve the financial (and lifestyle) situation.

Uh…can someone get my car down…please?

Monster Garage
By Alex Ulam
Wired
12/2005

An automated parking garage - Park the car, lock the doors, walk away, and the elevators move it up and over into an empty space. Sort of like putting toys away in a warehouse-shelving unit. No parking attendant, no way to walk to your car and drive away, and if the power goes down…then what?

On the one hand it’s ingenious, on the other it’s an awful lot like applying vending machine technology to car parking – and I’ve lost a whole lot of change into those vending machines.

Be all you choose to be

Memory’s Revenge
By JoAnn Wypiijewski
Mother Jones
Sept/Oct, 2005

This article reviews some programs run by veterans, talking to students (primarily teenagers) about what it’s really like to join the military, and what it’s really like to go to war. They aren’t ashamed of being veterans, they aren’t bashing current enlisted men and women, they’re simply saying ‘this is the real deal, never mind what the recruiters tell you – we’ve actually been there.’

The article presents the objective as discouraging students from enlisting and, perhaps, that is the ultimate objective of the veterans involved. Personally, what I like most about this was the honesty. I have a great respect for people who are able to say: ‘This is my experience, this is the reality of what I lived through, and if your situation is similar, then take my story for what it’s worth and make your own decision.’

It’s no news to me that the recruiters lie…or exaggerate, or place emphasis on the possible outcomes to the point where they may seem to be promises of what will happen. I’ve had my share of friends who enlisted and found themselves disappointed by what they got (compared to what they expected), and I have military family and experience working on a military base…the things I was told when I was a teenager were things I already knew about from personal experience. The exaggerations didn’t mean much, because I already had a good idea about what it was all about. Personally, I don’t hold anything against Recruiters. Recruiters are salesmen with quotas and they are military under orders to meet those quotes. They do what they have to do.

Besides, for all of the young people who are convinced to join the military because it will turn their dead-end life, poverty-induced-lack-of-opportunities, or tendencies toward laziness (or simply poor discipline) around, and were then severely traumatized by the experience of war; there are an equal number of young people who took the same route and did turn their life around. The military is a choice and an opportunity, just like any other. College isn’t for everyone, and neither is the military.

But, this article focuses on the fact that the kids with little to no financial resources and the kids who are poor students are the ones targeted by recruiters. There’s a discrepancy in who fills the ranks based on family and finances. While this is true, and there is something not quite right about it, it’s also true that there are places in this country where there are exactly two opportunities – and the military is one of them. I have lived in an area like this and, as a result, I have a real problem with people who insist that the military is bad, all recruitment should be stopped, and anyone who makes that choice is either destroying their lives or proving themselves to be against peace and friendship between people of the world.

I have a problem with removing half of the opportunity of an entire town/area/region/segment of the population based on the fact that some people don’t like the idea of military due to its connection to war. For many people the military is needed for reasons that have nothing to do with the protection of the nation, and a person doesn’t have to like something to need it, much in the same way that a person does not have to have all-encompassing-support for something to respect it.

This is also part of the reason why I am so adamant about the development and support of small business – if you don’t like the options people are choosing then provide them with opportunities for more choices. There are many people who would choose to start their own business or go to college over entering into the military if the resources and the support required to do so were available to them.

If you want to reduce the number of people entering the military in a given region, then work to develop other options and choices for life paths (and survival) in that region.

But, I digress…

It would be nice if the military were more honest – almost to the point of discouragement. If they would come right out and say: ‘This is what we do, this is what you’ll be up against, this is what we promise, and there’s no guarantee that you’ll get anything more than promised. Advancement and opportunity is based on the following things, and here’s a list of things that are controlled by you….Now, can you handle it, or not?’

This Was My Child
By Cassidy Hartmann
Philadelphia Weekly
Sept 7-13, 2003

Celeste Zappala has been on the news and the local newspapers a lot. While I don’t see her much anymore, there were a few months when she was making the headlines regularly – including a few that claimed she was under surveillance by the FBI for saying that she wanted to kill Bush.

I don’t know if the kill-Bush statement was true or not (I have always suspected it either wasn’t, or it was taken out of context) but, even if she did, it only makes sense given the fact that she’s grieving (and angry) over the death of her son. Death of a loved one means going through extreme emotions (no matter who you are), and anger expressed toward the person responsible for the situation that caused your son’s death sounds pretty logical to me.

Often media sensationalism and sound-bite-sized quotes show great disrespect for the fact that every event in a person’s life involves a process, and time changes their anger and their opinions as the emotions subside and their mind returns to it’s normal state of clarity. Sometimes I worry that this constant bombardment of good-guy bad-guy media coverage, based on half a sentence that happened to bust out of someone’s mouth in the heat of a moment, is causing (or has caused) the general population to forget that everyone has a process, and a path, and stuff they have to work through. Because you don’t agree with me now does not make me evil – in fact, it doesn’t even mean that we will always disagree.

Zappala has been using the media coverage on her son’s death, and her skills as a long time peace activist, to protest the war, to make connection with fellow families of military who’ve been killed in Iraq, and to simply make life hard for Bush.

Zappala makes an interesting point about the illogical arguments in favor of the war. Namely, that they have to continue to fight the war so that the people who have died fighting will not have died in vain. According to Zappala, this translates into making sure that more people die so that the people who are already dead feel…better?

Sometimes I have this harsh reaction to people who get angry about their loved one’s dieing in battle. There’s this it-wasn’t-supposed-to-happen-to-me attitude that bothers me. War is, by it’s nature, a situation where people try to kill each other. The last nation standing, wins.

What did you think was going to happen?

But, I am also of the opinion that there are a lot of unrecognized wars going on in this country right now. There are sides, uniforms, territories, guns, and deaths in the name of my side, occurring in a whole lot of places that many of the people who don’t like war or violence tend to stay away from. And, not all of these places are in the city.

There’s sorrowful acceptance of the people who die on the street due to the choices made concerning the people they associate with the side of the battle they choose. Yet there’s protest and personal offense taken when people die due to making the choice to associate with the US military and whatever side of the battle that institution may choose.

However, all of that said, there is one aspect of this article that really stuck out to me – it was the choice made by Sherwood (Zappala’s son) and his reasons for doing so. Sherwood was in the National Guard, and he’d decided to join after working side-by-side with National Guardsmen stacking sandbags during a significant flood in the area. Sherwood joined the National Guard for the finances needed to help his family get by – but also because he got to know people who were actively enlisted, liked what he saw when they were called to duty, and wanted to take part in protecting his home town. He joined the National Guard because its focus was local.

But, military is military and war is war, so Sherwood became the first Pennsylvania National Guardsman to die in battle since 1945.

His death is heartbreaking, but his decisions were admirable. From what little I know, he lived his life well and he made the decisions he saw were right for him, his family, and his community. He wasn’t forced into it, or tricked into it, or drawn to it out of desperation. He made a choice, knowing full well that there were other choices available to him. I respect that.

I don’t agree with the war, I think war (in general) is something that should be avoided at all costs, while at the same time recognizing that it’s part of the human experience (you can disagree with that if you want to). I would prefer war to consist entirely of hand-to-hand combat (using weapons no more advanced than a bow and arrow) and not guns/tanks/long range missiles/etc because I think it’s more honorable and more apt to develop warriors instead of fighters…but that’s just me.

However, I do believe that every person has a right to their own choice, and one of the choices we all must make is where we belong and how we will take part in our communities. Sherwood did all of that, and I respect his actions and decisions, and I really wish the media and the protests and the anti-war actions could spend more time recognizing that fact about his life…and ours.


Keeping the Legacy Alive
By Lorraine Gennaro
South Philly Review
11/24/2005
http://www.triplenickle.com

Sam Day and Robert Sample are veterans who proudly wear triple nickel insignia. Day served in Korea and Sample served in Vietnam. They were both paratroopers.

The Triple Nickels were the first black paratroopers and later became the first black unit to become part of the US combat division. While the original members were given the job of acting as test platoons for military maneuvers and fighting forest fires (African Americans were not allowed into active combat at that time), they are a legacy, a part of history and the primary reason why African Americans can enter into the ranks of both paratroopers and active combat military.

Day and Sample speak at schools and go over their history as Triple Nickels. They explain what paratroopers do and how the triple Nichols came to be (as well as how they changed the US military). Both Day and Sample made it clear that they didn’t care whether or not someone chose to join the military; they just believe that they were a part of history – and an important part of history that should not be forgotten or passed over.

This is, effectively, the other part of the story. These are the stories from veterans who can’t hide their pride in their involvement or their accomplishments as members of the military.

And this brings me back to the issue of choice.

It’s important for people who are considering enlisting to know what they are getting into – both the good and the bad. There’s glory and there’s gore. There’s orders and actions that a soldier greatly disagrees with and there’s the opportunity to protect your hometown and everyone you know who lives there. There are the vague insinuations of amazing feats of accomplishment that might be yours and there is the bones honest truth about what you are guaranteed to experience and receive…there are a whole lot of sides to the story.

There are many who would like to see an end to recruitment. Personally, I would like to see a significant modification to its methods. Give recruiters the freedom to be honest and the duty of carrying the history of the armed services (particularly the history of the military in the area the recruiter is stations in) to the people in their area. Make recruiters the people who represent the military with the power (and secondary objective) to complete the paperwork for anyone wishing to enlist. Provide veterans with a contact who is both able and under orders to provide venues where their voices can be heard and their stories told – all sides of the stories (perhaps even point-counterpoint debates made up entirely of veterans).

If that kind of change were made, I would support anyone trying to make this a part of the local community events managed/supported by city government, and a mandatory part of the history and civics classes required for both high school and college students.

Every person makes their own decisions, and respect for the individual making life-changing decisions is expressed through the action of honesty, and the presentation of complete information is part of what it means to be honest.

'cause it's not about Oil

In the Garden of Armageddon
By Kurt Pitzer
Mother Jones
Sept/Oct, 2005

Mahdi Obeidi is the only Weapons of Mass Destruction scientist (WMD) brought into the United States for safety and information. Obeidi has to go to the press to force the US to do it, too.

Apparently there are hundreds of WMD scientists, some of whom are world renowned for their research and breakthrough science in the area of nuclear war power, and al but a small handful are missing. The speculation is that they have taken underground jobs with countries and groups interested in creating their own weapons (as the knowledge these people possess is highly valuable), or they’ve been killed in the war and political unrest of their homeland. Whatever their fate, the US neither knows nor seems to care.

Obeidi had hoped to bring his colleagues to the United States and share their knowledge with US scientists and politicians. The US turned him down.

If this war is about terrorists and WMDs, then why the disinterest in the people who know how to make them, whether or not they were ever made in Iraq, and (possibly) where they are located?

My way, your way, and insults all around

Why is France Burning?
By Doug Ireland
The Nation
11/28/2005

There are ghettoes in France, filled with Arabs (who are also Muslim) from countries formally under French control (read: colonies). These are people who were brought into the country either as refugees (transported by military leaders who refused to follow orders to leave everyone not born in France-proper behind during a bloody massacre) or as laborers. They were placed in low-income housing out of view of the French cities.

Effectively, they are the imported working class that France no longer needs and would just assume leave the country.

So, now the Arab youth, fed up with treatment from all possible sides, have started burning things. Buildings, cars, shops…whatever. They are rioting all over the country and they are using their cell phones to communicate with one another when then see the police coming and need to move to a new area.

For some reason I never think of European Countries as having

The Dutch-Muslim Culture War
By Deborah Scroggins
The Nation
06/27/2005

Ayaan Hirsi is a woman who was raised Muslim in Somalia under full-veil. She has experienced female circumcision first-hand and is now living in the Netherlands after escaping from relatives who were taking her to the man (located in Canada) she’d been promised to as a wife.

Hirsi helped in the creation of a movie (Submission) about Islam’s oppression of women. As a result local radical Muslims have made death threats, and one of them has already killed her collaborator on the film.

The Netherlands has an immigrant population of Muslims that accounts for 5.5 percent of the population, but produces the largest number of women seeking help from battered women’s shelters and abortion clinics. There are those who would like to point to the patriarchal culture, and not the religion of Islam (which could be easily interpreted in a female-friendly way).

Some things I found interesting:
1) The most violent and radical Muslims are the one’s who were born in Europe and are disconnected from the lands of their birth. In the Netherlands, as elsewhere, the Muslim population lives in communities separate from the rest of the population, and enforces Muslim laws within their areas. Laws including honor killings are enforced among Muslims, and cause problems in the countries they live as national laws calls them murder.
2) 2) The countries facing the issue of Muslim populations, angry and disconnected youth, Muslim women getting their first taste of freedom and feminism (and the resulting problems within their community), and the fact that the European standard for working with Immigrants is to give them their own, separate, area to live and then either forget about them or make their lives difficult (or both), consists of most of Europe. The article mentions France, Germany, Holland, Switzerland, Norway, The Netherlands, and Austria.

Can it Happen Here?
By Richard Alba and Nancy Foner
The Nation
10/17/2005

The integration of church and state is a significant factor in terrorist acts performed by European Muslims due to the estrangement from the local community, the inability to build a Mosque for worship, the lack of Muslim based schools (or the ability to build them), and state mandated integration of the local religion (primarily Christianity) in all fascist of government and life.

According to this article, when immigrants of any nation arrive in a country and are not brought into the community with an ability to practice their own religion freely, they are difficult to convert into patriots of their chosen country.

Thus, the Bush administration’s push to integrate Christianity into government affairs as much as possible (and often in backdoor and sneaky ways) is inviting acts of terrorism through the estrangement of community.

Thoughts on all Three Articles:

Racial issues are obviously a worldwide concern. Trying to deal with incoming populations and the language, culture, beliefs, and struggles they bring is not easy. There are no easy answers and everyone’s sense of identity is affected or challenged.

What is French or British or German or American?

Definitions change as populations change, but change can be both messy and violent.

That said, I think it’s dangerous to say that there is one thing that causes it, or one action that will fix it. It’s never that simple and the factors affecting each country will be different – regardless if every country is working with the same population (example: Muslims).

The separation of church and state is important. When the government gets tangled up in religion and philosophy, the possibility for holy wars (both inside and outside of the country’s borders) significantly increases.

For example: How can you say you’re Irish if you’re not Catholic? How can you say you’re British if you’re not Protestant? How can the British occupying Ireland allow the Catholics to continue their Catholic ways when the British now have control and they’re all supposed to act like they’re British anyway?

A government and a culture accepting of the fact that everyone has their own traditions based on family and experience, everyone has their own spiritual path, and none of that is anyone’s problem save the person living it, would probably have an easier time of it. But, that would require acceptance of that fact on all sides.

Which affectively makes evangelical Christianity a blatant deterrent to peace between people due to it’s near obsessive emphasis on recruitment and forcing the world to always state that they are correct in whatever they may choose to believe or demand.

However, Christianity is not the only religion or culture that takes a hard nosed (arrogant?) perspective to all persons living outside of their ranks. The us-versus-them thing is a powerful force imbedded into most (if not all) religions.

How does one govern a population having problems based on culture and religion without getting involved in those religions? Particularly when some (if not all) of those religions have hateful (if not violent) opinions and reactions to other religions in their area?

This is another commentary that I will end with the words: I don’t know.

I have no brilliant answer, I’m just pointing out that there’s more to this than is currently being discussed.

The Good ‘ole Days of Spies and Intrigue are Finally Back

Revving Up the China Threat
By Michael Klare
The Nation
10/24/2005

Dragon Tales
By James Galbraith
Mother Jones
Sept/Oct, 2005

China is the new ‘evil empire.’ They’re taking away jobs, producing super low cost goods that make competition in this country difficult, and they’re building up more advanced weaponry and military power.

Oh, and they want our oil too…er, uh…the oil found in other countries that we are currently protecting and/or competing for.

I guess this means that we can all celebrate the return of old-style James Bond movies (replacing Russia with China), political insinuations of mass attack and destruction of local culture by the evil communists, and even the return of the word ‘commie’ as an insult (once the word ‘terrorist’ has lost it’s popularity).

I guess the US political structure was feeling nostalgic.

The oracle foretold the hurricane, the people did not listen, and they could not communicate when it arrived...

Reinventing 911
By Gary Wolf Wired
12/2005

Bread Roses & The Flood
By Eric Foner
The Nation
10/03/2005

Levee Town
By Alexander Cockburn
The Nation
10/03/2005

Intelligible Design
By Kathy Pollitt
The Nation
10/03/2005

Why the Hurricane Plan Got Trashed
By Peter Schwartz
Wired
11/2005

Gary Wolf, in his examination of ways in which the entire 911 system is (or could be) changing, examines the Hurricane Katrina situation from a scientific point of view. This is something that anyone who’s angry or disturbed about the hurricane should read, because it covers more than the politics and the lack of manpower into the poorer areas of New Orleans – it covers an entire communication system that went down (from the ground up as well as the top down), and several scientific warnings and what-if scenarios supplied to the city…several of which proved to be prophetic, point for point.

There are some very good points made about the insurance game weighing out the costs of prevention over the costs of post-disaster payment, as well as the simply no-longer-applicable-or-workable system of centralized and rigidly structured warning systems.

There are new systems and new ideas, some of which have been very successfully implemented in California (as earthquake prevention as well as day-to-day public safety) and none of it require new technology or billions of dollars in research. It’s a just a new way of handling communication by basing it on the idea that more people and organizations need to have immediate access to potential (and current) dangers. Organizations like schools, hospitals, the security divisions of large high-rises, and even people with cells phones and pagers who request emailed updates on anything happening in their area.

The perspective presented by the Wired article, is that the majority of the problems faced by Katrina could have been prevented through implementation of suggestions from scientists before the event occurred, and greatly helped by a simple and wide spread network of communication that would have informed most, if not all, of the citizens of New Orleans of what was about to happen (or was happening).

Scientifically speaking, it didn’t have to happen, and it could be easily avoided in the future.

Scientifically speaking, the government’s method of addressing potential terrorist attacks through increased secrecy and rigidly structured control is not only not effective, it sets us up for significant damage, should the attacks actually occur. The only safety is a safety in numbers, and that means letting the people in on what’s going on – everything that’s going on.

Peter Schwartz (Why the Hurricane Plan Got Trashed), looks at the disaster from another scientific view – the near prophetic research from scientists who have been presenting reports and warnings since the 1960s. Work that was blatantly ignored and undermined by political structures focused on short-term thinking. Bottom line, there was no one in a position of power who did not have access to information telling them exactly (point for point) what was going to happen, and none of them chose to act on the information.

The political points of view, expressed in the articles from The Nation, are focused on 1) the government’s poor handling of the situation before and after, 2) the fact that poor people were the one’s who were hit hard (non-whites who were middle to upper class got away just like the rest of the people in their income bracket), 3) the reconstruction of New Orleans will involve the take over of large quantities of land previously called home by the city’s poorest residents, as the plans for new low-income housing places those people on the outskirts of the city (conveniently falling in line with city plans and objectives that have been in place for a very long time), 4) the poor is New Orleans are a necessary low-wage source of workers, but no one wants to actually have to see them, and 5) now that the world has seen the horrors of the tragedy, and is aware of just how desperate in New Orleans are, things will begin to change.

Some of this makes sense, and some of it doesn’t.

Foner (Bread, Roses, and the Flood) compares Katrina to the Lawrence, MA strike of 1912, where the march of under-nourished, poorly clothed, and heartbreakingly poor children out of the city (in preparation for the strike, the kids were sent to live elsewhere for the duration of the negotiations), caused the public and government officials to stand up and take notice. Once the children were seen, the concerns of their families could no longer be ignored. The problem with this argument is the fact that we are not living in the world of 1912. Commercials, media, and even advertising campaigns (ever stop into a Starbucks take a look at the photos of the workers who grow the beans that make their coffee?) present similar, and sometimes worse, images every day. All of those adopt-a-child campaigns with emaciated children whose eyes and nose are covered in flies have been come both hum-drum and the source of jokes. While there are plenty of people who are related to the people in New Orleans, and the event is directly connected to our own government, it’s going to fade from the public eye (and the public memory) rather quickly. The changes that need to be made, and the issues that have been raised, in New Orleans are not going to be made during the course of a 2-3 month media blitz. And, our government officials (and the businesses that work with them) have gotten very good at making promises, and then taking actions that only seem to follow through on the promises made. The world is more complicated and more jaded than the world of 1912, and sad pictures just aren’t going to cut it.

Alexander Cockburn (Levee Town) makes a good point for the convenient nature of the hurricane to any and all developers who are looking for the opportunity to take over lands previously covered in housing owned by the poor. In his words: “The scarcely suppressed class war in New Orleans was what gave the place, and its music, its edge. And why, at least until now, the Disneyfication of the core city could never quite be consummated.” Now the city and the developers and the tourist trade kings can take over New Orleans and turn it into a year-round Marti Gras with a sterilized version of the music the city’s known for and the places it can be heard played. So, was this a planned mistake, or just happy coincidence for the ones in charge of the money and the power?

Katha Pollitt (Intelligible Design) takes the disaster and broadens the scope of the state of the nation that Katrina illustrates. She touches on education, birth control, religious fanaticism, the loss of jobs to cheaper-wages in other countries, abortion and single mothers, and the attempts on the part of government to remove itself from the business of government through excessive privatization and pandering to the wealthy elite. The country was headed for a disaster; Katrina was that disaster, now where are we headed from here?

The hurricane, like most natural disasters, was heartbreaking and full of pointing fingers. The reason it happened was up to nature (or, if you prefer, God), but the reaction was up to us. ‘Us’ is often interpreted as the government we pay for in taxes and loss of personal freedom, and there’s always a lot of time spent on ‘you were supposed to’ commentary from people concerned about things people in power really don’t spend much time on…unless, of course, it’s an election year.

I was once told a story by a professor (during my undergraduate years) that described a community that had decided to make a decision. The incidence of fetal alcohol syndrome was dangerously high, so the community had discussions and then announced to all living within the borders of their area that pregnant women will not drink – period. We can’t control what you do outside of our area, but when you’re here, you will not drink. For whatever reason, government officials came in and took the community to court based on the idea that they were violating a woman’s right to privacy. The community didn’t bother to show up to court and the government won their case. However, if you were living in that community, and you were pregnant, you did not drink. Those were the house rules – like it or leave. Fetal alcohol syndrome in that community dropped significantly and, therefore, the rules struck…government be damned.

That story has stuck with me since the day I heard it. Government is only as useful, or as powerful, as we chose to make it. Sometimes it’s safer, and more effective, to simply identify your community’s needs and address them directly…government be damned.

In this age of technology (and the relatively easy access to it) it would be merely a matter of logistics to create a people-created and people-run 911 system - a warning network more elaborate and more affective than the old phone tree idea, but similar to it in spirit.

In fact, I rather think that there are a lot of things that people rely on the government, and big business, for that could be done away with (or supplemented in case of emergency) through a little ingenuity and networking. Finances are always an issue, granted, but if something is needed badly enough, and a community recognizes the need (and the fact that they are going to have to take care of themselves if they ever want it done), there are ways around that.

The one thing that I have taken from the Katrina disaster is that it’s a dangerous thing to view your government as a safety net or a friendly ‘uncle.’ There are thousands upon thousands of communities in this country, making us a patchwork of needs, ideas, beliefs, and objectives. If each community would truly focus on the bare necessities and the needs of its people from the perspective of a worst-case scenario (read: What do we need to survive? How will we know when serious danger is afoot? How will we handle losing all services from governments and companies?), and then taking a good hard look at their immediate communities and making simple changes (in housing, in communication, in resources, in back up generators, etc), it would not only reduce the affects of disaster upon their community, it would reduce the power of government over their lives.

Of course, this is the kind of action that must come from within a community – not something that should be mandated (or financed or managed) by government. It’s not so much a suggestion for a new way to handle and govern things, as it is a recognition of the dact that we all have more power than we think we have, and taking some of that under our own control can be a good thing.

While it is important to always work for change, to never stop questioning government, and to never let them off the hook for not supplying the services they are there to supply; it’s equally important to be realistic about the bare-necessity needs of your community, and how they will be addressed should the cavalry never arrive.

Death is wrong when it's on TV

(still doing these on the fly...spellchecks will return someday, promise)

After running across a few articles on the execution of Stanley 'Tookie' Williams and doing a little thinking about the abolitionists/anti-death-penalty activists I've knoen over the years (not to mention my own back and forth opinions on the issue) I did another one of my searches for information and opinions.

The following articles cover the entire spectrum.

A Guilty Man
by Vince Beiser
Mother Jones
Sept/Oct, 2005

Vince Beiser covers the story of Bill Wiseman - the state legislator who wrote the legislation adopting lethl injection as a method of execution in Oklahoma. Wiseman is anti-death-penalty, but he'd hoped to make executions more humane. Now he feels guilty because it appears that lethal injection has made the death penalty easier to select as a punishment because it's so quiet, calm, and easy to complete as a process. No bodies swining from a rope, no burning flesh in the chair, no load noises from a fireing squad - just a criminal appearing to go to sleep. Sort of like putting a pet down, really.

Now Wiseman is a religious lader and actively working against the death penalty, while atoning for his part in making it so much easier to enact.

This also goes over how terribly painful and difficult lethal injection can be, given no doctors take part in the procedure and the injectible-drug-affected viens of many who are executed can cause the sedation and pain killing aspects of the process to fail to enter into the system properly (or at all), thereby leaving the criminal paralized (as that portion is always completed) and in excrutiating pain as the poison passes through.

The possibility for less than five minutes of fire in the veins pain is given as a strong reason for ending the death penalty.

Curiously, media are indifferent to victims
by Kerry Dougherty
The Virginia-Pilot
12/15/2005

Dougherty speaks for the victems of the murders on death row and asks why their names are not as well known, and their cause (memory) is nowhere near as well publicized, or considered to be of concern, as the criminals on death row.

How can anti-death-penalty activists forget or ignore the people who were executed by the people being executed?

Her unstated point is well taken - her's was the only article I ran accross that focused on the victems (and their names and families) specifically. Many didn't even name, much less pay tribute, to the people who died at the hands of those being executed.

While Dougherty directs her opinions at anti-death-penalty activists, she doesn't directly address the directly related issue - the complete lack of coverage in the press. The little blond girl who was a child model and murdered in her family home was splashed all over every tabloid a grocery store might carry, for months (years?) and I've purposely blocked her name so I can't tell you what it is...the point is, she's the only victem anyone really knows anything about, and that's because she was cute, she was photogrnic, and she was blond.

Hundreds Attend Rites for Stanley 'Tookie' Williams
Compiled by the Diversity Inc staff
© 2005 DiversityInc.com®
December 21, 2005

This one made me cringe. Hundreds of people showed up for the funeral of Stanley 'Tookie' Williams, including a popular rapper who read a poem insisting that this rather famous gang leader didn't do it - at which point the people in the parking lot, watching the funeral on the television stationed there, cheered.

One of many opinions I've stumbled accross insisting that because Tookie had atoned for his sins (and a wrote a few children's books) he should have been forgiven and released, not executed.

It's also one of a few articles that imply that Tookie was framed because he was black and the system doesn't like black men. There is no explanation for how he can be so clean and innocent when everyone freely admits (and even proudly declares) that he founded an extremely violent gang...do the original members of gangs start out as Eagle Scounts who just naively let bad apples join in their little club and then lose control over the actions and behavior of the people spoiling their good name?

Like it or not, agree with it or not, the fact that he was black and he was killed makes him a symbol of oppression and injustice in this country.

It is also never discussed that sometimes attoning for your past, and taking responsibility for your actions, also involves facing the consequences of those actions. Sometimes 'I'm sorry' doesn't get you off - no matter who you are.

Costs of the Death Penalty
Death Penalty Information Center
http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/

This is a listing of the costs associated with giving a convicted criminal the death penalty. If you look them over, you'll see they are quite large.

I believe that they're that large, but only because people sit on death row for decades. There is no comparison to the cost of placing someone in prison for life - particularly someone who's crimes and/or behaviors require them to be placed in a secured area away from the general population.

The crime, not his race, put Baker on death row
by Gregory Kane
Baltimore News
12/03/2005

This is the first (and only) article that I ran accross which pointedly (and directly) stated that Stanley 'Tookie' Williams came to the fate he did because of his own actions.

Kane also points out the fact that the same crime Tookie was convicted for will get you death row in one area of town, and barely a flinch (or a trial) in another. There are regions where it's safer to be a criminal than others.

Of course, if you have a large reputation, have racked up enough crimes, or hold enough criminal power, then you have this way of becoming of interested to the people in charge of sending killers to jail. Kane doesn't mention this point, but his commentary on location is clear.


OK. So, having gone over all of the above (and a few not listed above), what are my own conclusions on the topic?

I associate with left-wing politics, I think that much is clear. However, like it or not, my opinions on this topic are not very 'lefty.'

The points made about the victems gruesome and violent deaths (often taking a far longer time and involving far more torture than execution), and the fact that people who commit crimes living out the consequences of those crimes, are very much in line with what I think.

However, when it comes down to it, they are not what bother me the most. What really makes my spine itch is the focused placed on the deaths everyone can see.

I have known people who have spent time in prison. I have become good friends with people who spent a significant time in prison. I have become good friends with people who have immediate relatives in prison. Anyone who's been that close to the realities of incarceration know - people die in prison. Lot's of people die in prison and most of them are at the hands of other prisoners.

Then, there's the fact that people are murdered on the street everyday. Often, the people who find themselves in prison (regardless of how long) have been very close to murder, either through the death of someone close, or witnessing a death of someone they don't know when taht person is gunned down in front of them.

Violence is out there. So is retribution.

The strangest aspect to the death penalty (from my perspective) is the fact that death row is one of the safest places a person can be (as far as prison goes). Death row is seperate from the general population and under heavy guard (from what I understand). The chances of a death row inmate being randomly killed by another inmate in prison, are pretty slim, whereas the chance of a general population inmate dying at the hands of another inamte, are higher than the penal system would probably like known.

Add onto that the number of people tortured and killed in domestic abuse cases with murderers rarely, if ever, coming to trial because of their personal connection-relationship to the victem (as long as you marry the woman before hand, slitting her throat isn't quite as big of a deal).

And then there are the prostitutes, transients, children, and other 'invisible' people who are murdered and never noticed or investigated.

Not to mention the people who commit crimes, or murders, or otherwise offend people, and wind up dead as a matter of revenge and vigilante justice. Convicts getting out of prison have to face this on the streets. Convicts in prison have to face it from the cell block. People who've never been caught have to live with it.

Why is it better to be killed in the privacy of your own community, by fellows seeking vigilante revenge, then to be sentenced to death after a complete trial?

There's a whole lot of killing going on, but the state mandated, they-got-a-trial, make-this-as-humane-as-possible, televised on TV, wait-in-near-absolute-security-for-decades, and everyone-knows-it's-going-to-happen deaths are just to much for some people to handle.

Sometimes I think the biggest problem with the death penalty is the wait. Sentence to death and kill within a few days - that makes more sense to me...

But I'm left wing and that's a bit harsh for someone on the left.

Regardless of my opinion of time-on-death-row, I would really prefer to hear a lot less talk about execution from anti-death workers and a lot more about violence, murder, and death in our lives and our streets.

Gene testing and lawsuits - Native America waging battles

(Once again, please excuse the lack of a spellcheck - I'm doing this on the fly these days)

Blood Feud
by Brendan L. Koerner
Wired
09/2005

Accounting Coup
by Julia Whitty
Mother Jones
Sept/Oct, 2005

One of the reasons I subscribe to a variety of magazines is best illustrated by these two articles. The popular science take on the issues faced by Native Americans greatly differs from that of the liberal-activists-unionists perspective.

Koerner's focus is the genetic testing being used to define the racial history of any given person. Rick Kittles founded African Ancestry, and developed techniques have been helping African Americans find out where their roots are - which areas of the world and (at times) specific tribes.

The Native American aspect is the satus of freemen (people who were declared black by the US gov't in the 1800s) within the tribes. According to this article, the tribes are becoming rich off of the casinos and a lot of people are trying to declare themselves of native Heritage to get a peice of the financial pie. Due to politics and financial interest, tribal leaders decided to decare freemen non-native, and thre them out of their respective tribes.

The article lists many tribes affected by this issue, so the sense is that all Native American tribes are throwing out the blacks in their ranks.

To the resuce of this situation is genetic science and the man offering the define-your-bloodline service to the freemen trying to get, or get back, tribal membership.

Whitty's focus is on Elouise Cobell of the Blackfeet Nation and her fight with the US Gov't (the Bureau of Indian Affiars, specifically) to get complete documentation of monies due to the Native Americans whose lands have been 'managed' by the gov't (read: taken over, leased out to ranchers and oil tycoons, and profits taken in - yet seldom, if ever, doled back out). Elouise is an accountant and banker, she set up Native American banks (which are thriving and helping to create and support native American businesses), and is in a long-term court case to get the control over the funds into Native Hands (and away from the BIA) as well as the back money due (dateing back to the 1800s).

This article's focus is on the actions of an activist who is taking charge and making change. It's presentation of Native America is one that portrays the nations as extremly poor and very supportive of one another. One of banding together to fight poverty, lack of education, and unacceptable treatment at the hands of the gov't formed by the people who invaded and took over their land (by force).

So, which is right?

Why the drastic difference?

Science shows unacceptable splits caused by a recent flood of incoming cash that can be cured by genetics capable of proving the absolute percentage of every possible bloodline that person happens to carry. Socially-focused activism shows amazing feats of collaberation and change among people facing desperation and absolute poverty.

For absolutely no logical reason, when I read the Wired article, I had this gut response of wrongness. For some reason, I found myself thinking that their was a strong possibility that either the author greatly exageratted the situation, or he was taken for a fool. I have no proof or counter evidence to base this on, just a general sense of something not being right.

However, those interested in science are concered with genetics and their possible application.

Interesting thing - the article never goes into the potential ethical issues, of problems that might arise, from people being able to define race via a blood test. Rick Kittles is quoted as saying that massive genetic testing would prove that no one was as pure as he or she thinks they are, but that's as far as that part of the issue goes.

Whitty's article, never touches on Native American tribe's that are dealing with increases in income due to casino business, or the affect their experiences are having on the court case, native American banking, or financial issues Native Amricans, overall, are facing. Accirding to her, all native Americans are living in tiny shacks with $30 BIA checks covering their expense.

Granted, every author must make a point in a limited amount of words, but sometimes the differences in opinion are fascinating...and disturbing.

I suppose one must always keep in mind that the extremes sell, and the truth lies somewhere in between.