Some thoughts on Glenn Beck. Let’s begin with Glenn Beck on Glen Beck:
“I’m a rodeo clown,” he said in an interview, adding with a coy smile, “It takes great skill.”
And:
He added later: “I say on the air all time, ‘if you take what I say as gospel, you’re an idiot.’ ”
[Source: New York Times]
Yet his declarations are taken as absolutely true by millions. That means, according to him, those who believe absolutely in him, are idiots. Ummm...how gullible are these people?
Well, they believe that when he picked the date for his holy crusade to restore honor to a long list of stuff [and to sell gold and get richer], it was a miracle that it just happened to be the anniversary of Dr. King’s I have a Dream speech. Yes, and if Beck chose to hold a special service on December 25 using a pine tree decorated with colored lights and a star on top, it would shock him to discover that these are symbols of Christmas and that the 25th is Christmas. Who would have thought it?
What is disturbing about all this is that so many blindly follow this self declared rodeo clown. He is now proclaiming that the Holy Spirit will speak though him at the rally. Having been so successful in scamming so many, he is now entering into the highly lucrative cult con. David Koresh and Jim Jones both went this way, Jones clearly was a con man at the beginning and there is good cause for believing that Koresh was doing the same. But both came to believe they really were Prophets. It is a dangerous route. All the more dangerous because Beck already has the devotion and blind obedience of far more Americans than Koresh and Jones put together.
Am I afraid of Beck? Only for the sake of the fools who believe in him. He can’t hurt me or America much, but he can destroy their lives. They may be fools, but it is their fear that drives away their rationality. They don’t deserve whatever Beck will do to them.
Friday, August 27, 2010
Monday, August 2, 2010
Obviously, I did not reconnect two days ago to continue my side of the artistic discussion with Bobby on the book we’re working on. I had a crash and lost a day to vertigo. Still not good today, and I must rest so that I can get out tomorrow to get some dental care and pay the rent. But I want to get my ideas out for Bobby’s response.
So, the original was a play which had a number of implications for the book, if the projects are to remain connected and not be completely different. For a variety of reasons, I wish the two to remain facets of the one project. Now a play has little description beyond general suggestions for staging and sets. Yet it is a profoundly visual experience when performed. The details are left the director and the stage manager [once these were one position], in the case of school plays, the functions remain one and are filled by the teacher. Moving the play to a book means both description and art create the setting. In effect the physical artifact of the book becomes the stage.
Now, if I keep the original age target of the play, the book becomes a children's novel-- I don't actually want to go that route. Remembering that the play was intended to be performed by fifth graders, but would be seen by groups as young as third graders, I can lower the intended age to roughly 9. This allows a format I feel is suitable to the material. After all, the stories are collected from many sources. The isolation imposed on slaves both by the nature of the system of exploitation and for defensive purposes [slaveholders wanted their “property” as ignorant as possible, therefore isolation was an active technique of suppression]. The effect of all this was to make the stories of TJ [Trickster John] to be local and very personalized.
To reflect this, I intended that the play use different characters for each story, rather than one actor being John throughout. Transferring the same idea to the book, makes for an odd hybrid. Imagine a picture book, but with much more text aimed at an older audience than usual for this format. In effect, I am still staging the play, you are then bringing it to life on the stage which is the pictures floating above the text. I don’t know any book like this. It’s a rather radical proposal as far as I know -- what do you think? Can do? Or am I way off on what is reasonable to ask of an artist?
Of course, an alternative is to use the format of a graphic novel. This has the advantage of making each story its own small volume. I find this alternative quite attractive too. I would be happy to tackle either challenge, both being new to me.
I wish you lived close by. We could wrangle these issues out more collaboratively. Think about it and let me know. Early planning and intent are so important as I proceed. As many authors have commented, the characters often take a story over and it goes where you did not intend, but that comes later. I still need a clear vision of what I want to accomplish and where I am going with a story to get it started. It may morph into something completely different, but that comes with the process. I still need a focus to begin the work.
Just think about the difference between a graphic novel and the picture book I suggested first. In the picture book, I write a book which stands entirely on its own, even without illustration. I feel the illustrations are vital, but theoretically, the written work could stand alone. In a graphic novel, I would write very differently, more like a play. Description fades and the “staging” becomes the illustrations. For me as author description fades out and dialogue dominates -- you know, this may be the better format after all. A graphic novel is, in effect, a play performed by the illustrated actors. I’m inclining in this direction.
Back to the painful issues of dealing with the problems of race and resentment. As I noted before, I see no real way to avoid the straight black vs. white aspect of this in a book. As a play it was easy. Whatever class was yours for that year was your pool from which the cast was to be drawn. Had I actually staged this particular play, every child would have tried out for whatever part he or she wished. When doing a play on the origins of Santa Claus [a curricular unit, of course, with historical trends and facts beginning with Saint Nicholas in Asia Minor], a role for God was included. No, I wasn’t preaching, God was needed to work the miracle to bring “”Santa” into reality. The point is that each child who wanted that God part tried out and the best actor won. Over the years I did the play I had at least one blue eyed, one black, and one female God.
This applies to TJ. I envisioned identifying slaves and slave owners, not by the color of their skin, but by sashes, black or white. This would allow each child to try out for whatever part appealed to them and also emphasize my intent to make the story a human, rather than a racial story Humans, Black and White, have been the oppressors and the resistors throughout history. Not nice, but factual. For example, coastal tribes of Africans happily enslaved and sold their interior neighbors. Even the American slave trade, when viewed globally, was exploited for profit by both Whites and Blacks. A truth which we might work into the story, but which would be a minor point, as I know of no stories of TJ which relate to the African end of the slave trade and I want to be true to the slaves who told his stories by not inventing tales, only repeating and retelling those which they actually shared in the antebellum South.
Silly ideas like drawing in the sashes on kids drawn as actors in a play occur to me, but I feel they would simply not work. I toss it out in the spirit of the brainstorming technique in which even bad ideas can stimulate good ones in response. I can’t see injecting some nice Whites into the story. Slaves on a plantation did not experience nice whites and even many abolitionists believed that Blacks were inferior [read Frederick Douglas on Lincoln for insight into this problem]. I can’t imagine original TJ stories including nice Whites [except for the plantation children. It is an odd, but very real phenomenon which is reflected in American literature that slaves and the children of the masters sometimes formed a mutual bond. Both were harshly disciplined -- harsh for the kids, horrible for the slaves -- and were subject to the whims of the adult masters. Of course, this faded as the white children grew into slave masters themselves. Some of this is reflected in the Uncle Remus tales.] I fear the only sympathetic White characters we can allow would be the children. I know of at least one original tale in which Ol Massa’s son is kind and friendly to TJ.
Then there is the problem of writing this as a comic story for kids. The humor was original to the slave folklore, but every slave knew the horrors of slavery. That didn’t need to be detailed. It was as natural as assuming that the character breathed air and lived on land. We, however, must make it clear that slavery was horrible, yet not give our young readers nightmares. Some ideas to this end might be in the background of illustrations. A Black mother who looks at Ol Massa, Ol Miss, or another authority figure with an instinctive fear for her small child. Clutching the child in an unthinking attempt to hide it from the threat? Something you don’t notice the first time you read the story, but which becomes obvious when you look for it?
Of course, the rich, fancy clothes worn by the masters against the rags worn by the slaves tells much of the reality too.
As I have been writing it occurs to me that the graphic novel format would also allow us to keep the target age are 10-12. A real advantage in many ways. Have you discovered the Mushishi series? Both in the graphic novel and the animated versions, a great set of stories, beautifully illustrated. I loved it as animation as it makes real the thinking and culture of a people who believe in spirits. Reading the novels, I found that the author was exploring exactly that. He was reflecting and examining the world as seen by an elderly relative of his. Wonderful!
I need some input from you on how you think the illustrations should be applied. Should they be a character essential to the story as in Mushsisi, Thomas Hardy’s novels, and John Ford’s westerns? The South certainly could add to the story -- Magnolia’s and huge oaks draped with Spanish moss... you can see it in your mind. Or is it better to go to the opposite extreme and make the background fade into minor detail? Not being the one responsible for the labor of doing the drawing, I am inclined to a rich, detailed, vigorous role for the settings. However, I am also picturing a sort of Mushishi style drawing. More pencil sketch, but detailed, than painting or watercolor. Or like the animated Mushishsi, lots of color with the same feel...
And should TJ be one character as normal story telling requires? Or should he change form story to story as happened since this was real folklore. He didn’t even have one name, being crated fresh within every group of slaves who told his tales.
Well, lots ideas here. I was thinking out loud in this entry, so forgive my chaotic style. I am very anxious to have your response. This project is really exciting me. I believe this can be a great work for both of us. That does not mean it will ever be published. I have no faith in the wisdom of publishers. Remember that Geisell, aka, Dr. Seuss, was rejected by almost 30 publishers before he found someone who thought his work was worth taking the financial risk of publishing it. Publishers also prefer to buy an author’s work, then add the illustrator they like or vice versa. Well, what happens happens. Getting published is a surprising extra for me. I am enjoying this already. The creation is what matters. As for the rest? Que serra, serra.
http://www.animecastle.com/c-23191-mushishi-graphic-novels.aspx
http://www.google.com/search?q=mushishi+episode+1&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7&rlz=1I7GGLL_en
So, the original was a play which had a number of implications for the book, if the projects are to remain connected and not be completely different. For a variety of reasons, I wish the two to remain facets of the one project. Now a play has little description beyond general suggestions for staging and sets. Yet it is a profoundly visual experience when performed. The details are left the director and the stage manager [once these were one position], in the case of school plays, the functions remain one and are filled by the teacher. Moving the play to a book means both description and art create the setting. In effect the physical artifact of the book becomes the stage.
Now, if I keep the original age target of the play, the book becomes a children's novel-- I don't actually want to go that route. Remembering that the play was intended to be performed by fifth graders, but would be seen by groups as young as third graders, I can lower the intended age to roughly 9. This allows a format I feel is suitable to the material. After all, the stories are collected from many sources. The isolation imposed on slaves both by the nature of the system of exploitation and for defensive purposes [slaveholders wanted their “property” as ignorant as possible, therefore isolation was an active technique of suppression]. The effect of all this was to make the stories of TJ [Trickster John] to be local and very personalized.
To reflect this, I intended that the play use different characters for each story, rather than one actor being John throughout. Transferring the same idea to the book, makes for an odd hybrid. Imagine a picture book, but with much more text aimed at an older audience than usual for this format. In effect, I am still staging the play, you are then bringing it to life on the stage which is the pictures floating above the text. I don’t know any book like this. It’s a rather radical proposal as far as I know -- what do you think? Can do? Or am I way off on what is reasonable to ask of an artist?
Of course, an alternative is to use the format of a graphic novel. This has the advantage of making each story its own small volume. I find this alternative quite attractive too. I would be happy to tackle either challenge, both being new to me.
I wish you lived close by. We could wrangle these issues out more collaboratively. Think about it and let me know. Early planning and intent are so important as I proceed. As many authors have commented, the characters often take a story over and it goes where you did not intend, but that comes later. I still need a clear vision of what I want to accomplish and where I am going with a story to get it started. It may morph into something completely different, but that comes with the process. I still need a focus to begin the work.
Just think about the difference between a graphic novel and the picture book I suggested first. In the picture book, I write a book which stands entirely on its own, even without illustration. I feel the illustrations are vital, but theoretically, the written work could stand alone. In a graphic novel, I would write very differently, more like a play. Description fades and the “staging” becomes the illustrations. For me as author description fades out and dialogue dominates -- you know, this may be the better format after all. A graphic novel is, in effect, a play performed by the illustrated actors. I’m inclining in this direction.
Back to the painful issues of dealing with the problems of race and resentment. As I noted before, I see no real way to avoid the straight black vs. white aspect of this in a book. As a play it was easy. Whatever class was yours for that year was your pool from which the cast was to be drawn. Had I actually staged this particular play, every child would have tried out for whatever part he or she wished. When doing a play on the origins of Santa Claus [a curricular unit, of course, with historical trends and facts beginning with Saint Nicholas in Asia Minor], a role for God was included. No, I wasn’t preaching, God was needed to work the miracle to bring “”Santa” into reality. The point is that each child who wanted that God part tried out and the best actor won. Over the years I did the play I had at least one blue eyed, one black, and one female God.
This applies to TJ. I envisioned identifying slaves and slave owners, not by the color of their skin, but by sashes, black or white. This would allow each child to try out for whatever part appealed to them and also emphasize my intent to make the story a human, rather than a racial story Humans, Black and White, have been the oppressors and the resistors throughout history. Not nice, but factual. For example, coastal tribes of Africans happily enslaved and sold their interior neighbors. Even the American slave trade, when viewed globally, was exploited for profit by both Whites and Blacks. A truth which we might work into the story, but which would be a minor point, as I know of no stories of TJ which relate to the African end of the slave trade and I want to be true to the slaves who told his stories by not inventing tales, only repeating and retelling those which they actually shared in the antebellum South.
Silly ideas like drawing in the sashes on kids drawn as actors in a play occur to me, but I feel they would simply not work. I toss it out in the spirit of the brainstorming technique in which even bad ideas can stimulate good ones in response. I can’t see injecting some nice Whites into the story. Slaves on a plantation did not experience nice whites and even many abolitionists believed that Blacks were inferior [read Frederick Douglas on Lincoln for insight into this problem]. I can’t imagine original TJ stories including nice Whites [except for the plantation children. It is an odd, but very real phenomenon which is reflected in American literature that slaves and the children of the masters sometimes formed a mutual bond. Both were harshly disciplined -- harsh for the kids, horrible for the slaves -- and were subject to the whims of the adult masters. Of course, this faded as the white children grew into slave masters themselves. Some of this is reflected in the Uncle Remus tales.] I fear the only sympathetic White characters we can allow would be the children. I know of at least one original tale in which Ol Massa’s son is kind and friendly to TJ.
Then there is the problem of writing this as a comic story for kids. The humor was original to the slave folklore, but every slave knew the horrors of slavery. That didn’t need to be detailed. It was as natural as assuming that the character breathed air and lived on land. We, however, must make it clear that slavery was horrible, yet not give our young readers nightmares. Some ideas to this end might be in the background of illustrations. A Black mother who looks at Ol Massa, Ol Miss, or another authority figure with an instinctive fear for her small child. Clutching the child in an unthinking attempt to hide it from the threat? Something you don’t notice the first time you read the story, but which becomes obvious when you look for it?
Of course, the rich, fancy clothes worn by the masters against the rags worn by the slaves tells much of the reality too.
As I have been writing it occurs to me that the graphic novel format would also allow us to keep the target age are 10-12. A real advantage in many ways. Have you discovered the Mushishi series? Both in the graphic novel and the animated versions, a great set of stories, beautifully illustrated. I loved it as animation as it makes real the thinking and culture of a people who believe in spirits. Reading the novels, I found that the author was exploring exactly that. He was reflecting and examining the world as seen by an elderly relative of his. Wonderful!
I need some input from you on how you think the illustrations should be applied. Should they be a character essential to the story as in Mushsisi, Thomas Hardy’s novels, and John Ford’s westerns? The South certainly could add to the story -- Magnolia’s and huge oaks draped with Spanish moss... you can see it in your mind. Or is it better to go to the opposite extreme and make the background fade into minor detail? Not being the one responsible for the labor of doing the drawing, I am inclined to a rich, detailed, vigorous role for the settings. However, I am also picturing a sort of Mushishi style drawing. More pencil sketch, but detailed, than painting or watercolor. Or like the animated Mushishsi, lots of color with the same feel...
And should TJ be one character as normal story telling requires? Or should he change form story to story as happened since this was real folklore. He didn’t even have one name, being crated fresh within every group of slaves who told his tales.
Well, lots ideas here. I was thinking out loud in this entry, so forgive my chaotic style. I am very anxious to have your response. This project is really exciting me. I believe this can be a great work for both of us. That does not mean it will ever be published. I have no faith in the wisdom of publishers. Remember that Geisell, aka, Dr. Seuss, was rejected by almost 30 publishers before he found someone who thought his work was worth taking the financial risk of publishing it. Publishers also prefer to buy an author’s work, then add the illustrator they like or vice versa. Well, what happens happens. Getting published is a surprising extra for me. I am enjoying this already. The creation is what matters. As for the rest? Que serra, serra.
http://www.animecastle.com/c-23191-mushishi-graphic-novels.aspx
http://www.google.com/search?q=mushishi+episode+1&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7&rlz=1I7GGLL_en
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Post for Bobby, but interesting to all [maybe]:
About our Trickster John project -- I have no current title so TJ will do. To repeat what we discussed in person: Years ago I wrote a play for 5th or 6th grade. It was intended as the core of a curricular unit on slavery. I have always been interested in folklore , and when I took a course on the subject I learned that much of what I had loved was fakelore, usually invented by corporations to support their destructive habits and predatory ways. [ex: John Bunyon was created by logging companies to justify the rape of our natural resources. Only one actual folk tale featuring him could be found, and it was derivative and pornographic.]
Research into slave tales collected by ethnographers from those who had actually suffered under the South’s Noble Cause revealed a large collection of stories in the trickster mode. Most, if not all, societies have these tales. They range from Jack in the Germanic/English tradition; to Coyote or Raven in the Americas; to Anansi, who, Wikipedia informs me, is of West African origin. Torn from their native lands and cultures and forced into artificial groupings by the plantation system, the new Americans kept their old culture as alive as they could. One way was to turn old folk tales into new versions which reflected the horrors of captivity.
We all know of Brer Rabbit. Joel Chandler Harris’ character was based on actual slave tales, but Harris could not avoid racist assumptions, including a sense of Black inferiority. The tales of the character I prefer, sometimes called John, often called by many other names, were more edgy and often aimed at belittling and insulting Ol Massa and Ol Miss and other White authority figures. If Harris was told of these tales [and that is very unlikely], he was either incapable of or unwilling to repeat stories which suggested that the slaves could outsmart their White oppressors and strike back with demeaning stories about how smart a slave could be and how gullible a master often was. Think Hogan's Heroes with a sharp cutting edge.
I’ll do the re-write, unfortunately I haven’t yet found the play. I may have to start from scratch. You do the drawings. Which brings me to the purpose of this entry. I have asked you to join me in this project and that makes us partners. Should this ever be sold, we will simply split any royalties. The only problem that might arrive is if we disagree on contract terms with a publisher. Since these tend to be standardized, I don’t expect a problem. I will hold the copyright on the words, you on the art.
So, if we are to be coworkers, cocreators? coartists? artistes? Who cares? If we are to work together, let’s agree that you have the absolute final word on art and I on wording. Still, we need to work together. I suggest that we freely accept mutual critiques, but never forget who commands which portion and therefore has the final say.
All the verbiage in the paragraph above is an excuse for me to step outside the boundaries of common sense and discuss the artwork with you. Since my drawing skills are at a third grade level at best, this is extremely presumptuous of me, but you don’t mind. Do you?
If you do, stop reading now! You have been warned!
Continuing to read past this point constitutes complete acceptance of the above terms and conditions; plus any others I can think of later.
It’s OK, you can trust me.
Honest. You really can.
Of course, thousands of children's books go out to publishers every year. The whole issue is dependent upon many factors beyond our control, but who knows? It might sell.
So, to get to the grit and grind: The story is potentially divisive. It could be read as an attack on Whites, rather than on the White Supremacists who actually committed the crimes of slavery. It could also make slavery look fun and amusing. Here lie Scylla and Charybdis. We must navigate carefully. The point of the story, from my point of view, is to communicate nothing about Blacks or Whites, but instead to convey the inherent dignity and sense of personal value natural to all humanity. Unfortunately, slavery, which started largely nonracial, became purely racial as time wore on. While a form of white slavery found in bonded servants [one which reflected the biblical requirement that slaves eventually be freed], and slavery involving Amerinds faded, the Black/White version persisted and still haunts us today.
So why even go there? Because the issue is real and must be faced. I love both German and Japanese culture. Yet I feel the Germans have truly repented of the horrors their ancestors perpetrated in WW II, and made what repentance can be made, out of a genuine sense of contrition. A few [very few] Jews have actually emigrated back to their ancestral homes in Germany.
But, as much as I love Japan and her people, Japanese politics are still dominated by secret and powerful right wing groups which feel no remorse for the war or the atrocities committed during it. The issue is very complex, with most young Japanese as blissfully unaware of their past as most young Americans are of slavery [well, nonBlack young Americans anyway]. There are also many Japanese who are aware and wish to make appropriate acts of contrition and reconciliation with the world. For this, I hold Japan accountable. Not because they were worse than the Nazis, but because the nation remains sharply divided over the issue with many believing to this day that Japan was forced to go to war by United States’ aggression!
I see in Japan much of what I see in America. We need to face the horrors of slavery and make sincere acts of condition and reconciliation. We are better about it now than we were when I was child. I still recall the textbooks in school when Dad was stationed in Biloxi, Mississippi. They showed happy slaves who were well treated and benefited greatly from the benign rule of their masters. As I recall, the point was actually made that they were better off here than in Africa. God, it was sickening! Even at that age I knew it was a horrible lie.
Still, we have hardly faced our ugly past as well as the Germans have faced theirs. Worse, they have done so in only 60 years. We have had since 1865 to do so. I love my country too much to ignore this oversight. Curricula no longer justify slavery. Many teachers do fine units on the subject which are entirely fair and honest [within the context of the tender age of the children being taught. There are limits to what can be told to a child.] I recall a school wide project at Westside in which “slaves” escaped and were hunted by “slave catchers” It was fun, yes, but no one pretended that in real life there had been any joy in it for the escapees. Man, I have to pause and say, I had a fine staff back in those days. Genuinely great teachers who cared and made a real difference. I miss working with such people. That’s why I want to work with you on this.
My point is, great teaching notwithstanding, as a society we look a lot like Japan. Some of us, of all races, have and will continue to deal with the ugly past. Others, like the Texas Board of Education, want to rewrite history and make it clear that slavery was a minor and forgettable blip in American perfection and holiness. This work is, to me, a statement of man’s struggle for freedom and dignity under any conditions and a reaffirmation of the need for redemption.
How’s that for an inflated sense of self importance? I work at it.
Before I got deflected into all the verbiage above, I was going to talk about details. This is already too long for a blog entry, so I’ll make a second one later today for those details.
About our Trickster John project -- I have no current title so TJ will do. To repeat what we discussed in person: Years ago I wrote a play for 5th or 6th grade. It was intended as the core of a curricular unit on slavery. I have always been interested in folklore , and when I took a course on the subject I learned that much of what I had loved was fakelore, usually invented by corporations to support their destructive habits and predatory ways. [ex: John Bunyon was created by logging companies to justify the rape of our natural resources. Only one actual folk tale featuring him could be found, and it was derivative and pornographic.]
Research into slave tales collected by ethnographers from those who had actually suffered under the South’s Noble Cause revealed a large collection of stories in the trickster mode. Most, if not all, societies have these tales. They range from Jack in the Germanic/English tradition; to Coyote or Raven in the Americas; to Anansi, who, Wikipedia informs me, is of West African origin. Torn from their native lands and cultures and forced into artificial groupings by the plantation system, the new Americans kept their old culture as alive as they could. One way was to turn old folk tales into new versions which reflected the horrors of captivity.
We all know of Brer Rabbit. Joel Chandler Harris’ character was based on actual slave tales, but Harris could not avoid racist assumptions, including a sense of Black inferiority. The tales of the character I prefer, sometimes called John, often called by many other names, were more edgy and often aimed at belittling and insulting Ol Massa and Ol Miss and other White authority figures. If Harris was told of these tales [and that is very unlikely], he was either incapable of or unwilling to repeat stories which suggested that the slaves could outsmart their White oppressors and strike back with demeaning stories about how smart a slave could be and how gullible a master often was. Think Hogan's Heroes with a sharp cutting edge.
I’ll do the re-write, unfortunately I haven’t yet found the play. I may have to start from scratch. You do the drawings. Which brings me to the purpose of this entry. I have asked you to join me in this project and that makes us partners. Should this ever be sold, we will simply split any royalties. The only problem that might arrive is if we disagree on contract terms with a publisher. Since these tend to be standardized, I don’t expect a problem. I will hold the copyright on the words, you on the art.
So, if we are to be coworkers, cocreators? coartists? artistes? Who cares? If we are to work together, let’s agree that you have the absolute final word on art and I on wording. Still, we need to work together. I suggest that we freely accept mutual critiques, but never forget who commands which portion and therefore has the final say.
All the verbiage in the paragraph above is an excuse for me to step outside the boundaries of common sense and discuss the artwork with you. Since my drawing skills are at a third grade level at best, this is extremely presumptuous of me, but you don’t mind. Do you?
If you do, stop reading now! You have been warned!
Continuing to read past this point constitutes complete acceptance of the above terms and conditions; plus any others I can think of later.
It’s OK, you can trust me.
Honest. You really can.
Of course, thousands of children's books go out to publishers every year. The whole issue is dependent upon many factors beyond our control, but who knows? It might sell.
So, to get to the grit and grind: The story is potentially divisive. It could be read as an attack on Whites, rather than on the White Supremacists who actually committed the crimes of slavery. It could also make slavery look fun and amusing. Here lie Scylla and Charybdis. We must navigate carefully. The point of the story, from my point of view, is to communicate nothing about Blacks or Whites, but instead to convey the inherent dignity and sense of personal value natural to all humanity. Unfortunately, slavery, which started largely nonracial, became purely racial as time wore on. While a form of white slavery found in bonded servants [one which reflected the biblical requirement that slaves eventually be freed], and slavery involving Amerinds faded, the Black/White version persisted and still haunts us today.
So why even go there? Because the issue is real and must be faced. I love both German and Japanese culture. Yet I feel the Germans have truly repented of the horrors their ancestors perpetrated in WW II, and made what repentance can be made, out of a genuine sense of contrition. A few [very few] Jews have actually emigrated back to their ancestral homes in Germany.
But, as much as I love Japan and her people, Japanese politics are still dominated by secret and powerful right wing groups which feel no remorse for the war or the atrocities committed during it. The issue is very complex, with most young Japanese as blissfully unaware of their past as most young Americans are of slavery [well, nonBlack young Americans anyway]. There are also many Japanese who are aware and wish to make appropriate acts of contrition and reconciliation with the world. For this, I hold Japan accountable. Not because they were worse than the Nazis, but because the nation remains sharply divided over the issue with many believing to this day that Japan was forced to go to war by United States’ aggression!
I see in Japan much of what I see in America. We need to face the horrors of slavery and make sincere acts of condition and reconciliation. We are better about it now than we were when I was child. I still recall the textbooks in school when Dad was stationed in Biloxi, Mississippi. They showed happy slaves who were well treated and benefited greatly from the benign rule of their masters. As I recall, the point was actually made that they were better off here than in Africa. God, it was sickening! Even at that age I knew it was a horrible lie.
Still, we have hardly faced our ugly past as well as the Germans have faced theirs. Worse, they have done so in only 60 years. We have had since 1865 to do so. I love my country too much to ignore this oversight. Curricula no longer justify slavery. Many teachers do fine units on the subject which are entirely fair and honest [within the context of the tender age of the children being taught. There are limits to what can be told to a child.] I recall a school wide project at Westside in which “slaves” escaped and were hunted by “slave catchers” It was fun, yes, but no one pretended that in real life there had been any joy in it for the escapees. Man, I have to pause and say, I had a fine staff back in those days. Genuinely great teachers who cared and made a real difference. I miss working with such people. That’s why I want to work with you on this.
My point is, great teaching notwithstanding, as a society we look a lot like Japan. Some of us, of all races, have and will continue to deal with the ugly past. Others, like the Texas Board of Education, want to rewrite history and make it clear that slavery was a minor and forgettable blip in American perfection and holiness. This work is, to me, a statement of man’s struggle for freedom and dignity under any conditions and a reaffirmation of the need for redemption.
How’s that for an inflated sense of self importance? I work at it.
Before I got deflected into all the verbiage above, I was going to talk about details. This is already too long for a blog entry, so I’ll make a second one later today for those details.
Thursday, July 8, 2010
A few odds and ends:
Bobby, I have hope that I might yet be able to create those three art works I once described to you. I have no talent, but have been aware of the potential of "printers" which build up a three dimensional object layer by layer. The technology was not mature but was very expensive. Today, a home kit of the device is available. still rather costly at $750, but affordable. it can only create small objects, but it is a start.
I recall reading in the L A Times when I was in high school that there was too little water available to sustain a continually growing Southern California. Today we are suffering for ignoring what was well known to experts 40 years ago. In Monday's Times, an editorial comment on the water problem noted that Wesley Powell publicly declared, "Gentlemen, you are pilling up a heritage of conflict and litigation over water rights, for there is not sufficient water to supply the land." He was shouted down. This happened in 1893.
Today the superstitious, who prefer comforting advertising style sound bites to reality, refuse to believe in global warming. Here we go again.
The July/August issue of Skeptical Inquirer has an article entitled, Blindsided by a Culture of Disinformation by Alan J. Scott. and has, in its follow up section, another article entitled the Twenty Year Effort to Create Doubt about [sic.] Climate Change by John R. Mashey. Interesting articles, anyone who is interested can find the facts quite easily, so I won’t sum them up. the simple fact is that there is no serious scientific doubt about climate change, but more and more Americans are fooled by the noise of the deceivers into doubting reality.
I feel that the situation is well defined by the movie, The Day the Earth Stood Still. I love the original, and was very worried about a remake, but I found that I liked the new version. The point of the movie was that we humans are shortsighted, even self destructive in our refusal to face reality; but when the crisis becomes undeniable we muster our resources and make astounding efforts to correct the problem. Of course, it would have been cheaper and much easier to avoid it in the first place, but that is not how we function in a large group. To put it another way, we are very gullible and very easily conned, but eventually we manage to figure out what was obvious all along.
This offers hope, but the damage we are doing to the environment on many levels is very dangerous. We cannot simply assume that fixing our errors will be easy, or even possible. Still, hope exists.
Bobby, I have hope that I might yet be able to create those three art works I once described to you. I have no talent, but have been aware of the potential of "printers" which build up a three dimensional object layer by layer. The technology was not mature but was very expensive. Today, a home kit of the device is available. still rather costly at $750, but affordable. it can only create small objects, but it is a start.
I recall reading in the L A Times when I was in high school that there was too little water available to sustain a continually growing Southern California. Today we are suffering for ignoring what was well known to experts 40 years ago. In Monday's Times, an editorial comment on the water problem noted that Wesley Powell publicly declared, "Gentlemen, you are pilling up a heritage of conflict and litigation over water rights, for there is not sufficient water to supply the land." He was shouted down. This happened in 1893.
Today the superstitious, who prefer comforting advertising style sound bites to reality, refuse to believe in global warming. Here we go again.
The July/August issue of Skeptical Inquirer has an article entitled, Blindsided by a Culture of Disinformation by Alan J. Scott. and has, in its follow up section, another article entitled the Twenty Year Effort to Create Doubt about [sic.] Climate Change by John R. Mashey. Interesting articles, anyone who is interested can find the facts quite easily, so I won’t sum them up. the simple fact is that there is no serious scientific doubt about climate change, but more and more Americans are fooled by the noise of the deceivers into doubting reality.
I feel that the situation is well defined by the movie, The Day the Earth Stood Still. I love the original, and was very worried about a remake, but I found that I liked the new version. The point of the movie was that we humans are shortsighted, even self destructive in our refusal to face reality; but when the crisis becomes undeniable we muster our resources and make astounding efforts to correct the problem. Of course, it would have been cheaper and much easier to avoid it in the first place, but that is not how we function in a large group. To put it another way, we are very gullible and very easily conned, but eventually we manage to figure out what was obvious all along.
This offers hope, but the damage we are doing to the environment on many levels is very dangerous. We cannot simply assume that fixing our errors will be easy, or even possible. Still, hope exists.
Friday, June 25, 2010
On the McChrystal flap:
A couple of points force their way to my consciousness.
One: McChrystal's early judgment of Obama. He indicated that he felt the President was weak and intimidated in the presence of so many senior officers at an early meeting. This obviously laid the foundation for his later contempt of Presidential authority. I am inevitably reminded of Nikita Khrushchev's similar dismissal of Kennedy as weak and easily dominated. Both assessments were wrong and both men suffered for misjudging their opponent. [This actually points up a serious problem in the American military which I was pleased to see reflected in a recent L A Times editorial. More on this below.]
Lest any right wing extremist ever hear of this [yeah, that’s likely], let me point out that I am making a comparison only between the dangers of collecting bad intelligence data and underestimating your enemy, not saying anything about McChrystal's political inclinations. I find it sad that our nation is so polarized that I have to state that obvious fact.
Two: McChrystal's excellence as a military commander is surpassed only by his incompetence in dealing with the press and public, not to mention his superiors. Reminds me of Patton. One of the greatest generals of the war, feared more than any other allied commander by the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW) , Patton nevertheless managed to get himself fired more than once due to his in ability to accept his subordinate status and to make politically wise decisions. No, I don't think McChrystal's abilities rise to Patton's, but he is fine general in strictly tactical terms.
In summation, everyone needs to recall that McChrystal's actions were in direct violation of military law. The Uniform code of Military Justice prescribes a court martial for what McChyrstal did. The president did the right thing in not pursuing this option, but he could have done so.
Now to the issue of greatest importance. Anyone who is watching the Religious Right and the growing extremism which is seducing the Republican Party knows that the United States Military has become more and more political. The times editorial pointed out that until after WW II, many serving officers declined to vote in national elections. They felt that they need to remain pure in their service to their country and that to vote for a President would pollute that purity by making them partisan. Now that’s honor.
Today the military academies are struggling to end the prejudice in favor of fundamental evangelical Christianity and the pressure placed on plebes to join that sect and the Republican Party. This is fundamentally in contradiction to the most essential concepts of honor and duty as understood by our military for all its history. Yes, there are political and politicized generals, ranging for the mutinous [justifiably mutinous] revolutionary officers who wanted to rise up against Congress [some things never change], to political incompetents appointed by senators during the Civil War to the self serving presidential ambitions of McArthur, but the record as a whole is absolutely clear. Serving military officers must not become involved in politics.
The Times editorial indicated that much of the fault lies in poor training in this essential concept. I am certain that this is correct, but more fundamental is the leadership, both civilian and military. Flag rank officers lead by example. A politically motivated and directed senior officer demonstrates that this attitude is not only acceptable, but normative. Still, I feel the civilian authority is most at fault here. And more than anyone else I blame President Clinton.
When the military began to openly show contempt and disrespect to him, he needed to call in America’s military leaders and, as service men are apt to say, chew him some ass. By not forcing this issue and demanding the respect that the office of President of the United States demands, especially of it military, he gave covert permission to act in this manner. The rot was already present, but he permitted it to stay and therefore spread.
Once or twice, I happened to be around when Dad chewed him some ass. I hated it. Being a nonconflict sort of kid I thought Dad was being horrible. In retrospect, I realize that the officer who doesn’t at least occasionally dress down his subordinates, when justified, of course, will have no respect. While the President is not an officer, he is more, much more. He is the head of State, the representative of the American people. Respect is not optional. Obedience is not a decision to be made. If we permit these basic functions of a citizen army to become a choice, American will become another banana republic with every colonel dreaming of the day when he will El Presidente.
Do I fear for the Republic? Not at all. In my 6 decades plus as an
American I have only truly feared for our survival twice. One during the Cuban missile crisis, when I feared nuclear war would reduce not only our nation, but humanity to rubble and during Georgie Porgy's second term when the Religious Right looked like they would become the American ayatollah's who would decide who was and was not permitted to run for public office. Even during that second event, I decided there was nothing for fear unless Bush was replaced by another agent of religious oppression. When the Terry Shaivo case exploded and the Republicans began scrambling to lie their way out of their earlier extremist positions, I knew I had underestimated my fellow Americans. We will tolerate a certain level of abuse of authority, and no more.
When Obama replaced Bush, it was clear that I had done what I usually condemn. I allowed a brief political movement to seem to me to be a serious change in the nature of American democracy. My error.
All the problems we face are real and serious. I do not belittle them, but I am confident that we will solve them and that our nation will continue to inspire the world. No nation lasts forever, but we are here for the immediate future. Immediate future in this case means for this century at least, and I’d confidently bet on the next couple of centuries as well.
A couple of points force their way to my consciousness.
One: McChrystal's early judgment of Obama. He indicated that he felt the President was weak and intimidated in the presence of so many senior officers at an early meeting. This obviously laid the foundation for his later contempt of Presidential authority. I am inevitably reminded of Nikita Khrushchev's similar dismissal of Kennedy as weak and easily dominated. Both assessments were wrong and both men suffered for misjudging their opponent. [This actually points up a serious problem in the American military which I was pleased to see reflected in a recent L A Times editorial. More on this below.]
Lest any right wing extremist ever hear of this [yeah, that’s likely], let me point out that I am making a comparison only between the dangers of collecting bad intelligence data and underestimating your enemy, not saying anything about McChrystal's political inclinations. I find it sad that our nation is so polarized that I have to state that obvious fact.
Two: McChrystal's excellence as a military commander is surpassed only by his incompetence in dealing with the press and public, not to mention his superiors. Reminds me of Patton. One of the greatest generals of the war, feared more than any other allied commander by the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW) , Patton nevertheless managed to get himself fired more than once due to his in ability to accept his subordinate status and to make politically wise decisions. No, I don't think McChrystal's abilities rise to Patton's, but he is fine general in strictly tactical terms.
In summation, everyone needs to recall that McChrystal's actions were in direct violation of military law. The Uniform code of Military Justice prescribes a court martial for what McChyrstal did. The president did the right thing in not pursuing this option, but he could have done so.
Now to the issue of greatest importance. Anyone who is watching the Religious Right and the growing extremism which is seducing the Republican Party knows that the United States Military has become more and more political. The times editorial pointed out that until after WW II, many serving officers declined to vote in national elections. They felt that they need to remain pure in their service to their country and that to vote for a President would pollute that purity by making them partisan. Now that’s honor.
Today the military academies are struggling to end the prejudice in favor of fundamental evangelical Christianity and the pressure placed on plebes to join that sect and the Republican Party. This is fundamentally in contradiction to the most essential concepts of honor and duty as understood by our military for all its history. Yes, there are political and politicized generals, ranging for the mutinous [justifiably mutinous] revolutionary officers who wanted to rise up against Congress [some things never change], to political incompetents appointed by senators during the Civil War to the self serving presidential ambitions of McArthur, but the record as a whole is absolutely clear. Serving military officers must not become involved in politics.
The Times editorial indicated that much of the fault lies in poor training in this essential concept. I am certain that this is correct, but more fundamental is the leadership, both civilian and military. Flag rank officers lead by example. A politically motivated and directed senior officer demonstrates that this attitude is not only acceptable, but normative. Still, I feel the civilian authority is most at fault here. And more than anyone else I blame President Clinton.
When the military began to openly show contempt and disrespect to him, he needed to call in America’s military leaders and, as service men are apt to say, chew him some ass. By not forcing this issue and demanding the respect that the office of President of the United States demands, especially of it military, he gave covert permission to act in this manner. The rot was already present, but he permitted it to stay and therefore spread.
Once or twice, I happened to be around when Dad chewed him some ass. I hated it. Being a nonconflict sort of kid I thought Dad was being horrible. In retrospect, I realize that the officer who doesn’t at least occasionally dress down his subordinates, when justified, of course, will have no respect. While the President is not an officer, he is more, much more. He is the head of State, the representative of the American people. Respect is not optional. Obedience is not a decision to be made. If we permit these basic functions of a citizen army to become a choice, American will become another banana republic with every colonel dreaming of the day when he will El Presidente.
Do I fear for the Republic? Not at all. In my 6 decades plus as an
American I have only truly feared for our survival twice. One during the Cuban missile crisis, when I feared nuclear war would reduce not only our nation, but humanity to rubble and during Georgie Porgy's second term when the Religious Right looked like they would become the American ayatollah's who would decide who was and was not permitted to run for public office. Even during that second event, I decided there was nothing for fear unless Bush was replaced by another agent of religious oppression. When the Terry Shaivo case exploded and the Republicans began scrambling to lie their way out of their earlier extremist positions, I knew I had underestimated my fellow Americans. We will tolerate a certain level of abuse of authority, and no more.
When Obama replaced Bush, it was clear that I had done what I usually condemn. I allowed a brief political movement to seem to me to be a serious change in the nature of American democracy. My error.
All the problems we face are real and serious. I do not belittle them, but I am confident that we will solve them and that our nation will continue to inspire the world. No nation lasts forever, but we are here for the immediate future. Immediate future in this case means for this century at least, and I’d confidently bet on the next couple of centuries as well.
Saturday, June 12, 2010
A continuation of the May 24th 2010 entry and comment by Bobby [keywords economics and Plutocracy]:
"ambit"--nice word. I'll try to remember that. Actually, I am not so anti-wealth as I may have seemed. My objection is that the rich have taken control of the government and intend to use it to adjust society to insure that their wealth is protected. This is presented as a function of free enterprise when it is the opposite. Freedom to succeed necessitates the freedom to fail.
I do not begrudge Bill Gates his wealth. I do begrudge the concept of a new aristocracy which is entitled to wealth, not by ability, but by birth.
As far as your concern not with , "income inequality in our country, but the poverty line and the portion of society below it." I am in agreement with you. The ancient Greek conceptualization of an enforced poverty is going too far. As you probably know, it was considered an offense against the gods and your fellow citizens to become too wealthy. A citizen who attained an excess of wealth, as perceived by his peers, was expected to donate that excess to the city in the form of public buildings or the maintenance of one or more soldiers for its defense. To fail to do so was to be seen as an outcast who thought of himself as superior to his fellow Greeks.
I believe instead that society, through its tool of government, needs to insure that the rules are equally and fairly applied to all citizens. No one gets a free pass to wealth or power, not even via your successful parent. Of course, it is human to provide for your children, and, of course, this means that being born to privilege will always have its effect. But this is different from a system which is fine tuned to keeping wealth in the hands of the select few and therefore, inevitably, out of the hands of everyone else.
What we need, then, is to insure that no one, especially children, are forced to go to bed hungry, or to shiver in the cold, or to be denied medical care. We also need to provide an excellent, tax payer supported, education system that reaches at least to Bachelor's level. This is not to deny the existence of private colleges and universities, which will, naturally, be used by the wealthy to give their offspring a boost up in the world. I don't think everyone has a right to wealth, only to the basic minimums which give one the tools necessary to have a fair chance at building wealth.
I have heard the statements that the mere existence of great wealth is a form of social obscenity. This assumes that if someone lives in a state of excess while others live in deprivation, the discontinuity is intolerable. I do not agree. Back in the early 90’s, I recall an author who declared that the only way to live justly was for everyone in the world to accept poverty. In his conceptualization, America, Europe, and Japan would need to accept a sharply restricted diet and life style so that the wealth could be evenly distributed among the world’s people. He acknowledged that everyone in the world would be poor, but felt that this was justified since everyone would be equally poor. [Anyone recall his name or that of his book?]
His reasoning was flawed in several ways. First, he ignored human self interest. Love or despise this drive, it is real and asking people to deny it is to ask them to cease to be human and to become some other species. What species, I can’t imagine, as this is an evolutionary force. Not a natural species then, but something engineered.
Second, he ignored the equal, or perhaps more powerful, urge to provide for and advance the interests of your own children and relatives. Even in social insects, it has been proven that what appears as sacrifice for the good of the hive is really sacrifice for the genes of your relatives. Again, he dreams, as utopians do, of over riding human nature for the sake of his vision of the ideal, or at least the much improved social order.
In short, he imagines that everyone will work for the benefit of others. First Worlders, he thinks, will struggle and sacrifice their own health to feed strangers on the far side of the globe. Utopians often fall into this trap. The simple fact is that we while are a social species and do care about the suffering of strangers, we care much more about ourselves and our children.
Finally, he ignores the fact that in the world he proposed, everyone becomes a peasant. Who is to create the wealth he wants to distribute? We are hugely wealthy because we eat so well, live so comfortably, have so much leisure. Eliminate these and everyone will be equally poor, but it will be the abject poverty of the third World made universal.
To sum it all up- The ability to accumulate wealth and share it with your offspring is the great engine of human desire and effort. Even macaque monkeys have aristocracies of inherited privilege. Moreover, there is a kind of trickle down effect, far weaker than that which St. Ronald of Reagan imagined. When society creates new wealth, a just society allows all members to have a fair chance at exploiting this source. The benefits are not automatic, but must be protected by governmental regulation--effective and nondestructive regulation. We must not allow guilt or an interest in social justice to strangle this natural and invigorating motivation. But, at the other extreme, we must provide a minimum of security and a maximum of potential to everyone, so that this motivation is universally available and utilized for the benefit of all humanity
"ambit"--nice word. I'll try to remember that. Actually, I am not so anti-wealth as I may have seemed. My objection is that the rich have taken control of the government and intend to use it to adjust society to insure that their wealth is protected. This is presented as a function of free enterprise when it is the opposite. Freedom to succeed necessitates the freedom to fail.
I do not begrudge Bill Gates his wealth. I do begrudge the concept of a new aristocracy which is entitled to wealth, not by ability, but by birth.
As far as your concern not with , "income inequality in our country, but the poverty line and the portion of society below it." I am in agreement with you. The ancient Greek conceptualization of an enforced poverty is going too far. As you probably know, it was considered an offense against the gods and your fellow citizens to become too wealthy. A citizen who attained an excess of wealth, as perceived by his peers, was expected to donate that excess to the city in the form of public buildings or the maintenance of one or more soldiers for its defense. To fail to do so was to be seen as an outcast who thought of himself as superior to his fellow Greeks.
I believe instead that society, through its tool of government, needs to insure that the rules are equally and fairly applied to all citizens. No one gets a free pass to wealth or power, not even via your successful parent. Of course, it is human to provide for your children, and, of course, this means that being born to privilege will always have its effect. But this is different from a system which is fine tuned to keeping wealth in the hands of the select few and therefore, inevitably, out of the hands of everyone else.
What we need, then, is to insure that no one, especially children, are forced to go to bed hungry, or to shiver in the cold, or to be denied medical care. We also need to provide an excellent, tax payer supported, education system that reaches at least to Bachelor's level. This is not to deny the existence of private colleges and universities, which will, naturally, be used by the wealthy to give their offspring a boost up in the world. I don't think everyone has a right to wealth, only to the basic minimums which give one the tools necessary to have a fair chance at building wealth.
I have heard the statements that the mere existence of great wealth is a form of social obscenity. This assumes that if someone lives in a state of excess while others live in deprivation, the discontinuity is intolerable. I do not agree. Back in the early 90’s, I recall an author who declared that the only way to live justly was for everyone in the world to accept poverty. In his conceptualization, America, Europe, and Japan would need to accept a sharply restricted diet and life style so that the wealth could be evenly distributed among the world’s people. He acknowledged that everyone in the world would be poor, but felt that this was justified since everyone would be equally poor. [Anyone recall his name or that of his book?]
His reasoning was flawed in several ways. First, he ignored human self interest. Love or despise this drive, it is real and asking people to deny it is to ask them to cease to be human and to become some other species. What species, I can’t imagine, as this is an evolutionary force. Not a natural species then, but something engineered.
Second, he ignored the equal, or perhaps more powerful, urge to provide for and advance the interests of your own children and relatives. Even in social insects, it has been proven that what appears as sacrifice for the good of the hive is really sacrifice for the genes of your relatives. Again, he dreams, as utopians do, of over riding human nature for the sake of his vision of the ideal, or at least the much improved social order.
In short, he imagines that everyone will work for the benefit of others. First Worlders, he thinks, will struggle and sacrifice their own health to feed strangers on the far side of the globe. Utopians often fall into this trap. The simple fact is that we while are a social species and do care about the suffering of strangers, we care much more about ourselves and our children.
Finally, he ignores the fact that in the world he proposed, everyone becomes a peasant. Who is to create the wealth he wants to distribute? We are hugely wealthy because we eat so well, live so comfortably, have so much leisure. Eliminate these and everyone will be equally poor, but it will be the abject poverty of the third World made universal.
To sum it all up- The ability to accumulate wealth and share it with your offspring is the great engine of human desire and effort. Even macaque monkeys have aristocracies of inherited privilege. Moreover, there is a kind of trickle down effect, far weaker than that which St. Ronald of Reagan imagined. When society creates new wealth, a just society allows all members to have a fair chance at exploiting this source. The benefits are not automatic, but must be protected by governmental regulation--effective and nondestructive regulation. We must not allow guilt or an interest in social justice to strangle this natural and invigorating motivation. But, at the other extreme, we must provide a minimum of security and a maximum of potential to everyone, so that this motivation is universally available and utilized for the benefit of all humanity
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