Learning How To Die

"but learning how to live takes a whole life, and, which may surprise you more, it takes a whole life to learn how to die." ~ Seneca
 

This won't come as a surprise to anyone who reads this blog regularly, but today I want to write to you about death.

The above passage from Seneca rings very true to me, and when my head is on straight, death--not in a morbid way--is never far from my thoughts.  The other day my kids were talking about death. A beloved family member had recently died, and my 8 year old said, 'I wish I could make a machine that would stop people from dying'. My 11 year old responded, 'People have to die though. The world would become crowded otherwise. It's nature's way of keeping our species alive'.

Two totally different interpretations there. One, emotional, the other, coldly rational. I sympathize with both.

Just a few days before I was commenting to a friend about the necessity of the 'old order' to die so that the new order could move the human project forward. Each generation is only good for so much progress before it becomes a hindrance to greater progress. Conservativism seeps into all of our bones after a while.

Living forever has never seemed to be the goal to me. It is tragic when young people die, or when people die tragically, or with important unresolved issues. When old people die of normal human causes, and seem to have left a good legacy behind them, and have gone in relative peace, the affair seems bittersweet: the point of life doesn't seem to be to live long, but to live well. With this consideration, even a person who does not make it into ripe old age can be seen not necessarily as a tragedy when they pass, but can also possess something of a bittersweet quality.

Of course, that's easy for me to say when I am not talking about the death of someone incredibly close to me: of course I will always appreciate the sweetness of knowing great, beautiful people, but the closer the person comes to you, the younger they are, and the uglier the circumstances of their departure, the stronger the bitterness will no doubt be. May we all be spared such bitterness.

But we all have to die, and it shouldn't surprise us. It's something that seems healthy to keep in our minds, to keep us kind, to keep us charitable, to keep us focused. Seneca has to be right about the amount of time it will take us to adequately prepare for that moment, and in so doing, may we also learn how to live in the process.

 

The Owners Are Getting Scared

I work at a homeless shelter. Tonight at dinner, as I sat at our service desk and watched all of the people eat, and talk, and laugh, I remembered how disturbed one of my neighbors was when he heard about our efforts to ensure that the residents of our shelter--and all shelters--got out and voted. My neighbor--white, christian, male, conservative, mid-fifties--went from disturbed to downright offended when President Obama won re-election, and the county that it all seemed to come down to was our county, Hamilton County, Ohio. To my neighbor, by bringing local community organizers into our shelter to have residents sign voting pledges, by have state agencies come in to help our residents register to vote, we were essentially delivering the country to President Obama.

"We didn't tell them who to vote for". I said.

"Of course you knew who they were going to vote for. Who gave them the free cell phone?" he said.

Ah, the so-called 'Obamaphone'. Conservatives hate it. To them, it smacks of decadence, and misguided liberal spending. In reality, it's a very practical investment for our society to make. Newt Gingrich talked about replacing the safety net with a trampoline: we live in a very high-tech world, and in order to function in this world, we have to be plugged in. If we expect disenfranchised folks to even have a chance at competing, wouldn't they also have to be plugged in? In the shelter business, we are about helping people get housing, but we're also about helping people eliminate barriers to housing. If our residents have cell phones, that cuts out a lot of walking time, and a lot of paper work. Ultimately, it should help them get back on their feet, and that is something we all want.

"People who are on the government tit shouldn't be allowed to vote". he said.

"If you believe that, then no C.E.O. in the country should be allowed to vote." I said, always the troublemaker.

"The rich worked for what they've got. The people who stay at your shelter have been made soft by the system. " He said.

My response: You are likely to die in the class you are born into. Inherited wealth gives a person an unfair advantage. Being born into a privileged class gives a person an unfair advantage.Yes, a person can rise from the bottom to the top, but what do they have to become to do so? What do they have to sacrifice? I guarantee you a privileged person who rose to the same level did not sacrifice as much. And what if you don't have the killer instinct? What if you just want to live a simple life, and not participate in the rat race? Should you have to work so hard? Yes, the man born with sand bags tied around his legs can still hypothetically 'win the race', but why not take off those sand bags and see how he does? Why not give him the option of not even running the damned pointless thing in the first place?

It's a frustrating conversation, especially when you consider that my neighbor should be on my side on this: he is not one of the owners of this society. At best, he only serves as one of the owner's many attack dogs, operating under the illusion that 'if only I work hard enough, I too can join the ranks of the owners'. But dogs cannot become men.

The point is, this argument about who should and shouldn't be allowed to vote is coming up more and more. After Romney lost what he and his followers had deluded themselves into believing would be a great white landslide (no way colored and poor folk will vote again like they did last time!), they started talking about restricting the vote.

But it's too late for that. Us poor people, Us women, Us black people, Us latino people, Us asian people, us gay people, us disabled people, Us non-religious people--we're voting. We're being heard. And if you want to say we are just voting for people who are promoting our best interests, then you're right: but tell me that the rich in this country don't do the same thing.

And there are more of us.

The owners are getting scared.

And they should be.

Ignore the Noise; Do the Work

My thoughts have been mainly introspective lately. It's true that I've recently formed a study group to read Marx's Capital in one year, and that Marx is inherently about the world and other people, but I don't have much to say to you about that. I'm just reading, talking to other people about what I'm reading, and percolating.

This year's motto is going to be 'ignore the noise; do the work'. That literally translates into focusing on my job and my responsibilities to my family, but also metaphorically translates into 'do the personal work'. I've got some spiritual and emotional growing to do, and I've got to give myself some space to do it in.

One of the concepts that helped me quit drinking was the concept of 'the booze brain'. The idea that there was this ever-whispering voice constantly trying to sabotage my own sobriety and masquerading as my own mind, helped me dislocate myself from my disease. If I found myself in the midst of a clever rationalization I would ask myself, 'does this line of thinking end up with me drinking?', and if the answer was 'yes', I would know that it was not my own brain that was thinking, but my booze brain.

I have come to realize that the booze brain has many other cousins, and each can throw up a distracting clamor that prevents one from 'doing the work'.

'The work', by the way, is whatever is central to your character. It's whatever you need to do to grow, to find peace, to progress towards self actualization. It can be your job, It can be your relationship with others. It can be reading a book, riding a bike, or even washing the dishes. It's the product of your labor, a thing that you would do for the hell of it, even if no money or status were attached to it (maybe there is some Marx slipping in there). I would like to do things for their own sake, 'for the hell of it'. I would like to do things prayerfully, and seriously. Too often, I am trying to ride two horses with one ass.

'The noise' is the other horse. It's the thoughts that tempt you away from what you know you should be doing, or drain them of their joy. The noise is the self-doubt, the naysayers, the shiny thing that distracts you from your goals.

That's all. I get cranky if I go too long without writing something, so here's something.

How Much Must We Suffer?

When you have a mental illness, you suffer. Every day can be a struggle. To be alive, to function, to focus on basic tasks...all of these things can look and feel like steep mountain climbs.

The medical establishment can offer you medications, however, that might mute your suffering. I have heard many creative individuals who view their illness as an intricate element of their powers and very being voice concerns over whether the bargain--we'll take away a bit of the pain, but you may end up giving up a bit of yourself--is worth taking.

How much suffering is too much? When does struggling lead to suffering?

Struggle is the currency of personal growth. Whether it be in the gym, at your job, in your relationships, or acquiring any kind of skill, you will struggle. Suffering is the biproduct of struggle. Suffering is struggle without resolution. As you struggle to lift weights outside of your existing comfort zone, your muscles suffer. As you attempt to understand a new and complicated philosophical model, your mind suffers. Your spirit suffers. Eventually, however, a membrane breaks: you come out the other side, and suddenly that philosophical model--those weights--are within your range of capability.

Many artists have mental illness, and many of them do not medicate because they feel it will cause their art to suffer. Many artists also commit suicide, and what causes art to suffer more than the death of the artist?

Maybe an artist would suggest that they must suffer, because the world needs art. The world needs 'executive madness'. All of our best leaders have had at least a touch of this madness. If they all were to go on mood stabilizers, would progress halt? Is the art, or the leadership, or the vision, worth the cost of the life of the artist or the leader or the visionary? It's a tough call. On an even simpler level, are we really living if we are not experiencing life to our fullest capability?

I think of the Christian belief that Jesus had to suffer on the cross in order that mankind might be forgiven of our collective sins. The rationale and the mechanics of this set-up are a mess, but the fundamental Christian understanding that suffering must accompany struggle, and that only through struggle can something higher be obtained appear to be self-evidently true. Whether or not the suffering can be done vicariously is a different issue entirely, which would need to be explored separately. This Christian core also seems to accept the idea that there is an acceptable amount of human life that might be sacrificed for a higher creative end; be it Jesus dying so that man might be redeemed, or the artist dying so that man might be raised up.

The question of acceptable suffering also looks different when you look at mental illness through the (appropriate) lens of medical health; how much suffering would you allow yourself to experience if you had cancer or irritable bowel syndrome? What higher purpose would justify those pains? How much of your individuality would you be sacrificing if you allowed yourself to be alleviated of that suffering?

It's a very complicated question, and it's one that isn't helped by the stigma and misunderstanding that surrounds mental illness. It also isn't helped by one of the dominant themes of our capitalist society: we must always be comfortable. We must always be enjoying ourselves.

Usually, I write for my own illumination: writing helps me hash out what my real feelings are about an issue. Here, I find myself at the end with the same questions I started with. C'est la vie.

Giving God His Propers

We don't really know each other. We have perceptions of each other based on our own experiences, proclivities, hopes, fears, and prejudices. We have 'best guesses' of each other, with varying degrees of accuracy. Like Thomas Aquinas pointed out, our perceptions of each other are like the panels in the eye of a fly: representative--possibly--of one aspect of the being that we perceive, but hardly representative of the whole.

If you misjudge me, I can set you right. But I don't really even totally know myself, so how right can I set you? Our perceptions of ourselves are also 'best guesses'. Perhaps they are more educated guesses; but they're still guesses. Our perceptions of ourselves are based on our own experiences, proclivities, hopes, fears, and prejudices. Our perceptions of ourselves are also like the panels in the eye of a fly, but instead of windows, they are mirrors.

So if you misjudge me, I can try to set you right, but maybe I'm wrong. You have all kinds of reasons to reject my self-interpretation in favor of your own interpretation, because you know deep inside that I possess as many blind spots as you do to interpreting the nature of a being. We are also pattern seeking animals, and it is your method of pattern seeking that has kept you alive all this time.

I am able to rebut your perception of me, because I am right in front of you. Actually, I am not. You're reading something I've written. You could e-mail me, or call me, or visit me, and we could discuss what I've written, and I could tell you what I think is wrong about your reading, and you could tell me what you think is wrong about my writing. Perhaps we'd come up with a synthesis. But I'm alive, I'm in this world, and it is possible to get closer to my original intent than it would be if I were dead, or if it were probable that someone else had written this little piece under my name. Who could even begin to guess the motive of someone who would do something so unprofitable?

God, who is alleged to be much 'bigger' than us, with ways much 'higher', would be much more difficult to perceive. We would do so with our own experiences, proclivities, hopes, fears, and prejudices. Because God is not present to set us right, ultimately our perceptions of God would be manifestations of our own private values, aspirations, wishes and fears. You may refer to a particular holy text or guru as someone or something that might set me right on this, but the same problem that is encountered when examining this text is also present, but compounded. It's compounded by the absence of the author, by the dubiousness of the authorship, by the unlikelihood of the supernatural claims, and by the Outsider's Test For Faith, which, if taken honestly, points directly at the ultimately subjective nature of faith-value.

God is not here to rebut your perception, and it is highly unlikely that God even exists. How much projection can I cast upon a being that is unlikely to exist? A lot more than I can cast upon a being that I know exists, and that's a hell of a lot.

I don't believe in God. I am an atheist. I have also come to realize that non-belief is perhaps the most respectful and appropriate response to any possible gods. If we can't make wholly accurate statements about the motives and actions of others--and even ourselves--then how can we even begin to approach statements about a thing that is alleged to be much 'bigger' and 'higher' than ourselves? Surely, any belief that we state in such a being would ultimately be only a deification of some aspect of ourselves, and isn't that the worst kind of blasphemy?

I don't believe in God, which makes sense for an atheist. But my recommendation to the theist as well--if they truly love their god--is to abandon belief in it. It's the only way to appropriately respect the bigness, highness, and mystery of that potential being. It's the only way, ultimately, to remain open to it.

Merry Christmas!

Enjoy your day. Find somebody you love, and give them a big hug. Be grateful that you're here, because this is it, baby.

Advice for the Mail

Yesterday my son and I walked out to the mailbox to check the mail. He is 11. I am 31. I opened the box, put my hand inside, and drew out a stack of envelopes. A political advertisement. An envelope full of coupons. An envelope that contained a big yellow bag I could use to donate things to a veteran's organization. A plain white envelope which looked like a bill.

I put all the items back.

"You're not going to bring them in?" my son asked.

"No." I said. "They're not interesting enough. I only bring interesting mail into our house. Let's leave them in the box until they become more interesting".

"Jeez." he said. "I'm glad I'm not a piece of mail".

"Spencer" I said--my son's name is Spencer too--"I would always bring you in the house if you were a piece of mail. You are one of the most interesting people I know".

He smiled. It was a tender moment.

But that made me think. Maybe I'm being unfair to the mail. Maybe it would be better if the mail knew my standards. I am writing this piece for the mail, so that it may increase its chances of making it into my house.

1) Don't be a bill.

2) Don't be an envelope containing a big yellow bag I could use to donate things to a veteran's organization. It's not that I dislike veterans, it is just that I am very selfish, and rarely engage in such activities.

3) Don't be an envelope full of coupons. It's not that I don't like saving, it is just that I am lazy, and feel restricted by coupon shopping. I think of grocery shopping as an art. If I have decided to buy JIF peanut butter over Peter Pan peanut butter one day, I want it to be in a fit of inspiration, not because JIF is 25 cents off that day.

4) Do not be a bill.

5) Do not look like you might be a bill.

6) Do not be a political advertisement.

7) Do not be from an organization requesting that I join you. I know the organizations I want to belong to, and I am a member of those organizations.

8) Be a magazine. But not just any magazine--be a magazine I am interested in. I subscribe to many magazines, but not all of them get read. You see, I am a very pretentious man. If you want to get into the house, don't be the Economist or the International Socialist Review. Be MAD magazine, or maybe Playboy. If you are a catalog, be Victoria's Secret, or maybe IKEA. I think they have some really neat stuff.

9) Don't contain Anthrax. Neither the deadly poison nor the band will make it into my house.

10) Be a package from Amazon. Even if it is not addressed to me, I will open it. I love getting packages in the mail.

11) Be a movie from Netflix, but not a hoity-toity movie that I ordered because I thought it would give me culture. Be something funny, or maybe a disc from a BBC series. BBC has some really funny shows.

12) Be a piece of my neighbor's mail. I think they're up to something, but I'm not sure what. I will take all the intelligence I can get.

13) Be a long lost letter from my friend Ryan. We were exchanging letters before he died, and I never got the response to the last letter I sent him. I loved him, and I miss him. I think reading his last letter would be very comforting to me.

"You only get to see the light/Just one time in your life."

3 Essential Woody Allen Quotes

I often declare--to the scoffs and rolled eyes of friends, family, and random passers-by--that Woody Allen is the modern world's answer to William Shakespeare. He's not a shoddy answer either; who else traffics in comedy and tragedy, big and ambiguous morality, ghosts, lust, crime, and punishment in as entertaining, consistent, and concise a way as Woody? Only the bard, and he was nowhere near as prolific. He also didn't know anything about jazz.

Woody--like Shakespeare--is also endlessly quotable. Here are the three Woody Allen quotes that I find lend themselves best to a good, robust life.

The first quote is about attendance:

1) "80 percent of success is showing up."

The second quote is about how to conduct yourself once you get there:

2) "Talent is luck. The important thing in life is courage".



The third quote is about perspective:

3) "To you I'm an atheist. To God, I'm the loyal Opposition" - from Stardust Memories

Dexter, Religion, and Mental Illness

I am just now catching up with season six of Dexter. On the episode we watched last night, Dexter was astounded to find out this season's killer was motivated by religion. "A killer with faith?!" was his exclamation. I wish T.V. writers would actually research their subjects a little before depicting them; walk into any psych ward and ask some of those folk about their relationship with some kind of God. Religion is a great (and popular) conduit for mental illness.

This complaint is lodged more as a person who works in the human services than it is lodged as an atheist.  I have stated previously that religious people can be perfectly healthy; often more healthy than non-religious people. This complaint is lodged even more as a fan of good T.V. than it is as an atheist or a human service worker. See? It's a trinity complaint. I am the trinity complainer.
Anyway, Dexter is still a great show, and Mos Def did a great job on season 6. Maybe I'll discover the message becomes more balanced towards the end.

Religion doesn't only interact with mental illness in a negative way. In fact, it can often act as a salve. The underlying trope that season 6 of Dexter seems to have bought into is that to engage in socially destructive and deviant behavior has some root in a lack of spiritual mooring. I agree that a person must have more than just a lack of belief in god/gods to guide them in this life, but atheism is far from a corroding influence. In fact for many non-believers--myself included--it is the first step towards a healthy worldview. Atheism can be a great corrective, and there is plenty of evidence out there that atheists care about their communities and families.

Writing, and Discovering Josephine

I have been writing lately, but nothing for the blog. I've written a couple of stories--one of them pretty long--and sent them off to different literary magazines. If none of them get picked up (which is probable) I will post them here. I'm also writing a manual for my job; so the writing is flowing, just nothing for the blog.

On another note, I've been looking into Josephine Baker lately, and am very impressed. What a sexy, talented, driven woman! I admire her tenacity, and the easy-going and fun aspect she managed to preserve throughout her life. She was way bigger than the time period that contained her, and she seemed to know it.

There have been so many interesting people on this planet.

Josephine dancing:



Josephine singing:



Josephine living:

An Aspect Of the 1950's That Conservatives Do Not Pine For

"Along the way, however, we’ve forgotten something important — namely, that economic justice and economic growth aren’t incompatible. America in the 1950s made the rich pay their fair share; it gave workers the power to bargain for decent wages and benefits; yet contrary to right-wing propaganda then and now, it prospered. And we can do that again." - From The Twinkie Manifesto, by Paul Krugman

Suffering

“The times when you are suffering can be those when you are most open, and where you are extremely vulnerable can be where you greatest strength really lies. Say to yourself: ‘I am not going to run away from this suffering. I want to use it in the best and richest way I can, so that I can become more compassionate and more helpful to others.’ Suffering, after all, can teach us about compassion. If you suffer you will know how it is when others suffer. And if you are in a position to help others, it is through your suffering that you will find the understanding and compassion to do so.”

—	Tibetan Book of Living and Dying

The Great Tragedy of the 2012 Election

I ate lunch yesterday with my grandfather and grandmother. During the course of our lunch at a local Mexican restaurant, My grandfather mentioned that he thought Mitt Romney was a lot like Richard Nixon. He meant this as a positive, because he thought both Romney and Nixon were 'People's Presidents'.

I told him I thought his comparison was funny, because I had also been making it pre-election, except as a negative. Mitt Romney reminded me of a teetotalling version of Nixon as portrayed in 'Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72', by Hunter S. Thompson. Always preening, always rolling out new versions of himself. Cynical to the core.

Then last night I had a dream about Hunter S. Thompson. He was a major league pitcher who was famous for pitching as many wild balls as he was striking people out. Baseball in my dream was different in that instead of a catcher, the pitcher threw balls at a drumhead, and each drumhead was decorated with an emblem that represented the pitcher. I suppose the gonzo symbol would have been appropriate for Hunter, but dreams have their own logic, and Hunter's drumhead had the silhouette of a woman's leg with a stylistic moon hovering over the top of the thigh.

I'm not a religious man, but I still have a lot of good old fashioned West Virginia superstition running through my blood--my mother's side of the family hails from Maetwan--so I thought maybe I needed to honor the demon and write about this man who keeps popping into my mind and conversation lately.

Hunter Thompson would have been great during this past election cycle. A young Hunter would have been great, I should say. One that was relatively near the beginning of his cycle of chemical self destruction. Reading his dispatches from the trail would have been wonderful, as would reading his caricatures of Mitt Romney and Barack Obama. Would he have found something hopeful about the community organizer from Illinois? I certainly would hope so. Would he have found something to Loathe in Mitt Romney? No doubt.

I did my feeble best to pay tribute to Thompson earlier on in the cycle (google Paul Ryan + Ibogaine to see what I mean), but no tribute is suitable.

I think Hunter would have benefited from this election as much as his writing would have benefited us.

Unfortunately though, suicides are never on time.

"Football season is over".

Atheists Should Meet Theists Where They're At

We have a saying in social work: 'Meet them where they're at'. This means, essentially, that we know where this person needs to end up in order to be healthy, but they are currently participants in a lifestyle or worldview that only allows for gradual progress. Embrace the whole person, and pick your 'learning opportunities' wisely.

I endorse a version of this approach when it comes to interacting with the religious as well.

The difference between the version of this approach employed by atheists interacting with religious folks and social workers interacting with their clientele is first and foremost that a religious person is not necessarily unhealthy. In many cases, the religious person may be far healthier than the atheist. They may be far closer to self actualization, and performing far closer to their peak capacity. They may be more intelligent, happier, funnier, and kinder. Their worldviews are just couched in a falsehood.

The atheist has to ask themselves first and foremost, what can I learn from this other human being that I am interacting with? Their religious views do not discredit the entirety of their worldview, or reduce them to the content of their religious views. The first thing the atheist must do is to find what is human about the religious person they are interacting with. The faithful are often advised to 'look for god in the person', and this is essentially my advice, substituting the word 'god' for the phrase 'what is human'. Religion is a very human thing. It is an understandable human phenomenon. What leads a person to religious belief? Often it is a personal desire to have their life make sense in a holistic kind of way. Often it is the reaction to stress and uncertainty. Often it is simply a framework that is learned in childhood that evolves along with the person as they grow into adults. It is human, and it is something we as atheists should be able to identify with.

Why? Because we are meaning-seeking creatures too. Atheism, as I have discussed in the past on this blog, is not enough. We need more. In our own attempts to determine what that 'more' is going to be, we should be able to sympathize with folks who have discovered a 'more' that works for them, even if it is one that we view to be wrongheaded.

It is from the framework of the 'more' that we need to view our religious brothers and sisters. So they believe in a god and follow a religion. What does this god and religion compel them to do? Does it compel them to contribute to their community? Does it compel them to be kind to their families, their neighbors, and animals? If so, then their motivation should become secondary to their actions in our consideration.

If on the other hand, their religion can be seen to feed into negative and harmful traits, it will need to be confronted at its root. Religious views that lead people to view benign and natural human orientations like homosexuality as 'sinful', or views that advocate for the genital mutilation of children, or refusal to receive blood transfusions, or patriarchal and racist views, will need to be challenged.

First and foremost, we have to encounter each other as human beings, not as infidels in need of conversion or conquer. That M.O. is better suited to the religious fundamentalist than it is the atheist humanist.

I am writing this as much for myself as I am anyone else. I am a white male American. I live in the suburbs and am married to a woman. Atheism is one of the only traits that puts me in the minority. If there is anything that has become obvious lately, white male Americans living in the suburbs are uncomfortable being minorities. So perhaps in the past I have been overly aggressive (read: defensive) in my interactions with religious folks, and perhaps I've discounted many because of their beliefs. After I gave up religion, many of my friends went from being 'My friend ______' to 'My Christian friend ___________'.  That was wrong.

I don't believe in God. I am glad that people find cause to do good in their religion, but I think there are plenty of non-religious reasons to do good. I tend to believe that people do good because they are good, and that my religious friends--in spite of their insistance otherwise--would be good without god. Perhaps even better.

I also don't want to sound like I'm discouraging discussion. Discussion and debate are very important. I'm writing this--as much for myself as for anyone else--as a call not to lose sight of the human heart when approaching a person with a different outlook than your own. I can't tell you how many times I have heard my views cynically rationalized away by christians who would not allow for the fact that I have honestly arrived at the conclusions I have. I've been told I had made a choice not to accept God into my life. The idea that I had just discovered that there had never actually been such a divine invitation was just not something they could consider. I've been told I didn't properly understand christianity, and that is why I am an atheist. I've been told that I am 'taking the easy road'. All of these cynical responses to my belief system irk me, but really, how much more generous am I when considering the beliefs of the religious? Often, not much.

So yes, it would be great if all of this god nonsense was behind us. Evidence indicates that it's on its way to being so. In the meantime, however, do I really need to go around trying to beat it out of people? Leaving religion is a big deal, and it leaves a huge vacuum in a person's life. I can tell you this from personal experience. Is it responsible to try to take this core out of people and not stick around to help them rebuild something sturdier?

Better to seek common ground, I'm coming to believe. There are plenty of atheists out there whose sole concern is removing 'in god we trust' from our money, and making sure that there are no nativity displays on public grounds. I have much more in common with christians, jews, and muslims who are motivated to help the poor and homeless than I do these privileged misanthropes. Better to work with them--and my fellow atheist humanists also similarly focused--and actually make a meaningful contribution to the welfare of my fellow primates.

I'd rather role up my sleeves and build something with people looking in a common direction, and leave the theological discussions for pleasant post-project coffee talk.

6 Completely Reasonable Conservative Principles

Conservative news outlets all agree: We are a 'divided country'. Funny, I wonder if that's the headline they would have gone with if Romney had won? Whatever the case, I want to work towards healing that divide. It's something we will need to do if we're going to move forward together. In that spirit, I've compiled a list of 6 conservative principles that I believe should be absolutely uncontroversial.

1. Don't Spend More Than You Take In

What could be more basic? I won't go into the data that shows Democrats have been better stewards of our national finances than have Republicans--this is, after all, an effort at ecumenicism--but whenever I ask a Republican, especially the tea party variety, what the most important role of Government is, this is one of their first responses. Really, it's not a point that can be argued: Debt equals enslavement to outside interests, and restricts personal and national freedom. The more self reliant our country is, the better.

2. Reward According To Merit

Another important, fundamental principle. Trophies for participation really grate on the conservative soul. It's a tough world out there, and it takes grit. Where does a person get grit? Well, by competing. By losing. By 'Failing forward'. 'Always make new mistakes', and all of those other corporate cliches.

But there is one caveat: in order to reward according to merit, the competitors have to be competing on a level playing field. Our society has been designed to promote the white, the male, the christian, the abled, the established, and the heterosexual. All of our institutions are geared towards the success of the aforementioned categories, and the more of those categories you can tick off, the more likely you are to succeed. Yes, there are plenty of 'rags to riches' stories out there, but the fact is, you are pretty much guaranteed to end up in the class you are born in. We also have to ask ourselves of those who went from little to a lot, was it worth it for them? The amount of work and game-playing a person has to engage in to succeed in this country are enormous. We do not treat human beings as 'ends unto themselves' in this country: we treat them as appendages of production, and capital and status accumulating machines. If a person fails at any of these things--or takes little interest in them--they are considered failures. We also have to ask of those who went from little to a lot, was the system fair? Did you have to work far harder than those who inherited their lot? The answer will always be 'yes', and if that is the case, then we really aren't rewarding according to merit.

3. Hold Others--And Yourself--Accountable

We should hold everyone accountable for their actions. The criminal must pay for the crime. Justice must be done.

So why are there more minority drug users in prison than there are white Americans, when more white Americans use drugs? Why are individuals experiencing tough times expected to 'pull themselves up by their boot straps', when corporate America gets a bailout after it commits gross malfeasance?

The inconsistencies go on and on, but the conservatives are right: We need to hold ourselves and others accountable. We also need to hold our system accountable, too.

4. Build A Strong Military

From the time I was sixteen to maybe twenty, I identified as a pacifist. I attributed my pacifism to my christianity, which has also since lapsed. I didn't understand how we are going to stop violence with violence: to live by the sword is to die by the sword.

But violence is a reality, and there are armed villains in the world that need to be kept at bay. Governments opress their people, and sometimes other governments need to step in in the name of justice. We have to have a strong military.

But do we have to spend as much money on the military as we do?

Let's go back to the first principle on our list. "Don't spend more than you take in". Is such a huge and expansive military really in keeping with this principle, especially when so many within our country are going without? Couldn't we have a strong military and still scale it back quite a bit?

5. Support Israel

Conservatives love Israel. I don't have a problem with Israel. They are an undeniable ally. We should support our allies.

But what we are involved with in Israel is more than a matter of a relationship with an ally: bronze age mythology absolutely colors the entire conflict between Israel and its neighbors, and especially its relationship with Palestine. We have to de-mythologize the conflict, or at least our involvement in it. We have to promote pragmatic peace, which will inevitably include a Palestinian state, and the permanent cessation of settlements.

6. Protect the Family

Maybe this one will seem a little tricky on my part, but it's not intended to be so. The family is the bedrock of our society, and it must be protected. It must be preserved and promoted. One of the best ways to do this, is to ensure that consenting, loving adults, regardless of gender, sex, color, or creed, should be able to marry other loving adults, regardless of gender, sex, color, or creed. The family promotes cohesion. Families fuel our economy. The more families we have the better, whatever those families are constructed of.

Another way to protect the family is to understand that capitalism destroys families. Capitalism does not respect the integrity of individuals. To capitalism, we are all just individual units of labor. It is becoming increasingly expensive to survive in this capitalist system that we have, especially for lower income families. Everyone must work. There are no stay-at-home moms and dads anymore in my end of the economic pool, at least very few.  We are all just exploited labor power, and it takes all of us working in order to make ends meet. That leaves more children to be raised by the system itself; a system that ultimately transforms them into yet more units of labor power, stripping them of their human integrity.

Yes, we must support the family. The only way to do that, however, is to outgrow the existing system.

You Make Me Horny, Ohio

Last week, I wrote a blog post saying that I was very nervous about how my home state of Ohio was going to turn out for the President. The conservatives around me seemed very confident, and my fellow liberals and leftists...not so much.

The good people at Daily Kos who commented on this post gently scoffed at me, and I thought, 'These people have drank the Kool Aid."

I was 'tense and nervous', to quote David Byrne the night before and the day of the election. I posted the following on Facebook:

"So excited about voting: don't know if I'll be able to sleep. However nervous the American people make me, it is hard to be cynical about democracy. What an awesome tool. I Hope to see you all on the battlefield tomorrow."

I had gotten myself into a positive headspace by 4am:
"Enough sleep! Time to get showered, dressed, wake up the kids, get them ready, and get to the polls. We plan to be first in line...We've got a long day of protecting America from Mitt Romney ahead of us!"

Election day is like Christmas around my house. Presidential elections are like...Super Christmas. We took the day off to celebrate together. Here are my democracy warriors:

And then here we are, first at the polls:

Standing in line, I tweeted the following dispatch:

"I feel like Alvy Singer waiting in line for the movies with this tea party yahoo behind me giving the sparks notes version of the Glenn Beck show to everyone who will listen. I Hope Obama takes his guns away."

It was gratifying to know that an uber-leftist was the first in line in my conservative district, but the conversation in line behind me had me feeling like the dogs were at my heels.

We voted, and then went to breakfast. After that, we swung by Half Price Books, and then went to the grocery store to get preparations for our election night party. In between that moment and 7:30, I must have taken the dog for a walk about 10 times.

Troxell polling results headquarters:

Not long before our polls closed, I sent out the following message:

"I must have visited drudge, the daily kos, the daily dish, real clear politics, huffpo, think progress, the blaze, and NPR twenty times each today. You've got me sweating, America."

After Obama won Pennsylvania:

"It's all on us, Ohio..."

Then, finally, after the announcement that my aformentioned nervousness was for naught:

"THE GIANTS WIN THE PENNANT! THE GIANTS WIN THE PENNANT! Thank you Ohio!"

My boys had dozed off during the night, so I woke them up. They smiled wanly, and promptly went back to sleep.

We got Sherrod Brown, Elizabeth Warren, Barack Obama, Tim Kaine, Alan Grayson, civil rights for homosexuals, and legalized marijuana. I liked all of my liberal friends celebratory remarks on Facebook, and then liked Mitt Romney's page. I left him the following comment after his concession speech:

"You gave my candidate a good run, Governor. Thanks for a classy and open-hearted concession speech. I wish you and your family the best of luck."

And then I went to sleep a happy man.

Sorry I ever doubted you, Ohio. You're looking pretty good to me this morning. So much was on the line, and you came through. You done good, kid. Real good.

The Sermon Under the Mount

 [I have been asked to deliver a sermon to the Unitarian Universalist Church my family attends at some point in the near future. I think this message--or some variation of it--is what I'm going to use].

I still don't know what to make of mankind, or 'manunkind' as e.e. cummings called us. George Carlin correctly identified the twin poles in our nature when he called his second book 'Napalm and Silly Putty'. On the one hand, we are capable of great levity, leisure, and gentle innocence. On the other, we have made chemicals that can burn the skin off of young children, and sear the lungs of anyone who breathes it.

Let's dispense with gods right from the start: we are alone here. Thankfully. We are condemned to freedom, as Sartre proclaimed, and there could be no fairer business. So this world is really what we make it, and oh, what we have made it.

We have in the U.S. a social system that turns human beings into appendages of the means of production, strips from them their ability to see in themselves and their fellow mean that we are all 'ends unto ourself', and prevents us from self actualizing. Capitalism is a great and vicious machine that must always be moving, and it is fueled by the churning out of alienated human bodies.

On the other hand, look at the human response to this calamitous system: we have social workers, faith groups, and individuals compelled by pity to treat their fellow man--their fellow sufferers as Schopenhauer would put it--with great kindness.  It is moving to see the activity of human hands motivated by human hearts that have managed to pry themselves from the sheer requirements of surviving in this law of the jungle society we inhabit.  I am constantly touched by a decency that seems to reside somewhere beneath the loads of paperwork, dirty laundry, and self flagellation that piles itself up on top of the typical American spirit. I see it daily in the work I do at the shelter I work at. The little old lady who makes sure our tables always have fresh flowers on them. The volunteers who come into our shelter during the winter to take care of the feet of our residents and give them new shoes. The children who come in to help their parents serve meals, who put smiles on many life-hardened faces. I am an unwavering atheist, but I have been touched by the various faith groups who have come into our shelter in various capacities to lift the spirits and the standard of living for our residents.

Let me go back to Schopenhauer for a minute. I feel like I'm in danger of over-quoting this excerpt, but it really has moved me and stayed with me. It has moved me so much in fact, that I named my Chihuahua after the great pessimistic philosopher, which--if you know what Schopenhauer's relationship with dogs was--is not the backhanded compliment it may seem to be.
He said,

"The conviction that the world, and therefore man too, is something which really ought not to exist is in fact calculated to instil in us indulgence towards one another: for what can be expected of beings placed in such a situation as we are? From this point of view one might indeed consider that the appropriate form of address between man and man ought to be, not monsieur sir, but fellow sufferer, compagnon de misereres. However strange this may sound, it corresponds to the nature of the case, makes us see other men in a true light and reminds us of what are the most necessary of all things: tolerance, patience, forebearance, and charity, which each of us needs and which each of us therefore owes."

Amen and amen. We are all born into this world screaming and frightened, naked and dependant. We die as alone as we do together, and as Hamlet observes in the graveyard, the worms feed upon the corpses of kings and popes as easily as they do those of peasants. In between, we make choices, choices which have been limited for us by our genetics, or circumstances, and the degree to which we accept and internalize our social conventions and taboos. We are a superstitious species, and we cling to certainty and treat inquiry as something of an extreme sport.

We kill one another. We leave 'the least among us' to die, to remain unsupported, to roll the stone of their lives forever up and down the mountainside. We leave our potential untapped, we fail to truly see each other, to love each other, to embrace each other. We take our angers and frustration out on the people we love the most.

But we also make love. We dance, we help, we create art. We listen. We share. We do things 'for the hell of it', which is the best reason of all to do anything.  We are patient. We are kind. We practice "tolerance, forebearance, and charity, which each of us needs and which each of us therefore owes".

We're not far out of the trees, and death is an inconvenient book end. If anything, that obelisk that stands at the end of each of our individual book shelves (I like to imagine that some of our shelves are composed of cook books, some photography, some literature, some pulp, some technical and instructional manuals, and some vast collections of pornography), should spur us on to do something, even if that something is only to read faster.

I don't know what to do with these different manifestations of the animal called man. I can see both seeds--the napalm and the silly putty--in my own character. I can feel them both very fully at different times, and at different times can take solace in both.

I wish I could end this piece on a more declarative note, but above all in my writing, I aim for honesty. So let's stop here.

You Make Me Nervous, Ohio

If I had to describe the collective mood of Ohio Republicans, I would say it is quietly confident. If I had to describe the mood of Ohio Democrats, I would say we are a little nervous.

The polls are close. There's a lot of talk about Romney leading among independents, but I'm not sure that's such a big problem for President Obama. Tea Partiers have taken to calling themselves independents lately, and I am convinced that this is why we are seeing so many 'independents' favoring Romney. They are repackaged republicans.

But it is still close. My chihuahua, Schopenhauer--or Schopey as we call him--is unmoved by the whole thing. To be as philosophical about human politics as a dog would be a great gift. My kids are invested, though. We're planning on making a day of voting; head to the polls as soon as they open, go out for breakfast, and then maybe take a trip to the zoo. We talked about heading up to Chicago if weather permits, so we could be there for either the triumphal celebration or the mass suicide.

This morning on his talk radio show, Glenn Beck gently chided and forewarned Ohio that this was all up to us, and that we could end up as hated by the right as Florida has been in previous elections if we gave Ohio to Brown & Obama. I'm pretty sure Glenn thinks his team has this one in the bag--via divine providence, and a great white suburban housewife awakening, I believe--but there's that twinge of doubt in the back of his mind.

 I would like nothing more than to incur the condemnation of Glenn and Sean and Rush and all of the tea party faithful who tell us we're throwing our country in the garbage disposal if we re-elect Sherrod Brown and Barack Obama. It would be joyous to turn on the radio the day after the election and hear the brute choir tell us all to go to hell.  Ohio is a difficult nut to crack. Either we are some of the most reasonable people in the country, or we are some of the most shallow and fickle. My hope is that our vote for President Obama and Sherrod Brown 4 years ago was actually a collective act of principle, and that we've been paying enough attention since that vote to realize that not only has the President done a substantive, good-faith job, but also that Mitt Romney is the most hollowed out and cynical presidential candidate since Nixon. The Republican party and talk radio has worked very hard to scare us. They've painted the road to a truly just, truly egalitarian society, with a robust and functioning safety net as the road to hell.

Let's do it: let's walk down the dark and twisted path of easier access to education, health care, expanded civil liberties, and responsible and competent exercising of global power that the right describes. I know all of these things sound scary, but really, your eyes adjust to the darkness once you've entered the cold and soulless cave of liberalism.  It is terrifying to imagine consenting adults in loving relationships being allowed to marry one another. The idea of women making the same amount of money as their male counterparts is totally Lovecraftian. The image of an American President not blustering around on the world stage like Donald Trump in...well, any environment you might find Donald Trump in...may have the same impact on the average voter as that video from the movie 'The Ring' had on the people who watched it.

Seriously though, I can't think of a worse transition. Handing the country over to Mitt Romney seems akin to someone returning to an abusive relationship. Handing Ohio over to Josh Mandel seems akin to letting your infant child change its own diaper.

Do the right thing on Tuesday, Ohio. Re-elect President Obama and Senator Brown.

Bow Ties Are Cool

Tonight is Drop Inn Center's Angels to the Homeless Gala, and I've decided to use the occasion as an excuse to finally try on a bow tie.

The problem is, before last night, I had never tied a bow tie in my life. After purchasing the strangely shaped piece of cloth from a local department store, I took it out of the bag and looked at it, dumbfounded. I figured there would be something intuitive about putting it on, but as I looked at the strange hour-glass shapes at each end of the tie, I realized I would need some help.

I went to You Tube to look up 'how to' videos, and what did I find? Bill Nye the Science Guy, giving a bow tie tutorial:



Pretty awesome.

So, I practiced and practiced. I'll let you be the judge of how successful I was:

Watch out, Gala.

If you're unable to make it to our Gala tonight, no need to worry. We will still gladly accept your money. Winter is coming, and every little bit helps. Donate here.