In My Trifles...

Joss Whedon

2009-03-25T18:55:00.000-07:00

On whedonesque.com, there was recently a discussion about Whedon's position as a feminist. In one of his responses, Whedon seemed to lament that his position as such was widely acknowledged--he would want his work to stand on its own without the audience projecting his beliefs, his comments, or his intentions onto it so far as they understood them. Which is understandable. People who don't dog the internet for interviews or at least know Joss Whedon, should be able to get the same things out of his work, n'est pas?

But what I think is more interesting is what people use as proof, not what Joss says. Buffy and Dollhouse are centered on strong (not to say kickass) female leads. Which is uncontestedly cool. But, Alias is centered on a strong (and again kickass) female lead without having, for me, a truly feminist ethic.

I love Alias; I do, but Sydney Bristow's vulnerability doesn't have the ring of truth for me, rooted as it is, not in weakness, but emotional trauma and her inability to trust (due to the emotional trauma). Also, Sydney, though she could take you in a moment, is useful and entertaining for the cool costumes and crazy wigs. As an agent, she's kind of prostituted.

Whedon's women have very human flaws, and they are complex, not just their circumstances. Buffy lies, rebels, abuses power, neglects her friends and family, suffers from hubris & self-loathing, uses people. Willow is socially backward, selfish. Inara--a respectable hooker who runs with thieves--she is no simple hooker with a heart of gold a la Claire Trevor in Stagecoach (which I also love). Joyce. Kaylee. Echo. River. Fred. Cordelia. Dawn. Mellie (who is my new favorite). Tara. Blah, blah, blah--a hundred examples. And even though all these women can be sexy, they're not only beautiful and powerful--as Willow said, they're "nifty."

And so many of them are...ordinary? Willow, Mellie, Joyce, Kaylee, Fred, Tara. They seem so real; they could be you or me, but they all possess something.

There is some hidden strength--power.

Whedon's love of women, in my mind, is more evident through his more minor characters than through his heroines.

So yeah, I'd say Whedon is a feminist. Not because he says so and not because Equality Now says so and not only because his female leads are powerful. He doesn't simply objectify women, although sex appeal isn't villified, thank goodness. They aren't simply caricatures. They are lovable. They are weak. They are sometimes victimized but that is not what defines them. They are forgivable. They can kick your ass; or if they can't, they will try, or they outwit you.

Simply put, the guy likes girls. More than I've seen anywhere (sadly for me). He thinks they're neat.

Freedom

2008-08-01T21:08:00.001-07:00

"The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all."

--H.L. Menken

Aeneid, trans. Anne V. Powell

2008-01-30T19:16:00.000-08:00

My senior year of college, as an elective, I took Latin II as an independent study course. My self-appointed project was to translate the first part of The Aeneid. I only got 25 lines in before my professor suggested something else. I still have it on my computer though, and I looked at it again today and was impressed with myself. It's not good, but it's all mine:

I sing of deeds of arms and the man who first from Troy, a destined exile, came to Italy and the Lavinian shore—much tossed from above both on lands and sea on account of Juno’s cruel memory and anger. Much also he endured in war, until he established the city and brought his gods to Latium—the source of the Latin race, the Alban fathers, and also the high walls of Rome.
O Muse, cause me to remember, what divine will offended or what grievance of the queen of the gods would drive a man of such marked devotion to undergo misfortune and encounter so many sufferings. What divinity can have such a spirit of wrath?
There was an ancient city Carthage, (which housed the colonists from Tyre) over against Italy but far from the mouth of the Tiber—rich in resources [for] the fiercest pursuit of war; which Juno is said to have cherished more than all lands, Samos esteemed less than it alone: here were her arms, here her chariot; the goddess strove that this city might be the ruling power for all nations—if the Fates have wished it. But, she heard that the progeny to have been drawn from the blood of Troy who would overthrow the towers of Tyre some day; from this line, a people, widely ruling and proud in war, will come with destruction for Libya: thus the Fates had resolved. Juno, the daughter of Saturn, dreading and remembering the long-standing war, which she had first waged toward Troy on account of her dear Argos (cause of wrath and fierce passions had also not yet perished from her soul;

A remarkable thought:

2008-01-19T19:40:00.000-08:00

"There is nothing in which deduction is so necessary as in religion," said he, leaning with his back against the shutters. "It can be built up as an exact science by the reasoner. Our highest assurance of the goodness of Providence seems to me to rest in the flowers. All other things, our powers, our desires, our food, are all really necessary for our existence in the first instance. But this rose is an extra. Its smell and its color are an embellishment of life, not a condition of it. It is only goodness which gives extras, and so I say again that we have much to hope from the flowers."

--Sherlock Holmes, "The Adventure of the Naval Treaty"

Party Politics

2007-12-15T16:47:00.000-08:00

Why would any self-respecting human or a Republican vote for Rudy Guilliani?
The man has absolutely nothing in common with the Republican platform.

This is what is wrong with party politics--besides the parties...and the politics.

People would vote for someone simply for the sake of winning.
He's ahead in the Republican polls because people think he can win.

And Fred Thompson is next because he was on Law & Order.

And all the Christians are gonna vote for Mike Huckabee because he used to be a Baptist preacher even though he's for expanding federal power as long as that power aligns with conservative Christian ideals. AND MAYBE I WANT TO BE A SMOKER!!

Somehow--perhaps it's due to real adulthood or fear of executive orders--I have gotten very caught up in the throws of the presidential race. *sigh*

Oh well.

I'll vote for Ron Paul--and you should too.

And maybe someday I'll move to a state where my vote will count.

Mike Huckabee

2007-11-21T16:13:00.001-08:00

I have recently heard that the evangelicals, in general, are in support of Mike Huckabee. My response to that is...

...seriously?!?

This is the guy who wants to make all public smoking illegal.

Granted, many evangelicals are against smoking. I am, myself, not particularly fond of inhaling 2nd-hand smoke simply because it smells icky.

However! This is a point of principle. If something as inane as smoking is prohibited (and making public smoking illegal is pretty much a prohibition) even for the sake of a majority preference--Forget that! Majority preference is just another tyrannous mob.

But if you let people take away your right to smoke--no--people may think this is a slippery slope argument, but the government is already so slippery, someone should be making it. One right, any right is important and worth fighting for because if you let that one right go, then it'll be another and another and another; and then it's 1984, and you're just a shell of a person who loves Big Brother.

Come on!
Besides, just because someone is (or was) a Baptist preacher, they are not necessarily a good person, a good leader, or a good presidential candidate.

An indication:
"I do not necessarily buy into the traditional Darwinian theory, personally."

What a politician! Blech.

Bankruptcy laws are changing...

2007-11-21T13:57:00.000-08:00

I'm not entirely clear on this. I was reading my dad's economic news articles.

Anyways, bankruptcy laws are changing and being able to declare bankruptcy may be eliminated. If you can't pay your loans, you will either have to go to debtors' prison or serve in the military for 8 years.

Guess what kind of loans can be called in at any time?
Student loans.

Oh wait, post-college age people would be good for what profession?
Hmm...

The morale of this story:
Don't get into extra debt and pay off your college loans like a shnike.

Forewarned is fore...mmm...well, I guess you're just screwed

2007-11-20T20:05:00.000-08:00

The official interpretation of the 2nd amendment is going to be determined by the Supreme Court shortly. Apparently, the debate is whether the 2nd amendment applies to individuals or to militia.

The official wording:
"A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed."

Having a well regulated militia is the rationale for the right, not the right itself.
And whose right is it? The people's.

Whether you dislike guns or are anti-gun, however, ceases to be relevant. Being able to strip citizens of one of the fundamental rights of Americans, one of the rights promised to us, sets a precedent. What's next? The rest of the Bill of Rights is susceptible. Maybe not now. Maybe not even in my lifetime. But sometime, the ability to interpret the Bill of Rights away from its promises will be a point of leverage--and not for me. (Go read Animal Farm by the way.)

So, what'll it be? Freedom of speech, press, religion.

And, as a sidenote, the first thing the Nazis did when they took power was take away private gun ownership.

Only the government and criminals have guns--and frankly, they cease to be distinguishable.

M.A. Exam stress makes for a strange unconscious...

2007-11-13T11:42:00.000-08:00

Last night, I dreamed that Andrea (an enormous, mean, scary, black girl I knew in elementary school) was repeatedly hitting me over the head with a typewriter while chanting "barbaric yawp."

I've been reading too much.

Ron Paul

2007-11-11T13:43:00.000-08:00

I hate politics, but I'm loving this guy.

The only thing I don't like about his platform is ending "birthright citizenship." I can understand how that would be expedient given sticky immigration problems, but it is a part of the Constitution (and not just as an amendment, either).

What Need Fulfilled

2007-10-24T15:39:00.000-07:00

Sometimes the obvious things don't hit you for a very long time.

The other evening I watched what was and is a friend's favorite movie, and it was definitely not for me. We both have excellent taste. We both are intelligent people. We both care about people, though often in different ways. Can it be a simple matter of preferences? Of personal taste?

I pondered. I have never found those answers satisfactory. There must be a something else.

And, as all great truths (and often insignificant ones) should be discovered, I stumbled on the answer. I jokingly told my friend she was a closet manic-depressive, as the members of my family have all jokingly and honestly clapped each other. And I was right.

Well, almost.
She isn't manic, just depressive. Not in a clinical, should be watched for suicidal tendencies sort of way, but she is quietly troubled by life's cruelties. By suffering. By guilt. By the unequal distribution of God's blessings. And unlike my family, whose outbursts of rage or sadness or feeling are tempered by occasional, rambunctious impersonations of vampire bunnies or fanged spiders leaping at you from the bathroom walls, her happy mood is usually quieter and more serious. Thankfully, however, she can be silly or she might have gone nuts already.

"I knew, just as surely and clearly, that life is not a work of art, and that the moment could not last."

For little old manic me, that line is totally defeating. "A work of art"? Who said life is a work of art? And moments? If I lived for only the moments, I would go crazy. They're too much. I can't handle them.

But for her, my depressive friend, it's the whole thing that's too hard. The crushing paralyzing weight of the world and of the future; they're too much. And maybe this good, wonderful, scintillating moment won't last, but there will be another and another, and that makes it all okay? Or worthwhile? Or maybe bearable.

Where I can love the cosmically poetic resolution of The Age of Innocence, she will delight in the radiant moments of A River Runs Through It.

That's the thing we need or feel or agree with, so that's what we like.

It's the best book I ever heard

2007-10-22T23:20:00.000-07:00

There was something about Beloved that made it hard for me to read. The sentences didn't make sense in my head. The words didn't sound right. I understood, but I wasn't getting through it.

I need to read it for my M.A. exam, however, so I decided to buy the book on CD. Maybe if I just let it wash over me, I wouldn't have this problem anymore. The CDs that I bought were read by Toni Morrison.

It may be one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard.
The way she says the words makes so much sense.

When I was reading it, some of the sentences were just indecipherable for some reason. I've never had a problem with anything written in a dialect, but I'm glad I've been so stupid because I've really enjoyed listening to this.

A bit of fluff...

2007-10-03T20:34:00.000-07:00

What Jane Austen Character Are You?

What Jane Austen Novel Suits You?

Which Austen Man is Right for You?

Which Austen Minor Character Are You?

Do you ever...

2007-09-26T20:41:00.000-07:00

Do you ever secretly believe
there is a place such as Hogwarts
or that there are truly superheroes
protecting the passively evil citizens
of our respective Gothams
or perhaps that Frankenstein
did ennervate his monster
or that some elusive closet or pool or painting
is a door to somewhere...more

And maybe I don't believe the world is flat anymore
But what would happen if it were?
What expeditions would we take?

And a dull, cool mood sweeps over me when I think it isn't true
That there's nothing to expect

Maybe it was the yellow moon that made me think of the bulging yellow eyes of the monster

And then I have a little hope
That maybe it's all true

Family Snobs

2007-09-02T13:10:00.000-07:00

I once said my family were snobs.
Well, it's not really true.

Sure, we watch a lot of Masterpiece Theatre and enjoy good art museums and may use the word ignoramus more than some, but we are not exclusively high-brow. In fact, we grew up with a lot of terrible B movies from the 30's-50's. We love John Wayne--even his really corny movies (except for Angel and the Badman which was just so maudlin). We saw Tombstone in theaters 13 times, my dad being a Wyatt Earp enthusiast. We watched Dragnet. We watched musicals. We watched the musicals that no one has even heard of. We watched all the TGIF sitcoms from the early 90's and enjoyed them.

One of my college professors described my family as very English. One of my friends actually thought I was related to the English royal family several generations back. But my family is so quintessentially American. We watch and rewatch Barry Bostwick's rendition of George Washington. We are eternally skeptical of politicians and the government. We belive in the people's right and duty to be skeptical of both. We believe in the triumph of the individual through adversity--give us your poor, etc. My sister named all of her stuffed animals George after George Washington. We believe in conscientious not controlled capitalism.

We hate loud obnoxious people and loud obnoxious music.
Popular culture is often crass and distasteful.
And people who like Jackson Pollock are full of crap.

But why should any of that seem incongruous?

I often used to hear "It's all about complexity."
But in that observation, there was room only for defiance of the conservative while being conservative. It often seemed a manufactured complexity. But could not complexity be an enjoyment of two things that don't seem to go together without that apparent incongruity having to make a statement?

Being judgmental, so to speak

2007-08-25T14:28:00.000-07:00

I have said that not all judgment is bad, and I'll hold to that.

It may sound cynical and misanthropic, but, in general, I'm okay with that too. Cynicism (or depression) is often just the moody side of a bipolar idealism.

It's not that I espouse a condemnatory mode of interaction. I just don't believe in trust.
*gasp*

It is a nice idea to give everyone the benefit of a doubt, but we don't do it. Even if we say we do, we don't--because it isn't wise.

We shouldn't give infomericals, emails from refugees asking for our bank numbers, used car salesmen, or politicians the benefit of the doubt. Not to mention insurance salesmen and people who frequent dive bars.

All extreme examples but all characters who elicit distrust. Why is that not true of anyone else we meet? Should we give our confidences to strangers? Heck, I don't want to give my confidences to some of the people I know well.

Besides, let's be honest. We are all judgmental anyway. To like one thing over another, to hold one opinion over another, to think someone is wrong or ugly or silly or fat or mean or friendly, even, is to judge them.

The question is not "Will you be judged?"; it's "How will you be judged?" and by what criteria.
I prefer the kind of person who offers no pretense.

Taxation Frustration

2007-08-23T16:48:00.000-07:00

Did you know that the 2 guys who caught Barry Bonds's record-tying 755th and record-breaking 756th homerun baseballs had to sell them because they couldn't afford the taxes they were required to pay on them?

Unbelievable!

Apparently, it was the government's baseball in the first place.
I hate this country sometimes.

On the unreading haters of Harry Potter

2007-08-18T21:38:00.000-07:00

I have a good friend who continues to rail against the Harry Potter phenomenon without having read them, who criticizes the inordinate international hype for sensationalized fantasy,
and I must admit, I can't blame him.

Not that I don't love Harry Potter--I do--BUT I refused to read the series until the summer of 2005 because they were just too popular to be any good.

In 2005, I only read them out of boredom and unemployment (and the inappropriateness of continuing to knit scarves in Southern California through June--the original enterprise that sprang from boredom and unemployment).

I was hooked from Chapter 1.

I'll admit, the Harry Potter books are not the greatest books ever written, but they are well-written (in fact, quite well-written), they contain a collection of some of the best ideas in fantasy, they have something to say without being pedantic, and they are genuinely delightful.

And I'm a snob. In fact, I come from a family of fictional snobs. We grew up watching Masterpiece Theatre and reading books we didn't quite understand yet. We say things like, "Headstone functions as a double for Eugene. They're complete opposites yet they become the same by having the same obsession" or "Oliver Twist really isn't his strongest work." It's not that we intend to be snobs or we like to feel important by being discriminating readers. We just like the books we like and most of them happen to be written by people who died 100 years ago or so.

It was nearly impossible to convince the rest of the "snobs" in my family to read HP. But they did, and it spite of their immense bias against it, they couldn't help but love it.

In my opinion, that's a testimony to HP's merit.

I hope, that if my friend ever reads them, he experiences the same delight I did, or if he never does, he will at least let his kids read them. Even if they are too popular to be any good.

Grief

2007-06-28T15:15:00.000-07:00

Why does our culture refuse to let us grieve?

I am of the mind that if tragedy smites you, you still have to keep on keeping on. Work still needs to be done, children still need to be raised--are you going to be a leader in your own life or are you going to succumb to heartache?
But does being strong mean you can't also be sad?

In some way, we think so.
Grief is an obstacle that prevents us from getting on with our lives.
And showing grief is a sign of weakness.

But that's simply untrue.
If you are truly grieving, there is no getting on--you're life has just been changed for the worse--of course, there's no getting on.

This last year, I worked with a woman whose husband had unexpectedly died of a heartattack while still rather young, leaving her with two adolescent sons and an elderly father. When she spoke of it, she told us that a friend of hers told her that she had never "dealt with" her husband's death and it was still affecting her.

Of course it's still affecting her. He was her husband.
She was living a happy, secure life and now, she misses him.

She struggles with her job and her sons and her father, and she no longer has that one person who can help most and that one person who can comfort her when she feels most weighed down.

He's gone.

How can such a thing be dealt with?
Is it possible that she will feel less and less sad as the years go by? Yes.
Is it possible that she will get used to being on her own? Of course.
But that doesn't mean she won't sometimes look back and cry because she misses him.

And there's nothing wrong with that.

Swearing

2007-06-13T14:29:00.000-07:00

To many, swearing is truly offensive--it's disgusting; it's rude.

To a different many, those who try to regulate their swearing are infringing on the swearer's freedom of speech.

Some consider swearing to be neither here nor there. They wouldn't swear in front of their parents or someone else's children (if they remember), but they're very lackadaisical about it.

But really, swearing is like picking your nose.

But with picking your nose, there is no hot political debate about the infringement of one's right to pick one's nose. There is no condemnation heaped on those who concur that one should not pick one's nose; no one will say you're conditioned to think this way and society has stolen you're soul because you think picking your nose is disgusting. The people who are telling you not to pick your nose aren't trying to infringe on your personal liberty.

But many people do pick theirs noses. Well, some people, when they were children, would do it in defiance of their squeamish parents or playmates. Others didn't care and never learned to care about what other people think. Some do it to gross people out. For some, it's just a habit. Some are simply inconsiderate. Some just do what everybody else is doing.

Picking your nose is not a moral issue. People will point at you and judge you, snicker or whisper behind their hands (and with some cause), but it's not a moral issue.
Neither really is swearing, and people may swear for all the reasons aforementioned. But, if you swear, you can expect that some will point at you and judge you (again with some cause).

After all, words are simply words, yes? No, not always.

Some words do carry baggage with them. Like "rape" for instance. Not a bad word, in that sense, but not a word to be used lightly. A friend of mine (while working for an orchestra) had a male customer complain to her "I don't want to be raped here" because his seats were at the end and not in the middle of a row. Understandably, she fumed about that for days. Where does this guy come from that he thinks rape is something to be treated flippantly? The same is true of the f-word. I hate the f-word. It's disgusting. It describes something bestial and evil and hearing it frequently come out of the mouths of junior high girls (not to mention a large percentage of the population in Southern CA) gives me the creeps.

Similar is the n-word. I find it odd that people will have a nervous breakdown about the use of the n-word in Huck Finn while missing the point. Huck learns to love Jim for the amazing and good-hearted man he is and to realize Jim's no different (to horribly simplify). The outcome is essentially opposed to the demeaning language inherent to the social system that Huck is initially a part of. Anyone who uses the n-word now, however, is using it because they're not supposed to. They say it in defiance, in spite. Basically, they are jerks.

So, will I judge you for the words you use? Of course. What words we choose to use is indicative of who we are, like what clothes we choose to wear and what people we choose to associate with, what we like and why. But not all judgment is bad (a subject I'll deal with some other time).

If nothing else, we should consider what we say.

Treason

2007-06-12T12:16:00.000-07:00

In class today, we went through Brutus's and Antony's speeches just after the death of Julius Caesar (in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, of course). Although Brutus never calls Caesar a traitor, his argument was that Caesar's ambition was heading toward the destruction of Roman freedom. Hence his death and Brutus's innocence. Caesar was a traitor to Rome.

Marc Antony, however, refers to the conspirators with "traitors' arm" and "bloody treason." They had assassinated their leader. They were traitors to Caesar.

Wherein, I thought just then, does treason lie? And consequently, wherein should loyalty lie?
Is treason a betrayal of the nation, of the people or of its leaders?
Should we feel loyal to the nation or the government?

Hypothetically, in a perfect world, betrayal of the leaders would be a betrayal of the nation because the nation's leaders would be so connected to the good of the nation without thought of self-interest that there would be no split. But that's not the case.

Well, I fall heartily on one side. I do not believe in vigilante justice nor in assassination. But...
In a pinch, I would defend my country against its leaders (if that became necessary).

Look at the American Revolution, the revolutionaries were traitors in a sense. The freedoms that should have been their right (by law) were more authoritative than the figureheads who should have stood for and upheld them. They were traitors to the government but not traitors to the idea of England...which transformed into the idea of the United States.

Were the members of the underground in France and Germany and Poland during Nazi control--were they traitors?

Yes, in a governmental sense. But no. Of course they weren't.

People have an unseemly habit of assuming politicians are beyond reproach. Perhaps they don't in thought, but they do in action. Votes, support, belief, and obedience are brought as offerings to the well-seeming politician.

We should, "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country." Unfortunately, such a neat speech can function as a hook for a gullible public, a hook which truly means "ask what you can do for me."

In most public policy, in most bills and laws, in most wars the good of the people is superficially considered. But what power do these measures wrest from a unseeing public and settle into the hands of an increasingly controlling government.

"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved for the States respectively, or to the people."

"...or to the people." That's the end of the Bill of Rights. I think we forget that we are lawfully invested with power. At the polling place instead, we frequently confer our power on those who could and may eventually (and do already in part) steal away our freedoms.

I suppose, "If this be treason, make the most of it."

Ethanol?

2007-06-11T22:09:00.000-07:00

It's understandable that everybody has become crazed about oil.

Personally: Gas is expensive.
Collectively: Importing oil is expensive and increasingly--dangerous?

But what is the solution?

Conservationists, taxes, and government regulation have prevented domestic oil from becoming a viable (read "profitable") option.

The answer is Ethanol--a renewable energy source. The angels sing their praises of this inspired idea. Except...

If switching to ethanol had been viable, the fuel companies (and car companies) would have been all over that in no time. Keeping people happy keeps people buying your product.
And people aren't happy. Nobody. The Nature-worshipers who hug bunnies and trees aren't happy; the conspicuous consumers who buy Escalades aren't happy; the car companies who lose business with each hike in gas prices aren't happy.

But with the ethanol craze, a new problem has arisen that hardly anyone's noticed. Food prices have gone up. The cost of vegetables and the cost of meat has gone up because the folks who used to raise corn for food (whether for people or stock) are raising it to make cups for Ben & Jerry's shakes and floats. What's more important: food or eco-friendly fuel? In the short and long run, it's food. America/Americans will always be able to afford it but what about poorer countries? Must they starve so we don't have to use oil?

Besides, it takes a lot of oil to make not a whole lot of ethanol.

And another thing, I find it ironic who supports ethanol.

The celebrities fan out in military array condemning oil companies and oil-addicted (as one Starbucks cup termed it) Americans. Yet, they jump in their jets after an ethanol pep rally and speed away.

How much fuel does a private jet use?
Not to mention how much pollution they cause.
The working man has to get around and working men's (or women's) cars have less to do with oil consumption and pollution than one day's traffic at LAX.

Sure the oil companies are making money, but that's what companies do. And the government is making a tidy sum from taxes on gasoline and the oil companies, and I'm sure it doesn't all find it's way into improving the roads.

Jury Duty

2007-06-10T12:57:00.000-07:00

Does it seem suspicious that in a panel of potential jurors for a case on a DUI charge the doctor, the vice president of a corporation, and the part-time English professor/Ph.D. student are excused from serving?

Apparently, a jury of our peers does not necessarily contain the educated, the responsible and the competent.

The Mob & Knowing Yourself

2007-06-08T13:02:00.000-07:00

I would have to say that any mob (or simply group) of people is stupid, gullible, violent, and unjust.
Most historical, literary, and cinematic mobs would affirm it.
Shakespeare would affirm it.
My professors would affirm it.

But, who says that I would be one among the dissenting few.
I think we have a tendency to think more of ourselves than is true.

My sister is currently reading Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. And a question that has come up with us before came up again:

If we had lived in the South at that time, would we have owned slaves?

It seems horrible to think it and it is horrible to think it, but basic self-indulgence, if we wish to avoid accusations of selfishness, ultimately triumph over conviction, or at least a practical outworking of conviction--in almost everyone.

And frankly, you and I and everyone else we know is in the majority.

I did not know this before the other day, but I found it interesting:
Robert E. Lee's father had almost nothing to leave his son except his slaves when he died (he was very bad with money). When he did die, however, Robert E. Lee freed them all in spite of the financial hardship it created for himself. You sniff at that perhaps. That's the least he could do, you might say. But think for one second: If it had been you, and it wasn't the obvious choice it seems now, would you choose possible financial ruin over wealth?

I can't say for myself. I wish I would, but I honestly don't know.

People often fail to understand their weakness. Will I do the right thing in such-and-such a case? Some invite temptation thinking they are above such things. But look at all absolutist governments. Absolute power has never been handled well. Power, of any kind, has almost never been handled well. People weaken to their desire--for power and mastery, for money and stuff, for sex, whatever.

I don't mean to sound sympathetic of wrong. I'm not. But I'm also heartily suppressing my own tendencies toward it.
How quaint and Freudian I may sound...but I try to treat people well.

People, I find, often use the word community but still are looking out for themselves. Community is a buzz word for looking like you care about other people and are helping other people when you want to be the one controlling them and actually are behaving like a jerk.

The old adage is "Charity begins at home."
I think that's true, not as an excuse for not helping others but because true charity means taking care of and helping those closest to you first. A philanthropic man who does not consider the needs of his children is still blamable.

Well, community begins at home as well.
As does thoughtfulness and sensitivity and selflessness.
How you treat your family and the people that you live with says more about you than your public shows of virtue.

But I digress.

The Lord of the Rings

2007-05-31T22:22:00.001-07:00

It's been a long while since I read or watched The Lord of the Rings, so I pulled it off my shelf of DVDs late tonight when there was nothing else to do. Amidst all Gandalf's warnings not to give him the ring, it struck me :

The only ones capable of having absolute power are the naive, the provincial.

Not men and dwarfs (who are mighty) or elves (who are wise) or wizards (who are both wise and powerful).

And the Hobbits must not wield it; they must dispose of it.

We have an unfortunate habit of undervaluing those who are only good and contented--as if being good and contented were things to be sniffed at. They are not unimportant; they're everything.

Ode to a Parasite

2007-05-20T20:08:00.000-07:00

There was a tiny parasite
That proved a worthy foe;
With microscopic stealth,
He brought me very low.
I thought I was the mighty one:
Five feet, eight inches tall,
But that microscopic parasite
Could make me scream and crawl.

So this is my one warning,
Be careful what you eat
Because that tiny parasite
Is very hard to beat.

The title of my blog...

2007-05-17T20:58:00.000-07:00

"In my trifles, I have learnt..."

This is actually a misheard quote of Lover's Vows in an old BBC adaptation of Mansfield Park.
These are the trifles I may or may not have learned.

True, I am a nerd, but I've made my peace with it.