Pledge Or Else

If you are a member of the Facebook world, you have probably seen this, or something like it, circulating among your “friends” (I put that in quotes, since most Facebook users include in their “friend” base people they have never met and barely know, straining the traditional understanding of the word).  Posts like this are all too common.  Usually they involve a kind of minor psychological blackmail: If you don’t repost this, it means you’re an insensitive, uncaring, totally bad person.  It’s rather like the good luck one is supposed to reap by passing on a chain letter, and the dire threats of what will happen if you don’t.  The digital age has made it so much easier to circulate these bacteria (like a virus, but not as evil).

This one in particular insinuates that anyone who doesn’t help in this effort isn’t an AMERICAN.  Evidently real AMERICANS like to shout.  And they all believe in GOD.  The propagators of this little piece of in-your-face theistic nationalism fail to understand that Facebook is international.   By attempting to flood Facebook with it they are screaming at Canadians, Europeans, Australians, and just about anybody else who is plugged into the network and can read English.  I imagine that would be pretty annoying.  But I expect folks from other countries may be used to that from AMERICANS.

Several of my FB connections reposted this before it finally died a well-deserved death (although it’s probably still out there somewhere; nothing ever really goes away on the Internet, as much as you might wish it would).  They are nice people.  But they didn’t think it through.  After several “Right on!” comments, the other side began weighing in.  Commenters began gently pointing out that this is really kind of offensive and intolerant.  One of the reposters went to great lengths to defend herself and affirm how tolerant she is; she was just reposting it as a favor to a friend who feels strongly about it.  Well, meant, I’m sure.  But again, not well-thought-out.

This, by the way, is probably what started the brouhaha, a decision made by NBC to voluntarily return to an earlier version of the Pledge that does not mention God.  For those who may not be aware of it, The Pledge has gone through several incarnations since it was adopted.  Here’s a brief and interesting summary of its history.  The “under God” business is pretty recent, added during the paranoid era of the 1950s as a response to “godless” Communism.  Rabid patriots act as if the current Pledge were penned by George Washington himself, forgetting that the Founding Fathers went to great pains to make this a secular government that would distance itself from any religion in order to assure tolerance for all, or none.  Hence the No Religious Test clause found in the Constitution, Article VI, paragraph 3: No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.   By the way, kindly mention this next time you run across somebody who, in one breath praises the Constitution, and in the next advocates barring atheists from holding office.

So, going back to the little exercise in the overuse of capitals and exclamation points that started this off, besides forgetting that there are others besides AMERICANS that use Facebook, and disregarding the fact that many who are, in fact, loyal American citizens also happen to be atheist, how does reciting the Pledge without the words “under God” show disrespect for the country, the flag or the military?  There simply is no logic to this.  None whatsoever.  So, what is the point of all this capitalized outrage that must be reposted ad infinitum ad nauseum?

Beyond this teapot tempest of frantic religious flag-waving, I’d like to take issue with the Pledge itself.  I do not recite it, and do not encourage others (including my sons) to recite it.  I advocate standing respectfully but silently should others do so.  My allegiance lies with a body of principles, not a body of government.  Governments, institutions, and individuals within governments and institutions can become corrupt, and when they do, they not deserve either respect or support.

I respect those in the military who have served honorably.  I do not respect those in the military who have used their service as an excuse to bully and brutalize.  I support my government when I think it is acting properly.  I do not support it when it acts in a manner which I judge to be immoral.  I respect theists whose belief in God leads them to act with kindness and compassion.  I do not respect theists who think their religion gives them license to act with hatred and intolerance.

Thus, I am not going to take a pledge that my moral compass might prevent me from keeping, whether it is under an arguably fictional deity or not.   An allegiance I can confidently pledge is one to the principles of compassion, tolerance, understanding and forgiveness, to defend the rights of others no matter their national origin or belief system, and to resist the forces of violence and warfare whenever possible.  Write that one up, and I’ll happily sign on.

I might post it on Facebook but whether you want to share it or not is your affair.  You’re just as good a person if you choose not to.

Being Gentle with Ourselves

[Michelle Murrain describes herself as a polymath: writer, teacher, web developer, theologian, scientist. She is interested in just about everything. One of the things she does a lot of is "observe and reflect", and dig deeper into things that are happening in the world. In that way, she is a philosopher like myself, a lover of wisdom. In this guest post from her, she shares a little bit of that wisdom.]

I am, by far, my worst critic, and I think that is true for most of us. We often find the way we are, or the ways we behave, or the things we do, problematic in one way or another. We weigh too much, we eat too much sugar, we are too quick to anger, or we are too critical with our loved ones, on and on. We have long lists of things that we don’t like about ourselves.

And it is easy to walk through life with the weight of those critiques on our shoulders. Often, we assume those critiques should spur us to change. But sadly, the shame and guilt attached to those critiques keeps us locked in place.

The answer to this might surprise you. It might surprise you that the most important thing you can do is to look at those faults with compassion and gentleness, and work to come to accept that they are as they are, and come to accept all of who we are as we are. The irony is that it is only when we fully, completely accept the things we don’t like about ourselves, that we can change those things. Hating those things, and pushing the reality of those things as far away as possible is what keeps us where we are. It keeps us in the cycle of shame that immobilizes us.

Think of how you would hold an infant, or a baby chick, or a tiny kitten just born a few days ago. Think of that gentleness, that love that comes from somewhere inside of yourself in the presence of a new being like that. And then think of yourself, with all of your faults, and the things you don’t like, or even hate, with that kind of gentleness and love.

How you are and what you are is what is. It is all that is, but that doesn’t mean that is all that ever will be. It is just what is now. Accept it with gentleness. Let the shame go. And if you can’t let the shame go (it’s hard, I know,) accept the shame. And if you can’t accept the shame, accept that you can’t accept it.

Slowly but surely, you will come to see that you can accept yourself, as you are. And then you won’t be frozen in place anymore. Then you can move, and change, and grow.

Michelle Murrain

Things I haven’t quite worked out yet

Hiking: step by step, mountain to mountain, breathing, sometimes hard but always breathing

Being a philosopher doesn’t mean having all the answers – quite the opposite. It means being full of questions. Understanding is the process of getting those questions answered. Inevitably, there are questions that go wanting. Often the most important questions are the most difficult to answer – if they have answers at all.

For instance, what are the limits of tolerance? There is a point at which the right of one group to practice their beliefs begins to encroach on the rights of those around them. Should one group be able to silence other groups because it finds their speech offensive? At what point does respect for parental authority collide with the responsibility of a society to protect its children? Is spanking abuse? Is it harmful to a child to refuse to educate her in any way that conflicts with her family’s religious belief? At what point ought society to intervene?

If the government of a sovereign nation has decided to put Sharia Law into effect, with what we believe are draconian punishments for minor offenses and radically oppressive treatment of women, have we a moral obligation to oppose that government? And if so, how far does that moral obligation go? Rhetoric? Embargoes? Subversion? A declaration of war? And on the subject of war, when can we justify its suffering and destruction? Why, if I kill a man on the street it is murder, but if I do it in uniform in another country it is patriotism? There are those who refuse to kill even in self-defense. Are they heroes or fools?

We don’t often get called upon in our daily lives to make these kinds of decisions. We can debate the hypotheticals, and berate our leaders and lawmakers when they answer these questions in what we think is the wrong way. These are the sorts of issues you argue about over dinner with your friends (or, folly of follies, on Facebook). Other questions cut deeper, close and personal, and their debate takes place in anguished solitude.

We all suffer traumas. People we love die or abandon us. People we trust betray us. We are wounded, crushed, battered. Sometimes it is our own fault; sometimes it is no one’s fault. We are told we must deal with it and move on. What does this mean?

I have wrestled with it lying awake in the small hours. I have taken long walks and chewed on it. I’ve thought it through the best that I can, and it doesn’t haunt me anymore. I go through my days cheerful, never giving it another thought. Am I done now? If it is conjured up again, if I am forced to look into that box of snakes once more and I find myself twisted with emotion, does that mean that I’m not done yet and there’s something else I’m supposed to do? If so, what?

Vague terms like “finding closure” and “working through it” are not terribly helpful. There isn’t always a definable ending, like the firm click of a door closing, to let you know that it is finished. Somewhere along the continuum from “It torments me constantly” to “It doesn’t affect me at all” there is a point where one can live with a past trauma and it is no longer crippling. For many of us, I expect that’s the best we can hope for. Opening the box will never cease to make us shudder.

We are brought up with heroic stories of brave souls who persevered beyond all logic to achieve their dream, to reach a goal, to fight an enemy, to resist defeat. Because they refused to admit failure, they ultimately triumphed. Never give up, we are told. Never stop believing in yourself.

Life is seldom so accommodating. Sometimes we simply have to cut our losses and change course or Reality takes us out like the Sioux took out Custer at Little Big Horn. Don Quixote was a magnificent character, but not one we’d necessarily want to emulate. So, how does one know when it is time to quit? How does one tell the difference between wisdom and wimping out, between the courage of conviction, and mere delusion? If those around you say you need to be fixed, but you don’t feel broken, how do you decide who’s right?

As I said in the title, these are all things I haven’t quite figured out yet. It could be this way, but then, it’s possible to see how it could be that. The open mind is tugged constantly between enlightenment and doubt. Most of the time I have to default to the simple, three word answer: I don’t know. If forced to pick a direction, I can take a guess, close my eyes and jump, hoping for the best. An awful lot of life is like that; we just don’t know. We take our best shot and muddle through; maybe we did the right thing and maybe not.

Step by step, day by day, and wherever you are, there you are. This much I have worked out. I can’t change yesterday, I can’t be certain of tomorrow, all I have to work with is right now. As long as I’m breathing, there’s the hope some good will come of it. And maybe, a bit more understanding.

Monkey, the Fey Cat

“Strutting along the edge of Oppie’s stall was Monkey, the feral tom cat that ‘lived’ in the big stable with the riding ring… It looked like a mix of tortoise shell and Siamese with its funky coloring. The cat gave a half-hearted hiss in the Shire stallion’s direction, but returned its gaze to me. With a flick of his tail and an irritated angling of his ears, the feline began cleaning himself.
Yes, yes, I’m a cat that can communicate with humans. Your family’s being plagued by a kelpie and you just ran from the castle as if all the beasts of Hell were on your tail… are you really all that shocked about a talking cat?“

Justine Graykin has been another great friend for many years who has an excellent, moving, poignant, and informative blog that I happily subscribe to. She also lost two of her dear kitties last year in particularly difficult circumstances, so I wanted to send Monkey, the faerie cat who befriends Heather in The Kelpie, to her. Monkey would definitely love throwing philosophy around with Justine; it’s totally a cat thing. But he also has a very caring and loyal side, despite being a cat, that I think Justine would also appreciate.

Thank you very much for being part of my Cover Reveal Scavenger Hunt, Justine!

[No problem, Trisha! And, for the information of my regular readers, TJ Wooldridge is one of many writers I know who have turned to small Indie publishers to bring their work to print. Spencer Hill Press is one of these, publishing quality work that the “Big Six” have overlooked, taking chances on new authors with fresh ideas and innovative perspectives.  Blog hops and “scavenger hunts” like this are among the clever and fun ways they are using social media to spread the word about their books.  <rant> Small presses lack the deep pockets for the splashy advertising campaigns of major publishers, whose financial resources come largely from playing it safe with known big names and trusted formulas, from squeezing libraries and distributors, and offering progressively more penurious contracts to writers.  I strongly urge all the visitors to my website to support small independent presses and the work they promote.  Buy the books, read them, review them, Tweet them and talk them up.  It’s another small blow against the Empire.</rant>

We Are the Tribe

The more I look around at the research being done, the more the evolutionary roots of our social and moral behavior become clear. I saw a fascinating TED talk in which experiments done with chimps, elephants and monkeys clearly demonstrate empathy, cooperation, reciprocity and a strong sense of fairness. These are not the god-given characteristics of human souls, nor the result of values imposed on us by our upbringing. They are instincts hardwired into the very structure of minds as social animals. Far from being selfish, violent, competitive savages at heart, in need of the rigorous discipline of social institutions and religion to civilize us, it would seem that we have an innate impulse to cooperate, to console one another in times of sorrow, and to rebel when we are treated unfairly or see others unjustly treated.

Score one for compassion and the moral compass. I am also reading Jared Diamond’s “The World Until Yesterday”, and it becomes very clear as I see his comparisons of social organizations ranging from the small band to the large state, just where we get some of our more negative traits. While it is to an individual’s advantage to practice cooperation and compassion within one’s group, it is also advantageous to advance the needs of one’s own group over other groups, especially when resources are scarce. Thus, one needs a strong sense who is “in” and who is “out”. When you have a band of some hundreds of individuals, it’s possible to know everybody and easily tell who is familiar and who is a dangerous stranger (and in Diamond’s research, for most such cultures every stranger is considered dangerous). As social groups get larger, and greater organization is necessary, mechanisms are needed to enforce obedience to the chief and loyalty to the group. Religious belief is a particularly successful mechanism to accomplish both.

When you consider the frenzy that religious conviction is able to evoke in people, how fervently they defend their god and their leaders, it is easy to see how this trait would be selected for in tribes and nations. Commanding legions who are fanatically devoted and convinced against all reason that they are right and all others are wrong bestows a formidable amount of power. Other tribes who lack that blind, fervent dedication to group and leader would be swept aside. As the social group grows and increases in territory, population and wealth, the need to maintain control means that all other gods must be crushed in favor of the dominant one. Sound familiar?

It is not too difficult to transfer this deep-seated impulse to blind loyalty to the state itself, to substitute nationalism for religious devotion. When this happens, the State can afford to tolerate a diversity of faiths, so long as all subjects obey the leaders. This is what happened in Rome, for example. And no, the Romans did not systematically persecute other religions. As a general rule, a wide diversity of beliefs and even atheism was tolerated. What Rome would not put up with was anything that subverted the power of Rome. If Christians were persecuted, it was for their politics, not for their faith. And the Romans were just as brutal in dealing with insurrection as Christians were in dealing with heresy. Same principle.

We are the product of hundreds of thousands of years of selection for behaviors that promoted our survival, not just as individuals, but as groups. Both sides of the coin, compassion and fairness, as well as xenophobia and warfare, are built into us. But another brilliant evolutionary advantage is also built into us: the ability to reason, to understand, and to influence our own behavior. We are remarkably plastic. As we continue to study ourselves and come to understand who we are and how we came to be that way, the better we will be able to transcend our weaknesses and utilize our strengths.

It remains to be seen whether a new strategy of universal tolerance and dedication to undifferentiated human thriving can succeed, or if the baggage of our past will defeat us.

Magical Thinking Nation

Faith that does not fear truth is a faith that will endure.

There seems to be a prevailing mindset among the people of these (dis)United States that if they believe something loudly enough, it will be true. Conversely, if they deny something passionately enough, it becomes not true. There even seems to be something heroic about it in the national imagination; the brave, idealistic soul, staunchly clinging to his convictions in spite of the facts arrayed against him.

Thus certain groups dispense with evolution and substitute Intelligent Design, deny global climate change, insist on the reality of angels, visiting aliens, assorted conspiracies and Bigfoot, and force their prejudices and illusions into the public discourse. Politicians, talk show hosts and entire networks cater to what would otherwise be fringe thinking and base wildly successful careers on it. It creates a dangerous feedback loop, as the deluded find their delusions validated in the media, and believe them all the harder, picking up more converts on the way. Hey, it was on the news. An important person (important because he was on TV or radio) is taking alien abductions seriously. Maybe I should, too.

This is America, a country designed specifically to encourage crank ideas, on the premise that some of those crank ideas might turn out to be valid. But for a crank idea to prove itself and become mainstream, it needs to be tested by reality. Do the facts support it? Can science prove it? Do people who have devoted their lives to understanding how the world works think the idea has merit? Thus we have moved forward in an often lurching, erratic path to find answers that work, that cure diseases and provide the framework for amazing new technologies.

Unfortunately, somewhere along the line we decided to skip that validation process and allow the crank ideas to hit the mainstream without being tested by anything other than popular opinion. Thus travesties like Creation “Science” get to be taken seriously when they have absolutely no validity at all outside the misguided imagination.

I do not mean to attack religious belief per se. One is free to gather together into congregations and express whatever spiritual truth feels good and righteous. Just keep it in church and don’t come into the classroom or the halls of government with it. That’s what we mean by separation of Church and State.

Magical thinking may be helpful to people in their personal lives, to get them through the struggle of dealing with a world that is often cruel and unfeeling. There is comfort in the idea of “letting go”, allowing Jesus, or God, or angels or whatever take over and do the driving. But please don’t do that literally on the highway at rush hour. People will get killed.

Perhaps there is something to prayer, psychologically or otherwise, that can heal a person. But if your child is seriously ill, diabetic or badly injured, take them to a hospital. Don’t take them to a church and pray over them. Children whose parents do that die.

Sam Harris, author of The End of Faith and The Moral Landscape

And if you are a politician, it may play well to your constituents to adhere fervently to some crackpot notion. But please pay attention to the facts, to reality, when you vote. No matter how much you want to believe that Saddam Hussein is hoarding weapons of mass destruction, no matter how determined you are that the war you want to fight will be a great success and will fulfill all sorts of greater political ambitions, if the experts tell you it just ain’t so, believe them. Because otherwise, people will die. Lots and lots of people.

Human happiness is real and measurable. The efficacy of a particular medical practice can be studied and evaluated. The success of a political policy can be observed, and if it fails, it should be discarded. Believing something to be true does not make it true, and there are reliable means of testing one’s beliefs. The Bible did not tell us how to cure polio, Sharia Law did not give us the computer, and meditation won’t keep ocean levels from rising as the glaciers melt. The Bible, Sharia Law and meditation may all have some use, but Reality trumps everything.

Boskone 2013

Lisa Bouchard and Jen Pelland at the Broad Universe table in the Huckster’s Room

It was the Golden Boskone, the New England Science Fiction Association‘s fiftieth convention.  After you’ve had your fun with the parties and cosplay of Arisia, you sober up and get down to business at Boskone.  Not that they don’t have fun.  But it’s different.  Arisia had Barfleet.  Boskone had the Maltcon scotch tasting party.

First panel was Friday afternoon, barely giving me time to check in and register.  The topic was “Are Writers and Fans Good for Each Other?” (answer: sometimes Yes, I Couldn’t Live Without You and sometimes Kindly Back Off You’re Creeping Me Out) moderated by Priscilla Olson, with Elaine Isaak, Beth Meacham and myself.  After that, with barely enough time for me to grab a bite to eat, was a real plum of a panel, another question, “Is the Internet Reprogramming Your Brain?”  I shared the table with Charles Gannon, John P. Murphy, and Jerry Pournelle, with James Patrick Kelly immoderating.  Daniel Dern was supposed to join us, and I was disappointed to find out he wouldn’t be.  Never mind; one more person on the panel would just have made it even harder to get a word in edgewise.  Jerry Pournelle, who was after all the NESFA Press Guest, had a great deal he wished to share with us.

Note: Pournelle self-describes as “somewhere to the right of Genghis Khan”, and is the author of Pournelle’s Iron Law of Bureaucracy: “In any bureaucratic organization there will be two kinds of people: those who work to further the actual goals of the organization, and those who work for the organization itself. Examples in education would be teachers who work and sacrifice to teach children, vs. union representative who work to protect any teacher including the most incompetent. The Iron Law states that in all cases, the second type of person will always gain control of the organization, and will always write the rules under which the organization functions.” Brilliant. I don’t particularly like his example, but the law itself elegantly explains a great deal.

Following shortly thereafter was the Broad Universe Rapid Fire Reading, which featured authors Elaine Isaak, Trisha Wooldridge, Rose Mambert, Lisa Bouchard, and Terri Bruce.  Roberta Rogow, who also does filk, varied the fare by singing instead of reading.

After all that, I welcomed the pleasant break of the Boskone Reception, with a dessert smorgasbord and cash bar, which included white and dark chocolate fountains.  The assortment of sweet treats was breathtaking and gorgeously laid out.  One of the perks of being on the program was getting a chit for a free drink, so I was able to enjoy an excellent glass of chablis while watching the rest of the room (which included, by the way, George R. R. Martin) tuck into their amaretto cheesecake and pineapple mango trifle.  After that, a tour through the art gallery, sweet treats (and some not so sweet) for the eyes.

Saturday I made the acquaintance of Daniel Kimmel, author of Jar Jar Binks Must Die (which was nominated for a Hugo, which means, as he put it, it lost). I was on a panel with him about “Humor in the Stuff We Read” later in the day, so when I noticed he was reading during an empty slot in my schedule, I went to listen. He was picking selections from his new book, Shh! It’s a Secret: A Novel About Aliens, Hollywood, and the Bartender’s Guide, and I enjoyed it so much I bought the book. Dan, by the way, returned the favor by coming to my reading, an excerpt from Archimedes Nesselrode, which is coming out later this year. I had one of those “What Was I Thinking!?!” moments when I realized that what I had chosen to read did not, to my horror, represent my work terribly well. It seemed like a good choice at the time. In spite of this, Dan kindly agreed to read the rest of the book to see if he’d be willing to blurb it. What a mensch.

The panel, by the way, was a lot of fun. We were joined by Craig Shaw Gardner (who has written lots of stuff), Darlene Marshall, and Paul Tremblay, who “fears many things, including the return of his uvula.” Darlene normally writes historical romance about pirates, privateers, smugglers and the occasional possum, but got in on her creds as an SF fan. I love humor panels.

Now, I really must hand it to Boskone Programming for boldly going where Arisia refused to tread.  Even if they did do it holding their nose, and stuffed us in the tiny little Independence room where unknown writers go to die, Boskone gave us the Brony panel that Arisia refused to.  This still baffles me, considering that Arisia is far more into lifestyle and fandom panels.  I can only guess that all they know about Bronies is what Faux News told them.  It’s easy to dismiss the idea of a male adult fandom to an ostensibly little girls’ show as something perverse, perhaps just east of pedophilia.   And to be sure, there is that dark corner of the fandom (think Rule 34). But that is monstrously far from what Brony fandom is really all about, and that is why I have pushed to have panels on the subject to correct the misconceptions.

Thank you Boskone.  You did a good thing.  We had a packed room and had to bring in extra chairs, and even so there were people sitting on the side tables and standing against the wall.  A man even came in and set up a camera because his daughter desperately wanted to attend the panel but couldn’t be at the convention.  That’s the kind of demand there was.  We had several parents whose children, male and female, were Bronies and they wanted to understand why.  We even had one young man who talked his mom into going to the panel so he could “come out” to her as a Brony in a safe environment.

Fellow panelists Gillian Danials and Shira Lipkin and I talked about the quality of the show, how great the writing and the animation is, what a fantastic job Lauren Faust, the creative force behind MLP Friendship is Magic, did to take the rather one-dimensional My Little Pony franchise and turn it into a show with strong characters and themes of feminism, cooperation and compassion. Part of its appeal is its optimism, its message that strong bonds of friendship can allow you to grow and endure the dangers and struggles of life.  In a world filled with fear and bigotry, the Brony community has become a place of acceptance and safety, a place where males and females both can cast off the gender roles society tries to force on them.

In screaming contradiction to the myth of the queer man-child living in his parents’ basement, many bronies are young professionals (and thus have the resources to contribute all that money that has been raised by Bronies for social causes, including helping handicapped children and donating to Doctors Without Borders).   Most are heterosexual and many are in the military (as was the son of one of the mothers at our panel).  To further dispel the misconceptions and help folks understand what this is all about, we recommended checking out the documentary ‪Bronies: The Extremely Unexpected Adult Fans of My Little Pony‬.

Not a lot of costumes at Boskone, but a few elaborate exceptions.

A few shout-outs and tips of the hat: Thanks to Aradia Willard for the awesome glassware!  To Broad Universe, and particularly the New England Broads chapter, for the time and skills they volunteer to promote new women writers of spec fic.  And special thanks to BU president Trisha Wooldridge for making it possible for me to get to Boskone this year (of course, you did get pack mule services out of me, lugging the BU gear to the Dealer’s Room and back).  A big thank-you to the volunteers who kept the Con Suite going, although I must plead with you to open earlier.  I need my Earl Gray hot by 9:00 am anyway if I’m going to make a panel by 10:00.

Biggest gripe: limited opportunities for dinner.  No Green Room and only one restaurant.  We faced nearly a two hour wait at the hotel pub, and the only alternatives were walking several blocks or ordering out. Then again, eating out did have its advantages, despite the discomfort of poor Terri, who had to wobble there on spike heels. Aradia set up the parameters for me to improvise a story while we waited for dinner, based on suggestions from everyone at the table. It was a smashing success. Remind me sometime to tell you about the Pope, the leprechaun’s farm, and the zombie prostitute.