Crit

Bad, Bad News

YES, THAT WAS MY EMAIL which KQED’s Michael Krasny read during his second hour this morning, which program concerned the effect of bad news on man-in-the-street audients. The show is worth a listen — archive available at http://www.kqed.org/epArchive/R201006091000. (I riffed on the concomitant effect of bad news on the reporters who witness it.)

Many listeners discussed the heartbreak of our instant-everywhere media and the dangers of being desensitized by a flood of horrible real images about which one can do nothing or too damn little. Some said they’ve switched off radios and TV sets and canceled newspapers; some severely curtail their media intake to the non-visual or (more often) The Daily Show. One woman addressed the desensitization issue thus: When she sees the faces and names of American soldiers killed most recently in Iraq and Afghanistan (A”H, PBUT and rest in peace), she “goes into a little prayer for them” — she tries to connect her inner spark-of-what-some-call-God to theirs, to their lives and those surrounding them, and to the hole left by what was formerly their presence.

She says that helps. I believe her.

One of the most difficult aspects of living a “religious” or “spiritual” life is reconciling the universal amazingness of God with the frustrative pettiness of some humans. (“Monotheism isn’t for wimps,” as my old buddy Sputnik sometimes said.) It’s the sort of thing which worried Job, at least until God said, “That’s just the way it is.” It worries me too; these days I’m finding it difficult to keep from turning my eyes away from the horror. (Granted, I’m sort of dealing with a lot right now.) But this morning I discovered that not only am I not the only one who feels that way — I’m not alone in thinking that’s unacceptable. I don’t want to be ignorant of what’s going on in the world; I don’t want to be paralyzed by the knowledge either.

Maybe the answer, an answer, or anyway what my tool-using Mr. Fixit primate brain will substitute, isn’t to switch off but to find something you can do something about. Wherever you live, someone needs help — find them and offer it! (In Sonoma Valley, you can do that through FISH, or friendsinsonomahelping.org; if you don’t have something similar near you, start one. )

Even if we can’t directly affect what enrages us, we can channel that rage to productive ends. It may be hard work — but isn’t anything better than paralysis?

Life

Pithyism #1440

RESEARCH THROUGH BOOKS WALKS A vast flagstone patio; online research is a path laid stone by stone.

Life

Pithyism #PKD

WHEN THE POCKET CAMERA ASKS if your subject blinked, it’s time to turn off ALL the machines.

*

?, Life

Not Good For The Jews, Or Anyone Really

THE WORLD IS SO SMALL these days that you never know who might be reading you — including the families of those aboard the Gaza flotilla.

If that’s the case, then please let me apologize in advance. I am very sorry, sincerely and sadly and non-ironically, that your friends and relatives were injured and/or killed trying to support a tragic cause. I have a fondness for tragic causes; one might say that defines a Jew. But this cause is tragic because it is wrong.

Granted, “wrong” is a subjective term, often misapplied. (For example, it’s sometimes been said of me.) But from my little knot of spacetime consciousness:

It is wrong to aid those who have sworn to murder me and mine (or anyone else for that matter).

It is wrong to seduce non-violent people to a violent cause by feigning non-violent resistance.

It is wrong for feigners of non-violent resistance to complain when their lie is uncovered. (I’m talking about the organizers here — I have no doubt that many in the flotilla have a Ghandi-like non-violence, which is weird to me given their sympathies).

It is wrong to force people to kill you in self defense.

And it is wrong, very wrong, to kill civilians. Sometimes it’s evil, like when you shoot rockets and mortars at their schools, homes and shopping centers on a daily basis, or blow yourself up in their pizzerias and discos. Sometimes it’s tragic, like when well-intentioned people are cynically exploited by those more interested in racking up sympathy deaths than in peace. Sometimes it begs the question of “civilian.”

But it is always wrong — and wrong in a watching-a-slow-motion-auto-accident way that can twist your heart around trying to make it right. May the G?d who sees past our hatreds, prejudices and self-created madness, to the possibility of what we might become once we quit micturating on each other’s footwear … well, now would be a good time. Can’t think of a better one, in fact.

(PS: I have nothing else to say about this, and nothing to defend, but feel free to excoriate or cheer this piece as desired. I forgive both in advance.)

?

It’s Not About The Barbecue

UNTIL THEIR SACRIFICE IS OBVIATED by a calmer world, we remember them.

In Flanders Fields
By: Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

?

Silicon Intermission

WE AT FRANCE STREET TOOL and Blog (i.e., Ann & moi — G is only exploring keyboards) will be offline for the next 12 to 18 hours, G?d willing, as a new computer (thanks again, Dad) replaces the old (thanks again, Don). Try to be good to each other in the meanwhile?