Tag Archives: discussion

Culture/Politics

A Tale Of Two Interviews

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I saw this pop up on my Facebook feed today.


Though I didn’t care for all his politics, I enjoyed listening to President Obama as a public speaker. I’m sure some of that credit belongs to good speech writers, but still… I felt like here’s a guy who can make a coherent case for the position he holds, even if I don’t agree with him.

I tried to imagine how this interview might go with the current administration:

“Have you ever read Reinhold Niebuhr?”
“Who?” Trump smirked. “Is that an op-ed guy from some fake news media site? I don’t—“
“He’s a philosopher, Mister President.”
“Oh.” Trump shakes his head. “The thing with those guys is—I mean, it’s great to have people who sit around thinking really deep about stuff, but in business you don’t have time for, you know, I’m going to—what about the human condition and how does it play into—you’re there to win, and be great, and make good deals.”
“Of course,” I respond. “But wouldn’t you say there’s—“
“You know, we have a lot of guys that want to read this or that guy, what does he think about, I don’t know, poverty or diplomacy or whatever. But as a successful businessman, I learned the value of fast action—you just go after it and get it done, which—I think that’s kind of a philosophy of it’s own. Maybe the best philosophy. I wrote a book about it, you know. The Art of the Deal. Have you read it?” 
He flashes a grin. “I’ll turn the tables on you. What do you think of Donald Trump?”
Before I can come up with an appropriate response, he laughs, waves me off with one hand, and goes on. “Not that it really matters. I know how many copies it sold. One of the best books in America, the best. What was your question again?”

To any of my friends on the Right, #sorrynotsorry and I hope some day the President proves me wrong. I look forward to that day like a thirsting man in the desert crawling toward an oasis.

To my friends on the Left, don’t become what you hate about the Right—because there’s a lot of mindless groupthink on your side too.

I long for the return of politics where we can communicate with one another and actually discuss the merits and concerns of any given policy or change. 

I’m beyond tired of party-line foul-atics, where all that matters is your slavish devotion to whatever your party’s gods and goddesses deem correct. “I support this initiative.” Why? “Because it’s what’s best. I saw a piece by (Alex Jones / Rachel Maddow), so I know this is what the country needs.”

Whether it’s Tomi Lahren getting fired on the Right because she disagreed with the party norm about abortion, or people dog-piling something Bill Maher or Jon Stewart says which goes against the flow, tribalism fuels this kind of “politics” instead of thought.
We have had eloquent Presidents in the past, and we can again. Fair point. 

More importantly, we also have been an eloquent, educated, considerate people in the past. We can become that again.

Culture/Politics

Knock It Off

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In my time as an aircrew member in the Air Force, the most valuable training I received is a course called Crew Resource Management, or CRM. The short version is “this is how you talk to people so that you probably don’t die.”

Put multiple humans together on an airplane (or a flight of single-seat aircraft working in conjunction) and communication becomes essential, vital to both mission success and safety.

Even though we’re all in the same metal tube hurtling through the sky, getting this many people to communicate in a critical situation is more difficult than it seems. (This crew was awesome at it.)

In CRM, we learn the common causes of human error, the contributing factors in safety accidents and incidents, the price of breakdowns in communication, and the expensive cost in equipment and human lives when someone doesn’t take the time to listen to and recognize the importance of information that could avert disaster.

All too often, a jet slams into a mountain or wanders into an unsafe situation even despite the fact that people on board were aware of the problem and vocalized the impending danger. That’s the other side of this training—learning that you might be the one standing in the way of safety, ignoring the information that could keep your mission from failing or save your life.

We must be able to talk and get each other’s attention. We have to be able to focus everyone’s minds on the key bits of information that might mean life or death.

To that end, we learn key words and phrases that every aircrew member knows. “I am concerned about what we are doing right now. I feel unsafe because of this situation. I don’t have a clear picture of what is going on and where we are headed as a crew.”

The phrase to trump all others? “Knock it off.”

In a training environment, that means “Stop playing whatever game or exercise we’re doing, everybody shut up a minute, and let’s make sure we’re doing the right thing.”

When a crisis develops, it means “everybody, cease all the distractions and focus on the critical situation taking place right now.”

One might think that the training solves all our problems, but that’s not the case. Despite every aircrew member receiving the same recurring briefings and classes, some people still don’t get it and drop the ball when a moment of miscommunication arises.

I’ve said all these terms to an aircraft commander on behalf of a dozen peers in the back end of the jet, in conjunction with support and agreement from other officers onboard, only to watch the guy in charge ignore what’s an ingrained response. Sometimes we get stubbornly convinced of how right we are and nothing can dissuade us, no matter how many people say it, no matter how they put it into words.

CRM and Knock-It-Off are designed to help us see those weaknesses, but they can’t fix everything.

This morning I read headlines about George H. W. Bush and some of his negative thoughts on President Trump’s performance. Apparently, George W. Bush has also expressed some disapproval about this administration’s performance.

Judging by the comments section, both the Bushes are traitors, or political hacks, or so arrogant as to presume that the Oval Office was owed to one of their family members. It’s an all-too-familiar turning upon and tearing apart a member of the pack when they go against the grain.

I used to be amazed watching conservatives eat their own—shifting from “they’re awesome” to vilifying and condemning as traitors anyone that didn’t support the party’s pet issue or candidate.
No one is safe from this shifting allegiance. Go against the accepted view, and you’re a RINO, you’re the swamp, you’re bleeding from your whatever, you’re a hack, you’re a liberal in disguise, you’re finally revealing your true colors and you should have been hated all along.

Whatever you are, you’re never a person expressing your convictions or concerns out of faithful devotion to what you understand as conservative ideals. You’re never a person asking serious questions because you want your political party to succeed and do well.

I guess let’s add both George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush to the ever-growing list of people not Right enough for the Right.

Reagan himself could rise from the grave today, declare his disappointment with what the Right has become, and yet people would say, “I always knew he was just another big-mouthed Hollywood blowhard actor who thinks their movie career means people should listen to them.”

(President Reagan speaking in Minneapolis 1982, by Michael Evans. Public Domain.)
Well, Hollywood, there you go again… 

This is why I can’t identify with anything coming from the Right Wing anymore… because for so many of them, it’s a one-strike, you’re-out system demanding mindless devotion to whatever the core of the party does or says. Agree or get out of here, you faker.

We have to be able to talk in order to succeed. We have to be able to raise concerns and those need to be addressed in a serious manner if there’s going to be a foundation of mutual trust within the party’s ranks.

We make fun of the Left for expecting everyone to fall in line on certain issues (try surviving as a pro-life Democrat, for example). We’re just as guilty if not worse.

Conservatives, I am concerned about what we are doing right now. I feel that our party is moving into unsafe territory, putting ourselves at risk. Many of us in the base don’t have a clear picture of where we are headed as a party.

Conservatives, knock it off.

Culture/Politics

Defining Moments

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A friend posted a riddle presented in his managment class. “If the day before the day before yesterday is Tuesday, what is the day after the day after tomorrow?”

I came up with Monday, since ‘today’ in the riddle seems to me to be Friday. He had the same answer. The instructor said he was wrong, and the answer to the riddle was Friday. My linguist friends and I started tearing this apart trying to sort out what the right answer is and how to arrive at it. Some argued that the conditional ‘if’ phrase is trumped by the present tense verb ‘is,’ kind of like a grammar version of PEMDAS, the rule that guides which part of a math equation one must complete first. Had the question been stated “was Tuesday” instead of “is,” then Monday would have been correct.

(Or so they claim. I have my doubts. Not to mention, searching for versions of that riddle on Google pointed toward a similar-but-clearly-worded variant, one which doesn’t play a trick based on verb tenses but simply asks the reader to figure out the puzzle. I suspect the lesson writers or instructor copied the riddle wrong from the start. But I’m arrogant about these things.)

My frustration with the explanation boils down to playing a trick of grammar rules and definitions. Rather than speak clearly, the riddle as explained by my linguist friends ignores common usage of language and depends on an oft-ignored rule that supposedly shifts the meaning completely from what is implied. It’s someone claiming a simple answer depends on what the definition of ‘is’ is–technically accurate and a proper debate tactic, but readily dismissed as shady or truth-dodging by the average person.

I thought of this little exchange when my Facebook exploded with a mixture of Cecil the Lion and all the videos about Planned Parenthood. I very nearly posted a tweet something to the effect of

Maybe if there was a market for lion parts, PP supporters could get behind hunting. #profitsmatter

Then I realized that would do no good. It alienates rather than persuades. It mocks issues people care about deeply. And I think we have plenty of that already.

I got the video link for a feminist declaring “Planned Parenthood Isn’t Selling Baby Parts, You F@#$ing Idiots” and a day later, the right-wing response “Planned Parenthood IS Selling Baby Parts, You Freaking Feminist Hosebeast.” (They also sanctimoniously called out the feminist for dropping f-bombs left and right, while they stooped to a ‘clean’ version of name-calling that is no better in my opinion.)

Meanwhile plenty of people point out the disparity between response to the PP videos and the slaying of Cecil the Lion. Plenty of tweets and posts encouraging the murder of that dentist, whether by lion mauling or by drilling him a new orifice. Whichever side of the aisle your circle of friends leans toward, no doubt you’re seeing a ton of outrage that invariably paints dissenters as morons, idiots, worthless human beings devoid of morality. “How can anyone support this?!” both sides scream, while talking about two different subjects.

We’re talking past each other. Everyone’s speaking but no one is listening.

When the right yells about baby parts, the left sighs at best or swears at them, because the legal definition in our country is “fetal tissue” or “medical waste” produced by a legal and optional medical procedure. There may be aspects that are legally questionable, like whether “sales” are taking place or procedures are being altered from what the patients consented to in order to produce better remains. But “by definition” they’re not selling baby parts, duh, because you have to remember what the definition of “fetus” is.

And the right shouts, “How can you care about a stupid lion more than you care about the horrors depicted in those leaked videos? Look at the evidence; listen to the words of the doctors and the staff.” Many will admit if pressed that they’d like to see the hunter who killed Cecil prosecuted for where he broke the law, if indeed that can be proven. But to most, it’s just a lion, and doesn’t compare with the human remains shown in the PP videos. Going from a religious or moral definition of all human life as being precious, the anti-abortion / pro-life crowd can’t help but be furious about the sale of baby parts — because you have to remember what the definition of “life” is.

We’re all heavily invested emotionally into so many various societal and cultural issues that it can be hard to hit the brakes and take a look around. Maybe it’s a debate about white privilege and the #blacklivesmatter trend. Maybe it’s the Confederate flag, or gun control. Maybe it’s a fight for rights we feel we’ve been denied, or a challenging sense that the comfortable culture we once knew is slipping and changing into something far different.

The river of outrage in this country seems neverending. It’s easy to forget that there are people just like us on both banks.

Locking in on my one point of view and refusing to consider the opposition only creates tension, division, and strife. Yes, we might never agree… but at least I can do you the courtesy of listening to find out exactly what I’m disagreeing with, and vice versa. (For example, here is a challenging view on Planned Parenthood from a Christian man faced with an impossible choice.)

I’m grateful for my friends on all sides of these discussions who are willing to have conversations and dig down to the roots of where our points of view diverge. I spent a good chunk of yesterday morning discussing the value of life and the question “When is it justifiable to kill another human being?” I don’t think either of us walked away with a different point of view, but we maintained the mutual respect we’ve developed over the years.

For me, that respect is what matters. Rather than debate words and call each other names, we’ve made sure to define our friendship first. We’ve defined our individual morality to include striving to show respect for others, and we make sure our conversations on these subjects are guided by that definition.

A mind that won’t listen can’t be changed. And when my first thought is that someone else is guilty of this, usually I figure out that it’s me.

Let’s not categorize ourselves with “us” and “them” on this or any other issue. We are not engaged in a civil war despite all the cultural issues and debates. We have to figure out how to be “we the people” because that’s what this nation is founded upon and defined by.

Culture/Politics

Tolerating Questions

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If anyone had any doubts about Ben Affleck getting into the role of Batman, those fears can be allayed. He goes after what he views as justice like the Caped Crusader pursuing the Joker.

Too bad the real joke is his viewpoint.

What am I talking about?

It’s been my experience that we in the Right-wing Christian community love to see militant Islam called out for its sins.

Sometimes that makes people uncomfortable, as it may come across like we’re judging every Muslim by the bad apples… something we hate to see done to Christians. Comparisons might be made to Westboro Baptist Church, for example, or to the most recent televangelist or big name involved in a scandal. And we say, “But we’re not like that.”

What if the available data show that we are?

Recently I watched a portion of a Bill Maher show about Islam, and what (and to what extent) it motivates its adherents to do or support.

I’m not exactly a fan of Bill Maher or Sam Harris. But facts are facts, and statistical data are statistical data. We use these tools for a reason–they more accurately reflect reality than our biases and assumptions do.

For example, one person might be afraid of every Muslim that crosses their path, because “you never know.” Another might assume any Muslim encountered in the West is likely a moderate, friendly person willing to live peaceably with others, because why else would they be here?

But Bill Maher and Sam Harris address certain inclinations among a broad range of Muslims, based on surveys and poll data. And they get called out rather vehemently by Ben Affleck and Nicholas Kristof for their “racism” and their “bigotry.”

Here’s the video to that part of the show:

In a lengthy blog post, Sam Harris addresses his concerns. It’s worth a read. His overall point is: If one cannot discuss or question a belief or idea without being accused of judging an individual or espousing bigotry, then where is the room for discourse?

He states:

 My criticism of Islam is a criticism of beliefs and their consequences—but my fellow liberals reflexively view it as an expression of intolerance toward people.

He writes his concerns about how the discussion was framed as “racism” and “bigotry” as a question of whether Liberalism can be saved from itself.

I daresay the question applies to us in the Christian community just as much. I’ve seen honest questions about theology or discussions of how beliefs impact action descend into accusations of hatred, intolerance, bias, and willful ignorance–and these claims come from Christians towards non-believers.

Questions and discussions don’t weaken us; they make us stronger. Hiding from questions, shutting down discussion, eliminating any possibility of debate or dissension in the ranks–this just shows we have weaknesses to hide, vulnerabilities we dare not reveal to the world.

We read that we are to “always be ready to give a defense for the faith” (1 Pet 3:15). That means we have to be willing and open to hear questions people ask. We can’t take everything as a personal attack, a restriction on our freedom of religious expression, or an example of hateful intolerance.

When we hide behind name-calling and assumptions about the other person’s motivations, we’re doing ourselves no favors.

We may not have a perfect answer at the tip of our tongues. But do we at least have a listening ear?

Culture/Politics

H Words

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On Thursday, I sat in the presence of an apparent hate-monger. Worse, I listened to her advice on illustrating, collaborating with writers, and marketing.

I might never have known, without the intervention of the Huffington Post on my google search. The day has been saved, if “saved” is not a word too charged with religious meaning.

The local Christian writers’ group I joined two years ago, the Omaha WordSowers meet on the 2nd Thursday of each month. They have a guest speaker who provides information or personal experience about some aspect of the writer’s journey from creative idea to published work.

Yesterday’s guest speakers were Lori Schulz and Hannah Segura, who talked about the process of publishing Papa’s Plan for Buddy Bee, which Lori wrote and Hannah illustrated.

Papa's Plan for Buddy Bee
A 100% Hate-Free Children’s Book

Lori gave her blog site link, but Hannah only mentioned an online following where she posts some of her art. I searched in hopes of finding her blog or site, since I hope to stay connected with the friends and fellow writers I’ve made here.

Hannah is one of many home-schooled young people I’ve met that challenge old stereotypes of that method of education. She is (like they are) full of vigor and joy, polite, socially at ease, well-spoken, and most of all just plain nice to everyone.

So the first few sites I found surprised me, because Hannah was equated with hate. Some time ago, she illustrated another book written by a different Christian author, on the subject of God’s design for families. A Bible-believing author wrote a kids’ book about marriage being one man and one woman for life, and a Bible-believing illustrator drew pictures to match the story. This came as no surprise to me. It should come as no surprise to anyone else.

That word choice, hate, really bothers me.

Maybe it’s because I am a linguist by profession and a writer by passion, so words and their definitions matter.

Maybe it’s because I know Hannah as an acquaintance, and as trite as it may sound, she doesn’t appear to have a hate-filled cell in her body.

Maybe it’s because I’ve heard the same term used to accuse me of feeling a way I’ve never felt about someone else.

And maybe it’s because I’m sick of rhetorical guerilla tactics, using evocative words to provoke a reaction and “win” a cultural battle without any reasonable discussion.

People throw hate and homophobe (among other terms) around at anyone who bucks current public opinion, regardless of motivation, regardless of personality. It’s equivalent to creating a minefield around the discussion table. Anyone who tries to say something gets blown up before they can speak their mind. Nobody wants to be affiliated with hate. No one wants to be associated with a homophobe.

The target changes from discussing a cultural, political, or religious position to attacking an individual person.

Worse yet, if one’s intended purpose is to convince the opposition to reconsider their view, attacking them as individuals shuts them down.

“You’re full of hate.” If I don’t feel hatred toward anyone, this makes me defensive, eager to absolve myself of crimes I don’t think I’ve committed. It doesn’t help me hear opposing views.

“You’re a homophobe.” If I am not afraid of homosexuals, if I’m not one of those who says, “Eww they’re icky” and acts all disgusted, then once again I will feel the need to object instead of open up to a different point of view.

“You’re too close-minded,” I’ve heard people say when confronting so-called “hate.” Yes, I think, because you’re closing them down by attacking instead of opening them up by connecting.

That sword definitely cuts both sides of this cultural debate. I hope we all want to be above that sort of thing, whichever side we’re on.

Nobody gains anything from a discussion that never happens.

I’m a fan of understanding, of seeing from the perspective of the other. I have said and done many things out of ignorance, and my responses over the years on the subject of homosexuality are no exception. Thankfully, I’ve had the benefit of friends and even rational opponents who take the time to open my eyes to their point of view while demonstrating willingness to listen to mine.

So what helps that take place?

First, avoid assumptions.

Some hate and fear is obvious, but not all. Jumping to conclusions about what motivates an individual gets us nowhere but angry at each other. If I can’t know that someone hates another person, then ‘hate’ isn’t the right word. If I don’t know that someone actually fears another, then ‘homophobe’ is a poor choice. Build bridges, not walls.

Second, use accurate terms.

Maybe “ignorant” or “unfamiliar” is more appropriate. It’s hard to walk in the shoes of another, and we all pretty much suck at it. So instead of declaring “I know what your kind is like,” how about “Can I tell you what it’s like from my point of view?” Speak to flesh-and-blood people, not emotionless positions.

Let’s trade some hate for harmony.