Category Archives: Social Rules

Old People Love Volunteering The Young For Military Service

04/03/2016 X Teri Leave a comment

Apologies for my little side rant here. For whatever reason, the quantity of old farts pontificating about the need to do something about all the alleged issues young people are causing has been on the uptick lately. The cacophony of dentures clicking in complaint has been deafening.

Why is it that the people most likely to complain about today’s youth being spoiled and needing mandatory military service are also the very same people who rarely served in the military themselves? Or didn’t force their own children, college-bound or not, to serve? I’m generalizing, but most of these self-righteous people also had behaviors that would not have survived military service. My skin crawls when I read some older person crying and pounding the table about great it would be if all young people had to serve in the military.

It is not the young people who have messed up the world- they haven’t had their turn yet. It is us, the generations already making questionable decisions, who currently own the problems of society.

Don’t point at the current young crop of people and demand they be held accountable for what we’ve done wrong. The military is there for anyone who chooses to be a part of it, for reasons of their own, whether economic or self-improvement. Requiring military service won’t necessarily breed a generation of conservatives like you would hope. Military service isn’t a magic pill to require conformity or agreement.

The same tired group of people demanding mandatory military service are also the first to whine if society or government tells them what to do, even for social benefit. It is so strange to watch them object to everything based on their own ‘freedom,’ yet immediately want to volunteer others for duties they haven’t chosen for themselves. Everything government-related is dangerous to them, yet they claim to idolize the virtues that military service would instill.

This isn’t a great post, I realize. And it could easily be misconstrued to make arguments I’m not making.

Satire Parody, Social Rules

Jury Duty At Last

03/15/2016 X Teri 1 Comment

When I was very young, I tried repeatedly to get jury duty. Probably due to my asinine name, I couldn’t manage it. I remember the look of incredulity one of the federal court employees gave me when I asked her how to get on jury duty. One would have thought I asked her to cut my hair by peeling the scalp off my head. I guess asking for jury duty wasn’t something a normal person aspired to? The same result occurred at the county level. I’m pretty sure they were laughing at me when I exited the clerk’s office after inquiring.

No one wanted me. I felt like Spiderman must have felt when he showed up at the crime scene suffering from terrible diarrhea.

After years of thinking nothing more of it, I got the dreaded Jury Duty Notice in the mail recently. I could also hear the universe laughing maniacally at my shock when I opened the notice. I’m not sure the government knows what kind of nutcase they are inviting to be a part of the process, but if they want me to play the part of dutiful citizen, I will vainly try to keep a straight face while doing so. I may very well be wearing a fake mustache, but I will have a straight face.

Let’s be honest, would any of you want me sitting in a jury deciding your fate? I didn’t think so. I would come in 5th in a three-man race for ‘Most Reasonable.’

In what universe is it sensible to invite ME to jury duty? If called to trial, I am going to object loudly for both sides, bring my own handcuffs, as well as consume large quantities of beans for every meal. I may also chew on garlic tablets at every opportunity. To paraphrase Zach Galifianakis, I might also sit quietly with my eyes on either the prosecutor or litigant’s attorney and say “Oh bullcrap” quietly each time they make a point. I’m also going to wear a different wig each day until someone notices.

I have a real problem deciding a person’s freedom. Monetary claims are one thing, but I have always said I’m not comfortable being involved in cases where jail is a possibility. (For the defendant, not me, although given my irreverence, I may very well be behind bars for a big list of reasons, the least of which might be contempt of court.)

Anyone with a critical eye can see that money is the single biggest determinant of outcome for lawsuits, whether criminal or civil. Eyewitness testimony is unreliable, our memory is nothing like we imagine it to be, and impartiality is what we claim we have all the while believing in nonsense such as horoscopes and the political process being fair. The ability of our legal system to restrict our ability to see and hear all the evidence is almost total. As in life, we think we know what we are talking about because we saw a two-minute clip about it on the Ellen show one afternoon. We’ll all seen too many courtroom dramas and heard too many cases where nothing turns out to be as it seemed. Trials are massively complicated affairs that should be left to the experts.

I feel very sympathetic to those without means being required to perform jury duty. Not all employers encourage or treat those chosen for jury duty appropriately. It disrupts one’s life, the ability to care for one’s family, not to mention gives some of those who can’t get out of it a terrible attitude. Remember that when you are watching a real jury sitting in the box, frowning and fidgeting, desperately waiting to get behind closed doors and find a way to give someone the death penalty. Just for not returning a library book.

There are too many people who are retired, independently capable of duty, or not able to work but who possess the mental faculty to be on juries for us to continue to mandate jury duty.

And it will be me, confusing the perplexed jurors stuck in the room with me, who is to blame when a one-day trial results in a six-week jury deliberation and $12,000 dining bill for the county.

We’ll all finally come out of the jury room and then quietly line up in the box. The judge will ask with great solemnity: “Have you reached a verdict?” At which point the fatigued foreman will rise, open a crumpled envelope and say, “Yes, we the jury find X Teri guilty of gross ignorance and stupidity and sentence him to jail instead of the defendant.” And a great applause will erupt while all the jurors weep in relief.

And as the judge commences to bang his gavel to close the proceedings, I will jump up to the bench and hold a single nail underneath his gavel, so that when it arcs down and hammers, it will drive the nail halfway into the judge’s desk. It’s something I’ve always aspired to, especially when I used to watch Judge Ito in the O.J. case. I could then gleefully say “He nailed it.”

I really did get a 3 month sentence (I mean to say ‘term’) of jury duty. I’ll do the best I can and although I am joking about it, I will do what I can to follow all instructions from the court. Like the Army though, my motto is “Be All You Can Be.” That’s dangerous advice for weirdos.

I will faithfully listen with great caution and remind myself that we are wrong about so much that failing to take it seriously can cause harm to people who have done nothing to injure me. But if the prosecutor paces in front of me too much, I am going to lick my lips provocatively at him or her until he or she forgets what in blazes was being said. And if he walks to close, I’m definitely going to trip him or her while mumbling, “That was for Marcia Clark.” Thanks

Politics, Religion, Social Rules

I Do Know You

02/07/2016 X Teri Leave a comment

This post opens softly and as with a strange movie, please stick around for the plot twist… It is true that social media often gives us a false feeling of knowing everything about someone, especially when we jump to hurtful conclusions. Most of the time, it is because we see truth in the words or pictures of our friends and family, uncomfortable truths which prick at our own certainty. We recognize our doubt as treason toward whatever we believe and that doubt often manifests as derision toward others.
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(PS: but if more people at least t-r-i-e-d to use social media like I do, as an outlet for who I am and for expressive purposes instead of innocuous links and memes, we might indeed know who people are. Social media is a wondrous creation, if used creatively.)
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I’ve written about this topic at least a dozen times, because it seems to come back from the dead in new and queasy ways. John Pavlovitz runs across the same things I have, albeit from a different perspective as a progressive Christian pastor. (He recently reminded us about the “Iceberg Perspective” of human interaction.)
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If you are a liberal whose idea of rightness is the ability to change one’s mind, a skeptic with the default position of ‘we should examine this closer,’ or simply someone with the idea that the best or most pragmatic idea gets the most attention, you probably think about these things more than most people.
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For many, they recoil at the idea that we can live in a secular society, one that embraces multiple religions and expressions of faith, as long as none seek dominance, hurt people, or limit others free expression. Some don’t want to hear that their friends believe health care is a right, one which of course should be provided by society as a whole without regard to such subjective concepts as ‘laziness’ or ‘worthiness.’ That prophets such as Jesus were revolutionary precisely because the ‘other guy’ was placed foremost in our priorities, without qualification. For most major religions, there are no pre-qualifications for compassion. Being was sufficient. “Pure meritocracies are for asses,” to coin a new phrase.
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There are so many smart and compassionate people in our world, all with both great ideas and horrendous ones. (Someone thought putting fish on pizza was a great concept, so we can’t always trust even the geniuses running around loose among us.) We can’t judge people too harshly for sometimes believing that aliens kidnap us, that carbon emissions don’t impact our environment, or even when they go crazy and insist that either Bush was a good president; sometimes, they have stupendous and uplifting ideas, too.
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But…
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But, if you post that you hate all members of a particular religion, just ‘know’ that gays and lesbians choose their ‘lifestyle,’ or refuse to listen to any contrary – or new – information and reasoning about life, politics or religion, then I do know you.
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If you say the “N-word” out of hate or even passive superiority (even in quiet moments behind closed doors), don’t want women to be pastors, priests or clergy, think war is often the answer, won’t consider that birth control is often good for humanity, or want your brand of religion to be the only one with a voice, I do know you.
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If you look the to the imperfect past as a roadmap instead of a cautionary guidebook, revere our all-too-human ancestors who thought killing people because of color, religion or manifest destiny was the only answer and wish desperately to return to whatever your version of the good old days might be, I do know you.
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If you think people are lazier, dumber or worse than they ever been, or that the world isn’t improving in multiple ways – and your outlook above life and everything in it reflects that strange belief, then I do know you.
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If you look to the future and see dark shadows instead of the chance at greatness for all of us, I do know you.
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You are the collective ‘us,’ and we can all learn to be ‘the other.’
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But it is uncomfortable to recognize that we are often telling people who we are, incrementally, minute by minute, word by word. As I’m doing now, hopefully while not breaking too many toes.
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It is this revelation and sharing that makes the word ‘alive’ bristle with promise and expectation. Thanks

Business, Social Rules

Mixed Feelings About Personal Branding

01/09/2016 X Teri Leave a comment

“Be careful what you put up on social media….Protect your personal brand.” [Russell Tooley, Tyson]

I have mixed feelings about this type of protective stance. Not because it is bad advice – quite the contrary. Overall, it is probably what you should do. Mostly, I hate to see it because I’ve never once checked behind someone who is preaching it that didn’t have some crazy stuff already out there. Business leaders, lawyers, teachers, doctors, ditch-diggers, poultry workers – everyone in any occupation has been guilty of doing the opposite. Which is also okay. I’m not the hypocrisy police, especially given my life choices.

Because I observe how people behave, once I note that someone is closely guarding their image, I default to the assumption that the person is deflecting attention, usually away from a less than stellar past. At a minimum, their content is stale, aloof, and smacks of falsity. I assume they are hiding their character. If not their character, at least some missteps in life.

There’s a huge difference between showing yourself upside down on a keg when you were at a college party and concealing your true interests, beliefs and background. In many ways, I trust someone more implicitly who in fact shares the drinking picture. That person trusts our humanity and knows that we’ve all also done some stupid things. They don’t define us and shirking from them in horror is what perpetuates the myth of ‘normal.’

If I were an employer and noted that all of a person’s content was ‘safe’ or curated, all I would assume is that they had cleaned it prior to coming forward for a job. If you’ve said nothing controversial or done nothing stupid, I don’t want you on my team. I want flesh and bones, smart and creative, and while not dwelling on past indiscretions, not afraid to reveal them to me. My view might go against conventional wisdom, of course but I reach this conclusion repeatedly as I go around social media, reading, watching, and listening.

‘Protecting your personal brand,’ in my opinion, is usually another means to conceal your true self for an illusory chance to control how people perceive you. It doesn’t work, we know who you are. And if does work, it works against you in regards to people like me.

For most people, it is safer to play it safe and curate everything you share with social media. Just know that people like me play with a different set of rules and if you’re in the game assuming everyone honors the same rules, you have to be prepared.

Social Rules

Humility and DWIs

01/09/2016 X Teri Leave a comment

I’ve commented many times over the years about DWI offenses. I’ve told a million people that as long as no one is injured, we shouldn’t ruin people’s lives because they had a foolish moment. The first offense is a wake-up call, a warning toward learning from one’s mistakes and working to avoid repeating the misstep. The embarrassment of being caught combined with the economic impact usually deters most people from stepping into the same hole. We should require bumper stickers on their vehicles, breathalyzers to double-check them and ensure that they undergo long counseling and community service.

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(Except for my parents: they reached double digits in the number of times they were pulled over and/or arrested for drunk driving. They never learned their lesson during their entire adulthood, even after someone dying, children in the cars in question.)

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What does continue to bug me is when someone gets a D.W.I. and lashes out in anger at the attention or second-guessing they receive. If I had to put a word to what I expect, I would call it “humility.” If you messed up so badly you were rewarded with a DWI, stop getting angry at everyone else about it. Deal with the consequences directly, honestly, and move on as quickly as your circumstances will allow.

Don’t try to silence criticism or bully your way out of dealing with honest commentary or even gossip. You messed up and were caught, not the people whose jaws are wagging. If you lose your job as a result, your license, or have to display a sticker on your vehicle indicating you were guilty of driving under the influence, don’t make it worse by being angry at the world. That’s the recipe for repetition. Your picture is going to be in the paper and everyone is going to be whispering about it. Don’t kid yourself: literally everyone you know is going to be talking about it.

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I’ve said it before in different ways: If you do something as ignorant as getting a DWI, trust me, EVERYONE knows about and those whispers you suspect are about you are indeed about what you have done. Don’t fight it. It only gets worse.

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Your friends will download your booking photo and forward it to one another. Your picture is going to be on the internet, probably forever. You will be second-guessed for a long time, until the memory of what you did fades enough for people to see that you have learned from your mistake.
(If I ever get a DWI, I’m going to post it on social media, send emails, and makes some calls. I’d rather everyone hear it from me. It’s almost impossible to avoid the stigma of people finding out your secret.)

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If you get a DWI and are not in jail, spend that time being glad that society lets you walk around and try to resume a normal life. Don’t focus on the idea that ‘everyone knows,’ because not only does everyone know about it, but they can’t help but to discuss it.

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Don’t lash out at people because you screwed up. Be humble.

PS: Remember that I also caution many who have never been charged with DWI. Many of you, if you are being honest, know that you have driven under the influence and only by luck or circumstance did you avoid being labelled as a drunk driver. Or have connections to help you avoid paying the consequences of driving under the influence.

Personal, Social Rules

You Might Have a Problem…

01/02/2016 X Teri Leave a comment

I’m never going to finish this or be able to cram the six or seven additional stories into the post, so I’m going to just post it, imperfections and badly expressed ideas left to fester.
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A post earlier in 2015 on one of the “Remember (your hometown here) When?” social groups made me laugh, grimace and ponder more than it should have. Some inconsiderate poster had sidetracked the post with an inelegant and uncomfortable comment about the people in question being racist. (Not about the current people posting; rather, about people of a previous generation many of the current generation knew.)
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As an inconsiderate poster myself, I understand the issue from both sides. It is a fine line trying to decide whether to voice contrary – or negative – opinion when a chorus of voices is saying the opposite. I am confident the detractor believes she was correct in claiming that someone was racist, especially 30-40 years ago. She had some very specific anecdotes to substantiate her point, too. It was in bad taste to post as she did – but it is a member’s forum and people should be able to post their respectfully expressed opinions. Unfortunately, it also means that they can derail otherwise great memories. However, not everyone shares the same rosy, glossed-over version of our collective memories. Wanting open and honest discussion only when it fits a narrow line of commentary doesn’t help anyone.
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We all walked the same streets, perhaps, but our shared hometown was not the same in spirit. Our attitudes about those streets are going to vary. It is possible to grow up in a town and love it passionately, even amidst racism or other social issues. Our human nature pushes us to try to make the best of whatever situation we find ourselves.
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It is a common mistake for those of us who are not minorities to believe that we all experience the exact same reality or that our skin color did not detract or contribute to our lives. “White privilege” is controversial precisely because it pricks at the recognition that we have ideas we hold true which are unrecognizable as truths by those who are different from us. The playing field always looks level to some, and not just because they are more likely to be the ones who own it.
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One of the regular discussion group members made a generic declaration of this sort: “I’m sure none of us were racist and we certainly didn’t know anyone who was.” Then, people jumped in with the other half of the formula: “If you don’t want to agree with us, go somewhere else with that type of commentary.” Or, “If you don’t have anything nice to say, shut the hell up.” I will agree that it would have been a better choice for the lady in question to skip the commentary – but I am not the person in question and I do not know what prompted the poster to move to action, to cannonball the discussion with accusatory claims of racism. She may have been just stirring the pot to get the Black Sock Mafia in a tizzy. There is a chance, though, that she had suffered directly because of the people of the past in question. I’m not guessing or judging what pushed her to lash out that day. I stick my foot in mouth with such regularity that I can’t legitimately point the finger too harshly at others when they do it.
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(Sidenote: I was surprised to discover that many regular posters on the hometown group in question were unaware that a companion site almost exclusively for minorities exists – and has more members and participation than the hometown memory group I’m discussing. What a shame that both groups don’t live and interact on social media – or that they can’t.)
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In regards to the “no racism in our town” argument, I can assure that there was indeed both overt and hidden prejudice infecting the town in question. Racism was a hallmark of youth – and I have stories I love to share. There is a reason that some places still bear the reputation of prejudice today, regardless of the strides made. It is not indicative of how they want to be perceived and I’m not saying it is fair to automatically label anyone from there as racist – that is stupid and unhelpful. The label should only be used where appropriate and not lightly. Like so many important social and civil issues, the people working hard to improve everyone’s lives are striving to get past what happened before, to improve it, and to avoid a repeat of our exclusionary history.
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(Calling someone ‘racist’ without both strong evidence and a need to do so is no better than calling someone by a racially charged nickname. It is much more helpful to limit one’s critique to the specific words or behaviors, as we all make the major error of adding motive to what we perceive as a wrong action or utterance. People are saying ‘racist’ far too often and without evaluating a person’s viewpoint. I’m guilty of it. Usually, it is more likely the person is just an ass, not that he or she is racist. People lash out in anger and use the hot button words too quickly.)
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However, speaking from direct personal experience, the towns of my youth indeed had prejudice, and not just the casual “n-word” bombs being dropped with routine regularity. Many whites generally hated minorities. They were vocal about it, at least among people who they believed to be sympathizers. They resented integration, being told they couldn’t call minorities by the slurs they had learned throughout their lives or that as employers they couldn’t treat some people as second-class citizens. If someone had an obstacle in life, it could easily be blamed on minorities.
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All of these people lived among their neighbors, attending church, running businesses, marrying, and living their lives. Most of them learned to be bigots from their family and surrounding communities. They didn’t ‘stick out’ necessarily. It was not common for them to be forcefully called out on their racism.
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“It’s just a word. Why is everyone getting offended?” It wasn’t just a word. It was a gateway insult that represented so many worse underlying attitudes about people solely because they were a different skin color. “Well, I wasn’t talking about normal (n-words). This guy is a real (n-word.)” I heard so many versions of that concept. None of them were creative. Whether people want to know it is true or not, if someone is still using the “n-word” in casual conversation (and usually softly or secretly whispered), the chances are that they need to understand that we are looking at them as if their hair is on fire. It’s not the word that is the problem: it is their attitude toward other people.
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To be clear, I really believe that not everyone who uses the ‘n-word’ is a racist. They might be ignorant or not understand what they are saying, but their attitude isn’t one of denigration or denial toward other people. It’s a small distinction that is often overlooked when discussing racism. People who use the ‘n-word’ tend to be racist, but it is not fair to use a wide brush and label all who use it as racist. It tends to be a sign of poor education or refinement, but most of us can be guilty of that. As humans, we grab the most easily used word, no matter how volatile, to lash out and express our anger.
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Yes, the racists get terribly angry when their attitudes or behaviors are labeled. Each racist, though, feels that his or her attitudes were legitimately earned and that their conclusions were reached via rational thinking and practical observation of the world. For anyone to tell them that they are both wrong and in need of education is just about as offensive as anything else you could say to them. They are the first to scream “Political Correctness” or to sidestep away from the glare of accusation. They didn’t earn their prejudices, but it is almost impossible to get an otherwise smart person to stop and consider the loose sanity upon which most prejudices are built. Some of the worst lashing out and retaliation I’ve ever seen resulted from people being called out on their prejudices. They do not let go lightly. Prejudices scar people’s self-awareness.
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We are moving incrementally away from prejudices. It is built into our nature, though, and it takes work from all of us. It is difficult to believe that I once sat as a very young boy with my mom eating soup one night and couldn’t believe it when she told me that integration was so late coming to the place of her childhood. She told me that integration was one of the worst ideas ever devised. She loved it when we moved north, where blacks were a rare presence. When she worked for Southwestern Bell, there were a couple of times she was furious because she claimed that blacks got special treatment in scheduling, promotions, and raises. She blamed them for many of the workplace problems – yet later she was proud as anyone could be when a black co-worker she had picketed with got a huge raise and better hours for all of them.
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I don’t know how to describe much of her racism. If there was a problem in her life and blacks were present, it often became their fault. If no jobs were available, it was because minorities were taking them all or getting welfare to sit at home. Taxes too high? Deadbeat minorities. And on and on. Ignorance of the world and a failure to understand that people are people and remarkably similar no matter where you find them.
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My mom was guilty of saying and doing some of the most hateful racist things. Yet, the person she would have identified as one of her best friends before her death was black. Mom genuinely loved her. It’s that type of complexity that proves that people can slowly learn and move away from the idiocy that poisoned them when young. She was still very prejudiced until the end of her life, but the door had been opened. She rationalized it by thinking of her friend as different from all the rest. While I was growing up, I’m sure I heard my mom say the ‘n-word’ at least as often as she said the word ‘hello.’ Sometimes, she screamed it through a rolled-down window or across the street. It made some social interactions interesting, if that is the right word to use.
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Therein lays the key to surviving all the hate: we are all individuals. Lumping us into definable groups is a shortcut for other goals, but it allows many to point hate toward those who don’t deserve it.
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There is no shame in admitting that our ancestors were indeed racist. Don’t defend it, call it ‘our heritage,’ or minimize the magnitude of it. The shame is moving forward without stomping out the last vestiges of prejudice or turning a blind eye when it comes out in our modern world.
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For those who say we should just ‘move on,’ I think almost all of us would love to do just that. But in so doing we have to address the very real shadow on ongoing racism and prejudice. It’s easy for the majority to want to move on, to forget past stupidity and hatred.
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The towns of my youth were overall no more racist than the average small town in America. I’d like to think most people weren’t racist and didn’t appreciate its presence. Racism was pervasive, though. Insisting that it didn’t exist is a disservice to the past and to ourselves. “The good old days” for many whites do not harken to the same memories as those of minorities. I wouldn’t understand someone who blamed me for the sins of my parents or some of my family. They own their prejudices. I was lucky enough to get past most of it. Not all of it, of course, because racism leaves a stain that tends to inspire guilt or an awkwardness where none should be present.
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If you aren’t racist, don’t get mad if someone accuses your ancestors of being so – because many were. You’re not responsible for their attitudes. It’s just a fact of history. Our country condoned owning other people, disallowing women the right to vote, rounded up people and put them in camps all because of their appearance.
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We’re learning and improving as a country and as a people. The world is a much better place now and it continues to improve. I’m proud that we elected a black president. Even though people often get angry when it is mentioned, he wasn’t elected because he was black. He was elected because he was qualified for the job. That’s the way things should work.
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Don’t get mad if someone reminds us, even inelegantly, that our ancestors were sometimes bastards. We probably believe some things now that will be interpreted as horrifying to future generations.
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As for the woman derailing the ‘remember when’ post with specific allegations of racism, she only galvanized more anger. Her message was packaged in a way that no one would listen to it. It would be impossible, though, to get her to believe that the stories of racism she knows aren’t true, because many of them must be.
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The fringe conservative movement of late has emboldened some to be more aggressive in voicing or acting on their racism and xenophobia. At its heart, racism is a focus on ‘the other,’ ignoring the shared human experience we should all be enjoying. It encourages people to jump to unsupported conclusions while fanning the ignorance of distrust and fear of ‘the other.’
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It’s strange to hear the “n-word” from people I love dearly, or to know that they think less of other humans solely because of skin color. I understand it though. And I see clearly that it will lessen with each generation, unless the younger members of the family somehow immerse themselves in another pocket of prejudice.
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I know a couple of people who have re-embraced their racist roots and do so because of their exposure to poverty and crime-filled areas. They see symptoms of poverty and crime and assume their genesis arises from skin color. It’s an old formula for social failure. With their prejudices comes the tired anger.
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I feel sorry for them. Telling them so would only provoke anger and defensive posturing.
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And so it goes.