I know that people are frightened of “the other”, and I know that, since at least September 11, 2001, primary alien number one for the west has been Islam. But I am still astounded by the racism (or religionism, as the case may be …) that is directed towards Muslims by people in North America and Europe.
Last week, I read an article about a Michigan town that has put in a bid to have the Guantanamo detainees housed in their empty jail. The fact that this plan to save the town from economic ruin is controversial is not, in and of itself, surprising. There’s always going to be NIMBYism associated with prisons. What is surprising, though, is some of the rhetoric coming from the townspeople who oppose the plan. Regarding the jail’s former inmates – murderers and rapists – one of the locals is quoted as saying: “well at least they're human, they're just like you and I, American citizens.” In other words, what dehumanizes terrorists and “enemy combatants” is not their acts of violence, but their foreignness.
Next on this week’s anti-Islam hit-list is the recent Swiss referendum to ban minarets on mosques. What we’re talking about here is an architectural feature that identifies mosques as, well, mosques. According to my trusty sources at wikipedia, the minaret is used for the call to prayer. But that is not the case in Switzerland, so what we’re really talking about is a physical identification of a building as a mosque. The ban is weird for several reasons: there were only 4 mosques in Switzerland; and there apparently aren’t problems with Islamic militancy there. The purported reason behind the ban is pure fear-mongering: the argument is that the minaret is “the thin of the wedge” of allowing Islam to take a foothold in Switzerland, and will lead to covered women, sharia law, etc etc. And, despite the strong opposition to the ban by many Swiss leaders, the public bought it – voting 57% in favour of the ban.
One of the things that strikes me about both of these reactions to the stranger in our midst is that they are irrational. Justifying that some anti-social killers are “human” because they come from the same place as you, while others aren’t, because they don’t, doesn’t make any sense. Neither does restricting the practice of a religious freedom that is not causing anyone harm. And so the question is, why? Is it because people need a “them” so there can be an “us”? Is it because the thought of seeking commonalities, rather than focusing on differences, is somehow a threat to our own identities? Or maybe it’s just because these people don’t know any Muslims, and it’s easy to dehumanize when you are considering a concept, rather than actual people. Whatever the cause, this conflict between civilizations, or whatever it is, is never going to end, as long as people on both sides react to “them” with visceral fear, rather than reason.
Monday, November 30, 2009
Sunday, November 29, 2009
seeing with different eyes
Today, I knew I would have to walk home from church, so I brought along my little pocket camera, because I often find myself wishing I had my camera when I am on a walk. And it wasn't long before I had my first photographable subject:
And once the camera was in my hand, I started seeing everything I passed with different eyes. And I realized that that's one of the things I love about photography - it makes me engage in my surroundings, and see the art in the mundane. I used to consider myself an artist, but I don't act, or sing, or any of the things that I used to do. But walking down the street with a little camera on a grey november day made me realize that I can still be an artist: I just have to think like one.
And once the camera was in my hand, I started seeing everything I passed with different eyes. And I realized that that's one of the things I love about photography - it makes me engage in my surroundings, and see the art in the mundane. I used to consider myself an artist, but I don't act, or sing, or any of the things that I used to do. But walking down the street with a little camera on a grey november day made me realize that I can still be an artist: I just have to think like one.
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
The World's Greatest!
A few weeks ago, it was the world’s biggest bowl of taboulleh – made by a Lebanese chef who wanted to wrest the title back from the Turks. And today, it’s the biggest meatball – because the record rightly belongs to the east coast of the U.S., and those Mexican usurpers who stole the title last August have to understand that nobody messes with the birthright of the Italian-American.
Now, I understand national pride associated with traditional foods, and I understand the appeal of seeking world records (while I don’t feel the personal drive, I can intellectually see the appeal behind wanting to be the first or the fastest). But I don’t understand the drive that causes people to combine these two desires (I also don’t understand the need to make the longest paper-clip chain: a record captured by students at Wilfrid Laurier shortly before I attended: my residence don had participated, and told us how cool it was. I was sceptical …). I guess there’s a certain kitschy appeal, but still . . .
The desire to achieve world records of no consequence seems to come from the same place that makes people want to be on reality television: a wish to be special without necessarily having to perfect a skill or craft of any kind. And it’s kind of sad, because fame doesn’t make people special . . . we are all special, intrinsically. I have to admit that I still dream of writing the Great Canadian Novel and/or becoming Secretary-General of the U.N., and it’s partly because I want to be important. But since I will likely not become Margaret Atwood and Kofi Annan’s love child at any point in the near future, I choose to put my energies into small things that can make a difference, instead of grandiose gestures that are ultimately empty.
Now, I understand national pride associated with traditional foods, and I understand the appeal of seeking world records (while I don’t feel the personal drive, I can intellectually see the appeal behind wanting to be the first or the fastest). But I don’t understand the drive that causes people to combine these two desires (I also don’t understand the need to make the longest paper-clip chain: a record captured by students at Wilfrid Laurier shortly before I attended: my residence don had participated, and told us how cool it was. I was sceptical …). I guess there’s a certain kitschy appeal, but still . . .
The desire to achieve world records of no consequence seems to come from the same place that makes people want to be on reality television: a wish to be special without necessarily having to perfect a skill or craft of any kind. And it’s kind of sad, because fame doesn’t make people special . . . we are all special, intrinsically. I have to admit that I still dream of writing the Great Canadian Novel and/or becoming Secretary-General of the U.N., and it’s partly because I want to be important. But since I will likely not become Margaret Atwood and Kofi Annan’s love child at any point in the near future, I choose to put my energies into small things that can make a difference, instead of grandiose gestures that are ultimately empty.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
in the image ...
Back in the 90s, the United Church issued its new hymn book, Voices United. As with any change, there was bound to be controversy and resistance, but the most controversial issue with this publication was the use of gender-inclusive language: any reference to “mankind” etc. or to God, were changed to be gender-neutral. And, I have to admit that, at the time, I was one of the people who were against the change. I thought that it was an example of excessive political correctness, and was silly to change well-known songs that were written in a pre-feminist era – I figured I was advanced enough to be able to sing about mankind and know that it included me; and God is bigger than our gender constructs, so if we want to use the masculine pronoun, it’s just about convenience and doesn’t reveal any truth about the nature of God.
I’ve been rethinking this issue recently. I’m reading “All We’re Meant to Be” right now, a book of feminist theology that was written originally in the 1960s, and then updated in the ‘80s. The authors explain that they initially didn’t think that inclusive language was important, but have moved towards it, and changed their references to God throughout the second edition of the book to use non-gendered language. Their argument is that our language shapes the way we think, so that if we refer to God as male, even if it’s just for convenience’s sake, we think in those terms, and we are therefore less likely to truly embrace the fact that women are equally made in God’s image.
So I’ve been thinking about how we talk about God can affect how we view God, and I am going to try an experiment – I am trying to only refer to God in gender-inclusive language, and see if it does change my perception. This is tricky – even in writing this, I have had to stop myself from typing “him” and “he” whenever a pronoun would usually be inserted. I generally don’t think of God as much of a “person” which, on the one hand, means that it might not make much of a difference, but on the other hand is all the more reason to move away from personal pronouns.
Going forward, I am not too worried about the other element of gender-inclusive language: it is generally accepted (at least in the circles I move in) that it’s “humanity”, and not “mankind”. But I still am not sure what I think about changing per-feminist texts to insert inclusive language. On the one hand, how can we move to gender equality in the church if we continue to tell women “oh don’t worry, when it says ‘man’, it really means you too . . .”, but then, this is art that was created in a certain context, and I am a bit uncomfortable with changing art to make it meet our sensibilities (à la fig leaf on David) …. So I don’t know where I will fall on that debate, but (despite reservations about the musical difficulty of a number of the songs . . . a topic for another rant . . .) I definitely now appreciate what the writers of Voices United were trying to do, and why it is important.
I’ve been rethinking this issue recently. I’m reading “All We’re Meant to Be” right now, a book of feminist theology that was written originally in the 1960s, and then updated in the ‘80s. The authors explain that they initially didn’t think that inclusive language was important, but have moved towards it, and changed their references to God throughout the second edition of the book to use non-gendered language. Their argument is that our language shapes the way we think, so that if we refer to God as male, even if it’s just for convenience’s sake, we think in those terms, and we are therefore less likely to truly embrace the fact that women are equally made in God’s image.
So I’ve been thinking about how we talk about God can affect how we view God, and I am going to try an experiment – I am trying to only refer to God in gender-inclusive language, and see if it does change my perception. This is tricky – even in writing this, I have had to stop myself from typing “him” and “he” whenever a pronoun would usually be inserted. I generally don’t think of God as much of a “person” which, on the one hand, means that it might not make much of a difference, but on the other hand is all the more reason to move away from personal pronouns.
Going forward, I am not too worried about the other element of gender-inclusive language: it is generally accepted (at least in the circles I move in) that it’s “humanity”, and not “mankind”. But I still am not sure what I think about changing per-feminist texts to insert inclusive language. On the one hand, how can we move to gender equality in the church if we continue to tell women “oh don’t worry, when it says ‘man’, it really means you too . . .”, but then, this is art that was created in a certain context, and I am a bit uncomfortable with changing art to make it meet our sensibilities (à la fig leaf on David) …. So I don’t know where I will fall on that debate, but (despite reservations about the musical difficulty of a number of the songs . . . a topic for another rant . . .) I definitely now appreciate what the writers of Voices United were trying to do, and why it is important.
Song and Dance
I saw the Drowsy Chaperone last night, and it was fabulous. Now, when I was young, I loved the big Broadway hit musicals – I had a scrapbook of all of the different ads that would come out in the Toronto Star for the Phantom of the Opera and Les Misérables. I eagerly awaited every new Andrew Lloyd Webber production. But things went sour sometime around Sunset Boulevard. Mom and I went to see it, and it was just dull. The next night, we saw a production of Aristophanes’ Clouds in a simple black box theatre for a fraction of the price, and laughed until we cried.
My estrangement with the big musical was deepened by the advent of the Disney Musical and, despite the fact that Mamma Mia was hilarious (hee hee, flipper dance = genius), the “take a bunch of songs from a famous band and make a musical out of it” musical. I am under no delusions that musical theatre was ever made for purely artistic reasons, but I do feel like there’s been a certain increase in the crassness of the commercialization of musicals in recent history: the model is to take something that already exists (music, movie, toy), get Oprah to endorse it, charge $100/ticket, and call it theatre. I even saw a poster for a Legally Blonde musical last time I was in NYC, for goodness sake! (And, yes, I know I am a snob . . . an unfortunate fact that led to me being denied the joys of Buffy the Vampire Slayer until 12 years after it debuted . . . but that’s another story.)
I’d like a bit of pure intentions with my glitz . . . which brings me back to the Drowsy Chaperone. I was excited about seeing it, because of the story of the show’s background: it started as a skit, was expanded to a fringe show, and kept on growing until it made its way to Broadway, and 5 Tony nominations. In other words, its buzz wasn’t artificially created by some kind of entertainment juggernaut – it earned it.
It is not a particularly deep play. It’s a spoof of 1920s musicals, narrated by “the Man in the Chair,” a character who comments on the history of the actors that are supposed to be playing each role, and the various contrived twists and turns of the plots. But, it skewers the genre perfectly, while being full of the entertaining song-and-dance numbers that make it so great. And, through the Man in the Chair, there’s even a theme about our attachment to theatre, and our wish to escape through entertainment.
We don’t need media personalities telling us what to watch on the stage – that’s what we have TV for. Please, if you want to watch Legally Blonde, spend $5 to rent the movie. If you want to go see a musical, go to see something that was designed first and foremost to entertain you, rather than to make money for its producers.
My estrangement with the big musical was deepened by the advent of the Disney Musical and, despite the fact that Mamma Mia was hilarious (hee hee, flipper dance = genius), the “take a bunch of songs from a famous band and make a musical out of it” musical. I am under no delusions that musical theatre was ever made for purely artistic reasons, but I do feel like there’s been a certain increase in the crassness of the commercialization of musicals in recent history: the model is to take something that already exists (music, movie, toy), get Oprah to endorse it, charge $100/ticket, and call it theatre. I even saw a poster for a Legally Blonde musical last time I was in NYC, for goodness sake! (And, yes, I know I am a snob . . . an unfortunate fact that led to me being denied the joys of Buffy the Vampire Slayer until 12 years after it debuted . . . but that’s another story.)
I’d like a bit of pure intentions with my glitz . . . which brings me back to the Drowsy Chaperone. I was excited about seeing it, because of the story of the show’s background: it started as a skit, was expanded to a fringe show, and kept on growing until it made its way to Broadway, and 5 Tony nominations. In other words, its buzz wasn’t artificially created by some kind of entertainment juggernaut – it earned it.
It is not a particularly deep play. It’s a spoof of 1920s musicals, narrated by “the Man in the Chair,” a character who comments on the history of the actors that are supposed to be playing each role, and the various contrived twists and turns of the plots. But, it skewers the genre perfectly, while being full of the entertaining song-and-dance numbers that make it so great. And, through the Man in the Chair, there’s even a theme about our attachment to theatre, and our wish to escape through entertainment.
We don’t need media personalities telling us what to watch on the stage – that’s what we have TV for. Please, if you want to watch Legally Blonde, spend $5 to rent the movie. If you want to go see a musical, go to see something that was designed first and foremost to entertain you, rather than to make money for its producers.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
bad things happen . . .
There was a short piece on the radio this morning about white collar crime. They interviewed a woman who had been defrauded, and (particularly after just learning that the latest ponzi scheme perpetrator was someone from my hometown) I really felt bad for her. She obviously felt betrayed and wounded by a person who she’d trusted. But then she said something that made me pause – she said “I always told my kids that if you are a good person, good things will happen to you, and if you’re a bad person, bad things will happen to you, but that’s not the case here.”
And I thought . . . wait a minute, why would you ever tell your children that? Because that was never the deal. Whatever justice may mean on a human or more divine scale, history has not given us any indication that good things happen to good people, and vice versa. Jesus got crucified, Martin Luther King Jr. got shot, and Nelson Mandela spent an awfully long time in prison. Kanye West is a superstar with legions of fans.
It seems to me that having a worldview based on good and bad being doled out on a quid pro quo basis is dangerous. Because what happens when something bad happens to you? There are two possibilities: either a) something bad has happened to you because you are actually a bad person; or b) your worldview was wrong, and even though you are a good person, this will not protect you from bad things happening. Either way, why bother continuing to do good?
So, I don’t know what you should tell your children (maybe I should add moral philosophy to my fun fall reading list, along with feminist theology and development theory ... ), but it seems that if you build your moral framework around the idea that good things happen to good people, you’re going to be ill-equipped to deal with the tragedies and betrayals that are part of life.
And I thought . . . wait a minute, why would you ever tell your children that? Because that was never the deal. Whatever justice may mean on a human or more divine scale, history has not given us any indication that good things happen to good people, and vice versa. Jesus got crucified, Martin Luther King Jr. got shot, and Nelson Mandela spent an awfully long time in prison. Kanye West is a superstar with legions of fans.
It seems to me that having a worldview based on good and bad being doled out on a quid pro quo basis is dangerous. Because what happens when something bad happens to you? There are two possibilities: either a) something bad has happened to you because you are actually a bad person; or b) your worldview was wrong, and even though you are a good person, this will not protect you from bad things happening. Either way, why bother continuing to do good?
So, I don’t know what you should tell your children (maybe I should add moral philosophy to my fun fall reading list, along with feminist theology and development theory ... ), but it seems that if you build your moral framework around the idea that good things happen to good people, you’re going to be ill-equipped to deal with the tragedies and betrayals that are part of life.
Monday, September 14, 2009
election malaise
I try to care about politics – we’re talking about the leadership of my country, after all. I watch the leaders’ debate before every election, and try to be informed of every party’s platform and vote based on what they are promoting, rather than on a knee-jerk reaction based on general party ideology.
But, as the Globe and Mail and the CBC start to talk election, my gut reaction is “I’m so bored!” I am so tired of elections and, just like the one at this time last year, I can’t see that this one is necessary. The polls suggest we are still in a conservative-minority holding pattern, and neither the Conservatives nor the Liberals are talking about any big ideas that would change business as usual.
When this election gets called, I will see what they each have to say, and I will go and vote, because I believe that it’s part of my responsibility as a citizen in a democratic country. But I’m not happy about it.
But, as the Globe and Mail and the CBC start to talk election, my gut reaction is “I’m so bored!” I am so tired of elections and, just like the one at this time last year, I can’t see that this one is necessary. The polls suggest we are still in a conservative-minority holding pattern, and neither the Conservatives nor the Liberals are talking about any big ideas that would change business as usual.
When this election gets called, I will see what they each have to say, and I will go and vote, because I believe that it’s part of my responsibility as a citizen in a democratic country. But I’m not happy about it.
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