Here's the thing. A lot of important Guelph issues are really complex. And to understand them we need more than "sound bites" and knee-jerk ideology. The Guelph Back-Grounder is a place where people can read the background information that explains why things are the way they are, and, the complex issues that people have to negotiate if they want to make Guelph a better city. No anger, just the facts.
Today I begin a new weekend literary feature. I'm going a bit out on a limb here because I'm not presenting an already finished work, but rather writing a novella week-bye-week for publication. This is how a lot of Victorian authors---like Dickens and Dostoevsky---put out their books, which were first published as serials in newspapers. I can't guarantee the results, but I thought I'd give it a try.
&&&&
Cult Smashers of the 21st Century
The sun came up at about 6:00 am. Time to go to martial arts
class. Then work in the kitchen.
Bleah.
Nate Kunstler (or Nat---as his friends called him) had never been
a “morning person”. But it didn’t matter where he was or what
he was doing, each day has a morning and he still had to soldier
through it. So he put on his sweats, did his bathroom thing, and,
headed out to the gym.
Kelly Hughson was, as usual, already there. He was doing standing
meditation in the “tree-hugging posture”, so Nat just joined in
and they both waited for the others. After about 20 minutes everyone
who was coming was there. Then Kelly started the deep knee bends,
everyone followed. Then the “sawing the log” exercises. Then “the
snake creeps down”. Then the “warm up” long form.
At that point the lesson began. “There are lots of ways to deal
with force directed against you. You can block it by putting up a
hard wall. You can turn into jello and just let if flow through you
without harm. You can dodge it. You can deflect it. And you can
change it’s direction so it just glances off you. Today I’m going
to show you how to change the direction of gravity instead of letting
it hurt you.”
“I will demonstrate.” He stood in front of them, fell
backwards, and, with one sinuous move rolled on his spine, onto his
knees, then back onto his feet. Then he was on his feet---facing the
same way six feet further back than he had been an instant before.
“There’s no big secret. The key points are you need to keep
your legs straight and stay relaxed. If you bend your knees, you will
fall straight down onto your buttocks and the force will travel up
your spine and into your head. This will hurt you. But if you keep
your legs straight, the force will propagate parallel to the floor
and if you relax the natural tendency will be for you curl up into a
ball and you will roll along your spine, over your head. At that
point you pull your knees up to your abdomen. Momentum will carry you
over so you can roll on you kneecaps and then onto your feet. They
all you have to do is stand up.”
He demonstrated a couple times more. Then added “Be careful!
This is an easy thing to learn, but you can hurt yourself if you
don’t keep your legs straight! Trust what I’m telling you and
focus on keeping your legs straight! Everything else will just flow
naturally.”
A tall thin, woman with the sort of face that comes from a hard
life asked a question. “If you can hurt yourself, why are you
teaching us how to do this on a hard floor instead of mats like any
other school would do?” Kelly’s response was “Thanks for the
question, Sally. Oddly enough. It is harder to do on a padded floor
because it’s more difficult to be ‘rooted’ in your initial
stance. That means that the odds are greater that you will hurt
yourself---even if you are doing it right. I suppose you simply have
to take that on trust from me.”
“Let me see you try. Olive, come up front and give it a whirl.”
A tall, red-headed woman came up front. “Just keep your legs
straight and you’ll do fine.” She did as instructed, and as
predicted rolled neatly down her spine, onto her kneecaps, and, back
up onto her feet.
“Wow! That was easy. A lot more than I expected.”
Hughson then had everyone come up to the front and try it one
after another. The class found they could do it at least after a
fashion with their first try. “OK. I want you to work on this on
your own over the next week. Here are the ‘important tips’.
First, don’t ever do this on a surface that isn’t clear of things
like rocks. That’s because if you try to roll like this and find a
sharp rock hidden by grass---for example---you might find it jamming
into a vulnerable spot, like your kidneys. You would not want that to
happen!”
Sally interrupted “But why are you showing this to us then? It
doesn’t seem to be a terribly useful self defence move if that can
happen.”
“Good question. A lot of what I’m teaching you isn’t about
learning the right ‘moves’ so you can become the next Bruce Lee.
Instead, these lessons illustrate principles that you are going to
have to learn how to apply in your life according to the specific
circumstances you find yourself in. In this case, the important point
is to know that you don’t have to accept force being directed at
you but can instead choose to change its direction so it is less
harmful. I could tell you all of this, but it wouldn’t ‘stick’
with you nearly as well as when I illustrate it physically. You need
to learn this lesson ‘in your bones’, and this is how I can help you do
that.”
&&&&
Moreover I say unto you, the Climate Emergency must be dealt with!
I had an acquaintance years ago that used to say "sustainability starts at home". The idea is that it doesn't matter what you are doing, you need to take care of yourself.
Sage words.
I'm taking his words to heart right now, because I find that the amount of copy I've been putting out isn't sustainable. To that end, I'm going to be "easing off the throttle" from now on. I'm going to still be working on stories, but I want to put a little more emphasis on quality over quantity.
I'm currently working on a "deep dig", but want to give it the attention it deserves, so nothing's ready to publish this week.
One of the things that institutes of higher education usually
describe as “part of their mandate” is to teach young people
something called “leadership”. I've often wondered why they do
that. Why not teach “citizenship” instead? Actually, I suspect
that most of us are a little wary of people who just assume that they
should be the “leader”. Why them? Why shouldn't they be
“followers”? Indeed, do we really need to have “leaders” and
“followers” at all? Why not have a system of equality where
everyone co-operates? Even if we accept that it is necessary to
divide the human population into “leaders” and “followers”,
then how do we decide which is which?
But if we accept that there are difficulties with “leadership”,
that doesn't explain why it is that a Daoist should “dare not to be
at the front of the world”. To understand this, look at what the
DDJ says is wrong with it. “Daring not to be at the world's front,
One can grow to a full vessel”, and, “To discard staying behind,
yet to be at the front, One dies!”.
In some situations it can be a very bad thing to be visible. In the
West there is something called “the tall poppy syndrome”.
According to Wikipedia, it comes from a passage in Herodotus' The
Histories where a ruler asks for advice about how to govern a
city. The advice is given by a person who walks through a wheat field
and breaks off all the heads that have grown higher than the average.
The implication is that anyone in the city who shows exceptional
ability---and is therefore a potential leader of any future
opposition---should be killed. The Japanese have an aphorism that
says much the same thing, "A stake that sticks out will be
hammered". Which is to say, anyone who makes themselves visible
by being better than the herd will end up being beaten down to
conformity.
China has never been a liberal democracy, which means that pretty
much from the time when the DDJ was first created until present days,
“standing out in the crowd” has been a dangerous thing to do. In
fact, I can remember having a conversation about this with a roomie
from Shanghai who said that the best strategy in life is to be
“useful” without being “threatening”. People get executed or
assassinated in purges when they support one side and the other wins.
Or, even if they just “get in the way” of another person's
personal ambitions. Keeping your head down and being invisible can be
life-saving advice.
Even if you aren't living in a piranha tank, it can pay to avoid
putting yourself in front. There are a lot of very competitive places
of work where anyone who aspires to upper management is putting
themselves in for a big risk. Where I work, for example, managers
have none of the official job security that the unionized employees
have.
...........
Beyond this very obvious issue of “life or death”, there is
another way of looking at this issue. Being able to “grow to a full
vessel” has a double meaning that is missed by modern people. In
ancient China minor infractions of the law involved amputation. If
you made a mistake you would have a piece of your “vessel” cut
off. (Just like Japanese Mafia members who have fingers cut off for
minor mistakes.) But once we recognize this literal meaning, a
metaphor becomes obvious---there is a psychological “vessel” too.
Being “in front” is a social role that requires a certain type of
psychological make-up to sustain. For example, “humility” is
usually considered a virtue, yet it is a vice for leaders. Leaders
have to constantly blow their own horn in order to get ahead. A
leader who quietly works behind the scenes will never get noticed,
and therefore will never get promoted. Similarly, any leader that
admits her mistakes or always tries to give credit where it is due
will be seen as “weak”. In addition, leaders have to be
enormously disciplined with both their attention and time in order
pursue their goals---this stifles creativity and keeps them from
learning unexpected information.
The problem with deciding to blow your own horn and never admit
errors, of course, is that pretense eventual turns into belief. Play
the role of the infallible leader long enough, and you will start to
believe your own propaganda. And, if a person stops admitting to
himself that he makes mistakes, he loses the opportunity to learn
from that particular experience. Moreover, once a leader stops
believing in the possibility of making mistakes, she eventually
surrounds herself with “yes men” who remove the possibility of
even learning about---yet alone from---mistakes. This is why so many
leaders seem to constantly make the same mistakes over and over again
in their careers.
In the same way, if someone never gives credit to others for her
successes, she will soon find herself surrounded by second-rate
people. Partially this is because no one wants to have the value of
their work ignored. But more importantly, if you don't publicly
acknowledge a person's worth, eventually you won't do so privately
either. And once this happens, the leader will only be interested in
the advice of people who agree with him. This is why leaders often
start out with great lieutenants and end up surrounded by
nonentities.
I used to be appalled by the number of national leaders who set out
at a very early age to become the President (eg Bill Clinton) or
Prime minister (eg Brian Mulroney) and then devoted all their
energies to that goal. I still find it sad, but now I expect it. The
“collateral damage” must be appalling---how many people devote
all their energies to a goal like this yet end up falling to the
wayside for one reason or another? Even if a person does succeed, how
many opportunities to learn and grow as a human being are sacrificed
to the all-absorbing long term goal?
This is why leaders often seem
so tremendously isolated from the rest of society. Think about the
people who led the US into the war in Iraq. When interviewed many of
them opine that “hindsight is 20/20” and “who knew that we
would get into so many problems?” Well, the head of the US army,
Eric Shinseki, for one---who was forced into early retirement when he
warned that far too few troops were being sent. As did the hundreds
of thousands---if not millions---of people all over the world who
protested against the invasion. How can people like Dick Cheney and
Donald Rumsfeld be so obtuse? A Daoist could ask “how could they
not?”. The process that led to their gaining their positions of
great influence and power mitigated against them ever being sensitive
to the information that was immediately obvious to many other people.
&&&&
Moreover I say unto you, the Climate Emergency must be dealt with!
Last week I started off with improvisational workshops for the tech sector and ended up writing about sacred clowns. Since then, I kept thinking about the same things and decided to discuss something that has really bugged me for a long time: nasty humour.
&&&&
There are several ways that what people call funny I find reprehensible. The one I want to complain about here is when a person says something that is just a flat out lie, but when called out they say "can't you take a joke?". To illustrate this situation, consider the following. First, I'll start by deconstructing a website post that someone sent me because she was upset about animal experiments.
The above purports to be about some cruel experiments that Dr. Anthony Fauci funded while head of the National Institute of Health (NIH).
According to FactCheck, if this assertion was actually true, it would have been one of thousands of different studies that would have been funded that year---and which were cleared for support by a large committee of experts. So while in some tenuous sense "the buck stops at the top", the truth is that Fauci probably wouldn't have anything about this individual experiment's design.
But having said that, let's look at the particulars of the story. It contains the following quote from a Congressional organization I won't give a link to because I don't want to help spread it's nonsense.
"Our investigators show that Fauci’s NIH division shipped part of a
$375,800 grant to a lab in Tunisia to drug beagles and lock their heads
in mesh cages filled with hungry sand flies so that the insects could
eat them alive,"
I looked into the details, and what was happening was that these dogs were being sedated and then exposed to sand flies so they would be bitten to see if an experimental drug gave them protection against a really nasty, common tropical disease called Leishmaniasis.
An ulcer caused by Leishmaniasis, public domain image c/o Wikimedia Commons.
A couple minor points bear mentioning. The story says that the sand flies were supposed to eat the puppies alive. That's just hyperbole. The idea was to ensure that the dogs got a sufficient and consistent load of parasites from bites to ensure an adequate data sample. It also goes on to say that the dogs had had their vocal cords "removed" [sic] to cut down on the barking. (They are beagles, which is a breed that is know to be quite loud, and a lab full of them barking would have gotten really loud and chaotic.) A procedure known as "debarking" is commonly done by vets to dogs that owners find excessively noisy. People can debate the ethical merits of this procedure, but it certainly isn't as obviously outrageous as this article would suggest.
I think it's important to put this experiment into a context. First of all, whatever one may think about the issue of animal rights, lab experiments often seem (and probably are) cruel. But historically society has tended to decide that as long as the issue being tested is sufficiently important (like trying to cure or prevent a serious disease like Leishmaniasis) and there is professional oversight to ensure things don't get out of control, the decision has been made that these tests are "OK".
Animal rights are a big issue and I'm not going to get into them here. But almost all the people reading this article have benefited from animal experiments because it is how most medical research gets done. Moreover, the vast majority of people are not vegans. And having worked in the livestock industry myself, I know there is nothing happening to these dogs that is any worse than what happens in modern intensive livestock production or modern high capacity packing plants. If this effects you emotionally, I think it should spur you to some reflection about the big picture instead of focusing on one particular individual---such as Anthony Fauci.
Moreover, when FactCheck looked into the story they found out that the study hadn't actually been funded by the NIH anyway. When this was pointed out to politicians who originally brought this to the public's attention, they backed down (probably in a private email only). But please note that as I write these words, Zero Hedge has yet to take the post down---let alone offered a retraction.
Indeed, after a bit of research I found out that the byline for the story is actually fake. Here's a blown up view of it plus the original version of the photo that I found on line:
"Tyler Durden" is actually a character from the movie Fight Club that was played by Brad Pitt. Functionally, this hides from the general public who exactly wrote the piece. This is a useful tactic for two reasons. First of all, it hides the actual identity of the person libelling Fauci. But even more importantly, it creates semi-plausible protection to both the author and the website by wrapping itself in the mantle of "satire".
This is important because judges (especially American judges) give political satire a pass when someone tries to sue an author for libel. The idea is that if someone in a clown suit stands up on a stage and says something, the audience can be assumed to be less prone to believe it than if he was wearing a business suit.
But what exactly is "satire" in the first place? Wikipedia has the following definition:
Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming or exposing the perceived flaws of individuals, corporations, government, or society itself into improvement. Although satire is usually meant to be humorous, its greater purpose is often constructive social criticism, using wit to draw attention to both particular and wider issues in society.
Just what vice, folly, abuse, or, shortcoming is this anonymous writer drawing readers attention towards? That doctor Fauci isn't personally reading every single experiment that was funded by the NIH? Or, that medical research is evil because it harms puppies? This is what bugs me. There is absolutely nothing humorous or "satirical" about this article. It is written in a deadly serious way and the friend who sent me the post was really upset by it---and used it as evidence that Dr. Anthony Fauci was a cruel, inhumane person who could not be trusted.
Many readers will probably think I'm over-reacting to this post and projecting the idea of bad humour onto it. Perhaps I am, but look at this last image that the anonymous writer put on on the article:
The Babylon Bee is a website that explicitly purports to be humorous. Do you see anything at all on this tweet that is funny? Or even looks like it was meant to be funny? This tweet was probably a "teaser" designed to get people to go over to the story they wrote about this subject. For those of you who have more sense than to click on the link I've given, here's a quote:
"Now that everyone's upset about the puppies, maybe they'll forget about how I played god with their lives for the last year and a half," he confided to a friend, according to an anonymous source. "Everyone loves puppies. Well, except me, because I'm an evil bad guy. But people get real mad when you kill dogs for some reason. They'll get upset about this and probably try to cancel me. You know, this whole 'cancel culture' thing is really getting out of hand. You torture and murder a few dozen puppies and suddenly everyone's out to get you."
The "satire" of the piece is that Fauci is torturing puppies to divert attention from the people he's torturing by encouraging them to wear masks and get a vaccine against a disease that's already killed almost a million Americans. Take a look at the hilarious chart I downloaded from the Centre for Disease Control.
Cumulative deaths of American citizens due to COVID-19. Closing in on that 1 million death rate. The USA is still exceptional---in fact, it's a shining charnel house on a hill!
Never mind what's really going on with Zero Hedge, the fictional movie character can't be sued by Dr. Fauci because it's obviously "satire"---see, there's an image of a tweet from the Babylon Bee being used to support his laugh-out-loud piece.
I started with the Tyler Durden piece because it got sent to me by a friend who was deeply upset about it. But Zero Hedge isn't a predominately humorous site, the Babylon Bee is the "go to" for this sort of thing.
Check out this knee-slapper from the Bee.
Not only would no libel lawyer would ever touch this with a ten foot pole, it also seems to have gotten past the fact checkers at Google, Twitter, and, FaceBook. And it has advertisements too, which means that it hasn't even been demonetized.
&&&&
Why am I making such a big deal about a dumb attempt at humour?
First of all, because the only way you can show there's a problem with the humour is to make a big deal of it. This is the phenomenon that is referenced in the saying:
A lie is half way around the world by the time the truth has put its boots on.
It's really, really easy to make something up or just repeat something someone else told you. It's a lot more work to come up with a new idea and critically research to see if it makes sense. It also takes a lot of work to double check something someone else says in order to figure out if they know what they are talking about. (I've spent a lot of time researching and thinking through various ways of writing this article, for example.)
Secondly, these sorts of stories are based upon reinforcing already existing stereotypes. I suspect that this is a lot more important than we might think.
When my wife got her dog she did an exceptional job training it. She got me to help her. She wanted to avoid "begging" behaviour by having me train him that if he was quiet and well-behaved he would get more treats than if he begged for them from me. The way she did this was have me sit and watch tv with some potato chips. (Something I'm an absolute expert at doing.) When Nic (the dog) came over and begged for a chip, I ignored him. When he gave up and just laid down in the room, I'd wait a while and then call out "Nic!". Once he got up and came over, I'd give him a chip.
He eventually got to the point where I could give him different commands "Sit", "Come", etc. But Misha (my significant other) told me that even once he'd learned well, I should repeat the practice once in a while just to ensure that he didn't slide back into begging.
What's this got to do with jokes?
I'd argue that these sorts of bad jokes act on anti-vaxxers like those potato chips I tossed to Nic. They are reminders to hold onto the description of reality that tells them that vaccines are dangerous and part of a conspiracy to take away their freedom to die in a hospital room with a ventilator tube jammed down their throats. It tells them that they aren't alone in their tinfoil hat idiocy, but rather holding onto a very reasonable assessment of what does or doesn't make sense.
Moreover, if the form these lies take is very polished---like that very nicely done "Compliant Elmo" fake advert---it helps reinforce the idea that the ideas they spread are completely rational. And because effort put into form is much more visible than that put into substance, and translates into "credibility" for a lot of people, the business model of things like the Babylon Bee is much more successful than fact-based sites like the Guelph-Back-Grounder.
&&&&
Which raises the issue of subscriptions. If you can afford it, why not sign up on Patreon or Pay Pal to help support the work I do?
&&&&
There used to be an absolute Niagara of sexist and racist
jokes that flowed in workplace lunch rooms when I left the farm and
started paid employment. Thankfully, they seem to have dried up and I
haven't heard one in decades---that type of humour has moved from
"mainstream" to "beyond the pale". Maybe there's a corner in Hell where
the comedians who invented these witticisms play dominoes with blackface
musicians---but they seem to have moved out of my neighbourhood.
I think that this has been an important part of slowly reducing racism, sexism, and, homophobia in society. That's because each one of those jokes was reinforcing prejudice as an essential element of people's worldview. When those---and other---conceptual potato chips stopped flying through the air, it became easier for people to look at things a little more objectively. And the result is a younger generation who are much less prejudiced than mine.
&&&&
Just to show that I'm not a grump who can't appreciate humour, let's quote a couple jokes my sister sent to me the other day.
A woman was picking through the frozen turkeys at the grocery store but she couldn't find one big enough for her family. She asked a stock boy, "Do these turkeys get any bigger?" The stock boy replied, "No ma'am, they're dead."
A truck driver was driving along the freeway and noticed a sign that read: Low Bridge Ahead. Before he knows it, the bridge is right in front of him and his truck gets wedged under it. Cars are backed up for miles. Finally, a police vehicle comes up. The cop gets out of his car, walks to the truck driver, puts his hands on his hips and says, "Got stuck, huh?" The truck driver says, "No, I was delivering this bridge and I ran out of gas."
&&&&
Moreover I say unto you, the Climate Emergency must be dealt with!
Daoists are not opposed to nice things, but they would argue that
most come with some sort of cost. And it is important to be aware of
that cost in advance to avoid paying too high a price. What this
means is that the frugal man has fewer entanglements that limit his
freedom. For example, someone who is living pay-cheque to pay-cheque
is less likely to quit his job when his boss starts to pressure him
to do something immoral. Similarly, he will have less money to offer
to charity or a friend in need. Being “wide reaching” means
thinking about more than the day-to-day grind. Being over-committed
narrows that focus.
And being “frugal” isn't just about money. Time can also be
something that we “over commit”. The conflict between family time
and career has become such a commonly recognized problem that there
is a bureaucratic title for the issue: “work/life balance”.
Books have been written and consultants are hired to give seminars.
The person who has developed a career that is too time intensive will
find that she no longer has the freedom to love her partner, be a
parent, or, have any real friends.
Just as importantly, she will also find that she no longer has time
to be open to new ideas and spontaneous in her actions.
Over-committed women do not read books on subjects they know nothing
about. Nor do they meet people who live totally outside her class,
family, or professional orbit. This means that she effectively stops
learning. Again, there is a bureaucratic name for this phenomenon:
living in a “silo”.
Think about the problem from the viewpoint of computer science. The
power of a computer resides in its “RAM”. This is an acronym that
stands for “Randomly Accessible Memory”. A computer with a lot of
RAM is able to access and connect bits of information from a lot of
different sources at the same time. In the same way, a person who has
“wide ranging” interests and knowledge about society can make
connections and see patterns that do not appear to people who
specialize on what is important to their profession to the exclusion
of all else. This is why “silo” thinking is a problem for large
institutions. To give one example, if all the senior executives at
your telephone company are focused on improving the ability of the
existing system to provide long distance phone calls, they might not
realize that there are new start up companies that are developing
Voice Over Internet Phone (VOIP) technology (e.g. Skype) that
completely bypasses the phone company's long distance billing system.
They may also not notice an entire emerging generation of people who
would rather type out chat messages than make voice-based phone
calls.
Beyond the issue of money and time, there is another one: “loyalty”.
People build their lives around allegiances to specific notions or
ideals. These can include various concepts like “the Law”, “Free
Enterprise”, “a Good Job”, “the Church”, “the Party”,
and so on. There's the stock image of the failed party official or
general who “takes the easy way out” by blowing his brains out
with a revolver. We also have an iconic image of failed investors
jumping to their death after a stock market plunge has “wiped them
out”. Below the level of suicide, we have individuals who are so
emotionally invested in an institution that they progressively find
themselves committing greater and greater moral outrages in order to
prop it up. One example of this is the Catholic Church's desperate
attempts to protect pedophile clergy.
People who have signed-up to institutions that require this depth of
commitment often pay a steep price for being “wide ranging” in
their viewpoint. Chelsea Manning was sent to prison because she felt
that people needed to see what sort of horrible outrages were being
committed by the US military in Iraq. Edward Snowden is an exile in
Russia because he felt that the citizens of the world needed to know
how comprehensively intelligence agencies were spying on them. And,
Julian Assange spent years as a prisoner in the Ecuadorian embassy
because he created the institution, Wikileaks, that allowed both
Manning and Snowden to expose their information to the wider world.
Whistle blowers are prime examples of people who have not been frugal
in swearing personal allegiance and paid a big price for being “wide
ranging”. (It might be, however, that they pay less of a price than
those who simply “go along” with the institutions they serve and
as a result destroy their innate sense of right and wrong. There are
worse places to be than prison.)
..........
Beyond
these
obvious issues,
Ellen
Chen's commentary on this section of the Tao Te Ching talks of
resonances in the original ancient Chinese of the word that we
translate as “frugality”: “Chien is
organically connected with p'u, the original state of nature
as the uncarved wood. Chien stands for the economy of nature
that does not waste anything.”
This is somewhat similar to the relationship between the words
“economy” and “ecology”. They are joined together by the
“eco” which comes from the Greek word “oikos”, or
“household”. “Eco” about where we live. And the “logy”
comes from “logos”, or the various ways we try to
articulate or understand a specific aspect of life. In this sense
“oikos” plus “logos” means “understanding where we live”.
The “nomy” of “economy” comes from the word “nemein”,
or “to distribute”. So “oikos” plus “nemein” means
“distributing what our home has”. For the Daoist what we call
“frugality” doesn't just entail the money we save in our bank
account, but also how lightly we walk upon the earth. And this
doesn't mean “doing without”, so much as being integrated into
the economy of nature where nothing is wasted and everything is
recycled.
Because the Daoist has worked his way into the warp and weave of his
surroundings, he is able to do things that would be impossible if he
were wasting resources battling with his environs. The joke that says
“When you are up to ass in alligators it is hard to remember that
you are here to drain a swamp” makes no sense to a Daoist. This is
because in most cases he wouldn't see why the swamp should be drained
in the first place. And if he did have to do something about it, he
probably would find some way of doing so that wouldn't entail causing
problems for the large reptiles.
............
Yet another way to think about this is to consider frugality in terms
of “economy of design”. Consider the 19th century
American sect called the “Shakers”. They had an aesthetic that
was based on the simplicity and frugality that is very much in
keeping with Daoist principles. Aaron Copeland made one of their
hymns famous by putting it in his score for Martha Graham's ballet
“Appalachian Spring”. The lyrics could have come from a Daoist
text:
'Tis the gift to be simple, 'tis the gift to be free
'Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be,
And when we find ourselves in the place just right,
'Twill be in the valley of love and delight.
When true simplicity is gained,
To bow and to bend we shan't be ashamed,
To turn, turn will be our delight,
Till by turning, turning we come 'round right.
The Shakers were also famous for their furniture, which was
based on a lack of ornamentation plus utilitarian design. One of
their ideas, for example, was to design chairs that could easily be
hung on the wall when not in use, which allowed a room to be
“re-purposed” for another task, such as dancing. (The Shakers
were big into dancing, hence the “turn, turn” and “turning,
turning”---which are dance instructions in the above lyrics.)
I'm belabouring the issue of frugality because our society seems to
have lost the ability to incorporate economy into design. Instead of
cooling our homes by having windows that open and catch a breeze or
using shade to avoid the hot sun, we build expensive air conditioning
systems that eat huge amounts of electricity. And instead of
designing cities in ways that encourage people to use transit,
bicycle, or walk to work---planners create sprawling subdivisions
where every adult has to own their own automobile. We also create
needlessly complex systems of governance that necessitate the
creation of armies of non-productive “experts” who consume
society's resources---lawyers, managers, prison guards, social
workers, tax accountants, bureaucrats, etc. Economists have a phrase
to identify this sort of “anti-frugal” design: “enforced
scarcity”. That is, the creation of an environment so profoundly
inefficient that people are forced to make an artificially high
income in order to simply survive. This is why even though we are the
richest society the world has ever seen yet, we still have beggars on
the street and the government says it cannot afford to deal with them
or any other major social problem.
&&&&
Moreover I say unto you, the Climate Emergency must be dealt with!
A couple weeks ago, I spent a few days reading a Master's thesis that's been published as a book titled Fun at Work. It's by a Guelphite named Lauren Stein. After reading it and thinking, I decided to ask Ms. Stein for an interview on short notice. She called me up and we did it.
The result was something that goes quite beyond what I originally envisioned as "just" a book review with a local author and instead talks about something that has become a minor social movement. One, I think, that says something about the human spirit and how it responds to the regimentation of modern life.
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Lauren Stein, photo by Gili Getz, and the cover of her book.
My apologies about the sound quality of the following interview. It's obviously been heavily edited. That's because we did a sort of impromptu interview, which means that I didn't have any time to do research or come up with questions. The result was a lot of me blathering on trying to figure out what I wanted to ask her. Most of that had to be removed to put Ms. Stein back on the centre of the stage.
Moreover, I've been doing all my interviews through a telephone because of the pandemic. Usually this works pretty good, but in this case I found that there were significantly different sound levels between her voice and mine, which means I had to amplify about half of the result. And in places that resulted in a lot of static. I decided not to filter that out because the result would have probably been her sounding like she was at the bottom of a swimming pool. The result isn't perfect, but I think people will be able to clearly hear almost everything---which is what I think most important.
I started out trying to put a label on the subject of the thesis. It's a report---using informal language---of a workshop that Stein held for employees of a tech company in Toronto. She doesn't reveal the name of the actual business and instead calls it "beet root". (I assume she was making a reference to one of the most iconic technology giants, "apple".)
A group of what I assume were managers, engineers, designers, programmers, etc, were invited to do a broad range of exercises. There were things that people did on their own, like journaling, but the focus was on spontaneous "improvised" group activity. These involved going through a variety of special exercises aimed at helping participants overcome their tendency to be self-conscious. Here's a YouTube video that shows several different exercises.
The goal that Stein wanted the group to work towards was to create an impromptu "play". The idea is that the group will learn to work together as a group where each individual has learned to non-judgmentally work with the others and do so in a way that encourages experimentation and thinking "outside of the box".
Here's an example of a improvised skit from a comedy club.
When I asked about what she was doing and introduced the term "industrial psychology", I was wondering why a business like "beet root" would sponsor a workshop like this. After some research, I was left with the impression that modern high-tech firms tend to see the people that work for them as being their primary capital investment. That's because if your business is creating new, incredibly complex machines and processes, the most important asset you have is the creativity of the people doing the research and engineering. To that end, anything that helps those people do their jobs better can be useful. In addition, anything that helps keep your key staff happy at their jobs is going to help reduce staff turnover---which is tremendously important if you are always at risk of your best staff moving to another corporation. And, of course, making your workplace more "fun" is ultimately going to cost a lot less than simply increasing employee pay.
As a general rule, this sort of thing is not an option for people who's skills aren't in similar "high demand". And if you are an educated professional it's sometimes easy to forget that there are a whole class of "underlings" who exist to clean the floors, build the widgets, deliver them, and, provide the coffee and meals that support the "super-men" who write the programs and market the products. Having spent most of my work life as an "underling" (albeit unionized and as such better off than most of my fellow "low lifes"), I'm acutely aware of how rarely the "softer ways" of modern management have yet to "trickle down" to the lower decks. As a result, I can be a bit of a "grump" when I hear about touchy feely workshops for my "betters".
Just because capitalism has created class warfare doesn't mean that absolutely everything has to be poisoned by it. Giving workshops for our tech over-lords and their minions doesn't mean that there isn't anything of value to the content. But it is important to remember to acknowledge that class warfare does exist and point it out when possible. Consider my less-than-gracious comments with Ms. Stein as being somewhat similar to the "land acknowledgements" that start a lot of public meetings today. It's an attempt to publicly point out that I haven't forgotten about the way capitalism poisons the way people interact with one another.
Having gotten that out of the way, I can now move on to discuss other notions.
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&&&&
Lauren mentions "curiosity coaching" which prompted me to ask her about the Unwinding Anxiety app that you can download onto your Apple or Android device. I looked into it because the White Coat, Black Art CBC podcast strongly recommended it. I'm also recommending the program myself after using it for several months during the pandemic.
It comes from the research by Dr. Judson A. Brewer who has managed to amalgamate Pavlovian conditioning and Buddhist mindfulness practice to help people deal with a wide range of problems such as over-eating, tobacco addiction, and, anxiety disorders (eg: my PTSD). One of his key insights is that bringing a sense of dispassionate curiosity to introspection can help break the stimulus-response-reward chains that bind people to unproductive behaviours such as over eating, smoking, and, fretting.
When I looked at the two YouTube clips that I posted above, it seems clear to me that what improv does for the minds of participants (much like Buddhist mindfulness) is to force them to totally focus on the here-and-now. For example, in the final skit, it requires a significant amount of focus to be able to invent a plot line based on the other actor's improvised lines while at the same time limiting what they say to the arbitrarily set number of words allowed. Brewer's program does much the same thing by asking people to periodically take stock of the sounds they hear, what sensations they feel in their body, etc. The point is to break up the conditioned habit loops in their minds that keep people fretting about mistakes from the past and problems that may arise in the future. That's pretty much what Brewer's program is all about---so I can certainly see how Stein's form of therapy could be effective.
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There is a bigger element at play, however.
Improvisation has been an important part of public performance for a very, very long time. Lauren brings up the example of commedie dell'arte, which was an improvised theatrical art style that became popular starting in the 16th century. But my understanding is that going all the way back to long before Homer, bards improvised their poetry by following basic stories and improvising verse as they told/sang their tales.
I first came across this notion by listening to a CBC Ideas show decades ago. According to it (if memory serves), there existed until very recently bardic traditions in Eastern Europe, Ireland, and, the Middle East where people would apprentice and learn the ability to compose poetry "on the fly" in front of an audience---often while performing music too. I was gobsmacked by this, because I had acted in plays while at high school where I was expected to memorize long pieces of dialogue plus blocking. Having done this, I just assumed that oral traditions involved memorizing tales from past generations.
But, as the academics pointed out, accurate memorization is much more difficult to do in a preliterate society---simply because there was no written-down text to work from. Moreover, they had direct evidence from their field research that helped them understand that bards couldn't just repeat the same thing over and over again. They had to entertain in order to get paid, and to do that their performances had to fit the mood of the audience. The good ones learned how to adapt to the moment.
The written works that have come down through history were probably examples of the very best versions that the authors had heard performed. Moreover, before the printing presses it was very common for each person copying a text to do their own form of improvisation by making the odd change themselves. The result was a type of natural selection that moulded and preserved the very best tellings of the our collective ancient stories.
Incidentally, this process continues. Check out the following performance of a tiny fragment of mankind's oldest story: Gilgamesh and Enkidu. It too is an individual performer's "take" on an old, old story.
There are, of course, fully extant and well-understood forms of improvisational music that are quite mainstream. The best example is jazz, which is often improvised by musicians who have learned to instantly understand the musical chords that their ensemble is working within and can make up new beats and themes on the fly.
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But why is improvisation so important to some people?
It seems obvious to me that there is a certain joy in life that comes from just being able to do something totally without premeditation and without the direction of another human being. Unfortunately, I suspect that people's opportunities to do this seem to be getting fewer and farther between as our society becomes even more complex and competitive.
I know that the farmers that I knew as a child and young adult had a freedom to do "their own thing" that far exceeded most of what I was allowed during my work life in Guelph. And while it's true that there are now lots of independent business people and "contractors", I don't think this sort of being "self-employed" often comes to much more than being under the thumb of your customers in much the same way as others are at the beck-and-call of bosses.
Beyond the issue of being directed by another human being, a lot of folks find what they do for a living has become more in common with engineering and science than the arts. Fewer and fewer people do much problem solving or making repairs from scratch anymore. Instead, they just plug in expensive diagnostic tools to find out which module to replace. Engineers and scientists do have opportunities for creativity, but they are also working under the rigid discipline of numbers and facts.
Even things that used to allow people a certain degree of pride have ceased to do so. Traditional crafts like making furniture have become replaced by factories that churn out tables, chairs, sofas and ottomans by the acre. It's also hard for people like carpenters and masons to take pride in their work because they are under the gun of having to work faster and faster to keep costs under control. Similarly, the finely-grained legal liability rules that govern a lot of workplaces have often resulted in more "people-centred" jobs also being reduced to rote. People end up so defined by their jobs that they are forbidden to help people simply because "it isn't in their job description".
If you can't be spontaneous in your work life, it seems that most people need to find some other way of doing it. I can certainly see how someone who feels they have no ability left to be spontaneous while at work would love to have an opportunity to really play when on their own time. And I can certainly see how this sort of therapy can be of real use to people---even if they they have no diagnosis of a pathology.
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The Zen teacher I mentioned with regard to clowning and "plunges" was the late Bernie Glassman. I couldn't find much on line about his clowning, other than some pictures of him wearing a rubber nose. It does however raise the issue of sacred clowning and it's relationship to the modern improvisation movement.
I looked at Stein's blog where she describes her experience clowning on the TTC. In passing, she mentions that she attended a workshop led by Patch Adams MD, who is also famous for using clowning during his medical practice. (There was a movie extremely loosely based on his life that starred Robin Williams.) That's an interesting reference, because he is also someone who's practice seems to be a modern re-invention of a very old practice.
I suspect that most of my readers don't know this, but humans have a long history of using humour to teach traditional wisdom, and, to heal both individuals and society as a whole. Here's a drawing of one example from the Hopi First Nation from the American South West.
Copyleft registered image by Neil David Sr. c/o Wiki Media Commons
The Wikipedia says about the role of clowns for the Pueblo peoples:
Their function can help defuse community tensions by providing their own
humorous interpretation of the tribe's popular culture, by reinforcing
taboos, and by communicating traditions. A 1656 case of a young Hopi man
impersonating the resident Franciscan priest at Awat'ovi is thought to be a historic instance of Pueblo clowning.
Europe also has a tradition of clowns as important bearers of cultural wisdom, both religious and secular.
The most famous sacred clown in Western Europe was probably Saint Francis of Assisi, who was famous for doing outrageous acts that were pointed comments about the society he inhabited. For example, when he found that the inhabitants of a city were indifferent to his preaching, he went out and gave a sermon to the fish in a nearby body of water. (Pious people often miss the obvious point by arguing that the fish actually listened to the sermon. Alas, comedians have always been afflicted by people who don't get the joke---.)
Eastern Christianity had a much more well-developed culture of "fool saints" and they became something of a minor stock character in Russian literature. The best example is probably Saint Basil the Blessed who used to go around naked summer and winter, and who did outrageous things like shoplift for the poor.
Saint Basil at prayer, copyleft image c/o Wikimedia commons.
But what exactly is the point of sacred clowning?
I suppose the best way to think of it is to say it allows people to "speak truth to power" without alienating the audience. In a modern context the equivalent are the comedy news programs that help expose casual viewers to important issues of the day---often in greater depth than on offer from professional, mainstream journalism. For example, consider the following. I was just trying to find a funny example to share with you and ended up learning something in much greater detail than I expected.
Just consider the above news item. It is an absolutely deadly serious issue. People are dying because of the nonsense that FaceBook is spreading around the world. And it's pretty clear that the tech over lords are far more concerned about making money than how many uneducated, atomized people end up dying because of the propaganda artificial intelligences spew into their minds. This could be depressing as Hell---which would induce most people to just change the channel and try to forget all about it. But John Oliver and his researchers are able to make their points while keeping us laughing. That's the value of the clown or court jester, and it should be recognized as tremendously valuable.
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Moreover I say unto you, the Climate Emergency must be dealt with!
In Chapter 67 of the Dao De Jing
we are introduced to the “three treasures”.
2.
I
have three treasures (pao),
To hold
and to keep:
The
first is motherly love (tz'u),
The
second is frugality (chien),
The third
is daring not be at the world's front.
3. With
motherly love one can be courageous,
With
frugality one can be wide reaching,
Daring
not be at the world's front,
One
can grow to a full vessel (ch'i).
4. Now to
discard motherly love, yet to be courageous,
To
discard frugality, yet to be wide reaching,
To
discard staying behind, yet to be at the front,
One dies!
5 One
with motherly love is victorious in battle,
Invulnerable
in defense.
When
Heaven wills to save a people,
It guards
them with motherly love.
Ellen Chen, trans.
The
three treasures of Daoism are something like the ten commandments and golden rule rolled up into one. But to a modern Western ear
they sound bizarre and paradoxical. How can “motherly love” help
you win battles? How does frugality help anyone become “wide
reaching”? And
how does
one dare
not to be at the “world's front”?
Motherly Love
When we go hiking in the wilderness one thing that everyone knows is
that you should try to never get in between a mother and her child.
Not only does this apply to ferocious predators like wolves, bears
and cougars, but also normally peaceful animals like moose or even
deer. This is because mother animals protecting their young have a
fearlessness and ferocity that is unmatched. Predators chasing prey
are wary of being injured. As are males fighting over potential
mates. But mothers don't care about their own safety at all.
The
other aspect of this to remember is the immunity that mother animals
have towards retaliation. If an animal attacks humans as prey or
because it is too “familiar” with human beings, game wardens will
hunt it down and kill it as a matter of course. But if the attack
came from someone getting in between mother and cubs, generally
people acknowledge that there was no blame, except perhaps on the
part of the human. I
have read accounts
by
people who were lying in hospital beds after savage maulings that
show
the same sentiment.
In
the relations between people and nations it is a sad fact of
existence that violence is sometimes
necessary. But Daoists
try to always act with the love of a mother towards her children.
That means when it is necessary, they need to fight to both
ferociously and fearlessly. But the act of violence needs to be
directed towards only one aim: defense. All violence must be
proportionate and directed specifically towards whomever or whatever
is the threat. And once the threat is passed there is absolutely no
room for animosity or
grudges.
We
have recently had many examples of what happens when one doesn't
follow this principle. Wars that are not about defense but rather
about the “interests” of states have
severely
damaged those same interests. And wars that were based on “shock
and awe” and which accepted far too much “collateral damage”
have created violent
responses by people enraged by the carnage they have seen inflicted
on
their communities.
As long as a nation restricts its military activity to genuine
defence,
it has the respect of the world. But once it embarks on needless
adventures it becomes a pariah.
Exactly the same thing happens in our personal lives. We all have
boundaries that we need to defend: personally, in our family, and, in
the various communities we inhabit. This means that conflict is
pretty much inevitable at least once in a while. But Daoists believe
that the best way to manage them is by remembering to keep the ideal
of the love between a mother and her child as the guiding principle
that informs our actions and responses. Of course, no one can ever
live totally according any ideal. But it is what we strive towards.
..........
Another way of looking at this passage is to consider the quality of
the relationships one builds in society and how that affects one's
influence within it. Another book strongly influenced by the Daoist
viewpoint is Sun Tzu's Art of War. Consider this
passage:
A general regards his men as infants who will march with
him into the deepest valleys. He treats them as his own beloved sons
and they will stand by him unto death. If a general indulges his men
but is unable to employ them, if he loves them but cannot enforce his
commands, if the men are disorderly and he is unable to control them,
they may be compared to spoiled children, and are useless.
(Chapter 10, General Tao
Hanzhang version, Yuan Shibing trans.)
This idea of a parent sending her children off to fight a war may
grate on some people's ears. But the important issue is how the
general feels towards her men. Sun Tzu's general is genuinely
concerned about her soldiers. She doesn't see them as a means to an
end, or, as pawns to move on a chess board in order to advance her
career or to prove some aspect of a pet ideology. They are subjects,
not objects.
Having said that, it is important to remember that a Daoist is not
just any type of mother, she is someone who acts in a certain way.
That is to say, she is not sentimental. This means that while
she treats her soldiers like her own children, she is the type of
mother that is not indulgent. She believes in “tough love”. Being
overly indulgent towards your children is another form of
objectification. This is because the sentimental mother doesn't see
her children as individuals that have their own agendas and need to
find their own way in the world, but rather as puppets that act out
the emotions that dominate her consciousness. Objectively viewing
your children as human beings in their own right instead of
extensions of your internal mental state can be a profound act of
love towards them.
If we treat our children as being autonomous individuals who have
rights beyond what we want them to be, then they also have
responsibilities too. And we expect those children to live up
to those responsibilities. Soldiers do not respect officers who
over-indulge them because the smart ones realize that their welfare
is bound up with the group. Sailors say a “tight [ie:
well-disciplined] ship is a happy ship”. This is because in a slack
ship the best men end up doing extra work that the worst ones shirk.
And when I read Caesar’s Conquest of Gaul,
I remember him quoting wise Centurions who warned their
soldiers that “indulgent generals lose battles”. And, there can be no
greater calamity for a soldier than losing a battle.
This point is reinforced by what immediately precedes the above quote
from Sun Tzu:
---the general who in advancing does not seek personal
fame, and in retreating is not concerned with disgrace, but whose
only purpose is to protect the country and promote the best interests
of his sovereign, is the precious jewel of the state.
(Chapter 10, General Tao
Hanzhang version, Yuan Shibing trans.)
The General who acts according to Daoist principles is selfless.
She doesn't care about her career. She isn't dominated by whatever
emotional baggage she might be carrying. She is like the mother
cougar or grizzly who defends her cubs without any thought to her
self interest. It is the same for the Daoist in society---only the
“off-spring” may be many things. It may be the soldiers under her
command, it may be the sovereign she serves, or, it may be the
greater good of the entire community. Unfortunately, these sorts of
leaders are very rare, which is why the competent sovereign needs to
treat them like “the precious jewel of the state”.
&&&&
Moreover I say unto you, the Climate Emergency must be dealt with!
The article that I wanted to publish this week got a bit bigger than I thought it would be. Part of that involved an impromptu interview that unfortunately had less than stellar sound quality. This required a lot of editing but I'm pretty happy with the results none-the-less. As a result, I'm not going to get anything ready to publish until next week. I hope that you will think that the ultimate result was worth the delay.
&&&&
&&&&
Furthermore I say unto you, the Climate Emergency must be dealt with!
