Category Archives: Critical Thinking

Fat is the Head that Wears the Crown

Posted on by under Critical Thinking

I was noodling around on Wikipedia recently and began reading a page about the difference between a “head of state” and a “head of government,” and I had a moment of insight.

According to this Wikipedia entry, a head of state (or chief of state) is the public persona who officially embodies a state. This is not to be confused with the head of government.

It occurred to me that Donald Trump, in running for president of the United States, wanted to be the head of state. He wanted all of the adulation and ornamentation that accrues to heads of state–monarchs, essentially. He wanted to be the persona of America (or his version of America) and emulate strongmen “leaders” and arbitrary sovereigns. He wanted the thrill of the large crowds cheering for him.

But he definitely did not want to be bothered with mundane things such as laws and regulations.

Trump’s insistence on on posing with a Bible in front of church for photographers on June 1, 2020–and forcibly removing racial justice protestors in the process–is a prime example of what a head of state would do, but likely not a head of government.

Just as importantly, his MAGA-hatted, Trump-flag-waving followers wanted a head of state too. This was demonstrated by the fervent devotion exhibited at all of his campaign rallies and most notably by the mob of rioters on January 6 who, in the name of keeping him as the “leader” of the United States, attacked and vandalized out of zealous loyalty to one man the very seat of our democratic republic.

I recognize that prior to America’s experiment in democracy, the identity of a nation was tied to “king and country.” This is what motivated people–Europeans mostly–to create colonies and subjugate other people.

But the creation of the United States and our written constitution was intended to do away with that, or at least the worst parts of it.

Interestingly, while in America we have a head of state who also is the head of government, there are several different ways of handling this, according to Wikipedia. These range form some power shearing to cases where the head of state has almost nothing to do with running the apparatus that implements the laws under which citizens live their lives.

Trump’s presidency–and the forces that put him into office–emphasize that our system perhaps is due for a makeover. The American setup is not the only way to do this, and it is a useful exercise to consider how we could modify our Constitution to make things a bit more reflective of the modern realities of our multicultural nation. To be blunt, if people want to elect a head of state, and that head of state has no interest in governing, then there’s a way to do that which is safe and quite possibly effective.

But we’d have to amend the Constitution and the odds of that aren’t great as long as we live under this pervasive political opinion that “They” are trying to get “Us” and that we are unable to function as a “We” as in “We the People.”

I for one would welcome some changes to how our country is run. All I have to do is pause and reflect on the fact that nearly 250 years ago, we fought a war and people gave their lives precisely so that we would NOT have a king in America. I think that was a noble cause, and these current generations would do well to uphold it.

Founding father and original patriot John Adams once said:

Power always thinks it has a great soul and vast views beyond the comprehension of the weak; and that it is doing God’s service when it is violating all His laws.

Speaking Up

Posted on by under Critical Thinking, Introversion, Risk

I am an introvert.

There a number of ways in which introverts and extroverts differ, some of which are fairly obvious day to day and others that are more subtle. One of the ones that shows up rather frequently is that introverts think about what they are going to say, and extroverts talk so that they know what they think. Each can be annoying to the other but being self aware about which camp you are in helps when navigating social situations.

So, for myself, my tendency is to not speak until I have something to say. This carries over to social media (something that I’ve discussed previously here).

But in the new year, I’m resolving to make a change: to speak up more often when it is necessary.

And necessary it is in 2021. Because we have learned that there are real-world consequences to giving free reign on social media to extroverts, those who lack impulse control or self-awareness, and people for whom belief is more important than thinking critically.

I know a lot of extroverts (who doesn’t? They are a dominant force in culture). Many of them are lovely people, warm and friendly, kind and loving.

But the danger comes when many act before they think–which as I said before is part of their nature. And on social media it is SO easy to act before thinking. You click the like button or shoot off a nasty reply before you even process what you’ve seen or read. (The person who coined the phrase that it’s better to ask forgiveness than to ask permission was an extrovert.)

This is how things “go viral” (a term I hate, by the way). But it is also how things become a shit storm. People pile on, one thing leads to another, and before you can say “Facebook” you have a flame war on your hands.

Voices of reason–badly needed right now–are drowned out, buried, lost in the flood. Calm dialog is shouted down. Mob mentality prevails.

So I don’t truly believe that my effort will make any difference, at least not right away. But I do need to defy my nature and speak up when warranted. And not be upset by the inevitable nasty responses. Or apologetic without reason.

If civility is actually what we want in this country (doubtful, but it’s a worthy goal), then somebody has to get the ball rolling, Might as well be me, and maybe you too.

Don’t Like the News? Kill the Messenger

Posted on by under Critical Thinking, Loss

I’m not a journalist but I have worked with and around journalists for over two decades, something I have talked about before here and here.

Which is why I found it disheartening to read the story of the demise of LAWeekly as I knew it. While it is true that newspapers and other journalism outlets have struggled over the past decade or so in the face of economic hardship brought on by the internet (and to some extent, themselves), to learn that an established news outlet has been deliberately targeted for destruction is chilling.

Years ago, I read the LAWeekly and its sister publication the East Bay Express rather frequently when I was a college student in California. These “alternative” weeklies could always be relied on to provide thoughtful stories about local issues not covered in much depth by the bigger news organizations. (Washington, D.C.’s alternative weekly, the Washington City Paper, is still chugging away, but it’s sister paper, the Baltimore City Paper, folded in 2017.)

The story I read about how the LAWeekly has been gutted may contain some hyperbole–journalists are not perfect, and often they have an overblown sense of self and of the importance of their work, in my view.

But I have no doubt that the institution of journalism with its modern emphasis on fairness and accuracy is essential to the effectiveness of democracy and the protection of civil rights. To disparage legitimate journalism as so-called fake news–as President Trump does almost daily–creates a situation where fewer and fewer people trust facts, such as they are.

(It’s important to remember that the freedom of the press was important enough to the Founding Fathers that it is guaranteed by the First Amendment to the Constitution–alongside the freedom to practice the religion of one’s choice and ahead of the right to bear arms.)

According to this version of events from the editorial staff at The LAnd Magazine, the LAWeekly was bought by a “cabal of Republican donors and Trump supporters from Orange County” who are “devoted to defeating progressive ideas by indoctrinating young conservatives and infiltrating what they considered to be liberal institutions.” If true, this is another example of the hypocrisy of conservatives these days.

Conservatives themselves claim with alarming frequency that liberals are somehow “indoctrinating” or “brainwashing” people (if you want examples, leave a comment–I don’t want to unnecessarily drive traffic to people promoting falsehoods). The argument is illogical, however.

The conventional concept of brainwashing requires that someone is led by the intentional actions of others to believe something they would not have and could not have believed if left to their own thought processes. If a journalistic organization publishes verifiable fact, without attempting to manipulate its audience, and someone reads it and draws a conclusion, I can’t see how that, in any way, is brainwashing. (Note that conservative “news” manipulates its audience intentionally every day by distorting the facts and not questioning unsupported claims.)

Conservatives give lip service to individual liberty. However, conservatives are all too eager to oppose that exercise of personal liberty when individuals make up their own minds about their own lives and the lives of those around them in a way that does not conform to an established conservative point of view.

Conservatism, almost be definition, is threatened by new ideas and the reconsideration of how we as a society view the world. It is thus not in favor of personal liberty at all, but rather the adherence to a strict set of codes of (mostly old fashioned) behavior. If a news outlet such as LAWeekly questions those conservative “values,” it is seen as a threat to the conservative ideal.

A threat that, unfortunately, is sometimes targeted for elimination. So who is the larger threat?

Maybe this is an isolated incident and perhaps I’m over-generalizing (overreacting?). And maybe the ideal of having news that’s free of bias is a pipe dream. But the possibility that reasonable people cannot agree on some basic structures of society, such that we now have flavored news that meets our preferred tastes, is frightening.

“Participatory democracy depends on a broadly shared view of reality, and therefore on trusted institutions of journalism and mass media.” – Kevin Platt, University of Pennsylvania

Change Comes from Within

Posted on by under Connection, Critical Thinking

A few years ago, a documentary aired on TV called 1968: The Year That Changed America. It was about how the events, politics, and social movements of 1968, in the words of the producers, “forever changed the modern American landscape.”

Except that, it now would seem that nothing ever really changed at all. America may no longer be legally segregated, but we are as much divided along racial, ethnic, and religious lines as we ever were. The federal government is in chaos and unable to effectively address the real needs of the American people. People are protesting in the streets nationwide. We have a president who is egotistical, unqualified, and more interested in scoring political points than actually governing the country. We have a media industry that is both part of the solution and contributing to the problem. We have an economy that works well for a few people and excludes many. We have people self-destructing through excessive drug use. We have a Congress that appears to be unable to do anything meaningful.

It would appear that we as a country have learned nothing, and it makes me wonder how that happened. It is as if we collectively have an underdeveloped ability to learn, to regulate our own behavior, and to make changes for the better. Perhaps we suffer from multiple personality disorder, that there isn’t just one America but many, many different ones.

Or perhaps we are in recovery from trauma, that the events of 1968 didn’t set us on the road to improvement but rather created the dividing line between before and after. Most people who suffer a traumatic event view it as a pivotal point in their lives, that they are not the same person after that they were before.

Maybe America continues to struggle with coming to terms with this new sense of self, and we’re not there yet. But are we trying? Sometimes I wonder. Many are, but are there enough of us to create true change? Is change gonna come? Or will we just anesthetize ourselves and turn a blind eye to the real work that needs doing.

I would like to think we have it in us to do the work. When we’re at our best, we do. But, as with anything, we have to want to change. And it is our loss of we don’t.

What is new about American police brutality towards black people? Why did it take the death of George Floyd for the people of Bristol to recognize that they had a monument to a slave owner in their city’s midst? The real question is not what should people do but will people go back to sleep or not? Will we have learned? – Dr. Gabor Mate

 

A genuine change must first come from within the individual, only then can he or she attempt to make a significant contribution to humanity. – Dalai Lama

 

Guns are Owned by People

Posted on by under Critical Thinking

Full disclosure: I’ve given money more than once to Everytown for Gun Safety, because I believe that America would be a better place with less gun violence. Just in the past two years, we’ve seen Las Vegas, Pittsburgh, Thousand Oaks, Sutherland Springs, Parkland. Before that, there was Orlando, Washington Navy Yard, Newtown. On a regular basis, we get reports of a new one.

This is on top of what could be called “normal background” gun violence. These are the drive-by shootings in a city like Chicago, Baltimore or Los Angeles, the hunting accidents, the self-inflicted gun wounds. To me, having fewer guns at hand and making them harder to obtain would, automatically, reduce the level of gun violence. It just makes sense.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not anti-gun. Guns are, under the right circumstances, a useful means for getting what you want, such as a deer, and marksmanship is a fun test of skill (I once upon a time earned my Marksman First Class certificate from the NRA).

Those who advocate for tougher gun policies also feel that guns are too easy to get. “Weak gun laws in most states mean that virtually anyone can openly carry loaded weapons without any permits, training or background checks,” says one email from Everytown for Gun Safety. “Inadequate laws that fail to hold adults accountable for unintentional shootings reinforce the idea that they are merely “accidents” rather than completely preventable tragedies,” another says.

Common sense, no? Who would dispute that fewer guns, or raising the level of gun owner responsibility to that of a motor vehicle owner, would equate to fewer gun deaths? Why is there so little traction on this issue?

Because gun ownership and usage are not one unified issue but at least two distinct ones with very little overlap.

On the one hand, guns are owned and gun violence is committed by people who view the gun as a tool. The gun, and the shooting of people (or anything else), is a means to an end. Whether it is for settling disputes, defending territory, or obtaining something they want, the gun is the the hammer that drives the nail, the wrench that removes the bolt, the key to open a door.

On the other hand, there are a significant number of people (in America) for whom owning a gun is an important piece of their identity. In other words, they identify as “gun owner” just as they identify as a member of their family, a part of their culture, or with being an American. And when someone says that gun ownership should be restricted, it is these people who get anxious and defensive.

This is actually an understandable reaction. The concept of identity is complex, and goes to the very heart of who we perceive ourselves to be. What I am is a bundle of self-identifiers, and if enough of them are removed, I would find it difficult to recognize myself. And the piece of my identity that defines me the most is the one I will cling to the hardest.

This leads to some complicated social interactions, fuzzy logic, and paradoxical situations. An article published last year in the Atlantic makes the point that it is common for people to deny what’s in front of them if it means denying a firmly-held belief about themselves. “If the thing you might be wrong about is a belief that’s deeply tied to your identity or worldview…then people [do] all the mental gymnastics it takes to remain convinced that they’re right.”

Additionally, because a vital facet of identity is being able to recognize who is in your tribe, then surrendering a piece of your identity will naturally cut you off from your social support network. “Having social support…is far more important than knowing the truth about some facts that do not directly impinge on your life,” the article quotes Pascal Boyer, an anthropologist.

No one wants to live in a violent community, but no one wants to feel alone either. People will disagree on what to do about gun violence based on how they see “us” versus “them.”

Those who dispute that fewer guns would equate to fewer gun deaths seem to be those gun owners for whom such information conflicts with their identity. The current gun control debate rings false for lawful gun owners, who get more and more entrenched in their desire to defend who they perceive themselves to be.

If Everytown for Gun Safety really wants to make progress on the gun sense laws, they will need to find common ground with the lawful gun owners. That won’t happen without a change in tactics, tone, and language. Simply stating statistics accomplishes nothing, according to the Atlantic article, because to the person who holds a particular belief about themselves, such arguments are to be ignored.

The events of the 20th century show that when people’s identities are threatened–whether it’s by increased rights for women, desegregation, redistribution of wealth, immigration policies, etc.–forced change breeds antipathy and resentment. And that’s not a recipe for lasting change.