realia

*re-post* pinko is the new black

Re-posting.  Not because of any (tanking) mayor.  Because we're still remembering an awful night and thinking a certain critical and creative mind would be welcome today.  

 
(Originally published: 8 December 2010)  

Yesterday an entertainer in a Pepto Bismol coloured suit stood up in Toronto’s city council and ranted and raged about “left wing pinkos” to show his support for our new mayor.  It seems the mayor requested that this person – a national celebrity who has been known to rant his bigoted views on what is probably the nation’s most popular television show, causing many to question the soundness of his mind and his relevance on a show watched by many, many children – be the one to introduce him and decorate him with the chain of office on the first official day of the new council.

Yesterday’s show tipped the “cringe-o-meter” for many thinking people.  Here we had an entertainer in a pink suit taking that deplorable political tool – the sound bite – to a new low in stirring up anger and divisiveness, and helping this mayor move our city from world-class to class-less.

The same night over dinner my daughters and I had a conversation about John Lennon.  I said that the pink clad entertainer would call Lennon a “left wing pinko” with great glee.  Carly and Kelsey, in their 20s, had never heard the term “pinko” before yesterday; Carly said she'd Googled it.  I thought it was funny that a great many of the people the guy in pink was trying to insult would have had to research what exactly his dusty old slur meant since it hadn't been seen in a number of decades.

My girls - both intelligent, thoughtful, reasonable young women – were saying that they feel Lennon’s murderer robbed their generation of knowing a fine critical mind and thought-provoking artist.  He died before they were both born – but it just doesn’t seem like it – thirty years on Lennon’s persona looms still.  He angered many, but he inspired many more.  And that’s because he was a man with big ideas, and he worked them out and expressed them in truly original (and sometimes groundbreaking) ways.  None of his protest art included name-calling or trite clichés or sound bites, although the media loved to take sound bites out of his statements, like the infamous “we’re bigger than Jesus...”

Sound bites water ideas down to single layered messages.  Sound bites take bits of language and turn them into a symbol.  Given that humans process symbols before they process language, it’s not surprising marketers and politicians have turned it into a remarkably effective tool for persuasion.  We see the symbol – we don’t have to bother to think – the meaning is handed to us in a neat little package.

Fortunately, many of us still like to use our brains.  Many of us – like my daughters – stop and think about what is in, around and behind a message and work out its meaning for ourselves based on our learning and experiences.

One might say War is Over was a John Lennon sound bite.  But it was one of many layers – of contradiction, optimism, questioning the status quo, change, motivation, suggestive selling, opportunity, no, yes, maybe… Lennon’s War is Over might have made you think about a hundred things.  The point is, it was intended to make you think - not relieve you of the need to do so.

What were the layers of meaning in the “left-wing pinko” sound bite?  I don’t think more than one meaning was intended – it simply meant “the other side.”  It was easy for that guy’s fans, or the angry supporters of the angry mayor.  Who needs to think?  Yahoo – take that you Other Side!

Lots of Toronto people though – like my critical minded daughters – are wearing Left-Wing Pinko as a badge of honour today.  Especially given that it’s also the day in which many of us are thinking about one particular left-wing pinko and what might have been another thirty years of ideas and music and art - robbed, from a world that could really use them, in one violent moment.

John – I really wish my girls could have lived in the same world you did for a little while.  But your messages are not lost on them.  If you were here today, you might be as encouraged as I am that there are lots young people around who are able, like you once were, to think beyond a sound bite and imagine a world in which anything is possible.

 

 
 
 

funny

A favourite song dedicated to the young fellas talking in my office this morning about "just a bunch of damn hippies in a useless 'non-demonstration who didn't have the sense to show up on a weekday.'"

Funny thing was, thirty minutes previous [on this Monday] I'd been waving to the second round of today's march in the "non-demonstration" from the windows of my yoga studio, a few blocks away from our office on Bay Street in Toronto's financial district.  And Saturday's "non-demonstration" was, from what I saw, part of a global "non-demonstration" against a kind of insanity no sane person could deny. 

 

 

 

And despite all the folks who refuse to look out their windows, peace, love and understanding are beautiful things number sixy-seven, sixty-eight and sixty-nine.

 

  

 

 

pissing people off with peace love and understanding

Peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek, but a means by which we arrive at that goal. - Martin Luther King, Jr.

I'm sorry to be bringing this up again, because I know that to most of the rest of the world, Canadian national concerns are not sexy.  I mean, we don’t have leadership candidates feeding us crazy-interesting sound bites like: hurricane Irene is god’s wrath at our spending too much money on our people.  (Seriously, I read that today.  Is that true?)  Our leaders are just not that interesting, even when they lie.  Anyway, for the most part, we don't care about your disinterest.

But I am compelled to write about the events of the last week because I think they're really significant. These events have triggered an expression of the desire in us to know a different public reality.  In this video you'll see the power of a message perpetuating that desire, from the only politician in the room who was dead.

Find in the video below a former politician and current humanitarian delivering that powerful message of hope and encouragement.  The message pissed a whole bunch of people off, but it inspired a whole bunch more.  

If you’re not Canadian, there are some things you should know before you watch:

This was a state funeral.  Jack Layton was the leader of Canada's official opposition to the government.  Our biggest dignitaries are all there. The Queen is represented by the Governor General. I make note that it's a state funeral because you might not think so seeing all that clapping and standing and cheering.

You also need to know that the reaction in that room is not just representative of Layton's party supporters who were present.  Thousands had collected outside and along the route of the funeral procession.  People showed up to City Hall in Toronto and on Parliament Hill in Ottawa and other cities to pay personal tribute all week. 

You need to know that everybody knew how sick Jack was, but when he died everybody was shocked anyway. Nobody anticipated the reaction to this loss because Canadians just don't act this way. 

What I see in this eulogy, and in the response to it, and in the response to Jack's death in general, is that I am not alone in my rejection of the anger and ugliness that has permeated our social and political realms.  What I see are people that are finished with it; we don't want to be held apart anymore.

Please watch; it’s Stephen Lewis, one of the most gifted and passionate orators alive, paying homage to a man's life work and ideals.  You'll be glad you did.

(And if you do I promise to shut up about it.)

(The Canadian politcs part, not the peace love and understanding part.)

 

hippie news and a favourite beauty

How much do I LOVE this gal?  She's has to be the smartest, most insightful, ascerbic, funny and talented writer I know.  Slide the video ahead to 5:38 or so and you'll see her in all her marvellousness. 

(THEN - after you've enjoyed Tricia extolling the value of finding beauty, wind back and enjoy Hippie News. Hippie News rocks.)

Tricia and Winston and all the folks at Hippie News - beautiful thing number 60.

 

 

if you had one last thing to say to the world and you knew a lot of people would listen, what would you say?

I don’t let politics get on my blog much.  Once in awhile I might let go a little rant on this space, because in real life I have strong opinions about social and political concerns, and everyone who knows me knows pretty much what my stand on things is.  That stand hasn’t changed much in the 40 or so years since I started to pay attention.

But I decided a long time ago that this space isn’t going to be about people I don’t like.  And I’m sorry to say, I don’t like most politicians, and I sure as hell don’t like what politics has become.

Public service is an honourable calling.  Politicking turned it ugly.  These days you rarely see an elite politician behaving honourably; it’s all about the win.  Politics has become a tool of power, and those who get it will do anything to hang on to it, even if it means fucking over the people who have hired them to govern.  The recent debacle over the debt ceiling in the US is a spectacular example of that. 

For one day here at home today it wasn’t ugly.  Today politicians of all stripes and people of all beliefs mourned the loss of Jack Layton, leader of the New Democratic Party, who died of cancer early this morning.  Despite that he looked emaciated and weak last time he showed up on TV a month ago, everyone was shocked. 

Jack was widely liked and respected for his principles and determination.  He was fearless and unrelenting in his message and people were inspired by that.  You never felt like he was playing you.  Don’t think this popularity came up in his death; in the past four years, he took a party that clung to a few measly seats, hanging on the brink of irrelevance, to one that swept past the most dominant party in our history to become the official opposition for the first time in history.

Jack made us remember people like Tommy Douglas and Ed Broadbent and how they connected to people; he made us look past the conservative rhetoric and think “well yeah, it CAN be done.”  Jack made us remember that it was the NDP that shaped a large part of who we believe we are.  He was another feisty NDP leader who rose up out of seemingly nothing against the bigger, older, louder, more moneyed old school parties.  The right and extreme right parties in this country might have merged their money and forces and won a majority, but we yeah we also got an opposition with balls to keep them in check.  We sure felt a lot better than we would have if the lamo liberals had taken that spot. 

This afternoon my dear New York pal Sheryl posted on my facebook: “I wish we had more like him here.”  I replied that I thought it was sad that politicians who actually inspire people are rare anywhere. 

Jack’s not getting on my blog because he’s dead.  He’s getting on my blog because of the message he left with Canadians in life, and in a letter he wrote in these last dying days:

“...consider the alternatives; and consider that we can be a better, fairer, more equal country by working together. Don’t let them tell you it can’t be done.

My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world.”

That’s the kind of political messaging that gets on my blog.

Now go say something nice to your neighbour.

 
 
(A country coming together to celebrate a true public servant and inspiring leader: beautiful thing number fifty nine.) 

productivity and love

Between Don Mills and Sheppard-Yonge Stations

Look at me; I’m being one of those annoying people who busts out a computer on the subway.  But if I don’t get a blog post written quickly (in the space of a trip between Don Mills and Union Stations), it’s not going to get written for several more days.  And I miss you, blog people.  What I need is something copyable and pasteable for when I get home.  This time, transcribing notes scribbled around the edges of a newspaper or back of a rental car confirmation is just not going to work. Even if the post-commute-trying-to-work-out-what-the-hell-that-scribble-was-trying-to-capture adds that much to the nuance of a story.

So, I get a new job, and I give my notice in and the Shit. Hits. The. Fan.  I knew it was going to happen.  This big project has been looming for weeks, and before I get the job offer I’m trying to keep a safe distance from it, because I just know I'm not going to be here much longer.  I try to prep the junior writer, without telling him what’s really coming, “there’s this big, high profile project.  You could really show your mettle here.  Step up to the plate, kid, everyone will love you…”

(Train Change)

Between Sheppard-Yonge and Union Stations

So just as the project is kicked off I get the great job offer and I give my notice.  People at work are wanting to be nice to me and wish me well – to talk about my whole leaving thing.  To take me to lunch.  And I’ve not had much more than ten minutes to take a walk and get a cup of coffee.  But it’s okay – even if I’m leaving in two weeks, I still have pride in what work that leaves my desk. 

That’s where I’ve been the past week.  Sitting at a desk, in an office in North York, hammering out documents like I’m some sort of assembly line Training Guide manufacturer.  Making up for an unequivocally uninterested and unambitious junior writer.  You know the theory, that you just keep banging your head against the wall because it feels so good when it stops?  That’s what all the “It’ll be all over soon, Jennifer” sounds like at this point.  They’re right, but I’m bloody tired and not feeling all that reasonable.

The Good News

I did get some fun in over the weekend – big fun.  Meaningful fun.  My sister blew into the city on Friday for an after work going-away party for a colleague.  It was at a pub very close to my house and we hadn’t seen each other in a month because she’s been travelling with her job, and damned if we weren’t going to take advantage of that opportunity. 

  
 
No, my glass was not larger than hers.  And yes, it was Cathy, not me, who said, "Yay!  I it's a good place that serves wine in a decent sized glass!" 

And next morning my girls and I got on the highway and headed back home to attend the 50th birthday party for one of my oldest and dearest friends, Denis.  Carly drove and Kelsey operated the stereo while I sat in the back and worked – as my sister said, “you can’t sit in a car on the 401 and not be productive at a time like this!  She was right.  For much of the four hours there and four hours back I was doing what I’m doing now – sitting in a moving car with a computer on my lap.

The time away from work might have cost me a little blood and sweat today, but it was worth it.  At times like this, nothing cures the work-overload-blues like time with a sister and a bunch of people who you’ve loved to be around more than pretty much anyone for three decades.

Here's to the "50 Club!  (Debbie, Jen, Denis)

I hope you stick with me blog people.  I’ll be back.  Refreshed.  With a new job and a WALKING TO WORK COMMUTE (have I mentioned that part?). 

In the meantime, I’m back to writing about a healthcare database application.  At least it’s a good cause, no?
xoxo

ps - Despite the crappy phone camera shots, the pictures are worth a million.

standing on a street corner with my sign

Blog Sign Day. I saw that when I visited the ever inspiring Mrs. Mediocrity.  She was referring to a challenge thought up by Debi and Graciel, which arose from this idea:

“life is just overwhelming at times, and we are all
standing on a corner with a sign in our hands
needing something.”

"What do you need?  What would your sign say?" they asked.  I jumped all over it – I love the idea of distilling ideas down, giving due attention to some major internal themes.  And I was also enamoured with the idea of a sign.  If you only had a little square of cardboard on which to put one message, what would you say?  I got thinking about a post I wrote about a year ago inspired by this project about a unique form of communication – signs made by homeless people.  What if you only had the benefit of capturing someone’s glimpse, a few seconds with which to get your message across?  What would you say?

It didn’t take me long to think of a sign.  One of the biggest themes residing within me these days – one of the most important messages I could think of to convey is related to this angry world we are living in these days.  And it’s a world growing more and more so.  We’re fighting amongst ourselves as well as fighting with others.  We’re being pitted against one another by our leaders who are appealing to emotions like anger and fear and I swear to god, not one bit of good’s going to come of it. 

When I made my sign I thought, “gawd, I sound just like my mother.”  Actually, my mother used to say this very thing to us when we were kids and would start bickering with one another.  Now that we’re adults, we think our mother gave us one of the most important lessons of all. 

And if I were standing on a street corner with a sign, this is what my sign would say.  This is what I need:

 

imagine peace

Paul McAdams at A Change is Coming: Travels and Human Rights reminded me that today is International Day of Peace.  Go read his piece - I love his reflection on this day, that maybe we could look inside and recognize the peace we might find there, and then take a look around and show some kindness to people who might not be so lucky.  Maybe like that couple I wrote about this morning.

Here's my little playlist of some of my favourite peace songs, in honour of the day.  If you care to listen why not give some thought about what you would do, if you could, to perpetuate the spirit of the day. 

People all around the world have been doing that today.  Imagining peace.  Can you feel it?



 

sister solidarity is the new black

Or: In which we are inspired by Selma opening up a can of whup-ass

Some things just demand to be written.  They sort of grab hold of your collar out of the blue and get their nose right in your face and say “Hellloooo!  Get on it sister!”  The signs were coming at me from all corners this morning: "This is what the story is about today."

Sometime in the mid-morning I read this fabulous post by my friend Selma, which prompted a too-long and impassioned response.  But as I read over the thing before burdening her blog with it, it started screaming "I BELONG ON YOUR OWN BLOG."  Then I caught some catty jesting coming over Twitter.  Then there was an unnecessarily barbed comment in a meeting.  And here I am. 

Selma’s piece was about several things, but mostly about her rising up and taking a stand against some uncalled for catty behaviour by some acquaintences.  Opening up the proverbial can of whup-ass and the subsequent "Whoo! I rule!."  But the issues she raises have resonated with me for many years. 

So, a few hours prior to reading that I’m on the streetcar headed to Union Station, and there are two attractive young women in the seats in front of me having a conversation.  It is just chatting about mutual friends and what-are-you-doing-this-weekend kind of conversation, nothing real interesting to your average eavesdropping blogger.

Then another attractive young woman gets on and sits near the front.  She’s turned sideways in her seat and is surveying the people in the car behind her.  Again, nothing so remarkable, until she fixes on the two women in front of me and starts giving them the old “up and down” look.  Not just an “up and down checking out the outfit” kind of look, but a repeated “'I scorn thee' up and down;” increasingly scornful with each journey of the eyeballs.  She “ups and downs” them for so long I wonder if she is trying to get them to notice her doing so.

So I get thinking, what is it about them that irks you so?  All three of you are attractive, well dressed and seemingly going off to decent jobs – certainly luckier than the majority of the women on this planet.

I get to the station and onto the subway and forget about them; until later in the morning when I read Selma’s story about self confidence, soldiering on, nightgowns, cows catty sorts, words and brown eggs.

This is not a new issue – us women have talked about us being catty to each other for decades.  Most of us have probably behaved this way on one level or another.  At the very least we've seen it - starting in elementary school.  There are numerous explanations for it put out there by various factions – from the “you women are petty and shallow creatures anyway” to (what I consider to be the most logical one) the notion that we have a good deal of fucked-upness based on centuries of cultural oppression and objectification. 

I can just see my mother cringe.  She and I differ greatly on the merits of the women’s movement and women’s issues.  I expect that’s related to her devotion to Christianity, one of the biggest culprits in the objectification of us gals as far as I’m concerned, but that’s another post. 

And let me say, this is not a man-bashing post.  I love men, I adore them.  I’ve often said I’d rather hang around with the men at a party than the women.  Maybe that’s got something to do with womens' inherent prickliness toward one another.  But I can say with confidence, I have many amazing men in my life and I do not hold them responsible for my, or anyone else’s, fucked-upness.   Our fucked-upness wasn’t their idea.

I guess you could say it’s more of a women-bashing post.  Because let me put this out there sisters: as long as we are divided, we’ll always be conquered.  As long as we are judgemental of each other and our bodies, our looks, our beliefs, our actions, our intentions – as long as we make catty, underhanded remarks designed to make ourselves feel somehow superior to each other – we will not rise above anything that held us down in the past.

Selma says she thinks people should have to obtain a license before they speak.  How about we just think for a minute about the power of words?  I am still working on rising above someone telling me I wasn’t talented enough more than 30 years ago.  And once, in my early 20s, I was dancing with a guy who told me I was a bad dancer.  At 49, I’m only learning to dance with joy now. 

I take 100% responsibility for my own life.  I’m not shifting blame for my issues to other people – but I am trying illustrate the power that words have.  I would suggest that my best qualities – my strength, self assurance, compassion and competency are no doubt also the result of the many positive messages passed on to me. 

What I’m trying to say is that maybe us gals should think more about these issues that seem to pit us against one another, wherein we see each other as the enemy.  Because there’s room for all of us.  We’ve shown we’re strong, capable, innovative, and, by nature, we work great in team situations.  Imagine what it would be like if we focused positive energy on one another; imagine if we directed our attention away from our privileged selves and directed our energies to our less fortunate sisters, and said “yeah – rock on girl.”  The world, in turn, might be rocked right off its axis.

One of the last signs that I should write this post:  After I drafted out part of this piece, I saw that a friend had posted this on her facebook page:

Better than a thousand hollow words, is one word that brings peace.  ~ Buddha

literacy is power

It's International Literacy Day today. This is a re-post of a piece I did a year ago. I hope you'll read it and think about how lucky you are to be able do so. 

I teach creative writing courses in a continuing education department of a college. Most would consider these to be “special interest” courses, which people take for enjoyment. And that’s great – one of the reasons I teach these courses is because I enjoy it.

But there is another really big reason I do it. It’s because I believe that lifelong learning is a fundamental right of every human being, and that lifelong learning makes better citizens, communities and countries. I teach courses because I want to help people achieve that feeling of satisfaction and power I get when I expand my own knowledge. When a learner says to me “I’ve changed because of this course” the sense of gratification I feel in having engendered, just a little, someone’s personal growth and the power they feel at having told a story is enormous.  

But adult learning is so much more than that which I promote in my own little world. According to UNESCO, one in five adults is not literate. Two-thirds of those adults are women. 75 million children on this planet are not in school. You want to talk about how literacy is about personal empowerment and human development?

Then think about what it means that that 776 million adults lack minimum literacy. It means that 776 million people lack the skills necessary to overcome poverty. 776 million people lack access to information about how to take care of themselves and their children, about how to find help and support, how to achieve gender equality and how to carry out sustainable development so they can support themselves and their communities. Literate parents raise literate children. People who are literate participate more in their communities and they make their voices heard through actions – like voting.

And just as literacy is a tool of personal empowerment and human development – illiteracy is a tool of oppression and domination. We all know the Taliban work hard to oppress and dominate by withholding education. It’s not a new idea – it’s been going on for centuries, and continues around the globe.

Today is International Literacy Day. Stop for a few minutes and think about what literacy means in your world. What your access to education and information affords you and those around you. Think about what it means as you sit at that computer, accessing and contributing to the world of ideas and information on the World Wide Web.

Think about the sheer courage that girl in Afghanistan must drum up just to go to school in the morning because she probably heard stories about angry dudes throwing acid the faces of girls who go to school. Think about your laid-off neighbour who is suddenly faced with navigating the “information society” for a job his high school education didn’t equip him for all those decades ago. Think about your new neighbour who has escaped an oppressive regime but lacks the language skills to read a simple street sign, a carton of milk, a prescription bottle or the newspaper.

And maybe instead of buying coffee at Starbucks this week, give that ten bucks to an organization like this one or this one or one in your community (check your local library), and imagine the possibilities for a world in which 776 million people don’t lack basic literacy skills and have a chance to rise above poverty and oppression. Literacy is power. Share the power.