Rivers I Have Known

New Year’s Day, 2023, seems like a good time to jumpstart my blog.  Previously, I chose to write on political and social justice topics. Starting this year, I want to focus more on personal topics. So here goes a simple blog…

 Today I finished reading Mark Twain’s Life on the Mississippi, which I have been reading for over 2 years, only a page or two a day. Twain fascinates me, although this isn’t my favorite book of his. Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer I enjoyed much more. I read both of these works as a child, so I don’t recall many details from either. What I do remember is his humor, the strong characterizations, and vivid descriptions of the environment. Life on the Mississippi has humor, and both strong characters and vivid descriptions, yet it is disjointed.

 The first half of the book is about Twain’s apprenticeship as a steamboat captain before the Civil War. The second half chronicled a trip Twain took 50 years later on a steamboat from St. Louis to New Orleans. It would have worked better as two books. Twain’s best works, in my opinion, are his short stories, like” The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” and “The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg”. However, Tom Sawyer is quite well organized, mostly devoid of the diversions found in Huckleberry Finn, Life on the Mississippi, and his other novels.

 Anyway, Twain took me all along the Mississippi River so that I could see it through his eyes as living, breathing, ever changing, and the life blood of sailors, those who lived near the river, and those whose livelihoods depended on fishing, or carrying cargo up or down river. I went aboard The Delta Queen Steamboat, which was moored on the Ohio River near Louisville, Kentucky in the summer after my high school graduation. Well, I don’t mean to write a book review.

 I am nostalgic for the days when rivers were more important, when rivers were not so polluted with factory and other waste. My next bathroom reading book is The French Broad by Wilma Dykeman. Might as well learn a bit about the main river in this area. I know that Cherokees used to race up and down this river before Buncombe County was settled by whites. It is too polluted now for fishing or canoe races, sadly.

 So it goes, as fellow Hoosier, Kurt Vonnegut, would say. As a child in Shelby County, Indiana, I spent many hours on the banks of the Big Blue and Little Blue Rivers, Sugar Creek, and Flat Rock River, fishing with my dad. I knew those rivers. I miss them. Guess I will revisit Blue River in Charles Major’s Bears of Blue River, about life in my hometown around the turn of the 20th century.

 All these rivers to follow…Shall I take a dip in one? I can do that vicariously when I read, in my mind’s eye. So can anyone who reads.  Here’s to more reading in 2023.

American Malaise: Fueling the Insurrection

 

Several months ago, some of my friends urged me to look at the November election in a positive way, to think that Biden would win and that if he did win, that these dark days of our country’s rule by big money, big military, and predatory capitalism would come to an end. I was not convinced. While Biden is a better choice at the helm of our government since he, at least, is not a neo-fascist, I don’t think that the removal of Trump from office will end the problems we face in the United States today.

The anger, rage, and frustration behind the infamous insurrection at the US Capitol Building on January 6^th has been festering, sometimes beneath the surface, for decades, beginning as early as the Civil War, which many in the South seem to still be fighting. (A confederate flag was brought into the White House that infamous day.) I understand optimism. Really, I do. However, looking at our socio-political situation with rose-colored glasses will not help address the neo-fascism that has been festering in society for decades. It is important to look at the policies of both parties, the Democratic as well as the Republican Party, to understand how we got here, how a mob of unruly, disparate rioters stormed the United States Capitol and came close to stopping the certification of Joe Biden’s win of the presidency.

 The coup at the Capitol, the culmination of months of Trump’s exhortations to his allies to overturn the results of the 2020 election based on baseless claims of fraud, left dozens wounded and five dead (seven if we count the police officers who committed suicide after the riot). Without complicity with some members of the Capitol Police Force, many Republicans who challenge Biden’s presidential certification, and even some Democrats, it would not have been possible for the angry, unruly mob to have breached the Capitol and to have entered the chambers and offices of Congress members.

 How did we get here? The answer is not so simple. Donald Trump and Trumpism are merely the symbols for a sickness, lurking deep within our society. Trump and his allies may have stoked the violence, but they didn’t create the phenomenon. Trump and his supporters were merely capitalizing on the deep despair, the shattering of families, and the lessening of social and community bonds in the country today. The sociologist, Emile Durkheim, whom I studied in my undergraduate days, calls this mass loneliness and alienation, this American malaise, as Chris Hedges calls it, ‘anomie’. The disappearance of Trump will not solve the problem. Nearly half of the US population voted for him. Massive unemployment, underemployment, poor wages, questionable jobs, inadequate health care, deteriorating schools, inequality of people of color, women, and immigrants have laid the foundation for the seething unrest, and makes some people become easy prey to politicians with right-wing agendas.

 Will Biden be able to help heal the nation’s wounds, as he claims? At best, the new administration will be able to put a few band-aids on the gaping wounds in society. The Democratic Party is closely tied to Wall Street, super-PACS, and big money, without which most of Congress could not have been elected. In an RT “On Contact” interview with Pulitzer Prize-winning author and activist, Chris Hedges, Dr. Cornel West, Harvard professor, moral philosopher and activist, asserts that Joe Biden’s economic team has never understood the depths of division in the country and how inequality percolates, the hierarchy in which a tiny minority at the top make decisions and make the profits. We may be seeing increased repression, increased social misery, and even gangsterization, (https://youtu.be/jHW0Q0CPpqQ)

Twenty million Americans are reduced to unemployment compensation. Anger is rooted in ever-deteriorating socio-economic conditions. There is a predatory capitalist system that is commodifying everyone, all of which conditions contribute to an underlying general malaise and anomie. Many people feel hopeless and alone and don’t know how to change their lives or to create societal change, either.  Biden can expect an even larger group of angry people directing their rage at him unless he is willing to face the changes that need to be made. However, it was Biden who was one of the advocates for the war in Iraq, and other US-led wars in Central America, repealed the Glass-Stegall Act (banking regulation), and also crafted the legislation that has put millions of poor and people of color in prison for low-level drug offenses.

What we have is a mediocre, nostalgic, middle-of-the-road president who, rather than working to transform the economy and repair the ruptured social bonds in the nation with a New Deal-type jobs and social programs initiative, instead he will most likely be working to preserve the American Empire. To do otherwise would lose him and the neoliberals now in charge of the government, their jobs.

 As Cornel West and Chris Hedges assert in their interview, what we need is a total transformation, a complete restructuring of society so that everyone can live their best lives and feel connected with their families, communities, and society again. They don’t really lay out a game plan. We need a new system of government, one that will provide minimum necessities to all, give all meaningful employment, and strengthen communities by returning control to localities, rather than lining the pockets of billionaires and big business.  

As said Amanda Gorman, the first US youth poet laureate, at the inauguration::

"There is always light

Only if we are brave enough to see it

There is always light.

Only if we are brave enough to be it."

Onward into that light with renewed resolve to create that better world.

.

 

2020: The Year that Shook us Awake

As an undergrad English major, I was immersed in British and American authors. American poet T.S. Eliot was one of my favorites. Even though He isn’t the poet with the most positive outlook for the human species, his poems come to mind during our current political and pandemic crises. In “The Hollow Men,” Eliot asserts that civilization will end “not with a bang, but with a whimper.”

This 1925 poem sheds some light on the dilemma facing human civilization in 2020, one hundred years after the poem’s publication. "The Hollow Men" is stuffed with allusions and allegory, with which I do not intend to bog down the reader. Let me simply point to Eliot’s “the hollow men” who are described in the poem.

“We are the hollow men We are the stuffed men. /Leaning together/Headpiece filled with straw. Alas! Our dried voices, when/We whisper together/Are quiet and meaningless/As wind in dry grass.”

Eliot is describing a world in which people have lost their ability to be heard, even together, their voices are like whispers “like the wind in dry grass.” I see parallels with the predicament that we face in society today. We see injustices happening all around us, with people of color being murdered by the police and incarcerated at a shockingly higher rate than other citizens. We see women being the most affected by the pandemic, with a majority of frontline health care workers being women, and a large percentage of women having to stay home with children who are not in school. Women are also at higher risk for eviction. In poor Black and Latinx neighborhoods, eviction of women and incarceration of black men are intertwined. Since incarcerated Black men are a poor risk to sign leases, their partners have to sign them. Then an eviction is filed against the women lease holders.  (https://www.huffpost.com/entry/covid-19-eviction-crisis-women_n_5fca8af3c5b626e08a29de11?ncid=newsltushpmgpolitics).

As of December 26, 2020, 19,000,000 in the US have contracted the coronavirus with 330,000 deaths (https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#cases_deathsper100k). Millions of Americans are out of work with benefits and stimulus payments held up for months, and now by a President, who won’t sign the bill to provide some measure of relief.

Prisoners are being put to death with a reinstated federal death penalty while convicted felons who are associates of Trump are being pardoned.

“Job losses from the pandemic overwhelmingly affected low-wage, minority workers most. Seven months into the recovery, Black women, Black men and mothers-of school-age children are taking the longest time to regain their employment” (https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/business/coronavirus-recession-equality/).

It is easier to get a presidential pardon these days than a stimulus check. I am painting a bleak picture. Is there no light at the end of the tunnel? When Biden takes over as president on January 20^th, the country will get some relief. However, the neoliberal policies of the democratic party will not solve all of society’s problems. I will address this issue in a future blog.

My point is that as a human civilization, we are degrading miserably. Instead of advancing and taking care of our population better with all the knowledge, wealth, and resources we possess in this country, we are spiraling backward into darkness. It will take a major shift to propel the country into the light. Are human beings inherently evil and selfish? I don’t think so. What I do put forth here is that we have become mesmerized with the disinformation we are fed by some of the major news outlets and by actors in our government. We have been told time and time again that our opinions don’t matter as popular protests are met with violent police actions, and even most recently, that our votes don’t matter, in the long, extended attempt by the Trump administration to steal the election in the guise of correcting imagined voter fraud.

Eliot asserts, “Those who have crossed/With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom/Remember us—if at all—not as lost Violent souls, but only/As the hollow men/The stuffed men”. We are searching for the light much as a dying star becomes a red giant and then explodes, also in Eliot’s poem's  symbolism. Let’s not kid ourselves. Unless we come together and work to make our government responsive and dedicated to taking care of our people, all our people, not just the wealthy and super-wealthy, we are very like the hollow men in Eliot’s poem. What does Eliot say will redeem us? “Sightless, unless/The eyes reappear/As the perpetual star/Multifoliate rose.” Here Eliot is referencing his personal Christian theology in which angels are spiraling above in a Divine Order. I believe he is saying that as a species we need to find our inner guiding light. As all good poets do, Eliot is pointing the way as a seer, guiding us to a brighter future.

Dawn of the New Day

What IS the way? We must forge for ourselves a spiritual, ethical, and humanitarian foundation for a new society, a society that is for the good and happiness of all and is based on an economy in which all beings matter. I invite a conversation on what such a society will look like. As sculptors shape their creations from clay, we must shape a new society from the chorus of all our voices. We must regain our voices now. We cannot let the world “end with a whimper” as in Eliot’s poem. Let’s take courage, speak our truths, and watch a new world take shape before our newly seeing eyes and recovered voices.

Freeing Communication from Gender Bias

 

The English language, like many other languages, is fraught with inherent gender bias. This we know. Every time a customer service representative refers to me as “Mrs.,” I choke back a scream. Of course, I realize that this person is probably reading from a script, which may give instructions to refer to all women as “Mrs.” if her marital status is unknown. However, these companies need to get with the program. For heaven’s sake, it isn’t the 1950s! In that era, women were not even allowed to have a bank account or property in their names. Mail sometimes came to our house to “Mrs. Russell Price” as if my mother had no first name of her own. Decidedly antiquated.

 

Ida B. Wells, journalist, anti-racist & suffragist

With the sexual revolution of the 1960s, “Ms.” became an acceptable form of address for a woman, regardless of marital status. Why should it be necessary to identify a woman as to whether or not she is married? I remember I posed this same question to a teaching assistant in a masters’ class at Northern Arizona University in the 1990s. She insisted on referring to students as “Mr.” or “Miss” or “Mrs.”. This instructor told me that she was proud to be married and to use the title, “Mrs.” When I got over my shock at this revelation of a fellow academic, I realized that she had the right to use “Mrs.” as her title of address if she preferred. However, I was still irritated by being called “Miss” by this teacher. It goes without saying that I certainly did not prefer to be called “Miss,” finding it to be discriminatory and stereotyping. The subtext is that if a woman isn’t married, she is less than complete, invisible. It is in relationship with a man that a woman has value. At least that has been interwoven into our common language by the practice of excluding women.

Remember the statement: All men are created equal? English has changed some since the Declaration of Independence was written. Most readers no longer understand the word “man” to mean “person.” Using gender-neutral language has become standard practice in both journalistic and academic writing. However underlying stereotypes still crop up to rear their ugly heads of gender bias.

We still see nouns such as policeman, fireman, congressman, etc., even though women are currently represented in these careers. We must make the transition to more gender-neutral terms, like “police officer,” “firefighter,” and “member of Congress,” for example. In a field like nursing in which women have been predominate, we need to discard terms like “male nurse.” We can change that easily to “nurse,” whether the nurse be male or female.

And what about pronouns? I remember in the ‘60s, some feminine linguists were promoting new words like “hir” to be used for both “his” and “her.” Though these scholars were well-intentioned, such pronouns never caught on. Today, some linguists propose just solving the problem by using a plural pronoun. For example, “The student put their books away.” (If we don’t know the gender of the student.) I find this awkward in some contexts. Another choice is to use ‘his’ or ‘her’ alternated with ‘her’ or ‘him’. For example, “The student put his or her books away. “Or “The student put her or his books away. “Using “her/his” or “his/her” used to be more acceptable but is losing ground in some academic settings.

Now the question of non-binary gender terminology arises. Generally, it is accepted to ask people what their preferred pronouns are. For example, I use, “she, her, hers.” This avoids the problem of incorrectly labeling a transgendered or non-binary gendered individual. Just ask them what they prefer if you are not sure what gender the person prefers to be identified with.

I urge men who have had built in gender preference in language, to ask themselves if they would feel included if all they heard for decades was “All men are created equal.” Would they feel included if the phrase were “All women are created equal.? Of course not.

Here are a few terms that we would do well to rid of gender bias and find a better choice.

Cleaning lady can be a cleaner; a businessman is a business executive. A landlord or landlady can be a building manager; a mailman becomes a mail carrier. A policemen changes to a police officer. A saleslady or salesman can be called a salesclerk. A housewife or house husband can be a homemaker. Brotherhood is community. Being manly is being strong. There are many more examples. These have been a few to start with for paying attention to and consciously altering terms to a bias-free choice.

Here are some tips to avoid gender-biased language:

1.      Know your own biases. Take stock of your own language, written and oral, to find ways you can use more gender-neutral language.

2.      Focus on what’s relevant.by including information about things like race, marital status, or age only when necessary.

3.      Recognize and acknowledge differences. Treat them professionally and respectfully.

4.      Avoid labels. Some common labels are offensive while others may be preferred by the group you’re describing.

5.      When in doubt, ask. (https://grammar.yourdictionary.com/style-and-usage/unbiased-language.html).

Finding our Voices as Women

 

Winona LaDuke Speaking for the Earth

Those who know me well would probably not say that I am reluctant to voice my opinions. I do speak up when I have something to say.. However, at times I speak in such a direct, forceful manner that it puts some people off. Why? I think I can be blunt is that, even after many decades of speaking my mind, I am still not wholly comfortable with doing so.

I think it stems from the utter suppression of my voice I experienced as a child. My father was not really interested in my opinion, or even to hear about a need I might have. It wasn’t that he didn’t care so much as it was the old “a child should be seen and not heard” attitude that many parents in the 50s and 60s believed. Even though I do express my opinions to most everyone, somewhere inside me I am fighting against hard wiring that what I say and feel doesn’t matter. So why express it?

 Surprisingly, many women I know in their prime still can’t speak their mind, express their needs, or voice an opinion on a current issue because they 1.) were conditioned to be submissive, 2.) lack confidence that their feelings, thoughts, and opinions matter, 3.) are afraid of standing out, 4.) avoid confrontation, or 5.) are people pleasers.

 No matter why we don’t speak our minds, it is important that we tell ourselves that what we think and feel is important…that we are important. The next step is to practice speaking up for ourselves.

 Consider the following ways to practice using our voices:

•           Journal your feelings. Write through your grief, anger, and insecurities.
•           Don’t say “yes’ when you really want to say “no.”
•          Join a women’s group where you can safely learn to practice your voice.
•          Sing. It’s a good way to  practice using your voice creatively.

We all have wisdom and important ideas and feelings to share with others. We can all make a difference by using our voices to speak our truths. We can support one another and encourage other women to speak out. Sometimes we won’t always have our words received as we want. When we can touch our inner self and speak from our deepest core, we can better deflect the challenge posed by those who would suppress our voices. We cannot all be like Winona LaDuke, climate activist and water protector, who courageously opposes oil pipelines on native lands, yet we can raise our own voices.

 I know I need much practice in using gentler words and a milder tone. Yet even if our presentation isn’t perfect or doesn’t conform to the standard of being “ladylike,” we still must power on and hone our communication skills. We women will come into our collective power when all of us, one by one, learn to speak our minds in our own unique and precious voices.

COVID Comfort

For the last six months, we have all been living through a pandemic, the likes of which most of us have never been through or dreamed was a possible reality. I have good days and bad days. Some days I am engulfed in frustration that I cannot just go to the grocery store whenever I like as it may be too crowded for someone like me who has pre-existing conditions that put me in the high risk category. On these days I often feel isolated and lonely, taking some comfort, though, in Zoom meetings and classes.

sj-objio-8hHxO3iYuU0-unsplash

 Other days, especially when I have one of those rare in-person meetings with a friend, I feel more hopeful, that someday this pandemic will run its course, that this new normal will meld into a newer, less scary reality with more possibilities for connection and entry back into a life of engagement and productivity. 

This is a time of distance, physical, psychic, spiritual, and emotional. This distance is within me, as well. Often I feel estranged from my core, out of sync with my emotions, and my best self. I strive to take care of my health, meditate, exercise, eat well, and keep in touch with friends by phone and Internet as much as possible. It isn't as comforting as being in the physical presence of others, but it is some contact...and contact is what I am really missing. In my mind I hear the words, "Is anybody out there?" These words echo and race around and around inside my being. 

One time I got a pretty good answer coming back to me. In the wee hours of night, in the middle of a deep sleep, some words suddenly blared loudly inside my brain, waking me, prompting me to jump up to a sitting position in bed. It was someone singing a particular chant, "Baba Nam Kevalam," "Love is All There Is." Who had so abruptly woken me up from such a deep sleep chanting these Sanskrit words?  I looked around me, still groggy with sleep. There was no one there. No electronic device was on. 

It's a mystery. I'd like to think it may have been an answer to the question running around my mind, "Is anybody out there?" Shall I venture a guess that it was my Higher Self, or God reaching out in my despair. My spiritual teacher has said, "You are never alone or helpless. The force that guides the stars guides you, too." We all need one another in these challenging times. We need to show one another that there IS somebody out there. We are all one.WE are who is out there. Each and everyone of us. That thought does give me some comfort here during this strange time of COVID-19. May it be of comfort to you, too. 

Trump Speak: P. T. Barnum with a Megaphone

 

In today’s charged national atmosphere, we are used to hearing language that is exaggerated and strident from President Trump. The question in my mind is: Why are Trump’s speeches appealing to many people? What is there about the language he uses that brings people in?

Linguist George Lakoff explains that Trump uses salesmen’s tricks to appeal to audiences. These tricks shape our unconscious, whether or not we believe what he is saying, according to Lakoff (https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/1/11/14238274/trumps-speaking-style-press-conference-linguists-explain). What are these salesmen’s tricks?

Here is a list of a few of these tricks: 1. Trump implies that others share the same idea, as when he says that “many people are saying” or “believe me”. People are more likely to believe something if they feel many other people share this same opinion. 2. He assigns stereotypes to people or groups of people and gains traction by repeating the slur. For example, he called Hilary Clinton “crooked;” he called terrorists “radical Muslims”. 3. He refers to his supporters as “folks” to identify with them. 4. He uses many pauses, ramblings, and unfinished sentences. “He knows his audience can finish his sentences for him," Lakoff says (https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/1/11/14238274/trumps-speaking-style-press-conference-linguists-explain).

Trump/Library of Congress

What would seem to be off-putting in a speaker’s style like a lot of pauses and false starts sometimes works to his advantage as audiences can predict what he was going to say, which may bring them closer to him. Audiences fill in the blanks with sentiments that resonate with them, e.g., fear of joblessness, fear of foreign terrorist groups, and fear of other races gaining power over whites. He taps into their insecurity, allowing his audience to express their fear through anger, which gives them a false sense of empowerment.

That is a secret to Trump’s success as a speaker—his uncanny ability to use words that resonate with a large section of the population, the increasing numbers of people who are out of work, cannot get adequate health insurance, and struggle to take care of their families. Trump can fire them up by appealing to these fears and insecurities, and offering false hope that he can solve all their problems, much like did P.T. Barnum, when he got crowds to believe his wild claims about his circus, enticing them to buy tickets to see the show at the big top.

Trump and Barnum have more in common than both being "dream weavers." Barnun, who was a 

 Barnum & Bailey

 slave owner, had as his first freaky attraction, an enslaved woman he promoted as being George Washington’s 161-year-old nurse (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/true-story-pt-barnum-greatest-humbug-them-all-180967634/). They are dream weavers, but just as Barnum displayed and exploited unfortunate souls like bearded ladies, Siamese twins, and .little people, Trump as circus barker, is leading us toward a scary apocalypse where only rich, white supremacists can buy a ticket to the big show. It is only when crowds cease to be taken in by empty promises, hype, and dreams of a lily-white society that we can begin to shake loose of the mesmerism of Trump’s rhetoric. Do we want to create a dystopian society populated by white, cookie cutter robots, marching all, line by line, down into a fiery oblivion of our own making?

Is this the picture of the new, ideal society, based on equality and love that we all want in our heart of hearts? If not, we have been called to action to turn back the tide of hate and greed. The time is now. The need is urgent. There is nothing holding us back but our complacency and our fears. All we have to lose are our chains.