Sunday, September 18, 2005

Peeling potatoes for god's sake.

[Aside: I haven't posted in a couple weeks in part because I wanted to let my last post sit for a while. I wanted it to be my statement to the world for a bit of time. But also, I wasn't sure how to follow it. Not because it was so great or anything, but because of its subject. It seemed too serious to follow with another silly extended observation about Tivo. So, a compromise. I'll jump back into it. But I'll write about something important. Here goes.]

I cut my thumb today. I was peeling potatoes and I went to wipe an errant bit of potato skin from the paring knife. And instead I sliced through the skin of my thumb. The tip. Right on the pad. A vertical cut, as though my thumb were my wrist and I was trying to kill myself.

So. It hurts a little. And it's difficult to get a bandaid to stay on the tip of your thumb. But that's not why this cut is so important.

Its significance lies in the reminder of how important thumbs really are. The opposable kind. Not just the silly fifth-of-five-index-fingers kind, like the hands on the "people" I used to draw in kindergarten. When moving your thumb and pressing it against anything offers you a sharp pain, when you're trying not to get the bandaid on your thumb wet, when you begin to avoid using your thumb on your dominant hand -- you really start to realize how useful the opposable thumb is. Someday, if you think of it, count how many times a day you do something you simply couldn't do (or, at least, not in the way you normally do it) without the ability to grip something tightly in one hand. You'll lose count. I promise. Some of you more quickly than others.

And if and when you do that little experiment (even if it's just a thought experiment), some of you will begin to think the following innocuous little thought: The opposable thumb is an amazing creation.

And then you'll come to a starkly defined fork in the road of logic. The first path is studded with randomly sprouting flora and punctuated by streams snaking back and forth asymmetrically. The second path is guarded by free-floating fiery swords, lit by burning bushes, and passes unceasing through split seas.

Science and religion, folks. Evolution and creationism. Natural selection and intelligent design. More similar than some of you may think (a nod to Blake, and a paper she seemed to always be writing for four years). But, ultimately, different.

Now. I'm not going to run through all the tired arguments. Ok. I am. But quickly.

Yes, the opposable thumb is awesome. That's why it's still around. And that's why it's around on the hands of the dominant species on the planet. The wondrous utility of the opposable thumb is a testament to millenia devoted to weeding out those without them. And the fossil record, along with the so-called living fossil record, offers plenty of evidence in that regard.

Or maybe god sat down (that's a funny image to me), took out a pencil, sharpened it (another funny image), and drew up a schematic for the human hand. And it had five index fingers. He set it down on a cloud and floated around it in a circle (again, funny), considering it from all angles. And he was about ready to go ahead and say, "Let there be hands with five index fingers!" when he had a second thought: How about an opposable thumb? He weighed the various pros against the obvious con of increased masturbation, and decided to go ahead with it. And thus came about the opposable thumb.

Well. Maybe. But there's no fossil record of that (no doubt because god, in his infinite wisdom, threw that original schematic into a burning bush). And like I said above -- it's a series of funny images to me.

But. Here's the main point.

Those of you who see the opposable thumb and exclaim, "Perfection! See! How could that be random!" You're the same sort of people who long ago saw a burning bush and exclaimed, "God is here!" rather than, "Lightning was here!"

And that's great. Whatever. I don't care. You're free to find god in whatever you like. The Bible, the Koran, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (another nod to Blake). I don't care.

But at least have the decency to acknowledge that it's belief.

And it's your belief. Not mine. So don't force it on my kids.

Keep your god in your special schools on Saturdays and Sundays.

During the school week--as I'm constantly telling my students--you need evidence for your arguments.

Sunday, September 04, 2005

The Sound of a Clown Who Cried in the Alley.

Politics is important. The downward cycles of morality, of truth, of integrity, of true patriotism, and of true freedom spiralled fatally out of control this week and descended on the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast. Lack of preparedness, negligent planning, insufficient troop strength, communication breakdowns, inability to keep order -- this same dirty laundry we've all heard listed ad nauseum since March of 2003 has finally erupted violently out of our hamper here at home.

What is perhaps most interesting to me intellectually about this disaster is the quickness with which Americans--anonymous individuals, celebrities, journalists, politicians--have begun to criticize our government's response to this disaster. I remember writing, in September of 2001, the following byline for a column I titled "Another Side of a Devastating Coin":

by J_____ B_________ ’04 who has only now begun to be able to go beyond pure feeling and to intellectualize about this tragedy.

I wrote that on 9.19.01. And it wasn't a criticism of the government. It was a column mourning the global community I feared would lose several significant ties in the months to follow. The spirits of patriotism and unity overwhelmed criticism in the weeks immediately following 9/11. But in the wake of Katrina, Americans were beginning to place blame while the winds could still be felt. And no doubt something more could have been done. No doubt too much money was diverted away from the Army Corps of Engineers to support wars and tax cuts. No doubt there was a now-starkly-apparent underlying racism (and classism) that allowed those too poor to evacuate to be forgotten or ignored. No doubt our government failed us this last week.

And eventually we will have to address these monumental government failures. That time is now for some among us. Campaigns to effect changes in the bigger picture are ultimately perhaps even more important than monetary, in-kind, or volunteer contributions to the relief efforts.

But for most of us, the immediate picture won't get much bigger than New Orleans, Biloxi, Gulfport, and now Houston and other cities that have accepted evacuees. And so, for now, we must do what we can.

In 1971 Peter Singer--now Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at the University Center for Human Values of Princeton University--wrote an essay, entitled "Famine, Affluence, and Morality" (widely available on the web), in which he set forth the following argument:

"[I]f it is in our power to prevent something very bad from happening, without thereby sacrificing anything morally significant, we ought, morally, to do it. An application of this principle would be as follows: if I am walking past a shallow pond and see a child drowning in it, I ought to wade in and pull the child out. This will mean getting my clothes muddy, but this is insignificant, while the death of the child would presumably be a very bad thing."

It's time we all got our clothes muddy.

If you've read a newspaper, watched cable news, or checked google news in the last six days, you've heard the stories. Young girls raped in the Superdome. Corpses floating down Canal Street. An elderly woman in a wheelchair, draped with a sheet, in the sun, dead. A child screaming until he vomited as he was forced to leave behind his cherished dog. Two New Orleans police officers taking their own lives.

You've seen the airlift rescues and the helicopters dropping bottled water into flooded streets for those now homeless to collect. You've seen local officials breaking down during press conferences. And federal officials, as stoic as possible, providing what information they have.

You've also seen cities and states, schools and universities, individuals and corporations and foreign nations opening their doors and wallets. You've heard people placing blame and people pleading for assistance. You've heard the estimated death toll gradually rise into the thousands.

All manner of people and organizations have offered aid. In a matter of hours a few days ago, I received three emails: one from the iTunes Music Store requesting donations to the Red Cross; one from the Dave Matthews Band about a benefit concert in Colorado; and one from the people at MoveOn.org about the grassroots temporary housing program they're facilitating.

It's time we all got our clothes muddy.

One in five evacuees left their homes without shoes on their feet. People now housed in the Houston Astrodome are wearing pajamas and hospital gowns because they have no clean clothes. Children who have been promised placement in Texas schools will quickly deplete the supplies of those districts. Diabetics are without insulin; asthmatics are without inhalers. Employees are without jobs. Students are without teachers. Parishes are without priests. Children are without parents. And they are all without their homes.

These people need everything.

It's time we all got our clothes muddy.


And what did you hear, my blue-eyed son?
And what did you hear, my darling young one?
I heard the sound of a thunder, it roared out a warnin',
Heard the roar of a wave that could drown the whole world,
Heard one hundred drummers whose hands were a-blazin',
Heard ten thousand whisperin' and nobody listenin',
Heard one person starve, I heard many people laughin',
Heard the song of a poet who died in the gutter,
Heard the sound of a clown who cried in the alley,
And it's a hard, and it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard,
And it's a hard rain's a-gonna fall.
-Bob Dylan