I was recently able to purchase House, Season 2 from Target for $18! This is a GREAT buy--even House pre-viewed seasons go for over $25, and I have promised myself that I won't purchase any seasons unless they are under $20--otherwise, I would have way too many DVDs and no money.
I watched the episode about the model and then went to Polite Dissent's review of the episode. My brother Joe introduced me to this site, and I get a kick out of the reviews and the medical insights.
What surprises me, though, is how many of Polite Dissent's commenters (not all) have this "I can't stand it when they get the medicine wrong! I had to stop watching the show!" reaction. I appreciate the fact that Scott (creator of Polite Dissent) grades both the medicine and what he calls "the soap opera"; I also appreciate that he seems to think they can balance each other out.
I appreciate it because--I confess!--I have the same reaction to the medicine on House that I do to the forensics on CSI and, frankly, to the technobabble on Star Trek. I'm sorry, I'm sorry to group those three shows together! But, honestly, the moment the characters in all three shows start doing the technical-exposition thing, I . . . well, I don't stop listening. In fact, with House, I'm particularly attentive because of the metaphors (I use a clip from the episode "Autopsy" to explain metaphors to my students: in about three minutes, a tumor is compared to an octopus, a girl's body is compared to a "lemon" (car), and House makes an extended metaphor about cancer cells and terrorists: good stuff!)
Yet even though I listen to the dialog, I don't really listen for the technobabble unless it is thematically relevant as in "Skin Deep," where House says, "The perfect woman is a man!" after his rant about estrogen.
For me, it's mostly about HOW the language (script) is put together rather than WHAT is being said.
Here's what I mean: I love the Red Dwarf episode where Lister is trying to explain time travel to the Cat with words like "interstellar dimensional space-time continuum." Finally, Lister says, "It's a magic door." "Oooooh," the Cat says, "why didn't you say so?!"
That's what technobabble is to me--fancy words for "a magic door."
I have wondered, though, if this is because I don't specialize in medicine or forensics (or interstellar travel). I don't believe everything I hear on House or CSI (one reason I like Scott's site), but I don't much care when the technobabble is wrong either. (And I kind of take for granted that all the technobabble on Star Trek is wrong.)
But I suppose if I were watching a show about English teachers, and the teacher characters kept misdefining subjects and verbs and stuff, I'd get really ticked. That kind of stuff matters to me even when I know it doesn't matter to my students. (Thanks, Eugene, for clarifying grammar rules for me!) So I suppose I would get upset if the writers got it wrong.
However . . . most television writers are English geeks like me who get their forensic and medicine technobabble second-hand (no matter how many experts they have on staff), so they probably care more about dangling modifiers and metaphors in any case!
Friday, August 28, 2009
Friday, August 21, 2009
L is for Lighthearted (Letts)
What I read: Where the Heart Is by Billie Letts
Where the Heart Is is an Oprah's Bookclub book. Oprah specializes in saga tales--or at least, it always seems as if the books I see with Oprah's stamp on them are saga tales--and I usually avoid saga tales. By "saga tales," I mean books that take you through all the tragedy, heart-aches, trials, and tribulations of a person's life.
Most of Oprah's books (if not all) are about surviving the tragedy, heart-ache, trials, tribulations. Still, there's all that tragertribution to get through, and it makes me tired. There's something to be said for "escapism" as the purpose of literature.
However, Where the Heart Is--although it has its share of tragertribution--is so lovely, the tragertribution takes a back seat. The book is, really, singingly optimistic. What a nice change from so many other Americana tales!
Part of this singing optimism is due to the tone/style. In some ways, Letts' style reminds me of McCall Smith's style in the Ladies Detective Agency books. There's this sense of wide-open space filled with the gentle current of humanity. People are just so everyday nice: not nice in a sycophantic, sticky-sweet way but rather nice, and quirky, in the way people really can be. I mean, there are people like this in the world! Even Forneys!
Part of this singing optimism is Novalee who grows from a clueless, but still resilient, seventeen-year-old to a strong, compassionate, wise twenty-five-year old in the course of the book. We don't ever see her faults, but that's not the point of the book. We are so much on her side, her faults hardly matter, and her growth from naive teenager-with-baby to Renaissance woman-with-seven-year-old is completely believable.
The only part of the book where the singing optimism falters is when Lexie (Novalee's best friend) gets beat up by her pedophile boyfriend. It isn't the tragedy that kills the mood; the book can afford a few tragedies. It is, unfortunately, the platitudes that Novalee dumps on Lexie. Lexie blames herself, and . . . Lexie should. She has continually dated guys who get her pregnant and dump her. After number five, yeah, Lexie should have learned to be more savvy or, at least, get the guy vetted, or, at the risk of sounding Puritanical, just stopped dating. At some point, the thought, "I'm not doing my kids any good" should have crossed this woman's mind, and it annoyed me that Novalee swept it all away with a "bad things happen, but we look for the good in life and move on" speech. As far as I'm concerned, Novalee's reaction should have been, "Yes, and I was a lousy friend for not telling you to be more careful about the jerks you date." At the very least, I would have liked some recognition by Novalee that her friend may be a wonderful human being (and should be helped, whatever her accountability) but doesn't have enough commonsense to fill a teacup and should never be allowed to take care of Novalee's own daughter.
Especially since Novalee herself does make tough commonsense choices for the sake of her daughter. Like Lexie, she messes up after Americus is born, but the event acts as a traffic signal in her life: slow down! think! The reader sees the woman Novalee is going to become, a person who has her feet firmly planted on the ground.
However, this shift from singing optimism to Pollyanna-erk is fairly brief and pretty far into the book. I'm not even sure why Letts put it in other than to add 1000 more words. Otherwise, the book's overall positive viewpoint is not saccharine or wishy-washy or uneven. It's gentle, plausible, and pleasant and makes the book one of my recommendations, saga tale or not.
Where the Heart Is is an Oprah's Bookclub book. Oprah specializes in saga tales--or at least, it always seems as if the books I see with Oprah's stamp on them are saga tales--and I usually avoid saga tales. By "saga tales," I mean books that take you through all the tragedy, heart-aches, trials, and tribulations of a person's life.
Most of Oprah's books (if not all) are about surviving the tragedy, heart-ache, trials, tribulations. Still, there's all that tragertribution to get through, and it makes me tired. There's something to be said for "escapism" as the purpose of literature.
However, Where the Heart Is--although it has its share of tragertribution--is so lovely, the tragertribution takes a back seat. The book is, really, singingly optimistic. What a nice change from so many other Americana tales!
Part of this singing optimism is due to the tone/style. In some ways, Letts' style reminds me of McCall Smith's style in the Ladies Detective Agency books. There's this sense of wide-open space filled with the gentle current of humanity. People are just so everyday nice: not nice in a sycophantic, sticky-sweet way but rather nice, and quirky, in the way people really can be. I mean, there are people like this in the world! Even Forneys!
Part of this singing optimism is Novalee who grows from a clueless, but still resilient, seventeen-year-old to a strong, compassionate, wise twenty-five-year old in the course of the book. We don't ever see her faults, but that's not the point of the book. We are so much on her side, her faults hardly matter, and her growth from naive teenager-with-baby to Renaissance woman-with-seven-year-old is completely believable.
The only part of the book where the singing optimism falters is when Lexie (Novalee's best friend) gets beat up by her pedophile boyfriend. It isn't the tragedy that kills the mood; the book can afford a few tragedies. It is, unfortunately, the platitudes that Novalee dumps on Lexie. Lexie blames herself, and . . . Lexie should. She has continually dated guys who get her pregnant and dump her. After number five, yeah, Lexie should have learned to be more savvy or, at least, get the guy vetted, or, at the risk of sounding Puritanical, just stopped dating. At some point, the thought, "I'm not doing my kids any good" should have crossed this woman's mind, and it annoyed me that Novalee swept it all away with a "bad things happen, but we look for the good in life and move on" speech. As far as I'm concerned, Novalee's reaction should have been, "Yes, and I was a lousy friend for not telling you to be more careful about the jerks you date." At the very least, I would have liked some recognition by Novalee that her friend may be a wonderful human being (and should be helped, whatever her accountability) but doesn't have enough commonsense to fill a teacup and should never be allowed to take care of Novalee's own daughter.
Especially since Novalee herself does make tough commonsense choices for the sake of her daughter. Like Lexie, she messes up after Americus is born, but the event acts as a traffic signal in her life: slow down! think! The reader sees the woman Novalee is going to become, a person who has her feet firmly planted on the ground.
However, this shift from singing optimism to Pollyanna-erk is fairly brief and pretty far into the book. I'm not even sure why Letts put it in other than to add 1000 more words. Otherwise, the book's overall positive viewpoint is not saccharine or wishy-washy or uneven. It's gentle, plausible, and pleasant and makes the book one of my recommendations, saga tale or not.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
For Stephen King Fans: A Question about Misery!
Although this blog is titled "Votaries of Horror," I am not actually a big fan of horror (and I can't write it--I've tried!). I am also not a huge Stephen King fan although I recommend his book On Writing as the best book on writing I've read.
And I do admire his work, AND I have seen the man in person plus his house (thanks, Mike!). So, when I needed to come up with contemporary examples of captivity narratives, I thought of Misery.
I didn't really want to read the book (see above), but I got out several books on King, including detailed synopses of Misery, analyses of Misery, and yes, I did actually skim through Misery itself, closely reading the last pages.
I knew the overall plot, of course (mostly from spoofs), but I hadn't realized until I read the detailed synopses and the end of the book what exactly King had done with the idea, and I was impressed. (And yes, Misery is a good example of the captivity narrative.)
Then I read some of the analyses. One essay I read is actually more about King's films than about his books, but in the analyses, the author (preparatory to making a refutation) brings up a feminist critique of King in which, well, I have to quote it since there's no way I will do it justice otherwise: "In Misery, creativity is solely a masculine prerogative, for the artist is male, and both the reader and the character/antagonist--made one in Paul Sheldon's vicious and dangerous fan Annie Wilkes--are female . . ."
I was completely flummoxed. I thought, "Did the feminist who wrote this even READ the book?"
Well, I didn't read the book, so I have to ask Stephen King fans:
Isn't Annie Wilkes a kind of muse for Sheldon? Far from being a stereotypical non-creative female reader/character/antagonist, isn't she, to a degree, the source of his creativity? (I'm talking about what King actually does with her, not what Annie or Sheldon say--remember, literature students, the narrator does not always tell the truth.) She demands excellence from him (she wants him to keep writing about her favorite character but won't let him do it in a token, off-the-cuff kind of way). Doesn't that make her some kind of sociopathic/psychopathic Calliope (muse of epic poetry)? Doesn't Sheldon thank her ghost at the end for making him a better writer? Doesn't that make her the source of his creativity? Isn't King writing about the writing process, as hard and demanding, in a way that involves both Sheldon and Wilkes? Doesn't that kind of undermine the feminist critique I quoted above?
After reading that critique, I could see why King might have a problem with higher academic intellectualism.
Now, to be fair, feminism is a very broad ideology, if it's even fair to call it that ("broad umbrella"?). There're many different forms. And I actually think of myself as a feminist these days (once I realized there were many different forms, not just 80s-NOW-political feminism). But there's a particular form that usually appears in academe that is so dumb it makes your head ache. It's so dumb, female scholars in women's studies programs will often feel called upon to write about how dumb it is at the risk of being labeled "traitors" to their programs.
It's the "I've decided life is unfair, patriarchal, and misogynistic--so that's all I will see. No matter what!!"
I took a class in which the professor, who was otherwise a well-read, intelligent sort of person, went on about the Statue of Liberty being ironic because it is a "silent" woman which is symbolic of women not having rights in the America's history.
Uhhh, okay. That makes sense . . . if one's brain stops working, and one knows nothing about women's history. Suppose the statue had been built with her mouth open: wouldn't that make the statue a symbol of the "gossip," a stereotyped image of women who chatter incessantly about nothing? And suppose it was a man instead of a woman? That symbolism isn't too hard to figure, so I won't bother. Suppose it was a man in drag--wait, it kind of looks like a man in drag. And that means . . .
Not an argument one can possibly win--one way or the other. (We have a statue of a Woman of Victory here in Portland. It was built to represent the North winning the Civil War. The woman holds a sword but is wearing some off-the-shoulder Greek-type outfit. Maybe . . . she's a dominatrix? The statue is symbolic of . . . porn? Personally, I think it's kind of cool she's not a guy, whatever she symbolizes. In London, you can't walk through the meridian of a round-about without stumbling over a statue of a guy on a horse. And all the statues seem to be from the Crimean War era.)
In any case, if I'm right about Misery, I'd be happy to hear! You can let me know if I'm wrong too though I warn you, I have a hard time taking "there must be symbols in here about women being marginalized because the writer is male!" explanations seriously.
And I do admire his work, AND I have seen the man in person plus his house (thanks, Mike!). So, when I needed to come up with contemporary examples of captivity narratives, I thought of Misery.
I didn't really want to read the book (see above), but I got out several books on King, including detailed synopses of Misery, analyses of Misery, and yes, I did actually skim through Misery itself, closely reading the last pages.
I knew the overall plot, of course (mostly from spoofs), but I hadn't realized until I read the detailed synopses and the end of the book what exactly King had done with the idea, and I was impressed. (And yes, Misery is a good example of the captivity narrative.)
Then I read some of the analyses. One essay I read is actually more about King's films than about his books, but in the analyses, the author (preparatory to making a refutation) brings up a feminist critique of King in which, well, I have to quote it since there's no way I will do it justice otherwise: "In Misery, creativity is solely a masculine prerogative, for the artist is male, and both the reader and the character/antagonist--made one in Paul Sheldon's vicious and dangerous fan Annie Wilkes--are female . . ."
I was completely flummoxed. I thought, "Did the feminist who wrote this even READ the book?"
Well, I didn't read the book, so I have to ask Stephen King fans:
Isn't Annie Wilkes a kind of muse for Sheldon? Far from being a stereotypical non-creative female reader/character/antagonist, isn't she, to a degree, the source of his creativity? (I'm talking about what King actually does with her, not what Annie or Sheldon say--remember, literature students, the narrator does not always tell the truth.) She demands excellence from him (she wants him to keep writing about her favorite character but won't let him do it in a token, off-the-cuff kind of way). Doesn't that make her some kind of sociopathic/psychopathic Calliope (muse of epic poetry)? Doesn't Sheldon thank her ghost at the end for making him a better writer? Doesn't that make her the source of his creativity? Isn't King writing about the writing process, as hard and demanding, in a way that involves both Sheldon and Wilkes? Doesn't that kind of undermine the feminist critique I quoted above?
After reading that critique, I could see why King might have a problem with higher academic intellectualism.
Now, to be fair, feminism is a very broad ideology, if it's even fair to call it that ("broad umbrella"?). There're many different forms. And I actually think of myself as a feminist these days (once I realized there were many different forms, not just 80s-NOW-political feminism). But there's a particular form that usually appears in academe that is so dumb it makes your head ache. It's so dumb, female scholars in women's studies programs will often feel called upon to write about how dumb it is at the risk of being labeled "traitors" to their programs.
It's the "I've decided life is unfair, patriarchal, and misogynistic--so that's all I will see. No matter what!!"
I took a class in which the professor, who was otherwise a well-read, intelligent sort of person, went on about the Statue of Liberty being ironic because it is a "silent" woman which is symbolic of women not having rights in the America's history.
Uhhh, okay. That makes sense . . . if one's brain stops working, and one knows nothing about women's history. Suppose the statue had been built with her mouth open: wouldn't that make the statue a symbol of the "gossip," a stereotyped image of women who chatter incessantly about nothing? And suppose it was a man instead of a woman? That symbolism isn't too hard to figure, so I won't bother. Suppose it was a man in drag--wait, it kind of looks like a man in drag. And that means . . .
Not an argument one can possibly win--one way or the other. (We have a statue of a Woman of Victory here in Portland. It was built to represent the North winning the Civil War. The woman holds a sword but is wearing some off-the-shoulder Greek-type outfit. Maybe . . . she's a dominatrix? The statue is symbolic of . . . porn? Personally, I think it's kind of cool she's not a guy, whatever she symbolizes. In London, you can't walk through the meridian of a round-about without stumbling over a statue of a guy on a horse. And all the statues seem to be from the Crimean War era.)
In any case, if I'm right about Misery, I'd be happy to hear! You can let me know if I'm wrong too though I warn you, I have a hard time taking "there must be symbols in here about women being marginalized because the writer is male!" explanations seriously.
Friday, August 14, 2009
Career Actors: Kurtwood Smith
I'm a big fan of what I call "career" actors and actresses.
Sure, I like "big" actors and actresses, such as Tom Hanks. But I have enormous respect for actors and actresses who work consistently on television (sometimes in the movies), giving consistently good performances. They may not win lots of awards or acclaim, but they are darn good at their jobs; in many ways, I like them because it is just a job.
To elucidate the difference: Nimoy and Shatner both wanted to be "big." They became big, just not in the way they had hoped. Nimoy, in his typical gentlemanly fashion, came to terms with this. I'm not sure Shatner ever has completely (I guess, time has forced him to come to terms with it).
DeForest Kelley, on the other hand, was an old Hollywood career actor by the time he showed up on Star Trek. It was just another job, and he did it as well as he did any of his jobs. He ended up "big," of course, like everyone in the Star Trek universe, but I don't think he ever regretted not being bigger or being a more diversified star. I think he figured, "Hey, that turned into a pretty decent gig." I've always admired him for showing up on the first episode of Star Trek: NG. This was when fans and stars were still comparing the new show to the old show, and there was some tension about the new show NOT being the old show, blah, blah, blah, but there's Kelley, making his guest appearance, doing his job.
I love that.
Kurtwood Smith is a career actor that I adore. I have seen him on House ("Half-Wit"), X-Files ("Grotesque"), Star Trek: Voyager ("Year of Hell, Parts I and II"), and, of course, That '70s Show as "Red." He's a fairly versatile actor. If I hadn't seen him on House, I would have said he just did 'grumpy guy' really, really well. (In X-Files and Star Trek, he plays high-maintenance grumpy guys but still grumpy guys.) One of my favorite lines in That '70s Show is when Eric's grandmother gets ill and goes to the hospital and, naturally, Eric and his entire entourage go too, at which point Red snaps, "Why is it, everywhere we go, all these people come with us?" Maybe it's a growing-up-in-the-70's thing, but that line always makes me laugh.
And Smith is good at being grumpy. House, however, showed me that he could do more than grumpy. When "Half-Wit" aired, the big hoopla was Dave Matthews plus Hugh Laurie playing piano with Dave Matthews, but I don't think that episode would have been half as good if the father hadn't been Kurtwood Smith. The scenes with him and Laurie are powerful. It's an interesting episode with a typical House conundrum--is losing a special power or gift worth being ordinary, accepted, and happy? House forces the father to make the decision, knowing the boy's ability to function is more important than his ability to play. However, House won't make the decision, as he so often does, because he doesn't know what he himself would choose. The father, who must make this difficult choice, has to be an actor who can evoke sympathy from House and the audience, and Kurtwood Smith does this without being maudlin.
Kudos!
Sure, I like "big" actors and actresses, such as Tom Hanks. But I have enormous respect for actors and actresses who work consistently on television (sometimes in the movies), giving consistently good performances. They may not win lots of awards or acclaim, but they are darn good at their jobs; in many ways, I like them because it is just a job.
To elucidate the difference: Nimoy and Shatner both wanted to be "big." They became big, just not in the way they had hoped. Nimoy, in his typical gentlemanly fashion, came to terms with this. I'm not sure Shatner ever has completely (I guess, time has forced him to come to terms with it).
DeForest Kelley, on the other hand, was an old Hollywood career actor by the time he showed up on Star Trek. It was just another job, and he did it as well as he did any of his jobs. He ended up "big," of course, like everyone in the Star Trek universe, but I don't think he ever regretted not being bigger or being a more diversified star. I think he figured, "Hey, that turned into a pretty decent gig." I've always admired him for showing up on the first episode of Star Trek: NG. This was when fans and stars were still comparing the new show to the old show, and there was some tension about the new show NOT being the old show, blah, blah, blah, but there's Kelley, making his guest appearance, doing his job.
I love that.
Kurtwood Smith is a career actor that I adore. I have seen him on House ("Half-Wit"), X-Files ("Grotesque"), Star Trek: Voyager ("Year of Hell, Parts I and II"), and, of course, That '70s Show as "Red." He's a fairly versatile actor. If I hadn't seen him on House, I would have said he just did 'grumpy guy' really, really well. (In X-Files and Star Trek, he plays high-maintenance grumpy guys but still grumpy guys.) One of my favorite lines in That '70s Show is when Eric's grandmother gets ill and goes to the hospital and, naturally, Eric and his entire entourage go too, at which point Red snaps, "Why is it, everywhere we go, all these people come with us?" Maybe it's a growing-up-in-the-70's thing, but that line always makes me laugh.
And Smith is good at being grumpy. House, however, showed me that he could do more than grumpy. When "Half-Wit" aired, the big hoopla was Dave Matthews plus Hugh Laurie playing piano with Dave Matthews, but I don't think that episode would have been half as good if the father hadn't been Kurtwood Smith. The scenes with him and Laurie are powerful. It's an interesting episode with a typical House conundrum--is losing a special power or gift worth being ordinary, accepted, and happy? House forces the father to make the decision, knowing the boy's ability to function is more important than his ability to play. However, House won't make the decision, as he so often does, because he doesn't know what he himself would choose. The father, who must make this difficult choice, has to be an actor who can evoke sympathy from House and the audience, and Kurtwood Smith does this without being maudlin.
Kudos!
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Religious People Can Be Imperfect: It's Okay
I was at the library this afternoon, picking up Robert Frost and Edgar Allen Poe for my folklore class--thanks to everyone who has sent me suggestions for my folklore class!
I came across a book about a man losing his faith. I flipped it open and immediately come across this argument (which I've encountered before):
I know so many religious people who don't practice what they preach; their religions (organized religions, usually) must therefore be pointless or useless or false.
I wanted to go on record as saying, I have never understood this argument.
I was raised Mormon, and I'm still active. I was raised Mormon by incredibly decent people, and I grew up around some of the nicest people in the world (sure, my family is opinionated, and I'm hardly suggesting we're perfect, but my siblings and parents are seriously nice), and I still don't understand this argument.
In other words, I have every reason in the world to think that religious people (or people raised in religions) do practice their beliefs, thereby justifying my upbringing and belief system . . .
And I still have never understood this argument.
The argument rests on one or more fallacies, and the fallacies are, well, fallacious:
Fallacy #1: People practice their beliefs.
Got people? The gap between practice and belief is a fundamental truth of human nature from parents who smoke but tell their kids not to all the way to environmentalists who inform you about the earth's dewindling resources with one of their 2 million pamphlets (recycle, schmycled; it's still paper). And these are, perhaps, obvious hypocrisies. There are still the gaps between private and public acts/beliefs and private and public faces. Yes, ideally (see 2), people should be the same everywhere they go although I'm not even sure about that. I'm politically libertarian and religiously conservative. That is, I support certain actions politically that I don't practice personally. However, I don't pretend about it to anyone, so maybe that's the point.
Fallacy #2: People should practice their beliefs, and if they don't, there is something wrong with their beliefs.
The problem with this argument--which is obviously problematic but lots of people buy into it--is its corollary: If people do practice their beliefs, those beliefs must be true. Most people will reject this latter statement as erroneous but accept the prior statement as true.
If I'm right, and people are flawed (and I am, by the way: flawed and right), then #2 is a non-starter. I can act like my town doesn't have traffic laws, but it won't stop the police from pulling me over. However, "truth" in this case is big UNIVERSAL TRUTH, not little-law-bending truth. Still, I don't see why my actions or feelings should automatically substantiate or negate a universal truth to anyone other than myself. "Only your parents and your friends have reason to believe you," I tell my students. I can teach them about European witchcraft trials and mention that over a span of 300 years, the chances of a woman being accused of witchcraft were astronomically less than her dying in childbirth or, speaking in terms of modern statistics, being murdered, but that doesn't mean my students will believe me or care. (My next job, as an academician, would be to give them proof.)
In other words, a thing can be true, or not true, without any emotional involvement or particular personal investment by the people facing that thing. To segue into House, House needs assistants who can afford to be wrong--because there is a right answer, but they might not always get it. They have to be prepared to be wrong about the right answer since the answer isn't relative, and how nice or good or wonderful or well-meaning they are won't necessarily get them that answer. Something can be true, even if nobody acts as if it is true.
Fallacy #3: People should practice their beliefs, but if they only practice part of them, that's as good as them not practicing any of them.
This isn't too different from that bumper sticker I hate: "No one is free if others are oppressed." And it is so fundamentally inaccurate, it's hard to know how reasonable/perceptive people can believe it. A man may be nice to his wife and kids but not so nice to his neighbors. It doesn't follow that his inability to be nice to everyone means that he is an entire failure at his religion.
That doesn't mean he shouldn't be nice to his neighbors; it just isn't an either/or proposition. Flaws do not indicate complete failure. I suppose there is a point where the equation tips, and the flaws outweigh the average person's ability to be perceived as good and kind. But from my perspective, that equation had better be pretty generous. I think many an academic argument has failed to understand an event or individual because the equation was not generous enough. I'm reading The Magician's Book by Laura Miller right now in which Ms Miller attempts to balance what she perceives as C.S. Lewis's flaws with his talents in order to reach a balanced appreciation of books (the Narnia Chronicles) she loved as a child. I don't completely agree with her analysis or her arguments (or even her form of criticism since I put more weight on performance than I do on reading-between-the-lines), but I can read her book because of her generous perspective.
Deciding that someone's failure to live up to an ideal is the sum total of that someone's personality is not an accurate, or charitable, assessment.
Fallacy #4: All groups are nasty to outsiders, thus all groups are bad; if someone is dissatisfied with a group (i.e. organized religion), it must mean that group has treated that person badly and behaved intolerantly (no other reason).
Actually, there's some truth to the first part of this argument. Here's an example:
Back when I lived in Washington State, I listen to a lot of talk radio. One day, I was listening to a discussion of "whether gays can be Republican." I don't really understand these types of arguments. I figure people can do whatever they want. But the guest speaker, a gay writer about economics (no, the three things have no automatic relationship, but that's how he was presented) was talking, and I started listening, and okay, I'll admit it, it wasn't really what he was saying because frankly, economics bore me, it was his voice: Bing Crosby meets James Earl Jones. Golden honey.
So he gets done talking, and people start calling in, and a lot of the callers say things like, "Hi, I'm a fundamentalist conservative, and I think what you have to say is great!"
Any guesses on the angriest callers? Yep, those who thought the man had "betrayed" the Democratic Party by being a fiscal conservative.
I think my disillusionment about so-called liberal/left "tolerance" started about then. Well, I was never really "disillusioned" because I've never really believed liberals were automatically more tolerant than anyone else, but my belief that similar types of human reactions can be found within any group received serious support on that day.
And that reaction--"Traitor!"--isn't atypical. Humans are social animals and tend to act accordingly. We shouldn't (says the libertarian in me), but we do, and it isn't all bad; it just isn't all good (I'm not an anarchist, just a libertarian).
What bothers me about the claim, "All groups are nasty to outsiders, thus all groups are bad, so (to paraphrase) all dissatisfaction by the individual must rest with the group" is how seldom that claim allows for nuance and complication: that is, a group behaves a certain way, and everyone assumes that the group is behaving according to the cliché without examining the underlying, individual causes or variations.
Example #1: Burning witches is nasty; however, the cliché states that sweet, angelic, herb-planting midwives were scampering about their beautiful gardens worshipping earth-goddesses when the mean patriarchy (organized group) came along and burned them. For no reason at all!
Writers, such as Diane Purkiss, have pointed out that the witches weren't always angelic or midwives (in fact, often midwives testified against witches) or even automatically pagan. Writers, such as Dan Burton and David Grandy, have pointed out that most witch accusations were made in small communities that contained long-standing grudges (not exactly systematic) and that in the few cases where accusations were systematic, men and boys were often executed as well.
The cliché tells a generalized truth: generally, women were accused and executed more than men, and generally, they tended to be marginalized members of their communities. Plus burning witches isn't nice. But it misses all the real-life realities: all the interesting stuff about actual trials and cases and individuals.
Example #2: When I first moved to Maine, I worked as a secretary in a law school. It was one of the most ideologically diverse places I've ever worked. We were all white but religiously and politically speaking, we had a representative for just about every position: mainstream, fundamentalist, atheist, agnostic, Democratic, liberal, Republican, conservative, Marxist . . .
Everyone got along okay, but ideologically-speaking, I was just about the only person there who didn't think someone was out to get me: big business, liberals, crazy religious people, diehard right-wingers, etc. etc. etc.
I figured they couldn't all be right--at least, not all right in the same place at the same time: Southern Maine wasn't going to become, in the next ten years, a left-leaning, fascist nightmare filled with godless, God-fearing fundamentalist Donald Trumps. I mean, sure, Maine taxes people to death, but I'm not sure one could blame that on a left-leaning-fascist-godless-God-fearing-fundamentalist-Donald-Trump. One could try, I suppose. But it would be kind of hard. I don't think even I could do it, and I believe that people are complicated and don't come all-of-a-piece.
This is the problem with saying (to condense the fallacy), "Oh, the group is to blame; the group is making me unhappy." It could be true. The people where I worked believed it was true, but that didn't automatically make it true or even probable. In fact, they'd each created an image of an anti-group and then become frightened by the image. (Who are all these conspiring people? Where are they?) I was more impressed by the fact that everyone got along okay, no matter how paranoid.
In other words, groups can behave badly, but they also usually behave complexly, so blaming the group (rather than the individual) may be correct, but it also may not, especially since the group--or the image of the group--may not even exist. In any case, "the group as bad guy" is not a given.
My conclusion: Give me the particulars first. I want to know the people before I judge the situation. Whatever the situation.
Disclaimer: Yes, I know, I don't always do this as thoroughly as I should--see #3 above.
I came across a book about a man losing his faith. I flipped it open and immediately come across this argument (which I've encountered before):
I know so many religious people who don't practice what they preach; their religions (organized religions, usually) must therefore be pointless or useless or false.
I wanted to go on record as saying, I have never understood this argument.
I was raised Mormon, and I'm still active. I was raised Mormon by incredibly decent people, and I grew up around some of the nicest people in the world (sure, my family is opinionated, and I'm hardly suggesting we're perfect, but my siblings and parents are seriously nice), and I still don't understand this argument.
In other words, I have every reason in the world to think that religious people (or people raised in religions) do practice their beliefs, thereby justifying my upbringing and belief system . . .
And I still have never understood this argument.
The argument rests on one or more fallacies, and the fallacies are, well, fallacious:
Fallacy #1: People practice their beliefs.
Got people? The gap between practice and belief is a fundamental truth of human nature from parents who smoke but tell their kids not to all the way to environmentalists who inform you about the earth's dewindling resources with one of their 2 million pamphlets (recycle, schmycled; it's still paper). And these are, perhaps, obvious hypocrisies. There are still the gaps between private and public acts/beliefs and private and public faces. Yes, ideally (see 2), people should be the same everywhere they go although I'm not even sure about that. I'm politically libertarian and religiously conservative. That is, I support certain actions politically that I don't practice personally. However, I don't pretend about it to anyone, so maybe that's the point.
Fallacy #2: People should practice their beliefs, and if they don't, there is something wrong with their beliefs.
The problem with this argument--which is obviously problematic but lots of people buy into it--is its corollary: If people do practice their beliefs, those beliefs must be true. Most people will reject this latter statement as erroneous but accept the prior statement as true.
If I'm right, and people are flawed (and I am, by the way: flawed and right), then #2 is a non-starter. I can act like my town doesn't have traffic laws, but it won't stop the police from pulling me over. However, "truth" in this case is big UNIVERSAL TRUTH, not little-law-bending truth. Still, I don't see why my actions or feelings should automatically substantiate or negate a universal truth to anyone other than myself. "Only your parents and your friends have reason to believe you," I tell my students. I can teach them about European witchcraft trials and mention that over a span of 300 years, the chances of a woman being accused of witchcraft were astronomically less than her dying in childbirth or, speaking in terms of modern statistics, being murdered, but that doesn't mean my students will believe me or care. (My next job, as an academician, would be to give them proof.)
In other words, a thing can be true, or not true, without any emotional involvement or particular personal investment by the people facing that thing. To segue into House, House needs assistants who can afford to be wrong--because there is a right answer, but they might not always get it. They have to be prepared to be wrong about the right answer since the answer isn't relative, and how nice or good or wonderful or well-meaning they are won't necessarily get them that answer. Something can be true, even if nobody acts as if it is true.
Fallacy #3: People should practice their beliefs, but if they only practice part of them, that's as good as them not practicing any of them.
This isn't too different from that bumper sticker I hate: "No one is free if others are oppressed." And it is so fundamentally inaccurate, it's hard to know how reasonable/perceptive people can believe it. A man may be nice to his wife and kids but not so nice to his neighbors. It doesn't follow that his inability to be nice to everyone means that he is an entire failure at his religion.
That doesn't mean he shouldn't be nice to his neighbors; it just isn't an either/or proposition. Flaws do not indicate complete failure. I suppose there is a point where the equation tips, and the flaws outweigh the average person's ability to be perceived as good and kind. But from my perspective, that equation had better be pretty generous. I think many an academic argument has failed to understand an event or individual because the equation was not generous enough. I'm reading The Magician's Book by Laura Miller right now in which Ms Miller attempts to balance what she perceives as C.S. Lewis's flaws with his talents in order to reach a balanced appreciation of books (the Narnia Chronicles) she loved as a child. I don't completely agree with her analysis or her arguments (or even her form of criticism since I put more weight on performance than I do on reading-between-the-lines), but I can read her book because of her generous perspective.
Deciding that someone's failure to live up to an ideal is the sum total of that someone's personality is not an accurate, or charitable, assessment.
Fallacy #4: All groups are nasty to outsiders, thus all groups are bad; if someone is dissatisfied with a group (i.e. organized religion), it must mean that group has treated that person badly and behaved intolerantly (no other reason).
Actually, there's some truth to the first part of this argument. Here's an example:
Back when I lived in Washington State, I listen to a lot of talk radio. One day, I was listening to a discussion of "whether gays can be Republican." I don't really understand these types of arguments. I figure people can do whatever they want. But the guest speaker, a gay writer about economics (no, the three things have no automatic relationship, but that's how he was presented) was talking, and I started listening, and okay, I'll admit it, it wasn't really what he was saying because frankly, economics bore me, it was his voice: Bing Crosby meets James Earl Jones. Golden honey.
So he gets done talking, and people start calling in, and a lot of the callers say things like, "Hi, I'm a fundamentalist conservative, and I think what you have to say is great!"
Any guesses on the angriest callers? Yep, those who thought the man had "betrayed" the Democratic Party by being a fiscal conservative.
I think my disillusionment about so-called liberal/left "tolerance" started about then. Well, I was never really "disillusioned" because I've never really believed liberals were automatically more tolerant than anyone else, but my belief that similar types of human reactions can be found within any group received serious support on that day.
And that reaction--"Traitor!"--isn't atypical. Humans are social animals and tend to act accordingly. We shouldn't (says the libertarian in me), but we do, and it isn't all bad; it just isn't all good (I'm not an anarchist, just a libertarian).
What bothers me about the claim, "All groups are nasty to outsiders, thus all groups are bad, so (to paraphrase) all dissatisfaction by the individual must rest with the group" is how seldom that claim allows for nuance and complication: that is, a group behaves a certain way, and everyone assumes that the group is behaving according to the cliché without examining the underlying, individual causes or variations.
Example #1: Burning witches is nasty; however, the cliché states that sweet, angelic, herb-planting midwives were scampering about their beautiful gardens worshipping earth-goddesses when the mean patriarchy (organized group) came along and burned them. For no reason at all!
Writers, such as Diane Purkiss, have pointed out that the witches weren't always angelic or midwives (in fact, often midwives testified against witches) or even automatically pagan. Writers, such as Dan Burton and David Grandy, have pointed out that most witch accusations were made in small communities that contained long-standing grudges (not exactly systematic) and that in the few cases where accusations were systematic, men and boys were often executed as well.
The cliché tells a generalized truth: generally, women were accused and executed more than men, and generally, they tended to be marginalized members of their communities. Plus burning witches isn't nice. But it misses all the real-life realities: all the interesting stuff about actual trials and cases and individuals.
Example #2: When I first moved to Maine, I worked as a secretary in a law school. It was one of the most ideologically diverse places I've ever worked. We were all white but religiously and politically speaking, we had a representative for just about every position: mainstream, fundamentalist, atheist, agnostic, Democratic, liberal, Republican, conservative, Marxist . . .
Everyone got along okay, but ideologically-speaking, I was just about the only person there who didn't think someone was out to get me: big business, liberals, crazy religious people, diehard right-wingers, etc. etc. etc.
I figured they couldn't all be right--at least, not all right in the same place at the same time: Southern Maine wasn't going to become, in the next ten years, a left-leaning, fascist nightmare filled with godless, God-fearing fundamentalist Donald Trumps. I mean, sure, Maine taxes people to death, but I'm not sure one could blame that on a left-leaning-fascist-godless-God-fearing-fundamentalist-Donald-Trump. One could try, I suppose. But it would be kind of hard. I don't think even I could do it, and I believe that people are complicated and don't come all-of-a-piece.
This is the problem with saying (to condense the fallacy), "Oh, the group is to blame; the group is making me unhappy." It could be true. The people where I worked believed it was true, but that didn't automatically make it true or even probable. In fact, they'd each created an image of an anti-group and then become frightened by the image. (Who are all these conspiring people? Where are they?) I was more impressed by the fact that everyone got along okay, no matter how paranoid.
In other words, groups can behave badly, but they also usually behave complexly, so blaming the group (rather than the individual) may be correct, but it also may not, especially since the group--or the image of the group--may not even exist. In any case, "the group as bad guy" is not a given.
My conclusion: Give me the particulars first. I want to know the people before I judge the situation. Whatever the situation.
Disclaimer: Yes, I know, I don't always do this as thoroughly as I should--see #3 above.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)