On Violent vs. Non-Violent Activism

A review was posted today on a local (Grand Rapids) peace'n'justice website, Media Mouse, of a book titled "How Nonviolence Strengthens the State." Here are a few comments that I posted to the West Michigan Justice and Peace Coalition email list (which I also happen to moderate) in response. (I suggest that you glance over the review first, but if you are in a hurry, I think my comments can stand alone reasonably well.)

A few thoughts on the review...

1) First, who wrote it? Is there a reason that book reviews on Media Mouse are anonymous? Personally I like knowing at least a name and perhaps some more relevant info on the person reviewing the book, since I want to get some idea of the "positional perspective" of the writer.

2) I think it is good and important that ideological pacifism/non-violence gets challenged by people who are both sympathetic and antagonistic to the anti-war perspective. It keeps the apologists and arguments stronger and more relevant to real-life considerations. I don't like the idea of a "doctrinaire" pacifism, which seems to be the main beef that the reviewer has with his(?) principled non-violent colleagues. I can understand a bit of what s/he is getting at - I have felt the subtle pressures of "orthodoxy" at various meetings but seldom do I see or hear it expressed forcefully or coercively. Usually what happens is that one or more outspoken people set a tone and that tone gets established as the ground rules for a particular meeting, event, intervention, discussion group, etc. So we have to sometimes work hard to keep the options open and allow for effective and expressive diversity of views.

3) I do consider myself a person who believes in and seeks to practice non-violence, even though I am not as "purist" in this as many are. I think that activists who want to advocate for violent/destructive/disruptive tactics have a pretty high burden of proof to demonstrate that their actions have a plausible chance of instigating the change that they are striving for. In the lead-up to the Iraq war, I put what I considered a lot of personal effort into opposing it, but I also realized that the pro-war forces had a solid political base to support their actions and that the chances of us actually persuading the Bush admin. away from launching the invasion were very small. So I did not see much wisdom in some of the tactics that were discussed such as blocking traffic or doing other disruptive things that would just create inconvenience for citizens and generate hostility against those of us who mainly had a simple ethical point to make in the effort to appeal to the conscience of our persuadable neighbors on the subject. So my question for anyone who wants to endorse destruction as a tactic (whether it's Seattle-style anti-globalists, Muslim jihadists, Black Panthers, Weathermen, etc.) is, are you prepared to explain the necessity of the destructive acts to the "innocent bystanders" whose lives are negatively impacted by your decisions? Are you certain that this was the best or the only way that your objectives could have been achieved?

4) I think that we always have to beware of the nostalgia trap, reminiscing over the good ol' days when giants like King, Gandhi and Jesus walked upon the earth and trying to emulate what they did. Each of these, and other less celebrated, figures emerged in a specific time and context and probably had to take advantage of unique opportunities that their predecessors and successors didn't have. In our context, we have to recognize that both King and Gandhi were able to structure their activism within a set of moral parameters that existed in their respective societies that don't necessarily translate all that well to our own times and circumstances. We can learn from them, of course, but it may well be (probably is) the case that mass demonstrations in the streets are not going to work the same way as they did in the last century, and even if we want to take that approach, it is going to be a challenge to find the right message to get people to turn out. We have to deal with a lot of complacency and apathy, which I know have always been eroding influences on social actions, but our society in particular has more diversions and distractions to offer its citizens than any previous culture, it seems to me. We may well be in a phase where both violent and non-violent activism is going to have only marginal success in engaging sufficient millions of citizens for them to really move the system off of its present course. If the macro-social controls are in place, or nearly there, how can we effectively promote peace and justice on the micro-scale? Perhaps this is a discussion that we can pour our energy into and achieve more fruitful results.

Tweaked House!

I'm going to do a little venting here. The local PBS affiliate just screwed up majorly in handling the concluding episode of Masterpiece Theater's presentation of "Bleak House," a mini-series based on the Charles Dickens novel. Here's the email I just sent to the station's managers:

My wife and I were quite engaged with the conclusion of "Bleak House" tonight, when at a crucial moment in the story, when a pivotal character was in mid-sentence interrogating a murder suspect, the program was interrupted by a fund-raising appeal! Then we had to sit through several minutes of "commercials" and then it switched, amazingly, to a gospel music concert that is still playing, 15 minutes later! What is going on? I am highly irritated by this blunder, or series of blunders, and would sincerely appreciate an explanation. What does your station intend to do to make up for this interruption of what has been a very fine series - the most sustained viewing of a PBS program we've had in quite a few years!?

I am very disappointed and also surprised and even offended by this mess-up. I have a hard time understanding the chain of events that led to this situation, and I seriously think that some kind of explanation is forthcoming to myself and the hundreds, if not thousands, of other viewers who are similarly aggravated by such a poor handling of your broadcast responsibilities. This is most definitely not the way to recruit financial support for your station!
(end of email message)

After leaving a voicemail on their corporate number, I just got off the phone with one of the hapless souls working the pledge line, who had to plead ignorance about the cause of the problems but assured me that management would give me a personal response ASAP. Since my email already had all the personal info, I declined to give it to the phone operator, but I was at least nice to her, as she was to me, since I understand she had nothing whatsoever to do with the technical glitches that cast a pall over the conclusion of my weekend. She and her fellow pledge-ops are getting flooded with calls so I was content to just add my voice to the chorus and hope that this fiasco leaves such a big impression that the station makes sure that this kind of thing NEVER HAPPENS AGAIN!

Update: 2/28/06 - Here's the email I got from the station yesterday:

Dear Mr. Blakeslee:

First please let me apologize for the grave errors in what we aired last night. We learned this morning that WGVU experienced a major technical error in our new automation system during the airing of the conclusion to MASTERPIECE THEATRE’s “Bleak House.” Currently, we are working diligently to determine all factors that led to this error and correct them to prevent future program interruptions.

We will be re-airing the program on Tuesday, February 28 from 2 - 4 a.m., Wednesday, March 1 from 3 - 5 a.m., Sunday, March 5 from 2 - 4 a.m. and again from 9 - 11 p.m. We at WGVU deeply regret the inconvenience and frustration this has caused to viewers and members of the station. We thank you for contacting us so that we can notify you of our additional broadcasts.

If you would like to discuss this with me in person, please do give me a call at 800 xxx xxxx (front desk) or 616 xxx xxxx (my desk.) Again, we are deeply sorry for this incident.

Sincerely,

Carrie Corbin

WGVU-TV Program Manager

MAFAK Conference

My photo...


Artist's rendering... obviously standing on the same streetcorner!

Hey, guess where I am? Give up? I'm in beautiful downtown Kalamazoo, Michigan, in room 633 of the Radisson Hotel! I spoke yesterday at the annual conference of the Michigan Association of Foster, Adoptive and Kinship Parents (MAFAK.) I presented on the topic of "Creating a Trauma-Sensitive Environment." (You won't see my name on the program in the website, since I'm substituting for my boss, Vito, whose wife underwent a planned surgery yesterday morning.) This is a condensed version of a three-hour training that Vito and I developed last fall. Here, I only had an hour and a half to present my material. Since my background is more in residential treatment, not foster or adoptive care, I had to retool some of the points I made, though I'm still talking about essentially the same type of kids and treatment needs.

But I tell ya, the time really flew by fast this afternoon. After doing a lot of thinking and prep work for this conference over the past week or so (when I wasn't focusing on CPR,) I wanted to put forth a good effort that offered real, practical support for these parents. Things were going good, we had some active exchanges between participants and myself, I was grooving along. It was almost startling when I looked at the clock and realized that I had an abundance of material that I had not even gotten to, with only fifteen minutes left! So I'll have to find a way to whittle things down a bit more, since I'll be doing another presentation again later this afternoon. One of the reasons that the time went so fast is that things got a bit emotional. I showed a short video clip called "Multiple Transitions," giving the perspective of kids who've survived abuse and the subsequent disruption of their home life, that brought tears to several sets of eyes, which then got me misted up as I listened to some of the memories that the video triggered. One woman, who was placed in foster care herself as a teen (along with several of her siblings), really made the training sink in when she offered her own validation of the message of the video based on her own experience. She's now in the process of becoming a foster mom herself, which is why she's at the conference. I felt very honored and blessed to be able to affirm her journey, and we had a nice follow-up conversation after the meeting disbanded.

Last night, I went to a reception in one of the banquet halls where I had more opportunities to interact with these unsung heroes of our society. I met and listened to the stories of people who've fostered and adopted literally dozens of children (one woman had nearly 150 different children come through her care over a period of 25 years as a foster parent - another couple announced that they had recently celebrated their 40th anniversary as foster parents!) In the presence of people with such experience, who put themselves, their homes and their families so fully into this work (better yet, this mission,) I felt a little flustered thinking that I am there to teach them, when I know they have a lot they could teach me! But I also recognize that I do have something good and new to offer them - I've done my homework and put together some good resources that I am confident will give them useful tools to better understand and connect with these vexingly difficult, traumatized children that society keeps sending our way. God bless 'em! God help us all, who take upon ourselves a small share of the responsibility to assist as best we can these overlooked outcasts of our mixed up, misguided world...

Wasteful, hateful cruelty

Here are two pictures to let you compare what was to what is. The Golden Dome of the Al Askari Shrine was blown up in Samarra, Iraq this morning, an apparent attempt to trigger a civil war in that country. I'll steer clear of the politics of all this, because I really don't want to assume much about the reasons, causes, guilty parties, etc. I just think it's really sad that a beautiful, sacred place should have to suffer such a fate. Obviously, many other buildings and, even more importantly, lives have been lost in that afflicted country, but this seems like an especially heinous crime, a tragically evocative symbol of just how much has been lost in Iraq and how much suffering the poor people living there will still have to endure before some prospect of peace and "normalcy" can even begin to seem possible.

Diversity Skits

This afternoon at work, I spent an hour or so rehearsing a quartet of short skits that I wrote (with input from a few colleagues) on the topic of Diversity. Tomorrow morning, Wedgwood will be holding a Diversity Celebration where we'll honor several people for their excellent work within our agency and local community. As part of the entertainment, we'll offer these little vignettes aimed at illustrating some of the other ways (besides racial/ethnic) that diversity can expose our biases and lead to potential conflicts or abuses in the workplace.

I have a huge regret that I am not able to be personally present at the event, since I am going to be getting trained on how to be a CPR/First Aid Instructor at that same time. That's part of my new job... So I won't even get to see how the skits come across in front of a live audience. I hope they record the event on video, but I'm not even sure if that will happen. Kind of a bummer to not be part of the production, but our rehearsal went fairly well today once we got into working with the material. I'll be the first to admit that the dialogue offered below is kind of stiff and clunky in a few spots. I've encouraged the actors to take the central point and express it in their own words - I have a lot of work to do before I could ever consider myself a playwrite! But I will offer them for your perusal. I think they are kind of funny, but I'll let you draw your own conclusions...

Ageism

Title: “Generation Gap”

Two staff (PATRICK & JEVON) in office setting. PATRICK is clearly older than JEVON, twice JEVON’s age or more. PATRICK is seated, writing in a notebook (where your script can be placed) while JEVON enters and begins talking.

JEVON: (speaking in a youthful, somewhat hyper delivery, full of slang and body language.) Man, Casey sure is trippin’ tonight! I had to get after him pretty hard to get him to handle that it was time for him to go to bed. I dunno, it’s like anything I said to him just set him off all over again. All of a sudden he’s jumpin’ up in my grill. He better check his attitude or there’s gonna be problems! Problems!

PATRICK: (adopting a “wiser than thou” tone) Hmmm. Well, after you’ve grown up a bit, son, you’ll learn more effective ways of working with the kids than just trying to boss them around. That’s OK… you’ll learn some day, even if it’s the hard way…

JEVON: Huh! What do you got to say about that, old man? Maybe I should give you some Viagra so you can get up off your butt! Man, I know how you get the guys to go to bed on time – you just bore them to sleep with your old “back in my day” stories! (Immaturely laughs at his own joke)

PATRICK: Now hold on there, son! Have some respect. I was working with kids like these back when you were still crawling around in your Huggies! You can learn a lot from an old warhorse like me, even if you’re too cocky and full of yourself to understand or admit it!

JEVON: You think! Man, you let these kids get away with so much around here, I wonder why they still keep you around. It’s like you got Alzheimers – you remember, then you forget… remember… forget!

PATRICK: All right, that’s enough. Why don’t you just hand over your keys – seems to me like we need to admit you as a respite! I tell ya, I never knew thought I’d see the day when we were hiring kids to work with our kids!

Social Justice/Political Diversity

Title: “Partisan Divide”

Scenario: Two staff (STEPHANIE and TERI) are sitting in chairs next to each other, each reading the newspaper. They don’t make eye contact with each other, but instead just stare straight at the paper or look up at the audience intermittently.

STEPH & TERI (in unison): Oh man, check this out! What an outrage! I can’t believe what these jokers are trying to pull off now! It says here…

STEPH: that leaders in Congress are questioning the President’s commitment to civil rights and accusing him of fear-mongering as he tries to keep our country safe from the threat of terrorism!

TERI: that leaders in Congress are looking to cut funding for social service programs and want to roll back the gains that have been made through affirmative action!

STEPH & TERI (in unison): You know, it amazes me that anyone can be a

STEPH: Democrat
TERI: Republican (both words spoken loudly and simultaneously)

STEPH & TERI (in unison): and still work for an agency like Wedgwood!

STEPH: “Stupid liberals!”
TERI: “Stupid conservatives!” (again loudly and simultaneously)

STEPH and TERI turn their heads and make eye contact. Then they sneer at each other and pivot in their seats with their backs turned, let out a disgusted sigh and go back to reading their papers…)

Church Affiliation

Title: “Denominational Split”

Scene: One staff (BRAD) is sitting in a chair, another (JEFF) enters and sits down.

JEFF: Have you heard the latest? Johnny says he’s a “Satanist” now!

BRAD: Oh boy. Him too? My goodness, one “goth” gets admitted into the program and now we have a bunch of imitators who think it’s cool to mess around with devil worship.

JEFF: Yeah, it is pretty weird how this came about with the guys so quickly. Just last week they were all getting into Young Life and paying attention at devos, and now everything’s different. (Pause.) You know, I was thinking, you’re Catholic! (joking tone) Why don’t you call your priest and arrange for an exorcism?! (chuckling) Have him stop on by and sprinkle some of that holy water on him! Just don’t ask me to clean up the mess afterwards! (laughing)

BRAD: (Silent, with an offended look on his face)

JEFF: Uh oh, it looks like I touched a nerve… what, are we gonna have some kind of a “cartoon controversy?” Can’t take a joke?

BRAD: (Shaking his head.) I don’t think that demonic possession is anything to make fun of. Anyway, your “frozen chosen” church probably doesn’t know the first thing about how to deal with these issues. Too concerned with looking proper and respectable!

JEFF: Aww, lighten up, man! I didn’t mean anything by it. All right, how’s this? When old holy roller Pete gets in to work the overnight, we’ll ask him to lay his hands on Johnny and baptize him in the Holy Ghost! Get him speaking in tongues, that’ll set the boy straight, at least long enough for him to settle him down so that I can talk some sense into him and tell him what it means to be a real Christian!

Sexism

Title: “Boardroom Brush-off”

Scene: Three administrators are in a meeting, two male (BRAD and JEVON) and one female (MARY.) They’re in the middle of a fairly heated discussion. BRAD is on the defensive, responding to objections to his proposal that are voiced, in turn, by JEVON and MARY.

BRAD: So, that’s the gist of my proposal. I think the board may challenge a few points here or there, but with a unified front, I think we can get them to accept the plan and move forward from here. What do you two think?

JEVON: I think you make some good points, but I still have a few reservations of my own. For instance, we need to get a firmer commitment from our funding sources to ensure that we can make up the budget deficits that got carried over from last year. You know that Walter won't not let that detail slip past him, so you better get your facts straight and be ready to deal with his objections. And frankly, I just don’t think our funding sources are reliable enough to make the kind of commitment we need from them. My recommendation is that you hold off on making this proposal for another month at least.

BRAD: Hmm, you make a strong point there. I’m going to have to give your perspective some serious thought. My proposal is already on the agenda, but I think we can reframe it so that it doesn’t look like I’m being indecisive, if I agree to go along with your recommendation. But we may just have to agree to disagree.

MARY: I’d like to comment on the points you raise here on page 2.

BRAD: Oh really now? (Patronizing tone) Let’s hear what you have to say then.

MARY: OK, along similar lines as what (JEVON) said, I think this part of your plan could be seen as over-reaching by some of the more cautious members of our board. Perhaps a more moderate budget increase or a clearer demonstration of how our line items will be re-allocated would improve the chances of board approval.

BRAD: Ah, let’s not get our undies in a bunch now! I think I know how to work my way through a board meeting! I appreciate your interest in getting involved at this level of decision-making, but trust me, the clout I’ve earned with that group will be enough to push that part of the plan through.

MARY: With all due respect, I’d like to mention that I was in conversation with one of the board members just last week, and she mentioned to me that she just didn’t see much likelihood that a bold proposal would get approval at this time.

BRAD: That’s why I’m glad that our board isn’t just a bunch of Nervous Nellies who lack the vision, or might I say, the testosterone to think big! Say… this coffee decanter is empty. Would you mind going to get a refill for us?

MARY: (Silently takes the decanter and exits.)

BRAD: (to JEVON) Wow, why does she have to be so difficult all the time? How’d you like to be married to that?! I guess we know who wears the pants in that family!


So... there you have it! I hope you all enjoyed my little excursion into the dramatic arts! I'll let you know how the CPR/First Aid training goes in tomorrow's installment of...

The PostModern AdVenTures of

PoMoXian!

Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite

This morning, I went to hear a sermon preached by Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite, president of the Chicago Theological Seminary and an advocate for a "Just Peace" perspective that opposes war as a contradiction of the message and way of Jesus. (Follow the links to get more background info.)

Her sermon was titled, "Can I Get a Witness," and it was an interesting talk. In it, she spoke of her weariness at having had to serve as a voice of resistance to the current atmosphere of war, conflict, secrecy and dissembling that permeates our culture at the leadership levels of society. She had the honor recently at testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee during the hearings for John Roberts that preceded his confirmation as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. She voiced concerns over his views on separation of church and state and privacy. While she was not in favor of his nomination, this topic was just a side note of her message. The main purpose of her talk was to remind the church of its responsibilities to be a prophetic (not merely a "progressive") voice, offering the "bottom up" view in following the biblical example offered by Jesus and Isaiah, whose words from chapters 40 and 42 provided the scriptural basis of the sermon.

It was a good message for me to hear, as I consider just how to go about incorporating my own views about social justice, non-violence, inclusive spirituality and a high respect for human rights into various projects I'm involved with, both at work and elsewhere. Though I'm not a regular attender at the church where she spoke (Plymouth Congregational UCC), I got a good dose of encouragement and her words will, I believe, stick with me as I continue to do some internal sifting and sorting, determining where I go from here as I settle into a new set of job responsibilities and the creative opportunities that they present to me and my colleagues.

Don Quixote... sort of.

Julie and I went to a high school play tonight, a production "loosely based" on Cervantes' Don Quixote, the classic 17th century literary work that most people including myself who know something about it have still never read.

I was looking forward to this production because I always enjoy increasing my knowledge of the classics without having to dedicate myself to the hours of labor involved with actually reading them. But while this play was entertaining, I'm not really sure that I learned much more than I already knew about whatever it was that Cervantes was trying to tell us.

Of course, it's a high school production, and a stage play, so much is going to be cut from the novel. This script appeared to take a lot of liberties with the original though, turning the performance largely into a vehicle for the two leads who portrayed Don Quixote and Sancho Panza to do their unique riffs on the relationship between those two characters. The guy who played Quixote, David Aboosamra, has a lanky, forlorn, rambling way about him that was put to great effect last year as he played a rather deranged and accident prone farmer in "The Egg and I." (Where my twins also had significant but smaller roles. Here's a picture of Curt - the banjo player - in one of that play's musical interludes!)



David, who happens to be playing the ukelele in the above photo, and the director's interpretation of Quixote (the character) leaned heavily on the absurd elements in the story, which provoked a lot of laughter from the audience, including myself. It was fun watching these kids do their thing - including some nicely choreographed and executed dance sequences and other performances that supported the kookiness of the lead characters with solidly emotive and engaging projections that kept most of us engaged.

It wasn't to everyone's taste though. I heard one parent of a high-school girl down the aisle from me whisper to his daughter, "I'll never get these three hours of my life back," kind of a crass thing to say, IMO, since she seemed to be enjoying herself. I think the goofier aspects of high school humor seem to trivial to him - he might have been a pastor of some sort - he was wearing a button-up shirt with an embrodered church logo above the pocket, and I earlier heard him talk about praying, Bible studies, etc. with people around him. He seemed like he was in a hurry to leave when the lights came up.

My final comments on the play are that the set with the windmills was beautifully constructed and there were plenty enough surprise elements that came up every few minutes to keep me from drifting off into the nappy slumber that I would have if I'd just been sitting at home tonight. The long day yesterday and a six-hour session of Handle With Care training, with a short night's sleep in between, drained off most of my surplus energy. But I get to sleep in tomorrow and have most of the next four days off! So I'm happy about that! I really could use a longer, actual vacation, but that's a ways off, no definite plans at this time, actually, so a long weekend will have to suffice for now.

Long Day

I'm in the midst of a fairly demanding stretch of work. I had to be in at 8 am this morning in order to prep for a three-hour Behavior Management training, then I did an interview with the new supervisor at Delta for a FT Overnight position, then off to the Delta unit itself to work an 8-hour contact shift, filling in as Shift Supervisor as well! Your basic 14-hour workday. But it's all good -we had a pretty decent night, the training went great - I had a talkative, responsive group and it feels nice to have that feeling of accomplishment, like the energy I put into all these activities is paying off in achieving some good results.

I'm not done yet - tomorrow I have to lead my first Handle With Care Introduction training in the past four or five months - I've done a few recertifications more recently, but not the long version Intro. I think it will also go just fine, but there's always a slight case of the jitters that I have to get through before launching into a longer training event.

After that, ahhh, life will be good. I will have most of the day off on both Friday and Monday, as well as the whole weekend in between - a nice and much needed breather prior to another very busy training-focused week from 2/22-25 where I'll be earning my status as a CPR Instructor and giving two presentations in Kalamazoo on Becoming Trauma-Sensitive on Friday and Saturday. But I'll have more to say about all that when we get there. Now it's time to go watch a little Olympics or something before I head off to bed in about a half-hour or so...

Valentine's Day

This has generally been an awkward holiday for Julie and I over the years, primarily because she is a professional floral designer and February 14 is always just a long, difficult and exhausting day for her (and I assume all the other workaday florists doing business across our great nation.) Which makes the idea of a night out, wining and dining and all that, seem positively unappealing to her when what she really wants is to just come home and get a foot rub.

So my (and her) natural reluctance to spend big bucks on fresh-cut flowers, which is always operative since she can get a better deal on them than I can, is even more in effect on Valentine's Day. My gifts to her in past years have focused more on the chocolates and less on the roses, but this year I decided to just break that mold a bit. I didn't run for the roses though - instead, I bought her a dozen Gerber daisys (a bright, happy, smiley flower that you see pictured above) and a clutch of greens to surround them, and arranged them myself - clumsily, in an empty mixed nut jar, but cute nonetheless. Along with a foil "I Love You" balloon. And no chocolates this year since she is doing a dietary detox routine at the moment and would rather not deal with any unnecessary temptations.

We just got home about twenty minutes ago (it's about 10:30 pm.) We did end up going out to Applebee's for dinner, with our youngest son Derek along for the ride and meal, then off to Julie's brother's farm where he spent the day fixing a leaking oil pan gasket on my Taurus. So that's a recap of my day and with that I'll respectfully wrap this up since I have a foot rub request to fulfill.

Nickelback

I just got back from working the Nickelback concert at the Van Andel Arena. In case you don't know it, Nickelback is one of the most successful contemporary rock bands working the touring circuit these days. They recently approached the pinnacle of the Billboard Hot 100 list, reaching the #2 spot for one week with their song "Photograph," which in my opinion is quite a remarkable thing in this day when rap and R&B has pretty close to a stranglehold on the top spots. Unless you are an American Idol alumni. Even pop singers like Gwen Stefani have to pay homage to Hip-Hop to get that high in the rankings. So even though Nickelback didn't make it to #1, the fact that an actual arena-rock band can make such a strong showing in the pop charts of 2005/06 signifies something to me. I'm not sure what, exactly. The song itself is not all that special to me - kind of a collection of cliches strung along to a familiar and predictable rock beat and rhythm. But it connects with the masses. That gets me interested to figure out just what is going on that sets this band apart.

So I had a chance to hang out in their vicinity for a little over an hour. In order to do so, I had to get through the sets of two opening bands, one called "Default" and the other, "Trapt." I asked Brandon the other day if he knew anything about these bands, and he made the same connection I did between "Trapt" and another group called "Staind" - bands that take their name from some kind of existential state of despair that their audience presumably can relate to, and make it sound "cool" by removing a silent vowel. Another band name that comes to mind is "Disturbed" but they are a bit older, and obviously missed their chance to market themselves as "Dysterbd" or something along that line...

Trapt has a hit song from a couple years ago that I recognized, "Headstrong" that I remember hearing on Sunday mornings when my boys and I would be out delivering papers when the twins were 15 years old and going through their "nu-metal" phase (now they have moved on to Indie Rock, which to me is a move in the right direction.) But otherwise I didn't note anything all that distinctive, though to be fair I was more focused on selling food and drinks to my customers at the concession stand. Default is a Canadian band (like Nickelback, whose lead singer Chad Kroeger, the bearded one in the photo above, also produced their latest album) who has not really broken out in the US as far as I can tell. They opened the evening.

But anyway, Nickelback was the main draw, and I was a bit surprised to see just how strong a following they appear to have developed. I really just don't know what it is that causes them to stand out all that much. They have had some popular success over the past several years with other tunes, most notably "How You Remind Me," from 2001. I have just spent a few minutes reading listener reviews of their albums on Amazon.com and it looks like what they have going in their favor is what I heard tonight - a consistent, workman-like ability to crank out songs that hit that magical spot that balances hard'n'crunchy rock riffs with radio-friendly hooks that aren't too aggressive or too wimpy either. The lyrics seem to fit into the range of topics that a broad swath of mostly white working-class fans (guys and their girlfriends) can relate to - relationships and all the ups and downs associated with them, venting of various levels of emotional angst without descending into serious emo territory. The band members are all suitably masculine in their swagger and presentation, but not so brimming with testosterone that the floor in front of the stage becomes an unbearably hazardous mosh-pit for the ladies. In short, they fit the formula that for some people at least satisfies their sense of what arena-rock is supposed to be in this day and age. They show people a pretty good time, and produce songs that give ample reason to pound the steering wheel or dashboard, depending on where one is sitting in the car when the song goes into its climactic moments and if one is sufficiently moved to engage in such behavior by hard rock music in the first place.

That, and they have a pretty kick-ass pyrotechnic show in their live performances. I mean, smoke and percussion bombs, fireworks fountains and flame jets - BIG ones that shoot way up into the light rigging some of the time. That definitely got a rise out of the crowd, 10,00 strong. The reactions of the crowd as they were walking out indicated that overall they were pretty highly satisfied so who am I to knock Nickelback? I definitely give them credit for professionalism and speaking in a language their audience relates to and appreciates. I'm still just not all that sure that I can place my finger on what makes them all that different from a lot of the other rock bands out there doing more or less the same thing that I heard from them. They aren't "excessively" corporate from what I can tell - maybe they're just today's version of older artists like Bob Seger or REO Speedwagon: middle-of-the-continent rockers who have no interest in being avant garde or global celebrities, playing for an audience of people who themselves harbor few ambitions of notoriety or idiosyncratic uniqueness themselves, but are simply content to do a decent day's work and rock out with their romantic partner and friends when the time is right, with an occasional wistful reflection or two on the meaning of it all in order to stay sufficiently grounded in the real world.

I suppose that if that's their aim, they are doing a good enough job after all.

Volunteer Fair

This morning I spent a couple hours at a local church on behalf of my employer. The church is in the middle of a "40 Days of Purpose" campaign and hosted a Volunteer Fair, giving its members a chance to learn about some local ministries and organizations that are in need of their help.

I'm not too familiar with the details of these "40 Days of Purpose" programs. They are based on Rick Warren's "Purpose Driven Life" book which is a huge phenomenon in contemporary evangelical churches. I own the book - I bought it for a dollar at a library clearance sale, but haven't read it yet. Figured I should get some familiarity with this material, much like I read "The Prayer of Jabez" several years ago, just to see what is grabbing so many peoples' attention.
But the theme of today was something to do with how church members can get involved "out there in the world." Last week, their focus was on internal church-based ministries. So I and probably twenty or more other groups had tables in the church's multi-purpose room. I was between Habitat for Humanity and next summer's "Fiesta"-themed Vacation Bible School. (Sounds like an internal ministry to me, but that's not my business, I suppose.) Also represented were Stephen Ministries, Crossway Bible Institute, some local food banks and homeless shelters and several other fine organizations who are doing good work amongst the needy in our world.

Well. I don't want to sound bitter or ungrateful, but I am not sure that the pastor's exhortations had much effect. The room was full enough (free cinammon rolls and coffee offered some easy enticements) but I did not have any interested inquiries for people wanting to mentor the young people we work with at Wedgwood. Nor was anyone interested in learning how to be a foster parent. Too bad, because I'm quite prepared and happy to talk about our mission and the needs of our kids. I did get a chance to talk with a few people who've supported us financially over the years, but they are older folks and I didn't think there was much point in trying to get them more actively involved. I also had the unexpected pleasure of seeing a couple of former co-workers who I haven't seen in ten years or so and we did a lot of catching up and reminiscing
about days gone by. So that made the event worthwhile from a strictly personal viewpoint.

But overall, though the people who hosted me were cordial and pleasant enough, I wasn't exactly impressed with the show of interest and support for local ministries. The event really just seemed like your typical after-the-service coffee hour, with a more interesting variety of visual displays but not a lot of curiousity shown by people who in all fairness are probably quite busy and fully loaded with managing their own domestic scenes. Plus I know the kids we work with are very tough - I think of us as the Marine Corps of volunteer opportunities - the few, the proud, the brave. :o) But I was able to get our brand out there for people to see and perhaps in some small, indirect way, I made a positive impact on our local community by staffing the table today.

So I don't really know what is supposed to come out of all this ""40 Days of Purpose" promotion. I hope it results in getting some people to at least question the level of complacency that they've settled into. But I can also see how it offers something close to the "illusion" of getting involved without leading to any kind of a real change or commitment. Mass-marketed change-your-life fads tend to come and go like that, you know.

Olympics

Last night was a time for sitting at home and relaxing a bit after another busy week that had me out and about four of the five evenings in addition to work responsibilities during the day. So what better to do than watch the opening ceremonies of the Winter Olympics in Turin/Torino?

I am not a huge Olympics watcher like some folks I know who generally plan their lives around these games as they roll around every couple of years, so don't expect that I'm going to have much more to say about them here. The parts of last night's ceremonies that draw my response have to do with the role that American music played in the program. I generally find the opening and closing festivities to be an interesting spectacle because the various symbols, costumes and choreography all convey messages of peace, goodwill and humanity's more benevolent traits, as filtered through the culture of the host nation. Last night was no exception to that - I enjoyed the acrobats who scampered around a big grid to eventually form the shape of a dove, for example. And it was cool to see Yoko One introducing Peter Gabriel who sang a rather down-tempo rendition of "Imagine."

But the incongruous part of the proceedings to me had to do with the background music that played while the athletes from all the nations were introduced. As those watching it know, it was nothing much different than a "Time-Life Greatest Pop Hits" collection of American Top 10 tunes from the late 70's/early 80's. At first it was strictly 75-79 era disco, then they branched out into some synth-pop from the first half of the 80's as a way of introducing variety into the program!

So I wonder what inspired this choice? Is that music really what brings the world together? I mean, I have most of those songs on my computer, so I'm not against it or offended or anything, but it just seems to me like a blunder on the part of the planners to base this procession on music that I personally find campy and slightly absurd (I mean that in a nice, fun way) and which might have been less than considerate to nations who aren't exactly warmly embracing American culture these days. It just seemed like a misguided endorsement of a musical style and cultural attitude that doesn't really "deserve" to be enshrined in Olympic history that way.

So what would I have suggested as a compromise? My own preference would have been a kind of techno-world music hybrid that used musical themes originating from the respective nations that were being introduced, woven into a 21st century electronica backwash that ties it all together. I'm sure that there is no shortage of remix artists who could have come up with a very cool program, but instead they settled for a program that any deejay in your local Yellow Pages could have put together. I'm just surprised by the lack of imagination and the presumption that Van Halen's "Jump" and the Village People's "YMCA" are bona fide "world anthems" that speak that universal language of peace, love and unity...

PoMoXian on Video!

My two-part series on "Where Have All the Protest Songs Gone?" is now complete. Last Thursday, the same night that I cleaned out my office at Wedgwood, we met at IGE (prior to me going in to work) and did a follow-up to the session I hosted in January. I watched the DVD of our meeting this morning here at home and have to say that I'm pretty pleased with the document, as plain and amateurish as it is. Basically, a digicam pointed at our group as we sat in a circle and listened to songs I played on my computer, and talked about them afterward. These videos were made for public-access TV and the one we just made will make its debut this coming Saturday (2/11/06.) I imagine that I will get some comments from people I know who will be surprised to see me talking to them on the tube as they channel-surf for lack of anything better to do. That happened in January and it was kind of fun to get their reactions.

Now that I have the DVDs, I am making it known here that I am willing to make copies for any of my friends who request one or both. I also plan to make a playlist for the next issue of Equity, the IGE newsletter that's published quarterly, for anyone who wants to know what songs and artists we featured in the program. Just leave me a comment or send me an email and I will be happy to get more information to you on this topic.

In other news, today marks the first non-admin shift that I'll work in my new Staff Development job. It won't be radically different - I'm working on the unit that I've supervised for the last dozen years - but it will be wierd because everyone, including myself, will have to adjust to my new role.

I also take some encouragement by the position adopted by a group of evangelical Christian leaders who have decided to take global warming seriously and join the effort to address this problem. They had to overcome some resistance from more established leaders like Chuck Colson, James Dobson and D. James Kennedy, who continue to prop up Bush administration and corporate/Republican resistance to the views of most scientists who have examined the data. You can read about this statement here.

Muhammad Cartoon Furor

I've been following this story about the anger and increasingly violent protests spreading throughout Muslim societies in response to a dozen or so cartoons that were published in European newspapers depicting Muhammad and other Islamic subjects in ways that offended devout Muslims. Today, the Danish Embassy in Syria went up in flames and it seems likely that the tensions won't dissolve anytime soon.

My take on all this is one of regret and even embarrassment for the lack of maturity and insight in the sectors of the Muslim community that would allow their emotions to be so easily provoked, over such a trifling excuse. I mean, driven to furious outrage because of satirical cartoons?!? I can try to understand that "their" sensitivities are very different than "ours" (or mine, at least) but the bottom line here is that the offenses were not committed by Muslims and I don't think it is legitimate for either Muslim leaders or Western governments to exert pressure on non-believers to respect taboos that don't cause deliberate harm to others.

The issue here, of course, is how "defensible" are the cartoons themselves? I've done the Google search and found most of them, and there's nothing in them that approaches the level of extreme sacrilege that I've seen directed against Jesus over the years. There's nothing explicitly graphic or obscene - they mostly link Islam to the terrorist violence that has been perpetrated in Western societies and elsewhere by self-proclaimed Muslims in recent years. The cartoons' messages may be crude and insensitive, and I don't question anyone's right to take offense if that's their reaction. But expressing that anger in death threats and rioting is unacceptable and I don't see any need or purpose in catering to the mindset that legitimizes that kind of response.

I have no problem with a formal statement of protest or even some kind of effect on economic or diplomatic relationships, if that is seen as necessary by those offended by the cartoons. But now we have frenzied mobs setting buildings on fire and to my knowledge, little exertion of authority by Islamic leaders to keep their people in check or maintain some kind of rational perspective on the fact that there are people in this world who have sharp disagreements with some of the restrictions that religions impose on their followers. This seems like a basic fact of life that any adult should be able to cope with, without losing self-control or rationality.

Since I've never spent much time seriously engaged in the study of Islam and don't feel much of a desire to immerse myself in such an endeavor, I don't feel any sense of reverence toward either the Quran or Muhammad himself. If God wants to judge me for that, or if that makes me intolerant, then I guess I will have to deal with those consequences. But to be honest, I am not very impressed by what I see the Muslim world exporting our way, culturally speaking. That in itself may explain my lack of curiousity to know more about the religion of Muhammad and my resistance toward incorporating anything resembling the kind of toxic, inflamed and over-reactive mindset that would make my life a living hell if I had to abide by such a set of constrictions.

What do others have to say about all this?

Clearing Out My Office

At this moment, it's 2:05 a.m. on Friday, Feb. 3. I'm working an overnight shift at Delta, and I'm sitting in my office. This is, strangely enough, the last shift that I'm going to work as a Home Supervisor. After tonight, the office will no longer be mine.

I picked up the shift because one of our full-time overnight staff finished up earlier this week and we couldn't find anyone to fill it. I think that it works out just fine for me to do this, since it gives me a long stretch of uninterrupted time to go through my files and sort through the stuff that's been accumulating since I moved into this space in September of 1997. (Yes, I have cleaned it up every once in awhile since then, but I'm seriously stripping the place down so that Tonia can take over this coming Monday.

Combining the melancholy task with this late hour of the night only heightens the sense of sentimentality that I feel as I pull old forms, reports and documents out of the folders in which they've sat, mostly undisturbed, for several years or longer. All the decorations are off the wall - my stackable trays are empty - a few boxes are filling up the floor space until I get ready to take them down to my car within the next couple of hours. Some of the paperwork is current - reports I will sign off on since the incidents they document happened on my watch. I'll make it a clean start with as little backlog as possible for Tonia. Certainly a better hand-off than I received when I took over the position back in 1993, where one of my very first duties was to deliver a fairly confrontational evaluation to a veteran staff of long-standing and almost venerable reputation (the issue was his frequent tardiness to shifts and a low, apparently fatigued energy level - problems that I had never observed myself but which fell to me to address in his evaluation that was two months overdue, since the old supervisor had split the scene, also leaving me numerous other loose ends to deal with.) I'm glad to be at the point of winding this job down, but I'm also pleased that Tonia and I will be able to talk things over as she establishes herself in this new role.

So what am I finding as I sift through these stacks of photocopied paper? Let me offer a few examples...

Here's a bag of contraband letters that were discovered after two girls had thoroughly trashed their bedroom a couple years ago. Professional cleaners had to be called in to make the room liveable again, and in the process, this little trove of gossipy communications came to my attention. It's interesting to read what the kids say to each other when they feel confident that the staff are not around. Well, I'll have to shred that - it's confidential you know...

Here's a letter from a girl who also instigated a lot of property damage and other drama. She got sent to Juvenile Detention for all that, and after she got there, she wrote a sad note to our team thanking us for helping her out and showing her so much love when she needed it, even though she left in rough circumstances.

An old training piece on moral and ethical decision making. Keep it.

A file of documents related to reducing or eliminating the use of seclusion when dealing with aggressive children. (The terminology this report uses is "shifting to Child-Guided Special Treatments.) Keep it. Maybe of some use in future research on reducing restraint and seclusion.

A pile of client rights complaints and the results of the subsequent investigations (a very small percentage of which were substantiated to the point where corrective action was required... I always strive to take client rights very seriously, and I believe that our team follows that lead.) Shred it - all confidential and no longer relevant.

Here's something very precious to me. A flow chart of all the people that I've supervised since I took this position. I used legal pad paper, put one month on each line of the page, and drew a vertical line down from names written across the top, indicating where each person's time in that role on the team started and stopped. I just put an end to the line that stretches out from under my name. That's that!

Examples of various level systems and point sheets that have been used in different programs over the years. Worth saving as I look to do some thinking about how we can develop more effective ways of evaluating clients' progress and giving them feedback on how they're doing.

Wow. Here's a file full of old team meeting notes. I thought I'd thrown that stuff out. Unsure of what to do with it. I have all this stuff in electronic form on my computer. I don't think I'll really take the time to read all those old announcements and rule clarifications, but at the same time, it seems kind of a shame to have this weekly chronicle of our home in hand, only to throw it out because I don't feel like finding a good long-term storage place for it. OK, I'll save them... for now.

Old tapes and CDs left behind by kids who didn't need them after they were discharged. My fantasy football trophy from 1998. A tire iron that inexplicably sat under my desk for the past, I dunno, three or four years? (No, I did not keep it there for "self-defense" purposes...)

A mechanized candy dispenser of Dilbert sitting at a computer. Push on his mouse and his head wobbles around and M&M's drop into a little hatch. I haven't had candy in that thing for years but the battery still works. A resident gave it to me as a Christmas present back in 2000 or 2001, I think.

A Polaroid of me and my former Assistant, Roxy, who now lives in North Carolina. It shows us both smiling and holding the "Employee of the Month" plaques that we earned within a few months of each other back in the summer of 2001. I like Roxy. A fun, warm, wonderful person that I still talk to every once in awhile on the phone, though it's been probably a year or so since we last spoke.

A file labelled "Memories" full of old birthday cards, Colleague Commendations, decorated daily schedules, funny notes and collages, Wedgwood pins and some of the pictures I just tonight pulled down off the walls and bulletin board around my desk.

Here's something that makes me chuckle. Our local weekly advertiser paper has a "Sidewalk Views" column where they interview people on the street to get their responses to topical questions of the day. From November, 2003, a column appeared that featured a former client of ours, who answered this question - "Are you confident Michigan's economy will improve in the next few months, and why?" - thusly: "No, because it hasn't improved yet. Everything is getting suckier. It's going to get worse, not better. The job situation sucks. It's very doubtful it will get better." Ah, today's youth! That's what comes of growing up listening to screamo and nu-metal!

...mmm, it's been a couple hours now, perhaps it's time to stop this cataloguing of administrative memorabilia and tidy things up. We'll have to start waking the girls in another hour or so and I want to have my stuff loaded out to my car before then. I may have more to say here about the job switch, in fact, I probably will. For now, I guess it's sufficient just to observe the moment and realize that a significant chapter of my professional life has just about come to a close.

I'm grateful to have gotten through it all in the condition that I'm in!

Passing the Torch

My successor as Home Supervisor of the Delta Residential Treatment Program has been named - she's my Assistant, Tonia. She's been working in that role for the past two years now and has carried a larger load of responsibilities than most Asst. Sups ever since I started the job split as a Staff Development trainer in late 2004. I'm happy for her and pleased that she is taking over the responsibilities that I've held since 1993. She's a great-hearted woman who has earned my trust and admiration and been of inestimable help to me in managing two different and demanding jobs at the same time.

I will continue to work with our team for the next few weeks or so at least, as there are a number of open positions that need to be filled. It's a unique transition process - most of the time, when people leave my job, they move over to a full-time role elsewhere and generally depart the team altogether, but in my case, I have 20 hours of "flexible time" that can be spent doing any number of different things on a week-to-week basis. Eventually I plan to use those hours working with the treatment teams in the ten other residential programs that Wedgwood operates. But for now, Delta needs my support. Our schedule has a lot of holes in it as we seek to replace an full-time overnighter, our Activity Therapist, a full-time contact staff, two open part time positions and, for starters, a new Assistant Supervisor to work with Tonia (which may start a domino effect of more openings if we hire from within our team...) These moves are not related to my own departure - each person has his or her reasons to move on to another job - but we are going through a perfect storm of staff turnover that will take the rest of February to address.

It is going to be wierd for me to separate from this position that I've held for well over a decade now, but I am happy to be at this point! I will officially relinquish the Supervisor role some time between February 6 and 13, and let me tell you, it will be a relief to have only one job and one set of assigned duties to manage. I truly love and admire the team I'm leaving behind, and take a lot of pride in the work we've done over the years, but it's my time to move on. My intentions for the future are to sharpen my focus on teaching conflict resolution, therapeutic peacemaking and helping our agency do a better job at creating our own version, as best we can, of the Beloved Community that Dr. and Mrs. King articulated and poured their hearts and souls into realizing.