On Friendships of Utility

It sounds horrible, doesn't it?  Like we're using people, hanging out with them only because they have a nice car or because they often pick up the bill for lunch. I wrote here about utility like it's a bad thing, but what if we use people for their company? Does that make it different? And is that better, on an ethical continuum, than ditching people because they're bad company?

I have people in my life whom I find irritating and infuriating, yet I also love them all to bits. From time to time sometimes remarks on a friendship I have with someone I have had occasion to despise in the past. It seems some people are more likely to completely blot people out of their lives forever, and I think this has become a trend in relationship dynamics.

One point of view rejects the popular suggestion to ditch negative Nancies in favour of surrounding yourself only with positive people because the idea fosters a prejudice against people with depression. I'd add it also is very much using people in the worst way to improve your own emotional experience of the world (or something like that) instead of seeing people as valuable in their own right (not just as they relate to you).  But I also question the suggestion that same writer makes of ditching people who are "toxic," or perhaps my issue really is with how we define toxic. Sometime people are jerks. My general path after someone does something jerk-ish is to either avoid them for a while or, more expediently, tell them off, then there's often a sheepish awkward time to wade through, and then you can hang out again. The key part is the sheepishness, the remorse, some suggestion that it wasn't good behaviour and some movement towards changing that. People who get in a cycle of jerk-apology-jerk... or just jerk-jerk-jerk... can take a hike, but I don't think they're as common as self-help articles would have us believe. I fear we're sometimes a little quick to call a minor transgression "abuse." This isn't to negate actual abuse, but the contrary: when we use the word when it's not warranted, it waters it down until it becomes meaningless. It must be used with care.

The short answer I sometimes give for why I hang with people who have wronged me in the past is that I forgive easily, but that's really bullshit. If all were so easily forgiven, I don't think the emotions would be so easily dredged up at a reminder of that one horrible thing they did so many years ago. A different short answer offered by a sometimes-infuriating friend I adore is that I'm a walking victim, a sucker for punishment. I think it's more complicated than that.  

I think it's that I recognize we all suck sometimes. All of us do. But we're also all greater than the sum of our worst bits. So it's baffling to me that some people would choose to completely write off someone, forever, for a transgression they themselves might have committed had they been in the same circumstances. I try to remember that, even though I try to ensure my decisions and actions are moral, I am embarrassingly fallible. Then I end up friends with people whose decisions I don't wholly respect, but I also don't entirely respect some of the decisions I've made either. Works in progress, we are.

Typically I waver morally due to fear or ignorance. I might get so concerned with money or safety that I make regrettable decisions. Or I don't stop to think through the ethics of a decision, like putting money in a TFSA even though I think we should be taxed on interest on extra money we've accumulated. However, fear over losing social status doesn't drive me to immoral acts as much as it seems to affect others; I'm pretty content on lower ground. And I think this fear is one that can lead to a whole lot of mean-spirited actions in attempts to maintain our place on the pecking order. This is what causes some to go down that throw-them-under-the-bus path. But all things considered, we all falter in our choices, and we'll never get on the other side of that.

What I find trickier, though, is when people are affected by none of this, but they have a strikingly "different" morality than I have. Of course, a different morality is typically perceived as an immoral way of thinking unless I can be convinced that my view is actually in error. Years ago I was about to sell a house and found out, after making a verbal promise to a buyer but before signing, that my house was worth significantly more than I had thought. It was my word vs more money. It wasn't really such a dilemma because I had made a promise, and that was enough for me. I would have been sick with guilt had I told the buyer differently. But when I told friends of the situation, I was surprised by the number (all but one) who thought I had made the wrong choice. One told me, "When money's involved, then ethics have to go out the window." I feel the exact opposite is true: that ethics needs to deploy a steely resolve when money is in the picture. The only other person on my side also has a philosophy background, which leads me to believe that affects our ability and willingness to consider issues from this stance - a way that's a little less self-serving.

More recently, my daughter had been chastised by her friend's mom for stealing pastries from the friend's house. My daughter protested that the friend had stolen them, so it wasn't her fault. I asked her one question: "Did you know your friend wasn't supposed to have them?" Since she had, and she stood to benefit from the action, then, as far as I'm concerned, she's complicit. Therefore, she should apologize even though they didn't get a chance to actually eat the treats yet. It's a hard but, I believe, vitally important lesson to learn to take responsibility when we're involved in a wrong-doing even if we're not the direct actors. But a friend thinks my daughter's not responsible at all, and that give me pause - about the friend, not the morality of the situation.

These aren't as extreme examples as trying to maintain a friendship with someone who openly, head held high, plans to vote for Harper, but it can be unnerving to watch your view of important ethical considerations so casually tossed aside. None of these are deal-breakers for me though. But should they be? Is it lacking integrity to continue fostering relationships with people we find immoral? Or is it of the highest ethical standing to turn a blind eye to other's foibles?

But back to that utility thing: there's a cost-benefit analysis that comes into play that I don't sit with comfortably. I spend time with people I find entertaining. Their moral choices could be questionable, but if they make me laugh or think or get me up dancing, then whatever. There are people out there who are far more careful with their decisions, but if they're boring, then I'm out. I will hang out with people who don't recycle or who think feminism is a waste of time or who think some people should 'go back to their own country' if they like the same movies I like. And that feels really shallow. It is really shallow. I clearly value entertainment over ethics, but I also can turn a blind eye to the nasty parts for the benefit of the other bits of people who might be generally kind even if their world view is on the narrow side.

Is it better (more ethical) to refuse to talk with people because of their stance on an issue or to tolerate the questionable ethics and refuse to give up on anyone that presents the mildest connection?

What would Aristotle say?

He'd call these relationships I've described as, technically, based on pleasure, not utility, and see them as of a slightly higher quality than utility because we appreciate the witty character of the other rather than just their pragmatic usefulness. We're still using someone for something, but it's a product of their character we're using rather than their things or abilities, so it's somewhat less transient. Permanence is everything for many of the ancient Greeks. Things that last longer are necessarily better, which is an arguable way to value friendship at the outset. Both of these conditions, pleasure or utility, are lacking because they can change over time. If my sense of humour or taste in music alters, then my friendships might fall apart. The day it hit me that catch-and-release fishing is barbaric altered one relationship dramatically, but that doesn't necessarily negate the friendship that existed prior to the change, however brief.

But, according to Aristotle, these relationships are 'incidental' because they're selfish in nature. They're about a net gain from a transaction of some sort, hence my discomfort. But is it a problem if it's a mutual using, if there's a net gain on both sides? IF someone's no longer funny because of an illness, and the friendship dissolves, does that mean it didn't exist? Is a fairweather friend still a friend? What we're supposed to be after is a friendship in which we both admire one another's values and that helps us to be more ethical than we would be otherwise. This is something I might hope for in a romantic relationship, maybe, but I can't actually imagine finding it in a variety of friendships.

"Do men love, then, the good, or what is good for them [or what seems good for them]?...To be friends, then, there must be mutually recognized as bearing goodwill and wishing well to each other" (2).... those who love for the sake of utility love for the sake of what is good for themselves, and those who love for the sake of pleasure do so for the sake of what is pleasant to themselves, and not in so far as the other is the person loved but in so far as he is useful or pleasant. And thus these friendships are only incidental; for it is not as being the man he is that the loved person is loved, but as providing some good or pleasure. Such friendships, then, are easily dissolved, if the parties do not remain like themselves; for if the one party is no longer pleasant or useful the other ceases to love him....Perfect friendship is the friendship of men who are good, and alike in virtue; for these wish well alike to each other qua good, and they are good themselves. Now those who wish well to their friends for their sake are most truly friends; for they do this by reason of own nature and not incidentally; therefore their friendship lasts as long as they are good-and goodness is an enduring thing....But it is natural that such friendships should be infrequent; for such men are rare. Further, such friendship requires time and familiarity; as the proverb says, men cannot know each other till they have 'eaten salt together'; nor can they admit each other to friendship or be friends till each has been found lovable and been trusted by each. Those who quickly show the marks of friendship to each other wish to be friends, but are not friends unless they both are lovable and know the fact; for a wish for friendship may arise quickly, but friendship does not" (3).

For a friendship to exist, we have to wish the other well, so any serious competition between two buddies could end things even if they keep hanging out as if they each actually wanted the other to get that promotion. But that's an interesting bit he says at the end of that passage: that a mutual wish for friendship is different than a friendship. According to Aristotle, if we're not alike in virtue then the company we keep are mere wishes rather than actualities.

"This kind of friendship, then, is perfect both in respect of duration and in all other respects, and in it each gets from each in all respects the same as, or something like what, he gives; which is what ought to happen between friends....Those who are friends for the sake of utility part when the advantage is at an end; for they were lovers not of each other but of profit....This bit is key to my discussion here: For the sake of pleasure or utility, then, even bad men may be friends of each other, or good men of bad, or one who is neither good nor bad may be a friend to any sort of person, but for their own sake clearly only good men can be friends; for bad men do not delight in each other unless some advantage come of the relation" (4).

But, as I suggested, this can happen in a pleasure or utility based relationship also out of sense of equity. It's not the case that friends will necessarily want to each have a better deal and run as soon as we're on the losing end. We can be ethically and equitably minded regardless of affection and equal virtue. The only thing lacking seems to be longevity. It might not go on as long as one with matching virtues. But I question the level of effort we put into friendships that aren't of this special brand or "true." When Montaigne's BFF got the plague, he sat with him day and night until he died. I would definitely do that for one of my kids, and likely for a close family member or partner, but with most friends, I might drop by to offer help, to offer a place if they're put out on the street, or offer labour to fix a shed, or offer an afternoon of company. But I wouldn't be there day and night even if I might want to be. There are closer loved-ones who would sit by the wasting body. I'm not at that level with any of my friends, and it's curious that we relegate that much more to romantic attachments now. The romance-friend hierarchy flipped in the past couple of centuries.  But I don't believe my lack of bedside sitting means the friendship doesn't exist - that it's just a wished for friendship.

"The truest friendship, then, is that of the good, as we have frequently said; for that which is without qualification good or pleasant seems to be lovable and desirable, and for each person that which is good or pleasant to him; and the good man is lovable and desirable to the good man for both these reasons...those who live together delight in each other and confer benefits on each other....Those, however, who approve of each other but do not live together seem to be well-disposed rather than actual friends. For there is nothing so characteristic of friends as living together" (5).

He paints a picture of friends who are so close they want to spend their days and nights together. I think that would be ideal - based on fond memories of living with friends in university - but I can't imagine it happening once everyone starts families. It works better if we're only talking about men, and the women and kids are cordoned off elsewhere. The best living situation I had was with a friend who called me, stuck in BC with only just enough cash for a flight home, but then nowhere to live. I offered free room and board in exchange for all the cooking, cleaning, and general upkeep of my house. He stayed almost a year until he got a job out of town. Today we still each think we got the better deal. It's only when you live together that you can start routines like Thursday night homemade fries in front of Seinfeld. They seem like nothing, but little traditions are bonding in a way we don't always notice until later. It's effortless to maintain a friendship when they're always there to talk with and eat with and argue with. But now that he's gone, I haven't seen him in years. Was that just a wished for friendship?

Aristotle's last bit of advice:

"People who are supremely happy, too, have no need of useful friends, but do need pleasant friends; for they wish to live with some one and, though they can endure for a short time what is painful, no one could put up with it continuously, nor even with the Good itself if it were painful to him; this is why they look out for friends who are pleasant. Perhaps they should look out for friends who, being pleasant, are also good, and good for them too; for so they will have all the characteristics that friends should have" (6).

Good AND good for them? That's an awful lot to ask of such a fallible lot. It makes me wonder if we've truly lost that much character over the millennia or if Aristotle's standards were always out of reach for most of us.

On Rape on Campus

Since I saw Into the Wild and started reading Krakauer, I haven't stopped. But this last one took a while to open. It's about rape on college campuses, specifically in one football-lovin' town: Missoula.

The book is readable only because the rape scenes are reported factually and "reporter-ly" without any emotional language attached to the narrative. But the descriptions are still really detailed.

"Females between sixteen and twenty-four years old face a higher risk of being sexually assaulted than any other age group. Most victims of campus rape are preyed upon when they are in their first or second year of college, usually by someone they know" (346). 

And if you have a daughter in university, like I do, you might try covering your ears and eyes and singing, "Tra-la-la, I can't hear you!" But it'll still be a problem. The women in this book sometimes were drinking at parties, but other times they were just watching a movie with an old friend. That's the creepy part about sexual assault: we can never tell who might be an offender. Ever.

Like his other books, Krakauer tells us what we all know, but he also helps us to understand the perspectives of all the people involved whether it's why people climb mountains, live in the woods alone, enlist in the army voluntarily, accept the arranged marriages of children within a religious order, or start undressing a woman who's asleep on the couch. We're helped to understand behaviours that may be totally foreign to us.

This is a frustrating book to read as we watch a guy who has confessed to a crime routinely acquitted because he's so necessary at next week's game. Some people are valued more than others. This 5-minute video really hits the nail on the head with respect to the connection between football and assault:

"Football isn't about rape. It's about violently dominating anything that stands between you and anything you want. You gotta get yourself in the mindset that you are gods! And you're entitled to this! Are they just going to lay down and give it to you? No! You've got to go out there and take it from them!"

In my class last year, early on in the spate of Jian Ghomeshi accusations, I had a student who insisted the first accuser must be lying because, had she really been assaulted, she would have immediately gone to the police to report it. I took the better part of a class trying to explain why that just isn't true. Krakauer does an excellent job explaining the psychology of trauma victims.

"...when people are raped, the experience is so traumatic that it often causes them to behave in wide variety of ways that may seem inexplicable....the fact that they didn't immediately make a break for it, or the fact that they didn't scream - none of those things necessarily mean that this was a consensual encounter" (70).

But all too often, judges and juries don't understand this reality. Women who don't cause a ruckus during the act - even if they are statue still for their own survival - are deemed liars. Women who don't call the police immediately - even if it means a second, different type of violation at the hands of the defence attorney - are called liars.

One women, sleeping in bed next to her husband and son, woke up to find their guest's fingers penetrating her vagina. But she just lay there. In court, the defence asked what she was thinking.  She said she was thinking,

"Oh my God, I hope my husband doesn't wake up....He would have killed this guy, and my four-year-old son laying next to me, his life would have been ruined, my life would have been ruined, and my husband's life would have been ruined. So my first thought was 'I hope he doesn't wake up'" (71).

Sometimes being still and silent is necessary for survival, even if it's for a more long-term survival, which can be more difficult to understand by outside observers.

It's really hard to get a conviction unless the case is very clear-cut, so some attorneys won't even try to take the case to court. It's just not expedient.

False accusations do happen, but they're relatively rare:

"...the prevalence of false allegations is between 2 percent and 10 percent; that figure was based on eight methodologically rigorous studies....These findings contradict the still widely promulgated stereotype that false rape allegations are a common occurrence....Such assertions not only undermine rational discourse but also damage individual victims of sexual violence. The stereotype that false rape allegations are a common occurrence, a widely held misconception in broad swaths of society, including among police officers, has very direct and concrete consequences. It contributes to the enormous problems of underreporting by victims of rape and sexual abuse...[and] to negative responses to victims who do report, whether by family members or by personnel within the criminal justice system....their approach to victims can easily become more akin to hostile interrogation than to fact finding. Rape is the most underreported serious crime in the nation...at least 80 percent of rapes are never disclosed to law enforcement agencies" (109-110).

But more disconcerting, Krakauer noted the disparity in the scrutiny and effort on the part of attorneys and the judicial system to determine culpability:

"Police and prosecutors generally do a pretty good job of weeding out false rape accusations to avoid charging the innocent. But cops and prosecutors are not nearly as conscientious when it comes to pursuing charges against those who are guilty. This is borne out by statistics indicating, indisputably, that the overwhelming majority of rapists get away scot-free....more than 90 percent of the time the rapist gets away with the crime" (109-110).

He also notes studies that indicate that very few men ever consider raping anyone. The number of assaults is caused directly by repeat offenders who don't get caught - the Jian Ghomeshi and Bill Cosbys of the world.

"The serial rapists hidden in plain sight among us...harbor all the usual myths and misconceptions about rape....they share this common idea that a rapist is a guy in a ski mask, wielding a knife, who drags women into the bushes. But these undetected rapists don't wear masks or wield knives or drag women into the bushes. So they had absolutely no sense of themselves as rapists and were only too happy to talk about their sexual behaviors....Additionally, we now have data showing they are more narcissistic than average. So they are caught up in their own worldview. They lack the ability to see what they do from the perspective of their victims....They exist in their own world, and in their world there is often a tremendous sense of entitlement" (118-119).

Krakauer also explores the pressure on media figures to spin these crimes in the way that bests serves the community - i.e. to make it all go away. Nothing illustrates this reality better than an episode of BoJack Horseman - but you need Netflix to see it.  It's Season 2, Episode 7, in which "Diane finds herself in hot water when she accuses a beloved personality named Hank Hippopopalous for having sexual relations with his assistants during Princess Carolyn's book promotion of BoJack's autobiography in paperback form." The media's job is to expose the truth, not to keep everyone happy, but this episode sheds light on how difficult it can be to be a journalist in the midst of an unsavoury story. The journalist in Missoula was denigrated as much as the victims were. Torturously so.

And Krakauer looks at why so many take the side of the perpetrator with a quotation from Judith Lewis Herman:

"It is morally impossible to remain neutral in this conflict. The bystander is forced to take sides. It is very tempting to take the side of the perpetrator. All the perpetrator asks is that the bystander do nothing. He appeals to the universal desire to see, hear, and speak no evil. The victim, on the contrary, asks the bystander to share the burden of pain. The victim demands action, engagement, and remembering" (189).

There's no clear reaction from a victim to prove they're a victim, and there's no clear behaviours of a rapists to tell if they're a rapist until they're caught:

"There's no profile of a rapist that you can use to say either somebody is or that somebody isn't....We all like to think that we would be able to recognize the sort of person who might be a rapist..., but the truth is, we can't....It's not uncommon...for victims to go back and forth between feeling like something really bad happened to them, and being very confused, and even trying to deny that something bad happened to them...as a way of trying to essentially tell themselves that, no, something bad didn't happen to me" (251-4). 

So women will sometimes even give their assailant a ride home afterwards. That's the power of denial. They'll blame themselves because "self-blame is much easier and feels better than living in fear" (255).

Finally, from the jacket liner:

"Krakauer's dispassionate, carefully documented account of what these women endured cuts through the abstract ideological debate about campus rape. College-age women are not raped because they are promiscuous, or drunk, or send mixed signals, or feel guilty about casual sex, or seek attention They are the victims of a terrible crime and deserving of compassion from society and fairness from a justice system that is clearly broken."

On Divorcing Well

I moderate my comments because I once got 67 comments about carpet cleaning on one post. I rarely get comments at all, so I hate to block any I do get, but an anonymous writer sent in a comment on my recent post on Krakauer's latest book. The comment had little to do with the post; it's largely just misdirected vitriol, so I thought I'd share it here for some closer scrutiny. (Sorry about the swears.)

We men must boycott marriage, and never marry. Why? Because there are ZERO benefits for men in marriage. If you get married, there is at least a 50 percent chance that your wife will divorce you, kidnap your children from you, and steal all your money in divorce. 

So, what are the alternatives to marriage?
1. Learn how to game and seduce women
2. Fuck prostitutes
3. Masturbate to porn
etc 

Did you know that it's cheaper to fuck a prostitute once a week than to maintain a wife? You will get bored of fucking your wife after the first six months of marriage but with a prostitute you can fuck a new one every time. 

There is already a MASSIVE anti-marriage campaign worldwide, with men basically giving up on marriage and refusing to get married. Here are two recent articles on it:

ABOUT THOSE ARTICLES:

This main article is from Peter Lloyd of the Daily Mail (the second article is merely reporting on the first link). Lloyd writes about a new book that suggests the falling marriage rate is all women's fault:

"Ultimately, men know there’s a good chance they’ll lose their friends, their respect, their space, their sex life, their money and — if it all goes wrong — their family,’ says Dr Helen Smith, author of Why Men Are Boycotting Marriage, Fatherhood And The American Dream." 

Lloyd discusses primarily the legal ramifications of marriage that skew everything in favour of the mom now in Britain (and elsewhere): "The Children Act of 1989 specifically declares: ‘The rule of law that a father is the natural guardian of his legitimate child is abolished.’"

And this is a real concern. It's not uncommon for challenged power structures to flip, Animal Farm style, instead of dissolving into a beautiful puddle of equity. Until recently, women were in a position to lose everything without a husband to grant them legitimate children and a home and a name, but once women found the numbers and strategies necessary to fight back, the dynamics flipped, and now child support and custody absolutely favour women.

I know this first hand. When I was splitting from my kid's dad, I sat down to look at how much I'd need to maintain my daughter's life at the same standard of living. This is what child support is supposed to be about - making sure children don't suffer during a break-up. But then I checked the Ontario child support tables, and found that I "had a right to" THREE TIMES that amount, which amounted to almost 45% of his take home pay. So I showed him the tables, asked for a third of the suggested amount, and we did it all without lawyers or courthouses. I'm all for primary caregivers getting support, but I question an amount that leaves the secondary caregiver struggling to get by.

And I know some women might get a little greedy when they see the dollar signs, and, possibly, when they have a lawyer that suggests they should get as much as they can to invest for the child's future. It's asking a lot of people to see what they could have and hope they choose to take less. In fact, if we could manage that at all, we wouldn't be in the dire straights we're in environmentally.

I've been through this twice. The first time round, a rookie, I immediately went to a lawyer who aggressively tried to convince me to get back-pay from the moment my oldest was born - amounting to $20,000.  I knew that a lump sum payment like that would set my ex back significantly, and I declined. But I had to be firm on that. My lawyer was ready to fight for things I didn't want. I can imagine a less anti-materialistic person having a hard time refusing to get into that battle.

I'm not sure how prevalent it is for women to go for the gold. I know it happens. But what's interesting to me is how strong that stereotype is. Even though I took only what I really needed and not a penny more in order to work towards an equitable solution for the best of the kids, both exes started down the road of common lines from these types of arguments.  It took a while to erode the stereotypes enough for them to remember what I'm actually like:

I'd stop their random drop-in visits, and get the standard accusation: "You're trying to keep the kids from me!" and I'd respond with "Not at all - let's arrange another day each week at your place." And that extra day would inevitably just fall away as they realized they didn't actually want to take them more than half the time. Restrictions can be hard to live with, so a sense of freedom can help people see what actually works best.

They'd want to buy something they couldn't afford and accuse me of being in it for the money, but a quick look at my expenses, how frugally I live, and how much I could have asked for, eventually ended those random attacks. I can't afford travelling through Europe either.

It's to a point that it can be hard to be heard above the cacophony of stereotypes around broken homes: conniving moms and deadbeat dads or disney dads. I wasn't ready for it the first time round, and it took me by surprise to be automatically slated into the bad guy role, but when I heard the same words in round two, which was a very different scenario, I knew it was a bigger cultural issue and not something I was provoking. The role models of how to make this work amiably are few and far between.


BACK TO ANON'S DIATRIBE: 

First of all, the divorce rate has actually gone down significantly. It peaked at 50% shortly after becoming easier to get, but it's not still up there. But it is true that marriage is in decline. I've never actually married myself, not for the reasons Anon suggests - all those prostitutes! - but mainly because I don't think we can actually vow to love anyone for any amount of time, much less to death. I touch a bit on other thoughts here.

But it's clear from that portion of Anon's comment that he - I'm going to go right ahead and assume it's a 'he' - really sees marriage as all about sex, even about money for sex no matter how you slice it. I find this so weird in this day and age when casual sex outside of marriage is so much more acceptable. First of all, as I explain here, there's nothing that states that sex has to be part of a marriage. It's just part of what might happen. But, that being said, some studies show that sex actually gets better after marriage. Being with one person for a while can open up new adventures that don't often happen on the first try - even with a skilled professional. But there are other things partnering up can offer: an extra set of hands to help around the house, someone to actually raise children with jointly, and maybe even at chance at some company and, if it's not asking too much, support when you need a kind word or pat on the back. Yes these things can be had outside of a marriage too, but many people find them key benefits to their marriage. Whatever works.


BUT HE HAS EVEN MORE TO SAY!

Anon goes on to explain that the problem isn't just about marriage, but about - wait for it - feminism:

Now, there are THREE main ways we can destroy feminism forever and take women off the massive pedestal they are on. We must fund and promote the following three technologies: 

1. Virtual reality sex programs,   2. Artificial wombs,   3. Sex Robots

Once these three technologies are in place, women will no longer have any power in society. After all, why would you waste time chasing after fat women in real life when you can fuck hot supermodels in virtual reality or fuck a female sex robot? And since women's main power comes from their reproduction capacity, if we REMOVE that capacity from women through the technology of artificial wombs, then women will have ZERO power left in society and thus feminism is finished forever.

THIS is the solution, gentlemen! Now we must do our part and spread the above message to as many men as possible so that we can raise the consciousness of men worldwide. I am the guy who created the famous Boycott American Women blog, which reached around 40 million people worldwide through the internet campaign I created. Therefore I know what I am talking about.

In summary:

Do not ever get married. Simply seduce and bang women, or fuck prostitutes, and help promote the above three technologies, and we will DESTROY FEMINISM FOREVER! Thank you!

If you still have doubts about WHY you should not get married, I strongly recommend you to read the following article.

Apparently, there's a belief out there that the power feminists have comes entirely from the hold we have over men as the only means to satisfy their need for sex and children. With robots to provide these services, women would lose all their hard-won gains.

It makes me wish I could write science-fiction; I'd like to see what Robert Sawyer could do with that initial premise. I picture some men spending all their money on sex machines, the way they currently might with prostitutes, and then the rest of the world just carrying on, falling in love and marrying and having babies the old-fashioned way. It might put flesh-and-blood prostitutes out of work, but there coud be openings in other fields now that men are so busy with their robots and their "iWomb" children. Would child-care become an entirely male centred activity? If so, then it's just a flipped version of the 50s, with the men home with the kids and the sex toys, and the women freed up from their mothering and sexual duties to really get powerful.

Careful what you wish for!


BUT... ONE MORE THING:

It's hard when you've been destroyed by someone close to you. It's hard when you started at square one and are now twenty paces behind in the game. That really sucks. Absolutely.

It's especially hard when your expectations of relationships don't come close to matching the real world. You know that real world, where women are more than just jizz buckets who make sandwiches; they're actually people worthy of the same respect given to men. Some women are jerks, of course they are, and so are some men. That's another part of reality that can be hard to get used to. If you come to a relationship expecting a housekeeper with benefits, then I can understand your disappointment. But it's that expectation that need to shift, not the services granted by the women encountered. That's a difficult journey to begin, but I know it's possible to get there.  This guy does a great job of explaining it all:



It can feel really good to find a scapegoat for all that pain and suffering, but this is when we have to be so, so careful about what we attack next. There's a built in reaction in all mammals: the pain-aggression response. When we feel pain, we'll attack the first thing we see. Ever stub your toe then yell at your friend for something completely unrelated? It makes sense if you're in the jungle to immediately attack when pain hits, but it makes far less sense in our day-to-day lives. I believe we have big enough brains to override this instinct - most of the time.

Here's the thing: your pain is not the fault of feminists. It's got precious little to do with the movement that helped to get women up to the same legal status as men. And attacking feminists just gets you written off as a nut-job instead of really listened to, and then nothing can change.

Stereotypes are deadly.

I work to remember this myself: When another kid gets killed by police I take a minute to remind myself of all the awesome cops there are out there who are risking their lives to keep us safe. If we start assigning the behaviours of a few bad apples to the entire group, then we'll just have so many more to hate and so few allies to work towards a better way to live and love together. We can't take sides in a ridiculous war. The stakes are way too high right now. We work together as fellow citizens of this wounded planet, or we all die trying.


ETA: This link on sex with robots:

"But for all our creativity, are we so unimaginative that we can’t conceive of any other way to interact with sentient beings besides domination? The human ability to designate subhumans (in this case, robots) represents the worst in our species’ capacity; if men by and large don’t treat women well, gynoids won’t help any more than owning slaves has made men less likely to abuse their wives. We cannot improve as a society or a culture through replication."

One Neat Trick to Lose Weight

I just lost 10 pounds without even trying!!

So I was ready to give away some clothes to charity because it was time to resign myself to my middle-age body. I had to accept that I wasn't going to fit into these clothes ever again.  Then I tried them on one last time, and THEY FIT!

It's a miracle!

And, even better, this radical new program requires absolutely no change to your regular activities. You too can drop the pounds WITHOUT EXERCISE!!

(But you should still more around some because it's good for you.)

You just have to cut out this one food from your diet - JUST ONE FOOD ITEM!! And I feel as energetic as ever.

I know you're just dying to find out my secret. And I'll tell you for FREE!

What is this one neat trick??

Stop eating meat.

SOOO EASY!!

I stopped eating meat this spring after watching a presentation by one of my students on factory farms. It was nothing I didn't already know, but hearing it all again was the tipping point for me.  That coupled with Chris Hedges' insightful articles on why he became a vegetarian.

Because it's not just about the suffering animals in cramped quarters never seeing the light of day, and, more to the point, it's not just about maintaining my girlish figure:

"By eating meat and dairy products we aid and abet a system that is perhaps the primary cause of global warming and is pumping toxins and poisons into our bodies and the rest of the ecosystem. Animal agriculture sends more greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere than worldwide transportation. The waste and flatulence from livestock are responsible for creating at least 32,000 million tons of carbon dioxide per year, or 51 percent of all worldwide greenhouse gas emissions. Livestock causes 65 percent of all emissions of anthropogenic nitrous oxide, a greenhouse gas 296 times more destructive than carbon dioxide. Crops raised to feed livestock consume 56 percent of the water used in the United States. Seventy percent of the crops we grow in the U.S. are fed to animals. Eighty percent of the world’s soy crop is fed to animals. It is a flagrant waste of precious and diminishing resources. It takes 1,000 gallons of water to produce one gallon of milk."

 We can have more clean water and food for everyone and fewer GHG in our atmosphere and fewer toxins in our bodies, all by just changing our diet just a little bit.

What do you have to lose, except your waistline?

On Anger

Anger may be defined as an impulse, accompanied by pain, to a conspicuous revenge for a conspicuous slight directed without justification towards what concerns oneself or towards what concerns one's friends. If this is a proper definition of anger, it must always be felt towards some particular individual, e.g. Cleon, and not "man" in general. It must be felt because the other has done or intended to do something to him or one of his friends. It must always be attended by a certain pleasure -- that which arises from the expectation of revenge. - Aristotle

I'm just trying to figure out some things about anger here, so this will be long and rambling.

Aristotle wrote Rhetoric to teach the art of persuasion. The key to convincing others of your position is arousing emotions in them because emotions have the power to modify people's judgments to the point that we can persuade people to hate or desire that which was previously neutral. We're affected by this principle whenever we suddenly want something we've never considered after seeing an ad, or when we suddenly hate someone after hearing some gossip. He didn't want to get people to rise to action, but merely to be persuaded to agree with a position being offered. He was a very different sort than Socrates on that front. As influential as he was, some of us still think it's better to persuade with rational argumentation. Better? Maybe, in ethical terms at least, but effective? Not so much. Aristotle takes this one hands down. Lots of very rational discourse on environmental issues is doing squat to persuade the masses.

But my interest here is in that one statement: "It must always be felt towards some particular individual." Proper anger, useful anger, isn't tossed about in all directions. It's focused on someone specific who slighted you without justification. It appears we often do anger wrong.

A few posts back I mentioned the pain-aggression response - otherwise known as pain-induced aggression. When we feel pain, we attack. It's a very primitive instinct common to all mammals. Way back when, in a university psych class, we were shown a video of a raccoon and rat inside a cage together. The raccoon had a good 3-4 times the weight of the rat, easily, but the two prisoners just sniffed around largely ignoring each other. Then an experimenter gave the rat an electric shock, and it lunged at the raccoon's throat, attacking it violently. The video cut off before we saw the aftermath of the battle though, so we don't know who won.

the #1 endangered big cat

But that video stayed with me.

And, like Aristotle says, it's not just our own pain that causes anger. Because of mirror neurons, we feel pain when we see someone else experience pain - even people we've never met, or lions, or, less commonly, the many species going extinct because of our frivolousness. It pains us to see others harmed without justification, and that makes us angry. But we don't always get angry at the instigator of the pain the way Aristotle hopes we will.

This entire line of consideration was planted years ago, but it sprouted when some trolls visited here, and grew when Amanda Marcotte wrote an article on why men are so angry with women.  She discussed the recently viral study that shows a strong correlation between how well men succeed at video games and how much vitriol they spew at women: losers are haters. But she takes the researchers to task for their analysis of the situation wrapped in terms of evolutionary sexual advantage. Instead, she thinks that angry reaction has more to do with the pain caused by losing and the fact that women are an easy target:

"...some people who are feeling bad about themselves try to regain a sense of mastery by picking on someone they think is down the social pecking order from them. In other words, these guys are bullies. They pick on women not because of some elaborate hardwired mating game, but because men are socialized to think women are weaker and somehow inferior to men.... They pick on women for the same reason kids at school like to bully the nerdy kid or the fat kid or the gay kid: To feel bigger and better than someone else, to get that rush of power over someone else, to kill a perceived weakness inside of them, to trick other people into thinking they're big and tough.... 

People are going to feel low sometimes and are going to want a quick fix to feel powerful. What we need, as a society, is to discourage men from chasing that quick fix by picking on women in this way. Sure, maybe teach better coping mechanisms--get some therapy, learn a hobby, get some exercise--but more importantly, stop seeing women as ciphers that exist for them to dump on. Learn to see women as equals and people who, like men, are worthy of respect."

If that raccoon and rat also had a mouse in their cage, then I think it likely that the shocked rat would have taken on the easier prey, but both are clearly easier than the experimenter who's outside the cage free to provoke others at will. We feel pain and we attack, not what caused the pain, but whatever's easy. Whatever's convenient. Sometimes what causes our pain is impossible to attack. The person is too powerful for us or too elusive. Of course it would be best to attack the person who caused the harm in order to actually try to resolve the situation (assuming, as Aristotle does, that revenge can be necessary), but it's easiest to attack whomever's close at hand and unable to retaliate effectively.

So if that's the issue, then Marcotte's solution "learn to see women as equals" is unhelpful regardless its accuracy. The solution has to involve specifically making sure the unwitting victims are able to retaliate effectively (through some online means of finding perpetrators and holding them responsible for their words) AND finding ways for the first victims, the shocked rats, to resolve problems with the original aggressor or the perception of original harm. That "original aggressor" might just be some woman who said "no" to a date, so we do need to attack the perspective that is creating all that pain. Attacking a person is so much easier than attacking an ideology, so this will be a hard slog.

Hedges talks about this male rage in Empire of Illusion, in an interview with a male porn star who explained,

"My whole reason for being in the industry is to satisfy the desire of the men in the world who basically don't much care for women and want to see the men in my industry getting even with the women they couldn't have when they were growing up....We're getting even for their lost dreams....All I know is that large segments around the world like to watch young girls being tortured."

Hedges links the anger to the pain of rejection - not just actual rejection, but also the thought of being rejected by women who might say 'no' to them.

This is our whole mindset in a consumerist society. We are led to believe that, if we work hard, we should be able to have whatever we want. I can be a great athlete if I try hard enough - except I couldn't hit the side of a barn with a beach ball. I can buy a house without saving up for a down payment - except then I'll have insurmountable debt. I should be able to have whatever I see, just because I want it, without any negative consequences, dammit!! The career, the house, and the wife and kids. It's our birthright.

I wrote about the problems with that attitude a couple years ago. It's a bugger. It's invasive, and it's making us miserable.

Another peg in this board is that sharing anger helps it dissipate. I know if I'm in a snit, and I get mad at anyone for anything, I feel much better immediately - better enough to apologize profusely for my outburst. It's as if I've given the anger away to whomever I yelled at. I know how good this feels, but I try to prevent it, and it can be prevented. Ranting about the enraging situation to a supportive friend or the interwebs can do wonders for diminishing that build up of rage, even when the trigger is still there *coughHarpercough*.  We can't always immediately stop what's causing the pain, so we create support groups to help us deal with it so we don't inadvertently lash out at our loved ones nearby.

But that's exactly what some really angry men have done online, sort of. They've found each other. But instead of dissipating their anger through ranting, they've exacerbated it for one another. And instead of targeting the real cause of the pain in their lives - feeling crappy because of a losing streak on a game or a bad relationship - they verbally attack random women they've never met and ask other men to spread the word about them. To see how warp this is, an analogy would be an anti-Harper site with people suggesting we DESTROY ALL CONSERVATIVES, and posting this message on random con blogs everywhere. It's different than attack ads because the message doesn't question the policies or the person, but instead implies a straight route to a violent end to the actual existence of the people within the targeted group, or at least a silencing of them through a terror campaign. A lot of people are really, really upset with what's happened politically in the last few years, but there aren't many who wish actual harm to come to specific conservatives. We're not threatening them with a bombardment of heinous descriptions of sexual assaults.

That's a different level of anger that's scary and, it feels, growing exponentially.

From Maricotte's explanation, clearly it's not just about pain. It's about fear. Pain just tells us that there's something nearby that we should be afraid of, something that needs to be taken down. So we react aggressively until we feel safe again. We react aggressively when in pain, but the pain is often due to a perception that causes us to be afraid.

So why are some men so afraid?

Sometimes fear is from feeling like we have no say in anything. Being scared and trapped, without any means of controlling the situation, might necessitate aggressive action. But when we're not actually caged, we have to see that we're not as trapped as we think.

What's worked for me in my encounters with angry people is to give them control over the situation to alleviate their fears enough to find common ground and a viable solution. Freaking out because you don't want to do that assignment (likely because you're struggling)? Then feel free to choose another way you can show you understand the ideas. Upset because you don't have the kids tonight and you've got nothing else to do? How about you choose the nights you'd prefer them. It's not enough to give an illusion of control - like some politicians do. People feeling fearful have to be allowed to call the shots - but usually just until they feel more stabilized. It can be surprisingly effective at immediately alleviating rage.

Except we don't really have all that much control in the first place. It would work better if we could just let go of that need to run the show. We can do everything in our power to head towards a goal and still not make it. Shit happens. And so much is outside of our directly influence.

What's worked for me when I'm angry, is to do a quick 'stop and think' about what I'm afraid of.  Typically I start pitching a fit if I'm in a hurry - I'm afraid of being late, except that I'm never actually late for anything, and if I were, I could survive the inconvenience. A quick reminder of that can go a long way.

Except, anger actually feels good. It definitely feels much better than fear, but it can even feel much better than contentment. It's exciting and energizing. Sometimes people work hard to keep it going in order to keep up that rush of adrenaline. It can be hard to give that up - hard to see the more permanent rewards of stable relationships and world peace over the immediate reward of having power over others.

So why are they scared, scared and in pain enough to cause a crazy kind of anger that's only relieved by terrorizing women online?

If they don't get that girl, or win that game, or succeed at life, then they don't measure up. To be a man means to WIN, which is an impossible definition to live up to. Even men who have made it in many areas feel they're still not up to par. How could it not inspire some - if not many - to feel upset and, subsequently, very angry with the world? And the reality of our legal system right now is that women online are very easy targets for attack. The law has not yet caught up to technology, but it's also the case that descriptions of rape and torture cause pain in a way that's deeper than descriptions of unadorned murder threats. They don't have to actually carry out the threat to have an effect. This is a power too easily won, it might be hard to resist, the anger too satisfactorily relieved.

Okay, I'm no MRA apologist, so bear with me here.

When women have body image issues, and we understand that one root cause is the media that plants false expectations of reality in the culture's minds, we don't take it out on the women starving themselves (ok, some people do). The empathetic among us take it out on the media portrays: all the photoshopping and the very narrow version of beauty we see everywhere we look.

But when men have anger issues, and we understand that one root cause is the media that plants false expectations of reality in the culture's minds, we completely take it out on the men. I think we need to be more angry with the media portrays: all the storylines that have men walking away from an explosion unscathed (literally or metaphorically), and the very narrow version of masculinity we see everywhere we look that offers women as trophies for success.

Yup, women get hit from both side - unable to live up to the beauty standards of the day AND, if they do, being relegated to trophy status.

And yes, those men need to grow up and rise above those unrealistic portrayals of men everywhere, but would we ever say women need to just stop being affected by the media?  I mean, it's a great idea in theory, but it's hard to expect people to be completely untainted by all persuasive ideology surrounding us. One significant difference between the two is body image issue may cause self-harm, but aggression might harm others, and there needs to be some expectation of responsibility taken for any harm that's caused by our behaviour. Absolutely. But as much as we rally around changing the norms for women, we must rally around changing the norms for men. Saying "he's just a bully" is far less effective than saying "he's been too affected by the dominant norms portrayed in media." His behaviour is bullying, but that's not who he is, necessarily, it's how's he's reacting to the cognitive dissonance perpetuated from seeing the world's expectations of him compared to his own unfulfilled reality.

We have much more complex brains than common rats, so we can override our basic instincts. We need to get people to 'stop and think' and recognize the bullshit presented to them at every turn. And we also need to put more out there that challenges the crap we're ALL swimming in.

Something like that.   ETA:

 

Is Prostitution Necessarily Exploitative?

Bill C-36, which passed into law almost a year ago, begins like this:

"Whereas the Parliament of Canada has grave concerns about the exploitation that is inherent in prostitution and the risks of violence posed to those who engage in it...recognizes the social harm caused by the objectification of the human body and the commodification of sexual activity...it is important to protect human dignity and the equality of all Canadians by discouraging prostitution..."

The new law criminalizes buying sex, advertising, or otherwise benefiting from the sex trade (minimum cash fines and up to a maximum of five years in jail - ten for pimping), but it doesn't criminalize selling sex if only the sex worker benefits. It's theoretically a move to protect sex workers, except it limits their ability to advertise without walking the streets, and it limits their ability to discuss services in a public place. It took out restrictions for running bawdy houses, but it can charge men as they enter or leave.

But is prostitution necessarily exploitative?

Marlena Evans has an interesting piece at The Toast about working as a prostitute in order to pay her way through university. I'll look at the issues from the position of the prostitutes and the clients separately. I'm assuming it's a given that trafficking and pimping are obviously heinous acts that should be shut down by all means possible, but it's the grey areas that need a second look. And I'm not touching the potential for infidelity involved. Lots of things make it easier to cheat but aren't illegal. My question is: Is it necessarily exploitative or harmful to society if some people offer sex in exchange for money?


The Prostitutes: Is sex work necessary for women to survive, and is it necessarily harmful?

Evans presents her own case as proof that prostitution isn't necessarily exploitative, or at least, no more exploitative than a standard minimum wage job. And higher wages means she can work fewer hours.

She undermines the stereotype of prostitutes as struggling to feed their children or a drug-addiction. She's doing it to advance herself at school, a reason that's seen by her clients somehow as selfish.

"...people laugh about student poverty — they joke about cavities and scurvy as though one’s early twenties are merely a dry run for real life and one cannot actually starve to death."

She explains how working in the sex trade is significantly better than working in fast food.  I've had many students over the years share tales of working for exploitative managers that break ESA laws openly relating how unlikely it is that any kid will risk even a crappy job to complain - because the jobs are all crappy.

"If I got sick too often working at the fast food place, I had to provide a doctor’s note. I suffered abuse from customers who lumped me in with the automated machines. My gifts and talents were utterly squandered as I stood, sometimes for hours at a time, staring at the door, waiting for someone to come in and put me to use, knowing that if I got caught reading or writing or even listening to music I would be reprimanded. All of this and I wasn’t making enough money to pay rent and utilities in the same month."

Objectification and degradation anyone? We have a workforce of wasted talents following corporate-driven orders to behave in specific ways during their shifts (and sometimes beyond) for less than a living wage. We have many university students - the best and the brightest - who have to work 20-hours/week to pay rent and tuition even though it affects their grades and any ability to reach their potential. These are real problems in our country. I'm all for getting rid of exploitation, but it's a red herring to suggest it's just a problem in one type of business.

Some argue that a guaranteed minimum income will reduce society to a bunch of layabouts squandering their talents, but Evan's example shows quite the opposite. Some people are currently being held back from honing their talents because of their economic situation, so a guaranteed income would increase their ability to add to the greatness of our people. One Canadian study found this financial plan increased health and emotional well-being, and that the only people who quit their jobs were new moms and students, arguably the people with the greatest potential to benefit society if allowed to focus their talents without fear of economic reprisal.

Evans also gets at a different means of exploitation:

"I’ve been assaulted by countless men. By a man who was a client? Only once."

We have a vision of sex workers as throwaway women allowed to or willing to or coerced into bearing the brunt of assault, which somehow acts to keep the rest of us safe. But considering sex work as the one place that exploits is an illusion. Sexual harassment and assault is still a problem in and out of many fields of work. There are worse jobs women can do that nobody questions. Sexual oppression is in the fabric of our society. I'm not convinced the existence of the voluntary sex trade, as Evans describes it, increases that reality.

ETA: By way of contrast, see Hedges interview with Rachel Moran who calls prostitution "being raped for a living." Her experience isn't of voluntary sex work however, and I believe, as Evans suggests, that "voluntary sex work" is not an oxymoron. I believe it's condescending to suggest that all sex work is necessarily coerced even if prostitutes believe they've made a free choice. To honour people's different experiences, to believe women, means believing that they have the ability to distinguish a free choice from coercion. It's insulting to portray women as unwitting victims when they themselves feel empowered to choose sex work over fast food. Moran argues, “The nature of sex is mutuality, And where you don’t have mutuality, you have sexual abuse.” I'm not sure what "mutuality" means, but perhaps I'll dissect that quote another day.


The Clients: Will prostitution always be a reality, and is that necessarily a bad thing?

With prostitution available, people (predominantly men) can get a physical and emotional connection otherwise lacking in their lives. Many people are unable to find a mate or any physical contact at all with random strangers. They shouldn't have to live without any human connection because they're deemed less desirable by those in close proximity. This is an argument that many people can accept, especially after seeing The Sessions.

But some people seek out a prostitute for the lack of constraints this type of relationship has on their lives. They want to do something beyond the boundaries of a monogamous relationships: to have a variety of partners or acts available, to avoid any emotional responsibility, or even just to avoid having to clean themselves up a bit. When Hugh Grant was with Elizabeth Hurley and got caught with a significantly less beautiful prostitute, people speculated that Hurley wouldn't "go downtown." The infidelity aside, what makes it wrong to seek out sexual release in a specific way without courtship and commitment?

It seems we can accept the need some men have for the sex trade only if all other avenues have been exhausted. It should be a last resort for people in need, not a first choice for guys who like some convenience, variety, or just don't want to put down the video controller long enough to develop behaviours conducive to dating. But is this just a puritanical belief or a valid ethical position? Is this simple, easy sex option harmful to society in general?

A couple years ago, Wente wrote an article suggesting that men won't grow up and fulfill their potential if they don't have to work for sex. I'd completely write that off except that famed psychologist  Zimbardo furthers a similar thesis. The easy availability of sex today might prevent some men from rising to the challenge of getting a date, and, some argue, that challenge is what brings men to live up to their potential thus furthering society. But I'm not convinced that's a problem. I'm going on an assumption that most men who would only improve themselves for the reward of a stable sex life a relationship might offer are not necessarily the kind of men who are on the verge of curing cancer. I don't think it's the case that we will lose half the potential of the world if men can get laid easily. I agree that this focus might be a concern for some boys, but I don't agree with Wente and Zimbardo that it should be a concern for society.

Zimbardo laments the demise of boys, that their test scores and admittance to high-ranking schools is lower than girls now. That doesn't necessarily affect society if the strongest students are still working hard, which I imagine they are. From what I've seen, when students are exceptional, they're driven by the rewards of personal efficacy in their field - of being able to finally solve that problem. Accolades and external rewards are secondary. They don't need stickers to keep working as children or a woman's civilizing touch to keep them productive citizens as adults. From that it might follow that in schools today with fewer males entering, all things being equal (which they're not), we'd see a pretty even number of men and women getting the top marks. If it's only lower down the honour roll that will see an influx of more feminine names, then we're unlikely to suffer a loss of ingenuity as predicted. I suggest that the biggest impact easy access to sex might have in society is a lack of available partners for hetero women, but perhaps it's an effective means to separate the wheat from the chaff for them in the dating pool.

If one goal in our competitive society is for workers to be as productive as possible, on-call to answer e-mails 24/7, then having uncomplicated sex lives can foster this productive work habit. I don't think that type of life is necessarily most conducive to happiness or well-being, but if it works for some, then who benefits by making it illegal?

On Childhood Angst and Existentialism

Can children be existentialists? What I'm asking isn't so much whether or not it's possible, but should we allow it? 

If I dare to claim to define some central ideas here, the part about living authentically and embracing the freedom that comes with taking responsibility for all our choices with no excuses, that side of it is, I believe, pretty useful for everyone. But what about the darker edges of the philosophy? Life is objectively meaningless, and, since being unceremoniously dropped here, we're each of us alone in our quest to find meaning for ourselves. Things don't all work out in the end somehow; wonderful people can suffer many tragedies, one right after another. Nobody's controlling the game to make sure the good are justly rewarded. It's all a crapshoot.... And then you die. And, according to some, getting your head around the finality of our existence is key to the authentic life.

Is that too harsh for the little ones?

At what age is it acceptable to have conversations with children about this topic? What if your children bring up a sense of dread and angst at the possibility of their own demise. Is it better to acknowledge death, foster illusions of permanence, or deflect the issue entirely? Which will have the least detrimental effect?

A friend's daughter is suffering some anxiety; she's a worrier. Maybe it's because she has a gene for rumination. Or maybe she's a typical bright, creative kid.  One study, albeit with a very small sample size, found a link between intelligence and anxiety.

"Those with anxiety disorder tended to have higher IQ scores than healthy people, as well as higher levels of activity in regions of the brain that aid in communication between parts of the brain. These regions are thought to have contributed to the evolutionary success of humans. . . . High levels of anxiety can be disabling, and patients' worries are often irrational. But every so often there's a wild-card danger. Then, that excessive worry becomes highly adaptive. People who act on the signals of that wild-card danger are likely to preserve their lives and the lives of their offspring." 

But another study with an enormous sample size found a strong link between creativity and mental illness:

They found that people working in creative fields, including dancers, photographers and authors, were 8% more likely to live with bipolar disorder. Writers were a staggering 121% more likely to suffer from the condition, and nearly 50% more likely to commit suicide than the general population. . . . Earlier studies on families have suggested that there could be an inherited trait that gives rise to both creativity and mental illness.*

It can be weirdly comforting to know that anxiety has links to positive traits, but more important than understanding why it starts, is to figure out what to do now. How do we help our children when they worry they'll run out of food or get hit by a meteorite or get hit by lightening or get conscripted into a war or get abducted on the way home from school? We feel helpless. We are helpless. The reality is we can't guarantee our children's security. We do our best to try, but there are no guarantees we'll be successful. Should we pretend there are? How much control can we really have over this - over their security and over their sense of security? It can help to believe we can fix everything for our kids, but I wonder if it's healthier to recognize how often we can't.

We really like to find patterns in the world, connections that make it all seem predictable. If everything works through a rational cause and effect system, then we can have a measure of control over the outcome. If we can observe the effects of different actions enough to see where the connections are, then we can behave in a way to provoke a specific outcome. But however we might look back at a sequence of events and connect the dots to try to understand how we got here, sorry to say, that only works in hindsight. Our lives are largely unpredictable. We live with a comforting illusion that we can control events, but then random acts steer us in a different direction.

Things are generally predictable, but not specifically, and that trips people up. Like Mlodinow explains in one of my favourite books, people are like molecules. Heat them up, and we can safely predict they'll all spread out, but we can't accurately predict the trajectory of any individual molecule. So we know that, generally, a university degree leads to a better job, but we can't know if your university degree will get you anywhere. This can be a little daunting, so we seek out other factors that caused the unexpected effect. We fight hard to grasp at an illusion of control over our lives, but, for better or worse, we encounter the absurdity of the the world. But if we can accept that some things just are and can't be controlled or fixed or prevented, it can actually make it easier to live through the random events that mark human existence. 

I suggested to this friend that acknowledging death is the best course over pretending we can guarantee a long life or ignoring the heart of the concerns. He responded, "I'm not going to tell my 8-year-old that we're all going to die." And coming from that angle, my suggestion sounds crazy. And yet, after some time to consider the situation, I maintain my position because doesn't she already know that to be the case?

I asked my 11-year-old what she thinks about the idea of talking to kids about death and what she thinks about kids having lots of anxiety these days.  She said,

"I think kids should know the truth instead of thinking that the whole world is a perfect place. Because it's not. We've got a lot of places that have a lot of problems right now. I worry about stuff that's going to happen, but I worry about it too soon."

I think she's hit on something important about worry - that it's often a concern when it's a matter of inappropriate timing. It makes more sense when it's right in front of us and very likely than when it's further away or less likely. Anxiety can give us an adrenaline rush that helps us stay up late to hit a deadline when we need it, but it's fruitless when it's too far in advance.

My concern here with an avoidance of existentialist thinking is that our culture's drive to protect children from anything remotely painful might be creating a society of people with lowered resilience who struggle to cope with the most minor setbacks, like students weeping over an essay because they can't think of a topic. This is a fairly recent phenomenon, or, at least, it's only recently that it is being openly displayed to teachers. 

Maybe previously we were all ashamed of feeling anxious, so we hid it. If that's the case, then it's a positive that we're seeing more of it.

But I wonder if it's the case that, previously, our anxiety over having enough food or money or supports in the face of plenty and a general fear of losing everything we've worked for was met with "Yup you might. Get over it!" comments that convinced us to cut-off those thought instead of dwelling on them and talking about them and bringing our concerns to person after person who would share their deepest fears, thereby giving credence to our worry and further embedding the pathways in our brain that allow worry to flourish! Flippant reactions might have a similar effect as current CBT methods in which people might be told to stop negative thoughts by imagining a big red "X" over the negative idea, then replace them with alternative thoughts, and then those troubling ideas will eventually decrease in frequency and intensity. Flippant reactions to worry can have the same effect of "You're fine!" in response to a tumble on the playground instead of rushing in with peroxide and bandaids. We rush in an awful lot these days.

We've gone down a different road of listening to everyone's feelings to the point that now we have a generation of second-order anxiety: personal anxiety plus anxiety over our children's anxiety. Have we fostered discussions of our concerns to a point that they've become normalized and entrenched in our brains? We feel like we worry for good reason about our anxious children because sometimes anxiety can turn into something worse like self-mutilation or suicide ideation. And then then we worry that worrying about our children's anxiety might actually make it worse! I think it was easier for my parents to acknowledge the worst case scenarios because they were born in the '20s and lived through the depression and then WWII. They experienced the worst and survived. We've been too sheltered from real trauma in our generation's past to be able to acknowledge that it could be a very real part of our future and to just get on with things. We're here today, and we have food and shelter, and we haven't been hit by a meteorite, so do your homework already!

Worrying about what might happen (like a child's anxiety turning into something worse) helps us feel like we're doing something productive about something we might have little effect over. But it could just an illusion of productivity. The tricky business is figuring out when we can have an effect and when we can't. We might stand back as parents and watch our kids fight through various stages of depression and anxiety, trying one therapist or medication after another wondering if doing nothing would have been as effective. It's complicated. But when they're beginning to express some fears over things clearly outside our control, a brush-off might be the trick. 

I can be a pretty intense worrier, and I actively work to decrease those thoughts. When I was growing up, I was terrified of the cold war. I was absolutely convinced we were all going to waste away from radiation poisoning if we weren't lucky enough to be hit directly.  This cartoon didn't help. It's of a middle age couple slowly dying, yet in denial the entire time, desperately trying to look on the bright side: "I should put some skin lotion on these spots. They should soon clear up." No wonder I had nightmares. But we lived, and all that worry was for naught. It did nothing to affect nuclear disarmament. Nothing.

I recognize this might not work for everyone, but what helped me cope as a child and now, what I believe prevented a journey into deeper anxiety or spells of crying in front of teachers, was my mum's very Epicurean acknowledgement that, "We all have to die of something," as she'd light another cigarette. Epicurus explained that, of course we're going to die, but we're not dead now, and, when we're dead, we won't know about it anyway; therefore, it doesn't make sense to worry about death. My mum was the kind who required a bloody appendage stapled to any request to miss a day of school. She'd soften the blow by tacking on, "But it likely won't happen for a long time....But, then again, we never know!" It had the effect of making me very productive. If death could be around any corner, then maybe I should drag myself from the TV to seize the day. And it helped me see that we're all in this together, Kings and paupers alike.

Recognizing the randomness of our lives, and how little control we have over it all, and the reality that death is inevitable, can actually help us live a more satisfying existence. I didn't wait for a magical age to share this with my children, but aimed to answer questions and concerns as authentically as possible throughout their lives. It's not all bad news. The worst might happen tomorrow, but if you're alive and well today, then let's celebrate that fact.

from this cite of awesomeness

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*I'm not sure the difference between being an author and being a writer, but for the sake of my mental health, I hope I'm in the former group.

On Population Control: Freedom at Any Cost?

China has officially ended its one-child policy, and the New York Times argues against any similar policy ever existing again.

The Chinese government’s decision to end its draconian one-child policy is a pragmatic economic move, but it’s hardly sufficient. The government continues to control personal freedom by limiting the number of children a couple can have to two, an abhorrent policy that no nation should have.

The editorial talks about limiting freedoms like it's the worst possible action, but there are far worse consequences if we don't. If no nation should limit their population, then we'll have some bigger problems in our hands. We have to begin to control our population, and asking people nicely isn't going to do squat! I explained the logic behind this a whole other blog ago. Most of us just aren't made to care about the entire world, so the masses have to be forced to do what's right for the greater good.

In my school board, they've implemented a 75/5 paper reduction policy starting a year ago: we're to decrease paper use by 75% within the next five (now four) years. Stats were run, and I tried to convince the keeper of the numbers to accidentally leak them - or, better, openly post them and warn that updated numbers will be posted quarterly.  He already suggested that we limit printing to 600 pages/year, and there was an uproar. With stats in hand, he's clarified that most people are doing that already, but a few - about 10 in 80 teachers - are way, way above those numbers. Unfortunately he's not quite comfortable posting those names yet, but I think it's the only thing that will work.

As I walked out of that paper meeting, another teacher said we'll never get teachers to do this - even with on-line resources in our back pockets - literally. But back in the day when I started teaching, we rarely photocopied anything because we had one mimeograph machine (Remember smelling the paper to get a buzz?), and it took forever to make copies. We got by without copies and without computers. So it's entirely possible to reduce paper use, but the masses won't do it out of the goodness of their hearts. It won't happen until it's forced to happen. People will complain for a couple years because change is hard, but then they'll get used to the new rules, and life will go on with a few more trees in the ground (and more money at the board office).

If we don't create some rules around population, it will be truly disastrous. Suzuki illustrates that here:



After reading Jared Diamond's Collapse, I summarized his research on the reality of not having any pro-active population control:

Diamond moved on to collapse through genocides with a caution that it's not enough to increase food production to feed the world; we must simultaneously rein in population growth (312). Many genocidal studies focus on ethnic hatred as the catalyst that must be prevented, but Diamond points out the real problem is typically over-population of an area. He looks at Rwanda in which, in 1993, 40% of citizens were living below the poverty level, and 100% of 25-year-old men were still living at home unable to live on their own or start their own families. ”It is not rare, even today, to hear Rwandans argue that a war is necessary to wipe out an excess of population and to bring numbers into line with the available land resources" (326). Population pressure, the strain of hunger is the powder in the keg, and the ethnic division was the match. “The people whose children had to walk barefoot to school killed the people who could buy shoes for theirs” (328).

It seems pretty clear that either we can choose to allow genocides to reduce populations, or we consciously prevent more children from being born. I think we'd all like to choose that second option... except when it directly affects us, which is much of the time.

The reality is that if we want to have a healthy planet for our grandchildren to live on, we have to stop having so many grandchildren. We have to spread the word to anyone from 15 to 40 to have fewer children, and from 40 up to tell their children to stop having children at all, or maybe to have one among the lot of them. I have three kids, and, so far,  I've convinced two of them not to have any kids. But intelligent friends my age laugh at this suggestion. They just don't believe this is a real problem that they need to actually act on in any real way. So we need something else to get us going.

We could try incentives, and I suggested to my grade 12s that we offer free education in exchange for voluntary permanent sterilization. We'd have to do it when they're 18-20, before they get a strong biological urge to reproduce. It's young for them to make such an important decision, but that's the point. I think it's the only time we could conceivable (ha!) convince people to willingly give up their right to have children. They pointed out that if we tie incentives to university, then we might reduce population in the smartest group of people and potentially end up with an Idiocracy:



So that plan might not work.

We need to change our entire mythology around freedom in order to survive another couple generations. We need to stop thinking that freedom should come at any cost. I said as much after watching Mad Max: Fury Road. In that film, the bad guy rationed water, and our hero opened the valves for all to drink freely. Fast-forward twenty years, and we'd see the fatal short-sightedness of that style of leadership.

We're back to Plato's Republic where control = freedom, except it doesn't have to turn out like 1984 or a Nazi regime. Quite the opposite. We can have a very transparent government explain the consequences of our actions and suggest a series of reforms that limit our reproductive freedoms. We can be asked to vote on the best method of limitation, but we have to limit it in some way. In Canada, we're happy to limit the freedom to buy automatic weapons and the freedom to elicit others towards hatred of an identifiable group of people. We force teenagers to go to school against their will if necessary. We've banned the sale of sugary foods in schools, and some cities have successfully banned water bottles. Now can we learn to recognize the wisdom of limiting our freedom to reproduce even though it fights against a significant biological instinct? That's the question this generation must answer. Immediately.

But what about our pensions and jobs and the economy? We can't have an economy without a tolerable planet to put it on. It's too late to look on this as a 50/50 choice. Environmental legislation has to win or else we all lose.

On Losing Skills

I tell my students of the magic of "command F" on Macs and "control F" on PCs. This F function key, that can find a word or phrase anywhere in the text, is a game-changer when hunting for the best quotation or for that juicy bit of information or when searching through lines of code to add a fancy new feature to a blog. But it has a dark side.

Now when I try to skim through a hard-copy document, like a book, I grow impatient with the task. If I suddenly realize the brilliant acuity of a passage a few pages back, it's painful to have to skim over what I've already read to find it. Sure I can try to laugh it off, ignore that irritating feeling, and persist. But that niggling feeling continues to torment my brain, hampering my focus, and making it even more difficult to skim with any skill. This is a skill I was once lauded for (perhaps owing to my scarcity of abilities). Now I get grumbly after a few pages, and, after a few more, I desperately want to relinquish the pursuit. It takes a steely resolve now to do something I used to do effortlessly. It could be as time-consuming as always, but the effort is marred with the knowledge that there is an easier way.

More than two millennia ago, Socrates warned against putting words in print because those new-fangled books would destroy the memories - and hence the minds - of the populous. Without exercising our minds by demanding more and more of their talents, they'll atrophy. Current brain science concurs, and my anecdote adds further evidence to the pile. If we stop doing a task as often, the pathways in our brain get sluggish, and we can no longer do the task as well.

“As particular circuits in our brain strengthen through the repetition of a physical or mental activity, they begin to transform that activity into a habit…the chemically triggered synapses that link our neurons progam us, in effect, to want to keep exercising the circuits they’ve formed. Once we’ve wired new circuitry in our brain…’we long to keep it activated.’ That’s the way the brain fine-tunes its operations. Routine activities are carried out ever more quickly and efficiently, while unused circuits are pruned away....“If we stop exercising our mental skills…we do not just forget them: the brain map space for those skills is turned over to the skills we practice instead….the possibility of intellectual decay is inherent in the malleability of our brains. That doesn’t mean that we can’t, with concerted effort, once again redirect our neural signals and rebuild the skills we’ve lost. What is does mean is that the vital paths in our brains become…the paths of least resistance” (34-35).

It sometimes feels like we're left with two options: either we improve the technology so we never need our brains to do such a menial task again (a command F-bot for print), or we avoid the technology, or at least avoid reliance on the technology, in order to strengthen our brain's ability to attack that text and prevent skills from being 'pruned away.' It seems like a no-brainer to take up the technology for all it's worth but for the loss of our sense of industry and usefulness.

It makes me worry a bit about self-driving cars. Will we all become incompetent drivers, or perhaps more incompetent is appropriate here? But then again, will it even matter if that skill becomes obsolete? Maybe it's better if we don't have to learn to pay attention to the road. Our car can takes us to work and home without commanding our attention so we can pay for all our stuff we bought online during our daily commute!

But then, what about sex robots? Will we become a culture annoyed with the incompetence of a human partner when we could have the accuracy and effortlessness of a sex toy that never demands a turn? Are we already impatient with imperfection?

I'm glad that books grew to be commonplace, and I spend no time lamenting my inability to remember epic tales in detail. Maybe in 2,000 years, if we're still here and still have enough resources for advances in technology, we'll think it funny that people ever used birth control or fertility drugs or prostitutes when they could have just had sex with programmable machines without all the hassles. And why be concerned with our ability to find information in a book when we can likely find the book online (or put it online ourselves) and then let the computer skim for us?

Self-efficacy.

Our ability to hone skills is tied to our feelings of self-worth. If we have fewer skills that matter, then we won't matter. Students will stop coming to me to find a specific quote in a lengthy essay and show delight with how quickly I can do it. They won't need my help. We might laud independence to our detriment. I have a friend who can rhyme off the birthdays of every person she knows, but facebook notifications have already rendered her skill redundant. And car-chases will no longer draw a crowd to a film like these:



(They always leave out a favourite:)




The loss of an ability to give pleasure to one another could be the most profound disruption to our culture. Honing personal skills that are exclusively developed to suit the particular taste of one other person enhances a recognition and knowledge of the other in a depth that conversation merely skims. A robot could be programmed to hit the mark perfectly every time, but this is a classic case of the perfect being enemy of the good. And it's never as simple and universal as it's presented in media:




Obviously skill-destroying technology is not always an all or nothing situation nor is it always a problem.  I can't remember any friends' phone numbers or e-mail addresses any more because I don't have to, but I'm happy I no longer have any use for a washboard besides possibly in a rhythm section of a band. How soon before we all forget skills and later deeply regret their loss? It might be useful to consider how necessary each piece technology is to our lives relative to how useful the eroding skills may be to our sense of self-worth.