I was going to write about RC Swing tonight, but there’s something else that’s been on my mind all day, so I’ll postpone that just like I postponed yesterday’s topic.  Today, I want to talk about how I deal with social networking and the media.

Starting just after the election, I got off of social media completely for several months.  I wasn’t sure I was even going to go back to Facebook.  I hated to give it up completely, though, because there are some people I’ve reconnected with on Facebook that I don’t interact with in any other way.  Giving up Facebook was giving up on those people, and I care about them.

I gave up social media because I couldn’t stand the constant conflict.  I kept getting upset by what I saw there, and I didn’t really know how to deal with it.  So I walked away and took a break.

I kept reading the news, however.  And I continued to get upset.

Now I’m back on Facebook, reading the news, and I’m even spending time on Twitter.  I’ve fully immersed myself in all the topical, temporary flotsam that I can handle.  I’m gorging myself on current events and political opinions.

How does it make me feel?

It doesn’t make me happy.  For the most part, I’ve built up something of a tolerance, but I’m not exactly enjoying what I’m reading.  The news stories aren’t always reliable, and it’s a little bit exhausting going off to multiple sources and double-checking reality.  Social media is punctuated with frivolity and snark intertwined.  Everything is formatted either as a lure or a weapon, to draw someone in or illicit some emotional reaction.  There’s constant noise, constant banality, constant terror.  It drains my attention and my energy.

At the same time, there are moments of light that make it worth it.  There’s humor and humanity.  There are people being truly supportive of one another, sharing in their victories, and helping others through their hard times.  There are momentary flashes of the best of what humanity has to offer, like islands of comfort beset on all sides by a sea of anger and vitriol.

Also, I can’t look away.  It’s like being a passenger in a car.  Some people are comfortable as passengers.  I’m not.  I have to see where I’m going and what’s going on, even if I’m powerless to make a difference.  If we’re going to crash, I want to know about it before it happens.

The last couple of days have been really difficult.  First there was the mass shooting in Las Vegas.  Then Tom Petty died.

There’s been bad news in constant supply for weeks and weeks, mostly coming through political channels.  When the news is bad enough, like it has been the last couple of days, I find it hard to stay focused and do what needs doing.  It impacts my work, my music, and my writing.

But I keep going.  The last couple of days have been harder than other days, but I keep going.  I summon my willpower.  I buckle down.  Sometimes I blast some music.  I do what must be done.  I write the program.  I play the music.  I write the words.  I keep going.

Several times, I’ve seen the sentiment that it’s not talent that makes a writer successful, but stubbornness.  The will to keep going, to push through rejection and just be persistent enough to write the next story and submit again.  I believe it, and I also believe that writers aren’t the only ones to succeed through such strength.

I want to offer advice on how to find the strength to keep going when the going is tough, but I don’t have any.  It’s different for different people, and it’s different for different situations.  Sometimes, you have to just close yourself off from everything and focus on the individual tasks, like putting one foot in front of the other.  Sometimes, you have to take a step back and look at the big picture, like looking up to the horizon, or checking a map.  Either way, to reach your destination, you have to keep moving.

To bring this back to the original topic, I see a lot of people that refuse to read the news or stay informed, and I understand why.  Ignorance truly can be bliss, and I have a couple of coworkers that are happier believing that things are as they’ve always been, and nothing ever really changes.  If nothing every really changes, what’s the point of reading the news or staying up-to-date with social media?

I believe things do change, though.  The climate is changing.  The political landscape has changed.  Technology advances.  The world is smaller and more accessible than it has ever been in history.

So, I’ll continue to watch and hope for the best.  The time for me closing my eyes and burying my head in the sand is past.

I was going to write about my band tonight.  I’d been really looking forward to it.  Instead, I’m going to take a moment to form and share my thoughts on the recent tragedy.

I’ve written about guns before.  In the past, I’ve made it clear that I wasn’t super excited about extra gun regulations.  For as much as I lean liberal, I’ve always been a little bit pro-gun.  I’ve never thought that they should be handed out easily.  I’ve always thought that people should be screened, and that we should have and enforce some common sense gun rules.

Events like the Las Vegas shooting disrupt my world view.  When it comes down to it, I just want people to be responsible.  I want to treat people like adults, and I want to trust people.

And let’s face it.  Way in the back of my heart, I always felt that if something really terrible happened, I’d rather we all be armed and have reliable access to weapons, in case the citizens had to fight for their country.

But my world view is shaken.  Maybe we can’t trust people to be responsible with weapons.  I know plenty of individuals that are trustworthy, but people?  Statistically, if you have a lot of guns and a lot of people, you’re chances of a bad gun landing in the hands of a bad person approach certainty.

America has more guns than any other nation, and we have more gun deaths.  There are some staggering statistics about how Americans are number one at literally killing themselves.  The mass shootings are too common.  Our forefathers did not want us killing ourselves like this.

If you’ve been reading my blog, you know how I feel about Trump.  He’s a lying, racist, incompetent conman playing at fascism and endangering American lives.  I haven’t succumbed to “fake news” or liberal spin.  I’ve listened to his words.  I’ve watched his actions.  The one that convinced me that he is unfit to be President is Donald Trump himself.

I bring him up for now for two reasons.

1. He isn’t going to do anything useful after this latest shooting.  He’s not going to offer genuine comfort.  He has no empathy or true sympathy for the victims.  If anyone is hoping that our President will lead us through this crisis, prepare to be disappointed.  That is not part of his skill set.  What he will likely do is defend the gun lobby and contribute tone deaf words in favor of Americans having guns.  We’ve heard the tune before, and I don’t think we should dance to it again.
2. An argument could be made that he is exactly the sort of thing our forefathers feared, and perhaps wanted us armed to deal with.  Consider this quote:
   

   “A prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a people who mean to be free.” – Thomas Jefferson

Allow me to bring the thought to its conclusion.

Our forefathers may have envisioned and feared a despot rising up on the shoulders of a populist movement.  They may have wanted us armed to deal with such a despot, and some of the arguments for the 2nd Amendment are in line with this sort of thinking.  That if the American people should have their freedoms threatened by a power, that people should rise up in force and take back their country.

But that’s not how we’re going to pave the way to a better future.  The use of such force is not an effective way to achieving a better world.  It is a way to destroy a world and endanger the people and values that we cherish.

The answer lies in non-violent solutions.  It lies in building communities.  Spreading awareness.  Peacefully demonstrating.  Volunteering.  Voting.  Taking responsibility for our lives and helping those that we can.

We need to promote leaders based on their ability, rather than their popularity.  We need to quit electing actors and television personalities, and instead find and support people that talk and act in good conscience.

We need to grow up.

That might mean putting away our toys.  And by toys, I mean guns.

We are not alone in the world.  Whatever exceptionalism we may have demonstrated in the past, we are not currently embodying.  We live in constant fear, and we justify that fears by making it easy for people to get guns.

Maybe we need to disarm the whole society.  Both the people and the police.  I don’t know how we’ll do it, but I know that if it’s to work, someone prominent on The Right is going to have to lead the charge.  Maybe invoke Reagan’s name and remind people of the Brady Handgun Bill and why we adopted it.

We should all be looking at what happened in Las Vegas.  We should think about where we stand on gun violence, gun ownership, and examine why we feel the way we do about guns.

If you can look at the headlines, read about the tragic loss of life, and still think America’s current stance on guns is okay, I’d love to hear how.  Because I can’t.  Not anymore.

It is October!  A month of pumpkin spice, scary stories, spooky decorations, and colder weather.  It all culminates in a night of costumes and candy, where once again the Buhl household will be giving out full-size candy bars and a can of soda to every Trick-or-Treater..  Also, it is another month where I attempt to write 31 blog posts in 31 days.

I’ve been doing this for a couple of years now, mostly as a way of preparing for NaNoWriMo.  I figure that if I can find the time to dedicate to a blog post every day for a month, the exercise will help me get in the habit of working on a novel every day for a month.  Blog-tober shows me the places in my daily schedule where I can get some writing done, and helps prepare me for the next month.

Last year, I failed at the blog challenge pretty early, then failed even worse in NaNoWriMo.  I came into the season low on energy and low on motivation.  This year, I’m planning on turning that all around.

To help make this year’s blog challenge successful, I’ve made a list of topics I can write about, one for each day.  It’s a rough plan, set more in clay than in stone.  There are gaps, too.  Here is the list of planned topics:

1. (Today) This Announcement!
2. Rancho Cordova River City Concert Band
3. RC Swing
4. Works in Progress
5. The State of Science Fiction
6. Current Events
7. Literary Theory (for Michael)
8. (Sunday) The Effects of the Political Environment on Everyday Life
9. Teaching My Niece
10. Listening to Music While Programming
11. Plotting, Planning, and Winging It
12. Lying
13. Current Events
14. Trucks (for Richard)
15. (Sunday) What it Means to be a Liberal
16. Parenting
17. Listening to Music While Writing
18. Making Characters Come Alive
19. ?
20. Current Events
21. ?
22. (Sunday) What it Means to be a Conservative
23. ?
24. ?
25. Adjectives Are Delicious
26. ?
27. Current Events
28. ?
29. (Sunday) My Views on Money
30. Halloween – What it means to me
31. Finale – NaNoWriMo

I’ve made a note for each Sunday, as I think those are going to be days where I can tackle larger topics.  I’ve also set Fridays aside for talking about my thoughts on whatever is in the news at that time.  I going to write about writing topics on Wednesdays.

Many of these topics were suggestions given to me by friends.  If you are reading this and there is a topic you’d like to see me write about, leave me a comment with the suggestion.  You can leave the comment here, on my Facebook, or on Twitter.  Whatever you suggest, I will probably add to the list.  The topic doesn’t necessarily have to make a lot of sense.  For example, Richard suggested “Trucks” so I added it to the list.  What am I going to say about trucks?  Who knows!  If I stick to the schedule, everyone (including me) will find out what I think about Trucks on October 14th.

So that’s the idea, that’s the announcement, and this is the first post of October 2017.  It won’t all be politics and ranting, though there will definitely be quite a bit of that.  To provide context for myself in the future should I look back on this post: Yesterday, President Trump attacked the mayor of San Juan, Porto Rico.  Today, he said that Rex Tillerson shouldn’t bother with negotiating with North Korea, suggesting that we’ll take care of it with military action.

It’s going to be really hard to talk about things that aren’t political this month.  But we’re going to give it a try!

First off, as a veteran, I support anyone’s right to peacefully protest.  As many have already said, that is a fundamental right paid for with the blood and lives of our finest men and women.

Now let’s talk about one of the fundamental flaws in our country right now: the treatment of patriotism as a religion.

Religion is comprised of a combination of faith, rituals, symbols, and ideology.  It’s the mixture of faith and symbolism that make attacks on the symbols into attacks on the religion.  Defiling a crucifix, taking the Lord’s name in vain, depicting images of the Prophet, burning sacred texts… these all translate into personal affronts for those that hold those symbols dear.

Patriotism, on the other hand, doesn’t have to rely on faith.  True patriotism is acting in support of the ideology and protecting the home.

The flag and the national anthem as symbols of patriotism aren’t worth very much if the ideals that they represent are not being followed and protected.

I’ve spoken before on this blog that I’m not a very good patriot.  In light of current events, I’m forced to re-evaluate my position.

I support the Constitution and I’m willing to fight for it.  I support the ideals that my country was founded on.  Every individual is created equal and endowed with rights and freedoms that shall not be infringed, because these rights are not granted to them by a faceless state.  These are rights are inherent, and some of them are redundantly spelled out as amendments to our Constitution.

From 1993 to 1999, I served in the Air Force.  If my country had called on me to bleed or die to protect it, I would have done my duty.  It is now 2017, and I no longer have a uniform.  But if my country called on me to bleed or die in the service of the Constitution, if I was called to protect the rights that I believe are so important, then I would do so.

Maybe I am a patriot, after all.

But even as a patriot, I don’t subscribe to America as my religion.  The flag is a symbol.  A useful symbol sometimes, but the flag is not my country.

The ritual of standing when the flag is presented and the national anthem is played… that isn’t part of my religion, either.  I usually stand because it feels rude not to, just as it would feel rude to use profanity in certain company.  But if I felt that it would make a difference to sit or take a knee… if I believed that in silent protest I could fight to protect the rights and lives of American citizens, I would do so, without hesitation.

That’s what Kaepernick is doing.  That’s the movement he’s started.  He kneels because American citizens are dying in their own country.  They are not receiving the protection that they deserve.  He’s fighting for their lives, and he’s doing it without a gun or hurting anyone.

Kaepernick and those other athletes that are kneeling with him are demonstrating true patriotism.

I think it’s important to examine your actions from time to time and evaluated the reasoning behind them.  Looking at someone taking a knee and understanding why they are doing it, I see true patriotism.

When someone complains about the silent protest, I have to examine that action as well.  What is the motivation behind trying to make someone stand for the national anthem?

If we are to be a great nation, we must regard the ideals more highly than the symbols.  We must honor the Constitution, the rights of all Americans, and the rule of law.  We must put those ideals above the flag, the national anthem, and the religious trappings of American Nationalism.

I’ve been looking through my news feeds and my social media, and I’m seeing a common theme: Sean Spicer lied to the American People, and he should not be forgiven.

Here’s a link to a CNN article which goes in depth on that point.

 

Here’s an example of the kind of tweets I’m seeing:

Emmys: We’re awarding several women & POC tonight. That’ll fix our image.

Also Emmys: Meet America’s favorite Hitler defender, Sean Spicer.

— (((OhNoSheTwitnt))) (@OhNoSheTwitnt) September 18, 2017

 

The idea is that there is no room for forgiveness for any of the people doing Donald Trump’s dirty work.  They have sinned against the Will of the American People, and for that, they should be punished.  It is a great injustice to celebrate Sean Spicer at the Emmy’s.

I’d like to take a step back from that and offer some counterpoints.

Sean Spicer was a Mouthpiece

The first point is that Spicer stood in front of the podium and lied at the order of the President.  We know he lied, and we knew he was lying right from the very start.  We have photographic evidence refuting his lies.

Everyone’s saying he lied, and I’m agreeing.  I just want us to take a step back and acknowledge that they weren’t Spicer’s lies.  They were Donald Trump’s.

We can criticize Spicer for his lack of integrity.  Perhaps he’s a coward.  Perhaps he believed that broadcasting his boss’s lies was for the good of the country.  We can’t know for certain why Spicer continued to do the job as long as he did it.  But he’s clearly not doing that job anymore.

We might even criticize him for being bad at his job.  He is not the best liar Donald Trump has employed.  I think that mantle currently rests on the shoulders of Sarah Huckabee Sanders.

 

Sean Spicer’s Actions at the Emmy’s Confirms the Lies

When Melissa McCarthy stood behind a podium on SNL and mocked Sean Spicer, she gave voice to the outrage over the administration’s lies through satire.  She exaggerated Spicer’s idiosyncrasies.  She helped reinforce what we all knew: that the messages coming from Spicer’s podium were a lie, and could not be trusted or taken seriously.

When Sean Spicer wheeled out the podium at the Emmy’s, he validated Melissa McCarthy’s performance.  He confirmed that what he’d been spouting from the podium, starting with the “largest crowd in history” comment, was a false narrative.

That’s huge.  Who else has left Trump’s administration and come clean like that?

And before I leave this point, consider this.  There are still people that are drinking from the Trump trough and believe every word from the administration is the gospel truth.  Those people remember who Sean Spicer is, and they know how the liberal elite gather at awards like the Emmy’s.  What kind of message do you think Trump supporters are reading out of Spicer’s performance at the Emmy’s?

 

We Should Make it Easy For People to Leave Trump

Suppose Spicer didn’t go to the Emmy’s.  Suppose that Spicer was black-balled from speaking engagements, exiled to obscurity, and punished in the ways that social media seems to think he should have been punished.  What is gained?  We still have Trump’s shills and enablers doing the same dirty work that they did yesterday.  We still have a Republican senate trying to take away people’s health care.  We still have an unqualified narcissist with no empathy and a short attention span as our President.  We gain nothing from punishing Spicer.

But if we embrace Spicer and give him a chance to tell us, through actions if not words, that he really had been a stooge?  That could give hope to every other person in the administration that has an inkling of a conscience.

The message we should be sending is this: We know what you’re doing, and we know who is really responsible.  Grow a spine, quite doing Trump’s dirty work, and you can still come to our parties and hang out.  Maybe we’ll share a laugh about this whole mess, someday.

My plan is to finish the third (and hopefully final) draft of my novel today.  I’m excited to do this.  I’ve got a new ending in mind that I’ve lost sleep over.  This is going to be great!

Before I can get to this, I need to get this idea out of my head and onto the blog, because it’s getting in the way.  It’s an itch that I’ve put off scratching, and I don’t think I’m going to get any fiction written today until I resolve this.

Let’s talk about criticizing the President.

A Question of Patriotism

The idea was put in front of me recently that it is unpatriotic to criticize the President.  They said, “He’s our elected official, and we need to stand by him.”

I have to disagree.  He has been elected to the Executive Branch, and has been endowed with certain powers.  Freedom from criticism is not one of those powers.

In fact, I think it is our patriotic duty to be critical of the President when he (or someday, she) is not doing their job well.  The Constitution is law, not the will of the President.

Particularly cruel or unusual acts by The President must be met with objection.  It is our country, and it is our responsibility to hold our leaders accountable.  That’s what it means to be a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people.”

Besides, if our leadership can’t handle criticism, they shouldn’t be in such positions where they’re certain to receive it.

Don’t Focus on The Inconsequential

The color of Trump’s skin does not matter.

The size of Trump’s hands does not matter.

When we attack Trump, focusing on his physicality or other details that are not pertinent to his ability to govern, we are wasting time, weakening our arguments, and giving fuel for those that blindly support him.

There are plenty of actual, substantial areas to hold Trump responsible for.  We don’t need to keep going for the low hanging fruit.  Maybe it’s satisfying in the moment, but it’s not worth it.  Often the people talking about Trump’s orange skin or small hands would be appalled if similar criticisms were leveled on anyone else.

Let’s not be hypocrites.  Leave Trump’s physical peculiarities out of it.

Do Focus on Actual Issues

The latest absurdity to come from Trump is the ending of DACA.  This is an act of cruelty that does not make our country greater.  There is no good reason or justification for doing this.

It is easy to find other areas of substance that deserve attention.  Threatening to shut down the government if the budget doesn’t include a border wall, for example, is an easy topic for discussion.  Not only is the border wall ineffective, expensive, and an even dumber idea after the massive flooding of Texas, Trump’s take on paying for the wall is contrary to his campaign promise.  Mexico is not going to pay for the wall.  Mexico will never pay for the wall.

I could probably spend thousands of words focusing on issues of actual substance where Trump should be criticized.  These aren’t even Republican versus Democrat ideas, but actual issues where the Constitution is being ignored or violated (Emoluments Clause, anyone?).

I’m not going to go into it here.  Instead, I’m going to encourage you to find the issue that bothers you the most and carry the conversation forward.  Maybe you’re pissed at how much Trump has spent traveling to golf courses?  Maybe you (rightfully) think that Trump focusing on removing transgender people in the military is needless, expensive, and unwanted?

Seriously, Trump is the worst President we’ve ever had.  If you haven’t taken issue with something that he’s said or done, then you’re just not paying attention.

Stick to the Truth

Trump lies so often that I’m forced to question if he has some psychological condition.  Do you lie more when you’re senile?  He lied throughout his campaign, and he started off his presidency with lies about his inauguration crowd size.  Trump lies constantly.

That doesn’t give us an excuse to lie ourselves, or continue spreading lies.

When it comes to honesty, we have to be better than Trump.  That’s a pretty low bar.

In regards to the truth, try to find primary sources.  If someone says that Trump said something or did something, look for a video or pictures of Trump doing that thing.  There are plenty people on social media that are spreading misinformation.  Try to avoid the memes, especially when they’re not true.

This point goes a little deeper, though.  We need to be honest with ourselves.

An example is how we talked about Hurricane Harvey and Trump’s response.  A lot of time was dedicated to Trump’s first visit.  He commented on the crowd size.  He didn’t visit with any actual victims.  He was about as far as he could be from the most affected areas.

The bandwidth we gave to that particular visit isn’t particularly honest.  Were we supposed to be shocked that Trump showed no empathy?  That’s practically his brand.  At his core, he is a dishonest narcissist with no empathy, often motivated by fear and misinformation.  Did we expect him to change just because dozens of people died in one of the worst natural disasters of our time?

But maybe people thought giving that particular story more energy would help show Trump supporters just what kind of man he is.  If those supporters are blind to the other stuff, why would this change their minds?

Finally, Trump did wind up going back, and he did go to where there was damage.  He tried to help.  He still said some stupid stuff, but he apparently worked at a food kitchen and helped in some token way.

That second visit didn’t get nearly the amount of energy that the first visit did, and that’s where the dishonesty is most visible.  Trump did something that is contrary to the current trend of Trump bashing, and social media swept it under the rug or ignored it because it didn’t jive with the narrative.

The most troubling aspect of the times we live in is our disregard for the truth.

Trump is a terrible president and a reprehensible human being, from everything I’ve seen.  But that doesn’t mean that I’m going to ignore any good he might do.  From what I’ve gathered, his second trip to Texas was what his first trip should have been.  Maybe he was forced into it by his family.  Maybe he did it try to and change the Hurricane Harvey story.  I don’t know, and I can’t know for certain because we are letting our biases impact what we share and believe.

Please note that I’m in no way bashing the media on this point.  I think that some of what I’m saying applies to them, but I honestly believe that journalists are doing their best.  It’s journalists that made me aware of Trump’s second visit to Texas.

Changing People’s Minds

The whole point is to try and get that friend or relative that seems to be a blind Trump supporter to change their mind, right?  Or maybe you’ve got a coworker that isn’t looking at the news at all, and thinks that everything is just as it always has been, and it doesn’t matter if Trump is president.  Maybe you want them to care, right?

The reality is that you’re not going to change anyone’s mind.  Trump’s approval rating isn’t going to go much lower.  There will continue to be people that are all about party over country.  There will continue to be people that listen only to Hannity or Alex Jones.  Hell, there will continue to be racists like David Duke that are paying attention to everything Trump is saying, and the words are music to their ears.

If there is any hope to changing anyone’s mind, it’s through Trump’s own words.  That’s how I’ve come to the conclusions I’ve come to.  I didn’t read some op-ed or analysis of Trump’s presidency.  I listened to the man speak, all by himself, and found what he was saying to be antithetical to what makes this country great.

My mind can be changed about Trump, but it would take Trump himself to do it.  He would need to make up for a lot of his own history, from “grab them by the pussy” to his recent jabs at South Korea in the face of North Korea’s nuclear aggression.  Trump hasn’t given me any reason to believe that there is a great man inside him, waiting to emerge and be the president we deserve.  If anything, from his blatant nepotism to his hawking of $40 USA hats, I’m thinking that we should have taken an inventory of the White House before he moved in.

 

Now that that’s off my chest, I’m going to write some fiction.

About 30 years ago, I read The Cat Who Walks Through Walls.  It was my first adventure outside of kids’ books, and the first Robert Heinlein story I ever read.  I think I was with my Dad at a supermarket when we picked up the paperback off a rack.  That book started my Heinlein phase, which didn’t end until I’d read almost 30 other Heinlein books.

Some of the subject material went over my head.  Some of the stories stuck with me and influenced my writing.  Others were just okay.

I never finished Stranger in a Strange Land.  When talking to other Heinlein fans at conventions, I kept this fact secret.  I was embarrassed.  This is probably Heinlein’s most famous book.  It won the 1962 Hugo.  It gave us the word “grok.” I read almost all of his books.  How could I have left that one out?

A couple of weeks ago, I decided to correct this omission.  I downloaded the audio book and I chewed through it slowly.  I wanted to savor it because in many ways, I was going back in time.  I was going back to a reflection of the 60’s, when Heinlein wrote the book.  I was also going back to when I was much younger, and the only thing I was reading was Heinlein paperbacks.

Here, then, are my observations.

 

The Casual Misogyny

The first thing that hit me as I listened to the book was that women did not have an equal place in the world.  Jill Boardman is constantly called by pet names.  The women are often admonished as if they are children rather than as adults.  Several male characters throughout the book, including Jubal Harshaw, describe the role of women in society, and it isn’t flattering.

To Heinlein’s credit, the female protagonists aren’t wilting flowers.  They display strength in personality.  They eventually express their own sexuality and appetites on par with their male counterparts.  But even within the views of Jill and Michael, there is a “truth” that Jill realizes: it is natural for men to need to look at women, and it is natural for women to flaunt and be seen.

I chalked up the inequality of the sexes as being a byproduct of being written in the early 60’s.  A time full of dames and broads.  Given that context, the story is quite progressive.

 

Jubal Harshaw, The Pro From Dover

Jubal Harshaw is a bigger than life character.  Both a doctor and a lawyer, no one gets one over on Jubal Harshaw.  Throughout the story, he outmaneuvers world leaders, police forces, and religious zealots.  He is the only one that fully groks without learning Martian first.  Michael values Jubal Harshaw’s word above all others.

Again, this seems like a trope from the era.  That is, authors from that time seemed to inject in their heroes over-the-top qualities that make them unbelievable.

My first attempts at writing fiction featured a character named Arthur Kane that was also over-the-top.  He was rich, super smart, knew karate, and was a mechanical genius.  Even though I hadn’t finished Strange in a Strange Land before I started writing, I feel like this type of writing was present in the other Heinlein books I’d read.  His influence on my early writing is clear.

 

Religion

I found the exploration of religion extremely interesting.  I saw the Fosterites with their hedonism, commercialism, and political and military influence as an exaggerated version of today’s Christian right.  When Michael talks about initiates in his church, he refers to them as marks.  Indeed, everyone that attends a church in the book is made out to be a dupe getting suckered by carnies.  When it comes to church in Stranger in a Strange Land, the game is always rigged.

Once people have made it far enough into Michael’s church, they realize that it isn’t a church at all.  They become part of the community and they’re no longer treated like suckers.  Their enlightenment is that every creature that can understand, that can grok, is God.  Thou art God.

Interestingly enough, Jubal Harshaw, the patron saint of Michael’s church, the figure that Michael claims to be capable of grokking fully even without learning Martian, is an atheist.  He is the last to join Michael’s home, and he never gives up his agnostic views.

It’s also interesting that the Christ-like figure of Michael is brought to an ultimate conclusion as a martyr.  Having delivered his message and done what he needed to do in a corporeal body, he discorporated.

In Stranger in a Strange Land, all religions are true.  And none of them are.  I don’t believe Heinlein intended to give us any answers.  I believe he just tried to make people think and discuss.  However, if he was projecting his own philosophy anywhere, I’d guess it was through the pragmatic viewpoint of Jubal Harshaw.

 

Left Versus Right

Just as Heinlein can’t avoid bringing bits of his culture into his writing, I can’t avoid bringing bits of my own into it when reading.  Consequently, I saw reflections of our present day in the pages of Stranger in a Strange Land.

All of the protagonists lean so far left that their homes describe perfect socialist utopias.  In Jubal Harshaw’s home, people work for Jubal, but they’re treated as family.  They eat together.  They play together.  While sex is not quite as free as it is in Michael’s home, it isn’t discouraged.

Michael’s home goes even further.  Money and possessions and clothing are things that are used outside the home.  The relationships are polygamous.  There is no place for jealousy.  All are equal, for all are God.  Michael is described as a first among equals and is given reverence, but only to a point.

The protagonists are definitely bleeding heart lefty liberals, with their free love and socialist living.  And in the context of the story, taken to the ultimate conclusion, they are superior and closer to natural order.  They have control of their bodies.  They are happy.  They move with purpose.  They need not fear death, because they are spiritual, enlightened beings.

Who are the antagonists, then?  The Fosterites, certainly.  And as I said before, they’re very much Tea Party right wingers taken to the extreme.  They seek money and power.  They borrow scripture from Christianity without actually living lives that follow that religion.  And they are intolerant of any other faith or way of life.  They are destructively evangelical.

Joseph Douglas and his police forces are antagonists for a while.   I believe the police are even described as “S.S. troupes.” though I might be mistaken as a fault of listening rather than reading.

In the end, it’s the police state influenced by the Fosterites that closes in on Michael and his home.  As he is being killed, the news media keeps cutting to commercials.  The media is unemotional in broadcasting the gruesome destruction of someone preaching love and hope.  They continue to smile while that’s going on, peddling products with commercial glee.

I don’t want to go too much into the reflections I see with present day reality because some of my conclusions aren’t particularly flattering.  I don’t mind offending people, but it’s not what I’m setting out to do in this post.

 

Conclusion

I enjoyed Strainger in a Strange Land.  If for no other reason, the nostalgia from reading a Robert Heinlein story was fantastic.  Beyond that, I liked picking out (or perhaps guessing at) the world Heinlein lived in when he wrote the book.  He set out to write a story that would make people think and get them talking.  I think he succeeded.

If you have not read it before, I recommend it.  But don’t go in lightly.  Be prepared for some viewpoints that would not survive the world we live in today.

Like my last post, I’m going to start with the important stuff, because I don’t want to be misunderstood.

Donald Trump’s recent press conference failed to denounce white nationalists, KKK, and Nazis.  He went off script and demonstrated his low character, his wrong-headed approach, and just how unfit for office he is.  He gave false equivalence between the Alt-Right and those of us that think Nazis are bad.  He blew it.  He sucks.  He should be impeached and removed from office as soon as possible.

That’s the important part.  I needed to state that, because there were a couple of things he said that might have been truthful.  I’m going to cherry pick those points, because they are important.  But I’m not letting Trump off the hook.  He screwed up.

These last few days have been an emotional roller coaster.  A woman lost her life to a homegrown terrorist in a car.  Social media has exploded with righteous outrage and sincere grief.  There have been a lot of emotional releases and some things said in haste, and I want us all to take a step back and consider a few things, so that we don’t lose our own humanity.

1. The Nazis, Alt-Right, and KKK are the Minority

There are way fewer of them than there are of us.  That doesn’t make what they’re doing any less deplorable, but it should give us hope.  Their bigoted, narrow-minded view cannot last, because their voice will continue to get smaller and smaller, until they’re just a dark spot in the history books.

It’s true that Bannon, Miller, and Gorka are in prominent positions, and Trump has elevated the Alt-Right’s to a place where they have disproportionate influence.  But the age of Trump will end.  His influence will continue to wane as his approval plummets.  When it becomes obvious to the Republicans that he will sink their chance of re-election, they’ll renounce him.

And let’s face it.  When things get tough, they’ll turn on each other and destroy themselves.

2. We Need to be Careful with the Doxing

In the last few days, pictures of the tiki torch wielding assholes have been appearing on Twitter, and people have been identifying them.  Many have already lost their jobs.

I think it’s great that white supremacists are facing consequences for their actions.  If you go out and publicly start spouting hate, I hope you get what you deserve.

Let’s just be careful, though.  How hard would it be to take a picture of someone and put it out there, suggesting that they were among the white supremacists?  What defense would that person have?

Or, let’s say we do take a legitimate image of someone that marched with the tiki-Nazis.  Is it possible that they were there, but their only interest was in preserving the monument?

As I said in my last post, my gut tells me it’s wrong to tear down the monuments.  I’ve examined that feeling, and I know that it comes from a place of privilege.  To me, the monuments represent scars in our nation’s history.  To other people, they represent oppression and slavery.  From a place of compassion, I can support tearing them down, even if my initial instinct is to find some other solution.

But there could have been well-meaning individuals at the rally that simply wanted to preserve the monuments. It’s one of the things Trump said in his last press conference that might be true.  There might have been people on the side of the Alt-Right that were not white nationalists.  Maybe.  And if that’s true, then getting them fired and black balled on the internet seems a little bit harsh.

Also, doxing itself isn’t cool.  It was the tactic used by small-minded, cowardly boys to punish women for enjoying video games.  Maybe we should think twice about using the tactic.

3. Nazis are Still Human

This point receives a surprising amount of resistance.  Earlier, I tried to make this point in a comment, and I wound up having to delete it.  The blow-back was “When they are acting human, we’ll recognize them as human.”

This sentiment is wrong.  It is the heart of the argument of racists and bigots.  It is the problem with the internet, and it is why we can’t have nice things.

Nazis are bad.  I’m not sympathetic to their cause.  I renounce their hatred and their methods.  I do not agree with them.  If I’m in a position where a Nazi needs to be fought, I will fight them.  But I do not renounce their humanity, because then I’m no better than they are.

4. We are Judged by How We Treat our Enemies

I can’t find the quote, but I believe that how we treat our enemies is a reflection of the quality of ourselves and our society.  We already judge the Nazis, KKK, and Alt-Right jerks by how they treat their enemies.  History will judged us on how we treat them in turn.

 

I’ve seen a lot of people saying things about how love only defeats your enemy when they have a conscience.  I’ve seen people say that love doesn’t work.  I’d like to end this post with a quote from Martin Luther King Jr which is as pertinent now as it has ever been:

“Now there is a final reason I think that Jesus says, “Love your enemies.” It is this: that love has within it a redemptive power. And there is a power there that eventually transforms individuals. Just keep being friendly to that person. Just keep loving them, and they can’t stand it too long. Oh, they react in many ways in the beginning. They react with guilt feelings, and sometimes they’ll hate you a little more at that transition period, but just keep loving them. And by the power of your love they will break down under the load. That’s love, you see. It is redemptive, and this is why Jesus says love. There’s something about love that builds up and is creative. There is something about hate that tears down and is destructive. So love your enemies.” – Martin Luther King, Jr. (from “Loving Your Enemies”)

 

Normally, I would want to start from the very beginning of an event and work chronologically forward.  This time, I need to go backwards, because I need to get to the important stuff first.

I condemn the behavior of the white nationalists that brought violence and death to Charlottesville.  There are no excuses.  Their behavior and their values are not American.  Whether you are Republican, Democrat, or Independent, we should all be united in this stance.

That is the important part.  Some of the rest of this post is going to sound like I’m softening on it, but I’m not.  Do not misunderstand me.  There is no excuse for the behavior of white nationalists, KKK, Nazis, and far right extremists.  They are taking advantage of the freedoms that make this country great.  They are hypocrites of the highest order.  They are reprehensible.

I’m not going to go so far as to wish harm on them, or suggest that they should be rounded up.  I hope those that violated the law were caught, and that they suffer punishment that is suitable to their crimes.  I hope that justice prevails.  They caught the driver that killed at least one person and injured many others.  As for the rest, I hope they learn the value of human life, the depth of the American values that they have taken advantage of, and that they have a change of heart.  I hope they all get what they deserve.

If there had been no violence, we could all be having a different discussion.  It is everyone’s right to peacefully assemble.  If a group of white nationalists want to peacefully assemble and protest, that is their right.  I typed that with the hugest of eye rolls, but it’s true.  The right to demonstrate isn’t granted based on the quality of the people’s argument.

I think that if you’re going to wander around waving flags with swastikas or chant “blood and soil,” you’ve earned the mockery you’re going to receive.  But as an American that believes in his country, I have to support anyone’s right to peacefully gather.  Even if it’s just to display ignorance, and demonstrate how far on the wrong side of history some people have chosen to stand.

It’s also the right of others to counter-protest, as long as no laws are violated and everyone stays safe and sane.

But that’s not how things went down.  And at least one person is dead, and many others are injured.

And this all stemmed from a statue.  A memorial to Robert E. Lee.

Now comes the plot twist to this whole post.  I actually support the idea of preserving the statue.  I’m not in favor of tearing it down.

Whether we like it or not, Robert E. Lee is a part of our nation’s history.  We should remember his name and his role in the civil war.  We should remember what he stood for.  And we should remember that he fought on the wrong side.

Paris still has monuments to Napoleon, a man that crowned himself and formed his own dictatorship.  A man that, once deposed, tried to turn his army on Paris, but his men mutinied.  They still have statues of him, one of which is made from melted down cannons.  France has not forgotten its history, and neither should we.

I would rather be having this kind of conversation about the preservation of history.  I would rather have someone that disagrees with me offer me counter arguments, such as the statue is a source of pain for people of color in the area.  Maybe I’m not being sensitive enough to people that are directly harmed by the statue’s existence.  If that’s the argument… well… my mind can be changed.  Maybe there’s a compromise, such as moving the statue to another location.

That’s not the kind of conversation we can have, though.  Instead, we have to deal with the ramifications of a bunch of racist, close-minded assholes.  We have to take a stand and condemn the acts of evil men.  And in some cases, condemn other people that aren’t fast enough with their own condemnation.

I believe that white supremacists usurped an issue and applied their own agenda.  They took a stage not meant for them, called for the spotlight, made damned fools of themselves, and now we’re forced to talk about them and their idiocy.

But what other choice do we have?

Everywhere I look, I see people bashing the Dark Tower movie.  Very few people are actually defending it.  So, I’m going to talk about it, and I’m going to go deep into spoiler territory, for both the movie and the books.

I repeat, this post will contain spoilers for both the movies and the books.  If you haven’t read the books and you intend to, don’t read this post.  If you haven’t seen the movie and you don’t like spoilers, look away, my friend.  Because we’re going to get into it.

Okay?  Okay.  Let’s start with the books.

The books start with one of the best opening lines: The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.

This is a great opening because it gives us our protagonist, our antagonist, and our setting in one line.  Roland, The Man in Black, and the desert, which really is Roland’s world.  A world that has moved on.  A world that looks like it might once have been like our world.  But different.

In the first book, Roland knows he is a gunslinger.  He is resolute.  He is duty bound to a fault.  He is willing to let a boy fall to his death in order to achieve his goal.  Ultimately, his goal is to get to The Dark Tower.  The Man in Black is just a stepping stone to achieve that goal.

Continuing on with the books, Roland draws his companions to him.  We learn about what it means to be a gunslinger.  We learn about those that traveled with him in the past, and how they fell along the way.  We see, right up to the very end, that Roland’s curse is to follow his duty, and in the pursuit of that duty, walk across the backs of the beloved dead in order to reach his goal.

At the end of the books, he pretty much does that.  Jake and Eddie are dead and gone.  Susanna leaves him.  He’s lost everyone, but he perseveres until the Crimson King is defeated and he enters The Dark Tower.  He goes up each level, seeing his life.  At the last level of the tower, there is one more door.  He goes through it, and what happens?

The man in black flees across the desert, and the gunslinger follows.  He’s back to where we saw him at the beginning of the quest.  The cycle starts again, but there is hope that Roland has learned something.  That this time around, it will be a little bit different.

The Dark Tower series contains multiple endings.  Roland starting the cycle over again is one of them.  Another ending involves Susanna.  She is in another world, much like our own, but a little bit different.  She finds Eddie there.  This Eddie is much like the one she’d lost, but this one is alive, clean and sober.  And Jake is there, too.  Jake and Eddie are brothers, and they are both happy and alive.  They’re the same people we’ve loved through the series.  Just a little bit different.

I’ve spent a bunch of time talking about (and spoiling) the books, but before I go on to the movie, let me talk about one other minor point.  In the books, Roland laments that he should have taken just a few seconds longer at one battle, and picked up The Horn of Eld when his companion Cuthbert had died.  In his visions of approaching the tower, he saw himself standing on a hill, surrounded by roses.  He blows the horn before going to the tower.

When the cycle is restarted, a hint that things are different is that he has the horn.  Roland has grown and changed.  And if he has changed, then maybe the next time around will be different.  Maybe Eddie and Jake won’t have to die.

Now let’s talk about the movie.

The movie does not start with the gunslinger in the desert.  It starts with Jake having a vision of Roland’s world, and how Walter, the Man in Black, is using gifted children to attack the tower.

The movie focuses on Jake at the beginning, because when we get to Roland, he is a different man.  He’s broken in a fundamental way.  The deaths of his companions weigh on him.  He is no longer trying to get to The Dark Tower.  He just wants to kill the one responsible for the death of the ones he loved.

Right away, we can see that this is a different story than the one in the books.  Both Jake and Roland are similar to what we saw in the books, but they’re different.  In the books, Jake grew up in 80’s, and he had to die in order to get to Roland’s world.  In the movie, he’s in our present day, and he finds his own way to Roland’s world.

The characters are familiar, but a little bit different.  Does that sound familiar?

The movie is not trying to retell the story from the book.  It’s not an adaptation.  It’s an extension.  It’s a new chapter.

The movie even addresses this with one, subtle clue.  The Horn of Eld.  Roland doesn’t ever mention it in the movie, and no one remarks on it.  But look at this picture:

Nestled into that bag with all of that ammo is The Horn of Eld.  In this movie, Roland stopped when his good friend Cuthbert fell at the Jericho Hill.  He stopped, mourned the loss, and took up the horn.  In the movie world, if Roland reaches The Dark Tower, he won’t have the same regrets as the Roland from the books.

And yet, the movie is getting bad reviews.

Obviously, I went into it with a bunch of knowledge.  The lore from the books enriched my movie experience, and excited me every time I saw a nod to the story I already knew.

What about people that haven’t read the books?  Well, Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey gave outstanding performances.  The set pieces were detailed.  The action was great.  Tom Taylor as Jake did fine.  The story was fine.  And at only 95 minutes, it didn’t drag on too long.  I didn’t notice any pacing issues.

So what gives?

Here is my theory.  I think the first reviews came from people that wanted to see the story from the books on the big screen.  People that wanted to see the Roland they enjoyed and adventured with for thousands of pages.  People that loved Eddie and Jake and Susanna, and were looking forward to The Drawing of the Three.  People that might have forgotten the ending of the series, or maybe put the endings out of their mind, because Stephen King isn’t known for great endings.  Besides, he wrote himself into the last books.  How corny is that?  Who would want to remember how The Dark Tower ended?

Since the story in the movies is so different than the books, it did not meet expectations.  Therefore, the movie is bad.

Let’s face it.  Some people on the internet started shitting on the movie as soon as they found out that Idris Elbas was cast as Roland.  In the books, Roland is described as looking like Clint Eastwood.  A thin, hard-case.  Idris Elba is not particular thin, and he really doesn’t look like Clint Eastwood.

After the first few bad reviews, Group Think took over, and now everyone is saying it’s terrible.

Obviously, I disagree with the bad reviews.  I enjoyed it.  I’m glad I saw it in the theater.  When it hits DVD, I’ll buy it and watch it again.  I’m sure I will see even more details that I missed on first viewing.

The bad reviews tell me that we don’t want new stories.  We want the ones we know regurgitated back on the screen.

I’m not sure what I’m going to do with that knowledge as I try to write new stories.