Archives for January 2014

Florida is a strange state. You know that, I know that, people with double digit IQs know it, yet Floridians themselves seem blissfully unaware of that fact. This is the state that encouraged people to hunt pythons with hand guns. Which is just as effective as hunting elephants with pebbles. Fortunately no one was killed. Why is there a python problem in Florida? Because they hold cockroach eating contests so poor people can own them too until the poor people realize they can’t afford the upkeep pythons require and end up setting them loose in the swamps. Where they kill lots of stuff because they’re hungry and they can. Then again this is the fun state that took four tries to outlaw bestiality and then promptly got sued by a citizen who argues, still, that denying him sheep sex infringes on his personal rights. I could go on and on but you get the idea. Clearly infringing on people’s rights is a no-no in Florida.

Kind of.

Thanks to the Stand Your Ground law killing people can be considered a hobby. But, if you’re a gassy kid you’re going to the big house.

No, I’m not kidding.

Christopher di Armani has the whole, bizarre, story.

Schools have always had their fair share of “problem children”, but we used to actually be able to cope with them in a reasonable and sensible manner.  Not so any more.   A scan of headlines across America for just this past week showed me some bizarre and horrifying examples of how we in North America are doing our best to instill an abiding sense of fear and terror of police into our children.

For example, the case of a 12-year-old student at Stuart’s Spectrum Jr./Sr. High School was arrested for farting in class.  Sure, the little puke was being disruptive.  He’s a 12-year-old boy for crying out loud!  He’s supposed to be disruptive at that age.  It’s in his DNA.

You kick him out of class until he settles down… maybe even send him home after a phone call to his parents, but to bring in the police and arrest the kid? Put him in handcuffs and parade him out like a terrorist?

That is so far beyond absurd I don’t even know what to call it.  Clearly police from the Martin County Sheriff’s Department need to get a life, or at the very least go find some actual criminals to harass.

If they’ve got the time to arrest 12-year-old farting boys, then perhaps Martin County doesn’t need a Sheriff’s Department at all.

I’m sure the intended lesson won’t be lost on this young man… “Obey or else.”

These police officers ought to be, at the very least, ashamed of themselves.  They would appear to have missed out on even the most meager portion of common sense.

The next case of gross police absurdity comes from Midway, Georgia, where police found it necessary to shut down a lemonade stand run by a couple of kids.

Believe it or not, Midway Police Chief Kelly Morningstar said, according toFox News, that “police didn’t know how the lemonade was made, who made it or what was in it.”

Now I’m no cop, but I’m willing to bet you that I could find out the answers to those questions inside of 60 seconds and have lots of room to spare, if I felt the need to grill these kids in the first place, which I don’t.

According to the good Chief Morningstar, the kids needed to have a business license, a peddler’s permit and a food permit before operating their lemonade stand would be legal.  That would only cost a total of $230.

They were trying to raise some money for a trip to a water park. How many lemonade stands do you know that are pulling in that kind of cash?

Common sense anyone?  Don’t ask Chief Kelly Morningstar for any – she’s clearly missed her quota as well.

Citing “the law’s the law,” Morningstar was quoted as saying.  Well Chief Morningstar… in this case, the law is an ass, as is your enforcement of it.

Last on my list of asinine police actions is the case of a 16-year-old student and cheerleader who was arrested for “stealing” her cheerleader’s uniform.

Seriously?

Have we no bloody common sense any more?

Well, there is some.  It comes from the attorney for the young woman, Terence Kindlon.

“I’ve been practicing law for over 35 years now, and I have to say without hesitation this is the most absurd criminal prosecution I’ve ever seen.”

The student from New Lebanon High School was arrested because her cheerleading coach said she stole her own uniform.

Wow.  She won’t give back the uniform?  Fine.  Charge her for it and make her pay for the lost items if she wants to keep them so badly.  Who cares?

Penny Black, the cheerleading coach in question, doesn’t have an issue with this sort of stupidity.

To quote another website:

Deputy Shufelt met with Amber and her mother before a criminal complaint was signed in an effort to reconcile the situation, according to the Sheriff’s Office, but Amber “repeatedly” refused to return the uniform.

“The owner then requested criminal charges be filed and after consulting with the Columbia County District Attorney’s Office, the defendant was charged with petty larceny,” said the Sheriff’s Office report.

Amber was asked to turn herself in and be issued an appearance ticket, according to the report, but she refused that request. Deputy Shufelt got a warrant for her arrest and Amber was picked up at her job here.

Arresting a cheerleader for “stealing” her uniform is just about the most asinine thing I’ve ever heard of.

Except, of course, arresting a kid for farting, or shutting down a kid’s lemonade stand because she doesn’t have a business license for it.

I must be old-fashioned or something, because none of this makes any sense to me.

To recap, killing strangers is good. Farting, selling lemonade or being a cheerleader is bad.

Oh, and eating cockroaches is fun too. Well, except for the giant mutant ones they let loose that have no natural predators.

I seriously wonder if David Lynch runs that state.

The last two examples, from Georgia and rural NY are also fun in a “gee, can you learn to pretend to be a human” sort of way. I say this as someone who walked into an Aryan Front bar in New York once. Stupid is everywhere folks. Remain vigilant.

Mark Morford at the San Francisco Chronicle has put together a compendium of really depressing stats.

Six percent of Americans believe in unicorns. Thirty-six percent believe in UFOs. A whopping 24 percent believe dinosaurs and man hung out together. Eighteen percent still believe the sun revolves around the Earth. Nearly 30 percent believe cloud computing involves… actual clouds. A shockingly sad 18 percent, to this very day, believe the president is a Muslim. Aren’t they cute? And Floridian?

Do you believe in angels? Forty-five percent of Americans do. In fact, roughly 48 percent – Republicans and Democrats alike – believe in some form of creationism. A hilariously large percent of terrified right-wingers are convinced Obama is soon going to take away all their guns, so when the Newtown shooting happened and 20 young children were massacred due to America’s fetish for, obsession with and addiction to firearms, violence and fear, they bought more bullets. Because obviously.

In sum and all averaged out, it’s safe to say about 37 percent of Americans are just are not very bright. Or rather, quite shockingly dumb. Perhaps beyond reach. Perhaps beyond hope or redemption. Perhaps beyond caring about anything they have to say in the public sphere ever again. Sorry, Kansas.

Did you frown at that last paragraph? Was it a terribly elitist and unkind thing to say? Sort of. Probably. But I’m not sure it matters, because none of those people are reading this column right now, or any column for that matter, because reading anything even remotely complex or analytical is something only 42 percent of the population enjoy doing on a regular basis, which is why most TV shows, all reality shows, many major media blogs and all of Fox News is scripted for a 5th-grade education/attention span. OMG LOL kittens! 19 babies having a worse day than you. WTF is up with Justin Timberlake’s hair?!?

It is this bizarre, circular, catch-22 kind of question, asked almost exclusively by intellectual liberals because intellectual conservatives don’t actually exist, given how higher education leads to more developed critical thinking (you already know the vast majority of university professors and scientists identify as Democrat/progressive, right?) which leads straight to a more nimble, open-minded perspective. In short: The smarter you are, the less rigid/more liberal you become.

Until you get old. Or rich. And scared. And you forget. And you clamp down, seize up, fossilize. And the GOP grabs you like a mold.

Oh right! The question: How to reach the not-very-bright hordes, when they simply refuse to be reached by logic, fact, or modern mode? How to communicate obvious and vital truths (conservation, global warming, public health, sexuality, basic nutrition, religion as parable/myth, the general awfulness of Mumford & Sons) the lack of understanding of which keep the country straggling and embarrassing, the laughingstock of the civilized world?

And who are these people, exactly? And are they all really in Kentucky and Florida and Mississippi? Are they all in the Tea Party? Is failing education to blame? A dumbed-down media? Reality TV? In the wealthiest and most egomaniacal superpower in the world, why is the chasm so wide?

There is no easy answer, but there is a great deal of irony. It is a wicked conundrum that you and I can debate the definition of elitism, whether or not it’s fair to criticize those who believe that, say, gay marriage means kids will be indoctrinated into homosexuality, or that evolution is still a theory, or that Jesus literally flew up out of a cave and into the sky, when the discussion itself is, by nature, elitist, exclusionary, requiring fluid, abstract thinking the very people we’re discussing simply do not possess, and therefore cannot participate in.

TLC used to stand for “The Learning Channel.” Thanks to deregulation it is now the home of shows called “Sister Wives” and “90 Day Fiancé.”

So much for edjumakayshun.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that every channel should be like PBS. But it would be nice if people tried to raise the bar a little.

And, as to real education I remind you that the majority of textbooks are manufactured in Texas where they, recently, did try and get creationism and evolution both listed as valid scientific theories. Of course in Louisiana they do actually teach them side by side without any hint of irony.

And let us not forget this gem reported by Susan Guyet from Reuters.

Up to 150 students at a Missouri high school that ordered “Slaughterhouse-Five” pulled from its library shelves can get a free copy of the novel, courtesy of the Kurt Vonnegut Memorial Library, library officials said on Thursday.

The offer for students at Republic High School comes on the heels of the Republic School Board’s decision to remove Vonnegut’s novel and Sarah Ockler’s “Twenty Boy Summer” from the curriculum and the school library shelves.

“All of these students will be eligible to vote and some may be protecting our country through military service in the next year or two,” Julia Whitehead, the executive director of the Vonnegut library in Indianapolis, said in a statement.

“It is shocking and unfortunate that those young adults and citizens would not be considered mature enough to handle the important topics raised by Kurt Vonnegut, a decorated war veteran. Everyone can learn something from his book.”

Slaughterhouse-Five, considered Vonnegut’s most influential and popular work, is a satirical novel centered around the bombing of the German city of Dresden during World War Two.

The Republic School District took the move at its April 18 meeting following a complaint lodged by local resident Wesley Scroggins in the spring of 2010.

In his complaint, the Missouri State University associate business professor called on district officials to stop using textbooks and other materials “that create false conceptions of American history and government or that teach principles contrary to Biblical morality and truth.”

Neither Scroggins nor Republic School Superintendent Vern Minor were immediately available for comment.

Whitehead said she was talking with the American Civil Liberties Union in Missouri and Indiana to support the First Amendment rights of the students at Republic High School.

The offer of a free book to any Republic high school student who requests one is a way for the fledgling 7-month-old library, located in Vonnegut’s hometown, to show support, she said.

Yes, Wesley Scroggins is a moron and Vern Minor is a wimp. This is exactly when the school superintendent should use this as a teaching moment and explain what the First Amendment is and what it really protects.

It allows Mr. Scroggins to continue being a moron but it allows us the freedom to disagree with him.

Although, I can see why an enlightened gentleman such as Mr. Scroggins might have had a problem with the book.

Americans, like human beings everywhere, believe many things that are obviously untrue… Their most destructive untruth is that it is very easy for any American to make money. They will not acknowledge how in fact hard money is to come by, and, therefore, those who have no money blame and blame and blame themselves. This inward blame has been a treasure for the rich and powerful, who have had to do less for their poor, publicly and privately, than any other ruling class since, say, Napoleonic times.

Many novelties have come from America. The most startling of these, a thing without precedent is a mass of undignified poor. They do not love one another because they do not love themselves.
― Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five

There are many unintended consequences. A quick search of the Interweb will keep you goggle eyed for hours. And most of them are bad. Really bad. Simple things like cutting funding for birth control can lead to the state spending millions on orphans and neglected kids. This is called “bad” in case you’re unsure. But not every unintended consequence is an opening into hell. For example, I have been shopping a novel, just like you, and it has earned me a couple of new friends who have made my life better. Still haven’t sold the book but their input has made it a better project and gives me a much better chance. Also, I have gotten coffee. I like coffee.

When you look at the title of today’s post you probably thought of something like the pic I posted. And that’s fine. A leisurely stroll through a fishnet fantasy never hurt anyone.. But, oddly enough, it is not our topic today. No, today is one of those unintended consequence things. This one turns out well.

Well, I can’t be depressing all the time.

John M. Grohol, Psy.D., of PsychCentral, a web site for mental health specialists, reports that cities are installing blue lights and people are stopping killing themselves and each other.

An intriguing, anecdotal finding was recently reported by some news outlets that the implementation of blue-colored streetlights has reduced both crime and suicides:

Glasgow, Scotland, introduced blue street lighting to improve the city’s landscape in 2000. Afterward, the number of crimes in areas illuminated in blue noticeably decreased.

The Nara, Japan, prefectural police set up blue street lights in the prefecture in 2005, and found the number of crimes decreased by about 9 percent in blue-illuminated neighborhoods. Many other areas nationwide have followed suit.

Keihin Electric Express Railway Co. changed the color of eight lights on the ends of platforms at Gumyoji Station in Yokohama, Japan, in February.

Since the railway company introduced the new blue lights, they’ve had no new suicide attempts.

This effect may be attributed to a few possible reasons (some of which are mentioned in the comments section of the article):

• The light color is new and unusual, causing people to act more cautiously in the area (as a person is unsure what to expect in the unusually-lit area).
• Blue is a light color almost universally associated with a police presence, suggesting it is an area of stricter law enforcement.
• Blue may be a more pleasant illuminating color to most people, as opposed to yellow, orange or red (according to some research, such as Lewinski, 1938).

In fact, the article quotes from a professor at the end, noting it may just be an “unusualness effect:”

Prof. Tsuneo Suzuki at Keio University said: “There are a number of pieces of data to prove blue has a calming effect upon people. However, it’s an unusual color for lighting, so people may just feel like avoiding standing out by committing crimes or suicide under such unusual illumination. It’s a little risky to believe that the color of lighting can prevent anything.”

There is a lot of research into the psychology of color, but not as much has looked into the color of blue illumination itself (as opposed to the color of an object or wall). But some research looking into short wavelength light (blue) has demonstrated that it is a potentially effective treatment for seasonal affective disorder (a seasonal type of depression; see for instance, Glickman, et al., 2006), and helps to reduce the stress response in fish (it hasn’t been yet tested on humans).

If this finding is robust and the behavior change associated with it is still prevalent a few years from now (when everyone has become accustomed to the new light color), it would be an interesting finding. A simple, inexpensive change might be effective in helping reduce at least one method of suicide (and reduce crime to boot).

What is interesting about this is the consistency. This has been happening for 13 years now and shows no sign of abating. They put up blue street lights and crime and suicides drop between 9% and 10%, depending on how you slice the data.

Plus there is anecdotal evidence that people in these areas are, in general, nicer.

As noted above there has been a ton of research done on the effects of colors on people’s emotions but very little done on the effects of light.

I will say this. I have a friend who suffered seasonal depression. He was just a mess in the winter. He tried several drugs over the years to minimal avail. Then, two years ago, his doctor suggested he try a blue light. He hit the hardware store, bought a few and installed them. He’s been fine ever since.

As he says, he doesn’t care if it is the silliest thing he’s ever done, he feels normal again.

Given the crime rate in America this seems worth a shot.

As it were.