A man frequents a cafeteria that serves Campbell's soup out of vintage pots. The contents of each pot are handwritten on small chalkboards that hang from the pots.
Since the cafeteria serves the same soups day after day, it uses the same signs day after day, and the signs become smudged as they are bumped by patrons ladling soup.
One of the pots holds chicken noodle soup and the second "o" in "noodle" has been brushed away by hundreds of shirtsleeves brushing it each day.
The hero of the our story sees this every day and comments every day: "I'll have the chicken with no DLE. Ha ha ha!"
Later in the story, the hero gets hit by a Campbell's Soup delivery truck. When the EMTs arrive, he looks up at the truck and whispers, "No DLE, no DLE," and then he dies.
One EMT says to the other, "Did you get that? What do you think... a name? An address?"
The other replies, "I guess we'll never know," and pulls a blanket over the dead man's face.
2 Religion... [and] economics... both grow out of the nature of human societies
"Everyone grows up inside some tradition, under some authority and given some revelation – those are three things that every parent provides for their children, and which children will always find, even if they have to create it. ... Religion is not something imposed on us by priests any more than economics is imposed on us by bankers. Both grow out of the nature of human societies." --Andrew Brown guardian.co.uk
3 Say something else in that ear.
"Americans are in love with voting. They don't care much what they're voting about." --Clarence 0ddbody
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[1] I once worked at a big retailer that had a cafe that served soup in this manner. I remarked a number of times, "Why is that soup missing DLE?" The cashier never supplied the missing "o," nor even a humorless smile.
Why is abortion acceptable to so many people? It's someone else's baby.
We are evolved creatures; there are many examples in the animal kingdom of one member of a species killing the offspring of another member of the same species. I suspect we have some of that left in us, and are only seeing the application in a new context and on an industrialized scale.[1]
However, we rely on ethical frameworks to manage our health and safety, individually and corporately. The same sensibility that gives me a free flu shot each year also establishes laws against jay walking. I am given opportunities every day to protect myself and others by adjusting my behavior. Guidelines around these opportunities are based on a set of shared values regarding human life, safety, privacy, decency, etc. (Eg, we don't we sell liquor and XXX materials near schools and churches.)
That is only prologue to this: Deciding what is alive and not, and who lives or not (sterilization, abortion, euthanasia, capital punishment, etc), are moral and ethical discussions. And if you're going to have these discussions, you have to listen to religious perspectives you may not agree with.
The presence of a deity in a perspective doesn't invalidate it any more than an absence legitimizes it.
An evolutionary perspective doesn't explain why some mothers are not repulsed at aborting their own babies. I believe that is a modern psychological phenomenon that's grown out of refusal to fully acknowledge that conditions have obligations and actions have consequences (so sex is divorced from procreation, procreation from parenthood, parenthood from nurturing, family from community, etc.).[2]
(Many who've had an abortion are actually terribly distressed; I think the public anger from some women may in part be an attempt to mask that. The anger from men I've addressed elsewhere - "Why Some Men Support a Woman's Right to Abortion" .)
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[1] I.e, indifference may be programmed into us. I've not seen this idea anywhere else, but it seems too obvious not to have been observed before. Of course, you certainly wouldn't find it used as a defense of abortion, since most on that side of the debate wish to retain other moral standards that a purely evolutionary defense would remove.
I find it personally reassuring to believe aborted children have a life elsewhere that they were denied on earth.
[2] How do conditions have obligations? Good Samaritan laws, for example, or being charged with accessory even if you didn't commit a crime. Communities recognize that we have some responsibilities when we find ourselves in some situations; ignoring that can range from rudeness to criminality.
I finally threw in the towel on the issues this election year. I was watching a TV ad on Prop 2 in Michigan[1] and couldn't take it anymore.
How dare you manipulate the facts and then hold me accountable for making an informed decision at the polls.
I hadn't heard about this issue until a few days ago, and now both sides of this debate are dancing like a couple preschoolers that have to go to the bathroom.
The presidential race is no better.
I went straight through disgust and into indignation, where I am comfortably seething and will continue to do so until I walk into the voting booth.
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For crying out loud, tell it like it is and let your constituents use their brains to make a choice. That is what it's about, isn't it?
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No, that's not what it's about. It's about focusing on irrelevant or peripheral facts ("Mr. President, have you looked at your pension?") to avoid examining something more complicated and interesting ("My mega gabillion dollars are handled by a blind trust. Did you hear the word blind? That means I'm not responsible for what others do with my money.")
At one point in the second debate, both Romney and Obama had the chance to discuss HHS and they both blew it. Obama says Romney is anti-contraception and all Romney can say is "No I'm not, no I'm not, you stop saying that."
It took CNN, God bless 'em (sometimes), to point out from a conservative woman's perspective that HHS is not about preventing women from getting access to contraception, but about the constitutional protection of religious conscience. Period. BIG period.
But you won't hear Obama say that. He'll allow a misunderstanding that assists him.
And you won't hear Romney say that, because... well... I don't think he understands it. Too bad, he's got a winner there and doesn't know it. But my guess he's better skilled at hearing a host of elevator speeches and making an executive decision, not crafting a good elevator speech.
I think we need some stairway speeches - long-winded knock-down drag-out stairway speeches, 10 flights at least - where both of these candidates tell me enough of the truth so I can make up my own mind.
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NPR, commenting on the contraception debate, used a soundbite of a woman who said something to the effect "we have more important things to worry about," but the story was meant to give insight into what was important, not if it should or should not be important, so there was no editorial comment.
By which the listener may assume the issue really is unimportant. If you dismiss something, even by editorial omission, you can get others to dismiss it too.
And someday, when enough people want to make another exception to the Constitution, it just may be something more of us do think is important.
The beauty of a constitutional democracy is that at any one point in time, it doesn't matter what popular opinion is, it matters what the law says. It survives shifting opinions, which are more often the face of competing agendas, not nationwide consensus.
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Vote Yes on Michigan Prop 2
Vote No on Michigan Prop 2
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Related: Study links 45,000 U.S. deaths to lack of insurance . Source >
About four in 10 American pregnancies are terminated by abortion. From 1973 through 2008, nearly 50 million legal abortions occurred. Source >
A vote for either Romney or Obama will elect a man who will directly contribute to the deaths of those who are too weak, poor, marginalized, or small to protect themselves.
That is not a choice.
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The sad fact is that those running for office don't care what I think, as long as there are enough folks who aren't thinking.
It's a numbers game. It's not about you or me or aborted fetuses or the poor schlemiel that doesn't go to the doctor until it's too late because he can't afford it.
When I see a yard full of political signs I see someone desperate to belong to something bigger than themselves and manipulated into thinking they do.
In 7th grade science class at Bethel Christian School (back when it was at 737 E. 26th Street in Erie, PA) , we were studying nutrition in Mr Rodney Blystone's class. Calories were being discussed that day.
I was confused. I raised my hand and asked, "Since no one likes calories, why don't we just take them out?"
A classmate enlightened me in front of the others.[1] But I still didn't understand at the end of the hour. If calories are something "in" something else, why we can't just take them out?
I did understand the concept of attributes and qualities, so it wasn't incomprehensible to me.
I think perhaps because that era saw the beginning of low-calorie, reduced-fat, fat-free etc, I presumed there was a process for removing the offending attributes rather than creating the product without them in the first place.
It's not the only time my sensitivity to word formation has incorrectly informed my understanding. It can be a little embarrassing.
[2012-10-12]
2 Life
Does "life" have an attribute apart from size, intelligence, self-awareness, etc that adheres to all creatures that possess it?
Is something lost at the death of an insect that is in some way identical to something lost when a human dies?
There is a story told of the Buddha (IIRC) whose enlightenment was sparked by seeing the destruction of a termite hill; he pondered something similar.
[2012-10-19]
3 Overheard
"Well done, though stupid and faithful servant." --Fr John Riccardo, 2012-10-19, taped broadcast.
[2012-10-19]
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[1] Jerry Beers, whom I found and lost online some years ago and respected a great deal. He became a minister; Wesleyan, I believe. He was a very good storyteller and told me when we reconnected all those years ago that he was known for that still.
Jerry Beers from Bethel Christian School in Erie, PA, if you're still out there, look me up here >
"Americans are in love with voting. They don't care much what they're voting about."
