This Needs To STOP

Today, I was struck by an exhibit at the National Museum of African Art at the Smithsonian entitled

The Divine Comedy: Heaven, Purgatory, and Hell Revisited by Contemporary African Artists

The introduction asked visitors:

What do your fears look like? Are they located in the dark or in a blinding light? Do they feel hot or hopelessly cold? And what or who is it that scares you or deserves your condemnation? People and places fracturing and splitting apart? Forces of nature spun out of control? A senseless war in which men blow off one another’s heads? The artists in this section explore these questions and others, for hell can be found in a passion for land or religion if it leads to war; it can even be embodied by a beached whale. This is a hell in which we never see ourselves and others fully but always in bits and pieces. What would your hell look like?

That last question?  I thought about it and very quickly something popped into mind.

For much of my adult life I have had the same nightmare.

It usually involves me in some dire situation, often being chased or threatened by a man, desperately trying to get someone's, anyone's attention and yet, when I open my mouth to scream for help — nothing comes out.

Nothing.

No scream. No yell.  No screech.  No sound.

It often ends with me waking — in a complete sweat, shaking and feeling horrible.

Occasionally, very small, hoarsely whispered cries of " Help ! "  " Help !! " do escape and rouse my husband who then gently awakens me to say, "You're having a bad dream."

It IS a bad dream, a hellish dream in fact, that always rattles me to my core and leaves me feeling vulnerable and shaken.

And what really disturbs me is that whenever I mention this, I've heard several women (even my friend's mother) share that they too have this same sort of nightmare.  A nightmare where mouth open, no sound emerges and horrifyingly they are unable to call for help.

Why?

Do men ever experience this dilemma in a dream?  Or is it only women?

Recently, I was profoundly disturbed by a documentary I watched on Netflix — 

IT HAPPENED HERE

... a compelling new documentary from director Lisa F. Jackson and producer Marjorie Schwartz Nielsen, explores sexual assault on campuses through the personal testimonials of five survivors who transform their experiences into a springboard for change.

In raw and intimate interviews, the students describe surviving sexual assault only to be met with apathy, disbelief, blame and retaliation from the authorities when they tried to report the crime. When they tried to get justice, they were ignored, belittled and shamed, while their attackers remained on campus with impunity. But instead of hiding away in shame, they chose to speak out, and found a way to force institutional change. 

[from the website http://www.ithappenedhere.org]

We live in a culture that accepts rape.  The rape of women during wars; the rape of women by abusive partners; the rape of women in the military; the rape of women on college campuses.

I can't imagine what their nightmares are like and the hell that each has gone through.  

In this film five young women summon the courage and resolve to speak up and yet their voices are ignored and while my nightmare, is not about rape, it IS about feeling completely and utterly powerless.

Feeling powerless is a hell.  

It's time for all of us to work to end the way women who have been raped are treated. There is NO justification for excusing rape.

If you are someone on a college campus, in a military institution, a police station, or in any way privy to helping a survivor of rape, just imagine the person opposite you is your sister, daughter, mother or friend, and STAND UP.

It's time for all our voices to rise up in a very loud crescendo and say,

NO MORE.

What can we do to stop this?  What can YOU do to stop this nightmare ?

TLC — and I Don't Mean Tender, Loving Care

As I wrote in this blog almost two years ago in Write Your Life —  I had to answer this essay question on a national exam:  “If you had to choose only one object for people to find 100 hundred years from now that would give insight on our society, what would it be?” I said, the TV Guide was a window on our world and it wasn't a very flattering picture. Future generations could read it and know how we frittered our time away on game shows, soap operas, detective stories and more.

This is what I was troubled by and ashamed of in the late 80s. Little did I know what was coming 25 years later — far beyond soap opera — as they say in today's vernacular, "OMG." 

What is it about our culture that devours such awful stuff? The Learning Channel (now TLC) used to be a channel that sought to educate and improve the lives of its viewers.  But it was sold and bought and changed.  Look how far it's strayed. All the way to the other side — 180-degrees — with barely a quarter of its shows offering viewers any saving grace. Still, there must be an audience that watches the junk — over 3 million are glued to Here Comes Honey Boo Boo. THREE MILLION.

If you want an overview of how this channel went from positive educational content to prurient pablum, read this article from Business Insider that chronicles the downfall. A far, far fall.

Today TLC boasts on its very own YouTube channel:

TLC is television network dedicated to covering "real life" reality 

and finding fun and beauty in the unexpected!

Along with...

Here Comes Honey Boo Boo

I choose another of TLC's finest...

America's Worst Tattoos

So that's what they call it..."finding fun and beauty in the unexpected"...hmmm...

I admit that I like and watch 19 Kids and Counting, Say Yes to the Dress, and have watched (some frequently, some occasionally) What Not To Wear, little people, BIG WORLD, little COUPLE, and Long Island Medium — they each have redeeming value (well, maybe not Say Yes) but represent just a small portion of what TLC offers the viewing public.

For your edification, in my own order, here are those shows that clearly indicate TLC is certainly following the life spectrum in its line-up of "real life" reality ...

[Well, this last one is a saving grace...it's not in the same category as those before.]


After watching all these other "peeping tom" shows that voyeuristically look at what is not best about us, is it any wonder  __________________________________________ ? 

(You fill in the blank.)

ORANGE is the new BLACK

ORANGE is the new BLACK is yet another series where we find ourselves rooting for the bad guy — or gal in this case.  Though not as extreme as a seemingly mild-mannered serial killer (Dexter), as conniving as a soft-spoken high-school teacher turned drug lord (Breaking Bad), as treacherous as a military hero who is working with the enemy (Homeland) nor as repugnant as a silky smooth politician whose smile masks the most reprehensible behavior (House of Cards), this "heroine," Piper Chapman suddenly finds her wild and crazy past catching up with her in a stop-in-your-tracks way.  

In this based-on-true-events story, Chapman's a white, upper-middle-class, engaged-to-be married, Smith-educated graduate who finds herself heading for federal prison on a drug charge from an action in her past.  Everything we see points to the fact that this is someone who doesn't belong in an orange jumpsuit.  Because she looks like us.  

ORANGE is the new BLACK features yet another anti-hero, but here's what I think is different: 

• We see a character who is bi-sexual and, despite the complications, is fairly comfortable with that orientation. 

• We see prison life from the inside — not the frightening horror stories of a Scared Straight or Oz but the daily, mundane frustrating prison routine filled with injustices big and small and constant reminders of missing freedoms — big and small.  

• We see the backstory of all Chapman's sister prisoners — each of these ladies (and the prison staff) could be a series of their own. Chapman is atypical. (Another small loss is your first name because in prison you go by your last name.) 

Piper's got a blindsided fiancé living life without her on the outside, and further complicating her mess on the inside is that she's locked up with the ex-girlfriend who fingered her for being a drug-runner. There's lots more going on in the show but suffice to say, through the thirteen episodes that are available on Netflix, Piper is doing her best to hang on to her sanity in an environment filled with unknowns that doesn't follow any of the rules she's come to take for granted in her privileged world. 

Telling the stories of Piper (and her band of widely diverse inmates) through flashbacks of life before prison, makes these characters human and allows us to feel empathy for them — even prods us to identify with her.  But Season One ended on a disturbing note as the weight of being locked behind bars permeates Piper's psyche and explodes with a vengeance.

Guess I'll have to stayed tune.

In the Aftermath of Newtown

This school shooting, just as those before it, was horrific — but this one especially horrific because it involved innocent, joyous first-graders who had not yet lived long enough to become sassy tweens, back-talking teens, or know-it-all college students.  It is particularly painful to think of all the already wrapped presents still hidden in closets; painful that what was once a happy holiday will forever be marred.  A bleak anniversary of unimaginable horribly real loss — in a family, at a school, on a playground, and everywhere in their community.

It's startling to realize this is the fourth such tragedy during the President's tenure — what is it in our society that sparks such rage and ignites such devastation?  Since Columbine there is always talk of safer schools or greater gun control or, in the most superficial way, the need for character education.

There is no one solution.  If someone is compelled or chooses to manifest their emotional outrage as an assault on others, this cannot be stopped.  Despite the current rhetoric, we cannot arm our teachers nor surround our schools with a bullet-proof web.  But we can try more consistently and uniformly to create a culture of character in the places where our children spend most of their days (if we are lucky).

Character and citizenship were the purview of families, schools, and faith-based communities.  But this triumvirate of support systems which taught, practiced and reinforced the moral upbringing of children has been under siege from all fronts — most especially from the bombardment of violence and violence-themed messages permeating television, movies, music, and video games.  We no longer have a society that filters and protects its young — what was always deemed inappropriate, now is the norm.

Though there will always be families, faith-based organizations, and classrooms committed to developing kind and caring young people, often these forces are fighting an uphill (at best) or losing battle (at worst).

We have allowed violence to become a staple of everyday living.  We celebrate cell-phone-throwing-DWI divas and promote "reality" TV that glorifies back-stabbing, road rage, and vengeance.  

WHY do we watch this?  What is so appealing about this side of our humanity? I don't understand it, but I know we as a society implicitly condone it and consumerize it.

I know that to address these acts of horror — that seem to occur with uncomfortable regularity — means to look at all facets of the issue.  This includes rethinking access to weapons and the kind of weapons we allow — and more focus on identifying and treating mental health without stigmatization.  But I also know that we need to commit to character development — not just the trait of the month in elementary school or the occasional week-long  middle school activity to get involved in local elections or high-school admonitions not to cheat.  With some school exceptions, most of our present efforts are all too fragmented, too little, too late.

Here are a few findings I want to share from a 2002 study the Secret Service conducted on school shootings after Columbine:

• There is no accurate or useful "profile" of students who engaged in targeted school violence — they varied considerably in age, demographic, background and other characteristics.
• All were male; three-quarters of the attackers were white 
• Almost two-thirds of the attackers came from two-parent families 
• Very few of the attackers were known to be failing in school; most were doing well in school at the time of the attack, generally receiving As and Bs in their courses
• Over half of the attackers demonstrated some interest in violence, through movies, video games, books, and other media 
• Most attackers had access to and had used weapons prior to the attack
• Almost three-quarters of the attackers felt persecuted, bullied, threatened, attacked or injured by others prior to the incident
• In several cases, individual attackers had experienced bullying and harassment that was long-standing and severe.  In some of these cases the experience of being bullied seemed to have a significant impact on the attacker and appeared to have been a factor in his decision to mount an attack at the school.

The shooters came from intact families and broken ones; they belonged to religious communities and they didn't; they had good grades for the most part.  Two factors were prevalent: access to weapons and being bullied.

We need to face up to the fact that placing paramount emphasis on grades and test scores is falling far short of what the best educational system in the world should have as its outcome — educating honest and compassionate students who value civic engagement and service.  If we build a curriculum that has at its core a regular and routine focus on building character, than we stand a chance of creating a culture of caring for students and perhaps having more children make it to the second grade and beyond.

Don't we owe our kids that much?

The Import of Ai Weiwei

If you can get to the Smithsonian Museum in Washington DC before February 24, you owe it to yourself to see the exhibit Ai Weiwei: According To What?  I don't know much about conceptual art but I know what I like and I am in awe of his creative genius.  For those of you who don't know about Ai, you can Google to find out about his life, his work, his experiences in the US, and his troubles in China.  But this exhibit (I believe his first in North America), and the accompanying installations at the Hirshorn and the Sackler, will give you a firsthand look at what this one artist is attempting to do with both his work and his words.  

His massive Zodiac Heads installation makes you ponder the meaning of the twelve animals symbolizing the Chinese astrological signs and makes those animals more than human due to their intricacy, expression, and sheer size (and that eleven are actual animals and one — mine — is the mythical and mighty dragon).  Walking around this Circle of Heads made me wonder what if, what if these animals towered over us and we didn't have what my friend and animal-advocate Kris calls "the right of capture"? Our human sense of entitlement that just because we can, we kill?

There is a majestic magnificence to these bronzes and they present these creatures in a way that heralds their the superiority over we humans.  I wish I could fully explain the significance of the images I've taken or bring you there and walk you through the thoughtful philosophical approach that Ai Weiwei brings to his art — but I can't.  I can only share bits and pieces of what spoke to me.  And he must've spoken to Elton John as well because this past week he told his Beijing audience that he was dedicating his concert to the spirit of Ai Weiwei, which must have upset the concert's organizers as Ai has been under house arrest and is banned from leaving China.

The images should give you something to ponder, but Ai's words can do a far better job explaining his perspective than can I.

This may have been my favorite piece and may best portray the simplicity and sharpness of his work...so if you can, make your way to the Hirshorn Museum and soak in the importance of his point of view — before  some government somewhere decides you shouldn't.

The field and the houses are all made of tea. The scent was glorious.

My Own Mount Rushmore

William C Friday

Rushworth Kidder

                        

                     John Medlin Jr

                      

                     William Raspberry

This year these four men died.  Each had as part of their public and private persona that which I greatly admire — individual responsibility and integrity.  

Rushworth Kidder was the first of these men that I crossed paths with.  I was getting ready for an important job interview and searching for materials to educate me.  It was a job I really, really wanted but I did NOT possess the expected qualifications. I came across an article written by someone with an unusual name in a newsletter for — of all things — county managers.  It was entitled "Shared Human Values" about the common ground we share and can build on.  When I read it, I thought, "Hey, this is what I believe and have been doing versions of all along in my K-12 work. This is something I know and can contribute to."  The article was by Rushworth Kidder.  I got the job.

As a journalist for The Christian Science Monitor, Kidder was the first western reporter allowed in to Chernobyl and what he learned astounded and changed him.  He referred to Chernobyl not as an accident, but as a human "moral meltdown" and it led him eventually to create the Institute for Global Ethics, where he lived his ethics for the rest of his life.  He was famous for the "right vs right" dilemma — the way he explained it to me: "People know the difference between right and wrong and they don't always choose to do what's right.  But what keeps us up at nights is when there are competing "rights" — do you tell the truth? or are you loyal and stay silent to protect someone?  These are real dilemmas: truth vs loyalty, justice vs mercy, short term vs long term and the individual vs community."

The job led me to meet John Medlin who was always gracious and helpful to me in every way.  The first time I was on a local educational talk show, I was horrified when it aired on TV.  The entire time I was nodding my head in agreement with everyone — I looked like a bobble-head doll.  When John saw it he sent me a note that said, "The show was great and by far, you were the STAR."  His kindness made me feel so much better about my awkward performance.  John was a well-respected finance CEO who was a straight-shooter and a gentleman; some of his business maxims will acquaint you with his character.

• Answer your own phone by two rings.  Clean out your in box everyday.  

• Don’t let the sun go down without responding to a customer inquiry.  Even if you don’t have the answer, tell them that. [This is known as the sundown rule.] 

• Don’t let the urgent always crowd out the important.

• It takes a century to build a great reputation it can take a second and one wrong decision to ruin it.

Also through the job I was fortunate to meet Pulitzer Prize-winning syndicated columnist for The Washington Post, William Raspberry, a straight-talking no-nonsense practical commentator on life who called it as he saw it, in spite of what others might think.  What he wrote often ruffled feathers and he continued ruffling right up until the end.  Here are some excerpts from his final column in 2008: 

“The schools black children attend don't work as well as they should — but most often for reasons that have less to do with white attitudes than with our own. Many black children — and too many of their parents — don't value education. If they do, they see it as a debt owed rather than a prize to be earned ... [Obama's}  ascendancy to the most powerful political position in the world does not mean an end to black problems — including the problem of racial discrimination.  But it may allow our children to begin to see life as a series of problems and possibilities and not just a list of grievances.”

In the meetings I was in with ill, he didn't say much, but what he said cut to the heart of the matter in the most direct and understated way.  After he retired from teaching and writing, Bill Raspberry started a foundation Baby Steps, in his hometown of Okolona, Mississippi, focused on engaging parents of very young children to get involved in their education.

And last but never least, William Friday, an icon of the southern gentlemen who promoted education and philanthropy through an ole-boy's network.  Soft-spoken in voice but solid-steel when brokering a deal, Bill Friday moved the state's college education system toward integration and help drive a seismic shift from an agrarian economy to one targeted on education, high tech, research and development — not an easy feat.  He was founding co-chair of the Knight Foundation Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics and worked relentlessly to promote integrity in college athletics.  I felt he was disappointed that after fifteen-plus years, the college sports machine didn't fully embrace their responsibility for building character along with athleticism.  When I went to him for advice on my character development program he made me feel as if what I was creating was the most important and valuable thing in the world.  The The William and Ida Friday Continuing Education Center, named for Bill and his wife, was where I took my writing class Write Your Life.

I am grateful for the lessons I learned from each of these men (yes, I realize the figures on my Rushmore are all male).  These are the faces today's MBA candidates should be learning about and looking up to.

I wanted to acknowledge the passing of these four men...who would be on your Mount Rushmore?