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Chanticleer Calls - December 15, 1999
IN THIS ISSUE:
BLAME IT ON RIO, BUT NOT ON Y2K
When (if?) you get up on January 1st and your newspaper hasn't been delivered, or if your milk has soured, or your door seems to squeak - before you blame it on Y2K, consider these statistical tidbits offered by the Dallas Morning News yesterday:
SURGEON GENERAL ON 'MENTAL' HEALTH
'Mental' health is in the news because of the recently-released Surgeon General's report. Some reported findings:
In a separate report, the drug Ritalin was determined to be "more effective than behavior-modification therapy in treating children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder". However, the report also stated that 70 percent of the children in the study also suffered from other problems, such as depression and anxiety. In those cases, behavior therapy provided significant benefits, especially when used with Ritalin.
The report does not detail what constitutes "behavior-modification therapy".
Did you see the 80's movie "Mr. Mom", with Michael Keaton and Terri Garr? Jack's been laid off, and his wife takes a job, and on her first day she's rushing out the door and trying to give him some very explicit instructions for how to get the kids to school. And he's all, "Sure, sure, no problem, you run along, I've got it under control ...." And then it's pouring rain, the kids are in the back seat screaming, Jack's to peering out the foggy windshield through the wiper blades, trying to see his turn-in at the school, and the kids yell, "No, Dad, not here, YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG!" And Jack is all, "Keep it down, I know exactly what I'm doing, I'm doing it Jack's way." And he stops at the curb as a yellow raincoated-volunteer flags him over, and he rolls down his window against the driving rain, and the neighborly volunteer says:
Jack, you're doing it wrong.
Would it surprise anybody if I invoked the memorable works and names of Alfred Korzybski, Irving J. Lee, S.I Hayakawa, Wendell Johnson, Abraham Maslow, Benjamin Whorf, et al, at this point? For about seventy years now, since Korzybski wrote Science and Sanity, we have had the means to not only recognize the pernicious, insidious ways in we talk ourselves into 'unsanity', but to also diagnose and prescribe methods to become less 'unsane'.
Hello? We're doing it wrong!
Now, I'm not talking about severe 'mental' disorders resulting from chemical imbalances, brain damage, etc. I'm talking about those instances of depression, anxiety, stress, fear, paranoia, inattention, etc., which are generally considered to be 'treatable' through psychotherapy.
And what is involved in "psychotherapy"? From my three years experience, I can say that mine involved a lot of straightening out how I talked to myself. What was yours like?
At some point, SOMEBODY has got to catch on that Korzybski, et al, have some very relevant things to say about our language hygiene - not only for those fortunate 1 out of 5 who know they have impairments, but especially for the other 80% who, in all likelihood, have significant impairments but don't know it!
Just as one example ... for our first 10 or so years, or about 13% of our lifetimes, we are systematically, deliberately and thoroughly taught to believe - hook, line and sinker - in known falsehoods. Now it's done primarily out of 'love', and generally out of compassion, and from good memories on the part of parents, yet still - almost every parent teaches his/her child to believe in things that don't exist. Yeah, old ChantiScrooge here is talking about Santa Claus.
And you're thinking, "Woah! Let's not go overboard here, guy. You're talking about ... (revered hush) ... Santa Claus! The Spirit of Christmas, Red-Nosed Rudolph, and Jimmy Stewart. The glittering sparkle of a child's wondering eyes reflecting the lighted icicles of the family's tree."
To which I respond: If it were just Santa Claus - okay. Let's spend the first ten impressionable years of a child's life indoctrinating her to believe, and not even for one moment to doubt, that this fat guy from the North Pole will reward her once a year with gifts - only if she's been nice, and not naughty - and then after the tenth Christmas, we just say, "Kings X - we were just kidding! Your mom and I bought the stuff at Wal-mart, put it together and put it under the tree while you were asleep. Nope, we didn't drink the hot chocolate because it was always cold after sitting there for three hours. And yeah, I'll take the blame that the second gear on your first bike never worked."
No harm, no foul. Ollie-ollie-in-free.
But it's NOT just Santa Claus. I'm talking about the Easter Bunny. And the tooth fairy. And since Charlie Brown, the Great Pumpkin. And I'm talking about fairy tales, and ghosts and goblins and unicorns and talking animals. And as we grow older, I'm talking about myths, and old wives' tales, and superstitions, and jinxes. And psychic hot lines, and horoscopes, and Tarot cards. And then we're adults and we're listening to relentless, indiscriminate, unaccountable, incessant advertising claims and we hear, "Better ingredients, better pizza", and we just shrug and we never, never, never even think to stop and demand, "Oh yeah? Prove it!"
You think I'm over-reacting? Do you think every fifth person you see on the street is a Forrest Gump or an R.P. McMurphy, or a Sling Blade?
I cannot help but believe that there are ultimate consequences from indoctrinating each successive generation to believe in things for which there is no evidence of existence, and that these consequences might correlate to the twenty percent of the U.S. population referred to in the Surgeon General's report.
In Milton Dawes' article On Time-binding, he quotes Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young: "You, you along the road must have a code, that you can live by...... so teach your children well".
LET'S TALK ABOUT SEX: "Don't!"
Headline in the DMN: "A third of schools use abstinence-only sex education, studies say"
Chanticleer comments:
"France unveils strict rules for 'morning after' pill in schools"
Purported to have been tacked on Albert Einstein's wall: Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts.
MASTER OF WHOSE DOMAIN?
From a Washington Post story, printed in the DMN ... advocacy groups such as the NAACP and the ADL (Anti-Defamation League) are "racing to secure Internet address names that contain some of the most racist words in the English language in order to keep them away from hate groups. The NAACP has registered several address variations on anti-black slurs. Likewise, the Anti-Defamation League has purchased rights to numerous addresses that contain anti-Semitic epithets."
(The article claims a seller with the handle "animius" was using eBay.com to auction off the domain name which includes the "n-word" for $1M. However, your ever-diligent Chanticleer scratched around the eBay site and could find no evidence of the "n-word" or "animius". In case you don't know, it costs $70.00 to register domain names, and fortunes have been made by 'cyber-squatters' who staked claims several years ago to certain high-value words and phrases.)
Words ..... words ...... words ..... when we will ever learn?
sigh
STACY'S POEM
My daughter Stacy shared a couple of poems she wrote recently. A phrase in one of them struck me as, well, I just like her self-aware insight. Contemplating a former 'love' (I'll qualify that, since she's just 16):
AND FINALLY - "ART"
I had the thoroughly enjoyable privilege of seeing the Tony award-winning play "ART" recently. Judd Hirsch, from TV's "Taxi", starred as one of three middle-aged men in Paris whose friendships begin to unravel when one of them pays an outrageous amount for a white-on-white painting. One of the three, Yvan, has been seeing a therapist in advance of his approaching marriage. In an effort to quell the rising tension among the three, Yvan shares this wisdom offered by his therapist to his friends, Marc and Serge: (from the script, written by Yasmina Reza and translated by Christopher Hampton)
BUT YOU THOUGHT
...
If I read the statement below correctly, Mr Gabler wasn't suggesting that children should be allowed to choose what they study, but they should be taught both theories, and be allowed to choose which they believe. Makes sense to me.
Steve, still chuckling--and that tends to arouse a lot of suspicion in the halls of academia--after reading your review of Dogma. My son and I saw it together and had an uproarious good time during and after the movie as we rehashed it. - Andrea J. in Wisconsin
Again I wonder why such treatment is only applied to evolution, since it can be applied to all fields of science. Any statement in science, any "law of nature", etc., 'is' theory. So what I'm saying is that, while there is no doubt for me that we are talking about theories (multi-ordinal term), higher order abstractions, etc., not to be opposed to 'facts' (m.o) --, it is highly suspicious that such disclaimer has not been requested for physics, chemistry, etc. I suggest it is because it presently contradicts the dogma still sustained by the Church today. Not so long ago, Galileo was accused of a similar fault and judged accordingly.
Besides, did you notice nobody ever requested that such a disclaimer be printed on all Bibles, in religious schools? - Jose K. in France
Great issue (IMO). Ever since the Monty Python's the Meaning of
Life, Catholic Bashing as become a definite favorite movie theme of mine. I
can't wait to see Dogma now. I would like to know how you handle the
following (and I believe most predictable scenario. I too believe I have
integrated the concept of me as the observer for any event. For example if
I have felt "jealous" at a party when my girlfriend has spent time
"flirting" with other men, I tell her that I am feeling jealous and I
realize it's just me. (I know (or at least I make that strong assumption)
that my brother's threshold for jealousy is a lot more tolerant than mine so
her behavior would probably go un-noticed by him in a similar situation). I
find however that most of the time people skip past that distinction and get
offended. Often I have been accused of playing semantics. In your opinion
is it possible to explain that distinction without handing the person a copy
of Science and Sanity (rather unsightly in formal attire don't you think?)
and wait for a few months while the distinction is made clear? - GB in Plano
Steve, this was really good! I've also heard lots of comments about the film Dogma and your analysis (opinions/observations/insights, etc.) help me to understand what some of the 'fuss' might be about. I think Dogma will be an interesting adventure for both my sister and I. She says GS 'trained' me to have no belief in anything, while I think I sorta' believe in everything! I know that might sound strange, but I don't have a clue what might be 'the truth' about religion/God/creation/etc.....so maybe there's bits and pieces of information to be gathered from many sources to make decisions about my own 'beliefs'. Of course, this drives my sister 'batty'. She feels there's comfort in having 'one belief', in knowing 'one truth', which, by the way, she also translates as the 'right truth'. Kinda' makes me feel a bit sorry for all the non-Christians who are out there living their lives with the 'wrong truth'! If, as you indicated, the film might challenge method of 'beliefs', I can't wait for the adventure to begin! - Lynn in Wisconsin
this was GREAT!!!!!! - i forwarded to my mother - she will love it! - Maria in Dallas
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