Men I'd Like To Be: Keith Olbermann

This video was absolutely moving.

Impassioned. Eloquent. Heartbreaking. Most importantly, born of the importance of justice and access for all. Not from personal interest, but from compassion for those around you.

This post didn't start out as a "men I'd like to be" post. It was going to be about using your position, your sphere of influence, to make a change. To stand and be counted, or to speak and be heard. To take your knowledge, take your passion, and spread it to those who might benefit and for those who might benefit both. To advocate on behalf of those outside of your own interests, as those are often the voices heard most clearly and with most credence. Perhaps a validation of my own interest in moving South or moving West, where my speaking out might reach a greater audience of people who need to hear what I have to say.

Then I realized that Keith was taking me to task. He was doing all these things in his sphere. He was showing that he had the microphone, he held the reins, and we are going where he's telling us we're going. Listen to what's in his voice-- the strain and the emotion. The sincerity. Therein lies a man agonized by a course of events that degrade the lives and experiences of other Americans.

Is this the most important cause? Is this the greatest task we can act upon? Daresay, I don't believe so. It is a cause, and it is important, and he's advocating for it. He feels about it. Damnit, thats more than most of us.

Partisanship is the new post partisanship

Once upon a time, specifically just before the summer of '08, I was promised post partisan politics.

Now, either someone has reneged on this offer, it was a limited time promotion, or we've just moved past it. Post-partisan politics maybe got lower Nielson ratings than the Olympics, so we switched back? Maybe John Edwards' affair made it so, no matter what the presidential candidates were doing, at least they weren't having affairs on their terminal wives.

Forget the faux-outrage. Forget the calls that each statement is "the new low". Forget that you're trying to win an election. This is not the model on which electoral politics should be built. Elections are not about figuring out who is the worst candidate, or trying to persuade me to vote for you because the other party is a terrible choice. This is not about pandering to my interests because it might win you the blue collar vote.

Maybe this is a little idealistic, and maybe this is a little naive. Part of the reason I felt so great heading into this election was that there was so much less in the way of attacking the other candidates. It was about "this is how my idea works, this is why my idea works". When the party driven attacks began, it wasn't necessarily snarky or personal. It was "this is why my idea works and theirs doesn't". Its the process of persuasion. This is why I'm the best. Look at my virtues, look at his virtues, and if you like one over the other then you're going to have picked a president based on their value.

Instead, when I ask people why they are voting for someone, the answer is often "McCain is Bush's 3rd term... he's shown poor judgement..." or "Barack Obama is too inexperienced...He's not the reformer he claims to be...".

The time is coming where the electorate needs to call up in one voice, outraged with the course that both parties have set. I refuse to stand by and levy the same attacks used against me. I refuse to degrade opinion for superficial reasons. I refuse to vote for someone simply to vote against another.

Men I'd Like to Be: Phil Borges

Phil Borges is a photographer who deals with the rapidly diminishing number of native tongues and populations in a world that is rapidly globalizing. The work pictured here shows two sides of his work and two sides of the world. He is just as concerned with the aging remnants of a culture as he is with the children growing up, not knowing the language or culture. His work is tied to the Bridges Project, which aims to preserve the rapidly dissolving cultures in our world. Specifically, he is photographing peoples with animist religions tied to the natural world.

The images themselves are desaturated digital photographs showing indigenous peoples in their God given land and in their current complex social surroundings. Figures are meant to "pop" out from the background, and with a striking result. The descriptions of his work are often compassionate narratives on the plight of the individuals in each image. They are not about the image as image. They are the image as reactant. As mover and shaker.

What I like most about his work is that 1) his interest is more sincere than Edward Curtis and 2) that his artwork is tied to a social theme and organization. In the *past few weeks, I've been thinking hard about the roll of the artist in the world after the death of the image. Creating images that tie into and further social action and social betterment could be one of the roles of the artist in this age.

More specifically to the point of this series, Phil Borges has turned his artwork, something he obviously loves and about which he is passionate, and turned it into a personally fulfilling and outwardly helpful experience. He is culturally enriching while providing a global service. That, my friends, is the goal

*bloggers note: Most of this was originally written for my senior capstone blog in studio art. I wouldn't be posting it here if I didn't believe all the same things I wrote about it 10 months ago -M

On Eating Meat, June 16th 2008

For about 15 months, I was a practicing vegetarian.

Let me break down what I mean first, because I think there is a lot to say about my practicing.

When I say practicing, I don't mean how a doctor practices medicine. I mean in the way that I tried. I practiced. It was a way of living, but not a way of life. I generally did not buy or eat meat. If it was served at a family meal (which I attended mainly at special occasions), then I would eat it without remorse. Partially to keep peace with my family, but also as a result of my motives for 'practicing'. Of course, practice makes perfect, and we practice because we are not perfect. I slipped up from time to time, or made conscious decisions in times of stress. After finals my junior year, I planned on and deliberately went to KFC for some breaded chicken deliciousness-- the result of which was particularly disappointing. Who would have thought that KFC tastes like spicy death?

This weekend, I was home for Father's Day. As part of the festivities, we had steak and veggies. I obliged, eating a small serving of steak. On an unrelated aside, it was very close to smaller than the 4 oz. recommended meal sized serving. I didn't feel too badly about it at the time. Reduced usage still reduces the fiscal payback to large farms. I was still mainly vegetarian, and planned on resuming the practice when I came back to Worcester.

Two events occurred over the weekend, though, that reaffirmed my need to avoid meat. They were also potentially enough to help me shake off animal products in general, lest they are certifiably cruelty free. They are, in this order:

1)http://www.chooseveg.com/animal-cruelty.asp
This video is one of the many "factory farms are cruel to animals" films that are out there in the internet ether. I had seen some of the anti-foie gras sites and anti fur videos, but never had I realized the depth and scope of the cruelty involved in products that are relevant to almost everyone's daily life. Our dinners are served on bloody plates: tainted by the wanton cruelty towards animals for profit and our consumption. Even a glass of milk is suspect, and perhaps as terrible as veal. In fact, it enables veal. Pigs, which are intelligent creatures capable of the same kind of cognitive processes of three year olds (according to this site) are disemboweled alive.

I'm put in a tough moral place with this kind of knowledge. Obviously, meat is a part of a human's natural diet... but does engaging in that need at the cruel expense of the animals justify our place in the food chain?

Also, I am deathly allergic to soy milk and have heard rice milk contains known carcinogens. So my moral dilemma also encompasses the question of "what do I put in my coffee and cereal"?

2) Lobster
I was unable to make it home for Mother's day, so I decided to surprise my mother with her favorite meal: Boiled lobster.

Now, again, I try not to eat meat, but generally didn't feel guilty when I did partake. Perhaps that is because there is a distinct emotional disconnect between buying a shapeless slab of meat or piece of bacon, and actually killing your meal to eat. But, like a good son, I boiled the water, set the lobsters up, and dropped them in to their deaths. Unlike some, I did not deprive myself the responsibility of watching the result of my actions. They clearly knew that they were fucked, could feel it, and suffered. As they turned bright red, I felt so extremely guilty. So I put the cover on the top of the pot, and walked into the other room to pet my mother's cats. It struck me that what I had done was in some ways no different than stuffing my cat into the oven for dinner. The only difference was that people don't generally eat cats-- but they do eat crustaceans. Social norms made it okay to boil these bug-fish alive.

I felt terrible for the next eight minutes, then plated them up with what I thought of as a brave resolve. My mother had set the table outside, so we carried the carcasses outside with a side of mashed red potatoes (which I will serve at my wedding, when I find the guy). Rending the tail from the body, I looked inside and saw what appeared to be green sludge. My mother tells me that it meant that both of the lobsters were pregnant. It took a great emotional resolve to choke down the meal... but delicious emotional resolve smothered in real butter.

I'm still feeling a little queasy from the meal, probably from the emotions and not the lobster itself. What I have decided, though, from all this, is that I have a responsibility to reduce/remove animal products from my diet wholly and for better reasons than "it was something fun to try for 15 months".