Bertrand Russell's "Ten Commandments"

I just discovered this, and I love it. This is Bertrand Russell's "Ten Commandments." 1: Do not feel absolutely certain of anything.

2: Do not think it worthwhile to produce belief by concealing evidence, for the evidence is sure to come to light.

3: Never try to discourage thinking, for you are sure to succeed.

4: When you meet with opposition, even if it should be from your husband or your children, endeavor to overcome it by argument and not by authority, for a victory dependent upon authority is unreal and illusory.

5: Have no respect for the authority of others, for there are always contrary authorities to be found.

6: Do not use power to suppress opinions you think pernicious, for if you do the opinions will suppress you.

7: Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.

8: Find more pleasure in intelligent dissent than in passive agreement, for, if you value intelligence as you should, the former implies a deeper agreement than the latter.

9: Be scrupulously truthful, even when truth is inconvenient, for it is more inconvenient when you try to conceal it.

10. Do not feel envious of the happiness of those who live in a fool’s paradise, for only a fool will think that it is happiness.

I wonder what Russell would think of The Sum of Our Gods. On the one hand, it revels in uncertainty and shows very little respect for authority. On the other hand, while it strives to tell the truth, it's the truth of fictional characters. Would Russell consider fiction to be "scrupulously truthful" or merely convenient?

Review of Divergent

Today I read Veronica Roth's Divergent. All of it. In one day. I'm not a fast reader like my wife or some of my colleagues, so that feels like an accomplishment to me. My verdict is ...mixed. The fact that it's a remarkably fast read doesn't really win or lose the book any points for me. I've torn through books before because they were so good I couldn't put them down. I also read Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code very quickly, rolling my eyes every time he described Audrey Tautou's character as "incredulous," which was about 400 times. Roth's writing is certainly better than Dan Brown's, but that compliment feels more like an insult than I intend.

The world of Divergent is genuinely interesting and engrossing. I love dystopias, and the use of factions based on virtues is interesting. Calling the factions "factions" is a bit on-the-nose, but I can forgive that in YA. The choosing of the faction, though cliché, is also forgivable in a YA coming-of-age story. Whether it's the sorting hat or the Reaping or the shooting of a first deer, these moments are dramatic and speak to a longing in our culture for distinct coming-of-age rituals which we lack. I get that, and Roth handled that part just fine even if it wasn't unique. The protagonist, Tris, isn't sure whether she belongs in Slytherin Dauntless or Hufflepuff Abnegation, wrestles with the decision, and ultimately chooses a faction only to find that they are all flawed and none fit her perfectly. It works, and if it ain't broke ...well, a bit more creativity would be nice, but I can handle it.

Here's what is broken and which must be fixed. The narrator, Tris, is a gawky, accident-prone, scrawny, pretty (but not too pretty) girl who thinks she is ugly. Since she's the narrator, we are only exposed to her beauty by reading about all her self-doubts and then recognizing that they don't fit with the reactions of the boys around her who find her attractive. I can forgive Roth for drawing from the archetypal coming-of-age myths, but do we need another Bella Swann or Katniss Everdeen? Katniss is better than Tris in that she has confidence in her hunting ability and her role as the provider for her family. Tris has more pride than Bella Swann, but she even feels guilty about that pride. At least Tris doesn't have to get knocked-up by a guy who is more than a hundred years old on their honeymoon in order to discover her own self-worth by becoming a mother. Can we please stop telling teenage girls that, in order to be likable, they have to have unrealistically low opinions of themselves? This trend can't be good for anybody.

It's difficult to read around a protagonist who is unlikeable, but the other characters kept me going. Tobias/Four, the love interest, is genuinely interesting and somewhat complicated, at least until his unswerving adoration of Tris becomes clear. Then he just becomes a realistic swooning teenage boy, and that's bearable, too. Considering his backstory, he could have been a lot more insufferable in his brooding. Points for Roth on that.

And why present tense? Writers, listen to me! Present tense is great for action sequences, so I can see why it appeals to people who are setting out to write fast-paced, action heavy books. If you have any sense that the time period covered by the book will extend for any prolonged period of time, resist this temptation, especially if the book is written in first person. Learn from Suzanne Collins' mistake. After a second reading, I have grown to like Mockingjay, the third Hunger Games book, but I completely understand why it gets such mixed reviews from my students. In The Hunger Games trilogy. the first book happens over the course of a handful of days, so the present tense works. The second book happens over the course of a couple weeks, so it works, but slightly less well. The third covers a much longer period of time, but Collins couldn't switch because she'd painted herself into a corner. Unless you can maintain the urgency of an action scene for the whole series (which would probably be exhausting for the reader and would lead to a lot of blunt exposition at the expense of more beautiful prose), don't make this mistake. Better yet, write the thing in one tense, then rewrite it in another and see which works better. I suspect that, most of the time, you'll find that the demand for intensity is overbalanced by the fact that we naturally tell stories in the past tense in our daily lives, so this compulsion to haste leads to a stiff, awkward writing style.

The most interesting element of Divergent is the mystery of how this seeming-utopia is breaking down and what that says about the virtues which under-gird it. We really only get to see that starting to play out in the last third of the book, so I'll read the sequels to see if the series gets deeper into those questions of values and motivations. Also, my wife says Tris gets more likable. Color me skeptical. Still, I have to remind myself that The Lightning Thief, the first book in the Percy Jackson series, was painfully derivative of Harry Potter, but the series found its own way in the second book and ended up being pretty great by the end. Maybe the Divergent trilogy will find its own path and break free from some of the more well-worn elements of YA fiction in the second and third book.

I admit I'm very curious to see how they handle the severity of the book's violence in the film, so I'll be checking that out, too. My prediction, a largely bloodless version of a bloody, savage story. Hopefully my low expectations will cause me to be pleasantly surprised. Those who've seen the movie, are the directors really bold enough to make the audience sit through multiple beatings that continue until one of the participants is an unconscious, bloody pulp? I would respect that for both its faithfulness to the book and its audacity, but it doesn't sound like a lot of fun, and it would certainly upset some parents. How far do they go? Far enough? Too far?

Review of Watership Down

Today I assigned my nine-year-old son, Noah, to write a short review of the book he’d just finished. I explained that this wasn’t just busywork. It’s actually a good way to collect one’s thoughts about a book after finishing it. Well, tonight I finished Richard Adams’ Watership Down, a book that had been on my “I really should have read that a long time ago” list for many years. I guess it’s time to walk my talk.

If you are one of the three or four people in the English-speaking world who, like me, managed to miss this book, allow me to give you the basics. It’s about rabbits. It’s a remarkably subtle blend of anthropomorphization and well-researched naturalism. It draws heavily on great human epics about heroes and journeys and battles.  Essentially, a character named Fiver is Cassandra (the character in Greek mythology cursed to always tell the truth but never be believed), but his brother, Hazel, does believe him and takes a group of rabbits on a journey. Hazel turns out to be Odysseus, only instead of returning from a war to his beloved wife, he’s using clever tricks to get his rabbits to a new warren. Then there’s Bigwig, the old warrior who is brave enough to stand up to the monstrous tyrant who wants to destroy the new warren. I guess that makes him like Achilles or Beowulf, but in his defense of the warren on Watership Down, he’s more like Hector bravely willing to give his life for Troy and his brother’s honor. No, that’s not quite right, either. Anyway, they are all great characters who deserve to have their stories told to many generations of rabbits and humans.

One of the things that struck me was Richard Adams’ insistence that the book is not an allegory for any human events. I think he’s being totally honest that he didn’t intend for any allegory, but that doesn’t mean that one doesn’t exist. Perhaps it’s a testament to the human need to create stories, just as the rabbits of Watership Down tell one another stories (beautiful stories interspersed throughout the book), that we connect this story to our own experience whether the author intends for us to do so or not. When General Woundwart, the leader of the opposing warren, comes to Watership Down and rejects the offer of peace out of fear and obsession, I couldn’t help but think of times I’ve made similar (though less deadly) blunders based on pride and a need to save face. I also thought of all the human wars started due to the same base motives. It’s not comfortable to discover a connection between my own failed attempts to maintain control in situations where I should have sought a win-win and times when whole nations flung themselves at one another because leaders made the same blunders on catastrophic scales, but that’s just the kind of connection that these non-allegory epic tales of adventure can produce if we are willing to let them.

Though I told Noah it was fine to spoil the ending in his own notes, I won’t do it here in a public forum. Suffice it to say that the ending was entirely satisfactory in that it resolved all the issues but made me wish Hazel, Fiver, and Bigwig could get caught up in another series of adventures so that I could spend more time with them.

The writing is masterful. It’s always difficult to know how much to describe the natural world in a human story, and too often writers allow themselves to wax on and on about the movements of clouds and the play of sunlight through leaves fluttering in the wind without any thought to the fact that the human characters in the story don’t give a flying photon, and thus the readers don’t either. In general, these are prime examples of the darlings that must be killed. But in Watership Down, the descriptions of the natural world are direct products of the characters’ interests and their immediate sensory impressions. Just as a description of the direction of the wind is entirely relevant in a story about sailing ships, a description of scents on a breeze really matters in this book because it matters to the rabbits. That’s a good reminder for writers; if the reader cares about the characters, he/she will care about what the characters care about. But if you spend too much time on trivialities that are unimportant to the characters, the reader will not only lose interest in the story, but may cease to like the characters, too. I’ll be giving that more thought as I revise thanks to this novel.

Do not continue to make the mistake I made for so many years. Grab a copy of Watership Down posthaste.

...after you get a copy of The Sum of Our Gods, of course.

Tonight, Sherman Alexie said, "Fuck you!" to me!

I totally deserved it. Some background. First of all, getting to hear Sherman Alexie speak is a privilege for anybody because he's a supremely talented speaker. It's a bigger deal for me because he's in my Top Ten. Those aren't the ten writers I enjoy reading the most, though I thoroughly enjoy reading Mr. Alexie's work. Saying he's one of my favorite writers, though true, feels too much like saying, "I'm on Team Sherman!" Bleck. No, my Top Ten are the writers whose work I respect the most because they are masters of their craft. The roster of the Top Ten sometimes changes, but he's been a consistent member since I was 17 and read The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven. Some of the other writers are dead. Some are alive, but recluses, like Cormac McCarthy, so I don't expect I'll get to hear them speak anytime soon. One member is dead and he was an asshole, so I'm not sure I would even have wanted to hear him speak. I might be paraphrasing, but I think Stephan King said something about how Earnest Hemingway was an asshole, but he was also a motherfucking genius. If Hemingway asked me to go out drinking with him I would demure because I know he would get me drunk, challenge me to a boxing match, impugn my masculinity until I agreed, and then beat the tar out of me. On second thought, I would still say yes and be grateful to have the chance to be beaten up by Hemingway. On third thought, I'd say no because I'd be too creeped-out if a dead guy asked me to go drinking. Nah, I'd still say yes.

Anyway, back to a member of the Top Ten who is less likely to beat me up (I'm still wary of you, Margaret Atwood!). I've heard Mr. Alexie speak before at the Portland Arts and Lectures series, but I didn't ask a question. I told myself that I was letting the high school students have that opportunity, but really I was too star struck. Tonight, I girded my loins and jumped for the mic when the time came.

Then, like a douche, I tried to make a joke about how I was still reeling from the news that this is the 20th anniversary of The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven, a book I read when I was 17. I wanted to explain that the book was hugely important to me because it was one of the first things I'd read that taught me that good writing can punch you in the gut. Up until then, I'd read classics without the ability to put myself into another time and place and fully feel how impactful they were to the audiences of their day. I also read a lot of fantasy and sci-fi that were wonderful, but which were largely vacations from my life, not books that openly challenged me. (That's not a knock on fantasy or sci-fi. I just hadn't yet found books like 1984 or The Year of the Flood that pack a wallop.) Somebody put The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven into my hands when I got to college (some friend in the dorm, not one of my profs. It was too new to be canonized yet) and I found that short fiction and poetry, especially the poetry, could knock the wind out of me. I thought Mr. Alexie might take particular pleasure in the knowledge that his writing delivered a beat-down to a suburban white kid, but he'd also appreciate that it carried his images into my classroom, into my own writing, and into crevices in my brain where they have resided for twenty years and show no signs of vacating.

Of course, by pointing out that the twentieth anniversary made me feel old, I couldn't help but imply that Mr. Alexie is even older. So, before I could try to shoehorn all that praise into a short preamble to my real question, he said, "Fuck you!"

Now, this was great for a couple reasons. For one thing, I'd brought a group of my high school students. They absolutely loved watching a great writer tell one of their teachers off. On the bus on the way home, they kept asking, "Can we tell people what he said to you in school tomorrow?"

I shrugged. "You'd be quoting, so I guess it's fine as long as you put it in context and cite your source. Always cite your sources."

The other reason why this was so great was because it was Sherman Alexie and he was saying it to me. A couple weeks ago, as a fluke, I had my name drawn out of a hat and had a chance to go meet a couple of the Portland Trailblazers. It wasn't just a handshake/signature affair. We got to participate in a mock practice. Their great new center, Robin Lopez, who is listed at seven feet tall but struck me as more like eight, was kind enough to swat one of my attempted layups into the stands. That's what this felt like. Having Sherman Alexie tell me, "Fuck you!" was like having an NBA player swat my weak shot into the stands.

It didn't register at first. I'm not particularly prurient when it comes to language. Words are tools. They have no moral weight. When the right tool for the job is a four letter one, then it should be used. When any word, no matter how innocuous it might seem out of context, is employed to hurt someone, it becomes a "bad word." Even then, sometimes a bad word is also the right word. This casual attitude about so-called "swear words" is a bit dangerous for a school teacher. After listening to Mr. Alexie speak, I almost said that the revelation about the book's age made me "feel fuckin' old," and that would have been a bad slip-up in front of my kids. (They would have loved it, but I probably would have gotten hell from a parent or two.) When Mr. Alexie said, "Fuck you!" I not only wasn't offended; I was relieved. Standing up in front of a room full of people might be de rigueur for him, but there were a lot more grown-ups in that room than I am used to, and he made me feel like we were just two guys talking. Sure, he's the literary equivalent of an NBA seven footer and I'm the literary equivalent of ...well, I have one novel published, so I guess I'm the literary equivalent of the fan who jumps out of his recliner to shout at the TV sometimes. Still, he was talking with me, and that was very cool.

After that, I stumbled my way through my question. He used to stutter, so that's probably why he was patient with me. I asked him about how difficult it was to edit the beginning of The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian, a description of poverty and its psychological effects that is so carefully crafted and effective that I think every politician and policy-maker should have to read it to even be considered for office.

"Where do you teach?" he asked.

Now that really freaked me out. After all, this was a guy who had just said, "Fuck you!" and if he didn't like my question and had decided to light me up, I was about to give him a huge opening.

I told him. "Wow," he said. "They have some good teachers at Central High School." This is true. I'd ridden on the bus with some teachers who are better than I am. But I got the impression he was talking about me, and I will accept that praise (uncomfortably, as always).

Then he answered my question. His answer was generous, too generous for me to recount completely. He said that he'd edited that particular portion of the book probably 50 times. Then he demonstrated how one finds that sweet spot where a story manages to hit home without being preachy. You read that correctly. He demonstrated. On the spot. He told a story about the time his family got their first toilet. They didn't have indoor plumbing before, and, when they got it, it was magical. He had us all laughing as he talked about the mythic men from Sears who carried it in, and how the family drew straw to see who would get to use it first. He was the first Alexie to use the first Alexie toilet. Once he had us all feeling amused and included, he showed how the story can pivot in a natural way, grab us by the guts, and twist. He told us about how, when he was little, he was so scared that his dad would disappear on another bender that, when his dad would go into that bathroom to sit on that toilet, Sherman Jr. would go down the hall and sit by the door, knocking, just to make sure his dad was still home.

Bam! That's how it's done.

After demonstrating, he reminded us all that a lot of the editing process comes from reading. That was a good reminder for this English teacher. I always tell students how important it is to read often in order to become a better writer, but I forget to tell them that they need to read in order to become better editors, to analyze their own work and measure it by what has been successful in the writing they enjoy. I will make a point to share that with the students in my creative writing class tomorrow, though I know I won't do so half as well as Mr. Alexie did tonight.

To sum up, iIn just one evening, Mr. Alexie made me a better editor, a better writer, and a better teacher (and probably a better father, a better liberal, and a better white person, if I'm totally honest). To him, that's probably just like every other fucking day, but, to me, it was one helluva night.

But I didn't get to tell him how much I loved War Dances.

Grumpy Cat Pumpkin

For Halloween, I carved a pumpkin for my wife, Paige, that looked like her favorite animal in the world, Grumpy Cat. The other pumpkins quickly rotted away, but Grumpy Cat Pumpkin lingered, so I started taking pictures of his slow and bitter decline. Want to know what's grumpier than Grumpy Cat? Click your way through these:

I love you, Paige!

To All My New Conservative Friends on Facebook

Dearest New Friends, When I was invited to join your protest against the Affordable Care Act, I clicked on the “Decline” button. Facebook, mistaking your brave online protest for a party, asked me to fill in a textbox explaining why I wouldn’t be attending. Due to a lack of willpower, I filled in that box. As soon as I hit “Post,” I instantly regretted the decision, but now I see that it was one of the smartest things I’ve ever done. By engaging with all of you, my new friends, I have realized the error of my ways and have completely come over to your side. I think everyone should have a chance to learn all about your brilliant rhetorical techniques so that they can also see how well you defend your (well, I guess now it’s our) position on US domestic policy.

Kathryn Mullins, I apologize for not being convinced by your initial foray. Unfortunately, unlike those who would come to your aid later in the thread, you tried to use numbers and facts. In between, you threw in lots of multiple exclamation points. These really should have convinced me that I was wrong all by themselves. I’m embarrassed to say that your use of caps-lock didn’t convince me, either. Luckily, you ended by shouting, “YOU CAN'T FIX STUPID!!” and that really got me thinking about how correct you must be, despite the historical and factual inaccuracies in your post.

John Graham, it’s a good thing you hopped in to help Kathryn out. By letting me know that my opinion is a “b.o. talking point,” you showed me that there was no need for you to even address the facts of the case, and that really made me reconsider. You only used caps-lock a little bit, though. Maybe that’s why I still needed some persuading.

Jason Freeman Jones, you really upped everyone’s game by jumping in to repeat the same sentence four times. Sure, the sentence was factually wrong, but because you wrote it four times and then followed it up with, “Get it?” that basically obviated the need for truth of any kind. You could learn a thing or two about the use of exclamation points from Kathryn, though.

James LeBeau, thanks for pointing out that there’s really no point in anyone having any kind of insurance of any kind since it might end up being money wasted on a need that never materializes. I can’t believe I was one of those dupes who thought risk could be managed by insurance. What a fool I’ve been! I also appreciate your point about how we made it 137 years without any taxes in this country. Sure, that’s not even remotely true, but who cares! Truth is as dumb as insurance! Calling me a moron helped me understand that. Thanks, James!

Link*, you really need some help from these folks. You tried to post articles, establish facts, and demand specificity. You didn’t even bother to call me a “lib-tard” or tell me I was “drunk on FOOL-AID!!” Good thing Kathryn was there to help you out.

Luckily, a bunch of you showed up to make the discussion far more persuasive. John Graham, thanks for bringing up the New World Order conspiracy theory. Christina McDermott, thanks for criticizing liberals by sharing the lyrics from a song from 1993 that made fun of George H. W. Bush. I’m still not sure how that related, but you shared it as though it did, so it must have. Hai Vuong, thank you for kicking things up a notch with your creative idea to file a lawsuit on whitehouse.gov about the legitimacy of Barack Obama’s birth certificate. (I don’t think that’s quite how the court system works, but…)

Mark W. Mumma, I’m sorry I pushed back on your statement that you “prefer the government stay the hell out of our lives.” You were right to be offended when I pointed out that the government is made up of public servants like firefighters and police officers. Of course one can hate the government but like public servants. There is no disconnect there at all. I see that now. I suppose you’re correct that I was using liberal “all-or-nothing reasoning.” Now I see that “We prefer the government stay the hell out of our lives,” is a nuanced view, as is your claim that “There's two kinds of people in this country.” Now that you all have brought me over to your way of thinking, I will strive for this kind of complexity.

Things seemed to be cooling off, and there was a real danger that I wouldn’t be persuaded when Christina was just calling me an idiot. Luckily, Derek Lozoski showed up and posted, “Benjamin G = Fucktard!” I think the power of the statement comes from its brevity. Suddenly, I was really wavering again. Thanks, Derek! And then when Mark quipped that Derek had just insulted fucktards everywhere, I realized that they must be right!

But now that I’d seen the light, what kind of conservative or libertarian should I become? Surely all these people couldn’t be completely in lock-step with only a few of us libtards on the outside, right?

Just then Joe Fisher showed up to inform us all that “i want my plan, not a niger scam artist plan.”

Rick Morgan called Joe on both his racism and spelling ability, but I’m guessing that Rick isn’t the kind of conservative/libertarian the others want me to be, because he wasn’t participating in convincing me that I was a fucktard, and none of the conservatives liked his comment while they were falling all over each other to like the unified theory of liberalism. Heck, even Joe Fischer got a “Like.” And Christina McDermott came to Joe’s defense, explaining that Joe wasn’t a racist because black people use the n-word.

At this point, I made what I now see was clearly a big mistake. I pointed out that I’d gone all that time without personally insulting any of you. Thank you all for really piling on at that point to teach me that name-calling is the best way to persuade people. Sure, “Dumb-ass” wasn’t that strong. “Silly Boy,” and “Drama queen,” didn’t really push me over the edge. The way many of you used words like “liberal” and “socialist” as insults was actually a bit more persuasive, and made me rethink my political leanings. Insults like “doggie” and “sheep” were a bit weird but appreciated. However, it was when you told me that I was both impotent and receiving oral sex from the President that I really was forced to conclude that you folks are on to something.  Suddenly the fact that you mix up communism and fascism, or confuse the progressive Republicans of Lincoln with the modern Republican Party, seems perfectly acceptable! Who needs facts when we have multiple exclamation points AND CAPS LOCK?!!!

And why should America need civil public discourse when we have such brave and persuasive defenders of liberty?

Again, thank you all for telling me who I suck and who sucks me. This has logically convinced me that the Affordable Care Act is a bad idea.

Now you have someone you all consider to be an illiterate communist fucktard firmly on your side.

We’re all winners!!!

DOESN’T IT FEEL GREAT?!!!

*Upon request, I removed Link's last name. I'd only included him to give him credit for being civil, but I understand why he doesn't want to be associated with the conversation. If the other people who said horrible, obscene things would like to have their last names removed, they can send a request to notachance@snowballschancein.hell

Interview on Funemployment Radio!

Today I was interviewed on Funemployment Radio, a great podcast out of Portland. The hosts, Greg Nibler and Sarah X. Dylan, were both wonderful and made me feel very comfortable. I needed that because I was nervous as all get out! Here's the episode. Click on the link below to go to the page where you can download the episode. I'm on from about the 47 minute mark through to the end, but I encourage everybody to listen to the whole thing because Greg and Sarah are great at what they do. Shout-out to my friend Jon Bernard who turned me on to the show and contacted them before I did to tell them they should have me on. I owe you a beer at the Funemployment Listening Party on the 22nd, Jon! http://funemploymentradio.com/2014/02/11/funemployment-radio-episode-1040/

And here's proof that I really was there:

Should a Former Christian Send His Son to Church?

My mom sent me a message today that poses an interesting question for agnostic parents, especially an agnostic like me who was once a Christian: Should I be sending my son to church? After listening to the podcast of an interview I did for Artist First Radio, she wrote of my answers, “What I noticed was the need for community… Noah needs that for his opportunity to develop a faith journey. You may continue to question and think and intellectualize until the cows come home, but a community is where faith develops.”

My first response is a bit defensive. Either due to the answers I gave or to my mom’s wishful thinking, she presumes I want my faith to develop. I’m not sure what that would mean for me, but I don’t think my particular lack of faith is something she wants me to foster, so I presume she wants me to develop in some other direction. As someone who lost his faith while deeply involved in a truly excellent church, my experience doesn't support the notion that communities naturally lead to faith, nor do I want to go through the painful process of extricating myself from a loving community ever again.

The point that really piques my curiosity is the one about my son, Noah. Mom says he needs an opportunity for his faith to develop. That’s a very challenging idea for me, as an agnostic. The central tenant of my religion (or, more accurately, my position on religion), is that I don’t know and do not believe I am capable of knowing about the existence and nature of the supernatural. So do I owe it to Noah to give him the same experience I had, considering the conclusions I’ve come to?

If I were an atheist, this would be much simpler. If someone told an atheist to take his son to church so that his son’s faith could develop, the atheist could respectfully reply that, while some church time might be valuable for the cross-cultural experience, since the basic principle of all houses of worship hinges on the belief that there is a God, and since the atheist believes this to be untrue, sending his son to a church would be tantamount to intentionally exposing his child to a lie in order that the son might develop a deepening belief in a myth. In that case, it’s clear that the atheist wouldn’t be asked in the first place, and if he were, we would all understand why he would decline.

It’s not as straight forward for an agnostic. I can’t refuse to take Noah to a church on the grounds that he will be exposed to lies. As an agnostic, I don’t know that the teachings he would hear in a church are true or untrue. Instead, I have to evaluate whether or not it’s worthwhile to expose him to something I myself am unsure of. In that case, the question becomes a bit more nuanced; now it’s a question of the authority of the church, my authority as a parent, and the danger of the persuasiveness of certainty.

As a high school English teacher, every year I have to carefully explain to students why it’s preferable to avoid first person pronouns in their formal writing. When I was a kid, teachers would just say, “It’s wrong. Don’t do it.” They presented this as though the rule were as hard and fast as the most basic rules of spelling and simple grammar. Unfortunately for them, students could pick up high quality formal writing in respected sources and find personal pronouns all over the place. Did this mean the writers were bad? Did it mean the teachers were wrong? Neither. It meant the true edict should have been explained more fully. There’s nothing inherently wrong with personal pronouns in formal writing. If the purpose of a piece is to persuade the reader, for example, and the writer makes a determination that the most effective technique to persuade a particular audience involves some evidence from the writer’s own experience, personal pronouns in personal narratives are actually a good choice. The reason writers should learn to avoid them is that, far too often, beginners use personal pronouns to qualify what they’re writing about. Instead of, “Moby Dick is a novel about obsession,” they write “I think Moby Dick is a novel about obsession,” or “In my personal opinion, Mody Dick is a novel about obsession.” The use of the personal pronouns, in these cases, diminishes the authority of the writer and of her ideas. She’s far better served to express her opinions as though they are facts. We, the readers, will know these are her opinions because her name is on the paper. These qualifiers are either a sign of a lack of confidence in her ideas or of a kind of false humility that can have the unintended consequence of turning the reader against the writer. “Writing,” I tell my students, “is an act of courage. You are bravely sharing your ideas. So be brave! Be bold! If you have the guts to put it on the page and then put it in front of someone’s eyeballs, follow through and write with conviction.” I tell them this because I know that statements made with a tone of certainty are for more persuasive.

That very certainty is the hallmark of the kind of faith one finds presented at churches, and it’s also precisely what drove me away from my faith. I was lucky enough to have a pastor who was very open about his own doubts, but he still had a lot more faith than I did, and I couldn’t reconcile my own limited, human comprehension of the divine with that kind of certainty. The pastor has to be at least certain enough to do her job. I do not believe that level of certainty is advisable since I don’t think that kind of knowledge of the divine is possible (at least for me).

Consequently, if I send my son to church, I’m saying, “Dad isn’t sure what’s true. These people are remarkably, sometimes even dangerously sure of what they believe. Go decide for yourself.” Since I know certainty is persuasive, I’m knowingly bringing a knife to a gun fight and asking my son to make a prediction about the outcome. “Who do you think is right?” I’m asking. “The guy who isn’t sure or the institution which claims to be?” In this context, it’s not fair to say I’m simply letting him make up his own mind, something that I sincerely want for him. Instead, I’m pretending that I want him to make up his own mind while putting a finger on the scales, and for the other side!

This brings me to the next question: If I know that attending a church is likely to persuade a 9-year-old to become a Christian, is that something I should do? This question is actually harder than it might appear, since I had a host of positive experiences in church. Besides the friends I made, I learned songs I’m glad I know, I worked for folks who were down on their luck on mission trips, I learned to focus my mind during open worship (a time of deep prayer similar to meditation but focused outward on God), and a bunch of other things. I became a much better reader through church, first improving my fluency by reading above my parents’ fingers as they helped me learn to sing along to the lyrics of hymns, then learning to read critically as I studied the Bible on my own and in Sunday school classes. I learned that I love to come up with arguments and debate philosophical ideas while trying to prove the existence of God and debating free-will vs. predestination. I even had some distinctly un-churchy experiences thanks to church. My first kiss was at a church camp (horribly embarrassing, but I got it out of the way), my first real make out session was at a church lock-in, and my first serious girlfriend was someone I met through Youth Group.

These valuable experiences of community might outweigh some of the potential dangers of church attendance, though those are worth considering, too. Since I would be taking him to a church sight-unseen, I might be exposing him to some of the elements of American Christianity I find most repugnant. He could hear anti-feminist, gender essentialist rhetoric from the pulpit. He could hear anti-gay propaganda. He could hear closed-minded attitudes towards other religions. He would almost certainly eventually hear regressive attitudes about sexuality. He might hear some of that anti-science rhetoric (or the even more unethical, deceptive Intelligent Design variant). Hell, he could hear some of that Gospel-of-Wealth bullshit that even flies in the face of Jesus’ own teachings about wealth and responsibility to the poor. Those would all be things I’d feel compelled to confront, further confusing him.

But even if I managed to find a progressive church that I didn’t need to argue against on social grounds, I still don’t think the value of community outweighs the danger of a community whose beliefs are antithetical to my own. Here’s why: Imagine I lived in a similarly small town, but in some far off country, and there were no Christian churches. Would my mom be encouraging me to take Noah to the local mosque or Sikh or Buddhist or Shinto temple? I doubt it. I think, at its core, the notion that some-community-is-better-than-no-community is rooted in the assumption that the-default-community-will-be-my-community. Only, Christianity isn’t my community anymore. As an agnostic, I’m not a Christian who is searching, not someone who is part of the un-Church movement, not a post-modern Christian. I’m someone who fundamentally believes that there may or may not be a God (or gods), but that if higher intelligences exist outside our ability to perceive them with our senses or accurately describe them with our imperfect, human language, then, by definition, they also exist beyond our comprehension. Furthermore, I believe that religions which simultaneously preach submission to an all-powerful deity (an expression of humility) but also dictate a command to have some degree of certainty in their particular conception of that deity (an act of hubris) have an irreconcilable consistency problem.

Ultimately, while I respect and admire a lot of things about Christianity (the architecture, the music, the care for one another and for those outside the community itself, the elevation of literacy and education, many of the dictates about how people should treat one another) and admire and respect a lot of individual Christians (my mom foremost among them), it’s simply not my religion. Consequently, I don’t feel compelled to deposit my son into someone else’s community so that he can develop his faith in someone else’s god.

If my wife (a Christian) wants to take him to church, that would be fine, but that's completely up to her. If my parents want to take him to church, I'd be fine with that, too. It just shouldn't be me.

But, every year at Christmas time, I do wish he knew more of the songs.

GOP Response: More Hypocritical Government Bashing

I'm not quite sure which kind of hypocrisy irks me more, right-wing media outlets complaining about "The Media" or right-wing government employees complaining about "The Government." Tonight, in the GOP response to the President's State of the Union Address, U.S. Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers went on what can fairly be described as an anti-government tear. "...Republican vision… One that empowers you, not the government…"

"trusts people to make their own decisions, not a government that decides for you."

"...To grow the working middle class, not the government..."

"...more spending, government bailouts, and red tape…"

"...health care choices should be yours, not the government’s."

Sensing a theme? By the end, I think she was literally choking on her own hatred of the government - the precise institution that she works for!

But it's worse than that. She started off with a mini-biography about how she pulled herself up by her bootstraps, working at the McDonald's drive-thru to put herself through college. Buried in that bio, she mentioned that her father was a school bus driver. Now, it is possible, though unlikely, that her dad worked for a private school. I tried to confirm either way and couldn't find out that detail in any of her bios online. But since most school bus drivers drive for the public schools, and since most private schools don't employ their own bus drivers (at least in rural areas where I work and where McMorris Rodgers grew up), this means her father was, more than likely, a government employee. So while she was working at McDs to put herself through school, the food she was eating around the kitchen table and the roof over her head were paid for, in part, by the hard work that her father did for the evil government she kept deriding.

And this gets at the heart of why I am so frequently irritated when I hear people griping about "the government." Do you know who gets kids to schools safely and brings them home safely to their families each day? The government. And who teaches them and cares for them while they are at school? The government. And the police and firefighters who keep those families safe? The government.

Now, when pressed, I expect most conservatives would say, "Well, that's not the part of the government I have a problem with."

Oh, so you like local services but dislike the evil "Federal Government"?

"Yeah, that's what I really mean."

Yeah, except that most of the employees of the federal government work for the military, and conservatives seem to like them.

"Well, sure, that's not the part of the federal government I have a problem with."

Veteran's Affairs?

"No, not them either."

The treasury that prints your money?

"No."

The courts?

"Well, there are those activist judges I dislike and the activist judges I like (because when they agree with me they aren't activist judges anymore), but no, that's not the part of the government I mean."

Then what? Homeland Security? Agriculture? Interior? Transportation? Commerce? Labor? Energy? Housing and Urban Development? NASA?

"No, not those."

Um, The Tennessee Valley Authority?

"I don't like the IRS!"

So you like all the parts except for the part that collects the taxes that make them all possible?

"No. I don't like all the parts. I don't like the EPA!"

Yeah. Clean water is a bitch. Mercury and lead are tasty; no argument there.

See, here's where I think the average conservative voter and their political leaders part ways. They can both hum along to the same "the government" dog whistle, but it means two different things to each. To the voter, it means "I like most of the parts of the government, but I vote for the team that doesn't want it to work because I don't like the team that makes it work." Is that an oversimplification? Yes. But we need these people. This conservative impulse is actually good, because, in a measured degree, it could save us all from government overreach which is a real thing that could happen if the only people in power were the ones who believe in government solutions. They would wield the tools they have (government solutions) for everything, and that would be bad. We need conservative voters.

What we do not need are right-wing politicians who mean something very different when they say "the government." Because if you do a close reading of McMorris Rodgers' speech, she's not talking about the NSA (clear government overreach) or drone strikes. She's talking about taking away limits. This is another code for "regulations," another word the Republicans have tried to make into swear word. And I worry that it's working and that people don't give that a second thought. Because while stupid regulations are bad, Republicans don't propose smart regulations. They oppose all regulation on principle; the rules that keep your water clean, that prevent your car from being a ticking time bomb, that try (and often fail) from keeping the banking industry from throwing away your life savings. Why?

Because what Republican politicians really want, in spite of the fact that conservative voters actually like a lot of government programs, is to cash in on all those potential markets. Schools? Privatize them all. Police? More money to be made in private security forces. The military? Blackwater mercenaries. EPA? Let Exxon Mobile do whatever it wants. What bad things could possibly come from that?

Now, of course this irks me because I'm a public sector employee who firmly believes that all children in the world's richest nation deserve a free, high quality public education. But this goes beyond self interest. I overhear my students in the halls parroting this anti-government propaganda and I can't say anything because that wouldn't be appropriate. I oversee my former students grousing about the government on Facebook and twitter, and it depresses me. 

Despite Republican's claims to be the "party of personal responsibility," this constant anti-government drum beat has diminished a whole generation's sense that they need to take personal responsibility for their government. It becomes "the government," this nebulous entity that can only wreak havoc on their young lives. What they don't see is that, unlike the corporation they work for, the government is an entity they own and control. It's certainly not perfect and it's not the solution for everything, but it is an entity that belongs to all of us. The government is an extension of We the People. Anti-government rhetoric from people who carry around little copies of the Constitution seems like the most bitter form of irony to me. Read the first three words! The government is us. And if we don't like it, we shouldn't complain about some institution out there. We should fix it. Because it's ours. The people who hate the government hate something we have created (or failed to create due to our apathy), and that should be an insult to all of us. 

The insult is even more severe when those people work for that government or are asking for our permission to go to work for it.

So tell me the government should change in this way or that way. I can appreciate that. Tell me you want to reign in this specific part or alter this other specific part. But don't sneer every time you mention the government until you're literally choking at the end of your speech. Because that government belongs to us.

Geeking Out.