Burn Notice

I just deactivated my account on Facebook. There is just too much contentiousness there for me. It feels like a forum in which everyone has an opinion that many consider to be fact. It feels like an unsafe place for those who are not part of a rabid majority. It is not a place where I feel like I am able to engage in free dialogue with others about ideas and new ways of thinking. So here is a place where I am able to hear myself think; a place where I don't have to listen to the inane rantings of fringe wingnuts.

Watching You

I read the news today, like yesterday. It was rife with suggestions that somebody is horribly off base about something that journalist was reporting to the general public. It seems so crucial that we know the opinion and possible fallout of now sharing the same view. I have come to think that we are no longer hoping to survive as a nation. We are tearing ourselves apart from the inside out. Democrat or Republican; Progressive or Conservative; Corporate or Government; Left or Right; Tall or Short. We almost always see the differences instead of the similarities. We are not nearly as different as so many purport. We eat; we work; we love; we waste. We cry; we laugh; we believe and we disparage. We all have or at least had family. We plant our opinions as if the opinion itself is gospel. We don't question how we "know" this or evaluate new information that might alter our position. It is sad. People can either disappoint you or you can accept that each of us is human.

There are so very many good things to see in this world. Open your eyes to some of the good; the beautiful; the lovely. See kindness and when you don't see, do something to make it a better world. I am going to do it. Maybe it will catch on and we can stop focusing on the "scarcity principle".

NIMBY!

People are people. Americans have emerged from so many national and ethnic groups that it is hard to decide what is an American. This week we learned that some people are incensed that the new Ms America has East Indian ancestry. The blogs were rife with messages about "real Ameicans". I feel sadness when I hear this. Here are some American faces: We had other mass shootings - Washington, DC and locally, here in Minneapolis. We love our guns. We love Free Speech, when the speaker is talking about something we endorse. We have little respect for those whose views are contradictory to our own. Sometimes even when the perspective is parallel but not identical we have troubling understanding why someone might believe other than what we choose. Imagine that. I can't hear myself for the roar of the Facebook rantings and the bellicose tweets. While our elected politcal officials and corporate denizens decide what is in our national best interests we have children missing out on education. We have diminished opportunity. We have disparate treatment of so many groups it is not worth shedding light. We have the powerful and then there are the rest of us. Fortunately, for some, the two groups are not mutually exclusive. We have global uncertainty. Weather, geopolitical issues, conflicting theocracies, political ideologies, Marxism, Facism, Socialism, Captitalism, Anarchy. Choose the one that works best for you today. Who is your neighbor?