Several times this past week, I've seen small children doing that thing where you only step on certain coloured tiles or otherwise have to follow certain patterns in tiles or sidewalk cracks, which sometimes involve jumping around or walking in a way that may appear erratic.
I know what these kids are trying to do. I did it myself as a kid (and still do it sometimes as an adult). I totally respect their game, and I understand that if they step on the wrong tiles the alligators will get them.
But here's the weird part: every time I've seen this, I've been unable to recognize the pattern they were following! This is relevant because I kept walking across their paths, causing them to step on the wrong tiles and get eaten by alligators, and perhaps get scolded by their parents for fooling around and getting in the nice lady's way.
I don't mean to ruin their game or get them scolded, but for some reason the patterns followed in this game have been impenetrable to me lately. I don't know what this means.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Teach me about sunrise times
Look at this chart of sunrise and sunset times in Toronto in December 2010.
The solstice is December 21, with 8h 55m 34s of daylight. Sunrise is at 7:48 AM and sunset is at 4:43 PM.
But then sunrise time keeps getting later. It's 7:49 on December 23, 7:50 on December 25, and 7:51 on December 29. In fact, it takes until January 17 for sunrise time to get back to being earlier than it was on the solstice.
And I just noticed the same goes for the sunset. It's 4:43 on the solstice, but it's earlier than that on the days leading up to the solstice, going as early as 4:40 between December 7 and 11.
Why is this?
The solstice is December 21, with 8h 55m 34s of daylight. Sunrise is at 7:48 AM and sunset is at 4:43 PM.
But then sunrise time keeps getting later. It's 7:49 on December 23, 7:50 on December 25, and 7:51 on December 29. In fact, it takes until January 17 for sunrise time to get back to being earlier than it was on the solstice.
And I just noticed the same goes for the sunset. It's 4:43 on the solstice, but it's earlier than that on the days leading up to the solstice, going as early as 4:40 between December 7 and 11.
Why is this?
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Things They Should Invent: accept paper in the organic waste stream
Before I bought a paper shredder, I'd dispose of important documents by ripping them up by hand and then putting some (but not all) of the pieces in my kitchen garbage. On top of the fact that the document was a) ripped up and b) not all in the same garbage bag, I then had the additional layer of security of it being really gross to retrieve the pieces, because they were in with egg shells and coffee grinds and apples cores and rotten lettuce.
As an added service to the public, the City should let everyone put any important papers that need to be disposed of in with their organic waste. Paper does biodegrade so it shouldn't hurt anything, and it will make pilfering personal documents out of the garbage at least more unpleasant, if not more difficult.
As an added service to the public, the City should let everyone put any important papers that need to be disposed of in with their organic waste. Paper does biodegrade so it shouldn't hurt anything, and it will make pilfering personal documents out of the garbage at least more unpleasant, if not more difficult.
Things They Should Invent: chose the healthiest cans possible for food bank donation packages
Metro has this thing where you give a small amount of money at the cash register to purchase a "food bank package" - a few cans and other nonperishable food items in a little bag, to go in the food bank donation box.
I noticed that all the items in the food bank package are store brand items, which has me wondering how healthy they are.
In the past few years, my body's been reacting negatively when my sodium intake is too high. Unfortunately, I still crave the taste of salt, so I've been looking for ways to cut back the amount of sodium I consume in foods that don't address my salt craving. So I started reading nutritional information on the non-salty processed foods that I do eat, and I noticed that cheaper brands systematically have more sodium. And the store brand is nearly always the cheapest one. For things like soup and tomato sauce, they'd often have 30%-40% of your recommended daily intake in just one serving! (And we know that the servings based on which nutritional information is calculated tend to be smaller than what one person would normally eat in one sitting.)
I haven't examined every single product in the food bank package, and I haven't done compared any nutritional information other than sodium content (although high sodium content is certainly a risk factor for heart disease in and of itself), but this makes me worried that we might be giving the unhealthiest food to food banks, when we could be making our food bank donations significantly less unhealthy by just going a couple of items over on the same shelf.
At this point, someone is likely to argue "But they shouldn't be eating processed foods anyway, they should be eating wholesome fresh foods!" I'll do you one better: we shouldn't need food banks at all - our social safety net should be strong enough that people should buy their own groceries. But the fact remains that there are people who are hungry, and they're hungry right this minute and can't wait until we revamp the whole infrastructure. The existing system for getting food to needy people is food banks, and the nature of existing food banks requires large-scale donations canned and other nonperishable (and therefore processed) foods. And human nature is such that you'll get more donations by asking people to pay a harmless amount for a preselected package of goods than by requiring them to take the initiative and choose items to donate on their own.
What we can do right now, without interrupting the flow of food to needy people, is get someone to read the labels, pick the healthiest items off the supermarket shelf, and put those in the food bank packages. Then people won't have to choose between increasing their risk of heart disease and going to bed hungry.
I noticed that all the items in the food bank package are store brand items, which has me wondering how healthy they are.
In the past few years, my body's been reacting negatively when my sodium intake is too high. Unfortunately, I still crave the taste of salt, so I've been looking for ways to cut back the amount of sodium I consume in foods that don't address my salt craving. So I started reading nutritional information on the non-salty processed foods that I do eat, and I noticed that cheaper brands systematically have more sodium. And the store brand is nearly always the cheapest one. For things like soup and tomato sauce, they'd often have 30%-40% of your recommended daily intake in just one serving! (And we know that the servings based on which nutritional information is calculated tend to be smaller than what one person would normally eat in one sitting.)
I haven't examined every single product in the food bank package, and I haven't done compared any nutritional information other than sodium content (although high sodium content is certainly a risk factor for heart disease in and of itself), but this makes me worried that we might be giving the unhealthiest food to food banks, when we could be making our food bank donations significantly less unhealthy by just going a couple of items over on the same shelf.
At this point, someone is likely to argue "But they shouldn't be eating processed foods anyway, they should be eating wholesome fresh foods!" I'll do you one better: we shouldn't need food banks at all - our social safety net should be strong enough that people should buy their own groceries. But the fact remains that there are people who are hungry, and they're hungry right this minute and can't wait until we revamp the whole infrastructure. The existing system for getting food to needy people is food banks, and the nature of existing food banks requires large-scale donations canned and other nonperishable (and therefore processed) foods. And human nature is such that you'll get more donations by asking people to pay a harmless amount for a preselected package of goods than by requiring them to take the initiative and choose items to donate on their own.
What we can do right now, without interrupting the flow of food to needy people, is get someone to read the labels, pick the healthiest items off the supermarket shelf, and put those in the food bank packages. Then people won't have to choose between increasing their risk of heart disease and going to bed hungry.
Thursday, November 25, 2010
What I got from my bullies
Before I get into the substance of this post, I want to make one thing clear: my bullies did not make me stronger. There are a number of (rather loud) people who want my narrative to go that way. If I mention my bullying, if I point out that I was constantly told "just ignore them" and that didn't work at all (unless you count the fact that after years of ignoring them I ended up in a different physical location so they were never in the same room as me), the happy ending contingent says "But ultimately it made you a stronger person, right?"
No, it didn't. It seriously fucked me up. It made me (and I still am) skittish, paranoid, and defensive, entirely unable to predict how people would react and what was expected in real-life social situations. I'm about 10 years behind in my people skills and had to work hella hard to catch up that far. I still get cringey and hidey when I hear people whispering and giggling in a cube near mine, even though I know intellectually that it's just my co-workers talking about their weekends. I still look at the floor and avoid eye contact when I see cool teenagers.
But, that said, there have been a few odd positive outcomes:
1. I don't expect people to like or respect me. If someone doesn't want to be my friend or doesn't invite me to the thing, it doesn't hurt my feelings at all. That's to be expected. And if someone does want to be my friend or does invite me to the thing, that's a pleasant surprise. One of the things that really surprised me about cop behaviour at the G20 is that they were so sensitive to the most minor of slights, as though it actually hurt their feelings. That sort of thing would never bother me, because I consider it baseline. When people over whom I have authority (insofar as I have any authority) respect what authority I have, it's always a bit of a pleasant surprise. When stores that are cooler than me give me good customer service (which they always do), it makes my day. If they didn't, it would be an everyday annoyance, on par with missing the subway and having to wait another 4 minutes.
2. My self-concept is unattractive. When paint and spackle and engineering and technology can make me look attractive (which it often can), it always feels like a bit of an added bonus. When I look in the mirror and dislike what I see, that's SOP. I know a few people whose self-concept is attractive, and it's always a massive blow when they gain a few pounds or get hair sprouting where no hair should ever sprout. Such things will never cause me to lose self-esteem, because I'm used to being ugly.
3. I love being alone. All I ever wanted from my bullies was for them to leave me alone. And, in fact, one of the things I was bullied for was being alone at any given time, whether it was on the playground at recess or at home on a Friday night. So now that, as an adult, I can be alone on a daily basis and without social censure, I rejoice in it. It feels like a little victory. Some of the elders in my life find it difficult to leave the house and get depressed about being alone all day. I doubt I would ever get depressed in that sort of situation - on the contrary, I find it peaceful and very nearly liberating.
4. I don't fall for charming. We've all read Gift of Fear or otherwise heard about charming people who turn out to be scam artists or sociopaths. After years of seeing my peers turn up the charm for parents/teachers/cool kids and then turn around and bully me, I don't fall for that. Oh, I use it! I completely take advantage of other people's fake charming as a social lubricant. But I don't fall for it. I don't trust it, so it can't trick me.
No, it didn't. It seriously fucked me up. It made me (and I still am) skittish, paranoid, and defensive, entirely unable to predict how people would react and what was expected in real-life social situations. I'm about 10 years behind in my people skills and had to work hella hard to catch up that far. I still get cringey and hidey when I hear people whispering and giggling in a cube near mine, even though I know intellectually that it's just my co-workers talking about their weekends. I still look at the floor and avoid eye contact when I see cool teenagers.
But, that said, there have been a few odd positive outcomes:
1. I don't expect people to like or respect me. If someone doesn't want to be my friend or doesn't invite me to the thing, it doesn't hurt my feelings at all. That's to be expected. And if someone does want to be my friend or does invite me to the thing, that's a pleasant surprise. One of the things that really surprised me about cop behaviour at the G20 is that they were so sensitive to the most minor of slights, as though it actually hurt their feelings. That sort of thing would never bother me, because I consider it baseline. When people over whom I have authority (insofar as I have any authority) respect what authority I have, it's always a bit of a pleasant surprise. When stores that are cooler than me give me good customer service (which they always do), it makes my day. If they didn't, it would be an everyday annoyance, on par with missing the subway and having to wait another 4 minutes.
2. My self-concept is unattractive. When paint and spackle and engineering and technology can make me look attractive (which it often can), it always feels like a bit of an added bonus. When I look in the mirror and dislike what I see, that's SOP. I know a few people whose self-concept is attractive, and it's always a massive blow when they gain a few pounds or get hair sprouting where no hair should ever sprout. Such things will never cause me to lose self-esteem, because I'm used to being ugly.
3. I love being alone. All I ever wanted from my bullies was for them to leave me alone. And, in fact, one of the things I was bullied for was being alone at any given time, whether it was on the playground at recess or at home on a Friday night. So now that, as an adult, I can be alone on a daily basis and without social censure, I rejoice in it. It feels like a little victory. Some of the elders in my life find it difficult to leave the house and get depressed about being alone all day. I doubt I would ever get depressed in that sort of situation - on the contrary, I find it peaceful and very nearly liberating.
4. I don't fall for charming. We've all read Gift of Fear or otherwise heard about charming people who turn out to be scam artists or sociopaths. After years of seeing my peers turn up the charm for parents/teachers/cool kids and then turn around and bully me, I don't fall for that. Oh, I use it! I completely take advantage of other people's fake charming as a social lubricant. But I don't fall for it. I don't trust it, so it can't trick me.
Monday, November 22, 2010
Things They Should Study: what would it cost to make critical workers unbribable?
Apparently border guards might soon be authorized to strip search airport and port employees because they think these employees might be involved in smuggling illegal drugs.
This makes me wonder about the economics of the situation from the employees' point of view. How much money do they make? How much bribe money or whatever would they get for helping to smuggle drugs? How much bribe money can drug cartels afford to pay them? How much of a pay increase would it take to make this bribe money negligible to them? What if they offered the workers financial incentive greater than the bribe amounts for fingering known drug smuggling operations?
Has anyone done the numbers on this yet? If not, someone should.
This makes me wonder about the economics of the situation from the employees' point of view. How much money do they make? How much bribe money or whatever would they get for helping to smuggle drugs? How much bribe money can drug cartels afford to pay them? How much of a pay increase would it take to make this bribe money negligible to them? What if they offered the workers financial incentive greater than the bribe amounts for fingering known drug smuggling operations?
Has anyone done the numbers on this yet? If not, someone should.
Thursday, November 18, 2010
More information please: why does the law care how many cars are in a driveway in the first place?
Recently in the news, someone got a ticket for parking in her own driveway. Apparently there's a by-law that if you have a single garage, you're only allowed to park one car in your driveway.
What I really want to know, but isn't mentioned anywhere in this article: how did such a thing come to be law in the first place?
The only hint in the article:
So it sounds like someone thinks it's a problem when there are numerous cars in people's driveways. And because it's a law, it sounds like either enough people complained loudly enough about similar things or powerful enough people exerted enough influence to make this become a law. In any case, a critical mass of people seem to be looking at their neighbour's driveway and being bothered enough by the sight of multiple cars to take action.
I literally cannot imagine any circumstances under which I might care how many cars are parked in my neighbour's driveway. I cannot fathom any way that it might possibly affect me badly enough to want to get changes made to laws.
So how on earth did this all come about in the first place?
What I really want to know, but isn't mentioned anywhere in this article: how did such a thing come to be law in the first place?
The only hint in the article:
The restrictions are meant to reduce clutter in residential neighbourhoods, but city officials have said bylaw officers won’t actively seek out offenders.
So it sounds like someone thinks it's a problem when there are numerous cars in people's driveways. And because it's a law, it sounds like either enough people complained loudly enough about similar things or powerful enough people exerted enough influence to make this become a law. In any case, a critical mass of people seem to be looking at their neighbour's driveway and being bothered enough by the sight of multiple cars to take action.
I literally cannot imagine any circumstances under which I might care how many cars are parked in my neighbour's driveway. I cannot fathom any way that it might possibly affect me badly enough to want to get changes made to laws.
So how on earth did this all come about in the first place?
Things they Should Invent: opt-in window washing
Washing windows is hard, and if you're not good at it (like me), it isn't particularly effective because you leave streaks everywhere.
Every building I've lived in has hired professional window-washers to do the non-accessible windows, but has left the tenants to their own devices for windows on balconies (presumably because window-washing is expensive). But I've always had balconies (#FirstWorldProblems), so I've always been stuck making my windows streaky.
what landlords should do is give tenants the option to pay some money and have their balcony windows washed when the professional window washers are there. Then people who want their windows washed professionally can get it done, and people who'd rather do it themselves don't have to pay the money.
Every building I've lived in has hired professional window-washers to do the non-accessible windows, but has left the tenants to their own devices for windows on balconies (presumably because window-washing is expensive). But I've always had balconies (#FirstWorldProblems), so I've always been stuck making my windows streaky.
what landlords should do is give tenants the option to pay some money and have their balcony windows washed when the professional window washers are there. Then people who want their windows washed professionally can get it done, and people who'd rather do it themselves don't have to pay the money.
Monday, November 15, 2010
Spooky dream
Last night I dreamed that I was going to meet my mother and grandmother somewhere, but first had to pick something up at her house. As I looked through her kitchen for the macguffin, I accidentally hit something on her gas stove (IRL it's an ordinary, old-fashioned gas stove, but in the dream it was a multi-layered, wall-sized, pipe-organ-like affair). It started spurting flames and I couldn't figure out how to turn it off. Everything button I pressed and knob I turned just caused more flame to come out.
Then I noticed my grandfather standing behind me. He walked up to the stove and turned it off for me.
My grandfather has been dead for 10 years.
That was the first time in my life I have ever, to my knowledge, had a dead person turn up in a dream. I don't know what it means.
Then I noticed my grandfather standing behind me. He walked up to the stove and turned it off for me.
My grandfather has been dead for 10 years.
That was the first time in my life I have ever, to my knowledge, had a dead person turn up in a dream. I don't know what it means.
Sunday, November 14, 2010
Why do we talk about health care spending as a percentage of the overall budget?
You often hear health care costs spoken of as a percentage of the provincial budget. The Globe & Mail has been doing a series on this recently, and a number of people have expressed concern that health care represents too high a percentage of the budget.
I have a simple solution to that problem: provide free university tuition for everyone, double all social assistance rates, reimburse housing costs for all households earning under the poverty line, and increase taxes accordingly.
That doesn't address health care at all, does it? The end result would be exactly the same health care we have now at exactly the same cost. But health care would be a smaller percentage of the budget, because the budget as a whole would be bigger.
Looking at health care as a percentage of the budget doesn't address the number of dollars being spent, whether people are getting care we need, whether the aspects of health care not covered by OHIP are affordable, or whether we're getting good value for our money. It is dependent on a wide range of factors that are completely unrelated to health care.
So why do people keep talking about it this way?
I have a simple solution to that problem: provide free university tuition for everyone, double all social assistance rates, reimburse housing costs for all households earning under the poverty line, and increase taxes accordingly.
That doesn't address health care at all, does it? The end result would be exactly the same health care we have now at exactly the same cost. But health care would be a smaller percentage of the budget, because the budget as a whole would be bigger.
Looking at health care as a percentage of the budget doesn't address the number of dollars being spent, whether people are getting care we need, whether the aspects of health care not covered by OHIP are affordable, or whether we're getting good value for our money. It is dependent on a wide range of factors that are completely unrelated to health care.
So why do people keep talking about it this way?
What's missing from Remembrance Day
Last week, I saw a young vet selling poppies. He was definitely under 40, might even have been younger than me. (I can't tell age well in men, his head was shaved, and he was wearing the blue jacketed vet uniform that I'm used to seeing on elderly men.)
What is missing from Remembrance Day is acknowledgment that this is not okay!
I'm certain the people who first created Remembrance Day would be devastated that, nearly 100 years later, a young man - possibly a great-grandson of a WWI vet - is a war veteran!
This is not nothing. We shouldn't be scanning over without noticing it. We need to be acknowledging, at the very very least, that this is suboptimal.
Media coverage of Remembrance Day often mentions, with a tinge of sadness, that WWI and WWII veterans are dying out. I don't think that tinge of sadness is appropriate. Not that I want all my elders to die, but rather that if all the living veterans eventually die out, it will mean that we've succeeded in creating the peace and freedom that they all thought they were fighting for. If we're making more veterans, then we have failed and their sacrifices were in vain.
What is missing from Remembrance Day is acknowledgment that this is not okay!
I'm certain the people who first created Remembrance Day would be devastated that, nearly 100 years later, a young man - possibly a great-grandson of a WWI vet - is a war veteran!
This is not nothing. We shouldn't be scanning over without noticing it. We need to be acknowledging, at the very very least, that this is suboptimal.
Media coverage of Remembrance Day often mentions, with a tinge of sadness, that WWI and WWII veterans are dying out. I don't think that tinge of sadness is appropriate. Not that I want all my elders to die, but rather that if all the living veterans eventually die out, it will mean that we've succeeded in creating the peace and freedom that they all thought they were fighting for. If we're making more veterans, then we have failed and their sacrifices were in vain.
Friday, November 12, 2010
Still trying to figure out the proper name for a hodd-d-d-d-d
If you don't know what I mean by a hodd-d-d-d-d, watch Eddie here, starting at about 4:30:
What is that thing actually called?
Update: The always-awesome @TravelMaus tells me that it's a carpet sweeper! I've been trying to figure that out for ages! (It's awfully hard to google when you don't know what it's called)
What is that thing actually called?
Update: The always-awesome @TravelMaus tells me that it's a carpet sweeper! I've been trying to figure that out for ages! (It's awfully hard to google when you don't know what it's called)
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Things They Should Invent: make all political donations anonymous
Currently, political donations are a matter of public record in the name of transparency, and there are all kinds of limits on who can donate and how much they can donate to prevent people from buying influence.
Better idea: make it mandatory for all donations to be anonymous. Donations are paid into some central organization and then distributed to the party or individual for which they are earmarked. This is done electronically and double-blind whenever possible, so no one knows or can find out how much anyone donated to anyone. (Yes, they could tell each other, but people who want to influence politicians could also lie about donating to them.)
Maybe they could even aggregate the money and pay it out to the politicos at regular intervals, so the politicos don't know the individual amounts. Why might this be important? Suppose I was trying to influence a politician, so I tell them that I donated a large amount of money to them. To prove to them that I actually made that donation, I could make it a strange number (like $1,097) and then specifically tell them the number.
Better idea: make it mandatory for all donations to be anonymous. Donations are paid into some central organization and then distributed to the party or individual for which they are earmarked. This is done electronically and double-blind whenever possible, so no one knows or can find out how much anyone donated to anyone. (Yes, they could tell each other, but people who want to influence politicians could also lie about donating to them.)
Maybe they could even aggregate the money and pay it out to the politicos at regular intervals, so the politicos don't know the individual amounts. Why might this be important? Suppose I was trying to influence a politician, so I tell them that I donated a large amount of money to them. To prove to them that I actually made that donation, I could make it a strange number (like $1,097) and then specifically tell them the number.
The remaining mystery of the Toronto municipal election
One of the councillor candidates in Ward 22 was one Elizabeth Cook. I couldn't find any information about her. Her profile on the City of Toronto election site didn't include a website or even a campaign office phone number. She received no media coverage that I could find (with some media outlets even saying they weren't able to get in touch with her), and was not present at any of the candidates' debates. I put quite a bit of effort into looking, but the only evidence I could find of her existence was the fact that her name was on the candidates' list.
But she somehow got 1,900 votes. And what's even weirder is that she came in third out of the four candidates! And the fourth-place finisher, William Molls, had a website and a platform and attended all the debates and was mentioned in the media a few times, and even talked to people on twitter!
So I'm still super curious about who is this Elizabeth Cook? Did she have an actual campaign that I didn't see and couldn't find (and media outlets couldn't find either)? Who voted for her and why?
But she somehow got 1,900 votes. And what's even weirder is that she came in third out of the four candidates! And the fourth-place finisher, William Molls, had a website and a platform and attended all the debates and was mentioned in the media a few times, and even talked to people on twitter!
So I'm still super curious about who is this Elizabeth Cook? Did she have an actual campaign that I didn't see and couldn't find (and media outlets couldn't find either)? Who voted for her and why?
"My truth": what it means and why I keep talking about it
I've been using the phrase "my truth" a lot on this blog recently. I've heard the phrase criticized in other contexts. "What do you mean your truth? The truth is the truth. You don't get your very own truth!"
I can best explain with an example:
Taxes don't hurt.
That is my truth. My taxes have never hurt. When I had very little money I was getting refunds on all the taxes I paid, when I had a little more money I was paying only a small amount of taxes that really didn't make a difference to anything, and my net income has always increased whenever my gross income has increased. My taxes don't hurt and they never have hurt. That is true.
However, it's not necessarily true for everyone. Given the number of people who complain about taxes, it's reasonable to assume that some people's taxes hurt, and that is their truth.
Their truth does not negate my truth, and vice versa. The fact that my taxes don't hurt doesn't mean other people's taxes don't hurt, and the fact that other people's taxes hurt doesn't make my taxes hurt.
I've been glomming onto this concept lately because of the recently Toronto election, and especially the media coverage thereof. I kept hearing candidates and media telling me that I want/need/prioritize things that I don't, and barely heard my truth represented at all.
I've always tried to speak and write and blog in a way that acknowledges that what's right for me isn't right for everyone, but I can't go around marginalizing myself just because the loudest people don't agree with me. So now I'm focusing a lot more on expressing my truth. It's probably going to make my blog (and me) a lot more egotistical than usual, but it looks like I have to do it because no one else is going to.
I can best explain with an example:
Taxes don't hurt.
That is my truth. My taxes have never hurt. When I had very little money I was getting refunds on all the taxes I paid, when I had a little more money I was paying only a small amount of taxes that really didn't make a difference to anything, and my net income has always increased whenever my gross income has increased. My taxes don't hurt and they never have hurt. That is true.
However, it's not necessarily true for everyone. Given the number of people who complain about taxes, it's reasonable to assume that some people's taxes hurt, and that is their truth.
Their truth does not negate my truth, and vice versa. The fact that my taxes don't hurt doesn't mean other people's taxes don't hurt, and the fact that other people's taxes hurt doesn't make my taxes hurt.
I've been glomming onto this concept lately because of the recently Toronto election, and especially the media coverage thereof. I kept hearing candidates and media telling me that I want/need/prioritize things that I don't, and barely heard my truth represented at all.
I've always tried to speak and write and blog in a way that acknowledges that what's right for me isn't right for everyone, but I can't go around marginalizing myself just because the loudest people don't agree with me. So now I'm focusing a lot more on expressing my truth. It's probably going to make my blog (and me) a lot more egotistical than usual, but it looks like I have to do it because no one else is going to.
Cars and yelling
This post is further to this braindump.
I've noticed a correlation between driving and yelly/angry behaviour.
A friend of mine once worked for the City of Toronto in a number of different offices, and she said that by far the most anger she ever faced was in the parking office. People get way more disproportionately angry about parking tickets or not being allowed to park where they want or not being able to find a parking spot than anything else. That is consistent with my own observations of life in general.
For the purposes of constructing a sensible sentence, I'm going to deem the set of all the people who have ever been the driver of a car in which I was a passenger "my drivers". I'd say a good 80% of the anger I have witnessed from my drivers has occurred while they were driving, even though the vast majority of the time I have spent with these people has been outside of the car.
My yelly fast-food customers were nearly all drivers, and actually most of the yelly behaviour came through the drive-thru.
Rob Ford's angry demographic skews towards drivers. And again, I'm supporting and they're opposing policies that would make driving less necessary.
Is driving scary? I think so, but not everyone does. Is driving stressful? I think so, but not everyone does. Is driving disempowering? No. Driving increases empowerment and agency and resilience.
So why does it correlate with an increase in anger and yelling?
I've noticed a correlation between driving and yelly/angry behaviour.
A friend of mine once worked for the City of Toronto in a number of different offices, and she said that by far the most anger she ever faced was in the parking office. People get way more disproportionately angry about parking tickets or not being allowed to park where they want or not being able to find a parking spot than anything else. That is consistent with my own observations of life in general.
For the purposes of constructing a sensible sentence, I'm going to deem the set of all the people who have ever been the driver of a car in which I was a passenger "my drivers". I'd say a good 80% of the anger I have witnessed from my drivers has occurred while they were driving, even though the vast majority of the time I have spent with these people has been outside of the car.
My yelly fast-food customers were nearly all drivers, and actually most of the yelly behaviour came through the drive-thru.
Rob Ford's angry demographic skews towards drivers. And again, I'm supporting and they're opposing policies that would make driving less necessary.
Is driving scary? I think so, but not everyone does. Is driving stressful? I think so, but not everyone does. Is driving disempowering? No. Driving increases empowerment and agency and resilience.
So why does it correlate with an increase in anger and yelling?
Analogy for why I'd rather have the social safety be too generous than too stingy
Suppose you're having a bunch of people over for dinner and you're not entirely sure how much food you'll need. If you buy too much, it will go to waste. If you don't buy enough, not everyone will get fed.
Isn't it better to buy too much, even if you do end up spending more money than strictly necessary, rather than having people at your dinner party hungry? It would be way assholic to have people sitting around hungry just because you were afraid of spending a few too many dollars. And if you do buy too much, it can still do some good - you can give some to your guests to take home or bring it into the office or give some to your friendly neighbourhood panhandlers if they're after food rather than money.
Isn't it better to buy too much, even if you do end up spending more money than strictly necessary, rather than having people at your dinner party hungry? It would be way assholic to have people sitting around hungry just because you were afraid of spending a few too many dollars. And if you do buy too much, it can still do some good - you can give some to your guests to take home or bring it into the office or give some to your friendly neighbourhood panhandlers if they're after food rather than money.
Things They Should Invent: pre-sliced frozen pizza
Frozen pizza isn't as good as fresh real pizza, but it certainly does the job and is significantly cheaper than having a pizza delivered and easier than going out. If you cook it in the oven and maybe sprinkle it with a bit of extra shredded cheese so it goes all melty and gooey, it totally satisfies the pizza craving.
The problem is that a whole frozen pizza is way too much for just one person (and even for two if you're watching your weight) and reheated pizza isn't nearly as good (and creates pressure for you to eat pizza again the next few days even if you just had the craving the one day, which, again, is problematic if you're watching your weight).
The solution: slice the frozen pizza into standard slices, maybe make them kind of perforated so the pizza is still a cohesive whole but parts of it can be broken off (I've seen this before with a sort of round frozen garlic bread intended to be broken into individual finger-sized slices). Then you can take, say, two slices of pizza and heat them up separately, leaving the rest in the freezer for later. You're still full of pizza, but there's no pressure to overeat.
(Yes, those little mini-pizzas are available frozen, but their crust to toppings ratio is suboptimal enough that they don't satisfy the gooey hot cheese craving.)
The problem is that a whole frozen pizza is way too much for just one person (and even for two if you're watching your weight) and reheated pizza isn't nearly as good (and creates pressure for you to eat pizza again the next few days even if you just had the craving the one day, which, again, is problematic if you're watching your weight).
The solution: slice the frozen pizza into standard slices, maybe make them kind of perforated so the pizza is still a cohesive whole but parts of it can be broken off (I've seen this before with a sort of round frozen garlic bread intended to be broken into individual finger-sized slices). Then you can take, say, two slices of pizza and heat them up separately, leaving the rest in the freezer for later. You're still full of pizza, but there's no pressure to overeat.
(Yes, those little mini-pizzas are available frozen, but their crust to toppings ratio is suboptimal enough that they don't satisfy the gooey hot cheese craving.)
Hate speech braindump (part 1 of ???)
I support hate speech laws, and I'm the only person I know who does. Unfortunately, I've never been able to articulate usefully why exactly I do support hate speech laws. However, the more I think and learn about it, and the more I'm exposed to the efforts of everyone I know to convince me otherwise, the more I become convinced that hate speech laws are a good idea. But I still can't articulate why. So I'm going to braindump around the concept and see what I can come up with. You can try to debate me if you want, but you're totally going to win right now because my thoughts aren't words yet.
1. There's a parenting technique whereby siblings are to be left to sort out their interpersonal problems among themselves I've blogged about my experience with it here. The problem for me is that what I wanted was to be left alone. It didn't hurt anyone, it didn't demand anything of anyone. But what my sister wanted was apparently to bother me, to stop me from having privacy, to make sure that I didn't get what I wanted. The same thing with my bullies. Leave me alone, either work civilly with me or ignore me in class, let me read my book. But what they wanted apparently was to bother me. What I wanted had no impact on anyone else; what they wanted was specifically to bother me. But this technique of letting kids sort out their own interpersonal problems treated them both as equally valid. It didn't give any credit to the fact that I wasn't hurting anyone, I wasn't bothering anyone. Because they did want to hurt and bother, they were good at it; because I didn't want to hurt and bother, I was bad at it. Therefore, they always won, and the net result was that someone was hurt and bothered. Which is, objectively, a negative outcome, whereas if I had been left alone the outcome would have been neutral or perhaps even positive.
My child-self didn't have these negative skills of hurt and bothering, but she did have the positive skills of amusing herself quietly without hurting or bothering. In a society, these are excellent, helpful, even productive skills to have, and if our child society had been mediated by adults, my child-self would have been left alone to be productive and our little corner of society would have been better for it. But when kids are left to their unmediated anarchy, these positive skills are worthless and the negative outcomes prevail, to the detriment of all but the lowest common denominator.
There needs to be…something, some way of mediating discourse to prevent the people with the best bullying skills from winning just because they have the best bullying skills. There needs to be some way of giving more credit or weight to positions that are productive as opposed to positions that are harmful. There needs to be some way of creating a public environment in which people can't bully their way to credibility. Without this, we may as well be back on the playground.
2. Go read Death or Cake and them come back here (this is an archive.org page and the formatting is messed, so you have to scroll down about halfway before the content starts). In this particular article they're talking about US political parties, but let's take it as broader interpretation: the contingent calling for Cake is being opposed by a contingent calling for Death. This reminded me of something I wrote during the last municipal strike. It uses up a lot of time and energy and bandwidth and column space and airtime to have to constantly counter shouts of "Death! Death!" It's draining, and it's preventing us from being productive. Maybe Cake isn't the optimal solution, but all the energy we're putting into countering calls for Death is preventing us from being able to to build a better cake, or maybe a pie instead.
We need…something, some way of taking Death off the table, so we can examine Cake objectively. How do we make it work for vegans and diabetics? I have a great recipe for gluten-free cookies! What if there was a nice salad? We can't do this when we're frantically trying to negotiate down to a maiming.
3. A while back, I read this article by a US columnist on Canadian hate speech laws, and I got the impression that he isn't seeing something that's apparent to me. I'm still not able to fully articulate my reaction (although I can point to the exact part of my brain where it occurs), but I think at least part of it is that the concept of hate speech is far more closely circumscribed than this columnist - or, I think, people who are opposed to hate speech in general - realize. You can't just point at someone saying something you don't like and scream "Hate speech!" and get them in trouble. And any idea with some actual non-hate substance to it can totally be expressed in a way that doesn't constitute hate speech.
I don't have on hand any real examples of hate speech with substance beneath, so I'll try to explain this using the Death or Cake example. Suppose that, rather than simply shouting "Death! Death!", the Death contingent was saying "You know, we have a bit of an overpopulation problem here…" We could work with that. We could start talking about improving access to family planning or introducing voluntary euthanasia options. It would not only save a whole lot of time and energy and yelling, but also keep anyone from being maimed in the name of "reasonable" compromise.
That is part (not all) of the nuance of what constitutes hate speech. "Death! Death! Death to Those People!" is hate speech. "We have an overpopulation problem. " is not. That's part of why the more I think about it, the more I support the existence of hate speech laws. It's a little step in the general direction of giving a bit more weight to productive positions. It's a little step towards taking Death off the table so we can focus on the real issue of controlling overpopulation while keeping the existing population from starving. It stops people from being able to go around doing harm just because they're bigger and louder like the bullies. And maybe if my bullies had been forced to say what it was they wanted from me, why exactly they wouldn't just leave me alone and what exactly they hoped to accomplish, maybe we could have had a situation where everyone was happier and no one was bothered.
4. When I say that any idea with non-hate substance can be expressed in a way that doesn't constitute hate speech, some of you are probably thinking "But not everyone is as good with words as you are! How can you say - and this in a blog post full of 'I can't quite articulate' - that people should get in trouble just because they can't express the precise connotation they need?" But that's how the rest of the world works. If I want to compliment a subordinate on her outfit, it's incumbent upon me to do so in a way that cannot be interpreted as sexual harassment. If I joke to the woman waiting in front of me in line that we should shoplift our purchases and then it turns out she's a police officer, it's incumbent upon me to do so in a way that makes it clear I'm not actually planning to shoplift. If I want to tease you about something, it's incumbent upon me to do so in a way that isn't cruel. So why should the people making the most hateful statements in our collective discourse get a bye?
5. Hate speech laws are to free speech as libel/slander laws are to freedom of the press.
6. As I've written about before somewhere, I do well in a society, but wouldn't do well in anarchy or a survivalist situation. I've found something I'm good at, and someone pays me money to do that, and then I can trade that money for things I need. In exchange for contributing what I can and keeping out of everyone else's way the rest of the time, I have enough food and shelter that keeps the bugs away and time and space to learn and think and grow. And a lot of the reason why this works is because of laws. Because we have laws, my employer pays me what's due to me, my landlord doesn't kick me out or raise my rent every month, the grocery store sells me food at the posted price and the food isn't poisonous, etc. This allows people like me who aren't good at fighting for their very survival to participate and even thrive, and it also allows our society as a whole to ascend Maslow's pyramid. I think hate speech laws do the same thing for discourse. It takes death off the table so we can work on building a better cake while also solving the overpopulation problem, all without anyone getting maimed along the way.
That's all the words I have at the moment, and it feels like somewhere around 20-30% of what's in my brain. More later.
1. There's a parenting technique whereby siblings are to be left to sort out their interpersonal problems among themselves I've blogged about my experience with it here. The problem for me is that what I wanted was to be left alone. It didn't hurt anyone, it didn't demand anything of anyone. But what my sister wanted was apparently to bother me, to stop me from having privacy, to make sure that I didn't get what I wanted. The same thing with my bullies. Leave me alone, either work civilly with me or ignore me in class, let me read my book. But what they wanted apparently was to bother me. What I wanted had no impact on anyone else; what they wanted was specifically to bother me. But this technique of letting kids sort out their own interpersonal problems treated them both as equally valid. It didn't give any credit to the fact that I wasn't hurting anyone, I wasn't bothering anyone. Because they did want to hurt and bother, they were good at it; because I didn't want to hurt and bother, I was bad at it. Therefore, they always won, and the net result was that someone was hurt and bothered. Which is, objectively, a negative outcome, whereas if I had been left alone the outcome would have been neutral or perhaps even positive.
My child-self didn't have these negative skills of hurt and bothering, but she did have the positive skills of amusing herself quietly without hurting or bothering. In a society, these are excellent, helpful, even productive skills to have, and if our child society had been mediated by adults, my child-self would have been left alone to be productive and our little corner of society would have been better for it. But when kids are left to their unmediated anarchy, these positive skills are worthless and the negative outcomes prevail, to the detriment of all but the lowest common denominator.
There needs to be…something, some way of mediating discourse to prevent the people with the best bullying skills from winning just because they have the best bullying skills. There needs to be some way of giving more credit or weight to positions that are productive as opposed to positions that are harmful. There needs to be some way of creating a public environment in which people can't bully their way to credibility. Without this, we may as well be back on the playground.
2. Go read Death or Cake and them come back here (this is an archive.org page and the formatting is messed, so you have to scroll down about halfway before the content starts). In this particular article they're talking about US political parties, but let's take it as broader interpretation: the contingent calling for Cake is being opposed by a contingent calling for Death. This reminded me of something I wrote during the last municipal strike. It uses up a lot of time and energy and bandwidth and column space and airtime to have to constantly counter shouts of "Death! Death!" It's draining, and it's preventing us from being productive. Maybe Cake isn't the optimal solution, but all the energy we're putting into countering calls for Death is preventing us from being able to to build a better cake, or maybe a pie instead.
We need…something, some way of taking Death off the table, so we can examine Cake objectively. How do we make it work for vegans and diabetics? I have a great recipe for gluten-free cookies! What if there was a nice salad? We can't do this when we're frantically trying to negotiate down to a maiming.
3. A while back, I read this article by a US columnist on Canadian hate speech laws, and I got the impression that he isn't seeing something that's apparent to me. I'm still not able to fully articulate my reaction (although I can point to the exact part of my brain where it occurs), but I think at least part of it is that the concept of hate speech is far more closely circumscribed than this columnist - or, I think, people who are opposed to hate speech in general - realize. You can't just point at someone saying something you don't like and scream "Hate speech!" and get them in trouble. And any idea with some actual non-hate substance to it can totally be expressed in a way that doesn't constitute hate speech.
I don't have on hand any real examples of hate speech with substance beneath, so I'll try to explain this using the Death or Cake example. Suppose that, rather than simply shouting "Death! Death!", the Death contingent was saying "You know, we have a bit of an overpopulation problem here…" We could work with that. We could start talking about improving access to family planning or introducing voluntary euthanasia options. It would not only save a whole lot of time and energy and yelling, but also keep anyone from being maimed in the name of "reasonable" compromise.
That is part (not all) of the nuance of what constitutes hate speech. "Death! Death! Death to Those People!" is hate speech. "We have an overpopulation problem. " is not. That's part of why the more I think about it, the more I support the existence of hate speech laws. It's a little step in the general direction of giving a bit more weight to productive positions. It's a little step towards taking Death off the table so we can focus on the real issue of controlling overpopulation while keeping the existing population from starving. It stops people from being able to go around doing harm just because they're bigger and louder like the bullies. And maybe if my bullies had been forced to say what it was they wanted from me, why exactly they wouldn't just leave me alone and what exactly they hoped to accomplish, maybe we could have had a situation where everyone was happier and no one was bothered.
4. When I say that any idea with non-hate substance can be expressed in a way that doesn't constitute hate speech, some of you are probably thinking "But not everyone is as good with words as you are! How can you say - and this in a blog post full of 'I can't quite articulate' - that people should get in trouble just because they can't express the precise connotation they need?" But that's how the rest of the world works. If I want to compliment a subordinate on her outfit, it's incumbent upon me to do so in a way that cannot be interpreted as sexual harassment. If I joke to the woman waiting in front of me in line that we should shoplift our purchases and then it turns out she's a police officer, it's incumbent upon me to do so in a way that makes it clear I'm not actually planning to shoplift. If I want to tease you about something, it's incumbent upon me to do so in a way that isn't cruel. So why should the people making the most hateful statements in our collective discourse get a bye?
5. Hate speech laws are to free speech as libel/slander laws are to freedom of the press.
6. As I've written about before somewhere, I do well in a society, but wouldn't do well in anarchy or a survivalist situation. I've found something I'm good at, and someone pays me money to do that, and then I can trade that money for things I need. In exchange for contributing what I can and keeping out of everyone else's way the rest of the time, I have enough food and shelter that keeps the bugs away and time and space to learn and think and grow. And a lot of the reason why this works is because of laws. Because we have laws, my employer pays me what's due to me, my landlord doesn't kick me out or raise my rent every month, the grocery store sells me food at the posted price and the food isn't poisonous, etc. This allows people like me who aren't good at fighting for their very survival to participate and even thrive, and it also allows our society as a whole to ascend Maslow's pyramid. I think hate speech laws do the same thing for discourse. It takes death off the table so we can work on building a better cake while also solving the overpopulation problem, all without anyone getting maimed along the way.
That's all the words I have at the moment, and it feels like somewhere around 20-30% of what's in my brain. More later.
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