Matthew Dicks's Blog, page 282

Tiny moments like this is why I teach

My students were reading the first scene of Hamlet yesterday, trying to determining the meaning of the language using background knowledge and context clues..

In the first scene, Horatio says of Hamlet's father's ghost:

This spirit, dumb to us, will speak to him.
Do you consent we shall acquaint him with it,
as needful in our loves, fitting our duty?

"Dumb" in this case means mute. The ghost refuses to speak to anyone but Hamlet. Two of my students were able to determine the meaning of dumb in this instances.

One student used context clues.

The other told me that he learned the word by listening to Elton John's version of Pinball Wizard, which includes the line:

That deaf dumb and blind kid
Sure plays a mean pin ball!

He added that the Elton John version of the song is superior to The Who's version. Thus began a spirited debate as to why The Who's version of the song is far superior to Elton John's half-witted cover for the film version of Tommy. 

Eventually, I had to wrap up the debate as other children with far less pressing, less interesting matters were waiting to speak to me, but next week, I'll be playing both versions of the song to my class so they can decide for themselves. 

This is one of the reasons I teach. For moments like this. 

I was stupid when I was young.

My daughter Clara - age 8 - in the midst of eating breakfast and watching Blues Clues, just asked me who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2016.

"Are they talking about The Nobel Prize on Blues Clues?" I asked. 

"No," she said. "I was reading something about inspirational people in the world yesterday. And I just thought that the Nobel Peace Prize winner from last year would probably be inspirational."

She reminds me every day about how incredibly stupid I was at her age and for many years thereafter. 

The glory and might of a good old fashioned pillow fight

Back in the early 1990's, when I was living in Attleboro, MA with my best friend, Bengi, in a home we affectionately referred to as The Heavy Metal Playhouse, we engaged in some of the most epic pillow fights in history.

After sunset, the shades would be pulled, the lights turned out, and anywhere from four to eight of us would use pillows, sofa cushions, and even stuffed animals to wallop one another in the near-pitch dark. The sofa cushions has zippers, so they would occasionally leave scratches across faces, arms, and legs, but we wore those scratches as badges of honor.

Couches would be tipped over to provide cover against frontal assaults. Temporary alliances would form out of desperate necessity. Smaller pillows would be fired as projectile weapons across the room. Occasionally a guy and girl would disappear into a corner to make out until discovered by some pillow-wielding attacker who would quickly break them up.

These pillow fights could go on for hours. They were glorious.   

I feel like we could all benefit from a few more pillow fights in our lives.

Of course, not every pillow fight ends well: 

In 1921, the New York Tribune reported that a small boy named Charles Hunton fell from his six-floor winder after having a pillow fight with his brother Arthur. Although Charles was knocked unconscious, a hospital examination found no broken bones or internal injuries. When asked how he was feeling, the boy nonchalantly said he was “fine” and asked for some ice cream.New York police responded to a hospital riot in 1953, but found something more unusual: The New York Herald reported that rival wings of a narcotics ward at Riverside Hospital erupted into an intense pillow fight. Seventy-two men engaged in the melee before armed police came to shut it down. The brawl started at around 10 p.m., but was quelled within 45 minutes. Leave it to the police to ruin yet another good pillow fight. In 2009, a public pillow fight planned at Campus Martius Park was shut down before it even began. Detroit Free Press said police arrived at the scene and sent potential fighters home. "We don't have a problem with consenting adults hitting each other with pillows, but the issue becomes cleanup," Detroit Spokesperson James Tate said. 

Men who grumble about jeans and sweaters are stupid.

Back in December I wrote a piece about the stupidity of forbidding jeans in the workplace.

Just a couple days ago, I wrote a piece about the stupidity of bemoaning casual dress in America.

Yesterday a reader sent me this story about North Dakota's Governor Doug Burgum being asked to leave the North Dakota Senate floor for wearing jeans.

Burgum is a Republican. 

Burgum's preference for jeans and sweaters has reportedly spurred much grumbling at the Capitol among many male lawmakers who wear a suit and tie when the Legislature is in session.

Can you imagine? The state is facing a one billion dollar budget deficit - the largest in the country - and these lawmakers are grumbling about what about the clothing that the governor of the state is wearing.

Middle school nonsense. That's what this is. Wrapping a floral noose around your neck and throwing a needless coat over your shirt doesn't make you a better leader. 

It simply makes you a better conformer.

The Internet has certainly evolved in the last 20 years

1997:

Never, ever get into a stranger's car. Never arrange to meet people from the Internet in real life. 

2017:

Literally summon strangers from the Internet to get in their cars.

5 things to remember when bemoaning the proliferation of casual dress in America.

The next time you bemoan (or hear someone bemoan) the proliferation of casual dress in Americans today, please remember these five things:

For centuries, clothing was specifically used to identify social class, gender, and age. It's only been recently that Americans have been able to break free from these culturally imposed norms and express personal identitythrough self image. This is a good thing.  Formal attire is expensive. The people who complain about the casual dress of Americans today tend to be the people who can afford more formal attire and are probably blind to their own good fortune and privilege.   Owning a wardrobe consisting of both formal and less formal attire is also expensive. Once again, the people who complain about the casual dress of Americans today tend to be the people who can afford more expansive and diverse wardrobes and are probably blind to their own good fortune and privilege.  For many people, clothing is not nearly as important as investments in education, experiences, and their children's futures. Complaining about the proliferation of casual dress in America today is to argue that your priorities are the right priorities. This makes you a jackass of the highest order.  People who are concerned with the physical appearance of others tend to be some of the smallest, most insignificant people on the planet. Our kindergarten teachers taught us not to judge books by their covers. These are people who need to go back to kindergarten.    

Historian Deirdra Clemente says it better than me: 

“Americans dress casual. Why? Because clothes are freedom—freedom to choose how we present ourselves to the world; freedom to blur the lines between man and woman, old and young, rich and poor. The rise of casual style directly undermined millennia-old rules that dictated noticeable luxury for the rich and functioning work clothes for the poor. Until a little more than a century ago, there were very few ways to disguise your social class. You wore it—literally—on your sleeve. Today, CEOs wear sandals to work and white suburban kids tweak their L.A. Raiders hat a little too far to the side. Compliments of global capitalism, the clothing market is flooded with options to mix-and-match to create a personal style.”

— Deirdra Clemente

Trump called the media "the enemy of the American people." This could not be further from the truth.

Donald Trump's assault on the press took a new and ominous step yesterday when he called the press the "enemy of the American people." At a rally in Florida, he misquoted Thomas Jefferson in an effort to defend his position, a fact brought to light by journalists. 

The Jeffersonian quote that Trump should've used was this:

"The only security of all is in a free press." - Thomas Jefferson

He might've also cited the words of South African President Nelson Mandela:

"A critical, independent and investigative press is the lifeblood of any democracy."

I understand why Trump is attempting to turn the American people against the media. In just his third week in office, journalists revealed that National Security Advisor Mike Flynn had lied to the Vice President and the American people about his discussions with Russia prior to the inauguration - lies that Trump knew about for at least two weeks and did nothing about except fire the one person (Sally Yates) who warned him about Flynn's lies and his possible exposure to blackmail as a result. 

This led to the eventual firing of Flynn - something Trump obviously wanted to avoid but needed to happen for the safety and security of the country.

The truth can be inconvenient, particularly when you are attempting to cover up illegalities in your administration. 

Thankfully, Americans are supporting the media in numbers greater than ever before. Increases in subscriptions and viewership across television and newspapers is astounding:

The New York Times - a favorite target of the President - is enjoying record numbers of digital subscriptions, and their stock is at a 52 week high.  

The media is not and never has been the enemy of the American people. The media is comprised of men and women who seek the truth on a daily basis, oftentimes risking their lives in the process.

Journalism giants like Woodward and Bernstein saved our country from a tyrant (who also referred to the press as an enemy). Trailblazing journalists like Nellie Bly changed the way mental health institutions are run today.

And then there are the thousands of journalists who have been kidnapped, tortured, murdered, beheaded, and otherwise killed in the line of duty.

1230 since 1992 alone.

Here are the faces of just a few of the men and women who have given their lives in pursuit of the truth in the last few years. A President who was granted five highly questionable military deferments during Vietnam has no right referring to our press as the enemy of the American people.

Journalists are all that stands between propaganda and truth. They are underpaid, under-appreciated, oftentimes unsung heroes of the American people.

We must stand beside them in times like these.   

Three types of people who people hate

I think this list is fairly obvious, and yet I deal with people like this ALL THE TIME.

So in case you are not aware of your own shortcomings, here are three types of people who people hate. Check and make sure that you are not one of them:

Complainers: There is nothing wrong with taking issue in a matter of importance, but if you are a person who finds something to complain about on an almost daily basis, or you have several complaints going on at the same time, the problem is not the world. The problem is you. And we all hate you for it.

"Yeah, but": Similar to complainers, these are people who reject solutions to their problems by simultaneously acknowledging the potential effectiveness of a proposed solution while at the same time finding ways to continue to complain about the same problem. These are people who enjoy problems and find simple solutions oddly offensive. If you frequently say "yeah, but" or something along those lines, we hate you.

Escalators: These are people who may have legitimate issues with individuals, organizations, and other entities, but rather than approaching these entities in a measured, productive, civil manner, they take pride and pleasure in airing out their issues in public or semi-public forums in ways that make everyone around them uncomfortable. These are also people who constantly assume the worst of others and love to threaten to sue at the drop of a dime.

Here's a good way of determining if you are an escalator:

The average number of times that a person threatens to sue another person or organization in their lifetime is less than one. Even if you were to sue someone, reasonable people don't threaten to sue. They simply file their lawsuit in a court of law, absent of the verbal flourish. If the number of times you have threatened to sue someone in your lifetime exceeds two, you are likely an escalator, and we hate you.

Watch this.

My daughter embraces respectful dissent and nonconformity. Even in the face of Trump.

My eight year-old daughter, Clara, is no fan of Donald Trump. Ever since she saw a clip of him speaking poorly to Megyn Kelly on CBS Sunday Morning months ago (it seems like years ago), she has despised the man. 

Nothing since then has convinced her otherwise. Understandably so.

Still, when confronted with a weekly reader at her school featuring a piece on Trump's inauguration, she said, "Most of the kids in my class scratched his face off the cover of the magazine because they all hate him, too. But I didn't. I wanted to be respectful even though I really don't like him." 

Had Clara scratched his face off the magazine. I would not have complained. I may have even cheered the decision. 

Still, I was proud of her. I appreciated her surprisingly nuanced understanding of respectful dissent.

Her little brother, by comparison, is fond of saying that Donald Trump belongs in a trashcan.

A lot less nuance. 

Also, whenever my daughter takes the side of nonconformity, it warms her Daddy's heart. It's not always the path of least resistance (as I well know), but I believe it's the path to inner strength and enlightenment.