Posts labeled Culture
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"One of the remarkable things about Occupy is how kind people are to each other. As I have at other protests here, I met many good and decent people with whom I had great conversations. Most of these people really care about the state of our world, and have embraced this movement with gratitude for having a place where they can figure out ways to take that caring and turn it into tangible action.
I point this out because no matter what the mainstream media says about Saturday’s action, there’s a big piece of the story that can only be absorbed by walking with these people and getting to know them. The heart of Occupy Oakland is so good. It’s been a bit broken by all the repressive police actions, ranging from waging war on the Occupiers the day of the first raid, to arresting people for things as petty as taking a blanket out of a garbage can. In spite of all the attempts to break the the movement’s heart and destroy it, it continues on, beating strongly and moving forward."
--Kevin Army, from his article in Salon.
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"It would be well to remind white America of its debt to Dr. Du Bois. When they corrupted Negro history they distorted American history because Negroes are too big a part of the building of this nation to be written out of it without destroying scientific history. White America, drenched with lies about Negroes, has lived too long in a fog of ignorance. Dr. Du Bois gave them a gift of truth for which they should eternally be indebted to him."
--Martin Luther King Jr. (Feb. 23, 1968)
#drewdellingersluminouslibrary #raremlk
In honor of today's national holiday clebrating Dr. King and the Civil Rights Movement, here's a video of some recent remarks I made at Darrin Drda's book release party.
"All I know is that when I see white people regularly yelling at police officers then something good is happening. I know it is easy to be snarktastic, but why do it with the Occupy Movement? There are plenty of things to snark about that don't involve the oppression of the poor. Do yourself a favor. Be on the right side of history."
--W. Kamau Bell
Read the article here.
Matt Taibbi nails it.
Excerpt:
"What happened at UC Davis was the inevitable result of our failure to make sure our government stayed in the business of defending our principles. When we stopped insisting on that relationship with our government, they became something separate from us."
--Matt Taibbi
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Glen Greenwald hits the nail on the head. Here's an excerpt:
"The intent and effect of such abuse is that it renders those guaranteed freedoms meaningless. If a population becomes bullied or intimidated out of exercising rights offered on paper, those rights effectively cease to exist. Every time the citizenry watches peaceful protesters getting pepper-sprayed — or hears that an Occupy protester suffered brain damage and almost died after being shot in the skull with a rubber bullet — many become increasingly fearful of participating in this citizen movement, and also become fearful in general of exercising their rights in a way that is bothersome or threatening to those in power. That’s a natural response, and it’s exactly what the climate of fear imposed by all abusive police state actions is intended to achieve: to coerce citizens to “decide” on their own to be passive and compliant — to refrain from exercising their rights — out of fear of what will happen if they don’t.
The genius of this approach is how insidious its effects are: because the rights continue to be offered on paper, the citizenry continues to believe it is free. They believe that they are free to do everything they choose to do, because they have been “persuaded” — through fear and intimidation — to passively accept the status quo. As Rosa Luxemburg so perfectly put it: “Those who do not move, do not notice their chains.” Someone who sits at home and never protests or effectively challenges power factions will not realize that their rights of speech and assembly have been effectively eroded because they never seek to exercise those rights; it’s only when we see steadfast, courageous resistance from the likes of these UC-Davis students is this erosion of rights manifest."
--Glen Greenwald
Bill Twist, Pia Banerjee, Lynne Twist, John Perkins, Drew Dellinger, Jon Symes. Here's a photo from the panel that followed the Awakening the Dreamer "Super Symposium." Yesterday's event was the unveiling of the newest version of the Symposium.
In 2003-2004, Drew was a key member of the team that developed and designed the Awakening the Dreamer, Changing the Dream Symposium. The Symposium has now been used in 60 countries, in 14 languages.
I was honored to have Joel Olson as a guest speaker in a class I taught at Prescott College in the late '90s. Later I heard him speak in the bay area about his excellent book, "The Abolition of White Democracy."
I respect Joel and his scholoarship immensely. Check out his recent article, "Whiteness and the 99%."
Stories reflect the ecological nature of reality. Each story is an ecosystem, a galaxy of its own, a holographic microcosm that contains and mirrors the One Story that is the cosmos.
(Nod to Susan Griffin and Thomas Berry.)
"Calling someone a racist individualizes the behavior and veils the fact that racism can occur only where it is culturally, socially, and legally supported. It lays the blame on the individual rather than the systemic forces that have shaped that individual and his or her society. White people know they do not want to be labeled racist; they become concerned with how to avoid that label, rather than worrying about systemic racism and how to change it."
--Wildman and Davis, "Making Systems of Privilege Visible,"
in White Privilege, Rothenberg, ed.
"The attention of the audience is gained through a willingness of the performer to involve himself totally in the performance and to call for the audience to do so as strongly. This the artful talker does by 'dancing' his talk, by dramatizing himself and his argument in physical ways."
--Roger Abrahams
"White coaches resisted the jump shot for two decades. When Nat Holman, coach at City College of New York, saw his first jump shot in the late 1930s, he declared, 'That's not basketball. If my boys ever shot one-handed, I'd quit coaching.' In his autobiography, former Boston Celtics player and coach Bill Russell describes playing ball in the 1950s when coaches routinely benched players for taking 'Negro' jump shots. Today the move is so essential to basketball that we cannot imagine the game without it."
--GENA DAGEL CAPONI
p. 4, Signifyin(g), Sanctifyin', and Slam Dunking: A Reader in African American Expressive Culture
#drewdellingersluminouslibrary
A great spiritual leader has passed. Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, known for his fearlessness, initiated the Birmingham Campaign that turned the tide of the nation and led directly to the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom and the Civil Rights Act.
In 1956, after 16 sticks of dynamite blew off the corner of his house and literally blasted him out of bed, he was never again afraid. "It took the fear out of me and it made me know that god saved me to lead the fight so that I was never fearful after that."
"Sgt. Pepper hit a nerve in popular culture as nothing before had.... 'For a brief while,' critic Langdon Winner famously wrote, 'the irreparably fragmented consciousness of the West was unified, at least in the minds of the young.'
This was seen -- and is still remembered -- as a call to community. In some ways, the Beatles had represented this ideal all along: Through them, we witnessed the cultural power that a pop group and its audience could create; with Sgt. Pepper, possibilities of all sorts that felt boundless. Rock & roll became collusive with the social and political disruptions of the 1960s."
--Mikal Gilmore,
Rolling Stone magazine,
The Beatles: The Ultimate Album-by-Album Guide
Will Palin run, and if so, will she wear an "I'm too pretty to do homework" shirt?
"A Day in the Life" exists in the space between unawareness and disenchantment -- the space that the times now moved in -- and it closes with the most famous moment in 1960s music: a single chord played by Lennon, McCartney, Ringo Starr, [George] Martin and Mal Evans across several pianos at once, reverberating on and on, like a possibility without resolution. It was the abyss at the end of the dream, the void that the dream had to somehow surmount. As that eventful chord lingered and then decayed, it bound up an entire culture in its mysteries, its implications, its sense of providence found and lost. In some ways, it was the most stirring moment that the culture would ever share, and the last gesture of genuine unity that we would ever hear from the Beatles."
--Mikal Gilmore, Rolling Stone magazine,
The Beatles: The Ultimate Album-By-Album Guide (2011)
#drewdellingersluminouslibrary
"Myths grow like crystals, according to their own, recurrent pattern; but there must be a suitable core to start their growth. Mediocrities or cranks have no myth-generating power; they may create a fashion, but it soon peters out."
--Arthur Koestler (1959)
"Jesus Christ was not a white man."
--Martin Luther King Jr.
"People ask, 'what's wrong with young people?' The question is, 'what's wrong with America?'"
--Martin Luther King Jr.
"The current electronic revolution is already so pervasive that we have difficulty in stepping outside of it and scrutinizing it objectively."
--Carpenter & McLuhan (1960)
Check out this amazing clip of Al Jarreau's cover of "Your Song." (The song starts at about 1:15.)
Yes, that's w/ a capital "J":
from the Chicago Manual of Style. 16th Ed., p. 411:
"Jordanesque (a la Michael Jordan)"
"These persons gain prominence and power by the dissemination of false ideas, and by deliberately appealing to the deepest hate responses within the human mind."
--Martin Luther King Jr. (1957)
"To the prophets even a minor injustice assumes cosmic proportions."
--Heschel, The Prophets, Vol. 1
Rabbi Heschel and Dr. King on the March from Selma to Montgomery "Instead of showing us a way through the elegant mansions of the mind, the prophets take us to the slums."
-Abraham J. Heschel
It would not be correct to say that a creation myth explains existence, for the function of myth is not to explain, but rather to connect the known and the unknown; to connect our everyday world with the Unfathomable Beyond that initiates, informs, infuses, and enfolds this world.
[See Scheub, The Poem in the Story, p. 184]
"Something is happening in our world. The masses of people are rising up. And wherever they are assembled today...the cry is always the same -- "We want to be free."
--Martin Luther King Jr., April 3, 1968
"The religion of Jesus makes the love-ethic central. This is no ordinary achievement."
--Howard Thurman (1949)
Check out my new article in Tikkun magazine, "Five Lessons from Martin Luther King Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement."
We need to act logically. And mythologically.
"The moment I feel that I don't have anything more to give musically, that's when I won't be found on this planet. I'm not sure I will live to be 28 years-old, but then again, so many beautiful things have happened to me in the last three years, the world owes me nothing."
--Jimi Hendrix
Drake, "Forever," featuring some guys, and Eminem who KILLS IT (starting at 4:54). There's a reason that Shady raps last on this song. Nice track.
What are some of your favorite songs of 2010?
Dear John McCain, You aren't blocking repeal of DADT because you're still mad about The Village People's "In the Navy" song, are you?
Still Love This! The capacity to name our experience is a quintessential power of art, as well as politics. WATCH HERE
Jon Stewart complains about dismissive coverage of the Tea Party, versus the anti-war movement. Uh, Jon, the media have given almost zero coverage to the anti-war movement for seven years. Despite the tens of millions involved, the peace movement has received a sliver of the coverage that's been heaped on the Tea Party.
"Art is not concerned merely with great artists, with genius or with prodigious skills. It is, fundamentally, the outward form of an inward search. To participate in this search, on whatever level and with whatever ability, is to be an artist."
--Andy Ford
(quoted in "Why Poetry Matters," by Alexandra Yurkovsky, SF Guardian, April 2003)
"We have built...instruments that peer into the unfathomable ranges of interstellar space....But in spite of this something basic is missing. In spite of all our scientific and technological progress we suffer from a kind of poverty of the spirit."
--Martin Luther King Jr., "Sense of Priorities," Feb. 6, 1968, Washington, DC
Marin Theater Company's new play, "Nine Circles," is amazing. The last scene is stunning. Art to hold the lacerating brutality of war that the media hides.
No matter what happens, we have the strength to love.
No matter what happens in the future we can all choose compassion, solidarity, connection and love.
They said that sacrifice was needed, so 5000 troops must give up their lives.
They said that sacrifice was necessary, so 1 million Iraqi civilians had to die.
They said we all must sacrifice, and trade privacy and liberty for unprecedented surveillance.
They said we have to all pitch in, and bail out the reckless bankers on Wall Street.
They said we have to sacrifice, the planet, our climate, the future.
But when the very wealthiest are asked to simply let the Bush tax cuts expire as planned, the sacrifice suddenly seems to be too much, their answer: ‘not a chance!’
Note to pretentious directors: adding titles and credits to your music video doesn't actually make it a film.
Medea Benjamin explains why I can't get excited about Jon Stewart's rally.
Dr. Cornel West (photo: glen E. friedman)
“…my basic aim in life: to speak the truth to power with love so that the quality of everyday life for ordinary people is enhanced and white supremacy is stripped of its authority and legitimacy.”
--Cornel West, Race Matters, p. x
Arlo Guthrie Never heard this cover before! Arlo sings Bob's brilliance in grand fashion. The lyrics are stunning.
"If we can put America back to work, we can pull America back together." --Van Jones, lecture at Princeton University
We need stories that can reconcile us to our history. Stories that show how the past lives in the present are necessary for freeing the future.
David Ray Griffin "One way the Bush administration prevented public questioning of the official account of 9/11 was by presenting it as a sacred story, so that any questioning of it would be regarded as not only unpatriotic but also sacrilegious."
--David Ray Griffin, The New Pearl Harbor Revisited
"The historical and the cosmic can be seen as a single process."
--Thomas Berry
"Our arrogance can be our doom. It can bring the curtain down on our national drama. Ultimately a great nation is a compassionate nation."
--Martin Luther King Jr. (Feb. 25, 1967)
read more here
OK, this is becoming one of my pet peeves.
I've been in conversations about the ecological situation, and the fate of the planet, at least since I started college 20 years ago. And I can't tell you how many times I've heard someone say something like this:
"You know, the Earth will be fine; It's humans who will be extinct."
Or "The planet will survive just fine, it's just that humans won't be around." Or something like this.
I'm sure I must have heard this 45 times or more. In fact, I think I've even said it myself. Year after year, it keeps getting repeated as if it's a clever, insightful, or accurate rejoinder.
But it's not.
Just last Saturday night I heard it said by a noted environmental thinker, Stewart Brand. Brand is the visionary who created The Whole Earth Catalog and called for a photograph of Earth from space. Brand is also a bit of a contrarian. He's not afraid to advocate a controversial idea, such as nuclear power or GMOs. But even knowing the contrarian side of Brand, I was stunned to hear him repeat the old canard about how 'the Earth will be fine..."
Here's the context:
This was a panel of ecological folks that followed a screening of an excellent new documentary, "Climate Refugees." Brand and others were discussing the immense threat that climate change poses to humanity and civilization. This is, of course, a clear and compelling point that we all need to understand. But to my mind, Brand stretched the point too far when he implied that the only threat or primary threat was to civilization. Specifically he said "Life will be fine." And later, "The planet's OK."
This was more than enough to send my pet peeve sensors into high alert.
But it doesn't matter who's recycling this golden oldie, because whether it's an environmental legend, your earnest college roommate, or an annoying co-worker, here's why it's totally wrong.
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"An artist cannot fail; it is a success to be one."
--Charles Horton Cooley
This shoe is 1000 years older than the Great Pyramid. History is the ultimate trip.
The history of the universe is the craziest thing ever, and human history is a mind-blowing part of that.
A group of archaeologists from UCLA and Ireland have just announced the discovery of the world's oldest leather shoe, described as "an exquisitely preserved, 5,600-year-old woman's size 7 lace-up," found "in a cave in Armenia," (LA Times, June 10).
The shoe dates from the Copper Age, the time of "the first cities, the first kings, the first axes, the first beauracrats, the first international trading system."
Inside the cave, along with the shoe, they discovered "winemaking apparatus complete with grapes and three human heads preserved in jars."
Say what?! That's raw.
History is wierd.
And raw.
And real.
History never fails to fascinate.
"And this, my friends, is what white privilege is all about. The ability to threaten others, to engage in violent and incendiary rhetoric without consequence, to be viewed as patriotic and normal no matter what you do, and never to be feared and despised as people of color would be, if they tried to get away with half the shit we do, on a daily basis."
--Tim Wise, on white privilege in the Tea Party
Photo: Bret Webster
Martin Luther King Jr.:
Along with the scientific and technological revolution, we have also witnessed a world-wide freedom revolution over the last few decades….In one sense the civil rights movement in the United States is a special American phenomenon which must be understood in the light of American history and dealt with in terms of the American situation. But on another and more important level, what is happening in the United States today is a significant part of world development.
We live in a day, said the philosopher Alfred North Whitehead, “when civilization is shifting its basic outlook; a major turning point in history where the presuppositions on which society is structured are being analyzed, sharply challenged, and profoundly changed.” What we are seeing now is a freedom explosion, the realization of “an idea whose time has come,” to use Victor Hugo’s phrase. The deep rumbling of discontent that we hear today is the thunder of disinherited masses….All over the world like a fever, freedom is spreading in the widest liberation movement in history. The great masses of people are determined to end the exploitation of their races and lands. They are awake and moving toward their goal like a tidal wave….For several centuries the direction of history flowed from the nations and societies of Western Europe out into the rest of the world in “conquests” of various sorts. That period, the era of colonialism, is at an end. East is moving West. The earth is being redistributed. Yes, we are “shifting our basic outlooks.”
--Martin Luther King Jr.
"Chapter V: Where Are We Going," pp.169-70, from Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community, (1967)
"That should be the world's national anthem, the world's global anthem."
--Rachel Kohn, ABC Radio National, Australia,
After hearing John Seed recite "Word to the Mother," by Drew Dellinger.
(April 18, 2010)
Have you heard about the Nevada candidate for US Senate, Sue Lowden, who has proposed that we emulate our grandparents and pay for healthcare by bartering livestock?
(For background, cluck here.)
This 'chicken for a CAT scan' nonsense reminds me of the poignant scene in "To Kill a Mockingbird," when Mr. Cunningham sheepishly repays Atticus Finch's legal fees with a sack of hickory nuts. (Some internet satirist should dig up that clip.)
It's not that bartering is, in itself, ridiculous. In fact, I'm all for local, alternative economies. But the idea that this is a solution for the catastrophic rise in health care costs, or a viable option for patients in desperate need, is laughable. It shows how disconnected the Republicans are from reality.
How would this play out in real life? Can I trade you this celery for some chemotherapy? A turnip in exchange for treating my tumor? It sounds like an SNL skit.
The proposal is unserious, stupid and callous.
It's like when Sen. Tom Coburn responded to a woman in financial and medical crisis by saying neighbors should help one another. A noble sentiment, but when was the last time you knocked on a neighbor's door and asked, "Can I borrow $168,000 for a lung transplant?"
The Greek Poets: Homer to the Present, Constantine, et al, eds. (Norton, 2010)
excerpt:
When I heard you were dead, Heraclitus,
tears came, and I remembered how often
you and I had talked the sun to bed.
Long ago you turned to ashes, my Halicarnassian friend,
but your poems, your Nightingales, still live.
Hades clutches all things yet can't touch these.
--Callimachus
(third century BCE; translated by Edmund Keeley)
I think it is true, as someone said recently, that as brilliant as Obama is as a communicator, the administration has too often lost control of the narrative in this first year, or ceded control of the narrative to others.
It's been distressing to see the most lunatic narratives gaining power in these fearful and anxious and economically desparate times. And to see the right wing's rabid sway over the corporate mainstream media. Right-wing fearmongers have had far too much control of the narrative, from health care, to climate change, to Van Jones, to ACORN, and on down the line. All to the detriment of our discourse and democracy.
The concluding paragraph to this piece by Robert Reich illustrates the president's struggle to sculpt the story:
"But our President is not comfortable wielding blame. He will not give the public the larger narrative of private-sector greed, its nefarious effect on the American public at this dangerous juncture, and the private sector's corruption of the democratic process. He has so far eschewed any major plan to get corporate and Wall Street money out of politics. He can be indignant- as when he lashed out at the "fat cats" on Wall Street - but his indignance is fleeting, and it is no match for the faux indignance of the right that blames government for all that ails us."
--Robert Reich
Obama, following his often noble, sometimes futile, instinct toward reconcilliation, has thus far failed to craft a compelling narrative with the emotional, rhetorical and spiritual power that animated the campaign and electrified the world.
The success of his policies and his presidency, as well as the hopes of so many struggling people, depend on Obama's ability to wield the power story and activate a narrative that will motivate the nation.
Lucille Clifton died February 13, 2010, at 73 years old. She was an amazing poet. If you haven't checked her out, you might enjoy doing so. Below is a poem from Ms. Clifton. Blessings for her journey and gratitude for her truth-telling voice.
the earth is a living thing
is a black shambling bear
ruffling its wild back and tossing
mountains into the sea
is a black hawk circling
the burying ground circling the bones
picked clean and discarded
is a fish black blind in the belly of water
is a diamond blind in the black belly of coal
is a black and living thing
is a favorite child
of the universe
feel her rolling her hand
in its kinky hair
feel her brushing it clean
--Lucille Clifton
"Through the wild cathedral evening, the rain unraveled tales."
--Bob Dylan, "Chimes of Freedom"
A friend recently emailed me asking for a simple definition of "cosmology." Below is my reply.
--Drew
It's not always easy to find a simple definition of cosmology that covers it fully, so when I present, I generally throw out a flurry along these lines (and some of these definitions are influenced by the ones used by Brian Swimme and Miriam MacGillis over the years):
Most simply, "cosmology" is the study of the cosmos. (Or the study of the universe.)
In terms of modern science, "cosmology" is the study of the origin and development of the universe as a whole ("in its totality" also works, and avoids any confusion that could arise from the fact that "whole" and "hole" are homonyms.)
Swimme would add this: "Cosmology" is the study of the origin and development of the universe in its totality, and the role of the human in the universe. Science would tend to ignore that last part about "the role of the human in the universe." To a 'new cosmologist' like Swimme, that dimension is crucial.
But the scientific study of the origin and development of the universe (the "Big Bang" theory; the study of the galaxies, and the large-scale structure of the cosmos; astronomy and astrophysics) is only half of a full definition of "cosmology."
"Cosmology" is also a worldview or 'cultural story.' (A paradigm or "cosmo-vision")
To capture this sense, I say, "cosmology" is the story that a culture tells itself about how the world came to be, and how we fit into it.
So I think that a complete definition of "cosmology" (even a simple one) should include these two major aspects: the 'scientific' and the 'cultural'. "Cosmology" is both 'scientific study' and 'cultural story.'
So to reiterate,
"Cosmology" is the study of the origin and development of the universe as a whole, and the role of the human in the universe. It is also the story that a culture tells itself about how the world came to be, and how we fit into it.
(One last wrinkle is that the mainstream definition of "cosmology" and particularly "cosmologist" leans toward the 'scientific study' part, so almost any time you hear the word "cosmologist," it would be in reference to a physicist, astronomer, astrophysicist, scientist, etc. The 'cultural story' aspect of "cosmology" is less understood, though that is changing.)
Hope this is helpful,
Drew
Van Jones resigned last night.
My heart is heavy today.
Van is a personal friend and one of the most inspiring and effective visionaries of our time.
I am almost speechless about the right-wing racist attack machine. It's jaw-dropping to see the venomous comments from hate-filled know-nothings all over the web, spreading lies and distortions, calling Van a "racist" and "avowed communist."
(Most of this "communist" nonsense comes from one paragraph in a highly problematic profile of Van from the East Bay Express a couple years ago, the point of which was how Van has moved far beyond his youthful radicalism, and embraced market-based solutions to ecological and social problems.)
I am disgusted, saddened and worried about our country.
The hypocrisy of the Republicans, the right and the media is overwhelming. Do I even have to mention how many right-wing office-holders have said things 10x worse than Van's statements? Everything Van said was accurate, if occasionally provocative to a mainstream culture unaccustomed to critical thinking.
Van Jones is a hero, working for the well-being of all people. It is unimaginable to see him slandered as a "racist" by people who have no idea what they're talking about.
I am proud to stand with Van and to call him a friend.
My heart is very heavy today.
The right-wing is lying about Van Jones, and Glenn Beck is their Liar-in-Chief.
This is just the latest in a long series of attemtps to cynically swiftboat our discourse and our democracy. The untrustworthy folks who won't hesitate to smear the service of veterans like Max Cleland and John Kerry, who claim that health insurance reform is a plot to kill grandma, and Obama is a foreigner with a fake birth certificate, are now spreading ridiculous lies about the White House advisor for Green Jobs, Van Jones.
Somebody should tell these clowns that their neo-McCarthy red-scare antics are wearing thin. The American people want ideas and vision, not lies, hysteria, and racist fear-mongering.
I've known Van Jones personally for the last ten years, and ideas and vision are what he's all about. Van is quite simply a hero, committed to the well-being of all people.
To anyone who knows Van, and his work as a compassionate, visionary bridge-builder and leader, it would seem incredible that the Republican slime-slingers would attempt to slander him as a racist, communist, socialist, or whatever nonsense they're spewing...but arrogant disregard for truth has become the Republicans' only strategy. Why sweat facts when you're committed to spreading fear, and attempting to play the American people for suckers and fools?
In the last few days, right-wing dittoheads have been flooding websites with comments describing Van Jones as a "racist," and "avowed communist." These charges are simply false. The people passing along these lies don't know Van and don't know what they're talking about.
It is laughable to see these ludicrous claims that my friend of ten years "hates white people."
(Apparently, noticing or mentioning the history of racism is all it takes to be accused of hating white people.)
We progressives must stand strong when our allies and leaders are maliciously maligned. The unscrupulous mendacity of the right wing must be challenged and refuted.
Van Jones is working to create jobs for Americans of every race and background. He is a loving father, and a person of immense integrity. I am honored to stand with Van Jones in his work to build a green economy, and deeply grateful to call Van Jones my friend.
Lately I've been kind of obsessed with John Denver. Now, before you go thinking that John Denver sucks, allow me to say, I know. Believe me...growing up in the 70s, John Denver on the radio was like community-sanctioned child abuse.
(That's one of the interesting things about music: even the greatest songs, played too much, can, at best, lose appeal, and, at worse, drive you nuts.)
But a few weeks ago PBS showed a special about John Denver. (This was during their pledge week, when they pull out all the old music to tug on the heart- and purse-strings of their Boomer donor demographic.) Suddenly childhood memories were washing over me in his melodies--from the early 70s when I was 3 or 4, through to the end of the decade.
And I had to appreciate again that John Denver kind of kicks ass. There is definitely a reason he was so insanely popular.
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"If we are to have peace on earth…we must develop a world perspective."
--Martin Luther King Jr., December 24, 1967
"Oh, my God! Look at that picture over there! Here's the earth coming up. Wow, is that pretty!"
--Commander Frank Borman, Apollo 8, December 24, 1968
Forty years ago, on Christmas Eve 1968, an astronaut orbiting the moon took a photograph that changed the world. As we near the end of the 40th anniversary of one of the most heart-breaking years in our history, it is worth remembering that the year of trauma ended in triumph.
As '68 dawned, the Tet offensive dispelled illusions of easy victory in Vietnam. Later that spring, in the early evening of April 4, one of the world's most visible and visionary activists for justice was shot down in Memphis, triggering waves of outrage and sadness, as more than 100 cities burst into flames of despair and rebellion. Two months later, Bobby Kennedy was shot and killed in Los Angeles.
Throughout '68, student protests and general uprisings broke out in Europe, the Americas, and elsewhere. In Mexico City, the Summer Olympics set the stage for the raised-fist defiance of John Carlos and Tommie Smith. In August, police and demonstrators clashed violently at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
This was the troubled world that the crew of Apollo 8 left behind in December, as they became the first humans to journey around the moon. Just as it seemed the world was falling apart, the astronauts on Apollo 8 took a photograph that would bring us all together, and forever change our image of the planet and ourselves.
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Has anyone else noticed that "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" sends a terrible message to kids? Basically Rudolph gets used like a tool and we're supposed to be happy about it. At first Rudolph is shunned by the other reindeer because of his appearance, ostracized from their clique-ish "reindeer games." (And where is Santa during this bullying?)
Then, for no reason other than meteorological happenstance, the tide turns dramatically "one foggy Christmas Eve," when suddenly Rudolph can be useful to Santa and Blitzen and the rest of the 'foggy-weather friends.' It would be perfectly reasonable for Rudolph to tell them to kiss his red ass...but I commend him for taking the high road of reconciliation.
Christmas Song Grade: B- Engaging story; catchy tune; terrible lesson.
On the other hand, I love "The Little Drummer Boy."
First of all, you can't beat the hook: the killer snare drum line echoed vocally with the "pa rum pum pum pums. " Second, the story is awesome, if legendary. (I hear the Little Drummer Boy cried when the Jesus Seminar voted that his existence was unsupported by scholarly evidence :)
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Forty years ago today, Martin Luther King, Jr. stood before a microphone at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Los Angeles and spoke words that would forever alter his place in history: "I oppose the war in Vietnam because I love America."
Though past the peak of his popularity he was at the height of his prophetic powers. Increasingly embattled, his influence waning, with the climactic victories of the civil rights movement behind him, King first announced in the City of Angels the opposition to war that marked his spiritual growth in the last years of his life. His concern anticipated that of many Americans about the current war.
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