Women are cutting off their small toes so they can wear stiletto heels. This is insane. Enough said!
The American Podiatric Medical Association says, “eighty-seven percent of women have had foot problems from wearing uncomfortable or ill-fitting shoes such as high heels.”
A collective belief of our culture is that women should have small dainty feet. We were all programmed by the story of Cinderella: the stepsisters’ feet were too big for the dainty glass slipper, and their huge feet were as much a part of their ugliness as the look of their faces.
How different are we from the Chinese who bound their women’s feet?
As a feminist once said about the Virginia Slim slogan (“You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby”): “You haven’t come a long way and you aren’t a baby.”
Showing posts with label Current Events. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Current Events. Show all posts
Monday, January 21, 2013
Tuesday, January 1, 2013
Search for a Motive
The perpetrator of the latest American mass shooting—at the elementary school in Newton Connecticut—also killed himself and his mother. In addition, Adam Lanza smashed his computer hard drive before he went on his rampage. This, we are told by the investigators, is going to make it harder to find what motivated Mr. Lanza to do such a horrible thing.
When we say we want to find the motive for a crime, what we want is a clear, logical, rational explanation for an action that makes it understandable. However, when someone does something of this nature—a mass killing—you can be sure they were not thinking clearly and rationally. Sure they could think clearly about the guns, ammunition, clothing, etc., but this deludes us into thinking that the motivation for their action is also rational.
Dr. James Gilligan, a psychiatrist who directed the Center for the Study of Violence at Harvard Medical School and was in charge of psychiatric services for the Massachusetts state prison system for ten years, begins his book, Violence, with this message: “The first lesson...is that all violence is an attempt to reach justice, or what the violent person perceives as justice, for himself or for whomever it is on whose behalf he is being violent…Thus, the attempt to achieve and maintain justice, or to undo or prevent injustice, is the one and only universal cause of violence. [italics in the original]
I think Dr. Gilligan gives us the guidance we need in our search for a motive: somehow, for Adam Lanza this action was an attempt to achieve justice. It’s not too hard to imagine how Mr. Lanza might have perceived that his mother had caused him an injustice, but it’s much harder to get a handle on how killing children could undo or prevent injustice. I suggest we’ll never know for sure. All we can know is that in some way this action helped Lanza, in his mind, right an injustice that he believed had been done to him.
When we say we want to find the motive for a crime, what we want is a clear, logical, rational explanation for an action that makes it understandable. However, when someone does something of this nature—a mass killing—you can be sure they were not thinking clearly and rationally. Sure they could think clearly about the guns, ammunition, clothing, etc., but this deludes us into thinking that the motivation for their action is also rational.
Dr. James Gilligan, a psychiatrist who directed the Center for the Study of Violence at Harvard Medical School and was in charge of psychiatric services for the Massachusetts state prison system for ten years, begins his book, Violence, with this message: “The first lesson...is that all violence is an attempt to reach justice, or what the violent person perceives as justice, for himself or for whomever it is on whose behalf he is being violent…Thus, the attempt to achieve and maintain justice, or to undo or prevent injustice, is the one and only universal cause of violence. [italics in the original]
I think Dr. Gilligan gives us the guidance we need in our search for a motive: somehow, for Adam Lanza this action was an attempt to achieve justice. It’s not too hard to imagine how Mr. Lanza might have perceived that his mother had caused him an injustice, but it’s much harder to get a handle on how killing children could undo or prevent injustice. I suggest we’ll never know for sure. All we can know is that in some way this action helped Lanza, in his mind, right an injustice that he believed had been done to him.
Wednesday, December 19, 2012
Who Knows What is Good or Bad?
Last night I watched James Cameron’s Titanic. One of the twists of the film’s story is that Jack, the protagonist, was not supposed to be on that ship. Just before the Titanic sailed he won two tickets in a poker game with two Swedes. When one of the Swedes realized that the other had bet and lost their tickets to America, he punched his friend out. This appeared to be a disaster for the Swedes, and a triumph for Jack and his Italian friend.
After boarding, Jack and his friend ran down the corridor of the great ship’s third-class compartment, and Jack shouted, “We’re the luckiest sons-of-bitches in the world!”
This makes me think of a Chinese parable: One day a farmer’s only horse disappeared. When his neighbor came to console him the farmer said, “Who knows what’s good or bad?” The next day the farmer’s horse returned accompanied by a wild horse, and the neighbor came to congratulate him on his good fortune. “Who knows what’s good or bad?” said the farmer. The next day the farmer’s son broke his leg trying to ride the new horse, and the neighbor came to console him again. “Who knows what’s good or bad?” said the farmer. When the army passed through, conscripting men for war, they passed over the farmer’s son because of his broken leg. When the man came to congratulate the farmer that his son would be spared, again the farmer asked, “Who knows what’s good or bad?”
In the movie, Jack and his friend ended up dying, and the Swedes were now the luckiest sons-of-bitches in the world.
After boarding, Jack and his friend ran down the corridor of the great ship’s third-class compartment, and Jack shouted, “We’re the luckiest sons-of-bitches in the world!”
This makes me think of a Chinese parable: One day a farmer’s only horse disappeared. When his neighbor came to console him the farmer said, “Who knows what’s good or bad?” The next day the farmer’s horse returned accompanied by a wild horse, and the neighbor came to congratulate him on his good fortune. “Who knows what’s good or bad?” said the farmer. The next day the farmer’s son broke his leg trying to ride the new horse, and the neighbor came to console him again. “Who knows what’s good or bad?” said the farmer. When the army passed through, conscripting men for war, they passed over the farmer’s son because of his broken leg. When the man came to congratulate the farmer that his son would be spared, again the farmer asked, “Who knows what’s good or bad?”
In the movie, Jack and his friend ended up dying, and the Swedes were now the luckiest sons-of-bitches in the world.
Thursday, November 8, 2012
Delusional Thinking in Action
This week presented an excellent example of delusional thinking in action: the U.S. Presidential election. Many Republican strategists and conservative pundits predicted not only a Romney victory, but a landslide. This delusional reality was so strong that it led to such embarrassments as Karl Rove’s live meltdown on election night (watch John Stewart’s treatment).
This is an excellent example of how a culture can create its own reality, and the members of that culture will believe in a truth even when the evidence is against it.
In the days leading up to the election the right-wing true believers accused the polling companies of bias because the numbers didn’t fit their beliefs. (Even though this didn’t make any sense: if the pollsters were biased towards Obama, predicting a Democratic victory would mean liberals would be less motivated to go to the polls. I believe one of the reasons turnout was so high is because liberals believed Obama might lose. But this is typical of delusional thinking: it’s not rational.) The conservative media spent those days discussing the liberal machinations of the mainstream media and how the liberals were conspiring to create misleading polls, instead of facing the true situation of their presidential candidate.
But it turned out that the people who statistically analyzed those polls using facts and not wishful thinking, eminently including Nate Silver at the New York Times, were extremely accurate.
This is an excellent example of how a culture can create its own reality, and the members of that culture will believe in a truth even when the evidence is against it.
In the days leading up to the election the right-wing true believers accused the polling companies of bias because the numbers didn’t fit their beliefs. (Even though this didn’t make any sense: if the pollsters were biased towards Obama, predicting a Democratic victory would mean liberals would be less motivated to go to the polls. I believe one of the reasons turnout was so high is because liberals believed Obama might lose. But this is typical of delusional thinking: it’s not rational.) The conservative media spent those days discussing the liberal machinations of the mainstream media and how the liberals were conspiring to create misleading polls, instead of facing the true situation of their presidential candidate.
But it turned out that the people who statistically analyzed those polls using facts and not wishful thinking, eminently including Nate Silver at the New York Times, were extremely accurate.
Saturday, July 28, 2012
Aurora shooting occurs at film that glorifies violence
Has anyone else noticed the irony that the audience in Aurora was gleefully assembled to drink in every frame of Hollywood's latest simulated snuff-film, a blockbuster extolling violence as a solution? Got a problem? Kill it! Someone hurt you? Hurt 'em back! Tit for tat! The shooter obviously agreed with this lofty editorial position: (a) other people have made my life wretched (b) other people are the problem (c) other people must suffer as I have suffered. A no-brainer. Literally.
Bob Dylan once wrote a song called "Who Killed Davey Moore?" about a prize fighter who died in the ring. The question is repeatedly asked, "Who killed Davey Moore? Why and what's the reason for?" Each subsequent verse is devoted to a person or persons involved in the "sport" who deny their culpability: "Not I," said the referee, the crowd, the manager, the gambling man, the boxing writer, and finally the opponent who dealt the actual death blow.
I think we should legalize snuff films--have poor people well-paid to literally be slaughtered for our amusement up there on the big screen. Wouldn't that be more honest?
People ask "Why?"
Because we've been trained to love violence that's why. The purveyors of this sick trash are insane and so are we when we support it.
Bob Dylan once wrote a song called "Who Killed Davey Moore?" about a prize fighter who died in the ring. The question is repeatedly asked, "Who killed Davey Moore? Why and what's the reason for?" Each subsequent verse is devoted to a person or persons involved in the "sport" who deny their culpability: "Not I," said the referee, the crowd, the manager, the gambling man, the boxing writer, and finally the opponent who dealt the actual death blow.
I think we should legalize snuff films--have poor people well-paid to literally be slaughtered for our amusement up there on the big screen. Wouldn't that be more honest?
People ask "Why?"
Because we've been trained to love violence that's why. The purveyors of this sick trash are insane and so are we when we support it.
Monday, July 23, 2012
Hurting others is an act of insanity
Do we think James Holmes is innocent by reason of insanity for the Aurora Colorado mass killing? Absolutely.
When you look at the crime itself, and think about how much preparation this man did ahead of time, it is understandable that many people would think he is sane. It appears that a lot of coldhearted, rational, logical thinking went into the planning. It’s easy to conclude that Holmes must be some kind of evil monster, even “diabolical” and “demonic” to quote Governor Hickenlooper of Colorado from Sunday's Meet the Press.
But according to the thinking of this philosophy, no one in his or her right mind could ever commit such an act. It is impossible to be sane and do such a thing. In fact, any act that hurts another person is the result of delusional thinking, from a driver cutting someone off in traffic to a trader on Wall Street purposefully deceiving her customers to Jerry Sandusky molesting children. Hurting yourself or another is an indication of insanity.
When you look at the crime itself, and think about how much preparation this man did ahead of time, it is understandable that many people would think he is sane. It appears that a lot of coldhearted, rational, logical thinking went into the planning. It’s easy to conclude that Holmes must be some kind of evil monster, even “diabolical” and “demonic” to quote Governor Hickenlooper of Colorado from Sunday's Meet the Press.
But according to the thinking of this philosophy, no one in his or her right mind could ever commit such an act. It is impossible to be sane and do such a thing. In fact, any act that hurts another person is the result of delusional thinking, from a driver cutting someone off in traffic to a trader on Wall Street purposefully deceiving her customers to Jerry Sandusky molesting children. Hurting yourself or another is an indication of insanity.
Saturday, July 14, 2012
Planning Fallacy and the London Olympics
In his bestseller Thinking Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman discusses many common cognitive and decision-making errors. One that I’m certainly familiar with is called the “planning fallacy.”
Almost everyone, Kahneman says, creates forecasts that “are unrealistically close to best-case scenarios and could be improved by consulting the statistics of similar cases.” He uses as an example kitchen renovation projects. The average estimate for the job is about $18,000, and the average final cost is close to $38,000. But no one ever begins the renovation thinking their project will have those kinds of cost over-runs.
It’s not surprising that ordinary people fall prey to this common decision-making error, but you’d think people who are professional planners would know better. In the August 2012 Harper’s Index, there’s a perfect example of the planning fallacy on a large scale:
When is the last time you heard of a large government or corporate project that didn’t involve huge cost overruns? You’d think the people involved in the planning of such projects would study similar projects, learn from the mistakes others have made, and plan accordingly. But it seems like we are all afflicted with the same prejudice: I’m different and I won’t fall prey to the same problems other people do.
What word describes the Olympics cost over-run better than “insane”? This is the confusion of subjective opinion with objective fact (our definition of insane) brought into the realm of public policy. (Not to mention the insanity of spending this kind of money on a spectacle with the austerity budget now in place in Britain.)
Almost everyone, Kahneman says, creates forecasts that “are unrealistically close to best-case scenarios and could be improved by consulting the statistics of similar cases.” He uses as an example kitchen renovation projects. The average estimate for the job is about $18,000, and the average final cost is close to $38,000. But no one ever begins the renovation thinking their project will have those kinds of cost over-runs.
It’s not surprising that ordinary people fall prey to this common decision-making error, but you’d think people who are professional planners would know better. In the August 2012 Harper’s Index, there’s a perfect example of the planning fallacy on a large scale:
Cost of staging the 2012 London Olympics Games as estimated by the British government in 2003: $3.7 billion
Cost as currently estimated by the British government: $14.6 billion
As estimated by an independent study: $37 billion
When is the last time you heard of a large government or corporate project that didn’t involve huge cost overruns? You’d think the people involved in the planning of such projects would study similar projects, learn from the mistakes others have made, and plan accordingly. But it seems like we are all afflicted with the same prejudice: I’m different and I won’t fall prey to the same problems other people do.
What word describes the Olympics cost over-run better than “insane”? This is the confusion of subjective opinion with objective fact (our definition of insane) brought into the realm of public policy. (Not to mention the insanity of spending this kind of money on a spectacle with the austerity budget now in place in Britain.)
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