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Cross-Race Recognition Deficit: Why Linking Obama To Wright Is Wrong genre: Hip-Gnosis & Nouveau Thoughts & Polispeak & Six Degrees of Speculation

I've got a different take on the focus that is being placed on the statement's of Jeremiah Wright and their relationship to the candidacy of Barack Obama. I agree that he isn't doing Senator Obama any favors by appearing at numerous events...especially since many Americans seemed willing to accept his explanations and observations on the issue of race following the first release of excerpts from Pastor Wright's sermons.

However, realizing the detrimental effect of Pastor Wright's continued presence in the spotlight ignores an essential and salient question...one that asks why Wright's ongoing remarks and the associated media attention continues to result in a strong and persistent linkage to Senator Obama...despite the Senator's lucid observations on the complexities of race in America.

As I've watched this situation unfold, I've had a nagging suspicion that something else was at play. Fortunately, as I saw today's endless coverage of the topic, I was able to connect these troubling events with a theory I previously discovered as a result of my endless curiosity with human psychology. The theory hasn't received all that much attention though I suspect it soon will.

The theory, and my related hypothesis, suggests that the incessant linkage of Obama with Jeremiah Wright is indicative of a phenomenon that has typified race relations in this country for many years. The psychological concept has it's origin in the study of "cross-race recognition deficit"...or what would be commonly known as a predisposition to conclude that "they all look the same" when attempting to distinguish individuals of a race that differs from our own. Hence we are prone to conclude that 'they' all look alike...and more importantly...that 'they' are in fact alike in ways that exceed or transcend their physical descriptions or characteristics.

The following provides a basic explanation of, and a primer on, the research that underlies the theory of "cross-race recognition deficit".

From The American Psychological Association:

WASHINGTON - Why do people of one racial group fail to recognize faces from another racial group? This so-called cross-race recognition deficit, a topic of debate within the social science community, is sometimes explained by suggesting that people have less experience seeing faces from other races. But, a new research finding by Kent State University psychologist Daniel T. Levin, Ph.D., suggests that the information people "see" when looking at the face of a person of another race is information that allows them to classify the person as White or Black but is not information which allows them to individualize the person, such as the color of their eyes or shape of their nose.

Dr. Levin's conclusions, as published in the December issue of the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, published by the American Psychological Association, is based on experiments designed to determine the kind of information people retain when looking at cross-race faces.

In his first experiment, Levin compared how well people recognize faces of other races with how readily they locate these faces in a visual search task. He made two average faces, one derived from 16 Black faces morphed together and a second created when 16 White faces were morphed together. These Black and White faces were at either ends of a cross-race spectrum of faces.

Using these faces, Levin tested 25 participants (the participants were nearly all White, with a few Asians also included) on their ability to locate a Black face amid a series of White faces or visa versa. Next, the same participants were shown yearbook photos of 16 White and 16 Black male students. They were then shown another set of photos and asked to indicate whether any of the second set also appeared in the yearbook photos.

As expected, on the face memory test using yearbook photos, participants were better at recognizing White faces than they were at recognizing Black ones. But, paradoxically, participants who performed most poorly in recognizing Black faces in the yearbook photo test were most likely in the first part of the experiment - the visual search task -- to locate Black faces among the White faces more quickly than the White faces among Black faces.

This occurs, according to Levin, because the information people focus on when looking at a face of another racial group is information that is optimal for group classification (that's a Black man") rather than individual recognition ("that's a man with a mustache and a down-turned mouth").

"Participants who were poor at recognizing black faces appear to code blackness as a visual feature while they may not code whiteness at all," says Dr. Levin. "The problem is not that we can't code the details of cross-race faces; it's that we don't. Instead, we substitute group information, or information about the race, for information about the features that help us tell individual people apart."

I contend that Dr. Levin's work on the subject is on the leading edge of better understanding what we're witnessing with regards to the campaign of Senator Obama and thus pushing us towards our next foray into understanding the impact of race in America.

Specifically, the notion of substituting group information or information about a particular race for the discriminations needed to distinguish one individual from another are at play with regards to the remarks of Pastor Wright and the linkage being applied as a result of Senator Obama's membership in his church.

Let's look more closely at the details of Dr. Levin's research. In his follow up work, Dr. Levin provides evidence that suggests that the recognition deficit does exist but he takes it a step further when he exposes the possibility that the deficit doesn't result from an inability to identify subtle differences; rather it may well be that we simply don't or won't.

The fact that he quickly demonstrates that it can be done with a minimal amount of instruction suggests that we're prone to what I would characterize as 'lumping'. Essentially lumping means that once we distinguish race, we frequently go no further in order to identify or delineate for the characteristics of each individual. I would argue that this process of generalization is apt to transcend physical attributes. If so, it may well explain why the words of Pastor Wright are being indelibly attached to Senator Obama.

From Monitor On Psychology:

People are notoriously awful at recognizing faces from other races. It's a human foible often explained by the notion that we have more experience looking at members of our own race and thus acquire "perceptual expertise" for characteristics of our own kind.

One influential version of that hypothesis argues that the so-called cross-race recognition deficit can be modeled by assuming that faces of other races are more psychologically similar than are faces of one's own race. But Daniel Levin, PhD, a cognitive psychologist at Kent State University, has been unsatisfied with that argument.

"The perceptual expertise position is pretty intuitive, and it makes sense," he says. "But I'm arguing that it's not really the case. The problem is not that we can't code the details of cross-race faces--it's that we don't."

Instead, he says, people place inordinate emphasis on race categories--whether someone is white, black or Asian--ignoring information that would help them recognize people as individuals. In recent research, Levin has shown that people can, in fact, perceive fine differences among faces of people from other races--as long as they're using those differences to make race classifications.

Levin hypothesized that when people see cross-race faces, they code race-specifying information at the expense of individuating information--something they don't do when they see same-race faces.

To test the notion that people are able to perceive subtle differences among faces of people from other races, Levin next explored how readily people distinguish among cross-race faces versus own-race faces in making race classifications. Using the two average black and white faces from the earlier experiments, he created a continuum of faces that ran from black at one end to white at the other. Thirteen participants viewed pairs of faces that differed by 20 percent along the black-white continuum. For half the trials, participants judged which of the two faces was most similar to the face at the black end point face. For the other half, they judged which was most similar to the face at the white end.

He found that participants were more often accurate when discriminating between two faces at the black end of the continuum than they were for faces at the white end of the continuum. That finding demonstrates, Levin explains, that people possess the perceptual expertise to detect minute differences among cross-race faces.

A final experiment corroborated those results. As before, for faces on a black-white continuum, participants were better at discriminating between subtly different black faces than they were for subtly different white faces. But on a different continuum that had black faces at both end points, making it impossible for faces to be distinguished based on race, participants did not show such skill at discriminating between faces. That suggests that the extent to which the subtle variations convey race information, as opposed to individuating information, is an important part of the discrimination task, Levin argues.

The excerpt that follows includes remarks from other researchers on the validity of Levin's observations and conclusions. While a discussion of the data would clearly need to be more complex than the text provided below, the gist of the alternate argument contends that Levin fails to provide evidence of reversal...meaning Whites and Blacks should exhibit similar abilities to 'classify' the faces of other races.

A prior political event may help us understand why the reversal sought by others isn't necessary to confirm Levin's hypothesis. In fact, the example may actually direct us towards the additional research needed to conclusively support Dr. Levin's contention that one must look at the differences in majority and minority status to fully understand the causations and ramifications of this theory. That further body of work could also substantiate the extrapolations I'm making with regards to Reverend Wright and Senator Obama.

Back in 1960, John Kennedy's candidacy was endangered by his Catholicism despite his assertions he wouldn't be beholding to or guided by those in Rome. He, like Senator Obama, found it necessary to explain his membership and the fact that he would remain a participant in his church of choice. Skeptical voters sought assurances that he could separate the duties and objectives of his party and the office of the president from the doctrines and objectives perceived to be espoused by his clergy.

Many years later, in 2004, John Kerry met with the disfavor of a number of leaders of the Catholic Church. His support for a woman's right to choose (and other positions) was in opposition to the teachings of the Church yet his ongoing commitment to his religion of choice didn't elicit suspicions as to his allegiances or what he might do once elected. With the passage of decades, those who chose to support John Kerry were able and willing to accept that the Senator's beliefs differed from those within the hierarchy of his church. In fact, he was even able to separate his own personal beliefs on abortion from the constitutional obligations he felt came with winning the presidency.

Returning to reversal, Levin disagrees, as do I, that it is a requirement to validate his hypothesis. Instead, it likely means that further research and better understandings are necessary to explain why there may be an absence of reversal in the minority group. To that end, I suspect that minorities simply begin to internalize the categorizations that society imposes...regardless of whether they have been applied by the majority consciously or as a matter of unconscious, though ingrained discriminations.

In fact, I believe that those who feel such recognitions are applied as negative attributions would be resistant to adopt the use of similar discriminations. While doing so could be construed (by the minority) at some level to be a measure of retribution, it could also lend support to those seeking vindication for their actions and validation of their generalized, though often arbitrary, attributions. I suspect the absence of reversal in minorities is therefore accompanied by an increase in dissonance. Over time, the negative discriminations...and thus the dissonance...may well abate as assimilation is advanced.

From Monitor On Psychology:

Tim Valentine, PhD, of Goldsmiths College, University of London, also challenges Levin's interpretation. In order for Levin to support his claim that people more quickly classify other-race faces according to their race than they classify own-race faces, he says, "it is necessary to show that an effect for one race of participants reverses for the other race--for example, that black participants classify white faces faster than black faces. Levin has never shown this crossover that is critical for his hypothesis."

Levin disagrees, however, that showing such a reversal is critical. His argument, he emphasizes, depends only on having found that people who are poorest at recognizing cross-race faces are in fact best at discriminating between them on the basis of race.

And Levin concurs with Mullen that members of minority groups are likely to respond differently than are members of majority groups. Indeed, he points out, his report discusses previous research that suggests that minority group members tend to code not only people of other races at the category level, but also do so for people of their own race.

Ultimately, suggests Alice O'Toole, PhD, a psychologist at the University of Texas at Dallas who also studies face recognition, Levin's new findings may be compatible with perceptual expertise and similarity hypotheses.

"I see less division in the ideas than he does," O'Toole says. "One consequence of the perceptual problems that we may have with other-race faces could simply be that race is just a much more salient aspect of our encoding of faces of other races than it is of faces of our own race. I think the hypotheses are compatible, but Levin's idea is at more of a social level of analysis."

Levin acknowledges, "The problem with the [perceptual expertise] models is not really that they're wrong, per se. Rather, it's a problem of focus. They're focused on this sort of reductivist analysis of similarity, when they really ought to be focused on trying to figure out why people use the features they use."

In the final paragraph of the above excerpt lies the fundamental question of interest. Understanding the phenomenon of cross-race recognition deficit and all the behaviors that may be associated with it is only the first step. Being able to dissect the underlying beliefs that lead to this type of behavior is likely to help us understand and deconstruct the dynamics that drive racial tensions and the prejudices that fuel and promote them.

In the end, Senator Obama is an individual. While many impugn the validity of his stated beliefs and refuse to accept any of the distinctions he has made with regard to his beliefs and those of his pastor, the degree of doubt that remains is likely to be more reflective of the society in which we live than it is of our ability to make informed discriminations absent the influence of race.

Barack Obama may well continue to be harmed by his linkage to the words and images of Pastor Wright. Unfortunately, I contend that connection is a manifestation of the subtle and insidious racial divisions that continue to inhabit our perplexing psyches. Much of what Wright says may be wrong...but concluding Obama is wrong for America because of what Wright has said is also wrong.

Tagged as: 2008 Election, Barack Obama, Cross-Race Recognition Deficit, Daniel Levin PhD, Jeremiah Wright, John F. Kennedy, John Kerry, Kent State University, Psychology, Race Relations, Racism

Daniel DiRito | April 28, 2008 | 11:27 AM | link | Comments (2)

All About The Onion: 63,000 Jobs & An Economy Without A Core genre: Econ-Recon & Nouveau Thoughts & Six Degrees of Speculation

Tagged as: Comedy, Economics, ExxonMobil, Federal Reserve, Foreclosures, GDP, Housing Bubble, Humor, Interest Rates, Jobs, Multi-national Corporations, Recession, Savings & Loan Scandal, The Onion, Unemployment, Wages

Daniel DiRito | March 7, 2008 | 11:22 AM | link | Comments (0)

Sometimes When You Get Too Close, You Get Too Far genre: Do Not Resuscitate & Nouveau Thoughts & Polispeak & Six Degrees of Speculation

"Sometimes when you get too close, you get too far" is one of many pearls of wisdom handed down from my Italian immigrant grandparents. They used the expression to warn their children that all relationships weren't the same and that there are circumstances whereby getting too involved is ill advised. Fortunately, my parents passed those same words along to their children. I've been focused on the saying for several weeks as I've been seeking an understanding of my own indeterminate malaise.

Let me offer some background and then some explanation. I love politics and psychology and I often focus on their overlap when writing. I've done so because I'm convinced that all of our actions can be traced back to the individual's psyche. Try as we might, I suspect we actually understand very little about the mechanics of that entity...other than the fact that it undoubtedly makes each of us uniquely flawed individuals.

If we look close enough, perhaps we can find themes or threads that connect some of us. At the same time, it seems safe to infer that the reverse is true...meaning there are also threadbare holes in this imperfect human tapestry that divide us. Politics is thus the tundra upon which these commonalities and these differences unfold.

This current election cycle is a unique moment in our American history. Never before has it been inevitable that either a woman or an African American would be the nominee of one of our political parties. Part and parcel of that eventuality is the concept of change. Confronting this change, in my estimation, involves many of the same dynamics found in my grandparent's thoughtful insights.

There is a spoken belief that our nation long ago confronted issues of race and gender and set in motion the removal of the barriers associated with either. There is also an unspoken reality that neither has been achieved. As we approach the moment where our lip service may well be forced to acquiesce to the living of these lofty proclamations, we begin to see that the closer we get to its achievement, the further we may be from its existence.

The evidence that exists is no doubt the equivalent of a DNA match. Whether it's a product of our capitalistic mindset that idealizes winning and posits that the opposite is losing, I don't know for sure...but I suspect it may well be. If so, then nothing could be more divisive than to ask voters to affirm one oppressed group over another. It's as if fate is bringing us to the precipice of progress...only to ask us to make a choice that will catapult one group to the pinnacle while seemingly pushing the other into the abyss. While this isn't actually the choice, it may be the perception.

Worse still, those groups who lack a contestant in the competition for the quintessential prize worry that the elevation of one of their fellow second class societal equivalents may well result in the further disproportionate distribution of the spoils of success. Hence, if the perception exists that the proverbial pie isn't large enough to nourish us all, then the thought that one's longtime competitor (for the crumbs that fall off the table) is about to receive not only a place at the table, but a plate...and a bigger piece of the pie, is apt to create angst...and resentment. Therein lies what we must attempt to understand.

An example might be beneficial. I received a distressing call from my younger sister last week. As I picked up the phone and said hello, all I heard on the other end was my sister sobbing...telling me that she had just gotten off the phone with my mother. My heart sunk as my mind raced to guess who had died or was diagnosed with a terminal disease or fallen gravely ill. It's amazing how many thoughts can occupy a few seconds. I immediately asked, "What's the matter?" As I braced for the bad news, she replied, "I told mom I had caucused for Obama and she got mad and hung up on me".

You see my mom is in her seventies...and the thought that a fellow woman would choose to support "the other candidate" (a man who happens to be black) is akin to treason. Add to that the fact that she grew up in a small Colorado community as a Catholic whose Italian immigrant parents had distinct accents and customs that were foreign to those around them and one begins to see the generational impact.

Such is the insidious nature of discrimination and prolonged periods of lost or limited opportunities. Let me be clear...my mom doesn't have a racist bone in her body and I can't recall a single disparaging remark about any minority (save for her angry comments at my announcement many years ago that I was gay). Nonetheless, she is a product of a society that relegated her and other women to a lesser status and in so doing served to rob her and many others of the same opportunities as their male counterparts. The fact that she saw similar limitations placed upon her foreign born parents only exacerbated her awareness of the issue.

When I subsequently spoke with my mother on the phone, the gravity of the situation was revealed when she stated, "I want to see a woman elected to the presidency before I die." Yes, the same woman who idolized the charisma and the hope she found in JFK couldn't envision that my sister had seen the same in Barack Obama. She could only feel her own sense of loss and sadness at the fact that time is cutting short her chances to witness the culmination of her dreams and her hopes.

2008 will be a historical election...but whether it will be a transformative one remains to be seen. Sometimes the closer we get to fulfilling the hopes and dreams of the least of us, the more difficult it can be to preserve them for the rest of us. Hence, transformation can be a double-edged sword.

My love for my mom and my sister is unlimited...and yet it can't always bridge the gaps that come between people from disparate eras. When injustice has been administered and experienced over lengthy periods of time, it may be impossible to repair the damages or remove the regrets that accompany it.

We each see life through our own prisms. We occasionally see the same thing when looking through those prisms...yet if we see those things in our lives at differing chronological points, they will likely have different meanings. In the end, sometimes when you've gone too long without, you've gone too far within. Perhaps the lessons learned in 2008 will bring all of us closer to where we belong.

Tagged as: 2008 election, Aging, Barack Obama, Chauvinism, Death, Gender Inequality, Generation Gap, Hillary Clinton, Immigration, Italian Immigrants, JFK, Misogyny, Racism

Daniel DiRito | February 11, 2008 | 10:01 AM | link | Comments (0)

Going To The Matt - Reach Out & Bring Them Back genre: Gaylingual & Hip-Gnosis & Nouveau Thoughts & Six Degrees of Speculation

I’ve spent an inordinate amount of time researching Matthew Murray in hope of understanding what led him to the place that ended his troubled life and the lives of four innocent individuals who were far too young to exit this existence. In retrospect, I probably uncovered the person I expected to find. I say as much because I’m sure I have walked in his shoes at various junctures in my own life. I’ll try to explain…and in so doing…perhaps I can shine a much needed light on these lost individuals.

As a child, I was outgoing and generally popular at school…until I reached the eighth grade. In fact, I had always been one of the best students and I was often singled out in that regard. As fate would have it, I was also very small and I didn’t mature until I was a freshman in college. While the other boys in the class were growing and maturing, I maintained the stature of a child.

Needless to say, I knew nothing about girls and though I tried to participate in the games of courtship, I wasn’t particularly adept at it…and unbeknownst to anyone, my belief that I was gay was simmering in the background. Just to avoid misunderstanding, I never exhibited any of the stereotypical behaviors most people associate with being gay…save for what was likely an air of detachment due to the fact that I was different and didn’t know what to do about it…nor did I dare discuss it.

Having grown up in Catholic schools in the 60’s and 70’s, I knew how the Church…and virtually everyone around me…felt about homosexuality. It was not only a sin…it was a scourge…and I knew well what I would encounter should my true identity be exposed. Hence I chose to pray at night that God would let me wake up in the morning and find myself to be straight. I made countless bargains with God…and while I realize how silly that may sound…it was deadly serious to me. Notwithstanding, I remained gay.

So here’s the thing…we live in a society that prefers to isolate the unfamiliar…the different…the unordinary. We are a go along to get along nation. Perhaps it’s an offshoot of the competition which accompanies our capitalist orientation…perhaps it’s also a basic element of our human nature. At the same time, we likely place a greater value on success and winning than many other societies…a dynamic which serves to further isolate the awkward, the introverted, the socially clumsy, the overweight, the homely, and many others.

Fortunately, over time, most people find some semblance of success that can overcome the handicaps that were all too easy for others to point out during their formative years. Sadly, some individuals are so badly scarred by these early years experiences that they fail to find or see the attributes they possess. Instead, like a calf marked for culling from the herd, they are forever aware of their “differentness" and try as they might, they are forever anticipating the moment when they will be singled out.

In this awareness…in what seems to be a horrific and perpetual practical joke perpetrated by fate…these individuals become even further handicapped as they adopt the easily seen mannerisms that denote the full-scale manifestation of suspended socialization skills. It’s the inability to speak in groups, the looking down or away when spoken to, the nervous movements, the sweaty palms, and any number of other identifiers that scream, “I’m different and I know it…and it makes me squirm".

As nature would also have it, such individuals are quickly viewed as “defeatable"…they are not noted as competition and they soon become an afterthought in our haste to climb any number of ladders. As this news is disseminated…and, have no doubt, it travels quickly…they are even further set aside as inconsequential.

For me, I was one of the lucky ones. After bloodying the nose of the largest boy in my eighth grade class, I was restored as a viable being in the eyes of those who had made the assessment that I served no threat. However, that moment of vindication only came after months of begging my mom and dad to not send me to school, months of fearing what would be done to me the moment my grandma dropped me off and her car was out of sight, months of racing to morning mass in order to avoid time on the playground before school, months of sitting near the entrance to the school during recess in case I needed to escape into safety.

Yes, I survived to try again…but I did so while carrying any number of scars for more years than I care to admit. Truth be told, I didn’t even know how to accept my newfound status. I expected the other shoe to drop at any second and I remember listening intensely during every conversation for the moment when it would turn against me…when instead of talking to me, “they" would be talking about me…planning the next antic to embarrass me and snatch from me another piece of my already sparse dignity and my tenuous identity.

As I've pondered Matthew’s situation, I couldn’t help but think back to the fear I absorbed and the anger I swallowed before mustering the strength and the courage to punch someone in the hopes of saving myself. I would relate the feeling to drowning…it's that moment when you’ve gone under a couple of times…and despite someone being there attempting to help you…to pull you out of danger…all you can think to do is flail and grasp for any inkling of hope to keep you afloat…even if it is taking you and your rescuer under in the process.

And while I’ve nearly drowned both literally and figuratively…I can’t really say how to identify the inevitability of that pivotal moment of explosion, nor can I tell you how to anticipate it…either for oneself or for another one might encounter. And yet we must find the means to identify and prevent the next Matthew in order to save him as well as those he may take under with him.

All I know is this…there are individuals in our midst who are in waters where there feet cannot reach bottom in order to keep their head afloat…there are individuals who are adrift and will soon be in those same waters…there are no doubt some individuals who have already gone under the water once…maybe even twice.

Perhaps nature…ever the antagonist…has in this instance actually provided us with the answer…perhaps she gave us two hands knowing there would be times we would want and need to lend one to another. It’s too late to pull Matthew and those he took back from the depths…but I ask you now…take the time to pause and look around…somewhere nearby…someone is fidgeting and feeling all alone…reach out and bring them back.

Tagged as: Chrstnghtmr, Colorado Shootings, LGBT, Matthew Murray, New Life Church, nghtmrchld26, Youth With A Mission, YWAM

Daniel DiRito | December 13, 2007 | 12:18 AM | link | Comments (7)

Move On Folks: Nothing To See Here But Us Humans genre: Do Not Resuscitate & Nouveau Thoughts & Six Degrees of Speculation & Uncivil Unions & Video-Philes

Tagged as: 9/11, Bill Maher, Chickenhawks, Death, Democrats, Republicans, Terrorism, War

Daniel DiRito | October 3, 2007 | 3:52 PM | link | Comments (0)

Understanding Left & Right: It's All About The "W"? genre: Nouveau Thoughts & Polispeak

Results of a new study intended to gauge the brain differences between liberal and conservatives suggest that it all comes down to the "W''s...and in the case of George W. Bush, it may make perfect sense. All kidding aside, the results offer an intriguing look into understanding the role neurobiology may play in determining one's particular political leanings. Clearly, more research is needed and more will undoubtedly occur.

Exploring the neurobiology of politics, scientists have found that liberals tolerate ambiguity and conflict better than conservatives because of how their brains work.

In a simple experiment reported today in the journal Nature Neuroscience, scientists at New York University and UCLA show that political orientation is related to differences in how the brain processes information.

Previous psychological studies have found that conservatives tend to be more structured and persistent in their judgments whereas liberals are more open to new experiences. The latest study found those traits are not confined to political situations but also influence everyday decisions.

Participants were college students whose politics ranged from "very liberal" to "very conservative." They were instructed to tap a keyboard when an M appeared on a computer monitor and to refrain from tapping when they saw a W.

M appeared four times more frequently than W, conditioning participants to press a key in knee-jerk fashion whenever they saw a letter.

Each participant was wired to an electroencephalograph that recorded activity in the anterior cingulate cortex, the part of the brain that detects conflicts between a habitual tendency (pressing a key) and a more appropriate response (not pressing the key). Liberals had more brain activity and made fewer mistakes than conservatives when they saw a W, researchers said. Liberals and conservatives were equally accurate in recognizing M.

Researchers got the same results when they repeated the experiment in reverse, asking another set of participants to tap when a W appeared.

Analyzing the data, Sulloway said liberals were 4.9 times as likely as conservatives to show activity in the brain circuits that deal with conflicts, and 2.2 times as likely to score in the top half of the distribution for accuracy.

Sulloway said the results could explain why President Bush demonstrated a single-minded commitment to the Iraq war and why some people perceived Sen. John F. Kerry, the liberal Massachusetts Democrat who opposed Bush in the 2004 presidential race, as a "flip-flopper" for changing his mind about the conflict.

Based on the results, he said, liberals could be expected to more readily accept new social, scientific or religious ideas.

While it is difficult to extrapolate from such studies...given my own curiosity with psychology...I decided it might be fun to apply the basic findings of this research to the President and his actions in office. I offer the following thoughts for pondering in that regard.

1. Is there a desire to see M's which can be predicted to lead to the errors when seeing W's?

If conservatives look for consistency, is it possible that the President...when confronted with the aftermath of 9/11...sought to see the connections between Iraq and al-Qaeda even though they likely didn't exist to any substantive degree?

2. If choosing M's is the favored outcome...and M's significantly outnumber W's...then isn't it possible that W's are viewed as threatening rather than just different?

Can the desire for consistency be related to the opposition to gay rights, including same-sex marriage? If one is inclined to seek consistency and to avoid altering existing constructs, then isn't it possible that same-sex marriage elicits an natural averse and/or fearful reaction?

3. If the appearance of W's creates a degree of angst (they don't fit the objective of identifying M's), could that lead to oversimplifications in order to avoid the existence of conflicting data (a strategy emerges to ignore the W's)?

Does the desire for structure and consistency explain the President's success with identifying a few simple campaign phrases and repeating them over and over without deviation...regardless of changing dynamics and/or facts...as opposed to the oppositions more lengthy, nuanced, and potentially shifting campaign rhetoric?

4. If M's represent structure and consistency...that which can be equated with the status quo...do W's therefore come to represent frightening change that is rejected?

Is it possible that the seeming unwillingness to revisit and revise the strategy in Iraq results from a resistance to confronting the conflict that comes when the eventual outcomes fails to match the initial objectives?

5. If M's are identified as the letter of choice, does that lead one to view M's as ideal and therefore create a need to vilify the W's?

Could the Bush administrations inclination to characterize those opposed to the war as unpatriotic, against our troops, and down on America be explained as a need to avoid the conflict which may be created when the validity of U.S. actions are questioned?

I'm sure one could identify other possible links to the study but the above provide ample food for thought. I find the topic fascinating and I hope the research continues to expand. I say as much because I've always felt that a meeting of the minds requires that the participants are able to understand each others way of thinking and the prevailing propensities which may influence how each side interprets the situations and circumstances they encounter.

In the end, the study suggests that right and wrong may be little more than a function of biological structure. While that doesn't offer solutions, it has the potential to begin defusing the animosity which so often accompanies conflicting thoughts and ideas...a shift which could possibly lead to an added willingness to listen and compromise...or at a minimum to disagree without the need to condemn. Wouldn't that be a novel development?

Tagged as: Conservative, George W. Bush, Iraq, Liberal, Neurobiology, Psychology, Same-Sex Marriage

Daniel DiRito | September 10, 2007 | 10:13 AM | link | Comments (0)

What If God Is Sick & Tired Of Our Arrogance? genre: Hip-Gnosis & Nouveau Thoughts & Six Degrees of Speculation

Do you ever see a headline in a newspaper or at a site online which catches your attention, but for some reason you just can't convince yourself to read the content? I saw one of those headlines yesterday and while I didn't succumb to reading the article at that moment, I broke down and read it today.

As to why, well, initially I wasn't completely sure...perhaps curiosity...maybe boredom with the lack of other eye catching news...but then I took the time to explore what the headline said that turned me off...as well as led me back to the article. Following the title and some relevant excerpts below, I'll attempt an explanation.

Dutch Bishop: Call God ‘Allah’ To Ease Relations

AMSTERDAM - A Roman Catholic Bishop in the Netherlands has proposed people of all faiths refer to God as Allah to foster understanding, stoking an already heated debate on religious tolerance in a country with one million Muslims.

Bishop Tiny Muskens, from the southern diocese of Breda, told Dutch television on Monday that God did not mind what he was named and that in Indonesia, where Muskens spent eight years, priests used the word "Allah" while celebrating Mass.

"Allah is a very beautiful word for God. Shouldn't we all say that from now on we will name God Allah? ... What does God care what we call him? It is our problem."

A survey in the Netherlands' biggest-selling newspaper De Telegraaf on Wednesday found 92 percent of the more than 4,000 people polled disagreed with the bishop's view, which also drew ridicule.

First, a bit of background. The climate in the Netherlands has been rather volatile since the death of filmmaker Theo Van Gogh. Van Gogh's work was critical of Islam and his murder, viewed to be an act of retaliation, increased tensions with the immigrant Islamic community.

The comments of the Bishop were intended to be a conciliatory gesture to the Islamic community and I don't doubt his sincerity. Unfortunately, the irrationality which permeates the circumstances leading to the Bishop's remarks comprise the basis of the angst I experienced when first reading the headline.

With nary a thought, I knew if I read the article it would not only lead to frustration, it would serve to remind me why I find religion to be such a baffling exercise in contradiction as well as a perpetual source of human conflict. Having now read the article, I can attest to the fact that it easily met my stated expectations.

Here's my dilemma...and perhaps someone will be able to offer the insight necessary to unburden me. Let's assume that the Bishop's followers...no, let's go so far as to say that all those in the Netherlands who currently use the term god...suddenly acquiesce to the use of the term allah. With that assumption, would those who believe in the tenets of Islam suddenly shed their animosity towards other religious persuasions?

Conversely, if all those who profess an allegiance to Islam in the Netherlands suddenly conceded to use the tern god instead of allah, would the anger directed at those who embrace Islam suddenly evaporate?

I'll answer my own questions. In both cases, I would respond "of course not". In providing this answer, I point to the utter insanity that exists with regards to religious beliefs. Here's the point...on some hypothetical level, most people would assert and agree that there is only one god or one allah. At the same time, the actions of the majority of religious people suggests that there must either be numerous gods or allahs, or that a majority of the world's population undoubtedly believes in false gods or allahs.

Even more perplexing, each religious group is certain of the infallible nature of their belief in their god or their allah...which also means they are certain of the invalidity of the beliefs held by the remaining majority of human beings. In holding this view, the world therefore has numerous minority populations who are convinced that they are justified in condemning all others, justified in their efforts to impose those laws that support their beliefs and nullify the beliefs of their adversaries, and justified in pursuing and prosecuting plans to prevail.

So in the end, while I commend the effort of the Bishop to be magnanimous, I wouldn't hesitate to bet the farm on the following. If you put the Bishop in a room with a Mullah to discuss religion and tell them they may not leave the room until such time as they agree on one god or one allah...and of course that also means they must agree that there can only be one set of values or mores for living a proper life...the two of them will never emerge from that room. Further, if the door to that room does open, it will likely mean that only one of the two men remains alive and able to emerge...and he will do so while espousing that the one true god or allah had granted him the strength to prevail.

As such, I don't know how to conclude anything other than the fact that civilization has and will always be on the verge of utter chaos and constant conflict. When I acknowledge that thought, I find myself more convinced that god or allah are nothing more than creations of the human mind designed to enable one man to negate another.

Lastly, as a person fond of logic, reason, and rationality...I find myself imagining what a god or an allah might be thinking...were he or she to actually exist...as he or she watched us humans interact. In that exercise, one would be hard pressed to reach any plausible conclusions.

Let's start with the assumption that god or allah has a sick sense of humor and we're simply here for amusement. That would mean that he or she has devised a world such that his or her existence will remain unproven to us humans because he or she has chosen as much. In this model, the amusement would arise when he or she whispers clues into enough ears to pit us all against each other. The amusement would presumably emanate from us remaining in conflict on a perpetual basis. Unfortunately, as an all knowing being, we wouldn't actually be amusing because god or allah would already know what we were going to do. Therefore amusement fails as an explanation.

Two, if we believe that god or allah created humans...then he or she would have done so with the full intent that we be imperfect since he or she, in his or her perfection, could have made us perfect. Therefore, if one were god or allah...meaning one is all knowing...creating imperfect beings while knowing the outcome of said creation would ultimately serve no purpose. It couldn't entertain because he or she would already know the script. So what other reasons might explain our creation?

If we assume we are the product of a deity's creation, then his or her creation would never become perfect of its own volition since it would have been knowingly created with chosen or selected flaws. That would mean that he or she would have to fix us for us to serve any meaningful purpose in our association with a perfect being. If he or she intends to enact the fix...since we humans could not do so by design...because if we could, we would have to already possess the capabilities of a god...then why hasn't he or she already affected the fix and what reason would suffice for him or her to keep us around in a perpetually imperfect state? I'm not sure there is an answer that makes sense.

Further, if we assume that he or she is gradually revealing more answers to us over time...then that would have to happen through god or allah's selection of certain individuals since we wouldn't possess that ability innately. That means that those of us who were not chosen would actually serve no purpose and we would always remain reliant upon the ability and willingness of those chosen to know more, to share it with us.

However, in our imperfection, we would never understand what god or allah had revealed to the chosen few; we would have to believe them as a matter of faith. However, since god or allah already knows our imperfections, god or allah would know that we were incapable of knowing how to decide what we should believe as a matter of faith. Therefore, making some people capable of understanding more and providing them clues or knowledge would do little more than fuel controversy and conflict.

In other words, our enlightenment would ultimately still have to be given to each of us by god or allah electing to alter the imperfections we were created with. That holds true if we're to receive enlightenment as a matter of faith through others or if we're each to be given more knowledge directly from god or allah.

In the end, we humans cannot explain or understand the notion of a god or allah outside of our human existence...which leads us to define god or allah in human terms and which means our perceptions will always be flawed. At the same time, in our imperfections, we will always disagree as to who is more right. Moreover, logic tells us that our imperfections will preclude any of us from ever being able to prove what we believe to be right.

Therefore, in our efforts to define god or allah, we actually insult the very god or allah we think exists. When we presume to know god or allahs intentions, we diminish god or allah by falsely elevating ourselves. Knowing as much ought to instruct us to spend our time understanding each other and making this existence as palatable as humanly possible...for all of us humans.

If there is a god or an allah, he or she would already know that such a goal is the noblest practice and the highest pinnacle we can achieve with the abilities he or she had provided to us. I'm not sure any higher being would be amused by our preoccupation with assigning them a name...let alone an identity of our human making. Perhaps its time that we humans focus on that which is within our grasp?

Tagged as: Allah, Catholicism, Faith, God, Humanity, Islam, Religion

Daniel DiRito | August 16, 2007 | 11:57 AM | link | Comments (0)

Silver Spoon? Nah, I Prefer Platinum genre: Nouveau Thoughts & Six Degrees of Speculation & Uncivil Unions

Not long ago I wrote about what I call our "Chain Letter Society"...the construct that we have become a society obsessed with being number one, being the best, being the person at the top of the pyramid. Parents seem to be teaching children that they are entitled, that they are the best and that the world will acquiesce to all of their needs and demands. I contend that this is not only a negative construct; it is going to handicap a generation that will struggle to understand why the world didn't react according to their expectations.

Much to my surprise, I found an article today that voices many of the same concerns. For the most part I agree with the author though I think he may place too much focus on forces outside the home. I'm more inclined to see the home as the primary source of this burgeoning problem.

I've included some excerpts below but I would definitely recommend reading the entire article.

Don Chance, a finance professor at Louisiana State University, says it dawned on him last spring. The semester was ending, and as usual, students were making a pilgrimage to his office, asking for the extra points needed to lift their grades to A's.

"They felt so entitled," he recalls, "and it just hit me. We can blame Mr. Rogers."

Fred Rogers, the late TV icon, told several generations of children that they were "special" just for being whoever they were. He meant well, and he was a sterling role model in many ways. But what often got lost in his self-esteem-building patter was the idea that being special comes from working hard and having high expectations for yourself.

While children may be influenced by television programs, the reality is that much of their behavior and their perception of the world are adopted from their parents. I could be wrong but if I were asked to bet what would happen if we took away Mr. Rogers (and his passing effectively achieved as much), the impact on the degree to which a child feels special or entitled will nary miss a beat.

Signs of narcissism among college students have been rising for 25 years, according to a recent study led by a San Diego State University psychologist. Obviously, Mr. Rogers alone can't be blamed for this. But as Prof. Chance sees it, "he's representative of a culture of excessive doting."

Prof. Chance teaches many Asian-born students, and says they accept whatever grade they're given; they see B's and C's as an indication that they must work harder, and that their elders assessed them accurately. They didn't grow up with Mr. Rogers or anyone else telling them they were born special.

By contrast, American students often view lower grades as a reason to "hit you up for an A because they came to class and feel they worked hard," says Prof. Chance. He wishes more parents would offer kids this perspective: "The world owes you nothing. You have to work and compete. If you want to be special, you'll have to prove it."

Don't get me wrong, I'm no proponent of teaching a kid to swim by throwing them in the lake...just as I'm not in favor of telling a three year old that they will win a gold medal because they swim well for their age. History tells us that reality is somewhere in the middle...it's the principle of the bell curve...a few people make up the extreme points and the rest are traveling shoulder to shoulder with the pack. I appreciate that mommy and daddy want the best for their children...but preparing a child for the world needs to be more than promises of bells and whistles.

In America today, life often begins with the anointing of "His Majesty, the Fetus," he says. From then on, many parents focus their conversations on their kids. Today's parents "are the best-educated generation ever," says Dr. Rosenfeld. "So why do our kids see us primarily discussing kids' schedules and activities?"

He encourages parents to talk about their passions and interests; about politics, business, world events. "Because everything is child-centered today, we're depriving children of adults," he says. "If they never see us as adults being adults, how will they deal with important matters when it is their world?"

I have a slightly different take on this final phenomenon. I think we've seen a gradual progression of the entitlement mentality and what parents are doing today is acting out the fulfillment of their own unmet expectations.

You see, they may be successful but the only relevant measure is whether they are as successful as their expectations. It depends on what they believe. While it may be reasonable to view their achievements as success, if they don't feel it as such, then the natural instinct is going to be to transfer that need to their children. It’s the, "By god, I'm going to do everything to make sure my kid doesn't miss any opportunities" mindset.

What we often fail to consider is happiness and how that is best achieved. Our consumption society is hyper-focused on a concept of happiness that is measured externally...what do you have...what is your title...how well known have you become. The problem with that notion is there will always be someone who has more, has a better title, and is better known. Perhaps we need to adjust our notion of happiness?

Image courtesy of www.worth1000.com

Daniel DiRito | July 5, 2007 | 7:33 PM | link | Comments (1)

iPhone Premiere: Is It Real Life Or Is It Mad TV? genre: Econ-Recon & Indie-Script & Nouveau Thoughts

Daniel DiRito | July 2, 2007 | 9:56 AM | link | Comments (0)

Proof That Man Did Not Evolve Emerges genre: Nouveau Thoughts & Six Degrees of Speculation

Amidst the debate as to whether humans are the result of a lengthy process of evolution or if they were part of a six day creation spree by the almighty, new evidence has emerged to suggest that we didn't evolve. No, its not what you may think...its not the result of a scientific discovery...its not based upon the unearthing of an ancient fossil...not even due to an opinion offered by a renowned expert. It’s from two headlines found in the news.

From The Associated Press:

Texas Crowd Kills Man After Car Hit Girl

An angry crowd beat a man to death after a vehicle he was riding in struck and injured a young girl, police said Wednesday.

Police believe 2,000 to 3,000 people were in the area for a Juneteenth celebration when the attack occurred Tuesday night.

The driver had stopped to check on the little girl at the entrance to an apartment complex when a group of men attacked him, authorities said. The passenger, David Rivas Morales, 40, got out to try to help the driver, but the crowd turned on him, said police Commander Harold Piatt.

Morales was beaten to death by as many as 20 men and left lying in a parking lot, Piatt said. A preliminary autopsy listed blunt force trauma as the cause of death.

The little girl, 3 or 4 years old, was taken to a hospital with non-life threatening injuries.

The driver, who got away from the crowd, is cooperating with investigators, police said.

Baby's Death Tied To Taped-On Pacifier

A woman was charged with manslaughter in the death of her 4-month-old son after she told authorities she taped a pacifier to his mouth to keep it from falling out.

Bonnie M. Desmond, 19, was charged Tuesday in the death of Noah James Petersen. Bail was set at $500,000.

"The only thing I can think of is I taped the pacifier to keep it from falling out. I didn't know it would hurt him, or I wouldn't have done that," Desmond told police, according to the reports.

OK, I'm no expert...but if this is the degree to which we humans have evolved, I vote that we end the debate now. Spending time debating lofty notions seems rather pointless when evidence abounds that we share this existence with humans...like the ones described above...that have little, if any, respect for humanity.

While I'm ranting, situations of this nature also remind me why I'm frequently baffled by people who contend that life is sacred at the moment of conception. Let me be clear. I accept their right to that belief and I understand the basis of such beliefs...I just can't get too excited when we are surrounded by abject disregard and a lack of human decency for living, breathing, and birthed humans.

Is that relative ethics? Perhaps. Regardless, I'm content to argue that, until we find the wherewithal to sanctify the human beings already in our midst, I simply haven't the energy to spend on defending the viability of accidental or unwanted pregnancies.

Here's the point. We can ban every single abortion and still remain divorced from our humanity...and until we heal our all too easily demonstrated inhumanity, there will be no palpable advancement in our civility quotient. I find that far too many people are willing to champion abstract causes because they require little more than vocal protestations.

Where is the line of pro-lifers offering to adopt any and all of the children that result from the prevention of an abortion? Where are the pro-life retirees who are offering to baby-sit for single parent women who have foregone an abortion? Where are the collection boxes for pro-lifers to donate cash to provide food, healthcare, and education to the children rescued from abortions?

Frankly, the only lines I see are the lines of people asking me to acknowledge their proximity to morality...people who wear their holiness as a badge while lacking the heart to make real sacrifices to demonstrate their compassion...people who want others to think they are destined for gods blessings because they voted for a candidate that favored the overturning of Roe v. Wade...the same candidate that opposed the revamping of the healthcare system to cover the uninsured...the same candidate that voted against a minimum wage increase for a decade...the same candidate that thinks we have no business sending troops to Darfur but blindly supports our president's Iraq fiasco.

I've said it before and I'll say it again...I love words...but I love them for what they mean; not simply for one's ability to string them together into a ration of rhetoric. Our society has become far too comfortable with hollow platitudes and far too removed from tangible actions. We have become a collection of nouns that lack the willingness to attach ourselves to meaningful verbs. That, my friends, is a grammatical error of immense proportions.

Daniel DiRito | June 20, 2007 | 1:51 PM | link | Comments (1)

Icebergs And Identities: What Lies Beneath? genre: Hip-Gnosis & Nouveau Thoughts & Six Degrees of Speculation & Uncivil Unions

We often hear the expression, "That's just the tip of the iceberg". The good news is that our familiarity with that terminology has probably prevented a few maritime collisions. The bad news is that the principal holds true for numerous other life situations...situations that go unnoticed or ignored because we really don't want to understand the depth and breadth of the issues we encounter and exactly what they might tell us about our choices, our beliefs, and our identities.

Let me ease into the topic with a story my dad has told for a number of years. My dad and my uncle were business partners for all of their working lives. At different points along the way, they entered into partnerships with other individuals. This particular story is about one of those partners...I'll call him John.

John was married when the partnership began but there were lingering questions about John's propensity to have outside interests. Eventually, John and his wife divorced and over the next few years he dated a number of different women...enough to catch my dad's attention. My dad, my uncle, and John spent a lot of time together discussing the business...which as we all know allows one an opportunity to see how people behave...to learn about their idiosyncrasies.

As the three of them were out and about, my dad and my uncle were always comfortable noticing and pointing out an attractive woman. As my dad says, "What's wrong with acknowledging what you see and what you think?" In other words, a pretty woman is a pretty woman...and noticing that reality is normal. John, on the other hand, never noticed or acknowledged an attractive woman. It was as if they didn't exist...never saw them, never gonna see them.

So I recall many nights when my dad would joke about the fact that John seemed to always have a new woman sitting next to him in his car...and my dad would ask, "If he never sees or acknowledges an attractive woman, how is that he always has a new girlfriend?" Of course he always answered his own rhetorical question...John had learned to lead two lives...the one he wanted everyone to see and the one he actually preferred...and he lived those two lives while he was married and while he wasn't. Somewhere in John's identity, he needed others to see him as a good family man...even if he couldn't actually live that life.

In the end, my dad's conclusion was that it is unhealthy to deny human nature...people are sexual beings that notice what they find attractive. If you accept that reality and make your choices mindful of that aspect of your human nature, you'll be able to make good choices...because you will better understand yourself. If you deny that reality, you will always be in the throes of a deceitful internal battle and your choices will lack clarity and your actions will betray the outward persona you present. Thus, you end up fooling yourself...perhaps the worst transgression one can commit.

I was reminded of icebergs and John's story while surfing the internet this morning. I came across an article discussing an organization called XXXChurch.com, a religious based group intended to help Christian men come to grips with their obsession with pornography.

Brian McGinness had an insatiable appetite for porn. Day after day, for more than eight years, he spent countless hours surfing the Web for it, usually on a computer that he used after business hours at his old job.

Because of his compulsion to view pornography, McGinness spent more time away from home, so he lied to his wife about having to work overtime in the evenings. He felt guilty about what he was doing, believing that it was morally wrong and knowing that it was keeping him from his spouse and their two young children. But he also felt unable to control himself.

All that started to change one Saturday morning in December after he attended a breakfast of "Porn and Pancakes" organized by XXXChurch.com, an online ministry created to get Christians talking about their X-rated addictions.

The December event attracted more than 500 men to Ada Bible Church, which McGinness attends. They ate pancakes and sausage while discussing how pornography had harmed their lives, including their relationships with God and their families.

Craig Gross, a pastor with XXXChurch.com, refers to the widespread use of porn as "the elephant in the pew" that many churches ignored for years because they didn't know how to deal with it.

First, I commend Gross and his organization for having the ability and the integrity to expose and address the issue. At the same time, I'm not surprised that the problem exists. One need only recall the many high profile ministers that have fallen from grace as a result of sexual indiscretions...the type of indiscretions that were often the subject of their sermons and that I would suggest result from this concept of dual identity.

Here's the equation. Religious beliefs often focus on sin and sex...virtually portraying sex as sin and creating an environment whereby one's proximity to god is premised on one's denial of sexual reality. Good men are family oriented, have sexual desires for only one woman...desires that are believed to exist in order to create Christian families...which are to become testaments to the established doctrine. Sex is packaged into a tidy formula and acting outside that formula is viewed as a betrayal of one's faith...a formula I believe to be both unrealistic and unhealthy.

Freud described the concept of identity as a tube of toothpaste. If one allows one's identity to flow from the tube naturally by removing the cap, then the identity functions as it should. If one puts a cap on the tube and applies pressure, toothpaste will find weak points from which to escape...toothpaste being the dark corners of our unhealthy and unexplored identity that become pathology (bad behavior). I think the model explains the issue of porn addiction or obsession in these Christian men. Doctrine becomes the cap that places an inordinate amount of pressure on the capped identity...and in due time it escapes in unhealthy ways.

Let me be clear. I am not suggesting that pornography is sinful or evil (Isn't it actually just visual images of our sexuality?). The state of mind one brings to the viewing of pornography is the issue. We watch people act out other elements of human nature in movies and on television all the time and we're still able to use good judgment about our behaviors. Watching pornography needn't be any different so long as one hasn't given it far more power than it actually possesses.

I think it’s akin to the way alcohol consumption is addressed in the United States as opposed to Europe. In our Italian family, having a glass of wine wasn't just reserved for those over the age of 21...we were allowed to drink wine as children (in moderation) and it never became an obsession brought about by an archaic notion of denial.

We don't give children the keys to the car the minute they turn 16...we spend time teaching them how to drive and giving them an opportunity to gain some experience. Does it make sense to forbid a child to taste alcohol before they turn 21 and then turn them loose to drink all they can consume? Is sex any different? Does it make sense to tell children not to partake of this great thing...until we tell you its time...and then Katie bar the door?

I'm not suggesting parents ought to encourage their children to have sex...but I am suggesting that the model of denial is nothing more than the predecessor of an unhealthy perspective that is likely to haunt the individual well into adulthood if not indefinitely. Connecting sex with loving relationships ought to be a parent's focus because it will provide the proper motivation and avoid instilling a cookie jar binge mentality. We should rethink the current construct and I would suggest that an unhealthy obsession with pornography supports that argument.

"We're not going to shut down the porn industry," Gross said. "So, why even try? It's a $13 billion-dollar-a-year industry in the United States.

"The right-wingers say, 'Let's boycott this, let's all stop doing this.' Well, if the Christians would just stop consuming it, that would put a dent in it. To me, they (in the porn industry) have a right to do what they do."

McGinness, who has been married for more than 10 years and has children ages 8 and 3, said he is not ashamed of talking publicly about his former problem because he hopes to help others by doing so.

"I want other people out there to know there is a way to get away from this."

Look, sexuality is not extinguishable...but having healthy thoughts about sexuality is achievable. I agree with McGinness that banning porn isn't the answer. Unfortunately, the goal of XXXChurch is to extinguish the interest in pornography amongst Christians by reasserting the importance of religious doctrine and family values. I don't begrudge his efforts though I doubt it provides a lasting solution. It may, in the short term, diminish the obsession...but until the underlying realities of sexuality are addressed in a proactive and positive manner without the attachment of sin and judgment, there will no doubt be more Ted Haggard’s and more money spent on pornography.

An iceberg is not only what is visible, but it is also what exists beneath the surface. Life is no different. We can elect to only address that which is visible and on the surface or we can accept and embrace that which exists just beyond our view. When we choose to ignore the whole of our human identity, we run the risk of being torn apart by that which lurks below. We need not steer clear of who we are...the whole of our essence must be acknowledged and accepted.

If we turn and run, then the weight of what lies beneath will become an albatross around our necks and pull what little remains of our authenticity and awareness into the dark abyss of self-deceit. If we embrace our totality, it will be the ballast that allows us to endure the rough waters that lie ahead...but most importantly, it will be the anchor that firmly fastens us to the whole of our wondrous human identity.

Image courtesy of www.shiftingbaselines.org

Daniel DiRito | June 15, 2007 | 9:52 AM | link | Comments (0)

A Treatise On Personal Responsibility genre: Nouveau Thoughts & Six Degrees of Speculation

We live in a world that is all too often based upon deniability and a disregard for accountability. We’ve become adept at and accustomed to doublespeak in our spiral towards the mediocrity that accompanies the perception that obfuscation trumps objectivity. Those traits that serve to elevate ego over egalitarianism have become the opiate that fuels our exodus away from integrity and towards inventive and invective hyperbole.

So what leads me to this postulation? I’ve long believed that we humans have divided the reality of our identities into two disparate worlds that grow more distant and distinct each and every day. It’s the quiet and docile student that cannot assimilate his anger and animosity before unleashing the murderous monster that is germinating within. It’s the daughter that cuts herself in the closet because she cannot reconcile the reality of her evolving feelings with the demands to quickly and efficiently comprehend their meaning in a world that requires children to grow up, mature, and achieve before they have the skills to cope with all of the associated complexities.

There are also far less innocuous examples. It’s the football player that suddenly transitions from underprivileged and at risk inner city statistic to elite status in the NFL complete with celebrity and boo-coo cash…fully unprepared to understand and integrate the night and day dichotomy. It’s the lottery winner that spent twenty five years as a factory worker who is suddenly in the spotlight long before they understand how a huge bank account makes them a media darling. It’s the college co-ed that submits photos to Playboy and suddenly becomes the fantasy fixation of former father figures and gets lost in the materialism of objectification before ever experiencing the magic of mutual and meaningful respect.

There are also the fully ordinary, though equally damaging and diminishing, examples. I’ll cite my own experience with the individual that, until quite recently, maintained my website. Over six months ago I posted an inquiry on a professional network seeking someone to provide ongoing technical support. I stated my needs and cited the skill sets that would be applicable…and I received a number of responses. I selected an individual that represented themselves as an expert. Yesterday I put an end to the six months of deception and denial that characterized this particular situation and that is found in so many of our daily involvements.

I won’t belabor you with all the details as they are subordinate to the larger point I seek to make...that who we really are has become less and less relevant and / or connected to the behaviors that we exhibit.

Back to my example. Suffice it to say that my list of requests grew larger and longer over the course of our involvement and culminated in my pushing for their completion two weeks ago. At that time, the party apologized for the repeated delays, provided an incomplete list of outstanding items, a price to do the work, and a timeframe for completion. After two weeks of untold frustration, I sent an inquiry as to when I could expect the items to be completed and I received the following response:

2010?

I responded by asking if I should interpret the message as a joke…and instinctively I knew what would follow as I’ve been archiving all of the inconsistencies and making note of all of the signals of pending hostility. I call situations like I was about to experience my moments of hyper-reality…the times at which all of my nagging suspicions, instincts, and intuitions that we've all been taught to bury (in this particular case in the interest of commerce and the unspoken code of conduct that characterizes our capitalistic endeavors) rush to the surface of my awareness. Don’t get me wrong, I am not about to condemn capitalism…just as I wouldn’t condemn communism. Neither system is perfect as both systems are executed by us fully flawed humans.

Regardless, that caveat cannot and should not lessen our obligation to aspire to an ever evolving demonstration of personal responsibility…the singular mechanism by which any system of societal structure can hope to succeed. I knew I was about to witness the wholesale disregard of that concept…sending me spiraling into that bittersweet realm of perception I call hyper-reality. In all honesty, I find a good deal of comfort in my moments of hyper-reality...it's a time when who I am and what I really believe rises to the surface of my awareness, overcomes the many incongruent constructs we've all adopted, and brings me a sense of restored wholeness.

Anyway, here’s the response I received:

I have looked at the CSS until my eyes were crossed. I downloaded and looked at all the images and figured out exactly what your original designer did.

On the left the image and the CSS is as it should be. Yet there is a black border.

I hired (name removed) who is a Perl and MT programmer. He was paid and stands behind his work. I hired and paid my graphics guy to make the new graphics and installed them and added the code to six StyleSheets. Then I spent hours going through Movable Types new method of using Modules.

All I have received from you for a ridiculous amount of time since day one is freaking abuse. It seems I am now personally responsible for a site I DID NOT make, with problems with a web host I recommended AGAINST.

And when I mention I have received no money for my time whatsoever I have been insulted.

What do you expect?

A few items of clarification are necessary. In response to my inquiry on a Professional Network, this individual assured me that he was a Movable Type and Perl expert. Six months ago he told me he would provide a list of recommended changes along with costs for each item. Two weeks ago, I pressed him for a price for my own list of requested changes and I was told it would cost approximately X amount of dollars and worst case no more than X…and would be completed on the following Sunday.

Very early that Sunday morning I realized that he had not reviewed my detailed list of items (even though they had been listed in the estimate he provided…albeit with little detail), that he had not recalled our countless discussions and my numerous confirming emails with full details of the work needed…and I also realized he wasn’t going to be able to execute the agreed upon work.

In frustration, he quickly indicated he would need to consult another individual with Movable Type and Perl expertise. He also insinuated that he would need to pay that individual and asked that I send the payment for the worst case amount…which I did first thing Monday morning before the bulk of the work had been completed.

After making full payment, he began to hint on Monday that the quoted price along with the need to hire another expert would result in him spending hours of time completing the remaining items for next to nothing. I sent an email suggesting that we could revisit the cost.

Shortly thereafter, following an ongoing exchange of emails related to some of the specific tasks, I got an email that completely overlooked and ignored a matter of fact that I had provided on Sunday…insinuating that I wasn’t following through on a particular item. At that point, I sent a lengthy email stating that the most recent exchange was a perfect demonstration of why he was finding himself worried that the items were going to take longer than anticipated. I went on to state that I was frustrated with the lack of attention to detail, that he seemingly ignore or skimmed over the details in my correspondences, and that that was likely the reason he was upside down on the estimate. I suggested he examine his own lack of thoroughness and cease shifting responsibility for his inadequate oversight.

I believe that is an ample amount of history. The following is an excerpt from the response that I sent to the above message which I believe fully captures the essence of the argument I’m making herein:

What you really mean to say is something that I have heard from countless people throughout my life...and that is "don't hold me responsible for anything I've said or done because if you do I will get mad and try to reinvent reality so that I don't have to look at my own part in the problem and my own baggage." You see, it may make you feel better to ignore your part in creating this situation...and it may make you feel better to attack me and make me the bad guy...but one thing is certain...it will never change the truth and you know that as well as I do...and that is what is really bothering you.

Not to worry...I've been here before and while it is always disappointing...it no longer comes as a surprise...I've come to expect that most people haven't the willingness or the wherewithal to see and acknowledge th