From Hats to Heels

I hope everyone had a very happy Easter. But I notice something when I went to my church yesterday. As you probably know Easter is the time where everyone is suppose to dress up. It is especially the time when women wear big hats. I remember as a kid seeing all of the fancy hats that were on the heads of the women in the Easter service. But yesterday I saw only one hat and it was not fancy at all. It seems the hat tradition is dead in my church.
But that did not mean that women were not dressing up. In fact what I did notice was that almost all women were wearing high heel shoes. And by high heels I do not mean an inch. I was looking at three and four inch heels on those women. And I use the term woman with some caution. I think some of the girls who were about 10 also had on these monster heels. I am not saying that women never wore high heels to my church except yesterday. But, yesterday almost all of the women wore these super heels and that does not usually happen.
So what am I to make of this. It seems to me that Easter is still a big dress up day but that fancy hats seem passe. Instead women dress up their feet more than their heads. Funny but I thought that women always wore heels to dress up but I really notice it yesterday. Maybe it has always been this way but the big hats distracted me from their feet. Or it may be a racial thing. The churches I went to as a kid were predominately black churches but now I go to a multiracial church. Perhaps big hats are a black thing. But the black women at my church yesterday were not wearing the hats either.
There are several ways to take this. As a sociologist I can note that heels are not physically healthy for women and this is another way that body images are used in a patriarchal way. As a Christian I can complain about the emphasis on dress instead on the true meaning of Easter, which in some ways is a more meaningful holiday than Christmas. As a man I can just appreciate the way high heels creates a beautiful site when worn by pretty women. Hey I gotta be honest or else I can not be a real trouble-maker. Regardless, it will be an interesting trend I will keep my eyes on in the coming years.

Sincerely,

Trouble-Maker

Truth or Birth

Remember the 9-11 truthers? They were the mostly left-wing nutjobs who argued that President Bush was behind 9-11. Supposedly Bush did this to help increase his popularity. Still sounds stupid today.
Well now we have the birthers. They are the mostly right-wing nutjobs who argue that President Obama was not born in the United States. I guess that way back someone knew that Obama would be the future president if they could fake his birth in the United States. They sound about as stupid as the birthers.
Under normal circumstances I would basically ignore both groups. They do not represent the left (truthers) or the right (birthers). They can be entertaining but are not much good for anything else.
But now the birthers have their champion. His name is Donald Trump. I should ignore him too. However, some of the recent surveys show that Trump is a leading contender as a possible Republican candidate for President. So I can not totally ignore the birthers. I have to wonder why so many people can fall for this crude.
I have heard some people say that they like Trump because he is a straight talker. He is not PC and will say what is on his mind. But if what is on his mind is a bunch of illogical thinking then what good is that? Do people really think that Trump is right? If so then heaven help us.
It does not bother me that some kooks believe in the birther nonsense. It does disturb me that a sizable percentage of the population does. What can we do to help people become clearer thinkers on issues like this? I see Trump's popularity as a warning that we have allowed to much sloppy thinking in our society. I hope we take the warning seriously.

Sincerely,

Trouble-Maker

Have you seen the commercial for the new "comedy" series Wilfred on FX. Please spare me. It looks as funny as that other FX knee slapper "Its always Sunny in Philadelphia." If terrorist ever want to get information out of me all they have to do is sit me down in front of that program for about 10 minutes. Of course FX makes up for these shows with the classic "The League." Not. Do not get me wrong. I like FX when they put the right movies on the air. Because that is what they are known for. Good sci-fi movies. It is when they dabble into "comedy" that they seem totally clueless. But they are not the only channel that has lost its way. I loved the History channel. I often fantasized that one day we may have a sociology channel with shows as interesting as what they did with history channel. Shows like "The Barbarians", and "Dogfights" were highly entertaining and informative. I remember non-war presentations of biblical history and the historical westward expansion. It was great. But now. Come on. Swamp People? Top Shot? Ax Men? What does that have to do with history. You can not bribe me to watch those shows with all the cheesecake in the world. What happen here. What I think happened in both cases is you had TV channels that forgot what they were. They went for something that they thought was glamours like comedy for FX and contemporary human drama for the History channel. In doing so they lost what made them special. At least in my eyes. Maybe these shows are succeeding. But I can not help but to think that something has been lost. That is one of the dangers of forgetting who you are. In time I like to see both TV channels return to their roots and give me something I can not get somewhere else. But in the meantime I like to think that what I have observed helps to keep me remembering who I am. There is only one me and I like to think that the world would be a little poorer if I tried to be something or someone else. But I could be wrong about that. Sincerely, Trouble-Maker

Dancing with Trouble

Okay I solved the problem of terrorism in my last few blogs so on to a more serious subject - dancing. Recently I have started to attend dancing lessons at the Electric Cowboy. It only costs me the three dollar cover and then I buy one drink so that I do not feel guilty about taking space in the nightclub. We have been working on a swing dance called the push. I have been twice but plan on making this a regular part of my routine. I must say that this is both fun and frustrating. I thought for a while that my dance instructor liked me until I realized that she was spending so much time with me because I am so bad as a swing dancer (now give me some r and b and then watch out!!!). But it is fun to learn something new and that is the point of this blog entry. Too often people my age get settled into their lives and do not want to learn new things. But learning new things is an important part of life. I remember reading somewhere that learning new tasks is important for helping us to stay healthy and mentally active. So while I have accidentally happen upon these dance lessons, I have intended on trying to learn something new in my life. It may be that I throw myself into swing dancing (I can see myself on Dancing with the Star now. Only I will not drop Kristi Alley) or something else will take my fancy. But I want to learn something new. By the way. Something new is not a different sociological statistical or methodological technique or discovering some new academic theorist. I have been doing that for the past twenty years or so. To learn something new it has to be something that is totally out of our comfort zone. Swing dancing is that for me, at least right now. And it has been fun. And frustrating. Sincerely, Trouble-Maker

Being Realistic about Terroism - Part 3

Given the different type of Muslims in our world how do we tackle the problem of terrorism. We need a flexible solution that detains or kills Type 1 Muslims, empowers Type 2 Muslims and convince Type 3 Muslims that terrorism is not a good option (If all of these types are confusing you then please look at my last blog entry. I will not repeat my classification at this time). Notice last week that I did not state the percentages of Muslims that fall into each group. That is because we really have no way of finding out how big each group is. The sociological methodology has not yet been created to survey such a diffuse and suspicious population. We know that there are enough Type 1 Muslims to create a lot of trouble but beyond that we are just guessing. So anyone who tells you that most Muslims are warmongers or most are peaceful is just guessing as well.

The key is the Type 2 Muslims. It is in the interest of everyone that such individuals become more powerful in the Muslim community. There interpretation of Islam is one that allows for us to live in peace. I have heard some people argue that Islam is a religion that preaches violence more than other religions. Whether that is true or not is irrelevant. We want the Muslims who see Islam as a religion of peace to gain more influence in their communities so they will convince Type 3 Muslims of their religious interpretation. As such our policy towards terrorism should center on the fact that we need to empower Type 2 Muslims.

Does this mean that military action is off the table? Not really. There are times where the Type 1 Muslims are so powerful in a given area that military action may be necessary to stop them. I am under no illusion that Type 1 Muslims can be reformed in any great number. But that military action must be measured and justifiable to Type 2 Muslims. The case for war must be made in ways so that at least the Type 2 Muslims, if not the Type 3 Muslims, accept the need for violence. Deaths to non-combatants will empower Type 1 Muslims to recruit from Type 3 Muslins and must be avoided. I understand that this seems like I am arguing for “politically correct” war but actually I am arguing for “politically smart” war. We must move in ways that reduce the threat of Type 1 Muslims but do not inhibit the ability of Type 3 Muslims to emphasis a peaceful interpretation of Islam.

We who are non-Muslims must negotiate in good faith with Type 2 Muslims and give them some of what they want. They can then take such victories to their communities and show the fruits of non-violence. This does not mean that we capitulate to Type 2 Muslims in all areas, but we have to understand that if we listen to and can address their concerns that we are helping them to create a more peaceful community. On the other hand we must fight to never reward the violence that comes from Type 1 Muslims. If police action or limited military action is necessary to punish then we must carefully engage in such action.

Ultimately it is Muslims who will change Muslims. It does not matter if I think that the Koran is a book of peace. It matters if Muslims believe such and work to promote such peace. There is a limit to how much we can life up Type 2 Muslims. If it looks like they are co-oped by non-Muslims then their influence in the Islamic community will wane. However, our governments need to weigh each action with the question of whether this will empower peaceful Muslims to have more influence in their communities. Even when violence is necessary for dealing with Type 1 Muslims this question must take priority as we decide how to engage in that violence. Only when we have developed this priority will we be able to develop measures that will attack the problem of terrorism at its roots, and thus create long-term, instead of temporary, solutions.

Sincerely,

Trouble-Maker