My Problem With Authority

I started thinking today about the past 30 years. One thing occurred to me: my entire life, right down to the moment of my birth, has been about defying convention and authority. In truth, I'm convinced that the problem with authority is genetic. See, I was born 30 years ago today, and I am aware that it was to two people who had problems accepting the status quo. So, below is a list of things that lead up to me, and what was expected to happen.

My father had problems with the entire concept of convention. When most people who grew up when he did knew that they would be married once, that was clearly a sign to him that divorce and infidelity was an option. He was married four times (that the family knows of), and for a while, two of those marriages was concurrent. The Christian faith says to marry once, the Islamic faith says that polygamy is accepted. He was born and raised Christian. He met his concurrent wife (at the time) while in an Islamic nation. The entire time he was married, to all of his wives, he clearly had no problems with potentially leaving a few other genetic markers around. Officially, I am his fifth child and only known son. Unofficially, I am his only known son, but that could be an entirely different matter in truth as he clearly had his share of mistresses. Dad, thanks for defying convention. And then, for your fourth (known) marriage, you had to go out and find my mother. Oh, and when most men have given up on reproduction, you conceived me in your 57th year, and I was born just short of your 58th.

My mother was always too darned smart for her own good. She was four when she started first grade. She ended up being the only daughter of her parents who fled the authority of the Chinese cultural revolution and ended up in the Dutch-Islamic colony of Indonesia. And then, with a mother that had converted to Islam, she managed to grow up Catholic. Oh, and if that wouldn't defy convention enough, you had to marry this American.

Now, when most people talk about jungle fever, they think of interracial cross-pollination. Nope, not only did my parents who came from two entirely different cultures, but two entirely different socio-economic backgrounds, meet, they met in the jungles of East Kalimantan or what is commonly known as Borneo. Yep, I am a direct result of a nasty and horribly literal case of jungle fever.

Then of course, is the fact that I was scheduled to be born on Christmas day. In fact, I was scheduled to be the fourth generation in a row on my mother's direct line to be born on Christmas. Oops. I clearly decided that being born on that day wouldn't do. Also, I would have been the only male born of that line to be born on that day. Yep, that clearly wouldn't do either. So while convention would have dictated that I would have either been born in Asia or the States, I had to be born three days early and in Europe. Oh, and while most are born either by Caesarian or in a completely natural way, I had to be induced. Apparently, the extra three days without being induced would have been quite fatal to my mother. Then of course, after I was born, she made the decision that though I was born to carry two passports as a subject of the Queen and as an American, she insured that I would carry only an American passport. Of course, mother would insist that I speak Oxford at home, even though I was being reared in the states.

I gotta tell you, thirty years of defying convention and authority is clearly in my blood. Yup, I attribute all of it to my unconventional circumstances. May the next thirty years be just as odd.

Christmas

Let me be straight with you, the expression "Happy Holidays" just does not fly with me. Between Thanksgiving and the New Year there are the Winter Solstice, Hanukkah, and Christmas. Kwanzaa is not one of those legitimate holidays. If a person uses the expression "Happy Holidays" around me, I will ask them to clarify. I would prefer it if they used Merry Christmas or Happy Hanukkah around me. Those are legitimate holidays. But Happy Holidays is just a cop-out for people who do not wish to offend anyone. And in the process, that offends the hell out of me.

The United States is founded upon Judeo-Christian principles. Kwanzaa was started by a black separatist who did not think that black Americans should be Christian. It was started to supplant Christmas in the 1960s. As a result, Kwanzaa is a bullshit holiday. And heaven forbid that someone names that bullshit holiday in front of my face because I will correct them on it.

Oh, and while I'm at it, Wicca is a bullshit religion. Roman Paganism is legitimate, Celtic Paganism is legitimate, Norse Pantheism is legitimate. Wicca was an attempt in the 1960s to resurrect Celtic Pantheism/Druidic practices by an American.

And on that note, to my readers, Happy Hanukkah, Merry Christmas, and may your new year be wonderful.

The Fourth Estate

I haven't posted in a while, but I would like to take the time to address an issue that has been jabbing into my gut recently.

The news media has taken a great many liberties over the years. How many of us would really be all that surprised to hear that one of the vaunted reporters had made an error, and that by doing so, drew an inaccurate conclusion? Basically, that is a tactful way of saying, would anyone be surprised if it turned out that one or all of them didn't know what they were talking about?

I very much doubt it. What concerns me, though, is their claim to some form of higher justice. "We are in the business of reporting the news." Isn't that what they say? Interesting that there is no mention of truth. The only requisite is that the story garners interest.

So, how can they honestly say that they are the People's Voice? How can they say that they represent the interests of the "Common Man" when they are not held accountable for their foibles?

Oh, and where in the Declaration of Independance or the Constitution of the United States does it give the press the esteemed position of watchdogging the government? Last I checked, there were three pillars in our governmental structure, not four.

The Freedom of the Press is guaranteed by the Constitution. What this means is that no charges can be brought against the press for presenting a dissenting article that refutes what is released by the government. There were once even laws that required that the information be factual.

Do you want to know why? Ever hear of the term "Yellow Journalism"? Dictionary.com provides the following definition:

yellow journalism n. Journalism that exploits, distorts, or exaggerates the news to create sensations and attract readers.

I don't know the origin of the phrase, but I can tell you where I first heard it. It was in U.S. History, back in Middle School. What they were talking about were two of the most embarassing moments of our governmental history. Because of public misunderstanding and outrage that was a direct result of unethical reporting practices, the U.S. Government did two things.

1. They entered into a conflict that is remembered today as the Spanish/American War. The press reported that the ship that blew up was attacked and sunk. Forensic evidence later confirmed that the explosion came from INSIDE the vessel, not outside.
2. They unlawfully, and without invitation, annexed the Hawaiian Archipelago, believing the papers when they said that a majority of the inhabitants of those islands wished for it to happen.

I am quite certain that many, if not all, of the people that read this can come up with even more examples of this manner of reporting, but, following the findings after the Spanish/American War, the goverment set down guidelines for honest and ethical reporting.

In their need to keep readership, the Major News Networks and Publications could not allow their most effective weapon, sensationalism, to be taken from them. Lobbying considerable pressure and finacial support, they were able to either get the restrictions removed, or lightened.

The end of honest and ethical reporting was heralded by the courts deciding back in the 1980's that the reporters did not have to reveal their C.I.'s (confidential informants) identities. I honestly think that they snuck that one in under the radar when the law enforcement agencies were lobbying to protect their own, but whether or not this was so does not change the result.

Today, the only accountability that a reporter must worry about is to their editor. A simple retraction can forgive many an inaccuracy, and the government wouldn't DARE interfere. Can you say, "Censorship"?

I don't know that there is any easy or good fix to this problem, but one needs to be found. The days when we, as a people and as a nation, can be lead around unquestioningly by the nose by someone whose sole purpose is to sell papers instead of reporting the truth should be long gone.

If they aren't, well, then we are not nearly as civilized as we claim to be, are we?