Race and the Boston bombing

Muslims have a history of causing Americans to think about race. Following his pilgrimage to Mecca, Malcolm X wrote a letter to the members of his organization back in New York in which he talked about the impact of seeing white Muslims. He said, in part:

There were tens of thousands of pilgrims, from all over the world.  They were of all colors, from blue-eyed blondes to black-skinned Africans.  But we were all participating in the same ritual, displaying a spirit of unity and brotherhood that my experiences in America had led me to believe never could exist between the white and non-white.

America needs to understand Islam, because this is the one religion that erases from its society the race problem.  Throughout my travels in the Muslim world, I have met, talked to, and even eaten with people who in America would have been considered white – but the white attitude was removed from their minds by the religion of Islam.  I have never before seen sincere and true brotherhood practiced by all colors together, irrespective of their color.

You may be shocked by these words coming from me.  But on this pilgrimage, what I have seen, and experienced, has forced me to rearrange much of my thought-patterns previously held, and to toss aside some of my previous conclusions.  This was not too difficult for me.  Despite my firm convictions, I have always been a man who tries to face facts, and to accept the reality of life as new experience and new knowledge unfolds it.  I have always kept an open mind, which is necessary to the flexibility that must go hand in hand with every form of intelligent search for truth.

During the past eleven days here in the Muslim world, I have eaten from the same plate, drunk from the same glass, and slept on the same rug – while praying to the same God – with fellow Muslims, whose eyes were the bluest of blue, whose hair was the blondest of blond, and whose skin was the whitest of white.  And in the words and in the deeds of the white Muslims, I felt the same sincerity that I felt among the black African Muslims of Nigeria, Sudan and Ghana.

We were truly all the same (brothers) – because their belief in one God had removed the white from their minds, the white from their behavior, and the white from their attitude.

Following the bombing in Boston and the death and capture of the two suspects, Americans have again been shocked to discover that there are white Muslims. As Edward Wyckoff Williams wrote at The Root:

“a blatant display of Islamophobic rhetoric and racial profiling became a benchmark of many reports, proving what some had already suspected — that xenophobia and racially tinged, anti-Muslim sentiment have become tacitly accepted byproducts of post-Sept. 11 American society. Most disturbing was that these attitudes were readily articulated by standard-bearers of credible news outlets, whose profession it is to disseminate “facts” without bias.”

(Of course, “credible” news outlets can handle things pretty poorly, as Jon Stewart pointed out.) Later, he states:

[T]he Tsarnaev brothers offer a much-needed challenge to America’s antiquated ideologies on race. Hailing from Dagestan and Chechnya, nation states of the former Soviet Republic in the Caucasus region, the Tsarnaevs are quite literally “Caucasian” — and, by any racial trajectory, are simply considered “white.”

Salon’s Joan Walsh pointed out how some conservative news sites have claimed that the brothers’ Chechen heritage makes them “nonwhite.” Ironically, Walsh notes, the same logic was used with respect to Italian, Irish, Jewish and Eastern European immigrants in the 19th and 20th centuries. Over time, and with assimilation — including the collective oppression of African Americans — “whiteness” became more loosely defined.

Indeed, a story at The Onion highlighted Americans’ lack of knowledge about world geography while highlighting our anti-Muslim sentiment. That the associated stereotypes could be applied, however, to those who are white seems to be hard for many to accept, which makes it ideal for class discussions about the social construction of race.

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A day in the life of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev

It seems very likely that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has done terrible things. He and his brother were suspected of the bombing at the Boston Marathon and the events that have transpired since their photos were released on April 18 have done nothing to ease this suspicion. Still, seeing media coverage of the events between the time his photo was released and his subsequent capture, I couldn’t help but feel bad for him.

Lots of people have probably fantasized about violent acts, even if few carry out those acts. Watching the media coverage I couldn’t stop thinking about Dzhokhar as somebody whose fantasies had become real in the worst possible way. He and his brother seem to have carried out the bombings at the Boston Marathon without much of a plan. Afterward, they did not flee the city, they appear to have carried on as if nothing had happened. Dzhokhar attended class, went to the gym, and even went to a party.

It seems unlikely that the weight and ramifications of what he had done were “real” to him at this point. The fact that he stayed in town seems to indicate that he underestimated the ability of the police to identify him based on video and photos before and after the shooting (the sheer amount of data that police combed through to identify the suspects was, indeed, staggering). But three days after the bombing he was identified, looking like a frat guy, as the suspect in the white hat.

This is where I suspect that things started to get real. With no apparent plan (or, at least, no good plan), the Tsarnaev brothers shoot and kill an MIT police officer, hijack a car when they apparently already had one, allow the driver of the car to flee, and engage in a firefight with police. Likely injured, Dzhokhar gets in a car and attempts to escape, running over his own brother in the process, before eventually abandoning the car and escaping on foot. He and his brother had been identified. Things had gone awry. His brother was dead. Dzhokhar was alone.

Waking up on Friday the 19th and reading about the shootout in Watertown, I wondered how Dzohkhar felt. His brother was dead but the entire city of Boston was at a standstill because of him. If he had access to TV or the internet I surmised that he either  felt very powerful or completely out of options. You can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube, as they say. Based on his eventual capture, though, I suspect that the latter is closer to how he actually felt.

Having been shot by the police, Dzhokhar spent Friday the 19th bleeding and hiding in a boat in somebody’s backyard. The world knew his name and what he was accused of doing. The entire city of Boston was looking for him. He knew that his brother was either dead or in police custody. Escape was impossible. His own capture or death was inevitable. He was as alone as a person can possibly be in this world, bleeding, lying in a boat in a stranger’s backyard. I felt bad for him.

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We have reached the end of sanity in car commercials

Sometimes, car commercials depict drivers doing things that would be illegal on public roads. These commercials always feature a small-print disclaimer stating “Professional driver on closed course.” The fact that drivers can legally utilize very little of a car’s potential during their daily commute doesn’t seem to matter. What matters is that the potential is there. (In Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson speculates that people drive BMWs like idiots in order to experience more of this potential and justify the purchase price.) Recently, however, I’ve noticed that car commercials are providing this disclaimer when cars are depicted doing things that are perfectly legal, like driving down a straight, empty road or leisurely taking a curve. A recent commercial for the BMW 5-Series is guilty of this but it also takes fine-print warnings to a whole new level. Note the fine print in this image:

It says: “Sticking your hand out the window is dangerous. Caution children not to engage in this activity.”

Seriously?! Is BMW really afraid that they are opening themselves up to a lawsuit from somebody whose kid sees this commercial and decides to open the window and stick his or her hand out, receiving some kind of injury from a bug or other flying debris? On second thought, somebody probably would file that sort of lawsuit, but fear of a ridiculous lawsuit does not justify making ridiculous statements.

Here is the entire commercial to demonstrate that I am not making this up:

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The world would be a little bit better…

if everybody was a little bit more like Mister Rogers.

Cracked makes the case that he was the greatest American, which led me to this 1998 article in Esquire.

His acceptance speech upon receiving a Lifetime Achievement Award at the daytime Emmys sums him up pretty well:

 

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Super Bowl ads? Twitter isn’t buying it

Some people watch the Super Bowl for the football game, some people watch it for the halftime show, and some people watch it for the commercials. This year, hashtags were featured in half of all super bowl ads, encouraging the public to talk about their products on social networks like Twitter. The most interesting hashtag, however, was #notbuyingit, intended to call out sexism in advertising. Missrepresentation.org, which started it all, provides a recap here. According to the site, the worst offenders were GoDaddy.com (no surprise there), Audi (are you brave enough for sexism?), Kia (female spokes-robots!), Budweiser (would you like some beer with your women?), and Calvin Klein (notable for sexualizing a man). Maybe Twitter is useful after all.

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It is almost Christmas, hopefully you have been able to avoid:

Buying gendered gifts for children.

Using toys to perpetuate class inequality.

Being surrounded by assholes who are intent on crushing your dreams.

Incest.

The world’s most offensive Christmas song.

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Thoughts on Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

I have always considered A Charlie Brown Christmas, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer to be the holy trinity of Christmas specials. (While I later developed an appreciation for the other Rankin-Bass animated shows, I am steadfast in my belief that Frosty the Snowman is absolute shit.) Over the years my affinity for these specials, and Rudolph in particular, has been challenged by my knowledge of sociology. This doesn’t stop me from watching it each year, but the sort of joy I receive from it now comes as much from mocking it as it does from nostalgia (and quite a bit more than the joy I receive from believing it is any sort of good storytelling). Here, then, are some semi-sociological thoughts (and questions) I had while re-watching Rudolph on TV the other night:

• For having a very distinctive appearance himself, Santa sure isn’t very accepting of differences in appearance.
• Based on the four food groups that Buddy discusses in Elf (Candy, Candy Canes, Candy Corns, and Syrup), they really do need a dentist at the North Pole.
• Other than Rudolph and Hermie, Clarice and Yukon Cornelius are about the only non-assholes in the entire movie.
• Why doesn’t Yukon Cornelius’s tongue ever get stuck to his pick axe?
• Which is worse for a kid, the threat of being eaten by an abominable snow monster, or whatever might happen on an iceberg with a strange man?
• My favorite gender stereotyped line, spoken by Donner when Rudolph’s mother (a.k.a. “Mrs. Donner”) and Clarice want to help him find Rudolph: “No, this is man’s work!” They show their respect for his wishes by waiting a few minutes before setting out on their own.
• On the Island of Misfit Toys, what is wrong with the girl and the scooter? Some have speculated that the girl has emotional issues. She does smile a lot and cry a lot. Maybe she is manic depressive. Some are apparently misfits on the outside, some are misfits on the inside.
• Given the talking toys, do Rudolph and Toy Story exist in the same universe?
• When everybody thinks that Yukon Cornelius has died, this only reinforces the belief in gender stereotypes. As Sam the snowman says, “Well, they are all very sad about the loss of their friend, but they realize that the best thing to do is to get the women back to Christmas Town.”
• Has anybody watching Rudolph ever actually been sad about the supposed death of Yukon Cornelius? I doubt it. Regardless, he is believed to be dead for less than a minute of screen time, so the sadness wouldn’t last long.
• Santa gains a lot of weight very quickly. That can’t be healthy.
• To all of the kids who have wondered how Santa gets down their chimneys, the answer is that HE DOESN’T! The toys are delivered via umbrella and then eat the cookies themselves. (Do toys eat?) The ends of the umbrellas must also double as lock-picks for houses without chimneys.
• Where I grew up, Rudolph went down in history like Columbus, not George Washington, Abe Lincoln, or whatever historical figure people put into the song where you lived.

What can we take away from all of this? Rudolph lives in a world of bigoted, sexist assholes. They hate him until they need him to help them out. In this way, Santa is like the captain of the football team who bullies the smart kids in school until he needs help with his math homework. I wonder how Rudolph was treated when they didn’t need his help to get through a terrible storm…

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Helicopter parents use Google Chrome

Any college professor who has received a call from a parent concerned about his or her child’s grade has experienced the wonder of helicopter parenting. While Lareau has demonstrated the involvement that many middle-class parents have in their children’s daily lives, this involvement can also extend past the teenage years (as documented by Arnett in Emerging Adulthood). As Nelson argues in Parenting Out of Control, technological advances are one of the primary factors driving this change. This recent commercial from Google shows us how:

I don’t mean to imply that the increased connections made possible by cell phones, texting, Facebook, and video chatting are necessarily bad (especially when a child’s mother has passed away!), but we are in a period of rapid change when it comes to relationships between parents and their college-age children. It wasn’t that long ago that I started college in a dorm room with one landline phone (and no answering machine) that was shared between five roommates who had to use calling cards to make long-distance calls home!

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Choice and the Republican platform

The Republican platform for 2012 states that abortion should be illegal with no exceptions. The Republican candidate for 2012 states that abortion should be illegal with some exceptions. Click here to see The Daily Show’s Samantha Bee hilariously dissect the beliefs of those at the Republican convention that American liberty allows individuals to make up their own minds on issues, as long as those issues are not abortion.

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Researching 5-hour Energy

If you have watched TV in the past few months you have probably seen the above commercial for 5-hour Energy that would provide a good introduction to misleading media deceptions in a research methods or statistics course. The commercial touts the fact that they surveyed over 3,000 doctors and what they found was amazing. What was apparently so amazing was the fact that 73% of doctors surveyed said that they would recommend 5-hour Energy. Wait, no, that’s not it. 73% of doctors surveyed said that they would “recommend a low-calorie energy supplement to their healthy patients who use energy supplements.” That’s not quite the same thing, is it?

Unlike those “look how great we are” commercials that say things like “four out of five dentists recommend Trident,” the claims made by 5-hour Energy seem more along the lines of “we spent a lot of money to do this survey and we’re going to advertise the results no matter what they show!” In fact, the small print (visible if you enlarge the ad above) is incredibly honest (for a commercial, at least) about the actual methods and findings. Here is the small print in order:

• All doctors surveyed identified themselves as primary care physicians
• Two surveys were conducted to determine the opinions of primary care physicians regarding energy supplements and 5-hour Energy: 1) an online survey of 503 participants; and 2) an in-person survey by 5-hour Energy representatives of 2,500 participants (50% of those approached). In both, participants agreed to review materials regarding 5-hour Energy consisting of label and basic description of its ingredients. Of the 503 online and 2,500 in-person, over 73% said they would recommend a low calorie energy supplement to their healthy patients who use energy supplements.
• Of the 73% of primary care physicians who would recommend a low calorie energy supplement to their healthy patients who use energy supplements, 56% would specifically recommend 5-hour Energy for their healthy patients who use energy supplements.
• Of all primary care physicians surveyed, 47% would specifically recommend 5-hour Energy for their healthy patients who use energy supplements.

So, 5-hour Energy has spent a lot of money on a survey and advertisements to tell people that 27% of doctors would not recommend low-calorie energy supplements to their healthy patients, even if they already use energy supplements. Furthermore, only 47% of the doctors surveyed would actually recommend 5-hour Energy. This is a far cry from the “four out of five dentists” claims. These results are amazing, all right. Amazingly unimpressive!

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