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Miracles (IV)

I’ve written prolifically about my meeting Victoria. It is hard to choose one account of this miracle, but I’ll start with a poem, which I hope tells the story of our first meeting. The miracle part is finding a woman on Match.com, but in the wrong city, 500 miles from my home.

The other part is the burst of poetry I was suddenly writing for six months, which I have never matched since. Inspiration means a lot to me, so God showed me what I had found, by lifting my hands and putting them down in verse.

Victoria

From the start you coached me

To look beneath

The teal hat, blown by the wind,

The elegant matching shawl

Donned for the occasion

The make-up

Betrayed by the reddening eyes,

The smooth face

Trembling with the touch

Of grief and joy.

Deeper I saw

Only more light

More sweetness, more willingness

To be known,

So unexpected at the first meeting

When every defense

Rises to the occasion

And couples compose

A flawless first impression.

 

But we were on the clock:

One dinner date

One hack at the façade

Three hours to decide

Our future 500 miles apart

Not so much speed dating

As speed revelation,

Skipping the pleasantries

Of the first, second, and

Third meetings.

The first unveiling

Happened in ten minutes.

The emotional dam

Broke before an hour,

Weeping, recovering, apologies

Tremulous admissions

Swept us along till we stood up reluctantly

Too soon out on the street

Walking toward anti-climax.

Swimming in disbelief

I pulled you closer for a few steps

As we hurried through the

Night chill toward your car

We parted with a chaste kiss,

Yet even that opened the curtain

Of your smile; my pulse spiked:

The evening had been no delusion.

 

I could not testify in court

What information was exchanged.

Oblivious to details, I even asked

what to call you at the end.

I would have trusted you

With my life, but I wouldn’t

Have known enough

To call you the name

I cannot now stop saying

Victoria.

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Miracles (III)

In April of my junior year in college I went to Mount Vernon (NY) to visit a church, pastored by Rev. Harold Bredesen, and known to participate in the “gifts of the Spirit,” i.e. speaking in tongues, spontaneous prophecies, spiritual teaching, etc. I went because the church invited all who wanted to share these gifts to visit on any Sunday evening.

I remember sitting through the service, unable to truly participate, and feeling like an outsider.I had an uncle, my father’s brother, who was a preacher in the Assembly of God Church, where the “baptism of the Spirit” was common experience. My father brought us to one of his brother’s services, and we left feeling very much like outsiders. Afterward my father gave a very skeptical verdict of the gifts we had witnessed there. He said he had heard of a Puerto Rican woman speaking in Spanish, when she claimed to be speaking in tongues.

But this time was different. Mainline churches had been reporting “baptisms of the Spirit” similar to what the Pentecostals had been doing for a century.  It was an “outpouring” of the Spirit like the original Pentecost in the Book of Acts.

At the end of the spirit-filled service we were invited to come up to the altar and receive prayer for the baptism, very reminiscent of the “altar call.”  Disappointed that I had not received the blessing during the service, I went to the altar, fighting back a nagging memory of altar calls.

As hands were placed on my head, I was encouraged to praise God with a spontaneous voice, a voice that suddenly broke into “tongues.”  It sounded like a Middle Eastern language I had never spoken, but I never assumed it was a message that needed to be interpreted, as some insist this “special language” should be. What this baptism meant to me was I had an unrehearsed, spontaneous language to praise God. I felt free in a way that my buttoned-down personality had never felt free.

“This is wonderful. Thank you.”

“It’s all a gift,” he replied. “Praise God for it.”

Today I  think of this moment as “being born again again.”  Indeed many call this event “the second baptism.” Jesus called it “being born of the water and spirit. What  is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit.” Jesus was often enigmatic in his conditions and promises. He never said what it meant to be born again, except these words quoted in John 3:5-6. In my home church, we considered being “born again” an experience like “going forward” at an evangelical rally.

It happened for me at a Youth for Christ rally when I was sixteen. I was already a baptized by water and a committed church member. In fact I had persuaded two of  my skeptical friends to join me and my friends at this rally. When the invitation to come forward was presented, they both stood up and walked to the front, where dozens were already gathered. Stunned, I felt I should join them, rather than leave them on their own. We, all three, accepted Christ that night.

However, nothing changed after we went home. Neither of my friends came to church, and I kept going. The movement of the Spirit ended at the rally.  I always assumed I had qualified myself for the Kingdom, but my friends were embarrassed enough to avoid sharing their experience. So were we really “born again”?

By my church’s standards “going forward,” making a public commitment, was all it took. What happened after that was God’s business. I have come to agree with that, but I am afraid our motives were peer pressure and the emotion of the moment.  I doubt that is what Jesus meant by “born of the water and Spirit. ”

That does not mean that emotion is a bad thing. It was a hallmark of my evangelical faith. We associated positive emotion with the movement of the Spirit, and that is why my “second baptism” felt so real. It was physical and spiritual at the same time, and it gave me something that distinguished me from my parents’ faith.

After the dramatic experience at Mount Vernon, I went home on a high, praising God, feeling more connected than I ever had in my twenty years of Evangelical Christianity. When I got home, my parents were in bed, so I went to my room and prayed to find out if this was real. Sure enough, I was speaking in tongues again.

Unable to contain myself, I went to my parents’ darkened room to share my joy.  My mother said, “Are you sure? Is this real? We don’t know what you mean.” My father said nothing. I tried to explain, but it was late, so I said, “Good night” and returned to my room, unable to sleep for an hour.

M life did change after being born again again. I rebounded from an abysmal  academic year, I filed an application to be a conscientious objector, I changed my career goals from writing to teaching, and I joined a charismatic Presbyterian church in Cambridge, MA, where I had started my M.A.T. program.

We worshipped in the Spirit every Sunday night, but not on Sunday morning. We had a Wednesday prayer group in various homes, where we worshipped in the same way. We especially enjoyed “singing in the Spirit,” which was new to me, but up lifting.

The “Baptism in the Spirit” was more transforming than my first born again experience. I think it gave me an independence from my parents’ version of Evangelical Christianity, which was more important, more significant than the experience of “speaking in tongues.” I was about to move out from my home physically, but I had already begun to move spiritually. This was the first sign that I was forging a new relationship with God.

This relationship brought me a new church, a loving spouse, a new job, and a community of friends, who lived together in proximity, as well as in faith. These new relationships persisted for twenty years of growth and struggle. But that’s another story.

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Miracles (II)

“A hundred million miracles/Are happening every day,” goes the song from Flower Drum Song. I would not disagree, but the miracles I write about are the turning points in my life, seen clearest in retrospect. The moments that make you think how differently your life would have turned out, but for this inexplicable event.  Was it divine intervention? Coincidental convergence of events? Dumb luck? An accident waiting to happen? Easy to explain it every which way. My choice is “miracle.”

Kathy and I had experienced a sudden disillusionment with the religious direction our lives had taken over the previous twenty years. We had found a church community during graduate school that had served us well for eighteen years, including a successful marriage, professional employment, and a close community of friends, living together and in proximity.

My sudden disillusionment came from our entanglement with a religious community that we almost joined, but abandoned instead , after conflicts over three months. What matters is that I was suddenly shocked that we had been so terribly wrong about what we had decided was God’s will. I had always assumed that when we prayed we would get it right.

Shortly before we rented our house and moved to proximity to the Community, we met with our new pastor at his request. He urged us to reconsider. He had strong reservations about the authoritarian approach of the Community.  Their stern counseling  had a hint of “our way or the highway.” We decided  he didn’t understand the tough love we expected to help us. It turned out he was right. We left the Community hurt and disillusioned.

After a drought of church avoidance, I began attending a Lutheran Church, a liturgical church, that kept its hand off your life decisions. It was also at a low point in my teaching career. I was not advancing as I had hoped, despite getting an administrative internship and contributing toward my department’s curriculum development.

I had begun to take some graduate courses at the University pf Massachusetts- Boston and Boston College. It was all rejuvenating for me, yet I could see that taking one course per semester, while I was teaching a full load, I would not be finishing a doctoral program before I was fifty. I needed a sabbatical to accelerate my progress.

We had a non-functioning sabbatical clause in our school contract. Two teachers had taken sabbaticals in consecutive years without returning for the required payback of teaching in the district of one to four years. The school district had given up litigating this non-compliance with the sabbatical clause, because it was too expensive. They just stopped approving sabbaticals.

I was complaining to the Teachers’ Association steward in my building about the hopelessness of getting a sabbatical, and he urged me to apply, hoping to test the functionality of the clause in the contract.

I applied and was turned down. The steward said, “Let’s grieve this. It is a simple petition and, at most, it will take you out of school for a day for a grievance hearing.” So I made my first grievance petition, giving substantial evidence that I had begun graduate study and wanted to bring what I learned back to the district. I felt pretty confident about my persuasiveness.

A grievance hearing is like any court hearing. The grieving party presents its case like the prosecution of a crime. Then the representative of the school district, the superintendent, gives an argument for the defense.

At the hearing I made my case before the school board and felt I had convinced them. I offered an open-and-shut case on how my learning would benefit the district. The teachers’ association representative argued the language for the sabbatical was already in the contract. The superintendent argued that the district could not afford another breach of the sabbatical clause. The steward and I felt we had made the case.

After a closed session to consider the grievance, they turned me down. It took maybe an hour to dash my dreams. They bought the superintendent’s argument that the district could not afford any potential breach of contract.

I left the hearing as close to depressed as I have ever been. I sleep-walked my way through school the next day, telling my colleagues that I had flunked the hearing. I had plenty of commiseration, but the subtext was that I had attempted the impossible. No one would ever get a sabbatical in our district again.

I was giving God an earful that afternoon after school, threatening to leave teaching for good. Teaching had been God’s idea, I was convinced, and I could see it wasn’t what it was cracked up to be. I spent the weekend in bitterness. Another week arrived.

After school on Monday I sat alone, in a darkened room, when the phone rang. It was the superintendent of schools, who explained why I had been turned down, with reasons already known to me. It sounded like a condolence call.

Then he said. “I’d like to offer you the sabbatical on the condition that you would actually return to the school district after your sabbatical year. I know you, and I believe you will keep your word, but it means I have to vouch for you with the school board. What do you think?”

I was stunned. The impossible sabbatical was being offered to me. I had to check in with reality for a moment, but then I said, “Of course I’ll come back. That’s the contract, right? Thank you. This means so much to me.” He told me to come to his office the next day to do the paperwork. This was going to happen!

Grace had intervened to salvage my dormant career. It would be easy to say my benevolent superintendent and my excellent reputation combined to open the opportunity to take a full year of study absent teaching obligations. Like the first miracle of getting into Harvard, it brought together improbable events:

  • My applying for a sabbatical, a defunct clause in the school contract
  • My uncharacteristically filing a grievance, when my application was denied
  • The superintendent granting the sabbatical, without the weight of the teachers’ contract

It was an array of conditions that delivered.  I had languished in desperation after my grievance hearing. I was hopeless. What changed me was the miracle, the unpredictable change in my life.

Like the miracle of getting into graduate school, the sabbatical changed my career trajectory. It enabled me to finish most of my program in June 1990, and propelled me through the mire of the dissertation process over three more years.  It gave me the qualifications to apply for other jobs in 1993-94. I interviewed at two school districts and two universities, and finally accepted an offer for a dream job at a university famous for teacher preparation.

I finished my dissertation in December, 1994, completing a pilgrimage, which only 50% of doctoral students finish.  I defended my thesis in February and graduated in May.  The sabbatical was a turning point in my career, when it could have gone a different way: persistence at best, teaching hell at worst.  My career and spiritual revival depended on that one event.

Later that summer I was asked to give the sermon during the pastor’s summer vacation. I was more than glad to tell the story of getting my sabbatical and give thanks to God for a miraculous intervention. No one tried to convince me otherwise. Lutherans are great that way.

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Miracles (I)

             The Latin mīror means “I wonder or marvel at.” The miracle is in the eye of the beholder. Witnessing a “miracle,” many will want to explain it by rational means. Others will take a wonder as a wonder. No need to explain to them. Such are the miracles in my life:  improbable, yet easy to explain away, if you are a doubter by nature.

According to the etymology of the word— miracle comes from the Greek thaumasion and the Latin miraculum—the definition follows: that which causes wonder and astonishment, being extraordinary in itself and amazing or inexplicable by normal standards. (emphasis added)

There is nothing of the divine in this definition, except maybe “inexplicable by normal standards.”  The truth is: every miracle can be explained by science, coincidence, illusion– even gullibility.  The key part of the definition is “that which causes wonder and astonishment,”  because if I wonder or am astonished you can’t take that away from me. A miracle can be ordained by me.

I remember four miracles in my life. Two of the miracles involve my choice or calling to be a teacher. If it was merely my choice to teach, then not so much a miracle. If I was abruptly launched into teaching–that might be a wonder.

Hamilton College had several composition courses for academic purposes and one course in “Writing for Publication.”  My career goal was to write–in journalism or free lance. I was stuck majoring in English Literature, entertaining, but not career-enriching. I hadn’t thought much about this when I applied. That was how I groped through life in those days.

So my senior year brought the abrupt realization that I had no preparation for writing. I had graduated from Hamilton with a B- average, although with departmental honors in English Literature.  I slap-dashed three applications to journalism schools and a creative writing program and submitted them with my woeful transcript.  To this day I cannot imagine why I was so casual about applying. I set myself up for failure. That’s what happened.

In the meantime, I had spent Winter Study in January with a professor and three other English majors teaching sophomores who had placed out of Freshman Composition. Despite arriving on campus with advanced placement, they felt, or had been told, they needed a refresher in good writing style. Our senior team took on 4-5  freshmen each, Winter Study courses met every day. At the the end of the first week our team of seniors met to talk about the class we had designed and to reflect on our progress. Our professor made occasional suggestions, but left us to teach on our own. We met this way for three and a half weeks.

The feedback from our students was very positive, and we felt we had improved their writing in three short weeks. It was my first teaching experience, but it was not a miracle. Teaching was a distraction, not a career goal. I had the condescending notion that: Those who can, do; Those who can’t, teach.

A few months later Professor Lindley, our teaching supervisor, called me into his office. To this point I had never taken a course with him, because Early English Literature was not on my bucket list. But he had noticed my aptitude and interest in teaching. He told me he had received a letter from the Harvard School of Education to recommend someone for their new Master of Arts in Teaching program. I thought, Why not? Even though I had a pathetic B- average and had not prepared to study education. He told me he would recommend me.

Then the miracle: I got in. After botching three journalism/ writing applications, I got into Harvard!  To that point I had a slight, but not decisive interest in teaching. Now I was fired up! I packed my bags for Cambridge in June, since my program began in the summer, and I was on my way.

I had taken just one Education course at Hamilton and didn’t like it. By all rights I should have been looking for a summer job. I had failed at writing and stumbled into teaching–in retrospect a turning point.

Three improbable things had happened that made this a miracle for me:           

  • I signed up for a teaching class with no plans to teach professionally.
  • Professor Lindley recommended me for an M.A.T. program at Harvard, even though I was barely an average student and had never taken his classes.
  • Harvard accepted me with a B- average.

When three improbable conditions come together at a turning point in your life, you can’t be blamed for calling the outcome “a miracle.” Not the kind that made y0u say, ” It will take a miracle to get me into Harvard.”  The kind that says, I was headed in one direction, and an amazing incident turned me around.

The spiritual side of me said, “I was saved by grace.”  With a more objective perspective fifty-five years later I say “I was saved by grace.”

And the miracles weren’t over . . .

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The Big Lie and Its Collaborators

A lie by any other name is gaslighting, psychotic delusion, brainwashing,  suspension of disbelief, or the step into a Reality  Distortion Field: whatever sidesteps the established truth .

For example, what do you consider the conviction that Joe Biden lost the 2020 election? One third of Americans, after three years,  still believe what has been disproven in every possible way.  [https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2024/01/02/jan-6-poll-post-trump/].

More breath-taking is the lie that the next election will also be rigged, but only if Trump loses!  My way or the Lie-way! Are these election-deniers self-deluded or victims of sinister plots?

Call it “suspension of disbelief,” as Samuel T.Coleridge urged us to do when engaging with fantasy. But that seems too much  like the one-who-suspends-belief has control. Such a person would be wholly conscious of the jump into fantasy. That seems like a jump too easy for the “Big Lie.”

“Gaslighting refers to manipulation where you question your own sanity, reality or judgments.”  In this case there is usually a “manipulator,” someone controlling your thinking. It assigns the blame to the “gaslighter.” Has the believer of the “Big Lie” lost control of thinking like the subject of a hypnotist? This seems too much like passive submission, especially when you consider the members of Congress, who retain their ability to choose while adopting the “Big Lie.”

Some refer succumbing to the “Big Lie” as “brainwashing,” but the actual procedure of brainwashing is annihilation of the will.  “Brainwashing” originally meant inducing belief by torture, as documented during the Korean  War.

Most terrifying is George Orwell’s account, in 1984, of the brainwashing of his protagonist, Winston Smith. Despite being a clear-thinking dissenter, Smith yields to the Party line because of his pathological fear of rats.  In 1984 the regime of Big Brother was so authoritarian as to convince the public of utter absurdities: “War is Peace/ Freedom is Slavery/ Ignorance is Strength.” What does that remind you of?

In brainwashing you submit to the lie because of torture or intense pressure.  Former Rep Adam Kinziger has theorized that the intense fear of being expelled from the tribe prevents members of Congress from publicly exposing “The Big Lie.” That sounds like extreme consequences for accepting the truth. But not really torture.

I first heard the term “reality distortion field” from Sean Spicer, who was Donald Trump’s Press Secretary for six months in 2017. He blamed his former boss for generating the field, like aliens in Star Trek or CEO Steve Jobs at Apple [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reality_distortion_field.

“Reality distortion field” implies a delusion that you choose. Not only does the field have its own power, but those who enter the field freely accept the consequences. Upon entering the field it is easy to believe that Trump will be a victim of cheating. The RDF decrees that only the 2024 election that Trump loses is rigged. How insane is that?

And yet sanity has nothing to do with it. It is not brainwashing, it is not gaslighting, it is not delusional. It is a fully conscious step into the field of Reality Distortion, a place where you will never find the truth– and never want to.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wikipedia cross references the terms

  • Brainwashing 
  • Charismatic authority
    • Described By Max Weber: Charismatic authority as the most lasting of regimes because the leader is seen as infallible and any action against him will be seen as a crime against the state.
  • Gaslighting
    • Originates from a 1940 British film “Gaslight”/ Merriam-Webster defines it as “psychological manipulation” to make someone question their “perception of reality” leading to “dependence on the perpetrator”.[2]
  • Suggestibility
    • Suggestibility uses cues to distort recollection: when the subject has been persistently told something about a past event, his or her memory of the event conforms to the repeated message.[1]

“Gaslighting” is the term in vogue to describe Donald Trump’s campaigning, because he repeatedly gives his own version of events and contradicts what eye witnesses assert to be true.  An example is his insistence that cats and dogs were eaten by Haitians in Springfield, IL, while the city officials insist that no credible evidence of that behavior exists. Apparently the rumor originated as a post by a Facebook ” influencer.”

As Jim Vandehei advises: Stop getting news on social media. Stop sharing things that you’ve never read. Stop reading something if a friend sent it to you and you don’t know what the source of it is. 

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JIM VANDEHEI: Stop getting news on social media. Stop sharing things that you’ve never read. Stop reading something if a friend sent it to you and you don’t know what the source of it is. Maybe just stop consuming altogether and go hang out with your kids, right? There’s a lot of healthy things that you can do. And then like try to find some sources of news and information that you think are trying to get to the closest approximation of the truth and then you’re gonna have a pretty healthy media diet.

Gaslighting is a colloquialism, defined as manipulating someone into questioning their own perception of reality.[1][2]

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The Humanity of Immigration

The divisive issue of immigration reform can be conceived through two different lenses: logistical and human. Logistics controls masses of people. Humanity reflects how individual people are treated.

The Democrats insist that the bill introduced May 24 addressed the primary concerns of the logistics of immigration. That bill lies fallen on the floors of  Congress.The Republicans insist that the bill was too little too late and was basically an election-year attempt to dispose of a problem. Logistics remains a primary problem for them.

But logistics are getting less attention as the election season reaches its climax. The human perspective of controlling immigration is ascending. For example, this summary by Donald Trump:

“The Democrats say, ‘Please don’t call them animals. They’re humans.’ I said, ‘No, they’re not humans, they’re not humans, they’re animals’ … Nancy Pelosi told me that. She said, ‘Please don’t use the word animals when you’re talking about these people.’ I said, ‘I’ll use the word animal because that’s what they are.’” — April 2, 2024, Grand Rapids, Michigan, campaign event. https://www.aclu.org/trump-on-immigration

Right wing Christians appear to sanction Donald Trump’s “animal” judgment by their silence. How do they justify the judgment of human beings as “animals”?

The biblical witness of the treatment of  immigrants (aliens, strangers) is clear:

You shall not wrong or oppress a resident alien, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt. (Exodus 22:21).

The Hebrew Bible has numerous references to the “alien” and the “stranger,” all admonishing the residents to treat the foreign settlers with respect. It would be only human to consider people, who do not share your beliefs or rituals, as undeserving. Both Jews and Christians have succumbed to such judgment. Thus the need for the law of mercy.

”The alien who resides with you shall be to you as the citizen among you; you shall love the alien as yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God. Leviticus 19:34

Anyone who has read the Ten Commandments or seen the movie version knows when a commandment concludes with “I am the Lord your God” (19:34) that God means business. Even though this commandment did not reach the Top Ten, it still carries the weight of God’s governance.

Christians will be interested in the part that says, you shall love the alien as yourself. This paraphrases what Jesus called one of the greatest commandments :

 “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’[a] 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[b] 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22:16-40).

Can Christians dodge this requirement? It is the equivalent of the Golden Rule, accepted by the religious and non-religious alike.

The part that reminds the Jewish people, “for you were aliens in the land of Egypt,“ should remind U.S. citizens that they were once the aliens in the North American continent, and the Native peoples were the residents. For some reason this point is lost on Christians when immigration is the issue.

Senator James Lankford, one of the authors of the immigration bill referenced above, said, in an interview with the New York Times, that his faith motivated him to get involved with immigration:

 My faith is important to me, and it’s not something I take off and put on. I tell people all the time, your faith should affect everything about you. It’s how I treat my wife. It’s how I treat total strangers. I believe every person’s created in the image of God. They have value and worth. Even if I disagree with them, that person has value and worth. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/10/magazine/james-lankford-senator-interview.html

Christians who believe faith is “not something you [I]take off and put on,” could follow Lankford’s example when he drafted the law that fell to the floor of Congress.   Why do they ignore morality, but focus on the logistics of immigration reform? Why do they accept the incendiary rhetoric of Donald Trump, who dehumanizes the strangers in their midst?

The lack of consideration of morality regarding immigrants shames Christians who follow the teachings of Jesus. Faith is not something “to take off and put on.”

Let mutual love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it. Hebrews 13:1-2

 

 

 

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A Crisis

If ever you had this

Friend you could never stand up

Appointment you could not miss

Opportunity to change your life

High holy day of obligation

Chance to be a hero

Moment to do or die

This is it

Vote

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The Elephant at the Ballot Box

In a fair-minded Op-Ed in the Post-Dispatch today (October 23) Linda Carli and Aice Eagley emphasize the significance of gender in the election of President of the United States. They cite an intriguing Gallup poll in January 2024 that “93% of Americans reported that they would vote for a well-qualified female for president from their party.” The other 7% are just being honest.

The authors point out that the gender stereotype of men, “assertive, bold and directive,” would rank higher in qualifications against the stereotype of women “kind, supportive and understanding.” Even though such stereotypes are unfair to both genders, it doesn’t mean that voters won’t submit to them. Furthermore, these stereotypes influence women as well as men.

I would say that is the main reason we have never had a woman president. Because even if the voter chooses the best qualified candidate, it doesn’t mean that “best qualified” would not overlap  the masculine stereotype of ” assertive, bold and directive.” In other words, a female candidate would probably be considered to lack the qualifications of stereotypical men.

Even if the woman possessed those qualities, it is quite possible that both men and women might consider the woman too assertive, failing to live up to a traditional view of womanhood. This may have been Hillary Clinton’s downfall. She was highly competent, assertive and well-qualified, but failed to exhibit the valued qualities of womanhood: kind, supportive and understanding. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.

This could explain why Donald Trump won the 2016 election and why Kamal Harris has a tiny needle opening to thread to attract enough voters in the 2024 election. That’s grossly unfair. If anyone could claim that the election is “rigged,” it would be Vice-president Harris.

As the election approaches, it can be expected that Donald Trump will play more to gender stereotypes, because he has history on his side. Historical momentum favors the male. Casting a vote for a female President would seem like the ultimate risk. Better to favor the assertive male who lives up to masculine stereotypes.

Could gender be the ultimate criterion despite what the 2024 Gallup poll says? Undoubtedly. We will need more voters of both genders to vote against their stereotypes to elect Kamala Harris, even though her image combines the best characteristics of both genders. She is both strong and fearless, as well as even-handed and compassionate. That, at least, is her image.

The test of gender is the elephant in the room. No one wants to admit it, although Donald Trump has never been shy about playing to stereotypes. Likely that will be his “trump” card in the final week of the election. “I’m the man. What else do you need to know?”

The passion of Black voters may have gotten Barack Obama elected in 2008, but it was also the willingness of White voters to sit on their prejudices, then step up and vote their conscience. What does that mean for male voters in 2024? First of all, they have to vote. Second, vote their conscience.  Arguably that is all that needs to happen for Kamala Harris to be elected.

If Kamala Harris is not elected, it will set women’s rights back half a century. The stereotypes will have won. The test of gender will have prevailed more than party, policy, or personality. That is why she cannot be allowed to lose, as well as whatever political reasons you care about. She may be a risk, but ask yourself if Donald Trump is a greater risk, even with his impressive masculine credentials.

Then it is up to the American voter to vote against stereotype. No  coin flips, no hold-your-breath-and-vote. Vote for the person you can trust for the next four years, the person with best qualities of both stereotypes.

In this year of bitter controversy and suspicious claims, voting is the best revenge. Take your revenge–I mean, vote!

 

 

 

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What is so Compelling About The Big Lie?

Joe Regenbogen, in his brilliant article about the greatness of Presidents, asks the most prominent question of the election season: Why did 74 million Americans vote to reelect Donald in 2020 despite the turmoil and failure of that term–and why is even a higher number preparing to do so again?  A related question: Why do 57% of Republicans believe Joe Biden was not legitimately elected President?

The second question partially answers the first.

At a forum at Washington University Thursday evening Adam Kinzinger estimated that, among the current Republican representatives in Congress , half do not believe the “Big Lie that Trump did not actually lose the election. Kinzinger served with most of these House members for twelve years, so he knows most of them.

The main reason these Representatives proclaim what they do not believe is their lifelong allegiance to the Republican Party. Kinzinger said that going against the Party and risking social ostracism is more than they can imagine. The loss of the tribe is one of the most threatening dangers human beings can risk.

Many of these representatives “would jump in front of a moving train to save a child, but they cannot risk social rejection,” theorized Kinzinger. Therefore they accept what they do not believe to prevent ostracism from their reference group, the Republican Party

  1. So the number one reason for politicians accepting the Big Lie and the related medium lies is Party Loyalty.
  2. This is the reason for many more Republican voters, who have never voted Democrat and cannot risk alienation from their reference group.
  3. Once you lie or give allegiance to a lie it is easier to accept subsequent lies.
  4. Single issue voters: some will use their main conviction to choose a candidate: abortion, taxes, inflation, etc. There is no consideration of honesty,  hopefulness, past performance.
  5. Populism: if you are unhappy with your present condition, a populist can convince you that he/ she will change that condition, just by promising change.
  6. Religious conviction: In some denominations believing in sponsorship or anointing of God answers their uncertainty. Republicans claim this authority; Democrats don’t.
  7. Nihilism: Many voters have decided that the news media and all sources of information lie, therefore it impossible to know the truth.
  8. If truth is unavailable you accept the candidate who has your ideal persona, e.g. the one who resonates with your anger.
  9. Conspiracy theories: some people are drawn to exotic theories about the causes of harsh conditions, such as poverty, disease, human trafficking, etc. This gives them a sense of control, knowing the causes of intolerable troubles. If they vote based on this theory they accept a lie.
  10. Double hating: many voters choose the lesser of two evils. Too many don’t vote at all.

Ten seems like a nice round number for accepting the Big Lie, so I’ll stop there.

Those who reject the Big Lie and fervently believe in most of the platform of a candidate and choose based on merit and hope, you are my kind of citizens. I’ll call this one reason for choosing “independent consideration of principles.”  Thank heavens for such voters.

Probably most people who are outside the “independent consideration of principles” group make their choice for a combination of the above reasons, and many reasons overlap each other (e.g. # 1-3), so the list is not of mutually exclusive reasons.

The essential matter is that many people do not make well-considered choices because that is too much trouble. Most do not follow the news daily, and those who do can not draw conclusions from a variety of conflicting issues. They would prefer to decide from an either/ or consideration or what is called “dualism.”

When Donald Trump says this election is a choice between good and evil, he is speaking to many who prefer dualism to critical thinking, in which many factors have to be considered before reaching a conclusion.

Even though most of us have been taught critical thinking in high school, we don’t always use it, because it is hard, or we don’t have the time to practice it conscientiously. Sometimes I just read what the newspaper tells me on the history of Proposition A  (hypothetically), because I don’t have time to research it myself. That is not critical thinking. Hopefully I did my best.

The ten reasons above are not good excuses for not seeking the truth about a candidate or a proposition.  These shortcuts are not only over-simplifying,  they are pretenses for choosing. If you try to make the best choice without these shortcuts (the offending ten), and do not think you are better than the rest of us, consider your civic duty done. Except, please vote.

If not, you are probably complicit in the “Big Lie.”